The Wicked Awakening of Anne Merchant (49 page)

“Explain yourself,” she commands Teddy.

“I’m so sorry!”

“Explain. Your. Actions.”

“Mephisto wanted the soul of Saligia back,” Teddy says quickly. “That’s your daughter, you know! The girl you think is so perfect she has to be protected. She doesn’t! She’s bad to the core.”

Molly blinks, and Teddy cowers.

“I know the truth!” Pilot shouts. He staggers toward us. “I knew all along. We all knew.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I ask him.

“I couldn’t, Anne. It involved Mephisto. His rank protected him and kept our lips sealed. But I did try to steer you away from Teddy. You know I did.”

Pilot explains that the plot to hobble Saligia—to take her legions from her and the love of her life from her—all started before she even left the underworld.

“Mephisto wanted to knock Gia down to size,” Pilot says. “She was becoming too powerful in the underworld. When she asked to become your daughter, Mrs. Merchant, because she wanted to experience real love—the kind of love that doesn’t exist Downstairs—she gave him her followers. But that wasn’t enough for him.” He glances at me. “He wanted her soul. He wanted her to serve him, which is something she would never have done, not even for her mentor.”

“You and Mephisto struck a deal,” I spit at Teddy.

“He’s the deal-maker,” Teddy says, as if that makes everything okay. “When you became a student here, he brought me in. Said if I could get you to surrender your soul to him—so you’d be his again— he’d give me a new life.”

“Disgusting,” I grumble.

“Anne, that’s enough,” Molly says.

“What did Dia have to do with any of this?” I ask Teddy.

He looks at Molly. “Give me life, and I’ll tell you.”

She narrows her gaze just a little, and he twists in agony. He begs for mercy. But he refuses to spill the truth without getting something for it.

That’s when Pilot recites an incantation. At once we are standing in Valedictorian Hall as it was the night I battled Villicus, the night everything changed for me. Villicus and Teddy—or the memories of them—are standing near the very duct I climbed out of that night, as if they’re real. We can hear them speaking quietly. I glance at Pilot and realize, as I do, that he never told me his power. Now it’s clear: Pilot, the demon now known as Sammie M. Firestone, is gifted with the ability to
manifest memories
.

“Miss Merchant knows the truth of her existence,” Teddy says to Villicus
.

“Of her coma? Or of Saligia?”

“Just her coma.”

Villicus nods. “It’s only a matter of time.”

“But what if…”

“If?”

“What if we could use this moment to our benefit?”

“Our benefit? There is no
our
, Dorian. You are my servant.”

“Your willing servant, Master. But I’m speaking now of growing your power as never before. Saligia once challenged your power with her legions, but you managed to shift her out of the underworld. Now only one devil compares to you.”

“Dia Voletto.”

“Her ex-lover.”

“Your proposition?”

“An exchange.”

“Naturally.”

“Miss Merchant is on her way here even now,” Teddy says. “I told you I would get her soul for you. But what if I could get you even more?”

“I’m listening.”

“What if you were to…let her win tonight? Let yourself be publicly humiliated by her. Let her escape—for a moment. And let Dia Voletto come here to take this school from you. He would rush at the chance to see his beloved Saligia again.”

“He was the one who encouraged her to leave the underworld. He’d rush to protect her, if anything.”

“So be it, Master! Bring Dia here. I’ll keep Miss Merchant here with a story that will tug at the very heartstrings that made her so unsuitable for the underworld. I’ll convince her that her purpose here is to destroy Dia. She’ll
end his life—he won’t see it coming, not from his great love. You’ll reap the benefits.”

“Why do I sense an ‘and’?”

Teddy chuckles. “If I can both destroy Dia and get Anne to surrender her soul to you, will you give me what I always wanted? Will you give me the life of eternal youth and beauty I left behind?”

“It’s agreed, Dorian.”

They both glance up at the duct, which is open above them. Villicus transforms into Hiltop, who flies up the wall at the same time Teddy disintegrates. No sooner has Hiltop shoved her scrawny arm into the duct than I see myself, pulled out and thrust to the hard floor of the hall
.

The memory vanishes. Teddy, engrossed in it, gasps and stares ahead, as if seeing his perfect vision disappear.

“It was all I ever wanted,” he says. “My beauty.”

I can’t believe I destroyed Dia Voletto to help Dorian Gray feed his vanity.

He collapses to his knees and throws himself at Molly’s feet. She’s her normal size again, but even still she seems too large and powerful for one small body.

“Have mercy!” Teddy cries. “If you knew the ways of the underworld, you would know my need to leave it. I’m not built to survive it. I was desperate. Please!”

“Go to Hell,” she says.

A wind rushes up from the gash in the floor. It pulls Teddy toward it.

“This won’t stop anything!” He clings to the rugs, chair legs, sculptures as he is tugged toward the crack in the floor. “I found a new land. The expansion is starting. I’ll tell you where it is if you’ll let me—”

He disappears into the crack, which seals after him.

Molly looks at Pilot. He stands, trembling, and looks at us uncertainly, as if he’s not sure where he’ll be sent. After all, the crack in the floor is sealed. He keeps his gaze on it.

“Molly,” he says quietly. “Or Mrs. Merchant. Or—I don’t…”

“Why did you work so hard to build up Anne’s followers, Pilot?”

“In part because…because I hoped Anne would outrank Mephisto, and then I could tell her the truth about this plan.”

“And in part because?” Molly asks. “Be honest.”

Slowly, timidly, he lifts his head. And he looks at me. “Because you were my second chance, Anne. You were my ticket out. I’m sorry.” His voice is quivering and thick with emotion. “I’m sorry for everything, especially for doing it for all the wrong reasons.”

Molly turns to me. She looks at me as only my mom can. Which is weird.

“I’m sorry, too,” I say to Pilot. “I’m sorry for destroying your vial. And for breaking my promise to help you get a new life.”

“Go then,” she says to him.

Without another word, he vanishes.

“Where did he go?”

“Home.”

“Like home-home?” I point up, gesturing to Heaven, which I’m pretty sure isn’t in the sky, but whatever. “Or home to the underworld?”

“Home to California. He can try to prove his worth once more.”

“A second chance.”

“You all deserve one, Anne.”

I can’t look at her now. “Even me?”

She lifts my chin, but she’s too beautiful to gaze at, like an eclipse that could blind me.

“You are the best second chance I ever had,” she says. “I was wrong to start your life on such a shaky foundation. I’ll never deserve to be your mother. But I’m so glad I got the chance to try.”

“You were an amazing mom,” I say. “You still are.”

She brushes at my tears. Her touch makes me feel a thousand times stronger.

“Mom?”

“Yes?”

“Why didn’t you tell me Teddy was Dorian?”

Caught off guard, she laughs. “I didn’t know. I’m not privy to the workings of the underworld. But I knew there was something amiss when you told me he said he was working with me. I couldn’t tell you he was lying without, well, revealing myself. Instead, I simply tried to guide you away from him.”

“So, then, why
did
you come here?” I ask, hoping to hear she missed me just a fraction as much as I’ve missed her.

“Because I’m sorry.” She drops her eyes. “I brought a devil into your life. I was desperate, Anne—desperate to have you when I asked Mephisto for you. When your dad sent you here, I kept watch over you, but I needed to get closer. To protect you.”

“I really can protect myself,” I whisper.

“You can’t blame me—or even Dia—for trying. Your friend Molly understood, when I asked her to do me this favor. She’s just as protective as I am. Since dying, she’s been darting in and out of God knows what—squirrels and birds and trees—to watch over her grandpa.”

“You met Molly?” I can’t help but smile.

“Mouthy girl. But a great girl. And a great friend to you.”

It occurs to me that, over the course of the year, I shared an awful lot with someone I
thought
was Molly. Which means my mom not only knows everything about every single time Ben and I kissed… but, um, didn’t she tell me to “wax my lady parts” once? I’m torn between cringing and laughing.

“You’re sneaky,” I say to her. “Aren’t you supposed to be a better role model for me?”

She laughs. “Now, sweetheart, are you ready to wake up?”

“No, stay with me. Let’s just stay here forever.”

“Your dad is waiting for you. He needs you, Annie.”

It occurs to me that Molly and my dad looked at each other like they knew each other. He felt my mom’s spirit even when I didn’t. They really loved each other.

“Can I tell him I saw you?” I ask.

“That might freak him out a bit.”

“But, the thing is,”—I pause—“I’m kinda done keeping secrets.”

She smiles. “Then tell him everything.”

“I’ll be grounded for eternity.”

“Probably.”

I can anticipate her leaving. I can practically hear the beeping of the hospital room. Before she waves her hand or does some tiny, simple gesture that sends me back to California, I throw my arms around her and sink into her embrace. This is it. This is good-bye. Knowing this is the last time I’ll be able to hug my mom—and the last I’ll ever see of Molly—I cling hard to her for as long as I can.

My face is pressed into her shoulder when I ask her one last question. “Why did you send me back into a coma that night, Mom?”

“The night you woke? In the hospital?”

“Yeah. When Dad went to get the nurse.”

“Do you remember who was waiting for you in Gigi’s house when you woke up?”

I will never forget. “Ben,” I say, and my face heats up. He was spooning me.

“Do you remember rolling onto a certain sheet of paper?”

“The sketch I did of him.”

“You needed to know.”

I lean away and look her in the eyes. “You sent me back for…a boy.” I smile through my tears. “Seriously?”

“For love. Is there anything better I could have sent you back here for?”

“I dunno, maybe to save 200 souls from the clutches of the devil?”

“You don’t need me to tell you to do that.”

It occurs to me that, in all the chaos and wonder of my mom’s return, I have no idea where Ben is now. What will become of him?

“If Mephisto’s gone, how will Ben be vivified?” I ask her. “You saved Pilot. Can you save him, too, Mom? Can you bring Ben back?”

“I could,” she says. “Or you could.” She runs her hands over my eyes. “Make me proud.”

Her voice is the last thing I hear before the excited rush of doctors racing into my hospital room awakens me. And I find myself, once again, in California.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Joanna Wiebe
is a graduate of the University of Alberta’s Honors English program, where she received the James Patrick Folinsbee Memorial Scholarship in Creative Writing. She lives in Victoria, British Columbia, with her partner, Lance. Find her online at
joannawiebefiction.com
.