Feathermore (18 page)

I faced Nate and whispered, “What the hell?” unsure what had taken her over.

Nate looked as if he was going to be sick, and I couldn’t help feeling a little guilty. I had made him say something Claire obviously didn’t want me to know, and now he would have to pay for it.

“
I’m sorry, Nate,” I said. “I just wanted to know. I need to have all the facts so I can make informed decisions. I’m new to all of this. You guys have been around for six hundred years, but I was pretty much just created.” I walked over to the freezer and dropped a few ice cubes in my cup, then slowly poured the root beer.

“
Four hundred and sixty-three,” he said, looking down at his hands.

“
Excuse me?”

“
I’m not six hundred years old; I’m four hundred and sixty-three. Claire was created before me.”

“
Oh, sorry. I thought she said your kind was created in pairs, as mates.”

“
We are. It’s a long story, and you should get some sleep.” He started toward their room. “Have a good night, okay?”

If they weren’t created together, did it mean she was created with a different mate? So why was she with Nate, then? I wasn’t sure what all this meant, and I was too tired to try to figure it out.

Not feeling like driving home, I projected myself there and went up to my room. I froze in front of the door to my parents’ room. It was closed. My heart felt constricted as I felt the tears well up. I took a step closer and rested my hand on the knob. I wasn’t ready to face those ghosts, to face the life they left behind.

I looked at the alarm clock, glowing green atop my nightstand. I pulled my cell phone from my purse and, deciding to get over myself, sent him a text:

“
Hope you made it home all right.

G’nite.”

I threw the phone onto my bed and started to undress on my way to the bathroom, letting my clothes fall on the floor as I went. It didn’t matter that I was clean thanks to manifestation; I still felt the need for a shower. It somehow felt as if the dirt were only being hidden by a veil of some sort.

I let the hot water pour over me, washing the weight of the day off. I just wanted to crawl into bed and wished I could crawl into
his
arms. As I turned off the water I heard the chiming of my phone, alerting me that I had received a text message. I wrapped the towel around me and ran to the bed, leaving wet footprints on the hardwood floor.

“
Already home. Don’t leave me.

I love you.”

I let the towel fall on the floor and slipped naked into bed.

I knew I was dreaming the moment I saw him. I had been running away from the dark figure with fiery hair when I saw him by the riverbank. He was wearing only jeans, and his bare back gleamed softly in the moonlight as he stared toward the mountains. I approached him slowly, looking around for the one who had chased me here. When I reached him, I wrapped my arms around him, my hands caressing his chest. His warm skin under my hands felt heavenly.

“
I have been waiting for you,” he said, his voice muffled. I went around to stand before him, taking in the beauty of his bare skin, the toned muscles that he always kept hidden under clothes.

It was a dream, so I went along with the charade. “I’m sorry I have kept you waiting,” I said, lifting my face to him, standing on my tiptoes, trying to reach his face, but he simply rejected me by moving away from me. Startled, I reached for him again. “What’s wrong?” I said.

He kept walking away from me, making me follow along. “This is what’s wrong. Us. How would you keep this from me?”

Unsure what he was speaking of, I called his name, but he wouldn’t stop. Instead, he sped up, making me break into a trot behind him. I caught him by the arm and used my supernatural strength to make him face me.

“
I thought you loved me, Jade,” he said.

“
I do! What are you talking about?” What kind of dream was this? Why wasn’t he all over me?

“
I’m talking about what you
are,
Jade.”

I froze. Surely he wasn’t talking about my being an angel. Then again, this was a dream. It was probably my subconscious expressing what I was truly feeling and what I was afraid would happen. I turned my face to the trees and squinted, trying to see a little better. I could have sworn I saw something or someone move. I kept my gaze there until I was sure we were all alone, but once I turned to face him he was gone.

I walked along the river, unsure what to make of this dream. If he was going to react that way, I really didn’t want to tell him, but how could I hide it? Eventually, he would realize I wasn’t aging as he was. And how was I going to explain the constant rejection when he wanted more out of this relationship? Sucking blood.

It was as if the air around me brought the words to my head. Nate had said I had to share my divinity with Avan just once and he would be immortal like us, but it would mean that both of us must give up heaven. At the moment, I wasn’t even sure what that really meant. Was I still one of them?

If I had been torn before the dream, now it had only made matters worse. I was totally scared of confronting Avan with my little secret.

18 FIREBALL

Things seemed to calm down for a while. It had been over a month since I saw Lilith, and I was beginning to think she had moved on—or at least, that was what I hoped.

Claire and I had kept our training sessions to about three days a week at Falls River Park, around dusk, when we were sure no one would see us. Her patience when it came to teaching was thin to nonexistent, so Nate had taken over that part, explaining everything I needed to know about angels, demons, and heaven and hell. We didn’t have a routine for this, so whenever it was just the three of us we would get to talking.

It was liberating to be finally getting the answers to the questions that had been pestering me for some time. I hadn’t seen or dreamed about Blake ever since, and that saddened me, but I had to move forward. If he wasn’t real, I couldn’t give up what I had for a phantom.

Things at school had changed, too. The new Jade didn’t seem much interested in patience, so whenever anyone annoyed me, weird things would happen. Amy had started spinning stupid rumors the second Avan and I got back together. One day in the cafeteria, fed up with her crap, I set her tray on fire. Of course, no one knew it was me, because that sort of thing doesn’t really show. One minute, she was gossiping away, and the next, flames had engulfed her whole tray and were spreading around the table. They had gone out instantly, and not by my doing. When I had looked at Nate, he scowled at me.

It felt good to see her scramble to her feet and shriek like a two-year-old. Another time, I made a window explode in class, also a few test tubes in chemistry, when Amy’s friends started making comments about me loud enough that I could hear. Too bad there hadn’t been something nasty in the test tubes.

But even with all the old and new distractions I had been dealing with the past two months, my grades stayed up.

Avan and I had been doing great. When I wasn’t training or with him I would be glued to my computer, looking for anything about
sharing divinity.
So far, I had found nada. I wondered if he had to bite me or something, but I didn’t want to make any mistakes or take any chances. I still hadn’t told him the truth about me, so I wasn’t completely sure whether I would need to share divinity in the end.

Things had been pretty good between us, actually—so good, in fact, that he had even started mentioning that it was time for me to go over his house and meet his mom. “Make it official,” he had said.

I wasn’t ready. I would take kicking demon ass over this anytime. But he was persuasive, and against my better judgment, I agreed. The first time I met Mrs. Blackwell, I was scared she wouldn’t approve of me. A sixteen-year-old who had just lost her parents and now lived on her own didn’t sound too promising as your only child’s girlfriend.

I couldn’t have been more wrong. She was nothing but sweet and had totally taken me in within the first ten minutes. It felt nice to have a parental figure around—yes, Claire and Nate were always taking care of me, but it just wasn’t the same. Hanging out with a real family definitely made me miss my parents, but at the same time, it gave me a little glint of hope that little by little, my life was getting back on track and I wasn’t as alone as I had once thought.

I had now gone over to Avan’s house for dinner a few times and even spent some alone time with Mrs. Blackwell, out shopping and having lunch together over the weekends. I knew she started doing this partly because she must have felt terrible about my situation, but as we grew closer it was easy to see, that wasn’t the case anymore. It had become natural, and I felt treated as one of her own. I was like a daughter to her now.

I still hadn’t told Avan about my secret yet, but I knew I would have to, and soon. I wasn’t looking forward to it, though. After my dream—more like a nightmare, perhaps—I had been terrified to confide in him. Would that be the way he would react when he learned my secret? I had been battling with this for quite some time, and what it truly came down to was, if he really loved me, he would just have to accept me for who I was. But what if he didn’t? I wasn’t ready to lose him, too. But maybe, just maybe, I was worrying for nothing and we would be happy together, forevermore.
Feathermore,
I said to myself, and smiled at my own lame joke.

* * *

“
Have you heard?” Claire asked as she sat across from me in the cafeteria. Her eyes were wide as she looked between Avan and me. We both looked at each other and just shrugged, having no clue what she was talking about. She took in our surroundings as if to make sure no one would hear. The cafeteria was packed, though. The weather had been cold and drizzly out, and we were all stuck inside. It was stuffy and it felt impossible to breathe.

Two guys on the wrestling team were at the end of our table, but they seemed content to be stuffing their faces and barely noticing anyone else.

“
Two kids from school were found dead right behind the sheriff’s office.” She stared at me as if I were supposed to know what had happened. I let go of Avan’s hand and reached for the apple I had in front of me, feeling suddenly uncomfortable.

“
What happened?” Avan said, carefully pushing my legs off his lap and leaning over the table.

“
They said some kind of animal got them.” She shot me another look. What was she getting at?

I leaned on Avan’s shoulder and said, “Well, if an animal got them, why were they right behind the sheriff’s office? That sounds strange. It’s smack in the middle of town—it’s not as if we had bears downtown.” No sooner had I said it than the light bulb went on.

That was why Claire was giving me those looks. Someone had done that to them, and even if it was an animal, it wasn’t an
accident
. Someone was trying to send a message. Could it be that Lilith was back?

Avan was shaking his head in disbelief, “How did you found out about it?” he said. “What else are they saying?” He was still shocked and intrigued about the news. He obviously didn’t see the connection we had made.

It must be nice to be blind to all this. How I wished none of it were true. Then maybe, just maybe, my parents would still be alive.

I looked at Avan, envying him for how naive he was of the unknown, of what was happening right under his nose. But now more than ever I was determined to keep him in the dark. He didn’t need all this. And if he knew that I may be the reason for all these new deaths, he would never accept who I was. It was too dangerous.

Claire looked at him and tried to play it off as she reached over for a slice of my apple. “Ah, I was at the front office filling in some paperwork when the deputies showed up. They didn’t really care that there were other students in there; they just got to the point.” She turned to me again, looked in my eyes, and then looked down at her hands. There was more to it than just that—I could see it in the way she was now avoiding my eyes. Without looking at me, she said, “They may be coming to ask you a few questions, Jade. They think it may be the same animal that attacked your parents.” She didn’t look at me again.

“
And what could I help them with?”

Avan took my hand in his and gave me a faint smile. He knew that talking about that day was something I didn’t like to do. I hadn’t really talked about
it
at all, actually.

“
Don’t worry,” he said. “They must want a description of the animal, just so if anyone sees it again they shoot it dead.” He seemed so sure of his answer, it made me feel the slightest hope that he might be right.

Two kids were dead because of me. I tightened my hand around Avan’s. What would keep Lilith away from the one good thing that remained in my life? From the one thing I loved? It was actually a surprise that her warning came with random kids from school and not Avan. Maybe she was keeping him for the grand finale.

I shook my head. I could not allow those sorts of thoughts in my mind. It was a relief when the bell rang. It was imperative that I talk to Claire, and I had to do it now. I kissed Avan and sent him on his way. He gave me a long, slow look and made sure I was fine before walking away in the crowded, noisy cafeteria.