Angelbound (22 page)

“Wow. They didn’t teach us that in school.” Frowning, I angrily pick at the chipped counter with my thumbnail. School sucks.

“I’m not surprised.” Mom makes another slice. “The demons routed our defenses and set up a puppet government of ghouls. Since then, as long as the ghouls send extra souls to Hell, the demons support their rule.” She shivers. “But I don’t think Armageddon will be happy with a puppet government in forever. It’s not in his nature.”

I lace my fingers behind my neck and let out a long breath. Let’s sum up the awfulness here. I have a ghoul for a dad, a silent treatment for a best friend, and
a Mom with a ton of depressing history to think through. My vision turns hazy at the edges.

Mom eyes me closely. “Why don’t you stay home from school today? You don’t look well.”

I picture facing Cissy and the silent treatment at school. I feel a little sick to my stomach.

“You’re right, Mom. I’m going back to bed.” I’ve been awake for less than an hour, but it’s already been that kind of day. I slump into my room, curl under my covers, and fall fast asleep. A contented smile curls my lips as I fall off into a dreamscape-free sleep.

***

I stay home the rest of that day, and the next, and the next. Mom’s really cool about it. She makes me frozen dinners and lets me watch all the television I want. A full week goes by before I trek back to class.

As I putter along the familiar route to school, my face stretches into a confident grin. After a whole week, Cissy must feel sorry for her super-sick best friend, transforming her envy demon into ancient history. In fact, I bet she’ll just say hello and chat away like nothing ever happened.

Yeah, that’s it.

I park Betsy, step into school and scan the crowded hallway. Cissy stands beside by her locker. I walk to her side and slap on my most winning smile.

“Hey there, Cissy.”

Silence.

“I’m feeling much better, thanks for asking.”

Cissy slowly turns to face me. The moment her eyes meet mine, her irises flash so brightly, I shield my eyes from the glare. With a low growl, she slams her locker and stomps off down the hallway.

My stomach twists with disappointment. So much for chatting away like nothing happened. Damn, her envy demon is a bitch when it’s up.

I go to class and pretend to look interested at whatever garbage the Old Timer has to say, but actually I’m brainstorming awesome one-liners for Cissy. I know if I can get her to laugh at lunch, she’ll crumble (and I’ll avoid the thrax tournament). My favorite line is: “Talk to me and I’ll brush your tail.” I nod silently. This will work for sure.

That’s when a thud sounds at the class door.

Everyone freezes as all eyes turn to the stranger. A dark figure looms through the door’s small glass window. The intruder’s skin is black and smooth as polished stone. My body tenses.

That looks like Armageddon. Hells bells. He’s coming to kill off the ghouls, just like Mom predicted. My tail arches over my shoulder, ready to strike.

The Old Timer waves the intruder away. “Come back later. I’m in a very important lesson.”

The stranger knocks again, this time hard enough to set the doorframe shaking. “Inspection!” The voice sounds like hundreds of people whispering at once.

My mind races through the different types of demons. Which one would have
a voice like that? The sound is grating, mysterious, and completely terrifying. Demonic wrath curls up my belly, preparing me to fight.

The Old Timer crinkles his nose, making his handlebar moustache twitch. “I wasn’t informed of any inspection.”

“
Demon
inspection.”

The Old Timer straightens his robes and rushes over to the class door, swinging it wide open with a flourish. “Welcome to my classroom, oh mighty demon.”

The figure lurches into the room. Tall and slender, it looks like a smaller version of Armageddon, right down to the fitted black tuxedo. The Old Timer speeds to the demon’s side, gesturing to the room full of students.

My inner demon growls with anger. The Old Timer’s showing us off like it’s dinnertime and we’re so many sides of beef. My mouth stretches into a dark smile. Just try something, you two. Anything.

“Mighty demon, this class is called Lessons in Servitude. Is there a particular skill you’d like to see? Robe cleaning, massage, bowing and scraping?”

“I’m not here to
see
anything.” The edges of the demon’s thin red mouth twist into a smile.

The Old Timer coils the end of his moustache with one finger. “Then, what are you here for?”

“This.” A bit of the demon’s cheek peels off into a butterfly-like creature with a blood-red body and thick black wings. The creature’s tiny face has bright red eyes, a turned-up nose and an itty-bitty mouth lined with gleaming black teeth. Its
dark wings pump furiously, causing its gangly arms and legs to sway in mid-air.

I let out a breath. Now I know exactly what monster this is: a Papilio demon. It’s nasty, but nowhere near as awful as Armageddon.

The demon’s body peels off into more evil butterflies. In no time, little flying demons flutter through the air in one great dark cloud. The humanoid demon’s bulk shrinks into a misshapen lump, and then disappears. In its place, a swarm of Papilio zoom about the classroom, upending chairs and startling students. Some of the little nasties get their arms tangled in my hair. Gross.

A bunch of kids start to scream; their sad cries set off my wrath reflex in a huge way. My eyes burn with rage as I start planning attack vectors and the best ways to skewer Papilio with my tail. It’s bad enough we have to sit in this school and listen to ghoul lies all day long. Demon attacks are off the curriculum.

The Papilio whiz about, pulling stuff out of backpacks, pockets, and purses. They shred books, crush coins into lumps of metal, and pull out hair by the handful. I rise to my feet, my hands balling with rage.

The swarm whips about me, then flips their focus, heading toward the Old Timer’s desk. He stands in front of it, his back against the desktop, his arms stretched forward.

My tail relaxes. The Old Timer gets a turn. Nice.

“Per Article 7 of the Spectral Treaty, inspections are limited to quasis only. This is a ghoul
teacher’s
desk.”

The Papilio encircle the Old Timer’s desk, tearing through his stuff with a vengeance. The floor quickly becomes littered with pens, papers, and shredded
books.

The Old Timer sets his fists on his bony hips. “These are my personal items! I’m a ghoul!
I have rights
!”

The little demons titter with a hundred whispery voices. A group of them grab one end of the Old Timer’s moustache and pull, hard. It breaks loose with a rrrrip.

The Old Timer’s gray hand pats his upper lip. “How
dare
you!”

The demons chuckle even louder, then swarm out the room and down the hall. The Old Timer follows after them, shaking his bony fist shoulder-high.

I slip back into my chair, a satisfied grin rounding my mouth. All our failed test papers and bad report cards lie in shreds on the classroom floor. That’s good, but it’s even better to watch a ghoul find out what demons are
really
like.

Like I’ve said all along, they’re anything but our noble allies.

I march across the greenish-yellow lawn at school. Setting my thumb into my mouth, I bite down on my nail and wince. Yowch. I’ve chewed every fingernail to a nub. The stupid thrax tournament is coming up this weekend. It’s been one week, four days, and six hours since I last spoke to Cissy.

I’m starting to crack.

I glance at my watch. I’m due at the muddy field behind school in two minutes. I step around the back of the building and scan for my class. My eye twitches as I spot a group of kids standing in the center of the sloppy green.

Jogging up to my gym class, I jam my hands into my hoodie pockets. I don’t say hello to anyone and no one greets me, either. You’d think after almost two weeks, I’d start to make new friends. Sure, I tried talking to other kids, but we form groups by our deadly-sin powers, and wrath’s pretty rare. And Furor-wrath, like me? Rare to the level of freaky.

I tried chatting up the few wrath-quasis at school, but they just wanted to kick my butt. It’s a wrath-thing; you like to see how you rank in the hierarchy.
Unfortunately, that would’ve ended with them in the hospital, not a new best friend for yours truly. Zeke’s lust-bunny buddies always ask me to join their lunch table, but Cissy’s there too. And every time we make eye contact, her envy demon roars to life. It’s just weird. All in all, I’ve spent a lot of quality time eating Demon bars in a corner.

The Old Timer and Tank step into the center of the group. Tank blows a long tweet from his whistle. Everyone falls silent.

Our gym teacher sets his monstrous hands on his hips. With his skyscraper build, bald head, and solid chin, he’s a tower in his black robes. Beside him, the Old Timer looks like a gray stick in a blanket with half a moustache.

“We’ve big news for you today,” says Tank. “OT-42 wanted to combine our classes for this special announcement because…” He looks down at the Old Timer. “Why are we doing this again?”

The Old Timer pats the raw skin above his lip. “Security.” He scans the field nervously. “You never know who’ll stop by.”

I hide a snarky smile under my hand. After the Papilio demon attack, the Old Timer hasn’t been the same ghoul, in a good way. The obnoxious lessons on ‘serving our masters’ have disappeared, replaced by study halls where we read demon self-defense books. He doesn’t even give tests anymore.

Tank slaps the Old Timer on the back with such force that the rickety ghoul almost tumbles into the crowd. “That’s right,” says Tank. “Safety in numbers. Very important.” He presses his huge hands together. “As you know, quasis are tested Senior Year and assigned a lifetime service. Testing hasn’t yet started for
this class.” A low groan rises from the group of students. Tank raises his arms. “Don’t worry. There’ll be no tests today.”

The Old Timer wraps his cloak around him more tightly. “In fact, we’re here to tell you there won’t be
any
testing this year.”

The groans change into happy chatter.

No testing? I pump the air with my fist. That’s freaking awesome!

Tank folds his huge arms over his barrel chest. “Now, quiet down.” The students instantly fall silent. “The Department of Quasi Learning has decided that this year, all students will be assigned the same service. Everyone will join the new Ghoul Protection League. Going forward, gym class will train you for this service.”

In the back of my mind, I remember Cissy telling me something about gym class changing. Fighting in a Protection League sounds pretty cool.

I raise my hand. “What battle skills will we learn?”

The Old Timer wags his bald head. “None. The GPL teaches you how to best lay down your lives for your ghoul masters, giving us time to escape in case of attack.”

A stunned silence falls over the group. No one moves.

Holy Hades! Sure, I wanted ghouls to realize demons aren’t allies, but I assumed they’d do something logical with the information, like leave Purgatory or build up some kind of army. But asking us to lay down our lives while they portal their asses out of here? Incredibly lame.

“OT-42 is exaggerating,” says Tank quickly. “You’ll learn other things too.
Angel warriors will teach you some defense skills.”

My brow arcs. Angel warriors? Battle skills? This class just got upgraded to somewhat lame.

The Old Timer nods vigorously. “Angels have been giving us advice on how to prepare for, well, just to prepare in general. They’ll help with training.”

A memory pops into my mind: the day the Old Timer asked me to make worm soufflé. Cissy pointed out angels on the lawn. Everyone was shocked, but I was too excited about avoiding squishing worms to think about it too much. My eyes stretch wide with understanding. So
that’s
why angels were hanging around school. They’re helping ghouls to—what did the Old Timer call it again—to ‘prepare in general?’

Of course. The angels are here to help the ghouls prepare for another demon invasion. A shiver runs across my shoulders. Mom said Armageddon would never be happy with puppet-rule of Purgatory, and she was right. Again.

Cissy raises her hand. I feel a pang in my chest; I miss her. There must be some way to snap her out of this demon envy thing. She clears her throat. “Who exactly are we protecting and preparing for? Demons?”

The Old Timer sets his arms out, palms forward. “No, no, no. Nothing like that. Demons are our friends. Everyone knows that.” His eyes glow bright red.

I roll my eyes. Suuuuuuuuure they are.

“Let’s get started.” Tank blasts his whistle again. “I want you all to practice running around the yard, flailing your arms, and screaming ‘Take
me
! Take
me
!’ On my mark. Set. Go!”

The other kids break up into small groups and start walking around the field. Some get into the exercise and really ham it up. Cissy and Zeke stroll nearby, chatting and smiling. My heart finally cracks.

I walk over to Cissy and stand directly in her walking path. Our gazes meet. Her irises flare bright red.

Zeke scratches his neck with his hand. “I’ll leave you two to talk.” He quickly slips away.

Cissy keeps glaring at me, her eyes flaring brighter. This has so got to end, and much as I hate to do this, I think there is only one way to get her envy demon to go bye-bye.

“I may possibly consider going to the tournament. Maybe.” I flip my finger back and forth between her eyes. “But I need to talk to my friend Cissy and not envy-demon girl.”

Cissy inhales a long breath, her eyes slowly turning back to their original tawny brown.

Good. Now we’re getting somewhere.

She shakes her head from side to side. “That’s better, now.” She lets out a few breaths. “I think my envy demon got a little out of control there.”

I plant my fists on my hips.
Now it’s time to let loose.
“A
little
out of control? You didn’t talk to me for two weeks. You’ve been a bitch on wheels. And about what? Some guy.” I waggle my finger at her. “I’ve been totally patient with you through the whole Zekie-poo lovey-dovey boyfriend festival. All I do is get into a few fights with a guy and you LOSE IT. For the record, you totally and completely
suck as a friend right now.”