Holly Black (8 page)

She pushed David out of the way.

“Excuse me, I’ve got a vampire to slay,” she growled, looking for Susan and Mr. Pointy.

THE DÉNOUEMENT

She managed to make it all the way through school, the drive home, and up to her room before crying. It began messily: a chin shake, a couple of coughs, several quick sniffs. She didn’t
want
to cry. She wanted to stay angry, or forget about it entirely.

Like an addict looking for a fix, she pawed through her neat shelves for something that would stop the pain.

Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Casablanca. Doctor Zhivago. Sabrina.
…

Montgomery chose
Sabrina
(the Audrey Hepburn one, of course), figuring the scene with the eggs would at least make her smile.

She delicately opened the DVD and snapped out the disk, holding it by the edges as if it were glass. She took it into her brother’s room (he had the upstairs TV) and put it in, then sat on the floor, hugging her knees.

Tears coursed down her cheeks. Her lips moved silently as the story began:

“Once upon a time…on the North Shore of Long Island, some thirty miles from New York…”

The sobbing began for real. She took a deep gulp of air—

—and then realized something.

“Oh my gosh.” Her eyes went beautifully wide with cheerleadery surprise.

She jumped up and grabbed her phone, stabbing at numbers. Not even bothering to pause the movie.

“Hello?” A grumpy female voice picked up from the other end.

“I GET IT!!!”
Montgomery shouted. “I GET IT!”

“Um, what?” Ellen asked, obviously holding the phone away from her ear.

Montgomery paced back and forth, excited. “I get it! The spaceships and the quoting lines and memorizing stupid details about High Elvish and arguing over pronunciations! Before I thought you were all weird for the sake of, you know, just being weird.

“But I GET IT NOW! You just
really
love it. It’s where you go to. Who you turn to. It’s your…your
home
.”

“Ah,” Ellen paused, obviously torn between a sarcastic response and a grown-up one. “Yes,” she decided.

There was a moment’s silence as the cheerleader wiped her nose, reveling in her revelation.

“Wait, ‘you’” Ellen suddenly asked. “‘
You
’ just really love it? Not ‘we’”

“What?” Montgomery asked, confused. “Oh. Right. Yes. Not we. I mean, me. I mean, I don’t love it, the elves and stuff, no.”

“Even after all this time? We didn’t convince you at all?”

Montgomery sighed. “I…
appreciate
your passion. Now. And I think I can even appreciate some of the more…easily accessible…aspects of science fiction and fantasy. But I don’t love it the way you guys do. I just don’t hate it anymore.”

“Oh,” Ellen said, thinking about it.

“But I like
you
guys,” the cheerleader pointed out. “Just not the stuff you like.”

“Well, I guess that’s something,” Ellen decided. She paused. “Um. I heard about Ryan…and, uh, David and what happened in the hallway, and you finding out, and…um, everything that was sucky. Um, sorry.”

“Thanks. It
was
. Sucky.” Montgomery sniffed. She was quiet for a moment, sad. And then she thought of something. “Hey. The girls are going to come over tonight and, you know, just hang with me for a while. Support circle. I’d…I’d really like it if you came, too.”

“You want me to come over and hang out with a bunch of cheerleaders?” Ellen asked carefully, making sure she heard right.

“With my
friends
,” the cheerleader corrected. “My
other
friends.”

Ellen paused, letting the significance of the statement sink in.

“I don’t know,” she finally said. “I appreciate the offer, but your
other friends
might not.”

Montgomery thought about it. Ellen was right; it was a little early for such a sudden culture clash. At least half her “other friends” had tormented Ellen and
her
friends at some point in their twelve long years of going to school together.

“But, um, if you want to go to the mall or something, maybe, Saturday, I could let you pick out some makeup for me,” Ellen offered. It obviously took a lot out of her.

“Okay, it’s a date,” Montgomery paused. “Hey, do you think you could invite Mica along?”

“
What?
Oh, no,” the other girl groaned. “No. No, no, no, no…”

“Jealous much?” the cheerleader quipped.

“Horrified, more. On a level I can’t even put into words. Like—cosmic horror. I don’t suppose you’ve read
The Call of Cthulhu
, have you?”

“Yes,” Montgomery answered proudly. “Yes, I have.”

Text by Holly Black and Cecil Castellucci. Illustrations by Hope Larson.

by
scott westerfeld

I wanted a mission, and for my sins the ConCom gave me one.

It was the usual chaos: everyone on the Convention Committee thought someone had wired the money. Nobody had. Eighty-four thousand dollars, due to the convention hotel two weeks ago. The owner was threatening cancellation, which really
would
be a problem: seventeen thousand stormtroopers, Browncoats, pirates, quidditch players, and Dr. Who sidekicks wandering the streets, plotting revenge on whomever had left them roomless.

The money was ready to go, but the hotel owner demanded cash now, delivered to her winter home in forty-eight hours. A crazy thing to want, but maybe the money was headed straight into drugs or political contributions—she was down in Florida, after all. That’s what you get for dealing with family-owned hotels instead of the soulless Sheratons and Marriotts of this world: personality, chaos.

But I wasn’t complaining. Like I said, I needed a mission. Even if it meant missing that weekend’s Stargate SG-1 marathon, I was ready to go.

The call came at noon; my berth on Amtrak’s Silver Star was booked for 3:25. An hour later I’d digested a handful of aspirin, showered, and packed, and was pulling my Walther PPK/S 380ACP (of German manufacture, not the post-war Manurhin production run) from its original cardboard box. I set to work with the (also original) finger-looped cleaning rod, bringing both the Walther and my Taurus PT138 to a dull shine. I decided that the Luger my dad gave me for acing my SATs was overkill, but I cleaned it, too, just for luck.

Let’s get one thing clear: my gun collection wasn’t the only reason the Convention Committee had chosen me. Just as important was my alignment, consistent across every system known to gamingkind. Whatever the common good needed, lawful or not, I was willing to do it. I was the only person for the job.

Or so I thought, until I saw Lexia Tollman waiting with the ConCom, bright-eyed, green-haired, and grinning like the devil. She was wearing the leather Peacekeeper jacket I remembered her always wanting, and it looked good on her.

“What’s
she
doing here?”

The ConCom shuffled their feet, staring at the floor. One ventured, “We figured you’d need some company.”

“Hey, Temptress Moon,” Lexia said. “How’s it going?”

I flinched at the sound of my old Mayhem name. Stats spilled across my mind: Temptress Moon had been a neutral good Paladin of Balance, Fourteenth Echelon, with a Voice of Barding and a persistent aetheric life-link. Practically divine, almost unkillable.

Almost…except for an obscure resurrection-blocking poison distilled from the bark of the Tree of Vile Tidings. Administered by my then girlfriend. For fun.

“You’ve got to be kidding,” I said.

The ConCom collectively hemmed and hawed, pretending they hadn’t expected any unpleasantness. As if Lexia’s betrayal of me wasn’t legendary on the Mayhem boards.

“We can’t have you going alone,” one said. “Not with that much money. We know it’s a little…awkward, but Lexia’s the only one who could go on such short notice.”

I nodded slowly. She’d always hated
Stargate
.

“You’re armed, after all,” another spoke up. “And she’s not.”

“You’re sure of that?” I said.

They all turned to stare at her.

I sighed. “Let me guess, she
said
she wasn’t.”

Lexia rolled her eyes, but pulled off the Peacekeeper jacket, its plastic snaps clicking between her fingers. She tossed it to me, kicked a small backpack across the floor in my direction, then turned slowly in place. All she wore now was a black T-shirt and a pair of jeans, too tight to hide a weapon. She’d been working out, I noticed.

I rifled the backpack: wallet, cell phone, another black T-shirt, and a bottle of my favorite vodka. The bottle made my mouth dry for a moment; I’d promised the ConCom to stay sober on the way down.

Then I saw the pair of handcuffs labeled:
Remember these, T-Moon?

My stomach flipped, but I didn’t let anything show on my face, just zipped the backpack up and searched the jacket. Nothing but two Amtrak tickets and pocket lint.

The public address crackled and screeched, then told us that the Silver Star was pulling up on Track One.

I could have told the ConCom
no
right then, gone back to my apartment for forty-eight solid hours of jonesing Jaffas and dodgy Dial-Home Devices. But suddenly my own DHD was out of order. Maybe it was just the chance to break out some +2 firepower in the real world. Or maybe something twisted inside me wanted to be trapped on a train with the woman who had killed me.

Lexia saw me hesitate. She smiled and yanked a black leather briefcase from one of the ConCom.

“I’ll carry the treasure.” Her tongue flickered across her lower lip. “Just like old times.”

I gave the ConCom one last glare, then followed her to the platform, preparing myself for twenty-seven hours of angst and nerves and the dredging of long-buried anger. Not the mission I’d expected, not at all. But at least this way one worry was gone….