I searched my memory and came up with a big, ruddy bear of a man. I nodded.

“It wasn’t safe to contact you kids or Beck. Too risky. But once or twice we were contacted by older witches, powerful ones who could protect themselves. Brian was one. I was astonished when he found us—thought he’d been dead all those years.”

I was sitting on the edge of my seat, my hands gripping the arms. Here it was, the whole story, after so long. It wasn’t what I’d thought it would be.

“Brian told us that you kids were safe, that Beck had gotten you. He told me the village had actually been spared.”

“But wait a minute,” I said, remembering something. “I went back there, not three years ago. The place is deserted and has been for years. No one lives there. I saw it.”

“Yes, they all returned a short time after the dark wave left—trickled back in one family at a time. They tried to make another go at it there, but apparently the dark wave came too close. It left a destructive spell in its wake. After everyone had come home and settled down, things started happening. Accidents, unexplained illnesses. Crops failed, gardens died, spells went wrong. It took a year of that before the whole village up and moved closer to the coast. They made a new town there, thirty miles away, and Brian told me they had prospered.”

I was dumbfounded. “So everyone left and no one bothered to look for us? They left me and Linden and Alwyn to die?”

“They didn’t know you were there, lad. Susan Forest knocked on our door that night. Mum and I had already fled. You kids slept like the dead and were spelled besides. Fiona and I wanted you to sleep soundly, not to wake up in the middle of the night and find us missing and be afraid.” Da’s voice caught there, and he shook his head as if to clear it. “Anyway, when she got no answer, she figured we’d all taken off.”

I shook my head, frowning in disbelief. “All this time I’ve been mourning not only my parents, but everyone I knew, everyone in our village. And now you’re telling me they’re hale and hearty, living thirty miles from home. I don’t believe this!” I said. “Why didn’t anyone contact us at Beck’s? Why hasn’t anyone told me this before?”

Da shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess Beck probably knows. Maybe he thought that if you knew, you’d leave him and go back to the village.”

“Why didn’t Brian Entwhistle bother to tell us that our parents were alive?” I was feeling a growing sense of indignation. All those years of tears, of pain. . so much of it could have been avoided. It made me ill to think about it.

Da met my eyes. “What would you have done if you’d known?”

“Come to find you!” I said.

“Right.”

Oh.

“Your mum and I thought that if we sacrificed ourselves, we could save our children, save our coven. When I scried and saw the village gone, it was a hard blow. I thought it had been for nothing. I was relieved when I found out my vision had been wrong.”

“But after you learned that the coven was safe, why didn’t you come back?”

“The dark wave was still after us. I’m not sure if it was always Selene, but at the time we reckoned it was. No one’s ever hated me like that. Goddess willing, no one ever will. At the time, it seemed that if we kept Selene occupied with finding us, she’d have less time to go after other covens, other witches. It seemed worth it.” He shrugged, as if that were no longer so clear.

“Why aren’t you in hiding now?” I asked. “Are you not in danger anymore?”

My father let out a deep breath, and again I was struck by how old he seemed, how frail. He looked like my grandfather. “You know why. Selene’s dead. So’s Cal.”

I nodded. So he did know. I figured the council must have told him when they’d found him with Sky’s lead. I drank my tea, trying to digest this story. It was light-years away from anything I had imagined.

“So now you work magick, now that you’re not hiding from Amyranth?”

Da shrugged, his thin shoulders rising like a coat hanger in his shirt. “Like I said, Fiona’s dead,” he said. “No point in hiding, in keeping safe. The one thing I wanted to protect is gone. What’s the point in fighting anymore? It was for her I kept moving, kept finding new sanctuaries. She wanted us to stick to this plan; I wanted to do what she wanted. But she’s gone now. There’s nothing left to protect.” He spoke like an automaton, his words expressionless, his eyes focused on the table in front of him.

By the time he finished talking, my face was burning. On the one hand, I was glad that he and Mum had had some noble cause behind their disappearance, glad they had acted unselfishly, glad they had been trying to protect others. But it was also incredibly hurtful to listen to my own father basically negate my existence, my dead brother’s, my sister’s. Obviously staying alive now for our sakes hadn’t occurred to him. I was glad he had been loyal to my mother; I was angry that he had not been loyal to his children.

Abruptly I got up and went into the living room. I undid the huge bundle of washing in the lounge, then made up Da’s bed with clean sheets and blankets. He was in the same position when I got back to the kitchen.

“I’m so sorry, son,” he said in a thin voice. “We thought we were acting for the best. Maybe we helped some—I hope we did. It’s hard to see clearly now what would have been best.”

“Yes. I see that. Well, it’s late,” I said, not looking at him. It was only eight-thirty. “Maybe we should turn in.”

“Aye. I’m knackered,” Da said. He got up and shuffled with his old man’s walk toward the one bedroom. I sat down at the kitchen table, had another cup of tea, and listened to the deep silence of the house. Again I missed Morgan fiercely. If she were here, I would feel so much better, so much stronger. I imagined her arms coming around me, her long hair falling over my shoulder like a heavy, maple-colored curtain. I imagined us locked together, kissing, rolling around on my bed. I remembered her wanting to make love with me and my saying no. What an idiot I’d been. I resolved to call her the next day as soon as I could get into town.

I washed up the few dishes and cleaned the kitchen. By ten o’clock I felt physically exhausted enough to try to sleep. I wrapped myself up in a scratchy wool blanket and the ugly afghan. After being washed, the afghan was only about half as big as it had been. Oops.

From the couch I extinguished the lanterns and candles with my mind, and after they were snuffed, I lay in the darkness that is never really darkness, not for a witch. I thought about my unrecognizable da. When I was younger, he’d seemed like a bear of a man, huge, powerful, an inevitable force to be reckoned with. Once when I was about six, I had been playing near an icy river that ran by our house. Of course I fell in, got carried downstream, and only barely managed to grab a low-hanging branch. I clung to it with all my strength while I frantically sent Da a witch message. It was long minutes before he came leaping down the bank toward me and splashed into the strong current. With one hand he grabbed my arm and hauled me out, flinging me toward the bank like a dead cat. I was shaking with cold, blue and numb, and mainly he felt I’d gotten what I’d deserved for being so stupid as to play near the river.

“Thanks, Da,” I gasped, my teeth chattering so hard, I almost bit my lip. He nodded at me abruptly, then gestured to my wet clothes. “Don’t let your mum see you like that.” I watched him stride up the bank and out of sight, like a giant, then I crawled to my knees and made my way home.

But he could be so patient, teaching us spells. He’d begun on me when I was four, simple little spells to keep me from burning my mouth on my tea, to help me relax and concentrate, to track our dogs, Judy and Floss. It’s true I caught on quickly; I was a good student. But it’s also true that Da was an incredibly good teacher, organized in his thoughts, able to impart information, able to give pertinent examples. He was kind when I messed up, and while he made it clear he expected a lot from me, still, he also made me feel that I was special, smart, quick, and satisfying to teach. I used to swell like a sponge when he praised me, almost bursting in the glow of his approval.