Silver Smoke (#1 of Seven Halos Series)

by Monica O'Brien

  She looked up at him, tears glistening from her eyes. "Because you do have powers," she choked. "The others are wrong." She sat up. "My powers change peoples' emotions, but you can block them. I don't understand how, but even when I touch your skin now—it has almost no effect. I can barely feel what you're thinking. It's like possessing any sort of sensation—sight, sound, hearing—and all of a sudden, having it dulled, perhaps by a blindfold, or earplugs."

  Pilot paled at the unspoken truth in Cora's words, reminded of what Kennedy had told him earlier in James' office. "You've changed my emotions before, haven't you?"

  "Yes," Cora confessed. "And Clara has changed your thoughts too, twice. We had no idea—"

  "That I was a Trinity also?" Pilot asked.

  "You aren't a Trinity, Pilot. We made sure of it, actually. We bound you, once we realized that you weren't going to develop powers naturally."

  "Great," Pilot mumbled. It was news to him that his powers were bound, but he didn't have the energy to question whether it was a good or bad thing at the moment.

  Cora looked at him. "Oh no," she said. "We didn't take your powers away from you. We just prevented you from getting powers, for your protection."

  "My protection," Pilot repeated.

  "So you are an earthlie with Trinity blood, and the ability to block Hallow attacks. It's unheard of."

  She hesitated. "You block their feelings for me. You can't imagine how hard it is, feeling everything that everyone around you feels, in addition to your own pain. It amplifies and intensifies everything you're feeling two or three times."

  The tears were falling down Cora's cheeks now, and Pilot brushed them away with his pointer finger.

  "You're right," he said. "I can't imagine it."

  There must have been a tone to his voice, because Cora looked up. "You're mad at me, aren't you? I mean, I think you are. Like I said, I can't tell." She sat up and positioned herself in front of him, holding the back of her hand to his cheek. "Yes, you're mad at me. Why, Pilot?"

  He reached up and entwined his fingers with hers, gently pulling her hand away from his face. "I get it," he said. "Everyone else's emotions exhaust you. Being with me is like putting a mute button on the TV, and..." he paused. Cora had her other hand on his other cheek.

  "You think I'm using you," Cora said, staring into his eyes.

  "Everyone else does." Pilot turned his head, breaking contact with her hand. It scared him, the way Cora communicated—she had a way of making him feel like they had a connection, but they didn't. It was just her powers.

  "I guess I am using you," she admitted. She brushed his bangs out of his eyes, lost in her own thoughts. "But I can take away your pain also, if you want. Then we'll be using each other."

  Pilot looked up quickly. "Kennedy," she said. "I can siphon away your feelings for her."

  "How?" Pilot asked. He had a hard time imagining anyone taking away the emptiness he felt right now.

  Cora's arms drifted to his waist; she lifted the front of his shirt and put her hands on his chest. He wrapped his own hands over hers, hoping she wouldn't let go of him. "Open your emotions to me," Cora said, closing her eyes. Pilot wasn't completely sure what she meant, and he wasn't sure he could trust her with how he was feeling.

  He closed his eyes and tried to pretend Cora was Kennedy, letting the most secret, painful feelings he had creep to the top.

  Cora's hands trembled against his chest as she pulled the feelings out of him, absorbing them into her own being. He had to admit that it made him feel better to release the feelings he was struggling with at the moment. Slowly, he released more anger, more hurt, dredging up things he didn't even realize existed.

  Anger toward his father and mother for making bad decisions. Jealousy toward Brie for being the favorite child. Embarrassment and pain toward himself for stupidly falling in love with a girl who didn't know how to love. One by one, Cora replaced his dangerous feelings with resolution and peace.

  Finally, she dropped her hands, shaking herself. He stared at her, wondering if he'd gone to far, wondering if he'd shown her something that would make her hate him. "I can't do any more," she confessed.

  "Another time."

  Brie came outside, lingering on the steps next to them. Or maybe she had been standing there the whole time and Pilot hadn't notice her. The way she looked at him made him feel like he'd been caught making out with someone. He wondered how much she had seen and what she made of it.

  Her face was red and blotchy and wet. "Can I talk to you?"

  Cora decoupled herself from Pilot and stood up. "I should check on my sister."

  Brie sat down on the stairs next to Pilot, but she didn't say anything.

  "What's going on in there?" Pilot finally asked.

  "Thessa and Rykken are stuck in a different world," Brie said. "I don't know what's going to happen to either of them. We're just playing the waiting game at this point."

  Pilot nodded absentmindedly. He knew why Brie was out here, but it didn't make it any easier on either of them. Pilot closed his eyes, repeating his mantra. Kennedy lied to me and manipulated me. Kennedy was using me. Kennedy tried to kill Rykken. Kennedy tried to hurt Brie.

  He added something new to the list. Kennedy might be dead.

  Brie stared at Pilot, with those green eyes that were so similar to the ones he saw in the mirror every day. "Please forgive me for Kennedy," she said. "Both Rykken and Thessa could die tonight, and it would be my fault. Clara hates me. I can't live with you hating me too."

  Brie's face reminded Pilot of a lost puppy.

  "You don't need forgiveness for what you did," Pilot said, more for her benefit than because it was true.

  She met his eyes, pain piercing her face. "It wasn't your fault," he said with more conviction. "Kennedy made her choices. She knew that hurting you or Rykken would destroy me and anything we had left."

  Brie gave him a hard look. "I hate her," she said. "I hate her for involving you."

  Pilot looked away, ashamed that he couldn't hate Kennedy, not yet. "I made my choices too," he said. They sat in silence for a minute. When Pilot glanced at Brie, she was practically biting her lip off.

  "Sirena thinks that we have to leave," Brie said.

  Pilot considered her words carefully. 'We' meant Sirena, Brie, and Rykken—not him. He couldn't decide if it was for the best or not—Cora's trick had left him in a better place, but there was no telling how he would feel about Brie and Rykken in the weeks to come. "Where are you going?" he asked.

  "No idea. Sirena doesn't feel safe here anymore." Brie fidgeted with her hands. "But you'll be fine here. Clara and Cora can protect you. Thessa too, if she comes out of this..."

  The look on Brie's face told Pilot that Thessa probably wasn't going to come out of whatever it was.

  "Okay." Pilot swallowed. Two conflicting sentiments toward Brie battled each other in his heart, but he refused to let the negative one win. "Brie, I'm worried about you."

  "I know," she said. "I'll be okay."

  "Kennedy's sister is going to notice she's gone when she doesn't report back in a few weeks. If she sends Trinities after you and Rykken—" Pilot stopped, not wanting to finish the sentence.

  "I know," Brie said more forcefully. "But what choice did I have? She was trying to kill Rykken."

  "That's the problem," Pilot said with more emphasis. "Rykken was an important target for Silver Smoke. If Kennedy didn't succeed..." He paused—the thought of Brie getting hurt pained him so much. His sentiment toward her became clearer—if given the choice, he would have saved Brie over Kennedy. Brie was his sister. He couldn't be mad at her for this.

  "If Kennedy didn't succeed," he said with more conviction, "none of us are safe."

  *****

  When Rykken woke up a second time, he felt like an abused rag doll, not nearly as physically sound as he had felt waking in Thessa's cavernous room. This time he recognized his surroundings at the van Rossum house, in the guest room where he alway
s stayed. He didn't look to his left—his instincts told him not to.

  Rykken fell back into his pillow, wishing he could bury himself there a bit longer. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a girl sitting next to him on the right.

  "Brie?"

  "She's outside," Sirena said. Now that Rykken's eyes had adjusted to the light, he saw the girl for who she was. Where he expected to find long, flowing brunette hair, he instead found dirty blonde. Sad brown eyes replaced the emerald ones he longed for.

  Sirena glanced across him on the bed to his left, where he guessed Thessa laid. Dead. He didn't have to look to know because he sensed her presence inside of him.

  All of a sudden, a million realizations smashed against his consciousness. Kennedy tried to kill him at birth. She drowned his brother as a baby. He had a family, but they hadn't come looking for him. Kennedy was most likely dead. Kennedy was the only one who knew his family. He had a family.

  Brie killed Kennedy. Pilot loved Kennedy. Would Pilot forgive either of them?

  Sirena was on the other side of him, hovering over Thessa's body. She kissed Thessa lightly on her forehead, then folded the bedsheets over Thessa's head.

  "I know why you wanted your blood tested," Sirena said, wiping tears from her eyes. "You think your parents are out there still, hiding from the New Order."

  "Kennedy told me they are," Rykken said, unsure of his voice.

  Sirena nodded her head. "Maybe I can help you find them."

  Rykken bit the inside of his mouth. He didn't want to talk to Sirena right now. All he wanted was Brie, the girl who had saved his life, the girl who had chosen him over her own kind. "Can you help me find Brie?" he asked her.

  Sirena stood up, her face devoid of emotions. "I'll have her come to you," she said, before touching the bed where Thessa laid. They both disappeared after several seconds.

  Rykken waited for at least ten minutes by himself. When Brie finally entered the room, she didn't rush to Rykken. She just looked at him in shock.

  "You aren't bleeding anymore," she said.

  "Come here," he told her. He wanted nothing more than to touch her face. He didn't understand why she wasn't happy to see him, alive.

  Brie stepped a little closer, but stayed out of his reach. "Clara says that they could have gotten you out. She thinks that Kennedy was just testing me to see how fast I would go dark."

  "You passed then," Rykken said.

  "Rykken, I killed her. And I killed you. The only reason you're here is because Thessa saved you. Now she's dead, and it's my fault."

  "You didn't know," Rykken insisted. "You were running away from Thessa, remember? She was about to betray you."

  Brie didn't answer him—it was like she was tuned into a different station. His words bounced off her, not making a dent in her mood.

  "Brie—I know you're scared, but you're not going to turn into Kennedy." He reached for her hand and pulled her toward him. She let him, reluctantly. He couldn't stand the pain on her face that seemed to reverberate through him against his will. "Your mom wanted you to search for the stones and become a Hallow, and we're going to make it happen."

  "Kennedy was right though," Brie said. "If Thessa couldn't do it, it's an impossible task. And I'm going to get darker and darker as time passes. I can already feel it."

  "It's not an impossible task," Rykken said, his voice rising. Why was she giving up? "I'm not going to let you go dark. I'm going to save you."

  She looked at him sadly. "I've already murdered someone. Put that on the list of irreversible dark crimes I've committed."

  "I can put saving me on the list of good deeds you've done. I owe you my life." He cupped her chin.

  "Brie, you are the bravest, most talented supernatural girl I've ever met."

  "Maybe," she said, though she seemed to cheer up a little. "Though it's not like you know a ton of supernatural girls."

  "You're stronger than the other Hallows, and I'll be there every step of the way to help you." He sat up to get a better look at her.

  Brie reached up to the nape of her neck and found a clump of hair to twirl in her fingers, like she always did.

  Rykken did a double take. The strands she twirled were the color of quarter coins, like they had been spun from silver itself.

  He stroked her hair, his lips meeting hers. After several seconds, she responded to him, kissing him back. He wrapped his arms around her waist, wishing he could lose himself in her before he had to face the rest of the Hallows.

  Rykken heard a knock at the door, followed by Pilot walking in without waiting for an answer. He pulled away from Brie automatically—Rykken expected Pilot to react to the way he was entwined with her, but Pilot completely ignored it. "I'm glad you're okay brother," he said, grabbing Rykken's hand and pulling him into a one-armed hug.

  "How are you," Rykken asked cautiously, eyeing Pilot's overly cheerful smile.

  Pilot blinked, his smile growing tighter across his face. "Better than I would be if you were dead and Kennedy were alive."

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  The clock struck midnight; it was time. Brie sprang from her bed and quietly donned the robe she had created, copied from the one Cora showed her earlier that day. The colors had been difficult to perfect—

  the robe started with yellow at the top, blended into orange toward the middle, and tapered off with inflamed red at the bottom. Annie, in exchange for not having her memories erased, helped Brie sew the material together once she had worked out the colors.

  Brie pulled the canary yellow hood over her head, tucking her loose hair under the cap. She looked at herself in the mirror. I'm on fire.

  The attire was modeled after the phoenix bursting into flames, a symbol of rebirth. Brie was headed to a funeral, but in the Hallow world, funerals were celebrations.

  Brie hoped the ceremony started on time. She concentrated and summoned her energy to travel. A few minutes later, she was standing in front of Saint Andrew's Cathedral in West Honolulu.

  A statue of St. Andrew stood in the center of a rectangular water fountain filled with bluish-green water. The fountain was lined with egg-white stone that extended throughout the structure. A cloistered garden surrounded the fountain, and the scene was reminiscent of the gothic architecture Brie remembered from her trips to Europe. The building looked empty and desolate from the outside, but Brie knew that inside, a ceremony was taking place.

  The entrance to the church was a mosaic of stained glass that spanned from the ground to the rooftop. She grabbed the handle to the outer doors, but her hand passed right through the frame. She stepped through the double doors and entered a cavernous room with the brightest, softest yellow light she had ever seen shining from every direction. The light bounced off the white pillars of arches that formed the inner cavity, which towered several stories high. The Hallows guarding the gate waved her in, glaring at her for being late only. They ushered her towards the endless rows of custom wooden pews to find a seat.

  Brie wasn't supposed to be there. In fact, she was taking a huge risk, attending an event as an unregistered Hallow. She wasn't even sure what the consequences were, because Clara and Cora and Sirena would never suspect that she disobey them at this point—not after the prophecy and Kennedy and everything she'd learnt about the stones.

  But Brie hadn't yet said her goodbyes to Thessa. Despite Thessa's near-betrayal, Thessa protected her and trained her and saved Rykken when she couldn't. Brie would always owe her.

  The official story about what happened was that Kennedy's attack on Rykken was a personal vendetta against his family. Thessa tracked them down, took out Kennedy, and used the pendant to split the Silver Smoke symbol. Splitting a symbol like that required incredibly powerful magic that only someone like Thessa could gain after thousands of years of life. Thessa brought Rykken back to her house and sacrificed her life to save his under Clara and Cora's watch.

  The story matched up on all fronts. It gave Kennedy a different and more believable mo
tive, instead the truth—which was, of course, attacking the future president of the Hallows based on a vision. It matched up with Rykken's selkie abilities and bloodlines, in case someone dug far enough back to uncover Kennedy's family vendettas. It matched what Thessa had discussed with Bristol, the head of the Trinities.

  It matched the Hallows expectations of Thessa's abilities too. Apparently, the Hallows ran a raid on Silver Smoke over one hundred years earlier under the monarchy, to eradicate the Trinities from the world for good. This was before the Hallows understood the true nature of the cross and wings symbol.

  Thessa was the only one to escape; and even then, she almost died.

  There was only one loose end, one person who could possibly decipher the truth—Thessa's contact at the New Order. None of the other girls knew his name, and he didn't have Brie, Pilot, or Rykken's names. He only had the knowledge of their blood samples, and the knowledge that Thessa was dabbling with a unique and not-entirely-legal crowd. The Hallows hoped that whatever Thessa had on him was so incriminating, he wouldn't take a chance on ratting them out. Besides, he didn't know that Thessa hadn't passed on the blackmail tidbit before she passed away.

  Brie took a spot near the back of the room, watching the events unfold.

  Mateo Vega, the president of the Hallows, took to the podium to speak before the blur of rituals started.

  The beautiful rituals broke Brie's heart, saddening her. She thought of her mother, who never got a Hallow send off like this one. Like Brie, Milena was someone for which a Hallow send off could never have been possible, even if Milena had embraced her powers. These same people would not accept her either, no matter what she did to save their people or fight the Nephilim.

  Clara took the podium, her presence alone sending chills through Brie's body. Brie closed her eyes, their last conversation at Thessa's deathbed replaying in her mind. Clara blamed Brie for Thessa's death. Clara would never forgive her. Clara wanted her to get the hell out of Honolulu.