Page 65 of Kings of Sherwood

His eyes drift from the dots to the X’s.

My mind is whirring too.

“Hang on,” I say. I look back at the photo. The dates of the cotillion. The marriage. The birth of their son.

“What were you saying about astrological positions and magnetic fields and all that?”

“Huh?” Tuck says. “Oh. Just that probably the conditions for a shifter birth would have to be exactly precise. That’s why it’s not genetic, per se. It doesn’t happen to everyone from an area or bloodline. You’d have to really get obsessive to even—”

“That’s what she was doing,” I interrupt. “Cecily. All these crazy notes. She was...trying to have a shifter baby. Right? Am I nuts for thinking that?”

Tuck gapes. At the datebook, then at me.

“The kwisatz haderach,” he says excitedly. “It’s basically the same thing, right?”

“What?”

“FromDune?” He shakes his head. “Um. Nothing. Never mind. You really think...”

“I...I do think,” I say. “I mean—it all makes sense, doesn’t it?” My mind reels. “It would explain why he was...so self-loathing as a shifter. Why he hated them. Or even, like...” I press a hand to my head. “Why he hated hismother. He finds out she was trying to, like, engineer him into existence with some weird-ass magic? He’d be mad.” I glance at the datebook, which now seems sinister despite sitting innocently behind glass. “I mean, she...she baby-trapped his dad with a supernatural child,” I finish. “I can’t imagine his dad was too thrilled. Or Guy, for that matter.”

Tuck considers. “That would explain why Guy didn’t...I don’t know. Fulfill the mission, or whatever, of our...kind. If she was trying to do it for justgaining powerinstead of fighting against misuse of power...that’s fundamentally at odds with what we do. Why we exist.” He shakes his head. “It’s a corruption of the whole point.”

A chill runs down my spine. I look at the smiling woman in the photo, trying to imagine what must have been going through her head.

“What possesses someone to do that?” Tuck murmurs, echoing my own thoughts. “Especially someone like her. I mean, talk about born with a silver spoon. Whatdidn’tsomeone like Cecily Gisbourne have?”

Realization, clear and vibrant as a bell, rings in my head.

“Power,” I say. “Or, no,powers.” I close my eyes, thinking back to the one and only interaction I’d ever had with this woman. “She...she knew my mom. Knewaboutmy mom, what she could do. And she was jealous. I mean, she didn’t say as much, but from the way she talked about her...”

I blow out a breath. “It sounds like my mom was kind of the belle of the ball. And Cecily resented her for it.”

“Then she finds out that your mom can heal people with the touch of her hand,” Tuck pieces out. “That’s...yeah. Insult to injury.” He gives his head a little shake. “I’ve got chills. This is six kinds of fucked up.”

“No kidding,” I say.

I bite my lip. Hard.

“You don’t think—” I blink, not wanting to speak the words. Not wanting to tempt fate. “You don’t think my mom did the same thing, do you? Like...tried to engineer me? Her own little magical baby?”

Tuck looks at me, searchingly, his eyes scanning my face.

“I really don’t know, Maren. You knew her better than I did—well, you knew her at all. Doyouthink that’s something she would do?”

I don’t answer. I just let my gaze drift around the room, unfocused—from photo to photo—until, like a magnet, it snaps into place.

On a face I recognize.

A face like mine.

Narrow. High cheekbones. The slight crooked tilt of the lips when we smile.

My mother.

She’s in the back of a group photo, dancing with someone whose face I can’t see—but who I recognize all the same.

My dad.

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