The Keep: The Watchers (15 page)

“Shut up.” I nudged him with my shoulder.

Unfortunately, this reminded me how scantily clad we both were.

Josh wore the standard-issue swimsuit, which for the guys was a pair of supertight boxer briefs—emphasis on
super
. Those things probably outlined more than I needed to see, but I couldn’t say because there was no way in hell I was looking down. And besides, my eyes had snagged on his upper body. He was lean but muscled, walking that line guys tread at our age—almost a man yet still almost a boy, too—though Josh was definitely tipping over into the almost-man side of that equation.

I tore my eyes away, pointing my gaze in the direction he was looking. Kenzie, my Proctor, was the last one in the water, still doing her laps. She had this trick of gliding all the way across the Olympic-sized pool and back again. Without taking a breath.

“She’s amazing,” he said.

I nodded. She was a blur of blond hair and navy blue Speedo. Her hair was a perfect bob to match her perfectly proportioned body. “She’s always reminded me of one of those American Girl dolls.”

“Yeah, if there were an MMA version.”

“MM…ohh, mixed martial arts?” I watched her, all sleek perfection. She was solid, but not buff like I imagined those MMA women would be. “Nah. More like…American Ninja Girl.”

“That’s it,” he exclaimed, clapping his hand on my shoulder, a naked slap that made me self-conscious. “You seen her weapons? Those sai knives?” His Australian accent lilted at the end, making his every sentence sound like it might’ve been a question. “Like a manga chick.”

It’d been Yasuo who’d told me what those knives of hers were called. She carried two of them, long and thin, each blade framed by two sharp prongs, making them look almost like tridents. They did seem like something a manga badass would wield.

She reached the edge and smoothly pulled herself up and out of the pool. We weren’t friends, but we were friendly enough, and she spared me a curt nod as she walked by, headed for her towel. I noted how she didn’t spare a glance for Josh, or any of the other guys for that matter.

We were surrounded by half-naked cuties, but Kenzie didn’t care. She was in her own world. It made me realize something: I’d never seen her with one vampire in particular, which implied she’d made it to Guidon by consuming only the shooters of blood they served in the dining hall. She probably didn’t drink from the source, and yet there she was, power and ease, swimming all over the damned pool. Without breathing.

I’d been nervous about the water, but Kenzie was an inspiration. Not that I’d break my bond with Carden, but if she could accomplish all that, if she could be that strong without a blood bond, then how far could I go? Could I truly break into the keep? Might I uncover their secrets? Discover what’d happened to all those fallen girls?

My journey started now. Here. I’d go to the pool more. Work out more. I’d be a force.

“Earth to Drew.” Josh was looking at me funny. I registered how he’d gone for his towel and come back, and I was still in the same spot, staring at that pale blue water. “You’d better shower up. Curfew’s soon.”

I was the last girl in the showers, hurriedly rinsing the conditioner from my hair as I heard the heavy metal door to the locker room slam shut. I turned off the water, the ancient knobs squealing. There was total silence. I was the last one. I scampered to my locker, careful not to slip. I’d dallied too long.

“Dammit.” I struggled to get my clothes on—I hated putting clothes on damp skin—but I needed to hustle. My hair was soaking—the ends of it would surely freeze on my race back to the dorm. “Damndamndammit.”

I hobbled out of the dressing room, forcing my heels into my boots. I’d just reached the pool deck when I heard a noise—a loud electronic sound reverberating through the pool area.
Whoomp.

The lights cut out. I was in pitch-darkness.

I
froze. I mean, how much would it suck to accidentally fall in the pool fully clothed? “Hello?” I called out. It was probably just some nighttime janitor out there, doing his job. “Is anybody there?”

There was another click, quieter this time, the sound like a flicking switch. The overhead lights were still off, but the pool lights switched on, looking like white orbs glowing underwater. The pale water shimmered eerily, making the black stripes along the bottom waver. I strained my ears for some movement, but there was just a distant
drip-drip
. The natatorium at night—creepiest thing ever.

“Hello?” I called again, but there was still no answer.

A door slammed, and I panicked. I’d seen the chain they used to lock up with—I was not about to spend the night at the natatorium, thankyouverymuch.

“Hey!” I called again, louder this time. “I’m still here!”

“That’s the problem.” There was another click, and light
flickered behind me. Not the overhead light, but a small bare bulb in the custodial closet.

“What?” I spun, looking for who’d spoken.

He was illuminated from above. In the darkness, the effect was freaky, like holding a flashlight under your chin only flipped the other way. “You’re still here, and that’s a problem.”

“What?” I squinted to see better. “Is that you, Yasuo? What are you talking about?”

“You’re here. She’s not. And now it’s time to eradicate the problem.” He flew at me, grabbing my neck before I had a chance to act. His fingers curled and tightened until I felt the delicate bones of my throat begin to give. He was going to kill me.

I grabbed his wrists and struggled backward. He squeezed tighter, and my body spasmed, fighting for air. I opened my mouth to shout, but couldn’t get a breath in or out.

The rubber soles of my boots skittered on the wet tile of the pool deck and my feet slid from under me. I had to hold on to his arms to avoid breaking my own neck. Finally, my boots got purchase. I got my feet back under me and tried to speak.
Stop
, I tried to say, but nothing came out. My mouth just opened and closed like a gasping fish.

I stared into his eyes, trying to communicate that way. His were bloodshot, giving him an insane, unhinged look. I wanted to connect. Tried to telegraph something with my pleading expression. Maybe he’d remember how I wasn’t so bad. How we used to be. But he wasn’t there. I stared into those eyes, and he wasn’t home. His gaze was flat and dead. Cold. He’d become something different. Whoever this creature was, it wasn’t my friend Yasuo anymore.

His fingers curled tighter, and I felt my eyes bug. Black spots popped into my vision. I was dead if I didn’t act.

Alarm, terror, grief…My emotions were so haywire, I expected Carden to appear any minute. But he didn’t.

Had Yas chained the door? Either way, it looked like I was on my own. Which meant I needed to stop the magical thinking.
Strength
, I told myself. I’d be strong, not terrified. I was strong.

I uncurled the fingers of my right hand and forced myself to release his arm. Hitching up my leg, I reached down. My fingers splayed, flapped, grasped toward the stars in my boot. But the farther I stretched, the deeper his fingers dug into me.

The black spots in my vision melded together. Became a black veil. My chest was spasming now, my throat making disturbing little croaking noises. But I sensed it as though from the end of a tunnel. I was passing out.

This was it.

I sensed movement.
Carden.
He’d come at last.

There was a slamming door, a rush of fresh air and light. But Yasuo didn’t take his eyes from me, so surely it was only my fantasy. This was my brain shutting down, me going into the light.

But suddenly Yasuo’s fingers were gone. His spine shot straight and his arms sprang from his sides like he might flap away. His back arched, and he bucked, then bucked again, eyes shut like he was having a seizure.

It was the last thing I saw before my own body took over, and I doubled over, dropping to my knees, coughs racking me. My chest shuddered to pull in oxygen, the moist air burning as it passed my throat.

Finally, my vision cleared and I looked up, expecting to find Carden. But my savior hadn’t been a vampire. It took me a moment to make sense of what I was seeing.

Yasuo was on his belly, and Kenzie sat straddled over him. She’d plunged her sai knives hilt-deep in his back.

She calmly met my eyes and said, “I forgot my goggles.” She glanced from me to Yas. “Just in time, apparently.” She stood and dusted off her knees, giving me a smile. “I hate missing a pool party.”

“Oh my God.” My voice was ragged, barely a rasp. “You killed him.”

She gave me an impatient look. “I’m better than that.”

“You did.” I pointed at the twin hilts, sticking out of him like an
X
. “His heart. You staked him.”

“Anatomy 101, Acari Drew. I’m a Guidon—I know
exactly
where his heart is.” Looking almost bored, she drew her finger down to a point just below his left shoulder, between her knives. “His heart is exactly between these two blades. The kid will be fine.”

She pulled out those blades, and Yasuo’s body shivered. So he was really alive?

Oh crap.
He was really alive.

And he’d be really pissed when he came to. I wavered to standing. “We should get out of here.”

“He’s out for a while.” Seeing my questioning look, she grinned. “Not my first rodeo, girlie.”

She was cleaning her blades on the hem of his uniform sweater, her posture so cool, it ratcheted her several notches up in my estimation.

“Whose side are you on anyway?” she asked.

My eyes shot to hers. “What?”

The word brought on a fresh bout of coughing, and she waited till I was done to say, “If I’m not mistaken, this Trainee just tried to kill you.”

I gazed at Yasuo’s face. His features were slack, but his chest rose and fell evenly now. Alive, just as she’d said. He looked so peaceful—more peaceful than I’d seen him since Emma’s death. “He’s confused.”

“Confused?” She nudged his leg with her foot. “These guys aren’t worth the trouble, if you ask me.”

I thought of Josh, my Australian pal. “Some of them are okay.”

She rolled her eyes at me as though I’d lost my mind. “If you’re into that sort of thing.”

Kenzie had obviously not bonded with a vampire. Lately, I’d thought a lot about strength versus power, but she didn’t mess with thoughts of who controlled whom. She fought. She survived. She was pure strength. A warrior.

I vowed to be more like her.

I hopped into step, catching the door before it swung shut. “Right behind you.”

T
his thing with Yasuo had to stop.

Maybe if I could definitively prove that Emma was alive when she left the ring, he’d finally understand that her death wasn’t really my fault. In fact, Alcántara had probably targeted her way back in our first semester, when she’d pulled out of the original Directorate Challenge.

I needed to get closer to the truth, which meant getting closer to Alcántara. It all came back to him.

And, I just realized, he was currently eyeing me again. I shifted in my seat, pretending to write something in my notebook. Every time he looked at me, I felt it, like a warm breeze blowing over my skin or a little shiver of relaxation at the base of my spine.

I girded myself. Sat tall. I’d lost my best friend. My other best friend was doing his best to kill me. And it was all the fault of this vampire.

He was lecturing on assassination techniques. Historical examples.
Issues of distance. Questions of proximity, of position. And I wasn’t hearing a word he was saying. I was plotting.

I dared not confide my plans to Carden…and where
was
he, anyway? I hadn’t seen him since that intense night we’d spent together.

Had I done something to make him keep his distance? I replayed our final conversation in my mind. I hadn’t said anything too strange about Ronan, right? I would’ve known at the time if he were upset.

He was probably just busy.

So why hadn’t he come when I needed him? I’d gotten used to my vampire coming when he sensed me upset, and when your supposedly good friend tries to
kill
you, it definitely falls under the Upset column. Surely Carden had felt my alarm. My anguish.