The Blood Keeper (The Blood Journals) (23 page)

The door to Arthur’s bedroom was open as I’d left it, and Lukas was on the bed with his eyes shut. He’d kicked off all the blankets and, instead of curling up in a ball, had sprawled across the bed with one arm flopped over the side.

I sat carefully on the edge, smoothing hair away from his face. “Lukas?” I said softly.

His eyelids twitched, and he moved his bandaged hand. I took it, holding it between my hands. I drew circles on the back of his wrist until he slowly looked up at me. “Hey,” I said. “How are you feeling?”

“Better,” he whispered. He smacked his lips. “Thirsty.” His small voice was dry and broken.

From the bathroom, I brought a tall glass of water, then helped prop him up so that he could sip. His skin felt warm, but only from sleeping, not from fever. As he drank, I told him what I’d done to the black candle rune. “He can’t hurt you with it now, and I will find another way to break his connection.”

Lukas fumbled with the glass because of his bandages, and I gently set it on the bedside table.

“Time?” he said.

“It’s evening. Donna’s bringing some stew and medicine.
But I think you’re doing just fine. You only need to sleep it off, recover your inner stores of magic. Because of the binding, I can’t feed you energy, or pass it from the trees.”

As he nodded, his eyes drooped. He touched my skirt and I sat again just beside his pillow. Clanking sounds and the light thump of opening and closing cabinets floated up the stairs and through the open bedroom door, from where Donna was putting away groceries and starting dinner. Lukas draped an arm across my lap, holding me very loosely. I put a hand on his head and rubbed circles into his temple, humming Mother’s favorite song about the sea.

When he was asleep again, I carefully stood up and went to the window. Through the windowpane I could see the snarl of roses down in the garden. Here I was, Deacon for less than two months and full up with people to aid. It was exhilarating but frightening. What happened to Will was my fault, because I’d chosen not to raze the roses but instead to listen to them. To open the world up to their poison.

How was that different from what Lukas’s father had done to him? Intention only. My will to undo it, to change the path I’d wrought.

I pushed open the window, letting in the warm evening breeze. It shouldn’t be too hot now that Lukas’s fire-fever had broken. I leaned outside, twisting my neck until I saw one of the crows perched at the edge of the roof. “Reese,” I said, beckoning with my hand.

The crow swooped down and landed on the sill.

He bobbed his head, and I moved aside so that he could hop over to the roughly carved wooden bedpost. There he
clutched, angling his beak down toward Lukas. “Thank you,” I whispered.

As I made my way back downstairs, I smoothed my finger over the dark blue marks of Will’s phone number. They were both my responsibility now, and I went to ready Will’s ointment for setting out under the moon.

I left you both early that night, taking myself to bed, where I read and then slept and dreamed of wandering the house as if suddenly a ghost, with no memory of dying but only knowing I did not belong
.

With Mab’s last smile on my mind, the rush of wind through my open windows was enough to fill the silence in my head. I felt dizzy, as if I’d left my inner ear back in the forest. But about a quarter mile away, my cell buzzed angrily on the passenger seat with a half dozen texts and voice messages. Worried, I slowed down and listened to the first one. It was Dad. “William, where are you? You need to call us ay-sap, boy. Your mother is worried sick.” The second was him again, saying the same, only with a tighter grip on his voice that meant he was pissed.

The clock radio said it was 7:52 p.m. I’d texted Mom and Ben that I was running out, and then I’d forgotten the cell in the car. If I was honest with myself, I hadn’t even thought about the time or calling to check in.

Instead of returning the calls, I sped up and focused on getting home. The speed blurred all my peace away, and I rolled up the window and punched the radio louder.

It was full dark except for a strip of orange and silver in the west when I pulled up to the house, and every window was lit. I saw a curtain in the front room flick closed. Half of me was irritated they’d been watching so carefully. It made my head
pound. I was seventeen. I had my own car. I would have called if I’d been in trouble. As I slammed the car door, clomped up the porch, and pushed into the house, I couldn’t even dredge up my usual smile.

The front hall light glared, and I squinted as I shut the front door behind me.

“William.”

Dad’s voice was firm from the den. I didn’t bother dragging my feet. This would be short and to the point.

I rounded the corner. Kept my eyes down. I wasn’t sure how easy it would be to see the red in them and didn’t want to find out. “Sir.”

He stood up from his recliner, hands clasped behind his back. The khakis and polo shirt did nothing to dispel the illusion that this was a military hearing. “You’ve been gone for hours. And were very sick yesterday. We expected you for dinner.”

“Yes, sir.”

Dad didn’t budge an inch.

“I went for a drive. I’ve been cooped up and wanted some air.”

“You didn’t call.”

“I didn’t have reception.”

“Not an excuse.”

“Dad—”

“You are not to be out for hours without checking in. That’s SOP, and you know it. You deliberately ignored a rule you’ve always known.”

There was no side of the truth I could tell him. I was screwed. “Yes, sir,” I said.

Dad relaxed only enough to sigh. “Will. Go see your mother. You’re grounded through the weekend. Home by three-thirty every day.”

“Dad!”

“William?” His jaw tightened just enough to warn me.

I fell silent, knew my frustration was all over my face, and wished that I could control it better, like all the rest of the men in my family. “Nothing, sir.”

“Good.”

With a tiny nod, I spun around and left in a hurry. I took the stairs three at a time. Mom would be reading a book in bed.

But Ben stopped me by coming out of his room and putting a hand on my shoulder. “Get off,” I said, jerking away. I didn’t need him to bitch me out, too.

“Hey.” His fingers squeezed.

“Ow.” I punched his shoulder, not too lightly.

He caught my fist. “Hold it. I just want to say one thing.”

The hall was dark, only dimly lit by the yellow light that had followed Ben out of his room. It made him into this looming shadow, but I could just hear something off in his tone: it wasn’t condemning enough. “What?” I demanded, quietly.

“Mom was afraid you were dead.”

“What?” I nearly squeaked, and cleared my throat. “I was only a few hours late.”

Ben let go of me and crossed his arms over his chest. I could see the perfect V of his shoulders since he was only wearing sweatpants. His muscles annoyed me. Dad was always saying,
If you picked up some weights at school or came to the Y with me, you could
be just as strong as your brother
. But I wasn’t a cart horse, I’d reply. I was built for speed. For flying.

As Ben continued to not say anything, I rewound through the past five minutes, and it dawned on me what he and Dad were so steamed about.
Aaron
.

I was a jackass. I winced, hissing in through my teeth.

“Yeah,” Ben said. “Go apologize.” He shoved me on my way and retreated to his bedroom.

Feeling like I deserved to have tiny bugs chomp on my eyeballs, I knocked quietly on Mom’s door.

“Come in,” she said.

I pushed it open and stepped in. She set the hardcover book in her lap and removed her rectangular reading glasses. A half-empty glass of water sat beside her on the bedside. She kept sleeping pills in the drawer, and I wondered if she’d taken them yet. “Hey, Mama.” I crossed the carpet and sat at her knees on the mattress.

“Hi, Will. You made it home safely.”

I fiddled with the blanket. “I’m sorry.”

Her hands twitched a little, and she pushed the book off her lap. “Come here and tell me what you were doing.” She patted Dad’s side of the bed.

After untying my shoes and tossing them toward the door, I sat next to her on top of the covers. She leaned her head on my shoulder. “I met a girl,” I said very quietly.

“Tell me about her.”

I laughed once. “She’s incredibly weird.”

“But you like her.”

“I, uh. Yeah. She’s easy to be around.” I wasn’t sure if I was
making it up or telling the truth. Mab was so different. How could I tell my mom that the first time I met her we’d battled a mud monster, and she’d been half covered in dirt and mud? And wearing giant goggles? She had a magic workshop and a life out of some movie. Mom would be scandalized by what Mab wore—or rather what she didn’t wear. And the tangled mess of her hair.

“Are you smiling, Will Sanger?” Mom scooted a few inches back to watch me.

“Aw, Mom.” I scrunched up my face and looked away. “Stop.”

“You should bring her over so we can meet her.”

“It isn’t like that! And besides, Dad grounded me.”

“Ah.”

I glanced back. Mom was very innocently reaching for her book again. Face clear of expression. Her wrist bones stood out hard against her skin. Poking up so that they looked painful. I thought I should start pushing half-and-half on her for her coffee in the mornings. “What are you reading?” I asked, scooting close enough to loom over her and pretend to be enthralled.

She told me it was some historical mystery that took place during World War I. I settled in against the headboard while she read a bit from the middle.

A while later, she woke me up and sent me to snore in my own bed.

I dreamed all night about monsters and screaming trees. And Mab, caught in a sticky red spiderweb, struggling to get out, to get to me.

I knelt beside the salvia, tearing out weeds, as the dawn rose behind heavy clouds the next morning. I heard the door open and your footsteps on the porch but continued with my work even as you passed me, paused, and turned back to watch
.

After a moment, you said, “Evelyn?”

My first name. I lifted my head and put the sharp bull thistle I’d just torn out of the ground atop the pile of its brothers
.

You came to me and stood, frowning slightly in the pale white morning. I got to my feet. “Arthur? What’s wrong?”

“Evelyn,” you said again, stepping closer and tilting your head, peering at my face as if you’d look through it into my heart. That made me fold my hands under my ribs. You leaned so close there was no room for light between us, and whispered, “What were you thinking, when you kissed me last night?”

I flung myself back, hands clapping over my mouth. You reached out, startled, but I jerked away from you. “What? When I what?” I flew through my memories of the past day, and there was nothing—nothing. Panicked that you or I was running mad, I backed up all the way to the porch while the expression drained out of you, while your fingers twitched and your head slowly lifted until you were staring past me at the house
.