by Lan Chan
Matilda made me dance across the floor with her shooting. My back hit the far wall of the training room. I pivoted out of the way as a toxic sludge bullet spat at the wall and promptly ate up the plaster.
I braced my palm against the ground and drew in a heavy breath. All three of them smiled at me. “Let the games begin,” Giselle said. Then she fired.
21
I glanced at Gabriel’s Key and contemplated whether it had been worth almost dying for. The convenience said yes. The spark of apprehension every time I used it said no. All in all, it kind of evened out.
Matilda dawdled over to where Sophie and I were waiting beside the hall. The Sisterhood had decided that Ravenhall was less objectionable than anywhere else in supernaturaldom, so this was their base when they weren’t working with Nora and Mani. Matilda had decided overnight that she was going to accompany me back to the human world. I wasn’t particularly looking forward to it.
Every bone in my body was draped in fatigue after a week of nightmare training sessions. The toxic burn on my right rib was still healing despite the poultice Sophie had used to patch it up.
“Ready?” Matilda finished sheathing a knife to the belt around her hips. She was lucky we wouldn’t have to go through any metal detectors. Then again, I didn’t blame her for being paranoid given she was living in Ravenhall.
“I guess so,” I said.
She gave her leather jacket one last tug for fit. “Let’s do this.”
I reached out and grabbed both their arms before commanding the ring to take me to Terran General. We popped into a spare room beside the admin office. Somebody screamed. It might not have been as spare as I remembered. My head whipped to the left where a woman in a hospital gown was scrambling up her single bed to try and get away from us.
“Ah shit,” Matilda said. She then promptly strode the length of the room and fiddled with the woman’s IV equipment. In a few beats, the woman was unconscious. Matilda dusted her hands together. “We’ll just tell her it was the morphine.”
The door swung open and Jessica barged in. She was in scrubs again. “Sorry,” she said, taking in the scene. “We’re up to our ears in patients again. I didn’t get a chance to get a message out that we’re full up.”
With the help of the supernaturals, Terran’s physical structure had been replaced almost overnight. You would never be able to tell it had been attacked by demons. “You might have to wait outside,” Jessica said.
Not that there was any more space in the waiting area. Her phone went off and she rushed down the corridor to answer it.
Despite the full house, we didn’t have to wait long. I suspected Jessica just wanted us to get out of there as quickly as possible.
Doctor Daly came down the outpatient hallway and motioned for me to follow her. Sophie and Matilda both came with me.
“How are you feeling?” Doctor Daly asked. Today she had on a black pencil skirt and a mint-coloured blouse that did nothing to flatter her dark skin tone. But fashion advice wasn’t what I was here for.
“Fine,” I said. That was my word for the century. I took it we weren’t going to make polite small talk about the fact that last time we’d met, a demon had tried to kill us.
We entered her consulting room. There weren’t enough chairs in here either. Besides the doctor, nobody moved to take a seat. There was bitterness on my tongue. For the first time in a long time, I had skipped breakfast. Yet the thought of food made me want to hurl. Doctor Daly picked some nonexistent lint off her blouse.
“You should really sit,” she said.
“That bad, huh?” I asked. Sophie grabbed my hand. I hadn’t noticed until then that I was tapping it against my thigh.
“I’m so sorry, Alessia,” Doctor Daly said. “None of the eggs we collected were viable. I think it’s quite safe to assume that the rest are also infertile. But if you’d like, we can test all of them just in case. We can freeze any that are viable.”
You could have heard a pin drop. What I did hear was the sound of deep-throated screaming coming from the distance. And the sound of my heart beating in between. I opened my mouth, shut it again, and cleared my throat. There didn’t seem to be any point checking. I had already known this was a long shot. No point putting myself through additional torture.
“Right,” I finally managed to say. “I guess it’s better to know.”
“I’ve got the number for some services –”
I cut her off. “No really, I’m okay. Thanks anyway.”
I shoved the door open and walked out. Neither Sophie nor Matilda said anything as we found a quiet spot and I teleported us back to Ravenhall.
“Tough break, kid,” Matilda said.
I was mute. She decided that was the perfect time to make herself scarce. When it was just Sophie and me, I turned to face her. We stared at each other for the longest time without saying a word.
I thought I had it together when warmth in my chest had me looking inside. The layer of green caught my attention. It chased through my body, filling it with comfort. Almost as though Kai knew that there was something wrong. Sophie wrapped her arms around me as the first bubble of a sob escaped my throat.
“You had to try,” she said. “And if that was the last shot then we’ll make Lucifer pay for it.”
Not for the first time, I thought that if I got to the end of the line and Sophie was all I had left, I would still be happy. She wiped away my tears with the sleeve of her top.
“You want to kill some pretend demons?” She nodded towards the Great Hall.
“Sure, why not.”
I spent the next four hours sticking Morning Star into as many demons as I possibly could. Did I feel better afterwards? Marginally. The only thing that got me through was knowing that when the time came, I would use the demon blade on Lucifer. And I would make it hurt.
Not long after we teleported back to the Academy that night, Sophie had another shift in the dining hall.
Figuring I had better let off some steam, I put on sweats and ran laps around the billabong. Phoenix loped beside me, his tongue sticking out of his mouth. I could never keep up with him, but he always came back and stayed with me for a few seconds before disappearing behind a hedge again. The problem with the track around the billabong was that a part of it opened up to a section of the Grove. Every time I did a lap, my chest would lurch when the Grove came into view.
My body clock still hadn’t readjusted. Every morning, my eyes snapped open before dawn and I would swing my legs out of bed before reality crashed back. I was on my tenth lap and slowing down a lot when I finally conceded that I was just buying time. On my next go around, I jogged in place when the Grove came into view.
What would happen if I tried to go in there? Would they attack me again? There was really only one way to find out. Phoenix yelped on his way back to me. When he realised I wasn’t running anymore, he did laps around my legs instead.
Not wanting to take the chance and get myself unconscious again, I drew the Ley dimension around me. There it was. A thin ribbon of rainbow-coloured light that circled around the entire Grove. That was the spell that kept out intruders. When I moved closer, I saw there was now an additional band of blue added to the base of the rainbow. I had no doubt that band was specifically attuned to me.
Kai had been right. I was stronger than the nymphs. If I wanted to, there was every possibility I would be able to dismantle the wards they had put up. Unfortunately, getting in wasn’t the problem. If I had only been here to steal Arcana fruit, that would be the end of it. But something didn’t feel right about being at the Academy and not being allowed into the Grove. The question was: How to apologise?
It was getting late. I was about to leave when I heard the sound of voices coming from inside. Or a single voice and several other higher-pitched squeals. The familiarity stopped me in my tracks. For some reason, I ducked behind the hydrangea bush and crouched down so they wouldn’t be able to see me.
From around the path bes
ide the front gate, Emily emerged with a band of four nymphs fluttering around her. She held an Arcana fruit in each hand. “I really don’t know what to do with them,” she was saying.
The purple nymph chortled in her usual excited speech. Emily gave a harassed laugh. I would bet my life she had absolutely no idea what they were saying. With her hands full, Emily wasn’t able to unlock the gate. The pink nymph waved her tiny hand. A flurry of glittery magic swung the gate open. Thankfully, I was biting my tongue to stop from making any noise or I would have sworn.
First, they gave her free Arcana fruit and now they were opening doors for her. It was like some kind of supernatural blind date. “Really, I only came back around to inspect the oak tree,” Emily said. “There was no need to give me anything. I just did a little bit of watering.” She tucked one of the Arcana under her left armpit to hold it in place. The thing was the size of a grapefruit. Her words had me pausing. It hit me what they were trying to do. They were trying to replace me with Emily. Did human labour equate to some kind of supernatural cache? Who the heck looked after the Arcana tree before I came along?
“I beg your pardon?” Emily said. The purple nymph screeched. “I’m sorry. I really can’t understand you.”
A flutter of bigger golden wings shot out from the other side of the running track. “Oh for goodness sake!” Isla snapped when she landed. In the blink of an eye, she snatched the Arcana fruit from Emily’s hands and threw them back over the gate. The nymphs went crazy trying to scratch at Isla’s face, but she deflected them with a single sweep of her hand.
“You’ve already got one slave,” Isla said. “Stop trying to recruit others just because you’re having an argument.”
Before the nymphs could retaliate, Isla grabbed Emily’s arm and started marching away in my direction. I froze. The invisibility circle had just completed itself when Isla stepped around the side of the hydrangea bush.
“Don’t go there again,” Isla said. “They’re not right in the head at the moment.”
Emily wrung her hands. “I only came to see the site of the explosion. To check if there was anything that might give me an idea of why I saw what I saw.”
“It’s a prophecy. There’s no meaning to them half the time.”
“There’s always meaning in my visions. My guardian angel –”
Isla stopped dead. “What guardian angel?” she pinched the bridge of her nose. “How long have you been hearing voices?”
Emily bounced on the balls of her feet. Nervous energy radiated from her. It was nice of her to keep this titbit from the elite guards. No wonder they were so hell bent on me disclosing everything.
“It comes and goes,” she said. “I’ve been hearing it all my life. But I haven’t been able to hear it since we arrived and –”
“What does it tell you to do?
“She,” Emily corrected. “She helps me make sense of the jumble of images.”
I’d seen Isla on the brink of a meltdown more than once but the look of utter frustration that caused her lips to go blue topped it all. “We’re going to see Jacqueline.”
“What?” Emily stuttered. “Why?”
Isla rounded on her. “Because around these parts, hearing voices in your head is a bad, bad thing.”
There was no way I couldn’t follow them now. But instead of using the stealth method, I allowed them to get a little bit of a head start and then dropped the invisibility circle. Teleporting back to the dorm, I picked up the Nephilim Codex. From there I proceeded casually towards Jacqueline’s on-campus residence. She wasn’t on duty this weekend.
Dmitri, our deputy headmaster, was in charge. There was no way Isla would tell him what was going on. He had a reputation for punishing first and asking questions later. Gabriel’s Key ensured that I was on Jacqueline’s doorstep in plenty of time. It gave me a few minutes to skim through the codex. The index at the back of the book was a goldmine.
I found Jacqueline’s name in their long list of family members and trawled through the few pages on her that I could. Huh. It turned out Jacqueline’s surname was adoptive. She took it on when she agreed to be posted as Headmistress of Bloodline. I bookmarked it for further reading later on and knocked lightly on her door.
The light in the front room was on but I didn’t hear any movement inside. The seconds ticked by. I wasn’t sure what the etiquette was in this instance. Snooping wasn’t kosher, but when I knocked a second time and didn’t get any response, things started to feel off.
I was trying to channel X-ray vision through her curtains when Isla’s voice rang out. “What are you doing here?” she huffed.
In my concern, I had forgotten she was on her way. “I came to ask Jacqueline about something in my book,” I lied. “But she’s not answering her door.”
Of course that made Isla step up beside me and peer through the opaque curtains too. Emily hovered a little way off. Her arms were clutched behind her back like a little girl in a china shop not wanting to touch anything.
“Can you feel anything?” I asked Isla.
She grimaced. “Like what? I’m Fae not pixie.”
The way she said it sounded like I’d insulted her. “I don’t know. I just thought you’d have a better shot at sensing something than me.”
Her knock was a lot louder than mine. Still there was no answer. “This is messed up,” Isla announced.
“Maybe we should leave her be?” Emily suggested. “What if she’s asleep?”
“What if she’s dead?” Isla contradicted.
Two ends of the spectrum. How had Isla not killed Emily by now? The Fae turned to me. “Go in there and check it out.”
“What? I can’t break down the door!”
She sighed and grabbed my hand, waving it in front of me. “Oh, the ring! Right!”
“How you’re still alive astounds me.”
I appraised the state of the house. It was eerily quiet. There were no outward signs of disturbances. A quick scan of the Ley dimension showed only Jacqueline’s aura in the house. “What are you waiting for?” Isla prompted.
“Sorry if I’m not that comfortable with breaking and entering.”
“We can’t just stand around all night! I’ll just do it.”
Her way would mean breaking down the door. In my periphery, Emily scooted backwards. “Can you just hold your horses for a moment?”
“She could have a broken neck in there and you’re hesitating?” Isla asked.
Why was I hesitating? Breaking down the door should have been the first thing I did. But there was something not quite right about potentially walking in on an awkward situation. The thought sat for a moment before I remembered that Kai and I weren’t together anymore. There was nothing else tying Jacqueline and I together. Kai.
“Brace yourself,” I told them.
I sank into the bond and called his name. He appeared in the blink of an eye. He must have been training because his T-shirt was soaked at the collar. It took him a second to survey the situation. It felt like he’d only just touched down when he disappeared into the house. Several other Fae lanterns flicked on. I tried the door again, but it remained locked.
“What are you guys doing here?” I asked half-heartedly as we waited. Isla had no qualms about breaching Emily’s privacy. “She’s hearing voices in her head.”
The front door opened. “Not again,” Jacqueline said. Her voice was hoarse. Like she’d been speaking for hours. Her hair was plastered to her face and she had a greenish tinge to her cheeks. I couldn’t quite get past what I was seeing. She looked like Nanna had that time she’d gotten the flu. Except Jacqueline was a supernatural. They didn’t get sick.
Kai tried to step in front of her and usher her back inside, but she resisted. It didn’t look like she had much strength to do that either, but she managed to stay upright at least.
“Gran,” Kai said, his voice a warning.
“Honestly, I was just asleep.”
“We banged pretty hard,” Isla said. Sp
eak for yourself.
Jacqueline coughed and then tried to hide it by inhaling loudly. “Now what’s this about hearing voices?” She all but staggered out onto the stoop.
“This isn’t happening,” Kai said. He scooped her up in his arms and carried her off inside. I closed the door behind them, knowing Jacqueline probably didn’t want us seeing her vulnerable.
“What the heck?” Isla said. My sentiments exactly. Kai’s expression when he came out of the house was closed over.
“What’s wrong with her?” I asked.
He shook his head. I chalked it up to the same concern that was making my heart thump faster. “She’s unwell.”
“No shit,” Isla said. “Isn’t that a bit of an issue? We don’t get sick!”
Kai glared at her. “You don’t get an opinion on anything. Why didn’t you go to Dmitri with this?” The whip-quick flicker of his gaze over to Emily had the other girl blushing. Oh jeez.
Isla’s chest expanded. The sneer on her face slowly evened out. “I don’t think Dmitri is the right person to deal with this. Unless you want to scare Emily even more?”
There was no arguing with that. Kai reached up and grabbed the back of his neck. Muscles bulged. Emily turned fire-engine red and stared at her feet. “Fine,” he said. “Come with me.”
His body turned into a wall when I tried to follow them. “This doesn’t have anything to do with you.”
He was right. Especially since Emily still wasn’t comfortable around me. That didn’t mean I liked it. “Okay. I might just sit here until Jacqueline comes back out.”
“Blue.”
“What’s wrong with her?”
“She’s just tired.”
“Try again.”
His jaw clamped. I searched his face, wondering why he was being so obstructive. If there was something wrong with Jacqueline, we had every right to know. “She was with Angus and some of the elite guard this morning in the prison. She must have picked up something from a demon. It’s nothing you need to worry about.”
