Deviate

by Tracy Clark

  Finn’s jaw clenched. “If it was, I wouldn’t have to steal it.”

  He drove through the gate and edged the car to the far side of the driveway near the grassy cliff where I once sat on a sunny afternoon, reading my mother’s journal. He got out and helped Giovanni scoot out of the car with my mother’s slender body clasped against him. I wanted, more than anything, to carry her in my own arms, or to touch her, kiss her, pull her back from where she was. I wanted more than anything for her not to be dead. To have a chance at a happy ending.

  My heart twisted and wrung out the useless wish. Every time someone I loved was taken from me, my heart would shrink more until there was nothing left. Is that how I would be taught to hate? Is that how I’d stray from the light in me?

  Giovanni carried my mother’s body as we followed Finn across the lawn toward the rounded head of a boulder jutting from freshly turned ground. I ran ahead of everyone. Words had been carved into the stone.

  “Oh, my friend, all that you see of me is just a shell

  And the rest belongs to love.”

  —Rumi

  I sank to my knees, placing my hands on the marker. Tears spilled down my cheeks, and my bottom lip trembled so hard it was difficult to speak. “You buried my father,” I gasped, with one hand over my stunned heart. Cutting remorse had consumed me every minute since I’d had to leave my father’s body behind in that tack shed. I’d never expected or even thought…

  I looked up at Finn standing next to me. The fact that he had done this for my father overwhelmed me with gratitude. Without rational thought, I threw myself into him, crushing us into a tight embrace. “Thank you,” I said, shaking with tears. He clutched my back and held me as tightly as I was holding him. His body shook against mine.

  It was impossible to separate the feelings competing inside of me. The pain, grief, anger, fear, love—all of it coexisted. I inhaled Finn’s familiar scent. Listened to the beat of his heart like it was the last falling notes of a song I’d never hear again. It was my own thievery, knowing it would likely be the last time I’d smell him, feel him against me, and let his warm colors envelop me.

  My truth reared up against my will. No one made me feel this way. He was still the hearth my heart warmed itself by. He was still my other half. I’d tried to let him go. It was inexplicable, but my Scintilla soul still longed for his Arrazi soul. He was home, and it didn’t matter how many times I turned my back on it. He was still home.

  “I might have been wrong about you,” I said into his neck. “Love is what we do every day. It’s in our actions. I was stupid and cruel to assume you were incapable of it. You’d never have done any of this if you didn’t love me.”

  Finn let out a choking cry and squeezed a bit harder. “I—I’m sorry,” he said, pushing me away and stumbling backward. My chest seized up. “I can’t…” Sorrow creased his eyes as he slowly backed away from me.

  He didn’t want my talk of love anymore.

  His aura was thin as mist, the colors muted. He was weakening, but not totally in need yet. I was such a lovesick fool that he was the one strong enough to remind me how unsafe I was in his presence.

  “I’m so sorry. So sorry.” Tears cascaded from his soft eyes, over his high cheekbones. “I did everything I could think of to save her. Ultana was never going to let her leave.”

  My breath caught. “What are you talking about, Finn?”

  “When it came down to either me or Ultana, Mari asked me to be the one to do it.” Finn sobbed into the heels of his hands. “I’ve hated myself every second, especially for not thinking to jump in front of Ultana when she was taking from Mari, like I did today. That’s how I got the idea, but it came too late for Mari. Oh God, forgive me. You’ve lost more than anyone should have to. I’m so sorry, luv.”

  That “luv” was both a balm and a bullet, but I was struggling to fathom what he was saying. “What—what are you telling me? You’re saying that Mari asked you to kill her? And you—” Stumbling over that word, I fought to finish. “And you did?”

  “No,” Mami Tulke gasped, pressing her palms together and lifting them to her lips like a prayer. She stumbled backward.

  I backed away from both of the boys who had betrayed me so deeply that I’d never be the same girl who gave away pieces of herself.

  A blast of blackened, scorched energy flew past me. Dun leaped onto Finn, pinning him to the ground. His aura blazed with rage, swirling around him like a hurricane. He raised his fists and pummeled Finn. Blow after blow landed on Finn’s body and face. Blood spurted from his nose. Darkened his split lips. Finn did nothing. And he could have. We all knew it. He closed his eyes and took the beating like it was rain falling upon him.

  Dun’s punches slowed, like he’d spun himself out, and a part of me was relieved. But when he fell forward and off Finn, I realized his aura had been attacked. Not fatally. Just enough to stop him.

  “Damn you, Finn!” I screamed, rushing to block Dun. This seemed a further betrayal after what he’d done. I would beat him unconscious myself. I raised my fist, but my own aura was attacked and I tumbled to the ground.

  “Not…me…” Finn groaned, breathless, bloody.

  “Enough!” a severe voice yelled from behind me. Ina Doyle smoothed her hand over her black hair, while shooting daggers at Dun and me. She cocked an eyebrow. “I won’t have it. I am a mother, above all.”

  Finn rolled to his side, clutching his ribs. He struggled to draw breath. “I’ll never stop—”

  “Shut up!” I sobbed. But he didn’t.

  “I’ll never stop being guilty, hating myself, feeling sorry. God, I’m so sorry. I’ll never stop wanting to be dead rather than be what I am. And until I am dead, Cora, I’ll never stop loving you.”

  For a few minutes, our cries floated on the morning air.

  “What will you do now?” Finn asked in a thick voice.

  I was too dazed to answer. All emotion, all feelings were sucked into a black hole somewhere inside of me—a place so deep and inaccessible that it felt like they would never rise up again. Utterly numb, I could only operate on the most base level, that of survival.

  “She will come to Chile with me,” Mami Tulke said with finality.

  “Shhh,” I said, standing and reaching for her hand. I needed someone’s hand or I was afraid I’d implode right there, next to my mother’s dead body over my dead father’s grave. “Clancy’s soul is on a string,” I said, parroting my mother’s words. “He might hear us.”

  Multiple looks drifted up and around as if we’d actually see the astral specter of Clancy Mulcarr floating nearby, eavesdropping, watching.

  “Mami Tulke, you’re the only family I have left. I know I’ll end up with you someday, if I’m lucky. I want you to take Giovanni and the—his—little girl with you. Keep them safe until I can join you.”

  “Until?” Giovanni asked. “Where do you think you’re going?”

  I ignored him and kept my eyes fixed on my grandmother. “Tell me why you took this key from the Vatican,” I pleaded, presenting the silver relic on my outstretched hand. “Please.”

  “Every generation of Scintilla speaks of us as the keys to heaven,” Mami Tulke said, her face bunching like old, mangled paper. “Who thinks they have exclusive ownership to the keys to heaven?” she asked. And when no one answered she spoke more forcefully. “The church!

  “It was a wild impulse to go, yes. Keys to heaven. But as I stared at Saint Peter with his pointing finger and his keys, I noticed that the hand was removable. I became obsessed with the idea that Saint Peter had something to hide.” Her eyes shone with pride as her chin tilted up. “I was right, mija.”

  “He may have been hiding a key, Grandma, but we don’t know to what. We don’t know why. If I’m ever going to stop this, I have to find out.”

  Ultana had said many things in the tomb, but she did confirm that Giovanni and I had been on the right track. Dante Alighieri knew the truth and had been trying to share it with the wor
ld. What the totality of that truth was, we still didn’t know. The thing Ultana said about being hunted as long as there was a God on the altar could’ve been a lie just like her immortality was. Either way, I was going to Italy. “Paradiso…” I murmured to myself.

  “You—you said Paradiso?” Finn asked, squinting one eye that was already swelling. “I have a—a thing to show you,” he said, being equally as careful not to say too much. “I found something about Dante at Ultana’s that you might want to see.”

  “Okay,” I said, discomfort mixing with curiosity.

  Giovanni approached me. “Why on earth, Cora?” He’d already surmised where I was headed, of course.

  “Dante, the key, Ultana’s warning…I believe the truth is there.”

  “The danger is there. I will go with you,” Giovanni said. “It’s truth I need to know, as well. You cannot go alone.” When I shot him a warning look, he lifted his proud chin and said, “Tell me no, and I’ll still trail you. I’ll be your shadow because it’s the right thing to do.”

  “Giovanni, you can’t save her life,” Finn said with effort. He then looked at me. “Let me go with you. Giovanni has had a geis put on him by Lorcan Lennon. He’s the bloke who attacked you, the one who was with me at the facility where you were being kept. And he’s Ultana’s son. Cora, you must believe what I say. If Giovanni saves your life,” Finn explained, looking from Giovanni to me, “he will die.”

  I gasped. Unbelievable.

  “These boys are right, you shouldn’t go alone,” Mami Tulke said.

  “I have to go.” I motioned to my mother’s body. “I can’t let this stand. And I’m going alone. For the survival of our kind, it’s best if we split up. None of you are coming.”

  “I don’t understand exactly what you hope to achieve,” Finn argued, struggling so hard to stand that his mother rushed to aid him. “Especially alone. To avenge your parents’ deaths? You’ll earn your own. Ultana could have been lying. Everything she said could have been lies.”

  “What if I could end this? I inferred from Ultana that Xepa was under the thumb of someone at the Vatican, and if that’s true, the church put my parents in the grave. How can I stand by and let them put the truth in the grave and bury all of us as if we never existed? Whoever is behind all of this is close, so close to eradicating us all, and they’re using the Arrazi to do it. I have to find out why.”

  “I’ll go,” Dun said. He was still sitting on the ground. His eyes were rimmed in red from crying. “I’ll go anywhere to help keep you safe. I’m not losing my other best friend,” he choked out a vow.

  “Cora, please.” The plea came from both Finn and Giovanni simultaneously. They cast sideways glances at each other as the morning sun crested over the tops of the trees and shone down on us.

  “Finn, you once said to me, ‘How can mankind evolve if we aren’t searchers of truth?’ I have to keep searching.” Finn looked away, stewing in his own words. I glanced at Giovanni. “I have to do this, have to keep moving forward. It’s the only way to fight for the truth and stay in the light.”

  I stared down at the key in my hand and intentionally eased out the memories it held: triangles, pyramids, the Star of David, Borromean rings, which reminded me of Michelangelo’s monogram, trefoils, the trinity, and three-headed gods… Along with all of the images, the triple spiral was there. The triple spiral…

  “I need to go back to Newgrange,” I said. A new idea sent fresh, urgent excitement coursing through me. “I need to go there right now.”

  Sixty-One

  Cora

  Everyone erupted into argument as I ran toward the car. I had to touch the ancient stone. The spirals would tell me what truths they stored—wouldn’t they?

  Shouts and pleas bounced off me as I reached for the door handle. Finn’s hand was suddenly over mine. I shot him a warning look that said I’d blacken his other eye if he tried to stop me, but he opened the car door for me with a yielding nod.

  I pleaded with Dun to stay with my grandmother and watch over her until we returned. No matter how helpful Finn’s family had been, I couldn’t leave her alone with Arrazi.

  Finn, Giovanni, and I jumped into Finn’s car. “You mind explaining,” Finn asked, pulling a tiny bit of skin from his split lip, “why you aim to go back toward the scene of your near-death? This is bloody insanity.”

  “Your charming Irish banter still needs work,” I said. “I have to touch the stone to access the memories.”

  “Your sortilege?” he asked.

  “Yes. There must be memories in the stones, and if there are,” I said, glancing at what I could see of Finn’s triple spiral tattoo, “they mean something to all of us. From the moment I dug up this key, I’ve been wearing clues around my neck. It wasn’t until today that I saw how they might fit together.”

  Arrazi worked for Xepa to find and kill the Scintilla, we’d confirmed that. But our focus on Ultana’s secret society only served to deviate us from the larger truth—she worked for someone else. Xepa wasn’t the top of the pyramid. From that moment until my last breath, I’d scrabble and climb and fight to find out who or what was at the top.

  Giovanni squeezed my shoulder. “We must be quick about this, Cora. We have no way of knowing how long the sedative will last. Surely Clancy and those men will find a way to get out of the tomb, even with the lock on the door.”

  “I won’t need much time.”

  “I don’t like this,” Finn said.

  I felt the tumbling rocks of nerves in my stomach, but I wouldn’t be stopped. Fear was a wall to plow through on the way to where I wanted to go. Once the idea about the triple spiral struck me, I couldn’t let it go. If I never set foot on Irish soil again, I’d always wonder about the truth of the ancient symbol. If my power could unlock that truth, I had to try.

  I steeled myself for what lay ahead. Regular people were dying in greater numbers, and genocide was the fate for anyone who just happened to be born a Scintilla—like the crime was just in existing. A shift was taking place on Earth, and with the natural disasters, it seemed like it was self-destructing along with everyone aboard. Would our cries ripple into the universe? Amid the raging beauty of the world and some of the people in it, it often felt treacherous, fragile, chaotic, and dark. Lies were the black soil being heaped over all of us. I wanted to believe in the raging beauty again. It made my heart ache before the fire of resolve pumped through it. I guess I was fighting as much for me as for everyone else.

  If it was my last act, I vowed to be the light that illuminated the truth.

  Acknowledgments

  With all of my heart, I thank Sydney and Cooper and my friends who’ve been so understanding about the passion, time, and commitment I give to my work. Without your support and love, this wouldn’t be as meaningful. Hazel, I owe you a million cups of cocoa.

  I am eternally grateful (and still pinching myself) for the continued opportunity to see a dream realized. Thank you, Michael Bourret. Thank you to the Entangled team who work so hard to magically transform my words into real-live books! To my editor Karen Grove, I’m raising my glass to our continued partnership. Thank you for believing so strongly in my stories.

  Thanks to Stacy Abrams, Kate Fall, and Nicole Steinhaus for their additional editorial guidance and shrewd eyes on both Scintillate and Deviate. To Pamela Sinclair and Kelly York for the beautiful cover designs. Heather Riccio, you’re a publicity wiz and a great advocate. Thank you for the amazing behind-the-scenes support.

  To actress Caitlin Rose Mahoney, for being the living embodiment of the sweetness and fire that is Cora Sandoval. To Sam Deas for being a perfect, swoon-worthy Finn. And to Brett Staal for bringing Giovanni to life. So much gratitude to the entire cast and crew of the Scintillate trailer. What an amazing thing you all made together. Blew my mind!

  Thanks to Jason Roer (www.cohortsandconspirators.com) for your creative vision and the know-how to make the best book trailer ever! I also thank you for your cheerleading and countless
hours of putting up with my revolving door of doubts, elations, worries, and ideas. You’ve been one of life’s surprising gifts.

  I’m indebted to my dear friends who critique and beta read for me. I sincerely appreciate the gift of your time and expertise.

  Thank you to my YASI sisterhood (www.yaseriesinsiders.com) and to Sophie Riggsby and Katie Bartow (Page Turners Blog and Mundie Moms) for your part in making this the best debut year an author could have!

  The Sandoval family was such an important part of my young-adult life that I had to name a character in your honor. Thank you.

  Wee one = Thea

  Readers! The biggest tackle-hug thanks for your kind words and enthusiasm, and for making my dream come true—that my story would land in the hands of people who would “get it” and enjoy it. This past year of school visits, reviews, messages, bookstore readings, and signings has been a gift and a constant reminder of why this is one of the best jobs in the universe. Thank you!

  Keep reading for a sneek peak of

  Illuminate

  Book 3—The Light Key Trilogy

  by Tracy Clark

  But already my desire and my will were being turned like a wheel, all at one speed, by the Love which moves the sun and the other stars.

  —Dante / Paradiso / canto XXXIII

  One

  Cora

  The keys to heaven.

  That phrase scratched a deep groove in my brain. I fingered the silver key pressing against my chest as Finn drove Giovanni and me to Brú na Bóinne—Newgrange, in Yankee speak. The key was much weightier since I found out it had been stolen by my grandmother from a statue of St. Peter at the Vatican. What was the connection between the key in my hand and the fact that it came from the hand of a saint at one of the most hallowed religious sites in the world? My key couldn’t be a literal key to heaven, could it? Mom’s journal said that the Scintilla were the keys to heaven. How could either of those things be true?