Fury's Fire (5 page)

There was something in her tone that Will couldn’t read. It didn’t help that he had lost his hearing in one ear the summer before. It meant that he heard most things as if they were being spoken through a thick wad of cotton.

Angus pulled up and got out of his battered Ford, carefully locking it before he walked over to the stand. “Greetings, friends! And others.” He grinned at Will and shoved his mop of curly brown hair out of his eyes. “So, has Gretchen filled you in on her philanthropy last night?”

Will looked over at Gretchen, who was flashing Angus a threatening glower.

“Aaannnd … I just said something I wasn’t supposed to,” Angus said.

“What? What are we talking about?” Will demanded.

Gretchen shrugged. “I got Kirk a job at the diner. No big deal.”

Will sighed, sitting down on the edge of the table. “Kirk Worstler?”

Gretchen came over and touched his shoulder. “What’s wrong? I know you don’t like him, but he’s not that weird.”

Will looked into her face—those chameleon-like green-blue eyes. It wasn’t the fact that he was weird that bothered Will. It was the fact that weird things happened around him. He was like a canary in a coal mine that way. But he didn’t want to get into it. “Okay,”
he said at last. But he couldn’t shake the feeling that Kirk’s presence was an ill omen. Several weeks ago, when Kirk was in the thick of one of his crazy moments, he had told Will, “The fury must awaken.”

FURY
.

Something wet brushed against Will’s cheek, and he looked up. It was a raindrop. Dark clouds had moved in. The sun was still burning behind them, sending out golden light at the edges, but the darkness was gathering. “It’s about to rain,” Will said.

“Well, we’d better get inside,” Angus pointed out. “No use getting drenched.”

“Yeah,” Will agreed, but he was looking at Gretchen. “It’s not like we can stop it.”

From
The Eumenides,
by Aeschylus

“Hold on,” Gretchen said as she plowed the Gremlin through a massive puddle, sending a sheet of water over a fence rail at the edge of the road. “Sorry,” she muttered.

“What could you have done about it?” Will asked, which was a reasonable question, in Gretchen’s opinion. The puddle had stretched entirely across the street, even flooding part of the lush green lawn. Rain poured from the dark gray sky as if it wanted to signal the official end to summer and the start of the gloomy fall.

Perfect day to start my senior year
, Gretchen thought. Still, she was glad to be heading to school in a comfortable pair of jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt instead of the plaid skirt and button-down white oxford that had been the uniform at her all-girls
academy in Manhattan. And she was glad to be with Will, under the protection of her vintage Gremlin, instead of alone, struggling with an umbrella as she walked the fourteen blocks from her apartment to the Standish School.

This morning she’d yanked some clothes from the boxes that had been delivered the day before, pulled them on, and tumbled outside toward her car. It seemed like a strangely informal way to start the day.

The wind picked up, howling in rage as the Gremlin made its way over the bridge. Lightning flashed over the water and thunder rumbled. Gretchen let out a grunt as she struggled with the steering wheel, fighting to keep a straight course. Her heart strained against her chest. She tried not to imagine plunging over the edge, beating her fists against the window as the car filled with water.…

“Strong wind,” Will said.

Gretchen nodded, keeping her eyes on the wet asphalt. She breathed easier as they reached the other side of the bridge and headed down a tree-lined lane.

“Here. Turn here,” Will said. “Left.”

“Already?” But Gretchen was following orders, taking the sharp left at the intersection.

“Now right,” Will instructed. “We’ll come in the rear parking lot. Front one is always packed. You’ll never get a spot.”

Gretchen nodded, and—sure enough—in a moment the playing fields at the rear of the school came into view. Gretchen cruised around the parking lot slowly, waiting patiently as the car in front of her pulled into
a spot. They were late. The parking lot was packed with cars but nearly empty of people. Everyone had gotten to school early.
Best foot forward
, Gretchen thought.
For them
.

A dark, hooded figure darted through the rain, toward the glass double doors.
Kirk
. Gretchen wondered what he thought of school. She was sort of surprised to see him going to class just like a normal person.

In the end, the only available parking spot was between two oversized SUVs. Gretchen pulled in carefully. “Do you have enough room to get out?”

Will peered out the window. “Barely,” he said.

The wind howled again as Will reached over the rear of his seat for his backpack. “Grab my umbrella—it’s in the backseat,” Gretchen said as she yanked open the handle and ducked into the rain. The wind blew harder, splattering her skin as it flew at her sideways.

The bell rang just as they hurried through the double doors. Water lay across the floor, and wet tracks led down the hall. A few students still loitered near lockers or strode past doorways, looking for classes. Gretchen pulled her damp class schedule from her bag. “Where am I going?” she asked, showing the limp paper to Will.

“That’s right down the hall.” Will pointed it out to her. “Third door on the right.”

“Where’s yours?” Gretchen asked.

“English is in the other wing. I’d better haul.”

Gretchen bit her lip and gave Will a half wave as he
hurried in the other direction. Until she saw him rushing away, she hadn’t realized just how much comfort it gave her to know he was there. She was hit with another sense of vertigo, similar to the one she’d had going over the bridge. She didn’t like the thought of him being in the other wing. She wanted to keep him close.

Gretchen turned toward her class, remembering the moment a few weeks earlier when she had awoken in the hospital. Will had been there. He had kissed her on the forehead, and the soft touch of his lips had sent warmth through her whole body.

She had loved Will for years, but it was a love that almost frightened her with its intensity and implications. That was why she often sought out other boyfriends—guys who were fun but didn’t mean much to her. Like Jason Detenber. He was smart and handsome, but he’d had a mean streak.

Class had already started by the time Gretchen arrived at advanced-placement chemistry. She stood in the doorway, waiting for the teacher to look up. Blood was still pounding in her ears, and she felt hot, despite being drenched to the skin. She shivered, although she wasn’t cold.

The teacher stood before a whiteboard, already talking about the requirements for labs. She was petite, and wore rimless glasses before large brown eyes. Her close-cropped hair and tailored clothes told Gretchen that she was the organized type, someone who would hand out a syllabus and expect all assignments on time—no excuses.

“Mrs. Hoover?”

“It’s Ms.,” the teacher corrected automatically, a fraction of a second before her eyebrows lifted archly.
Looking my best
, Gretchen thought wryly as the teacher’s face registered surprise at Gretchen’s disheveled appearance.

A murmur ran through the class.

“May I help you?” Ms. Hoover asked, as if Gretchen couldn’t possibly be one of her students.

Gretchen walked in and handed her teacher the schedule. “I’m in this class.”

Ms. Hoover read it, sighed, and looked at Gretchen. “Okay, there’s a seat at the back. We’re reviewing our equipment.”

Gretchen nodded and made her way to a table at the back, where a girl with long brown-black hair and golden skin sat beside an empty lab stool. As Gretchen passed, the other students smirked and snickered, but her lab partner just nodded as Gretchen slid onto the stool. She didn’t seem at all surprised or disturbed by Gretchen’s appearance. As the dark-haired girl surveyed her face with mysterious black eyes, Gretchen was hit with a sudden, stabbing headache, and she put her fingers to her temples. It subsided as suddenly as it had arrived, and Gretchen raked her fingers through her damp hair, trying to force it into some sort of order.

“Now I’d like you to take a moment to inventory and explore your equipment,” Ms. Hoover announced. “I’m passing out a list of everything that should be at your station.” She gave a stack of papers to a good-looking
guy in a letterman’s jacket, who handed a list to someone at each table. “Make sure it’s all in working order. Our first lab is on Wednesday, and I don’t want to hear any excuses.”

Gretchen was fighting a persistent sense of unreality—trying to jam thoughts that didn’t go together into her mind all at once.

“Who’s your new lab partner, Mafer?” the letterman asked as he handed her an inventory sheet. He had cocoa skin and a brilliant smile, and Gretchen was sure that he was used to having every female in a ten-mile radius sigh over him.

“Her name’s Gretchen,” Mafer replied.

Gretchen cocked her head. “How did you know?”

“Mafer knows all,” the letterman joked. He flashed a killer smile at Gretchen before heading off to his table.

Gretchen placed her hands on the table, trying to steady herself. “No, seriously, how did you know?”

“I’m psychic,” Mafer said. “Also, Ms. Hoover called roll. You were the only one who wasn’t here.” Her dark eyes were large and liquid, and her glance was cut with keen intelligence. There was something about Mafer that made her seem ancient. Gretchen shifted in her chair, uncomfortable.

“Oh. Right.”

Mafer held up the paper. “Should we run down this list? Want to see if all of the proper tongs are in the proper drawer?”

“Sure.”

Mafer read out the list of supplies, and Gretchen checked to make sure they were in the drawer. Everything was in excellent condition; nothing was missing.

“So, what kind of name is Mafer?” Gretchen asked when her lab partner pulled out the beakers. “Does it have a meaning?”

“It’s a nickname—short for Maria Fernanda. Maria Fernanda Aguilar Echevarria.”

“Why would you want to shorten that?” Gretchen joked.

“Right.” A dry smile. “My grandparents are from Mexico.”

“Were you born in Walfang?”

“No, Chicago. But my mom’s on a deployment. My brother and I have been living with my grandmother in Waterbreak. How did you end up here?”

How
did
I end up here?
It was a good question, one with a complicated answer. “My dad and I have always spent summers out here. He decided we should move out full-time.”

“You’re close to him.”

“Yeah.” Gretchen smiled at the thought of Johnny. It was funny to think that he would come in for a parent-teacher conference with buttoned-down Ms. Hoover.
Wonder what she’ll think of him
, Gretchen thought.

“So—are you feeling better?”

“Better?”

“You seemed upset when you came in. Are you okay now?”

The thought of the howling wind, the journey over the bridge, made Gretchen’s heart pound again.

Mafer must have read her face, because she said, “Sorry.”

“No, I—” Gretchen shook her head. “I just don’t like water much.”

Mafer nodded, sympathetic but unsurprised, and waited a moment, as if inviting her to say more. But Gretchen didn’t want to say more. She just focused on calming her breaths, making them even. Fifteen seconds ticked by, and Mafer handed Gretchen a box of matches and nodded at the Bunsen burner. “Let’s light this thing up.”

Gretchen checked to make sure that the holes in the burner were closed. Then she lit the match.

Gretchen pushed the button, then turned on the gas tap and held out the light. The burner lit, then flared unexpectedly, sending up a gout of flame. She shrieked as the edge of her sleeve caught fire.

The class erupted into chaos—everyone yelling at once—as Gretchen waved her flaming arm before her face. Mafer grabbed the sweater from the back of her chair and tossed it over Gretchen’s arm, then turned off the gas.

“What happened?” Ms. Hoover ran over, shouting. “What did you do?”

“Gretchen is going to the nurse,” Mafer announced. She took Gretchen’s other elbow and started to lead her out of the classroom. The students cleared a path for them. It flashed into Gretchen’s mind that her classmates were a little afraid of Mafer.

“Yes. Yes, of course.” Ms. Hoover looked serious. “Okay, everybody back to work. Nobody come near this burner.”

The noise subsided as the door to Ms. Hoover’s class shut behind them.