by P. C. Cast
“Ugh,” I said. Everyone (besides Damien) at the table nodded in agreement to my conjugating ugh, even though the Twins seemed out of synch and Erin kept giving Shaunee looks that went from annoyance to confusion and back again.
And that pretty much summed up the rest of the day: confusing, annoying, and just plain ugh.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Zoey
“I like his horse,” I said to Lenobia.
“I like his horse, too,” Lenobia said, even though she sounded like she hated to admit it.
We were standing in the corral, a little ways from the group that was clustered around Travis and his giant Percheron, Bonnie. The cowboy had been demonstrating to a very attentive audience of fledgling guys (and Darius and Rephaim and Stark) how to use a lance and a sword from horseback.
“So,” Johnny B said, “Is that all she can do? Just, like, lope or whatever back and forth in a straight line?”
From on top of Bonnie the cowboy looked about a zillion feet tall. Currently, he had a long lance in his hand and I wondered for a second if he was going to skewer smart aleck, muscle-brained Johnny B. But Travis just tilted his hat back, rested the lance on his hip, and said, “My girl can do everything a smaller horse can do. She has all the gaits: walk, trot, lope, gallop.” He glanced over at Lenobia and his easygoing smile turned wry. “Well, Bonnie can’t turn as quick as a quarter horse. She can’t run as fast and as long as a Thoroughbred. But she can tear up a trail with the best of ’em. Don’t forget that she can carry me, a pile of armor and weapons, and pull down a house. All at the same time. Underestimating her would be a mistake.” He shot another look at Lenobia and added, “But then underestimating females in general isn’t a good idea, boy.”
I covered my laugh with a cough.
Lenobia looked at me. “Don’t encourage him. He’s been holding fledgling court all day. The girls want to date him. The boys want to be him. He’s making my head hurt.”
“So you like him a little?”
I was wincing from Lenobia’s frosty stare when Travis raised his voice and called, “Well, you’d have to ask the professor over there about that, but I’d be all for a little field trip.”
Huh? Field trip? My ears perked up. “We go on field trips?”
“Not since we’ve been battling evil we haven’t,” Lenobia said under her breath. Then she raised her voice and started toward Bonnie and her cowboy saying, “I’m sorry, Travis, I wasn’t listening. What is it you’re asking?”
“One of the kids wanted to see Bonnie in action on a trail ride. I’d be happy to take some of ’em out with me and a few horses on a clear night. I grew up outside Sapulpa and know the old oil paths on the ridges there like the back o’ my hand.”
I saw Lenobia sucking in a breath and was sure she was getting ready to blast the cowboy into the stratosphere, when Ant, the littlest of the red fledgling kids, reached way up and, looking starstruck, patted Bonnie on her nose saying, “Wow! A trail ride? Like cowboys used to do? That’d be awesome.” With obvious adoration in his eyes, he gazed at Lenobia. “Professor Lenobia, could we really?”
I think it hit me at about the same time it hit Lenobia—Ant was just asking to do some normal school stuff—to take a field trip and be a kid—versus being dead and undead and fighting immortals and the booger monsters they brought with them and worrying about saving the world.
“Perhaps. I’ll have to see if I can work it into my lesson plan. There have already been several changes lately,” Lenobia said in her teacher voice.
Johnny B sighed. “Changes. That’d be us undying and coming back here and messing up the schedule.”
“Actually, the professor probably means me more than you,” Rephaim said. “I’m the reason Stark and Darius had to start a new class here in the stables.”
“Neither and both of you are right,” Lenobia said crisply. “You’ve changed things at this House of Night, but that’s not necessarily negative. I like to see change as a positive thing. It prevents stagnation. And I’m enjoying having the Warrior classes in my stables. As Travis has so aptly demonstrated today, Warriors and horses have a long, rich history together.”
I saw Rephaim’s surprised look and his tentative smile. Then the bell chimed and before everyone could sprint for the door Travis called out, “Whoa there, guys! No one leaves the stable until everythin’s in its right place. You boys there help Stark and Darius put the weapons and targets up.” Then he pointed at Rephaim and Ant. “You and you—help me get this tack off Bonnie and wipe her down. She’s worked hard today.”
Everyone snapped to. Lenobia hesitated, and then kinda nodded to herself, changed direction, and disappeared into her office.
Huh. So now with the approval of a tougher-than-tough vampyre professor a human cowboy was telling an ex-Raven Mocker, some undead guys, and a bunch of fledglings what to do. Huh.
* * *
By the time we rounded up all the kids, got on the short bus, and drove back to the depot it was just a little before six A.M. Even I was tired and unbelievably glad it was the weekend. I swear I didn’t want to do anything but sleep, watch trash TV, and maybe do a little decorating of the tunnels. I was just thinking about my thick blue blanket (that I’d grabbed when I’d crammed my clothes and stuff from my dorm room into a cardboard box), and how nice it would feel to be curled up under it with Stark and Nala when Stevie Rae rained on my parade.
“Okay, we gotta hurry.” She motioned to me, Rephaim, Stark, Darius, Aphrodite, the Twins, and Damien. “It’s gonna be dawn in about an hour and a half. Rephaim and Zoey have Kalona stuff they need to tell us.”
I sighed. “Okay. In the kitchen.”
It took even longer for us to get the kitchen cleared of hungry fledglings and sent off to their rooms.
“This ain’t gonna work good for long. We need us a place where we can have our own Council Meetings without morons all up in our business,” Kramisha said, as she frowned at Johnny B who was trying to see how many Cheetos he could cram in his mouth at one time.
“Muh uh mu,” Johnny B said around the Cheetos.
“Just take your silly ass outta here. We got things to discuss.” She shook her head and finished shooing him and the last of the red fledglings from the kitchen. Then Kramisha faced the rest of us. “No. I ain’t leavin’.”
“Oh, for shit’s sake, you have another poem?” Aphrodite said.
“I read in People magazine that negativity gives you wrinkles,” Kramisha said to Aphrodite. “You may wanna consider your attitude when you look in the mirror. ’Cause I do know you love you some mirror time.” She made a little “huh” noise and then her gaze went to Stevie Rae and then to me. “It come to me in Latin class.”
“Latin? Seriously?” Aphrodite said. “Your English isn’t even that great.”
“Non scholae sed vitae discimus,” Kramisha said smoothly.
There was a giant silence, then Stevie Rae said, “Dang, Latin always sounds so smart. Good job, Kramisha.”
“Thank you. It nice to be ’preciated by my High Priestess. Anyway…” She dug around in her gihugic bag until she found her purple notepad, then she pulled it out, came over to the table, and slapped it down in front of me. “This one’s for you.”
“Why?” I said before I could make my mouth stop.
Kramisha shrugged. “Don’t know, but you’re supposed to read it.”
“It would really be more helpful if you could get a little more info when these poems ‘come to you,’” Aphrodite air quoted sarcastically.
“Wrinkles,” Kramisha said without looking at her.
“Fine, I’ll read it.” I took the paper and then glanced at my gawking group. “Yes, out loud.” And I read:
“The dividing line forms—fashioned from:
Dragon’s tears
Missed years
Overcome fears
The fire and ice paradox
Seen with True Sight
Darkness does not always equate to evil
Light does not always bring good.”
As I read the last two lines my stomach squeezed. I glanced up at Kramisha. “You were right. I was supposed to read this.”
“How do you know?” Stark asked.
“The last lines—the part that starts with Darkness—it’s what Nyx said to me right before she kissed my forehead and filled in my crescent the day I was Marked.”
“Does the rest of it mean anything to you?” Damien said.
“Well, I dunno. We all know why Dragon would be crying.” Rephaim hunched his shoulders and I gave him a quick apologetic look. “The years and fears part could have to do with Dragon, too. Clearly we’re gonna have to get Shaylin involved ’cause of the True Sight part, and I’m not even sure what a paradox is.” I sighed. “So, in other words, no, I’m clueless about the rest of it.”
“A paradox is a statement or a situation that is contradictory, but true,” Damien said.
“Huh?” I said.
“Okay, an example: the paradox of war is that you have to kill people in order for people to stop being killed.”
“God, I hate figurative language,” Aphrodite said.
“But you are smart, my beauty. When you put your mind to something you figure it out,” Darius said.
“The paradox could have something to do with Kalona and Rephaim,” Shaunee suddenly spoke up.
“What do you mean?” Stevie Rae asked.
“Twin?” Erin said. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” Shaunee told her and then continued. “What I mean is that it’s a paradoxical situation, isn’t it? In order for Rephaim to prove he’s changed sides and is being good now, he has to turn his back on his dad, and that’s something that would usually be considered bad.”
“You may have something,” Damien said.
“She is fire,” Aphrodite said.
I blinked. “And Kalona is ice.”
“But my Twin doesn’t have anything to do with Kalona,” Erin said.
“Yes, she does,” Rephaim said. “She understands how I feel about him, especially after today.”
“Rephaim, I know you want your daddy to be a good guy and love you, but you just gotta give up on that,” Stevie Rae said. I could hear the frustration in her voice.
“Please tell her about today,” Rephaim said to me.
I stifled a sigh. “Kalona wants a truce with us.” After the commotion of everyone being all “no way” and “oh please”—well, everyone except Shaunee and Rephaim—I went on to explain exactly what had happened between Kalona, Rephaim, and me, and summed up with, “So, no, I don’t think we can trust him, but having a truce with him isn’t necessarily a bad thing.”
“Rephaim needs to keep our business to hisself,” Kramisha added, giving Rephaim a hard look.
“Yeah, we’ve already talked about that. Right, Rephaim?” I said.
“I won’t tell Father our secrets,” Rephaim said.
“It’s more than that, though,” Stark said. “It’s not a secret that we’re living here, but that’s something Kalona didn’t need to know.”
“If it’s not a secret Father could have found out anywhere,” Rephaim said.
“Yeah, maybe. But did ya ever think that maybe if he really had left Tulsa and was out west somewhere and he thought you were at the House of Night surrounded by Sons of Erebus he would have kept flying west and we’d be rid of him?” Stark said.
“That wasn’t going to happen. Father wasn’t going to leave me.”
“He already did!” Stevie Rae suddenly blew. She stood up and wrapped her arms around herself as if she was trying to physically hold her emotions in check. “He left you when you made a choice for good. He’s only come back now ’cause your brothers couldn’t get you to spy for him. So now he’s tryin’ for himself.”
“Spy?” Darius said.
Rephaim was looking at Stevie Rae as if she’d slapped him, but he answered Darius. “Yes. That is what my brothers came to ask of me. I refused right before Dragon and the Aurox creature found me.”
“Okay, look, like I already said, it’s clear that we shouldn’t trust Kalona, but I do think that he made a valid point today. If Neferet is immortal and can only be destroyed by herself, then we definitely need help in figuring out how to push her in that direction.” I paused and then added, “I also think we can trust Rephaim, even though he loves his dad.”
“Kalona is a ticking time bomb,” Stark said.
“So once were you. So once was I,” Rephaim said.
Stevie Rae unwrapped her arms from around herself and took Rephaim’s hand. “I was a time bomb, too, Rephaim, just like you guys. But all three of us made the choice for Light. Your daddy hasn’t. Please, you gotta remember that.”
“Again, I agree with the bumpkin,” Aphrodite said.
“So do I,” Erin said.
There was an obvious pause where Erin looked at Shaunee, who didn’t echo her in Twin-like fashion and didn’t meet her gaze.
“Well, that’s a miracle. Someone call the Vatican,” Aphrodite said dryly.
With the hand Stevie Rae wasn’t holding, Rephaim reached out and pulled Kramisha’s poem across the table. He glanced down and then read, “‘Darkness does not always equate to evil. Light does not always bring good.’ Maybe things aren’t exactly as they appear.”
“I know one thing that is for sure and exactly as it appears,” I said. “I was there in the Otherworld when Kalona asked Nyx if she would forgive him. The Goddess said only after he earned the right to ask. He hasn’t earned it, Rephaim.”
“Yet,” Shaunee said softly.
“Yet,” Rephaim echoed.
“Yet?” Erin said, shaking her head.
“All right, here’s the deal: until Kalona earns the right to ask for Nyx’s forgiveness, we do not trust him. We can truce with him, but it’s under the heading of my enemy’s enemy is my friend.” I said, hoping I’d gotten that quote right. “Period, the end.”
“But not trusting him doesn’t mean not hoping,” Shaunee said.
“No, it doesn’t mean that,” I said slowly, hating the resigned, sad look in my BFF’s eyes as she stared at Rephaim.
“I won’t let you down.” Rephaim spoke first to Stevie Rae, then his gaze moved to the rest of us. “It’s like Shaunee said—I can hope, but I won’t trust.”
“He’s going to break your heart,” Stevie Rae said.
“Too late to worry about that,” he said. “He already did.” And then a shudder rippled through Rephaim’s body. I swear I saw his skin twitch. “Dawn.” He stood, kissed Stevie Rae gently. “I must go. I love you.”
“I’ll go with—” Stevie Rae began, but then stopped herself. “No, you don’t want me to. It’s okay. I know it’s something you have to do alone.” She tiptoed and kissed him quickly. “Go on before you get caught down here.”
Rephaim nodded and then sprinted from the room.
“Huh. So, he turns into a bird? Just like that?” Aphrodite said.
“Besides the fact that it hurts him and humiliates him, yeah, just like that,” Stevie Rae said and, with a little sob, she bolted from the kitchen.
“Oh, for shit’s sake, I was just asking. She doesn’t need to be so sensitive about it.”
“How would you feel if Darius turned into a bird every day?” I asked her, trying (futilely) to get her to empathize with Stevie Rae.
“Annoyed,” she said. “I like to cuddle.” Aphrodite seemed to be considering something, and then she added, “You know, she might try sticking him in a really, really big cage just before dawn. Maybe she could tame him.”
We all gawked at her.
“What? It’s an idea.”
“One best kept to yourself,” Damien said.
“So that means I should or shouldn’t add it to the long shopping list I’m making for home improvements this weekend?”
“I say add it if you let me in on making the rest of the list,” Kramisha said.
“I’m
gonna go talk to my BFF,” I said. “You two shop, but don’t shop mean.”
“Hey, if it’s okay I’m going to bed,” Stark said. “I can feel the sun dragging me down.”
I forced a smile on my face and kissed him. “Sure, I’ll be there in just a little while.”
“Take your time. Be sure Stevie Rae’s okay.” With barely a glance at me he waved at the rest of the kids and walked heavily from the room.
He’d be asleep when I got to our bed. It made me feel weird, like I was suddenly having a relationship with an old man who couldn’t stay awake. But I shook off the feeling, said bye to the group, and hurried to Stevie Rae’s neat little room.
She was sitting on the bed bawling her eyes out and hugging Nala.
“Hey, baby girl,” I said, sitting beside them and petting Nala. “Are ya takin’ care of Stevie Rae?”
That made my BFF smile through her tears. “Yeah, she was in here already. She pretended to be all super grumpy, but she jumped right up on my lap and after she sneezed on me she put her paws on my chest and her face next to mine and started purrin’.”
“Nal’s good at her job,” I said.
“Job?” Stevie Rae sniffed and grabbed a tissue from the box by the bed.
“Cat Therapist. When she’s in her professional mode I like to think of her as Doctor Nal.”
“Does she charge by the hour?” she asked, petting Nala who had definitely turned her purr machine on high.
“Yep. She works for catnip. Lots of it.”
Stevie Rae smiled and wiped her eyes. “I’ll be sure to get me a bunch.”
“Wanna call your mom? Would that make you feel better?”
“Nah, she’s busy getting breakfast for my brothers. I’m fine.”
I gave her A Look.
“Okay, well, I’ll be fine. I’m just so worried about Rephaim. I know y’all can’t forget that he’s a Raven Mocker, but I wish you could understand that he’s really not evil anymore. Since Nyx changed him, he’s just a regular boy during the sunset hours. And he doesn’t know much about being a boy. Z, I’m afraid Kalona is gonna to do something that will make him mess up, and then he’ll have his humanity taken away from him.” She burst into noisy tears.