Son of Sun (Forgotten Gods (Book 2)) (3 page)

Mattie elbowed me in the ribs and we shared a silent laugh. Sam was forever losing things. It had become a running joke with us, but it was just who she was.

“Here!” She beamed proudly, finally finding the trophy of her quest in an outside pocket of the bag. In her hand she held a small box of sugar cubes, obviously taken from the coffee bar in the cafeteria. “I had a pony when I was little. He loved sugar cubes. I thought you could bribe the beast if all else failed.”

“Thanks, Sam. That’s really sweet.” A wide grin scrawled across my face as I took the box from her hand. “I didn’t know you rode horses?”

“I don’t. Getting thrown by a shetland pony was enough to scar me for life. I just loved him from the ground until daddy donated him to a petting zoo for a tax write-off.”

“What?” Mattie and I both exclaimed at the same time, unable to believe anyone would be heartless enough to take a little girl’s pony.

“I told you my dad’s a jerk,” Sam shrugged in an unaffected way and looked at her watch. “Mattie, we gotta go. We’ll be late.”

I hugged them both and we parted ways.

“Whoa!” Sam’s eyes went watermelon-wide when I shuffled through my dorm room door, shoulders slumped in defeat, dragging my book bag behind me. “What happened to you?” She turned from the mirror where she had been applying mascara, her eyes warily tracing me up and down. I sank onto my bed, dragging my hands down my face.

“Meghan,” I hissed the name as if it burned my throat to utter it. “Meghan happened to me.” Shaking my head in disgust, I flicked a few crusts of dried mud from my forearm. After Mattie’s pep talk, I was determined to prove what a good rider I was. I was given a horse named Diablo to ride. And after an hour’s lesson with the coach, I was certain of earning my place on St. Anne’s team. Until a redheaded witch named Meghan had caused a commotion in the ring that sent Diablo into a bucking fit a bull rider couldn’t have stayed on. When it was all over, Meghan and her minions were roaring with laughter, I was on the ground covered in mud and poor Diablo was tangled in a jump wondering what had attacked him.

“Red haired Meghan?” Sam tucked her head down to catch my eye as she took a seat on my bed—carefully sitting far enough away to keep her vibrant purple dress clean.

I nodded my head without looking up from the floor and sighed, more angry than disappointed with myself. Meghan, as it turned out, was not only the nasty redheaded, ring leader of the group of girls who spent their lunch hour talking about me, but also the captain of the equestrian team. Apparently, she was not impressed with my celebrity or my riding skills.

An opinion I had been determined to change. And if I hadn’t tried to show off and prove to Meghan that I was a better rider than she thought I was, I wouldn’t have been kicking myself for being such an idiot. In the chaotic aftermath of my fall, I had come dangerously close to ruining my carefully constructed world, and I was pretty sure Meghan wasn’t going to let me forget any of it.

“I really hate Meghan. She’s such a bully. We went to the same boarding school for a while. Steer clear of that girl. She lives to ruin people’s lives,” Sam offered with an awkward pat on my shoulder—the only spot on my right side that wasn’t caked with dirt from the arena floor.

“Eww...Faye!” Mattie observed my tattered appearance with a wrinkled nose as she appeared in the doorway, hair dripping wet, wrapped in a striking silk kimono her mother got her on a recent trip to Japan.

I held up my hand to stop her, already knowing what she was going to say. Mattie, who was supermodel beautiful with her hair soaking wet, wearing a Japanese bathrobe, was also a neat freak.

Without her having to ask, I hauled myself up from the bed and went over to the little cubby by our door where we left our shoes. The only good thing about ancient dorm rooms? They were huge.

“Faye had a rough first day at the barn,” Sam brought Mattie up to speed as I went to remove my dirty boots. “You know that girl Meghan in our Spanish class?”

Mattie nodded, looking me up and down, obviously
un
impressed by the amount of dirt I had collected on my clothes, as she walked passed me to her dresser.

“Apparently, she’s on the equestrian team,” Sam finished and both girls went silent as they watched me wrestle with my boots.

“
Captain
of the team,” I corrected unenthusiastically, unzipping my boots and lining them up beside the door.

“Ouch!” Mattie empathized as she retrieved underwear from the top drawer. “I told you it wouldn’t be easy, Faye,” she shrugged, not looking at me. “My first day of practice? Someone put icy hot on the inside of my swim cap.”

“Oh my gosh! What did you do?” I asked, wide eyed, padding sock-footed over to the mini fridge to grab a bottle of water. Eyeing the pile of sand of I had left on my comforter earlier, I opted for a seat on the floor, and plopped down cross legged to watch them get ready.

“I showed them I didn’t need a stupid swim cap to beat their best times!” She threw a confident smile over her shoulder and wiggled into a pair of panties without removing her kimono. She looked like an empress standing there in her imported silk. “You can’t let them break you, Faye. That’s exactly what they want. Claim your place on that team, girl. It’s
yours
, and there’s nothing Meghan can do about it.” Mattie’s face was hard with determination and she pointed her comb at me to emphasize her point. At that moment, I wished I had the confidence that seemed to come so easily to Mattie. But any resolve that had bubbled up in me that afternoon had been washed away by a tidal-wave of arena dirt and mud when I hit the ground.

Mattie turned to the mirror over her dresser to begin untangling her hair with a comb. I sighed and picked at the water bottle label in my hands.

“Where’d you get that kimono, Mattie? It’s gorgeous,” Sam admired the latest gift from Mattie’s mother.

“Mom sent it last week,” she answered, twirling around to give us the full effect of its bright pattern.

“Lucky girl. Wish I got weekly presents from all over the world like that.”

“Wish I had a mother who could stay in one spot for more than a nanosecond!” Mattie retorted with an exhausted look on her face. Mattie’s mother was an international flight attendant for a major airline, which meant she jetted from one exotic locale to another.

“What time are you guys leaving for town?” I asked casually as I took a sip of water.

“
WE
are leaving in an hour. I suggest you get in the shower.” Mattie’s face was hard again, and I knew this time her determination was focused on getting me to The Underground.

“I really don’t…” I began shaking my head and was immediately cut off.

“I really don’t care…” Mattie turned to me, “...what you were about to say. You
are
going. If you don’t? Meghan wins.” Mattie shrugged as she turned to me, hands on her hips, just waiting for me to try to argue my way out of going.

But I didn’t. She was right. There wasn’t a single fiber of my being that wanted to go sit in a smokey barroom where I was certain every shadow would hold a memory of Dayne, but I couldn’t let Meghan win. If I didn’t go, she would’ve succeeded in ruining my afternoon and my evening.

“Fine!” I sprang to my feet and wiggled out of the muddy riding clothes, shoving them to the bottom of my laundry basket so I wouldn’t be reminded of my failings every time I walked by.

Sam hadn’t said anything, so I turned to see what she was thinking about the whole thing, after all she was the only one of us who actually knew Meghan. She wasn’t even paying attention. Instead, she was discreetly looking through the little trinkets on top of my dresser where she had been applying mascara when I walked in.

I spotted the tube lying on my bedspread, and picked it up as I past. Biting at the sides of my lips to keep from laughing at my forgetful friend, I slid it onto the dresser beside her.

“Thanks!” Sam called out after me, her voice half embarrassed, half wondering how the heck I knew what she was doing.

Despite staying out way too late at The Underground, we were early to Spanish the next morning.

“Hey, save a seat for Mattie. She said she’d be a little late. I need to go get calculus notes from Elliot.” Sam nodded her head toward a be-speckled guy in the front row. When she set her bag in the seat beside me, I couldn't help but notice the top of a new
Scoop!
magazine sticking out of the top.

“May I?” I pointed to the magazine as she turned to leave.

“Take it. I never read them,” Sam dismissed her father’s magazine as if it was beneath her journalistic integrity. It was the only time Sam’s snobby side came out.

I had just made it past the “Closet Thieves” section where it compared stars side by side in the same outfit when Sam slinked back into her seat with an ashen face.

“What’s wrong?” I asked suddenly concerned for her health.

“Um...Faye, Meghan’s been talking about you,” Sam chanced a look over her shoulder to be sure no one could hear our conversation.

“That’s nothing new, Sam,” I laughed at her concern. “She’s been doing it since the first day I got here.”

“No, not that…” Sam fiddled with her notebook, tucking the notes she had just gotten from Elliot into a pocket, as she thought. “She’s telling everyone you’re some sort of witch.” Sam looked at me, waiting to see my reaction. All she got was a snorted laugh of disbelief.

“And why would she say that?” I asked, feeling the blood drain from my face.

“Something about your riding lesson yesterday?” Sam looked confused, and turned to face me.

I knew exactly what she was talking about. When I had fallen yesterday, Diablo’s hooves ended up right beside my face. As he began to struggle to free himself from the jump standard, he nearly kicked me in the nose. At the time, my only thought was to keep him from hurting us both. So, I had grabbed hold of his leg with one hand, soothing him just as I had Hannah months ago, and he stopped flailing long enough for us to get the jump off of him. The second I released his foot, his took off bucking around the arena.

No one had mentioned it then, so I assumed no one had noticed. Apparently Meghan had, and now she was telling everyone I had some sort of magical animal whispering powers.

“Of course she would,” I sighed, and tossed the magazine onto Sam’s desk.

“What happened?”

“I just kept the horse from freaking out when we fell. Meghan obviously doesn’t know how to calm things down. She only knows how to stir things up,” I said, narrowing my eyes at the back of her red head seated on the front row like a princess.

“So, it’s not a big deal?”

“I don’t think so,”

“Other people do that?”

“I’ve seen some who can. It depends on the person and the horse.” That was stretching it, but not a total lie. Dayne had the same effect on animals I did.

“Oh, good, I’m not late,” Mattie said, sliding into the seat beside me, still in her running clothes.

“Hey, you didn’t wake me up,” I said moving my bag so she had room.

“You were totally knocked out. I don’t think a fire alarm would’ve woken you this morning,” Mattie laughed as she sniffed her under arm. “Sorry, I didn’t have time to shower.”

“Where is the professor anyway?” Sam asked rhetorically, looking at her watch and back to the clock on the wall. Class officially started ten minutes ago.

“Hey guys! Listen up!” Bespeckled Elliot made his way to the front of the lecture hall, whistling between his fingers to get everyone’s attention. “I say we use the fifteen minute rule. According to my watch, if the teacher doesn’t show up in five minutes we can leave and not get counted absent. You with me?” He asked, grinning confidently at the crowd. No way would anyone disagree with leaving an 8am class.

“So,” he clapped his hands together and rubbed them excitedly. “What should we do to pass the time?” He looked eagerly at his audience, waiting for someone to come up with an idea. Unfortunately, everyone’s brains were turning slowly so early in the morning.

I had turned back to Sam’s magazine, trying to forget what she had just told me about Meghan, when I heard her voice.

“Faye, did you put some sort of sleeping spell on Ms. Garcia?” Meghan mocked me as she turned to face us. The girls on either side of her burst into laughter and high-fived each other.

My face flamed red, but I kept it buried in the magazine.

“Why don’t you shut up Meghan? Spreading rumors like that only makes
you
look stupid!” Sam barked from the seat beside me with the ferocity of a pitbull.

Dread washed from the top of my head to the tips of my toes, and I groaned inwardly, knowing this wasn’t going to end well. From behind the magazine, I peeked at the clock hanging on the wall between two huge windows.

“Why don’t you mind your own business, Sam? Or do you have a hard time staying out of everyone else’s lives like your father?” Meghan had turned around in her seat to face us, and every eye in the room volleyed back and forth between the two, more than happy to watch a cat fight to fill the remaining minutes.

“Oh please, Meghan. Don’t act like you don’t devour every word he prints.” Sam stood from her chair, peering down the slope of stadium seats to where Meghan and her minions sat. From the corner of my eye, I watched her hand ball to a fist at her side.

“Yeah, just to read the latest gossip about Faye. That is the only reason you’re friends with her, right? To get the dirt for Daddy?” Meghan laughed in Sam’s face as she spoke.

“No, I’m friends with her because she isn’t a stuck up snob like you.” Sam lurched forward, only to be stopped by Mattie’ strong arms.

“Oh, poor baby, is that the real reason why you left Whitney after ninth grade? Couldn’t hang with the big girls?” Meghan’s voice was mockingly whiny and pitiful, enough to make me want to fly at her and rip every strand of hair from her head. But I couldn’t. If I opened my mouth and got into the middle of this there was no telling what might come out. I couldn’t say anything. I just had to sit there like a pathetic bump on a log and listen to it all or risk exposing myself for what I really was.

When a voice frozen with icy contempt interrupted their verbal sparing, I startled behind my magazine.

“No Meghan, she probably got tired of looking at the nasty
somebody farted
look that’s taken up permanent residence on your face.” Behind my magazine I snorted in shock, and looked up into Mattie’s unflinching gaze. Meghan momentarily recoiled and washed the evil, omnipresent smirk from her face.

“Stay out of this, Mattie. I didn’t ask you.” Meghan shook her head and narrowed her eyes.

“Like I care what you
ask.”
Mattie stepped in front of Sam and me, making her way down the aisle toward Meghan’s group. “Sam’s my friend, and so is Faye. If you’ve got a problem with them, I’ve got a problem with you.” Mattie stopped halfway, the powerful muscles of her body going rigid as she stared at the evil redheaded witch.

“Well then, I guess we have a big problem.” Meghan stood at her seat, but the confidence in her face was quickly washing away, replaced by unfiltered fear. Mattie wasn’t like the pampered princesses Meghan had gone to school with. She wouldn’t be backed down by nasty words and a few ugly stares.

“Trust me Meghan, you don’t want to go there with me. I’m nothing like the girls you went to school with. You can’t bully me into submission. I fight back. And in case you haven’t heard...I don’t lose.”

“Oh, really?” Meghan cocked her head to the side. The atmosphere in the room had gone electric, everyone hanging on their dangerous volley of words. Beside me, Sam still stood rigidly straight. Fearing the violence that was about to erupt, and knowing I had to stick up for my friends who were defending me, I rose to stand beside Sam, both of us at Mattie’s back.

I wanted more than anything to be back in my dorm room, still sleeping under the covers. How had this escalated so quickly? My nerves were almost shot, terrified of what I might unleash if this altercation got physical. My body was growing way to strong, and I didn’t have the first clue how to contain it.

Mattie looked coldly into Meghan’s eyes and simply shrugged.

The room seemed suspended in time, awaiting the move that would send everything careening over the edge. Suspense kicked at my stomach like a bass drum, and the room began to spin as I fought to keep my anger under control.

Only, I was quickly losing that fight.

Every second that ticked off that clock reverberated like a cymbal clanging in my head. Trying to distract myself, I focused on the clock, watching the seconds tick away until we would be free to leave. Without an audience, and pride to defend, surely Meghan and Mattie would drop it. When the tiny red hand finally made its way around to the twelve for the last time, a relief took over my body so profound I feared I might hit the floor.

But I didn’t, instead every muscle in my body tensed like I was suddenly charged with a live wire. I focused even harder on the clock, so hard, too hard, unable to pull my attention away. My mind began to ache and the next second, the glass face of the clock shattered into a million pieces, raining to the floor like crystal confetti.

Sitting on the front row, Meghan and her friends were the closest ones to its spray. They screamed and jumped from their seats, raising their arms for protection.

Staring openmouthed at what I had just done, I barely caught the bile that charged up my throat. Fleeing the classroom, I ran in a blind daze, unable to remember where the bathroom was. My head ached, the blood rushing so violently around my brain I saw nothing but cloudy shapes. Holding on to the old stone wall, I staggered down the hallway, not knowing where I was going, but knowing I had to get away.

My hand brushed a door knob, and when I turned it, it gave way. I ended up in an empty class room, still darkened in the early morning light. A metal trash can stood beside the teachers desk in front and I ran to it, barely making it before I heaved up the pop tart I had eaten for breakfast.

“Faye? Are you okay?” Sam asked rushing in behind me.

“I’m fine,” I choked on the words, wiping my mouth as I plopped to the floor and leaned my back against the desk.

Sam gasped, and her eyes flew wide.

“Are you knocked up?” Her eyes went wild with shock as she watched me wipe the vomit from my mouth.

“Definitely not knocked up,” I shook my head.

“Nope, I can vouch for that. Our periods synced the first month we lived together,” Mattie said, slipping through the door and closing it behind her.

“Confrontation makes me….nervous,” I waved their concern away and took the bottle of water Mattie offered me.

“Ugh, not me! What I wouldn’t do to that red haired monster!” Sam growled under her breath, and ground her fist into her palm.

“Um, did you guys see the clock explode?” Mattie was grinning from ear to ear, totally unfazed by her near fight. “It barely missed Meghan. Serves her right.”

“I did, what happened?” Sam turned to Mattie, but I kept my eyes on the Kleenex I had taken from the desk, knowing exactly what had happened, and praying they wouldn’t ask me. I couldn’t lie to them, and I feared my brain was too foggy to come up with a way around the truth.

“Probably just as old as everything else in this place. But man, to see the look on her face!” Mattie hugged her waist and rocked back and forth in laughter. “Priceless!” She was rolling with laughter, not even trying to control her giggle fit.

“
Well, I guess we have a big problem!”
Sam puffed herself up and did her best impression of Meghan, smelly-fart face and all. They both collapsed into another fit of giggles and I tried to laugh along, but I couldn’t.

Something was wrong with me. Something I had never experience before. My magic was waking up, and without Dayne around to show me how to use it, I didn’t have a clue what was about to happen to me.