The Hierophant (Book 1 in The Arcana Series) (20 page)

Kyla bumps into me.

“A! Where have you been?” She grabs my arm, grinning. “Was that Trebor? Where’s he going?”

I look at her and try to smile. “Hey, we were dancing, yes, I don’t know.” It’s hard to breathe, like Trebor’s sudden exit has stolen the air from my lungs.

“You okay?” she asks.

I force a close-lipped smile, and nod. “I just need to sit a few songs out, I think. I’ll be fine.”

Kyla’s eyes tell me she doesn’t believe me, but she nods anyway.

— 43 —

I take a few minutes in the ladies room to collect myself—to calm myself. It’s difficult when your heartbeat isn’t necessarily determined by your own body, but I take comfort in the fact that maybe by focusing and slowing my heartbeat back to a normal rate I might be helping Trebor in some way. It’s hard—the bathroom is filled with girls reapplying makeup, checking their teeth, taking pictures of themselves with their cell phones. Kristen Leigh spots me slinking out of a stall and corners me.

“Look everyone, it’s Cinderella,” she squawks, getting a few chuckles from some of her friends.

“That doesn’t even make sense,” I mutter, washing my hands.

“Really? It’s just that you’re trash, all dolled up to look like someone special. Did prince charming fall for it?”

“What do you care?” I ask, exasperated, whirling to face her. “What does anything about my life have anything to do with
you
?”

She shrugs and smiles, pink lips stretching to flash blinding white teeth. “I just don’t like you.”

I rip a paper towel out of the dispenser by the sink and dry my hands. “Well, the feeling is mutual.”

She scoffs. “The difference is, no one cares what you think.”

I narrow my eyes at her, wondering what would happen if I used a magic net on her. Would she go back to Sheol, where the demons belong? Clearly, magic can’t solve all my problems. Words don’t seem capable of solving this one, either, so I just smile at her.

“That’s okay,” I tell her. I reach out and touch her arm like an old friend, and enjoy the frightened confusion spreading across her face. “Because, again, the feeling is mutual. You have a
lovely
time tonight, Kristen.” I give her my creepiest over-enthusiastic wink before I turn around and walk out of the bathroom.

Momentary glee shakes the heaviness from my mind, and I’m surprised by the truth of my words. I
really don’t care anymore
what anyone in this goddamn school thinks about me. I’m so incredibly
done
with caring, I almost laugh out loud when I return to the gymnasium.

But then a hand reaches out and grabs my arm. My heart leaps into my throat, and I turn around—

“Lay off the punch, Ana,” Andy says, hooking my arm with a too-dazzling smile. “You ready to dance yet?”

“Um…” But he’s already maneuvering me to the dance floor, the same way he once maneuvered me into Kyla’s kitchen to talk about
gypsies
—it just happens, before I know it.

“I saw Trebor earlier. Where’d he run off to?” he asks, taking my hand, turning to face me.

“He wasn’t feeling well,” I lie, skin crawling when his other hand falls on my waist.

“Too bad. You know, he’s a really nice kid.” He smirks. “Between you and me, though, he’s a little weird.”

“Ha, yes.” I nod, hesitating to place my hands on his shoulders. In the thick of the crowd on the dance floor, I peer beyond Andy and take in the twisting mass of bodies and familiar faces, all dressed up in unfamiliar attire. It’s all the more strange when I see faces I don’t recognize, and stranger still when I notice several in particular, here and there, watching me with unabashed intensity.

Because there’s nothing I can think to do, I pretend I don’t notice.

“Did you have a chance to ask your father about your mother’s clan?” Andy asks.

“Huh? Um. Yeah. He knew about it.” Eyes bouncing around the room, I see three, four, five faces, not all of them looking at me, but some, and all of them shining out from the crowd, as if illuminated by a soft internal light.

“And what about the box?” Andy asks, drawing my attention back.

I almost answer, but stop myself. “I didn’t tell you about a box.”

Andy blinks—caught or confused? “What? No, I meant did you ask him if your mother had any of those boxes. Why, do you already know of one?”

Every hair on my body stands on end. “Even if my mother had one, no one could open it now but her. So it’s useless.”

“True.” Andy nods. “But if you did have one, it would be worth a lot of money.”

“I wouldn’t be interested in selling.” I frown.

He knows. It’s no good pretending.

“I understand. Sentimental value.” He gives me one of his most charming smiles, and it feels like slugs moving over my skin.

The music crashes around us, and I feel like I’m in another world. It’s different from dancing with Trebor. I felt like we were the only people alive when I danced with him. With Andy, I feel cut off—trapped. He’s smiling, and kind-eyed, but there’s something
so wrong
about him right now.

“Are you okay?” Andy asks, his face too earnest, too concerned, as if it might slip into mockery at any moment.

“Why are you dancing with me?” I ask, cocking an eyebrow.

He doesn’t answer right away, but after an awkward moment he replies. “Because I like you. And I hope I’m not too late.”

“Too late for what?”

“To save you.”

I stand still, forcing Andy to do the same. “Save me from what?”

“You know what.”

“No, I don’t.”

“The Irin,” he says. “They think you have the key.”

I blink, and my eyes refocus on a girl in the crowd with fire-engine-red hair, standing about twenty feet behind Andy. Our eyes meet, and hers go wide—but I turn away, trying to pretend I don’t notice.

I pull away from Andy, but he holds onto my hand, my arm, too stiffly, and we both try to look like nothing weird is going on.

“How do you know about them?” I ask, fear taking firm root inside of me.

“It doesn’t matter, Anastasia. Let me help you.”
Anastasia
? No one in school calls me that.

“The key has nothing to do with me.” I frown, twisting my arm in his grip.

Andy gives me a sorry look. “You don’t know, then.”

“
Let go
,” I hiss, heart hammering as I see those glowing foreign faces moving towards us.

“Let me help you.”

“Leave me alone!”

“Ana—”

I give a final yank and pull my hands free from his. Turning, running, I dive into the crowd, weaving around bodies, and slip out the back of the gymnasium, into the parking lot. I sprint past students, teachers, faces I recognize, rolling or squinting their eyes at me, but I don’t give a single damn about them. The drum of fear beats too loudly for me to slow down, to try and act
normal
. I sprint to my car, fall into the driver’s seat, lock the doors, and wait for something terrible to happen.

But no one follows me out of the school. Nothing jumps up from the backseat of my car. The parking lot is motionless.

I grab my phone and text Kyla that
I have to go
, that
we’ll talk later
, that
I’m so sorry
. The fear inside of me twists up through the firmament, sprouting tiny buds of panic, a root network of living terror that I’m scrambling to catch and destroy before it destroys me—but I can’t. It’s too deep, too far-reaching. It’s out of my control.

“Then be brave,” I whisper Trebor’s words to me, and jam my keys into the ignition.

— 44 —

The cemetery gates are closed at this hour, but I know better. I slip in through the crooked bars around the maple tree that’s grown through the iron fence over the last century, and slink through the shadows, towards my mother’s grave. I’m wearing a black zip-up hoodie I found in my car, covering the bright gold of my dress, keeping out the cold as I move over the graves.

Row after row of grave markers pass by as I tiptoe through the dark, some strewn with old flowers, some neglected and covered in weeds. When I find my mother’s grave, I hunker down by her headstone, leaning against it as if to listen. I breathe deeply, too frightened to be sad tonight.

“How did this happen, Mom?” I wonder quietly, almost soundlessly. “I never thought I could pass for normal, but now I’m a paranormal freak whose life has been built on lies. And who’s lying? Which lies are worse? Mine, yours, theirs? I’m not even sure anymore. If I ever knew at all.” I touch the cool stone with my forehead, feel the fingers of cold reach deep, through skin, scalp, and bone, to the nape of my neck, like an icy hand lay there.

“I hope you’re really out there somewhere.” I swallow, sitting up, looking at the familiar letters chiseled into granite and seeing no words at all. “Watch over me, please? And Dad. And Kyla. And watch over Trebor, too. Even if—even if he’s keeping secrets, I don’t think he’s bad. I really think he means to help me. And I think—I think I…” But the words freeze in my throat. I close my eyes instead, and listen for my mother’s voice as I have so many times before, but there’s only the sigh of the wind, and the pounding of my heart.

“Anastasia Flynn,” a husky voice comes from behind, and I jump to my feet.

But it’s too late. I’m trapped. Those faces at the dance, shining and foreign, surround me now, dressed all in black: three men, three women, each with black tattoos snaking up their arms. Six Irin.

If they’re Irin, I should feel relieved, shouldn’t I? So why do I feel like running?

A tall, lithe woman with raven-black hair steps forward, hands at her back. “Where is Trebor?” she demands.

I swallow, shake my head, have no idea how to respond. “Who are you?”

“You
know
what we are,” she tells me. Her voice is low, like a threat. “The same thing he is.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

The woman takes a long, predatory step forward, the fabric of her black jumpsuit stretching over the sculpted muscles of her legs, catching the dim moonlight and swallowing it into dark. “Don’t bother lying, human. You’re harboring a fugitive, if you lie.”

“What?” I try to withhold expression, but my eyes betray my shock.

She cocks her head. “I’m sorry, how silly of me. Of course he would have lied to you.” She glowers. “He’s a traitor. Trebor has joined with the Sura. They’re looking for weapons to wage war on the Malakiim.” She steps forward again, stares me in the eyes, and even though I’m several inches taller than her I feel small, powerless. “He has Fallen. And he only means to use
you
as a weapon, as well.”

“No…” But my head and my heart are so full, the word comes out weak, groundless.

“He knows what you are, perhaps better than you do.”

“No. I’m just a girl,” I insist. “I’m just a human.”

“Don’t play dumb.” She sneers. “Faye.”

Another woman steps forward, no more than five feet tall, the one with a short mop of fire-engine-red hair. She has no expression on her face when she moves, but in her eyes I see something struggling to stay down.

“Take your cousin’s new
toy
and bind her.”

Faye nods and marches towards me, hands at her sides, glowing white.

“Wait, please,” I try to reason. “Faye, don’t. I’m—I’m dangerous. Don’t come near me!”

She hesitates, eyeing the darkness around us, as if expecting something to come leaping out of the shadows.

“I—I can’t control my power yet,” I stammer. “I might hurt you—”

“Silence!” The dark haired woman shouts, narrowed eyes darting between me and the Irin girl. “Faye!”

Faye moves forward again, her eyes finally settled on mine, mouthing something to me that I don’t quite grasp—

“Raven, get down!” One of the Irin shouts.

The five of them drop, leaving only Faye and I standing as a net of white light falls over the other Irin. Something heavy slams into my right side, hooks under my arms, grabs me, lifts me, shrieking—

“Hold on!” Trebor shouts, and I cling to him, arms latched around his neck, legs wound around his legs. I bury my face in his shoulder. Trebor squeezes back, and doesn’t let up.

Wind streams past us. We’re gliding through the air. I realize with some apprehension that we are—or at least Trebor is—
flying
.

When I finally open my eyes to peer over his shoulder, I take in the sight of long, slender bones under paper-thin skin, covered in thousands of tiny feather-like scales, shimmering dark blue and green like the sea—like dragon fly wings. Color and bone is spread against the night sky, beating down the air.

“
When the fuck did you grow wings?
” I scream.

But then we’re slowing down, falling, landing. His feet hit the ground with practiced ease, and mine magnetize to the earth, but my fists won’t stop clinging to him, won’t stop shaking. He’s shed his tuxedo jacket, and I can see from the bare skin below his rolled shirtsleeves that his tattoos are
gone
. His wings—huge, and beautiful, and impossible—are folding down against his back, almost gargoyle-like, protruding from two tears in the back of his shirt.

“There’s no time,
run
!” he pushes me, and I go, stealing glances at his wings as we race down the street to my car. They fold down and down, shimmering, breaking apart like pixels and dissolving, disappearing—clinging to his skin like ink
.

We reach the car and climb inside, strap our seatbelts on. I turn over the engine, fire her up, pull away from the curb and into the empty street.

“Wings?!” I yell.

“There are more important things to worry about, Ana!” Trebor points out.

“Yeah, like why you lied to me!” At the end of the street I pause only long enough to be certain we won’t die when I turn.

“I lied because I wasn’t sure you’d understand until you knew what it was like in Shemayiim. I needed you to trust me if I was going to help you. But I’m
not
working with the Sura, you have to—Ana—!”

As I turn onto Main Street, a silver SUV with hideous blue flames painted on the sides peels out in front of me from the curb. I swerve to avoid it, cursing, but the sight strikes fear into my gut. I know that car. Its tires squeal, spinning to catch up. I can’t see the driver in my rearview window, but I can see a living mass of shadows shifting and roiling inside the cab.

“Trebor?” I ask, both hands on the steering wheel, gunning the gas, but it’s no use. My car is too old for this kind of behavior.

“Sura,” he confirms. “They’ve found a mark. Someone let them in.” He curses, too.

The SUV accelerates, comes up alongside us. It’s solid black inside, except for the piercing white eyes blinking out, the sharp smiles, the curved claws scratching against the windows. For a moment, the inky dark parts, just long enough for me to put a face to the car.

“It’s
John
,” I barely manage to squeak out, turning my eyes back to the road.

“Never did like that guy,” Trebor mutters through gritted teeth. He’s holding onto the handle over the door, bracing himself between that and the driver’s seat.

John swerves and scrapes us, pushes us—
Oh my God we’re going to die
—knocking control from my hands as the wheels skitter and twist against the massive weight of his SUV.

“No, no, no,” I whimper, bracing, pushing down on the gas pedal with both feet, struggling with the steering wheel. The bridge over the creek is just up ahead, and I know—I
know
—John is—or the Sura are—trying to drive us straight into the water.

The SUV drifts away, winding up for a second attack. I try to slam on the brakes but it’s too little, too late. John cuts the wheel, driving his car right into our path as we fishtail and skid forward, fighting momentum. “Trebor!” I shriek, throwing my left arm in front of my face, reaching for him with my right.

He shouts something to me, but there’s too much noise, too much confusion: squealing rubber; the shattering of safety glass; crunching fiberglass and twisting metal; a cold, unlikely silence as the world flips and spins. Air rushes past my face through the new cracks and holes in my car, and for far too long, I feel weightless.

In the midst of those gravity-defying moments, Trebor’s hand finds mine. His fingers twine with my own, clasping our palms together, as if to embrace me—as if to tell me everything will be okay. I risk opening my eyes to slits, just for a moment. He’s watching me, eyes ablaze with thoughts and feelings I’m afraid I’ll never have the chance to understand.

Through the broken window behind him, I see water streaking past.

Then I feel it. The roof of the car slams into the shallow creek bed, spraying us with water. My seatbelt is unyielding against my chest and shoulder when my body snaps up—down—head thudding against the ceiling. There’s a sudden silence as the engine cuts, a muddled hissing noise, an echo in my mind that might have been my mother’s voice…

Wake up, Ana. Wake up!