All That Lives Must Die (37 page)

There. He’d done it.

Now he really was a hero rushing to the aid of his lady . . . the consequences be damned. Maybe, this time, literally.

40
. Black cats have historically been associated with witchcraft, luck (both good and bad) and/or evil, and hundreds of other superstitions. A black cat crossing one’s path is almost universally considered bad luck, however. Black cats were also believed to be shape-shifters—witches transformed, traveling incognito, and doing evil.
Gods of the First and Twenty-first Century, Volume 5, Core Myths (Part 2)
. Zypheron Press Ltd., Eighth Edition.

41
. “The Night Train,” translated from German. —Editor.

               43               

A MATCH

Fiona and the others walked through the deserted corridors of Paxington. It was eerie. They were the only ones there. Everyone else must still be taking midterms.

She felt like she’d been through war, and couldn’t even imagine what
finals
would be like.

Her footsteps echoed on the flagstones. The lords and ladies, gods and angels painted on the nearby murals seemed to disapprove of her for making so much noise.

“I thought it was great,” Amanda whispered, breaking the spell of silence. “We creamed them.” She smiled, but it was short-lived.

Sarah rolled her eyes.

“She’s right,” Mitch said. “We should be celebrating, not moping around like we’ve been to a funeral.”

“Could we at least make that a wake?” Jeremy asked, perking up.

Fiona tried to smile, but couldn’t manage it.

Why not? There
was
cause to celebrate. They’d all gotten As (well, okay, A–s) on their midterms. They’d done it as a team, too—not giving in to the prevalent “win at any cost” attitude of Paxington.

What was dragging her down?

She glanced over her shoulder: Robert lagged behind.

He glanced at her for a fraction of a second—their eyes locked—then he looked away, shifted his backpack, and rummaged through it . . . falling farther behind the group.

Only Robert never fell behind. Was this a magnanimous gesture? Acknowledgment that he knew Fiona and he couldn’t be around each other?

“Hey.” Mitch gently jostled her elbow. “I thought maybe I could use that rain check and have our coffee date now?”

Fiona blinked, not understanding.

Then she remembered that after the field trip to Ultima Thule, she and Mitch had been going for coffee—before they got seriously distracted rescuing Eliot in that “side” alley from an army of shadow creatures.

How typical was that?

And Fiona also recalled that Mitch had called it a coffee date then, too.

Was the emphasis on the
coffee
—as in two students going to grab something to drink and go over homework? Or was the emphasis on the
date?
As in a boy-and-girl type thing? (And still technically forbidden by Audrey’s Rule 106.)

“I don’t know,” Fiona whispered. “After everything that happened this morning, maybe we should lie low for a while.”

“If you never let yourself have any fun,” Mitch teased, “you’re going to end up as dried out as Miss Westin.”

He grinned. Fiona could never resist it and found herself smiling, too.

Besides, she’d never heard
anyone
make fun of Miss Westin. She half expected the Headmistress to appear, standing behind them all this time—glaring right through them like they didn’t exist.

But Miss Westin wasn’t there.

And Mitch’s smile could have lit a pitch-black room.

“Okay,” she said, ducking her head in a half nod. “Coffee it is.”

She was careful not to say this was a coffee
date
. . . not yet anyway.

Jeremy angled toward them. “Aye, coffee with a wee nip o’ whiskey would hit the—”

Sarah and Amanda stepped in front of him, Sarah elbowing him in the ribs as the two of them jostled Jeremy back from Mitch and Fiona.

Sarah quickly whispered to her cousin.

Jeremy shrugged, then gave a conspiratorial nod to Mitch.

“We’re heading to the library,” Sarah said, a little too loud. “Must return a few books.”

She and Amanda pushed Jeremy. Fiona heard him muttering: “The library? Gods! Couldn’t you think up a better excuse?”

Fiona would have to thank Amanda and Sarah later. The last person she wanted tagging along was Jeremy Covington.

And Robert? She glanced back over shoulder.

Robert was gone.

She and Mitch crossed the silent campus, seeing only a few older students, who looked more harried than they did. Fiona didn’t want to think about what senior midterms were like.

Harlan Dells waited for them at the front gate as if he had never left his post. He nodded to Mitch and gave a tiny bow to Fiona.

“Congratulations,” he said as calmly as if they had just taken an ordinary paper-and-pencil test. “A-minus. Most impressive.” He added with a chuckle, “Mr. Ma will spend all week rebuilding his pet monstrosity obstacle course. I believe he is quite . . . cross.”

Fiona wasn’t sure what to say. “Uh, thanks,” she tried.

Mr. Dells’s laserlike gaze flickered over her head and then returned, his expression cooling a bit.

“You two have a wonderful time.” He opened the gate for them.

Fiona turned toward the direction he’d looked. In the shade of a cedar tree along the path to Bristlecone Hall sulked the unmistakable silhouette of Robert Farmington.

Mitch saw, too. “Did you want to ask him to join us?” His tone was polite, but he managed to say it such that it was clear he was
only
being polite.

She couldn’t believe it. Robert following them? Was he jealous? Spying on them? Fiona thought they were getting over this.

She wandered through the gate and into the alley. “He’s
not
joining us,” she said, clenching her jaw.

Fiona tried to smother her mounting anger. She didn’t want to show that side of herself to Mitch.

She couldn’t stop Robert from watching her. He was quick, and all Drivers were trained to track by the League. He’d be there in the shadows while she and Mitch sat and sipped coffee at the Café Eridanus.

He was going to ruin it for them.

“It’ll be fine,” she said.

Mitch read her expression and glanced back at Robert. His smile reappeared. “We can do much better than ‘fine’ today.” He held out his hand. “Trust me.”

Fiona forgot her anger, suddenly curious but also wary. Her hand hesitated halfway toward him. “What are you going to do?”

“Give us a little space,” he replied. “It doesn’t always work—only when things are perfect . . . and only if I’m with the right person.”

He stared deep into her eyes and took her hand.

Mitch’s skin was soft and warm, but there was an underlying strength, as well. He pulled her gently along, three steps down the alley and around the corner—only it should’ve taken more than three steps to get there—and they turned onto the sidewalk.

There was the sensation of extra motion, like when you step on an escalator or moving sidewalk—then a sudden halt.

She stumbled. Mitch steadied her.

Fiona blinked. They weren’t near Presidio Park as they ought to be. They were still on a sidewalk, but the road now twisted and turned, switch-backing down a steep hill among picture-perfect gardens and houses.

This was Lombard Street . . .

. . . which was halfway across the city.

“How’d—?”

Mitch held up her hand, still twined within his. “Magic,” he whispered. “A gift a few in my family have . . . which seems to be working much better with you along. At heart, I guess, I’m nothing but a show-off.”
42

Fiona grinned, not completely understanding, but nonetheless thrilled at what had just happened.

It was more than just moving miles in a single step. And it was more than holding hands with Mitch (although that was nice). It was that she’d left Paxington and all the stress and worries behind. Not just physically . . . but in her head, too.

Apparently, the universe had other plans: A counterbalance to her rare moments of happiness . . . because a few blocks away, she heard the rumble of an all-too-familiar Harley Davidson racing toward them (a motorcycle crafted by Uncle Henry to go faster than the speed of sound).

Mitch cocked his head, also hearing. “Robert hasn’t given up.”

“In more ways than one,” she muttered to herself.

Mitch tugged on her arm. “Want to try again?”

“Can we?” Fiona replied.

Mitch gestured ahead, and they strolled together down stairs, past pots of Christmas poinsettias and ferns. His forehead creased with concentration as they crossed into shadow—

—and turned. The sun was brighter and higher overhead. The sidewalk was now paved with pink bricks, and on her right was a wide canal filled with sailboats. There were bridges and hotels and restaurants everywhere.

“We’re in Texas,” Mitch explained, exhaling as if he had just lifted a great weight. “Would you care to find someplace to sit?”

She squeezed his hand. “Let’s go farther.”

Mitch considered her a moment, his grin widened, and he squeezed her hand back. “Very well. Let’s tempt fate.”

He gripped her hand harder, as if he was afraid she’d slip free. Maybe there was some chance that this was dangerous—that if he let go, Fiona might land someplace between steps. Or maybe he just wanted to hold her.

She gripped his hand just as tight.

She wasn’t afraid . . . although her blood pounded . . . and it wasn’t her all-too-familiar anger, either. This was excitement and elation, and maybe a dash of infatuation.

Fiona leaned in closer to him as they turned into the shadows, stepped—

—through darkness for a moment, so cold and empty, she found it hard to breathe. Like she’d frozen solid. But then they stepped out—

—and the light had dimmed and turned gray. Skyscrapers reached for the clouds; there were six lanes of patched asphalt filled with cars on her right. People were everywhere, none of them looking their way.

Mitch seemed perfectly at ease, knowing exactly where he was and where he wanted to go. He kept her hand in his and led her around the corner, where she spotted a piece of sidewalk art: large red three-dimensional letters, L and O balanced atop a
V
and
E
.

“Is this Manhattan?” she whispered.

He nodded and pulled her to a hot dog vendor on the corner.

“You take yours with mustard?” Mitch asked, fishing out his wallet. “Or relish? Or plain?”

Fiona finally had to let go of his hand.

“Mustard, please,” she replied, eyeing the hot dogs suspiciously as the vendor pulled them out of a steam cabinet. Cee didn’t let this kind of “preprocessed poison” into her kitchen.

Mitch paid for two dogs with mustard and two lemonades.

To be polite, she took a bite of the thing.

It was delicious.

She took three more bites, then felt full. That had to be the continuing side effect of her severed appetite.

“Another?” Mitch asked, giving her a paper napkin.

She dabbed her mustard-smeared mouth. “No, thanks. This is good for now.”

Mitch offered his hand. “Let’s see Central Park, then.”

Fiona took it and they strolled down the Avenue of the Americas.

“You’ve never said anything about . . . ,” Fiona started to say. “I mean, ever since Jezebel told everyone . . .” She stopped, remembering there were rules about her talking about her League side of the family in public.

“Ever since she told everyone about your mother? Atropos?” Mitch shrugged, but offered no further comment.

Suspicion gnawed at Fiona. Had Mitch insisted on their coffee date today because of her new social status? Like everyone else, was he attracted to the League’s power?

“It’s just that everyone treats me differently.”

He laughed softly. “Oh, your paparazzi?”

“They’re not fans, so much,” she countered. “They just hang around and ask about my relatives.”

Mitch made a noncommittal murmur.

She wasn’t getting anywhere with this. Mitch was either being evasive or dense, or, astonishingly, he really didn’t care about her League connections.

Fiona just had to know—so she blurted out, “Doesn’t it make a difference to you who my family is?”

Ahead were the trees and rolling lawns in Central Park. There was a huge dog show in progress: hundreds of people and just as many yelping canines.

“Ugh,” Mitch said. “Not exactly what I was hoping for.” He gripped her hand and tugged her toward a shadow. They crossed the plane of darkness—

—and this time, when they stepped out it was dark . . . but a normal nighttime dark.

As her eyes adjusted, she saw they stood upon wide flat stones. On the horizon were the crisscrossing silhouettes of spires and columns and the broken spans of once mighty bridges. Farther, there was a jagged outline of a pyramid. Wind whipped through this place, crying like a wounded animal. It chilled her.

“The Gobi Desert,” Mitch whispered. “This city has never been found by any archaeologist. It was here before the Xia Dynasty. Been buried and uncovered by desert sands countless times.”

“It’s so dark,” Fiona whispered back. “I wish I could see.”

“Dark is why I brought you here.”

Mitch gestured over their heads.

It was a moonless night, and more stars filled the sky than Fiona had ever dreamed possible. The band of the Milky Way dazzled her with colors she’d never seen at night.

“Miss Westin talks about the Middle Realms,” Mitch said. “How great they are. But I think this world has wonders to match anything out there . . . especially with the right person.”

Fiona got dizzy looking straight up in the dark, and she leaned against Mitch almost without thinking about it . . . as if this was the most natural thing in the world for her to do.

He pulled her slightly closer to him. “I don’t care,” he whispered.

Mitch was warm, and shielded her against the cold night air.

“Don’t care about what?” she asked.

“Your family,” he murmured. “You asked before if it made a difference to me. You’re probably wondering if that’s the reason I wanted to go out with you.” Mitch was so close, she felt his breath rush along her neck. “It’s not.”

Fiona’s heart pounded and she found it impossible to concentrate on the stars. “Why, then?”

He hesitated. She felt his heart beating, just as fast, next to hers.

“It was that first day,” he said, “at the placement exams. When I saw you . . . I knew.”

Fiona shook her head, not understanding.

“My family’s magic lets us look at people, and sometimes we get a glimpse of what’s inside—a person’s soul—if you believe in that sort of thing.”