The Prophecy (10 page)

I had my
nose buried in a ledger and supply catalogue, calculating how many peas we had
left in stock and how much of a supply we’d need to order, when Priscilla
nudged me in the side. I shoved her arm away with an irritated grunt.

“Thanks
a lot. You made me lose count,” I said.

“Who’s
that with Adrian?” she hissed in my ear.

I
looked up and nearly snapped my pencil in two. All the blood rushed from my
head and I clutched her arm. “You have got to be kidding me,” I said. 

Adrian’s
face lit up with exaggerated glee the moment our eyes met. He skirted around
the table where Priscilla and I had set up our work things and nearly tripped
over a pile of boxes in his rush to get to me. He pulled me against him in a
tight hug.

“At
least pretend like you’re happy to see them,” he whispered in my ear.

I
couldn’t tear my eyes away from Caleb and Jasmine actually standing there, right
in my very own backyard, like one of my worst nightmares come to life. “What
are they doing here?”

I must
have said it louder than intended because Jasmine crossed her arms and
answered, “I keep asking myself that same question. This isn’t exactly how I
planned on spending my weekend, you know.”

Adrian’s
arms loosened around me, and I fumbled for my stool. If I didn’t sit down soon,
I was going to pass out.

“They came
for a visit.” Adrian’s smile stretched ear to ear as he and Caleb bumped fists.
“Awesome, right?”

“Awesome
isn’t exactly the word I would use to describe it,” Jasmine said.

Caleb
rolled his eyes. “Shut up, Jasmine. You’re just pissed because now you and
Astrid can’t sit around painting each other’s nails all weekend.”

She sniffed
as she looked around the greenhouse. “Yeah. Well, I suppose I can see why you didn’t
exactly put up a fight when Mom told us we were coming here.” She gave me a
pointed look, one brow raised higher than the other.

A
furious heat rose to my cheeks. Whatever she was implying, I did
not
feel that way about Caleb, and I didn’t exactly get that vibe from him. We
didn’t even know each other!

“You
came all this way just for a visit?” I said.

“Apparently
so,” Jasmine said, with not a little sarcasm.

Caleb
grabbed her arm. “Chill out, Jas—”

She
yanked free. “Sorry if I’m a little less enthusiastic than my brother here, but
I think I’m entitled. I actually had plans until my mom had to go and ruin them
all.”

Priscilla
cleared her throat beside me and gave a general wave to break the tension. “Hi.
So I’m Priscilla. Sarah’s best friend.”

I shook
my head, some of the shock of seeing our visitors wearing off. “Oh, um. This is
Caleb and Jasmine Moon.”

“I kind
of got that,” Priscilla said.

I
turned to Caleb. “So you’re here just to what, hang out with Adrian for a few
days?”

“Doubt
it,” Jasmine answered. “I can always tell when Mom’s up to something, and she’s
definitely up to something.”

That
sick feeling in the pit of my stomach returned. “Like what?”

“How
should I know?” Jasmine sneered.

She obviously
wasn’t happy to be here, and the feeling was mutual. I didn’t want to spend any
time with her, or Charley. I also didn’t want to share Adrian with Caleb,
especially since we had a date already planned for later that night.

I
hadn’t forgotten about the last time we’d seen each other two weeks ago, when
I’d found out he had powers, too. Seeing him now made me realize I’d been
worrying about the implications of what that meant.

 Jasmine
was still complaining, even though no one was really listening. I looked at
Caleb and rolled my eyes, and he turned his head to hide a grin.

“I
mean, how stupid is that?” Jasmine was rambling. “I honestly don’t know what’s gotten
into her.”

Meg,
who’d been helping a customer when Adrian, Caleb, and Jasmine showed up, approached
us just then. She smiled at Caleb. “Well isn’t this a surprise? What are you
doing here so far away from home?”

“They’re
staying with us for a few days,” Adrian said.

My eyes
cut first to Adrian, and then immediately to Jasmine. She eyed Adrian with a
proprietary grin and tossed her long, glossy hair behind her shoulder.

“I suppose
that
part isn’t so bad,” she said.

“Oh no
she didn’t,” Priscilla muttered with a giggle.

There goes
our date, I thought. I returned my attention to the ledger in front of me. Something
was definitely going on, like Jasmine said, but what?

Meg
left to help David with a customer, and Priscilla offered to show Caleb and
Jasmine around. Adrian sidled next to me, his arm nudging mine.

“You’re
freaking out,” he said when I refused to look at him. “I knew you would freak
out about this. Honestly, it’s not that big of a deal. It’s just for the
weekend. I’m sorry about tonight. We can reschedule.”

I threw
my pencil on the table, where it rolled off and fell to the ground. I left it
there. “I’m not upset about our date.”

“Then
what is it?”

 “We
talked about this already. You know how I feel about Jasmine, and she’s made it
perfectly clear how she feels about you. And now she’s here, rubbing my nose in
it. She’s even staying in the same house as you.”

In
fact, Jasmine’s name had come up a lot over the past two weeks. We’d talked
about her so much we’d had our very first fight and then gone two whole days
giving each other the silent treatment.

“Not
this again,” Adrian said as he closed his eyes and raised his face to the sky.
“She’s just a kid.”

“She’s
fifteen. And gorgeous. She’s practically throwing herself at you, and you’re
either too blind to see it or too dim-witted to notice.”

Adrian’s
eyes widened. “Did you really just call me dim-witted? I honestly thought you
were better than that.” He gritted his teeth. “For the last time, I told you
that you have nothing to be jealous about.”

“Jealous?
Who said anything about being jealous? I’m not jealous.”

“You
aren’t?” His skeptical tone told me he didn’t exactly believe me.

“Of
course not! I’m just . . . I’m just really . . .
I don’t like her!
”

The
muscles in Adrian’s neck bulged. “Well you know what? I don’t particularly like
the way Caleb looks at you, but you don’t see me getting jealous and acting all
weird about it.”

I gasped.
“What are you talking about?”

“And
not just Caleb. Maybe you don’t see how other guys look at you, but I do. They
look at you. All the time.”

“That’s
a load of BS! What guys are you talking about?”

“Caleb,
for one!”

“Why
are you so stuck on Caleb? What’s he got to do with anything?”

“He’s
interested in you. Don’t tell me you didn’t notice when we were on the
reservation.”

I rose
to my feet and thrust out my chin. “Like you said, I’m the most unobservant
person ever.”

“What?
I never said that!”

“It was
implied.”  

“For
the last time, I’m not—”

David inserted
himself between us, giving us each a severe glare. “Cool it. People are staring.
This
is still my place of business. And,” he said, looking pointedly at me, “your
place of employment.”

Adrian
stormed off and I bit the inside of my cheek, suddenly on the verge of tears. I
had never before been so furious with him. “I just wish we could go back to the
way things were. When we were normal.”

David’s
face softened and he gave my braid a playful tug. “We were never normal, Sarah.
You just didn’t know it.”

TEN

“I’m
hanging out at your place tonight,” Shyla said quietly as she sank into the
couch next to me. “If I have to stay here, with
her
,” she added, nodding
in Jasmine’s general direction, “I’ll lose my mind.”

Jasmine
was acting as though she didn’t care what Shyla was saying to me. However, as
someone who’d had a lot of practice pretending not to care, I thought she
wasn’t doing a very good job looking disinterested.

“You’re
always welcome at my place,” I said, not bothering to lower my voice. After the
way Jasmine had treated me during our visit to the Katori reservation, I wasn’t
going out of my way to hide my true feelings where she was concerned.

“Maybe
I’ll stay with you the entire weekend. I can’t believe—”

Charley
cleared her throat, effectively cutting off Shyla. “Thank you all for coming here
tonight. We’ll consider this an informal Council meeting.”

“Can
you believe how she’s practically moved in and taken over?” Shyla whispered to
me, her voice toxic with incredulity. “This is
Gran’s
house.”

“First
of all,” Charley said with an eye on Shyla and me, “I would like to thank
Imogene for welcoming us into her home on such short notice.”

Imogene
offered a tight smile in response. Apparently she hadn’t been given
any
notice at all. She could have pointed them in the direction of the nearest
hotel when they showed up on her doorstep that afternoon, but it wasn’t
Imogene’s style to turn anyone away. 

“So,”
Charley went on, clapping her hands together. “I know many of you are wondering
exactly what we’re doing here.”

“I
think we’re all wondering,” David said.

“Exactly,”
piped Jasmine. “I could have stayed with Astrid this weekend. I don’t
understand why you had to drag me here, too. This is so pointless. And unfair! I
have my own life, you know.”

Charley’s
lips compressed as she arched her brow at her daughter. “Are you done
tantruming?” Jasmine sat back, deflated, as her face turned a shade darker.

“What we’re
wondering,” Imogene said, ignoring the by-play, “is what was so important that it
necessitated a visit. You could have picked up the phone and saved yourself the
gas money.”

Charley
laughed as though she was the only one to get the joke. “Well, let’s just say it’s
a little too complicated for a phone call.”

“Let’s
just say you get on with it,” David said.

 Charley
leveled a dramatic gaze at each of us in turn. “I don’t want to alarm anyone,
but I believe Sarah is in danger.”

“You
don’t want to alarm us!?” Meg exclaimed, above the general commotion that
Charley’s statement had caused. She moved closer to me and put her hand on my
shoulder.

“You
can’t just come here and state that Sarah is in danger and not expect us to be
alarmed,” she said.

David
sat on the edge of his seat, his eyes blazing with intensity. “Is it Victor?
Has he come back?”

Charley
raised her hand and waited to speak until the room had fallen quiet. “The
evidence is circumstantial.”

“Circumstantial,”
Adrian said. “So what you’re saying is that you don’t know for sure that Sarah
is in danger?”

Charley
shook her head. “No, but—”

“No,
but
.”
Imogene threw her hands in the air. “Of all the irresponsible . . .” She shook
her finger at Charley. “If you weren’t positive there was a threat, why say
something and cause us to worry for nothing?”

Charley
put her hand to her chest. “Excuse me, but I thought I was doing the right
thing. Whether it’s circumstantial or not, I believe we should take even the
barest hint of threat seriously. Sarah is our acting Spirit Keeper. If anything
should happen to her—”

I sat
up straighter in my chair and felt Meg’s grip on my shoulder tighten in
response. “Who said anything is going to happen to me?”

“It’s
just a hypothetical,” Charley said with a dismissive wave of her hand.

Gritting
my teeth I said, “I don’t particularly like your hypothetical. In fact, you can
take your hypothetical and—”

“What
do we do in the meantime?” David said, more to the point and with a warning
look at me to sit back and be quiet.

Charley
raised her chin, a slight triumphant smile on her lips. “I have an idea. Two, as
a matter of fact.”

My
stomach sank. It looked like Jasmine had been right. Charley was up to
something, and I didn’t trust her one bit.

“Go on,”
Imogene said, her face creased with suspicion. “We’re listening.”

Charley
smiled again. “Sarah should come back to the reservation.”

“To
visit?” I said with a snort. Been there; done that. I wasn’t interested in
doing it again anytime soon. “That’s okay. I’ll pass.”

Charley
leveled her gaze at me. “Not to visit, Sarah. To stay.”

At
first I thought she was kidding and I started to laugh. But when she only
continued to stare at me, I knew she was totally serious. “Uh-uh. No way.
That’s
never
going to happen!”