It got hard to breathe through the thick terrycloth, though. So I had to peel it away and face the world again.
He was still watching me, the faint suggestion of a line between his dark eyebrows. Like he was worried about me or something.
I didn’t blame him. I was worried about me, too.
After a little while, he could probably tell I was ready. He was looking at me so intently, maybe he was reading my expression. My poker face was really sucking after all this.
“My Trial begins at sundown.” His hands rested on his knees, loose and easy. He always looked so impossibly finished, every thread tucked away and every surface carefully buffed. I never saw him taking any time in the bathroom to fix his look or anything. I was beginning to think he’d look like that even if he wasn’t djamphir. “If all goes well, it should take a little over an hour for all to come to light. Then . . .”
“What are you going to do?” I pressed the washcloth against my forehead again.
“I’m going to make certain Anna can’t hurt you. I’m going to make certain she pays for what she’s done.” His jaw set, and I was suddenly grateful he hadn’t ever talked about me in that chill, factual way. “When this all ends you won’t have to worry. Not about the Order, at least. Unless Sergej’s corruption runs deeper than I’ve found.” A muscle flicked high up on one smooth cheek. “But even then, I won’t leave you. I’m not going anywhere, Dru.”
“Yeah. Sure.” I closed my eyes, laid the cloth over them. It felt good. “Whatever. I want to find Graves.”
“Everyone is looking for him. He’s picked a good hiding spot. Unless . . .”
“Unless what?” I peeked out from under the washcloth.
“I don’t know what happened between you and him. But if something did happen, could he possibly have left the Schola?” Quietly, gently, like he was afraid of me breaking down again.
Hearing him say what I’d been thinking only made it worse. “He wouldn’t.” I bristled immediately. It was like defending Dad. You do it because you have to, even if you don’t believe it. “He wouldn’t leave me.”
I just couldn’t stand Christophe saying it.
It wasn’t like Graves to ditch me. It just wasn’t. He’d been sticking like glue since the Dakotas. It’s you and me against the world, he’d said. Don’t you dare leave me behind.
Come and find me.
I settled on what I hoped, as stupid as that was. “Something must have happened to him.” The words stuck in my throat. “God.”
“If he’s still at the Schola we can find him. It will take time, though. Do you want a search of every room?”
It won’t do any good. “They won’t do that.”
“If you ask, they will.” Like, The sky’s blue, or Vampires drink blood. With a healthy helping of duh, Dru. “They’ve been trained to leap when a svetocha speaks.”
“Anna.” Like it was a dirty word. It was getting to be. I almost flinched when I said it, as if she would suddenly pop out of thin air. “Christophe?”
“What?”
I sensed him leaning forward. It’s weird to feel someone’s attention on you that way, like you’re the only thing in the world they’re listening to. Most of the time people are distracted, or just thinking about what they’re going to say next. Not a lot of them actually listen, and never to me. Adults figure I don’t have anything real to say, boys are too busy with their own stuff, other girls are light-years away at the mall or the classroom or something. None of them gets what it’s like to break a hex or clean out a nest of roach spirits.
Or to have every person or thing you ever thought was stable and real taken away, one at a time. While vampires snarl and try to kill you.
I searched for something to say. “Do I smell weird?” I opened one eye a slice, peeked at him.
His eyebrows were all the way up, his cold eyes open for a moment instead of walled off. “What?”
“I, um. Some of the wulfen, they tell me I . . . smell. And you, well.” You smell like a Christmas candle, but in a good way. Only, if it comes from blood I’m not sure I like it so much.
“You’re very curious and perceptive, moja księżniczko.” He coughed slightly. I know that sound; it’s an adult getting ready to talk about Birds and Bees. “You do smell very nice. Spice, and salt. It’s very pleasant. It means, well, when a svetocha reaches blooming age, which is different than physical maturity—”
If he started talking in euphemisms I was going to scream. “That’s good. What about you? None of the other boys smell like you do.”
“I should be proud of that.” But his face had closed up again, the faint businesslike mockery back in place.
“If you’re not going to answer what I’m really asking, Christophe, just say so.” Now I regretted bringing the whole thing up. I balled up the washcloth and sighed, levering myself creakily to my feet. Washed out and emptied, everything inside me was shut down. It was a different kind of numbness, and one I liked. Even the thought of Dad didn’t hurt so much. Like pinching your leg when it’s fallen asleep. “What time is it?”
“Three o’clock. Dru—”
“I want to see Ash. Then I want to look for Graves.”
“You should rest. Tonight might be difficult.”
My chin lifted. It was the “stubborn mule” look Gran chided me for so often. “I’m not the one on trial.”
He nodded as if he’d expected that. “True. But you could be a little kinder to me, little bird.”
I’m supposed to be nice to you? Then I felt guilty. He’d saved my life, more than once. I wouldn’t even be standing there in a white bedroom full of directionless light—because the sun was hiding behind clouds, and the skylights were full of blind glow—if it wasn’t for him. The locket on my chest twitched a little as the old familiar anger tried to rise. It wasn’t real anger, it was just comfortable. Right now mad was about all I knew how to do.
Even though I couldn’t truly feel anything. The crying had washed it all away. The panic-inducing, really terrible thought was still in the bottom of my head. How do you deal with something like that?
Work, I decided. There’s got to be something I can do until tonight. “I want to go to the infirmary,” I said quietly and clearly and tossed the washcloth down in the middle of the lake of drying coffee. The breakfast tray stood abandoned by the front door. “And I want to look for Graves. If he’s here, I can find him.” And if he’s not, I want to know. I want to know if he’s just kicked me like a bad habit.
“Very well.” He rose gracefully, and I had to look away. The white cloth soaked up coffee, turning a weird stained-brown. I felt bad about it for a second. I mean, I’ve been raised to clean up my own mess. Dad was big on keeping things neat. and Gran was all about everything in its place.
But they weren’t here, and I was a ghost. I almost expected to lift my hand and see the light go right through it. I’d cried everything right out of me.
I looked around for shoes. The closet had one lone pair of sneakers in it. Good luck, I guess. I almost groaned when I bent over to pick them up. If I lived to middle age I’d have so many back problems, damn.
But I might not ever look any older. The boy djamphir didn’t, except for something in their eyes. And how old was Anna?
I didn’t want to think about it.
I couldn’t even imagine being fifty and trapped inside this skinny teenage body.
The last twelve hours caught up with me with a wallop. I leaned against the closet door’s jamb and tried to catch my breath. Warm oil slid down my skin, the aspect rising like ribbons of heat through tepid bathwater when you twist the knob again to add more. The hurt all through my muscles retreated, and my teeth tingled.
It was too bad the aspect couldn’t do anything about the aches inside me. I sniffed a little bit. A crying jag will leave your nose raw and messy, but my nasal passages opened up, and underneath the lemon and fresh air in the room there was the distinct note of dust and spiced apple pie.
>
“Am I on trial with you, too?” Christophe asked softly.
Yes. No. I don’t know. “I trust you,” I said again. It felt like a lie. “I just . . . none of this is designed to make me a happy camper, all right?”
“Of course.” He sounded like he wanted to say something else, but let it go.
Smart of him. I got myself into my sneakers, took a few deep breaths, and the aspect retreated. I couldn’t feel the fangs anymore when I turned around and faced him.
“Let’s go.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Djamphir and wulfen both heal pretty quickly. So the infirmary isn’t a place you want to end up. If you’re hurt so bad you have to go there, it’s probably not going to end well.
Ash wasn’t in one of the curtained enclosures in the middle of the big vaulted space. He was in one of the stone-walled rooms along the sides, wrapped in white bandages and strapped down to what looked like an operating table while IVs dripped and beeping machines measured his vital signs. Heartbeat, blood pressure, brainwaves, everything.
Underneath the beeping and booping, a humming crackle ran. His fur was matted with dried blood, and the shape of his face kept changing. The slender snout would retreat, fur sliding away until you could almost, almost get a glimpse of what he would look like as a boy.
Except for the ruined jaw. You could see where the silver grains went in, and it was still seeping a weird clear fluid. His eyes were closed, and the crackle would rise in waves.
“He’s trying to change back.” Dibs had a stethoscope on his neck and the businesslike attitude he always adopted around the wounded. “Getting close to it, too. If we can keep him alive long enough to do it. We’re feeding him intravenously with five and hypodermically with fifty percent dextrose to fuel the change—”
“What are his chances?” Christophe didn’t sound impressed.
“I’m not a doctor yet, you know. They just have me attending because I’m sub enough not to set him off.”
“What are his chances?”
“About twenty percent. Better than nothing, though, right? There’s hope.” Dibs cocked his head and looked at me as if I’d been the one asking questions. “We’re doing everything we can, Dru. He’s tied down because otherwise he rips the subclavian catheter out. That’s how we’re feeding him the five percent stuff, see? And the fifty percent solution with a hypo every hour or so. He’s holding steady.”
The crackle crested again, fur running off and melting. A patch of bare pale skin showed on his chest. I held my breath. The pale spot retreated, swallowed by dark wiry hair.
Ash surged against the restraints. I found out my hands were fists. You can do it. The same thing I’d told him night after night. Come on. You can do it.
I reached forward, my fingers unloosening just a little.
“Dru.” Christophe, warning me.
I ignored him. Touched the back of Ash’s paw. Hand. Whatever. Fur flowed away, another bare patch of white skin showing like the moon behind clouds. Long elegant fingers, ending in claws that spasmodically slid free and retracted, clenched and released. It looked like the white streak at his temple was widening, but I couldn’t tell for sure.
The skin was an odd texture. Soft, like a baby’s. Like it hadn’t been exposed to a lot. It was amazing—such a kickass creature, and underneath it all, so fragile. How many times had he saved my life so far?
It was Friday, I realized. Would the wulfen do their regular weekly run tomorrow? Could I go along with them?
And when Sunday came around, would I be able to go down into the cafeteria and act like a normal girl on a coffee date or something?
Good luck with that, Dru.
“I wonder why he’s doing this.”
“Broken doesn’t mean stupid.” Dibs stared at the machines keeping track of the rhythms, his fair blond face creasing. “Maybe he knows you want to help him.”
“I shot him in the face. With silver. And then after that he wanted to kill me too, but . . .” I replayed the scene in my head. So much had happened, but I was sure of one thing—Ash had been after me before Christophe drove him away, there in the snow.
Christophe stepped closer warily. “Maybe the silver interferes with Sergej’s call. I would give much to know if he went limping back to his master and was given a new directive, or if he went to ground and the silver changed him.”
“That’s the sixty-four-dollar question, ennit? He can’t tell us yet.” Dibs eyed the Broken werwulf. It was by far the least afraid I’d ever seen him. I guess with Ash strapped down and technically a patient, Dibs could handle it. “Although I think it’s the second.”
“Why?” Christophe glanced up, his eyes turned lighter and more thoughtful. They were still cold. Dad’s eyes had been that blue, but never so freezing. Christophe’s were a winter sky, on a day when the wind knifes right through whatever you’re wearing. Eyes that can turn you numb when they’re looking at you like a butterfly on a pin.
Christophe’s interest made Dibs pull his head down like a turtle. “Just a feeling, that’s all.”
“Well, your hunches are good, Samuel. If he can be saved, you’ll save him.”
Dibs didn’t believe it. At least, he didn’t look like he did, and I didn’t blame him. Some of the white bandages began to show spots of crimson. Like angry flowers. And I was too drained and numb to react much, smelling the copper salt of blood.
It was a blessing. My fangs didn’t tingle.
Dibs sighed. “What worries me is what’ll happen after we’ve got him recovering, not just stabilized. What are they going to do with him?”
“Same thing they have done, I’d bet. Make him Dru’s problem.” Christophe let out a sharp breath. “Have you seen the loup-garou?”
“Graves? No. Nobody has. Shanks saw him yesterday, heading away from a sparring gym looking like hell. But he was on duty for Dru and didn’t follow him. Weird, huh? He’s never very far away from her.” Dibs coughed a little, maybe remembering I was standing right there. “Alphas get mad, though. Maybe he’s just off cooling down.”
It sounded inadequate, and we all knew it. “He’s still bleeding.” I couldn’t tear my gaze away from the ruin of the Broken’s jaw, and the spots on the bandages widened. The patch of skin under my fingers shrank, choked with wiry vital fur.
“Crap. He’s about to have one of his swings again. Get out of here, Dru.” Dibs turned toward a tray of various implements and bottles and scooped up a package, broke it open with a practiced flick of his fingers, and subtracted a hypodermic needle the size of the Death Star. He looked down at the Broken, and his face changed a little. “Last thing I need is you coding on the table. I’m gonna save your life, wulf, whether you like it or not.” He glanced back at me as the beeps and boops picked up their pace. “Didn’t I tell you to leave?”
Wow. Where had the Dibs who couldn’t even choke out his name in a crowded lunchroom gone?
Christophe’s hand curled around my arm and he pulled me away. Dibs cursed as something rattled, and a snarl shook the room. Christophe swung the door shut and didn’t slow down until we were all the way down to the other end of the infirmary. “Why that wulf was stuck in a reform Schola is beyond me,” he muttered darkly. “The Order used to be a meritocracy. Dear God.”
“Is he going to be okay?”
“Which one? Samuel can take care of himself. Unless Ash breaks the restraints, and even then he won’t see a submissive as a threat. Unless he’s crazed. Which is very likely.” He palmed the heavy door at the end of the infirmary open, checked the hall, and had probably forgotten his hand around my arm. At least he wasn’t giving me another bruise to add to all the rest.
“What about Ash? Christophe, slow down.”
He stopped. The hallway was deserted. Shafts of westering sunlight pierced it at regular intervals, and the velvet drapes were still and silent. The busts studding the hall’s length peered at each other, never quite looking anyone in the eye. I was beginning to feel
like crawling under a bed and hiding for awhile. The more I thought about it, the more it seemed reasonable.
“It’s so quiet.” I tried to pull my arm away, but he wasn’t having any of it. “If you’re on Trial, why are they letting you run around like this? Nobody’s watching.”
“You only think nobody’s watching, skowroneczko moja. This is the Schola Prima; there are always eyes. Besides, I gave my word.” He cocked his head, listening.
“You gave your word.” I didn’t mean it to sound flat and unhelpful, but it did.
“When I say I will do something, Dru, I do it. Where would you like to start looking for the loup-garou?”
I shrugged. I didn’t have a clue. So much for Graves’s faith in me.
“Very well. Come along, we’ll start with Robert.”
“You’re going to have to let go of me.” This time I was successful in pulling my arm away. We stood there facing each other, and this time I looked away first. If there were eyes watching, I wasn’t so sure what I should be doing.
“As you like.” The businesslike mockery was back. “You’ve had a busy day or two. What happened between you and the loup-garou, Dru?”
“None of your business.” And I meant it. “What’s going on between you and Anna?”
“Touché.” He grimaced, half-turned, and set off down the hall. I had to follow.
What else was there to do?
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
“Jesus.” My mouth hung open; I closed it with a snap. When they’d said the blue room was torn to shreds, they weren’t kidding.
Shanks folded his arms. He had an ugly shiner that was healing even as I looked at it, yellow-green instead of red-blue and fresh. He moved a little stiffly, but seemed okay. “I been looking for anything to save, but there’s not much. The clothes are all torn up; even the carpet’s gonna have to be yanked up and redone. Broke everything in the bathroom. The washer and dryer—I mean, you know. Suckers.”
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