by Sarra Cannon
“I’m Franki,” I said awkwardly. “Mary Francis, really, but everyone calls me Franki.”
Her face broke out into a smile. “I’m Mary Anne,” she said.
“I can’t believe you’re real,” I said. Emotion released from me in a sudden gulp of air, and I lifted my hand to my mouth as tears welled up in my eyes. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize,” a girl said. “We're so glad you guys made it here safely.”
I looked up to see a beautiful girl with wavy blonde hair and deep, brown eyes, smiling at me.
“I’m Harper,” she said. She held her hand out to me and I shook it. The instant our skin touched, a tiny static shock went through me, and I pulled away. Harper laughed and rolled her eyes. “That happens to me all the time, sorry.”
I smiled, feeling the warmth coming from her, as if I were meeting with old friends instead of complete strangers.
“Come on in and meet everyone,” she said. She put one arm around Mordecai and gave him a brief hug.
Mary Anne held her hand out to the boy who had been sitting beside her. “This is Essex.”
When she said his name, her face blushed again.
“Hi Essex,” I said, unable to hide my smile. “Nice to meet you.”
Essex bowed his head. “I am very honored to be meeting you as well,” he said. His voice had a slight foreign accent to it that I couldn't quite place, and I wondered briefly where he'd come from.
He took Mary Anne’s hand and together we all walked up the steps to the house.
Harper led us to a room just off the main entryway where a group of teens were gathered, playing video games. They were shouting and laughing as zombies came after their characters on the screen.
“Shoot it,” one guy shouted. He lifted his hands up as if moving the controller up would save his character.
A gorgeous girl with tanned skin and a long black braid laughed and punched buttons on her controller faster. “I’m trying,” she shouted. “Get out of my way.”
A couple of other guys sat around watching them, cheering them on.
Another guy stood in the corner, alone, his expression sad even in the midst of all this laughter.
Harper cleared her throat and everyone turned and looked at us all at once.
“Hey guys, this is the girl I told you about,” she said. “Her name is Franki and she’s Mary Anne’s cousin. We’re going to help keep her safe for a little while, so no one outside this group needs to know she’s here.”
The two playing the game abandoned their controllers and stood to introduce themselves.
“I’m Lea,” the brunette said. She pointed to the other two guys on the couch. “The guy with the glasses there is Joost and this is Cristo.”
I waved, feeling self-conscious, but amazed at how welcoming everyone was.
“I’m Jackson." The guy who'd been playing video games lifted his chin in a nod. “And over there, that’s my twin brother Aerden.”
I glanced over at the quiet guy in the corner and noticed that the two of them were nearly identical except for the color of their eyes—one had green and the other blue.
“Nice to meet you guys.”
“You've been through a lot, so I’m sure you're anxious to take a shower and get settled,” Harper said. She came over and put a hand on my wrist. “You can meet the rest of the group later. If you want, Mary Anne can show you to her room and you can shower and change or whatever. You can take anything you want out of my closet. We should be about the same size, I think.”
I looked around the room at the group and wondered what their story was. Why were they all so willing to just accept me in and protect me when I could be putting them all in danger? And how were a bunch of teens all living in this big house together with no parents or guardians? It was a strange situation. They seemed to act like a family, but I knew Mordecai had said some were human and some were demons.
Mary Anne slipped her small hand into mine. “I’ll show you upstairs.”
Essex winked at her as we passed and Mary Anne smiled and ducked her head. They were so cute, I wanted to just grab them up and hug them. I wondered how long they’d been together.
“So, do you guys all live here?” I asked as we made our way up the stairs.
“Not everyone and not full-time, but yeah, sometimes,” she said. “This is kind of our headquarters, if you want to call it that.”
I had so many questions I wanted to ask her, but no idea where to even begin. I didn’t want to step over any boundaries, either, and I didn’t know if there were any topics that were off-limits.
“Thank you for taking me in like this,” I said. “I don’t want to put any of you guys in danger, though.”
Mary Anne gave me a stoic look. “Trust me, there’s nothing you can bring to the table that we haven’t faced, and then some,” she said. “We’ve been through a lot the past couple of years.”
I wanted to ask their story. I'd heard the name Harper from one of the dancers before, and I wondered if this could be the same girl. An orphan who grew up never knowing about her powers, but then quickly becoming extremely powerful. It had to be her, right?
Mary Anne showed me into a room decorated in rich black fabrics with blue accents that was off the main hallway. Black silk curtains hung from high windows, blocking out most of the outside light. A black bedspread with dark blue piping was on the bed. Even the rug covering part of the wood floors was a rich black wool.
“Big fan of black,” I said.
“I’m comforted by the darkness,” she said. “Which I guess is kind of ironic considering where we come from.”
I bit the inside of my lip. “Did you grow up with them? The other crows?” I asked. I wasn’t even sure if that’s what I was supposed to call them.
Mary Anne sat down on the edge of her bed. “For a little while,” she said. “It’s kind of a long story, but when I was about ten, the Mother Crow sent me here. This place used to be called Shadowford Home for Girls. It was set up to look like a kind of orphanage, but it was really a way for the Order of Shadows to look for someone who was very important to them.”
“Harper?” I asked, piecing together small parts of the story from the bits and pieces I’d gotten along the way.
“How did you know that? Has someone already told you the story?” she asked.
“No, but I've heard people talking about her.”
“Yeah, she’s kind of well-known all over these days,” Mary Anne said. “The Mother Crow originally sent me here knowing that if the Order ever found Harper, I could report back to her about it.”
I nodded, wondering what it would have been like to grow up with the rest of them, following orders and having no control over my own life.
“That must have been really hard. To leave your family like that.”
Mary Anne shrugged. “It was, in a way, but life in the village wasn’t exactly paradise either.”
“The village?”
She nodded. “It’s a small city above the trees that the Mother Crow built for all of us,” she said. “It’s where she kept us hidden all these years. She cast a spell on the village that made it impossible for anyone to see it or enter into it without having the blood of a crow.”
“Wow,” I whispered, taking a spot next to her on the bed. I never would have dreamed of a secret village above the trees. “And no one was allowed to leave?”
“Not unless they had a specific job to do,” she said. “And none of us who left were ever allowed to tell anyone who we were.”
“So, how did you get away from all that?” I asked.
“When the Mother Crow found out about Harper, she tried to kill her. I was supposed to be a part of it, but I’d already made friends with Harper,” she said. “I couldn’t let them do that to her.”
I shivered, remembering what Mordecai had told me earlier about blood sacrifice. Was that what they were doing to Harper?
“You saved her?”
Mary Ann
e shrugged and gave a small smile. “I helped,” she said. “But Harper’s amazingly good at saving herself in situations like that.”
“Situations? As in plural?”
“Like I said, we’ve been through a lot.”
“You guys seem really happy here,” I said. “Are you guys alone here? What happened to the people running the orphanage?”
Mary Anne laughed and scrunched her nose. “We killed them,” she said. “Or Harper killed the main woman in charge, Mrs. Shadowford. And the ones who set up the orphanage to begin with. It's been just us ever since.”
An awkward silence stretched out between us. I had so many questions I wanted to ask, but I didn't want to pry. I was relieved when Mary Anne asked me a question instead.
“How did you get away?” she asked. “I never knew of anyone who wasn’t part of the village. No one ever talked about a family that got out.”
“My mother’s name was Mary Beth. Growing up, she refused to tell me about her family or my father or anything. I didn’t even know I had a family or that we were witches,” I said. “To be honest, I just found out about everything a few days ago. It feels like I’ve lived a lifetime since then. And there’s still so much I don’t know.”
“Where's your mother now?”
Sadness flooded my heart, but I pushed it back, refusing to let myself be upset about a woman who had kept everything from me. Who had abandoned me when I needed her most.
“She left three years ago. Just disappeared without a trace,” I said. “Someone told me recently that she died.”
“I'm sorry. I don't know where my mother is, either.” Mary Anne reached out for my hand again. “I hope someday soon we’ll be able to sit down and really talk about all of it,” she said. “We’ll do everything we can to keep you safe.”
I shook my head. “It seems like no matter where I go, the Devil finds me. What if no place is safe anymore?”
She stood and looked me in the eyes, her face serious. “There’s one place I know is safe,” she said. “As soon as Rend gets here, we’ll take you there.”
I brought in a quick breath, a lump forming in my throat. “Rend’s coming here?”
Her face broke out in a smile. “Yes.” She glanced at her watch. “In fact, he should be here soon. If you want to clean up, I’ll go find you something in Harper’s closet to wear.”
I touched my hair and the cut along my forehead. I looked awful. I most definitely wanted to clean up and wash last night’s blood off my hands. I didn't want Rend to see me like this, but I also didn't want to miss it when he got here.
“Thanks,” I said. “I won't take long.”
Mary Anne showed me where I could find everything I needed in her bathroom, then left to give me some privacy.
As I climbed into the hot shower, I smiled and repeated the same words over and over to myself.
Rend is coming.
There Is Evil All Around Us
I changed into some of Harper’s clothes and made my way toward the stairs, planning to go down and see what everyone else was up to. And to see if anyone had an idea when Rend would be here.
It was probably close to dinner time and I hadn't had anything to eat since before my shift last night at Venom. I was starving.
I found the group in the kitchen sitting around a scarred wooden table that looked like it had seen many similar gatherings in the past. It looked to be the same people as before, only the sad guy—the twin with the blue eyes—was missing. A girl with very straight white-blonde hair and pale skin had taken his place.
“Is this her?” the blonde girl asked. Her voice was like tinkling bells, high-pitched and musical. She stood and rushed over to hug me. “I'm so happy to meet you, Franki. Welcome to our home.”
I smiled and hugged her back. There was nothing but joyful energy coming from her, as if she were some kind of fairy. And from what I'd learned the past few days, I wouldn't be surprised to learn she actually was a fairy.
“Don't worry,” she whispered loudly. “I won't hold it against you that you're related to Mary Anne.”
Mary Anne sighed and walked over. She pushed the girl to the side with a playful nudge. “This is Zara,” she said. “Our resident gardener.”
My eyes widened. “Did you plant all those flowers in the garden by the fountain?” I asked. “They're gorgeous.”
Zara smiled and her entire face shone with joy. “Plant?” She giggled.
“She would never dare get her pristine little hands dirty,” Mary Anne said. “She grew them with magic.”
“Oh,” I said. “I didn't realize you could—”
“Where is she? Is she okay?”
Rend's voice stopped me mid-sentence. I spun around and saw him coming around the corner near the staircase. My eyes filled with tears and I swallowed a thick lump in my throat. I wanted to run to him and feel his strong arms around me, but I had no idea how he felt about me right now. Was he angry at me for what happened? Did he blame me?
His lips parted as our eyes met, and I was relieved to see passion, not anger. Relief instead of rage.
He tightened his jaw, the muscles in his face rippling with tension. “Franki.”
His voice was strained and I was dying to know what was going on in his head. Was he feeling the same longing I was?
If I had doubted how I was feeling before this moment, seeing him again made everything clear. I wanted him. There was no denying it. I didn't even care if he did want my blood. I wanted him anyway.
And I couldn't tell him.
Not here in front of all these strangers.
I waited for him to walk to me, each step agonizingly slow. When he made it over to where I stood, he lifted his hands as if to hug me, then lowered them.
“Are you okay?” he said, his voice shaking.
“I'm a little shaken up, but I'm okay,” I said. “I thought you were dead.”
“I know,” he said. “I should have explained to you how the club's entrance worked when you first started there, but it never seemed like the right time. After work last night, I was going to...”
His voice trailed off and he looked up to find half the room staring at us. They all quickly turned around and went back to what they were doing, but we knew they were listening in. They were probably wondering what was going on just as much as I was.
The corner of Rend's mouth lifted into a smirk. “We can talk about it later,” he said softly.
I pressed my lips together hard to keep from smiling like a complete dork. “Okay,” I said. A shiver of anticipation rippled up my spine at the thought of what else might come later. Would we have a chance to be alone?
God, I hope so.
“What about Lyla and Marco?” I asked, trying to shake the thought of him possibly kissing me again out of my mind. “Have you heard from them?”
“They made it to Las Vegas, but I haven't heard from them since they landed,” he said. “Marco's family is there, so I think they'll be okay. At least for a while.”
“Thank God. I don't know if I can handle anyone else getting hurt.” I licked my lips and looked down at the floor. “Selena's dead.”
“I know,” Rend said. He put a hand on my shoulder. “She did what she had to do to keep all of us safe.”
“None of you would have been in any danger if it wasn't for me.”
“You can't blame yourself,” he said. “There is evil all around us. You can't hold yourself responsible for that.”
“What's your plan?” Harper asked. She leaned against an island in the kitchen. “What else can we do to help?”
“You've already done so much,” Rend said. “Just giving Franki a place to stay until I could get to her was help enough.”
“Where will you go?” Jackson asked. He stood behind Harper, his hand resting on hers, their pinkies entwined. “You guys are welcome to stay here as long as you need to.”
“We wouldn't want to put you in any more danger than you're already in,” Rend said. “I was pla
nning to take her back to my place. Through the hall of doorways.”
“No,” Mary Anne said, standing up from her spot at the dinner table and walking over to us. “It's not safe.”
I hid a smile and glanced toward Rend. I knew he wasn't used to someone telling him no or questioning his judgment. I was liking my cousin more and more, just for having the guts to speak up.
“It's probably the safest place there is,” Rend said. He shook his head, his shoulders tense. “There's a spell on my door keeping everyone out.”
“What about your Brotherhood?” Mary Anne asked. “All of them are barred from your home?”
Rend's eyebrows came together in a pinched expression. “No, not all of them. But I trust them.”
“Do you?” she challenged. “Isn't the Devil himself one of the Brotherhood?”
Rend cleared his throat. “Yes, but he is banned from my home, as is anyone working for him.”
“Anyone you know is working for him,” she corrected. “But from what I understand, a lot of the Brotherhood of Darkness is upset with you for your decision to stop drinking blood. Any chance someone you once considered a friend would be willing to betray you? Someone who was maybe looking to teach you a lesson?”
“Shit,” Rend said. He ran a hand through his thick black hair. “You have a good point.”
He paced the floor in front of the island.
“We could place another spell on the door,” he said. “Something that would keep everyone else out even if they originally had passage through the door to my house.”
“Can you cast something strong enough so quickly?” Harper asked.
“I don't know,” Rend said. “The barrier spell that's on there now is very strong, but it took me weeks to gather the power and items I needed in order to create the binding.”
“Besides, the Devil will expect you to take her there,” Mary Anne said. “He's already seen how far you're willing to go to keep her safe. Bringing her back to your place is the most logical response.”
Rend nodded. “We'll have to run,” he said.
“He'll follow you,” Harper said.
“Yes,” Rend said. “But we can't very well hide out here forever. This isn't your fight. You have important work of your own to do right now.”