Paranormal Academy

by Limited Edition Box Set

  But Ripley had allowed his feet to drift within striking range, and Ari kicked him, so he shrank back and shut his mouth.

  "Not now, Ripley," Ari hissed.

  Turning her attention back to Peter, she eyed him carefully. She knew they couldn't open that can of worms right now. Too many crises were already wearing Ari too thin. It wouldn't do any good to add extra burdens to the rest of them when they were already a wreck.

  "Who’s looking for me?" Ari asked him.

  But she dove back into the books inside her mind with a renewed sense of purpose. Whoever it was had Marx and she wanted him back. He was probably still alive; it wouldn't be the first time that someone had tried to use him as bait. It probably wouldn't be the last.

  She could push past her fear for him, she knew she could.

  "I don't know. He owns a big white house on this island, hidden by trees. They're strange, like a jungle, they aren't anything I've seen outside of movies."

  Ari was nodding, she could see it. The house was in a clutch of banana trees: old and white, made of stone like a castle. It even had its own little tower. Down a winding path, and past all that, were the skeletal remains of what appeared to be a private collection of exotic animals.

  "I see it," Ari said.

  "How do we get there?" Leo asked.

  "It's on the other side of the island," Ari said, shaking herself from the trance.

  She jumped to her feet but fell right back down. Her feet ached the worst, but her entire body was hurt and sore. Still, she wouldn't stop.

  "I need new shoes," Ari said, ripping the heels from her ruined feet and tossing them into a corner.

  As she sank back onto the box she'd been perched on, Ari tried to search for a plan that would bring them success. She refused to believe this could be the end, not when they had so many other endings they had to endure first.

  "We have flip flops by the register,” Leo said. “We'll snag you some on the way out."

  He held out his hand to her, but she just looked at it.

  "It will be all right," Ripley told her, patting her shoulder.

  It should have felt ridiculous and shallow, but the silliness of it unexpectedly warmed her, and that heat helped her back to her feet.

  *

  They all stood on the street, huddled together yet again, except for Leo. He was still inside, likely spinning a boring story to his mother, explaining what they were doing, without actually explaining anything. Ari had new flip flops with silver sequins on her feet. The lack of torturous black straps cutting into her feet seemed to make them hurt worse, because the feeling had returned.

  Music pulsed from different parts of the Mardi Gras celebration, and the noise of the crowd rose and fell like cresting waves.

  Ari could tell there were other people nearby, there were even others in this tucked away corner at the bottom of the stairs. Some were making out, some were conversing loudly about their plans for nothing good in the groups the size of Ari's own, but when Leo came back downstairs spinning a different ring of metal keys, they whispered.

  "You'll have to drive," he told Ari.

  She'd known what he meant for her to do as soon as she'd seen his mother's puffy pink keychain.

  "I know you hate it, but we're too young to drive,” Leo said, “and we look too young, too."

  Ari cringed inwardly but agreed.

  "We'll keep you from getting distracted," Ripley said.

  It wasn't that Ari hated driving, she even thought she'd like it, if she didn't always have to worry about falling into some other time or place while she was operating a motor vehicle. That was the problem.

  The coffee shop had its own employee parking space, just large enough at the back of the alley to hold a mom-ish old Saturn. Ari had to lay on the horn when a kissing couple failed to notice the car idling like it was dying right behind them, but eventually, they made it on to one of the side streets.

  She might not drive in town much, but Ari hated traffic as a driver or a passenger, and because of Mardi Gras, there was traffic all over the island.

  She'd driven almost halfway before she decided she needed a break. No one said a thing until they'd pulled into a vacant stall of an old self-service car wash. A trickle of water dropped every three seconds onto the window and was oddly soothing to Ari. She threw her head back onto the little headrest and let herself fall into her own mind.

  "What's the plan?" Leo asked her.

  She watched through half-closed lids as he wrapped his hands into fists; he was ready to fight right then, she only needed to point them in the right direction.

  "I’m working on it," Ari snapped, coming out more cutting than she had anticipated, but Leo was used to her antics. He didn't run away or even shrink back.

  "I couldn't think about it," she admitted, "not while driving, not unless we all wanted to die, and if that's the case, I don't have to think about it at all. I can drive us off the seawall with or without distraction."

  Ripley made an awful little half-laugh behind him, but Ari rolled her eyes where he could see them in the rearview mirror.

  "You people are all freaky calm," Peter said. Even with a decent AC in the crappy car, he was still sweating bullets. "Do you do this often?"

  The way Peter had asked made it sound like a joke, but Ari could tell it wasn't. Not really.

  "You could say that," Ari said.

  "Yes," Leo muttered, "you really could."

  Ari rubbed at her eyes as if she could make the vision in her mind clearer. Really, what she could use was silence, and mercilessly, the boys allowed her to have it. In her mind, Ari went back to the house. She walked the little path and saw Marx and two others. They were shadowed to her; likely the others Peter had spoken of. Neither of which being who Ari needed to seek out.

  Again, she went back to the house.

  This time, she tried to open the front doors in her mind, but they were closed to her. She tried different angles of looking at things until she found another winding path. This path forked in two directions: one went down to a private beach at the end of the bay, and the other led to a garden at the very back of the house.

  It had low hedges and rows of flowers as large as dinner plates in orange, yellow, and red.

  In the middle of the flowers stood a man, and that man was expecting her.

  Ari sat straight up in her seat, and she knew exactly what she had to do.

  "I have a plan," Ari said, “but I need something from my house first.”

  She put the car into gear and started down the familiar road home, before Leo and Ripley could voice their objections, and Ari knew there were bound to be many.

  "Are you sure that's a good idea?" Ripley asked, but Leo jumped further into his point at the same time.

  "There could be people there waiting to capture you!" Leo argued. There wouldn't be, but Ari wasn't going to tell him that.

  "I know," she said instead, and hoped it came out sincere. "Which is why I have to ask you and Ripley to run in and get it for me. I don't think you should go alone... I will drop you a block or so away, so the car won't be spotted."

  "Of course, it might not matter if the other Heralds have seen all this and told the people trying to catch you," Leo said.

  Having your own fortune teller was one thing, the enemies having one presented a whole new set of challenges they weren't used to dealing with.

  "They wouldn’t have told anyone," Peter said, "I mean, we did before, but we had an agreement when I escaped that... it doesn't matter... they won't say anything to anyone, I swear."

  Ari felt Leo turn to look at Peter, but she couldn't pay attention to what was transpiring between them. Not unless she wanted them all to die, and she had just recently decided she didn't want to do that today. That she didn't want to do that for quite some time. That she wanted to live to see the end of the world, maybe even be there for the start of it—again.

  A few streets from the little blue cottage Ari shared with Marx and a gr
andmotherly type, who pretended to be their guardian, without asking questions, Ari pulled off the side of the road. Thick green bushes blew in the wind, reaching out to touch the side of the car. Ari took her house key in her hand and quickly slid the chain that held it around her neck over her head. She handed it to Leo.

  "Go into my closet," Ari said, "and look in the shoe box. There's a little metal gadget in it, no bigger than a thimble. It even looks like one. Get it and get back here as quick as you can."

  Leo had already tossed his door open with a flair, and a glance in every direction.

  Only Ripley hadn't moved, and Ari turned her head to see what the holdup was, but he was looking at her strangely.

  Ari swallowed down the lump that was about to choke her, willing it to stay there.

  "But what does it do?" Ripley asked, "Why do you—"

  "I don't have time, Ripley. I'll explain on the way. Just hurry."

  Ripley was out of the car then. Curious, but still trusting. He had to hustle to catch up to Leo who was sprinting down the street, before Ripley had slammed the backdoor of the car shut behind him.

  Counting silently in her head, Ari waited and watched. When she saw them turn on to the next street, she gave them a full two minutes before pulling the car away from the curb in a sweeping arc, heading back the way they'd come.

  "What are you doing?" Peter asked from the backseat.

  But Ari didn't answer him right away.

  "Is something wrong? Are we being followed?" he asked, anxiously looking over his shoulder.

  "I think you know very well we aren't being followed, Peter."

  Silence sprouted from them. Ari wasn't sure if Peter knew what she meant. Not yet.

  "You want me to use my skill?" Peter asked her. "I don't just… I am not used to doing it all the time. So, I didn't know that we weren't being followed. Not until you said."

  He was wringing his hands again, and intriguing nervous tick he had.

  Ari was ashamed of herself for not noticing before.

  "That's not what I meant, Peter, don't worry. I'm not mad." Ari sucked in a breath. It was sharper than the hum of the AC. "Okay, not that mad. I know he has your sister. I know he made you swear. I should have picked up on it before now. I'm not blaming you. I'm blaming me."

  "I don't know what you' re—"

  Ari cut Peter off. "Oh, yes, you do, and you might as well stop. You betrayed my trust, you were here to double cross me, and I just fell into it. But I’m giving you a pass, all right? I understand dire circumstances. I've lived them. I know you escaped but were caught, and when they dragged you back, they offered you this one chance. The fewer people who knew, the better, and the less likely there would be breadcrumbs around for me to stumble across accidentally."

  Ari shook her hair out of her face; it had come loose from her ponytail, again. It wasn't that Peter was evil, not in the way some men could be, he was just trying to save someone he loved. Ari could understand that, even support it. In her mind, that was a noble cause, but she still hated getting mixed up in it.

  "I..." Peter began lamely.

  "You don't have to explain, Peter. I get it."

  Ari had started the car down a long winding drive. There was an onlookers or caution, and no trespassing signs she did not heed, painted in blood red and spaced in increasing intervals.

  "I still don't know what he wants with you," Peter admitted.

  He sounded sad, and Ari believed that he really was.

  The driveway narrowed and was flanked on both sides by thick stone walls, but they were newer than the miniature-sized castle of the house that loomed at the end of the drive.

  "My being here is the only way we're rescuing everyone else," Ari said, slowing the car, "and I'm okay with that. When I deal with... well, with you know who... he'll agree to release the others. I want you to run, you hear me? I want you to get back to where we were supposed to meet Leo and Ripley and tell them everything. Promise me."

  Peter threw himself against the high-back seat. A weird sense of fear and relief seemed to fill his eyes as Ari checked on him in the mirror before bringing the car to a graceful stop.

  She'd driven across the whole island... and no one had died.

  Not yet, anyway.

  9

  The darkness had finally set in. Gone was the pink from the sky and the warmth from the sun, but the heat still clung to the world like it was already summer. Peter walked right up to the path between all their cages. He stood just inside Marx's vision, where Marx was sure he could gaze at his sister.

  He looked dazed, his black hair and small silhouette looked even more insignificant and darker in the night than he'd remembered from the scuffle that afternoon.

  It was hard to believe that just that morning, they'd been sitting for their classes at Bayside Art Academy. The field trip had seemed like it would be a drag, but Marx would never have guessed what had happened by the end of the day. Ari could have if she weren't trying to keep tabs on everyone else at the same time. They'd have to be more careful in the future.

  "I'm glad you're all right," Peter said to Kate.

  "Can you help us get out of here?" Lauren asked. Her tear-stained face was filled with a burning intensity, like heaven's light itself. They had a mandate after all, even if they didn't know it yet.

  Peter slowly shook his head, causing his black bangs to fall into his narrow face like a screen full of ink.

  "You shouldn't have come back; they will just catch you again!" Kate barked.

  No matter how happy she was to see her brother, she would rather never see him again and know that he was safe. Marx was familiar with the way he knew she was feeling. He felt that way right then himself.

  "They already did," Peter said.

  Marx saw that the boy stood with his face forcibly turned away from the girls. He was pushing at a cobblestone from the walkway, dislodging it was a mud-caked show.

  "What do you mean?" Lauren asked. "How did you escape? Where did you go?"

  Peter's eyes shot up to meet Marx's. Guilt shone in them like a fat reflection of the moon. But why?

  "I didn't escape," Peter admitted, and it looked like it cost him ten years of his life.

  "What are you talking about!" Kate shouted. "You tackled the guard, you ran away. We saw you do it!"

  “We helped you plan it,” Lauren said delicately, suddenly seeming too afraid of pushing him too far when he appeared so close to the edge.

  Peter nodded his head. That much was right, at least.

  "I did get out of my cage, but now I am considering going back in."

  Marx felt a scowl bloom on his face. Why would anyone want to go back into a prison? Marx knew if he could get out, someone would have to kill him to get him back in. There would be no other way.

  “But why?” Lauren asked.

  She’d inched her way as close to the electric bars as any of them dared, just to glare at Peter.

  “Because I’m afraid,” Peter admitted, and Marx swore he saw the boy tremble, even though he was the only one outside the cage.

  “Afraid of what?” Kate asked him, and her sisterly tone was back.

  “Afraid of Marx, and what he’ll do to me when he realizes what I’ve done.”

  10

  Just like she'd seen in her vision, the front of the stone façade of the house held a fat wooden door, shaped like a drawbridge, with heavy iron closures. It had a standard-looking doorknob, though, and would have opened inward like any regular entry if it hadn't been locked to her just as she'd recalled before.

  Every light in the house was on, and haystack windows spilled light deep into the yard and onto the path Ari had to take in sweeping arcs. It was still at least ninety degrees, but Ari was sweating for an entirely different reason.

  Her new flip flops were streaked with dust by the time she came to the fore in the path. If she went right, into the deep darkness of night, she knew that she would reach a small sandy beach. She could hear the music of it
—it wasn't very far away. But Ari knew she must go left toward the gardens behind the house, and that was where she'd find the man.

  He was no longer looking for her; she knew that he knew she would come. As complicated as that sounded out loud, it was actually rather simple.

  When she found the white-haired man, he would be standing in a strange raised section of the gardens. It was surrounded by three-quarters of a rectangle of wickedly spiked black wrought-iron fencing.

  When she found the white-haired man, he would exchange the other's freedom for the answer to one lone question. Whether or not Ari could find the answer in five seconds or fifty years remained to be seen, but she'd make the trade, even if it cost her something else.

  She turned left, and the light from the house grew brighter as she approached it from a different side, and the garden held a light of its own. Crystal-looking globes hung from thick cords overhead for what seemed like acres of flowers and hedges, and even blank spaces with nothing but grass, artistically breaking it up.

  Under normal circumstances, it would be lovely. Then again, under normal circumstances, none of this would be happening.

  Which led Ari to believe that she knew nothing of ordinary and was surprised she hadn't adjusted herself to that ideal long before this dreadful moment.

  "I knew you'd come," the white-haired man said as she approached him.

  He was a strange man, wearing the knee-length britches of by-gone days. He had his back turned to Ari, his massive red hands were clasped in the small of it, just above where his long white ponytail ended in a funny little curl. He also wore an intricate vest, from which swung a chain for a pocket watch.

  Ari hadn't seen a watch like that outside of books since previous lifetimes.

  "I know you were expecting me," Ari said.

  Her voice was flat; the longer she drew this out, the longer she had to find the answer before she needed it.

  "I suppose Peter told you," the man said, but he still didn't turn to face her.

  "He didn't have to," Ari said honestly.