by P.C. Cast
"Watch out, Zo, they're coming for us," Heath said, trying to step around in front of me.
"No they're not," I said. I closed my eyes for just a second and centered myself, thinking of the power and warmth of flame—the way it can cleanse as well as destroy—and I thought of Shaunee. "Come to me, flame!" My palms started to feel hot. I opened my eyes and raised my hands, which were now glowing with a brilliant yellow flame.
"Stay back, Elliott! You were a pain in the ass when you were alive, and death hasn't changed anything." Elliott cringed back from the light I was producing. I took a step forward, ready to tell Heath to follow me so we could get the hell outta there, but her voice made me freeze.
"You're wrong, Zoey. Death has changed some things." The crowd of creatures parted to let Stevie Rae through.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
The flame in my palms sputtered and faded as shock broke my concentration. "Stevie Rae!" I started to take a step toward her, but the truth of her appearance hit me and I felt my body go cold and still. She looked terrible—worse than she had in the dream vision I'd had. It wasn't so much her pale thinness and the awful wrongness of the smell that clung to her that made her appear so changed. It was her expression. In life, Stevie Rae had been the kindest person I'd ever known. But now, whatever she was—dead, undead, bizarrely resurrected—she was different. Her eyes were cruel and flat. Her face devoid of any emotion except one, and that one emotion was hatred.
"Stevie Rae, what happened to you?”
"I died." Her voice was only a twisted, malformed shadow of what it had once been. She still had her Okie twang, but the soft sweetness that had filled it was totally gone. She sounded like mean trailer trash.
"Are you a ghost?”
"A ghost?" Her laugh was a sneer. "No, I ain't no damn ghost.”
I swallowed and felt a dizzy wash of hope. "So you're alive?”
She curled her lip in a sarcastic sneer that looked so wrong on her face it made me physically sick. "You'd say I'm alive, but I'd say it's not that simple. Then again I'm not as simple as I used to be.”
Well, at least she hadn't hissed at like that Elliott thing had. Stevie Rae is alive. I held tightly to that miracle, swallowed my fear and revulsion, and moving so quickly that she didn't have time to jerk away (or bite me or whatever), I grabbed her and, ignoring the horrid way she smelled, hugged her hard. "I'm so glad you're not dead!" I whispered to her.
It was like hugging a smelly piece of stone. She didn't jerk away from me. She didn't bite me. She didn't react at all, but the creatures surrounding us did. I could hear them hissing and muttering. I let go of her and stepped back.
"Don't touch me again," she said.
"Stevie Rae, is there someplace we can go so we can talk? I need to get Heath home, but I can come back and meet you. Or maybe you could come back to the school with me?”
"You don't understand anything, do you?”
"I understand that something bad has happened to you, but you're still my best friend, so we can figure this out.”
"Zoey, you're not going anywhere.”
"Fine," I purposefully pretended to misunderstand her threat. "I guess we could talk here, but, well ..." I looked around at the grossly hissing creatures. "It's not very private, and it's also disgusting down here.”
"Jusssst kill them!" Elliott snarled from behind Stevie Rae.
"Shut up, Elliott!" Stevie Rae and I snapped at him together. Her eyes met mine and I swear I saw a flash of something in them that was more than anger and cruelty.
"You know they can't live now that they've sssseen us," Elliott said. The other creatures stirred restlessly, making evil little noises of agreement.
Then a girl stepped out of the pack of creatures. She obviously used to be beautiful. Even now there was an eerie, surreal allure about her. She was tall and blond, and she moved more gracefully than the others. But when I looked into her red eyes I saw only meanness.
"If you can't do it, I will. I'll take the male first. I don't mind that his blood has been tainted by Imprint. It's still warm and alive,” she said, and she seemed to dance toward Heath.
I stepped in front of him, blocking her path. "Touch him and you die. Again," I said.
Stevie Rae interrupted her hissing laughter.
"Get back with the others, Venus. You don't strike until I tell you to.”
Venus. The name triggered my memory. "Venus Davis?" I said.
The pretty blonde narrowed her eyes at me. "How do you know me, fledgling?”
"She knows a lot of stuff," Heath said, stepping around me. He was using what I used to call his football player voice. He sounded tough and pissed and totally ready for a fight. "And I'm about sick of all of you fucked-up creatures.”
"Why is that speaking?" Stevie Rae spat.
I sighed and rolled my eyes. I agreed with Heath—I was totally sick of all of this scary weirdness. It was time we got out of there, and it was also time my best friend started acting like the person I'd glimpsed hiding in her eyes. "He isn't a that. He's Heath. Remember, Stevie Rae? My ex-boyfriend?”
"Zo. I am not your ex-boyfriend. I'm your boyfriend.”
"Heath. I told you before that this can't possibly work out between us.”
"Come on, Zo, we're Imprinted. That means it's you and me, baby!" He grinned at me as if we were in the middle of a prom instead of in the middle of a group of undead creatures that wanted to eat us.
"That was an accident, and we're gonna have to talk about it, but this is definitely not the time.”
"Oh, Zo, you know you love me." Heath's grin didn't fade one bit.
"Heath, you are the most stubborn kid I've ever known." He winked at me and I couldn't help smiling back at him. "Fine. I love you.”
"What’sss happening …" the gross Elliott creature hissed. The rest of the horrid things that surrounded us moved restlessly, and Venus glided one step closer to Heath. I forced myself not to shiver or scream or whatever. Instead, a weird calm came over me. I looked at Stevie Rae, and suddenly knew what I needed to say. I put my hands on my hips and faced her.
"Tell him," I said. "Tell all of them.”
"Tell them what?" She narrowed her garnet eyes dangerously.
"Tell them what's happening here. You know. I know you do.”
Stevie Rae's face contorted, and the words sounded like they were being wrenched from her throat. "Humanity! They're showing their humanity." The creatures snarled like she'd just thrown holy water on them (and please, that's such an untrue cliché about vampyres).
"Weakness! It's why we're stronger than they are." Venus curled her lip. "Because it's a weakness we don't have anymore.”
I ignored Venus. I ignored Elliott. Hell, I ignored them all and stared at Stevie Rae, forcing her to meet my , and forcing myself not to look away or flinch as hers glowed hot and red.
"Bullshit,” I said.
"She's right," Stevie Rae said. Her voice was cold and mean. "When we died, so did our humanity.”
"That might be true with them, but I don't believe it's true with you," I said.
"You don't know anything about this, Zoey," Stevie Rae said.
"I don't have to. I know you, and I know our Goddess, and that's all I need to know.”
"She's not my Goddess anymore.”
"Really, just like your mamma's not your mamma anymore?" I knew I'd hit a nerve when I saw her jerk as if she were in physical pain.
"I don't have a mamma. I'm not a human anymore.”
"Big f-ing deal. Technically, I'm not a human anymore, either. I'm somewhere in the middle of the Change, which makes me a little of this and a lot of that. Hell, the only one here who's still human is Heath.”
"Not that I hold your un-human-ness against you guys," Heath said.
I sighed. "Heath, un-human-ness isn't a word. It's inhumanity."
"Zo, I'm not stupid. I know that. I was just coining a word."
"Coining?" Had he really said that?
Despite our awful situation I laughed. "Heath, you really have been studying!”
"Told you so." He grinned, looking completely adorable.
"Enough!" Stevie Rae's voice echoed off the round walls of the tunnel. "I'm done with this." She turned her back to Heath and me, ignoring us completely. "They've seen us. They know too much. They have to die. Kill them.” And she walked away.
This time Heath didn't mess with trying to pull me behind him. Instead he whirled around and, completely catching me off guard, tackled me so that I landed on my butt on the disgusting mattress with an oofh. Then he turned to the closing circle of snarling undead creatures with his legs planted a hip's width apart and his hands balled into fists and he gave his Broken Arrow Tiger football growl.
"Bring it, freaks!”
Okay, it wasn't that I didn't appreciate Heath's machoness. But the boy was in over his cute blond head. I stood up and centered myself.
"Fire, I need you again!" This time I yelled the words with the command of a High Priestess. Flames burst into life from the palms of my hands all up and down my arms. I would have liked to have taken time to study the fire I'd called into being—it was cool that it could burn on me, and not actually burn me, but there was no time for that. "Move, Heath.”
He looked over his shoulder at me, and his eyes got huge and round. "Zo?”
"I'm fine. Just move!”
He jumped out of my way as, burning, I walked forward. The creatures cringed back from me, even as their hands tried to reach around me to get to Heath.
"Stop it!" I yelled. "Back off and leave him alone. Heath and I are going to walk out of here. Now. If you try to stop us, I'm going to kill you, and I have a feeling that this time you're going to die for good." Okay, I really, really didn't want to kill anyone. What I wanted to do was to get Heath out of there, and then find Stevie Rae and have her explain to me how fledglings who were supposed to have died could be walking around with bad attitudes, glowing eyes, and smelling like mold and dust.
From the edge of my vision I saw a movement. I turned in time to see one of the creatures launch herself at Heath. I lifted my arms and flung the fire at her as if I were throwing a ball. As she screamed and went up in flames I recognized her and had to fight hard not to be sick. It was Elizabeth No Last Name—the nice girl who had died last month. Now her burning body writhed on the floor, reeking of spoiled meat and decay, which was all that was left of her lifeless shell.
"Wind and rain! I call you," I cried, and as the air around me began to swirl and fill with the scent of spring rain, I got a flash of Damien and Erin sitting cross-legged beside Shaunee. Their eyes were closed in concentration and they were holding votives the color of their elements. I pointed my fiery finger at Elizabeth's smoldering body and it was washed in a sudden flush of rain, then a cool breeze took the green-tinged smoke, lifting it above our heads, and carried its stench down the tunnel and out into the night.
I faced the creatures again. "That's what I'll do to any of you who try to stop us." I motioned for Heath to walk in front of me, and I followed him, backing away from the creatures.
They followed us. I couldn't always see them as we rewound our way through the dark tunnel, but I could hear their shuffling feet and muffled snarls. It was about then that I began to feel the exhaustion. It was like I was a cell phone that hadn't been charged in a while, and someone was talking on me too long. I let the fire that outlined by arms go out except for a flickering flame that I cupped in my right hand. No way Heath could see to walk out of here without that, and I was still backing behind him, keeping an eye out for attacking creatures. After I passed two offshoot tunnel branches I called for Heath to stop.
"We should hurry, Zo. I know you have this power thing going on, but there are a lot of them—more than what were back there. I don't know how many you can handle." He touched my face. "Not to be mean or anything, but you look like shit.”
I felt like poo, too, but I didn't want to mention it. "I have an idea." We'd just come around a curve where the tunnel had narrowed until I could touch either side of it by spreading out my arms. I walked back to the narrowest part of the curve. Heath started to follow me, but I told him, "Stand over there," and pointed farther down the tunnel the way we were heading. He frowned, but did as I told him.
I turned my back to Heath and concentrated. Lifting my arms, I thought of newly plowed fields and pretty Oklahoma meadows filled with uncut winter hay. I thought about the earth and how I was standing within it ... surrounded by it .. .
"Earth! I call to you!" As I lifted my arms a vision of Stevie Rae flashed across my closed eyelids. She wasn't as she used to be—sweet-faced and concentrating hard over a glowing green candle. She was curled up in the corner of a dark tunnel. Her face was gaunt and white and her eyes glowed scarlet. But her face wasn't an emotionless parody of herself or a cruel mask. She was weeping openly, her expression filled with despair. It's a start, I thought. Then, with a swift, powerful motion I lowered my arms while I commanded, "Close!" In front and above me, pieces of dirt and rock began to fall from the ceiling. At first it was just a trickle of pebbles, but soon there was a mini-avalanche going on that quickly drowned out the pissed-off growls and hisses of the trapped creatures.
A wave of weakness crashed over me and I staggered back.
"I got ya, Zo." Heath's strong arms were around me and I let myself rest against him for a moment. Several of his cuts had broken loose during our escape, and the ripe scent of his blood tickled against my senses.
"They're not really trapped, you know," I said softly, trying to keep my mind off how much I wanted to lick the line of blood that was trickling down his cheek. "We passed a couple other tunnels. I'm sure they'll be able to find their way out eventually.”
"It's okay, Zo." Heath kept his arms wrapped around me, but he pulled back enough so that he could look into my eyes. "I know what you need. I can feel it. If you feed from me you won't be so weak." He smiled, and his blue eyes darkened. "It's okay," he repeated. "I want you to.”
"Heath, you've been through way too much. Who knows how much blood you've already lost? My drinking more of it isn't a good idea." I was saying no, but my voice trembled with desire.
"Are you kidding? A big, studly football jock like me? I got plenty of blood to spare," Heath teased. Then his expression turned serious. "For you, I have anything to spare." While he looked into my eyes, he wiped one of his fingers down the damp red slash on his cheek and the rubbed the blood on his bottom lip. Then he bent and kissed me.
I tasted the dark sweetness of his blood and it dissolved in my mouth to send a surge of fiery pleasure and energy through my body. Heath pulled his lips from mine and guided me to the cut on his cheek. When my tongue snaked out and touched it, he moaned and pressed my hips closer to his. I closed my eyes and began to lick—
"Kill me!" Stevie Rae's broken voice shattered the spell of Heath's blood.
CHAPTER THIRTY
My face flamed with embarrassment as I pushed myself out of Heath's arms, wiping my mouth and breathing hard. Stevie Rae was standing down the tunnel just a few yards from us. Tears still rained down her cheeks and her face was twisted in despair.
"Kill me," she repeated on a sob.
"No." I shook my head and took a step toward her, but she backed away from me, putting up her hand as if she wanted to hold me off. I stopped and gulped some deep breaths, trying to get myself under control. "Come back to the House of Night with me. We'll figure out how this happened. It'll be okay, Stevie Rae, I promise. All that matters is that you're alive.”
Stevie Rae had started shaking her head as I'd begun talking. "I'm not really alive, and I can't go back there.”
"Of course you're alive. You're walking and talking.”
"I'm not me anymore. I did die, an
d part of me—the best part of me—is still dead, just like it is for the rest of them." She gestured back at the cave-in.
"You're not like they are," I said firmly.
"I'm more like them than I am like you.” Her gaze shifted from me to Heath, who was standing quietly beside me. "You wouldn't believe the awful things that go through my mind. I could kill him without a second thought. I would have already if his blood hadn't been changed by the Imprint with you.”
"Maybe it wasn't just that, Stevie Rae. Maybe you didn't kill him because you really didn't want to," I said.
Her eyes found mine again. "No. I wanted to kill him. I still do.”
"The rest of them killed Brad and Chris," Heath said. "And that was my fault.”
"Heath, now's not the time—" I started, but he cut me off.
"No, you need to hear this, Zoey. Those things grabbed Brad and Chris because they were hanging around the House of Night, and that's my fault because I'd told them how hot you are." He gave me an apologetic look. "Sorry, Zo." Then his expression hardened and he said, "You should kill her. You should kill them all. As long as they're alive people will be in danger.”
"He's right," Stevie Rae said.
"And how will killing you and the rest of them solve this? Won't more of you happen?" I made my mind up and closed the space between Stevie Rae and me. She looked like she wanted to take off, but my words stopped her. "How did this happen? What made you like this?”
Her face contorted with anguish. "I don't know how. I only know who.”
"Then who did this?”
She opened her mouth to answer me and then, with a movement so fast her body blurred, she was suddenly cowering against the side of the tunnel.
"She's coming!”
"What? Who?" I crouched beside her.
"Get out of here! Fast. There's probably still time for you to get away." Then Stevie Rae reached out and took my hand in hers. Her flesh was cold, but her grip was strong. "She'll kill you if she sees you—you and him. You know too much. She may kill you anyway, but it'll be harder for her to do if you get back to the House of Night.”