The Dark Princess (The Balance Series Book 3)

by Janelle Stalder

  “You’re just jealous,” Lila sniped back. “There’s finally a man worthy of my attention at this school now, and you know it.”

  I could mentally picture the hair flip that accompanied that statement.

  “Whatever,” Aaron grunted. “I ain’t jealous of some pretty boy.”

  Brittany laughed. “Pretty boy? The guy is drop dead gorgeous.”

  Lila hummed her agreement.

  I didn’t know who everyone was referring to, but I decided he was not of any interest to me if Lila had gotten her figurative claws in him already.

  The entire class went by in a blur. I wasn’t normally so distracted, but my mind was having a hard time focusing today. I couldn’t help but go back and forth between thinking about the dream I’d woken up from, once again drenched in sweat, and wondering when Aaron and Jessie were going to exact their revenge on me. I also couldn’t help but wonder if Emily was serious about going to one of Lila’s infamous parties that weekend.

  I’d never been to a house party. I didn’t even know what to think about it. How did one dress? What did one do? Was it like in the movies, where people were drinking too much and then someone sporadically suggests everyone skinny dip, and then it’s like a mad rush of perfectly toned teenage bodies toward blue, inviting water? I narrowed my eyes thoughtfully, chewing on the end of my pencil as I played it all out in my head. Emily and I had never even gone to a movie together, never mind a party. It would be so awkward. People would look at us weird, and then my face would turn into a tomato and I’d have to run home in an embarrassed, snotty mess as I cried the whole way.

  Ew. I cringed at the mental image.

  Yeah, there was no way I was going. Why set myself up for the inevitable?

  The bell ending first period rang, and everyone got up in a rush of pushing bodies and too much cologne and perfume. I waited, bracing myself as Aaron and Jessie walked by, but neither said a thing.

  What the heck was going on?

  Grabbing my books, I headed to second, seriously confused. The rest of the morning went by without incident. By lunch I was walking around like I was waiting for something to suddenly fall out of the sky and hit me on the head. Emily was already at our usual table when I slid my tray on it, sitting down across from her.

  “I made my decision,” I informed her.

  “Let me guess, you’re not going?” She said.

  I nodded. “We’d be crazy to step foot in that house.”

  “No, we wouldn’t. Plus, I have a plan.”

  This couldn’t be good. “What kind of plan?”

  She smiled, a Cheshire grin if I ever saw one. “You always doubt my intelligence.”

  “I never doubt your intelligence,” I said. “I doubt your sanity. It’s very different.”

  She winked at me over the can of pop she gulped from, burping before she continued. I caught a few looks of disgust directed our way before I focused my attention back on her. Emily didn’t give a shit what anyone thought. It was one of the reasons I liked her. “Here’s what we do,” she said, leaning in. “We don’t actually show up until late. I’m thinking ten might be good. Maybe ten-thirty. By that time, I figure all those bitches will be in the bag, way too drunk to notice us.” She sat back, her smile widening.

  I stared.

  “Eh?” She wiggled her brows again. “Pretty good, am I right?”

  Shaking my head, I looked at my food and started eating.

  “What?” She said, chuckling. “You’re not impressed? I thought it was a pretty foolproof plan.”

  “Your plan is to arrive when everyone is drunk. It’s not exactly ingenious, Em.”

  “Come on,” she urged. “It’s pretty smart.”

  “If you say so,” I muttered.

  “Well, what would you suggest?”

  I raised my brows. “Not going.”

  “That’s no fun.” Emily sighed, leaning her elbows on the table. “Come on, Hope. I want to actually experience something in high school before it’s done,” she pleaded. “And you’re the only person who will do this with me.”

  I looked up into her large, sad eyes, a twinge of understanding and sympathy hitting me.

  “I know I’ll probably hate every moment of it, but I’d still like to know I went.”

  My eyes glanced over at the “popular” table. “I thought you liked to exfoliate with the blood of dead animals on Saturdays,” I said, lifting one corner of my lips in a smile as I looked back at her. The rumours of what the two of us did outside of school were nothing if not creative.

  “I can do that any day,” she said, grinning expectantly.

  I sighed. “Okay,” I agreed after a moment. “We can go.”

  “Yes!”

  “But,” I said, raising a finger.

  She nodded, clenching her hands to her chest.

  “If it turns bad, which it undoubtedly will, you have to leave with me, and vice versa. If either one of us is uncomfortable, the other has to promise not to let them leave alone, and to agree to leave without argument.”

  She reached a hand toward me, pinky lifted. “Cross my heart, and hope to die.”

  I smirked, wrapping my pinky around hers. “Fine. We will go to the party.” I almost choked on the words, but got a sense of satisfaction from seeing how happy I’d made her. “Now,” I started, changing the subject. “Tell me who this new person is.”

  “Oh! Him,” she said, fanning herself. “You haven’t seen him yet?”

  I shook my head.

  “He’s a senior,” she told me. “A regular Adonis. Tall, built, tanned, golden hair...” she sighed, looking into empty space.

  I scrunched my nose. For some reason, golden and built didn’t sound so appealing. A vision of dark and dangerous entered my mind. Eyes and hard lines that made my heart race. I blinked, wondering where that had come from. There was literally no one I knew like the guy I had just pictured.

  “You won’t be able to miss him when you see him,” Emily was saying.

  “I think I might try to,” I said. “I don’t want to get in Lila’s way.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure those two will be the newest couple by the end of the week. Perfect prom queen and king.”

  We both frowned at our lunches as we finished in silence. Why was it all the girls who were ugly on the inside got the most attention? I glanced over at the popular table and couldn’t help but wish that for just once, Lila didn’t get exactly what she wanted.

  Suddenly, one of the legs on their table snapped, causing trays to slide toward where Lila sat, covering her lap in mounds of food. A screech filled the cafeteria, along with hoots of laughter. My mouth fell open. Emily started laughing too as Lila stood up, swearing worse than any sailor possibly could manage. She stormed out of the room, her friends filing out after her in a flurry of reassurances and distress. The rest of the table laughed after her.

  My eyes collided with those of Aaron’s all the way across the room. They held mine, filled with amusement and some sort of unspoken accusation I wasn’t willing to acknowledge.

  Breaking away, I looked back down at my food and avoided glancing in that direction again for the rest of lunch.

  The air was damp and cold. He shivered. The crashing sound of waves was muffled this far into the caves. He hated it down here. It was too dark, too closed in, too underground. He preferred to be out in the open.

  Two voices, a man’s and a woman’s, reached his ears before he finally turned the corner to find them waiting in their usual spot.

  “You’re late.”

  “It’s the middle of the day,” he pointed out, trying his best to keep the annoyance he felt at their summons out of his voice. “It’s not that easy for me to just get away”

  She didn’t speak, simply watched him in that cold way. She could make any demon shake in fear under such scrutiny.

  His expression never changed either. The two of them were quite the pair.
r />   “What happened? I thought you had this taken care of. Caleb will have heard of this failed attempt by now.”

  “Minor setback,” he replied. “I’ll have it rectified by the end of the week.”

  “That’s what you said the last time we met.” Her voice cut through him like shards of ice.

  “I won’t let you down again.”

  They both grunted in unison.

  “We expect results. Her power grows each day. We trust you to take care of it.”

  He bowed his head in understanding. “What about him?” he almost spat his name out, hating the other one who had shown up so late in the game. A game he’d been controlling just fine up until now.

  She replied. “He is none of your concern.”

  “It’s unnecessary,” he said through clenched teeth.

  She smiled, an expression that look wholly unnatural on a face such as hers. It was all teeth and no warmth. He’d been around humans long enough to know the emotion that should be behind such an expression. “We’ll see,” she said.

  Biting back any further argument, he turned and headed back down the tunnel to the mouth of the cave. It was time to get back and get this over with. He’d been away from his natural home long enough.

  No more.

  Hope French might have managed to get away from one of the demon hounds, but she wouldn’t be able to escape an entire pack of them. He smiled in the dark.

  Friday was officially the longest day ever. By the time the final bell rang, I was more than ready to head home. My brain felt fried, and I’d had trouble keeping my eyes open during my last class. All week I’d been having terrifying dreams and they were starting to take a toll on me. My sleep was fitful at best when I was sleeping, and then when I woke up after one of the dreams, it would take me forever to fall back asleep.

  Always present was that voice, urging me to run faster, fight harder. With each dream he sounded more frustrated with me, as though he knew I was capable of more and I wasn’t achieving it. That voice haunted me almost as much as the creatures that hunted me. And those were getting scarier and larger in numbers the more I dreamt.

  Sighing, I took what I needed for homework that night, and headed out of the building. Maybe I needed to talk to my mom, I thought as I filed out of the building behind the rest of the crowd. She would probably lose it like she did when I had told her about the snake that I swore followed me around our garden when I was six years old. I’m no Harry Potter, but I could have sworn the thing listened to me when I spoke to it. For some reason, this had made my mom freak out and resulted in her keeping me locked inside for a week.

  One night, I had crept down the stairs to hear her whispering urgently to someone over the phone. I’d never figured it out who she was talking to, and I had never bothered asking. I could still remember the conversation though, because it had never made sense to me.

  “I don’t know, but if this is your brother’s doing, tell him to cut it out.” - “no, it’s not normal. Whatever is happening, I want it to stop. You hear me, Collin? Tell him to make it stop.”

  She’d never even said my name, but even at six, I’d somehow known they were taking about me.

  After that, I’d gone outside and never saw a snake again. It was probably just a coincidence, but it had taught me to be careful what I told my mother.

  A loud horn blared, snapping my head up in surprise. I’d walked right out into the parking lot, lost in thought. It was just my luck that I happened to walk in front of Jessie and Aaron. Sucking in a breath, I braced myself as the car’s breaks squealed in an attempt to stop. Even Jessie’s expression looked troubled.

  Suddenly, a strong arm banded around my middle, hoisting me out of the way. My feet flailed in the air for a second before I was deposited onto the sidewalk, safe from harm. The car screeched to a stop an inch from where I’d been. I let out a sigh of relief.

  “You got a death wish, Frenchie?” Aaron said out of the passenger window.

  I couldn’t seem to find the ability to reply to him, my heart and mind still racing with how close that had been. My eyes swept over the spot I’d been in a second ago, moving up the front of the car to stare at Jessie again. Was it my imagination, or did he look a little pale?

  I decided it was probably my imagination. I didn’t believe for one second that he would care if he actually plowed me over. Looking at Aaron, he seemed utterly unfazed. I still couldn’t understand why neither of them had bugged me about the windshield. Looking at it now, you’d never know anything had happened. I was actually surprised he’d gotten it fixed so quickly. Had this finally been the payback I’d been expecting?

  “Maybe if you hadn’t been driving so fast in a parking lot, she wouldn’t have been in danger.”

  The voice was coming from my saviour, whom I hadn’t even paid attention to until that second. It wasn’t a voice I recognized. Looking up, and up, at the broad back in front of me, I knew instantly this was the infamous and elusive new guy Emily, and every other girl, had been drooling over all week. I hadn’t seen him, not once, all week.

  Now, he stood slightly in front of me, his back tense as he faced off with Aaron.

  “What are you, her knight in shining armour?” Aaron snickered.

  “As if,” I heard Lila say, although I couldn’t see her around New Guy.

  Emily had been right, his hair was literally like gold, it flowed in waves that looked somehow natural and yet not at the same time. As if he’d literally walked out of some style magazine into real life. His body wasn’t like any other high school boy I’d ever known. He had to be over six feet tall, and his arms were probably wider than my legs. The boy was built. I could only imagine what his mother fed him.

  “Watch yourself,” he said, his voice low and warning.

  I didn’t see Aaron’s reaction, but a second later, they were peeling out of the parking lot. So much for watching their speed. I followed the car as it disappeared down the road.

  When I finally looked away, it was to come face to face with New Guy, who stood watching me silently, an unreadable expression on his face.

  Holy shit.

  And what a face it was.

  I swallowed.

  Okay, I got why even Emily had been fan girling. The man was perfection incarnate. A long, thin nose, squared jaw, full lips, thick brows over slightly tilted eyes the colour of molten gold and bronze, rimmed by impossible (and completely unfair) thick lashes.

  “Uhh...” Oh. My. God. My cheeks flamed.

  His eyes narrowed. “Are you Okay?”

  I nodded, not trusting my voice anymore.

  “You sure? You look like you’re in shock.”

  I was. Just not from almost dying, which was ironic.

  “She’s fine, Gabe,” Lila said, appearing beside him, her hand wrapped around one of his upper arms, barely able to fit around it.

  I shook my head, my face heating even more now that I was just staring at him while he watched me. Clearing my throat, I managed to speak. “I am,” I said, shifting on my feet as I gripped the straps of my backpack. “Fine, that is.” I attempted to smile. Something told me it was strained and awkward instead of pretty and charming. This guy was going to think I was a complete loser.

  “Do you want a ride home?”

  Dear God, I couldn’t even process being in a confined space with him. I was shaking my head just as Lila shook hers, the both of us looking at him like he’d lost his mind for even offering.

  “I like to walk,” I offered.

  I like to walk? What the hell was wrong with me. Why couldn’t I get it together?

  “Okay,” he said. “See you around then...?”

  “Hope,” I said, trying for another smile that felt slightly better than the first.

  “Hope,” he repeated. The sound of my name coming out of his mouth was ridiculous.

  Ridiculous.

  “See ya.”

  “Yeah, see ya,�
� I said with a pathetic wave to his back since he’d already started walking away with Lila by that point.

  Muttering to myself at how pathetic I was, I started home, thankful it was the weekend. It was only when I’d almost reached my house that I realized I hadn’t even thanked him for saving me.

  I was such an idiot. An ungrateful idiot at that.

  I guess that just meant I’d have to find him Monday and thank him, right? Sure, I could manage that.

  Right?