The Deck of Omens

by Christine Lynn Herman

  “It’s spreading the corruption,” she gasped.

  Ezra nodded grimly. “I believe so. While doing my research, I discovered more oblique references to the corruption we’re dealing with now. It would seem that what the founders trapped in the Gray was not just the Beast—it was the powers it possessed when it was roaming Four Paths, and those powers are leaking outward through the Gray and into town, hurting us.”

  “But they don’t hurt the founders,” May said.

  “I’ve noticed that, and I have a theory. I believe it’s because you are, essentially, already corrupted.”

  May raised an eyebrow. “Excuse me?”

  “It’s the equivalent of a vaccination,” Ezra said. “You’ve already been exposed to the pathogen in a contained environment when you completed your ritual with the Beast. The rest of the town, however, has not, and therefore they remain highly susceptible.”

  “But what about a founder who failed their ritual?” she asked slowly, thinking of Justin.

  Ezra hesitated. “If they were still exposed to it and survived… that theoretically means they could still be immune.”

  May thought about this. Direct contact with the Beast leading to a later immunity would include Justin, but she was still a little concerned about the possibility of contamination.

  “Either way, you don’t have immunity,” May said. “So be careful, okay?”

  “Don’t worry,” Ezra said, gesturing to his gloves, his steel-toed boots, the bandanna. May realized that he had as little skin exposed as possible without wearing a hazmat suit. “It spreads through direct contact—for now.”

  “For now?”

  “These growths concern me,” Ezra said frankly. “The corruption comes from the Gray, so when it opens, it emerges in its raw form, which seems to dissipate fairly quickly on its own. But when it finds a host to infect, it clings to it, festering and growing, turning its victims into vessels for the Beast. That’s how it spreads: Hosts come into direct contact with other hosts, which allows you to monitor and halt the spread with relative ease as we search for a cure. But these growths seem as though they emit a constant stream of raw corruption—as if they’ve taken it from the Gray and channeled it into Four Paths. They’re still dissipating fairly quickly, but if they spread, it will be immeasurably more difficult to stop the corruption. People will potentially be infected simply by getting too close and breathing it in.”

  May struggled to let the true magnitude of this sink in. If these buds bloomed, it would be impossible to stop the corruption from spreading more quickly. All their containment efforts would be for nothing. The thought made her want to rip each of the buds off with her bare hands and stomp on them, but she couldn’t do something that rash. Maybe all that would do was release it earlier.

  “You’re familiar with the other founders’ powers, yes?” Ezra asked. May nodded. “I believe a team-up of the Saunders girl, the Carlisle who can petrify things, and the Sullivan destruction is our best chance to stop this. Their powers are uniquely suited to this situation.”

  A flash of jealousy hit May. She was almost as useless as Justin when faced with such practical, easily applicable powers.

  But they can’t do what you can, a voice whispered in the back of May’s mind.

  Her powers were her responsibility. Her birthright. Her gift. What good was that gift if she could not use that to protect anyone?

  “Their powers aren’t the only ones that might be able to help here,” May said slowly.

  Ezra turned toward her. “Oh?”

  May took a deep breath. “You know a lot about the Hawthornes. Do you… Do you know anything about a Hawthorne who could change the future?”

  Ezra’s face transformed, and he stepped toward her.

  “May,” he said softly, “do you have something to tell me?”

  There was no going back if she told him the truth. He would be the only person in the world who knew what she had done. What she was capable of.

  But he deserved to know. So May banished her last bit of doubt, and as the words spilled from her, a plan formed in her mind. She’d changed the future to get her father back. Maybe she could change it again—to make sure they defeated the corruption.

  “Do you think it’s possible?” she asked him.

  “Potentially. But you’ll have to talk to someone who knows more than I do about your family’s powers.” He looked at her pointedly.

  May’s stomach churned. “Do I have to?”

  “I would do it myself, but I sincerely doubt our meeting would be productive.”

  “Don’t,” May said hastily. “It’s fine. I’ll do it.”

  Beside her, one of the buds began to twitch, like a hand about to unfurl. May swallowed down her nausea and left the clearing behind.

  CHAPTER TEN

  The founders’ seal looked like an opening eye, glowing reddish-brown in the light of the sunrise. Harper’s stomach clenched as she stood at the edge of the town square, staring at it.

  She’d been thinking. About what Augusta Hawthorne had told her regarding sacred places in the town. About the corruption’s spread. All that thinking had led to an idea. A dangerous idea, but Harper had a feeling it would actually work.

  “I can’t believe you got me up this early.” Violet’s red hair was sticking up in the back, her eyes swollen with sleep. She clutched her coffee thermos like it was made of gold.

  “I told you that you could stay home.”

  “You knew I wouldn’t.”

  “I did.” Harper hesitated. There was one thing hanging between them that she wanted to fix. It had been bothering her since their patrol. “The corruption. I didn’t realize you were blaming yourself for it. I… I wish you’d told me what you and Isaac did a little earlier.”

  Violet flinched, then seemed to deflate slightly, her head bowing. “I wanted to tell you,” she said. “But you didn’t seem to care what me and Isaac were up to. And with all you have going on, I felt like I couldn’t ask you for help—like I had to handle this one by myself.”

  “We’re friends,” Harper said. “I don’t want you to feel like you can’t talk to me about something, or ask me for help. You don’t have to keep secrets from me.”

  Violet’s eyes widened. Harper couldn’t read the expression on her face.

  “It’s easy to say that, but we all have secrets,” she said. “And I’m so scared of hurting any more people. When I thought the corruption was my fault, I couldn’t handle the guilt. I still feel it—this sense that I got to Four Paths and everything went off the rails.”

  Harper hadn’t known Violet for all that long, but she understood implicitly the deep fear that lurked within her. She’d seen it before when Violet talked about her father, her aunt, her sister. Harper had never lost someone she cared about the way Violet had. But she saw in that moment how it could make Violet worry that any mistake might cost her someone else.

  “Four Paths was off the rails long before you got here,” Harper said. “The Church of the Four Deities wasn’t your fault. Neither was Augusta’s bullshit. All you did was take all the messed-up stuff and yank it out into the open, and honestly, I like it better there. It means people can’t hide anymore.”

  “You won’t like it quite as much when we all get eviscerated by the Beast,” Violet said, but her tone was much lighter.

  Harper tried to sound nonchalant. “Saves me the trouble of eviscerating Justin myself.”

  A smile tugged at the corner of Violet’s mouth. “That’s a strange way of saying flirting.”

  Harper’s stomach twisted. “He gave me my memories back. Did you know that?”

  “I know. I—I knew.” The words were loaded, and Harper understood. We all have secrets.

  “You didn’t tell me,” she whispered.

  “No.” Violet’s words were careful. Harper could tell she’d put a lot of thought into this. “I told Justin that if he didn’t give you the memories back, I would. He asked me
to give him a chance to right the wrong of betraying you—so I did.”

  “Of course he wanted to do it himself,” Harper said, overwhelmed. “Look, you talk about us, and you say we’re flirting, but—is that even what we’re doing? He makes these ridiculous grand gestures that are really complicated, and it makes it impossible for me to think about him normally.”

  “None of our lives are normal,” Violet said. “Potential dating lives included, I guess.”

  Harper hesitated. Justin was one of the things that tethered her here most—a loose end that she had no idea how to resolve. Her siblings could be protected, but this—this was something else entirely. “I’m worried that I’m almost obligated to see our romantic relationship through because of everything that’s happened to us.”

  “You’re not obligated to feel anything,” Violet said sharply.

  “I know that,” Harper said. “But I also know that he’s chosen to tell the town the truth about his powers at least partially because of me. He’s trying so hard to grow up—he’s doing everything that I thought he wasn’t capable of.”

  “It’s great that he’s trying to be better, but you should only date him if you want to. Not because you feel that you need to help him, or change him, or save him. You come first, okay?”

  Harper opened her mouth, then shut it. “That was pretty nuanced dating advice for someone who’s never dated anybody and was forced to wake up at five a.m.”

  “I’m an excellent friend. Cherish me.”

  Harper snorted and elbowed her, sloshing Violet’s coffee thermos and earning a yell of disapproval.

  Isaac Sullivan appeared on the front steps of the town hall a moment later, eyeing them both with slight trepidation. He was the real reason why Harper had invited Violet here—because she knew there was a far better chance he’d show up if it wasn’t just her. And she needed him for her terrible plan to work.

  It was a plan that was deceptively simple: Go into the Gray. She had survived there far longer than anyone else in town, which meant she had the best shot of anybody of getting out. And this time, she had a mission: Try to find a source point for the corruption. She knew, as did Violet, that there was a possibility it would accelerate the spread of the disease or lead to some sort of retaliation from the Beast. But they had no leads, no ideas for how to cure it. They had to try everything they could.

  Which had meant contacting the last person in Four Paths she’d ever expected to get any help from: Isaac Sullivan. The last time the three of them had hung out, they’d been chasing down her little sister in the forest on the night of the equinox. Somehow, this was just as stressful.

  “You’re sure you want to do this?” he asked her now as they stood in front of the founders’ seal. “You might not come out. Also, someone might see us.”

  “That’s a risk I’m willing to take,” Harper said. It was why she’d chosen the break of dawn. As for the location—that was all Augusta’s doing. She’d heard about corruption spreading at the Sullivan house, and she had the stirrings of a theory building in her. Something about the corruption having source points. Going into the Gray from the seal would help her figure that out.

  “She said she can handle it,” Violet said. “I trust her.”

  Isaac still looked skeptical. “Last chance to back out, Carlisle.” He lifted his hands palms-out and spread them wide. The air around them began to hum and ripple, light refracting off the tree trunks at the edge of the clearing.

  “I won’t,” Harper said calmly.

  The world split open a second later, and tendrils of gray oozed out from the rip Isaac had created, growing stronger.

  “We have to be careful here,” Isaac said, gesturing at the gray. “I can’t keep this open.” Harper understood—they were creating a gateway to the corruption. It couldn’t hurt them, but it could potentially hurt someone else.

  “Reopen it in an hour,” she said. “If I’m not there, don’t come looking for me.”

  “I absolutely will come looking for you,” Violet said sharply. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  Harper bit back a laugh. “Then I guess I’d better be there.”

  “Yes! You’d better!”

  Harper smiled and patted the scabbard strapped to her waist. “You know I can protect myself.”

  “I know you can,” Violet said.

  Then she stepped back, and Harper stepped forward, and the moment the first wisp of fog brushed against her skin, the world around her disappeared.

  This was the Gray, for Harper: tendrils of white mist swirling around her, opening before her like a tunnel, or maybe a throat; a tinny sound in her ears, hollow and tuneless, whirling around her in words she could almost understand, and a smell that felt familiar, a mixture of the wood chips in her father’s workshop and the loamy dirt at the side of the riverbank.

  When the fog dissolved a heartbeat later, she was standing in the center of Four Paths as it had been a hundred and fifty years ago. Although it looked different, she knew her bearings from the town hall. It lacked the spire, but the stained-glass windows were still there, shaded in grayscale and backlit by the weak light.

  The biggest difference was the seal itself: It was ringed by trees, gray chestnut oaks with too-still branches and strangely patterned trunks. In the center of the founders’ symbol was a stump, gnarled and ancient, the roots cracking through the stone and burrowing beneath it. But although Harper scrutinized the copse of oak trees carefully, she saw no signs of iridescence.

  Harper walked slowly down Main Street, where, instead of storefronts, there were only a few log buildings and a dirt road. In the field where the mausoleum stood now was a graveyard, thin crosses and headstones tilting to the side. And all around them stretched the woods. Harper had always thought in the present day that the woods looked like they were about to take over the town, but now she could see how much had been cleared away. The chestnut oaks were everywhere. In the middle of the street, on either side of the town hall, their branches twining above the gravestones, roots snaking across the dirt road.

  She watched the dark, oily tree trunks pulsate, shuddering slightly as she realized that they were all moving in rhythm with one another like a great, grotesque heartbeat.

  From the way Violet had talked about the Gray, from her own fragmented memories of the time she’d spent there, Harper had thought it would be a hostile place. Instead it simply felt empty, like a dollhouse whose owner had grown out of it.

  Well, fine. Harper was looking for trouble. And if it wouldn’t come to her, she would find it all by herself. She pulled the sword out of her scabbard and set off into the thick of the woods, letting her lifetime in Four Paths guide her through this strange terrain.

  Her first sign that something was off was the smell. It reminded her of burnt hair and spoiled meat, harsh and unnervingly sweet, the same rotting stench that emanated from the corrupted trees in Four Paths.

  Harper’s heartbeat sped up, and she kept walking, the ground softening beneath her sneakers. When she glanced down at the ground, she saw shimmering pools of iridescence waiting for her. She threaded her way through them, following them until she broke through the tree line to the Carlisle lake.

  And gasped.

  Instead of water, it was filled to the brim with that same gray, oily, iridescent liquid. It was not a still thing, this shadow lake; it rippled and shivered, creating waves that crested and sloshed at the edge of the lakebed, mere inches away from Harper’s sneakers. This close, the smell of it was overpowering. Harper pulled the neck of her sweatshirt over the bottom half of her face and tried not to gag.

  The trees around the lake had changed, too. They had grown together, braided branches and trunks, like a massive fence. And they were dying. The trunks were paper-thin and shot through with veins, iridescent and shiny. Buds shaped like bunched fingers hung from their branches, wisps of smoke drifting aimlessly from their tips. Harper’s stomach churned as the smell hit her, so strong it w
as almost a tangible thing.

  She had been right. The corruption had worsened at the heart of Sullivan territory, and it was disastrous here, too, at her family’s ritual site. She needed to map this farther, check out the Saunders manor and the Hawthorne tree.

  The thinning bark of the tree nearest to her shifted, the side bulging out for a moment, as if the tree were an egg about to hatch. One of the buds brushed against her arm, soft and tender as her own flesh. Harper gasped and stumbled away from the branch. She could see the outline of hands pressing against the insides of the mutated tree trunk. Fear stirred in her chest, and a voice stirred with it, tinny and hollow.

  Two of Stones, it whispered, thin and fragile as a fleeting breeze. Interesting.

  She turned away from the tree.

  And there, at the edge of the Carlisle lake, was Justin Hawthorne.

  Justin couldn’t be here. This was not a place for him, without powers, without the strength she knew she’d always possessed. Yet here he was, smiling and blond, dressed in the same jeans and T-shirt she’d last seen him in.

  And then she met his eyes—flat and lifeless—and she understood. Something stirred in her chest that throbbed like a heartbeat and ached like a wound. She blinked, gray filling her vision, then let the tear roll down her cheek. She should’ve been scared. But she had never feared anything more than not knowing, and now she knew. Now she saw.

  It didn’t look much like a monster. But maybe that was the point.

  “You’re the Beast,” she said, brandishing her sword—for whatever good that would do her. The words rang out a moment later, a little shakier than she was proud of.

  Its smile widened. It looked wrong on Justin’s face—hard-edged and cruel, the smile of the boy she’d wanted him to be because it would make him easier to hate instead of the boy he really was, well-meaning but malleable, torn miserably between whatever he’d convinced himself he owed to her and his duty to his family.

  The Beast had taunted Violet with Rosie. Now it was taunting her with him.

  Very good, it said, its lips moving, although the words still rang out inside Harper’s head. You shouldn’t be here, little stone.