Let that be a lesson to all of you on fucking with Telekinetics; just don’t.
You’ll never see their punches coming.
CHAPTER 34
I don’t believe in God. If he or she exists at all, I think they’re probably something like Dr. Nowhere, using the world as their toilet and then heading off into the great unknown while the rest of us drown in shit. But fuck if there isn’t an occasional string of coincidences that pays off just right. If Vibe hadn’t gotten me away from the bar before telling me about our classmates’ project, if she hadn’t felt the girl’s terror, if we hadn’t gone to confront the Shifters, if those Shifters hadn’t both been caught shortly after, if Tessa hadn’t gotten in my face when I returned to the dorms…
Probably would have done something rash. Probably would’ve gotten myself kicked out then and there, like Vibe had predicted.
But fact was, all those things did happen. What’s more, by the time I woke up Sunday morning, Jeremiah was away; off to study, or exercise, or whatever the fuck the big bastard did when he wasn’t snoring like an earthquake. He was gone, and the anger was a smaller thing, almost manageable, curled up in my chest like some sort of multi-clawed beast.
By the time I saw him again—later that night, and then the next morning when we all headed off for the food we’d probably vomit right back up in Nikolai’s class—I had myself under control. Had myself almost convinced the whole thing had been a fair trade. Jeremiah had gotten the place of my birth along with a load of utter bullshit, and I’d gotten a reminder that the only thing free in this country was its name. Everything else—even a night at The Liquid Hero—had its cost, and that cost couldn’t always be paid with coin.
Hard lesson to learn. One I’ll keep learning until the day I die. Maybe even after that, when I’m one of you, and some shit-souled Crow pulls me into his orbit.
If you’re not learning, you’re dying. Not sure who said that. Was probably someone Pre-break.
Truth is, most of us are doing both.
•—•—•
It was several weeks before things went sideways again. Late June. Not long before presentations started, and only a few weeks more until mid-year exams. I wasn’t looking forward to more tests, but I thought I had a fair chance at passing everything but Ethics.
And fuck Ethics anyway. Ms. Ferra was going to flunk me no matter what I did, oblivious to the irony of her actions.
Anyway, late June. I was flipped around on my bed, looking at the sunlit sky through our room’s one window, when Jeremiah headed out for the day. I hadn’t spoken to Stonewall since The Liquid Hero. Had worked my ass off to ignore him, in fact. I’d decided not to make something out of the whole class project thing, but I sure as fuck wasn’t going to be friendly about it.
Might’ve stayed in that weird sort of status quo for weeks. Might’ve kept my anger nailed down all the way up to the presentation, maybe even further than that.
Might’ve done a lot of things, if Jeremiah hadn’t left his Glass behind.
From my spot on the bed, I could see its screen, still online, still active. A minute or so of idle time before it would shut down, inaccessible to anyone but the big Shifter.
I don’t remember deciding to move, but the next thing I knew, the Glass was in my hand. I tapped through the file system, found a folder helpfully labeled ‘Crow research’ and sent a copy of the entire folder over to my own Glass.
Didn’t have a clue how to erase what I’d done from the logs. Didn’t even think of it, to be honest. I’d gotten better with the tech since coming to school, but four months can only teach a guy so much.
Safely back on my side of the room, I turned to my own tablet, and started to dig through what I’d recovered.
The first sub-folder was all about Reno. Fucking Reno. The Crimson Death hadn’t been the most powerful Crow ever—that was Lord Bone or Sally Cemetery—but his one very bad day in Nevada had sure as shit caught the public’s attention. A whole city murdered on the sly while the Free States’ Capes fought off a large-scale invasion from the Pacific. By the time even the fastest Flyboys had made it inland, there was nothing left to greet them but the Necromancer himself, elbow deep in carnage, a wide smile on his bone-white face.
Additional folders held information on the other big names and their atrocities. Pictures of the aftermaths. Accounts from the survivors, on the rare occasions where there were any. Page after page after page of the shit my fellow Necromancers had perpetrated, of the lives that had been ruined in their wake.
None of it was good. I mean… I’d known that, already—was living proof of the sort of damage Crows could wreak—but having it all laid out there like that—pools of black blood and wide, staring eyes—really brought the fucking point home.
Pretty soon, I was wondering what Bard had been thinking in letting me enroll.
Then I hit the last sub-folder in the directory. Its label was a single word.
Bakersfield.
Motherfuckers.
•—•—•
It was my fault. I’d woven a web of lies for my big bastard roommate, even before I knew why he was digging for information, but it hadn’t occurred to me to lie about where I was from.
Turns out, that was all they’d needed to track me down.
I just stared at the folder for a long while. Bakersfield. Shit name for a shit town, but seeing it sent a cold chill down my spine. I stared at it, then stared some more,
