I don’t know if he would have killed her. I don’t know if he could have killed her, not with the ward she was wearing. Not without breaking the jar. Maybe. Or maybe Stefan was just testing me, testing the bounds of my humanity. It doesn’t matter. I couldn’t give the order. Obeah woman or not, Letitia Palmer was human and mortal. Killing her in cold blood would have violated Hel’s rule of order. And even if that weren’t the case, hell-spawn or not, I wasn’t a murderer.

I shook my head.

Letitia Palmer permitted herself a small, victorious smile. “I have spoken at length to your grandfather’s spirit,” she said to Sinclair. “The country needs you. Your sister needs you. I need you. I’m running for Parliament, you know. There’s a great deal at stake. Blood calls to blood, spirit to spirit. Your grandfather knows. He understands. When you’re ready, truly ready, to come home for good, you’ll be able to recapture his spirit and return it to Jamaica where it belongs. When you do, I’ll lay it to rest. Until then—”

“Mother, I am begging you,” Sinclair said. “Don’t—”

She did.

With a simple, deft twist, the Right Honorable Judge Palmer opened the jar. In case you were wondering, there wasn’t anything special about the jar. I don’t know what it held before it held her father’s spirit. Pickles, maybe.

An eddy of ice-cold air spilled forth from it, circling all of us. My skin prickled at its touch, rising into goose bumps, and I tucked my tail involuntarily between my legs. It smelled acrid and foul, like gunmetal and burning hair, with a powerful underlying note of death and decay, like meat left to rot. The stench of it triggered my gag reflex, and I came seriously close to throwing up. A handful of maple leaves rose in a flurry.

And then the wind died down as abruptly as it had sprung up. The maple leaves settled back onto the grass with a soft rustling sound. We all stood around waiting for something to happen.

“That’s it?” I said to Mrs. Palmer. “That’s your big, scary Grandpa Morgan duppy? A stinky breeze?”

She gave me a flat stare, but behind the bravado there was a hint of uncertainty in it. “Wait.”

“For what, exactly?” I returned her stare. “You don’t know, do you? Sinclair’s right. You’ve turned this thing loose on us with Little Niflheim underfoot, a functioning underworld, and you don’t have the faintest idea what’s going to happen.” My tail untucked and began lashing. “Right. Well, you’re not going to stick around to find out. As Hel’s liaison, I’m ordering you out of town. Now.”