Chaos Choreography (15 page)

“Kinda does,” I said apologetically. “Just see whether anyone's being weird.” One of the jazz dancers had apparently been a cheerleader in a past life, and was organizing a human pyramid. “Weirder than usual,” I amended.

“Do you really think one of us did this?” asked Malena.

“No,” I said. “But we're going to need to know that for sure.” Dancers wanted to dance more than they wanted to do anything else. Killing people would distract from the dancing. Whoever had done this, I didn't think we were going to find them here—and yet I needed to be sure, which meant we needed to start watching our surroundings.

“I thought I was supposed to be able to relax when I wasn't in the bottom three,” muttered Malena, and stalked off toward the revels.

“Come on,” I said to Pax.

No one came to ask us where we were going or why we weren't coming to the party as we made our way upstairs. We'd pay for that in the morning, when the main breakfast conversation was about whether or not we'd hooked up. That was fine: we could weather a few rumors more easily than we could weather Pax having an incident and eating half the dancers.

He made a beeline for the fridge once we reached the apartment. I kept going, making my way back to the bedroom I shared with Lyra. We both had laptops on our nightstands. Mine had a pink shell, and was covered in sparkly stickers. I ignored it as I dropped to my knees next to my bed, reached under the mattress, and pulled out a sleek, steel-colored notebook computer. It wasn't as big or as powerful as a full-sized laptop. I couldn't use it to manipulate graphics or play games. But it was small, it was fast, and best of all, it was equipped with its own wireless hotspot, thanks to the tireless efforts of my cousin Artie.

Pax was still rattling around in the kitchen when I returned. I sat on the living room floor, balancing the notebook on my crossed ankles, and activated the wireless. It would use the local cellular signals to boost itself,
allowing me to get messages out without Adrian's network IT people seeing them. That was important. Somehow, I didn't think transmitting a bunch of bloody corpses over the Crier Inc. network connection would have been good for my career.

My lifestyle has equipped me with a variety of interesting skills and coping mechanisms. As it turns out, knowing how to word the “Hey, Dad, found some unexpected corpses in the basement of my dance show, can you check them” email was not one of those skills. I finally wrote a quick line warning him about gory contents and asking whether he could tell me anything about the runes cut into the bodies. Dad would be able to take it from there.

He took it faster than expected. My phone rang only a few seconds after I hit “send.” The caller ID showed unknown number. I answered.

“Hello?”

“Where did you find those bodies?”

“Hi, Dad.” Just hearing his voice was enough to relax me. He would know what to do next. He always did. “In the basement of the theater. Those are the two contestants who got eliminated tonight.”

“You need to get out of there.”

He always knew what to do, and I always refused to do it. “Why?”

“Because those runes are intended to summon a snake god, and if the snake cultists are carving them into dead people, I'd rather they not decide to carve them into you.”

I leaned back until my shoulders rested against the arm of the couch. “See, and that's why I can't leave. I don't think we can convince Adrian to shut down the show—officially, the bodies haven't been found yet. Maybe when they are, he'll decide this is too dangerous, but I think he's just going to turn it into a bid for better ratings. Dancing for our fallen comrades and all that. Right now, I'm the only one here who could potentially make things better.”

“I don't like the thought of you out there without backup. Your mother and I—”

“Are
so
not coming out here,” I interrupted. “You have work to do, and there's nowhere for you to crash. Besides, I have backup. Dominic is here. The local cryptids include a chupacabra, an Ukupani, and a whole Nest of dragons that really wants to stay on my good side. I'll be fine.”

“That isn't enough,” he said. “These runes aren't amateur work, like the ones you found in the sewer. Someone has been working for a long time to bring their god to this plane of existence.”

“Do you even know
which
god?” Pax stuck his head out of the kitchen, mouth bloody and eyes wide. I covered the receiver with one hand and mouthed “snake god” exaggeratedly at him. He looked blank, shrugged, and withdrew back into the kitchen. I uncovered the receiver. “Because there are a lot of snake gods out there. Maybe they're summoning Uncle Naga, and we can have a fun chat about how dance proves that bipeds have too much nervous energy. Again.”

(Uncle Naga was a very nice, well, naga from a parallel dimension. His real name was unpronounceable by humans. He'd originally been summoned by a snake cult to eat my grandmother when she was a kid. Being a respectable professor of extra-dimensional studies who didn't believe in eating people he could have conversations with, he'd declined and has been a friend of the family ever since. And this is why we don't invite strangers over for Thanksgiving.)

“Naga cannot be summoned using these runes,” said Dad. “Honestly, I'm not sure what
can
be summoned using these runes, only that I'd rather you not meet it face-to-face, and especially not without backup.”

“Already told you, I have backup,” I said. “I just need you to find out whatever you can about these runes, and pass it along, so my backup and I have a better chance of staying alive.”

“I'll do my best,” he said. “The two people who were eliminated tonight, they weren't the first, were they?”

“See, you say that, but I know you've been watching the show,” I said. “I know because
your
mice have been sending Facebook messages to
my
mice. They really like the caps lock key. Someone should teach them about proper email etiquette.”

“Thanks for volunteering,” he said, before he sobered and asked, “The other people who have been eliminated . . . are they all right? Has anyone talked to them?”

I didn't drop the phone. I may as well have. My mouth going slack, I stared off into the distance, considering the terrible implications of his words. Because we hadn't heard from them, had we? Danny—he'd been eliminated in week three. He was a ballroom boy. We should have swarmed him with hugs, covered him with kisses, and sent him infinite supportive messages on social media. That was part of how this
worked
. You made a fuss over the outgoing contestants to remind America that you were still there, still alive and kicking. And we hadn't done it.

Why not? Where the hell were they?

“Verity? Are you still there?” Dad's voice turned sharp. “If you're in distress, breathe in sharply twice. We'll find a way to get help to you.”

“I'm fine, Daddy,” I said. The last thing I wanted was for my father to start mobilizing the troops. He'd start with Dominic—that was fine—but there was no telling where he would go from there. “I was just thinking about what you said. I wasn't close to any of the people who've been eliminated. My season is intact. But it's still weird that I haven't spoken to any of them. I'll look into it.”

“See to it that you do,” said Dad, and sighed. “You know, Verity, when you told us that ballroom dance was your life's true passion, I thought it meant you would be
safer
than your brother. Basements full of bodies sort of go against that.”

“I
am
safer than my brother,” I protested. “I haven't been bitten by a werewolf or turned to stone. Compared to Alex, I'm little Susie Safety.”

He chuckled ruefully. “I wish that weren't reassuring. All right: your mother and I will stay here. But I'm sending backup, and you're going to accept it, or I'm coming down there and carrying you home.”

“What kind of back—” I began.

It was too late. He had already hung up.

I dropped my phone on the carpet and began hitting my head against the couch. It was soothing. I was still hitting my head against the couch when Pax emerged from the kitchen again. He walked across the room to loom over me, a concerned expression on his face.

“It didn't go well?” he asked.

I stopped hitting my head against the couch. “Dad says the runes are intended to summon a snake god, although he doesn't know which one, and that they're really old, which means they have a better chance of working. So he's sending me backup, because apparently what I already have here is not sufficient. He also says we should be checking up on everyone else who's been eliminated, because
that's
the sort of thought that helps me sleep at night.”

“I see.” Pax sat down on the couch, still looking down at me. “What's a snake god?”

I blinked. “Okay, that was something I hadn't considered. Um. So most major human and cryptid religions have snakes in them somewhere. There's the whole Garden of Eden shtick, the Rainbow Serpent, Medusa, all that fun stuff. And maybe that's because of monomyths and things like that—ask my mother if you ever want to have your ear talked off—and maybe it's because all religions are a little bit right, but it's at least partially because there are a really disturbing number of dimensions filled with nothing but snakes.”

“Snakes,” said Pax slowly.

“Yup, snakes. You know how dimensions work, right?”

He looked at me blankly.

“You . . .
don't
know how dimensions work?”

“You don't have to sound so surprised,” he said, sitting up straighter. “I bet you don't know how the benthic zones of the sea function, but I understand them intimately.”

“We all have our own strengths,” I said, and shook my head, trying to switch into educational mode. “Have you ever seen a honeycomb?”

“Yes.”

“So think of our dimension as one cell in a really, really big honeycomb. It's touching a bunch of other realities, all sort of parallel, all sort of not. What you get is determined by what direction you go—and don't ask how you know what direction you're going, I am
not
a dimensional traveler, and I don't want to be. That's my Grandma Alice's job. Anyway, if you're traveling on the horizontal,” I swept my hand flat through the air in front of me, “you get humanoids, things that look like life in this dimension, but aren't necessarily the same. Cuckoos probably came from a horizontal dimension. If you're traveling on the vertical, you get things that aren't humanoid, but are statistically more likely to be like the people in this dimension—empathic, intelligent, friendly. And if you travel on the diagonal, you get weird shit. Frequently snakes. Like, three times out of four, snakes.”

“But why?”

“Hell if I know. Hell if
anyone
knows. The universe seems to really enjoy making snakes.” I pushed myself up off the floor, tucking my phone into my pocket. “Because there are so many snake dimensions, people have run into them at various points throughout history. And because humans are sometimes predictable in bad ways, there are always people who think summoning a giant snake from another dimension will help them get their heart's desire. I'm not sure what that says about people. Probably nothing good.”

Pax stared at me. “That's it, I'm going back to the ocean.”

“You're like the little mermaid in reverse.” I flashed him a smile and offered him my hand. “Come on. Are you feeling less like eating people?”

“Yes, but we're going to need more steak,” he said, taking my hand and letting me pull him to his feet.

“We can get more steak,” I said. “For right now, we need to get out there and pretend everything is normal. You up for it?”

“No,” he said dolefully.

“Good,” I said, and dragged him out the door. Yes, there was an element of fiddling while Rome burned in heading for a party when two of our fellow contestants had just died, but sometimes, keeping up appearances was all you could do. We'd avenge them later. Maybe I was being a little paranoid: I'd own it if that were the case. Hell, I'd even be grateful. But I didn't think I was. When something like this begins, it doesn't end until a lot more people are dead.

“Walking into danger with your eyes open and your mind clear is a sign of bravery, not foolishness. Well, sometimes foolishness. But as long as you walk back out again, you can pretend that part doesn't matter.”

—Enid Healy

The Crier Apartments, privately owned by Crier Productions, sometime after midnight

T
HE PARTY W
AS AS AWFUL
as I expected. People kept asking if I'd seen Poppy or Chaz, then laughing and making snarky comments about sore losers when I said I hadn't. It was triggering a weird sort of déjà vu; I was pretty sure I'd seen this scene play out over the course of the last few weeks, as people slipped away from us. I might even have been one of the ones asking where they'd gone.

Thinking about it made me want to grab and shake every single person I saw, and when I realized my hands had started balling into fists without my having consciously decided to hit somebody, I pleaded a headache and left. Lyra was still laughing, dancing on top of a picnic table with one of the contestants from season four. I decided to let her have her fun. She'd pay for it in the morning, and maybe the hangover would make the bad news feel a little less personal.

The front of the apartment was empty when I stepped
inside and started toward my bedroom. It was time to take off my wig, shower, massage my scalp, and get ready for bed. Nothing was going to stop me from getting a few hours of much-needed sleep.

Nothing except for maybe Dominic, perched on the windowsill above my bed like some bizarre bird of prey. He was even wearing his leather duster, which he usually only broke out for monster hunting these days. I stopped in the doorway.

“Close the door,” he said.

I closed the door. Then, without being told, I grabbed a chair from the closer of the room's two desks, and wedged it up under the doorknob. If Lyra came back, she could knock.

“Come over here,” he said.

Those were the words I needed to snap me out of my surprise. “What are you
doing
here?” I hissed, voice low. “You know you're not supposed to be this close to the studio housing. They have a lot of security around this place. You could have been arrested. You could
still
be arrested. You're supposed to text me and let me come to you!”

“Yes, there are a great many things we're supposed to do, aren't there?” Dominic stayed on the windowsill, eyes narrowed and jaw set in a hard line. “For example, when my
wife
discovers dead bodies in the place where she spends most of her time, I expect her to notify me. I certainly expect her to call me before she goes to a party, rather than leaving me to find out from an email CC.”

I paled. “Oh. Dad already got results?”

“You are the most insufferable, infuriating,
insane
woman I have ever—yes, he found some documentation of those runes you photographed. You remember, the ones
carved into the corpses of your fellows
.” He finally slid off the windowsill, striding toward me. “Verity, how could you?”

“Look, I know you're mad, but I was never directly in danger,” I protested. “They were dead by the time I got down to the basement. I didn't see the killer.”

“You think that's why I'm angry? Please. Danger is a natural part of what you've chosen to do with your life. I hope you don't get yourself killed while I'm not with you, but I accepted the possibility long before I asked you to marry me.” Dominic shook his head. “I'm angry because you didn't call. Because I had to find out from someone else, as an afterthought, and I've rarely been so worried, or felt so helpless.”

“I'm sorry,” I whispered. “I didn't think.” I'd followed procedure. I'd encountered a problem and notified the family. But I had more than my blood relatives now. I had Dominic, and he was
here
, and he'd needed me, and I hadn't called him. I was a terrible wife. He was probably going to divorce me. It would be just what I deserved. It would be—

Dominic put his hands on the sides of my face, pulled me closer, and kissed me. I could feel the relief radiating off him, so clear and vibrant that for a moment I thought this must be what it was like to be an empath. Artie had tried to explain what it was like to feel other people's emotions to me more than once: in that moment, in that kiss, I finally understood what I'd been missing.

Finally, Dominic pulled back, and said, “If you ever do that to me again,
ever
, I will lock you in the trunk of the nearest available vehicle and leave you there until I feel you've thought sufficiently about what you've done.”

“I'm sorry, did you just threaten to put me in time out?” I put a hand at the center of his chest and pushed lightly. “Nope. Not going to happen. But I'll try to be better.”

“That's all I've ever asked.”

“So if Dad found some info on these runes, does that mean you're up to speed?”

“Yes, although not with whatever unreasonable plan you've concocted to deal with the situation.”

“I'm going to go back to the theater tomorrow, and wait to see whether Adrian shuts down the show,” I said. “If he does, we get the hell out of Dodge. If he doesn't, I keep my eyes open and you start lurking around the
theater more, in case you're needed in a hurry. Dad thinks these may not have been the first bodies—just the first ones we've found. Someone may have gotten to the janitorial staff. I'm not sure yet. I need to wait and see.”

Dominic blinked. “That actually sounds reasonable. Who are you, and what have you done with my wife?”

“Ha, ha,” I said, before kissing him again. “Get out of here. The last thing we need right now is for you to get caught. I'll come see you tomorrow night, and you need to clear your calendar for this weekend.”

“Why?”

I grinned. “Because we're going to the flea market.”

After Dominic left and I'd taken my shower, I was able to manage almost five hours of uninterrupted sleep before the alarms went off and it was time to get moving again. Despite my corpse-and-intrigue–filled evening, I was still perkier than most of the other dancers as we lined up to wait for the town cars. Apparently, dead bodies aren't as bad for you as wine coolers. Not a surprise, but still good to have it proven.

Malena wandered over to our waiting area, nodding genially to Anders and Lyra before asking me, “All good?”

“All good,” I said. “I'll let you know if that changes.”

“Or you could not let me know,” she said. “That's always an option. Catch you on the backbeat.” Then she was gone, heading for her own waiting zone, while Anders and Lyra turned to stare at me.

“Are you making
friends
?” gasped Lyra. “With people who aren't
us
? Be still my heart, I never thought I'd see the day.”

“Quiet, you,” I said, before punching her on the arm. “I'm a friendly person. I know how to make friends.”

“Knowing how to do a thing and actually doing the thing are not the same thing,” said Anders. “You've never socialized with our competition.”

“I socialize with you,” I protested.

“I was your partner for the whole season. If you hadn't been willing to socialize with me, you would have spent all your free time sitting in a corner looking sad,” said Anders. “It still took me two weeks to get more than five words out of you when the cameras weren't on us.”

“You only started socializing with me and Pax after I got dropped on you during a group rehearsal,” said Lyra. “Ours is a friendship born of unstable footing and guilt.”

“Okay, so I'm mostly focused on my dancing,” I allowed. Lyra was wrong about why I'd started being friendly with her: the drop had been an excuse. I'd been trying to get closer to Pax, who was the first Ukupani I'd ever met. Scientific curiosity has always been a powerful motivator where I'm concerned. “That doesn't mean I'm unfriendly. I can make friends.”

“Malena's a nice girl,” said Pax. “If Val wants to make friends, I say we let her.”

“It's just so beautiful,” said Lyra, miming wiping a tear from the corner of her eye. “Our little Valerie's learning how to play nicely with the other children.”

“I will kill you all in your sleep,” I said.

Lyra was still laughing when the town car arrived.

The ride to the theater was harder than usual. I had to keep pretending nothing was wrong, even as the feeling of impending doom grew stronger. Soon, we'd find out how Adrian was planning to react to the bodies in his basement. In the meantime, I had to keep people from realizing I'd already known.

Worse yet was the possibility that Adrian wouldn't say anything; that the bodies wouldn't have been found, and I would have to decide how to play things from there. Not fun.

The cars let us out behind the theater, at what we all thought of as the stage door. We filed dutifully inside to learn what we'd be doing for the next week—or to find that the whole show had been canceled on account of the vicious murder of two of our own. I saw Malena through the crowd, casting worried glances at me and Pax. For
once, I was the person with the least to lose. I was the only one of the three of us who was human, and while intense media scrutiny might result in my having to spend a few years hiding from the Covenant of St. George, I didn't need to worry that I'd lose control, change forms, and eat a judge.

I found Pax's hand and squeezed. He didn't say anything, but he squeezed back.

We arrived on the stage in a mob. Adrian and Lindy were already at the judges' table. Cameras were set up around the edge of the stage, filming everything.

“Morning, all,” said Adrian. “We have a few announcements before you pull your choreography assignments.”

This was it. They'd found the bodies, and the show was going to continue as a memorial. The other four eliminated contestants were fine. Everyone would know to be much more careful, and we'd dance to honor the dead. Maybe it said something bad about my priorities, but I was relieved to know that we wouldn't be going home just yet.

“Remember that as of this week, America will be voting on whether or not to mix up your partnerships. If you want to keep your partners, you'll all need to work on your connection to one another, and on seeming like you actually enjoy what you're doing. If you feel like a new partner would be a good thing, then by all means keep smiling at the audience when you're supposed to be having a romantic moment.”

Lindy chose that moment to speak up. “We still have a
lot
of excellent ballroom dancers here, but we're already down two. I'd rather not lose one of you every week. So get your shoulders down and ground your feet like you actually remember what your choreographers taught you. Got it?”

“Yes, Lindy,” chorused the remaining ballroom dancers dutifully, me among them. It was no secret that Lindy favored the ballroom dancers—or that she'd come down on us like a ton of bricks if she felt we'd given her a reason.

(I never really had to give her a reason. My friendship with Brenna was enough to label me as a bad girl in her eyes. Lindy was professional enough that she'd never used it as an excuse to throw me under the bus, but during my season I'd been praised less than the other ballroom girls, a trend which was continuing into the present day. Oh, well. It wasn't like I needed her validation when I had all of America picking up their phones to vote for me.)

“Brenna will be here in a moment, and then you'll draw your routine for the week. We'll do it twice, to make sure you have a style that works for you; once that's done, you'll go and meet with your choreographers.” Adrian looked around the group. “Any questions?”

I had one.
Why aren't you saying anything about the murders?
But I couldn't ask that without betraying that I knew more than I should have, and so I kept my mouth shut and stared at him, willing him to say something.