Wicked Sense Page 22

  “The Singularity can do anything,” Brianna replies. Not a shred of doubt in her voice.

  Crap, crap, crap.

  Brianna is in this to the end. I have to stop her. But it will work only if Brianna understands what she’s doing. How much does she know? Only one way to find out.

  “I know you can’t kill Mona until Jane is ready to absorb the energy. You’re bluffing.”

  Brianna’s response is to force the blade into Mona’s throat, almost to the point of piercing it. I let out a gasp, but I don’t dare to move.

  Brianna smiles. “Jane told me the energy lingers for a while. Jane’s got a window. It doesn’t need to be at the exact moment. So, I can kill your sister anytime I want.”

  Is she bluffing now? If she can do it any time, what’s stopping her? My mind whirls. Jane is still in a trance. The determined look in Brianna’s eyes terrorize me.

  Is Brianna trying to hurt me too? Another desperate thought comes to me.

  “I’ve loved you, Brianna,” I say, trying to make the lie stick.

  She chuckles and shakes her head. “Well, I didn’t love you, Drake. It’s not about you.”

  When I realize I’m out of ideas, reality hits me. My sister is going to die.

  How do you think straight when your sister’s life is on the line?

  You don’t.

  Chapter 58: Skye

  I open my eyes, but it’s still dark. Where…?

  The hallway. Somebody threw something at me. A potion.

  A sleeping potion.

  The tingling. A Sister is around. Jane.

  It’s all fuzzy. My head feels like scrambled eggs.

  I prop myself on my elbows. The morning cleansing potions I’ve been taking and my protection rituals are paying off right now. If not for them, I’d be asleep for hours.

  Have I been? I look at my cell. The numbers are blurry. Squinting, I see I slept for about five minutes only.

  Where’s Drake? The gym!

  Dizzy, I pull myself up, the cell still in my hand. Call for help. Connor.

  I stagger toward the gym while speed-dialing Connor with one hand and steadying myself on the wall with the other. No! Don’t call him! Drake doesn’t trust Connor. I hang up before the call is completed. I turn off the phone for good measure.

  I’m already feeling better when I reach the gym’s door. I see Drake talking to Brianna, who’s about thirty feet away from him. She’s holding a knife—a black athame, the mark of the Night Sisters—to Mona’s throat.

  My tingling sense tells me that Jane is inside, somewhere to my right, but I can’t see her. Does she sense me too?

  I grab the gym’s doorknobs, ready to intervene.

  Suddenly, Drake lunges forward. Brianna presses the knife into Mona’s throat.

  Before Drake can reach them, Mona opens her eyes. I can see blood trickling down her neck.

  A lot of things happen at the same time, and my jelly mind has trouble comprehending it all. At first, a tsunami of magical energy hits me at once, paralyzing me. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever felt, a humongous jolt of pure magical energy. I grab the door’s handles to avoid being knocked back.

  Simultaneously, a fireball erupts where Mona and Brianna were just a second ago. Its shockwave throws Drake backward, hurtling him toward the gym wall.

  Brianna and Mona are a mass of fire. The gym is instantly ablaze, the fire spreading rapidly. Exercise mats are burning. Posters and signs blacken and crumble.

  The energy wave is suddenly gone. After I recover the control of my muscles, I push the doors open with all my strength. Hair-raising screams fill the gym.

  While removing my jacket, I rush toward Mona and Brianna, who are still on fire. In my peripheral vision, I see Jane in the corner of the court, thrashing around.

  I’m about to use the jacket as a blanket to quell the fire, when I see Mona stepping back from the orange and yellow flames, staring in horror at Brianna’s burning body.

  Mona is completely unharmed.

  Brianna is flailing and screaming. I try to wrap her with my jacket, but she spreads herself on the floor and starts to roll over. I use the jacket like a matador then, flapping it over her, helping her extinguish the flames. Why aren’t the sprinklers on?

  The wooden floor is catching fire quickly, and the smoke becomes thick. I see Mona step right over a high flame, and she doesn’t even acknowledge it. Not even her hospital gown burns. Behind her, flames lick the walls.

  Still helping Brianna, I yell to Mona, “Drake! Check him!”

  This brings Mona out of her stupor. She rushes to Drake.

  Brianna stops moving and just lies there, face down. But at least she’s not on fire anymore. When I turn her, a scarred, grimy face greets me.

  She’s breathing, barely. And she’s badly burned. The smoke will do her in soon.

  “We’ve got to get out of here!” I yell. “Now!” I grab Brianna under her armpits and drag her toward the door. I cough and look around, but I don’t see Jane anywhere.

  “I can’t carry him!” Mona yells.

  “Drag him!” I reply.

  “He’s too heavy!”

  I lay Brianna down on the floor. “Let’s switch!”

  We do that. Mona clutches Brianna’s left arm and drags her. I carry Drake, grabbing him by the armpits. He’s facing away from me, but I can tell he’s not burned as badly as Brianna.

  Mona and I maneuver to avoid the flames. My cough gets worse, but Mona is unaffected. When she opens the door, the hallway’s clean air is a blessing.

  The sprinklers still aren’t working. Mona closes the door, and we look through the glass. The gym is completely consumed by fire. Paint starts to bubble up on the smoldering walls on our side. The door is scorching.

  I look at Mona’s hand. She has just touched the handles. Not a single burn.

  Kneeling down, I examine Drake’s wounds. He’s breathing in gasps, his face covered in soot, and he’s got a few burn marks, but he’s not hurt as badly as Brianna.

  “The fire is spreading,” I say, turning to Mona. “We’ve got to move them.”

  “Call 911!” Mona says.

  Thinking fast, I search Brianna’s pockets and find a phone. “Call them on this. Tell them your name is Brianna. I have an idea. I’ll be right back.”

  The cafeteria is right next to the gym. I rush there and find a pair of busing trolleys. I come back with them.

  “The dispatcher told me they’re overwhelmed. They will send someone as soon as they can,” Mona says while we hoist Drake and lay him down on a trolley.

  We move to do the same with Brianna. “What about the firemen?”

  “Same thing,” says Mona. “What are we going to do?”

  We begin to roll them back to the entrance, away from the inferno. I say, “About the school? It’s no use. They’ll never be here on time. Let it burn,” I say.

  “What about them?” Mona asks, nodding in the direction of Drake and Brianna.

  “I have another idea,” I say. “But we have to move fast.”

  ***

  “Okay, don’t ask me anything,” I say. “We don’t have much time.”

  The gym is in the school’s central building, and I don’t think the neighbors have seen the fire yet. We have a small window before they notice the smoke and call for help. And maybe the firemen will still be busy with the quake.

  After Mona nods, I continue, “We’re doing a circle of prayer. I can’t use your energy, and you don’t know how to perform a healing ritual, but the both of us can pool our strengths and make it happen.”

  Maybe, I think. But I don’t say it.

  We’re standing up, holding hands. Drake and Brianna lie side-by-side on the ground, at our feet, still unconscious.

  To her credit, Mona doesn’t question anything. She just nods, her eyes small plates of awe.

  “You only have to do one thing. Do not freak out. Relax. Let the energy flow. Slowly.”

  “The energy?” she
asks.

  “Don’t worry. You’ll feel it.”

  She starts to shake and takes her hands away. “I can’t do it…”

  I grab her hands. “Drake told me tonight you’re a tough girl.” She looks at me. “Drake,” I repeat, nodding in his direction.

  She looks at him and nods to me, but her hands still shake.

  “You can do it,” I say. “You will do it.”

  We close our eyes. I start the chanting I did in the woods the day I met Drake. I already traced the bloody runes on their five points. We’re going to have make do with a makeshift commune. At least we’re outdoors, in contact with dirt and grass, and an enormous bonfire burns next to us.

  Please Goddess, allow it to work.

  I invoke my magical energy, but since we’re communing, Mona’s energy comes into the energy pool. I feel it, a rush of power. Mona’s body jerks back, but I expect it and grab her hands firmly.

  My biggest fear is Mona creating another disaster when she releases her energy. But she understands a little bit now, expects it, and that makes a difference. Other Sisters will feel her energy too, but it’s going to be much less intense than when she created the earthquake or the inferno. I hope.

  Her energy flow increases, and I push these thoughts from my mind. I breathe steady, visualizing Drake and Brianna’s healed bodies, invoking ancient powers of nature.

  Mona and I become one. Her energy is overwhelming, and, for a moment, I feel like she’s holding back, trying not to overpower either of us. It’s working.

  She learns fast.

  My chanting gets more intense, and I start to feel our energy flowing toward Brianna and Drake.

  ***

  When the ambulance finally arrives, Mona and I are in the Volvo parked next to the pool. Drake is coming in and out of consciousness, resting on the floor of the large cargo area.

  The school is beyond help. The paramedics get out and see Brianna lying on the grass, alive but still unconscious.

  I turn to Mona, and she smiles at me.

  Chapter 59: Drake

  I’m thinking about wearing a helmet everywhere I go. Seriously, how many times can you be knocked out without suffering a massive brain injury?

  At least I didn’t get burned in the fire. The shockwave threw me away from the flames. And I’ve got the world’s greatest nurse by my side.

  Skye leans over me and kisses me fully on the lips.

  “Hello, nurse,” I say.

  ***

  We had many bases to cover, and Skye came up with a solution for each of them.

  First, we had to explain Mona’s disappearance from the hospital. That was easy, but it required a lot of acting on Mona’s part. She just said she woke up in the hospital disoriented and called the nurses several times before leaving her room.

  The hospital staff and the police were skeptical at first, but they had had a number of machine glitches on the day of the earthquake. The confusion and the crowd also made it plausible that a patient would wander around the hospital attracting little attention.

  After the fire in the gym, Skye dropped Mona off at the hospital’s garage, where she was conveniently found by an orderly after a few minutes. She acted the part, sounding disoriented and making little sense. The police, busy with more pressing matters, gladly swallowed the explanation. The hospital also was awfully happy we weren’t pressing charges. Misplacing a patient is not good PR.

  Well, officially, they did misplace Jane. Police are still looking for her, since she hasn’t been seen since she disappeared from the hospital. Also, there’s the small matter of her school burning down. The police’s only clue about the fire is Brianna, who is in a coma.

  Mona and Skye’s voodoo worked well for me and spectacularly for Brianna. They actually saved Brianna’s life. They even reverted almost all of her burn wounds. When she wakes up, which Skye tells me it should be soon, she’ll be able to live a normal life.

  Well, as normal as a wannabe murderer can live.

  Police also asked us why we accused Jane of kidnapping Mona. After they interviewed some of Greenwood High school students and staff, the police understood our suspicion. Jane’s bad reputation saved us from more questioning.

  And the school is gone.

  Really, things couldn’t have worked out better. I mean, considering.

  Chapter 60: Skye

  I feel Connor’s signature and prepare for our meeting. Or rather, for our confrontation. He didn’t sound pleased on the phone. I wouldn’t care—not anymore—but I need him to be happy. He must believe my story.

  I chose a neutral ground for the talk: the International Fountain at Seattle Center, which is turned off. I sit at the raised edge of the sunken half-dome. When he arrives, I stand up and give him one of my best smiles. I’m glad my Allure is back. It makes things easier.

  “Why so chuffed?” he asks me, already suspicious.

  “I’ve got good news,” I say. I do, but I’m going to tell him a whole other set of good news, completely fabricated.

  He looks around. A guy eating his brown-bagged lunch is at the fountain, but he’s sitting on the opposite edge of the dome, away from us. A woman with a stroller crosses the Seattle Center boulevard. It’s too chilly for tourists. Connor waits until the woman is gone and asks, “Do you know where Jane is?”

  I’m taken aback. “Is that what you’re worried about?”

  His face gets heavier. This is not going well. “Don’t start with this again, Skye. Either you’re over me or you aren’t.”

  Damn, he’s right. Let it go, Skye. “I’m over you.”

  “So, it’s about Jane? I’m asking because she’s missing, and she would only disappear if she had found the Singularity.”

  Ooh, I’m going to relish this.

  “She did,” I say.

  The look on Connor’s face is priceless. Unfortunately, he recovers fast. “No more games, Skye. Tell me the truth.”

  I remind myself to resist his Trust Charm so I don’t babble the truth by mistake. “Actually, the Singularity found Jane.”

  He shoots me an exasperated look, and I try not to enjoy it too much.

  A middle-aged couple holding hands arrive and sit a few yards from us. She rests her head on his shoulders while she drinks from a Tully’s cup. Connor looks at them uncomfortably, and I don’t know if he’s worried about the Veil or the display of intimacy. Either way, I need him happy and relaxed today.

  “Come with me,” I whisper while going into the dry fountain area. I climb down the half-dome, careful not to slip. He follows me, and we stop by the water spouts. I hope nobody turns them on while we’re here.

  “Who is she? Where is she?” His voice is cold.

  “Her name is Brianna Jenkins. Right now, she’s in the hospital in a coma.”

  “Brianna?”

  “Do you know her?” I’m afraid of the answer, the only unaccounted item of my lie.

  “I remember Jane mentioned something about a Brianna. Wait, she goes to Greenwood!”

  I nod.

  Connor asks, “But how come Jane never detected her? How come you didn’t either?”

  Here I sprinkle a little bit of truth to make the lie more palatable. “The Singularity works differently. She is special. We were right: she has natural defenses. Magical shields, and they are always up, even at close range, even when we touch her. But we can sense her when she uses her magic and loses control of it. Only she doesn’t only use it, she unleashes it.”

  “The earthquake,” he says.

  I nod again. “She caused it. I still don’t know if she did it on purpose or if she lost control somehow while testing her powers.”

  Connor shakes his head. No doubt he’s imagining the consequences.

  “What does Jane have to do with it?”

  I hope the story sticks. “My guess is that Brianna sensed Jane, identified her as a Sister, and befriended her. Brianna doesn’t come from a witch family, so I think she had no other way of learning abo
ut magic unless she posed as a Knowing, doing whatever Jane asked her to do. Brianna was the one who gave me the blinding potion at school.”

  “It makes sense,” Connor says, more to himself.

  Yes!

  He looks at me with a hint of suspicion. “But how do you know that? And what about the school fire?”

  “I think Jane saw Brianna releasing her energy, but Jane was knocked down by the earthquake. When Jane woke up in the hospital, she realized who Brianna was and went after her.” I stop there, waiting for him to make the connection.

  Connor grabs my arm. “Jane can absorb energy!”

  “And Charms,” I say. I look at my arm, still held by him, and he lets it go. I decide to be graceful. “Remember how she stole my Allure? She probably hijacked your Trust Charm too. I imagine that’s how she got you to spill the beans about the Singularity’s location.” I’m not so sure about that part, but I want his sympathy.

  He nods. “Yes, it might have been that. She steals energy. She wanted to steal the Singularity’s energy! Wow,” he says. “Just… wow.”

  “Indeed. Brianna fought back when Jane attacked her and—intentionally or not—created the fire that razed the school.”

  Some kind of classical music starts to play. I look around, confused. The woman drinking coffee makes a beckoning gesture. “They’re turning the fountain on,” she yells.

  We thank her and climb up to the promenade. The water ballet starts.

  Connor watches it for a minute and then says, “Wait a minute. And what about your boyfriend’s sister? Why did Jane take her away?”

  It’s so weird hearing Connor, of all people, refer to Drake as my boyfriend. Anyway, that’s not why I’m here.

  Mona’s involvement is the part of the story I have most trouble with. “I have no idea. Maybe Jane wanted a hostage? I really don’t know. I think Jane changed her mind and gave Mona a forget potion. When they found Mona in the hospital garage, she didn’t know how she got there.”

  He looks at me for a long time, before saying, “It does sound like Jane.”

  I refrain from sighing in relief.