Poison Princess ac-1

by Kresley Cole

  “I’m in his pocket, so he’s in my eyes.”

  “And that means what?”

  Matthew nodded. “No truce. No peace. He is Death. He knows one thing—killing.”

  “Then I’ll run.” Was that what my life would be like from now on? Fleeing from an armored serial killer, always looking over my shoulder, dreading his approach? How long could I keep that up?

  With a shiver, I thought of Matthew’s eulogy for Calanthe.

  She fears him no more. . . .

  33

  DAY 242 A.F.

  TENNESSEE-ALABAMA BORDER

  “I doan like the feel of this,” Jackson muttered, clenching the van’s steering wheel, squinting to see the road. Only now he wasn’t peering through an ash storm . . .

  Fog blanketed us. The mountains flanking the interstate were bathed in it.

  I hadn’t seen fog since before the Flash. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the only weather change we were contending with. Over the last six days since we’d rescued Matthew, the temperatures had dropped to nearly freezing.

  The windstorms had grown less frequent, but when they hit, they were fierce.

  Biting winds in the Deep South—in May? Seeing our breaths smoke put all of us on edge. For all we knew, the entire earth was about to freeze over in a new ice age.

  I had only my hoodie, Jackson a thin leather jacket, and Matthew? A sleeping bag. Selena, of course, had her all-weather-performance clothes.

  From her position in shotgun, she studied our map. “We’re going the right way, J.D. Maybe the fog’s throwing you.”

  Each day, Jackson and Selena took the front seats, sticking Matthew and me in the back with their motorcycles. Like luggage.

  Matthew was currently lying on a sleeping bag on the floor, whistling the Star Wars theme song, completely oblivious to our disquiet.

  “The tank’s teetering on E,” Jackson said. “That map doan show any towns for miles. It was rural here.”

  “The map’s old,” Selena said. “There could be strip malls just ahead. And I guarantee you that we’ll find more gas than we did in the places we’ve already passed.”

  After Matthew’s rescue, we’d decided to go north into Tennessee before heading east to North Carolina. Backtracking south along the same desolate—and supply-free—highway in Alabama wasn’t an option.

  We had only a few energy bars left between us. Water was getting scarce.

  Though we had officially deviated from that big army’s swath of destruction, we still hadn’t found any food in this area.

  What had we found? More Bagmen. We’d see them crawling along the side of the road, reaching for our van.

  “We can always use the gas from the bikes,” Selena suggested.

  Jackson shook his head. “Wouldn’t get us ten miles in this thing. Besides, we got to conserve those tanks.”

  I noted the tense set of his shoulders, the clench of his jaw. He was weighed down with so much responsibility. I wished I could help in some way. I might not be able to—but Matthew could.

  As Jackson and Selena debated routes, I rearranged our box of weapons and empty gallon jugs in the back so I could lay out my sleeping bag next to Matthew’s. I dropped down beside him, curling up for warmth. The back of the van was drafty.

  We faced each other, whisper-distance away. “Matthew, talk to me,” I murmured. “Are we going the right way? Will we find food soon? Give me something we can use.”

  Jackson and Selena had no idea what kind of resource they possessed, still treating him like an idiot.

  Like a fool.

  Matthew glared. “They don’t deserve it,” he snapped under his breath, sounding more like a sixteen-year-old boy than a visionary. Then he started back up with the Star Wars theme.

  Whistling sucked.

  And there went Selena, turning on that grating industrial rock. He whistled louder; Selena cranked the volume.

  If there were any more tension in this van, it would explode. The four of us had about hit our limit of each other.

  Jackson had taken an instant dislike to Matthew, scowling whenever the boy clasped my hand in his as we walked, calling him bon à rien at every opportunity.

  On the surface, Selena appeared to ignore Matthew completely, but when she thought no one was watching, she studied the boy with an alarming intensity.

  The vision Matthew had sent me of her still gave me chills. But he didn’t seem to fear her in the least, which made me feel better.

  I’d forced myself to put all my worry—and jealousy—over Jackson and Selena on the back burner, focusing my attention on Matthew. I believed he was without continuous care for the first time in his life—and he was struggling.

  Most of the time, he didn’t appear to be experiencing our reality. He talked to himself, giving a stray laugh here and there. He slept fitfully, no doubt overwhelmed with those visions of his.

  He’d shown me one battle. I’d never asked for a repeat.

  Whenever we could talk without Jackson and Selena overhearing, I’d been delving about the Arcana. I’d found out that the Fool could see not only the futures of others but also their pasts and presents. I’d learned that there were many more kids like us. But not what our purpose was.

  If we were all in some kind of war with alliances and battles, then what had started the fight? I knew this was life-or-death—I’d seen Calanthe beheaded—but had other kids already died?

  Had Joules and Gabriel survived that night?

  Basically, Matthew had revealed just enough information to make me want to pull my hair out. A typical conversation:

  “How many Arcana are there?”

  “Cards?”

  “Yes, cards.”

  A firm nod. “Arcana.”

  “Okay, then. So what came first—the kids or the cards?”

  His answer: “Gods.”

  I could almost think he was doing it on purpose just to frustrate me, except that he got exasperated with me—as if he were trying to teach me a new language and I kept forgetting how to say “the.”

  I reached for his forehead now, smoothing away that mop of hair. “Matthew, let’s hold off on the whistling for a bit.”

  He drew a deeper breath, his expression defiant.

  “Pretty please?”

  He glowered, but did go quiet.

  A relief. Ideally, I wanted us to be so quiet that Jackson and Selena forgot we were here.

  “Empress fears Dee-vee-oh and Luna will throw me away.”

  “What? No way.” I might have had a brief worry a couple of days ago when I’d heard Jackson tell Selena, “That boy can’t fight, hunt, keep watch—or shut up. He’s a resource-suck.” Just what he called me. “He’s always hungry. We’re burning through any food we find.”

  Selena had replied, “But Evie likes him so much, J.D. Surely you can see how strongly she feels about him.”

  My attachment to Matthew wasn’t like that at all—and she knew it—but I couldn’t contradict her without outing myself as an eavesdropper.

  Then Selena had added, “Why don’t you tell her that we’ll keep him along, but only if she agrees to head back to my place. Otherwise, we’ll be forced to cut the deadweight.”

  Selena, you snake in the ash.

  Yet Jackson had told her, “I’ll think about it.” How much sway did she hold over him?

  Deciding there was no chance the two up front could hear us over that music, I whispered, “Matthew, can Selena literally bring doubt?”

  “She’s the Moon.” He began staring at one of his hands, turning it this way and that, seeming to examine every contour. Which usually meant he was done with a subject.

  I’d asked him if Jackson had been with Selena—and I’d received the same response. I still couldn’t tell if they had. The two of them got along great, but never betrayed that anything deeper was at work.

  At least Jackson didn’t. Selena was clearly head over heels for him.

  She might not be the only one.

>   If I could find out for certain that he wanted more from me, and that he hadn’t slept with our constant traveling companion, I’d tell him that I was falling for him. . . .

  Now Matthew gave me a disappointed look. “Empress lies about them throwing me away.”

  I exhaled. “I’d never let anything happen to you. If they toss you out, I’ll go with.”

  I’d told Jackson as much. Big mistake.

  Yesterday, in one of the rare moments when both Matthew and the clinging Selena had been out of earshot, Jackson had gruffly muttered to me, “Do you think that boy can take care of you? Can protect you on the road?”

  I’d blinked in confusion. “Uh, will he need to?” Then doubts had arisen. “Ohh, I see how it is. The tribe has spoken. You and Selena are going to lighten the load. Will you at least give me notice so we can be ready?”

  Jackson had drawn his head back, his jaw muscles bulging. “You believe I’d abandon you?”

  “I might have accidentally overheard you and Selena talking. You called Matthew a resource-suck, said he was burning through the food.” Would Jackson look at Matthew through “greater good” glasses? Especially with Selena’s influence and doubt-mongering?

  “That’s fact,” Jackson had said. “Something I tend to consider in decision-making.”

  “Like deciding whether to maroon him?”

  “And what would you do if I did?”

  “Go with him,” I’d said without hesitation.

  “You’d choose to go with him over me?” For the scarcest instant, I’d thought I saw something fierce and chillingly possessive in his gaze, then—

  Gone. His expression had grown shuttered once more. He’d said in a scathing tone, “Maybe that’s what I should do! Let you two make your own way, one more useless than the other. If I wasn’t so sure I’d be sending you to your grave, I’d probably cut bait now!” Then he’d stormed off, leaving me shaken.

  We hadn’t spoken more than a few words since, though I often caught his gaze on me in the rearview mirror.

  Now I told Matthew, “I don’t want you to worry about getting abandoned, okay? Promise me.”

  “We don’t need them,” he said. “You need your allies.”

  “Okay, I’ll play. Who are they?”

  “Arsenal!”

  “Shhh, kid.” As much as I felt like a big sister and best friend to Matthew, he could nettle me like no other. I imagined this was what it’d be like with a sibling on a long road trip.

  In a quieter tone, he said, “You need to practice your powers. Phytomanipulation.”

  This was something new! “Does that mean plant control?”

  “I’m hungry.”

  Patience. “Matthew, if I’m supposed to practice, are you going to be my coach?”

  “Yes!” he said brightly. “Flex your thorn claws.”

  Suddenly self-conscious that another person knew about them, I made fists. “I can’t just force them out.” The last time they’d appeared was in Selena’s neighborhood. “Or can I?”

  He gave a long-suffering sigh.

  I focused my attention on my fingernails, imagining them transforming. Nothing happened. I concentrated again. Same result. So I gave up. “You said I had other”—possibly easier—“abilities? What are they? What’s my Arcana call?”

  “I don’t see your claws.” He peered at my hands, then began studying his own. Topic finished.

  “Oh, I get it. We’re on a new reward system.” I lay back in a huff, staring at the van roof.

  Maybe I should just let things unfold. We could be at Gran’s in less than two weeks. I could wait till then to bombard her with all my questions.

  What am I? Why am I this way? What is my purpose?

  Can the world be . . . saved?

  Suddenly Matthew shot upright, his face paling. “Death sends his regards.”

  At once, Selena turned down the music. I saw Jackson’s eyes narrow in the rearview mirror.

  Matthew asked, “Why aren’t you preparing for Death, Evie? We’ve talked of what the future brings.”

  Oh, no, no. If our cryptic exchanges weren’t enough to make me batty, Matthew also liked to talk about his visions of Death. A lot. Which kept me on edge—Jackson as well.

  And Jackson didn’t even know that Matthew referred to a real man, a psychotic knight who’d vowed to execute me and drink my blood.

  This morning Jackson had told Matthew, “You mention death one more time, and I’ll knock you into next week. Comprends?”

  “Already been there,” Matthew had answered. Now he told me, “You have to be ready for Death, Evie.”

  Jackson said, “I warned you, coo-yôn!”

  Selena touched his forearm, casting him a fake, pleading, Be-patient-for-Evie’s-sake look.

  Her personality had been grating on my nerves, scaling new heights of annoyance. But as ever, I was filled with doubts about her. How fitting. I didn’t feel I could trust her, but I sensed I might have to . . . depend on her?

  Matthew asked me, “This time will be different, won’t it?”

  Though I had no idea what he was talking about, I promised, “Yes, Matthew. Let’s just lie back.”

  “You won’t kill me?”

  Jackson shot me a look in the mirror.

  Under my breath, I said, “I’d never hurt you!”

  “Death won’t wait forever.” With a confident nod, he added, “Strike first or be first struck.”

  When Jackson gripped the steering wheel harder, I said, “Hey, let’s talk about something else. Did you ever get to see the space shuttle in Florida?” Nothing. “How about those rascally Ewoks, huh?”

  “I’m in Death’s pocket, so he’s in my eyes,” Matthew said again. “He sees you even now. You’ll meet the Reaper soon.”

  “C’est ça coo-yôn! Jackson snapped. “That’s it! I’ve had enough of your crazy-ass talk—”

  The engine rattled.

  Sputter. Clunk. Done.

  Everyone fell silent as Jackson steered the van off the road—as if another car might need to pass. Once our momentum crept to a standstill, we all sat wordlessly, even Matthew.

  Without gas, we’d be walking. In the raw cold and fog. There was only one house in sight, a modest brick structure that had surely already been rolled.

  Just as I’d been in the days before my mom had passed, we were shit out of luck—and I felt like heading to the barn for my daily primal scream.

  Selena piped her lip to blow her hair out of her face. “What are we going to do now, J.D.?”

  “We passed a militia camp in a valley, not far back. They’ll have gas.”

  I hadn’t seen anything. Of course, I’d been trying to keep Matthew quiet. “How do you know it’s a militia?”

  “Several big fires. I saw them even through the fog. They got no fear that others might spot them, which means it’s an armed group.” He climbed out of the van, immediately tucking his chin and pulling his jacket close around him.

  I followed him, sucking in a shocked breath. The temperature had dropped even more since this morning.

  “Hate this cold,” he muttered.

  Though none of us was accustomed to these temperatures, at least I’d been skiing with Mel and her family each winter break.

  Jackson had never known a cold like this, had never been outside of Louisiana. When Selena had asked him what his favorite ski resort was, he’d shared an amused glance with me in the rearview mirror. “Wouldn’t know snow if it hit me in the face,” he’d said. “Bayou boy, me, born and raised. . . .”

  Once Selena and Matthew had climbed out, Jackson said, “We’ll stop at that house for the night, raid the camp in the morning.”

  “How are we going to steal gas from them?” I asked.

  “We?” Jackson raised his brows. “We ain’t goan to do nothing. You are goan to sit somewhere safe, you. Once the Bagmen get scarce at dawn, Selena and me will ride the bikes in closer.”

  She beamed.

  I glar
ed, feeling as useless as ever, embarrassed by my ineptitude, especially compared to her.

  Whenever Jackson called Matthew bon à rien, good-for-nothing, it only reminded me of all the times that he’d called me the same.

  A worthless little doll with no teeth.

  34

  I shot up with a gasp, fresh from a nightmare. When I blinked open my eyes, my claws were extended, glinting in the dim moonlight that streamed through a dirty window.

  Beside me, Selena and Matthew slept on. Earlier, the three of us had laid out sleeping bags around a cold hearth—we hadn’t dared to build a fire—then divided an energy bar. While we’d tried to sleep, Jackson had taken up watch in an adjoining room.

  I stared down at my claws as I remembered my dream. The witch had been surrounded by shadowy figures, burning with that aggression, that overwhelming compulsion to kill them.

  So she’d twirled in place until her leaf-strewn red hair spun around her head, emitting something into the air. Spores? Once she’d stopped in place, she’d assured her victims, “There is no shame in surrender.”

  I’d expected the villagers to choke, writhing like her young admirer had. Even when sleeping, I’d braced for more ghastly images to stain my brain.

  Instead, her victims had dropped to the ground with happy sighs, curling up on a grassy field, warmed by the sun.

  Where was the fractured bone? The bits of flesh? The shrieks? The people had simply gone to sleep.

  Yet they would never wake up.

  Experiencing this dream was almost worse than the most gruesome ones. Her subtle evil haunted me. There hadn’t been a single shriek—because not one soul had been aware enough to fight for his life. . . .

  As my claws began to recede, I wiggled my fingers, watching the light play over the thorns. I realized I was growing accustomed to them. The sight didn’t shock me at all anymore. In fact, I felt . . . numb.

  I was gradually becoming more like her. The abilities I’d once considered a gift now seemed more like a curse.

  Once my nails returned to normal, I rose, seeking Jackson. Seeking comfort. I just needed to be near him, knew it would make me feel better.