Hey, guys?  Remember that kidnapping Diana went through?  The torture?  The fear?  The night spent alone and abandoned in a dark pit?  The whole incident where Matthew also attacked her in order to try and force her magic out of her?

Well, this chapter opens with the two of them giggling and being cuddly and kissey and meditating.  Continuity?  Emotional consequences?  What’s that?  Phs, go away, logic, we’ve got more squishy romance to get to!

Diana discovers that she can also use telekinesis now.  Also something that she learned without any effort at all, and also something that she doesn’t ‘control’ so much as ‘it sort of just happens around her.’  She thinks “I need butter” and the butter comes to her.  Which might sound like it’s something she did, but it’s still a significant difference from “I want the butter to float through the air and come over here.”  After all, what if she needs butter, but also needs it to not fly across the room?  Having the world react to our basic desires is not the same thing as controlling our environment, because let’s face it, sometimes we want really stupid stuff.  And a lot of the time, our brains know that the stuff we want is stupid, which is why we don’t do it.

Also, Diana discovers that she can’t directly get things to move.  She can’t look at the fridge and say “milk, come here,” it’s just this vague power that sorta-kinda works based on if she wants something.  I guess.  Point is, it’s not exactly an example of a woman having autonomous control over her own powers, body, and environment. 

The magic house starts banging doors to get everyone’s attention, then it spits out a package that Diana’s mom left for her.  Did I mention I love the idea of a semi-alive magic house?  Because it really is awesome.  I want to rescue it from this awful book and give it a proper home somewhere. 

Inside the package is a letter and the missing pages from that magic book that’s been all but ignored for the past 20 chapters now.  The letter explains that Diana’s had special magic since she was born, her parents convinced the Congregation that they were sensing her dad’s power instead, and that’s why they were killed. 

Oh, it gets better.  Apparently the manuscript pages show an alchemic wedding, but the personifications in the illustration are of Diana and Matthew.

Yup, our luckless pair’s ‘marriage’ was foretold ages and ages ago and has some sort of mystical meaning or something like that.  Because you just don’t understand; their love is that special.

“‘Because you will love him as you love no one else, I tied your magic to your feelings for him.

*gag*  Oh, great job, Diana’s mom.  Make her even more of an ’emotional woman’ stereotype.

Yup, that’s right, even Diana’s mom set things up so that Diana would be helpless without her big, strong man.  Seriously, is the entire world against this woman?

I’m sorry about the panic attacks. They were the only thing I could think of. Sometimes you’re too brave for your own good. Good luck learning your spells—Sarah is a perfectionist.’”

Matthew smiled. “There always was something odd about your anxiety.”

“Odd how?”

“After we met in the Bodleian, it was almost impossible to provoke you into panicking.”

Yeah, I noticed that, too.  But this turns the whole thing into just plain bad writing.  We never saw her have a true panic attack, but she kept talking about the as if they were going on, so we were left to assume that the author just doesn’t know what she’s talking about.  If she wasn’t really having attacks, then Diana should have known that and commented on how odd it is that they went away at random.

Also, ‘only thing I could think if’?  That is the first and final word we get on these panic attacks.  No clue as to how or why they’re connected to Diana’s bound-up magic.  Just…“Oh, and also you have panic attacks now, because…reasons!”

Also, Diana was born with a caul that may or may not prove important in the future (knowing this book, anything could happen) and the letter only had one of the three pages missing from the magic book. 

Matthew gets a call and says that Marcus and Miriam are coming in to town because they have some sort of important news.  Diana starts calling Marcus her ‘son,’ because I give up.  I just really don’t care anymore.  If the book wants to carry on like this about them being married, fine.  Every time it comes up, it feels more and more like little kids playing house.  “I love you!  That means we’re married!  Yay!  And…um, Marcus will play our baby!  Hear that, Marcus?  You have to be the baby now, and Matthew and me and Mommy and Daddy.  Teeheehee.”