P.C. Cast - Burned

I stared at her, knowing that, like A-ya, she was telling me the truth.

Heath murmured in his sleep again, drawing my gaze to him. He looked so strong and normal and young, but he’d never step on another football field again. He’d never gun his truck around another slick corner and whoop like an Okie. He’d never be a husband. He’d never be a dad. I looked from him to the nine-year-old me.

“I don’t think I deserve to be happy again.”

“I’m sorry for you, Zoey,” she said, and disappeared.

Feeling kinda dizzy and light-headed, I paced.

The next version of me didn’t flicker or flutter at the edge of my vision. This version met me head-on, blocking my pacing path. She didn’t look like me. She was super tall. Her hair was long and wild and a bright copper red. It wasn’t until I met her gaze that I saw our similarity—we had the same eyes. She was another piece of me; I knew her.

“So who are you?” I said wearily. “And what part of me am I going to be missing if I don’t get you back?”

“You may call me Brighid. Without me, you lack strength.”

I sighed. “I’m too tired to be strong right now. How about we talk again after I take a nap?”

“You don’t get it, do you?” Brighid shook her head disdainfully. “Without us, you won’t take a nap—you won’t get better—you won’t rest. without us, you just get more and more incomplete, and you drift.”

I tried to focus through the headache that was building in my temples. “But I’d be drifting with Heath.”

“Yes, you might be.”

“And if I get all of you back together inside me, I’ll leave Heath.”

“Yes, you might.”

“I can’t do that. I can’t return to a world without him,” I said.

“Then you truly are broken.” Without another word, Brighid disappeared.

My legs gave out, and I sat down hard on the moss. I only knew I was crying when my tears started making wet marks on my jeans. I don’t know how long I sat there, bent with grief and confusion and weariness, but eventually a sound slipped inside my mental fog: wings, rustling, beating against the wind, hovering, dipping, searching.

“Come on, Zo. We need to get farther into the grove.”

I looked up to see that Heath was crouching beside me. “This is my fault,” I said.

“No, it’s not, but why does it matter so much whose fault it is? This is done, babe. It can’t be undone.”

“I can’t leave you, Heath,” I sobbed.

He brushed the hair back from my face and handed me another ball of Kleenexes. “I know you can’t.”

The sound of enormous wings got louder; tree boughs behind us swayed in response.

“Zo, let’s talk about this later, ’kay? Right now we need to move again.” He grabbed me under one of my elbows, lifted me to my feet, and started to guide me deeper into the grove, where the shadows were darker and the trees even more ancient-looking.

I let him move me. It felt better to move. Not good. I didn’t feel good. But it was better when I wasn’t holding still.

“It’s him, isn’t it?” I said listlessly.

“Him?” Heath asked, helping me step over a rough gray stone.

“Kalona.” The word seemed to change the density of the air around us. “He’s come for me.”

Heath gave me a sharp look, and shouted, “No, I’m not going to let him get you!”

“No, I’m not going to let him get you!” Dragon shouted.

Along with everyone else in the Council Chamber, Stevie Rae stared at the Sword Master, who looked like he might be getting ready to pop a major blood vessel.

“Uh, him who, Dragon?” Stevie Rae said.

“That Raven Mocker who killed my mate! That’s why you can’t go out alone until we track that creature down and destroy it.”

Stevie Rae tried to ignore the hollow feeling Dragon’s words gave her and the horrible sense of guilt she experienced as she faced him, seeing his heartbreak and knowing that even though Rephaim had saved her life, twice, it was also a fact that he had killed Anastasia Lankford.

He’s changed. He’s different now, she thought, wishing she could say the words aloud and not bring her world crashing down around them.

But she couldn’t tell Dragon about Rephaim. She couldn’t tell anyone about the Raven Mocker, so instead she began, again, to weave lies with the truth, forming a terrible tapestry of evasion and deceit.

“Dragon, I don’t know which Raven Mocker was there in the park. I mean, it’s not like he told me his name.”

“I think he was the head one—the Ref-whatever,” Dallas spoke up, even though Stevie Rae shot him a look .

“Rephaim,” Dragon said, with a voice like death.

“Yeah, that’s it. He was huge, just like you guys described, and his eyes really were human-looking. Plus, he had a thing about him. It was obvious he thought he was the shit.”

Stevie Rae stifled the urge to press her hand firmly over Dallas’s mouth—and maybe nose, too. Smothering him would definitely make him stop talking.

“Oh, Dallas, whatever. We don’t know who that Raven Mocker was. And, Dragon, I can understand why you’re worried and all, but we’re just talkin’ ’bout me goin’ to the Benedictine Abbey so that Grandma Redbird hears about Zoey from me. I’m not goin’ off into the wilderness alone.”

“But Dragon does have a good point,” Lenobia said. Erik and Professor Penthasilea nodded, their disagreements about Neferet and Kalona temporarily put aside. “This Raven Mocker did appear where you were, while you were communing with earth.”

“It’s too simplistic to say she was communing with the earth,” Dragon spoke quickly into Lenobia’s pause. “As Stevie Rae explained to us, she was dialoguing with ancient powers of good and evil. That creature appearing during the manifestation of evil cannot be a coincidence.”

“But the Raven Mocker wasn’t attackin’ me. It was—”

Dragon lifted a hand to silence her. “Undoubtedly it was drawn to the Darkness, which then turned on one of its own as evil often does. You cannot know with certainty that the creature isn’t after you.”

“We also cannot know with certainty that there is only one Raven Mocker in Tulsa,” Lenobia said.

Panic fluttered in Stevie Rae’s stomach. What if everyone was so freaked-out about the possibility of a bunch of Raven Mockers stalking around Tulsa that they made it impossible for her to get away to see Rephaim?

“I’m goin’ to the abbey to see Grandma Redbird,” Stevie Rae said firmly. “And I don’t think there’s a flock of those dang Raven Mockers out there. What I do think is that one bird guy somehow got left behind, and he was at the park because he was drawn to Darkness. Well, I’m sure as heck not gonna call Darkness to me again, so there’s no reason for the bird to have anything to do with me.”

“Do not underestimate the danger of that creature,” Dragon said, his voice sad and somber.

“I won’t. But I also won’t let it keep me locked up on campus. I don’t think any of us should let it do that,” she added hastily. “I mean, we can be careful, but we can’t let fear and evil rule our lives.”

“Stevie Rae makes a valid point,” Lenobia said. “Actually, I believe we should get the school back on a regular schedule and include the red fledglings in classes.”

Kramisha, who had until then been sitting silently to the left of Stevie Rae, snorted softly. She heard Dallas, who was sitting to her right, sigh heavily. She stifled a smile, and said, “I think that’s a real good idea.”

“I don’t think we should say much about Zoey’s condition,” Erik said. “At least not until something more, well, permanent happens.”