Free Carnival of Secrets by Melissa Marr Page A

she packed, she whispered a quiet prayer that she’d make friends in Franklin—or maybe even that Kaleb’s school was near her new town. That was all sorts of unlikely; she knew it, but she clung to the tendril of hope. She’d wanted some normalcy for years, but Kaleb was the first person she’d liked enough to want to try to find a way to really have in her life.
    Sometimes she thought her father saw threats where there weren’t any. She’d never even seen a daimon, but the house was warded, and she was covered in protection spells. Life was a series of flights and thwarted attempts at a real life.
    She walked to her father’s bedroom and considered searching for the item he’d taken from the daimons. If they gave it back, maybe they could stop running—and she could stay here and go on actual dates with Kaleb. Life would be so much easier . . . except finding it was only part of the problem. If she could find the missing item, she wasn’t sure what she’d do with it anyhow.
    Where does one find daimons?
    The daimons that kept them ever in flight hadn’t appeared in her daily life. No creature with shifting forms had approached her. No doorways to another world had opened in her path. Sometimes, she found it hard to believe that daimons were real, but she’d seen irrefutable proof of witches, and they all believed in daimons. More so, they talked about how, for over a century, daimons had massacred witches and their families at any opportunity. No, Adam wasn’t delusional. If anything, all evidence indicated that he was in very real danger—and her with him.
    She opened the door and glanced inside his room. His bed, dresser, and footlocker were all utilitarian, battered and familiar. A heavy quilt covered his bed, and the footlocker had a bulky padlock on it. She assumed that whatever he had stolen would be in there. Unless keeping it in a locked box is too obvious. Her father was practical, and he’d been running from the daimons all her life. He wouldn’t hide it in an obvious place. Would he?
    Despite the temptation to explore, Mallory didn’t go into his room, knowing it was as likely to be spelled as not. He wouldn’t put a restriction on the room, but he very well might have an alarm on the threshold—or the trunk or the dresser. She shook her head: it was impossible to keep secrets from Adam. If she went rifling through his things, he’d know and be upset.
    She closed his door, returned to her room, and resumed packing.
    An hour or so later, she heard the front door close.
    “Mals?”
    She tossed the jeans she’d been folding onto her bed and walked out to greet her father. As always, his attention swept her from head to toe. As a little girl, she’d thought he had special superhero radar vision. Now, she realized he was simply very, very attentive to details. She knew that he didn’t miss anything as he examined her: freshly painted bright-red toenails; blue-and-green gecko pajamas that were too loose lately; faded tee stolen from his wash-the-car clothes; earbuds dangling around her neck; and mousy brown hair caught up in a ponytail on top of her head.
    “Are you feeling any better?” He studied her. “The ankle? The scratches?”
    “All fine.” She offered him a reassuring smile. “Mostly just embarrassed.”
    “Everyone has accidents.” He gave her a one-armed hug.
    “Sure,” she said.
    She wanted to reassure him, to promise she could handle any real threats they encountered, but she knew that if he had his way, she’d never encounter any dangers.
    “Maybe at the next school you can meet someone to watch shows with or do whatever girl things with.” Adam stepped past her and dropped his briefcase on the kitchen table. “There are more witches there, and you’ll be safer.”
    “It’s fine.” She walked over to the stove, checked that the teakettle still had water, and then turned on the burner.
    “It’s not fine. I should be home more. We should do more