When the Stars Threw Down Their Spears: The Goblin Wars, Book Three (2 page)

“And back,” Finn said. “We’re that clever.”

Isabeau snatched for the knife Finn was holding, her hand moving unbelievably fast. Finn was faster still, and his arms were longer. He held it up out of her reach.

“Does Fear know what Kyle . . . what I was doing here?” she asked.

“I’d say he noticed what Kyle had done to Teagan.”

Leo kicked the body. “The perv did something to you, Tea?”

This time Teagan did shove her hands into the hoodie pockets.

“Nothing that kicking him will change. He infected me with a retrovirus.” A little bit of gene therapy engineered to burn away her genetic inheritance from her father. To make her pure Highborn.

“Shit.” Leo rubbed his knife hand on his jeans, as if that could clean off any residue left from touching Kyle. “I knew it had diseases.”

“Please.” Isabeau reached again for the knife and melted against Finn, forcing him to hold her up.

“Tea,” Abby said. “Did you just growl?”

“Of course not.” Teagan cleared her throat. “That was just a . . . a . . .”

“A what?” Donnie asked. “A burp?”

“I don’t know.” Teagan flushed. “A . . . noise.”

She knew perfectly well that Isabeau’s body wasn’t warm, that it didn’t feel like flesh against flesh. It didn’t feel as
good
. But that didn’t stop the bilocates from indulging their appetites.

“Let me go, Mac Cumhaill,” Isabeau purred. “I’ve got to get back to my body before the Dark Man finds it. You have no idea how vicious he can be.”

Finn pushed her upright but didn’t release her arm. “Tell us, then. What happens when you swear a blood oath to a fallen
aingeal
, then break it?”

“Quiet,” Teagan said, tipping her head to listen.

Footsteps at the end of the hall. Cautious footsteps.

“I just want to—” Isabeau managed before Finn clapped his hand over her mouth.

“Officer Fiorella is coming,” Teagan said.

Donnie headed for the cafeteria entrance. “Fiorella does something other than give D.A.R.E. lectures and flirt with student teachers?” He pushed the door open a crack and peeked out, then pulled it closed. “Tea’s right. He’s at the end of the hall. You could hear him? Seriously?”

“I told you,” Abby said. “She’s got, like, superpowers. So what do we do, Tea?”

One problem at a time
. Teagan took a deep breath. Leo Gagliano had just killed a teacher. That was the most immediate problem.

“Get rid of the body before Officer Fiorella comes through that door.” Teagan knelt beside Kyle and started rolling up his shirtsleeve. “Bring her over here, Finn.”

“Whatever you’re doing, do it faster,” Donnie said. “Cop’s coming.”

“You wouldn’t dare.” Isabeau hissed. “You wouldn’t
dare
send Mab’s son home like this.”

“Oh, she would.” Finn dragged Isabeau across the floor toward Teagan. “It’s a shame I don’t have my kit. I could use a bit of duct tape right now.”

“Duct tape?” Leo had stopped pacing.

“The most useful stuff in the world,” Finn assured him.

“What are you two doing?” Abby asked.

“Improvising.” Teagan unbuckled Kyle’s Gucci belt and pulled it off.

“Stop kicking.” Finn held Isabeau’s arm against Kyle’s while Teagan wrapped the belt around them both and pulled it so tight it cut into the flesh. “You wanted to go back to Mag Mell. You’re going.”

“Wait!” Abby said as Teagan and Finn backed away. “Isabeau, where’s Molly?” The bilocate had been staying with Molly’s family as a foreign exchange student, and Molly hadn’t been in class.

“Dead,” Isabeau said flatly.

“Goblins lie.” Finn stood up. “We won’t know where Molly’s been until we find her.”

“You’ll find her body,” Isabeau said. “Kyle killed her.”

“Where?” Leo demanded.

Isabeau shrugged. “Go look.”

“Fiorella’s almost here,” Teagan interrupted. “We’re out of time.”

“Back up,” Finn told the Gaglianos. “Get as far away from her as you can.”

Teagan followed Finn as he started away from Isabeau and Kyle. Officer Fiorella was just outside the door.

“Now!” Teagan said.

Isabeau screamed as Finn whirled and threw the knife; it pierced the hand she threw up to protect her throat. And then whatever gave the goblin girl’s soul substance in this corner of the multiverse came apart. Violently. Teagan was in midstep when the shock wave hit. It threw her forward into Finn and almost knocked him off his feet. Isabeau’s scream echoed inside Teagan. She knew exactly how it felt to be at the center of that disruption in space and time—it was how she had gotten back from Mag Mell, dragging Finn with her.

It hurt. A lot.

“Don’t be feeling sorry for her,” Finn said, setting Teagan upright. “There’s no time for it.”

She nodded, looking around to make sure everyone else was all right. The Gaglianos had been farther away, but apparently not far enough. Abby was helping Angel to his feet.

Kyle and Isabeau were gone. Leo’s knife lay in the middle of a pool of Kyle’s blood. The red spatter on the ceiling tiles would be from Isabeau.

The scream and the explosion must have frozen Officer Fiorella in place, or he’d have been through the door already.

“Ew,” Abby said. “You’ve got . . . stuff on your back, Tea.”

“Stay sharp.” Finn pulled the hoodie off over her head. She could feel the tension building in his body again. He was expecting more trouble. “Don’t tell the cops anything they don’t already know. Mamieo will send someone for us.” Teagan nodded again. Her mom had ended up in a mental hospital once because she told the truth about goblins.

Finn tossed the hoodie into the pool of blood just as Officer Fiorella burst through the door.

He didn’t look anything like the friendly, joking officer who teased students at his D.A.R.E. presentations. His gun was out, and the hand that held it was shaking. Teagan had seen the eyes of frightened animals dart from opponent to opponent the same way his were now.

“Who screamed?”

“Calm down, Fiorella.” Leo had his hands on top of his head, his fingers laced together. “It’s all over. Everyone’s fine.”

“The rest of you, put your hands on your heads,” Fiorella said. “Where I can see them.”

Finn put his hands on top of his head but he moved closer to Teagan as well, not quite touching her, but close enough that the electricity arced between them. The tension in his body was almost painful, and now Teagan understood why. Officer Fiorella was shaking, and he couldn’t decide where to point his gun.

“Leo Gagliano?” Fiorella said, turning it toward Leo. “You graduated three years ago.” Fiorella knew only the jocks or the bad kids. That he still recognized Leo couldn’t be a good thing. “What are you doing here?”

“I’ll tell you.” Leo’s voice was gentle.
He’s done this before
, Teagan realized. His body language was submissive. Respectful. “Where do you want me to start, Officer?”

“How about you start with the dead kid down the hall?”

Teagan’s heart sank. Cade and Jing had stepped in and tried to help because they were Abby’s friends. Her friends. Finn had told her this would happen if they let civilians get involved.

“He’s dead?” Leo asked.

“His guts are on the floor.”

“Jing is with him,” Abby said. “He won’t let Cade die.”

“The mighty Jinghez Khan was crying like a baby.” Officer Fiorella looked like he wanted to cry, too. “Cade’s a mess. If he’s not dead, he will be.”

“An animal can survive evisceration,” Teagan said.

Officer Fiorella turned to her, and suddenly she was looking right down the barrel of his gun. She felt Finn move beside her, ready to get between them.

“Who are you?” Fiorella demanded.

Her mouth was suddenly very dry. “Teagan Wylltson.”

His eyes flicked to the knife in the pool of blood. “You cut open animals, do you, Ms. Wylltson?”

“She works with the vet at the zoo,” Abby said. “You know you’ve got an attitude? It’s like we’re the bad guys or something.”

Fiorella studied Teagan for a moment longer. “I remember you. I let you into the science fair once. What are you doing mixed up with this?”

“She was in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Leo said before Teagan could answer. “There was another girl here, too. She ran.”

Officer Fiorella turned back toward Leo. “You’re telling me what’s going on?”

“Jack the Ripper was teaching the freaking psychology class,” Abby said, pulling out her cell phone.

“Hey!” Fiorella swung toward her. “Put it away, and get your hands back up.”

“I get a phone call,” Abby protested, raising her hands. “Right?”

Donatello sighed. “He hasn’t arrested anybody yet, Abby.”

“She a friend of yours, Leonardo?” Fiorella asked.

“Our little cousin,” Leo said.

“A Gagliano who’s never been arrested?” He studied Abby. “What are you, the white sheep of the family?”

“She’s a good kid,” Leo said, his hands still on top of his head. “Let me tell you what’s going to happen, Abigail. When the rest of Chicago’s Finest come through that door, they’re going to take us down to the station to have some pictures made. Then Krueger’s gonna show up in his fancy lawyer suit with all kind of reasons why they can’t keep us, and we’ll go home.”

“That’s true,” Officer Fiorella said. “So why don’t you give me a break and tell me what happened here before anyone shows up?”

“She told you,” Leo said. “Jack the Ripper was teaching psych class. You need to look into background checks, Fiorella. The guy didn’t even have a home address and you let him walk in here and teach?”

“How do you know he didn’t . . . ? Never mind.” Officer Fiorella shook his head. “So, you didn’t like his lesson plan?”

“Did you see the sick stuff he wrote on the board?” Abby asked.

Leo frowned at her.
“Shut it, Abby.”

“So,
you’re
going to keep talking to me instead, right, Leo?” Fiorella asked.

“Right. The guy they let teach—Bullen wasn’t his real name. He wasn’t even a teacher. He killed the cafeteria lady and pinned it on our brother.”

Officer Fiorella’s eyes narrowed. “You have proof?”

“None you’d like. So he frames my kid brother, like I said. We show up to talk to him about it. I meet my cousin Abby, and she tells us the teacher just slashed Cade open with his claws—”

“Claws?”

Leo shrugged. “There’s a classroom full of kids that saw it, Fiorella. Ask them. I wasn’t there. Like I said, Abby tells us what was happening and we corner him down here. He’s got a hostage—a girl—but she gets away. Then he and this evil chick named Isabeau explode.”

“Explode.”

“I swear.” From the expression on his face you’d think he’d just walked out of church. “They explode.”

Angel and Donnie were completely focused on their older brother.
Getting their story straight
. The police were not going to get one word out of them that hadn’t already come from Leo’s mouth.

They all heard the doors slam at the end of the hall, and the sound of running feet. Six of Chicago’s Finest came through the cafeteria door with their guns out. Fiorella put his gun away.

Teagan could feel Finn relax. It really was over now; no one else was going to die.

Finn glanced at the clock on the cafeteria wall. “Less than thirty minutes from incident to arrival. Impressive.”

“No talking,” one of the officers said. “Keep them separate until we’ve taken statements.”

“These two,” Officer Fiorella was saying, pointing at Leo and Finn, “aren’t students here.”

An officer took Teagan’s elbow and led her toward the door; his partner did the same with Abby.

The officer steered her to the side of the hall so they wouldn’t disturb the bloody footprints on the floor.

Cade’s blood.

They walked past locked doors with black paper taped over the small windows. Full lockdown. The students and teachers huddled against the walls inside the classrooms knew by now it wasn’t a drill even if no shots had been fired. They were probably texting furiously, trying to figure out what was going on.

The door to the AP Psychology class where Kyle had been pretending to teach while he waited for Teagan was wide open. She stopped. Paramedics were working on Cade. They wouldn’t be working if he were dead, would they? Jing was standing behind them, his arms wrapped around himself, rocking on his feet. Officer Fiorella was right. He was crying.

“Oh, my god,” Abby said.

That’s what happens when you get civilians involved
. Teagan could almost hear Finn’s voice. She hadn’t called the Gagliano brothers or asked Jing or Cade for their help. Abby had. But it was her fault Abby was involved.

The officer pulled gently on Teagan’s arm. She followed him toward the front doors of the school, praying that the paramedics knew what they were doing. Because if they didn’t, a boy who’d just tried to help because he was a friend would go into shock and die before he reached the hospital.

A crowd of people had gathered on the other side of the police line in front of the school—parents responding to texts. A column of smoke reached into the sky.

“What’s burning?” Teagan asked the officer.

“The library park,” he replied. “You from that neighborhood?”

“Yes,” she said. The park was where she had left Finn’s guardian angel, Raynor Schein; her own father; Gil, a wounded phooka; and Joe, the North American Green Man, all facing a seething wall of shadow men at the doorway to Mag Mell. Demons, Father Gordon would call them. The Dark Man’s offspring.

The officer put his hand on top of her head so she wouldn’t bump it getting into the back seat of the patrol car he’d led her to. Then he shut the door, but he didn’t get in the front. She was alone, watching the smoke rise.

Abby was taken to another car, and Finn, his hands cuffed behind him, put into a third. The paramedics loaded Cade into an ambulance as the press arrived. The Gagliano boys still hadn’t appeared when the authorities started evacuating the school, teachers leading lines of students out of the building and down the street.

Teagan tried the door handle. Locked, of course. It was maddening to be sitting in a police car, unable to find out what was happening to her friends and family.