Harbinger

by Sara Etienne

in an ocean of blood Death will be Autumn’s

  twin and its mercy will cradle the Earth

  After today, I understood only the tiniest part of the prophecy. Kel was the Harbinger, and the Harbinger was bringing Death. But how? As unnerving as the prophecies were, they didn’t change the fact that Kel was just a sixteen-year-old boy. Unless—

  I thought about the last vision I’d had, Kel watching us dig through the dirt. What had he said?

  Nothing. Every night they dig and still they find nothing.

  What did Kel expect us to find? Was he using us to uncover some sort of device? And the iron talisman we found with the diary . . . Maybe it was some sort of key?

  Why not? It made about as much sense as Nami’s vampires or Zach’s ninjas. The only thing I knew for certain was that something bad was happening and I had to stop it. I sighed and gathered up the diary, pen, and cards. Hoping things would be clearer tomorrow.

  The Vision. The Lovers. The Ritual.

  The Circle. The Harbinger. The Path.

  The Moon. The Sun. Death.

  Turning to replace them on the window ledge, I studied the only card that was upside down. The Lovers. A movement on the ground caught my eye. From the shadows of the courtyard, Kel watched my window.

  Two quarrel.

  I dropped to the floor, crouching out of sight. If Kel was the Harbinger, then I was . . . My face flared red as I remembered Kel’s eyes singeing into mine. The feel of his lips and the taste of something so familiar.

  I crushed the card in my fist. But sitting there tucked under the window, my back against the wall, I could still feel the Harbinger out there. Pulling me to him. Waiting to stalk me through the night.

  Abandoning the diary and cards, I crawled across the floor, climbed into bed, and pulled the covers over my head. I couldn’t deal with this. I understood M. H.’s words in her diary, when she described the madness creeping up on her. Then I thought about her chasing cards across the beach, laughing as she escaped the boring picnic. Before she’d found the talisman, before she’d seen any visions.

  What was my “before” like?

  My fingers drew the invisible scene against the rough sheets. M. H. standing on the cliff that October day. She looked out over the sea toward the beautiful island, and the trees shone with the same reds and oranges that I must have seen during my childhood.

  Then I drew myself, standing next to her, watching the waves lap against the shore. And I waited for the long night to be over.

  25

  MY HANDS DUG DEEP into the soil. Above me, the bright moon was being devoured by shadow.

  Hurry. Hurry.

  Drums throbbed, accompanying the rising tide’s chorus. A flute wove its voice into the song.

  The tide is high. The moon is full. It is time. Hurry.

  I dragged a body, a girl about my age, through the dirt. As I rolled her into the deep hole I’d made, her head lolled horribly. Not fully connected to her body. Then I climbed down into the pit after her.

  Something cold and hard weighed down my hand. I opened my fist to reveal a polished metal figurine, an arrow engraved on its face. Lifting my head, I joined the song. A stranger’s voice keened through the night air, chanting strange words.

  Then I bent over the girl and placed the tiny statue on her unmoving chest. The girl’s pale face was empty, drained of life, but the talisman was heavy with it. In the fading light of the moon, the metal gleamed with power.

  Someone’s thought floated through my head.

  It had to be done.

  I rested the girl’s hand on the iron talisman. The skin on my fingers tingled and crackled, every cell alert to the memories and vitality dormant there. A whole life trapped inside that metal. Just waiting for a new body.

  Another thought swam into my mind. Waiting for the Harbinger.

  I pulled a long stone dagger from my belt. The blade was already stained with blood, and the same arrow mark was carved into the shaft. With a swift striking motion, I sliced a red gash across my palm. I made a fist and blood gushed, mixing with the dirt.

  Then I picked up a heavy leather bag and flung a cloud of red powder over the body. A sharp, metallic smell filled the air as the red dust settled over the skin of the dead girl, masking her perfect face, her hands, the talisman.

  I pulled another body into the hole and another. And another. All of them teenagers. All with their throats slashed open.

  Making a circle of corpses, I repeated the ritual. Placing the glittering talisman. Reopening the cut on my hand. Pouring the powder over each corpse.

  Finally, I reached the sixth and final body. A boy. A look of surprise on his handsome face.

  I knelt next to him in the red earth of the pit, glad to be at the end of this gruesome task. Reaching out, I placed the last gleaming talisman on his chest and closed his hand around it.

  The boy’s eyes flew open. Dark eyes, crystallized with green. Kel’s eyes. Kel’s face.

  Then the green was snuffed out and it was the dead boy again. Then Kel. He grabbed my hand and pulled me to him. His face flickering between the stranger’s and his own. His voice coming out in a low rasp. “It’s too late.”

  Caught somewhere between nightmare and reality, I screamed. Fighting to get free.

  And the world flickered around me too. The talisman in Kel’s hand was gleaming one second and rusty the next. His eyes black, then green, then black again. The clouds appeared and disappeared in the sky. Two images overlapping, fighting with each other.

  It’s a dream. Dizzy, I closed my eyes. Trying to catch my breath as the night air moved heavily in and out of my lungs, saturated with humidity.

  Thunder growled in the distance and there was that smell. Ginger and musk.

  My eyes snapped open again. The world had stabilized and Kel was there in front of me. But different. Something of the dead boy was still in Kel’s face, still there in the dark of Kel’s eyes. And clutched in his hand was a rusty talisman.

  I didn’t know what this was, but it was no dream.

  “Faye, you are fulfilling the prophecy.” His voice was different too, infused with bitterness.

  “Get away from me!” I scrambled back, trying to put distance between him and me. Lightning struck, illuminating a girl splayed in the dirt inches from me. Despite the red smudges on her face I recognized the stubborn chin, the sharp nose, the hennaed hair. Maya.

  “No!” A sob squeezed my throat and I rushed to her, sprawling next to her in the dirt. I grabbed Maya’s limp hand, sending another rusty talisman skittering into the mud. A red smear sliced across her throat.

  The sky exploded again and I saw them all there. Arranged in a grotesque circle like the figures drawn on my floor. Maya, Damion, Zach, Nami. And Rita.

  “What have you done?” I could barely force out the words as I glared up at Kel.

  “Me? Look at yourself.” His voice was dazed. His eyes suddenly green again. “Look in your hand.”

  I clutched a stone dagger, stained with red. I remembered the tug of its blade across my palm. And the truth of the unmoving bodies soaked into my consciousness.

  A tremor shook my body and it was echoed by another low groan of thunder. “What did you make me do?”

  “Isn’t this what you wanted?” His now black eyes looked up, out of the mass grave, and I followed his gaze to the Screamers. They looked down at us with unseeing eyes. Their faces twisted in horror.

  Dropping the dagger, I tried to get away, but he was already on me. Grabbing my arm. Backing me against the side of the hole. Sending crimson earth cascading down on us.

  I tried not to think of Kel’s body pressing against mine. I concentrated on the feeling of the high dirt wall, solid behind my back. Letting the cool earth steady me.

  Kel’s hands gripped mine, so much stronger than before. In his eyes, through his skin, I felt only power. His sickness had been obliterated.

  “Please, Kel . . . why are you doing this?”

  “I’m no
t! I didn’t do this!” Kel screamed at me. Lightning flashed again and I saw the green flickering in and out of his eyes. Doubt sketching itself across his face. Then, as if begging for it to be true, he said, “I couldn’t have.”

  “Then let me go.” My voice rose, thunder rolling across my words.

  “I can’t.” Confusion trembled through Kel’s voice. He looked down at his own hand, locked around my arm, like he didn’t even recognize it.

  Sweat trickled down my forehead, and through my fear, I tried to think. Hadn’t Kel told me that we’d been sleepwalking? Hadn’t he told me that he hadn’t been taking Holbrook’s knockout pills? Hadn’t I even seen him in that vision, standing at the edge of this pit, watching us dig?

  “‘Every night they dig and still they find nothing.’ Isn’t that what you said?” I was trying to buy time. To find a way to escape from him. “But we found something tonight, didn’t we? We found the talismans?”

  Kel nodded slowly, like he was trying to remember. But he still gripped my arm.

  “Then you made me kill them.” My voice cracked, but I had to hold it together. I had to make it out of this alive.

  “No!”

  “Then talk to me, Kel. Make me understand—”

  A weak groan interrupted me. Maya blinked up at us and her eyes were different too. Her face a mask of confusion.

  Kel turned toward her, loosening his grip. And I sprang away from him, clawing up the side of the pit. Kicking foot holes in the loose dirt, I flung one arm over the top of the hole.

  “Wait!” Kel grabbed my foot. “We have to help them. Please, Faye. I need you!”

  I looked back, drawn in by the hint of green barely guttering in his eyes. By the groans of my friends, emerging from their trance. Then I thought about how Maya’s eyes had looked strange. Just like Kel’s.

  I clung to the grass and roots at the top for leverage, kicking back hard. Kel shouted with pain, my muddy foot slipping out of his grasp. The momentum carried me the rest of the way up and out of the grave.

  I was on my feet again, getting my bearings. Thunder crashed, and a cool drop of water hit my face. Then another and another. This time the water was real, and I welcomed it. Lightning lit up the world, and I tried to orient myself in the midst of the hideous, agonized faces of the Screamers.

  Only now did I see the gashes cut in the statues’ throats. The coppery water stains shining through the black patina like tears. The pedestals decorated with the incessant arrow marking.

  And in the same instant, I remembered M. H.’s final diary entry. And there are obstacles I must clear away before I give in to this insanity that is creeping upon me. I must carve the mark upon this world. So much to do before I can follow The Path.

  M. H. had left these six statues for me, one more sign of what was to come. One more warning.

  Only one person can stop Death’s approach.

  I looked behind me as lightning forked through the sky and saw Kel climbing out after me.

  Behind him, another hand thrust itself out of the hole. Then a head. Maya.

  Then there were more arms. Reaching. More smeared faces emerging from the deep pit. Crawling, dazed, out of the earth.

  I took off running.

  The sky opened up, and I could barely see. But that meant Kel and the others couldn’t either. I flew down the hill, weaving in and out of trees, my bare feet sliding across the wet leaves. Air tore in and out of my lungs, tasting like wet earth and green things.

  My feet took me toward the dorms without consulting my brain. I was too stunned to think of anywhere else.

  Checking over my shoulder, I saw Kel in the light of the storm, just twenty feet away. Thunder rumbled, and I remembered the drums in my vision. Hurry. Hurry.

  I burst through the woods and out onto the long, dark driveway that led to the road. The open sky pelted me with hail, stinging my wet skin. I sprinted across the gravel and back into the cover of the forest.

  Kel’s voice carried over the noise of the storm. “Faye! Wait!”

  The lights of the dorms were just up ahead. Putting on a burst of speed, my legs strained to reach the protection of its walls. I threw myself through the beam of floodlights and crouched, gasping, into the shadows.

  The vague outlines of two Takers stood huddled by the front door. The floodlights barely made a dent in the downpour, so I hoped my dash would go unnoticed. I raced through the shadows, finally reaching the safety of the ladder. The sliding part was already down, the padlock hooked over one of the rungs. I launched myself up the steps just as Kel hurtled through the spotlights toward me.

  Hurry. Hurry.

  Hail pelting my back, I climbed. Fighting to get a firm grip on the rungs. I dried my palms on my jumpsuit, but it was soaked too. Kel reached the ladder at the same time I reached the main section. I grabbed the bottom part and hauled it up.

  But Kel jumped after it. My arm was nearly ripped out of its socket when his weight hit the ladder, dragging it back down a couple of feet. But I held on.

  In a flash of lightning our eyes met. The storm. The nightmare. It all disappeared, and it was just Kel. I wanted to reach down to him. Kiss him again.

  Then he lunged for me, snatching at my hand. Jerking back, I yanked up hard on the ladder and Kel, eyes wide, slipped off the wet rungs and dropped down into the darkness. The bottom part of the ladder flew up, slamming my fingers in the locking mechanism.

  I shoved my fingers into my mouth to stop the scream. With my good hand, I grabbed the padlock. I’d forgotten it was broken, the metal warped and melted. I just hoped Kel couldn’t reach it. One-armed, I climbed through the blackness. Finally, my hand touched the lip of the ledge. Relief rushed through me as I pulled myself onto the little shelf. But it was short lived.

  The next streak of lightning illuminated Kel’s contorted face, still watching me from the ground. I pushed the window up, tumbled inside, and for the first time since I’d gotten here wished for more locks.

  The adrenaline seeped away, leaving me shaking and exhausted. I stripped off the wet jumpsuit and wrapped a thin blanket around myself. Before my body collapsed under me, I checked the door, making sure it was still locked. The knob didn’t budge, but then again, it was locked from the outside. My blood pounded in time with the rain. Hurry. Hurry. I slid down the door, pressing my weight against it. Hoping that would be enough.

  On the other side of the room, Maya’s bed was empty. The covers shoved back. I sat shivering in a puddle on the floor, trying to understand what’d happened out there in the storm. It was just like what had happened in dreams M. H. had described. The same kind of talisman she’d found.

  The diary, the pen, and the tarot cards were spread across the floor where I’d left them. I risked leaving my post at the door, scrambling to gather them up and carrying them back with me. Bracing my back against the door again.

  I put the Past cards together one more time. The Vision. The upside-down Lovers. The Ritual with its six swords. And the scene came back to me. The dagger in my hand. The six bodies. Shuddering, I turned the cards over, rereading their words. Searching for answers.

  Stronger than the others the Harbinger

  peers far into the Future There men

  will feast off of the Earth like maggots There The

  Circle will fail the Family Two quarrel and the

  Harbinger alone slaughters the

  lambs Forging a new Path and journeying

  the sea of time To finish what has begun

  Is that what Kel’s doing? Completing some horrific ritual that’d been started ages ago? Hadn’t Rita said something about the Past being unfinished? She had been there tonight, lying in that circle of bodies. I didn’t know who she was, but I doubted that she was just one of Holbrook’s finest.

  Footsteps tiptoed down the hall, growing louder. Closer. The door shook behind my back as the lock clicked and the knob twisted. I braced myself against the linoleum, thinking of dense, immovable things. Boulders. Trees.
Mountains.

  Terror sounded in my ears as the door pushed against my back. Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh. I gripped the metal door frame, concentrating on anchoring myself to the floor. My legs grew heavy and my back strong as I managed to hold the door shut.

  “Faye.” Maya’s voice whispered through the wood. “Please.”

  So she really was alive. I looked at one of my stained hands. There was a red line of mud smeared across my palm, but I wasn’t cut. Maybe I’d seen the same red mud slashed across her throat, instead of blood. My chest loosened a notch, but should I really have felt relieved? Should I let her in?

  She sounded scared and lost. Exactly like I felt. At least we could figure it out together. I eased away from the door.

  Then I heard a low voice whispering out in the hall. Was Maya helping Kel get to me? I pushed my body back against the door. I didn’t dare trust any of them.

  My teeth chattered and I cinched the blanket tight around my shoulders. The temperature had dropped fast with the raging storm, and my skin was damp and clammy. I stayed there until I heard the footsteps receding down the hall. Until dawn eased itself through the window. Until the lights in the dorm switched on.

  I tried to sleep, but I kept seeing it. The gray faces. The talisman. My Family crawling out of the grave.

  And Kel. The green fading out of his eyes. The rusty talisman in his hand.

  Kel is the Harbinger.

  The refrain repeated over and over in my head. And I was supposed to stop him. Before he really did kill us all.

  26

  I WAITED AS LONG as I could before I went out to the showers. I stalled, double-checking myself in the mirror. I looked like hell, but at least my jumpsuit had dried. Scraping a fleck of mud off my face, I headed out. Before the Takers came in after me.

  Nami and Maya were already there at the front of the line. Both of their heads swiveled toward me when I walked down the hallway, as if they could sense me coming.

  As I looked closer at Maya, it was as if a stranger stared out of her eyes. No, not a stranger. But not the Maya I was used to. All the distrust had been swallowed up by a growing surge of power. A storm of memories churned inside her, new ones mixing with old. But I couldn’t read any of them clearly. One phrase emerged from the chaos: The Circle.