Alex leaned against a pilaster. “Do you see—”
“Shhh.” He held a finger to his lips, his head cocked. And then Alex heard it too. It was a muffled whimper. “Hello?”
“Chaaaase.” The long wail echoed off the walls.
“Jonas?” Chase bellowed. He took off, flying up the staircase until he remembered he could think himself to the top.
Alex began to panic. Had Jonas seen them over the railing? Had he fallen in surprise? Thrown something in anger?
She tried to flicker and project herself to the top of the stairway, but she couldn’t concentrate. When she reached the third floor, Chase was huddled next to two crumpled figures outside Van Hanlin’s classroom. One was cradling the other, rocking back and forth. Jonas. He was holding someone with a head of curly blonde hair.
“What happened?” Chase demanded.
Jonas’s face was etched in agony. “He followed me. I didn’t know!”
Gabe’s head lolled back and smacked against the floor. His mouth hung open like the hinges of his jaw were broken.
“Gabe?” Chase cried. “Gabe?”
But his brother didn’t stir.
“What’s all over his face?” Alex’s terrified voice was barely above a whisper. Streaks of grayish-black whiplashes indented Gabe’s temple, cheek, and neck. Alex had seen similar markings before, though they were fainter and weathered, when Professor Darby had lifted the sleeves of his shirt.
Alex didn’t need to wait for an answer. “Did it scream?” she asked in horror. Chase gasped.
“No,” Jonas wailed. “It was bound when they brought it to us.”
“Brought it to you?” Chase exclaimed.
Battle the insane. Whoever was in charge of this “harmless” group had brought the banshee to the recruits.
“Why isn’t he conscious?”
“He was beaten. We need to go back. He wasn’t the only one.”
“Who else?”
Jonas shook uncontrollably. “P-Professor Van Hanlin.”
For a moment no one moved. Alex couldn’t feel anything. She was weightless, treading on a breeze of foreboding.
“They needed to weaken the banshee, so … ”
“So, what?” Chase was looking between Alex and Jonas, flabbergasted. “Why would anyone mess with a banshee?”
“So others could fight it,” Alex whispered.
Jonas’s face showed no expression, no shame that Alex knew where he’d been and what he’d been up to. It made her feel disgusted.
Chase was shaking his head in confusion. “Van Hanlin had you fight it?”
“No,” Jonas snapped. “He was attacked!”
“Where were you?”
“Home. Gabe must have followed me. I didn’t know where I was going. I was just told to take the emergency exit out of the city.”
“What emergency exit?”
“There. In the corner past Van Hanlin’s classroom. You have to want to see it to actually find it.”
Alex blinked, and a stairway appeared in the wall. It twisted upward like the ramp in the vestibule.
“We weren’t supposed to know where we were going. There were others there, and I couldn’t see anyone else besides Van Hanlin and Gabe, but I recognized the woods. It was home. Parrish home.”
Chase pried Jonas away from Gabe. “Alex, go tell someone about this,” he commanded, hoisting Gabe into the air. “We need to go to the medical center. Try not to jostle him too much, Jonas!”
But Jonas couldn’t stop shaking.
“Who do I tell?”
“Anyone. Paleo is in the Grandiuse, right?”
“What do I say?”
“Just tell her that I found Gabe, and he’s hurt. That’s all.”
“And Van Hanlin?”
“We can’t leave him out. What if he’s still being attacked? Just tell her that we found Gabe here. We don’t know why or how, and the Patrol should be able to go through the stairway to find Van Hanlin.”
Alex glanced nervously at the twisting stairway. If Jonas had gotten to the meeting that way, the others probably had, too. Every inch of her being tingled in urgency, afraid a mob of young pledges were about to come spilling out after them.
“Are you hurt?” Chase asked Jonas, who limped under one of Gabe’s arms.
“I had to enter the ring because I hadn’t battled yet.” His response was directed more to Alex than Chase. He clutched his head with his free hand. “I didn’t know they’d already weakened the banshee until we reached the clearing. And then I saw it. And I saw Gabe at its feet, and Van Hanlin crumbled off to the side. I scooped up Gabe, and I just ran!”
“Wait, someone used my brother for bait?” Chase accentuated the word, my, staring hard at Jonas. “Who?”
“I don’t know.” Jonas wailed. “I couldn’t see any faces, and I was told not to try.”
It seemed like someone else was moving Alex’s lips for her when she uttered, “Will he wake up?”
No one answered.
“Go, Alex,” Chase ordered again. “Please.”
She nodded and took one last look at Gabe’s lifeless body before she projected herself down the staircase and ran as fast as her fear would carry her.
***
The night seemed never-ending. While Alex and Chase paced in the waiting room, Jonas became strangely calm and finally informed them of the details involving his recruitment process. He’d received a bid to join an alliance of spirits who would eventually leave Eidolon to move on to bigger and better opportunities together. Membership was exclusive and secret. He didn’t know the name of the group because he was still in the initiatory stage and not everyone would survive the process. He had found the invitation written in his law notebook one day, the words promising him a place amongst the elite if he was initiated. Even though he was not a multigenerational spirit, he hadn’t had to prove himself worthy because he was a sibling, a rarity in itself.
It seemed too good to be true. When the banshee mission was proposed, he grew slightly unnerved, but figured the tasks had to be challenging, right? Then, Alex was attacked. He hadn’t been following her that night in Moribund. He’d been stalking the banshee. He didn’t want anyone to get hurt, so when he found the backpack of bladderwort flowers, he took them so no one else could accomplish the task. Whoever was writing in their law notebooks would have to assign another mission. He thought wrong.
For the duration of the story, Chase slouched with his elbows on his legs, refusing to look at his brother.
The buzz had died with the night, and the morning only brought dread and uncertainty. About Gabe, about Van Hanlin, about Jonas. The blame for this would fall on someone, and there was only one newbury who had witnessed the crime, a newbury who was affiliated with an attack on a professor.
Alex feared Jonas’s punishment and wondered when the Patrol would come for him. She was surprised they hadn’t arrived already. Hopefully that meant they’d found Van Hanlin.
“I’m not going to wait around to find out,” Jonas informed her when Chase left for an update on Gabe. “I’ll run.”
“That will make you look guilty.”
“Aren’t I guilty? I was there.”
“You didn’t attack him.”
“I didn’t save him, either.”
Even though it was against the laws of this utterly strict afterlife, she couldn’t find a voice to discourage him from running. If they took Chase away just for leaving the city, what would they do to Jonas for leaving, returning with a near dead brother and without a missing teacher?
Jonas stared at Alex, his eyes refusing to allow too much emotion to escape. “Unless you want me to stay.”
“What?”
“If you tell me to stay, I will.”
“You’re putting this on me?”
He leaned on the railing of Gabe’s bed and repeated himself. “If you tell me to stay, I will.”
Her response took too long. Chase returned with a frown, no news, and an order for
Alex to keep quiet about the ordeal.
Jonas agreed. “Just go about your normal day.”
“How am I supposed to do that?” she demanded. She felt Chase’s touch on the small of her back, and calmness flowed through her.
“They haven’t asked us anything yet, but I’m sure they’ll come soon. You shouldn’t be involved in this. You have enough attention already.”
“And don’t you dare tell Kaleb!” Jonas ordered.
“But—”
“Kaleb will know about him soon enough. Just give me a few hours.”
She felt helpless, but she did what they asked and headed back toward the campus. The moment she entered the vestibule, she collided with the very person she was trying most to avoid.
“Whoa! Where’s the fire?” Kaleb bellowed.
Alex did her best to appear composed. “It’s just, oh, never mind.”
“What’s the matter?”
“Nothing,” she said quickly. Think of something to say. “What are you doing with all these books? You look like”—the name stuck to her throat in a thick wad—“Gabe.”
He jutted his chin at the stack of notebooks in his arms. “Finishing touches. My project for Paleo is due tomorrow. On the time period with the Anovark girl. Actually, I was looking for you.”
“Me?” she yelped. “Why?”
Kaleb quickly surveyed the nearly empty vestibule. “Let’s sit down for a second.”
Alex glanced hastily at the clock and then fleetingly at the exit.
“Believe me. You want to see this.”
He chose a secluded table in the far corner of the room, tucked under the first tier of balconies. He sat and began to scrutinize her face, so she threw out her arms in emphasis. “What?”
“Chill out.” Kaleb crinkled his nose. “I went back through my research one last time just to be sure I didn’t miss anything good. You know I like to put on a good performance.”
“Not you,” Alex murmured sarcastically.
“I found something. It was strange because I’d gone through the notes a million times, and I never thought to look for a picture. I mean, why would there be a picture of a ghost? But then I thought maybe I could show off and try to project something like the teachers do, and well, it just appeared last night.”
“What are you talking about?”
Kaleb was shuffling furiously through the files. “Where is it,” he grumbled to himself.
“What would you need me for?”
“Hold your horses.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “I think I’ve discovered why the teachers look at you like you have five heads.”
“Because of my mother.”
Kaleb snickered. “No offense, Al. Yeah, you look like her, but she was here in town for maybe a decade, and her impact was about as resounding as a toothpick dropping to the floor.” Alex opened her mouth to argue but Kaleb held up his hand. “Before you make some argumentative Alex-y comment, think about it. Why would Ellington tell you to keep quiet about your family history? And when the banshee attacked, you said Westfall tried to block you from the Patrol, right? Have you thought about why?”
“Of course I’ve thought about it. I’m guessing it’s because of my mom.”
“You’ve been worried about the wrong person.”
He pulled a photo of a girl from an envelope. Alex immediately noticed the shape of the girl’s eyes. They were large and round with sadness weighing down the outer corners. With her delicate chin and porcelain doll features, she was Alex. The only difference was her stark white hair.
She flipped over the picture and felt her mouth fall open. Josephine “Sephi” Anovark 1849–1865–1901.
Alex’s mind spun. “This is the Parrish Cove Ghost,” she said, just to be sure.
“That’s her.”
“Her nickname was Sephi?”
“Allegedly.”
The pieces of a befuddling puzzle melded together. Josephine, the Parrish ghost, was Sephi. She had to be the recipient of Eviar’s letters. Same name, same time period. But that also meant she was murdered. Sephi would die. Eviar wouldn’t protect her.
And she looked just like Alex.
Kaleb waved the photo. “You are the spitting image of Eidolon’s most famous government advisor. And it girl.”
“You showed this to everyone?”
“Hell, no. Even if I’d wanted to, Paleo flipped her lid and stopped the presentation the second I mentioned Josephine’s name. We weren’t supposed to research people, just advancements. I asked her how in the world I was supposed to leave out a story like this. She said the project was about technology. I told her that was boring and—”
Alex interrupted his rambling. “How did she die again?”
“Some escaped mental patient killed her.”
Was this why her mother disappeared? Was this why Ellington had said not to mention her? Why would her name matter if Alex’s face gave away the secret? “The guy who killed her—do you know where he was from?”
Kaleb nodded. “Some place called Paradise.”
The walls in the psych room pulsated. Ellington eyed them warily. “Why the tension?”
Alex wondered if they were feeding off of her anxiety. About Gabe. About Sephi Anovark. “Better than that other time, right?”
During her session with Ellington following Chase’s return, she’d been so happy that the room had become smaller. The walls had closed in to try to get as near to Alex’s energy as they could, and Ellington, being claustrophobic, dismissed Alex immediately.
He gazed around the room. “How are you so strong?” he wondered aloud. “Your mind is quite extraordinary.”
“There are plenty of people who are smarter than me.”
“This isn’t about intelligence. It’s about brainpower, the energy your thoughts create. For goodness’ sake, you somehow withstood the shriek of a banshee.”
Alex grimaced. The word ‘banshee’ stung her entire being. The image of Gabe’s tattooed face flashed in her mind. “I don’t think that was because of me.”
“Don’t be so sure.”
“I told you about the dreams. About how Chase is there in my head.”
“Dream sharing is not unheard of; surviving a banshee is, however.” The walls jolted, knocking into a side table and sending a vase smashing to the ground. “And furthermore Chase does not have this effect on my room.”
“Dream sharing,” Alex repeated. “You mentioned that before. What is it?”
“Simply how it sounds. Visiting the dreams of others.”
“And speaking to them there?”
“Sometimes, but that is much more difficult to do.”
She chose her words carefully. “What about outside of dreams? Can spirits ever visit each other when the mind isn’t drifting?”
“You mean mentally? No, that’s impossible.”
Alex bit her tongue, and the walls shuddered.
Ellington eyed her suspiciously. “Why?”
“Just curious. But, how can I see the walls shiver like that, and believe that anything is impossible?”
“That’s just energy. Everything has energy, and in that there is life.”
“Can thoughts themselves be energy, then? Can they generate power?”
Ellington scrunched his lips, contemplating the idea. “Yes, I believe so.”
Alex watched the reverberating walls, wondering if perhaps the energy of Chase’s thoughts combined with hers explained how she survived the banshee. If there was double the amount of energy in her head. For a world so entirely mental, it was really hard to get solid answers.
“Why are you suffocating your notebook?”
Alex was inadvertently wringing a notebook like it was a dishtowel. Three seconds ago, she hadn’t had anything in her hands. Where had that come from?
“What’s bothering you?”
What wasn’t bothering her seemed to be the more appropriate question. She tossed her notebook to the floor.
“What happened to
my mother?” she asked bluntly.
“What do you think?”
“I think you hold out on me.”
“As do you,” he replied without missing a beat.
“I know about Sephi Anovark.”
“It was only a matter of time.”
“And my mother?”
He sighed. “There is no possible relation to Sephi. Her relatives were extinguished. Her family tree was ignited at the base, cremated to prevent more prophets from branching out into the world. Sephi was the only one known to have risen from the ashes to become a spirit.”
“But then why was my mom killed?”
“We will never know that for sure.”
“I don’t believe you.”
Tap, tap, tap. Ellington’s pen slammed into his legal pad with unnecessary vigor. “Your mother was given answers, and she still went searching for more. Eventually it killed her.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Erin was a spirit for barely a week before she knew about Sephi Anovark. Spirits lined the sidewalks in our city, just waiting for Erin to pass by, to catch a glimpse. They celebrated her like royalty. Truth be told, there is no explanation why there is such a strong resemblance. She found no genetic connection. It still wasn’t enough. She wanted proof, and we all know how that ended up.”
“Why? Who killed her?”
“Sephi worked with the Ardor Service to help imprison spirits. She could predict a crime before it happened. She was also responsible for the destruction of the losing side of the Restructuring war. Anyone on the opposing side, anyone who shared the beliefs of the opposing side, would fear her.”
“You think the same people who killed Sephi went after my mother?”
“Impossible. They’re dead.”
“The inmates from Paradise? What about the other prisoners? Why are they being questioned?”
Ellington raised a small eyebrow. “Have you considered detective work for your future?”
“I’m not joking.”
“Why do you think I was so alarmed when you began asking questions about Paradise?”
Alex leaned back in her chair. She hadn’t realized she’d been gravitating toward Ellington during the conversation. It was too much to be a coincidence that she would find letters written to someone who could be her twin, letters only she could see.
Of Breakable Things Page 25