The Breaker's Promise (YA Urban Fantasy) (Fixed Points Book 2) (2 page)

The earth shifted into ribbons of shade. They danced around, each piece leading back to the Breaker who created it. They were puppets, and their illusions were the strings that held them up. Which, I suppose, made me their puppet master. I stretched my arms out in front of me an instant before the grenade was to collide with my chest. It stopped. The world stopped. It was all under my control now.  I twitched, ever so slightly, and the grenade exploded. But its energy shrapnel didn’t hit me. Instead, it turned and targeted the two of the three red cronies who had helped Owen take out my team. I twitched again, and the three headed dogs that before had guarded him, attacked the last of the red cronies and drove her into the crackling red moat.

It was just Owen and I now, the Bloodmoon and the Dragon; a girl and the boy she loved. I marched toward him, flickers of both red and blue energies dancing around my slight frame.  I felt powerful now, and that scared me. But it was also exciting, which scared me even more.

I waved my hand, and all of the shade in the entire area disappeared, revealing where the red team’s flag was (sitting on a hill on the other side of what used to be the moat) and that fact that it was daytime, not night as we were led to believe during the game.

You’re too good at this
, Owen said inside my head. And, though I didn’t see it on his face, there was a smile in his voice.

I know
, I answered in kind.
Scary, isn’t it?

Actually, it’s sort of hot
, he answered, and this time, couldn’t stop the smile from showing up. He must have known he didn’t stand a chance, because he wasn’t even fighting back. He was just standing there, waiting for me to disqualify him. 
Be gentle
, he quipped.

Just move
.
Just get out of the way. Then I won’t have to
-

You know I can’t do that
, he interrupted, which was really disconcerting inside someone’s head.
Fight ‘til the end. It’s our way. It’s actually in the code.

The stupid Breaker’s code, I
had
to read that one of these days.
Have it your way
, I grinned, and gathered energy, almost as blue as Owen’s electric eyes. It wouldn’t be much, nothing fancy, just a simple blast to take him out of the game. I had already won. There was no sense in showing off. I reared back, readying myself to throw the shade at him.

You’re sexy when you’re triumphant
, he said, and closed his eyes, bracing for the blast.  A horn blared throughout the air. My shade, the only energy that I had allowed to existed within the field, dissipated into nothing. The game had been stopped short. This would make it a draw. But why, when I was an instant away from winning.

“What the hell?!” I yelled, looking around. Everyone was standing at attention now, starting to form a line; protocol when a horn sounds around here. 

“Fall in,” Flora said from the newly formed line.  But I was having none of it.

“For what?! This is bull! I won that game!”

“It’s just a game,” Flora responded, her body formal and rigid.

But it wasn’t just a game, at least not for me. It was the story of what could happen in my life, of what these stupid Breakers with their ridiculously accurate prophecies believed would happen. And I had to stop it. I had to win.

“I won!” I said, much louder than I intended. “I won!”

“And after all, that’s what’s really important to you, isn’t it?” A familiar voice sounded from behind me. “Personal victory.”

I turned, a little surprised to find Dahlia strutting toward me. She was dressed in a long purple gown, much more formal attire than her usual, though the stalwart dahlia pin was still clasped at her throat. It wasn’t that Dahlia kept her distance from things like this, much to the contrary. It wasn’t odd to see her taking a hands on approach with all of her students. Well, all of them but me. Ever since I returned from my little excursion that, among other things, cost Dahlia’s daughter her life, the older woman has avoided me like the plague.

I let it go for a while. Even though everything that happened wasn’t my fault, I felt guilty about how it all went down. But Dahlia wasn’t the only one who lost someone that day. My mom was dead. She was never coming back. And my best friend in the world wouldn’t recognize me if I walked past him with a ‘Cresta’ sign strapped across my chest. So, you’ll forgive me if I was done with Dahlia’s snarkiness.

“Save the opinions, okay Dahlia?” I said, marching toward her.  “I should have known it was you who stopped the illusion. You just couldn’t stand to see me win, could you?”

She scoffed, literally scoffed at me. “If you think your little games interest me at all, then you haven’t been paying enough attention. I couldn’t care less how many times or in what ways you succeed at your little make believe endeavors, not when you’ve failed at the real ones so spectacularly.”

“You know what?” I said scowling. “I’m done with this.” I spun around, walking back to my teammates. Dahlia grabbed my arm though, and turned me toward her.

“Do you think me petulant, child? The fact that I’m here, even speaking to you after what you did to my family should tell you all you need to know about the graveness of this situation.”

“What?!” I blurted out. “What could be so important that you’d lower yourself to grace me with your presence?”

She leaned in, closer than she had ever been to me, and through gritted teeth, whispered the words that I had been dreading for months. “They’re here. The Council of Masons is here.”

My heart pounded as I followed Dahlia through the halls and into the common area, toward Echo’s office. Although I knew that the Council coming to research all that had happened was a near certainty, I had still spent every waking moment of the last four months praying that it wouldn’t happen. The Council of Masons was the governing body of the Breakers, one of the oldest legislative bodies in the country, and- to hear Owen tell it, a fearsome thing to tangle with. His parents had went up against them years ago when, thinking their son was about to die, they beseeched them for assistance. I watched that memory while inside Owen’s memories, feeling every stab of pain as he watched the Council tell his mother that his death was a fixed point and, as such, there was nothing anyone could do to stop it.

Feeling Owen’s breath on my neck as he walked behind me to meet them brought me comfort. The Council had been wrong at least once. They could be wrong again; wrong about me. But all that was in some far off future, and I needed to deal with the now. Up ‘til now, I had managed to keep what had happened after the night in Crestview, the night my mother died, a secret. No one, save Owen and I, knew the truth; that it had been me driving the night my father died, that my birth mother had taken those memories away from me in order to keep me safe, that I had, in fact been responsible for someone’s death and, as such, met the prophesized requirements of being the Bloodmoon.

But the Council of Masons was different. They were powerful. They were strong.  With Owen’s help, my ability to manipulate shade was enough to fool Dahlia, Echo, and the Weathersby crowd. But who was to say if it would be enough to deceive the most powerful Breakers in the world?

Don’t worry. You can do this
, Owen said, directly into my head. It was like he was reading my mind, and maybe he was. It certainly wouldn’t have surprised me at this point.

I’m glad one of us is optimistic
, I responded.

You have nothing to worry about
, he responded; his breath still warm and heavy against my neck.
You’re powerful. You’re special, and besides, we have home field advantage.

I knew he was trying to be supportive, but the description struck me as strange. This place, Weathersby; it was not my home. My home was Crestview. It was Chicago. It was watching my mother try (and fail) to do my laundry. It was sneaking into the Val-U Cinema with Casper, making corny jokes during the movie, and then acting completely belligerent when they asked us to leave. Weathersby was fine and, in the last few months, I had even grown comfortable here. But it would never be home.

“Whatever you’re doing, I need you to stop it,” Dahlia said, as we made the last turn through the common area toward Echo’s office. 

“W-what are you talking about?” I stammered.

“You’re closed off,” she said, turning to me. She was a vision in her too formal gown; which now made sense to me. She wanted to look good in front of her bosses. Who wouldn’t? But it didn’t do much for her demeanor. All of her signature coldness still rested in her eyes and along her cheeks. “I understand that you’re likely nervous, and you have reason to be. But I can’t read you, and while such blocks won’t prove an issue for the Council, it may give them the impression that you have something to hide.” She settled in front of me, smelling of lilac and conformity. Crossing her arms, she added, “You have nothing to hide, Cresta. Your shortcomings are on display for all to see, and as astounding as they are, they aren’t world threatening. Don’t give the Council reason to believe that what happened that night was anything other than an ill-conceived and botched attempt to do the right thing.”

I wished that’s all it was. If what Dahlia had just described was all that had happened, then we’d be home free. I’d march into Echo’s office, meet the Council, and give them an all access pass to the old noggin. But, as it stood, doing that would reveal the fact that I was the Bloodmoon and, if Dahlia’s prior thoughts on the issue mirrored the Councils even a little, it would mean my head would be fitted with a fetching new spike.

“We’re going to see Echo first, and then we’ll meet with the Council,” Dahlia said, and opened the door to Echo’s office. In the days following that awful night in Crestview, I had made a place for myself right beside Echo. Wendy’s funeral, adjusting to my new life in Weathersby; through it all I leaned on Echo as my mother told me to the day she first sent me here.

“Morgan Montgomery is a good man,” she had said, and he was. He was
too
good of a man. After everything that happened, he had started to dote on me. He was protective and caring. He favored me in ways he shouldn’t have. He gave me guidance and support that any other student under him would have killed for. He allowed me to lean on him too much. At first, I thought it was because of what I had been through and, maybe-because I was Ash’s child (or at least because she had raised me), that he felt some sort of obligation to her to make sure that I came out of this okay. But it was more than that.

Soon, I realized that the reason he had taken such an interest in me was because he was lonely. He had lost a daughter and, in some ways, I think he might have looked to me to fill the void. And who knows? I had lost my parents too. Maybe I was looking at him to do the same thing. But it couldn’t continue. I
wasn’t
his daughter and, regardless of the relationship he had with my mother in the past, he wasn’t my father, either. And I had seen enough Dr. Phil to understand that both of us would have to learn to accept our losses if we were ever going to move on. So I explained it to him. I asked to be treated like any other student and, to his credit, that’s just what he did.

The smell of oranges assaulted me as I entered Echo’s office, but not regular oranges. This was the ‘cleaner’ citrusy smell; the sort you’d expect to encounter in a hospital or an old folks home; very industrial. As I took in the rest of Echo’s office, I understood why. Where his stacks of boxes and files of messy papers used to be, there was now nothing. The entire area had been scrubbed spotless. Echo himself looked very dapper, dressed in a three piece suit with his hair slicked back.

“This is what they’re wearing?” He asked, pointing to Owen and I as we entered.

“There wasn’t much time dear,” Dahlia said curtly. “Certainly, if we had been given some notice of this development, I’d not only have dressed them properly, but I’d have had a mop taken to this entire place; not just your quarters. As it is, I figured the Council would value punctuality over appearance.”

“Of course you’re right,” Echo answered, pulling at his hands nervously. “If we keep the Council waiting too long, they may think we’re trying to cover something up.”

“I knew you’d get there eventually,” Dahlia smirked triumphantly, running her hand down the front of her gown to smooth it.

Watching Echo and Dahlia’s nervous ticks made me all the more anxious. If these two seasoned Breakers who had absolutely nothing to hide were this apprehensive over a meeting with the Council, what kind of chance did I stand to get out of this with my head still attached.

“Why are they here?” I blurted out. “I mean, I know why they’re here, but why are they here now? It’s been four months, and not a word from them. You’d think that, if they were really that interested in all that went on, they’d have gotten around to seeing about it by now.”

Echo barely looked at me as he answered. “There have been a few developments that have kept the Council busy. Allister Leeman’s capture has led to the reveal of some of his cohorts within the Hourglass itself. No one knew how far and deep his connections ran, or how high his followers had climbed. It’s been a real awakening and, if my contacts are to be believed, it’s shaken the Hourglass to its core.”

While the idea of the Hourglass being shaken or whatever didn’t really do much for me one way or the other, I knew that to get at Allister Leeman’s secrets the Breakers would have to employ one of their nasty (and extremely intrusive) mental scanners. And the thought of Allister Leeman going through the same sort of hell I watched Owen deal with when he was subjected to one; that was almost enough to keep me smiling forever.

“And I suppose they’ve worked that out?” Owen asked from behind me. Even though I couldn’t hold his hand, couldn’t even look at him really for fear of Echo and Dahlia finding out about us, just hearing his voice steadied me a little.

“They’ve worked it out enough to turn their attention here, and that’s what matters,” Dahlia answered.

“And what are they looking for exactly?” Owen continued.

“For answers to questions,” Echo answered. “To place blame, to confirm or deny identities once and for all, to assess damage and count what’s lost. The Council will do what the Council always does. They will rummage through the mess we’ve made, find fate’s plan within it and, depending on what that plan is, they will work as hard as needed to either ensure or derail it.”

“I’m more concerned with what that has to do with us,” I admitted, stuffing my hands in the pockets of my apparently too casual pants.

“Were you not listening?” Dahlia asked with raised eyebrows. “We’ve all fallen short here. Did you think we wouldn’t have to answer for that?”

“Unless I’m misheard things, we were responsible for taking out a major threat to the Breakers and rooting out some imposters along the way. From what I can see, the stupid Council should be throwing us a parade,” I muttered.

Echo, finally making eye contact, leveled a stare at me that made me feel all of five years old. Then, in a voice so soft and unassuming that it was almost a whisper, said, “Then I’m afraid what you’re seeing is very shortsighted. In addition to the accomplishments you just listed, we were also responsible for breaking over a dozen age old laws, endangering the school as well as its one hundred and thirty seven students, and withholding essential information from the Council.” He bit his lip, looked away, and added, “Not to mention allowing the death of a seer; which is perhaps the most severe crime any Breaker can commit.”

The hurt in his voice was thick and palpable. It squeezed at my chest like a vice grip. “That was my fault. I did that, not you. Tell them, if they have to blame someone, then let them blame me.”

“You did what you had to,” Owen said, and placed a hand on my shoulder. I shrugged away from him, half because I didn’t want Echo and Dahlia thinking too much of it, and half because I didn’t feel like I deserved it. Regardless of my reasons, what I did caused this. Wendy was dead because of me.

“Our daughter knew what she was getting into,” Dahlia swallowed hard. “She saw the ending from the start, and she did it anyway. She’s hardly the first seer who’s wanted to throw herself on the sword for the greater good. The fault is with us for allowing it to happen.” She turned her back to us, and put her hands over her face. It was strange, seeing this kind of emotion come from Dahlia; especially considering that the daughter she was now grieving had spent most of her life locked in a tower that her parents were complicit with building. But who was I to belittle her pain? Maybe it was just a Breaker thing that I didn’t quite understand yet. Turning back around and, having gathered herself, she added, “Besides, that’s not the only thing they’ll be looking at. During this debacle, certain things about Owen’s past came to light.”

“You mean about the tattoo?” Owen shuffled beside me. “About me being the dragon.”

“You know things like that can’t be conformed until it’s decided by the Council,” Echo interjected. “And that’s part of what they’re doing here, trying to figure out what, if anything, that tattoo on your back means.”

“And what laws my parents broke in giving it to me,” Owen finished. Though I didn’t turn to him, I heard the flinch in his voice. Though Owen never spoke much about his parents beyond the normal everyday stuff, I knew how much they meant to him. I felt it when I sifted through his memories; the unconditional love for his mother, the deeply ingrained need to please his father. It was as much a part of him as his eyes or his ears. And he could just as easily part with it.

“As hard as it may be for you to understand, your mother and father’s fates aren’t your concern now,” Echo said.

A rush of heat pooled in my cheeks. “They’re his parents!” I said indignantly. “Of course they’re his concern.”

Dahlia walked closer to me, and I caught a whiff of her lilac perfume. It mixed with the orange cleaner scent to form a sickeningly sweet smell. “It can’t be his concern,” Dahlia said flatly. “Like you, he hasn’t that luxury. From the instant you walk through those chamber doors,” Dahlia pointed to the left. “Until the second they are out of sight, the Council will be watching your every move. It would be wise of the both of you to occupy yourselves with appeasing them. Open yourselves up. Let them in. And you,” she leveled a purple painted finger in my face. “You
will
treat the Council with the respect that a governing body of their importance deserves.”

“Fine,” I muttered, resigning myself to kiss old dude ass for the foreseeable future, so long as it kept them off my scent. “Wait a sec,” I said, as a thought hit me. “The only chambers to the left are your chambers; the master bedroom,” I said to Dahlia.

“That’s correct,” Dahlia smirked. “You see what I mean about respect?”

“Yeah yeah, you’re a regular Miss Manners. But how is the entire Council going to stay in your bedroom?” I thought about the vision of the Council I saw in Owen’s memories; at least a dozen old men and women. “I mean, I get that you’ve got the biggest bed in the school, but-“