by Cara Wylde
“What do you want?”
Interesting, but his hair was so dark that it seemed like the light bounced right off of it. His emerald green eyes were fixed on me, and his brows were slightly furrowed. Now what?! Why can’t the Mighty Jerks just give me a motherfucking break? He shrugged and sat down in GC’s place.
“Did you sleep with him last night? Because he saved you?”
“What the hell, Paz? No! And, anyway, even if I did, it’s none of your business.”
“I’m sorry about what happened. I had no idea. Francis and I… we saw you jump, we went closer to the edge to watch you swim to the surface, and it just never happened. We didn’t see Lorna come out of the trees. Sariel didn’t say a thing. We didn’t even know she was there. We were waiting for you, you were taking forever, and then GC came out of nowhere, fucking jumped off the cliff and shifted in the air, right before he hit the water.”
“Mhm. And you want me to believe you.”
“It’s the truth.”
“Sure.”
He leaned over the table, his hands so close to mine that I instinctively pulled away.
“I swear to God, Mila. It’s true.”
I cocked an eyebrow. “I don’t know, Paz, maybe if you swore to Satan, who’s actually your father… Swearing on your enemy’s name doesn’t strike me as…”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake! Mila, God and Satan aren’t enemies. You know so little about our world.”
“Well, it is my world, too, so get used to it. You guys wanted to get rid of me last night. Didn’t happen. I’m not going anywhere. So, go on. Do your worst. Try to kill me again. I’ll survive.”
“I didn’t…” He clenched his jaw, pursed his lips, and tried again. “You have to believe me, Mila. I had no idea what was happening. I thought… I thought you were taking longer to come up, I thought you… maybe you’d lied and didn’t actually know how to swim. I was getting ready to jump after you.”
“Were you?” I hoped the sarcasm in my voice was evident.
“Yes! Of course! God, I don’t want you to die, Mila.”
“Okay, stop saying my name like that. It’s disconcerting.” Normally, I would have liked it. He’d been the first of the Mighty Jerk Cabal to call me by my name, and it had had an effect on me then. But now I knew better. “Since I came here, you made fun of me, you never stopped Sariel from doing his worst, you cheered him on, actually. You told me to my face that you wanted to fuck me to get back at Pandora. And now that I’m with GC, what? What do you want from me?”
“I don’t want anything from you,” he said in a quiet voice. “I just…” he ran his hand through his raven-black hair, and that threw me aback a little. If I didn’t know better, I’d think he was truly distressed. “I just wanted to tell you something.”
“Okay, what?”
“I broke up with Pandora. Just now. Fuck our engagement. It was a sham anyway. I broke it.”
I took in a big breath and released it slowly. What was this supposed to mean? Why was he telling me this? What did I care if he was engaged or not?
“Good for you,” I said, finally. “Whatever you think is best.”
“I just wanted you to know.”
I shrugged. “Why? It doesn’t concern me.”
“But it does.” He leaned in closer, almost climbing on top of the table, and took my hand into his. I was so surprised, I didn’t react right away. “Mila, I’ve been thinking about you. I can’t stop thinking about you.”
“I don’t…”
“I broke up with her because…”
“Stop.” I got a hold of myself and pulled my hand free. “I’m not stupid. I don’t know where this is coming from, or what sort of fresh prank it is, but I know one thing. You wanted to fuck me to get back at Pandora. Maybe you still do. Maybe you didn’t break up with her at all, and you’re just trying to play me. As if you could…” I huffed. “Look, Paz, I’m going to tell you something, and please convey it to Sariel and Francis, too, okay? I’m not scared of you. Whatever you have planned, it won’t work.”
“Mila, you don’t know what you’re talking about.” His eyes turned a shade darker, and I could almost see his anger bubbling toward the surface. “I’m trying to tell you something, and you’re not listening. Why won’t you just shut up and listen? You have no idea what you’re doing to me…”
“I’m not doing anything to you.” I sprung to my feet. His eyes were starting to turn from dark green to red. For some reason, I’d enraged him, and the last thing I wanted was to be so close to an enraged demon. “And I don’t have to listen to you. You stood there and watched as I was drowning. And don’t give me that bullshit how you didn’t know what Lorna was doing, how you didn’t even know she was there. You stood there and watched.”
“Mila…”
“Go! You shouldn’t be here, you shouldn’t be talking to me. We have nothing to say to each other. Just leave me alone!”
“Is he bothering you?” GC dropped the pack of cards on the table, between me and Paz, and crossed his arms over his chest. “Yeah, he is. Dude, she asked you to go. So, what are you waiting for? Do you want me to make you?”
Pazuzu’s eyes were completely red now. He stood up and stepped so close to GC that their chests almost touched.
“You can’t make me.”
“You wanna bet on that?”
I held my breath. The whole courtyard was looking at us. Luckily, the RDC and the VDC were too busy with their game, so at least they hadn’t noticed the two guys having a pissing contest over… me. Over me? How the fuck did that happen?
Paz narrowed his eyes at GC, then threw a quick glance my way. He must have seen something on my face, something even I wasn’t aware of, because he backed off and walked away, not before whispering something to the false god.
“What did he say to you?” I asked GC when Paz disappeared inside the building.
“It doesn’t matter. It was a lie, anyway.”
We sat down at the table, but I was too rattled to play anything. For the next hour, he showed me card tricks to calm me down. And it worked.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Anatomy of Souls had to be my favorite class! It was the first day we were actually going to practice what we’d learned just in theory: how to detach a soul from the body. Of course, we weren’t going to do it for real, so instead of practicing with our scythes, Mr. Lesage gave us sticks. Normal, plain sticks that hadn’t even been cleaned of the bark. He was now matching us into pairs, and once he was done with that, we’d have to face our partner, focus on his or her aura until we saw it flowing around the physical body, then identify the exact place where we had to strike to separate the aura from matter. As we’d learned in PE, too, the soul wasn’t inside a person’s body. It was all around it, its range couldn’t actually be measured, and some experts even said it was so expansive that it could as well cover dozens of square meters around the body it was connected to. We, Grim Reapers, could see only a small part of it – the aura.
The theory said that the part of the soul that was closer to the physical body was denser than the rest, and it glowed in various colors, depending on how the soul felt. If it was a soul in pain, the aura would be a muddy green or a rotten yellow. If the soul was joyful, the aura would be colored light green, light blue, or even pink. All light nuances of any color usually meant joy, love, peace. Red was lust. When would a Grim Reaper have to deal with a red aura? Well, I suppose when someone had a heart attack while having sex. What a way to go…
“Mila and Francis, you’re together.”
What?! I looked at GC across the room, and he mouthed “I’m sorry.” He was supposed to make sure we’d be paired, but apparently, Mr. Lesage had ignored him. My fingers squeezed the stick. There was no way we could do any damage to someone’s aura with a stick, but I was sure as hell that if I tried hard enough, I could make Francis feel my strike. He came to stand in front of me. He didn’t say a word. Paz
had, at least, spoken to me after what had happened on Mabon. It hadn’t gone great, but he hadn’t pretended like I didn’t exist, and I could appreciate that. Francis, though… Ugh! He’d been such an ass! Weeks had passed, and he hadn’t come to the Holy Chapel once. I didn’t go as often because I had a boyfriend now, but I did go twice a week. After the incident, I’d wanted to confront him. I’d thought that if we were alone, if no one was around to watch our every move, then maybe Francis would have something to say to me. Paz had told me they had both been unaware of Lorna. Well, I wanted to hear it from Francis. Because, maybe, there was a better chance I’d actually believe Francis.
“Hey,” I said. He simply nodded but didn’t greet me back. What a douche! And I’d been really looking forward to this class. It would’ve been so much better if I’d been paired with GC or Klaus. Oh well. I’d have to make the best of it. I wasn’t going to let stupid Francis distract me. I’d worked extra hard in PE with my scythe, had learned how to swing it gracefully, and now I kind of wanted to impress Professor Lesage. I was hoping for some worth points, but if I were to be honest, I was also hoping for a smile and a pat on the back. Alain Lesage was somewhat of a silver fox. Tall, well-built, with a smile to die for, he was an incubus, and, oh my God, you could tell! All female students were in love with him, and even if I’d never admit it out loud, he’d stolen my heart, too. I mean, it wasn’t like that. I didn’t dream about him, or anything. In fact, once I was out of his class, I usually forgot all about him and went on with my life. He had that effect on women… Every time I saw him, every time I was in the same room as him, I’d get all swoony and girly. The second he was out of sight, I’d get back to normal and remember I already had the best boyfriend a girl could wish for. Maybe it was just the effect incubi had on people.
“Alright, class, let’s begin. For the time being, forget about the stick, and focus on your breath. Center yourselves, take a couple of deep belly breaths, release them, and when you’re ready, look at your partner. You know how to do this, we’ve practiced many times. Don’t look at them directly, but allow your eyes to unfocus and see the glow around their body.”
I followed his instructions diligently. If Francis didn’t want to speak to me, then maybe it was for the best. I could ignore that he was who he was, see him as just some random classmate, and enjoy my first practice on an actual aura. Little by little, I relaxed. The tension left my shoulders and arms when I changed my perspective on Francis. I was now holding the stick lightly, and my desire to hurt him had flown out the window. He wasn’t worth it. All I wanted was to do well today and earn myself some worth points. In the past couple of weeks, I’d risen through the ranks, and I couldn’t lie that my relationship with GC had something to do with it. The others weren’t bullying me as much, which meant they didn’t get me in trouble.
I let my eyes unfocus, so they could perceive the glow around Francis’s body. Slowly, his aura came into view, phasing in and out for a few seconds, then materializing around him, solidifying even, until I could see its color. I gasped involuntarily and took a step back. Francis’s aura was a mix of brown, yellow, and muddy green. It looked like… like… I didn’t even know what to compare it to! A swamp! It had that mix of colors and shades specific to a smelly swamp crawling with all kinds of disgusting animals and critters. I bit the inside of my cheek. What did it mean? That shade of green meant pain. But what about the others? Was Francis in pain? Oh my God, did his aura look like this all the time? Was he in pain all the time? And that brown… Should I ask Mr. Lesage what brown means in an aura? No. He’ll know why I’m asking…
“Are you okay?” I asked Francis. It was the only sensible thing that came to my mind.
He smiled forcefully. “Yes, of course.”
“I’m sorry, I just…” I sighed. It was obvious he didn’t want to talk to me about it. “I suck at this.”
“No, you don’t. Your aura is beautiful.” His smile turned genuine for a moment. “It has shades of pink and purple, and there are these tiny iridescent lights peppered all over it. It’s like it’s constantly moving and changing, flowing from light pink to light purple. Are you feeling joy right now?”
I cocked an eyebrow. “Not particularly. I guess I’m just relaxed.”
He nodded. “It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”
I blushed. And there goes my taste for revenge. I just can’t stay mad at this guy. He’d just complimented my aura, of all things!
“Err… do you want me to describe yours?”
There was that bitter, forced smile again. It hit me right in the heart.
“No. I know what my aura looks like.”
“You do…?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
Fair enough. Maybe I wouldn’t want to talk about it either, if my aura looked like a deadly swamp. But I couldn’t dwell on it now. I had some worth points to score. Francis’s demons were Francis’s demons. We weren’t even friends. I had been sorted into the Violent Death Cabal for a reason. I had no time to feel sadness or compassion.
I identified the place in his aura that connected his life energy to his physical body. The string, as we called it, was around his neck, coiled like a heavy necklace, as if clinging to him, as if someone had tried to sever it at least a dozen times, and each time, the string had become stronger and more stubborn, forming another coil, and another coil. Francis’s soul was holding onto him tightly. Or, it might as well have been the other way around. His body was holding onto his soul so desperately, that it had forced the string to grow in both length and thickness. This has to be the weirdest string I’ve ever seen. We’d practiced seeing other people’s auras in Anatomy of Souls before, but I’d usually been paired with someone from the Neutral Death Cabal or the Merciful Death Cabal. I even worked with Klaus twice. His string of life looked absolutely normal – a thin, gracious line floating around the crown of his head. I wondered what mine looked like. At the beginning of the year, Mr. Lesage had told us we shouldn’t tell our partner what his aura and string looked like. Sometimes, with the right knowledge and information, such a description could be used to predict that person’s time of death. And that certainly was something no one wanted to know. Ever.
Francis had just described my aura. He didn’t care much about the rules. I could have asked him to tell me where my string was and how it looked, and he would have probably told me. But what if it wasn’t a good idea? What if Professor Lesage was right, and I already knew too much?
“I’m going to use my stick, okay?” Francis’s voice snapped me out of my reverie.
“Yes, sure.”
He was supposed to use the stick to slash lightly at the string that connected my soul to my body, and I’d be able to feel it. The point was not to sever it, but to touch it and pull at it. A lot of finesse was involved. For one, even if one could see the string of life, that didn’t mean one could get it on first try. And that was what we were supposed to learn in PE and Anatomy of Souls. How to see the aura, see the string, then strike just right, just where we were supposed to strike, so we’d separate the soul from the body in one clean, painless cut. And no, the fact that I was a Violent Death and not a Merciful one, had nothing to do with it. It didn’t mean that I’d give my victims a violent death. It only meant that I was strong enough, physically and mentally, to take on those jobs that meant I’d have to reap souls that had gotten themselves into a violent situation right before their time had come. I was strong and sane enough to go reaping where wars raged, where mobsters did their dirty jobs in back alleys, where serial killers finished off their victims. I was a Violent Death because I could witness violence and still do my job with grace and dedication.
I wasn’t looking forward to my first job.
Francis swung his stick and… missed. At least, he must have missed, because I didn’t feel a thing. He couldn’t hurt me, but if he slashed at my string of life, I should have felt a tug.
�
��I’ll try again.”
“No. It’s my turn now.”
He furrowed his brows slightly but didn’t contradict me. That’s right, buddy. It’s not all about you.
I straightened my back and placed my feet firmly on the floor, making sure my balance was just right. His string of life was glowing eerily around his neck, waving and trembling in constant, subtle movement. That meant I had to strike right through his neck, but not his actual, physical neck. My aim was the aura field in front of his neck. Or to the side of his neck – that could also be an option. After identifying the position, length, and thickness of the string of life, it was important to figure out the best angle, the angle that would give immediate results.
I swung my stick back, then went for it. My calculations were perfect, the distance was right. The tip of the stick caught the string of life, pulled it downwards, then released it. The string bounced back and returned to its previous position.
“Ouch! That hurt.”
“Sorry. You really felt it?”
“Yes. You got a nice swing going there.”
I giggled. “I’ve been practicing. So, how did it feel?”
He thought for a second. “Like you’d grabbed a part of me, an invisible part of me, and pulled at it, trying to separate it from the rest of me.”
“Wow!” I shuddered, suddenly not looking forward to Francis trying again and doing it right.
“Bravo, Miss Lazarov! Bravo! If you’d had your scythe right now, that would’ve been a clean, painless cut.” Mr. Lesage clapped enthusiastically, drawing everyone’s attention to me. GC gave me the thumbs up. “Thirty worth points!”
“Thank you.” I was beaming. Professor Lesage gave me one of his best smiles, then moved on to correct Sheba’s posture. I turned back to Francis. “Come on. Do it right this time.”
We practiced like this for another thirty minutes, then Mr. Lesage gave us additional tips and tricks and sent us on our way. Francis got a perfect strike a couple of times, and I felt what he’d described. It was fascinating, because after each simulated cut, I felt more alive. It was as if my string of life grew stronger, and my desire to enjoy every minute on this Earth increased. Talk about a certain cure for depression…