“Okay, then.” Wanting to avoid conflict with the Principal was a reason I understood perfectly—even if I had no real concept what demon conflict meant or what made someone an Upper. “We promise to respect your secret and won’t tell anyone.” I raised my voice, “Right, guys?”
“Sure,” Nabila choked. “Of course.”
“Whatever pleases the Mistress,” Oscar murmured from the ground.
“The Mistress would like you to get off her floor. And for you—” Cat pointed at me, “—to get that stupid pin out of your arm.” She pulled a white plastic case marked with a red cross from behind the bar. “Here. Patch yourself up. You’re bleeding all over my bar. Once that’s done, you should go. It’s nearly nine.”
“We’ll go,” I confirmed, wondering if I still had a job come next Monday but knowing now wasn’t the time to ask. “We’ll pack up and go right away.”
“Good.” Cat picked up the bottle of amber liquid and stepped back across Oscar’s prone form.
Despite her request, he didn’t move so much as a finger until she’d left the room.
Chapter Thirty-One
“Wait. Stop. We need to talk about this.” Heading Nabila and Oscar off at the pass, I held my arms open and stood in front of them, blocking an easy exit from the alley. “We have more information now—and information is power.”
Nabila crossed her arms and glared.
Oscar stared silently at the ground.
“Come on, guys.” I struggled to think of what to say—the last thing I wanted was my friends thinking I’d signed their death warrant. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know. But nothing bad happened. No fire, no brimstone, no chewing off fingernails. We’re fine!”
Neither of them remotely closer to wanting to talk to me.
If anything, Nabila’s brows drew into an even more fearsome scowl, while Oscar’s shoulders hunched, as if bracing for attack.
My heart lurched. “Oscar. Don’t look like that. Cat told us the truth in there—she doesn’t want to hurt us.”
He flinched.
Nabila brandished a pin.
I dropped my hands to my sides, lifting the palms in a pleading gesture. “Can you please tell me why you’re so completely freaked?”
“Do you have any idea what kind of trouble we’re in?” Nabila glared at me.
The warning wasn’t necessary. I didn’t want another pin in my arm.
“No. I don’t—because I’ve got no idea why you think we’re dead.” I turned to look at Oscar. “Or why you tried to become the human doormat. I get that Upper demons are the most powerful, but we go to school with them every day! What makes Cat so different—she’s way less scary than Churchfield.”
Oscar gaped at me. “She’s not an Upper. She’s a Midwrath.”
“What?” It was my turn to gape at him.
“Upper demons are the boss demons, Ash,” Nabila said. “They don’t share. There’s only one at our school—and that’s the Principal.”
“But Bournival—”
“Isn’t one.” Shoulders slumping, Nabila propped herself against the alley wall and stared at me with a disturbingly defeated gaze. “The second I saw Oscar’s face, I knew that’s what your so-called boss was.”
“Feeders always know when an Upper’s around,” Oscar murmured.
“It doesn’t matter who owns which Feeder or Mixer,” she continued. “Uppers are all about the status quo—it’s the only area they don’t fight each other on. Any hint of rebellion is instantly crushed. No matter what.”
“That explains the pervasive theme in Churchill’s classroom. But…” I shook my head, trying to reconcile my friend with that description. “That doesn’t mean Cat has to be like that. Right? I mean, she’s not that much older than us. How evil can someone be who likes cartoon t-shirts and hot chocolate?”
Nabila started to laugh.
It wasn’t a friendly sound.
“They’re all like that. At the start.” The side of Oscar’s jaw flexed. He scrubbed his hands over his face. “Being an Upper means you’re the demon of horror stories. A bad soul that won’t die. You take what you want—including the host body you wear. Wearing them until they get used up and die, or you find one that’s more appealing. Most Uppers call them their meat-suits. Meat-suits, Ash.” He slammed a fist into the alley wall. “That’s what people are to Uppers. Nothing but clothing and fuel and food.”
“No… but…” I faltered.
He was telling the truth. I felt it in my bones. Pure, awful truth.
Cat wasn’t really Cat?
She was actually an undead, eternally black soul using that body as a suit? She’d touched me with a dead girl’s hands?
“Oh, God.” My insides revolted. Clamping a hand over my mouth, I rushed a short way back down the alley. Doubling over behind a dumpster, I violently excised pretzels and Coke from my body.
Someone reached around and pulled my hair back from my face.
Tears joined the former contents of my stomach on the alley floor. If Cat was the thing Oscar described, then had I really gotten my friends killed? I knew Cat had answered my questions honestly, but what if I’d asked the wrong things?
If this all came down on my friends and Jim, I wouldn’t be able to live with myself.
“Here.”
Blinking, I found an old-fashioned handkerchief dangling before me. Trust Oscar to be the only person my age who’d carry those.
“Thanks,” I choked out.
He patted me on the shoulder and gently nudged me toward the main street. “We have to head home, Ash. We don’t want to miss curfew. I think we have gotten in enough trouble today.”
“Okay,” I said meekly, trailing after him and Nabila as they led the way home.
I was deeply afraid my friends had decided to give up on our plan. And I wasn’t sure how to convince them otherwise.
“Um, guys?”
They both slowed, sharing a look before facing me. Great. Nabila and Oscar were obviously in alignment over this.
“Are we still in this?” I asked.
Oscar stared at me blankly. “In trouble? It seems so. Your warning when we first met, Ash, was rather more apt than I’d realized.”
“Hah. You’re a comedian.” I scrunched my face at him. “You know what I mean—are we still going to figure out what we found today and you know…” I raised my eyebrows meaningfully and glanced furtively around, too keyed up to speak any details on the crowded Vegas strip.
“Now she decides to be cautious,” Nabila grumbled.
I glared at her. “I thought I was being cautious, Voodoo. I thought she was my friend. I’m sorry! But unless being an Upper means they can make lies appear as truth, Cat was telling the truth.” My hands fisted, waiting for Nabila to scoff and tell me that’s exactly what evil, body-less spirits could do.
“No,” she said, dark gaze serious. “That’s one of the few things they can’t do.”
“Okay.” Tension leeched out of my body. “If you believe in what I can do—what I can see—then you have to believe me about this. She wasn’t lying. I don’t think she’s going to sell us out or hurt us. I’m sorry I thought she was a Shifter, but I’ve never met an Upper before. I had no idea they have fangs and claws.” My brow furrowed. “Unless they normally take Shifters as hosts?”
“Fangs? Claws? Give it up, Ash. Everyone knows the finite rule of the Demon-world.”
“Really? There’s someone right here who’s got no damn clue.” I pointed angrily at myself.
“You can’t be more than one demonic thing,” Oscar said, taking Nabila and me by the arm and steering us through a group of men whose fake ball-and-chain ankle wear and t-shirts asking for blow jobs marked them as a bachelor party. “It’s the all-guiding Principal. No Upper can take a Shifter, Mixer—not even a Feeder. Nabila is a Mixer. If she were to survive the change and become a Shifter, she’d no longer be able to Mix. Otherwise, all Uppers would want to possess the strongest Shifters and Mixers.”
>
“Wha—”
I bit off my questions as another wave of humanity crashed over us. I believed what Oscar said—but I also believed my own eyes. If Cat was an Upper, and no demon could be more than one thing, then how the hell did she have fangs?
Nabila ducked between a large cardboard Bumblebee and an unfortunate attempt at a werewolf. Oscar and I followed suit, turning onto the quiet street that would lead us to The Milton’s front door.
As soon as our feet hit the worn, mottled pavement, Nabila stopped.
Oscar grabbed my shoulders, pulling me to a haul moments before my nose collided with Nabila’s.
“Jesus, Nabila. What’s wrong with you now?”
“You swear to me that Upper was telling the truth?” She jabbed a finger into my chest.
“Yes, I swear.” I batted her hand away. “Careful. You’ve stuck me with enough things today.”
She gave me a hard look. “You, stay here. Oscar, come over here with me.”
“What is this, kindergarten?” I griped, trying to ignore the pang of hurt at being the brunt of the oldest trick in the book as Nabila moved away—obviously, she was going to talk to Oscar about me. Away from me.
Drawing in a deep breath, I stared at the ground. It wasn’t the first time I’d been cut out. It probably wouldn’t be the last. And I guess I deserved it after dropping them into everything with Cat.
“No,” Oscar said.
I looked up, surprised to find he hadn’t moved.
“Get over here, Oscar,” Nabila demanded.
“No. We agreed to do this together, Nabila. If we decide to break pact, the least we can do is agree on it together with Ash.” Drawing himself up to his full height, he crossed his arms. A mutinous expression marking territory on his face.
My jaw dropped.
Oscar having his stubborn on full display was bizarre in and of itself. But more so was his refusal to abandon me. He’d just plastered himself to the floor in a bar I’d dragged him to, and he wouldn’t leave me.
Heat burned the back of my eyes.
“Fine. Fine. Be that way,” Nabila said as she jogged back to us. “You want her to hear? Alright. I don’t know if we can trust Ash.”
“I don’t believe she knew she was taking us to an Upper,” Oscar said. “You wouldn’t have had a clue either, if it wasn’t for me.”
“What if this is all a plot by the Uppers to find out what my granddaddy left me?”
Of all the egotistical…
An outraged squeak erupted from my lips.
Oscar shrugged. “Doubtful. It would be a stupid plot. Before Ash, there was nothing to find. After today, we can be certain you needed her to read the message left by your granddaddy. So it follows that not trusting her is equally stupid.”
“Are you calling me stupid, Feeder?” Nabila pushed her face into Oscar’s.
I shoved her away—hard. “Don’t call him that. He might be too nice to call you stupid back—but I’m not. You’d still have dick without me, so get the fuck over yourself. You want to go back to solving this by yourself? Be my guest. Then you won’t just be stupid, you’ll be crazy. That’s the definition of crazy, you know, doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”
“I can’t survive this life. I have to get out!” Her voice broke.
“I know,” I said, gently taking each of her arms. The move was partly for comfort, and partly in the hopes it would stop her from stabbing me with another pin. “If I don’t find a way out of here, I’m going to lose Jim. They’re killing him, Nabila. I won’t do anything to risk this. You have to believe me.”
Her hands wrapped around both my wrists in a tight, fierce grasp. “I believe that you want out, Ash. I’m just not sure that when push comes to shove you’ll pick us.”
“You’ve shrunk your own head, Voodoo. Of course I’m with you. We’re going to find our freedom.”
“I hope so, Ash. I’ve trusted people before. They’ve made pretty promises and sworn to do what’s right, then they face the dark and they buckle. They’re offered something easy, something safe, and they take it.” Bitterness twisted her features. I didn’t need to ask who it was that’d hurt her, I knew instinctively that she spoke about her own family. “Now I’m trusting you, and you’ve got an in with the Shifters. You’re claimed,” she spat the word.
“So what? I’m not going to betray you. I just…”
Like Nash. Enjoy making out with him. Enjoy the tiny sliver of security.
I sucked in a breath, searching for the right words, but all I could hear was Aretha telling me to Think.
“Nash might let you talk with us now, but that’ll change. Especially if they find out what we’ve been up to.” Nabila turned away and released my wrists. “We’re home. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
She hurried down the street towards our apartment complex.
I glanced at Oscar, uncertain as to whether I should go after her.
He gave a slight shake of his head, and motioned for me to bend close. I did, grateful we were still far enough from the entrance that Myrtle couldn’t hear, and the wind was blowing in our favor. “Thanks for sticking by me,” I said to him. “For believing I won’t sell you out.”
“Of course. Nabila’s scared. I don’t think she’s ever been close to finding an answer before. She’s not the only one.” He touched my arm lightly, and I swallowed my instinctive comment.
I nodded, waiting for him to continue.
“Despite everything, the Upper might have told us what we need to know,” he said, offering me a quick smile when I twitched in surprise. “How lunar eclipses can blur the lines of truth? There is an ancient Feeder tale that speaks about the Time of Changing, when the light breaks, and the divide between demons and servants fades. It’s said one will come who can affect the truth, and that person will either bring our salvation or seal our fate.”
Solemn blue eyes met mine, holding my gaze for a long moment.
I gulped. Afraid of what came next, unable not to listen.
“Some say, that person is a powerful Seer,” he said. “And that salvation depends on the choices they make.”
He squeezed my hands and headed for The Milton.
I stumbled after him. A bell ringing in my head, soft yet insistent as we passed through The Milton’s outer fence and down the narrow passage into the courtyard. The familiar keels of my mental bell reminded me I’d heard such a story before.
Only in those stories, my mother had called the main character a Visionary.
She’d never once finished the tale—always claiming the ending was up to me.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Jim woke me up the next morning with breakfast. I didn’t love getting up a half-hour before my alarm, but it was good to see him.
At least he wasn’t dead. Or worse.
While I spiked my hair for the last day of school, the scents of bacon, eggs and burned toast wafted into the bathroom—mingling with the stench of burning hair. Not sure where that had come from, I barely touched my hair with the flat-iron. Whatever. I’d eat the eggs and bacon.
“Smells good,” I said, strolling into the kitchen. “Thanks for cooking.”
“No problem.” Jim had his back to me, turning over bacon rashers on the stove. “Sorry I haven’t been around lately, kiddo.”
Something rippled down my spine. I don’t know if it was an awareness or…
Lie. He wasn’t sorry.
What the hell?
I narrowed my eyes at him and eased around the counter to get a proper look. Was he drunk? Or something worse? The side of his face seemed fine, no weird coloring or blotches, but still…this didn’t feel like the Jim I’d shared spaghetti with, who’d been in awe of boiling pasta.
“It’s okay.” I tried to smile. Failed. “I know you’ve got to work a lot.”
“Thanks for being so understanding.” He turned and smiled at me.
His smile was too big. Too quick.
“Eat up.” He plunked a giant plate of steaming eggs and bacon in front of me, topped it with two slices of toast. I couldn’t help but wonder if this moment was one of his citations. Did he have to play Happy Stepford Dad as punishment?
Is that the only reason you’re here?
Well, great. I didn’t want to be here anymore than he did.
In fact… Maybe this was my punishment, too.
It made a sick sort of sense. Of course they’d get me back at me for trying to negotiate something on my own terms. I wasn’t going to let it get to me. I couldn’t.
Tears burned the back of my eyes.
No way would I let them fall, not in front of him. Pausing mid-bite, I put the unfinished piece of bacon back on my plate and pushed away from the counter. “I have to go, I need to get there early today.”
Hurrying to the couch, I grabbed my backpack.
Arriving early wouldn’t be that terrible. I could catch up with Nash, soothe his ruffled feathers after ignoring him for the better part of a week—
“Tell me, are you ready for the ball, dear?” My father’s voice echoed out of his mouth, but I knew in that instant whoever—whatever—stood before me wasn’t my father. He didn’t call me dear. And he didn’t have dead eyes.
I swallowed hard and lifted my chin. “Not quite.”
“What else do you need?” The Jim-Thing’s eyes focused on me with a singular intensity.
Somehow I managed not to scream. “Couple things. You know. Maybe sort out something to wear.”
He nodded as if he understood such regular, human needs. “I believe Mr. Bournival wishes you and your band to practice in his classroom after school today. He told me he offered you the space, but you haven’t been getting full use of the space. You should. It has good acoustics.”
I shrugged. “Oscar has stage fright.”
It wasn’t a lie. He’d said he didn’t want to be up in front of the whole school.
Strange energy pushed at me, trying to find a way in. I wouldn’t let it. I had to keep myself from running as I headed to the door. My strange talent was yelling at me, telling me to be careful and only speak the truth.
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