“Ask them that. I beg to differ.” I was mad, but this would cause a ripple I couldn’t recover from is she has any idea about seeing the future like they say. Who knows, she may be right. “But, I don’t intend to hurt anyone. They are both great, and my intentions are only to be the pleasant new girl that I am. No worries.” I walked away from her not looking back. I could guess her dirty ass looks she was giving me from the emotional overdrive she vibed.
ℓ ℓ ℓ ℓ ℓ
“So, Lee, huh?”
Maze blushed with her Amazon bronzed skin shining brightly standing in my dorm room putting make-up on.
“Yeah! Since you came, he’s gotten kind of friendly. Mostly we talk about you still. Weird, huh?”
“Yeah, weird. What do ya’ll talk about…me that is?”
“I don’t know. Like your funny sayings and words sometimes, if we hang out together, how you and Calum are glued together, things like that.”
“Is that what you two were so close to each other talking about in gym lately?” I’d noticed Lee giving her extra attention. He hadn’t spoken to Christin since the theatre except about Lit class stuff.
“Yeah. He’s cute. I like him.”
I was feeling really “weirded out” by the fact that their sole topic of conversation between them was me!
“You ready yet?” she asked.
“Yes, let’s go.” I grabbed my pouch purse and left after her, locking my door.
We climbed into the room, both boys lying suspiciously still on their beds.
The window was slanted open, so I just pushed it up and climbed in assuming the boys had it covered for us to be in there. But the way they were on the bed, I had my doubts.
“Calum,” I whispered, “What are you doing?”
He didn’t move initially. He sat a second longer and when Maze was through the window and standing next to me, they both popped out of the bed and tackled us both to their own beds, pinning us down.
In complete surprise, I did what any ordinary Valkyrie girl would do, ATTACK!
Before I knew it, I had Calum on the bed, under me, pinned as he’d wanted me to be, crouched and ready for a fight. His face was priceless after my initial shock value settled and my “I won’t be suppressed” value punch kicked in.
He was gripping me too tight the first second and limp a second later. He looked over to Lee for either his own needed ego boost or to see if he’d found the same fate. No dice. Maze was no Valkyrie, but I knew that Lee was half, like me.
Lee was grinning. I had a strange feeling he set this up. And he knew very well what I could really do. There was a small satisfaction in that bit of information, as well as his dangerous smile.
Calum rolled me over and I let him.
“Where did that come from? You’re way stronger than you make yourself out to be?” His face was very serious, but trying at best, to sound playful. "You were right about her not taking the rough entrance. I should have listened to you man," he ran a hand over his now messy hair.
I couldn’t stop the reflex now that I knew for sure, I looked at Lee. His eyes boring into mine expecting an answer like the boy beside me. “I…I…don’t know. Instinct just kicked in.” I was so going to get Lee for this. His face showing all kinds of guilty.
Guilty of menace. Guilty of secrecy. Guilty of jealousy. Guilty of…am I talking about him…or myself? Reality hit me hard.
Calum wasn’t convinced. Lee had won his little test. He gave Calum a clue.
He did give up the quest for answers and settled the two of us across his bed. Maze and Lee took the other. The small DVD player was blasting an old Terminator movie. All was good.
We watched the movie with nervous tension surfacing in a room that any four teenagers would own. The movie was nearly done with Calum and me hardly saying a word to each other. Maze and Lee had taken turns whispering and giggling the whole time. I knew Calum was still figuring my hidden strength. I tried not to notice all the times the other bed squeaked, but knowing it was Lee and sitting here listening to it was just...well, he was doing it on purpose.
I felt his breath on my ear. “Where did that strength come from?” His curiosity had to know. Yee Gods!
“I inherited it from my dad. He has the same strength.” This was true enough.
“That is more than Hunter strength.”
Did he feel my body tense up at his words? I didn’t answer. I did, however, squeeze his hand tighter, and tug his shirt collar down from behind me to move closer, invading my personal space.
A chance distraction, but needed. When his ear was close enough, “I don’t know why I was given the strength, but I do know that I would never do anything to hurt or embarrass you. I’m sorry. I can’t explain some of the other things about us that brought us together, but please don’t wonder about this just yet. We’ll know soon enough.” And that left him with just enough to know, I still had secrets. I’m going to lose him.
He stiffened, didn’t say anything back, and I couldn’t read his face because I sat in front of him to watch the movie. I dared a look at Lee. Dark and ominous eyes watched me. He’d heard the whole thing. Valkyrie hearing. How many other times had he listened? Hunters may hear well, but not like us.
Calum didn’t ask again.
“Anything you need?” he whispered when John Conner was in his final scene of the movie. I whispered a no back. He rested a hand on my thigh making the other side of the room jump three notches on the anger meter. I threw him a look to let him know I knew.
Maze climbed out first when Lee announced they were going for a walk. He gave off the premise of giving us alone time, but I knew better. I waited purposefully and turned to Calum, alone.
The second they left he asked me to tell him explain my strength.
“I’m sorry. I don’t know what to say.”
“I just want to know you. All of you.” His words lingered in the air.
“Are you sure?” I had to say.
“Yes! If there is something I need to know, I can take it.”
I closed my eyes at the thought of losing him. “I’m not sure you can.” I’m scared, more than I’ve ever been about anything in my life. I don’t want to lose him. And I just met him.
“I am more than just the girl you see, Calum. This,” I pointed to my stomach, “this,” my hair, “our electric charged amazing every time touch, our names, Orion itself, our birthdays, they are all just there. And I believe they mean something more than you or I know, but in the end, we, you and I, are not just two who met by accident. Neither one of us are in any way, normal. And I…I’m not ready yet to let you go. I don’t want to lose you. I…” my eyes stung. I couldn’t tell him how I really felt. I realized after I left Dyer, Lee, in the library in Summerville, that I felt something weird with Calum. I’m not sure if its love since I’m unfamiliar with the pangs of losing someone to know what love could feel like. I do know he is important to me somehow.
“Keep your secret for now. I can wait. But know something,” he bent closer to my ear, “I like you just the way you are, and I don’t care what secrets you hold. That won’t change how I feel.”
I stayed perfectly still as he leaned back now and watched my face for my reaction unable to find a reply. They were very powerful words.
Then I heard something. A noise outside.
Calum peeked. Nothing, he had said. I knew better. Valkyrie ears, Valkyrie hearing goes both ways.
“I meant what I said, Stace,” he watched my face, “when you’re ready.” His invitation still there.
I smiled, not wanting to say yea or nay, so I kissed him, long, and crawled through the window to a shadowed Lee waiting and listening after leaving him his own letter on his dresser. He would find out and make all kinds of new discoveries. Maybe even help me solve them.
“Why do you punish yourself? I know you don’t want to listen. You feel the emotions as I do.”
“Truth hurts, princess.”
“Why did you do that to
night, to Calum? You knew what I’d do.”
“He needs to know. I stepped up the progress. It’s not fair for him.”
He was right, of course. But I was a coward.
“After we find my brother, I promise. My safety is an issue, you know. If you give away too much else, they’ll put me with my brother. Besides you’re holding back as well. These Hunters don’t know what you’re capable of. You are wicked awesome with a sword and you know it.”
“Don’t count on it and I’ve handled just fine.” He walked ahead of me since I climbed out to join him but stopped at my next admission.
“I left the letter on the dresser. He’ll find it and read it before you return most likely.”
He nodded.
We were heading across the back wall staying in the shadows almost to where the parking lot was located. “Quinn will leave in fifteen minutes according to his conversation with Green today.”
“What do you mean, don’t count on it?”
“Just, there is a reason you are here and he is there. They know about the prophecy, and think it’s true. You’re here. Calum’s here. Your brother was a setup too. That’s no coincidence.” His voice spitting out the last part.
“You seem so confident of your assumptions.”
“I’m the fly on the wall. They never notice me.” His animosity outweighed his his pain.
Ignoring his need I said, “Why am I here?”
“Well, I thought about this after talking to you. After talking to Calum,” he saw how big my eyes were, “about his missing letter that he’s going to freaking think I put there!” His hands waved up in anger.
“And?” He wasn’t off that easy.
Crouched in the bushes now waiting, “You lost your knife at twelve. He lost the letter at twelve. What both of you don’t know is that both of you also told me your mother’s left them for you. I don’t know what that might mean, but I heard your dad say on the day he sent me away, ‘at the right time, Stace will know what to do.’ He was holding your knife.”
“So?”
“So, he held up the knife you found in Green’s drawer to Quinn. And then he said, ‘the boy will never rule without the girl. No one will accept her without all of them.’”
Things were adding up, a little. No, not much. “So, you think, the letter means it’s a real prophecy, my father stole my knife that I found in Green’s office, and…and…”
“I told you, still just a theory.”
“Great theories. Just dangerous to ponder.” I was still stuck on the idea of Calum ruling somewhere. What was that about? And how did I fit in this picture with a knife?
“Dangerous times!”
A car door slammed. We ducked lower behind the bush. Quinn was in the car and moving.
Lee signaled me. We ducked and ran to a very clean forest green sporty car I couldn’t decipher in the dark.
“Whose car?”
“Uh, mine.” Lee’s voice was passively calm.
“You have a car?”
“Yeah!”
The inside was the same, but darker green interior. It smelled like him. Lee. He smelled like the woods, just like he used to.
“How often do you drive anywhere?”
“Sometimes at night, late! They don’t let us leave often.”
I knew that. “Where do you go?”
“Nowhere in particular.” He pinched the end of his nose. Must be a guy thing.
It’s like he’s a new person. Not the boy I knew. He’d changed. I’d changed.
He was probably thinking the same thing, that we were worlds apart and yet back in the same place. So I added just to set the record straight, “You know, we were younger. Not even fifteen yet.” He shouldn’t think I’m still that same girl.
“I know,” Lee conceded unwittingly. The car’s engine purred at our silence. The ride was longer now that I brought "us" up. There would never be an "us".
“Almost there, I think.”
I stared at Quinn’s car ahead and asked, “What do you imagine we will do or see tonight?” I was checking my knives in my belts across my legs. Two at my waist, two below my boot line, and two at my back. I was so glad I’d slipped on my black leather boots before the movie. Yea, dressy, but easy to conceal weapons.
“Just watch. Confirm. Then we will talk. I don’t think it wise to tell your father about me or Quinn or Green.”
Why would Lee say that? “I can’t tell him no one is on the inside. Besides, I already told him Quinn and Green are in on it. I heard them one day.”
No reaction was offered.
Lee stayed focused on the windshield and ordered, “You have to figure this out. What their aim is. If this is bigger than just a kidnapping, something bigger going on that your brother’s rescue leads to, you have to be careful what action is right. They know I know who they are and are definitely suspicious of me since I was sent away from you. I always felt I was put at the school to be watched. I am guessing now it might just be more. They know I know things, Stace. Or guess it.”
“You are right,” I didn’t trust him just yet either. Not sure I ever would again.
“What?” he crooned.
“You are right,” I repeated louder.
“Say that again.”
I hit his arm and he laughed.
“You need to laugh more like that,” I said.
“With you around, I just may start again.”
The thought of him not laughing since I’d seen him at court hurt. “I hope I’m around after Calum knows. Why can’t there be a school for everyone? We haven’t hurt anyone while there.” I really loved saying “we”.
“If this “alliance” between you and Calum is a real thing, maybe that’s what the powers that be are trying to keep from us. Simple, you and Calum meet, he finds out you’re a lying, traitorous, Valkyrie spy and never speaks to you again. They win.”
Harsh! He saw the tears I’d tried to dam up. He slapped the steering wheel, “That’s me! Always making you upset instead of the one who makes you happy.”
“No you’re not. Just real. Everything you said, it’s most likely the truth. The horror of it is my father may be in on it. A daughter to be queen, or kept hidden from the truth for his own gains. And Calum will know the truth soon. I just want a few more days of a normal life.”
"I could go the other way and gain agreements between courts. Maybe it is not all bad."
Evil verses advancement of our people. Evil usually wanted personal gain.
Quinn stepped out of his black sedan and walked into a dark empty looking building in the middle of the woods. The sign over the fence he passed through said, “Bottling Co. Turn Right.”
I looked up and it pleased me ridiculously to see Orion and Cassiopeia peering down on us, giving me courage. When he was safely inside the screechy ten foot high doors, we slinked into the shadows and made for the outside wall away from the door.
The irony was significant to the mix of factions involved. Two teen Valkyrie, posing as Hunters, one half Hunter, and sneaking into a Hunter den with rescue efforts to a Valkyrie twin.
We used the side of the building’s classic fire escape death trap to gain access to the window-like squared off hole in the wall near the roof two floors up. Lee followed behind me calling himself chivalrous. I snarled off a remark about saving his butt and letting the favor be returned.
We found what we were looking for. Inside, my brother was tied to a free standing wall with all four limbs separated out. He seemed knocked out or worse. I trembled, but did my best to hide it from Lee but remembered too late he was Valkyrie after all. He put his hand on my shoulder to calm or quiet me, I didn't know. I didn’t move except to lean on my tip toes to see inside.
I heard Quinn say, “The princess is secure. The boy too.”
A deep male voice I couldn’t see asked, “Does the boy or girl know anything?”
That’s us, my heart stopped beating a second when I held my breath.
“They a
re catching on. The girl is exactly like everyone predicts. Nosy, strong, and hard to tame. The boy will not be ignorant for long.”
“And then what?”
Yes, then what?
“We separate them. The Hunter will hate her for what she is. The boy wonder here returns home, daddy’s happy or not, and we take a throne. The Valkyrie court will be in an uproar, and we will have all three courts in turmoil. They may have one plan, but it will not work out for their benefit. Knowing this boy doesn't heal like the girl helps us."
The reason for the torture.
Quinn was still through all the even hard to read voice, “And what would you have me do with Green?”
“Expendable. He’s no good to us after. He thinks he has the throne wrapped up with his boy on the way up to it. When the Vamp boy stops wishing for world peace he’ll want his claim to the throne to stay secure too. Oh the secrets we keep from our wee ones. Might have been better to have kept them better informed but we wouldn’t have all this power if they had, now would we? What a pity.”
I stepped up. I wanted to rip out his throat.
Lee squeezed my arm, held on, and whispered in my ear, “NO! We can’t do anything tonight. Let’s go before Quinn does.”
I reluctantly backed down the stairs and buckled my seatbelt fast and tight for the ride back before my inner anger issues took over. I guessed luck was with me that Lee had driven since I’d have chosen a different ending to the night’s events as of minutes ago.
After some silence with both of us sorting out the new “scare your pants off” facts, I broke it with, “Calum doesn’t know about his dad?”
“No.” And I’m sure we were both thinking who wants to be the one to tell him?
“Quinn doesn’t fit in this right. He looks as if he feels threatened, but driven to double cross for one reason or another. He must have one heck of a vendetta. He seems the minion, but surely he doesn’t hold a candle and is just as expendable to deep voice guy. Who the heck is he anyway?”
Lee squirmed in the driver seat. After a long pause he said, “Not sure. But someone who thinks he wants to be in charge. He’s either Valkyrie or Were.”
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