Frostbite (#4 Destroyers Series)

by Holly Hook

  Unfortunately, it was real life.

  And Sophia was the cause.

  No one noticed her pressing up against the wall. She wasn’t the only bystander. Others were gawking around the corners of the room at the doorways, watching in horror. In the scene, she was being missed.

  Release me, Hyrokkin begged. I promise more of this if you do not.

  Sophia made a croaking sound. Her knees threatened to fail, and so did she.

  The demon was getting stronger all the time, feeding on its own desperation to escape. Sophia grabbed the fake plant nearby to hold her balance. Her fingers slipped through the plastic leaves and grasped the trunk. Again, no one stared.

  She gagged, ready to heave something up, but there was nothing inside her stomach. Nothing inside her, period. A hole was opening up in her depths, swallowing more and more of her with each passing hour. Hyrokkin had taken over so much that she didn't even remember any of this happening. There was a blank between now and the time she'd walked out of the bathroom. That hadn't happened before. It was as if for however long it had been between the attack and now that she had ceased to exist.

  Maybe she had.

  "Over here!" an officer shouted, waving at another stretcher coming in through the doors. The man lying on the floor beside him wasn't even moving.

  Agree to release me now. I will attack again. These people are hypothermic already. They won't be able to handle it again.

  Sophia could feel two giant walls crushing her from both sides, like the closing edges of a glacier.

  "No," she muttered. Her voice felt crushed under the weight of thousands of years of ice.

  The familiar chill spread through her. Yes.

  Sophia turned away from the scene. She ran, out past another stretcher and out the main entrance to the parking lot. She stopped far away from the emergency lights spinning and flashing and far past a line of reporters surrounded by news vans and cameras.

  Between a car and an SUV, she fell to her knees and watched the pavement spin around her. The chill backed away, leaving only coolness in its place. The second attack seemed to be averted for now.

  She had hurt dozens of people. Some might have died if the airport terminal was much smaller. Maybe some had. The man on the floor hadn't even been responsive…

  Why had she even come here? There was too much danger. So long as she had Hyrokkin, she belonged around no one, human or Tempest or Outbreaker.

  Do you know why your mother left?

  Sophia stiffened as the world snapped back into place and turned still. Very, very still. Hryokkin had just asked her this out of the blue, and there was only one reason for it. She suddenly understood why her grandmother had sounded so worried on the phone a couple of days ago.

  "She left because she didn't want you to jump from her to me," she said before realizing it completely. "You were living with her before, weren't you? That's why she spent so much time holed up in her room!"

  Yes.

  Sophia let the pavement dig into her knees as she absorbed the word. It grew louder and louder in her head until she felt like Hyrokkin was screaming at her. Of course, she wasn't. She didn't have to.

  "You're the reason I lost my mother," she continued.

  Yes. She harbored me since I jumped from her father to her. Twenty years, it was. Drove her mad. She tried so hard to keep me quiet and to keep you away. I don't think she even realized I jumped to you right before she left. Probably still doesn't, to this day.

  Silence took Hyrokkin's place. Sophia listened to her pulse throbbing through her ears.

  After what felt like years, she stood and punched the window of the car next to her. The glass shook but refused to break. Never before had she wished she had the strength of an Outbreaker or a Tempest. She wanted that window to shatter and rain glass everywhere. And the next, and the next, until she had broken out the windows of every car in the parking lot.

  She would have taken another swing at it if she hadn't noticed the blue envelope drifting towards her on the wind.

  The anger flew away in a second.

  There was something surreal about the way the envelope flew towards her, twirling and doing acrobatics in the air. Behind it, a thunderstorm built, bluish-gray at the base and sending flashes of lightning around inside of it like synapses trying to communicate. Sophia hadn't even noticed it before.

  The envelope took a dive--a purposeful dive--straight down towards her. It landed face-up on the pavement, and the one word written on it made her brain lock and shut down for a second.

  Sophia.

  The frost rushed through her. Pick it up.

  She did. Tore it open. Sophia didn't care anymore.

  Hyrokkin had taken everything from her. She was growing stronger every second. It didn't matter if she got released or not. Either way, people were going to die.

  See you here soon. --Andrina.

  That was the entire message, in neat print on a simple white piece of paper. Below it, the storm goddess had written an address down and drawn a map from the airport to the intersection mentioned. It seemed to be on the other side of town. A large square marked the spot, complete with an X.

  That was the location where Hyrokkin would be released.

  There was no resisting anymore. Already, the ice crept down through her legs as if slush were flowing through her veins.

  Hurry, Hyrokkin said. Before they find us.

  Sophia looked up from the note in time to see a gray sedan pulling into the airport, ignoring the emergency vehicles crowding the way. No one stopped it. The car made a turn towards the parking lot. It seemed vaguely familiar, like Sophia had seen it before.

  Then she caught a glimpse of a man with wavy brown hair and glasses behind the windshield as it stopped near the curb. Next to him sat a girl with black hair and a tan face that she'd last seen plummeting into the bottom of the campsite lake. A third person sat in the back, but the darkness of the car made them unrecognizable.

  Janelle's father, Lucas. And Kenna, coming right after her. The news of the airport must already be broadcasting to every television around here.

  Sophia ducked down between the cars again and started to crawl, helped along by the winter demon. There was no turning back now, even if she still wanted to.

  "Let's go."

  * * * * *

  Leslie's hair stood on end as she marched towards the living room, to where the couch stood empty and the television still played the mid-afternoon soap opera that no one was watching. She was all too aware of Thomas Curt's footsteps coming after her and the fact that he was probably keeping the pistol trained at her. He said nothing as she walked, which was somehow worse.

  If she wasn't an Outbreaker now, would she already be dead? Thomas Curt hadn't seemed that horrified by the idea back at the Masonic Temple, back before he'd learned of her turning. Now he was sorry, shuffling his feet.

  Or maybe Andrina's betrayal was still burning in him, refusing to die.

  Leslie wondered if she could use it against him. Was there a way? Her head spun. It was too hard to think with a deadly weapon pointed at her.

  Leslie raised her hands behind her head as she neared the couch, hoping that Janelle spotted her silhouette marching in hostage position. The window was in view of the driveway. She might, if she was looking up right then.

  Thomas Curt said nothing to this. Maybe he even wanted someone to help her before he did whatever Andrina had ordered him to do.

  "You can sit," he said. "I promise I won't hurt you unless you try to escape. Then I'll have to, and I don't want to do that."

  Leslie sat, eyeing Thomas Curt as he slowly drew closer with the pistol at his side. She tried not to let her gaze stray to the rental car still sitting in the driveway. If she could just distract him enough or get him to move in front of the window, Mel and Janelle would at least see him in here.

  But he didn't. He stood in the middle of the living room, as if he wasn't sure what he wanted to do. Thomas Curt frowned
and stared at the walls, which her mother had stripped bare of her pictures sometime between two days ago and now. Leslie believed him. He didn't want to hurt her after all, but it wasn't because he had a change of heart. The Mobley mayor just had a soft spot for his own species now that it was in danger. That was all.

  "She made you do this," Leslie said, trying to ignore the ache of her mother's rejection inside her. "Andrina. Did she threaten to release you if she didn't?"

  "She didn't have to. Her words were enough."

  That she believed, too.

  "But she will release you when she doesn't need you anymore. I remember her saying that back at the Masonic Temple. She said she wouldn't release you yet."

  The man stiffened with the memory. He walked over and sat in the armchair, where Leslie had often done her homework after school for the off chance that she'd have a conversation with her mother. The lamp there was gone, and the space seemed so barren and desolate now, like it wasn't hers anymore. But now he was in view of the window. Janelle or Mel would spot him any second, if Mel looked up from his book of puzzles.

  "I know you brought friends," he continued, trying to steer the conversation away from the subject. "I won't hurt them, either, especially if it's Janelle. Andrina wouldn't just release me if that happened. She'd murder me. I'm expendable--" he stressed the word, weighing it down--"unlike you or her."

  Leslie shuddered again, thinking of her time talking to the goddess last night. I may not like you, Leslie, but I know you will do your duty in this.

  Then, she knew.

  This was all about that. Her duty, whatever it was. This was the other reason Andrina hadn't released her quite yet.

  "Okay," she breathed, staring at the pistol on his lap for a second. "What does she want me to do? Keep Janelle here while she goes and helps Hyrokkin unleash the next ice age at the airport?" Of course Andrina wouldn't want Janelle to get hurt or killed by it. She wasn't a goddess yet. And there was no way she was letting on to the fact that Kenna was already heading there to confront them both.

  A look of confusion came over Thomas Curt's face. "Is that her name? The goddess stuck sharing a body with that Sophia girl? What pantheon is that? I've never heard of her."

  "Norse." There was no point in hiding it from him anymore. "You don't want to mess with her. I don't even think Andrina should mess with her. She seems to hate everybody. I haven't seen her get along with anyone yet."

  "I agree," Thomas Curt said. "I don't want to see civilization end any more than you do. I do think we need to defend ourselves from it, but not like this. I may be an Outbreaker, but we're part of the world, too, as much as Andrina hates the thought. But rest assured, Andrina's meeting her away from the airport. Things aren't quite what you think."

  No, Leslie thought, a flutter of panic racing through her chest.

  If Andrina wasn't meeting Hyrokkin at the airport like they all thought, Kenna probably wouldn't find her in time to stop the release.

  How long would it be before the giant blizzard from Sophia's dream started? "Can't you try to convince her to stop it?" Leslie asked.

  The slump in his posture gave her his answer. "I've tried. Too many things could go wrong with what she has planned."

  "Well, try again!" she rose from the chair, careful not to make any motions that might convince him she was trying to escape. She could never get to the door before he shot the pistol. "Does she have a number? I'll call her myself and tell her to call it off! If she knows I'm here already, it doesn't matter. We at least have to try." The thought of calling the storm goddess chilled her as if Hyrokkin had leapt from Sophia to her, but they had to try something. The world outside was teetering on the edge. Even the sky was starting to darken. Was there a storm coming? There could be, if Andrina was planning on the meeting. There would have to be.

  The thought of a storm nearly sent her bolting for the door.

  "Leslie, calm down. We'll be fine for now."

  "No, we won't." She stopped herself there, before she mentioned Paul lying at the hospital. Hyrokkin wouldn't mind hurting him. "She'll--"

  The front door burst open, and Janelle was shouting before it even came open all the way. "Leslie. I think I heard what you wanted to tell me. Wow, I'm so glad you talk so much when Paul's around. It was a lifesaver--"

  Janelle froze in the doorway as the screen swung shut behind her, paling as she spotted Thomas Curt half-risen off the chair with the gun in hand. A tape recorder dangled in her grip, which Leslie realized she must have slid under Paul's hospital bed and left running there during the time she and Gary were gone.

  "Janelle. Why don't you sit?" Thomas Curt asked, motioning to the couch. "I'll repeat my promise that I won't hurt you."

  "Huh?" she asked, a dark cloud of hatred rushing over her features. "You pretended to be Leslie's mom? How did you know her boyfriend's name is Brett?"

  "Answering machine," he answered. Leslie hadn't thought of that until now. "She forgot to erase it before she left, I suppose. A shame, really. This wouldn't have worked so well otherwise."

  Janelle slowly walked towards the couch and sat. Leslie hoped she had some ideas, but she didn't seem to. The professional face went up, but it was just a disguise. Janelle was terrified. She could tell by the way she was grabbing the fabric of her pants, wrinkling it up around her knee.

  "Why are we here?" she asked.

  Thomas Curt nodded to the darkening sky outside as the first faint roll of thunder met her ears. "Leslie's first Outbreak, of course."

  Chapter Seventeen

  Leslie nearly leapt back off the couch in panic. Her hands started to move on their own, but she stopped herself in time.

  Another low rumble of thunder swept over her. The storm--and Andrina--was drawing closer. That she had no doubt of.

  "You're wrong," Leslie said. "It's too early yet. Paul said so, and he'd know."

  Thomas Curt raised the pistol enough to make her settle back into the couch. Even Janelle seemed to wither in front of it. The Tempest High Leader was disappearing and a scared sixteen-year-old girl was taking her place.

  "You're right that under normal circumstances, you shouldn't be able to have an Outbreak yet," Thomas Curt continued, letting the gun settle back down on his thigh. "It normally takes several months after turning to have your first, not a few weeks. But these aren't normal circumstances anymore."

  A gremlin of panic pounded with a hammer inside of her, rising up through her chest and reaching her throat. It hurt to speak. "What do you mean?"

  Thomas Curt nodded. "Andrina matured you when she touched you. At least, that's what she informed me."

  The gremlin exploded, screaming.

  Back at the hospital. The tingling. He couldn't mean anything else.

  "She didn't," Leslie said, leaping off the couch again.

  "I'm sorry. She did. It was necessary for what she needs to do."

  Leslie froze.

  All at once she understood.

  Andrina had planned this perfectly. She would have to give her breath to Janelle to stop herself from having an Outbreak right here in Flint. Maybe she and Paul had even given her the idea.

  Leslie had two options, closing in on her like crushing walls.

  Turn Janelle into a goddess and betray her best friend in the worst way possible.

  Or make history repeat itself in Flint--and break Paul's heart.

  She wondered how much Janelle had gotten from the tape recording of her and Paul. Had they talked about how Andrina wanted Leslie to give her Outbreaker breath? She couldn't remember. She hoped not. Not now. But Andrina had probably known that Janelle would come along with her like this. They were best friends. It made sense. "I'm not doing what she wants me to do." She kept her words vague, hoping that Janelle didn't get it.

  "You will," Thomas Curt said. His face was as emotionless as a painting's. "There will be no stopping your Outbreak. Surely Paul has explained that to you."

  Another rumble of thunder came, closer
.

  Leslie closed her eyes. She was once again in the parking lot of the arena, searching for Paul's van. Opening his door. Finding him cuffed to the seats, the color in his eyes swirling. Locking her lips with his, doing what she had to do to save the twenty thousand souls in the arena…

  "No," she sobbed, sliding off the couch.

  "Leslie." Janelle patted her back, but said nothing else. The move spoke volumes. Once, Janelle had been in this position, terrified of what she was about to become. Her best friend understood this exactly. "We'll get through this. Okay?"

  No, they wouldn't. Not as friends, anyway. If she turned Janelle, she'd never be forgiven. If she had an Outbreak here and killed, she'd never live with herself. Who would be able to live with her if that happened?

  It would kill Paul to see her go through this. That she knew.

  Leslie straightened up and looked outside again, blinking the tears away. Someone moved in front of the TV in the house across the street. A car went by, rumbling as it ran over a small pothole. Behind it all, a flash of lightning spread across the dark cloud base of the approaching storm.

  They had to get out of here. There wasn't much chance she could outrun the storm to avoid an Outbreak, but they had to at least get out of town. Mel could get them on the expressway and floor it, but they had to act quickly.

  Janelle blinked at her, as if trying to tell her something. Maybe she had a plan, because Leslie sure didn't. They wouldn't escape if she took a bullet to the leg, for instance.

  Then her best friend whirled around and lunged at Thomas Curt, who raised his hands in front of him. She swore. Swung her fists. Lunged for the pistol.