A Girl Called Dust

by V. B. Marlowe

  Mom gave me a small uncomfortable smile, while Dad busied himself gulping down a huge glass of water.

  I took a deep breath. “Are we going to act like everything is normal?” My family would barely look at me. I focused on my sisters. “Why are you guys acting so weird around me now? I’m still the same Arden I’ve always been.”

  “No, you’re not,” Quinn chirped. “You’re—”

  Paige elbowed her in the side, and they both looked down at their hands.

  “I’m what?” I asked. What had my parents told them? What had them walking on eggshells around me?

  Mom glanced over her shoulder. “This is not the time or the place to talk about this, Arden.”

  No one in the restaurant was paying us any attention. They were engrossed in their own conversations. “I think this is the perfect time to talk. We’re all together, and no one can rush to eat their dinners just so they can escape to their bedrooms.”

  My sisters exchanged guilty glances.

  “Arden,” Quinn said, “are you going to eat us?”

  The question sounded so ridiculous, yet it was appropriate. Who had to ask a question like that? Someone who was living with a monster-waiting-to-happen.

  “Of course not. I would never hurt any of you or anyone, period.”

  Paige folded her arms across her chest. “You can say that, but really you can’t control it. I looked up Wendigos. They never get full, and they’re always hungry for Human flesh.”

  A lump rose in my throat. She was afraid of me. Dad studied his empty plate. Mom and Quinn locked eyes with each other and then looked away. They were all afraid of me. My family thought I was going to kill them one day.

  “I—I don’t have to change if I don’t want to. I can control it. I just have to learn how.”

  Paige nodded. “Yeah, that’s the problem. You don’t know how to control it right now. I thought you were going to go live with those things.”

  She sounded as if she were disappointed that I had come home.

  Dad lowered his voice. “Arden, there is less than a year until your eighteenth birthday. Whatever transformation you’re going to go through is going to happen by then. None of us knows what to expect.” He turned to my sisters. “That doesn’t mean we treat her any differently. Whatever happens, we’ll make the adjustments we need to make.”

  Two waiters brought over a small table that held our meals and placed them before us, but no one ate.

  The fact that the people I loved the most in the world feared me had stolen my appetite. Dad was the first to finally pick up his fork. “And Arden, you know we love you, so please don’t take it personally if you go through some changes and we have to do what we have to do to protect ourselves.”

  I hated the sound of that. “What does that mean?”

  Dad glanced at Mom, who quickly poured dressing over her salad. She’d had the least to say the entire evening.

  “Wendigos are dangerous to Humans, honey,” Dad said. “I have to do right by everyone in this family. I have to protect all of you.”

  I didn’t know what that would involve, but I knew I didn’t want to find out.

  I slid down in my seat and said something I’d never thought I’d say. “Maybe I should see Scarlett again.” I had no idea whether or not Scarlett would see me after how I had behaved the last time, but I missed talking to her. Apparently therapy was helping me. If I came up with a really good apology, she’d probably forgive me.

  Mom swallowed a mouthful of food. “That’s not a good idea. We think that since you know the truth—”

  “Now that I know the truth about me, you’re afraid I’ll say something to Scarlett. You think I’m that stupid?”

  Dad was well into his plate of lasagna. “No one thinks you’re stupid. We just have to be very, very careful. Therapy has a way of pulling things out of you. We just can’t risk it. Honey, you can talk to us anytime. Anything you can say to Scarlett you can tell us.”

  That wasn’t true. I couldn’t completely trust them because they had lied to me. “Okay,” I said. “If we can talk about anything, let’s talk about that weekend. Where did you really go, Mom? And don’t try to sell me that spa weekend story.”

  My sisters looked at our mother, waiting expectantly.

  Mom’s face reddened slightly. “I went to see your father.”

  So why hadn’t she just said that before? If she were telling the truth, there had to be more to the story.

  “You went to see Dad for what?” Paige asked.

  Mom pressed her lips together and cut hastily into a tomato, so Dad answered for her. “We were looking for someone.”

  Quinn looked back and forth between Mom and Dad. “Who? Looking for who?”

  Dad put his fork down and closed his eyes. One of my greatest fears was unfolding right before me.

  I turned to Quinn. Someone had to tell the truth at this table. “Your sister. They were looking for your real sister.”

  I wondered how long it would take them to find Rose and slide her right into my place.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Sunday I went to see Wes for another scent-training lesson. On my way to the school I tried to be aware of the different scents I smelled in the air, but I didn’t know if I was getting any better at it. Dad told me it would come in time.

  On my way to the control room, I almost had a heart attack. Five figures dressed in black robes and hoodies turned into the corridor. They stopped abruptly, forming a wall in my path. Nothing but blackness and large white eyes showed where their faces were supposed to be.

  “Cousin,” one of them said. His voice was hoarse and hollow.

  What the hell? I took a step back. “Excuse me?”

  “You are Banshee,” said another, “and we are Grims. We are both announcers and deliverers of death. We are cousins.”

  “Yes, but Banshee is much, much more powerful,” spoke a third.

  “Oh, okay. Well, it’s nice to meet you.” I scooted around them and continued down the hall. When I glanced over my shoulder, the five Grims stood in the same spot, watching me.

  “Bye, cousin,” they said in unison.

  I waved and kept on my way. Creepy.

  After my lesson with Wes, he announced that he had a meeting with Mr. Mason, so he had to leave. Hollis entered the control room and parked himself in front of the monitors. I still had no idea what had been eating him the night before. I moved over to the table. His wings were out, so I couldn’t sit beside him.

  “Can’t you put those things away?”

  He shook his head. “I can’t control them anymore. They come out when they want and stay out until they feel like going away.”

  I sat three chairs over from him. “That sucks. Why were you so pissed yesterday?”

  He shrugged. “My dad. You know how that goes. Sometimes I need a break. I know he has to be hard on me because I’ll be taking over this place someday, but sometimes it’s just overkill.”

  I didn’t know what to say about that, so I said nothing.

  “I know he loves me, but no matter what I do, it’s never good enough for him, you know?”

  I did know because I felt the same way about my mother. She wanted me to be something I couldn’t be. It wasn’t in me to be like her, Quinn, and Paige. She needed Rose. Rose would make their family perfect. Mom and Dad would adore her. Quinn and Paige would look up to her. They’d forget all about me.

  “Hollis, the girl we saw Fletcher with that day, what is she?”

  “An Angel.”

  She definitely was their daughter. Of course she would be an Angel. Beautiful and delicate. Children dressed as angels for Halloween and Christmas pageants. No one was afraid of an Angel. No one worried about their Angel sister devouring them in the middle of the night.

  I wanted to know more about Rose, but Hollis and I were interrupted by Mr. Mason. “Son, give Arden and I a minute, please.”

  “Sure, Dad.” Hollis hurried out of the room, leaving
me alone with his father.

  Mr. Mason sat beside me and placed a leather-bound notebook on the table. He flashed me a smile and pulled a pen from the pocket of his suit jacket. Hollis looked so much like his father that it was uncanny, like Mr. Mason had made a carbon copy of himself.

  He opened the notebook. “We have a little business to take care of.”

  “Okay,” I said. Mr. Mason made me feel so uncomfortable.

  Mr. Mason stared into my face for what seemed like forever. “Someone told you that you weren’t special? Well, it’s quite the contrary, my dear. You are the most special.”

  I thought about all the exquisite creatures I’d come across in just a short period of time, and I thought that was impossible. “What do you mean I’m the most special?”

  “You are the last and only Banshee left in existence. Banshees were rare to begin with, and we’ve lost them all except for you.”

  “Wait, my mother, well my birth mother’s a Banshee.”

  Mr. Mason folded his hands underneath his chin. “Your mother was a Banshee.”

  A lump rose in my throat. “She’s dead.”

  He nodded. “Unfortunately, she passed some time ago. Some people think through natural causes, but I firmly believe the Givers had something to do with it.”

  Although I had never met my birth mother, I had hoped to meet her someday, but now that would never happen. Even though I had never known her, she had brought me into the world, and I would never get the chance to meet her or even know what she looked like.

  “Why would they want to kill her?” I asked.

  “Banshees are the most powerful beings.” He pulled a sheet of cream paper from the notebook. “Younger Banshees see death. Foresee it. But the older Banshees get, the more powerful they get. At your peak, you will be able to cause someone’s death by merely thinking about it. You will be the ultimate weapon for us. We won’t have to worry about losing any Takers in combat, if things ever come to that. We won’t have to fight anymore. All you will have to do is think death, and it will happen.”

  I didn’t want to be anyone’s weapon. I definitely didn’t want to cause anyone’s death. Mr. Mason must have sensed what I was thinking.

  “You don’t have much choice. This isn’t the flu. It’s not going to just go away. It’s a life sentence. You must make a choice. You may become a Banshee or a Wendigo. Those are your only options. Another Wendigo would be of no use to us. We already have scores of them running amuck in the sixth tunnel. If you don’t want to embrace your Banshee powers, a Wendigo you will be. Down in the tunnel you’ll go with the rest of them.”

  I gulped. How had my life choices turned so bleak? One minute my biggest decision was which dress I was going to wear to school the next day, and now I had to decide whether I was a carnivorous monster or a Death Fairy. It wasn’t fair.

  “Which is it going to be?”

  I cleared my throat. “A Banshee.” Anything to keep me from being condemned to that tunnel.

  “Good.” Mr. Mason slid the slip of cream paper across the table. There was lots of tiny writing on it. “We need you to sign this contract. There are only six rules you need to follow. Number one, you will take this solemn oath to never harm or hurt another Taker. Understood?”

  “Yes.”

  “Number two, you will not share our secrets or any information with a Human or a Giver.”

  “Okay.”

  He went on to the next one. “You will complete whatever task has been handed to you by a superior or any task that would benefit the group.”

  “Yes.”

  “Number four, you will not fraternize romantically with any creature, Giver or Taker. After the age of eighteen, you will be given a mate of your species.”

  I didn’t know what to think of that, and Mr. Mason didn’t give me time to think about it. He drew a line through that number on the contract. “This doesn’t apply to you.”

  For a moment, I was relieved. “Why not?”

  “You may only mate with your own kind. Aswangs with Aswangs. Grims with Grims, etcetera. It keeps the purity of each species intact. Your parents made a grave mistake and went against their oath. The result was you. There are only about ten mixed breeds out there because everyone else understands the sanctity of their oaths. Now your parents have left you to struggle with what you will become, and no matter what, you will never be a full Wendigo or full Banshee.”

  I was a mistake—that’s what I had gotten from his words.

  “Naturally, since you are a mix, you cannot mate or breed. You’re the only Banshee who exists, and all the Wendigos are sealed in the tunnel.”

  “So you’re telling me I can never get married or anything?”

  Mr. Mason nodded. “Thank your parents for that.”

  “Number five, keep our location secret.”

  That was easy.

  “And number six—kill your Gemini.”

  I nodded. I didn’t think that was anything I would ever be able to do, but I would try if it came down to me or Rose.

  “Give me your hand,” Mr. Mason ordered.

  I held my hand out obediently. He grabbed my right index finger and then sliced it with a silver blade on the end of his pen. I yelped, but he ignored it as he let a drop of blood fall next to each rule. At the bottom of the page, there was already a line with my name typed underneath. He used my bloody finger to write my initials on the line and then let my hand go. I sucked the blood off my finger.

  “Be careful. The greater your taste for flesh and blood, the harder it will be for you to resist changing into a Wendigo.”

  I quickly pulled my finger from my mouth.

  Mr. Mason flashed me another creepy smile. “You may go.”

  Monday afternoon, Fletcher and I holed up in his bedroom since he would never be welcomed in my house again. It was just as well, because I didn’t feel welcomed in my own house anymore either.

  “I don’t know if it’s a Wendigo doing this at all,” Fletcher said as I made notes on a legal pad. “Wendigos eat people. The thing that’s been attacking has only been ripping people to shreds, not eating them.”

  “So you think it’s another creature pretending to be a Wendigo? Why would they do that?”

  “I don’t know. Then I think about Ms. Melcher and how no one has found her body. Wendigos sometimes store people for later.”

  Perhaps I was still in denial, but I refused to believe that Ms. Melcher was dead. She could still be out there somewhere. Maybe.

  I told Fletcher what Bailey had told me that night and how she didn’t remember anymore.

  “Weird,” Fletcher said. “We’re going to have to catch it in the act.”

  “How are we going to do that?”

  “It only attacks in the woods at night. We set some bait there, and then when it comes, I’ll catch it.” Fletcher made it sound as if we were trying to trap a bunny in a cage.

  “Oh, is that all? Are you crazy? We can’t do that.”

  “No, we can’t. But I can. Trust me, I can take that thing.”

  Fletcher was a Walker, but I had yet to see him change, so I don’t think the idea had fully registered.

  From my reading, I’d learned that Walkers could take the form of different animals. “What do you turn into?”

  “So far either a wolf, a snake, or an owl. When I get older, I may be able to turn into more things. My father could turn into ten. Whatever I turn into, I’m always gray.”

  “What do we use as bait?”

  Fletcher thought for a long moment. “This thing only goes after Givers. I guess I’ll have to ask someone from school.”

  “To be bait? Fletcher, seriously, what if something happens?”

  Fletcher took the pad from me and jotted something down. “It’ll be fine. We know how to protect ourselves. If anything, I can turn into an owl and fly away.”

  Even though I had seen some pretty amazing things over the past few weeks, I had a hard time believing that my friend could ch
ange himself into an owl. I was tempted to ask him to do it right then, but I wasn’t sure that I was ready to see something like that. I’d never look at Fletcher the same way.

  “I’ll do it tomorrow night,” Fletcher announced.

  I cleared my throat. “You mean we’ll do it tomorrow night.”

  Fletcher shook his head. “You’re not doing anything, so you don’t need to be there. You can’t even transform yet. What if something happens to you?”

  “You said this thing is a Taker. It won’t hurt me. Don’t worry, Fletch. I want to know who’s trying to set me up. You’re not going there without me.”

  The events of the following day put a huge monkey wrench in our plans. School had been cancelled again. Fletcher and I sat on his porch, eating beef jerky.

  I pulled another piece from the bag that sat between us. “How’d they find him?”

  “Not like the others. They only found his head.”

  I shuddered. It hadn’t been a teacher this time. The latest victim was Ed Hurley, who owned the auto shop. He wasn’t found in the woods either. At closing time, Ed had been in the alley behind his shop, tossing trash into the dumpster. One of his employees realized he had been gone too long and went to check on him, and according to Fletcher, he only found Ed’s head.

  “So,” I said, “whatever it is, it ate the body this time.”

  Fletcher nodded. “Yeah. Poor Mr. Hurley.”

  “Was he, you know, one of us?” I asked.

  Fletcher shook his head. “I don’t know. I had never gotten close enough to tell. My parents hadn’t either.”

  A cool wind blew past. Fletcher shivered. “Let’s go inside.”

  In the house, the Whitelocks were tuned in to the news. The police had imposed an eight o’clock curfew and were blocking the woods off. That was the reason we had called our plan off.

  Fletcher’s father called him upstairs for something, leaving me and Mrs. Whitelock alone on the couch. “It’s awful whatever’s doing that,” she said.

  I wondered how much she knew about me. Probably everything. Everyone knew everything about me before I did. “You know, Mrs. Whitelock, I had nothing to do with it.”