Destined (38 page)

“I’m frightened,” Damien admitted. “Jack’s death is still too raw, too close, and thinking about seeing another death frightens me.”

“We’ll all be with you,” I told him. “We’re all in this together.”

“I’m scared. I’ve never circled without being a Twin,” Shaunee blurted.

There was a very uncomfortable silence, and then from the middle of the bus Erin said, “I’m still here. I’m still water to your fire. You won’t be alone.”

“We all need to be scared safe, not scared stupid,” I said, feeling incredibly relieved that the Twins were kinda sorta talking.

“Fear can be beneficial if it is tempered with common sense and courage.” We jumped as Thanatos seemed to magickally appear in the front of the bus. She was holding a ginormic spellwork basket and wearing a long, hooded cloak that was a beautiful sapphire blue color. She looked powerful and ancient and scary. Then she smiled, and her scary changed to somehow include us and I relaxed just a little bit.

“We’re all here,” I said after I swallowed down the heart that was in my throat. “We’re ready.”

“You are
almost
ready. Before we leave campus I have to task each of the five circle members. Because it is a reveal ritual, and the spell I cast will allow those present to see that which has been hidden, each of you must bring to the altar something that reveals a truth about yourself that is usually hidden.”

“Oh, boy.” I sighed.

“Take a moment to think about what it is you need to reveal about yourself, and then go collect something to symbolize it. Quickly. We must complete our ritual and set the spell this night, before it passes midnight and a new day begins.”

Shaunee was the first of us to get up. She looked determined as she hurried off the bus. Damien followed her. Then Stevie Rae. Then Erin. I had a sudden thought, and dug through my purse. In the bottom of it, with the used Kleenexes, topless ChapStick, and purse crud, I found it. Satisfied, I looked up to see Stark, Darius, Rephaim, and Aphrodite all gawking at me.

“Do you need help figuring out this assignment?” Aphrodite said, only semi-sarcastically.

“Zoey already has what she needs with her,” Thanatos said.

“Yeah. She’s right. I do.” I had the very immature urge to stick my tongue out at Aphrodite, which I didn’t do (of course). Instead I settled for crossing my arms and looking smug.

We didn’t have long to wait for my circle to come back. Stevie Rae was first. She looked unusually frowny. She wasn’t carrying anything, but when she sat down I saw her rest her hand over one of her front jeans pockets, as if she was protecting something there.

Damien left with his man purse and came back with it. He gave Thanatos an overly perky smile and said, “Mission accomplished!”

Shaunee came back next. She didn’t say anything. She just went back to her seat and resumed staring out the window.

Erin finally came back. She was carrying a little thermal sack. The kind high-end grocers (like Petty’s at Utica Square) give you to carry home ice cream and frozen stuff. “What?” She snapped at us. “I’m back. We’re ready. Let’s go.”

Thanatos quelled Erin’s outburst with one hard look, which sent the half of an ex-Twin skulking to the back of the bus. Then she told Darius, “Take us to the lavender farm of Sylvia Redbird.” Darius pulled the short bus out of the House of Night campus. I expected Thanatos to sit down (uh, like a normal teacher) and bounce along with the rest of us. Instead she took a firm hold of the handicapped (sigh) rail with one hand, and with the other she reached into her super-loaded spellwork basket and pulled out a big bundle of something that looked like a bunch of weeds that had clusters of little white flowers just like I’d seen at the side of the road and in Oklahoma fields and ditches about a thousand times.

“As you all know, we are going to perform a reveal ritual, and I am going to cast a spell invoking death that will, hopefully, illuminate images from the past, specifically those of Zoey’s mother’s murder. It is a difficult ritual and a complex spell.” Thanatos had been speaking to all of us, but now she turned her attention to Stevie Rae. “As I mentioned before, earth is the key to unlocking this spell. The success of the vision rests on the power of your connection to the earth, as well as the commitment of the circle to bringing alive the images of the events of the past.”

“I’m real connected to earth. Promise,” Stevie Rae said.

Thanatos’s lips tilted up. “That is an excellent beginning.”

“I think my circle is real committed to this ritual, too,” I said.

I heard my friends around me echoing my words with yeses and uh-huhs.

“What’s with the weeds?” Aphrodite asked.

Thanatos shook one plant free of the others and held it up so we could see it. Like I’d thought to begin with, it was just a plain old weed that had a bunch of ordinary, but kinda pretty, white flowers clustered at the end of it, a little like baby’s breath.

“This is not a weed. It is a wonderful wild flower called angelica. Its properties are unusually strong and pure. It is a flower of communication. When used in spellwork its nature is to reveal what is hidden to the conscious eye. During tonight’s ritual you, my young Red High Priestess, are going to wear a crown woven by your friends of this magickal flower.”

“Ooooh! That’s super cool!”

Thanatos handed the bundle of wildflowers to Stevie Rae. “Pass these out. The rest of you braid the plants you get together into a circle. Stevie Rae will stack the circles on her head before the ritual.”

“Braid?” Stark muttered.

Stevie Rae dropped a bunch of
flowers
in our laps. I raised my brows at Stark. “Yep,” I said. “Braid. Death orders it.”

“Well, in that case…” He sighed and started to awkwardly braid the long stems together.

While we all braided (even Rephaim, who actually seemed to have some kind of weird gift with knotwork and ended up doing a cool intricate braid
and
helping Stark with the mess he was working on) Thanatos walked up and down the aisle of the bus and talked to us. It was weirdly like being in a mobile classroom.

“From the moment our feet touch the earth of our ritual site, we must concentrate on the intent of our spell. Try to wipe the rest of the world from your minds. Concentrate only on one small thing—that we be allowed to see the truth of Linda Heffer’s death.”

“Murder,” I heard myself saying. “She didn’t just die. She was killed.” Thanatos turned and her gaze met mine. She nodded. “I stand corrected. We are seeking truth, and so we must speak the truth. Your mother did not die of old age or disease. She was murdered. We are asking to be allowed to witness it.”

“Thanks,” I said, and then went back to braiding.

“It is fortuitous that the murder took place on a lavender farm. Lavender is a powerful magick herb. It has cleansing properties, but at its purest lavender is the embodiment of tranquility. It calms and soothes. It evokes peace and tranquility.”

“Why is that good? Z’s mom was killed in the middle of what amounts to a giant mound of lavender. Looks like its calming stuff didn’t work too well,” Aphrodite said.

“An herb cannot force the actions of someone who is committed to their destructive path. Lavender could not have saved Zoey’s mother. But the fact that she was killed surrounded by land that nurtures lavender means that the earth itself is uneasy with the violence committed on a space intended for peace.”

“And that’s good for us because…” I asked, feeling more than a little dense.

“Because the land will want to be rid of the violence inflicted upon it. It should give the images over eagerly, if not easily.”

“Why not easily?” Damien said.

“Rituals and spells that deal with great emotion are never easy,” Thanatos said. “Death spells are particularly tricky. Death rarely cooperates, even when we just want to glimpse it versus embrace it fully.”

“So when my momma used to say nothin’ good ever comes easy, she was tellin’ the truth,” Stevie Rae said.

“She was,” Thanatos said. “So, let us continue to prepare. The spell will have three parts. The first will take place between here and the physical site of our ritual. It is known as the Releasing. In order for us to be successful tonight we must all be of one accord with our intent. Clear your minds. Concentrate.”

“On death?” Stevie Rae asked.

“No, on truth. Concentrate on our shared desire to seek and find the truth tonight.”

“True Sight.”

I didn’t realize I’d spoken the words out loud until Thanatos nodded and said, “Yes, indeed. True Sight is an excellent way to put it. Tonight we wish to see with true sight.”

Thanatos moved to the back of the bus to check on Erin’s angelica braiding. I felt eyes on me and looked up from my own wildflower wreath to see Aphrodite and Stevie Rae staring at me.

“Tonight, ‘seen with True Sight,’” Aphrodite quoted quietly. “‘Darkness does not always equate to evil. Light does not always bring good.’”

“I told you we should have brought Kramisha,” Stevie Rae whispered.

“I think we should have brought a damn tank,” Stark said.

“
Clear your minds!
” I practically hissed the whisper, giving all of them a hard look. Then I went back to braiding.

I tried to clear my mind.

I tried to think about truth.

But I was too young—too scared—too worried. So the truth I found myself concentrating on was simple, but definitely not what Thanatos meant:

The truth is I need my mom and I’d give just about anything to have her alive and on my side again.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Aurox

Aurox left the House of Night campus quickly, being sure he was well ahead of the school bus. It was, by human standards, very late and the roads were nearly empty. He was glad for the directions from the voice in his vehicle. Glad that he had time to drive and think without the worry of being discovered following an all too diligent Darius.

Neferet had ordered that he thwart the forthcoming ritual and the death spell Thanatos meant to cast, though she’d made it clear he wasn’t to kill any of the Priestesses in doing so. Aurox was not surprised that he was grateful for that one small caveat. For a moment while Neferet had been speaking her commands to him he’d believed she was going to task him with murdering Zoey. The thought had made him feel sick, although according to Priestess he did not have the ability to
feel
anything. He was a vessel. The emotions of others fueled his strength, but once used, the feelings were meant to dissipate.

Then why, since the moment he’d been alone with Zoey when she’d been weeping about her mother’s death, did he still feel sadness, a deep, pressing despair, guilt, and recently something else, something new? Aurox felt loneliness.

He could almost hear Priestess’s mocking laughter.

“Yes, I feel!” he shouted, and his voice echoed within the speeding vehicle, as if he was alone in a cave—always alone. “I do feel, even though Priestess says I do not.” He smashed his fist in the dashboard, not minding that his knuckles split and the leather dented. “I feel
her
sadness. I feel
her
fear. I feel
her
loneliness. Why? Why does Zoey Redbird make me feel?”

We each decide what we are by the life choices we make.
Thanatos’s voice seemed to be there with him in the car.
Our actions define us, and will keep defining us until even after death.

“I was created to serve Neferet.” Could Thanatos be correct, even for a creature such as him?

More of the High Priestess’s words came to him as if answering his question.

“…
the future need not be dictated by the past
.”

The voice in the car spoke then, dissipating Thanatos’s wisdom. It told him to turn right and within half a mile he was to arrive at his destination. Aurox completed the turn, but then he steered the car through the ditch and did not stop it until he was sure it was parked well away from passing headlights and prying eyes. He got out of the car and, moving silently and quickly, Aurox paralleled the quaint gravel lane, which led to a modest home.

Aurox halted before he came to the home, and not just because he needed to use the concealment of the small orchard adjacent to the house and the large lavender field that framed it. He halted because of the sight of the scorched circle within the winter-sleeping herbs. He knew that burning. It was not from fire that the land was charred and the lavender destroyed. It was from a cold burn—a frigid destruction.

Darkness has been here.
Aurox told himself. And then he understood.
Neferet and the white bull did this deed. They killed Zoey Redbird’s mother.

Something slipped inside him then, as if a wheel that had been stuck, struggling in the muck and the mud, had finally broken free. Aurox’s legs felt weak, and he sat heavily with his back leaning against the rough bark of one of the trees, waiting … watching … but doing nothing.

Dragon

Looking up Zoey’s home address had been quick and easy. Her grandmother’s farm was only an hour or so away. He waited until the school bus left campus, and then followed slowly, being certain the ever-vigilant Darius did not notice him in the rearview mirror. Dragon didn’t need to stay close to the bus. He knew where he was going. He knew what he must do.

Duty was everything.

His task was to keep the school and its students safe.

A dragon protects its own.

That’s all he had left—the dragon.

“Your death has broken me

The dragon is all I have left to be.”

His own words taunted him. “I was telling you the truth!” he shouted to the emptiness. “Anastasia, you’re gone. I have nothing left except the dragon and my duty.”

“If you are not my mate, kind and true,

how will I ever again find you?”

Anastasia’s answer seemed to drift around him, bringing with it the fecund scent of the land bordering the mighty Mississippi River and a warm brush of humid, summer breezes where sunflowers nodded their heavy heads as if in approval.