by Brea Viragh
I didn’t dare turn around and look back at the house. Soon I was out of the neighborhood, the tree-lined streets shifting to a modern-day cement jungle. Car traffic increased until I heard nothing outside of the honks and roar of engines. Every step toward the car rental place in the city was too heavy, too swift, carrying me away from whatever torment and misery I was leaving behind me, and toward whatever unknowns lay in front of me.
The man behind the counter at the car rental facility was busy helping another customer when I arrived. One of the good things about living in the northern Virginia suburbs, we had wilderness close and city amenities closer. I waited my turn with little patience, choosing a seat from the near-empty line of chairs and keeping my luggage close to me. The sun had kissed above the horizon, rising steadily. Ten hours of driving and I’d be out of this place forever.
Lowering my head to avoid unwanted attention, I thought about the night before.
I’d used the opportunity to scroll through the school’s website and memorize any information I could, hoping it would give me an edge over the rest of the applicants. The way a person would research a company before they went in for a job interview.
There hadn’t been much there. A picture of the headmaster whose name I couldn’t remember now. He looked young, kind, with dusky light-brown hair and an easy smile, ears pointed, eyes a strange shade of orange. I wasn’t sure if regular full-blooded Fae aged the same way humans did. There were no other photos of the rest of the staff. I assumed I would meet them when I arrived at the academy.
I knew nothing about Faerie. I had no clue about that part of my heritage.
What the hell am I doing?
Escaping one bad situation and catapulting myself into another, where I had no idea about the major players. I didn’t know how to be Fae. Unease swirled and settled beneath my sternum. Maybe my entire plan was nuts. Maybe I should have done what Uncle Will wanted and forced myself to go through with the arrangement with Kendrick.
My fingers clenched until my knuckles ached.
“Excuse me, Miss? You’re up.”
The car rental guy at the counter tapped a finger in the universal sign to hurry up. Not sure where he had to go or why he was suddenly in such a hurry, but I stood and followed him into a small office with beige blinds. When had the other customer left? I hadn’t been paying attention.
“Thanks,” I told the guy, but I wasn’t sure for what.
“What can I do to help you today?” he asked, holding a hand out for me to sit.
I dragged my luggage behind me and took a seat in front of him. I’d think it obvious why I was here. His hand remained outstretched to shake. I ignored it and said, “I need to rent a car, please.”
“What are you looking for?” he enquired as he settled into his seat. “Compact, mid-sized, luxury?”
Whatever will get me from Point A to Point B the fastest. I chewed the inside of my lip. “Compact.” It would be smaller, less likely to draw attention.
“Perfect. I need to see your driver’s license and I can get the process started for you.”
Reaching into my purse, I pulled the slim plastic card from my wallet and slid it across the desk to him. The man inclined his head, staring at the information. Then up to me. Then back to the card. The hairs of his reddish beard bristled.
“You’re only eighteen,” he said.
“Yes, my birthday was about a week ago.” Smile, Tavi. Keep it casual. Don’t let him see you sweat.
“You’re not old enough to rent a car, Miss Alderidge.” He said it like the information was obvious. “You have to be twenty-five years old. It’s the law.”
I stared at him for what felt like a good five minutes. “I’m sorry? What do you mean?”
“Twenty-five,” the man said again. “It’s standard. Do you have a guardian with you? He glanced around as though I’d hidden an adult somewhere. Maybe inside my suitcase.
“No, there’s no one.” I thought about the money I’d stolen from Uncle Will burning a hole in my pocket, ready to be spent. “Isn’t there anything you can do? Something I can pay? How much will it take?”
The man’s gaze hardened and at once he wasn’t the bland and helpful service provider but someone suspicious, someone who could potentially stand in my way. “No, honey, there isn’t.” Then his eyes narrowed. “Are you in trouble? Do you need me to call someone for you?”
Uh oh. Alert, alert! “No, thank you. Everything is fine.”
I hurried out of the car rental office with the knots in my stomach twisting into new and unfamiliar patterns. There were some things in this world money couldn’t buy, apparently. Rental cars among them. It was a new experience for me and one I didn’t want to repeat anytime soon. Especially not when people automatically assumed I was in trouble.
I was in trouble, but not the kind a human could help me conquer.
How would I make it to the academy by tomorrow without a car?
I absolutely could not go back to the house for my car. My uncle would track it as easily as he tracked prey in the woods. It left me stuck, scrambling to reset and to find another way to make this work.
I stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, with the sun high and people walking around me without a second thought. No one questioned the luggage. No one stopped to ask if I needed help. Good.
Luckily, I had money in my pocket. Money might not have been able to buy much with the rental car guy, but it could certainly get me a junker. A junker with enough go to travel ten hours, at least.
I could make it work.
It would take me a good twenty minutes to walk to the nearest place, if I remembered, but no worries. If it got me out of the city, then what choice did I have? I couldn’t risk the bus; the stops all had cameras and there were too many people to remember my face.
I hated this place. Hated cities period. I preferred the fields and the wild places where I could let myself be free without fear of repercussion. Instead now I had to put on a face. I had to pretend to be anything other than what I was.
Who was I kidding? I’d been this way my entire life. There had never been a moment where I felt the utter freedom to be safe with both of my sides.
Maybe there had been a time once, before my parents died. But those six years were a blank.
On to a new adventure, I tried to tell myself as I walked. If I could get to the academy, if I could make it through the required years and carve out a place for myself in Faerie, then maybe, just maybe, I could find freedom.
And Kendrick Grimaldi would never be able to find me.
I moved as fast as I could down the sidewalk. Arms aching and legs sore from hustling, I finally stood in front of the used car lot I remembered seeing on previous trips downtown. The owner had obviously made efforts to draw in the crowd with bright and vulgar banners proclaiming the fabulous deals he had to offer. The building, a squat concrete box with barred windows, looked like someone had picked up a tiny prison and plopped it down in the middle of the city block, with walls stained orange by rainwater dripping through the metal gutters.
But I was here, and the more time I wasted, the more time it gave someone at the house to notice I was not in my room.
I marched through the open gates, wheeling my suitcase behind me, duffel bag bouncing, glancing around at the car choices as I passed them. On the left I saw a red Lexus. Something I might have gotten if I’d had my pick of the lot. Even the tires gleamed, everything polished to a sheen. But a car like that would stand out at the academy. It would stand out anywhere.
“Well, hello there, little one. You have good taste. The Lexus is a premium piece of machinery, less than thirty thousand miles on her.”
A large brown-skinned man dressed in an expensive suit approached me, his smile firmly in place and voice filled with automatic courtesy.
I forced a similar expression on my face. It would make our conversation go much easier. “The Lexus is nice,” I agreed, shifting to relieve the pressure of my duffel
bag digging into my shoulder. “But I’m looking for something a little more understated.”
In one swift glance, the man judged me, the cut of my clothes and the brand of my purse. I could practically see dollar signs dancing behind his eyes.
“Aw, honey, you would look perfect behind the wheel of the Lexus. Think about how your friends will feel when they see you drive up to school in this beauty.” His hand came out, smoothly maneuvering me toward the car.
“What’s the oldest vehicle you have on the lot that still runs?” I asked him. “Something that’s going to blend in.”
The question surprised the man, clearly. He blinked as the wheels in his head turned and cogs clicked together. “In all good conscience, Big Dan can’t let you drive out of here in anything beneath you, Miss…”
I avoided giving him my name, stepping around him and eyeing the line of cars behind the Lexus. There had to be something here. Something nondescript and cheap.
It took less than five minutes of Big Dan trailing me, continuing with his spiel, to find the Toyota with a bumper held on by a hope and a prayer. I detected hints of dull areas where someone had used duct tape as a quick fix and it had worn away at the paint beneath.
Big Dan, or someone who worked for him, had tried to clean the car as well as they could but there were areas where the paint had been roughed and scratched. Even a good cleaning couldn’t disguise the wear. Peering inside, I saw a cracked dashboard showing a hint of yellow foam padding beneath.
I wanted it.
“How much for this one?” I purposely ignored the price written in marker across the windshield. If there was anything William had taught me, it was the importance of haggling. The final price wouldn’t be what was scribbled on the glass and we both knew it. I could get him down a bit lower. He expected the back and forth.
Big Dan walked over and leaned a massive hip against the hood, staring me down with the typical adult I-know-better-than-you smile with a hint of smugness at the edge of his lips. “Honey, this car…it’s not for someone like you,” he said.
He still thought he could talk me into the Lexus.
“I think it’s exactly for me. How much?” I repeated, drawing my brows together. No one would suspect I’d be driving this kind of car. It was the perfect disguise. “What’s the best you can do for it?”
“Sweetheart, there are better cars on the lot. I wouldn’t feel comfortable letting you drive off in the Toyota. Someone like you deserves better.”
“What’s the best you can do?” I asked again.
He finally saw I meant business. “Come into my office, little one, and we can talk.”
There were only so many cutesy pet names I could tolerate on a normal day. I’d heard them all at my internship with William’s firm. People, men in particular, thought they could sweet talk me with honeyed nicknames, nicknames with no bearing on who I was as a person, and it would help me to get my duties done faster. Or get me to do a special favor for them.
Big Dan didn’t know me from the next person on the street, and he didn’t know where I came from, which meant he could sweetie and honey and baby me until he turned blue in the face, but I wasn’t leaving without the Toyota.
There were some things money couldn’t buy, true. This wasn’t one of those times, I told myself, because I knew what I wanted.
Big Dan didn’t know what had hit him by the time I walked out. I left the small office cluttered with file cabinets two thousand dollars lighter, having managed to talk Big Dan down another five hundred off his asking price. It hadn’t taken much more than a few well-placed battings of the eyelashes along with tactics I’d picked up during my internship. And maybe a little magic.
Played.
Good, I thought. This was nothing but practice for the academy. I needed to be on my toes there.
A quick stop at a wireless phone store provided me a cheap and untraceable cell I’d use in place of the one I left behind. Who would I call? No one, I knew, but it felt familiar in my hand. And I could use the GPS system on the drive.
This was it.
The first step in the journey to my freedom. Throwing my luggage in the backseat, I finally slid behind the steering wheel and placed my hands on the cracked dashboard. The car smelled of burned microwave food and pine-scented air freshener, the seats cracked and stained. I didn’t care. It was my ticket out of here. Beautiful because it meant a shot at escape.
I thought about the stuff I’d tossed in the rear seat: everything important to me, including the empty picture frames from on top of my dresser. I thought about the money I’d taken from my skinflint uncle and hoped, if he ever noticed it was gone, maybe he could forgive me for taking it.
Forgive me for a lot of things.
Once he realized I was gone…no, he couldn’t get past the betrayal. What I’d done could damage relations between the Alderidge and Grimaldi packs for the foreseeable future. It would impact everyone in the packs from the alpha to the lowest omega.
I shook my head to clear it, tightening my grip on the steering wheel. Running away would be letting my pack down. For what he’d deal with, I was sorry.
Not sorry enough to stay.
The road spread out in front of me. Once I made it out of the city, I made good time. The burner phone, at least, came equipped with GPS and the mechanical voice guided me closer to the academy with each mile.
Closer to my future. Closer to my escape. And once I was out of the city past the early morning traffic, something eased inside of me, a tension I hadn’t been aware of. I thought of the vials in the backseat behind me. The vials to keep my shifter nature at bay. The rest would be up to me.
Hours passed. I grabbed fast food for lunch, with extra for dinner, and listened to the radio to pass the time. I decided to find a place to stop for the night. I hadn’t seen any road signs for a motel in a while but there should be some ahead. I’d stop at the next one I found. With autumn around the corner, the days were getting shorter, and already it was dark and I was tired.
I tapped on the steering wheel in time with the song on the radio. One step at a time, another mile closer to the academy.
In my head I was already there and figuring out my next step. But fatigue rode me hard, eyes blurring, shoulders tight. I needed to stop and get some sleep so I could rest up before orientation tomorrow morning.
Close, so close.
The car shook and sputtered, throwing me forward against the dashboard until the seatbelt bit into my neck. My wrist jolted painfully. Smoke curled from beneath the hood and the car wheezed like an old man with COPD.
“No, no! Come on, don’t do this to me. Not now.”
I managed to yank the wheel and bring the old girl over to the side of the road seconds before its final death call.
Black smoke belching, and the clock marking midnight, the car died a terrible death.
9
The immediate clench of fear in my gut at being stranded began to fade slightly the more time passed. Maybe Big Dan had been right about the car. I was stuck miles away from civilization in a broken-down heap.
The next thought was how I’d made a bad mistake in picking the worst car on the lot when I should have settled for something middle of the road for a little more money.
“Come on, baby. I know you can do this.” I spoke softly to the car, cajoling the way one would with a child or a scared animal.
I turned the key in the ignition repeatedly, listening to the slowly fading hum of the starter. This couldn’t be happening.
“You have to be kidding me!”
Fumbling to find the release, I popped the hood and stepped out of the car. The night was silent. Heavy. The weight of the silence bore down on me and I stared out into the darkness creeping closer and closer. I was in the middle of nowhere, rural Massachusetts, tall trees blocking my views of the sky.
“Breathe, Tavi, breathe,” I told myself.
Hands fisting my hair into knots, I tried to follow my own advice and fail
ed miserably, my lungs aching. I was still too far away from the school to walk and I definitely didn’t feel comfortable walking at this hour. Not when I wanted to keep my shifter side a secret—and it left me in a vulnerable position.
I opened the hood although I had no clue what I was doing. Smoke lay in a low blanket over most of the mechanics and I fanned it away on a cough, trying to see.
Not knowing what I was looking for, I couldn’t find the source of the problem and ended up choking on the smoke.
“This is fixable.” I spoke to myself to break up the cloying darkness pressing closer. I couldn’t take the quiet much longer. “No big deal. I’ll call a tow truck and get a lift to the nearest garage. I’ve got money, no problem, I can get the car fixed and maybe catch a ride to the school tomorrow.”
A tentative plan in place felt better than the underlying layer of helplessness I wanted to succumb to. But when I unlocked my phone and checked for bars, my heart sunk. A total dead zone. No wonder the GPS hadn’t been working.
A cold sweat broke out over my skin. I couldn’t even call 911 if I wanted to.
An owl hooted from somewhere in the woods and I nearly jumped out of my skin, diving back into the car. I closed the door behind me, making sure to engage the lock.
Minutes crept by. Only a single car passed me on the road and they didn’t stop. I wasn’t sure whether it made me happy or anxious.
More minutes. Then an hour. And another.
Teeth clenched, I shook out my hands to try and relieve some tension. “It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay.” I twisted the key in the ignition again, on the off chance the engine had rested enough to work this time.
Nope, no such luck.
It felt better to have the overhead light on. Then again, with the light, everything outside could see me and I couldn’t see a thing in return. The battery would only last for so long.
“I’m losing my marbles.” I let out a low laugh, letting my head hit the rest behind me. If this was a test, then I was foolish and had failed miserably. I’d wanted so badly to escape my situation I’d backed myself into this corner, the night outside a dark veil snapping with all manner of bad things.