“Your mother was crazy, Sarafina. I’m sorry about that. I’m sorry your father went AWOL, too, because he would have raised you correctly. As it happened, your mother, your only living blood relative, went insane and torched herself before she could teach you anything. That’s a pity for you.” Her mother, a highly religious woman, had raised Sarafina alone in a modest middle-class subdivision just west of Bowling Green. Every Sunday her mother had dragged her to church to cleanse the wickedness from Sarafina’s soul. Every day her mother had told her she was sinner, a tool of Satan. For a while Sarafina had even believed her.

Sarafina’s mother had said hell would be Sarafina’s punishment for being a witch, her watery light blue eyes narrowed in accusation. She’d pointed a thin index finger and declared, Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live!

Nearly every single day her mother berated her, up until the time she’d gone straight past crazy and over the cliff of truly insane. After that her mother’s berating days had come to a fiery end and Sarafina had collected a whole shiny new set of nightmares. . and a foster mother.

Stefan’s smile turned predatory. “As it turns out, it’s an advantage for us, though.” “What’s an advantage?” Her mind whirled. She couldn’t track what Stefan was talking about. He made absolutely no sense. It was like talking to her mother at the height of her illness. Sarafina would’ve said she was on Candid Camera or something if the whole situation hadn’t been so bizarre and threatening. Candid Camera did light and funny, not dangerous and crazy.

“That you’re a fire witch, of course. A powerful, untrained, completely oblivious, and vulnerable fire witch.” He smiled. “Ours for the taking, if we can convince you to work with us.” “W-witch?”

“I know it’s hard to believe. I can imagine what you’re thinking given your past and all the things I know you grew up with. It must be hard to comprehend that even though your mother was quite insane, she was also. . right.” Sarafina shook her head. “This is nuts. This is—” She cut off her sentence, her breath coming faster and faster in an impending panic attack. She whirled, looking again for a way out even though she knew there was none.