by Shelly Crane
“Watch it.” Charlie whipped his head around at him, his dark eyes glittering with fury. “Don’t talk to her.”
“Hey-”
“Just shut it.” Charlie pinned him in place with a look of warning that would have made a smarter man pee in his pants. Ari shivered, unsettled by him even though he was only defending her. He glanced back up at her, the anger still etched in his features. “Of course I’ll be there,” he told her quietly. “I’ll see you Friday.”
Not wanting to leave him there, Ari jerked her head in the direction of the parking lot. “Do you want to come have lunch with me?”
He shook his head infinitesimally, his features losing expression again. “Go back to school, Ari, I’ll see you later.”
Feeling that familiar ache in her chest, Ari nodded and spun around, hurrying out of the clearing and the woods and wishing like hell her car wasn’t in the garage and she could just head home.
She stopped on the hot asphalt, staring blankly at the Ohio plates of the Buick Lacrosse Rachel’s parents had bought her as a graduation gift. I can go home. I am going home. Ari turned and began heading towards the gate. It was a half hour walk, it was nothing. She could do with the exercise.
“Ari!”
Closing her eyes in disbelief Ari huffed and slowly turned around to see Rachel running across the lot towards her. “Rache.”
“Where are you going?”
“For a walk.”
“Were you going home?”
“I thought about it.”
Rachel shook her head, her eyes narrowing. “He’s put you on a downer again, hasn’t he?”
“It’s not his fault.”
“Stop making excuses for him, Ari. And you’re not going home.” She tugged on her arm, dragging her back towards the school.
“You’re not the boss of me,” Ari grunted, tripping on her flip flops.
“I am not letting Charlie ruin graduation for you. You think I don’t know why you’ve been so sullen and quiet every time we mention college and graduation? It’s Charlie! It’s always Charlie. You’re going to have to leave him to soak in his self-destructive soup and frankly I think it’s a good thing. He is such a loser. You are so much better than that.”
“Hey!” Ari yanked her arm away and shot her best friend a look so livid it was amazing waves of burning smoke didn’t start weeping from Rachel’s body. “You don’t get to call him that. He’s been through hell and I’m sorry if he doesn’t fall into your perfect little bubble but he’s my friend, and I don’t abandon my friends.”
Holding her hands up in a surrender gesture Rachel nodded, her eyes wide. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have called him that.”
Ari shook her head, sighing heavily. “Whatever. Let’s just get you back to the cafeteria before A.J. eats whatever you left on your tray.”
Her eyes almost popped out of her head. “My Snickers!”
Ari gave a bark of annoyed laughter, watching Rachel lope up the stone stairs two at a time. Watching her friend, who knew herself inside out, Ari wished she was more like Rachel… or that she had more time at least; time to discover who she was supposed to be.
For once, Ari was glad to step into the airy house she called home, waving behind her to Rachel who was driving her back and forth to school while her car was in the garage getting fixed. She shut the door, dropping her bag and pulling off the light summer jacket she had needed when clouds had rolled in over the Ridge out of nowhere after lunch. She hung it up on the coat pegs, using the label to loop it securely to the peg. When it slid up and off, falling to the ground, Ari groaned and bent down to pick it up. She secured it again and headed off towards the kitchen only to hear the pinging of the metal buttons hitting the wooden floor. Exhaling heavily, she spun back on her heel and picked it back up, jamming the jacket down on the peg.
Her poltergeist was such a pain in the ass.
“I’m not in the mood, Ms. Maggie!” she called out, scanning the hall.
Two years ago, sometime after her 16th actually, a poltergeist took up residence in her house. When she tried to tell her dad about furniture being moved, an invisible person using her laptop, books taken down from the shelf and left around and open, he’d told her to stop being childish. For the last four or five years he’d been gone a lot, traveling the country and wining and dining doctors and hospital execs as a pharmaceutical sales rep. Her dad was good at his job and she never wanted for anything - except maybe for more time with him. Anyway, her theory about the poltergeist didn’t really hit home until they got into an argument one day a year and a half ago. He’d raised his voice at her because she made the mistake of whining about him being gone so much and a book flew off one of the shelves and cracked him across the head. He hadn’t imagined it and was now sufficiently freaked out by their house. Ari, on the other hand, had stopped whining at her dad in the hopes that that would make him want to be home more, and had gotten used to the company of the poltergeist. She was pretty sure the poltergeist was a woman because she seemed to take offence to sexist, anti-feminist jokes and had a considerate nature Ari had only encountered in girls. Sure she was mischievous, like with the whole jacket thing, but once Ari told her to stop doing something she would. Ari had named her Ms. Maggie after the dog her dad had bought when she was eight and then promptly gotten rid of when he realized how much work was involved for him.
Ari breathed a sigh of relief when the jacket stayed in place. “Thanks, Ms. Maggie. I appreciate it. It’s been a rough day.” She wandered out of the cold hallway into the even colder, empty kitchen. Their house seemed to lack the cozy warmth of her friends’ houses. She didn’t know if that was to do with the minimalist furniture or the lack of any actual family living in it. There could have been a family. But Ari had ruined that for her dad.
All of her life Ari had lived with the knowledge that her mother, some mysterious woman named Sala, had broken her father’s heart after a passionate and brief affair before returning nine months later with a baby she said was his. She’d left Ari with him and disappeared, never to be seen again. Her father had done the best he could, Ari knew that. And she knew that he loved her more than anything. He had tried. He’d read to her every night before bed, he’d taught her to swim, to play baseball, to throw a punch without breaking her thumb, but as she’d gotten older they had grown apart. Over the years there had only been a few girlfriends, for which Ari was grateful. Unlike other kids with no moms Ari hadn’t wanted one. To her a mom was this creature who had stolen her daddy’s heart and ripped it out, leaving them both in the cold, lost and alone. So when Derek had started getting serious with this one woman when Ari was ten, she’d started to panic. If her father married this woman, she’d be Ari’s mom. What if she left too? She’d just break their hearts as well. And to be truthful Ari didn’t want to share her dad with anyone. The lie she’d told that had broken up the relationship still ate at her conscience eight years later. In a moment of pure childish stupidity, with no real clue to the consequences of her actions, Ari had lied and told her dad that his girlfriend (Michelle) had slapped her when Ari had told her she didn’t want her to be her mom. Derek was furious. He believed his daughter over his four month old relationship and had swiftly ended things. There hadn’t been anyone serious since. Ari blanched every time she thought about it. Her dad would so kill her if he knew the truth. Poor Michelle.
The upbeat melody of Sick Muse by Metric rang out from the pocket of Ari’s jeans and she jumped, startled in the quiet of the house. Jerking her cell out, she smiled softly at the caller ID and pressed the answer call button. “Dad.”
“Hey, sweetheart,” his warm, deep voice reminded her of Christmas Day on the couch watching Home Alone and eating chocolates for breakfast. “How’s things?”
“OK. Graduation in a couple of days,” she reminded him.
“I know, sweetheart,” he replied wearily. “I’ve asked Rachel’s mom to take care of you and to take lots of pictures of you i
n your cap and gown. I’m so sorry I can’t be there. You know I would if I could but I can’t miss this meeting. It could be my biggest sale this year.”
She nodded, feeling a little numb at the distance between them. “I know. Don’t worry about it, Dad. It’s not a big deal.”
“It is a big deal. That’s why I want you to take the emergency credit card and buy whatever you need for your birthday party, OK?”
“Thanks, that’s great.”
“I’ve also got a fantastic birthday present for you. I’ll be home in three weeks. I can’t wait to see your face when you open it.”
She smiled. Admittedly, her dad always bought her the most thoughtful presents. “I hope you didn’t do anything extravagant.”
Derek laughed. “It’s your 18th, of course I did. I love you, kid.”
“Love you too, Dad.”
Their conversation was short and sweet, like always, and Ari spent the rest of the evening cooking pasta, watching cartoons, worrying about Charlie, and stalking his Facebook and Twitter accounts to see if there was any recent activity. There never was. She talked to Rache and Staci for a while on Skype and then slid back from her desk, falling, emotionally exhausted, onto her king-sized bed.
“Ms. Maggie… can you hit the lights?” Two seconds later the click of the switch echoed around the room and the bedroom was plunged into darkness. “Thanks, you’re a doll.”
Two minutes later a flash of light across her closed lids broke her fall into sleep and she groaned, prying her eyes open to see her laptop had been turned on, the glow of the screen flicking across her walls as it changed from a Facebook account to Twitter.
“Ms. Maggie,” Ari groaned, flopping back against her pillows. “Can you Tweet in the morning. Please…”
The chair at her desk squeaked and the laptop went dark.
“Thank you,” she breathed. “Today was already depressing enough without the reminder that my poltergeist has more followers on Twitter than I do.”
(end of excerpt)
Continue Reading Smokeless Fire on amazon US and amazon UK
About Samantha Young
After graduating from the University of Edinburgh with a degree in ancient and medieval history Samantha Young returned to her main passion, writing. She often incorporates history and mythology into her novels.
Samantha's first release, The Tale of Lunarmorte trilogy, was followed by a second series titled Warriors of Ankh. At present she is a full-time writer working on a number of projects for near future release. Smokeless Fire is book one in her YA urban fantasy romance series about Jinn.
For more info on the author and her novels visit Samantha Young's official blog at http://www.samanthayoungbooks.com
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Please enjoy an excerpt from Rachel Higginson’s newest book Starbright, coming September 2012.
Chapter One
The night had never been darker, the blackness surrounding the car, never so suffocating. Even the piles of snow pushed to the sides of the narrow road, did nothing to break up the oppressive darkness. The stars above, shone brightly, I was sure of it, but they did so from behind a curtain of clouds that blocked the light from reaching the road. I felt swallowed up by emptiness.
I gripped the steering wheel tighter, my knuckles stretching until they gleamed white in the glow of the dashboard and my frozen fingers worked numbly against the cold plastic. The headlights of my old Jeep reached only a few feet in front of me and then stopped abruptly against a wall of darkness. I shivered violently, nestling my chin further into the down of my heavy winter coat and cursed the Nebraska winter for being equally as cold as it was desolate.
The farmland rolled away from the winding road, buried beneath several feet of iced over snow in every direction. Trees, planted for the privacy of farmers, lined the way home with empty branches and snowcapped tops. My breath puffed out in front of me, fogging up the frozen windshield and reminding me that the heater to my fifteen year old Jeep Cherokee remained unfixed.
“Tristan!” I growled furiously into the frigid air. “Why I let you talk me into another movie I will never know!”
There was no one there to hear my complaints, or sympathize with me against my best friend, but it felt comforting to make noise in an empty antique without a radio. Still, receiving not even a groan of empathy from the Jeep, I sat forward and peered into the impossible night ahead of me.
I knew these roads; I had each curve and turn memorized. The distance between Tristan Shields’ house and my own was well traveled and practically sacred. Still, out in the country where street lights were for city-folk and the deer and the antelope tended to play, their familiar territory became a dangerous, never-ending expanse of nerves and tension.
Even in summer, unless the stars and moon were bright and friendly, the country roads of the Nebraska farmland became shrouded in a heavy obscurity, the headlights of the best of cars mapping out the only visibility in the heavy cloak of night and beyond those flickering lights the world seemed to drop off the edge of a cliff into nothingness. But now, in the dead of winter, with temperatures well below zero, the night around my old Jeep seemed to have a life of its own, oppressive and angry.
I cleared my throat and mentally determined to conquer the creeping feeling of being afraid. I bit down on my lower lip and clutched the steering wheel tighter. My breath came out in shaky puffs of air, reminding me it was more than the roads and the night that curdled the most terrified places of my heart. It was more than the late hour and bitter cold that forced me to shiver and shift my eyes suspiciously in every direction.
It was the Darkness.
Not the country night, or the moonless sky. But the real Darkness. The Darkness that moved secretly through this world and threatened every living, breathing creature. The darkness that slithered in unseen places and survived on the death and rotten things. The darkness that I would fight until my dying breath.
But not tonight. Tonight I wasn’t ready. Tonight, I was still only sixteen, and my parents were still off saving the galaxy while I stayed home to finish high school with an elderly woman as my keeper.
Something moved out of the corner of my eye. I could swear it. Swirling my head around, and keeping a steady hold on the steering wheel, I peered into the darkness, searching out the moving creature.
Nothing.
Nothing beyond the snow banks piled in the ditches and the swaying lifeless trees that were becoming sparser as I passed expansive fields blanketed under the white of winter.
I turned my attention to the road again and with a numb hand, brushed my platinum blonde hair under the brim of my stocking cap. My fingers snapped with electricity and for a moment the cab of my Jeep was lit with the sparks of static. Only a few more miles till home. I could make it. There was nothing to be afraid of.
But why did tonight feel so different?
So dark?
And then out of my peripheral vision I saw it move again. A swift shadow sliding effortlessly through the night, riding the whipping wind like a wave and dropping the frozen temperature several degrees lower. The pungent smell of rotting eggs drifted through the air.
I didn’t have to turn my head this time to confirm. I knew it would be gone before my head could move in the right direction. Besides, they only existed in the peripheral, in the slight glances and far off places.
I had seen them before. Since before I could talk my parents would tell me about them, explain to me of their existence, warn me of their danger. I saw them everywhere, even during the day I could spot them, because they were everywhere.
Foot soldiers of a greater evil, sent to Earth, the last remaining inhabited planet, to prepare the way for their master. They were the evil in all things, the tyranny, the oppression, the hunger and violence. The Darkness. The force of wickedness that battled against the forces of good with one purpose in mind, to abolish the Light.
I was the Light. And because I was the answer to their destruction I hunke
red further into my winter coat and braved the bone-chilling cold.
It could be easy for me to warm up; even in a car with a broken heater it was the natural reaction of my body. I was born of the light, of the warmth. And to suffer against the natural elements was difficult enough, but the extra layer of malevolent chill became excruciatingly painful even in small doses.
Still, they couldn’t know what I was. They couldn’t discover me after all this time. At least not yet. So I breathed in the frosty air, feeling the burn in my lungs and forced myself to push forward a few more miles.
My parents had worked so hard to hide my existence and to blend in with normal humanity that no matter how easy it would be to ease my pain, I had to fight against the elements. I was brought to Earth as a baby, with the sole intention to one day take over as Earth’s protector. And so my parents had given up their positions as two of the greatest warriors of their generation to raise an alien infant in the middle of farmland.
