A Girl Called Dust (27 page)

I choked for a moment, thinking the Hag
had sucked the air out of me, but the shock of her revelation had done it.
“Lacey?”

“Yes.”

I couldn’t process what was happening.
Lacey was a Hag? The Queen Bee who hated anything and anyone that was
different?

“You mask your smell?”

“The best of us can.”

Something sharp stuck me in my throat.

“A simple prick will put you right to
sleep until you’re a full-grown Banshee. Don’t worry. I can teach you how to
become one.”

Think, Arden
.
I couldn’t defeat her physically, at least not in the vulnerable position she
had me in, so I had to use my words. Mrs. Martin’s stupid speech class came to
my mind. I needed to persuade her not to stick that needle into my throat by
distracting her.

“That’s why you tried to make me feel
unimportant.”

She cocked her head to one side. “What?”

“That’s why you wanted to make me feel
insignificant—like I didn’t matter—because the fact is, I’m the
most
important.
I’m the only creature that’s mixed like me. I have a power inside me that
everyone wants—that everyone’s afraid of. I’m the most special, and you know
that. You’re jealous, and you wanted to make me feel like I was the opposite.
But what about you, Hag? There’s about a hundred of you in existence, right?
How special does that make you?”

She grabbed my neck and squeezed, cutting
off my air. I managed to pry her hands from my throat. “You’re ugly and I’m
beautiful. I’m a Banshee. I’ll never look like you.”

She grimaced. No one was as superficial as
Lacey. She must hate being a Hag. “What’s beautiful really? Other than a label
that could mean a hundred different things to a hundred different people. Let’s
see how pretty you think you are after I write my name across your face with my
claws. Ask Bailey how my cosmetic procedure worked for her.”

Anger surged through me at the mention of
Bailey’s name. I grabbed her wrists and sank my nails into them. “You’re a
Taker. You’re not supposed to kill me.”

“I’m not supposed to do a lot of things.
Besides, I’m not going to kill you yet. Just put you to sleep.”

I tried desperately to remember everything
I had learned about Hags. They were evil. There was nothing good about a Hag.
They found their prey at night by sitting on their chests and stealing their
air. Hags were cowards in my opinion because they usually attacked their
victims while they slept. I couldn’t think of anything I remembered about how
they died or how to kill them.

Something banged against the bathroom
wall. Lacey and I paused and looked toward the door. A gray wolf walked toward
us menacingly, orange eyes focused on the Hag. Fletcher snarled.

Lacey narrowed her eyes at him. “Walker.”
Fletcher came closer, barking ferociously. The echo bounced off the bathroom
walls. Lacey pulled the needle away from my throat and held her hands up in
defensive mode. “Okay, okay.” She pushed herself off of me and backed toward
the window.

I sat up and scooted to the side just as
Fletcher lunged at Lacey, his powerful jaws ripping through her robe and
latching onto her leg.

Lacey let out a shriek and kicked at
Fletcher with her other leg. A hard kick connected with Fletcher’s side, and he
let go, sliding a few feet back.

 Lacey glared at me. “Your friend
won’t always be around to save those precious bones of yours.” She ascended
into the air as if invisible ropes were pulling her up, her dark robes
fluttering around her. She shot through the window, causing an explosion of
glass, and then disappeared into the moonlight.

Fletcher sat panting and staring at me. I
had the urge to hug him, but I didn’t know how he would feel about that, so I
didn’t.

“Thank you,” I whispered.

Fletcher sat beside me and licked the
small cut Lacey had made on my neck. It disappeared immediately.

Chapter
Twenty-Seven

The following morning, Fletcher and I sat
on our usual park bench sharing a bag of salt-and-vinegar potato chips.

“What did she mean about my bones? That
she needed to use them for something.” I wondered out loud. “What can my bones
do?”

Fletcher shoved a chip into his mouth.
“Don’t know.”

“Fletch, you have to help me figure out a
way to kill her.”

He raised one eyebrow at me. “What?”

“I know it sounds bad when I say it out
loud, but really, what choice to I have? She’s going to come back and kill me.
I might wake up one night with her sitting on my chest. She killed Mr.
Thompson, Mrs. Chin, Trent, and Ed Hurley. She hurt Bailey. She can’t get away
with that. She’s not going to stop on her own.”

Fletcher handed me the bag of chips and
dusted his hands off. “I don’t disagree that Lacey has to die, but you can’t be
the one to do it.”

“Why not? I’m the one she’s after.”

Fletcher took my hand, salty and filled
with crumbs, and I shuddered just a little. “Arden, there’s something you have
to understand about being part Wendigo. Once you kill someone, you’ll eat them.
That’s just your way. And once you get a taste of the flesh, you’ll develop an
unquenchable appetite for it, and you won’t be able to stop. Killing Lacey will
speed up the process of you turning into one of them.”

Bringing myself closer to transformation
was the last thing I wanted to do. “Then you kill her. That’s your job, isn’t it?”

He shook his head. “I could, but I can
only do that if she’s in her Hag form, and that’s not likely to happen now that
she knows that we know.”

“Then what am I supposed to do? Just sit
around waiting for her to kill me?”

Fletcher squeezed my hand tighter. “No,
Arden. Use your head. Go to your people. Whether you want them to be or not,
they’re your family. You need to tell them what’s going on and ask them what
you’re supposed to do.”

I didn’t want to do that. I wanted
Fletcher to help me solve my problems like always. He squeezed my hand even
tighter, and this time it hurt. “Please, Arden. Whatever you do, don’t kill her
yourself. Promise me.”

I gulped. “I promise.”

It had been a while since I had been to
the lair, and I dreaded going in.

“You’re in trouuuuuble,” Wes sang when he
saw me. He had been walking down the hallway reading a book.

“What? How can I be in trouble when I’ve
only been here for a second?”

Something dinged in Wes’s pocket, and he
pulled out his phone. “Mr. Mason wants to see you immediately.”

I swallowed hard. It felt like I was being
sent to the principal’s office. “Where is he?”

“In his study. Downstairs. All the way at
the end of the hallway. Make sure you knock first. He hates when people barge
in.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it. I didn’t even know
there was a downstairs. Where’s the staircase?”

“There’s no staircase that leads there.
You’ll have to use the elevator.” He pointed down the hallway. “Take the last
left, go as far as you can go, and you’ll come to it. Good luck.”

Just like that, Wes had gone on about his
business, leaving me to face Mr. Mason and whatever I had done wrong. I wished
he could have at least given me a clue.

I took my time walking even though I was
only delaying the inevitable. Following Wes’s directions, I came to the
elevator. It was a steel door with only one button to the left. I pushed it,
and the doors slid open. Reluctantly, I stepped inside, and the doors banged
shut behind me as if they were locking me in prison.

The ride to the ground level was a short
one, too short in my opinion. The bottom layer was creepily silent. There was
only one way to go—straight. The long hallway was lined with metal doors that
were all closed. What was behind them?

At the end, I came to a large door with a
golden plaque that read M. Mason. Taking a deep breath, I knocked. After a
moment, the door slid open on its own. I stepped into the doorway and stood
there awkwardly. Mr. Mason sat at his desk with a large book open in front of
him. “Come in.”

I stepped inside, and the door shut behind
me. I turned and stared at it, taking note that it had no handle. How the hell
was I supposed to get out of there?

“Sit,” he said curtly.

Slowly, I made my way to one of the two
leather chairs that sat in front of his desk. I couldn’t help but look at the
entire wall he had filled with monitors watching different things. Mr. Mason
scribbled something in the book with a fancy pen as if I wasn’t there.

“You wanted to see me, sir?”

He glanced at me, slammed the book shut,
and then folded his hands on top of it. “Yes. Is there something you would like
to tell me?”

I thought about what Fletcher had told me
earlier in the park. The Takers were my family. They were the ones I needed to
go to for help. “Yes. Last night I was attacked by a girl at my school, only
she wasn’t just a girl, she’s a Hag. She says she’s going to kill me, and I
believe her.”

“I know that. I know all of that.” Of
course he did. They had cameras all over the school. “What I don’t know is why
you didn’t come to us immediately after this happened.”

I shifted in my seat, feeling guilty.
“Well, it only happened last night and I’m here now . . .”

 “But you went to a Giver, of all
people, and not to your family.”

“I’m sorry. Fletcher’s my friend—”

Mr. Mason leaned forward, his face an
older, meaner version of Hollis’s. “Let’s make one thing perfectly clear—you’re
one of us. Not them. You have a problem, you come to us. The last person you
should be discussing it with is a Giver. That boy can’t help you.”

Fletcher had saved me the night before,
but I decided it would be best not to mention it. “Sorry,” I muttered.

“This is the problem with latecomers. You
haven’t been raised to know the ways of your kind. You’re silly and immature.
You have ridiculous romantic thoughts. You are not ready for what it takes to
live this life.”

That was just one insult too many. Who did
this guy think he was? “You don’t even know me! You don’t know anything about
me! The fact that you’ve been watching me on your stalkery cameras means
nothing.”

Mr. Mason stared at me for a long time
before speaking again. “I know your father made a mistake with you. I know he
should have never let you be raised among Humans. They waited too long to tell
you, and now you can’t handle it.”

I sank lower into my seat. Every word Mr.
Mason spoke made me feel worse. “Leave my father out of this.”

“I spoke with him the other day.”

“You talked to my father?” I could only
imagine how that conversation had gone. Dad probably didn’t like Mr. Mason either.

“Yes. I’ve told him that it would be in
your best interest to move down here immediately. You need every bit of
training you can get, but your mother won’t hear of it. She’s still holding on
to the hope that you’ll turn out to be a Human, but we all know that’s
impossible because you aren’t Human. And technically those people aren’t your
parents, so I think I’m being generous by indulging them.”

“They are my parents.”

Mr. Mason rolled his eyes. “I don’t know
what part Claire doesn’t understand. There is no possible way a Wendigo and
Banshee would produce a Human. It’s ludicrous to keep hoping for it.”

My legs were bouncing, so I held them
still. “Don’t talk about my mother like she’s some idiot. She just wants what’s
best for me. She just wants me to be normal.”

Mr. Mason cleared his throat loudly as if
telling me to shut up. “Anyway, as much as I hate to admit it, you’re special
to us. You are important to our world, and the fact that you belong to us is a
huge deal. We will protect you by any means. Normally we wouldn’t take the life
of one of our own, but this is different. The Hag has broken all of her vows
and almost caused our world to go to war. The girl will be taken care of.”

The phone rang from where it sat on the
edge of his desk. “Mason,” he said into the receiver. His eyebrows rose as he
listened to whoever was on the other end. “I don’t know why I bother. That boy
can’t do anything the way he’s supposed to. I’ll deal with him later.” I was
sure he was talking about Hollis, and I wondered what he had done wrong. Mr.
Mason hung the phone up and focused his attention back on me. “Where were we?”

“You said Lacey would be taken care of.” I
felt slightly relieved. “When?”

“Tonight. My idiot son is setting things
up as we speak.”

I wanted to tell him what a horrible thing
that was to say about his son, but I figured it would have been better for me
to mind my own business. I felt sorry for Hollis. I knew what it felt like to
try your hardest to please your parent, yet nothing was good enough.

Mr. Mason opened the book and returned to
what he had been doing before. “You may go.”

I stood and faced the door, waiting for it
to open and finally let me out. As soon as I walked through, it slammed shut
behind me. I prayed I would never have to go into his office again.

On the upper level, I found Hollis
sharpening what looked like a sword in his bedroom, which held nothing more
than a king-sized bed and a dresser. I hovered in the doorway before speaking.
“I like your room. Very minimalistic. Is that for tonight?”

Hollis looked up, surprised, and then
shook his head. “Nah. Weapons are for the weak.” He held his arms up in the
strong-man motion. “These are all I need.”

“Your father told me about tonight.”

Hollis went back to sharpening his sword.
“Yeah. Everything’s being handled. All you need to do is be here at nine
o’clock. Can’t tell you anything more than that.”

“Um, okay. See you then.”

He nodded, focused intently on the sword,
so I slipped out of the room.

On my way to the exit, I passed a room
with an open door. The lime-green walls and paper lanterns hanging from the
ceiling drew me in. Out of curiosity, I poked my head inside. A tiny girl with
a puff of purple hair that looked like cotton candy sat at a table playing
checkers by herself.

“Hey?” I asked. “What’s this place?”

She looked up from the checker board. “Our
game room.”

Tons of board games were stacked against a
wall. There was also a hand-hockey table, beanbag chairs, and a television that
sat on a TV stand in one corner. Some kind of game system was connected to it.

“This is cool.”

 The girl blushed and then went back
to her game. She was small and thin, with an angular face. Her purple hair and
bright-blue eyes made her seem way too colorful to be in a place like the lair.
The girl looked more like a Disney character. She couldn’t have been more than
thirteen. She took a black piece and jumped two red pieces.

“Why are you playing by yourself?”

“Nobody ever wants to play checkers. If it
doesn’t light up or make noises, they’re not interested.”

I took a seat at the end of the table.
“What are you, if you don’t mind me asking?” The girl could pass for Human—a
strange-looking one, but she could still pass.

“A Sylph,” she muttered.

I didn’t remember reading anything about
those. “Oh, that’s cool. What’s a Sylph?”

She blushed and looked down at her hands.
“I control clouds. I can make them move and form shapes and stuff.”

“Clouds, huh?” I wondered how that made
her a Taker. What was the purpose of her ability?

“You can say it. I know I’m the lamest
creature ever. I can’t do cool things like everyone else.”

“I don’t think that’s lame at all.” But I
kind of did. “What’s your name?”

Her shoulders drooped, and she lowered her
voice. “They call me Cuddle Bug.”

“Cuddle Bug? Why do they call you that?”

“Because I’m so gentle and mild and cute,”
she said with the edge of irritation on her voice. “So not like everyone else
here. Not like you. You’re a Banshee. You have the coolest gift ever.”

I didn’t think I’d ever call what Banshees
did cool. “What’s your real name?”

“Violet.”

“Violet’s beautiful. I like it better than
Cuddle Bug.”

She shrugged. “Me too, I guess.”

“Then that’s what you should go by.”

Violet began moving pieces on the board
again. “That’s not really up to me. Once you have a nickname, it’s yours.”

“Not if you don’t want it to be.” I
remembered the words Fletcher had told me not too long ago. “You don’t have to
answer to it. You can tell them not to call you that.”

“That’s easier said than done,” she said,
echoing my thoughts. Why was I giving her advice I didn’t follow myself? It was
easier to tell someone else to do it.