Deviate

by Tracy Clark

  “The letter V?” She smiled. “It does. Your markings are a bit more deliberate,” she commented, her eyes—startling seafoam green, I realized—darting to my neck where the arches of my tattoo curved up like a wave before diving back down beneath my shirt. “Do you mind if I ask what it is?”

  “Sure. The triple spiral.”

  A flash of something like understanding lit up her eyes. “How apropos.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Before Saoirse could answer, our attention was drawn to the other side of the table where the conversation had already taken a heated turn. Ultana leaned forward on the table, spine erect, head cocked like a warning, one finger punctuating her words. “Ina, I’ve often regarded your reluctance to associate with your own kind as a futile wish to deny what you are.”

  My mother, never one to shy away from engagement, or from her own truth, smiled with composure, but her voice had an unmistakable frost. “On the contrary. Only a wish to not associate with you in particular, Ultana.” Her lashes fluttered once, and I nearly laughed.

  “Ina Doyle,” Clancy hissed, but tried to hide it with laughter. “Now play nice, sister.” His expression was reproving. He’d warned us about this woman and her connection to the Society. It seemed to me she was on a fact-finding mission of sorts, to see where the Doyle family stood.

  My mother continued, despite her brother’s warning look. “You come around with the singular aim of securing a place within our family…”

  Saoirse shifted next to me.

  “Is it not our responsibility to ensure the survival of our great race?” Ultana asked.

  My father, who’d been quiet up until then, said, “While you endeavor to make extinct another?”

  “You have aligned yourself with a group we know nothing about, which has an agenda that makes no sense to us,” my mother said.

  Ultana’s eyes shot to Clancy with a look of anger and then back to my mother. Clearly she wasn’t pleased with Clancy for telling us what the Society’s aims were.

  “Their presence causes discord among Arrazi who compete to find and possess the ones who remain. The Scintilla are nothing. Beneath us.”

  “The Scintilla are the most beautiful and extraordinary beings on this planet!” I was pinned to my seat with the threatening look that Clancy shot me.

  “And how would you know this, young man?” Ultana asked, scrutinizing me with her penetrating stare. “Clancy informed me that your parents have told you next to nothing. Not about the Arrazi or the Scintilla. You speak of the legendary Scintilla as if you’d actually met one,” she said with a condescending laugh, as if that was the most preposterous thing she’d ever heard.

  My mother interrupted, likely to save me from exposing what I now realized was Clancy’s secret. He didn’t want Ultana to know about Cora and the others. “For as long as I can remember, the Scintilla have been rumored to be no more. If there are any left, their numbers must be so small as to guarantee their own demise. They can’t possibly be a concern. You are hunting an already endangered race. Explain the threat. Make me understand.”

  Ultana was slow to respond, guarded. “The Scintilla are no threat to the Arrazi.”

  “If that’s the case, then they’re a threat to someone else,” I said. “Or else someone wouldn’t want them dead. Why does the Society want them dead?”

  It was then that my mother played her hand. “If you’d like us to be allies,” she said, her voice dangling the promise that Ultana needed to hear, “please, act as an ally and tell us why doing so is in our best interest.”

  Everyone in the room seemed to hold their breath, waiting for Ultana Lennon to answer.

  Twenty-One

  Finn

  “There’s a great deal of money and power at stake,” Ultana said. “That is all I can tell you.”

  “We don’t kill for money or power,” my mother replied.

  “Would you kill for survival?”

  My mother smirked. “We already do.”

  “That’s kill or die. This,” Ultana said, taking a slow sip of red wine before setting down the glass, “is kill or be killed.”

  No one spoke as the threat hung heavy in the air.

  My fork clanked to my plate. “Be killed by the Scintilla?” It was preposterous. How were they a threat to us?

  “Of course not,” Ultana snapped. “The Society has made it very clear that the Arrazi are to cooperate or join the Scintilla’s fate. We can be killed just as methodically or we can join with them and serve at their right hand.”

  My father tipped his head back as if to throw a silent laugh to the ceiling. “Serve as supernatural henchmen, you mean,” he said. “Of course this is merely a tactical question—I am in the Defense Force, after all—why are we bowing to anyone when we have the ability to silently and invisibly kill? The Society does not fear the Arrazi will turn on them?”

  Ultana smirked. “You do not know who you’re up against,” she said. “Are you not tired of slinking in the shadows of humanity? We are promised exaltation. Baser humans will be kept in line where they belong, and the Arrazi will no longer have to kill in secret like criminals. It’s time we took our seat at the head of the table.”

  “I don’t see the big deal. The Scintilla are our enemy. Always have been,” Lorcan said, stuffing a wad of beef into his mouth. “And we’ve obviously annihilated the enemy or there’d be more of ’em, wouldn’t there? We get rid of the rest of ’em. Done.”

  The handle of the knife I held dug into my palm. I wanted to hurl it at him.

  Clancy pulled at the bottom of his vest. “Since they’re thought to be nearly nonexistent, we don’t have much to be concerned about, do we now?” One white eyebrow shot up at my mother. “It’s high time our families were on speaking terms again and that has been done. Let fate deal its hand.”

  “Fate will have nothing to do with it,” Ultana said with a lift of her glass. “I control my own fate.”

  As do I, I thought, turning to Saoirse. “Would you and your mother like to have coffee with me tomorrow? I need to go into the city, and would like to hear of the many things my parents neglected to tell me.”

  Throat clearing from my father. Stony silence from my mother.

  “They’ve told you nothing? Denial or duplicity, Ina?” Ultana’s eyes sparkled with victory. “Ah. The boy can play nice. Smart lad. I can’t possibly, however. Business.”

  Damn. I thought she’d jump on my invitation.

  “I’m sure Saoirse would be happy to fill in the gaps,” she said. “I didn’t keep my children in the dark about who they are. We have a rich legacy, Finn Doyle. In my opinion, it’s high time you knew about it.”

  “What did you think you were doing?” my mother fumed. “Ultana Lennon is a viper. Her son is a dodgy brute, and her poor daughter is a pawn in her mother’s scheming. She wants you, Finn. And you’ve played right into her hands.”

  “Or she into mine.”

  “Ah,” she said, after a moment. “Make her think you’re at odds with me and your father. Ingratiate yourself.” She stepped close, her voice low. “Don’t get cocky, young man. It’s a dangerous game, and you’re playing way out of your league.” She crossed her arms and paced in front of the fire. “There isn’t an ugly story I’ve heard that didn’t have Ultana connected with it. I don’t know what her history is, but I can tell you this, she knows more about the Scintilla than any of us.”

  “How do you know? Did you see her secret?” I asked excitedly. I’d honestly forgotten that my mother would have been trying to use her new sortilege to see what Ultana didn’t want her to.

  “She has so many. I fell into a pit of them when I looked into her eyes, but it was like writhing snakes in a well, impossible to read just one. How can a person have that many secrets in one lifetime?” Her pacing stopped and she uncrossed her arms to touch my cheek. “Sleep, son. You’ll need to be sharp for your lunch tomorrow. In Saoirse’s case, I pray the apple does fall far from the tree.”


  “Night, then.” I was happy to leave the library and go to bed. Every time I went in that room, the weight of memory crushed me. I’d had the most beautiful moment of my life in there with Cora. Right before I tried to kill her.

  “I’m glad my mother isn’t with us,” Saoirse confessed, her hushed voice shy. She curled her lips around the straw in her iced coffee, took a sip, and said, “Because I find myself wanting to say something that I could never say in front of her.”

  This was the most she’d spoken since I’d picked her up at home. Suddenly, she pierced me with a stare. She’d been doing everything but looking right at me the whole time. She couldn’t be called pretty, exactly. Saoirse was fascinating. Her eyes were a little too close together, her nose pointed like a dart above bowed lips. She was a breathing caricature of a fairy. In the daylight, her sea foam-colored eyes were even more startling, especially against her flaming hair.

  But this was not my Cora. Would never be.

  The look Saoirse gave me was intense, searching. She had something big to say. My nerves fired with anticipation.

  “My mother has been pushing the idea of you on me like you’re the second coming of Christ. I know your parents told you this, and it was painfully obvious last night. So I’m putting it out there in the open so it doesn’t have to be awkward, or forced. I have zero interest in her matchmaking schemes. I just wanted you to know, um, God…I’m not after you, Finn.”

  I feigned a dagger in the heart, which got a chuckle out of her. All of that came out in a hurried tumble, but I was impressed. Took balls. I didn’t think Saoirse had it in her. Then again, maybe my sortilege had compelled her to be so honest. I exhaled, relieved. I didn’t want to have to pretend to be interested in her romantically. It didn’t seem right. Though it’d be a lot easier to be a two-faced git if she was anything like her mother. I rather liked Saoirse so far—in a friendly way. Liking anyone for real would be impossible. My heart was forever taken.

  “Okay. You’re not after me. I can live with that.” I smiled to set her at ease.

  “But my mother is, and she’s formidable when she wants something.”

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  “I figured if I aired it out,” she said, “then maybe we could be friends. Real friends. It’s hard to be friends with regular people when you know you could kill them. Our secret is too huge. Besides my brother, I don’t have anyone I can talk to about all of this.”

  “Of course we can be friends,” I said. “I’m getting over something serious with someone anyway, if you want to know the truth. I’m damaged goods, I’m afraid.” My heart ached just admitting to it.

  “Aren’t we all?” she said, and we both smiled sadly. It made me wonder what her damage was. “I’m happy to tell you everything I can. I don’t want you to pretend to like me just to get information.”

  Wow. This girl was shrewder than I gave her credit for. A dainty, delicate appearance did not equal a mousy spirit. Lesson learned. “You’re right. I want information. I have respect for your honesty. I’d like to be friends,” I told her and was surprised to feel a splinter of truth in the words.

  “Grand.” Her voice became stronger, like a barometer of her comfort level. “No fakey romance. That’s the last thing I want.”

  “Wow. The mere thought of romance with me is repugnant, huh?” I teased. “Friends aren’t supposed to make friends feel like shite about themselves.”

  “Sorry to disappoint you, but it is repugnant,” Saoirse said, a deep blush flaming her pale skin. “I don’t want to be forced into something that should be natural. And I’m—I’m not ready. My mother will be a problem, though. She’s quite intent on us being together.”

  “Why?”

  “Two reasons, I reckon. One, she’s impatient for me to change. To”—she made quote fingers—“blossom fully into what I was born to be.” She rolled her doe eyes. “And often, it’s powerful feelings for another at this age that bring it on.”

  Cora… I bit my lip.

  Saoirse noticed, her eyes flickering to my mouth and then away, but continued on. “If I understand the theory, we have the connection to our parents as children, but it’s our first love that causes us to want to forge a connection with another. It’s the first time that we choose for our energy to reach out for another’s. Our intense longing to connect with that person is a trigger.”

  When she said that, I immediately understood her rebellion. “You’re reluctant to get involved with anyone because you don’t want to turn.”

  She looked away, her gaze wandering and then settling on a young couple a few tables over who’d left their pastries uneaten because they were too busy chatting with each other as if the world didn’t exist outside of them. “I know I’m supposed to want it to happen…”

  I couldn’t be sure if she was talking about romance or becoming a mature Arrazi.

  “Anyway, I’ve heard that intense hatred for another can also bring it on.”

  “I’ll be careful not to piss you off, then. And the second reason your mother is pushing me on you?”

  “It’s your family, your mother’s side to be specific. She makes it sound like the Mulcarrs have been around since the beginning.”

  “The beginning?”

  She cocked her head, a shock of red covering one eye. “Yes. Brú na Bóinne…Newgrange.”

  Twenty-Two

  Cora

  “Those blithe souls flashed out like comets streaming from the sky, Whirling in circles round determined poles. And even as wheels in clock escapement ply, In such fashion geared that motionless, Appears the first one, and the last to fly.”

  We sat around the table, having lunch as Giovanni read aloud from Paradiso. He slapped the book shut and stared at us with this amazed kind of expression that, frankly, perplexed us all. Dante wasn’t exactly easy reading.

  Dun slurped from his bowl of soup and set it down. “Dude. Ancient, old Italian fella said what?”

  “Yeah, it’s like a secret that you’re the only one in on even though you just told it to us. I think you have to read that, like, twelve more times for me to even understand what the hell he was talking about,” Mari said. “Whirling circles and flying?”

  “Who is Beatrice?” I asked him. She was a key figure in Paradiso.

  “Dante’s heart and soul. His love. In this canto, they are watching this celestial event together.”

  “What is it, child?” my mother asked. She’d apparently been watching me mull it over. Her eyes crackled with curiosity as she waited for me to answer. I think our quests were bringing her back to herself.

  “It reminds me of that painting in the Doyles’ manor. A man and a woman, standing together under this spiraling mass of angels. I wish I could see it again, because that’s what this quote makes me think of.”

  I wish I could ask Finn about it. I wish…

  I wished too many things, like that I could see Finn once again and talk about our bizarre lives, ask him what his family knew about Scintilla, ask him about the Dante painting, the Dante quote about flames and sparks, and why Griffin had said it to me in the hospital. I wished to look into Finn’s warm brown eyes, feel his lips on my cheek as he whispered to me. I wished to feel the way I felt when we were innocently falling in love. Well, it was love for me, anyway. I wished for his life to be different so he wouldn’t have preferred to die.

  I wished for the thousandth time to save my thoughts of Finn for someday when I could process everything without it feeling like a kick in the heart.

  I pushed my soup away, too troubled to eat. Morbid, negative feelings soaked through me. Although I’d been told to keep my thoughts grounded and positive, I’d been feeling worse. I tried working on making myself stronger in preparation for the party, in preparation for the unknown, for the attacks that Gráinne said were sure to come, but my body or mind or freaking vibration wouldn’t cooperate. My heart sagged with sadness. My limbs were heavy with anger. I buzzed with fear. None
of that was going to make me stronger. It was like pulling myself out of quicksand with one hand.

  Giovanni’s silver aura grew and swirled around his body, flowing from him toward me as he neared. “Stop that,” I snapped, feeling the hit as an appealing mist rolled over my skin. “You won’t always be there to give me strength or make me feel better. There will be times when you can’t give me what I don’t possess for myself. I have to learn this.”

  “Cora, you had to have massive strength to save my life. I know those men almost killed me. I felt myself floating out of my body. I was dying.” Giovanni touched my shoulder, sending warmth and waves of crackling energy down my arm. His voice softened. “You’re stronger than you know.”

  “You saved his life?” Dun said, mid-bite.

  “Don’t sound so astonished.”

  “How?”

  “With a kiss,” Giovanni answered, a smile in his voice. I think he was trying to lighten the mood, but it felt like taunting. And I didn’t want Mari and Dun to get the wrong idea.

  “What?” Mari practically yelled. “How very Sleeping Beauty mash-up of you!”

  “I didn’t save him with a kiss. I saved him with thoughts of you guys, of the people I loved.” I pushed out of my chair and left the room.

  Mari and Dun followed a few minutes later. I was glad they did. They—they were normal. They were pre-bizarre. They were home. And the only way I could go back to that home now was through them. They climbed on the bed, one on each side of me, and we all lay there like sardines, silent, staring up at the cracks in the ceiling. Hot tears flowed onto my temples.

  “I know you’re scared,” Mari said, the hush of her voice taking me back years to our “whisper time” in a darkened room when we were supposed to be sleeping but would lie awake and share our dreams and secrets. Whisper time was a sacred bubble.

  “I’m kinda scared,” Dun whispered. “I keep doing that thing I do when I leave the movies, you know…where I feel like what happened in the make-believe world of the movie is happening outside of the theater?”