All That Lives Must Die

Fiona made a mental note: Do not make small talk with an Infernal.

She smelled mint and turned. Sarah Covington stood next to her. Sarah’s red hair had been pulled back and tucked up under a white baseball cap. “Don’t worry about that,” Sarah said conspiratorially. “Tamara’s just sussing out the pecking order.”

Sarah offered Fiona a stick of gum, which she accepted to be polite, but didn’t unwrap.

“I’m dying to know about the girl who saved my cousin,” Sarah said. “No one is supposed to come back from the Valley of the New Year. You said your family name was. .”

“Post,” Fiona said, nervous, as if this were the answer to a pop quiz.

“As in ‘as dumb as’?” Sarah smiled and laughed. “I’m just jesting, my dear. You must take care not to take any of that nonsense from the other girls, or they’ll walk all over you for the next four years.”

Fiona didn’t like being called dumb-even as a joke. Especially as a joke.

Despite Sarah Covington’s outward kindness, Fiona didn’t think that’s what her teammate had in mind by coming over here and chatting. Her instincts told her this was another test. Not an official Paxington-sanctioned pencil-and-paper test. One more important.

Fiona straightened. “The last person who tried to ‘walk all over’ me and Eliot. . didn’t do any walking afterwards.”

Fiona had to soothe the anger coiled within her like a sleeping dragon, knowing how easily it could be aroused. . knowing, too, that despite her dorky appearance, she was special. . powerful. . and if she had to be, dangerous, too.

The smile on Sarah’s freckled face faded. “Yes, I can indeed see a bit of the spark that got you and my cousin out of Purgatory.” She looked as if she had more to say to Fiona, but her gaze then caught something intriguing across the locker room. “Excuse me. There’s a bit of unfinished business to take care of.”

Fiona watched Sarah flounce off.

Jezebel glanced at Fiona-with neither approval nor disdain-which Fiona guessed was what passed for a friendly gesture in Infernal circles.

Sarah moved to where Amanda Lane was awkwardly trying to tuck her T-shirt (which was three sizes too big) into her baggy shorts.

Fiona hadn’t seen Amanda when she came in. She had mastered social invisibility, and Fiona understood why. If no one ever saw you, you didn’t have to struggle to find the right words, and then stumble and stutter them out in the unlikely case someone actually spoke to you.

She knew all this because that’s just the silent subspecies of nerd she had been only a few months ago.

In many ways, she still was, and everything she was trying to be-poised, confident, and likable-was just an act.

“I don’t recall inviting you to Team Scarab,” Sarah told Amanda so sweetly that she could have been talking about the weather.

“I didn’t. .,” Amanda started. She swiped her straggly hair out of her face, but it fell immediately back. She looked at the ground. “I mean, my name was on the roster posted outside.”

“Then that’s a mistake,” Sarah said, jabbing at her for emphasis. “You need to find another team. And quickly, so we can find a suitable replacement.”

“But, I thought. .” Amanda’s voice faded to nothing.

“You said you were sponsored to Paxington by the League?” Sarah asked. “Of Immortals? Truly? Not the League of Losers? Or is this one of the gods’ practical jokes?” Sarah grabbed a handful of Amanda’s T-shirt, yanked it out of her shorts-then shoved her. “Or are you just a liar?”

Amanda banged into her locker and winced.

Fiona took an involuntary step closer. Her first instinct was to rush over there and stop this.

But she halted. Part of her wanted to know why Amanda was here, too. She knew Amanda wouldn’t lie about the League sponsorship. Why had they sent her here?

Sarah pressed on, however, before Fiona could act. She grasped Amanda by her arm and shoved her into the showers.

The other girls watched, some laughed, but most just kept doing what they were doing.

“No,” Amanda whimpered. She didn’t even look up, her eyes firmly glued to her feet, unwilling-or maybe unable-to stand up for herself.

Amanda stumbled onto the tiled stalls. “Please don’t,” she whispered to Sarah.

“ ‘Please’?” Sarah said, mocking her. “Please help you get clean? Help you wash that rat’s nest hair? Why, certainly.”

Sarah twisted on a cold water spigot. A shower nozzle sputtered and shot forth streams of water.

It hit Amanda, and she yelped, then jumped out of the way.

Sarah tapped the pipe. All the cold water spigots turned by themselves. Icy water rained and filled the entire shower section of the locker room.

Amanda backed into the corner, but still got drenched.

“St-st-stop it,” Amanda sobbed. “Please.”

Fiona had watched enough. Someone had to stand up for Amanda. And someone had to take that horrid Sarah Covington down a few notches.

She marched over to them. “Turn it off,” Fiona told Sarah.

Sarah looked around the gym, pursed her lips, and appeared for a split second as uneasy with this cruel prank as Fiona. . but then she shook her head.

Fiona reached for the water faucet-Sarah stepped in front of her.

Fiona wanted to punch Sarah right in her petite button nose, freckles and all.

But she checked the impulse as she remembered how she had fought Beelzebub. She’d hit and been hit with enough force to smash concrete. If she hit Sarah that hard, the girl might not survive.

And as tempting as that was, at this particular moment, Fiona knew violence was wrong.

So instead she reached for the main pipe, her fingers slipped over the beads of condensation on the metal, and she closed her hand-crushing the steel as if it were an empty aluminum can.

The water in the pipe squeaked and squealed and shuttered to a stop.

Louis had told her: “Within you burns the fury of all the Hells, unquenchable and unstoppable. . and yet you somehow manage to rein in that power.”

. . Maybe not entirely reined in at this moment.

Fiona released the mashed pipe and turned to Sarah. Her hand slowly clenched into a fist in front of Sarah’s face. “She’s on our team,” Fiona told her. “But if you don’t like it-you don’t have to be.”

Sarah glanced at the crushed pipe, seemingly unimpressed, then looked at Fiona’s fist. Her eyes narrowed a tad. She didn’t look frightened, but nonetheless she snorted and backed off a step, then returned to her locker.

“ ‘Just sussing out the pecking order,’ ” Fiona muttered after her.

Fiona might never be Sarah’s social equal at Paxington-but if she could help it, she wasn’t going to be bullied or let her bully anyone else.

Fiona went to Amanda.

The girl stood shivering in the corner, wet hair plastered over her face. She tried to control her sobs, but they still came out in little gasps.

Fiona was about to offer her hand to the girl. . but then thought better of it. Probably not the smartest thing to do after she had just crushed the pipe in front of her.

For a moment she wondered if Sarah hadn’t been right in one sense: Amanda didn’t belong here. She was going to get hurt. Or worse.

Why had the League sent her here anyway?

“It’s going to be okay,” Fiona said, amazingly sounding like she meant this.

“Th-th-thanks.” The word shuddered out of Amanda’s body.

“Let’s get you toweled off,” Fiona suggested. “I have an extra set of gym clothes you can borrow.”

Amanda nodded and skittered out of the showers.