Kiss of Frost

of her.

My psychometry let me remember every single person and every single object I'd ever touched. Once I flashed on someone or something, those vibes, feelings, and emotions became part of me. I could think about those memories and call them up at will, replaying the images over and over again in my head with perfect color, picture, and sound every single time. That was one of the cool things about my magic. But the flip side to it and one of the not-so-cool things was that sometimes the memories just came out of nowhere and flooded my mind whether I wanted them to or not. Either way, it was like having a photographic memory, only a lot freakier-especially given some of the bad, bad stuff I'd seen.

But they weren't really my memories. When I'd let go of the arrow, I'd been thinking about Daphne's memories, what she'd done and how she'd felt. I'd picked up her bow in her dorm room last week and had gotten a whole bunch of flashes of the Valkyrie competing at various archery tournaments.

I thought about Daphne again, this time really focusing on her, picturing her at one of the competitions-how she'd held her bow, how she'd lined up her arrow and pulled back the string, the electric thrill of victory she'd felt every time her arrow had hit the target dead center. Then I lifted the bow and concentrated on my own shot.

Once again, my own arrow zoomed straight into the center of the target.

'All right,' Kenzie said, clapping his hands. 'It looks like we're finally making progress with something.'

He grinned at me, and I returned his smile, even though I could see Oliver scowling behind him. I still didn't understand exactly what I'd done, how I'd used Daphne's memories to help myself, but at least I'd hit the target again. Yeah, it was kind of weird, but in a good way. It was certainly better than a lot of things I'd experienced since coming to the academy.

I turned around to see if Logan had noticed my success — and saw him French-kissing Savannah in the gym doorway. The Amazon had her arms around his neck, and Logan had his wrapped around her waist, pulling her even closer to him. They kissed for another few seconds before Savannah drew back. She grabbed the front of Logan's shirt and yanked him out of the gym. I didn't know where they were headed, but it was obvious what they were going to do-sneak in a make-out session before morning classes started.

Cold, bitter, aching hurt frosted my heart, piercing it the way my arrow had the target a few seconds ago.

'Gwen?' Kenzie asked, his voice soft and kind.

For once, even Oliver was quiet, instead of stinging me with some barbed remark.

Not everyone at the academy knew about my massive crush on Logan, but it had no doubt become painfully obvious to Kenzie and Oliver, since they'd watched me train with Logan for weeks now. Plus, they'd just seen my reaction to him leaving me behind to go tongue wrestle with another girl.

'I'm fine,' I snapped, hating the fact that they knew how much I cared about Logan, hating the fact that I still felt this way in the first place. 'Let's keep practicing.'

Kenzie handed me another arrow. He didn't say a word. Neither did Oliver.

Still channeling Daphne's memories and my own anger, I put five more arrows dead center into the target before training time was over.

'You have to come to Winter Carnival, Gwen. It's a Mythos Academy tradition.Everybody will be there.'

I ignored Daphne and stabbed another miniscule piece of fruit in the delicate, white china bowl in front of me. The fruit was a vibrant yellow color, with a strange, pointed shape. Definitely not kiwi. Maybe a star fruit? I brought it up to my nose and sniffed, but all I could smell was the sharp, sweet tang of the honey-vanilla-lime dressing. The weird fruit didn't look like it would kill me if I ate it. Then again, a lot of things at the academy seemed far nicer than they really were.

Across from me, Daphne cut another dainty bite of an egg white omelet topped with chunks of fresh, buttery lobster; sauteed spinach; and thick crumbles of Feta cheese. The Valkyrie was actually eating lobster for breakfast-and enjoying every single bite of it. Yucko.

Lobster was actually one of the tamer things served in the dining hall. Caviar, escargot, and veal were among the daily offerings for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, along with tons of other fancy, froufrou foods. Even the regular dishes — like lasagna, fried chicken, or the fruit salad I was eating — always featured weird ingredients, strange sauces, and bizarre toppings. But the other kids loved all the exotic foods, since they'd grown up eating the expensive entrees with their obscenely rich parents. The Mythos students scarfed down snails the way kids at my old public high school had inhaled greasy pizzas, crispy fries, and thick cheeseburgers.

The lack of simple, identifiable,normalfood was one of the things I hated about the dining hall-and one of the many things I hated about Mythos Academy in general.

'Gwen? Are you even listening to me?' Daphne snapped her fingers in front of my face, causing pink sparks of magic to flutter around us like tiny fireflies.

'I don't have to listen,' I said, putting my fork down in the bowl and pushing it, and the mystery fruit, away. 'All you've been talking about for the last two weeks is this weekend getaway all the students are invited to.'

'Not just any getaway,' Daphne said. 'Winter Carnival._{Trust me. It's one of the best events of the year.'}

'Why?' I groused. 'Because everyone gets to go to some fancy ski resort for the weekend, where they can drink, smoke, and have sex with limited interference from the professors?'

Daphne grinned, her black eyes bright with excitement. 'Exactly.'

I didn't see how the carnival would be any different from what went on at the academy on a daily basis, but I didn't say anything. The kids might all be at Mythos to supposedly learn how to fight and use their magic to help protect the world, but they liked to party hard while they did it. Given the fact that everyone's parents were filthy, filthy rich, they could easily afford to. Apparently, back in the day, all the various gods and goddesses had rewarded their warriors with gold, silver, and diamonds the size of my fist. The wealth had trickled down and multiplied through the generations, which is why the Mythos students had the very best of everything, from designer clothes to expensive cars to custom-made jewelry and weapons.

Back at my old high school, a party had been a sixpack of wine coolers that somebody's college-age sister had bought on the sly. Here at Mythos, the kids whose parents owned Dionysian wineries sent themcasesof the stuff.

'Come on,' Daphne wheedled. 'I'll need somebody to hold my hair back while I puke my guts out. Some of the parties can get pretty wild.'

I raised an eyebrow. 'Too wild for a mighty Valkyrie such as yourself to handle?'

Daphne grinned again. I snorted.

Like the other kids at Mythos, Daphne Cruz was the great-great-whatever descendant of an ancient warrior. Oh, she looked like just another rich, spoiled princess, with her smooth, golden hair; perfect amber skin; expensive pink cashmere sweater; and even more expensive matching pink purse. Daphne was definitely a girly-girl, but she also happened to be a Valkyrie as well, which meant she was incredibly strong. Seriously. Like Hulk strong. Daphne could have torn apart the table we were sitting at with her bare hands and not even break a nail doing it.

Valkyries also had magic, hence all the sparks flickering around us and in other spots in the dining hall where the girls were sitting. Every time Daphne's French-manicured nails scraped against something or she got particularly emotional, little princess pink sparks would shoot off her fingertips and fill the air. Daphne had once told me that her fingers were like sparklers on the Fourth of July. I didn't mind the cracks and flashes of color, though. Sitting next to her was like being close to a rainbow. Well, if rainbows were solid pink. And volatile. Sometimes Daphne's temper flared up almost as much as the sparks did.

Daphne's magic hadn't quickened, or manifested, yet, but once it did, she'd have even more power. Valkyries had all sorts of magical abilities, like being able to heal people, control the weather, and even create illusions.

I shivered. I'd learned that last one the hard way a few weeks ago, when Jasmine Ashton, another one of the rich Valkyrie princesses at Mythos, had summoned up an illusion of a Nemean prowler to try to kill me. If you believed in an illusion, it could hurt you-even kill you-like the real thing. The prowler-a big, black, pantherlike monster- would have ripped me to shreds if Logan hadn't stabbed it to death, causing the illusion to vanish.

Maybe I had my own twisted kind of power today, because as soon as I thought about Logan, he stepped through the door of the dining hall-with Savannah right beside him. No doubt Logan had come here to grab some breakfast before classes started, just like I had. The Spartan had showered and changed since I'd last seen him in the gym, and his black hair was still damp. He'd traded in his T-shirt and sweatpants for acid-washed jeans, a blue