Darkangel by Christine Pope (red queen ebook TXT) 📕

“Then why won’t you tell me what’s wrong? I can tell something isn’t right. You’ve got those people who look like refugees from Hogwarts camped out in your aunt’s store, you seem all jumpy, you won’t come up to Crown King even though technically it’s still in your ‘safe zone,’ whatever that means. So why don’t you trust me to tell me what’s going on?”

Her tone was hurt, and I really couldn’t blame her for that. She was right — she really had kept her mouth shut all these years, been a better friend than I probably deserved. A lot of people probably wondered why we were friends at all, since we were so different. Back in the day, I’d wondered the same thing, although at the time I’d thought she just wanted to take me on as a project. After all, the first thing she ever said to me, when she approached me on a cool October morning all those years ago, was, “Nineteen ninety-three called. It wants its shirt back.”

Okay, I had been wearing a flannel shirt, along with my favorite faded Levi’s and a pair of well-worn boots, whereas she’d had on a denim mini-skirt, tight top, and wedges. I must have looked like a total hick to her. Cottonwood High was a small pond, but even it had its hierarchy. Yet somehow Sydney had seen something in me that she found interesting. True, I knew she was safe to be friends with — the charm that made sure only congenial souls resided in Jerome also ensured that members of the clan only made friends with those we could trust. Still, she’d stuck by me through everything, and I knew she’d defended me to some of her other friends from the more popular crowd.

“I do trust you,” I said finally. “I guess I just didn’t want to drag you into this.”

“Into what?”

“We don’t know for sure. But it’s not good.” Quickly, I told her about the dark presence in my aunt’s shop, the nightmare, the need for increased vigilance. “None of us really know what’s going on,” I finished. “But we have to be really careful, so that means I can’t even go into Cottonwood without some kind of escort. I’d love to go with you guys to Crown King. But I just can’t.”

Through all this, Sydney’s expression had grown steadily more troubled. “I’m sorry,” she said quietly. “I had no idea. But can’t you guys, I don’t know, call in reinforcements or something?”

It would take way too much time to explain to her the alliances and hierarchies of the clans, how we were more or less friendly with the de la Pazes, or the Cortez family farther out to the west, true, but that didn’t mean we wanted to reveal any weakness to them. Admitting we were up against something we couldn’t handle was not something any of us wanted to do. Not yet, anyway. Not until all other resources had been exhausted.

I shook my head. “It’s usually every clan for themselves. It’s our problem, so we have to take care of it on our own. And it’s gotten better — I mean, since we stepped up the protection here, I haven’t had any more bad dreams or seen or felt any other dark presences. Maybe what we’re doing is enough. Even so, we don’t want to take any chances.”

“I can see why,” Sydney replied, and shivered. Then she added, in a too-hearty tone, “Well, it’s a good thing that the dance is right here in Jerome. They can’t keep you from going to that, can they?”

That worry had been hanging out in the back of my mind, but since no one had said anything to the contrary, I guessed that the dance was still considered safe enough. “No. I’m not saying we won’t have the Hogwarts contingent hanging out and keeping an eye on things, but if I can’t be safe at Spook Hall, a block away from where I live, then I can’t really be safe anywhere, can I?”

“I guess not.” She reached out and touched a strand of the beaded fringe of her Halloween dress, running it between her thumb and forefinger. “I don’t know how you do it, though.”

“Do what?”

“Keep on acting normal, as if you don’t have this horrible thing hanging over your head. I’d never want to leave my room.”

I shrugged. “Because I don’t have any other choice.”

Despite everything, the next two weeks practically flew by. There were no more incursions — no dark shapes skulking around town, no nightmares to wake me, gasping, from sleep. I also didn’t dream of him at all, but I was willing to accept that loss for the time being. Maybe his absence from my dreams meant he was finally going to make a real-world appearance.

The days grew colder, the leaves on the trees changing in earnest now, bright yellow for the cottonwoods in the river bottoms, flame orange and red for the oak and sumac around town. I’d always loved the fall, loved to watch the blaze of color around me and in the valley below. Now, though, despite no further incidents, I found myself watching the shadows more closely, looking over my shoulder more often. My aunt probably would have applauded my caution, but I hated it. I didn’t want to live that way.

And somehow — driven by desperation, probably — she managed to dig up two new candidates to make their attempts at the ritual kiss. No go for either one, of course. The second one came by two days before the Halloween dance, and I found myself even more irritated than usual by my failure.

“Can you wait until after the dance for the next one?” I’d demanded irritably, almost as soon as he left. I did allow myself a moment of guilt; the poor guy had driven here all the way from California. Not that I had much control over the situation, so my guilt was probably misplaced…and that made me crabbier than ever. “I’ve got enough on my mind as it is.”

“We can’t afford to wait, and you know it,” Aunt Rachel had said in imperturbable tones, as she continued to fold T-shirts and tidy up the display a rowdy group of college kids had wrecked.

Maybe they’d just picked up on my vibe…the whole time that group of laughing guys and girls were in the store, I’d watched them in some envy, wishing I could be that angst-free and oblivious. Hell, I wished I could just go to college like a normal person. But one of them had been wearing a Northern Pines University sweatshirt, which meant they had to have come down from Flagstaff…and which meant they were students at the last college I could ever possibly attend.

“I know we can’t afford to wait,” I told my aunt. Then, wanting to change the subject, “So are you and Tobias coming to the dance after all?”

“I think so,” she’d replied. “It’s probably best if there are as many of us there as possible…in case.”

In case dark vaporous figures started oozing out of the walls or something, I supposed. But, depressing as the situation was, better that than the alternative. All I could do was hope we wouldn’t have such a huge McAllister contingent there that they’d max out the occupancy of the place, thus defeating any chance of dancing with someone I hadn’t known since I was in diapers. Bad enough that Adam had already announced his intentions of accompanying Sydney and me to the dance. Anthony was working at the wine tasting room until eight that night and had promised to come up to Jerome as soon as he could, but he still wouldn’t be able to get to the dance much before nine.

Sydney didn’t have a problem with Adam because she’d always thought he was kind of cute, and I hadn’t quashed him because he had helped me a lot the day I saw the apparition — and afterward, too, mostly by backing off on his declarations of undying love for me. At that point I had to take what I could get.

Great-Aunt Ruby had called me into her presence several times, wanting a progress report. Not that there was much to tell her, since nothing had really happened. But she wanted to know the details of the warding spells we kept refreshing at twelve-hour intervals, wanted me to tell her if I’d noticed anything unusual about any of the tourists who’d visited the shop. Of course I hadn’t, because they were the usual mix of people from within the state coming up for weekend getaways and those who’d come from much farther away, visiting Jerome because it was almost as much a place to see in Arizona as Sedona or even the Grand Canyon.

Not that I would know what the Grand Canyon looked like in person. That was Wilcox territory.

And all the while my great-aunt was watching me, I was studying her in return, looking for any signs that might indicate she was feeling weaker, or failing somehow. I couldn’t see any; she looked as bright-eyed and sharp-minded as she ever had, and I told myself that maybe she’d simply wanted me to start preparing for the day when she would be gone, even if that might be somewhere far off in the future.

Wishful thinking, probably. But right then, wishes were about all I had.