Seriously? Max thought, feeling as though the thanks in this situation should only be pointing in one direction.

The aunt smiled, smoothing her gray hair behind her shoulder, still wild from the wind. “No. Thank you. I’m so proud of you.”

The aunt’s eyes looked the same way Max felt, as if she knew her words weren’t enough to convey what she really felt.

Vera was a superhero.

Vera

Vera watched as Max hugged his mother, and for the first time in a long time, the tug she felt on her chest held no fear, no psychic pull, no demonic energy. Max smoothed his mother’s curls from her face and comfort food poured into Vera’s soul.

“She’s okay,” Vera croaked.

“I think so,” said Father Chuck, stepping beside her. “How did you know what to do? Your aunt, she thought the chalice, the basement, was giving it power. She thought it was feeding it with demonic energy. But you…”

“I don’t know.” Vera shrugged. “I really don’t. You know how sometimes you drive someplace and don’t remember how you got there? Your body just does it?”

The priest nodded.

“That’s the best I can explain it.”

“It takes no bravery to drive a car, but what you did—”

“It’s what my parents do.” In fact, they had done exactly this yesterday and were going to do exactly this tomorrow when they got home. It was nothing special.

Father Chuck placed a heavy palm on her shoulder. “You saved a woman’s life.” His voice was heartfelt. “I have a feelin’ you’ll spend a lot of time reflecting on what happened here. I imagine we all will.”

Vera’s face flushed as she shook her head no. He was making too much of it. Her actions, she didn’t consciously make them. She just did them. She wasn’t a hero. Anyone would have done the same.

“The folks outside, the yellow-hatters, I think I oughta take a look at how they’re faring.” Father Chuck turned toward the windows, strangers milling in her front yard, aimlessly pacing with blinking, vacant eyes.

He left the house and Vera shifted back to Max, still hugging his mother—not it, but Mrs. Lilith Oliver. Lilith gazed up at Vera through thick, healthy lashes and smiled, her teeth as white and straight as a toothpaste ad. Her eyes leaked uncontrollable tears.

“Mom,” Max said. “This is Vera. She saved your life.”

“No. I didn’t. I just—” Vera shook her head.

“She’s amazing,” Max added.

The way he looked at her in that moment, the way his honey-brown eyes gleamed, was a picture Vera hoped she’d hold in her mind and her heart forever. Whenever the world got too cold, and her life got too dark, she prayed to every force she’d just summoned that she would always be able to picture his face gazing at her in exactly this way.

EPILOGUE

“You didn’t order the scampi. You ordered the crab cakes,” Max insisted as he set a plate in front of Aunt Tilda. “But I can get you the scampi if you want it.”