Tithes

by Claire Farrell

  “No, you have things to do,” I said. “Maybe keep out of the way until this dies down anyway. You don’t want to get dragged into this mess.”

  “Yeah, I read the paper already today.”

  “What paper?”

  “Uh, just pick up a newspaper.” She hung up scarily quick.

  I stopped in at the closest shop to buy a newspaper. I should have guessed—my picture was in the paper again. Of course, not when I had my hair and makeup done while wearing freaking high heels. That wouldn’t have been interesting enough. No, this picture was of me sprawled on my back, legs akimbo, with a broken table beneath me, food in my hair, and a bunch of protesters about to flatten me. If Carl cut out and framed that picture, I was going to kill him, best friend or not.

  I scanned the article. A pro-protester slant. Great. And Áine O’Neill again. I was really going to have to get on to her. The article was ridiculous, claiming that the “supernatural-heavy” police force had instigated the whole incident by provoking a protester known to be mentally unstable. It even finished with a few words from the victim claiming to completely understand why the protesters had barged in how they did. My day was not improving.

  * * *

  The following morning, Anka woke me from a nap on the sofa by banging my door down.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked sleepily when I answered.

  “The school!” She tugged on her hair, her fingers wide and clawing. “I just got a call. Something’s happening. The children aren’t safe. They’re supposed to be safe, but they’re—”

  “Slow down,” I said. “What exactly is happening?”

  “I’m not sure! They called to warn me not to go near the school, that they’re trying to control the situation. People are threatening to hurt the children, I think. We need to do something!”

  Carl came out of his house. “What’s going on?” he asked.

  While Anka told him, I called Peter.

  “I’m on my way there now,” he said, his voice gruff. “I don’t know what’s happening, but I heard something on the radio about a protest, so I’m heading over to help. If any protester even thinks about spewing hate at my son, they’ll be sorry.”

  “Come get me,” I said. “I need to be there. This has the potential to get nasty. If the kids get hurt—or if they try to fight back—it could get even nastier.”

  “I’m on my way with Val,” he said. “Be ready. I’m not waiting.”

  He hung up abruptly. I ran out of my gate to the others. “Peter’s coming to get me,” I said. “He should be a few minutes. He thinks the protesters are at the school, but I’ll get Dita home safely, I promise.”

  “I’m going with you,” Carl said. “I know the teachers and the kids. I could help.”

  “We don’t know what’s going on.”

  “I don’t care,” he said. “If they’re calling parents, something really fucked is going on.”

  “I should come,” Anka said, her voice trembling. She scratched at her forearms.

  I grabbed her hands to stop her. “You’ll only distract me, Anka. Let me find a way to deal with this. I swear I can get Dita out of there without getting her hurt. But you have to stay here. You’re too upset to be useful right now.”

  She nodded, her eyes glistening with tears. “You’ll call me if there’s news?”

  “We promise,” Carl said reassuringly. “It’s probably nothing, but we’ll let you know.”

  Peter soon arrived. Carl and I hopped into the backseat.

  “Is Anka all right?” Val asked.

  “Not until we get Dita home,” I said.

  “Call Shay,” Carl said. “He has to know more.”

  Peter called Shay and put him on speakerphone. He was already at the school, and the shouting in the background didn’t fill me with confidence.

  “What’s happening?” Peter asked.

  “There was a protest outside the school this afternoon,” Shay said. “It’s gotten a little heated. The school has decided that it would be for the best if parents don’t turn up and make things worse.”

  “We’re on our way anyway,” Peter said. “Val, Carl, and Ava are with me. Carl knows the school, Ava knows plenty of the kids, and Val—” He glanced at his partner. “Val’s a walking weapon. You might need our help.”

  “I do not want to see any violence from you lot,” Shay said.

  “Our presence might dissuade the protesters from growing violent,” Val said.

  “There are enough people here already winding them up.” Shay sighed. “We could probably use your help with the parents, never mind the protesters.”

  By the time we got to the school, the crowds outside had turned nasty. A group of protesters had tried to picket the building with ugly signs, and some parents had gotten angry. As news spread, the number of people grew. Keeping both groups separated and away from the school gates was all the police could manage.

  “Shay’s by the gates,” Carl said, gripping my arm. “Let’s go.”

  Protesters got in our way, trying to stop us from passing. I spotted Phoenix in the distance, but I couldn’t reach him. We squeezed our way to the front gates, despite the pinching hands trying to push us back, and caught up to Shay, who looked stressed.

  “It’s gotten worse,” he said, leading us behind his IAs, who were just about managing to keep the crowd back. “I didn’t want to mention it over the phone, but we have a new problem. Emergency services got a call about a bomb at the school.”

  “What?” Carl said.

  “I don’t believe it,” Shay said, “but we have to treat this kind of threat seriously. Any hint of a bomb threat, and protocol demands we evacuate. But we can’t bring the kids through the crowds, or there will be mayhem. We decided to lead them through the back way and into the next property. We organised ladders to get them over the walls, and the Gardaí have quietly been moving people from the neighbourhood for the last hour. It’s going to take everyone here to manage this crowd, and the teachers are still evacuating from inside the building, but they’re understaffed, and we’re afraid children will be left inside.”

  “Some of them will be scared enough by the noise out here to hide,” Carl said. “I can think of at least four with sensory issues who will freak if somebody doesn’t control the situation before they have a chance to lose it.”

  “That’s not all.” Shay glared at the crowd. “There’s a chance that somebody already got into the building while we were distracted with this bunch. My real concern is that we’ll have another situation like the charity event, and a child will be held hostage. We’re stretched to the limit, and I need people to do another sweep of the building to check for stragglers.” He gestured toward the heaving group to the left. “But if the parents realise we’re letting people in, they might try to storm in themselves.”

  “I’ll go in,” Carl said. “I know the building. The parents will think I’m there as a teacher, and Ava’s short. She can come with me. With her hood up, nobody will even notice her. It won’t cause any drama if we go in.”

  “Peter and I can go the long way around and sneak in then patrol outside to make sure the children aren’t attacked as they leave,” Val said.

  “No,” Shay said. “Someone could follow and find the children’s escape route. You two may as well go in with Carl. We’re going to get started trying to shift this lot away from the building. That should be a good distraction. There are still buses waiting to move the rest of the children to the home in the meantime. Some have already left, mostly the younger children. They were the hardest to sneak out. No idea how to be quiet and half of them thought this was the biggest adventure of their lives. Okay, let’s get you in. Watch out. This crowd will make an effort to follow.”

  “The protesters won’t get past us,” Peter said.

  “I’m more worried about the parents.” Shay managed a sardonic smile. “Ava, Carl, if I’m wrong, and you happen to find a bomb, please run.”

  The IAs opened th
e gates, and the crowd surged toward us. The four of us hurried through, then the gates were barricaded again. I glanced over my shoulder. Phoenix was extremely close to coming to blows with someone, and even Shay was losing his cool.

  “We prepared for situations like this,” Carl said. “The route is marked out. This shouldn’t be a problem.”

  “Good,” Peter said. “I just hope Emmett’s already gone in the first buses.”

  “If he isn’t, we’ll get him out,” I said.

  We separated, and Carl and I went inside the building. I followed him, and we methodically checked out each room. We passed a few stragglers leaving with an adult, and the rooms downstairs were empty, but I heard footsteps upstairs.

  “This is good,” Carl said. “We’re in the final stages of evacuation. This should be a breeze.”

  We hurried up the stairs, and a large smashing sound drew our attention. We rushed toward the noise and burst into the music room, where a group of children, including Emmett, were hiding behind Ari, who was magically flinging instruments at a balaclava-clad man with a knife.

  Carl tackled him without hesitation. I managed to reach the attacker and kick the dagger out of his hand before he could stab Carl. My friend pinned the man, his forearm against his throat. The man immediately stopped fighting.

  Emmett raced over to me. “There’s more than one,” he cried. “And I can’t find Dita anywhere. Leah went to look for her, and she never came back.”

  My heart threatened to stop. “They probably left already,” I said, trying to sound reassuring. The stranger was limp under Carl, his eyes eerily blank. “Carl, can you take care of them while I go look?”

  Carl pulled the man to his feet. He didn’t resist. “I can handle this until we get outside. Peter and Val will be happy to take over.”

  Ari bundled the kids together and directed them calmly. Maybe she wasn’t as terrible as I liked to think.

  I left the room and raced around the rest of the floor, looking through each door until I heard a scream from somewhere upstairs. I found a staircase and ran, but I came out onto the roof. Outside, I could clearly see the mob, which had gone silent, many of them looking up in horror.

  A man was advancing on Leah and Dita, who had their arms wrapped around each other. Their only defence was a scrawny wolf cub who couldn’t stay in his human form. But the attacker didn’t have a knife to threaten them with. This one had a gun. When I found out who was responsible for every second person suddenly threatening people with guns, then they were going to pay.

  I swallowed my terror and suspicion and raced for him. Nick, despite being terrified of guns, charged simultaneously. The girls ran for cover, and I skidded in low while Nick jumped at the attacker’s arm. The man tried to switch his aim, but he was already buckling on top of me, and although the gun went off, I smelled no blood but the man’s when Nick’s fangs dug into his flesh.

  The man shouted in pain and dropped the gun. I could have sworn I heard clapping outside. I grappled with the attacker while Nick growled ferociously next to us. I kneed the man in the groin as Leah darted in and kicked the gun away from his reaching hands. Moaning, he rolled over, and Nick shivered like a puppy, close to losing control.

  “Leah,” I shouted. “Get Nick and Dita outside. Now! Find Carl and follow his instructions.”

  I left the gun because I was scared to touch it. I didn’t like guns, either, and they had been a too-frequent presence in my life of late. I hauled the man to his feet, ignoring his protests. “Is there a bomb?” I demanded when the children had fled.

  He laughed instead of answering me. I resisted the urge to punch him. I wanted to tear him apart, but people were watching outside, watching how supernaturals reacted to attacks from humans. I wouldn’t give them anything to think about, no excuse to want to tear us down.

  He pulled back, his eyes wide with panic, when I pushed him toward the door, but once we were inside the building, he became strangely easy to manage. Too easy. An unsettling sense of foreboding wrapped around me.

  I led the man all the way through the school and outside without any more trouble and passed him to Val, who was probably the most dangerous person in the world when it came to people attacking Leah or Dita.

  “Try not to kill him,” I said. “I don’t want to clean up his blood.”

  The man urinated himself. I looked away in disgust. He had been brave with a gun in his hand and children in his crosshairs.

  Carl and I went back inside, but there were no more children.

  “Wait!” he said. “I forgot somebody.”

  I waited as he darted into a nearby classroom and came out with a hamster cage. He shrugged sheepishly. “Nobody gets left behind, right?”

  “You’re a hero,” I teased, but he had been. All of the children were safe, and while there had likely never been a bomb, at least nobody had gotten hurt.

  Outside, I spotted Val dragging the now-unconscious gunman behind her across the concrete. Well, almost nobody had gotten hurt.

  16

  The incident at the school did nothing to calm human-supernatural relations in the city. The media outlets were taking part in a battle of their own as two very opposing stories of the incident surfaced.

  “All we need now is for the Senate to turn on each other,” I said, frustrated as I flipped through the evening newspapers.

  Carl was driving us both to Shay’s office to sign statements about what happened. I still had to sign the statement about Wes getting shot, even though there had been no sign of Jennifer Boyle since.

  “They’re always turning on each other,” Carl said. “I’d be surprised if they didn’t.”

  “They haven’t publicly.” I frowned at the paper on my lap. “If they did, that would be the end of the Senate.”

  “Maybe that’s what somebody wants.”

  I shivered. “What if all they want is chaos?”

  “People without a plan are far scarier than people with one,” he replied. “Think they’ll open the school again soon?”

  “As soon as they’re sure the kids aren’t at risk. Who fakes a bomb anyhow?”

  “Scum, usually.”

  The Integration Offices were in chaos when we arrived. “Great,” I said. “Something else must have happened.”

  “Let’s just find Shay and get this over with,” Carl said.

  Shay was in the midst of a discussion with Moses.

  “Did something happen at the flats?” Carl asked.

  “Not exactly.” Shay handed us both our statements to sign.

  “Did you get anything out of the people who attacked the school?” I said.

  Shay leaned back in his seat. “Both men were inmates of a mental institution that happened to lose a few patients a couple of days ago. It’s a private organisation, and they decided to keep the incident private. As it turns out, a third patient happened to be at the charity event.”

  “No.” I shared a surprised look with Carl. “The man with the bottle?”

  “The very same. He went catatonic as soon as we put him in a cell for the night, and we’ve been trying to track down his identity ever since.” Shay gestured toward the statement in my hand. “Those two helped us make the connection, although neither man was lucid enough to tell us how they got the weapons. And now for the final kicker. When the gun was tested”—he rubbed his temples—“we discovered it was the same gun that Jennifer Foley used, the one that we didn’t notice was stolen from our evidence room. So, no, there won’t be any charges because these men are…” He shook his head. “If you could see them now. I’m not sure how they managed to walk around that school without help, never mind organise any of the rest of it.”

  “You’re kidding me.” I found a seat and collapsed into it. “I mean…”

  “I know,” Shay said. “And according to Moses here, we don’t have time to worry about that anyway.”

  “What else is going on?” Carl sat on the floor next to me and held up the pages in his ha
nd. “It must be big if you can afford to ignore this mess.”

  “It could be huge.” Moses cracked his knuckles. “So the gang who came into the flats to confront the loan sharks… well, their boss happened to have gotten himself assassinated last night, and Jay has stepped up to the plate. That boy is a loose cannon, and he’s already decided he knows who killed his boss.”

  I groaned. “He’s blaming it on the sharks.”

  “Yep. I don’t know if they did it or not, but if he catches up to those loan sharks, there will be blood spilled. There’s no new guns floating around, and nobody’s selling. I don’t know where these people sprouted from. Somebody’s in control, and Jay’s all set on finding out who. If he doesn’t get himself killed, he’ll get everyone else around him killed. And if he decides that it’s my fault—that the loan sharks actually belong to me—then things will get hairy in the flats.” He pointed at Shay. “And we won’t back down, no matter what you say, so you can give it a rest.”

  Shay stared at him, his left eye twitching slightly. “Don’t make me lock you up right now.”

  Moses let out a sharp laugh. “Sure, odds are I’ll be out in an hour on somebody else’s name. Give me a break, Shay. You’ve lost control, and it’s going to get worse before it gets better. Let me go after Jay, and you won’t have to.”

  “I can’t sanction crime,” Shay said impatiently. “I’m not that desperate.”

  Moses pursed his lips. “Sure about that?”

  “What if Moses pretended to help Jay?” I suggested. “Kept him out of trouble that way. In the meantime, you could look into everything else.”

  “I could do that,” Moses said with a shrug. “If nothing else, I might pick up a few new contacts along the way.”

  “You’re supposed to be keeping out of trouble,” Shay said.

  “Yet trouble keeps knocking on all of our doors.” Moses leaned forward in his seat. “Come on, man. It’ll only get worse if we ignore it. That’s what people did for years. We have to make a stand if we don’t want to get walked all over for the rest of our lives.”