by Jo Holloway
When enough time had passed that it was probably safe, she went back down and found them in the kitchen. “How was your trip?”
“Exhausting,” Josh replied. “I’m about to fall asleep at this table, but I need to stay awake a few more hours so I can get adjusted from Indonesia time. So tell me what’s been going on here.”
“Nothing much from my end,” Sandra said. “We settled on that big chemical spill case at the firm. Got our clients a good deal, so the boss is happy.”
Dark circles underlined her mom’s eyes. Sandra had been working long hours for the last few months, and Cara could see it had been taking a toll. At least she was getting a little break now.
“And how’s the track star?” Josh asked, turning to her.
“It’s not track. But I’m good. My last race was great. New personal best—”
“High five!” Josh held up his hand, and she looked at him sideways.
“Mom already told you didn’t she?”
“It’s still super exciting, kiddo,” he said. “And what about all these boys you’re spending your time with these days?”
He exchanged a little glance with her mom, and Cara rolled her eyes. “What have you been telling him?” She groaned. “You’ve met them, and there are definitely only two of them, that’s it, and they’re friends, that’s all. We’re all very clear on that now.”
His eyebrows arched at her statement, but he left it alone.
“Well, I was thinking, once I’m rested up tomorrow, how about I take the three of you out hiking? Remember when we had that favorite trail we used to go to all the time?”
“I remember,” she said. “Sounds great. I’ll message them and see if they’re up for it.”
They would be. They had been talking over the last few days about how to get her uncle alone so they could ask about some things. For one, he was a Pyxsee—the only adult one they knew—so he might have some insight about why another Pyxsee would be hunting Pyx. This was a perfect opportunity.
The next morning, she and her uncle packed lunches for all four of them, and then swung by Jory’s house where Wes had stayed over again.
“You’re not gonna make this weird, are you?” Cara asked her uncle before the boys got to the car.
“Course not. You know me, Cara-pace.”
“That’s exactly why I asked . . .”
The back doors to the rental car opened, and Wes and Jory climbed into the backseat on either side of Jenner.
“Hi, boys, welcome to the Cara-van of questions.” Josh chuckled as he pulled away from the curb.
Cara groaned and hid her face in her hands.
“Sorry, guys,” she said, sitting up and turning around in the front seat. “He’s kidding. He’s just not very funny.”
“People say I’m hilarious,” Josh countered.
By the time they arrived at the trailhead for Kings Mountain Trail, he had answered at least as many questions as he had asked. It was exactly what he deserved. He was still smiling about it. Jory wanted to know all about his job traveling the world, and Wes had questions about what it was like meeting Pyx in different places.
“It depends. The wanderers are mostly the same all over. The watchers get a little quirkier since they stay in one area, so they tend to develop their own little societies, just like people, in a way,” Josh explained.
Thinking of the elders who had stayed in the Portland area longer than any other Pyx, Cara understood what he meant. They were definitely on the weird side.
“Let’s go,” Josh said, locking the car doors. “Has Cara told you about how we used to come hiking here all the time?”
“I don’t think I’ve ever mentioned it,” Cara said. “Actually, there’s a story about a cougar I never told you either.”
She recounted the incident from the summer before she turned thirteen, and her uncle’s face grew horrified. He stopped walking when she got to the part where the cougar was on the branch right over her head, waiting to pounce.
“How could you not have told us?” he breathed.
“Um, yeah, that sounds pretty bad, Cara,” Jory added.
“It was pretty bad. I had the whole life-flashing-before-your-eyes thing and everything. But it was before I started seeing the green gleams or hearing voices. It was more like I got a weird calm feeling when I said no to it, and I knew it wouldn’t hurt me. I realize now there must have been a Pyx in it, but I had no idea what was going on at the time. That was actually when I started hiding things more because the whole encounter felt so unbelievable. I couldn’t have explained it if I wanted to.”
Wes had come to stand close beside her. “I’m glad he was a pyxis.”
“She,” Jenyx interrupted from ahead on the trail.
Three sets of Pyxsee eyes swiveled forward to look at Jenner. Jory caught on and nudged Wes to ask what was going on.
“How do you know the cougar was female?” Cara asked, peering at her dog with narrowed eyes.
“You already know I was watching you by then, child.”
“Hold on,” Josh said, “how long have you been watching my niece, exactly?”
“Since she saw a group of us when she was eight years old. To see so young, and with eyes like hers, we agreed to keep watch over her.”
“Eight?” Josh’s voice rose. He turned to her. “You’ve seen them since you were eight? I can’t remember if Jordan and I ever talked about what age he started to see, but I guess it could have been that early.”
“Assuming he was like me—and since he had the same eyes, he probably was—then he always saw them. I didn’t see the green gleams until last year, though, and then the voices, of course.”
Josh gave a low whistle and started to wander up the path again.
“You remember the hawk I told you about that day? The one that never came back?” She fell into step beside him.
“Yeah, you said it was brown and black and seemed to watch you. Oh—” Josh cut himself off. “Oh!” He pointed at Jenner as his eyes widened.
Cara nodded.
“What’d I miss?” Jory asked.
While Wes explained, Cara kept talking. “And that was right after the cougar—so you knew about it, Jenyx? Did you meet the Pyx in the cougar who saved me?”
“I already knew her, though you’ve met him now too,” Jenyx said.
Cara understood. While the cougar had been female, the Pyx was now in a male pyxis. “I’ve met him?”
“His pyxis is smaller now but very similar,” Jenyx said in his rare laughing tone.
Jory, who couldn’t even hear Jenyx, started waving his hand excitedly. “Oh, no way! I totally called Thomas a little cougar the other day. Course that was because he tried to bite my finger off when I was giving him some ham.”
“Tomyx? Tomyx saved my life? Why wouldn’t he say anything?” Cara asked.
“Because any Pyx would have done the same for a Pyxsee,” Jenyx replied.
Josh stared at Jenner with his mouth open for a moment, but he closed it and strode ahead without another word. The group walked on with only the rustling of the forest around them and the sound of their breath. Cara inhaled deeply, gazing up at the towering trees all around them, glad to have another old secret off her chest. Beauty and quiet hung in the air like things she could reach out and touch. If only they could stay in moments like this forever, safe from hidden dangers and bad people far away.
Her mind went to the mansion. It was the first time she’d been this close to it since leaving school three weeks ago, and she sensed its nearness with a surge of longing. She focused on the trail in front of her, bitter that the mansion now represented Rhys instead of the peace she had come to associate with it.
Wes broke the silence. “Josh, what do you know about the Whalton family?”
“What are you kids up to now?” Josh was immediately on guard. “You haven’t been back to Whalton Manor, have you?”
Cara gave a little jolt of surprise that Wes would jump into the topic like
that. Guilt about her promise not to go back to the manor hit her in the gut. Jory flicked a glance in her direction, and her eyes dropped to the path in front of her feet, but Wes kept his eye contact with Josh and answered for everyone.
“No, it’s not about the manor. We recently learned that Rhys Whalton, the son, is a Pyxsee.”
“Really? I’ve met his dad, Randall. I’m sure Randall’s not, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. Wes, you said you don’t think either of your parents are Pyxsees, right?”
“As far as I can tell, no. My mom has some of the same gold flecks in her eyes, so does Kaiah, but nowhere near as much as me.”
“Yeah, Jordan and I always wondered where our Pyxsee abilities came from. Your grandparents had none, Care Bear. Wait, how did you learn about Rhys? And why are you telling me?” Josh looked back and forth between Wes and Cara, his brow furrowed.
Wes stopped walking. “We’re pretty sure he’s the one who was taking Pyx last year, and he’s doing it again.”
Both Cara and Jory stopped to stare open-mouthed at Wes. What was he doing? Even Jenner had turned back to check on the conversation.
“Jeez, man, we could have talked about this first,” Jory muttered.
“Okay. What are you kids up to? You’d better tell me everything right now.” Josh was using his best parent voice, his hands resting on his hips as he stood and surveyed their faces.
Cara stepped in. “We’re not up to anything,” she said, shooting a look at Wes. “We’re just trying to learn what we can about him, that’s all. We don’t want any more Pyx to be in danger, so if we can find out more, then we can help them stay safe.”
“Cara, you do know they’re millions of years old and immortal, right?”
She felt a lurch that had nothing to do with her own feelings. What was that about? She couldn’t see anything around to have caused it.
“Still,” Wes said, “we’re just finding information. Like, what do you know about Mrs. Whalton disappearing from public life? Your organization has ties to some of these charity things. You’re in the loop of Portland’s social elite, right?”
Josh grunted. “Hardly. I’m sure I don’t know as much as whatever you could find in the papers from that time. She did stop showing up to stuff a few years ago, that part’s true, and there’s been nothing but rumors since then. I met her a few times before—and if you’re wondering, she’s also not a Pyxsee—pale blue-grey eyes, if I remember right. She was a really lovely lady. I hate to think any of the rumors are true, poor woman. The one I’ve heard most is she had a psychotic break and is still institutionalized.” He raised one shoulder in a sad shrug. “But who knows? You can’t go bugging that family. Even if they weren’t as powerful as they are, they’ve been through enough.”
“But—” Wes started.
“No, we get it.” Cara interrupted him with a warning look. “We won’t bother them. But can you think of why Rhys would be hunting Pyx? I mean, why would a Pyxsee go after them? It doesn’t make sense.”
Josh shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans. His shoulders leaned into the hill as he started to walk again. “No. I can’t imagine.”
Cara caught Wes’s eye, but he shrugged one shoulder. The conversation was apparently over. She checked Jory’s face and found a twinkle in his eye.
Uh oh.
“Race you to the top?” he said with a gigantic grin.
She glanced to Wes one more time as he started to smile. They all took off. Josh chuckled as they raced by him, grabbing at each other’s arms to surge ahead. Normally Jenner would have sprinted in front of them, but when Cara flopped to the dirt at the top of the hill, gasping for air, he was still walking sedately beside her uncle down below.
CHAPTER 9
Don’t Overreact
SHE WAS CAREFUL NOT to bring up anything to do with the Whaltons, or even Pyx in general, over the weekend. On Saturday, they went as a family to visit the cemetery, something they hadn’t done for a few years. She stood in peaceful silence, sandwiched between her mom and uncle with both their arms around her, while they each had their own moments with her dad. He felt close when they were all together like this. Sometimes she struggled to understand why her mom still visited every week after so long. Other times, like this, nothing could have made more sense to her.
After lunch at Lily’s diner, where she sat facing away from the booth along the far wall so she didn’t have to picture Rhys and his poufy hair sitting in her diner, they spent the rest of the day playing games and chatting in the backyard.
A sound of beating wings drew her eye up a second before the harsh voice called to her.
“Caw, caw, Cara.”
She didn’t react, but Josh looked up at the taunt from Ryx as his raven pyxis flew by, swooping lower over her yard than was strictly necessary.
“Honestly,” Jenyx said in a disapproving tone. “It would appear Ryx got the message he no longer needs to guard the mansion.”
Sandra busied herself turning on the barbeque for dinner, oblivious to anything out of the ordinary. Josh raised one eyebrow at Cara, but she shook her head and closed her eyes for a moment. Ryx was so annoying.
Cara spent the next two days reading another book in the magician series she was tearing through. Wes and his family had gone camping for a few days and had taken Jory with them. They’d invited her too, but her uncle was around so seldom, she opted to stay home.
She and Josh took Jenner for long walks each day, but they didn’t talk much about Pyx. Instead, he regaled her with funny stories about him and her dad as kids, from family vacations (like the one where Jordan had forgotten to pack any underwear) to the silly things they used to fight over (like whether Josh had deliberately unpacked and hidden Jordan’s underwear).
On Monday afternoon, her uncle left to pick up a large donation from another organization for the charity gala, and she savored a few hours alone to finish her book. The front door banged open earlier than she’d expected, but it wasn’t Josh. Her mom was home early, and Cara could tell something was wrong from the moment she flew in.
“Mom? What happened? Are you okay?”
“I’m okay, it’s not me. Just in a rush.” Sandra ran her hand through her hair, forgetting it was tied back for work and causing strands to fall out of the clip. She kicked off her shoes and ran up to the kitchen where she yanked open a drawer they hardly ever used. Things started to fall over the edges as she rifled through it.
“What’s going on? Mom!”
Sandra looked up at Cara’s sharp tone, and her face softened. “Sorry, sweetie. It’s Lydia. I need to get her spare house key.”
“Here, let me.” Cara stepped forward to sift through the cluttered drawer, placing pens, candles, notepads, and various other items on the counter as she searched more methodically. “Got it,” she said, holding up the labeled key. “Now what’s going on?”
“I don’t know. I told you about the day she flipped out on our boss a few weeks ago, right? The firm made her take some time off after that, but I don’t think she should have been back yet. Something really serious is going on with her. Today she started raving again, and I ran out to calm her down, but she pushed me and charged out the front door and right into traffic.”
Cara clapped a hand over her mouth and stared.
“She’s lucky she’s not dead. The paramedic said she has a broken leg. Mr. Jackson got an update from the hospital, and there are no other serious injuries, but they’re keeping her under psychiatric observation. I still have her key, so I’m going to get a few of her things to bring over. She doesn’t have any family.”
“Poor Lydia. That’s awful.”
“I know. I wish I’d seen some sort of sign. She got distant so abruptly last fall. I figured maybe she just didn’t want to be friends anymore, or maybe I did something. But this . . . I don’t know.”
“Let me change quickly. I’ll come with you,” Cara said, already climbing the stairs.
She had missed
the signs too—the signs of how much her mom was going through. Since Christmas, she’d barely spent any time at home until now, and had been so distracted by having friends of her own for the first time, she hadn’t noticed how much her mom was dealing with. She closed her eyes and took a long breath. Then she pulled on a clean shirt and ran back downstairs.
They stopped at Lydia’s townhouse to pick up some essentials and some clothes that would fit over the cast on her leg. The whole ride to the hospital, Cara revisited her concerns for her own mental health when she first started hearing voices. The fear still haunted her occasionally. She remembered wondering what a psych ward would really be like, assuming the movies didn’t exactly capture it right. Well, she was about to find out.
“This is her room,” Sandra said.
They had checked in with the nurse’s station, locked up their personal belongings, and received permission to bring Lydia’s things to her. Just as Cara was starting to relax, it hit her. Hostility—more intense than anything she’d ever felt. The feeling stopped her in her tracks. What was causing it?
Sandra pushed open the door and nodded to an attendant sitting in the room who made no move to leave. The icy feeling in Cara’s gut intensified as she stood in the doorway, to the point that she didn’t think she could be there. She couldn’t understand it.
Her mom noticed her grimace. “It’s okay, sweetie. You can wait outside. I’ll just talk to Lydia for a few minutes.”
“There’s a lounge down the hall.” The woman monitoring Lydia gestured out the door to the right, giving Cara a kind smile. “All the way to the end, and use the right-hand door. It’s the adolescent unit community area. You’ll be more comfortable there.”
Cara nodded and backed out of the room. She couldn’t understand why she was reacting this way to being here. She hadn’t even gone far enough in to actually see Lydia, but she was keen to put some distance between them.
At the end of the hall, Cara pushed through the door, and a large room opened up before her. She breathed a little easier. Here, earthy grey paint on the walls and the sun streaming through two banks of shining windows warmed the entire space. People sat on couches and chairs arranged under the windows, while several tables filled the central area, and two older teens watched television in one corner. Closest to the entrance, where she stood taking it all in, sat a row of waiting room chairs. She took a seat.
