Marked

by T. L. McDonald

  “Yeah, we waited for you out in the parking lot and when you didn’t show we came looking for you. What happened in here anyway?” He reaches behind me to close my locker. In a panic I jump in front of him before he can.

  “I’ll get this one. Why don’t you start on those ones over there across the hall?” He knows I’m hiding something and therefore won’t budge. “It’s nothing. Really. I’ll get this side and you get that side.”

  Gripping my shoulders, he moves me out of the way where he then closes my locker, reading the now horribly smeared word. Anger flickers in his eyes. “Who did this? Was it Kat? Does it have something to do with the fight you guys are in?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe. It could have been her or…” I don’t want to say.

  “Or who?”

  “Amber,” I say reluctantly.

  “Amber? Why would Amber…?” He trails off, his eyes full of realization. “Because of me. I never should have flirted with her and let her think that something could happen between us. I’m sorry Hanna. This is my fault.”

  “It’s not your fault. You didn’t put the bottle of nail polish in her hand. Besides, it might have been Kat that did it anyway. She’s really mad at me right now.”

  “What did you guys fight about anyway? You never did tell me.”

  “Just…girl stuff,” I say vaguely because I don’t want him to know that part of the fight had to do with him. “It was stupid and if she’d give me half a second to explain, I might be able to fix it.”

  “Want me to say something to her?”

  “No. This is something I need to take care of myself. But thank you.” Looking down the hall I see that Will and Zoe already have half of the lockers closed. “We should help them.”

  ***

  The church looks the same as it did the first time I saw it: tall, gothic, and beautiful. The symbol on my wrist burns just below the surface giving it a slight iridescent glow. Something about this place still pulls at me like there’s something more I’m supposed to see or find. Something important. Maybe if I give into Sam’s memories, he’ll show me.

  “Follow me,” Will says stopping me from touching the symbol. He takes the lead with Zoe close behind.

  Taking my hand Jared intertwines his fingers with mine; together we follow Will and Zoe up the stairs past the two stone angels.

  Heavy chains secured by a rather large and formidable looking lock wrap around the door handles of the church signifying that we won't be going in through the front door—unless Will or Zoe has a key that is. Half way up, Will veers to the right taking us through the high grass leaving the chained door behind. Guess that means there’s no key.

  At the side of the church, Will leads us down a hidden path between the building and the towering trees beside it. The air is cooler here with the warmth of the sun shining only through tiny gaps in the leafy branches overhead. Nearing the back of the church the path gives way to a large clearing full of overgrown weeds and forgotten flower gardens. At its center sits a white gazebo that’s seen better days. The paint on it has long since peeled away in places leaving the wood underneath raw and exposed. Further out, a wrought iron fence surrounds an old graveyard that the forest is trying hard to reclaim. Though everything here is severely neglected there’s a certain kind of beauty in its wildness. I kind of see why Sam liked it here so much.

  “This way,” Will says redirecting my attention. At the back of the building, Will moves aside a large chunk of ivy revealing a hidden door. It opens easily with a twist of his wrist. He moves aside gesturing for us pass. We come into a large back room of some kind that for the most part is empty with the exception of biblical paintings on the wall. Once we’re all in, Will then leads us into a long hall that takes us out into a large sanctuary.

  Outside the sun hits the stained glass windows at the front of the church, sending a rainbow of colors cascading through. Dust particles sparkle in the air like tiny fireflies giving the place an almost magical feel. Above me, the ceiling arches into high peaks, and on either side of the sanctuary, large stone pillars jut out from the walls separating each window into its own private nook. Most of the pews have been overturned or shoved to the side leaving the center of the church wide open. At my feet, a thin layer of dust covers the intricate designs in the marble floor, though not thick enough that I can’t see the beauty in their shapes. Closing my eyes, I imagine what this place must have looked like before it became lost and forgotten.

  Suddenly noticing my wrist, Jared turns my arm over. “Whoa, it’s glowing. Like a lot. You’re not going to, you know, become catatonic and slip into Sam’s memories are you?” Jared’s only seen me do that one other time and it completely freaked him out.

  “I don’t think so.” The symbol shimmers in shades of blue with every twist of my arm. “I think it’s just reacting to my being here.” Kind of like how it reacts to Will whenever he touches it, I think to myself. My eyes seek him out finding him lounging in a giant high backed chair behind the pulpit. Maybe it reacts that way because Sam was close to this place and to Will. I don’t know.

  “Wow. Can I see it?” Zoe asks coming up beside Jared. I hold out my wrist giving her a better view. “Is it okay if I touch it?”

  “Sure.” I assume it will react to her the same way it does to Will. It doesn’t. Instead of shimmering with a blue iridescence, it burns and dulls leaving me feeling cold and hollow inside. I want to pull it away from her. She doesn’t seem to notice anything wrong, but deep inside; I can feel that there is. It’s reacting to her this way for a reason and whatever that reason is it isn’t good.

  “Maybe you should try to access one of Sam’s memories here since its already reacting to this place. Maybe you’ll be able to uncover something,” Zoe suggests. I agree, even though I don’t really want to, just so she’ll stop touching it.

  Will and Jared drag over one of the overturned pews righting it so I can sit. Nervous sweat prickles at the back of my neck at the thought of not only going into Sam’s memories, but also because of the way it reacted to Zoe. It’s never done that before and it’s giving me a really bad feeling in the pit of my stomach. Plus, coming back out of Sam’s memories is getting harder and harder, so there’s that too. Maybe I shouldn’t do this here. I sneak a glance at Zoe, the weird horrible feeling in my gut flares. Or maybe I just shouldn’t do it while she’s here.

  Will sits beside me taking my hand. The symbol shimmers between us. “If you’re uncomfortable about doing this now you don’t have to.” He must be picking up on my unease. He rubs his thumb over the mark, it shimmers brighter leaving the usual iridescent trail. His deep blue eyes look into mine encouragingly. “But we do need to figure out what Sam’s trying to tell you sooner or later.”

  “I know.” Maybe I’m making too much out of the way it reacted to Zoe because it reacted to Will just fine. Maybe it was just some strange glitch or something, if magical marks glitch that is. “I’ll try.” I take a deep breath looking at my friends one last time. Blue light takes me away as I cover the symbol with my hand until the only part of me that’s left is Sam.

  I press my back as close to the wall as I can outside my father’s office straining my ears to hear the conversation inside through the crack in the door.

  “But that’s not possible Thomas. What you’re saying is blasphemy.”

  “I assure you, Charles, it is very possible.” A drawer opens followed by the sound of papers being rummaged through. “Last week I found a journal that she had kept before we met hidden under a loose floor board in the attic. Look for yourself.”

  Silence drags on forever as I wait for Charles to speak again.

  “If what she writes is true,” Charles finally says. “Then that means the child of the prophecy has been born.”

  “It was Emily’s personal journal, Charles. Why would she write anything other than the truth in it? The question is; what do we do about it?”

  I inch closer to the door. What does my mother have to do
with a prophecy? And what child are they talking about?

  “Does Sam know?” Charles asks.

  “That he has an older brother? Absolutely not and I want it to stay that way. You know how hard he took it when she passed. I don’t want his memories of her to be tainted by what she did.”

  I have an older brother?

  I inch closer; my foot hits the edge of the doorframe.

  “Who’s there?” I hear my father call.

  I run before he can find out.

  Air rushes into my lungs, my body jerking, as I become myself. The ground under me lurches, the world spinning in dizzying circles around and around. Tipping forward in my seat, I half fall, half slide, from the pew to the floor in a fit of dry heaves. When I can finally breathe again I curl myself up into a ball with the coolness of the marble floor against my face. Amplified by this place, Sam’s feelings of confusion over having a brother he never knew about along with his growing hurt at realizing everything he thought he knew about his mother could be wrong, I find myself crying not just for him, but also with him as if he were lying on this dusty floor with me. Will told me once that he thought Sam shared his soul with me when he marked my wrist, so maybe in some strange way he is here.

  “Hey, it’s okay.” Jared scoops me up in his arms holding me tight. I bury my face in his shirt until my tears run dry.

  “What did you see?” Zoe blurts. I look up at her just in time to see Will smack her upper arm with the back of his hand. “Ow. What was that for?” She glares, rubbing at her arm.

  “Obviously that was hard for her.” Will’s dark blue eyes meet mine briefly where for just a second I catch a glimpse of his pain before he returns his gaze to Zoe. Watching me re-live his best friends memories is just as hard for him as it is for me to experience them.

  “Sorry Hanna,” Zoe says for Will’s benefit and not because she means it. Judging by the look in her eye she could care less about how I feel or about how Sam felt. All she wants is to know what I know.

  Ignoring her, I look to Will meeting his gaze. “In the memory Sam was eavesdropping on his dad outside his office.” A look of sad understanding settles on his face. He knows what I’m going to say because Sam told him about this before. Only then, Will didn’t believe him. “Sam heard his dad talking to a guy named Charles about a journal his mom had written before they got together. She had kept it hidden because in it she talks about having another baby. Sam has an older brother.”

  Will and Zoe share a look, communicating something unspoken.

  “What?”

  “Charles is our dad’s name,” Zoe answers. “Did Sam hear anything else?”

  “Just that both his dad and Charles believe that the child is the one from the prophecy.”

  “We need to find that journal,” Will and Zoe say at the same time.

  “Out of the loop here guys,” Jared says beside me. “What prophecy are you talking about?”

  “Oh, you know just your average end of the world stuff where the child prophesized about is destined to grow up to decide the fate of the world as we know it by either aligning with The Order to save it, or aligning with the Fallen to destroy it,” I say.

  “Which is why we need to find the journal. We need to find Sam’s brother before the Fallen do,” Will says.

  “What if Sam already found him?” I say as all eyes fall on me. “What if that’s why Sam was at The Iron Knife that night? What if that’s why he was killed?” Will flinches at the word killed while Zoe looks away avoiding any eye contact with anyone. “In one of Sam’s memories,” I continue. “He was breaking into his father’s office looking for something. What if it was the journal? What if he found it, read it, and figured it out. The only question now is; how did Blondie know about Sam?”

  “What do you mean?” Zoe asks. She fidgets with her necklace, her large eyes boring into me.

  “I don’t think it was a coincidence that Blondie and Sam were both at The Iron Knife that night. I think Blondie knew Sam knew something about the prophecy and he wanted to find out what it was. When I was waking up in the hospital I had a dream that Blondie was stabbing me while trying to forcibly take something from my thoughts that I didn’t want to give, but now I know it wasn’t a dream at all. Now I know it was a—”

  “Memory,” Will finishes for me.

  “Yeah.”

  “But Blondie never got what he wanted,” Zoe mumbles more to herself than to anyone else in a tone that suggests she’s almost disappointed. But that would be crazy. Why would she be disappointed? Looking around the room nobody else seems to have picked up on her undertones, so maybe I’m wrong, but still…I can’t shake the feeling that something about her is off.

  “No. He didn’t get to because Hanna interrupted before he could,” Will says. Zoe’s eyes flick to her brother like she just realized she’d said what she’d said out loud. He doesn’t say anything else and she seems to relax a little. There’s definitely something off about her.

  Or maybe I’m completely wrong and I’m just being paranoid because of the strange way the symbol on my wrist reacted when she touched it. I don’t know.

  Shaking the confusing thoughts I’m having about her away I say, “We’re still not answering the most important question.” Zoe looks at me, her eyes unreadable. “How did Blondie know to go after Sam?”

  “He wouldn’t unless he was tipped off,” Jared says breaking the silence.

  “But who would tip him off?” Will narrows his eyes, as he comprehends what Jared’s not saying. “You think someone in The Order did it.” It’s not a question. Will shakes his head forcefully. “No. Not possible.”

  “Then how do you explain it?” Jared asks. “Who else would have known?”

  “I don’t know. Somebody.” Will heaves himself up from the pew. “Because there’s no way someone from The Order would divulge information to the Fallen. There’s just no way.” He starts to pace repeating ‘no way’ every so often in an attempt to convince himself that Jared’s wrong. By the look on his face he’s failing.

  I take this time to inconspicuously watch Zoe. She hasn’t said a word since Jared suggested it was someone in The Order who tipped Blondie off. Not one word to deny it. Not one word to consider it possible. I find that odd. Will’s over there pacing like a mad man trying to convince himself that it’s not true and here she sits fidgeting with her necklace with no opinion either way. Why is that?

  In a fit of frustration Will punches a stone pillar hard enough to take out a small chunk of its once flawless surface. “If I had just believed what Sam was telling me instead of blowing him off, I could have been there with him that night. I could have done something. I could have stopped Blondie before he…” He cuts himself off before finishing his sentence. Taking a deep breath he clenches his hands at his side. The half healed cut across his knuckles splits open to drip bright red blood onto the dusty gray floor. “I can’t change the fact that I wasn’t there when Sam needed me the most, but I can swear right here, right now, that I will avenge him. If there is a traitor in The Order, I will find out who it is, and I will make them pay.”

  ***

  “Try harder.” Jared coaches from behind. He places his hands on the tops of my shoulders giving them an encouraging squeeze. “You can do this.”

  Easier said than done. How am I supposed to concentrate on moving a stupid boot with my telekinetic powers when I’m too busy worrying about what Will and Zoe will find in their search for a traitor among The Order. What if they discover who the traitor is and then that person discovers that they found them out? Will and Zoe could be in trouble right now. Hurt even. Or worse. What if it’s worse? If this traitor person is working with the Fallen who knows how far they’re willing to take things.

  Maybe I should call Will just to make sure they’re okay.

  Fingers snap in front of my face. “Hanna, I know you’re worried about Will and Zoe, but they’re Guardians. They can take care of themselves. And if you really want to help
them then you need to get a handle on your abilities.”

  Jared’s right. Will and Zoe have had years of training and if I really want to be of any help then I need to figure this out. “Okay,” I say. “I can do this.” I straighten my back forcing myself to concentrate on the boot in front of me. If I can shatter large windows and bathroom mirrors, open all the lockers in a hallway, and completely destroy an area of the forest, then moving a single boot shouldn’t be too difficult? Right?

  I narrow my eyes concentrating as hard as I can. Nothing happens.

  Move you stupid boot.

  Taunting me, the boot remains motionless. Blocking everything out I take a deep breath.

  Come on. Move damn it.

  Again nothing.

  In a childish fit, I kick the boot out into the hallway. “Ugh. Stupid boot.” Why is this so hard?

  When I turn around Jared is laughing at me. “It’s not funny.” I try to keep a straight face, but his laughter is infectious. I punch him playfully in the arm. “Stop laughing. This is serious. I need to figure this out.”

  Jared retrieves the boot from the hall placing it back in the middle of my bedroom floor. “This time use your mind. Not your foot.” He winks at me, flashing his cute little dimple with a goofy grin.

  “Okay.” I take a few deep breaths, centering myself. “I know I can do this.”

  The boot doesn’t move. I growl in frustration. “It’s not working.”

  Sitting on the bed Jared leans forward tapping the side of his head with his index finger, his face all scrunched up in thought. “Maybe you just need to be motivated.” He starts to smile slow and mischievous. “Did I tell you that Amber sent me a photo text today of her in nothing but her bra and underwear. It was quite suggestive.”

  The boot, along with everything on top of my dresser, nightstand, and desk, flies across the room.

  She sent him a half-naked photo?