Mateo nodded. “I thought she asked because she cared. But she doesn’t, does she? She knows the curse is real?”

“Worse than that.” Nadia hated to say the next, but it was written there in Goodwife Hale’s spidery handwriting. “It says—it says that she cursed George Cabot and all his line so that she might know the future without suffering the consequences.”

Mateo said something so obscene Nadia had never before heard it spoken out loud. “You’re telling me Elizabeth cursed my ancestor. My Elizabeth.”

“That’s what it says.”

“So she cursed all of us. Every one of the Cabots. Right down to me.”

Nadia nodded.

“Elizabeth did this to me. She pretended to be my friend, but she did this to me. And—Mom—” He swallowed hard. “Do you know how many years I’ve been angry at Mom for rowing out into the ocean? And it wasn’t her fault. None of it. It was all Elizabeth.”

Mateo’s voice cracked, and Nadia remembered what he’d told her about his mother rowing out into the ocean to drown herself, leaving her young son behind. She’d done that because she’d been driven to insanity and despair, all so Elizabeth Pike could cheat time and fate yet again. Now the anger he’d felt toward his mother was cracking apart, leaving only the pain.

He turned away, hugging his knees to his chest. Yet she glimpsed the firelight glinting off one tear tracing down his cheek. He wouldn’t want to be seen crying; guys usually didn’t. Nadia longed to comfort him, but what could she say? She couldn’t think of anything that didn’t sound empty or stupid. This was about his mother being driven crazy and killed by the person he’d believed loved him. No words could make that seem any less horrible than it was.

Instead, she leaned against Mateo—her back to his back, so he had his privacy but knew she was here, that she hurt for him. After a moment, he let his head lean back onto her shoulder, but Nadia knew better than to touch him in any other way. Maybe it was enough just to be near.

On the far wall, the firelight cast the shadows of the two of them together, as though they were one person with two faces, one looking forward and one toward the past.

Finally, his voice hoarse, Mateo said, “That’s why Elizabeth asks me about the dreams. She’s using the curse to see the future without having to go crazy herself.”

“Right.” Nadia hated adding this, but better for him to hear the whole thing at once. He’d been lied to so horribly; she wouldn’t hide the truth from him any longer. “I’d be willing to bet that pretty much every memory you have of Elizabeth is fake. She wouldn’t have had any reason to pay attention to you until you started having the dreams. Anything you remember that goes back further—it probably isn’t real.”

“None of it,” he whispered. “I thought she was the only person besides my dad who cared about me. But there wasn’t anybody. Not in all this time.” His whole body went tense, like he was guarding himself against remembered pain.