by Ramy Vance
I nodded as he stared at my hand. I wanted to be with him, and I was about to say as much, but something stopped me. It wasn’t just that it was still too early. It was also that wedge, the stickiness of the World Army. Right now, despite our connection, we wanted very different things.
Most of all, it was clear he wasn’t over Kat—that, at the very least, he still had something to prove to her.
So I squeezed his hand. “Justin, I care about you.”
“But,” he said.
“ ‘But?’ ”
“That was the precursor to a ‘but …’ ”
I laughed. “Very perceptive, frat bro.”
“It’s almost like socializing all the time makes me socially aware.”
“Touche. Yes, there’s a but.” I inhaled, removing my hand. “But you and she need to work out what’s going on between you before anything more happens between us.”
He watched my fingers disappear beneath the table. “If I were a lesser frat bro, I would think you’re calling me a serial monogamist.”
I lifted both hands, palms out to him. “Hey, encantado here.”
And with surprising grace, he nodded. “I understand. But I want you to know that I really like you, Isa. I mean well.”
It was time to get real. Really, uncomfortably real. “I really like you, too. The thing is,” I blurted, “I’m not human.”
He watched me, waiting for me to go on.
“I’m an Other. You saw my natural form.”
In my long life, every man who’d beheld my true form—what amounted to a pink dolphin—had reacted in one of two ways: fear or disgust. And because I liked Justin so much, I didn’t know if I could handle rejection. Not from him. So I’d held back every time the topic came up.
Except now I was out of excuses.
“I saw you,” Justin said.
“And?”
“And I don’t care what you look like.”
My gut cinched, emotion rising up through my chest and neck and into my face. I wanted to push those words away. They had to be lies; they couldn’t possibly be the truth.
“Just know that I’m trying to do the right thing by you both,” he whispered.
“OK,” I said. When he handed me a napkin, I realized I’d been crying. “I believe you.”
↔
“So what you’re saying is, Justin Truly potentially breaking up with Katrina Darling is the least interesting part of today?”
From her perch on the end of her bed, Aimee looked skeptical.
My eyes drifted from the TV, which I’d been watching for three mind-numbing hours as I debated how to move forward. It was helping my nerves, even if cable TV had turned into nothing but commercials. “That’s what I’m saying.”
“All right, change my mind.”
So I told her about Dr. Serena Russo. The World Army. The file on Empusa, and what I’d seen under the microscope.
Finally, I told her what I needed to do in order to see that file again.
And sweet, cornflower-haired, blue-eyed Aimee? She laughed.
My arms folded over my chest. “I’m not joking.”
“Oh.”
“So, did I change your mind about my day?”
Within a few seconds, Aimee looked like someone had told her her dog had just died. Her eyes filled with tears, and she lifted both hands, gesturing for a hug.
When I sat down next to her, she wrapped her arms around me. She really was the most touchy-feely person I knew, and in an encantado’s life, that was saying a lot. But it did feel nice.
“That’s so dangerous, Isa,” she said.
“I know.”
“I’ll help you.”
I turned on her. “You’ll what?”
The pale-blue eyes lifted. “I said I’ll help you.”
“But you just said it’s dangerous.”
“Justin’s with the World Army now. You can’t get him to help you infiltrate the evil scientist’s workstation. Who else can you trust?”
I swallowed. Even if she was joking, “the evil scientist’s workstation” didn’t inspire much confidence in Aimee as my second. But she was right: who else could I trust? I felt strangely alone, vulnerable. The forces at work weren’t just powerful … they were lethal.
“You’re shivering,” Aimee said.
I glanced down, found my hands trembling on my thighs. I hadn’t realized I’d been shaking. “I think I know where to find Empusa.”
“Where?”
I closed my eyes; I couldn’t stop shivering. “Maybe … I don’t know. My brain’s a muddle.”
Telling Aimee everything—and especially thinking of going after Empusa—had brought out such a visceral reaction that my heart had started into a hard pounding against my chest. My whole nervous system felt on edge.
I was a runner, not a fighter. And yet here I was, trying to be the opposite.
She rolled across her bed, popped open the side table drawer. With a crinkle, out came a little baggie.
“No,” I said.
“Hear me out. Are you actually going to let me help you get into Dr. Russo’s workstation?”
“No.”
“Are you going to let me go with you to find Empusa?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Do you have any idea how you’re going to tackle either of those things?”
I paused. Then, “No.”
She shook the bag. “This is how I can help you.”
“I don’t know how that’s going to help,” I said, even as I reached for it. Did I mention how susceptible encantado are to mind-altering drugs? And I had decided to be a college student. Que bonito!
Twenty minutes later, I sat with the phone to my ear. In a moment of hazy brilliance, we had figured out exactly what we needed to do.
Cancel our cable TV subscription.
I mean, we were only getting like fifty mediocre channels, and half the time we weren’t even watching actual shows—just commercials. It was a total, infuriating ripoff.
Across the room, Aimee stared at me with big, red eyes. Smoke drifted around us.
“What?” I said.
“How long have you been on hold?”
I glanced at the clock on my desk. “Eighteen minutes.” Elevator muzak rang in my left ear, and I reached for the blunt. Aimee passed it over.
“Why are you still staring at me?” I said.
“I had a thought.”
“About the whole World Army-Dr. Russo-Empusa situation?”
She shook her head.
“OK—what?”
“If you burned time to get you off hold faster, would you actually be saving time, or losing it?”
I blinked. My mouth opened, closed again. “No,” I said. “Just no.”
“One minute.”
“That’s one minute off my life, Aimee!”
“You’ve been alive since like, 1502.”
“Hey, you swore you wouldn’t talk about my age.”
“Yeah, in public.”
“I’m not burning time to get off hold faster.”
“Thirty seconds.”
I was about to disappoint her again, but something on the shelf by her head caught my eye. Professor Allman’s textbook.
She followed my gaze. “Don’t tell me you’re thinking about biology.”
“I’m thinking about biology,” I said, setting the phone down. “Aimee, you’re a genius.”
“Well, yes …”
“Professor Allman wasn’t happy about the World Army getting involved in the biology department’s work. I could tell from the start.”
She looked impressed, and then her eyes narrowed. “You’re going to ask Professor Allman to help you infiltrate a high-level World Army scientist’s workstation?”
I took a long draw off the blunt, poured smoke out of the side of my lips. “And he’s going to say yes. Know why?”
She leaned forward. “Why?”
“Encantado magic.”
CHAPTER 21<
br />
I ’d never been great at walking in heels. Today, I had to be genius.
When Serena Russo walked out of the biology building with her purse over her shoulder, I glanced at the time on my phone. 12:15 p.m.
I had one hour.
I was lucky to be her protege in the lab, to know she had a “lunch engagement” this afternoon and wouldn’t be available to supervise my research.
Fine by me.
I walked into the biology building as soon as she’d disappeared around the corner and stepped into the first women’s bathroom I encountered. I checked to be sure all the stalls were empty, and then locked the main door to start the inexpert process of turning into Serena Russo.
Well, not turning into her, precisely. Looking like her. Sounding like her.
This was going to hurt.
I took off all my clothes and stood in front of the mirror, pressing my red hair behind my ears and closing my eyes. Before the gods left, this used to be a giddy moment, as familiar to me as getting dressed in the morning.
Now I felt only dread.
Some days I would shift between three or four illusions between dawn and dusk. I could snap my fingers and my hair would tumble black, then brown, then red. I could blink and be blue-eyed, blink again and hazel, violet, gray. Whatever a man wanted. Whatever I felt like that day.
Since the gods left, I’d changed illusions four times. The first time was the day they departed, and I didn’t understand how magic worked. I wanted to test the boundaries, to fully understand. The second time came two years later, when I decided I wanted to be the redhead I was now, a woman I’d seen at the airport in Montreal.
The third time, I became Katrina Darling. The litmus test was Justin, who never suspected I was anyone else. That was how good my illusions were.
And the fourth time, I un-became Katrina. I returned to the red-haired, green-eyed Isabella everyone in my life knew me as. The illusion that felt most like me. Going back was easy—because I’d already used it before, it only took five seconds off my life.
Going forward? That was the hard part.
I balled my hands to fists. I didn’t want to look like Serena Russo, to burn two months off the end of my life just to spend lunchtime pretending to be a scientist who had sold herself to the World Army.
But hey, maybe I’d eaten enough Twinkies that my future, arterially-blocked self would be grateful for an early end. Or maybe, I thought as the familiar bubbling started in my gut, I was just trying to make the most of a shitty situation.
Shitty wasn’t the right word.
Frightening. Depressing. Inviting the void.
Yes, those were the right words.
Once, I’d tried to describe to Aimee what it was like to burn time off my life. I’d compared it to approaching the edge of a cliff, beyond which was darkness. And burning time was like throwing yourself toward that edge.
“But we’re all looking out over a cliff,” Aimee said. “Humans and Others.”
“Right,” I said. “But imagine that, for five hundred years, there was no cliff. There was only a wide, rolling vista.”
Her eyes grew big. “And then an earthquake happened.”
“And then an earthquake happened,” I whispered. But for me, the gods’ departure wasn’t an earthquake. It wasn’t even a rumble. It was just that horn in the sky like a one-note tune, and then that voice pouring through the trees.
“Thank you for believing in us, but it is not enough. We’re leaving. Good luck.”
And after it had finished, the world settled onto me like a blanket. Where before the rainforest air had seemed refreshing, mortality brought an exhausting and throat-clutching humidity.
Mosquitos began biting. Leaves began to hurt my bare feet.
And all at once, illusions became a commodity. My life for the face I wanted.
I was trading my future for a little power. A little magic.
Four years of mortality wasn’t enough time to get used to that.
Aimee tried, but she couldn’t truly understand. It was impossible for humans, who’d been mortal from the time they understood their own existence. Every time Others used magic, we were sacrificing ourselves. We were inviting the void.
And for a OnceImmortal to do that, we had to be compelled by either life-threatening fear, or an overwhelming desire to do right.
This was me doing right.
I pictured Serena’s black hair, the sheen of it. Her eyes. Her olive skin. Her long, coltish limbs. The magic thrilled me and sapped me all at once, my life force surging through me and floating away on a soft breeze. All the illusions of my long life flitted through my mind, the moments I’d stood in just this way, becoming someone else.
Except this time, I couldn’t indulge. I only had fifteen minutes to make this illusion happen.
The cracking began as my bones separated, lengthened, stretching me out like a child’s doll. My skull cracked, widened, reseamed, the bones of my face reshaping themselves more prominent, my chin jutting farther. I gritted through it as the muscles wound themselves over the new bones, and the skin over that.
When I opened my eyes, Serena Russo breathed hard in front of me. I gasped, one set of red fingernails rising to her mouth. She was me. I was the enemy.
I glanced around, felt almost dizzy. The world looked a lot different from six feet up. And I would have to get used to it—quick.
I grabbed my backpack, pulled out the pant suit and heels I’d bought last night. I had to estimate her size, and I’d nearly gotten it right. It was just a little loose through the arms and legs. The black heels cramped my toes, but I’d only need to wear them for the next—
I glanced down at my phone on the counter; a half hour had elapsed. GoneGodDamn, I’d lost my edge.
I pushed the backpack and my old clothes into a corner and clattered toward the bathroom door with the elegant little purse I’d brought. No time to practice—no time to do anything but go straight to the man I needed to see.
When I emerged from the bathroom, a gaggle of biology students stared at me. I recognized two of the girls from my classes, though they looked much shorter now. I gave them my best imperious look as I strode by, my toes protesting with every step.
I got into the elevator, took it to the third floor. When I stepped out, I spotted his door open, a yellow rectangle of light spilling out into the hallway.
Thank the GoneGods he was there.
Half a minute later, I stood at the threshold of his office, knocked politely on the door. “Prof—“ I started. What was his first name? It had fled my mind. “Uh, Steve?”
Professor Allman glanced up from his desk. When his eyes lit on me, I sensed the familiar glint of attraction. Really? I thought. Her? I mean, she was beautiful, but she was also horrible.
But the body wants what the body wants. And I could use this to my advantage.
“Serena,” he said, nearly tipping his chair over as he stood. Its wheels whined across the floor in one of the awkwardest demonstrations of male attraction I’d seen, and that was saying a lot. His hands rubbed on the front of his pants. “What a surprise. I thought you’d be out to lunch.”
So he knew about her lunch engagement. Great.
I stepped forward, leaning lightly against the door. “It ended early. And silly me, when I got back, I realized I’d left my keycard at my workstation. Can’t do much to help Others if I can’t get into my work, can I?”
I set hopeful eyes on him.
Here it was: his chance to be a knight.
“Oh.” His brow furrowed. “Security couldn’t help you?”
Come on, Allman—I’m giving you an in.
I raised my shoulders. “They’re out to lunch, too.” I took another step forward. “Could you just swipe me in with yours?”
I knew his keycard would grant him access to Serena’s workstation because he was the volunteer fire responder for the biology building. Every building had a do-gooder professor who’d volunteered to be the
responder—to usher everyone out when the alarm sounded—and Professor Allman was that man. He was also the guy who wouldn’t hesitate to help out.
Which was part of why I admired him so much.
He grabbed up his keycard off his desk, gesturing me into the hallway ahead of him. “Of course.”
I grinned as I turned and stepped out. Still got it.
↔
Professor Allman swiped us through the lab’s outer door, which gave two unusually pleasant chirps. I’d expected something more sinister, more ominous—two staccato klaxon bursts, maybe.
When we came inside, my eyes darted right to Serena’s workstation. As before, the door was still shut. The keycard entry blinked red.
And then I noticed all the people; the lab bustled with an unpleasant number of researchers—way more than yesterday. I’d thought the lunch hour would mean everyone would clear out. But no, turns out scientists have a terrible sense of work/life balance. I should have known.
One lifted his head and approached me in a burst of recognition, what wisps remained of his blond hair blowing under the heating vent. He stood at least a foot shorter. “You’re back,” he said, lifting his face, “that was a quick meeting.”
I nodded, pursed my lips. “You know how it goes.”
He gave a knowing nod. “Do I.” His eyes traveled to Professor Allman, who stood beside me. “Come to check in on your undergrads, Professor?”
The moment he’d said it, Professor Allman’s face dropped a few degrees.
I ground my teeth at the condescension. Whoever this guy was, I wanted to tell him that Professor Allman was a brilliant biologist, and he had a 4.5 on the website RateMyProfessor—
“Actually, Serena forgot her keycard. I’m swiping her in,” Allman said. He set a daring hand at my back—go Steve!—and guided me toward Serena’s workstation.
As we walked, I glanced at my phone in my purse. I had twenty minutes remaining, and that was if she took the full hour. Given the way that scientist had looked at me after I’d said I cut the “meeting” short, I might not get that full twenty minutes.
“Here we go,” Allman said, swiping his keycard. And with two more chirps, I was in.