by P. C. Cast
Drinking the big blond Bull Boy’s blood wasn’t nearly as disgusting as Aphrodite would have thought—not that she’d thought about drinking the kid’s blood. Ever. Maybe part of the not-too-disgustingness of it was brought on by the fact that Z was definitely into the blood stuff. Huh. Z really did have a thing for Aurox. That was something she needed to remember. Along with the weird burning.
Then the scene changed and Stark was there, as per typically, spoiling all her (and Z’s) fun. He was acting like a possessive douche, so he and Zoey were fighting, which was annoying.
It was not white-hot-anger-making, though. But that’s what Aphrodite felt within Z. The girl was incredibly pissed.
That scene shifted into another, where the only thing that was the same was Z’s frustration level. Aphrodite couldn’t tell where she was. It wasn’t bright, sparking daylight, but it definitely wasn’t night, either, because the sky was bothering her eyes, so Zoey was keeping her gaze down, until some crappily dressed guys started messing with her. Zoey stood up to them, which Aphrodite totally agreed with, but then her anger level went way into the danger zone. Aphrodite watched helplessly as Z raised her hands and let loose all of the frustration and anger and confusion that had filled her. Aphrodite barely got a glimpse of the faces of the two guys, but the terror in their looks would forever be branded into her memory as they were hurled against a stone wall and blood exploded everywhere.
Change of scene again, and this time Aphrodite wasn’t looking through Zoey’s eyes. She was viewing her from a distance. Z had returned to the House of Night. Her anger had changed, and now she looked upset, scared, and confused. But that’s not the only change Aphrodite saw. She could see that Zoey carried something with her. Part of it was terrible. It looked like fleas or some kind of flesh-eating lice were clinging to Zoey, crawling under her skin. Yet as Aphrodite stared, completely grossed out, the crawling things shook and shifted, looking like glitter, or maybe even a beautiful cloak that was covering Zoey. And then Aphrodite blinked and the things changed back to horrible, crawling, nesting insects.
Aphrodite had no fucking idea what the things were, but it was pretty obvious that they were not coming from Zoey. They weren’t element based. Aphrodite’s mind raced. What had been pissing Z off so badly was normal stuff—boy frustration and people acting stupid in general. What was abnormal was Z’s reaction. Could that be because it wasn’t really Zoey’s reaction—it was frustration and anger flowing into her, being absorbed by her, being used by her, and Zoey didn’t realize it? And then why the hell did the things change, and look beautiful? Aphrodite didn’t know what was going on, but she did know the end result was Zoey being angry and powerful and completely out of control.
That terrified Aphrodite.
The next scene followed so quickly that Aphrodite felt vertigo-ish dizziness.
From Z’s perspective Aphrodite watched herself being led, handcuffed, into a prison cell. Right before the iron door slammed, shutting her into the claustrophobic solitary confinement cell, Zoey’s shoulders slumped. The anger that had filled her so powerfully and completely had been snuffed out. Utterly devastated, and filled with self-loathing, Zoey watched the iron door shut as if it sealed her tomb. Then the young High Priestess, and Aphrodite’s best friend, went to the corner of the cell, slid down the wall, hugged her knees to her chest, and began rocking back and forth, back and forth. Three words repeated over and over through Zoey’s mind: I deserve this. I deserve this. I deserve this. I deserve this…
Zoey had no hope left.
And then Aphrodite was yanked from Z’s point of view again and found herself hovering over the center of a great cathedral. Nauseated, she looked down to see that the parishioners were dead. All of them. Each of their throats were slashed and their bodies had been sucked dry of blood.
A triumphant voice repeated three words over and over through Aphrodite’s mind: I deserve this. I deserve this. I deserve this. I deserve this…
With great power come great responsibilities
Weigh the pleasure of leadership and luxury with the sword Damocles
When she believes the ancient is the key to all her needs
Then is when all will tumble down; then is when Light bleeds and bleeds…
The piece of poetry repeated through Aphrodite’s mind as the final disturbing scene dissipated and her spirit exploded back into her blind, pain-filled body.
“Darius!” she gasped, choking for air and pressing her hands against her closed, bleeding eyes.
“I’m here! You are safe!” he said. “I’ll send for Zoey and—”
“No!” with the last of her strength she told him. “Don’t let Z know. Don’t let anyone know.”
“I will do as you say, my beauty. Rest. I will always keep you safe.”
Then Aphrodite allowed herself to pass out.
CHAPTER FOUR
Zoey
“I never thought I’d wish school wouldn’t have been canceled,” I said, while I paced restlessly back and forth across the dorm room floor. “I don’t know what the hell Thanatos was thinking. Going to class today would at least give us something to do. And tomorrow is Saturday. We do not need a long weekend.”
Stark rolled over in bed, looking tousled and only half awake. He smiled his cute, cocky grin at me and did look totally cute and cocky, which wasn’t a bad thing. “If you come back to bed I’ll give you something to do.”
Still, I was too worried to be in the mood, so I batted my eyes innocently and in a clueless voice asked, “You’ll give me and the entire school something to do? That’s ambitious, even for you, Stark.”
“You know that’s not what I meant! Way to kill a mood, Z.”
I paused in my pacing long enough to laugh and give him a quick kiss. “Sorry, I slept crappily. I kept having nightmares about Dallas and his disgusting friends planting pieces of the mayor’s bloody clothing in Thanatos’s desk, and Lenobia’s barn, and even Erik’s drama classroom. Then after the cops arrested all of them, Neferet swooped back here and said she’d be happy to do her old job again, and bring in a bunch of new teachers. In my dream Neferet was a big, black leech, and our new teachers were all giant spiders.” I shivered. “Eesh, I hate leeches. And spiders.”
“Come here.” Stark patted the bed beside him.
I sighed, but I sat. When he started kneading my shoulders I felt some of my tension begin to fade. “You always know how to make me feel better.”
“Yep, and I always will. Just sit here for a little while and let me work on those knots in your shoulders, and try not to overthink everything for a few minutes.”
“I don’t overthink. I prepare.” I meant to sound tough and High Priestess-like, but there was no way on earth I could sound like that when he was giving me a seriously excellent shoulder rub.
“You overthink. And we are going to have plenty to do today. We’re going to go to the cafeteria and eat breakfast with our friends, and then we have to be sure all of our fledglings have rooms—especially our red fledglings. Z, we gotta be careful about where those kids spend the daylight hours. I’m with you in thinking Dallas is up to some shit, and I don’t want any of us hurt because he’s a mean little asshole.”
“He seriously has anger control issues,” I said. I tried to pull away from Stark so that I could think better, but he tugged me back down beside him and kept working on my shoulders.
“No, you sit here. We need to talk about stressful stuff, but you gotta learn to relax. The best way I can keep you from stressing totally out is to keep rubbing your shoulders.”
“You may have to keep doing that for the next several days.”
“That’s cool with me,” he said, and kissed my neck, making me shiver—this time in pleasure.
“Well, good. That makes me almost look forward to the next several days,” I said.
“Glad to hear it. And since I’ve got you in a receptive mood, I want you to promise me something.”
“What?” I instantl
y began to tense up again.
“Stop it.” He kneaded my shoulders harder, causing me to melt under his strong hands. “You know I’d never ask you to promise me anything awful. All I want is for you to keep our circle out of Erin’s funeral.”
“Why? I figured it would be a nice thing to do—maybe even a way Shaunee can have closure. Shaylin’s already shown an affinity for water, so it’s not like there would be a big empty space where Erin used to be.”
“Yeah, well, that was my first thought, too. But that was canceled out by all the hateful crap Dallas said to us last night.”
“You think he’d cause a fight at Erin’s funeral? That’s low, even for him.”
“He wants to fight, that’s for sure, but causing one at the funeral would only get him and his friends in big trouble with Thanatos, and I don’t think he’s ready to be in that much trouble yet. But here’s what I was thinking about—you heard him talking about how Erin didn’t want anything to do with you or your circle, right?”
“Yeah, right.”
“Z, think about it, even when Erin joined the circle it didn’t look to me like she was doing it because she was feeling sorry she’d been such a bitch. What I heard her say was that she didn’t want Aphrodite standing in for her.”
“Yeah, that’s what she said,” I admitted.
“Did her attitude change after I got Dallas out of there? Did she apologize to you, or Shaunee, for the shitty way she’d been treating you guys?”
“No. When she saw the spiders she agreed with me that they’re disgusting and said disgusting things have to go.”
“Z, I don’t like talking bad about a dead kid, and that’s not what I’m meaning to do, but I think it is important to remember that Erin had changed sides before she died, even though she knew that Neferet and Dallas had chosen Darkness over Light.”
“Yeah, that’s true. But it feels wrong to hold that against her now. I mean, Thanatos saw Nyx welcome her to the Otherworld. If the Goddess can forgive her, can’t we?”
“I think there’s a big difference between forgiving her and making her into something she wasn’t just because she’s dead. I might be wrong, but it doesn’t seem healthy to have our group, especially Shaunee, idolizing her.”
“Yeah, I get what you’re saying, and my gut’s telling me you’re right.”
“See what I mean about not wanting your circle to make a big show at her funeral?”
“I do. Okay, I’m going to talk to Shaunee and be sure her closure comes from knowing Erin is in the Otherworld and at peace with Nyx. I don’t see why Thanatos wouldn’t be cool with leading her funeral.”
“We need to focus on moving forward—not on looking back,” he said.
“Good point. Which reminds me, I better check on Aphrodite and make sure she’s okay, too. The mayor was a crappy dad, but he was her dad. She’s gonna be messed up by this death.”
“Z, Aphrodite was messed up before his death.”
I smacked his leg. “She can be hateful, but she’s still my friend.”
“And why she is, is a mystery to me.”
“Hey, Aphrodite is one of us, and we’re going to need to stand together and be strong for whatever nastiness Neferet is cooking up.”
“I know. I was just mostly kidding. Aphrodite’s a bitch, but she’s our bitch,” he said.
I laughed. “Exactly.”
“Okay, I think you’re noodle-like enough.” Stark squeezed my shoulders one last time, and then kissed me on my neck. “I’m starving. Let’s go get some breakfast and then deal with whatever crazy the day brings.”
“This was the first thing that really made me heart the House of Night,” I said happily as I ladled a gihugic pile of spaghetti onto my plate. “Psaghetti! For breakfast! I love our cafeteria.”
“When you say psaghetti you sound like you’re six years old,” Stark said, bumping my shoulder before he asked the cook to give him the other breakfast choice, the traditional (and boring) scrambled eggs and bacon.
I went to the drink bar and filled up my glass with brown pop—fully leaded—with caffeine—calling back to him, “Not six—nine. That’s when I made up the psaghetti madness song.” I cleared my throat and launched into “Pa-sghe-ti, pa-sghe-ti!” and even did the psaghetti dance on my way to our booth. I was just thinking that maybe the day wouldn’t be so bad. After all, it had started with a shoulder rub and psaghetti! But just as Stark was sliding in next to me I heard a deep, masculine voice echoing my psaghetti madness song.
I didn’t need to look at the cafeteria line to know who was singing. All I needed to do was look at Stark’s face. He’d been grinning at my psaghetti celebration, but that happiness had disappeared from his face, leaving instead a tense, serious expression that made him look frustrated and pissed.
“How old were you when you met Heath?” Stark asked.
“Nine,” I said. It made me feel miserable and helpless, but my gaze wouldn’t stay on Stark’s face. It was drawn to the guy who was still singing my song while he heaped psaghetti on his plate.
I wondered if it would have helped if Aurox hadn’t been so cute. He did a dorky guy version of the dance I’d just done as he headed over to the drink bar.
Nope, I decided, feeling my stomach do the weird butterfly thing it used to do when Heath would walk into a room. Aurox could have looked like a troll and he’d still make my stomach do flip-flops because he shared Heath’s soul.
“Good morning!” Damien came in with Shaunee, Stevie Rae, and Rephaim, who waved and said hi to Stark and me as they hurried to get in line and fill their plates.
They didn’t seem to notice that Stark and I didn’t say anything in return.
“Hey there, Aurox. Wanna sit with us?” I heard Damien give him a cheery invite.
“Sure, that would be great,” Aurox said.
“Awesome—Z and Stark are already at the table. It’s that one over there.” Damien pointed at us, which is when his happy-schmappy expression slid away, and was replaced by an uh-oh look. “Um, that is if there’s enough room and it’s okay with Z and Stark, and, um…” Damien trailed off uncomfortably, his cheeks getting pink.
“Fuck!” Stark said under his breath so that I was the only one who heard him. Then he sat up a little straighter and called, “Yeah, no problem. We got room for Aurox.”
When Aurox sat down directly across from me I focused on shoveling psaghetti into my face.
“So, where’d you learn that song?” Stark shocked the bejezzus out of me by asking Aurox.
“What song?” Aurox answered around a mouthful of noodles.
“Never mind,” Stark muttered.
The long, uncomfortable silence wasn’t broken until Damien and the rest of our group smooshed into the booth.
“Have y’all seen Aphrodite today?” Stevie Rae asked.
I looked up then to see everyone shaking their heads.
“Or Darius?” she added.
More head shaking.
“Crap,” I said. “I need to go check on her. It’s not like her to hermit in her room.”
“Yeah,” Stevie Rae agreed. “She calls breakfast the beginning of the day’s fashion parade. You know she actually told me once that she could predict which girls were going to turn into their fat, flabby mammas by how much makeup they wore to breakfast?”
“That girl is super crazy,” Shaunee said.
“Is wearing a lot of makeup to breakfast good or bad?” Damien asked.
“I have no clue,” Stevie Rae said. “I try to quit listenin’ if Aphrodite talks too long. She kinda hurts my ears.”
“Is her prediction about the girls part of her prophetic gift?” Aurox asked.
I couldn’t help laughing with everyone else. Well, everyone except Stark. Instead of laughing he was stabbing his scrambled eggs like he was trying to kill them.
“No,” Stevie Rae answered Aurox. “It’s part of her hateful gift, which we’re pretty sure wasn’t given to her by Nyx.”
“Oh, sorry,” Aurox said, looking sheepish. “That was probably a stupid thing to ask.”
“Hey, no worries, roomie,” Damien said, smiling kindly at him. “Aphrodite baffles all of us.”
“Roomie?” I heard myself asking. “You guys are sharing a dorm room?”
“Yes,” Aurox said, meeting my gaze for the first time. “Damien offered, and I did not want to be alone, nor did I wish to share a room with a stranger. The others, well, I often find them staring at me oddly.”
“That would be because you can change into a bull.” Stark’s voice was emotionless.
“I suppose you are correct,” Aurox said. He dropped his gaze from mine and went back to eating.
“Yeah, well, that brings up a subject Stark and I were talking about earlier,” I began.
“Yeah, we were talking when we woke up. Together. In the same bed. Right, roomie?” Stark put special emphasis on the word.
My friends threw worried looks from Stark to Aurox. I frowned. “Stark, everyone knows you and I are sleeping together.”
“Just wanted to be sure,” Stark said, attacking his eggs again.
“Anyway,” I went on, feeling my cheeks getting warm. “Stark and I were saying that it’s important to be sure our red fledglings and vampyres”—I managed to smile at Stevie Rae—“have someplace super safe to sleep until we can get back to our tunnels.”
“Rephaim and I were talkin’ ’bout that when he came back to me and Shaunee’s room after dusk,” Stevie Rae said. “I’m thinkin’ the same thing y’all are—we need to explore the school and find somewhere less aboveground for the kids.”
“And you, too, right?” I asked.
Stevie Rae shared a look with Rephaim before she said, “Well, no. I’m gonna keep roomin’ with Shaunee.”
“Even though I tried to talk her out of it,” Rephaim said.
