Today we get to be bogged down with overblown descriptions of alchemy!  Diana is studying Matthew’s book that has two unknown illustrations.  I honestly have no idea what we’re supposed to take away from this, since…well, it’s the only book with those illustrations in it, and generally speaking if you have an entire body of work like for alchemy and something is present in only one part of that, it means next to nothing.  Maybe the artist just really wanted to add that in, or maybe it was someone who wasn’t into the nitty gritty of alchemy and was just adding to the narrative, or maybe it was a theory that wasn’t accepted by later alchemists.  Whatever the answer, point is, a historian should know that outliers exist.  You can’t take every single word written in a historical text as if it’s gospel truth, because people have been making shit up since the dawn of time.

Furthermore, I really don’t know what we’re supposed to take from all this.  I mean, I still don’t even know what alchemy is in this world.  Is it real magic?  Is it not?  Can you really turn lead to gold and invent immortality?  Is it science?  It was introduced to us as Diana trying to prove alchemy is closer to science than magic, but then we find out magic is truefact, except when the book wants to imply that it isn’t, so really, what the hell is going on?  And what does any of this have to do with the plot?  Our only connection is that the magic book is an alchemic text, but at the same time, we’re told it’s more of an origin story hidden in an alchemic text.  So, is it, like, ‘real’ alchemy?  But if that’s real, then what is Diana studying, and why does it matter?  Why am I reading these long-winded descriptions that sound more like passages from Revelations than anything else?  I don’t know, because the book forgot to connect the dots, like it did with so much else.

I was surprisingly happy to be out of Oxford. Gillian’s threats, the picture of my parents, even Peter Knox—they all receded with each hour that passed.

Great.  The book is purposefully forgetting the plot, and furthermore, it’s happy about that fact.

They run across a new guy.

The way he leaned against a chestnut tree, with the elegance of a leopard on the prowl, suggested he was a vampire.

Great.  Another character than can somehow stand still elegantly.  Seriously, she’s trying to describe ‘leaned against’ with ‘on the prowl.’  Author, how do you not realize that those are opposites?

Well, this prowling-while-standing-still guy is Domenico, and he and Matthew trade lots of banter and reminiscing, I guess to show off that they know each other.  Like them knowing the other’s name wasn’t enough of a giveaway.  Matthew tries to send Diana away, but she just stands there like a lump – not refusing or complying, not thinking anything all, just a lump – as the plot continues to happen around her.

Seriously, what is it with protagonists that never participate in their own books?  Like Clary and Jace, here, Diana is just a silent observer to Matthew’s story.

Dom is there from the Congregation to say that Matthew and Diana’s ‘epic romance’ is so tots against the rules.  God, it’s teenage drama writ large, in an attempt to make it bigger than teenage drama.  But we can all see the truth.  This isn’t any different from Daddy saying you can’t date the boy with the leather jacket and the motorcycle, except stupider, because we still don’t know why a governing body cares.

“Diana Bishop.” Domenico bowed low. “It’s an honor to meet a witch of such ancient, distinguished lineage. So few of the old families are still with us.”

Well, if witchiness is hereditary, and most of the old bloodlines are extinct…um, where are all the current witches coming from?  Are they muggleborns?

Dom repeats that witches and vampires can’t have relationships (of any kind, or just romantic?) and she has to leave the castle.  Except he takes three fucking pages to do it.  Once he gets done telling Juliette that she can’t date Romeo, Matthew sends her off the house again, and she goes.  Because she’s just got every single power known on earth and a few more besides, and she’s an adult capable of making her own decisions, but all that’s not good enough.  Nope, the man said it’s too dangerous, so she scampers meekly away.

Ysabeau takes her up to the top of one of the towers.  They stand up there and watch Matthew and Dom talk and fight.

“I’m capable of taking care of myself.”

“You are, if you have as much power as Matthew believes. Witches are very good at protecting themselves, I’ve found, with a little effort and a drop of courage,” Ysabeau said.

Which…is why she got sent back to the house and has not only Matthew, but Marthe and Ysabeau protecting her?

Ysabeau tells her about the Congregation, but doesn’t give any more information than we got in Matthew’s chapter.

…in fact, all of Matthew’s chapters have been repeated in Diana’s chapters.  Why did we even have those chapters?  Oh, right, because this ENTIRE book is made out of stuffing.

So, we get the ‘relationships are too conspicuous’ excuse again (HOW?) and told that creatures can’t be in politics or religion.  And…that’s still it.  If anyone breaks these rules, the Congregation comes to stop them.  I guess there really is only the nine of them doing all this?

And, really, that’s all you need to keep this a global secret?  No rules against going on Oprah and saying “hey, I’m a witch, watch me cast a spell”?  I mean, that’s not political.  No rules against traveling around the world, cursing people you don’t like, just for the hell of it?  No rules against vampires leaving bloodless bodies around for people to find (as is happening)?  Why the hell haven’t these people been outed by now?

And why doesn’t Diana know about all this?  If this is the governing body in her world, and if there’s rules she has to obey or else she’ll be killed by random Congregation people, then why didn’t her aunts give her the run down?  If nothing else, then just to warn her away from running for office?

“I’m not under Matthew’s authority.”

“You, my dear, have a great deal to learn about vampires,” she said with a note of satisfaction.

I hate this book so very, very much.