by Lucy Auburn
Just like they watched out for me and saved me. “I’ll join some other time,” I tell the boys. “You guys have fun. Don’t get Olivia too drunk.” Glancing at Sam, I add, “And don’t fall off the roof.”
“Hey! Just because I told you that story about falling out of a second story window doesn’t mean I’m clumsy. I’m a cat. I land on my feet.”
Liam pipes up, “Me too! I’m way more elegant than this guy.”
I shake my head, smiling at their bickering. “Night boys. I’m sure you’ll have fun. Olivia—if they get too annoying, just fly away.”
She grins at me. “Oh, I’m planning on it.”
Heading to my room, I listen to their footsteps recede down the hall. There’s an envelope on the ground, slid underneath my door. My heart thumps, expecting it to be another menacing note—but it’s on official letterhead, written in a very neat calligraphy.
Opening it up, I discover that it’s my new room assignment. Apparently a group of “volunteer students” is going to show up Sunday morning to help me move my things into one of the official dorm buildings across the courtyard, on the other side of campus.
Which means tonight and tomorrow are the only nights I have left in the Great House, where the dining hall and classrooms are—as well as the library on the top floor. After this, if I want to sneak in and grab the book, I’ll have to get through the well-lit courtyard at night without attracting suspicion.
So it’s now or never.
I’m wearing my black hoodie and dark pants, but I swear I can feel eyes on me anyway.
The stairs to the tower at the top of the building seem to creak more at night. Or maybe that’s just my overactive imagination, certain that I’m going to get caught wandering around with another student’s ID at 1:00 AM and get expelled before I even get the chance to look at this book more closely.
Of course, as yet another step creaks loudly beneath my feet, my heart starts to race. And I feel them around me, inevitable as the sun rising, showing up at the most inopportune times.
Ezra is standing on the top of the stairs, arms crossed, a distinctly Ezra-like glower on his face. “Really? You made me corporeal once and then you just banished us like we were nothing? After we saved your life and helped you out.”
“It was just too much!” I blurt out, forgetting for a moment that I’m on a stealth mission. Leaning in close, I hiss at him, “I couldn’t deal with you anymore. But I managed to steal another student’s ID and I’m headed towards the library anyway, so you’re welcome. You’re about to go home.”
He recoils, like something I’ve said makes him unhappy. Behind me, Lynx murmurs, “Thanks, Dani.”
Sebastian walks up the stairs and passes through me, making my skin tingle all up and down my legs and arms. I force myself to ignore the way it feels. Giving me a blue-eyed dismissive glance, he drawls out, “Yeah, thanks Dani.”
“You’re welcome,” I hiss. “Now, can we please get on with it?”
I look up pointedly towards Ezra, who isn’t exactly blocking my way, but is standing somewhere that would force me to walk through him to make it to the library.
“Congratulations,” his says, voice deep and oddly bitter. “You’re getting rid of us soon.”
Stiffly, Ezra moves out of the way. For some reason the expression in his eyes makes me feel scalded, like I’m doing something wrong somehow. As I move past him, I look back down the stairs, towards Mateo, the only one of them who hasn’t spoken yet.
He’s standing at the bottom of the staircase, near one of the windows, moonlight streaming through his ghostly form. Arms crossed, eyes down on the floor, he looks completely despondent.
I know why, but I don’t want to admit it to myself. So I shake the thought off, square my shoulders, and walk down the hallway towards the library.
It’s not hard to find. A big plaque commemorating the founder of Phoenix Academy, Melisandra Towers, is positioned next to the grand double doors. Golden letters hung above the door name it after her, and the large electronic card reader lock on the right-hand side makes it clear that not all are welcome here.
Earlier in the week, Sam and Liam let slip an important piece of information during one of their one-upmanship stories: apparently the library is open twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. I know because they once bet each other who was the most studious, and wound up here all night “studying” until Liam fell asleep and Sam won a whopping five dollars.
Thankfully, though, there are no bets going on tonight, and no students so dedicated to studying for their classes that they’ve come here late on a Friday. Everyone is no doubt looking forward to the weekend after grueling days of physical and mental work. If any studying happens here at night, it’ll be cramming right before a test.
Grabbing Olivia’s lanyard out of my pocket, I slip the ID from its plastic case and slide it through the electronic lock, magnetic strip facing towards the card reader. My heart thumps so loudly that I swear if the demons weren’t already here I’d wind up summoning them a second time.
The light on the card reader switches from red to green, and the lock clicks open. Hand on the door, I let myself in—and turn around, expecting the demons to follow.
Ezra grimaces. “We can’t go in. The magical wards are up, even though the physical lock is unlocked.”
“We’ll wait out here for you,” Mateo says, sounding unusually subdued. “Don’t... don’t take too long.”
I feel like there’s something going on that I don’t know about, but when I open my mouth to ask what it is I can’t quite seem to get the words past. “I’ll be back in just a sec. Hopefully the Dewey Decimal System isn’t that different for weird magical shit.”
As the door closes behind me and seals them out, the sudden silence is overwhelming. There’s no one in the library at all, no white noise or sound, not even a single light shining down to make the place feel less abandoned.
I search the wall for a switch to flick the fluorescents overhead on, but quickly give up when I don’t find any. There’s enough moonlight from the dome overhead to guide me by, and all I need is to find a book with the same title on the spine as the one Richard had. I can read it later, when I’m back in my room.
It takes me a while to comb through the sections. The books here are separated into two halves, I eventually realize: one half for the mundane world and its normal things like guns and world history, and another half for books on magic and other paranormal weirdness that I’m still getting used to. Even the regular books are rare and old, making it obvious why this library is off-limits to new students until they’re trustworthy. It takes all my self-control to keep my itchy fingers from nabbing the most expensive first editions I spot.
Diving into the paranormal half, I search through the shelves until I start to see titles with words like “arcane” and “demonic” on them. The books here mostly have black spines; apparently demon summoners aren’t into bucking tradition. It figures that Richard would pick the most obvious book about the dark arts that he could find.
Crouching near the bottom shelves, I finally see what I’m looking for. The embossed gold letters are raised against a pitch black cover made of old leather that looks like it’s frequently oiled and clean. Pulling it out, I feel a surge of adrenaline at the knowledge that I’m close to getting what I want.
Unlike Richard’s book, which is covered in blood and no doubt safely locked away in a police evidence room somewhere, this book is fresh and untouched.
Cracking it open, I briefly let my eyes skim over the pages. There are strange rituals described, arcane-looking drawings, and things that make my stomach churn uneasily. But I won’t know which ritual I’m looking for on my own; that’s what the demons are for.
Slipping the book inside the big pocket of my hoodie, I creep back through the library and out into the hallway beyond. The demons are gone, somehow, even though I don’t remember calming down enough to dismiss them.
Maybe they’re j
ust hiding in the other rooms, sulking about not being able to go into the library with me. For some reason a twinge of disappointment goes through me at the thought.
As I head down the stairs, I spot them waiting for me on the second story landing. There’s an unusual hush in the air, and I get the feeling they were talking about me before I came around the corner.
“I found it.” Holding up the book, I wiggle it back and forth in the air. “Now all we gotta do is find the right spell, and... that’s it.”
Mateo echoes, “That’s it.”
Ezra looks away, while Lynx sighs, staring up at me with something like longing in his eyes. “Was the library big? Was it beautiful?”
It was hard to really notice through the overwhelming fear that I was about to get caught. “I uh, guess it was. I mean, the ceilings were tall.”
“Let’s not talk,” Sebastian interrupts. “Dani’s going to get caught. Let’s go.”
I follow them down the stairs, trying to match their quiet footsteps. Of course, no one can hear them the way they can hear me, but despite this the demons always seem to have an air of stealth around them. Maybe it’s the fact that they have to be able to sneak up on mortals and weigh their souls for violent murder.
That’s a disturbing thought. Or it should be. Somehow, in the past few days with them, I’ve started to see them differently than I did that night on the cliffs.
Mateo always has something enthusiastic to say—or inappropriate, depending. Lynx can pull an obscure piece of knowledge out of thin air, and makes me remember what it was like when I still loved going to school. Ezra has an unexpected patience to him, guiding me through classes when I’m lost, getting the others to shut up when I need silence.
Sebastian is the only one who evades scrutiny, though I do know he has a flair for dramatic deaths. What strikes me the most about him is the wild-eyed way he looked that night in Sticky’s attic, when he told me they weren’t the evil ones; the people who control them are. Something about the bitterness in his blue eyes tells me there’s a story there, one with a tragic ending.
They lead me towards the study I found them in the first day I was here, the one with a tricky lock. I nudge the doorstop beneath the edge of the door to keep it open just an inch or so; the last thing I need is to get locked in here while performing a demonic ritual.
“So.” I look at the four of them, suddenly uncertain. “Before we say goodbye, maybe... maybe tell me a little about yourselves. What’s your favorite movie?”
“Animal House,” Mateo quickly supplies, while Ezra just says, “Dani.”
He looks at me with those green eyes, and adds, “We have to go. We don’t belong here.”
How did he know? Is it written on my face that I want to keep them here with me just a little longer, like a dumb little kid? Suddenly I’m reminded of a girl at my group home who carried a dirty stuffed rabbit with her everywhere, despite the fact that its powder blue fur had long turned grey. She screamed and cried all night after one of the counselors threw it away during a lice infestation. I can still hear the sound of her lonely sobs, and remember how it annoyed me so much I threw a pillow at her face.
I didn’t want to be reminded of my own loneliness, echoed in the desperation of her pitiful cries.
Hardening my heart, just like I have a dozen other times, I nod. “Okay, stupid idea. Let’s figure out what ritual we need to do in here to send you guys to Little Hell or wherever.”
As I walk past Sebastian to set the book down on the desk, I swear I hear him murmur, “Ghost. Patrick Swayze, Demi Moore.”
Blinking, I glance over at him, but he’s not even looking at me. It must’ve been a mistake. Maybe I’ve gotten so dumb and lonely I’m imagining things now.
“Alright.” Pushing some papers aside, I crack the book open and let the demons take a peek at the table of contents. Lynx, of course, is first in line, staring eagerly down at the book like he’d give anything to be able to turn its pages. “Tell me. Which creepy weird ritual thing should I do? And please don’t say the word ‘entrails’ or I might just vomit the three dinners I ate onto this expensive carpet.”
In lieu of an answer, Lynx inexplicably says, “Ben-Hur.” He smiles up at me, words smooth with that easy French-Caribbean accent of his. “Though if we’re widening our circle outside English language films, Trois couleurs: Bleu is a favorite, too.”
Biting my lip, I murmur, “Thank you.”
Matteo grunts. “Nerd.”
“Dolt,” Lynx insults him back. He skims through the table of contents, frowning. “What about ‘Arcane Demonic Rituals’ on page 192? We can start with that section. It’s a hundred pages long though, so it might take a while.” He glances up at me and apologetically adds, “You’ll have to turn the pages for me.”
“On it.”
As I’m flipping through pages, a throat clears behind me. I wait.
Finally, after what feels like a whole minute, Ezra speaks up. “2001: A Space Odyssey. And I swear to all things dark and unholy, Mateo, if you call me a nerd I’ll blow up all your bombs and ruin your fun.”
The others keep their mouths shut. But I can’t help beaming wide, mouth curved open in a joyful smile. “Good to know.”
“And you, Dani?” He cocks his head to the side, green eyes looking at me expectantly. “What’s your favorite movie?”
Rooting through DVDs in houses that were never homes. Sneaking into movie theaters with other temporary kids. Being forced to watch made-for-TV issue films in the group home that were supposed to convince us not to get pregnant or do drugs.
I’m searching for an answer that won’t make me look like the sad, lame kid I am when I hear the screams.
“Help! Please, someone help me! It’s going to kill me!”
Chapter 18
Whirling around, I look for the source of the sound. There. Out in the hallway, a white light glows, brighter than any screen, impossibly wide and large.
Ezra slips in front of me. “Dani, don’t go out there.”
“Why? What is it? Do you know?”
He shakes his head, a frown on his face. “I think I have an idea, though, and it’s not good.”
“This would be a good time for me and my grenades to be corporeal,” Mateo points out.
More screaming. “Help!”
I can’t just stand here, even though I have no idea what the fuck I’m doing. I at least have to go get someone who can help her, whoever she is.
Creeping to the doorway, I get up on my toes and peer out of the little window there. The white light is nearly blinding it’s so bright, but I blink a few times and manage to see something through it, which is how I realize it’s not just a light.
There’s a person in the middle, body moving in strange, jerky fashion, long white hair streaming behind her head. The white light emanates from her entire body—but most of it is concentrated to either side of her shoulders, where it fans out in large, feathery wings.
Beside me, Lynx breathes out, “White Phoenix.”
A prickle goes down my skin. There’s someone on the ground, scrambling away from the white form. A student; I can’t tell who, because the bottom edge of the window blocks most of her face. But she suddenly shifts, transforms into a small animal, and scampers away.
The phoenix snarls. Stalking around the corner, she pursues her prey—and her light vanishes from the hallway in front of Yohan’s study. Taking a deep breath, I reach for the doorknob.
“Dani.” Ezra’s voice is sharp. “I don’t know if we can protect you in this. A phoenix’s heart is... different. Never fully evil, no matter what they do. We might not be able to manifest our bodies on this plane to fight her.”
“Then I’ll just have to find help on my own.”
An image of Yohan flits through my mind, sitting cross-legged on the ground, his great orange wings fanning behind him. Jared Fisk, bellowing like a forge; Laura McKinley, stalking around us with her long blonde hair pulled back in a severe bun
, looking like she could take down anything. Then Headmaster Towers, red flames bursting from her body, eyes searing into me like she could turn me into ash with a snap of her fingers.
The teachers sleep in the Great House. One of them has to be nearby. For the first time in my life, I actually want an authority figure around.
Pushing the door open, I carefully creep into the hallway, eyes fixed on the corner the phoenix turned down. Now would be a great time to find my wings, but of course I can’t feel them at all. At least I seem to still have my new ability to see in the dark; I can read the plaque on the wall that directs to the off-limits teachers’ wing. Time to break the rules and hopefully save a life.
“I’ll scout ahead,” Sebastian offers, walking in front of me, his form still half-translucent in the tiny bit of light streaming through the windows. “Stay there.”
Easier said than done. I back up into a wall, trying to fold myself down into the darkness. I can feel Ezra watching me, an unhappy expression on his face.
“This must be what that note was warning you about,” Lynx observes. “A White Phoenix.”
I nod, too worried about being heard to risk even the barest whisper.
Apparently Lynx isn’t looking for much of an answer. Book smart as usual, he starts listing off White Phoenix traits. “They’re formidable. Their fire burns hotter than normal phoenix fire. Let’s see... I think they also have claws on their fingertips, or at least some of the books say they do; that could just be a myth. They have a strong nose and hunting instincts, but they’re... off. Not all there. Just like all the undead.”
“Lynx,” Ezra murmurs. “Shut up. I think I hear something.”
I do, too. She’s headed back this way; I can see the barest hint of her light spilling down the hallway. My heart races uncontrollably fast, and I find myself wishing for one of the many weapons in Kade’s classroom.