by Brenda Drake
He brushes some dirt off my shoulder. “Why do haters hate? They’re mad at the world. It’s misplaced anger, honey. Those poltergeists despise Risers for what Isabella did. And that’s what you are, Ana. A Riser.”
I don’t even flinch when he calls me that. The ghosts hissed it so many times in my head, I believe it. Not sure what it means to be one. What powers go with it. But if it tortures people and makes them evil, I would never raise anyone from the dead.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Sid continues. “That you’ll never bring someone back from the dead. Isabella thought that, too. Think about it, would you bring your father back if you could? Someone you love.” His eyes shift to Marek then back to me. “Isabella was a newlywed when her husband fell off a horse and broke his neck. She couldn’t live without him. Brought him back. Watched him slowly turn evil. Her experiments were a search to cure him.”
“I won’t ever bring anyone back.” I twist out of Marek’s arms. “Not ever.”
Sid just smiles. “Sometimes it happens without thinking. Like with Shona and Cain.”
“Shona?” His mentioning her reminded me that he went to investigate her whereabouts. “Did you find her?”
“She’s alive and well,” he says. “Hiding out in a safe place. We’ll join her soon.”
I should be relieved to hear that, but the pain in my body consumes my thoughts.
“Why would Janus send us down there?” Marek asks. “If he knew those things would attack her.”
“As long as she was with you, they wouldn’t,” Sid says. “He didn’t think you’d separate.”
I step toward him. “How do you know that? And how did you know where to find us?”
“Janus rang me,” he says. “You see, we all went to Oxford together. Living forever, gods and goddesses can get bored. I used to attend colleges here and there. Janus, too.” He removes an old photograph from his pocket and hands it to me. “That’s me and Janus with Eli’s father, Richard. Your grandfather, Ana. On the right, at the end, is Adam.”
I pass it to Marek.
“Who’s the woman?” he asks.
“Oyá,” Sid says, a wide smile spreading across his lips. “Smart, beautiful, and tough. They all had a crush on her. I would have, too, if I weren’t infatuated with Richard. Ah, unrequited love. It’s the best kind. The pain is a reminder you’re alive.”
“How did you all just so happen to come together?” I’m skeptical. “I’m assuming my grandfather was a Riser and Marek’s grandfather was a…what do they call them?”
“Keepers,” Sid answers. “Since they are custodians of the Divinities Keep.”
“Okay, so you have them and a bunch of gods that just so happen to go to this prestigious school together? Not a coincidence.”
Sid waits for an English-speaking family to pass before saying, “Lugh, he’s another member of our group. Brought us together because of a dream. He saw your families come together for the big war between gods. We wanted to protect them. So Oxford offered them scholarships for different things when they never applied. That was my handiwork. But we all know how that story ended. We had the wrong family members.”
This little revelation that there are gods that want to protect us has me feeling a bit better.
“You think it’s us,” Marek says.
It’s a statement, not a question, but Sid nods anyway, glancing at the exits to the alley.
“Now that our little history lesson is over and you seem less freaked out,” he says. “We need to get you sewer rats cleaned up. We’re near Trevi Fountain. There’re shops. Fresh clothes are a must.”
Sid leads us down the alley and onto the street. A few passersby glance at how filthy Marek and I are. Ducking into the first clothing store, I instantly want to run out. It’s fancy, and all eyes are on us.
“Not to worry,” Sid says. “This is one of the kinder shops.”
The woman that helps us is surprisingly nice for how dirty our clothes are. She even lets us clean up in her bathroom in the back. I don’t wear lying well. Honestly, I’m surprised the woman believes me with all my stuttering while explaining how we got so dirty. “That’s never happened before,” was her response when I told her that one of the walls in the catacombs open to tourists collapsed.
So it wasn’t a total lie. We were in a catacomb.
I buy the black skinny jeans and sweater Sid insists I get and pass on the torture boots. His nose wrinkles slightly when I slip my Vans back on. The woman raises her perfectly shaped brows at me when I ask to toss my shirt and jeggings in her trash.
It feels good to be in new clothes. What I really want is a shower, but that will have to wait. I’m starving, and by the way Marek’s stomach growls as we exit the shop, he is, too.
Sid takes us to a pizzeria near the Trevi Fountain, and we sit at a table outside. We eat salads and share a margherita pizza. The street has less traffic than the ones closer to the famous landmark.
When he finishes, Sid stands. “I have an errand to do. Stay in this area. Visit the fountain. And by all means, don’t get into trouble.”
“Sure, we’ll be good little tourists.” I press a wide grin.
After Sid disappears around the corner of a building, Marek removes the silver canister from his pocket. “Guess we should see what’s in this. I’ll watch my way, and you watch yours. Let me know if you see anyone suspicious.”
“You think we should do it right here? In the open?” It’s a narrow street. The buildings are tall and close together.
“You know what they say…hidden in plain sight.”
Holding the canister against his chest, he pops off the lid, pinches the rolled up paper inside, and removes it. He stares at it for a few seconds before passing it to me. The parchment is thick, a cream color, but I’m not sure if it’s naturally that way or if it’s aged. I read it.
Elena Kristoffer Prevot
I look up from the slip of paper. “Do you know her?”
He shakes his head. “Never heard of her.”
The server comes over and picks up the bottle with still water on our table. He bends closer as he fills our glasses. “Finish your meal,” he says with an Italian accent. “Then go east. There are eyes west.” He thumps the bottle down and rushes off for the kitchen.
I want to turn around, but I keep my eyes on Marek. “Do you see anyone?”
“No,” he says, picking up his glass and taking a sip of water. “We’ll do as he says. Finish up and act as if we don’t know someone’s watching us.”
I lean over the table and whisper, “How do we know we can trust the server?”
The look on Marek’s face tells me he hadn’t thought of that. I slide my eyes in the direction of the kitchen.
After paying, we stroll in the opposite direction from the one the server warned us against going. A woman down the way catches my attention. A little too beautiful to be normal and a bit too interested in a teen couple walking down a narrow street.
Approaching an alley, I catch Marek’s hand and guide him in its direction, whispering, “I think we have another friend waiting for us down there.”
“Who?”
“A woman. Beautiful. Dark hair. Dark skin. At the end of the street.”
Once inside the alley, we sprint to the end. Gushing water sounds somewhere close by and grows more intense when we turn a corner onto another narrow road. Many of the streets in Rome are tight, squeezed on all sides by tall buildings in different shades of yellow, beige, and orange.
Falling water reaches a crescendo when we enter a square with a large crowd surrounding a fountain. I’m a little bummed at the moment. I’ve always wanted to come here, but not under these circumstances.
Marek checks the GPS. “We’re at the Trevi Fountain. I’ll try to find a hotel nearby.”
An enormous structure with a palac
e as its backdrop, the fountain is made out of some sort of white stone. It’s not marble, though the statues are. I forget what my teacher had said the material was in class, some kind of limestone, I think.
A massive sculpture of a man in a chariot, pulled out of the sea by horses, dominates the center. Some think it’s Neptune, but it isn’t. He’s Oceanus. On either side of him are two women figures shielded under arches—Abundance and Health.
“Which way do we go?” I ask.
He lifts his gaze from the GPS and searches the piazza. “It’s that way.” He motions across the square with his head.
The crowd is dense, filled with strangers and unknown dangers. We move into the throng of tourists.
A man aiming his phone at the fountain backs into me, and I stumble against Marek. His hands go to my waist, steadying me so I won’t fall, his eyes holding mine, and I forget where we are. I forget about the woman who may be following us. And I forget to breathe.
His hands drop away from my waist, and the spell is broken. I take a deep breath and twist around to find a break in the crowd. Maneuvering around bodies, dodging tourists too busy gawking at the fountain to pay attention to where they’re going, I’ve barely gone six feet.
I pivot, making sure Marek is still behind me. He gives me a half smile that seems to indicate he wonders if there’s anything wrong. Before I resume cutting a path through the jungle of people, the crowd on the far side of the fountain shifts. A chorus of screams drowns out the thunderous clap of the water falling into the basin.
Like a wave, the crowd moves, picking up speed, people running for the many streets that connect to the square. Marek’s and my hands instinctively come together. We turn around, hand in hand, and sprint for the road we just left.
Mixed in with the screams are growls, crashing sounds, and car alarms all bouncing off the tall buildings encompassing the square—echoing—magnifying.
Marek abruptly stops, causing me to bump into him. He stretches an arm out in front of me as if he’s going to protect me from something. I push by him to see what it is. The woman from the alley towers over us, her leather jacket flapping in the wind, her dark eyes determined.
“Not this way.” Her voice is accented, commanding, the look on her face fierce. “Or you’ll run into men who wish to harm you.”
Backing up, Marek pulls me to his side. “Who are you?”
“My name is Oyá.” She steals a quick look at each of us. “It will not be long before you are found. Come with me, if you wish to survive.”
Now that I look at her, she is the woman in the photo with Marek and our grandfathers. Her hair was longer then, and she was smiling, but it’s the same woman.
Marek tugs on my arm, urging me to go the opposite way as the woman.
“She was in the photograh Sid showed us,” I say, pulling back.
Oyá waves her hands in a circular motion, and two swords appear. “I could kill you now, should I desire it.”
A woman with a little girl clinging to her side screams at the sight of Oyá’s blades swooshing through the air.
Marek leans back and whispers, “Yeah, I say we trust her.”
I’m hypnotized by the light glinting against the steel. I nod. “Yes. Okay.”
“Good.” The swords in Oyá’s hands disappear. “I shall make a distraction. You must run into the fountain. I will follow.”
“What?” I glance back. I’m frozen, unable to move, not able to speak, holding my breath deep in my lungs. Men leap over the viewing tiers surrounding the fountain. People run from them with fear-stricken faces, ear-piercing screams. “Who are those men?”
“There isn’t time,” Oyá snaps. “I will tell you all when we are in a safe place. You must go now.”
People run past us, bumping our shoulders and pushing us against each other.
I look from Oyá to Marek. His eyes are just as questioning as mine.
“Those men are that way,” I yell. “We have to follow the others.”
Oyá grips my arm, and I turn my stare at her. “Go the way I told you.”
“Ana, we need to trust her.” Marek’s eyes search my face. “We don’t separate.”
“All right,” I say, and Oyá releases my arm.
We dart off toward the farthest side of the fountain from where the scary men are. I grab a look over my shoulder. Oyá’s hands are raised. The wind swirls and grows on her palms. With my attention on her, I almost trip at the first set of steps. I pound down them with Marek, and we reach the bottom.
One of the scary, rioting men blocks our path to the fountain. His face is twisted like a feral animal; a beast with inhuman eyes—primal. He snarls. Claw-like fingers swipe at Marek. He hops back, the nails barely missing him. Another swing misses and lands on the side of the fountain, breaking it and sending pieces flying.
A powerful whirlwind brushes past me and lifts the beast-man up, carrying him away. I turn to see Oyá riding a hurricane. Her arms extended, one inside the tunnel, the other outside, her feet spread apart, knees bent into a squat, it’s like she’s riding a wave.
Marek climbs over the basin of the fountain and plops into the water. “Ana, come on!” He reaches a hand out to me. I can hardly hear him over the chaos going on around us, and the howling of the wind.
There are injured people on the ground, bleeding from gashes, some unmoving. I can’t pull my eyes away.
No! Stop! I scream in my head. Please.
The humanlike beasts—men and women—a range of ages—pause, heads tilting from side to side, blood dripping from their hands and mouths. All their heads slowly turn in my direction.
They don’t make a sound. The only noise comes from people somewhere in the distance—crying, screaming, feet pounding—and the clapping of water against water in the fountain.
Almost silence.
Chapter Twenty-Five
“Analiese!” Marek breaks through my trance. I clutch his hand, scrambling over the edge and into the freezing water.
Chaos rings out over the plaza, again. Screams echo against the buildings.
“Now what?” I search for Oyá.
Her hurricane knocks many of the beasts over, and it spins toward us. When it hits the fountain, water sprays up. A door opens under Oceanus and his chariot. I wade through the fountain beside Marek to the door, and we spill into a small chamber. Lifting up on my hands and knees, I’m a fish out of water, gulping for air. Marek rolls on his back, panting.
Oyá rushes in, and the door slams shut. Dim blue light comes on. It’s cold, and I’m dripping wet, shivering, my teeth clattering together.
Marek pushes himself up from the floor.
I’m breathing better now, so I stand.
“We must get somewhere warm,” Oyá says, and a panel in the floor opens as she approaches it.
I wrap my arms around myself to try to get warm. My legs are numb as I follow her down a long, narrow corridor. Marek’s wet shoes squish behind me.
“Those things…their faces were scary. Like animals.” My breath stutters over the words.
“They were Risen,” she says.
“We’ve seen a Risen before,” Marek answers. “He didn’t look anything like that guy out there.”
Oyá hesitates before she responds, “He must have been a newly Risen. The longer a Risen lives in their second life, the more evil and stronger they become.” She looks at me as she says her next bit. “They are controlled by the one who raised them from death. At first they have free will, but it is lost the more they develop into a beast, only doing what their Death Riser tells them to do. That is why the people weren’t killed by them. Just the ones who got in their way were injured. They were after you. I tried to determine who the Death Riser was, but there were dummy ones to throw me off. Killing the Death Riser terminates all of their Risen as well.”
Ca
in would’ve changed. I can’t imagine a meaner Cain, and even though he was a complete ass, I feel horrible for him. Shona did say he was once a kind person.
“Can a Risen be changed?” I ask. “You know, go back to the way they were when they were alive?”
“They are alive,” she looks back at me. “You mean back to how they were in their first life? Maybe.There is a tale about the favorite child of a god of death being able to restore life to how it once was. To make it right. But only if the person died before it was their time. Though it is only a rumor.”
How do rumors get started? Because there is a grain of truth in them. It doesn’t matter. I’m almost sure Cain is dead for good now.
We walk for what feels like two city blocks before going up a set of stairs.
Oyá brings us out of a half door in the back of a shoestring hallway. The walls are a soft yellow with white molding. Smells of lemon and fried food waft in the air. She leads us up a polished marble staircase that winds around and around until we reach the fourth floor. It’s an apartment building.
She unlocks the door and holds it open for us to enter. The apartment is pretty standard for a warrior woman.
“My home is yours. Please, you are to make yourselves comfortable.” She secures the four locks on the door and heads for a back room. “Just a moment.”
Marek and I stand there by the door, our wet clothes dripping on the floor.
I shiver. “How are we supposed to get comfortable? I’m freezing. And we’re too wet to sit on the furniture.”
“We can ask for some towels when she returns.” Marek steps behind me and repeatedly rubs his hands up and down my arms. “Better?”
His light caress is comforting. I’m not sure which goose bumps are from being cold and which are from his touch. I don’t even notice when my head leans back and rests on his shoulder. My eyes stay open. I’m afraid of the images I’ll see if I close them.
Oyá returns, carrying thick towels and what look like robes. “Here, dry off and put these on. We shall talk after you’ve finished. Bring me your wet clothes to dry.”
In her tiny bathroom, I peel off my wet clothes and slip on the terry cloth robe. I inspect my injuries. The bruises on the sides of my neck are purple now. The scratches on my arms, stomach, and back have stopped bleeding. I retrieve my pillbox from the pocket in my jacket, remove a pill, and pop it into my mouth. Cupping my hands, I catch water from the faucet and drink down the tablet.