by P. C. Cast
I smiled up at him. “I get it.” Then I patted the place beside me, and Kevin sat.
We didn’t say anything. We just sat. Since Other Kevin had left, I’d been talking to this Kevin—a lot. But mostly on the phone. First, because he has a super busy school schedule and it was hard for him to get away—especially without the step-loser, my mom’s awful husband, knowing that Kevin and I had reconnected.
The second reason was harder. Seeing Kevin, like right now, made me miss Other Kevin. I mean, I liked talking to this Kevin. He’d grown into a nice guy, and he’d actually traded in his video game obsession for a wrestling obsession, and he’d made the varsity squad at Broken Arrow this year, which was cool. But he wasn’t a vampire. He couldn’t understand me like Other Kevin could. It wasn’t his fault, but that didn’t make it any less true.
“Hey, don’t you ever find this creepy?” Kevin interrupted my thoughts with a shoulder bump.
“What? Sitting on his grave? Nah, Heath would love it,” I said.
“Well, that, and that.” He pointed to the carving of fisherman Heath.
“Heath would love that too,” I said. “Do you not remember he had a sense of humor?”
“Sure. Do you not remember he’s dead?”
I jerked back as if Kevin had slapped me. “Of course, I remember. I was there. Losing him almost killed me. Why the hell would you ask me that?”
“Because of what Other Kevin told you.”
I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t say anything. This Kevin—this human brother of mine—couldn’t possibly understand about Old Magick. Nor would he understand about the dream I’d had, I was sure hadn’t been a dream, but a message from dead me. He’d think I was just making excuses if I told him what I’d decided—what I knew I had to do.
I’m not making excuses.
My brother—my other brother, needed help with Old Magick and help getting rid of Neferet. Neither of those things had anything to do with Other Heath Luck.
“Zoey, I’ll go with you. All you have to do is ask,” Kevin said into the silence that had settled between us.
My gaze snapped to his. “You can’t! I’m not alive in that world, so I can get away with sneaking over there, but you are—and you’re a rogue red vampyre who has become allied with the Resistance against Neferet and her armies. It’s not safe for you over there.”
“Z, according to what you’ve told me, it’s not safe for anyone over there.”
I looked away from Kevin and my gaze found Heath’s smiling image again.
“I understand that,” I said.
“Do you really?” my brother asked as he cracked his knuckles and flexed his fingers—a sure sign he was stressed.
“You know I’m going, don’t you?” I answered my brother’s question with one of my own.
“Yep, I do. And, Z, if I know it, so do your friends.”
I felt a terrible chill of foreboding. “No! I haven’t said one word to any of them.”
“You haven’t said one word to me, either. I figured it out.”
“Which means they will too,” I said.
“Uh, yeah. For sure.”
“Well, it’s not like I was going to sneak away by myself,” I said. “I’ve learned my lesson about thinking I can handle a major crisis all by myself—that’s just stupid.”
“That makes me feel better, but only a little. Z, are you sure you have to go?”
I turned from Heath’s image to meet my brother’s gaze. “Another version of you is in big trouble. I can help him. If you were him, what would you want me to do?”
He grinned, and I suddenly saw him as a boy, about seven, with a terrible buzz haircut and a gap in his smile where his front teeth should be—and my heart squeezed.
“Z, I can’t lie. I’d totally want you to come save my butt.”
This is going to break Stark’s heart, I thought, but all I said was, “Yeah, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do.”
18
Other Aphrodite
Aphrodite zipped up her sleek leather bombardier jacket and lifted her chin as she went out the front doors of the school and headed to the first vehicle in the army convoy. She could feel the eyes on her, but that was nothing new. Males had been watching her since before she’d grown boobs. Of course there was a difference between regular males and ravenous, stinky, eating-machine males, but as Neferet would say, Not that much difference.
She shook that thought out of her head. If I’m quoting Neferet it’s time for a serious reality check. I can do this. I can go with the army to the stupid field outside stupid Sapulpa, and then I can come home. Neferet will be pacified. I’ll be back on her good list, and everything can return to normal. The problem was that thought didn’t bring Aphrodite much comfort. Normal at the House of Night had become almost unbearable. For the zillionth time since Neferet had started her horrid war, Aphrodite wished she’d gotten out—gotten away to Italy and San Clemente Island before the damn thing had started. She was a Prophetess. Surely the High Council would’ve given her sanctuary and not put her on the next flight back to Tulsa when Neferet demanded she return.
Because Neferet would have demanded it. She only had one Prophetess. For the first time in her life, Aphrodite was sorry she had been so damn gifted by Nyx that she couldn’t pass for an average priestess.
“Who am I kidding. I could never pass for average.”
“Gotta agree with you there, gorgeous!”
Aphrodite looked to her right. There was a young blue vampyre lieutenant leaning against the lead vehicle giving her a smile that was way too much like a leer.
“What did you say?” she asked in a deceptively sweet voice.
“I agreed with you. You’re way too gorgeous to ever be average.” He winked at her.
She caught his gaze with her own. “Did I ask for your opinion?”
“Nah, but I—”
“But you what?” her voice sharp enough to skewer him. “You have no manners? You have no sense?”
“Hey, look—”
She sliced through his words again. “No, you look. Do you want to know when you’re going to die?”
“No!”
“Do you want to know how you’re going to die?”
“Hell no!”
“Then treat me with the respect a Prophetess of Nyx deserves, or I may feel the need to enlighten you. Goddess knows you could use some enlightening.”
“Uh, yeah. Okay.”
“Let me fix that for you. The correct way for you to respond is, I apologize, Prophetess. It won’t happen again, Prophetess. Let me get that door for you, Prophetess.” Aphrodite paused while the annoying little ass just stood there, his mouth opening and closing like a ferret-faced carp. She sighed and put her hands on her hips. “Is this General Stark’s truck thing?”
“Yeah, it’s his Hummer. Uh, I mean, yes, it is, Prophetess.”
“See, you are capable of learning. Then open the damn door for me.”
“Problem, Lieutenant Dallas?” Stark came from behind her and strode to the front passenger’s side of the vehicle. He wasn’t alone, but Aphrodite didn’t need to look to see who was with him. She could smell him.
“Nope, sir!” The moronic lieutenant instantly opened the Hummer door for Stark.
“Good to hear it. Let’s get moving.” Stark glanced at Aphrodite and Kevin, who had stopped beside her. “What are you two waiting for, a written invitation? Get in the back seat.” Stark shook his head, muttered something indecipherable, and Lieutenant Dallas closed his door with a firm slam.
Kevin stepped to the backseat door on their side of the vehicle and opened it. “After you, Prophetess,” he said.
“The only one with manners stinks. Fantastic.” She moved past Kevin and got inside. Kevin jogged around to the other side of the Hummer and took the seat besid
e her.
“All ready back there, Prophetess?” Dallas asked with just a touch of a sneer as he grinned into the rearview mirror.
“Just drive,” Stark told him sharply. As they led the convoy out of the House of Night, Stark turned in his seat. “Now, tell me what you didn’t tell Neferet about your vision.”
Aphrodite raised one brow at him. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Then she reached into her extra-large Louis Vuitton bag and pulled out one of three bottles of Veuve Clicquot, pleased to see she’d chosen the one rosé she’d brought. Without looking at him she handed the bottle to Kevin. “Open this. Don’t spill it. Don’t get any stink on it, either.”
Stark shook his head. “You brought champagne to a battle?”
“No, I brought good champagne to the prebattle. Kinda like tailgating, only less sports and more killing. Do you want a glass?” She lifted one pretty little flute she’d stashed in the side pocket with her emergency bottle of Xanax.
“No. I do want an answer to my question, though.”
Kevin popped the cork and Aphrodite held her glass out to him to be filled. “I did answer you.”
“A real answer.”
Aphrodite glanced at Kevin. “Cover the top of the bottle with the foil so it stays a little fizzy. Do you know nothing about champagne?”
“Nope. I’ve never tried it. My step-loser—uh, that’s what my sisters and I call my step-dad—is too religious to—”
“Boring!” Aphrodite looked at Stark. “I didn’t think they could talk.”
“You mean red vampyres?” Stark asked, sending Kevin an amused look.
“Yes, of course that’s what I mean.”
“Aphrodite, Kevin is an officer. They talk. You just heard him talking to Neferet in the briefing.”
“That wasn’t talking. That was reporting. Whatever.” She sipped her champagne and stared out the window as they took the turnpike toward Sapulpa.
“Still waiting for you to answer my question,” Stark said.
“Sorry. What was the question again?”
Stark sighed heavily, and Aphrodite noticed Lieutenant Dallas was grinning like she was his personal entertainment.
“Lieutenant Dickless, do you always find your amusement at your general’s expense?”
The grin instantly slid off his face, and his eyes went back to the road.
“Great. The only lieutenant who speaks also stinks. And to answer your question, General Bow Boy, I told Neferet everything. Well, except details like how the Red Army soldiers lost whatever might be left of their minds, and didn’t stop their disgusting killing spree with the humans they found in the bales. They also ate the fledglings—blue fledglings who could have grown up to be big boys like you. Oh, and they ate the blue vampyres too. Basically, your disgusting Red Army massacred everyone. How’s that?”
“Why didn’t you tell Neferet about that?” Kevin asked.
“Because she wouldn’t care. It wouldn’t have changed anything. She’d still send her Red Army. Everyone would still be slaughtered. The end.” She downed the rest of the glass and held it out for Kevin to refill. And I’m going to have to watch it happen. Again.
“Neferet might not care, but I do. We need those people alive. Especially the blue vampyres. They can give us intel on the Resistance,” Stark said.
“Oh, goodie. So, instead of being torn apart and eaten, they get to be tortured.”
“I didn’t say anything about torture!”
“You’re going to ask them nicely to give up their people and their headquarters, and when they say no thank you, you’ll—what? Give them a pat on the back and let them go?”
“Whose side are you on, Aphrodite?” Stark’s look had gone dark and angry.
“Nyx’s, of course.”
“That’s the same side we’re on,” Stark said.
Aphrodite snorted, but said nothing else. Bow Boy could run to Neferet and say she’d been Super Bitch on this little foray. That’d be fine. Actually, that’d be great. Less chance Neferet would send her out again. What he couldn’t do was run to the High Priestess and tell her Aphrodite was sympathetic to the Resistance. That wouldn’t be fine. That would be deadly.
What the hell do vamps like Stark and the Sons of Erebus Warriors think happened to all those High Priestesses Neferet demoted and then ordered to shut their mouths? That they really just disappeared to some crappy country House of Night to pray out the rest of their days in solitude?
Aphrodite knew better. She’d witnessed what Neferet had done to them. Nyx had sent her that vision. And that was one vision Aphrodite had shared with no one.
“Would you like more champagne?”
Aphrodite automatically held her glass out for the refill. Then she looked at the stinky kid sitting beside her. She was surprised to realize that he was obviously Native American. She hadn’t noticed that before. And if he changed his crappy, ill-fitting clothes and took care of some personal grooming—like, he really needed a haircut … and a destinking—he might even be cute. Real cute. She hadn’t noticed that before, either. Well, in all fairness, once she’d smelled him, she hadn’t really looked at him.
But he hadn’t smelled when he’d talked to her in the garden that night.
“How old are you?” she asked him.
He looked surprised at the question. “Sixteen.”
“Isn’t that young to be a lieutenant?”
He nodded. “Yeah. I’m the youngest lieutenant in the army.”
“When did you Change?” she asked.
“Almost a year ago.” He paused, and then added, “When did you Change?”
“When I was older than sixteen,” she said. Aphrodite wanted to ask him why he hadn’t smelled like death the night before, but no way was she going to let Dickless and Bow Boy hear that. No way did she want them anymore up in her business than they already were. “You’re a child. No wonder you haven’t had champagne.” She turned her head dismissively to stare out the window and wish she were anywhere else.
* * *
Other Kevin
The conversation stalled after Aphrodite called him a child. She didn’t look at him. She didn’t talk to him. She did, of course, hold out her glass from time to time for a champagne refill.
Man, she drinks champagne fast!
All Kevin could do was to sit and watch with growing dread as the Hummer ate up the miles and they got closer and closer to what most likely would be a terrible tragedy.
What if that bird didn’t get to Dragon?
No, he wouldn’t let himself think about that. All he could do was what he was doing. He sent the information. He was with the soldiers because maybe there could be something he could do in the middle of battle to help people get away from the Red Army. At this point Kevin didn’t give a damn whether he was discovered or not. He wasn’t going to stand by and watch innocents being slaughtered by monsters.
“Here, open another one.”
Aphrodite shoved a new bottle of champagne at him. He hadn’t even noticed she’d drained the other one. As he coaxed the cork out of it, he threw glances at Aphrodite. She looked bad.
Well, that wasn’t entirely true. She was beautiful. That hadn’t changed. But she was so damn thin and pale! Dark circles were showing through whatever she’d tried to cover them with, and when she wasn’t gulping champagne, her mouth was set in a hard line.
“How far are we from Lone Star Road?” Aphrodite asked as he filled her glass again.
Stark pointed to the light about a block in front of them. “We turn there, on Hickory. Then in about a mile and a half we’ll take a right onto Lone Star. That’s when I need you awake and aware.” Stark looked over his shoulder at her and frowned. “So, lighten up on that champagne.”
“Oh, relax, Grandpa. I’m a vampyre, remember? I can’t get wasted. I can’t
even get very high. Well, unless I mix a bunch of Xanax with this booze—which reminds me.” She reached into the giant bag that sat on the seat between them, pulled out a little pill bottle, and shook out a few tiny oval pills, which she washed down with a big swig of champagne. “And, I’m a professional at this.”
“You’d better be. Neferet is counting on it,” Stark said.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’ll recognize the damn field. Worry about your zombie army—not me.”
Stark turned back around and rubbed his forehead.
Kevin kept staring at Aphrodite until she met his eyes. Then, in a voice low enough that it wouldn’t carry to the front seat, he said, “You know how bad this is going to get. I don’t blame you for drinking and taking those.” He pointed a finger at the pill bottle that was sticking out of the top of her purse.
She looked like she was going to make another snarky comment, but then her face changed. Her shoulders slumped, and she nodded sadly, whispering, “It’s going to be worse than bad.”
“I won’t let you get hurt,” he said softly.
She stared at him with big, beautiful, haunted blue eyes. “They ate kids. Younger than you. I know. I saw it all. And now I’m going to see it again.” She shook her head and wiped angrily at a single tear.
He held her gaze and very distinctly but quietly told her, “Not if I can help it you won’t.”
Surprise flashed in her eyes, then Stark interrupted.
“Okay, this is Lone Star Road. Time for you to do your job.”
“I already did my job. I prophesized. This is not about my job. It’s about Neferet punishing me. But whatever. I’m a big girl. Tell Lieutenant Dickless to slow down so that I can check out these fields. The one I’m looking for is big. I remember a grove of pecan trees across the street. Oh, and there are trees lining the field, though a lot of the road side of it is open, so we should be able to see into most of the field.”
“Which side of the road is the field on?” Stark asked.
Aphrodite thought about it, then said, “It’s on our left.” They’d only driven about a mile down the windy road when Aphrodite pointed. “That’s it! I recognize that clump of trees.”
