"I'm not fiddling."
"You're fiddling. Just sit still."
"I am sitting still."
"No, you're not."
Kade ignored their usual bickering, relieved when they pulled into a parking space at the Pearl Street Mall. The tuxedo place was joined to the dress store, so half of the display window showed tailored suits and ties, while the other half featured pink taffeta and gold sequins. Most of the dresses reminded Kade of a nineteen eighties prom gone south. The door to the dress shop chimed as they entered and like lightning, Giselle bolted toward the racks as if Lindsey and Kade were planning to tackle her over one of the ugly gowns. Kade wondered if Giselle was one of those people who camped out in front of a Best Buy or a Target the night before Black Friday. Probably.
All of the dresses were hung according to color. From baby pink, to cobalt blue, to black. Kade fiddled with a few. Took them off the rack and hung them up again. It was hard to tell what they really looked like on the hangers.
"Can I help you find anything today?" An older woman asked, an expectant smile on her face.
"Um...I don't really know what I like."
The woman's gaze tracked up and down Kade's body. "Were you thinking short? Long? You're not very tall.” Nodding her head as if she'd made a decision, she said, "Definitely something short." She began taking dresses off the racks and handing them over. Kade wondered where her friends had taken off to, while she was being weighted down in a flurry of hangers and fabric.
"There." The sales woman put her hands on her hips. "That'll be enough for the first round."
First round?
"Dressing rooms are in the back." She pointed.
Kade nodded a thank you and ambled toward the back of the store, focused on not dropping the stack in her arms, or tripping and landing on her face.
"So, what then? You're saying Cole's making a move?"
At the mention of Cole's name, Kade's steps slowed.
"I'm just saying I don't trust him."
Jake?
Kade stopped behind one of the racks where the women's dresses ended, and the men's tuxedos began.
"Who does?" The other voice scoffed. "But if he's moving in on your territory, we need to do something about it."
"Just keep an eye out. I don't want the whole Ward involved. Not to mention that I have no idea if Kade even likes him," Jake said.
Oh, god.
"I mean, she fell down the damn stairs," he went on. "Who does that? I'd have caught Tiffany if she was going headfirst toward concrete, too. Not that she would. I'm probably just overreacting."
"Let's hope. I don't want a repeat of Saturday night. Your face still looks like hell."
"Thanks, asshole."
Jake's friend, who Kade guessed was Alex, by the familiar sound of his voice, laughed. "Just saying. With Kyle out of commission, I'm not sure we could take Cole and Danny if it came down to it."
Kyle's out of commission? Still? It explained why Kade hadn't seen him at school. She wondered if Cole had gotten a hold of him again.
"Really?" Jake snapped. "You're always underestimating me."
"Cole had you on Saturday night." Alex's tone was grave. "Lucky it was only your face. And your hand."
"Whatever." Jake's voice faded across the store. "Have you looked at your neck lately?"
"Did you get lost, dear?" The sales lady was back. "Well, no wonder. You can't even see over all these dresses, can you?" She took a few off the stack clutched in Kade's arms. "Did I pile them this high?" Kade gave a forced smile, too stunned to say anything. The clerk probably thought she was a mute. She hadn't said more than three words to her since she walked in the store.
"I believe your friends are already in the back."
"Thank you."
"Anytime, dear. This is what I do." Her high heels scuffed against the carpet.
Giselle was modeling a floor length gown in pale blue as they approached the dressing rooms. Lindsey sat sulking in the corner, her head resting against her arm as if she was falling asleep.
"Where have you been?" Giselle put her hands on her hips.
"You ran off and ditched me." Kade countered. "So I got some help." She motioned toward the lady removing all the dresses from her crushed arms.
"Oooh. I like that one." Giselle pointed to the last dress hanging off Kade's thumb. "That's the one. You can hang all the other ones back up."
The dress was deep blue and shimmered slightly in the light.
"Go. Go. Try it on."
Kade stood inside the small dressing room. Whatever Jake and Alex were talking about, she didn't like the sound of. Not when her name was attached to it.
And what the hell is the Ward? She'd heard Cole use that word, too, the day he'd half strangled Kyle in the parking lot.
"Hurry up." Giselle's pale blue heels peeked underneath the dressing room door.
With a groan, Kade shoved the dress on and slumped out the door with side zipper undone. "I'm not good at this kind of stuff."
"That's why you have me." Giselle zipped her up. "That's the one."
Kade turned, facing the wall of full length mirrors.
The dress came halfway down her thighs, shorter than any dress she'd ever worn, but not sleazy. It fit her shape, not tight, but comfortable, and had little cap sleeves that left her shoulders exposed, and a low neckline. She looked like someone she didn't know. A good someone.
"Told you." Giselle grinned.
The sales woman handed Kade a pair of silver heels. "Try these."
She slipped them on, reluctantly, knowing she'd probably fall on her face with the first step.
Giselle squealed. "Perfect. Jake is going to fall to his knees when he sees you."
Kade let out a breath. She wasn't interested in having Jake fall to his knees. She wanted to know what he meant by territory, and more importantly, what she had to do with it.
***
With their dresses locked in Lindsey's car, the three of them roamed the outdoor mall, and ended up at The Brew. Yelling what she wanted over her shoulder, Giselle made a beeline toward an empty table near the window.
"We need to figure out who's driving to the dance." Lindsey stirred sugar into her coffee at the counter.
"Are we all riding together?" Kade asked, unsure they'd made that plan since Lindsey and Giselle were going together rather than with a date.
"We don't have to." She shrugged. "I just thought your dad expected us to."
Kade followed her to their table, and Giselle snatched the Frappuccino away from Lindsey's hand like it was the One Ring and she was Gollum. Lindsey flexed her fingers as if checking she had all five fingers on her right hand.
Kade's brow lifted. "Like coffee, G?"
"She looovvvesss coffee. It's her obsession." Lindsey opened the lid to her cup and poured more sugar in.
"Besides clothes." Giselle grinned.
"So, the car thing?" Lindsey added even more sugar.
"Whatever is fine with me." Kade shrugged. "My dad didn't specify rules on rides."
A light dusting of snow fluttered by the window, changing the afternoon gray skies to white. Kade hoped the odd influx of cold in August would fade, but winter seemed insistent on staying. She doubted her new dress would look as good under a head to toe wool coat and thigh-high boots.
A blue Mustang stopped at the red light in front of the coffee place.
Jake.
Prickles flitted across Kade's shoulders. The car rolled away, and she focused her attention on the cup in her hands, the uncomfortable shimmy skirting up her spine.
"Space Kadet?" Giselle snapped her fingers.
Kade batted them away. "What are you doing?"
"No, what are you doing? Were those just puppy dog eyes I saw?"
"Sorry?"
"Your longing stare after Jake's car?" Giselle lifted a brow, and Lindsey smirked, both of them eyeing her.
"I was not."
"Better figure out what you want, Kadence, because I
can promise you Jake knows what he wants." Giselle took another pull from her straw.
Kade stared at the ceiling, not responding. It was easier if Giselle believed Kade liked Jake. It wasn't puppy dog eyes she'd had. Something was wrong. She could feel it.
***
The evening consisted of Kade trying her dress on with the silver heels, which she'd also bought, walking around her bedroom, up and down the stairs, while gripping the handrail, without falling on her face. If she could just work out the dancing thing, she'd be good. Giselle had only rolled her eyes five times trying to teach her. Kade figured that was a good percentage rate for the first hour.
"It's not that hard. You move your feet and sway." Giselle demonstrated.
The swaying part Kade could do, it was moving her feet with heels on and swaying at the same time that threw her off. Her ankles didn't want to stay still. "It's late, and I'm tired," Kade complained.
"It's six-thirty. Six-thirty isn't late. Thank god Jake knows how to dance," Giselle mumbled. "Otherwise you'd be dead in the water."
"He does?" Kade's brow cocked up. "And it's not like I can't dance, G. I danced at Crystalline. It's the slow part I haven't done before." She wasn't dead in the water.
"Kay, fine, you danced at a club. Yay. And yes, Jake knows how to slow dance. I danced with him our sophomore year."
"Why?"
Giselle shrugged. "We dated for like two weeks."
Kade's jaw hit the floor. "Sorry?"
"Oh, stop. We were fifteen, and we never even liked each other. It was over before it started." She waved a hand. "Now, try again."
"I can't go to the dance with someone you used to date—someone you still think is hot."
"Seriously? It was forever ago. No one cares. Just stop. I shouldn't have even said anything. And Jake's hot. So? There are a lot of hot guys at school. Doesn't mean I like any of them. Cole's hot, but I'm not interested in him, either."
Kade wanted to ask who Giselle was interested in, but she kept her mouth shut.
"I didn't like like him." Giselle's eyes widened. "Don't read more into it than there is."
"It's fine. Whatever." She held her arms out. "Make me twirl around or whatever it is you want me to do."
Giselle took Kade's hands in hers again like they were about to waltz across the living room. "You know what this confirms, though, right?" She slid her feet back and forth, and Kade tried to mimic the movement, staring at the ground.
"What?"
"That you do like him."
Kade raised her head.
Giselle grinned. "You like them both."
Kade looked back down at her feet.
***
The Sheol gate opened onto pitch darkness. Cole slumped on hands and knees, falling on his side in disabling pain. His right arm had gone completely numb and hung limp at his side. Shrieks and screams echoed around him. Even through his inability to move, he knew where he was. He remembered the feel of it, the resonance of the screams. He'd been trapped here before. When he was eight years old.
The Infernal Plane.
"Get up," a rough voice said. Cole's weight shifted and he was lifted to his feet, but his balance wavered and he fell back down, his head smacking the ground. "Not the strongest now, are you? No Warden to save you, either." Meaty hands grasped his shoulders and hurled him against the wall. Dark, sunken eyes swam before Cole's face. "And I thought a red corona couldn't be defeated."
"Kyle." Cole's breath was labored, all of his weight leaning against a roughly hewn wall. His hands ran across it at his back, and he reached for the inside of his sleeves.
"Don't bother. Your telums aren't on you."
Cole blinked, again and again. The Infernal Plane was a series of caves, made of a substance similar to hardened volcanic ash. Shiny black walls as hard as concrete. Too smooth to scale, he remembered from trying to climb out as a boy. “Once a person enters the Infernal Plane,” his father had told him, “the only way out, is up.”
"You said I wouldn't be able to track you." Kyle grinned, a wide, ruthless smile. "So, I lured you instead. I'm not as stupid as you think."
"You're not?" Cole's voice strained. Kyle reared back and struck him across the face. Blood spewed from Cole's mouth and he crashed to the ground.
"Smart ass. As bad as Kadence. She deserved to be slapped, too."
Cole pushed onto hands and knees, spitting blood. Even on his knees, he had a hard time staying upright. The shock he'd received when he entered the Sheol gate bit painfully, as though he was at the wrong end of a live electric wire. But he'd felt worse. Much, much worse.
"So this is your way of getting even? Rerouting a Leygate?" Cole rested against the wall, managing to sit down. "You went to an awful lot of trouble just for me." He heaved a breath.
Kyle mumbled and lumbered away. A dim light hung from the ceiling, and a small underground room came into view.
"You're going to have to speak in coherent, complete sentences if you expect me to understand what you're saying." Cole rested his arms on his knees with another deep exhale, unable to catch his breath.
"You might want to keep that attitude in check, smart boy, before I knock all your teeth loose.” Kyle sat down at a square table, and Cole noticed his telums resting on top of it.
“Praemonitus pramunitus.” Forewarned is forearmed. It took every ounce of control Cole had to stay calm.
“Whatever, smart boy.”
Cole’s jaw tightened, but he didn't rise to the bait. "So, is this where the interrogation part of you capturing me starts?" He grinned at Kyle's formal posture in the plastic chair. "Because I have certain rights. I'm sure you've seen how it works on T.V. The cop, that would be you in this scenario, questions the criminal, me." He flexed his tingling hands. "And they get into some sort of yelling match about guilty versus not guilty. We'll get to that part, I'm sure." Kyle's eyebrows crinkled between his wide set eyes, and Cole went on. "Not that it matters, really, because everyone knows the guy is guilty anyway so why argue it?"
"I think the electric shock went straight to your head. Just sit there and don't move. Not like you'll be able to go anywhere with as many volts as I tagged you with." Kyle leaned back in his chair, lifting the front legs off the floor. "It could take a while for Dracon to track Kade down. I think she was going dress shopping." He smirked.
Cole couldn't stop the growl that hit the back of his throat. "Dracon?"
"Thought that might shut your smart mouth up."
"Or loosen it. It all depends. I didn't realize you'd joined up with the enemy." Cole tried to stay calm, extending his legs across the floor. "But, hey, let's be honest, anyone could have pegged you for a traitor."
Kyle stood, the quick action knocking his chair back. "I'm no traitor."
"Difference of opinion. We can agree to disagree." He flexed his hands again, the feeling in his right arm returning. "Did you ever hear the story of how I learned to shut down blacked gates?"
Kyle tilted his head to the side. "There's something wrong with you."
"It's kind of legendary, really. The story," Cole continued. "All the newcomers in the Brotherhood ask me about it." He crossed his ankles. "See, when I was little, my dad taught me how to shut down the negative energy in blacked gates by making me reroute lightning strikes every time a storm passed over our house."
Kyle's brow crunched like he was confused—and possibly alarmed. He was probably wondering if Cole really was off.
"It took forever for my tolerance to strengthen so I could wield that kind of power, but I got good at it eventually. I don't know if you know this or not, but a lightning strike is five times hotter than the surface of the sun, and even though Primordials are hard wired to harness electromagnetic energy, we can still go into overload and be killed by electrocution." Cole leaned forward, sitting without support. "But you probably do know that or you wouldn't have tried to electrocute me." He flexed his right hand. "Now, though, because of my training, it takes a lot of voltage to keep me
immobilized for very long. You never heard that story?"
Kyle stared like Cole was certifiably insane. "Everyone says your dad was crazy, so…” He grabbed the chair off the floor and sat back down.
"Yeah." Cole's eyes darkened. "They do say that." He rolled his neck, pulling his knees to chest. "What was it you were saying about Kade again?"
"Nothing you need to worry about. She's not one of your own."
Cole's teeth ground audibly.
Kyle laughed. "I knew there was something going on between you two. Jake doesn't want to believe it, but I knew."
"Jake's not so bright. It isn't his fault." Cole shrugged. "It's in the genes."
"So, you admit it? And you called me a traitor?" He rolled his eyes.
"I'm not the one aiding and abetting the Devil's Children."
"I can't aid and abet something that I am."
Cole was the one scrunching his brow that time. "Something that you are?"
"You Primordial aren't as smart as you think. The Patriarchae has found the Araneum. So, while all you lemmings are running around trying to block up gates and save the planet from natural disasters, I'll be safe and sound within the heart of the web."
"Damn, Kyle, I never knew you were as delusional as you are stupid." Cole flexed his hands again. "Hanging with Nefarius, too? I think I remember those exact same words spilling from the mouth of the one I killed in the alley outside Crystalline."
"You are all already dead," Kyle said with eerie calm. "The new girl you cherish, too." Kyle's eyes closed, and a Shadow sat in the chair in front of Cole. It grinned, silver teeth shining, milky eyes, narrowed. "Like I said, I can't aid and abet something that I am. And I'm like a chameleon when I choose to be."
Cole was on his feet so fast, Kyle would never have been able to track his movement. Red light struck Kyle’s Shadow form, but he'd already broken himself apart, spreading across the ceiling in wisps before regrouping to solid form on the other side of the room. Cole ran for the table, grabbed one of his telums, threw it, and missed. The Shadow laughed and split itself in two, shooting toward the Sheol gate opening with a whistling sound. "Your strength has already been compromised. Good to know.”
"You're running?” Cole shouted. “You sorry—" Cole reached for his second weapon, threw it, and missed again. Another shot of red light blasted toward the Shadow and ricocheted off the walls. "Fight, dammit! You dragged me down here, coward, fight!”
CRYSTALLUM (The Primordial Principles Book 1) Page 19
