Betrayals

had a plan, after all, and it didn’t include hanging out up here all day. So I stopped staring at the woods and the sky and breathing in the odd cold rain-soaked happiness. It still stayed with me as I studied the lay of the rooftops, trying to see it like the hollers and ridges around Gran’s house. If you could get a vantage point, you could work out your way just about anywhere, with a compass and some common sense, that is. All I’d need up here was the sense.

How much sense I had climbing around on a roof, I don’t know. But I took a good look, and the fist inside my head opened up a little, sending out little bits of questing awareness. I waited for the tingle that would tell me it was safe to go, and would also tell me which road to take.

You can’t ever rush something like that. It’s the same reason why you can’t ask a pendulum anything you really, really want to know about. The wanting makes a screen in front of the real answer, which might be something you’d prefer not to hear. So you’ve got to go still and quiet, as unattached from the answer as possible. It’s different from really needing intuition in a pinch, when you have to just shut out the screaming all around you and listen for the still small voice of certainty.

Gran always harped on it, actually, how the pendulum would sometimes tell you just what you wanted to hear, and hang the rest. Common sense, she’d say over and over again. Ha! Common as hen’s teeth, maybe. Got to apply that old meat twixt your ears, honey.

A wave of homesickness crashed into me, so sharp and hot it almost rocked me back on my heels.

I longed to be back in Gran’s narrow little house up in Appalachians, listening to the whirr and thump of her spinning wheel on a cold evening, smelling whatever she’d cooked for dinner and the floor and window washes she was always using. Yarrow, lavender, wild rose, constant scrubbing.

But there was also that time in the evening when it was too dark to work outside, when Gran would spin and I would half-lay on the old love seat and stare at the iron stove. It was warm and safe and I never had to wait for Gran to come get me. She was always there.

The tugging tingle in my solar plexus came. I studied the roof some more and saw the way down.

It didn’t look like much; I’d have to zag over a couple of sharp slopes, and there was a bit of a drop onto a long, gallery-type roof. I could hop down from there in a protected angle, using a set of, were those dumpsters? Had to be, yeah, that would be right behind the kitchen. Maybe I could even peek in and see who was doing the cooking behind that screen of steam.

What about getting back up? You’re so smart, what about getting back into the Schola?

Getting in wouldn’t be a problem. I’d just bang on the front door for a while. They’d let me in, right?

I thought of the missing stone lions and wasn’t too sure. But it was too late to back out now. I’d figure something out.

I checked my scabbed hands one last time and got going.

* * *

It wasn’t hard to get into the boathouse. A plain wooden door, a latch that had once probably held a padlock rusted wide open. I looked for any sign of habitation, didn’t find it. Pushed the door gingerly with my foot, wincing at the screech of rusted locks, and stepped in. The stiletto had eased itself out of my pocket, and I wished I had a gun instead, to sweep the place.

The entire structure was completely dilapidated. One boat had sunk, rotting, under the glassine water lapping at the central well. Another hung overhead on rusting chains, looking like it hadn’t been touched in easily twenty years or so. Holes glared in its sides, and the chains didn’t seem too solid.

Coils of rope moldered in the corners. The place smelled like rot and mildew, and the flat iron tang of snowmelt river water. The floor sagged underneath my feet with each cautious step.

And on the other side of the bay where the rowboat wallowed at the sandy bottom under a blanket of clear heavy weight, he just appeared.

Christophe stepped out of the shadows, his blue eyes alight. Not a blond-highlighted, expensively cut hair was out of place. His hands dropped down to his sides, as if he’d been holding them up.

What had he been planning on doing? Did he think I was an enemy?

Everything boiled up inside of me and I let out a high-pitched, girly sound. The switchblade clicked open at the same time.

Great. Just great. All the practicing I’d done for this moment failed me utterly, and I stood there next to a pile of slumping, damp-eaten lumber and stared at him. “You lied to me!” I sounded like I’d been punched, hard.

“Hello is usually considered a more appropriate greeting.” He lifted one shoulder, dropped it. A breath of apples and cinnamon reached me, hit the back of my throat, and tickled the bloodhunger. “And what am I supposed to have lied to you about, Dru?”

Each time I saw him, it was like I’d forgotten how his face worked together, every line and plane proportionate. “A sixteenth, you said! You said you were called a half-breed, but you were technically a sixteenth!”

“What? A lecture on genetics?” But his face clouded. He obviously guessed where this was going.

For one long second I considered how satisfying it would be to hit him, to unleash the ball of rage behind my ribs and see if he could still smack me around so easily. “Sergej.” The name sent a glass spike of hatred through my head. “Your father.”

Christophe went utterly still, his eyes burning. His thumbs were hooked in his jean pockets, but his hands were tense and his shoulders rigid under the usual black sweater. He stared at me for a little while, his head cocked like he’d just had a good idea and was running it through before he swung into motion.

Finally, he spoke. “Who told you?”

I swallowed hard, lowering the knife. Its blade winked once in the hard, thin light. Oh God. Did you help kill my mother? Tell me. I have to know. I have to know something, anything, for sure. “Who? Oh, nobody. Just Anna. Another svetocha like me. Was that something you forgot too? She said—”

“Ah. Anna. Spreading her poison.” A silent snarl drifted over his face. “I didn’t ask to be born into my bloodline, Dru. Just like you didn’t ask to be born svetocha.” He showed his teeth, blond highlights sliding back through his hair as the aspect folded over him. “You should be grateful, though. My father’s strength passed on to me, and it’s the reason you’re still breathing enough to fling accusations.” He straightened. “What are you doing here? Someone should be watching you during the day.”

Yeah, right. Like someone’s supposed to watch me when it’s Restriction. That’s really been working out well. “I got out of my room. Didn’t you leave this?” I dug the note out of my pocket, suddenly wishing I could fold up the knife again. “The night I was…attacked?”

“Attacked? And… Anna.” The aspect kept his hair dark, and his teeth didn’t retract. “Tell me.”

“I want to know—” My heart was in my throat again.

I didn’t even see him move. One moment he was all the way across the boathouse. The next, the silvery screen of water over the sunken rowboat rippled, and he was right in front of me. I jerked back, my shoulders hitting the door, and his nose was inches from mine. His hands thudded onto the wood behind me, his wrists against my abused shoulders. Apple scent drifted around me.

Jesus. He was so fast. And his eyes were burning. The aspect retreated, blond sliding in his hair as a stray band of sunlight caressed it. “What do you think you want to know? If I wanted to betray you, kochana, I could have. Easily. If I wanted to hurt you, I would have already done it. I could have…” He paused. His fingers came down, wrapped around my wrist. The knife lifted, and he held it with the point just over the left side of his chest. “There. There’s the spot. Between those two ribs and twist, if you can. Don’t hesitate, Dru. If you honestly think I’m a danger to you, push the knife in. I’ll help.” His lips skinned back from his teeth, and his fingers tensed on mine. He jerked the knife forward, and I surprised myself by yanking back. I couldn’t let go, he was holding it too hard. My scraped fingers gave a flare of red pain, subsided.

He tried again, pulling. The point touched his sweater. The same paper-thin black V-neck he always wore, whether it was hip-deep in snow in the Dakotas, or freezing here. “Go ahead.” His breath touched my face. “Every djamphir is technically a sixteenth. Any more than that and we’re