Ascendant (33 page)

“Her family wasn’t interested,” Phil said. “Some nutty theory that unicorns are demons or something. Anyway, that’s par for the course. Lately it’s been even weirder. We get a tip about a possible hunter, or we track down a family line, but by the time we contact them, they’ve decided to relinquish their eligibility.”

“What?” I exclaimed.

“Exactly.” Phil shrugged. “I mean, who can blame them? Especially with all the stories your mother has been pushing to the press about how dangerous our lifestyle is, how we’re taking our lives in our hands every day. Yes, it’s all very glorious—just like she wants it to be—but the whole ‘band of brothers’ thing doesn’t necessarily market well to the average fifteen-year-old girl.”

That was for sure. Only a few months ago I was trying to submarine my eligibility as well.

“There was one in Ireland last week, one in Greece two months ago … It’s been really demoralizing for him,” Phil said. “Especially with Cory not doing any better.”

“And you getting ready to go back to school and leave us,” I added.

She looked away.

I grabbed her by the shoulders. “Phil. You
are
going back to school, aren’t you?”

She said nothing.

“You promised!” I cried. “Your scholarship!” At least someone in this family had to continue on to college.

She pulled away. “Volleyball doesn’t seem that important to me anymore,” she said. “Not like moving forward with unicorn protection. I’ve been putting all my effort into that lately. Even if I did go back, I’m not in any kind of training shape. I’d be a pathetic addition to the team. So instead of doing that and wasting everyone’s time, I’m going to do this. My contribution toward making the world a better place. I’m going to save the unicorns, Astrid. It’s really going to happen. And then we won’t need hunters, and all this recruitment stuff won’t matter, and everyone will be safe.”

This fantasy again. Oh, Neil and Phil were perfect for each other, to be sure. They both saw a prescribed end to this life. They both thought if they put their futures on hold for a few months, a few years, they could achieve a permanent solution for us all. But it was a pipe dream. I knew that now.

“How?” I asked, throwing up my hands. “How will preventing us from hunting the dangerous ones make us all safe? Believe me, Phil, I’m not hanging around here for the glory. I’m doing it because if I don’t, people will die. People
have
died. People are dying in unicorn attacks all over the world. So you save the unicorns. How are you going to save the humans?”

“Same way Clothilde did,” Phil said with confidence. “We’ll create a sanctuary for the unicorns, a place where they’ll be safe. A preserve …”

“Captivity,” I said. Bonegrinder looked curiously from me to Phil. “I’ve seen unicorns in captivity. It’s not a pretty sight.”

“You’ve seen unicorns in a tiny enclosure with no resources, like being in a zoo. I’m talking about a vast tract or tracts of land, separate from humanity, where they can live in the wild and—”

“We tried that,” I said. “Clothilde and Bucephalus did. It didn’t work.”

“It did,” Phil said. “For a hundred and sixty years.”

“Bucephalus told me last summer that their hiding place is gone. They reemerged because their last preserve was destroyed.” Gordian had been my preserve, but I’d lost that, too. Nothing lasted.

“Because there was no protection for it. But we can do it again. We can find another place. We can convince them—”

“Them the unicorns or them the lawmakers?” I asked. “You honestly think you can walk into one of these big government meetings you have planned and tell them that we have the magical ability to talk to unicorns and convince them to go hide out in a giant nature preserve?”

“No,” said Phil.
“We
don’t have that magical ability. But you do.”

The image of the einhorns ringed around me popped into my head, but I pushed it away. “Bucephalus has been keeping his distance for months, Phil. He’s the only one who could pull off something like that. And I don’t know if it would work again. From what I understand, the kirin are still bitter about their exile. I doubt they’d retreat willingly from mankind.”

She stood firm. “It’s the only option, Asteroid. Either we find them a wild space, or we hunt them to extinction. Don’t you see that’s the only possible end to this?”

I laughed, bitterly. “You see an end to this. That’s sweet. The only end I see is getting out, like Zelda, like all those missing recruits. Like you.”

Phil shook her head, looking near tears. “I’m not
out
, Astrid. I still have a duty to this place, magic or no magic. And I hate seeing you like this. I know this past year hasn’t been easy, and I know that a lesser person than you
would
have run away,
would
have gotten out. We
have
to believe there’s a solution; don’t you get it?”

No. No, I didn’t. My solution had been to run away from hunting and become a prison guard, but somehow, that was even worse. Angel was probably even now trapped in some sterile cage in the bowels of the Gordian labs, awaiting some horrible, scientific fate. I couldn’t save that unicorn. I couldn’t protect any of them. I couldn’t do it at the château, and I couldn’t do it here. And Phil, no matter what she wanted to believe, wouldn’t be able to do it, either.

Maybe Cory was right, and the only solution was to kill them all. Except, the hunters themselves were dropping like flies. Four unicorn hunters. René needn’t worry about the fate of the unicorns. It was mankind that was toast.

Bonegrinder whined and licked my hand.

T
wo days after my arrival, the remaining members of the Order of the Lioness gathered in the rotunda to bid Zelda Deschamps adieu. She stood with her luggage all around her, one hand resting casually on the waist of her boyfriend, David. They were flying to Fiji for a vacation and … whatever.

“Should be a good break from the weather,” Phil said bravely. I’d caught her crying this morning. She and Zelda had become close friends ever since I’d left for France. It made sense. At eighteen, Zelda was the nearest in age to Phil, and they probably had more in common than anyone else. I remembered when she’d first come, how Phil, Cory, and I had marveled that the gorgeous, black Parisian model had even been eligible to be a unicorn hunter.

“Should be a good break from a lot of things,” Zelda joked.

Rosamund had been inconsolable since dinner last night. This morning, her eyes were as red as her hair as she embraced her old roommate and wailed. “Must you go?” she asked. “It’s not too late.”

Zelda looked lovingly at David, affection and desire shining out of the depths of her dark eyes. “It’s way too late.” He smiled back at her, every bit as besotted.

I swallowed thickly, thinking of the way Giovanni used to look at me. I still hadn’t called him, not even to tell him I was in Rome. I’d picked up the phone five separate times. A few times, I’d even dialed the number, but I couldn’t bring myself to press the send button. As soon as I heard his voice, I’d have to tell him what I did.

And then I’d never hear his voice again.

Cory, Valerija, and Grace stood, bleary-eyed and obviously longing to return to bed. The worst of the food poisoning had passed, but they all looked as if they’d need a few days to get their energy back.

I’d brought Cory some soup and lemon soda my first night back, and confessed to her what I’d done with Brandt.

“Don’t worry,” she’d responded. “We all do stupid stuff. Like that time I ate headcheese. Oh, wait. That was yesterday.” She groaned and clutched her stomach. Food poisoning or not, I didn’t like the look of her. She’d grown thinner and paler than ever, and spoke of occasional fevers or aches in her joints.

“Giovanni doesn’t have to forgive you for that.”

Cory eyed me carefully. “I hate to say this, Astrid, but you must be prepared for the fact that Giovanni might not forgive you.”

We’d been interrupted then by Grace, returning from one of her many trips to the toilet. She grunted at the bowl of soup and bottle of soda I’d brought her, then collapsed on the bed and covered her face with a pillow. From what Cory had told me, she was bitter about getting Cory as a roommate, but after Neil and Phil had learned about Cory’s relationship with Valerija, they’d decided this arrangement worked far better.

Grace Bo as chaperone. I’m sure she loved it.

David had come into town last night, and we’d all heard their story, which was romantic enough to wow half a dozen teenagers trapped in a convent. Seems he and Zelda had been friends for years. Like her, he’d been a teen model, but he’d grown tired of the industry and quit in favor of École Polytechnique, which, as far as I could tell was the French equivalent of MIT, and which David always called “X” for some reason utterly unknown to me. Smart dude. During a fall holiday from classes, he’d gone to a party with some old modeling friends and ran into Zelda, who was on similar leave from her hunting duties.

“We talked all night,” Zelda had cooed.

They’d talked about their world post-modeling and how the lifestyle had never really suited either of them.

“Which was why we were hiding out from the party, if I recall,” David had said.

He told her about how much he was enjoying X, and she talked about how she regularly feared for her safety on unicorn hunts. She showed him her scars.

“He thought they were beautiful.”

I’d grimaced at that, remembering Brandt.

By morning, they were an item, and they remained so even when Zelda returned to her bow and her habit and her life at the Cloisters. They e-mailed and texted constantly.

“It’s kind of weird to fall in love on the Internet,” Zelda had said.

“We were in love already,” David replied. “We just found out about it on the Internet.”

It was a short jump from there to Zelda deciding that she could no longer stay with the Order of the Lioness. Not just because of David, she was quick to point out. But because David had reminded her that there was a whole world out there she was giving up.

“I want to go to school,” she said. “I want to study classics.”

“Why bother?” Melissende had asked. “We’re already living the lives of vestal virgins.”

And now Zelda was leaving. A romantic, tropical getaway with her handsome boyfriend and a new life as a student in the
classes préparatoires
, which were like special study courses French kids had to take before they could even hope to apply for their own entrance exams into one of the
grandes écoles
.

I was so jealous I could spit. Apparently, to get the life you’ve always dreamed of, all you had to do was bide your time and be lucky enough to meet a fantastic, supportive boyfriend who wanted you to go to college just like him—and then be smart enough not to cheat on him.

Oh, and also be willing to walk away from the unicorn magic, from your birthright, from the massive guilt you felt not just for the people you would have been able to save with your special abilities, but also for the unicorns you failed to help in their time of need.

Zelda approached Phil next and hugged her tight. “I will miss you,
amie.”

“Me, too,” I heard Phil murmur into Zelda’s shoulder.

“It is time for you to leave as well. The Order has no place in the modern world.”

“You’re right,” she said. “But
I
have a place with the unicorns.”

I liked to talk about giving up my powers, but I’d never been able to go through with it. And now, knowing what I did about the einhorns suffering at Gordian, about the plight of the Cloisters and their ever-smaller circle of hunters? Now that I knew exactly what Phil was sacrificing, even without magic? For sure I’d never abandon her. Just as, last summer, before she’d found a cause to sustain her, Phil had promised not to abandon me.

“You mean you have a place with Neil.” Zelda drew back and looked my cousin in the eye.

Phil said nothing, and I bit my lip, throat burning with even more jealousy. What had Phil told Zelda that she wouldn’t tell me?

And then I felt Phil fumbling for my hand, and I unclenched my fist and allowed her to take it. She squeezed, hard, and somehow, that was enough. I relaxed. Neil might be real, or he might never be, but Phil and I were forever.

Zelda knelt near Bonegrinder, who looked up at her with blue eyes filled with more adoration even than David’s.

“Adieu, malodorant monstre”
she said with a laugh. “I didn’t think I liked animals, but you are okay.”

Bonegrinder thwapped her tail against the mosaic floor.

“I suppose we shall never meet again,” she said. “But if we do, please do me the honor of not killing me.”

Bonegrinder licked her face, and Zelda crinkled up her nose. I wasn’t sure if that was the zhi’s version of a promise, or merely a taste test.