by Cara Wylde
“Okay, enough talking!” As if I’d done any talking at all… “Eat! I want to see my beautiful daughter eat, drink the best wine, and have fun.” As if I could have any fun at the professors’ table… Is he crazy? I think he’s crazy. Unlimited power could do that to you…
I looked at my plate and willed my appetite to come back. For some reason, I felt like it wouldn’t have been a good idea to say I wasn’t hungry and make a scene. He’d made enough of a scene already, earlier, when he’d so rudely interrupted the Psychology class. It was better to play nice, for now, and see if I could find out anything about why he was truly here and what he really wanted from me.
As I ate in silence, sipping my wine from time to time, trying to keep my head low and my eyes down, he started talking with the professors about things in the supernatural world I knew nothing about. Work was hard, too many violent deaths in the past few years, what had become of America? Okay, that much I could wrap my head around. A bus accident in India had caused thirty-five deaths, and he couldn’t understand why they hadn’t been assigned to Neutral Reapers or Righteous Reapers. Why did Violent Reapers have to take care of everything?! And the Supernatural Council… Why were they taking so long passing the law against copulation with humans?
I almost choked on a piece of mushroom. I looked up at him, my eyes filled with so many questions I already knew I wouldn’t have the balls to ask. He was against supernaturals having relationships with humans?! In what world did that make any sense? He was the result of an archangel shagging a human! I was the result of… Okay, maybe I shouldn’t be so disrespectful toward my family. The family I’d never known.
“Are you okay, daughter? Here, have more wine.” He filled up my glass. It struck me then that he was constantly calling me “daughter” because he didn’t know what else to call me.
“It’s a difficult decision to make,” said Headmaster Colin in reply to Morningstar’s outrage. “Even for the Council.”
“What? To finally organize a proper vote? The last one was a sham.”
“I don’t believe that’s true,” said Mrs. Charon, our PE teacher. “I remember five years ago the suggestion of passing the law was taken by the Council very seriously, and the voting took place over a period of three days. More than enough for everyone to express their opinion.”
“What about the propaganda? Have you all forgotten the pamphlets that were being passed around? The articles in The Daily Diviner? Whatever group was behind those was never discovered. They said humans were necessary for us to thrive. That having relationships with them only made us stronger.” He huffed. “A society of hybrids! That’s what these rebels want!”
Okay, I couldn’t take this any longer. And I knew I’d regret opening my mouth, but I just had to say it. Someone had to.
“But aren’t you a hybrid yourself? And aren’t I a human?”
He turned to me slowly and fixed me with a stern gaze for a second. Then, his lips curled into an indulgent smile.
“You have nothing to worry about, Mila. When the law passes, I will make sure it doesn’t affect you.”
I furrowed my brows. Was he really going to ditch my question like that?
“I’m not worried about anything. It’s just baffling to me that someone who is a hybrid and has a human daughter would support such a law. I mean… if it weren’t for humans, we wouldn’t exist.”
“Or maybe, we would. We would’ve been born anyway, but instead of being half-bloods or… no-bloods,” Ouch! That stung. “...we would’ve been pure-blooded supernaturals. Maybe, you would’ve even had powers of your own.”
Well, I couldn’t deny that sounded nice. As someone who’d wondered all her life what it was like to have powers, I couldn’t argue with his logic. But at the same time, I knew it didn’t make any sense. A Mila with powers would’ve been a different person. Not me. I had come to like me for me, and I’d never thought I’d say this, but having no special skills or powers had made me stronger, had made me fight harder and be better. I was where I was now, almost at the top of the worth scoreboard, not because of my name or my parents’ fortune, but because I was one stubborn bitch who wouldn’t give up even when faced with horrible bullying and the promise of death lurking around every corner. If I’d been a supernatural, I would’ve most certainly been a spoiled brat. Just like Lorna, Pandora, and… let’s face it, Pazuzu and GC Apis. At least, being who I was, I had a fair chance at liking myself. I wasn’t sure these people liked themselves very much.
“We aren’t, though,” I said. “You’re still a hybrid, and I’m still a human. And that’s okay, right? I mean, look at you. You’re the most powerful Grim Reaper of the twenty-two. I learned about you in History.” I didn’t mention I’d studied him outside of the History class, too. Looking at him, I couldn’t help but wonder why I’d been unable to find any pictures of him. He was legit handsome. When I’d asked Mrs. Morgan about it, she’d just said Valentine Morningstar didn’t like having his picture taken. “And I’m the only human who’s ever received an invitation to apply to the Academy.”
A dark shadow fell over his face. “And why do you think that happened?”
I gulped. He does have a point. “Because I’m your daughter…” My voice suddenly turned meek.
“No.” Everyone at the table was looking at us. They were so focused on our exchanges, so eager to catch every word and every inflection, that they were barely breathing. “Many supernaturals have children with humans, and those children are human, with not a bone of angel, demon, or vampire in them. Yet, you don’t see them at Grim Reaper Academy. Try again.”
Oh, the time when he’d call me “daughter” and tell me how much he missed me was long gone! And it had only been a few hours…
“I don’t know.” But I did know. The prophecy. Grim Reaper Academy, and maybe the Council even, wanted Valentine Morningstar removed. And who could be a better candidate than his own daughter?
He was silent for a long moment. The tension was so thick that one could cut it with a knife. It hung in the air, heavy and suffocating, like cigarette smoke in a cheap bar on game night. No one at the table said a single word. No one in the entire dining hall whispered, or even breathed. Thirty seconds. One minute. He finally relaxed back in his seat and gave me a bright smile.
“You know what? Headmaster Colin will excuse you tomorrow.” He looked at Mason Colin, who nodded. “I’m taking you out. Have you visited Salem? Lovely little town.”
I took a sip of wine, hoping the cold liquid would help bring back my voice.
“I’m not comfortable missing a whole day of school. It will be hard to catch up.”
“Nonsense! You’re the smartest student here! Just ask your fellas to lend you their notes.”
“I have Anthropology with the RDC.”
“So, ask someone else.” He stood up straighter and looked over the dining hall until he spotted the RDC table. “Miss Chiaramonte, you will lend your Anthropology notes to my daughter tomorrow.” That wasn’t a question, nor a suggestion. It was an order. “If that’s okay with you, of course.”
It was Lorna’s turn to play the deer-caught-in-the-headlights part. Honestly, seeing her so scared and confused made me feel better about myself. I really didn’t want her notes, though.
I leaned in to whisper in Morningstar’s general direction. “I don’t want to…”
“Shh. Lorna is more than happy to help!”
“Y-yes,” Lorna finally managed. “I’d be happy to share my notes with your daughter.” Her pale face turned an angry shade of pink, which showed just how humiliated she felt. In other circumstances, I would’ve enjoyed this victory. Except it wasn’t mine. So, naturally, I didn’t want it. Maybe I was more like my father than I wanted to admit.
“Marvelous!” He turned to me and raised his glass. “Tomorrow, after breakfast. You, me, and the town of Salem. There’s something I want to show you. You’ll love it.”
Would I? I s
tole a glance at Headmaster Colin, looking for a sign. Any kind of sign. He simply nodded then averted his gaze and poured himself more beer. Funny. I hadn’t seen him drink beer before.
CHAPTER NINE
My father owned a black Lamborghini. I never thought I’d say the words father and Lamborghini in the same sentence. Like… ever in my life. Valentine Morningstar wasn’t Stepan Lazarov. There were moments when I couldn’t decide who was worse. Because, for damn sure, neither of them was any good for me.
All hell broke loose after dinner last night. He’d popped up out of nowhere and turned my world upside down. Not that I was a fan of my social status before the whole school knew I was his daughter, but the sudden one-eighty the other students pulled on me in the span of a few hours freaked me out and might have scarred me for life. Now, Sheba and Sammy, who seemed to be joined at the hip, smiled at me every time I walked past them in the hallways. What. The. Fuck. Some guy from the RDC flirted with me at breakfast. I didn’t even know his name. He knew mine. At the VDC table, everyone wanted to sit as close to me as possible. Next to me was just not an option, since GC and Paz were – to their sudden, mystifying despair – still in the picture. Klaus had managed to demystify some of their behavior after breakfast, right before I was supposed to meet Morningstar at the gates.
“You can choose whoever your little heart desires now. You’re Valentine Morningstar’s daughter! You don’t have to settle.”
I laughed. “That’s ridiculous! We’re talking about GC freaking Apis and Pazuzu freaking Eremus. How am I settling?”
He shrugged. “You’ve been dating them for a few months. Maybe you’re bored.”
“I’m not bored.”
“Maybe you’re just a little bit curious about how… geez… I don’t know!... how an angel is in bed. Or a vampire. Or a merman, for that matter.” He grinned at me.
“I get it, I get it… Joel is rocking your world.”
“Not just my world, sister.”
“Well, I’m happy for you. And you should be happy for me, because GC and Paz are enough. More than I need, actually. I’m not curious about any angels, vampires, or mermen.”
“Maybe you’re curious about girls. Sheba seems to like you. Blond-haired demoness with catty eyes and cattier attitude… Don’t pass up this opportunity.”
“Okay, you’re just being annoying right now. Intentionally. What are you getting out of this? Sheba doesn’t like me. She hates my guts! I stole GC from her. And from Sammy. And from all the other girls at the Academy.”
“Bygones. They forgot all about it, believe me. You’re Mila Morningstar. You can steal whoever the fuck you want.”
“I’m not.”
“You’re not… what?”
“Mila Morningstar. Don’t call me that. I’m not that person.”
“What do you want me to call you then? You’re not Lazarov, for sure. And what kind of person is she that you hate her so much?”
“She’s selfish and entitled, and… and she has a name. A name that opens doors.”
“Hmm… déjà-vu. We’ve had this conversation before.”
“My mother’s name was Angelov. I’m thinking of taking it.”
We stopped at the end of the courtyard. That was as far as he’d agreed to walk me.
“He won’t let you,” he said after a moment’s pause. “He’s too proud.”
“Well, I’m proud, too. And I have a say in this.”
“I don’t know about that…”
“I do,” I snapped at him, then regretted it instantly. I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Klaus, you’re my friend. You should be supporting me.”
“I support you, sister. I support you by telling you the truth. Isn’t that what we’re about?” He motioned between us. “And the truth is that he’s here now, in your life. Why? Fuck knows. Why now? Again, fuck knows. Did you want him in your life? He doesn’t care. And he won’t care whether you want to take his name or not, either. You are who you are, the whole school knows it… Hell! The entire supernatural world knows it by now. And there’s no going back. Like it or not, you’re Mila Morningstar, and that’s who you’ll be from now on. There’s no getting out of this, so better make the best of it, am I right?”
I sighed. “Ugh! You’re making so much sense and I hate you!”
As if to confirm his reasoning, an NDC guy walked past us and threw me a casual “Hey, Mila! What’s up!” along with a wink and a wave. Who the fuck is that?!
“Caleb. He might be the merman I was telling you about.” Klaus read my mind. “I bet he’s going for a swim.”
I rolled my eyes. “I’m going.”
“Have fun! Don’t forget we’re convening in the library tonight, so you can tell us all about it!”
“What? No, we’re not!”
“Too late, I’ve already invited everyone, and Patty is bringing snacks.”
“Who’s everyone?”
He started counting on his fingers. “Me, Joel, Patty, GC, and Paz. Francis overheard us and said he wanted to be included.” He scratched the back of his neck. “Which was super weird. Anyway, I told him to fuck off.”
I laughed. “You told Francis Saint-Germain to fuck off? Who are you?”
He grinned from ear to ear. “Why, I’m Mila Morningstar’s best friend. I can afford to be a jerk now.”
“You’re not my best friend, Patty is. Anyway, I gotta run. Don’t break anything while I’m gone.”
As I was saying, my father owned a black Lamborghini. I got in and looked around as he pulled out of the parking lot and drove down the slope of the mountain, making my heart jump in my throat and my stomach do juggling tricks with my breakfast. He had his scythe in the back, and I might have stared at it for a second too long.
“Do you like it?”
I blinked at him, confused. “Y-yes. I guess so. Isn’t it like all the other scythes? I mean, attuned to your energy, of course, but similar to…”
“No,” he cut me off unceremoniously. He loved interrupting people. Okay, I made a note in his personality profile I’d drafted in my head. He didn’t think what other people said at any time was worth his patience. “I had one like yours a long time ago. The scythe I chose at the test… I used it all through the Academy years, graduated with it, and reaped with it for some hundreds of years after that. I had to replace it when it broke. I was devastated at first.” He laughed, his eyes on the road. Even if he drove a bit too fast for these mountain roads, he drove carefully. “A Grim Reaper with a broken scythe… It makes you doubt yourself, you know?”
To say that I was equally shocked and entranced by his story would’ve been an understatement. Open file, click mental pen, note down: Valentine Morningstar knew how to tell a story.
“I had no idea scythes could break,” I whispered.
“Me neither. Apparently, in certain circumstances, they can.”
“What circumstances?”
He was silent for a moment. He looked straight ahead. We were coming down the hill and entering Salem.
“When you try to reap a soul whose time hasn’t come yet.”
“Like… when someone tricks you into it? They want to commit suicide and you can’t stop them?”
“No. Like when you want to kill someone who isn’t supposed to die.”
A chill ran up my spine. I smiled at first, thinking it must have been a joke. I was ready to note that down in my invisible file: Valentine Morningstar could tell a good, albeit cruel joke. But he wasn’t laughing. The smile died on my lips.
“You can’t be serious.”
“Oh, I am.” He turned to me and fixed me with his gaze. I suddenly felt the urge to make myself small.
“Eyes on the road,” I whispered. Anything to get him to look away.
“What? Do you think Grim Reapers are saints? We have our own agendas. We want to kill people from time to time, people who stand in our way.”
“Who could ever stand i
n your way when you’re a Grim Reaper? You are Death.”
“Death,” he chuckled darkly. “There are twenty-two Grim Reapers, and only one Death. Don’t ever use them interchangeably.”
I guessed we hadn’t yet gotten to that particular part in our curriculum. Since the differences between Grim Reapers and the one Death were so subtle, I figured we were probably going to study them in year three. Morningstar was way ahead of me. He knew things I couldn’t even imagine existed right now, with my limited experience. And I’d also skipped practice last year, so I could barely keep up with my peers in that department, let alone with him.
We drove down the main street, then took a right to a secondary one and stopped in front of an old building made of red bricks. It was the bank.
“You said you wanted to show me something.” I doubted this was it.
“We’re here. Come on.”
Oh, it was. I followed him, but instead of going into the building, through the front door, we went around it. He had his scythe with him, and I was shocked to see no one seemed to notice it. I moved to his left, so I could get a better look at it. The curved handle seemed to be older than the blade, which meant that when he’d changed it, he’d kept the handle. The blade, however, was longer and more massive than the blade of my scythe – which I’d left in GC’s room – and the runes were, of course, placed in a different sequence. What was fascinating was that when the sun hit the top of the blade just right, the runes seemed to bleed. I’d never seen anything like it before.
“It seems to be new.” He’d said he’d used his old scythe for some hundreds of years. When had he exactly broken it?
“It is,” he stated simply. “Newer than you might think.” With that, the subject was closed. I could sense from his demeanor that he didn’t want to talk about it anymore.
