“Hazel is ours,” he said.
“No one is yours.” Ms. West held out her arms. Two figures cast aside their hoods and stepped forward to take her arms and haul her to her feet. Professor Atwood and Dr. Morgan regarded me with wary expressions. “We are all children of the Great Old God. You must be put in your place.”
She flicked her wrist again. Two more robed figures stepped out of the circle and grabbed Greg, lifting him between them.
No!
“You don’t control me.” I shoved Trey out of the way and stared down Ms. West with what I hoped was a defiant smirk. “Your god doesn’t control me. I’ve just proven that. You can throw Greg into that pit, but all that’s going to do is make me more dangerous. Ask Trey and Quinn and Ayaz how hard I fight back. Alternatively, I’ll make you an offer you can’t refuse.”
“Hazel, what are you doing?” Quinn’s voice trembled.
Ms. West held up her hand. The two figures paused, Greg’s limp body suspended from ropes between them. “We’re listening.”
“Here’s my deal. At the end of the fourth quarter, I’ll give myself to your demon god. Willingly. When the year is up, you can conduct whatever experiments you want on me to make me worthy, and it can suck my brain out through a straw in my nose if it wants. I don’t care.”
“No,” Trey growled. Ayaz moved in front of me, but I shoved him back.
“Let her speak, boys,” Dr. Morgan said.
“You can’t just give up like this!” Quinn cried. “That’s not you. You don’t know what will happen.”
“It’s my body to give up,” I shot back. “Under my own terms.”
Ms. West’s lips curled back. “Your country will appreciate your sacrifice. It will be for the benefit of all. What are your terms?”
I sucked in a deep breath. I hope like hell I’m doing the right thing. “I’ll do this only if you agree to let the other scholarship students go. Your god cannot touch Greg or Andre. They get to walk out of this school with their minds and lives intact. Would that please your, er… deity?”
“They will have to remain until the end of the year,” Headmistress West said. “And they are not allowed to know the secret of this school. They cannot learn of Miskatonic Prep.”
“I don’t intend to tell them.” I glanced down at Greg’s lifeless body. “But I can’t guarantee they won’t find out on their own.”
“We may have ways of altering their memory if it comes to that,” Headmistress West said.
No, you fucking don’t. I’m not letting you lay a finger on my friends.
“They won’t find out,” I promised. “My life for theirs, that’s my terms. If you break or anyone else breaks our agreement, I will kill myself, and I’ll do everything I can to torture your creature while I do it. Do we have a deal?”
From the depths, an odor like rotting flesh rose up, striking at my nostrils like a weapon. And I knew without knowing I had been given my answer.
“Our god is most pleased with your offer.” Headmistress West held out her hand to me. I took it. Her talons scraped across my skin as we shook. Her hand was ice cold and waxy, like my mother’s skin had felt when the firefighters dragged her from the blaze.
“You have all witnessed our agreement tonight,” Ms. West addressed the room. “Return to the school. Hazel has agreed to be sacrificed at the end of the year. Our god will wait with eternal patience to be sated by her soul.”
The teachers threw the trapdoor closed, wrapped the chains through the bolts, and locked it down tight. Instantly, the room felt a little brighter, a little less oppressive. Dr. Morgan dragged Greg’s limp body down from the ropes and dropped him at my feet. He stepped back and flashed me a cold smile.
“He’s yours,” he said. “Although you may be too late. His mind is not as strong as yours – many turn insane in the very presence of our god, before they even meet him in his prison.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re insane, all right.”
Quinn swooped in and scooped up Greg, throwing him over his shoulder. Trey grabbed my hand and dragged me out the opposite tunnel. Headmistress West’s tinkling laughter followed us.
Walls of shimmering stone pressed down on us, their angles always appearing slightly skewed. Quinn ran ahead, with Greg’s body flopping against his back. Trey and Ayaz jogged on either side of me, keeping pace with my shorter, wobbling legs. Ayaz’s hand rested on the small of my back, the gesture urging me onward even as my limbs screamed and my mind rebelled against all the horrors the entity had thrown at me.
The roof of the tunnel raised and the floor sloped into a set of wide steps. We clambered up them and through a small opening at the back of a supply closet. Dusty brooms and pails knocked against me as I fought my way outside, collapsing onto a cool marble floor. There were no lights on, and I could just make out an empty notice-board and a sign pointing to a locker room. A rancid smell filled the air, making me cough and choke.
Dimly, I realized that I recognized the hall and that smell. I’d been there only once before – on my way to the gymnasium.
Warm, strong hands grabbed me under the shoulders, lifting me, taking the burden of my weight. “Hazel, what have you done?” Trey hissed.
I glanced at his cruel mouth, then at Quinn’s stricken face, then to Ayaz, whose expression held only darkness. Something in the Turk’s eyes told me he had some inkling of what I was planning.
“What I’ve done is save two innocent lives,” I said, wishing my voice sounded strong and not tiny and terrified. I broke down into a coughing fit as the vile stench piled into my mouth.
“You’ve also doomed yourself,” Trey’s voice cracked. “You felt his presence touch your mind, but that’s nothing. Nothing. Do you have any inkling what it is like when the god embraces you? We tried so hard to save you, but you probably should have killed yourself. It would have been kinder.”
“What I’ve done is brought some time.” Determination set my jaw. “Now we’ve got until the end of the year to figure out how to banish that deity into the shadows and bring you all back from the dead, once and for all.”
Chapter Five
“I don’t care about school rules, I’m not trusting you alone in the dungeon tonight.” Trey pushed open the door to his dorm room and ushered me inside. “We can’t have you running off to make more fucking deals with malevolent deities.”
Students weren’t supposed to sleep in each other’s rooms. It was an instant 50-point demerit if you were caught, although it didn’t seem as if the teachers much cared what the monarchs did in their fancy suites that were more like apartments than dorm rooms. I desperately didn’t want to lose any of the hard-won points I’d gained during the first quarter, but I was also tired and cold and frightened and no fucking way did I want to sleep alone in the basement with the rats and that fucking demon sleeping beneath the school.
I collapsed onto Trey’s enormous sofa. Quinn staggered in after him and dropped Greg down beside me before sliding to the floor. Trey frowned. “You’ve smeared dirt all over the carpet. You’re cleaning it up.”
I bit back a retort. As soon as we’d dragged our weakened, filthy bodies up the flight of stairs leading from the gym, Trey had reverted to his usual dicksome self. I pointed to the trail of muddy prints he’d tracked across his own cream carpet. “You’re rocking your own creature from the Black Lagoon look, so chill. We should get Andre up here, too.”
“This isn’t a fucking sleepover.”
“Fine.” I stood up. My legs wailed in protest. “Bye.”
“Where are you going?” Ayaz moved to block the door.
“I’m not going to leave Andre alone in the basement. Not when that thing is…” I couldn’t finish the sentence.
“All right!” Trey yelled. “Quinn, go get the other charity case, if it will shut her up.”
Quinn got up, deliberately smearing his hand along the wall as he headed out the door. I slid back onto the sofa, nestling Greg’s head on my legs and pressing
my fingers to his wrist, feeling a steady pulse. I held my hand over his forehead. He’s freezing cold.
I went into Trey’s room and dragged his duvet out, placing it over Greg’s body and curling up around him, trying to warm my own freezing limbs at the same time. I stroked Greg’s face, hoping like hell he was unconscious the whole time, that he hadn’t had to endure the things the creature had fed into my head, that he hadn’t felt the god’s malevolence coursing through his veins.
If the god was that powerful and that malevolent while it was still – according to Ms. West – trapped within the earth in a deathlike slumber, then what could it do if it was awake and free? I couldn’t contemplate that now. I needed to stay sane.
“Where’s Ayaz?” I asked, noticing he was no longer in the doorway.
“He has to get something,” Trey muttered. He moved around the kitchen, slamming cupboards and banging crockery on the counter. Each clatter sent a shuddering headache through my temple.
I hurled my body up again and leaned over the counter. “What the fuck crawled up your ass and died?” I demanded. “Among other things, tonight I found out you’re undead and you and your secret club have been torturing me so you can sacrifice me to a demon. When I wrap my head around it fully, I’m going to unleash a serious amount of pain on your ass, and you’ll deserve every bit of it.”
Trey slammed one of his uber-fancy ready-to-eat meals on the counter. He shoved a bowl across at me so hard I had to lunge at it to stop it from careening over the edge and smashing on the tiles.
“Dish yourself some of that,” he barked. “You need strength.”
“Don’t order me around,” I shot back. “I don’t need food. I need answers and I’m still waiting. What’s got your goat?”
Trey popped the top off a bottle of beer with such force it dented the ceiling. “You shouldn’t have made that deal.”
“What’s it matter to you? You’re already dead. You’ve got nothing to lose. It’s me whose life is on the line here. Me and my friends.”
“Exactly,” Trey growled. He emptied half the container into the bowl and shoved it into the microwave, slamming the door so hard the machine slid a few inches across the counter.
“No. Not exactly. My life, my deal. I thought you’d be happy, since feeding me to this demon was exactly what you were trying to do in the first place. And why do you have all this food and drink, anyway? If you’re dead, you don’t need to eat.”
Trey grunted in reply. The microwave beeped. He didn’t even bother sliding on an oven mitt, just picked up the steaming bowl and slammed it on the counter. I touched the rim, then jerked my finger away. Piping hot. How are his hands not in agony right now?
Because he’s dead, duh.
But that also didn’t make any sense. Quinn was dead too, and he’d howled with pain when Trey threw the itching powder into his eyes. And Quinn’s eye had swollen from where his dad had hit him. So why…
No, I can’t think about all this now. I need to sleep. And eat. Spicy meat smells wafted from the bowl. Damn, that looks good.
“Fine, whatever.” I picked up the spoon and used it to hook the edge of the bowl and bring it closer. “Don’t answer me. But don’t expect things to be the same anymore. You’ve made it clear that you hate me and Greg and Andre, but—”
“Is that what you think?” In a second, Trey swung around the island and leaned over the chair. His muscled legs pressed up against the inside of my thighs. A fire curled in my core. Those ice eyes stared me down, challenging me. The tension between us sung with a rumbling note, like the string over a violin pulled taut.
Fuck you, Trey Bloomberg. You don’t intimidate me.
I planted my hand on his chest, shoving him away. Fire rushed up my arm, spreading across my chest, warming my whole core. Just touching Trey made heat burn in all the dark and dangerous places inside me.
Trey’s eyes smoldered. He slid back between my legs, reaching up with a cruel finger to pull at my bottom lip. My breath hitched as my heart raced ahead. I no longer wanted to shove him away. My fingers curled into my palm, nails digging into my flesh. The scar on my wrist buzzed with fire.
Trey pressed his finger into my bottom lip. “I’ve been taught to hate everything you are and everything you stand for. But I can’t get you out of my fucking head.”
He closed the distance between us in a moment. Our mouths crashed together as a wave of heat engulfed my body.
Trey’s kiss sizzled with all the same desperation of our last one – a restless need that he’d stamped down and buttoned up and hidden deep within his heart of stone. He wrapped his arm around my waist, pushing me hard against him. His body was the only thing preventing me from melting into a puddle on the floor.
The fire inside me roared to life. Trey’s hardness ground against my inner thigh and a moan escaped my lips. I shouldn’t be kissing this guy. He tormented me. He wanted to sacrifice me to a demon. And yet I couldn’t tear my lips from his. I knew there was so much more going on inside Trey’s head than what he was showing to Ms. West. With his lips and tongue he gave me the tiniest taste of it, and I was ready to fall into him and lose myself.
The door slammed. I jumped so high that the chair toppled backward. Trey leaned over to steady it, smashing his forehead against mine.
“Ow!”
“Fuck!” Trey growled.
“Did I interrupt something?” Ayaz dumped a battered box on the counter. “I found it. You’re lucky – the ink is still in good condition.”
Trey backed around the other side of the counter. Probably for the best. I think even if there was an entire football field between us, this tension would still sizzle, trying to draw us together.
Ayaz unpacked the contents of the box onto the counter, handing Trey a cable from a power unit to plug in. Surprised, I picked up the tattoo machine and a packet of needles still in their packets. Flashes of memories I didn’t want to face tugged at my battered mind.
“Why do you have a tattoo machine?” I demanded.
Ayaz fiddled with the regulator. “How’d you know that’s what it is?”
A memory bloomed inside my battered mind.
I raced up the stairs and flopped down on Dante’s bed. ‘My mom’s working tonight. Can I sleep over?’
Dante buzzed with excitement. He kept tugging at the ring in his earlobe, fidgeting with the stacks of sketchbooks stacked beside his bed, darting back and forth across the tiny room. He didn’t seem to hear me.
I waved a hand in front of his face. ‘Are you listening to me, bro? Is your foster dad home again? We could go to the club instead, if you want.’ Dante’s current foster dad was an alcoholic. He was on the road a lot for his job, but when he came home a cloud descended on their home and dulled the brightness in Dante’s eyes. On those nights, we would either climb into my tiny bed and listen to the water dripping through the leaking roof, or hang out backstage at Mom’s club. The working girls fawned over Dante and begged him to draw their portraits, but I hated being there, having to see Mom go off with strange men only to come back reeking of pot and cheap cologne.
‘Nah. For once, it’s good news. Look what I just got.’ Dante pulled a box from under his bed. He lifted the lid to reveal a medieval torture device.
‘What is it?’ I glared at the vicious-looking needles, the power unit, the tiny box of tools, little colored vials like an ancient apothecary kit.
‘It’s a tattoo machine,’ Dante grinned, dropping it into my hands as he swiped up a bag of fruit. ‘Some guy was selling them behind the school for fifty bucks. I’ve been practicing on oranges all day. Check this out.’ He held up an orange with a lopsided smiley face drawn in short, uncertain lines. ‘How does it look?’
‘It looks unhygienic.’ I held the machine between two fingers and dropped it back in the box.
Dante puffed out his lower lip. ‘You’re no fun. Guess you won’t let me ink you.’
‘You’ll be six feet underground before I let you anywher
e near my virginal skin.’ He grinned, and I grinned, and we both let the innuendo pass over us, unacknowledged and unfulfilled.
“My friend Dante had one.” I squeezed my eyes shut, pushing the memory aside. I really didn’t want to think about Dante. Not now. Not tonight. “I repeat, why do you have it now?”
Ayaz flipped down his cuff, showing me that runic tattoo on his wrist. “This is the Elder Sign – the symbol of the Eldritch Club. I have to place one on your wrist.”
“That’s not happening.” I folded my arms across my chest.
“Hazel, I have to.”
“Dude, I’m exhausted. I smell like a garbage truck. I just found out there’s a demon living under the gymnasium and the entire student body is walking zombies. I don’t need to also get a tattoo tonight, especially not from the guy who is sleeping with the high priestess of fuckery.”
“It’s a god, not a demon,” Ayaz corrected, ignoring my comment about Ms. West. “And this is for your protection. This sign marks you as one of the god’s chosen few. If you have it, the other students aren’t supposed to touch you.”
“If it’s for protection, then why did someone paint it on my locker?”
“Duh, to protect you.” Quinn swaggered into the room with a shirtless and sleepy-looking Andre trailing behind him. “For the smart girl, you’re slow tonight. We painted it there. The girls had something evil planned for you that day and we needed to stop them, so Trey painted it there to warn them to back off.”
“More evil than tarring my hair?” I demanded.
“Yeah. We had to let them do that. It was either that or…” Quinn shook his head. “You don’t want to know.”
“But I’m already protected by my pact. Besides, that’s the symbol of your secret club,” I pointed out. “I’m betting only monarchs can wear that, and I’m not a monarch.”
“You are now,” Ayaz washed his hands under the sink. “We decided.”
“Really? You just decided? I get that your word is law in this school, but I feel like Courtney and Tillie and the others will have something to say about me officially becoming part of the gang. Don’t you have to have a secret meeting and sacrifice a goat and dance around in your underwear before you issue a decree like that?”
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