Blood Ties (23 page)

“That's unfortunate,” said Sebastian.

Oliver watched the footage of the penguin enclosure from the night before.

“Stupid kids,” Bane muttered with a perfect sigh. “Having their little fun, pretending to have demons and nahualli. What a bunch of maggots. Then they go and mess it up for the rest of us.” He belched lightly, then slurped his coffee.

Oliver glanced at his brother, almost impressed. A trace of the bone-white paint still remained on the side of his neck, below his ear.

I don't know that he was involved,
Oliver reminded himself. It was entirely possible that Bane had put the jaguar away and someone else had come along and used it to commit the murder. But then why was Bane lying and saying he hadn't been there at all? Maybe he figured that if he admitted to Occupying the jaguar at one point in the evening, he'd have to answer a million annoying questions, and he didn't want to deal.

“Police are asking for anyone to come forward who might have information on last night's deadly events,” said Karma.

Oliver thought about mentioning Bane's presence at the zoo. It would be nice to watch him squirm. But Oliver didn't want to be the little brother who tattled. Talk about being a lamb. And Bane would never let him forget such an offense.

“All right,” Phlox announced, turning toward the boys. “Here we are.” She slid two plates onto the island. “This should ease the pain of starting school again.” Each plate held a fluffy Belgian waffle topped with blood-soaked strawberries, dark chocolate shavings, real maple syrup, and a mountain of whipped cream.

“Nice,” said Bane, still innocent.

“Thanks, Mom,” Oliver added. He dug into his waffle.

Moments later, Bane pushed back from the island. “I'm out,” he announced, and headed for the stairs. As he passed, Oliver prepared for the usual punch to the back, or hard slap to the head, but neither came.

“Charles, you can wait for Oliver,” Phlox instructed.

“The lamb is old enough to walk to school on his own already, Mom.” Bane continued right out of the kitchen.

“Charles!” Phlox called after him. Oliver watched her glance at Sebastian, who only raised his eyebrows. In the past, Phlox would not have stood for Bane's disrespect. She'd likely have lunged after him and delivered a tongue lashing, but now she only sighed with resignation. “Well then. Obviously you'll be fine, Oliver. I just like the idea of you two heading to school together like kids, but I suppose that time has passed.”

“It's okay,” said Oliver. He felt in his pocket, where he had Bane's necklace. Amazingly, Oliver felt a sliver of guilt at having it, and had thought about giving it back to Bane on their way to school. Now that opportunity was gone, and Oliver also reminded himself that any sympathetic feeling for Bane was dumb.
If he found something of mine,
Oliver thought,
he'd probably smash it right in front of me.
Besides, Oliver wanted to know what it was for, and Bane would never tell him.

“Good luck with your first night of school,” said Sebastian as he trudged down the hall toward his office.

“Thanks.” Oliver ate slowly, then grabbed his sweatshirt, and, with a heave of his shoulders, headed off to face the inevitable start of another school year.

Far too soon, Oliver found himself walking around to the back of the looming brick school building. Fresh chalk drawings from the humans' first day were being erased from the pavement by a light drizzle.

A gaggle of slightly younger students was entering, so Oliver hung back until he could go in alone. He knocked and Rodrigo, the vampire night janitor, opened the door.

“Welcome back, Mr. Nocturne, sir.”

“Hey, Rodrigo,” said Oliver. He stepped inside and headed up the wide staircase. All the neon, spray-painted grotesqua had been redone for the new year. It covered the humans' happy back-to-school bulletin boards with demonic faces and moving scenes of battle.

Oliver looked back at Rodrigo, who was standing silently by the door. “It looks great,” he said.

Rodrigo looked up with a start. “Oh. Oh, thank you, sir.” Rodrigo did all of the grotesqua himself, changing it faithfully for each new school year and holiday. He nodded at Oliver with a wide grin, and Oliver wondered if he was the first kid to bother complimenting Rodrigo on his artistry.

He walked alone between groups of students who were milling in mellow clusters, saving the usual wall climbing and horseplay for later school nights. Oliver heard mutterings here and there about the jaguar killing.

When he entered his classroom, he found an alarming change. In the past, the boys would have been congregating on one wall of the candle-lit room and the girls on the other. But now, there was a mixed group of boys and girls in a circle on the ceiling, upside down on their knees, the girls giggling and the boys joking all loud.

Oliver saw Theo with Kym leaning on his shoulder. Suzyn, Maggots, and Theo's other friend Jesper were up there, too. Oliver had heard that Theo and Kym had started going out over the summer. Theo even left a warm fox's heart on Kym's sewer doorstep, which was pretty serious. As a result, all the other boys and girls were flirting to keep up. Just now, Maggots mumbled something and punched Suzyn, then pretended not to have done anything.

“Don't … touch me,” Suzyn muttered, scowling and rolling her eyes. Maggots tried to laugh in response, but once no one was looking, his face soured to a disappointed frown.

“There's Nocturne,” Oliver heard Theo murmur to Kym. The group grew quiet, leering down at him in unison. Oliver crossed the room, head down, as whispers rippled above.

“He's such a freak!” Theo suddenly blurted in his three-times-too-loud way. Others in the group snickered.

The other half of the class was scattered around the corners of the room, either alone or in pairs, all trying to look as if they were just fine with what they were doing, and yet every now and then glancing up at the ceiling crowd. Oliver passed Berthold Welch, who was making the world's smallest spray-paint grotesqua design on the wall in the corner.

“Hey, Berthold,” Oliver said. He didn't usually say “Hi” to Berthold, not because Berthold was kind of an outcast—really, he was probably much higher on the popularity ladder than Oliver these days—but just because Oliver didn't usually think to say “Hi” to most people.

“Hey, Oliver,” Berthold squeaked in reply, hunching his shoulders to block Oliver's view of his tiny art.

“Hi, Oliver,” whispered Carly, a lone girl by the windows, as he trudged by. She was looking wistfully out into the night, stroking a tiny white mouse with her thumb. As Oliver passed, he heard a crack and then a light sucking sound as Carly had her breakfast.

He slid into his chair and found Seth already seated beside him, listening to headphones. Oliver saw Seth glance up, and so he offered a little nod. Seth frowned, looked to the ceiling to see if they were being observed, then murmured, “What's up?”

Theo laughed loudly again. Oliver forced himself not to gaze at the ceiling group. He didn't even want to be up there! And yet, it was a struggle to keep from checking to see what they were doing.

“How was the rest of your summer?” Oliver asked Seth. He sort of thought of Seth as a friend. Seth's mom, Francyne, worked for Half-Light as the Central Council liaison, and so she and Phlox had become friends, although Oliver wasn't sure if they'd seen each other all summer. Francyne did have a new baby daughter, but that should have meant that Phlox visited more instead of less.

Seth rolled his eyes and pulled off one of his headphones. “Fine.”

Oliver noted Seth's tone. “Is it still not cool to talk to me?”

Seth's face contorted. “I don't know.” He lowered his voice. “Look, everyone just wants to know what's going on with you Nocturnes.”

“What's that mean?”

“I don't know, like, my mom was talking about how your dad screwed up some big prophecy thing …”

“Oh.” Oliver felt a burst of nerves. “You know about the prophecy?”

“Everybody knows now,” said Seth. “Well, not
them
.” His eyebrows indicated the ceiling. “But they never know anything.” He smiled for a moment, then it faded. “Everybody at Half-Light knows, though.”

“Right … Well, um,” Oliver began, “my dad tried, but in the end, things worked out with the Artifact—”

“Yeah, but then, like, your brother messed things up, too.”

“Well, yeah—”

“And then there's you and your
human
. I mean, it's like, if I had your destiny, I'd be—”

“Not screwing it up?” Oliver finished.

“Pretty much,” Seth agreed.

“Well, it's not that easy,” said Oliver. “I … I'm not
trying
to screw it up.” Oliver stopped there, though, because the truth was that he hadn't tried to screw it up
yet.

“My mom wants to know why another family wasn't chosen for it. I mean, it's an honor, you know.”

“Huh,” Oliver replied. An honor? That was how everyone saw what he thought of as a curse.

“Guh!” Suddenly Maggots crashed to the floor, breaking a desk in two.

“Don't,” Suzyn hissed from the ceiling, “ever try that again.”

The ceiling gang exploded into laughter.

Oliver reclined in his chair, preparing for the endless night, but as his knee scraped against the underside of his desk, he heard a sound like crinkling paper. He sat up and felt beneath the desk, checking in with his senses as he did so. There was a familiar scent, and now he found a note wedged into the bars underneath.

The paper was peach colored with green lines, folded carefully into a rectangle. A long diagonal fold stretched across its front, and a tiny point of paper stuck out from this, with the word “pull” written on it. Oliver did, and unfolded the page. On it was rounded writing in glittery red. Oliver immediately slid the note back beneath the shadow of his desktop, and read:

hey O—sooo bored … tree bark bored … first day back and it's math math math with a side of who cares … but guess what? I bet you already figured it out with your creepy nose—this is my seat this year! my classroom, my seat. well technically it was Melina's seat, but then Ms. Davis suddenly had the urge to switch her with me … I wonder why she had that thought? Tee … hee … w.b.s. super nose. and don't forget about Saturday night …—e

Oliver felt a burst of excitement, but tried to keep it off his face as he concentrated on folding the note carefully back into its rectangle shape before he stuffed it in his pocket. Emalie sat right here? And would every day? Which meant that he would find her scent lingering every night, and possibly a note, or a forgotten item … oh boy.

“Students,” Mr. VanWick barked as he strolled into the room. He glanced at the ceiling and frowned, seeming to immediately understand how his class had changed over the summer. “Untangle yourselves, please, and take your seats. I'll expect you to focus whatever brainpower you can spare on your studies.” The students groaned as they dropped to the floor.

“We have a new textbook for this fall,” Mr. VanWick continued. “Seth and Carly will pass them out.”

“Smelly minions,” Theo chided from his seat. One of the leather-bound textbooks darted across the room and smacked him in the face.

“You can have yours first, Theopolis,” Mr. VanWick commented dryly, to a chorus of hissing chuckles. “Now, books to chapter one, ‘Great Successes in Cannibalism,' and we'll begin.”

Oliver found, as Mr. VanWick began his gravel-toned lecture, that with the note from Emalie fresh in his mind, he had barely any brainpower left for class.

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About the Author

Kevin Emerson once competed in a beauty pageant and lost (probably because he was wearing a suit of armor). He is the author of twelve novels for teen and middle grade readers, including the Atlanteans series, the Exile series, and
The Fellowship for Alien Detection
. He is also a guitarist and drummer in two bands: Northern Allies and the Board of Education. Emerson once appeared in a Swedish television commercial, knows that bow ties are cool, and also knows that Pinkie Pie is the best MLP. He lives with his wife and two young children in Seattle, where the damp, gloomy nights inspired Oliver's story.

All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2008 by Kevin Emerson

Cover design and illustration by Connie Gabbert

ISBN: 978-1-4976-0204-5

This edition published in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.

345 Hudson Street

New York, NY 10014

www.openroadmedia.com