Jealousy

He let out a laugh that was like a bark. White teeth flashed. “You sounded pretty sure.”

“It was a guess.” Or it was the touch blurring in my head, showing me other people’s business. Gran was big on minding your own business, but sometimes you just can’t. “A pretty good one, I suppose.”

Thinking about Gran made my head hurt. Her owl had pretty much saved my bacon so many times. I’d always thought of it as her owl because it showed up the night she died.

Now I wasn’t so sure.

“Why would she hate your mother?” Dibs finished smearing goop on my face. “Okay, that’s it. Let me take another look at that wrist. You’re not healing right.”

“I don’t know.” I tried not to sound fretful. “What do you mean, not healing right?”

“Too slow, especially if your aspect is rubbing through. Could be because you’re not fully bloomed yet. I wish I’d thought to bring that textbook. Maybe we should call Benjamin in—”

“No!” I yanked my hand away. Dibs squeaked a bit. “He’s already going to ask me what happened!”

“What would be wrong with that?” Shanks peeled himself away from the wall. “I’m a witness. She hit you first.”

I didn’t think I’d have to explain it to him of all people. “She’s the head of the Order, right? Who’s going to believe she jumped me first?”

Besides, I couldn’t tell him that I wanted to find Graves and get the hell out of here. The need to get on the road was itching under my skin in a big way.

“It’s the truth, though.” Dibs gently but firmly grabbed my hand, started manipulating my left wrist. It hurt. “Shanks saw it. Right?”

“You’re such an optimist.” Shanks sighed, crossed the room to the window. “She’s right. Her only witness is a werwulf from a reform Schola. Nobody will believe it. On the other hand, you did give as good as you got, Dru-girl. Maybe she’ll be embarrassed.”

What a cheerful thought. My wrist sent sharp jolts of pain up my arm as Dibs’s long slim fingers probed and poked and pulled.

My T-shirt was filthy with dried blood, sweat, and stuff I couldn’t remember getting on it. “You embarrass a bully, they’ll just lie in wait for you somewhere. Ouch! Stop yanking on it!”

“I think maybe I should splint this.” A crease deepened between Dibs’s fair eyebrows. He’s all business when he’s patching someone up. Hard to believe he’d barely even talk to me out in public because he’s so shy. “So what do we do, then?”

We? I don’t know about you, but I’m finding Graves once he’s calmed down and making the case to get the hell out of here. Like, yesterday.

“Leave it alone, I’m fine.” It hit me hard. I put my head down, breathed in softly. He’d said we. He took it for granted that it was his problem too. We. I didn’t think I’d be so grateful for one little word.

All at once I felt horrible about leaving him behind.

Dibs shrugged. “Wait and see. All we can do. Graves might have a bright idea. And Jesus, Dru. You should at least tell Benjamin. He wouldn’t have this job if he didn’t know how to play the game.”

“You keep saying it’s a game.” I let Dibs mess with my wrist some more. The blond wulfen produced a brand-new Ace bandage from the depths of his medical kit.

“Hold still.” He tore the package open with his white, sharp teeth.

Shanks let out an ironic little half-laugh.“Of course it’s a game. Djamphir are like suckers, always looking to one-up each other.” He gave me a guilty glance, tugged at the window sash. “’Cept you, of course. And then there’s Reynard. Wonder what the deal is with him and Red. You said she was trying to get you on her side about him.”

“If I find him I could maybe get him to answer some questions. Good luck with that, though.” It was weird to have someone else bandaging me up. I usually did the first aid for Dad. I remembered patching up August, too, more than once. My shoulders sagged. “Do you have any aspirin, Dibs?”

“Ibuprofen’s probably better. We should ice this.” He still looked troubled, beginning to wrap my wrist. “Shanks doesn’t mean djamphir are bad.”

He was always like that, looking to smooth over everyone’s feelings. Said it was part of being a “sub”— submissive and born that way. The only time I ever saw him with his back up was when he was bandaging someone.

“She knows what I mean, Dibsie.” A cold breeze touched the dark wulf’s hair, mouthed at his sweater. “I never thought I’d miss reform school.” He played with the curtains, his fingers flicking at the velvet. Took a deep lungful of night air, rolling it around in his mouth like champagne. “Huh.”

Dibs glanced up. His hands paused, the Ace bandage half-wrapped. His eyes widened, and he sniffed, too.

Tension threaded through my aching muscles. I couldn’t smell anything but my own snot, since I’d been crying so hard. “What?”

Shanks cocked his head. It reminded me of the RCA dog on some of Gran’s ancient record sleeves when he did that. “Dunno. Just . . . smells unsettled. Could be you, though. Whenever you get upset, the spice comes out.”

“Spice?” This conversation was getting better and better.

“You smell like cinnamon rolls,” Dibs volunteered helpfully. “All svetocha are supposed to smell different—some flowery, some spicy. It’s pretty strong on you. They smell that way whether or not they’ve fed.”

“Whoa. Back up. I smell?” Heat rose up from my throat, touched my bruised cheeks. Blushing again. At least I wasn’t sobbing like a baby.

All things considered, I was doing pretty well. I might earn my tough-girl card back if this kept up. But ouch. I didn’t want to earn it this way.

“It’s not an insult!” Dibs sounded half-panicked. “He’s not saying you’re a—”

“Just chill.” Shanks stood in the window. “I’m not saying you’re a glutter.”

“A what? You know about me, Shanks. Give me a vowel or something.” I mean, I was learning by leaps and bounds, and I’d known about the Real World pretty much all my life, but what Dad and I had been able to piece together was nothing compared to everything the Order had. Things even a baby werwulf would take for granted were news to me.

The blond werwulf finished wrapping my wrist, with prissy exactitude. “A glutter’s a djamphir who drinks like the vampires do. It makes them stronger. But they’re not supposed to do it. And we can smell them, glutters.”

I was beginning to get a very bad feeling about this. “But I’ve never—”

“Svetocha smell because they’re, um, when they get to puberty, they . . . ” Dibs looked over his shoulder. Shanks said nothing, but his shoulders quivered slightly.

Was he laughing?

Dibs gathered himself. He started cleaning up the detritus of used first-aid supplies on the bed. “When they’re, you know, fertile. They start smelling good. Glutters smell, too, like candy. Something about metabolizing the hemo. You can’t tell if a girl djamphir is a glutter, but you can tell if a boy is.”

“Oh.” I checked the wrist wrapping. If I blushed any harder, my skin would probably combust. And now I was wondering why Christophe smelled like apple pies baking, but none of the other djamphir boys did. Was he . . . did he actually . . . “I didn’t know about that.”

“I thought Graves’d be back by now. He had a lot of mad to run off, but still.” Shanks had apparently decided it was time to move on from Teaching Dru About Stuff She Should Know Anyway. “If he’s still off-campus by dawn it’ll be bad for him. But, still, he’s your problem. Or so they think. They might overlook it.”

“He was really mad,” I offered inadequately. “You said something about ibuprofen, Dibs?”

“Have you eaten anything?” He had a huge double handful of Band-Aid wrappers, cotton balls, and an empty