The Underworld (31 page)

was about the size of a softbal . But I didn’t want to be

touching it with my skin when I used my Foreseer

ability to try and get back to Laylen and Alex.

Worried I might stil be too close to the praesidium,

I decided to leave the house. I looked around until I

found the front door, threw it open, and ran outside. I

almost ate it when my feet hit a slick surface—crystal

and it was as slippery as trying to walk across an icy

parking lot. I slowly made my way across it, slipping

and sliding with every step I took. Final y, I couldn’t

take it anymore and crossed my fingers that this

would be far enough away.

I casted a glance back at the house, which now that

I looked at it, was not a normal house, but a dome

house that had been carved out of snow-white crystal.

The roof was dotted with bright red gemstones, and

the tree that towered beside it had leaves that glowed

like nightlights.

Just as I was closing my eyes to take off, the front

door to the dome house swung open, and Nicholas

stepped out.

“Gemma.” His voice echoed over the ice. “Don’t

even think about leaving.” He started to run toward

me, moving slowly— feebly, like the stone had

drained him of most of his energy.

I shut my eyes, and quickly conjured up a mental

picture of the massive SUV, hoping Laylen and Alex

would stil be at the gas station.

“Gemma.” Nicholas’s angry voice sounded closer.

I squeezed my eyes shut, picturing the leather

backseat of the SUV and how I had been lying down

on it. I heard Nicholas cal out my name again, but I

was already gone.

I landed on my back. My eyes were open and I

was staring up at the vinyl ceiling of the black SUV. I

shot upright, breathing heavily as I immediately

skimmed my surroundings. To my amazement, the

SUV was stil parked at the gas station, only now

instead of being parked to the side of a gas pump it

was in a parking space in front of the gas station. The

sun was stil shining brightly, so I must have not been

gone for too long.

But where were Laylen and Alex?

Right as I thought it, I spotted them standing not too

far off in front of the car. They looked like they were

arguing, stern expressions set on their faces, their

arms flying as the spoke heatedly.

I threw open the car door. “Hey,” I yel ed and they

both jumped.

As soon as they saw it was me, they ran over and

hopped into the car.

“Where the heck have you been?” Alex asked, not

in a rude way, but in an extremely freaked out one.

“We have to go,” Not knowing how long it would

take for Nicholas’s Foreseer power to return to him, I

knew we needed to get on the road fast.

Alex and Laylen looked at each other and then a

few moments later the tires were spinning as we

peeled out of the parking lot, leaving the gas station

behind in a cloud of dust.

I think it took Alex about a minute before he

started firing off questions at me. Where were you?

What happened? Why are your wrists bleeding? Are

you okay? The last one threw me for a bit of a turn, but

I answered each one, and made sure to include al the

details about the Fey and the Blood Promise. I even

took it upon myself to be the one to tel him that his

father was definitely a descendent of Malefiscus. I

also told him about Nicholas’s new mark.

I thought when I told Alex al of this, he would freak

out. Wel , I mean freak out in the sense that he would

deny, deny, deny, and refuse to believe such a thing

about his father. Yeah, he did change a little bit over

the course of the last few days, but some of the things

I told him were big.

So I was shocked when he shrugged and said, “Of

course my father is a descendent of Malefiscus. I

already knew that.”

Laylen’s head whipped in Alex’s direction. “What! I

mean, yeah we al guessed he was, but….you knew.”

Alex slumped back in the chair. “When I was little,

my father would tel me stories of Malefiscus.”

“Everyone’s parents did,” Laylen pointed out as he

merged the SUV into the left lane so he could pass a

very slow moving minivan.

“Yeah, but my father would tel me different stories.”

His jaw tightened. “Darker stories.”

“How dark of stories?” I asked, leaning forward on

the console.

“Stories of how one day a descendent of

Malefiscus,” he ran his fingers through his hair, letting

out a stressed breath, “would bare Malefiscus’s

mark.”

“Those were the kind of stories your father told you

when you were little.” I stared at him, horrified. Jeez,

maybe Marco and Sophia weren’t that bad.

He shrugged. “I was a little kid, so I thought it was

normal. I honestly didn’t even remember his story until

you mentioned your vision and how he…” He

swal owed hard. “How his parents cut off his mark. I

knew then that my father had to be the descendent he

always told me about.”

I shook my head at him. “And you didn’t bother

mentioning any of this to us because…”

“Because I don’t bother mentioning a lot of things to

you.” Alex stared out the window, with his arms folded.

As I sat there thinking about Alex, and the way that

he was, the thought that he might have been marked

by Stephan, just like Nicholas had, crept back up into

my mind.

“So did you know your father could mark people

with the Mark of Malefiscus?” I asked, looking at Alex.

He shook his head. “That I didn’t.”

I rested my arms on the console and leaned

forward even more, trying to get a better look at his

face, so I could watch his expression when I asked the

next question.

“He didn’t…I mean he didn’t mark…you, did he?” I

felt horrible for asking it, but we needed to know.

He just stared at me, unblinking, not saying a word.

“Sorry, but I had to ask,” I muttered.

He kept staring at me with this serious look in his

eyes. “Do you think I have the mark?”

“I don’t…a…I don’t know.” I sounded like a babbling

idiot. “I don’t know what to think anymore, not with

everything that’s happened.” I tried to make eye

contact with Laylen so I could signal to him to help me

out with this, but he was focused on the road.

“So what do you want me to do?” Alex cocked an

eyebrow at me. “Strip off al my clothes and prove to

you that I don’t have the Mark of Malefiscus

anywhere?”

“No,” I said, and then I turned my head away and bit

down on my bottom lip, hoping he couldn’t feel my

increasing body temperature.

“Okay, then, I guess you’l just have to believe me.”

There was a hint of laughter in his voice.

Believe him. Was that possible? A week ago I’d

have said there was absolutely no way I could believe

him. But, I don’t know, things change. The idea of

believing him didn’t seem as absurd as it once did.

“Wel , what are we going to do now?” Laylen asked

suddenly.

“We’re going to keep driving east.” Alex dropped

open the glove box. “We’l make a plan when we meet

up with Aislin.”

“A plan to go to The Underworld and save my

mother, right?” I said.

“If we can get the Ira back, then yes.” He started

digging though the glove box and I slipped the Ira bal

out of my pocket and placed it on top of the console in

a
Ta-da!
way. He glanced over his shoulder and his

eyes widened. “Where the heck did you get that?”

“I swiped it from Nicholas’s house before I left,” I

said proudly.

“Nice job.” Laylen flashed me a smile through the

rearview mirror.

“Impressive,” Alex added, looking very much

impressed. He picked up the Ira, lifted up the lid to the

middle console, and dropped the Ira down inside.

Then he returned his attention back to rummaging

around in the glove box.

“What are you looking for?” I asked, flopping back

against the seat.

“For this.” He pul ed out a first aid kit. “Your wrists

need to be cleaned up. What happened to you by the

way?”

I glanced down at my semi-mutilated wrist.

“Nicholas chained me up to the wal and every time I

jerked at the chain the metal cuffs cut into my skin.”

Alex’s jaw tightened. He hopped over the console

and into the backseat, opened up the first aid kit, and

took out a rol of gauze and a bottle of peroxide.

He held out his hand. “Here, let me see one of your

wrists.”

I gave him my left one first because it looked like

it’d taken the worse of it. I sat there, letting him

dabbed my skin with a cotton bal soaked with

peroxide, and tried hard not to wince. But then the

sparks tickled at my skin, and it numbed some of the

pain away.

Even dressed in his worn out clothes, Alex was stil

as gorgeous as ever. I thought about Stephan being

his father. Maybe that had contributed to why Alex

was such a jerk most of the time and why he was the

way he was. I thought about the younger Alex I saw

and how he was so much different—so much more

caring. Could it be possible that that Alex stil existed?

After Alex finished cleaning my left wrist with

peroxide, he asked for my other wrist. He dotted the

cotton bal on my cuts, but when he was done, he

didn’t wrap my wrists with gauze like I thought he

would. In fact, what he did next shocked the heck out

of me. He raised my wrist to his mouth, so there was

only a sliver of air between his lips and my skin. Then

he blew softly on my wound, causing my heart to flutter

and the electricity to shimmer. I closed my eyes and

focused on my breathing. He switched to the other

wrist, doing the same thing, and I tried not to gasp.

When he released my wrist, I opened my eyes, and

found him watching me with the most intense

expression on his face.

There was something different that happened

between us then. I don’t know how to describe it. The

prickle was there, on the back of my neck, but I

couldn’t quite place my finger on what feeling was

trying to emerge. I didn’t move away when he leaned

toward me, even though I knew he was going to kiss

me. In fact, I was more than wil ing to let him kiss me. I

wanted him to. But then the car came to a brake-

slamming stop that sent me flying forward, but Alex

caught hold of me before I made it too far.

“Sorry,” Laylen apologized. “I thought I saw a deer

in the road.”

I glanced around outside, but al I could see was the

sage brush covering the flat land. There was nowhere

for a deer to hide.

“Do you need me to drive so you can get some

rest?” Alex asked.

Laylen shook his head. “No, I’m good.”

He sped up the car again, and Alex bandaged

each of my wrists with gauze. I didn’t pay attention to

him much, though. I was too distracted by Laylen and

how strange he has been acting. Ever since he bit

me, he has been acting a little off. He hadn’t done

anything major, like run the streets biting people, but I

was stil worried that something was wrong. But I

didn’t want to bring it up to Alex because I figured he

would be unsympathetic. But I’l make sure to keep an

eye on him.

Just in case.

We drove for days. Yes, days. We drove al the

way to the other side of the country, to the beautiful,

but very humid, state of Maryland. The air was so

heavy and moisturized there, it was like being in a

sauna.

Not too far off from the little beach house we were

hiding out in was the ocean. From the room I was

staying in, I could sit out on the deck and watch the

ocean’s waves crash against the sandy shore. It was

a fascinating thing to watch for someone who had

never seen the ocean.

The house belonged to a friend of Adessa’s, which

was a good thing because that meant Stephan didn’t

know where it was, nor Nicholas. When we arrived,

we informed Aislin and she transported here. She had

also put up some location charms, which were

supposed to help make tracking us down more

difficult. But at this point, I was prepared for the fact

that at any given moment someone could turn up. It