Balthazar (39 page)

Quietly, Balthazar said to Skye, “You can't stay here.”

“I can't leave Mom and Dad,” she insisted, as stubbornly as she always had. “Not after they lost Dakota. It's too cruel, Balthazar.”

“Too cruel,” Charity agreed, in such a singsong tone of voice that Balthazar at first thought she was simply parroting words she'd heard, as she often did. But then she continued, “Crueler if they die because of you.”

That got through to Skye as nothing else had, Balthazar realized. She paled at the thought. Redgrave would have spared her parents because it suited his absurd ideas of his own nobility and fairness; the other vampires descending on the town would have no such qualms.

Craig suggested, “Take them with you.”

“Mom and Dad?” Skye considered this for a moment. “You mean, tell them the truth about all this?”

“Maybe they could handle it?” Britnee said. “I mean, we're kinda catching up?”

Craig nodded, deep in thought. It occurred to Balthazar that, as Skye's ex-boyfriend, Craig probably knew the Tierneys better than anyone else in the room besides Skye herself … and his view of them might be less clouded by guilt and grief. “I know they've been acting weird since Dakota—well, since Dakota,” Craig said. “But this stuff you're dealing with is too big for you to carry alone, Skye.”

Balthazar could imagine it now. Spiriting Skye and her parents somewhere out of the way, an unknown location where they could still lead regular lives. He could make sure they remained safe—perhaps allow himself the luxury of remaining with Skye a while longer before letting her get back to being the normal girl she deserved to be.

At that moment the front door opened. Balthazar went for Charity's blade, now in his own coat, but the new intruders weren't from Redgrave's tribe. They were people he'd never seen before—

“Mom! Dad!” Skye's eyes lit up as she put down her mug and rushed into her parents' arms. “We were just talking about you.”

“Honey, we came as soon as we could,” Mrs. Tierney said. “The bill's up for a vote tonight, but we just said, screw it.”

“Your mother means that we knew we needed to be here.” Mr. Tierney was the one his daughter took after, with the same dark hair and pale eyes. “We need to talk to you about this business with the teacher.”

Said teacher, still sitting on the sofa, now felt acutely embarrassed. Before Balthazar could begin making any kind of explanations or excuses, though, Mrs. Tierney gave them all a big smile. “Well, hello, Craig! Good to see you again. And you've got all your friends over, honey.”

“They're trying to make me feel better,” Skye said, “because all that stuff about the teacher is just Madison Findley's gossip. Ask Principal Zaslow yourself tomorrow.”

Craig grinned, at ease with people he must have known well for years. “Hey, Mr. and Mrs. Tierney. I see you guys still keep hot chocolate on hand for the needy.”

“We try,” Mr. Tierney said. Their jokes seemed a little hollow to Balthazar—as if her parents were trying hard to come across as happy and easygoing, but couldn't quite pull it off. Still, he would try to cut them some slack, now that he saw how comforted Skye was to finally have them near. “Why don't you introduce us to everyone else?”

Skye said, “Well, this is Balthazar. He's … in history with me.” Balthazar hoped he looked much younger with his glasses off. “And that's Craig's new girlfriend, Britnee, and—and that's—um—that's Charity.”

Charity looked cornered; she knew she needed to come across as a perfectly normal teenager, but clearly had no idea how to pull it off. She was casting around for something to say; God alone knew what she would come up with. Before Balthazar could start talking and cover the awkward moment, Charity blurted out, “I love Justin Bieber.”

“Oh, I remember that feeling!” Mrs. Tierney chuckled as she patted Charity fondly on the arm; Balthazar could see his sister resisting the urge to bite. “For me it was Shaun Cassidy. I used to sleep with his LP under my pillow.”

Mr. Tierney said, “As good as it is to see all of you, I think we need to talk with Skye for a while.”

“We're going,” Balthazar said, rising to his feet and taking hold of Charity's arm; her gaze toward Mrs. Tierney had only grown more pointed, and he gave her his best
don't eat the nice people
look. “Skye, I'll talk to you soon.”

“Soon,” she repeated. The night hadn't scarred her; her cheeks were rosy again, and her smile had never been as bright.

Craig and Britnee offered them a ride, but Balthazar refused it. As they drove off, he and Charity walked into the forest; the driving sleet of earlier had turned into light, gentle snow.

“Where will you go?” he said.

“I don't know. I always used to find Redgrave when I didn't know what to do. Now… I'll find out.” Though she still spoke in a childlike tone, Charity made more sense than she had in a long time. Balthazar wondered if—just possibly—Skye's blood had been powerful enough to work a permanent change in his sister. If she remembered enough of her living self, of the girl she'd been before the savage attack that killed them, she might be different from now on. Maybe that was too much to hope for, but for the first time in nearly four hundred years, he dared to dream.

He warned her, “Constantia's still out there. She's going to try to take over.”

“Should we stop her?”

“I think we should avoid her.”

“I don't like her,” Charity said. “She pulls hair.”

“Among other things.” Balthazar realized, with increasing concern, that Constantia was the most likely candidate to become the head of the vampires coming to Darby Glen. And she would be a formidable enemy—one capable of predicting Balthazar's moves, who knew many of his hideouts and habitations as well as he did. One capable of rallying most of Redgrave's tribe to join her instantly. One who already knew Skye's face and would never, ever forget it. Tonight's victory, sweet as it had been, was only the beginning of a longer battle.

Charity gave him a brittle look. “I'm still going to get you back someday.”

“You'll
try
.”

She laughed, as if it were now all one great game between them. Perhaps, from now on, that was what it would be. “You'll see!” Then she ran away from him at full speed, a zephyr of frost in the woods for one split second before she vanished completely.

Balthazar didn't chase her. The truth about whether or not Charity had changed would come only when she chose to find him again.

SKYE KNEW THE DANGER WAS FAR FROM OVER, but she couldn't think about that yet. Right now she just wanted to be where she was—on her living room sofa, between her parents—and who she was—the daughter they had forgotten, remembered at last.

As she took the last swallow of her hot cocoa, she watched her parents, both of whom were checking their phones … which was kind of annoying, but the bill
was
up for a vote tonight. What mattered most was that they'd finally dropped everything to return to her. Between this and seeing Dakota earlier, it was as though she'd gotten her entire family back tonight. Skye couldn't stop smiling.

“Ohhhh-kay,” Mom said, finally putting her phone on the coffee table. “Now, what's up with this teacher?”

“Nothing,” Skye insisted. By now, in her head, “Mr. More, the history teacher” was just a fictional character Balthazar had played; it was as easy to deny this as it would've been to deny that she'd had a hot affair with Harry Potter. The real Balthazar—the one she loved—was someone else entirely. “He never did anything inappropriate. He just let me talk to him about things. About … about Dakota.”

That was the first time she'd spoken his name to her parents since the day after the funeral. Their faces went slightly rigid, as if there was no way any real emotion was going to get to the surface, ever. Seeing that made Skye's heart ache for them, but she wasn't going to pull back, not now. It was time to talk about this. Eventually, when they learned she could still speak to Dakota, they'd be so grateful.

“His sister died when he was about my age,” she said. “So he understood about Dakota. About how—how you try to push the person you lost away, but you can't. You have to hold on to them, on to how much you loved them. Because you don't lose someone when they die. You only lose them when you forget the love you had together.”

There was a moment of silence before her father briskly folded his glasses and tucked them in a case. “It's a relief to hear that nothing problematic is going on,” he said. “We always thought you were far too sensible to get mixed up in anything like that.”

“I told you we should have stayed in Albany,” her mother said to him, and he shrugged, like,
Score one for you
.

And that was it. They hadn't even acknowledged that she'd said anything about Dakota. They were sorry they'd come home for her at all.

“Dad. Mom. Come on.” Skye felt sure she could get through to them. Okay, so it would take a little work. She couldn't expect them to change completely in an instant. “Aren't we ever going to talk about Dakota again?”

Sharply, her mother said, “Nobody's forgotten your brother, Skye. But we all handle things in our own ways. We've tried to respect your grief; you have to respect ours.”

When had they ever tried to respect her grief? When had they ever done anything but expect her to handle this the same way they did—by pushing her brother into the darkness of the past?

Dozens of images from the past year flickered in Skye's mind, illuminated differently than they had been before, and finally in true focus: Her father glancing away from the photos of Dakota in her room—away from Skye herself—until the day she gave up and put them in the drawer, away from sight. How they'd gone about business as usual the afternoon following the funeral, and how Skye had felt bad for crying when they could be so “brave.”

How they'd expected her to care for herself from now on, leaving her alone day and night to bury themselves in work. How she'd accepted that absurdity as something she could do for them. And for a month or two, maybe that wouldn't have been so wrong. They had come home tonight, after all; it wasn't as if they didn't love her. Skye knew perfectly well that they did.

But now—now she realized her parents were so deep in denial that they would never get out.

And they expected her to go on denying her brother's death with them, forever, even though that also meant denying his life.

Skye slowly rose from the couch. Neither of her parents looked up; Mom already had her phone back in hand. She said, “I've had a long day.” Which was putting it lightly. “I'm going to go up to bed.”

Her father gave her a distant sort of smile. “You're a good girl, Skye.”
We're so pleased with you for dropping the subject. See how easy denial can be?
“Sweet dreams.”

Once she was alone in her room again, Skye started work.

She pulled out her largest suitcase, stared at it for a minute, then put it back up and grabbed a pack for long horse trips instead. Into it she tucked only a couple changes of clothing, a few toiletries, and the picture of Dakota and her on their white-water rafting trip.

Then she saw her phone, still sitting where she'd dropped it hours ago. Balthazar's text messages were all hours old by now, but there were several from Clem:
R U there?

OK, I know u r busy but srsly txt me back. I'm freaking here
.

Skye?

Quickly Skye sent a few words back:
I'm safe—but barely. Will tell u the rest l8r
. She paused before adding,
Luv u
. That was kind of sappy for her and Clementine, but tonight Skye felt like she'd rather say too much than not enough. Like Dakota had told her, you could never say those words too often.

She glanced around her room, saw an equestrian trophy, and snapped a photo of it with her phone before tucking the phone into her coat pocket. At least that way she could still look at it.

Then she stood at her bedroom window, knowing that the light would silhouette her to anyone watching from the darkness.

To Balthazar.

Skye turned off the lights and waited. Within a few moments, she heard scraping on the bark of the tree outside, which made her breath come a little faster just in case it wasn't—but it was. Balthazar appeared outside her window, clinging to the tree branch with unearthly grace, and she slid the pane upward to allow him to climb in.

He whispered, “Downstairs, the lights are still on.”

“They're probably talking with their cronies at the state house, finding out how the vote is going.” Skye didn't bother to whisper. Even if they could hear, they weren't listening. “Balthazar, you were right. I have to leave Darby Glen.”

He studied her for a moment, no doubt weighing how serious she was about this. She knew that he understood her; he would see right away that she meant it. But he asked, “Your parents didn't believe you?”