Ascendant (10 page)

“You know, he’s practically living at the studio these days. You’d probably have a better chance of getting in touch with him on his cell phone.”

“Oh,” I said. Giovanni had a cell phone?

“You take care! Bye now.” Steve hung up before I could ask for the cell phone number. Which I didn’t want to do, because that would mean admitting that my boyfriend had a phone I didn’t know about.

Why wouldn’t Giovanni have told me about his cell phone? Would it mess with his calling plan? Maybe I couldn’t make international calls to his cell without racking up some sort of ridiculous charge.

Or maybe he didn’t want me crying to him all day and night about how much my life sucked. Maybe he was living it up back in New York City, and thoughts of me were a downer.

No, that wasn’t fair. After all, his roommates seemed to know who I was. They’d called me his girlfriend.

Though they’d also called me a nun, which wasn’t entirely accurate.

I reached up to replace the phone on the desk, then buried my face against my knees. Back in America, my mother was turning into a TV star and my boyfriend was fulfilling his artistic dreams. Here in Italy, I was a high school dropout, a fake nun who weekly risked her life in battles against poisonous monsters.

What if, last spring, I’d done what all my friends at school thought I should? What if I’d done what my ex-boyfriend Brandt had wanted me to do? What if I’d slept with him? I’d never have been a unicorn hunter. I’d still be in school, still candy-striping at the hospital, still the youngest girl in AP chemistry, still applying for college science scholarships, still imagining becoming a doctor.

It wouldn’t have been just me, either. If I hadn’t been a hunter that night in the woods, Brandt and I would never have been attacked by that zhi. Brandt would never have taken my mom’s only dose of the Remedy. Maybe he wouldn’t have run away from home as the publicity of being the only known survivor of a unicorn attack started to weigh on him. Brandt wasn’t my favorite person in the world—what with publicly dumping and humiliating me in the lunchroom after I’d saved him from a “rabid goat”—but he’d been a nice enough guy while we were dating. He’d been a champion swimmer, likely to get a college scholarship. And who knew what he was doing now?

Then there was Phil. If I hadn’t come to the Cloisters, there’d be no way she’d have followed me here. If I hadn’t come, she’d be back in college, kicking butt on the volleyball court. She’d have never met Seth. She’d never have been raped.

I’d have never met Cory or the other hunters; I’d never have met Giovanni. But then, I’d never be here. I’d never have understood magic or know what it felt like to kill. I’d never be scarred. I’d never be alone in a convent, hiding under a desk, terrified of what the next hunt would bring.

“T
his is a rather bad time for a trip.” Neil’s voice drifted into my brain.

“Any time is a bad time for a unicorn attack,” Phil replied. “But the fact that there was a survivor? That it was a teenage girl? That says ‘hunter’ to me, and so do some of the other details in the report. One of us needs to investigate this, and bring her here if we can.”

I blinked my eyes and lifted my head, neck muscles protesting. Somehow, I’d managed to cry myself to sleep beneath Neil’s desk.

“I already have a responsibility to Cory,” Neil said. “I
must
get her away from here.”

I began to crawl out, intending to alert them to my presence, but Phil’s next words stopped me cold.

“Oh, sure. Run away again, just like last time. Whenever things start to get hard—is that your MO?”

I froze and retreated.

“Not
hard”
Neil said softly. “Confusing.”

Phil was silent. I imagined them staring at each other. “Admit it,” she said at last, her voice harsh. “Cory is an excuse.”

“She needs my protection.”

“Protection?” Phil repeated. “You’re not a hunter. They’re the only ones that can protect her. Or
this—”
“Put that back on!” Neil ordered.

“You put it on!” Phil ordered back. “Stop acting like a martyr for me!”

There was a thunk, and the don’s ring fell on the floor, rolled a few inches, and stopped. I could see it, shining red and gold, in the gap between the bottom of the desk and the floor.

“I’m not playing games with you, Pippa,” said Neil. “You put that ring on this second or …”

“Or what?” I could almost see Phil staring him down. “We keep Bonegrinder chained. We have to, with two dons around and only one ring.”

“Bonegrinder isn’t the only unicorn on Earth. And with the number of hunters we have here, we’re in the epicenter of a storm. You’re in danger.”

“You’re
in danger every single day we’re both here. Don’t you think I know that? Don’t you think it weighs on me whenever I see that ring on my hand?”

“Which is why it would be better for me to leave.”

“But not the only reason, huh?”

I clapped my hands over my mouth.

Above me, everything was silent for several long moments, but the blood in my ears roared. Had they heard me?

“No,” said Neil at last. “Not the only reason. Are you happy now?”

“Of course not.”

“Then what was the point of forcing a confession?”

“So that we can talk about it!” There was a thump on the desk above my head. I curled into an even tighter ball, unsure whether to announce my presence now or try to will myself into deafness. I should
not
be hearing this. “So we can maybe
do
something about it.” Another thump.

Come out? Stay hidden? Rip my ears off with my bare hands?

“There is nothing to be done,” said Neil. “I’m going back to London. It will all be forgotten.”

“Why?” Phil asked, and for the first time, I heard the hurt in her tone.

“You know why.” And the hurt in his. Heck, even I knew why. There was, for starters, the age difference.

“I’m not a child,” said Phil. “I’m in college. You’re barely out of it.”

There was the fact that when she’d first come here, she’d been under his guardianship.

“I’m not a hunter anymore,” said Phil. “I’m a don, just like you.”

And, worst of all, there was Phil’s all-too-recent experiences. “What’s
really
bothering you?” More of an accusation than a question.

I squeezed my eyes shut. Some things I should never, ever hear.

“I’m sorry!” I shouted from beneath the desk. I scurried out and stood, taking in their astonishment and humiliation. “Astrid!” Phil gasped. “I’m sorry,” I repeated. “I’m sorry! I—”

“Good Lord.” Neil’s expression was stricken. He turned and beelined for the door.

Phil didn’t even watch him go. She stared at me, eyes wide, chest heaving. “Astrid.
What
were you
doing
under the
desk!”

I hung my head. “Sleeping?”

“What were you doing
sleeping
under the desk!” she cried again, her tone even more exasperated. “Why were you sneaking around? Why were you—” She dug her fists into her eyes. “Why were you in our office?”

“I
am
sorry,” I parroted. “I had no idea. I would never try to spy on you—”

“It doesn’t matter,” she said, hands still covering her face. “It doesn’t matter.”

“What’s going on with you two?”

I instantly regretted asking. She fixed me with a glare that would make a kirin quake in fear—hunter powers or no. “I’m sure you eavesdropped enough to hear the answer to that.
Absolutely nothing.”

“I can’t apologize any more than I already have, Phil,” I said, coming close to her. I reached for her hand. “I wish I’d just stayed down there.”

“What, to hear more?”

“No! So I wouldn’t have embarrassed you. Or interrupted you,” I added. Because it sounded as if they were about to hit some sort of breakthrough.

“How thoughtful of you,” Phil drawled, and pulled away. “Just … don’t tell anyone about this, okay? Especially not Cory.”

No worries there. Half the Order suspected it, anyway. I’d always thought their relationship was inappropriately flirtatious, but I never figured there was anything more to it—especially on Neil’s behalf—until the night Phil was attacked by Seth.

Then, of course, we’d all had far more important things to deal with than who had a crush on whom. And now, well, I suppose we still did, but that didn’t mean it didn’t matter. “But Phil,” I said. “If you care about each other—” Phil slammed her hand down on the desk and snorted. “My God, Astrid, you’re such a child.” She shook her head, tendrils of her blond hair falling into her face. “Please leave.”

So I did.

I didn’t go down to dinner. I was way too embarrassed. I hid in my room, cuddled up tight with Bonegrinder, my face buried in fur that smelled of flood and fire. And a bit like pepperoni.

My stomach growled.

“There you are,” said Cory. I took in her form, crutches and all, highlighted in the hall, and curled even more tightly toward Bonegrinder and the wall. “We missed you at dinner.”

I doubted that.

She came into the room then stopped dead. “I didn’t realize she was here.”

Bonegrinder and I both sat up. “Seriously?” I asked.

Cory tossed a package wrapped in napkins at me then plopped down on her bed. “Rub it in, why don’t you?”

Bonegrinder nosed at the napkins, but I yanked them away from her and pulled out a sandwich.

“Sorry,” I said between bites. “I just don’t get it.” Bonegrinder blinked at Cory. Inside her head, her thoughts were mild, adoring, and certainly of the I-heart-unicorn-hunters variety. There was none of the latent bloodlust I usually sensed whenever she was around Phil or Neil or even Father Guillermo. And yet, unlike all the other hunters, Cory couldn’t feel Bonegrinder’s presence, or sense her thoughts.

“Well, that makes all of us.” She looked around our shared room. “Will you miss me?”

Since her injuries, Cory had mostly chosen to sleep in the don’s quarters rather than brave the treacherous spiral staircase up into the dorm. We’d already packed most of her things in preparation for her trip back to England.

“Are you kidding?” I replied. “All I ever wanted was a single.”

Cory chuckled. “Don’t get too used to it. We’ll be getting more hunters soon.”

I wasn’t so sure about that. Neil had returned from his last few recruitment trips empty-handed. It was difficult to convince teenage girls or their parents that their best course of action to protect themselves from the threat of killer unicorns in their neighborhoods was to send the girls off to a convent with a gorgeous twenty-something British man and stick a bow and arrows in their hands.

The fact that my mom had been all over the plan might, in fact, be proof of her mental state.

Besides, Neil was crying off the newest recruitment trip to babysit Cory.

As reports of unicorn attacks spread, even fewer eligible hunters were willing to risk putting themselves in the line of fire. Even those hunters who hadn’t yet experienced the phenomenon of attracting unicorns had heard of incidents on the news. Unicorns left few survivors, and it didn’t surprise me that many eligible hunters would choose to isolate themselves rather than risk joining the Order and confronting the animals head—or horn—on. My mother wasn’t the only one who preferred that the concept of unicorn hunting remained in the abstract … and far in the distance.

Some eligible hunters had informed us they were moving away to isolated islands or into the depths of cities too developed or crowded to support unicorns. One family had even split up its daughters and sent them to separate cities, lest their combined attractive powers made unicorns risk traveling into urban areas, the way the Cloisters, with its concentrated population of hunters, had drawn unicorns from far and wide into Rome.

Bonegrinder’s thoughts turned menacing, and she’d started to growl even before I heard the light tapping on the door. I slipped my hand through her collar and looked up.

Neil stood on the threshold. “Good evening, Astrid,” he said, flashing the don’s ring at Bonegrinder until she settled. “Have a moment?”

I stared into my lap. “I guess.”

Cory flipped on the light as Neil came inside and shut the door behind him.

“I need to ask a favor of you,” he said, commandeering Cory’s desk chair. I still couldn’t look him in the face. “I had planned to accompany Cory back to England, but now it seems that I have other … commitments.”

And now I raised my eyes to meet his. “What?”

He swallowed. “I’m going to the United States to investigate the survivor of a recent unicorn attack. We have reason to believe she might be a hunter, though her family history is unknown.”

It was nothing new. Ilesha was also a hunter of unknown provenance. We’d found her when it had been discovered she was keeping a zhi as a pet.

“What about Cory’s
protection?”
I asked.