“You really have no idea, do you?”
“No idea of what?”
“I don’t believe this…” he grates, his voice low. “I just cannot…” His words fade away as he stares at me, his green eyes flashing dangerously, beautifully.
Mesmerizing me, like a snake its prey.
I can’t bring myself to move. In the simmering silence between us, I feel the air thickening strangely, until I’m almost struggling to breathe.
Oh dear God.
I’m struggling to breathe, but I don’t want to move.
I cannot stop looking into his eyes.
When he speaks again, he sounds almost despairing. “You really don’t know. All this time…” His face is mere inches away from mine, but his voice sounds as if it’s coming from far away. There’s a kind of ringing in my ears, a sweeping-shushing that makes it difficult to hear what he’s saying. “… they’ve kept you in the dark, and all the while I thought...”
“Nobody kept me in the dark,” I say weakly when I finally find my voice again. But my eyes are still locked in his, my breath weirdly irregular.
“You have no idea who I am, do you?”
I have to lick my lips to speak. “Of course I know who you are.”
“Oh my God.” He’s laughing now, a bitter, harsh, sound. “You really don’t!” He grabs his hair in a panicked, almost frantic gesture. “You don’t even know who you are! How could they do that? It’s fucking criminal! I don’t believe—”
“Jonathan Pendragon!” Mrs. Hector’s shrill, high screech slices through the air. “You will stop speaking to Jess right now!”
I shake my head, feeling as if I’ve just woken up from some kind of dream, suddenly uncomfortably aware that I’m still standing in the pool, shivering, in an odd little semi-embrace with Jonathan, and that everyone is staring at us. I take a stumbling step away, but although he lets go of my shoulder, his eyes keep burning into mine like hot coals.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Mrs. Hector hisses as she storms toward us, her face twisted in anger. “Get out of the pool immediately!”
I’m about to protest when I see that, for once, her anger isn’t focused on me.
“Jonathan Pendragon, I am speaking to you. Jonathan!”
He turns to her reluctantly.
“I’ll see you in my office as soon as you’re dressed,” she barks. “Now get out of this pool!”
“I didn’t mean—” Jonathan begins to protest.
“I don’t want to hear another word!”
“But—”
“Not another word!”
I suspect that nobody has ever spoken like this to him in his life before, but he seems too preoccupied to care. After a few long seconds, he gets out of the pool in one smooth, incredibly graceful movement, giving me a lingering last look as he reaches for his towel.
Then he shakes his head, almost hopelessly, and walks away.
“Jess!”
I have to physically force myself to stop staring at Jonathan’s receding back.
“Have I or have I not said that you are forbidden to enter the pool?” Mrs. Hector’s face has turned a nasty shade of puce. Her nostrils flare as she speaks to me, every word punctuated by flying spit.
“But that was last year—”
“Absolutely forbidden!” she hisses. “Last year, this year, every year! You are not to put a foot in my swimming pool ever again! Do you understand me?”
As usual, Mrs. Hector is being crazy unreasonable, but this time I just can’t bring myself to argue. I have the strange, unnerving feeling that something really important just happened, even if I have no idea what it was.
I get out of the pool awkwardly, aware that everyone is still staring. It’s so quiet you could hear a pin drop.
In the changing-room mirror I see that my face is deathly white and my eyes unusually green. I look… different.
Transformed in some way.
The thought scares me, so I quickly turn away, take a hasty shower, and get dressed with shaking fingers. But even after my shower, my head feels as if it’s not part of my body, and I feel excited and sick, even a bit feverish. By the time I get to my car, I’m shaking so much I can’t get my key into the door. I’m breathing too fast and I feel choked up, as if I’m about to start crying—
Out of the blue, Gunn is suddenly there.
Standing right next to me in all his tall, broad-shouldered, wonderfully reassuring male glory. Thank God.
I hand over my keys without arguing and he gets into the driver’s seat, then leans over to open the passenger door for me.
“What happened?” he asks once we’re out of the school gates and on our way home.
I shake my head, not knowing where to begin. “Why are you here?” I ask instead.
He waits a second too long before he answers. “I was worried about you.”
Oh. Of course.
How could I have forgotten? Gunn believes it’s his “sacred duty” to worry about me.
I don’t say another word until we get home, my stomach hollow, my heart empty.
When I open the car door, Gunn puts a large, warm hand over mine. “Talk to me, Jess. Please.”
I gently take my hand from his. But I don’t get out of the car.
We sit in silence. My windshield, I notice, needs a wash. Actually, all my windows could do with a wash. My whole car, probably. I stare at my dirty windows, thinking how much easier it is to think about practical things, like car washes, than emotional things, like feeling betrayed.
In the end, I sigh. “Does Jonathan know about my magic?”
“Jonathan Pendragon?”
“Yes. We just had this really weird scene in the pool. He grabbed my arm while I was swimming, and then he got really angry at me and told me I was kept in the dark, and that I don’t know who he is or who I—” I stop talking when I see the expression on Gunn’s face. “What?”
“Jonathan Pendragon touched you while you were in the pool?”
In spite of his size, I’ve never been afraid of Gunn, not once in all the years I’ve known him. But there is something so icy in his voice right now that I feel actual chills running down my spine.
I look up at his face for reassurance, hoping to see that lazy, familiar grin, but he is staring straight ahead, his profile a stark, aggressive line and his whole body vibrating with an uncharacteristic sense of violence.
“Yeah,” I say uncertainly. “It was weird.”
“Tell me exactly what happened,” he says quietly.
After I tell him the story, there’s a long, tense silence. Gunn’s eyes are closed, and he is taking deep, measured breaths. It takes me a moment to realize that he’s controlling his emotions in exactly the same way he taught me to control mine.
“Are you okay?” I ask after a while.
He nods, but I notice that he’s still gripping the steering wheel, his knuckles white with tension.
“Go get something to eat,” he grits out through clenched teeth, still taking measured breaths, still looking straight ahead. “I’ll come and find you as soon as I’ve spoken to Ingrid.”
Chapter 12
And so, even today, of all those made Outcast, the Pendragons remain both the most hated and the most feared. Hated, because their despicable crime broke every rule, not only of our Order, but also of common decency and basic morality, and feared because this transgression gave them powers of Seduction and Enthrallment so great that, as of yet, none could truly stand against them.
From A Brief History of The Order of Keepers
by Lord Harry Charles Shawcross (1961)
It’s about half an hour later. I’m standing at Ingrid’s bedroom door trying to work up the courage to go inside.
The last time I was in this room was about three and a half years ago, on a winter’s day when the snow outside fell in flakes so huge it looked like confetti. I’d been called from school to say my final goodbye to my mother, and when I entered the room, the
only thing I could think of was how everything outside looked so fresh and so white and so new, while inside everything was dark and old and rotten.
The heavy antique furniture. The black wooden floor. My mom on the bed, nothing but a skeleton covered in worn-out skin.
Already dead.
Ingrid was sitting next to the bed holding her hand, as composed and caring as she’d been throughout my mother’s illness. I remember standing in the doorway and hating her, just a little, for having the courage to touch my mother’s lifeless hand, when she crumpled into a heap without as much as a sound, like a puppet whose strings had been cut.
At first I thought she might have had a heart attack or a stroke, because she lay on the floor so awkwardly, so completely still. But then she started screaming, tugging at her hair and clutching at her breast, crawling on her hands and knees and beating her fists against the floor, howling like an animal in pain.
I remember how astonished I was. Up until that moment, I’d thought I was the only one who’d never recover from the loss of my mother. But seeing my own pain mirrored so exactly was more than I could stand. I turned and fled, and I’ve never, in all the years since then, returned to this part of the house again.
Until today.
I’m about to knock when I realize I can hear voices inside. I drop my hand, lean closer.
“You’re being overly dramatic, Gunnar. The boy might have acted inappropriately, but it’s hardly reason to flee.”
“If we leave now, we can still make it to a safe house in time.”
“In time for what?”
“Open your eyes, Ingrid! Jess’s magic could be sparked at any minute, and there’s nothing I can do to stop it. The training isn’t working. We need time.”
“I haven’t seen as much as a glimmer of power in the little one.”
“That’s because you never look at her!”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I see her every day.”
“Do you? Really?” There’s a creaking sound, like weight being shifted on a mattress. “Look, I know you’re hurting, and I’m sorry. I can’t even begin to imagine what you’ve been through. But Bella’s dead—no, listen to me!—she is dead and Jess is alive. You need to come to terms with that.”
Outside the door, I give a tiny little gasp at Gunn’s harsh words. In all the years since my mother’s death, I’ve not heard Ingrid speak her name once.
This is clearly not the kind of conversation I should be eavesdropping on.
I take a deep breath. Raise my hand and give a careful little knock. When I’m greeted by silence, I slowly push open the door.
Everything still looks the same.
The dark wooden floors. The oriental carpets. The huge sash windows. The enormous four-poster where my mother died in agony.
Ingrid is sitting at the foot of the bed, a heavily curtained monstrosity featuring all kinds of strange-looking monsters carved into the dark wooden bedposts. Her hair is hidden under a deep-blue turban and she’s wearing silky gold pajamas, which she’s accessorized with a dozen sparkly bangles on each wrist.
Gunn is standing a few feet away, his arms crossed over his broad chest. He gives me a quick smile, but I notice that the nerve in his jaw is jumping like mad.
“Jess,” he says. “I’m glad you’re here.”
“Hi, Ingrid.” I take a few uncertain steps into the room.
“Hello, little one.” Her smile is just a bit too bright. “My nephew tells me you’ve been up to all kinds of mischief today.”
“Not really,” I say. “It’s just that I had this really weird run-in with Jonathan Pendragon in the pool earlier.”
She winces at my words. “Good grief. Put like that, it does sound quite unacceptable.” She nods at Gunn as she reaches for her phone. “You’re right. This should never have happened. I’ll speak to Jack Pendragon straight away.”
“Speak to him about what?” I say. “Can someone please tell me what’s going on?”
“I don’t think so.” Ingrid sends a disapproving look in Gunn’s direction. “It has just come to my attention that certain people have told you far too much already.”
“But this isn’t about your old secrets,” I say. “It’s about my life, about normal people I see every day. Jonathan seemed surprised that I didn’t know who he was; he said I didn’t even know who I was.” I narrow my eyes at the two of them. “He’s part of it too, isn’t he?”
“Part of what, exactly?” Ingrid arches a brow.
“The Order of Keepers and all that magic stuff.”
“You told her about the Order?”
“Yes. I did.”
“Oh, Gunnar. I only hope you understand what this may cost you.”
“My first duty is to Jess. The rest I can handle.”
“So young and so brave.” Ingrid smiles bitterly. “And so unbelievably stupid. Sometimes you’re so like your father, I could weep.” She turns around, dismissing both of us with a small wave of her hand. “It’s probably wisest to forget about this. I’ll speak to Jack Pendragon and make sure it never happens again.”
“No.” I lift my chin. “I’m sick of forgetting things. I’m not leaving until someone tells me what’s going on.”
“Ingrid,” Gunn says quietly. “She has a right to know.”
Ingrid spins around, a brittle smile on her face. “Does she now? And what ‘right’ would that be, exactly?” The look she gives him is too intense and too strange for me to read, and when she turns to me, she just looks tired and sad. “Little one. Please. You cannot know the price of what you’re asking. In a couple of months’ time, you will turn eighteen, and Gunnar and I will be freed from our vow of secrecy. That’s not so long to wait, surely?”
“Maybe not,” I say. “But I hate that you’re keeping secrets from me. It makes me feel… unsafe.” I swallow against the unexpected tightness at the back of my throat. “And I also hate that you made that stupid vow in the first place. That you felt more loyalty toward some creepy secret Order than to me.”
“It’s more complicated than that, Jess” Gunn says quietly.
“People always say things are complicated when they don’t want to talk about it. And you have to talk to me. I mean, what am I supposed to do until I turn eighteen? Just ignore Jonathan whenever he speaks to me, or—”
“No!” Ingrid’s face pales visibly. “Absolutely not! That boy cannot speak to you. Not ever. You stay away from him, and from his father too, do you understand? I don’t want you to even look at them.”
“But why? What’s wrong with them?”
“Everything. They’re evil, Jess, in the purest sense of the word. Sick and perverted and dishonorable.” She gives a slight shudder. “Unclean.”
Her answer just confuses me further. “I don’t get it,” I say, frowning. “So, okay, his family might have done bad things in the past—I know people don’t usually get that rich by being good, upstanding citizens. But Jonathan’s only eighteen. What could he have done that’s so terrible?”
“Jonathan Pendragon may be young,” Gunn says, his eyes as hard and cold as I’ve ever seen them, “but make no mistake: he is your enemy, and he’s dangerous. More dangerous than you can imagine.”
I look from Gunn to Ingrid. Something about this doesn’t make sense.
“If he’s so dangerous,” I say slowly, feeling my way around the problem, “then why do we go to the same school? And if the Pendragons really are so evil, why do we live here, of all places in the world?” I raise both my hands in a sweeping gesture. “They own this town; everybody knows that! So what are we even doing here, if they’re such monsters?”
In the long, tense silence that follows, I notice that Ingrid and Gunn are careful to avoid each other’s eyes.
“Let’s just say it was a bad decision,” Ingrid finally says. “One in a long series of bad decisions, which are clearly still continuing.” She rubs a hand across her face, a look of resignation settling over her features. Then she walks to the sofa
at the foot of the bed and sits down heavily. “While he was so carelessly spilling our deepest secrets, did my nephew per chance mention exactly what kind of keepers we are?”
I glimpse at Gunn, who’s staring at the floor, his huge shoulders slumped.
“He said you belonged to the Black Clan.”
“Belonged.” She gives a brittle little laugh. “A strangely apt word. Did he tell you what that means? What that meant? Did he give you any idea?”
Gunn is still looking at the floor.
“He said that your family has been looking after mine since the time of the Crusades.”
Ingrid briefly puts her hands together as if she’s praying. Then she tilts her head to the space next to her. “Sit down, Jess. Now that my darling nephew has so spectacularly let the cat out of the bag, it might be time to see how many words I can slip past the sacred vow I once swore so solemnly on my own blood.”
I sit next to her, keeping a careful space between us, my back perfectly straight. Gunn remains standing a few feet away, his arms crossed over his chest and his feet apart, as if bracing himself.
The sofa, like everything else in this house, is old and peculiar. I stare at the fantastical creatures embroidered on the rich crimson fabric as Ingrid begins her story, her voice falsely bright.
“Do you know what’s ironic? Growing up, I never wanted to be a keeper. Not for a moment. Oh, I had the blood—the Order’s precious goddamned blood—in my veins, but I was a thoroughly modern woman and I wanted nothing to do with the Black clan’s ancient methods and dark rituals. All that secrecy and suffering and sacrifice… It just didn’t appeal to me. And I couldn’t have cared less about the magical powers. Who needed that anyway, in a modern world stuffed with so many technological marvels?
“It was my sister who felt the calling, and she was so enormously gifted that she became the Black Lady at the age of fifteen. Fifteen! Can you imagine? That said, by then the Black Clan had only one true ward left, so it wasn’t as if the job was too taxing. But still.” Ingrid gives me a wry smile. “Would you care to guess who that lone remaining ward was, little one?”
Ordinary Girl (The Dark Dragon Chronicles Book 1) Page 12
