Conspiracy Boy (Angel Academy) (15 page)

“You okay?” I heard Alec ask when Luc flopped onto the couch downstairs. “Hey, did I just hear Amelie say—”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

Alec chuckled, clearly amused. “I know the feeling.”

While the TV blared to life, I slammed the pillow down over my face. The whole night had shaken me. I couldn’t even tell which event won the award for most disturbing—the portal-jumping business in my closet, the interdimensional hell tour, or Luc Montaigne’s tongue down my throat. And that assumed the dream I’d just had wasn’t real. Because if it was, my disturb-o-meter was about to go ballistic.

“Ami?” Lisa’s steps echoed on the staircase as I peeled the shirt scraps off my chest. “Wow, nice.”

“It’s not what it looks like,” I said.

She grinned, dumping a load of laundry onto the bed. “Nightmare?”

“Okay, maybe it is.”

“Here.” She tossed me a T-shirt. “It may be a little tight, but given your options, I’m thinking the locals might find this less distracting. Now, tell me about your dream.”

I pulled on the shirt, trying to look regal. Not easy in a too-small baby tee with a glittery kitten on it. If there was any truth to the dream, then I didn’t want to tell her about it. Maybe she was all nicey-nice now, but I had no idea how long it would last. And I still didn’t know what the dream meant, so it was probably safer to just keep it quiet.

“Got any jeans?” I asked.

She flicked a pair of denims at my face. “They’ll be more like capris on you, but whatever. Beggars can’t be choosers.”

I pulled on the jeans and buckled them before stripping off my skirt. It wasn’t like she hadn’t seen me change clothes before. After three and a half years of combat class and about a gazillion slumber parties, there wasn’t much we hadn’t shared. But it felt weird being exposed in front of her now, knowing what she was. And what she’d done.

“You’re welcome, by the way,” she said, sinking onto the foot of the bed. “So, are you going to tell me which one?”

I frowned. “Which one?”

“Which dream.” She paused to fold a few washcloths and pile them in squares on the coverlet. “Was Mom there?”

I must have reacted, because she sat up straighter.

“Intense, right?” She smiled. “Kind of makes you think about Dominic and Petra differently, huh?”

“It’s probably not even true.”

“Of course it is.” Lisa looked up from the dishtowel she was folding. “Parts of it, anyway. Dominic told me some, though his memory’s patchy. Petra filled in the gaps.”

I frowned. “What was she doing at a Council meeting, anyway? And what about Mom?”

“Before Petra defected with Dominic, she was a Guardian assassin, so the Council used to bring her in for interrogations and whatnot. That’s why she’s got the Elders’ mark.” Lisa made a quick scrawly motion over her wrist at the spot where Petra’s glyph mark had been.

“So Petra’s an Elder?”

“Not really. I mean, she’s old, yeah. But more like the Elders’ attack dog,” Lisa said. “After she took Dominic that night, she became one of their most wanted. There’s been a price on her head since before we were born.”

It wasn’t that the news struck me as especially odd, that a political group might have employed a semi-Immortal, quasi-evil assassin. But the idea that the
Guardians
would have tried to use one to annihilate an entire species seemed wrong in so many ways, I couldn’t begin to count.

“So that was all true? The Elders wanted to murder Luc’s family?”

Before I could start messing with the clump of unfolded laundry I’d grabbed, Lisa yanked a few pairs of Alec’s boxers off the top.

“I’ll do those. And no, not Luc’s family. All the Immortals,” she said. “For the longest time, we thought they were like vampires—you know, humans that had been demon infected. Once the Peace Tenets were proposed—which Luc’s grandfather played a big role in, by the way—it came out that Immortals weren’t like other Inferni. They actually have angelblood in their veins. Which means they’ve been around at least as long as we have and could probably channel just as much Crossworlds power if they ever decided to turn on us.”

“You’re lying.”

“Nope. Creepy, huh?”

Beyond creepy, actually. I couldn’t speak.

“Anyway, the huge cluster mess didn’t start until the Council of Elders found out about Dominic’s Society for Unaffiliated Crossworlders. He started that with the idea that every Inferni should be able to defend him or herself against demonkind so they wouldn’t be so dependent on the Guardians.”

“So he was trying to help us.”

“Sort of,” she said. “More like he thought we were idiots who would eventually get ourselves killed off and figured he should start prepping for that. Anyway, the Council found out and assumed Dominic was training an army. They sent Mom and Robert to bring him in.”

“So they could torture him?”

“Well, Mom and Robert didn’t know that. High Elder Speakman and Elder Akira had that as a private agenda. Horowitz found out about it and tapped Mom and Petra for the countermission to save Luc and Dominic.” She piled another stack of folded laundry to the side and started on the shirts. “And don’t worry. I killed Speakman years ago. He was a jerk.”

“You killed him because he was a jerk?”

“No, because he was Gabriel’s bloodline.”

Right. That explained everything.

“It’s possible I may be missing some subtleties here,” I noted. “How do you and I figure into all this?”

“Ami,
I
don’t figure into anything anymore.” Lisa’s eyebrows drew together. “I wasn’t kidding before. Alec and I are
out
. Done. Retired.”

“From demon fighting?”

“From
everything
. Demons, prophecies, bloodthirsty Elders—you name it. We’re not interested in it.” Lisa snatched up another pair of Alec’s boxer briefs. “Every day, I have to find reasons not to hate myself for what I did last fall. Ami, I may sound like I’m over it, but I’m not. I cry every day. I pray every hour. Seriously, it almost destroyed me. The
only
reason I’m even bothering with this now is because of you.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you.” She rolled the underpants into a Tootsie Roll–shaped tube and stacked them in a corner of the bed. “And don’t give me that look. I know what the Elders are saying, and I know Dane must have talked to you. Despite everything it cost us, Alec and I failed. The prophecy didn’t get fulfilled.”

“But you killed Jack,” I argued.

“Yeah, I did.”

“And he’s the last Gabrielite.”

“That
was
the rumor.”

“So? Maybe the prophecy was wrong. Maybe there’s no ‘end to the Guardian’s burden’ or whatever.” I’d been fiddling with one of Alec’s gym socks, which Lisa now matched to its pair.

“Oh, there’s an end. The prophecy wasn’t wrong,” she said, “but it’s possible
we
were.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning that if Immortals are angelblood, too, there’s a chance another Gabrielite could exist. We just wouldn’t know because whoever it is isn’t a Guardian.”

A soft streak of nerves shot through my chest. The Great Books detailed all the Guardian bloodlines, which was how Lisa and Alec had gotten their original kill list—back when Thibault had recruited them to hunt down all the Gabrielites. Jack was the last of the Gabrielite warriors, which, in theory, meant the prophecy should have been done when he died. But that hadn’t happened.

“You’re saying you think there’s an Immortal out there somewhere who needs to die before the prophecy gets triggered?”

“I’m not saying I think that,” she told me. “I’m saying there
is
. And I’m saying unless you figure out who it is pronto and go spill some major blood, we’re all pretty much demon toast.”

I nodded. Really, nodding seemed about the only thing to do at that moment, given the immense gravitas of what she’d just said.

“I’m not going to prom this year, am I?” I asked.

She smiled. “Never say never.”

Chapter Fourteen:

The Road to Nowhere

It didn’t take long to finish the laundry and eat breakfast. Oh, and breakfast? Not just for mortals anymore. Luc’s first major foray into starchy, sweet foods proved rather shocking, since he put away—I’m not kidding—over a dozen pancakes. And not the little ones, either. Decent-sized things with a circumference bigger than my outstretched hand. With syrup. And bacon.
Really
undercooked bacon.

“You done?” I asked once the second batch had been cleared and he was mopping up a glob of butter with his last squirmy bacon strip.

He frowned but said nothing. Not that he
could
speak anyway with four pounds of pancakes in his mouth.

The bus station—if you could call it that—huddled in disappointing ambiguity. More like a kiosk at the gas station lunch counter than an actual purveyor of transportation. Once we got there, Lisa waited until the boys got out of Alec’s car before she pulled me aside.

“Ami,” she whispered, “not to sound like a broken record, but you need to get on this soon. Petra says the cracks between the worlds are widening. We won’t be able to hold our boundary much longer.”

“You think we’re holding it now?”

“Touché,” she said. “Also, there’s something going on inside the Guardian Council. Horowitz didn’t say what it was, but I think Arianna’s involved.”

“Yeah, okay.”

Honestly, I was too distracted by the spectacle in front of me to listen. Children stopped sucking their thumbs to stare at Alec and Luc. Women dropped their wallets. Even a few dudes started adjusting their baseball caps.

“Are you watching this?” I asked her. “It’s hilarious.”

“Humans are funny,” she agreed. “You should see them when he goes to the farmers market. They line up to buy his produce, no matter how tiny and pathetic it is.”

“I hope you don’t tell him his produce is tiny and pathetic.”

“Only when he annoys me.”

Alec had given Luc some Salvation Army fashion so he could blend, but that effort seemed more aspirational than realistic. Even in the faded jeans and the worn Megadeth T-shirt, Luc topped Hollister model standards.

“I wonder if it’ll be the same after,” she said.

“After?”

“After the cracks close. You know, when the prophecy gets fulfilled.”

I stared at her, somewhere between confused and
thoroughly
confused. “Say what?”

“Amelie, that’s what we’re talking about.” She grabbed my arm and pulled me into a shady corner of the bus station. “This is the
final prophecy
. The end of days. Once you kill the last Gabrielite, the cracks between the worlds will seal, and the Guardians’ jobs will be done. No more Crossworlds draw, no more Nether travel, no more demons. All our powers, nullified. We’ll be functionally human.”

Functionally human.

Her words echoed through my brain in a weird wish-fear loop. For part of me, it held a sentimental desire. Log cabin snuggles and firelight. Home-cooked dinners and epic sunrises on the back porch. And Jack would
die
for the whole roughing-it-in-the-woods gig. I mean, look at his car—it was practically made of twigs anyway.

“Can I keep my glyph-engraved throwing knives just in case? Those puppies slice through demon skin like butter.”

Lisa sighed, quietly rolling her eyes. “You ignore a lot of what I say, don’t you?”

“I try.”

“Babe?” Alec’s voice cut into the hubbub. “Next bus leaves at eleven thirty. Through Lake Charles then to Baton Rouge with an arrival at six fifteen. That circuitous enough?”

“When’s sunset?”

“Five forty-two.”

Lisa shot me a quick glance then called back, “It’ll do.”

They waited with me and Luc until the bus rolled in shortly after eleven fifteen and a few haggard men stumbled out. They all smelled like cigarette smoke and wore baseball caps identical to Luc’s except with sweat rings around the visors.

“This should be fun,” Luc muttered, pulling his own cap low.

“Try not to talk to anyone until you’ve gotten through the Baton Rouge terminal. Only pay cash, always sit in the back, and don’t tell anyone where you’ve been. This is a warded zone,” Lisa warned. “But if the Council traces you back here, it won’t matter how many wards I put up. They’ll kill me. Then you’ll die, too. Understand?”

I did understand.

The good news was, I had no idea what town we were in, and nobody on the bus floated a chat-me-up vibe. So the possibility of leaks seemed minimal.

As Luc loaded into the back of the bus, I gave Lisa a giant hug. It was different than the last time we’d said good-bye, when I’d gone on the run with Jack—much more complicated. But one thing remained the same. I still knew, beyond all doubt, that she was on my side.

She always would be.

“Don’t worry,” she said, hugging me back. “You’ll see me again.”

“I better.”

“You will. Now go save the world, okay?”

I hadn’t forgiven her for what she’d done—lying to me and killing all those people. Maybe it was a necessity, like she’d said. Maybe not. It didn’t matter. Bottom line, she was my sister and I loved her. Nothing would change that.

We held each other for a minute longer before Alec pried us apart. He pressed a couple of twenties into my hand and pushed me on to the bus. “Watch your back, kiddo. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

That almost made me laugh. Since there seemed no limit to what atrocities Alec would commit, I couldn’t imagine a scenario where I’d have to violate that directive.

Luc had his eyes closed when I sat next to him, though I could tell from his breathing that he was awake. His skin gave off a subtle glow as my shoulder brushed his.

“Want me to sit somewhere else?”

He kept his eyes shut, which I initially interpreted as dismissal, except when I stood to move away, he nudged me back down into my seat.

“Stay,” he ordered and went back to ignoring me.

Not confusing at all.

The whole ride, I couldn’t relax. My mind remained focused on what Lisa had told me about Immortals being angelblood. So weird. It made the pearly glow between us that much more terrifying. Plus, every time I thought about kissing him, my chest felt like a guilt hippo had set up camp on it.

“Luc?”

“What?”

“Do you…” I began and then stopped.

Did I really want to know if he had a thing for me? I mean, even if he
had
developed some minimal affection somehow, it didn’t change my feelings for Jack. And it certainly didn’t make this bond thread issue any better
,
so what was the point in opening a can of worms?

“Do I what?” Luc cut into my internal monologue.

“Do you, um, want the rest of my granola bar?” I finished. “It’s pretty delish, except for the raisins.”

Luc cracked an eye at me. “Can we maybe be quiet for a while?”

And that about summed up the rest of the trip back to New Orleans.

The only redeeming part was the sunset—a screaming shade of orange over haunted swampland as we drove into town. It lit up the heavens and shocked my brain to life. Nonetheless, by the time the bus pulled into the station, I felt grimy, chilled, and completely sick of raisins.

“Hang on a sec.” I hugged myself tightly as Luc started to hail a cab. The night had gotten cold again, and now that I wasn’t huddled next to him, I felt it more poignantly.

“What’s up?”

“I need to go somewhere.”

He nodded, thoughtful. “That may be the vaguest thing you’ve ever said to me.”

I sighed. “I need to visit the Great Books—specifically the Book of Lies—and I’m pretty sure Jack will tie me up and sit on me if he hears about this. So I’m going to go alone.”

Luc’s lips tightened with annoyance, and I couldn’t blame him. “You want me to lie to him.”

“Not exactly.” I shoved the wad of cash Alec had given me into Luc’s hand. “Just grab a taxi and tell everyone I’ll be there in a few. That’s not a lie.”

He looked at the money like it was a strange insect. “Why?”

“I can’t explain that yet,” I told him. “Maybe not ever. But I can promise you it’s important.”

I waited as Luc stared at his hands for a long, indecisive minute, then finally shoved the money into his pocket.

“You know I’m right,” I said.

“I
don’t
know that,” he replied. “What I do know is that I haven’t got a choice.”

He made a solid point. The Council had good reason last year for thinking it was me that had to fulfill the prophecy. Jack had once told me that this prophecy wasn’t just given by one person, and many of the translations of it named Lucifer’s line specifically. So with Lisa out of commission and Petra Netherbound, that left me.

“You can’t tell Jack,” I reminded him, “about anything. Not about Lisa or where the portal went, or about us—”

“There isn’t an ‘us.’”

“You know what I mean.”

He raked a hand through his hair. “I won’t lie to him, Amelie. He’s my cousin, and he loves you.”

I didn’t argue. How could I?

Maybe he was right. Maybe it would be better to just come clean completely. Spill everything about the Nether, about Luc and my dad and the Society. If Jack knew Immortals were angelblood, maybe he could help me find the last of Gabriel’s line and finish off the prophecy for good.

With a deep sigh, Luc stepped away, arms laced over his chest.

“Just be careful. I’m fairly certain if you disappear again, Jack and your father will have to take turns killing me.”

“The universe isn’t that cooperative.”

I didn’t flinch when he lifted a finger to the pendant at my throat and touched it lightly. Honestly, I’d forgotten I had it on. It didn’t seem to carry the same weight as before.

“I don’t think you need this anymore,” he said. “I can sense you, regardless.”

I let my eyes fall shut for a few seconds, trying to search the mental space between me and Luc. It was fuzzy but present. “That’s good, I guess. If I get into trouble, you’ll know.”

“
When
you get into trouble,” he corrected.

I couldn’t help smiling. Clearly, he knew me better than I thought.

...

The sun had long since set, but that didn’t seem to bother the city. The streets hummed with life and sound, humanity lighting them up like a power grid as I made the trek to St. Mary’s Church of the Ursuline Convent.

Predictably, the church was situated in an area of the French Quarter that, unless you knew where you were going, could easily result in an unplanned field trip to the wrong part of town. There was a midwinter bite to the air that rattled my teeth, and I hugged my coat tighter around my shoulders.

It was weird, doing this without Jack.

For years, he had been everything to me—my childhood crush, my hero, my hope for the future. When I’d thought he was dead last fall, it almost killed me. Even now, the idea of a future without him just held spectacularly little interest for me. So, if having a life with him meant killing some random Immortal and living in a crappy cabin in the woods for the rest of my life, then I would happily do it. Hell, I would kill ten Immortals if I had to—a hundred—if it meant never feeling that loss again.

That’s when I stopped in the street. And sat on the curb.

And it hit me.

This was exactly the choice Lisa had made. She had killed innocents, hundreds of them, to save the people she loved. She had done it for me, for Alec, for Matt, for our families. She had dismantled everything about her life and given up pieces of her soul to do it, because it was the only way to make things right.

It almost destroyed me.

Was that what I would become? A shred of myself, hiding in obsolescence? A criminal, lost and unforgiven, like Petra? Would it be worth it?

By the time I hit Chartres Street, I was muttering to myself like a bag lady. The church was close, I could feel it. Already, little tendrils of light and heat wrapped around my heart, twisting and wiggling with anticipation.

I had to do this. I
had
to get the name and finish the job, even if it destroyed me.

Jack once said some things were worth dying for. But dying wasn’t the highest price you could pay. Dying was easy heroism. One quick moment of pain, and it was over.
True
heroism came in suffering for the greater good. Letting everyone despise and blame you, never acknowledging what a sacrifice you’d made so they could keep their comfortable lives.

It occurred to me now
that
might be exactly what I was looking at—eternal shame and suffering.

The possibility weighed in my mind as I stood on the street corner, staring up at the stony white face of St. Mary’s Church. It was beautiful—not ornate like the cathedral or imposing like the Cabildo. But it held history. The dignity and diligence of having kept so many secrets through the ages.

I’m not sure how long I stood there, or what I was waiting for, until I heard him a few feet behind me.

“Hey, you,” Jack said. “Did you think I would let you do this alone?”

I breathed a sigh. That’s what I’d been waiting for. “You’re late.”

“I’m right on time.”

“Same difference,” I said. “Have I mentioned your cousin sucks at keeping his mouth shut?”

Jack grinned. “True. But remember, I have years of blackmail on him and, fortunately, he still cares what his mother thinks. You ready?”

My head shook slowly.
Ready?
I was about to go toe-to-toe with Lucifer himself. How could anyone be ready for that? Like, ever?

I was still trying to tell myself not to bolt when I felt Jack’s fingers slide through mine.

“Close your eyes,” he whispered, pulling me close. His shirt smelled like hard work and sunshine with just a hint of marshmallows. “Do you remember the last time we came here? How scared you were? Everyone thought you were a murderer out to swallow the world, didn’t they?”

I let my forehead fall against his chest, my body starting to relax.

“You had no idea how crazy in love with you I was,” he said. “How all I wanted was to run away with you and protect you forever. And I didn’t even care if you
had
killed all those people, or if you would eventually kill me. I just wanted to be with you for as long as I could. Do you remember?”