I match her glare. “They are. Everything’s different.”
“Nothing is different! Nothing is ever different. If you keep pretending like you’re a superhero, you’re going to get hurt. You’re the one who was always talking about how violence isn’t a gift or even a tool—it’s a crutch. How Slayers get so focused on killing that they never think things through, like it’s possible to talk things out with demons or something.”
“I never said—”
She cuts me off again. “And then there’s your lectures about how we need to be smart and cautious. Prioritize other solutions, like my fight training was somehow something to be ashamed of. But as soon as you get some strength, all that flies out the window, just like you!”
Her words sting. “Technically I jumped into the window, not out.”
She doesn’t smile at the joke. “Don’t you get it, Nina? You never trained. You’re like a loaded weapon in a child’s hands. Dangerous to everyone, most especially you. You should have run from the hellhound, not attacked. How am I supposed to protect you from yourself?”
My plan to tell her about the demon slinks away. When presented with a demonic problem, I decided to come straight back to Artemis and dump it on her. I don’t want to prove her right. I’ve depended on her for so many years. But how much of it was me actually needing her, and how much of it was just doing what we’ve always done?
Besides, she definitely would think I’m an idiot for waiting for this demon to wake up so we can talk it out, exactly like she said. I can’t trust her not to hurt the demon before we have more info. Not when she’s already so worked up about protecting me.
I’m not telling her. A few months ago, living with secrets from her would have been unfathomable. But after the last two months of having to hide my constant fear of the changes inside me, this almost feels natural.
I unlace my sneakers, trying to act like I’m not hiding anything. Trying to act like her words didn’t hurt. “I came in through the window because I didn’t want to see anyone. If you hadn’t opened it, I would have jumped back down and gone around to the front. It’s not a big deal.”
“Why did you leave in the first place? I called you.”
Thank goodness it was her and not someone else. “I couldn’t deal after what we heard the Council talking about. And I didn’t want to take your hiding spot in the passages, so I went outside.”
She softens ever so slightly, then flips her ponytail away from her shoulder. “Next time you decide to bolt, tell me first. I didn’t know where you were. Also, this was under our door when I got back.” She holds out a thick cream-colored note. Artemis has already broken the seal, even though my name is on the front. Someone has elegantly written the following:
Nina.
Please meet at 5 a.m. in the training center. Due to certain Council politics, discretion is necessary. Until then, sleep well and remember the power of your dreams.
It’s such precise cursive it looks like someone old wrote it. It must be from Bradford Smythe. He has answers. He’s the one who knew I was a Potential to begin with. And, unlike my mother, he’ll talk to me about it. I want to ask Artemis why she opened my note, but I don’t want any more tension between us. I try to lighten the mood instead. “ ‘Remember the power of your dreams’? That’s the dumbest aphorism I’ve ever heard. Is it supposed to be inspiring?”
“I think it’s supposed to be literal.” Artemis sits cross-legged on her bed with her back against the wall. “Slayer dreams. You know. Tapping into the power connects the whole line of Slayers.”
“Right. Yeah. Slayer dreams.” I say it with so much false enthusiasm that Artemis immediately knows I’m lying. Her eyes narrow. I flop onto my bed and pull my pillow over my face. “I don’t know what those are. I didn’t take advanced Slayer classes, remember?” I only ever studied the basics. Maybe my mother was worried the teachers would figure out what I was really destined to be. Maybe she was worried I would figure it out.
If I weren’t a Potential, would I have been pushed into full Watcher training like Artemis? A different life opens up before me. One where I mattered in Watcher society. One where I would have been given the ear of the Council, able to have voice and influence.
But if I weren’t a Potential, we wouldn’t have been taken away to be protected, and we would have been blown up alongside everyone else.
Gods, I can’t even hate being a Slayer without it getting complicated.
“Slayers are always important to study,” Artemis lectures, unaware of my internal strife. She’s annoyed with me again. “Sometimes their dreams are prophetic. The original Slayer communicates through them, and dreams used to link each former Slayer to the next. Ruth Zabuto has theorized that, with so many Slayers now, there might even be direct dream-to-dream connections, like everyone in a big group chat. You need to read up on it.”
“Great. Now I have even more homework.” Homework I won’t do. I don’t want to be a Slayer, much less delve into Slayer theory. Besides, the dreaded Buffy hasn’t shown up in any of my dreams in the last two months. I doubt she’s going to make an appearance now.
Unless knowing I can do this makes it possible for me to do it. . . . Great. Another thing to worry about.
“You should take this seriously!” Artemis says.
I yank my pillow away. “You just told me nothing is different and I shouldn’t act like a superhero!”
Artemis turns off her lamp and nighttime engulfs the room, separating us. “Whatever. Do whatever you want. I can’t help you be a Slayer.” It’s such an un-Artemis thing to say. Never in our lives has she told me to do whatever I want. She’s told me to do whatever she thinks is best for me. So either she no longer cares what’s best for me or she doesn’t know. And she’s pissed at me for it.
Being a Slayer is literally the last thing I would have asked for. Doesn’t she get how much this is killing me?
The realization that Buffy has, yet again, changed my entire life without my permission hits me so hard that I finally feel winded. Because if I’m a Slayer, it’s Buffy’s fault. I never would have been the Chosen One under the old one-at-a-time system. I would have forever remained an invisible Potential. And I never would have known. As furious as it makes me, it also seems preferable to this. Maybe my mom was right to keep it hidden.
Buffy cost me my father and, in a way, my mother. I won’t let her ruin my relationship with Artemis, too. She’s always taken care of me. Maybe she needs to feel like she still can.
Or maybe now it’s my turn to take care of her.
• • •
I didn’t understand the language coming out of my mouth, but I knew what I was saying as I directed my people to light spears on fire, to gather the children in the center of our village, and to do whatever they could to slow down the demon hordes descending on us.
I would not let the darkness claim my people.
I fought in a fury of blood and blades, slashing and hacking through everything that moved. Behind me, my people were screaming their own battles. Dying. If I took out the queen of the horde, her demons would scatter. I just had to live that long.
Claws raked across my back. Something caught my forehead and blood streamed into my eyes. I fought on pure instinct, a machine of death.
And then I was faced with the queen. She towered over me, seven feet of muscle, claw, exoskeleton, and death. Her scream pierced my eardrums, leaving the world a silent, throbbing mystery. I was blind and deaf. But I was not dead.
Her claws, poisonous, pierced my sides as she lifted me overhead. Just as I had hoped. Smiling, I threw my arms in the air to give the signal. Burning arrows slammed into me, and my gas-soaked clothes immediately caught. The queen screamed, trying to remove her claws from me, but I threw my own arms around her, embracing her in fire and death.
My people were safe.
My people were—
Red, and then black, but a soft black. The black of sleep. The black of a struggle over and
a rest well-earned.
A thousand voices sighed in unison. I smiled. I felt it all. The pain and the fear and the fury. And now I feel the pride and peace of her death.
The darkness rips away from me. It isn’t mine. Not yet. I roll onto the floor, choking. Smoke is everywhere. I know if I open my eyes, I’ll see flames so dark and purple it hurts to look at them, the colors wrong, the flames wrong. And I’ll see my mother holding Artemis.
I can’t breathe. Shouting pulls me from the dream, and I claw my way to consciousness to find my blanket wrapped around my head. Someone’s shaking me.
“Nina!” The blanket is yanked away.
My hand covers my racing heart. “Who was screaming?”
Artemis sighs as she lies down beside me. “You were. The fire again?”
I don’t need to answer her. “And something new. Let’s never talk about Slayers before bed again.” But weirdly, that first dream—filled with demons and blood and death—wasn’t disturbing. I felt energized. Proud, even. Then the fire came and ruined everything, as always.
Artemis stays, which I’m grateful for. She hasn’t slept in my bed for a long time. But even when we fight, no one makes me feel as safe as she does. She quickly falls back asleep.
I don’t want to sleep. Not now. Not ever.
My body disagrees, and I slip right back under. The only dream I have is of a woman—petite with blond pigtail buns—sitting on the edge of a roof overlooking the Golden Gate Bridge. Though the scene is quiet, I feel the pulsing presence of others around me. Unlike the darkness that had claimed the girl fighting the demon horde, there’s no peace here. We all watch, and we all feel the same thing, feeding off each other into a frenzy.
Rage. Focused on her.
Buffy sighs, her shoulders slumping. “I’m sorry,” she whispers.
I have never been part of something so big, so overwhelming. Surrounded, I lose myself in it. I surrender. I want to. The rage swells, a swarm of invisible violence focused on her. We are angry, we are multitudes, and we are buzzing.
And beeping.
Beeping.
Beeping.
I awake with a start, grabbing my clock. It’s 4:50 a.m. I turn off the alarm.
Whoever is waiting for me, they had better have coffee. And doughnuts. And a puppy.
“What?” Artemis asks, her voice muffled by the pillow.
“I have that meeting with Bradford Smythe.” I want to stay in bed, pretend nothing ever changed, that none of this ever happened. Anxiety seizes me as I consider the unknown future.
But I’ve been kept in the dark my whole life. I need answers before I decide what happens next. And I’m positive I just had Slayer dreams, which means that simply by knowing about a power, I was able to tap into it. What else can I do if I understand myself better?
“Yeah.” Artemis checks the clock and groans. She gets up at five forty-five every morning. I hate depriving her of these last precious minutes of sleep. “Let me get ready.”
“Why?”
She glares blearily at me. “I’m coming.”
“Oh. Okay.” I didn’t realize until this moment that I don’t want her there. Which is new for me. I’m nervous, but it’ll be worse if she comes. I’m worried that she’ll take over and I’ll let her, because it’s easier.
Her face hardens. “Fine. If you don’t need me to.”
“I didn’t say that! I don’t need you to, though. It’s just a meeting. I’m sure you’ll hear all about it. You hear everything.”
“Except about you being a Potential, apparently.”
“That’s not fair! I didn’t hear that either, and it was about me.”
Artemis sighs and sits up. Her face reluctantly resettles from angry to understanding. “I know.”
Some of the tightness in my chest loosens. We’re going to talk about it. Really talk about it. Cillian’s hug was what I needed yesterday, and Artemis’s open ear is what I need now. “Who do you think will be at the meeting?” I ask, working myself up to the big things.
“Obviously they’re trying to hide this meeting from Mom; otherwise they would have called you to the regular Council room at a normal time.”
“Do you think I should do it? If the whole Council doesn’t approve?” Maybe I’m hoping she’ll say I shouldn’t. That she’ll give me an out.
She rubs her face, then tugs her hair back into a ponytail. “It’s not like you have a choice. You’re already a Slayer. Ignoring it won’t make it go away.”
It stings. “I know that. Obviously. But that doesn’t make it suck less that I don’t have any choices here.”
Artemis stands, turning her back on me as she pulls clothes out of the closet for herself. She’s going to the meeting even though I told her not to. Her voice is soft when she finally speaks again. “When have we ever had choices?”
I stand to go to her, but she turns and tosses her clothing selection onto her bed, avoiding my eyes. “I can train you. Besides, we don’t even know what they’re going to say at the meeting. One step at a time.”
“Thanks.” I mean it. I feel better with her on my side, because she’s always been on my side. She’s the one who got them to approve my castle clinic and the funds to stock it, after all. Even when she doesn’t care about the same things I do, she cares about me. I start to rethink my decision to hide the demon from her. “Listen, last night—”
There’s a knock on our door. “Artemis?”
It’s our mom.
We share a look of fear. I throw myself back into bed, feigning sleep. Artemis opens the door softly. “What?” she whispers.
“Good, you’re up. I need your help checking the perimeters to see if we can determine where the hellhound came from.”
“Give me a second to change.”
The door closes. Our mom never visits us at this hour. I half suspect she was using the hellhound as an excuse to make sure I was here. I don’t peek my eyes open, just in case, as Artemis gets dressed and then slips out. I sit up, annoyed. I don’t even get a conversation, let alone a request to help, even though it was me who killed the hellhound. Artemis is still the one our mother chooses. Even when I’m a Chosen One.
And now I’m going to be late. I pad silently through the castle’s dark halls, careful that I don’t bump into my mother. The training center is located in the old throne room, which was converted to a gym. Another room I never had a place in. But I know where it is.
I duck inside just in time to see a knife flying through the air, right at my face.
8
I STARE UP AT THE knife, embedded and still quivering in the door where my head had been a split second before. I’m on my back on the floor. My body knew how to avoid the danger, even if my brain didn’t.
“In situations such as this,” Bradford Smythe says, sounding like he’s delivering a well-rehearsed lecture on geometry, “you’re supposed to catch the knife. That way you avoid being stabbed and take control of the weapon for your own use.”
“I’ll remember that the next time someone throws a knife at my head!” I stand, furious, and then freeze. Because it isn’t just Bradford “Good Morning, Here’s a Knife” Smythe in the training room. It’s also Eve Silvera.
And Leo.
I am suddenly aware—with more panicked urgency than the knife had induced—that I rolled out of bed and came straight here. My hair is wild on one side and flat on the other. My face probably still has pillow creases. And I’m wearing a long-sleeved flannel shirt three sizes too big . . . with shorts underneath so short it looks like I’m only wearing the shirt. I was so bleary from my whacked-out dreams that I didn’t even bother changing into appropriate clothes for knife dodging. Which I would have had to borrow from Artemis in the first place. But I thought this was a talking meeting, not one that would threaten my life.
“Hello, Athena,” Leo says.
I had forgotten. He’s the only person around here who calls me by my real name. When I was little I was always Athena, but aft
er the fire and my brief hospital stay, somehow it turned into Nina. I became someone to be taken care of and got pet-named right out of the Greek pantheon. The way Leo said my name used to flutter my stomach, because I thought it meant he saw me or respected me or wanted to marry me once we were both older so we could be the ultimate Watcher couple and save the world together while also maybe riding horses under a rainbow along a beach.
(There was a poem about that too. I’ve never been so prolific about anything in my life as I was during my Leo Poetry phase.)
I tug my shirt down, which makes the neck slip over one of my shoulders. Oh, sweet hellmouths, I’m not even wearing a bra. When I imagined meeting Leo again—which wasn’t often, because I was pretty sure he was dead and it was easier to not imagine him at all—it had always been in some really cool way. Like he was horribly injured and my quick thinking stopped the bleeding and saved his life. Or . . . well, actually, all my scenarios involved him being horribly injured. It was comforting. And it meant he would be the one embarrassed, not me.
None of them involved him standing professionally beside his mother while I was in my pajamas.
Gods, I hate him.
“Nina?” Eve asks.
I hastily do the top two buttons of my shirt and focus on her instead. She’s dressed as formally as she was during the meeting we spied on, but now her blazer is a deep plum. Her lipstick matches it again. I remember I’m not supposed to have been listening to the meeting, so I should be shocked they’re here. “Hi! Wow, you’re back.”
Her lips twist in an amused smile. “I am well aware of the secrets of this castle. Namely that it has no secrets. You don’t have to pretend like you didn’t know.”
I hurry to change the subject, not wanting to reveal the secret passageways. “I’m glad you guys aren’t dead!” Oh gods, let me stop talking. “I mean, we thought you were. Dead. And we were all really sad!” It comes out sounding cringingly insincere, which makes me feel awful—despite my never wanting to see Leo again, it was terrible believing the Silveras were dead. “It’s, uh, nice for someone to be alive for once. Usually it’s the opposite. Hey, does anyone have another knife they want to throw at me?”
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