Halo (35 page)

We lowered ourselves onto the bed and that was how we stayed—until we heard Ivy and Gabriel downstairs—just the two of us, holding each other. Molly would have thought it was crazy. But it was the contact we wanted. We wanted to feel like the same person rather than two separate individuals. Clothing concealed us. Without it, there was nowhere to hide, no way to mask any part of ourselves, and that was what we wanted—to be completely and utterly ourselves and feel completely safe.

Angel of Destruction

The next morning Xavier came back to have breakfast with us before school. As we ate, Gabriel tried to talk some sense into him. We all knew that Xavier was furious about Jake’s duplicity and was ready to take him on single-handedly. That was something Gabriel wanted to avoid at all costs, especially as we didn’t know the extent of Jake’s power.

“Whatever you do, you mustn’t confront him,” Gabriel said soberly.

Xavier looked at him over the rim of his coffee mug. “He threatened Beth,” he said, his shoulders tightening. “He forced himself on her. We can’t just let him get away with it.”

“Jake is not like the other students. You mustn’t try to deal with him alone,” Gabriel said. “We don’t know what he’s capable of.”

“Can’t be too dangerous, he’s pretty scrawny,” Xavier muttered under his breath.

Ivy gave him a stern look. “You know that his appearance has nothing to do with it.”

“So what do you want us to do then?” Xavier asked.

“We can’t do anything,” Gabriel said, “not without drawing unwanted attention to ourselves. We can only hope that he means no harm.”

Xavier let out a short laugh and then stared at Gabriel. “You’re serious?”

“Deadly.”

“But what about what he did at the prom?”

“I wouldn’t call that evidence,” Gabriel said.

“What about the accident with the cook and the deep fryer?” I said. “And the car crash at the start of term?”

“You think Jake might have had something to do with those things?” Ivy asked. “But he wasn’t even at the school when the crash happened.”

“He only needed to be in town,” I replied. “And he was definitely there that day in the cafeteria—I walked right past him.”

“I read about a boating accident at the jetty two days ago,” Xavier added. “And there have been a couple of fires recently that the paper said were started by arsonists. That’s never happened around here before.”

Gabriel put his head in his hands. “Let me think about this,” he said.

“That’s not all,” I cut in, feeling guilty to be the bearer of so much bad news. “He has
followers
, everywhere he goes, they’re right behind him, acting like he’s their ringleader, or something. It started off as just a few, but every time I see him, there are more.”

“Beth, go and get ready for school,” Gabriel said quietly.

“But . . . ,” I began.

“Just go,” he said. “Ivy and I need to talk.”

___

After the prom, Jake Thorn’s popularity seemed to grow with alarming speed, and his followers doubled in number. When I went back to school, I noticed they all walked around with vacant looks, like drug addicts, their pupils strangely dilated, their hands thrust deep in their pockets. Their faces only came alive when they saw Jake, taking on a disturbing, adoring expression that suggested they would drown themselves in the ocean if he instructed them to do so.

Acts of random vandalism also seemed to be suddenly on the increase. The doors of Saint Mark’s church were desecrated by obscenities, and the windows of the municipal offices were shattered by vandals, using homemade explosives. Fairhaven reported a virulent outbreak of food poisoning, and many of its residents had to be transferred to the hospital.

And it seemed that wherever disaster struck, Jake Thorn was there. He never allowed himself to be implicated in any way; he was always an observer, hovering at the sidelines. To me, it seemed he was bent on causing pain and suffering, and I couldn’t help thinking that his motivation was revenge. Was he showing me the consequences of my rejection?

On Thursday afternoon I planned to leave school early and pick Phantom up from the dog groomer. Gabriel hadn’t come to school that day because he called in sick; in truth, he and Ivy were replenishing their strength after a week spent cleaning up Jake’s messes. They weren’t used to having so much to do, and despite their strength, the constant effort had left them drained.

I had just grabbed my school bag and was heading out the front to meet Xavier at his car when I noticed a crowd of people a little way down the hall just outside the girls’ bathroom. I felt something at the back of my mind, like a warning telling me to stay away, but instinct and curiosity drew me closer. The group of students were clutching one another and talking in hushed voices. I saw that some of them were crying. One girl was sobbing into the shirt of a senior hockey player who was still in uniform. He’d obviously been called away from practice in a hurry, and he was staring at the bathroom door with a mixture of distress and disbelief on his face.

I moved through the crowd as if in slow motion. I had a strange feeling of being disconnected from my body—as though I was watching the scene on a television set, rather than being physically present. Interspersed with the faces of ordinary students, I noticed members of Jake Thorn’s crowd; they were easy to pick out these days by their trademark hollow faces and black clothing. Some of them stared at me as I passed, and I realized that they all had the same eyes: deep, wide, and black as pitch.

As I drew closer to the bathroom, I saw Dr. Chester standing by the door, along with two police officers. I saw one of the officers was talking to Jake Thorn. Jake’s face was molded into a mask of earnestness and concern, but his cat’s eyes glinted dangerously and his lip curled back ever so slightly as though he wished he could sink his teeth into the man’s throat. I got the feeling it was only me who could see the menace behind his expression and that to everybody else he looked every bit an innocent teenager. I moved closer to hear what they were talking about.

“I can’t think how it could have happened in a school like this,” I heard Jake say. “It’s come as a shock to us all.”

Then he shifted his position, and I couldn’t catch much else, just words here and there: “tragedy,” “no one around,” and “inform the family.” Eventually the police officer nodded and Jake turned away. I noticed that his followers were looking at one another, laughter in their eyes, traces of smiles on their lips. They looked greedy, almost hungry, and they all seemed to be secretly satisfied by whatever was going on.

Jake signaled and they began to disperse, moving subtly away from the crowd. I wanted to shout out for someone to stop them, to tell everyone just how dangerous they were, but I couldn’t find my voice.

I realized suddenly that I was edging closer to the open door of the bathroom, as if I’d been pulled there by some unseen force. Two paramedics were lifting a stretcher covered in a blue cloth. I saw that a red stain was starting to seep through, growing steadily larger and creeping across the fabric like a living thing. And hanging out from beneath the cloth was a long, pale hand. The fingertips were already bluish.

A rush of pain and fear took my breath away. But they weren’t my own feelings—they belonged to someone else, to the girl on the stretcher. I felt her hands gripping the handle of a knife. I felt the fear in her mind mingled with helplessness as some mysterious compulsion guided the blade to her throat. She struggled against it, but it was as though she had no control over her own body. I felt the shock of pain as the cold metal sliced across her skin and I heard the cruel laughter echoing through her brain. The last thing I saw was her face—it flashed across my field of vision like a lightning bolt. I knew that face. How many lunchtimes had I sat and listened to her endless gossip? How many times had I laughed at her antics, or taken her advice? Taylah’s face was burned into my brain. I felt her body lurch forward, felt her struggle for air as blood bubbled from the slit in her throat and poured down her neck. I saw the terror and panic in her eyes right before they turned glassy and she slumped down dead. I opened my mouth to scream, but no sound came out.

Just as my own body began to shake violently, someone stepped in front of me and took hold of my shoulders. I gasped and tried to break away, but his grip was firm. I looked up, expecting to see a pair of searing eyes and sunken cheeks, but instead it was Xavier, who wrapped his arms around me and pulled me away from the crowd and out into the open air.

“No,” I said, more to myself than to him. “Please, no . . .”

He kept his arm around my waist and half carried me over to his car because I seemed to have forgotten how to use my legs.

“It’s okay,” he said, pressing a hand against my face and looking me in the eye. “It’s going to be okay.”

“This can’t be happening . . . that was . . . that girl was . . .” My eyes were burning with tears.

“Get in the car, Beth,” he said, yanking open the door and helping me inside.

“Jake’s responsible for that!” I cried as he started the ignition. He seemed in a hurry to get home to Ivy and Gabriel. Come to think of it, so was I. They would know what to do.

“The police are treating it as a suicide,” Xavier explained flatly. “It’s tragic but it’s got nothing to do with Jake. In fact, he’s the one who noticed her missing and alerted the authorities.”

“No.” I shook my head vehemently. “Taylah would never do something like that. Jake had a hand in this.”

Xavier was unconvinced. “Jake may be many things, but he’s not a murderer.”

“You don’t understand.” I wiped my tears away. “I saw it all—it was like I was there when it happened.”

“What?” Xavier turned to look at me. “How?”

“When I saw her body, it was like I suddenly became the victim,” I explained. “She slit her own throat, but she didn’t want to do it—somebody made her. He was controlling her, and then he was laughing while she died. It was Jake, I know it.”

Xavier squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head. “Are you sure about this?”

“Xav, I could sense him. He did this.”

We both fell silent until I spoke again. “What happened after she died? I didn’t see that far.”

Xavier’s expression was pained, but his voice came out sounding impassive. “She was found dead on the bathroom floor. That’s all I know. One of the juniors came in and saw her lying in a pool of blood. There was nothing else there but a kitchen knife.” He was gripping the steering wheel so tightly that his knuckles had turned white.

“Why do you think Jake chose her?”

“I guess she was just unlucky.” Xavier said. “In the wrong place at the wrong time. I know she was your friend, Beth—I’m sorry this had to happen.”

“Is this our fault?” I asked in a small voice. “Did he do this to get back at us?”

“He did this because he’s sick,” Xavier said. He was staring unblinking at the road ahead, as if he was trying to hold back everything he felt inside. “I just wish you hadn’t been there to see it.” Xavier sounded angry, but I knew it wasn’t directed at me.

“I’ve seen worse.”

“Yeah?”

“We see a lot of bad things where I come from,” I said. I didn’t tell him how different it was experiencing the loss firsthand on earth, when the victim was your friend and the pain was amplified tenfold. “Did you know her too?” I asked quietly.

“I’ve been at school with those kids since first grade. I know them all.”

“I’m sorry.” I put my hand on his shoulder, which was tense and rigid.

“So am I,” Xavier said.

Gabriel and Ivy had already heard what happened by the time we got home.

“We have to act now,” Ivy said. “This has gone too far.”

“And what do you propose we do?” Gabriel asked her.

“We have to stop him,” I said. “Destroy him if that’s what it takes.”

“We cannot simply charge in and destroy him,” Gabriel said. “We’re not permitted to take life without reason.”

“But he’s taken someone else’s life!” I cried.

“Bethany, we cannot harm him unless we know without a doubt who or what he is. So, much as we might wish it, confrontation is out of the question for the time being.”

“Maybe you can’t hurt him,” Xavier said, “but I can. Let me fight him.”

Gabriel’s gray eyes were unyielding. “You will be no use to Bethany dead,” he said sharply.

“Gabe!” I cried, distressed by the very idea of anyone touching Xavier. I knew he would jump headfirst into a fight if he thought he was protecting me.

“I’m stronger than him,” Xavier said. “I know I am; let me do it.”

Ivy put a hand on Xavier’s shoulder. “You don’t know what we’re dealing with in Jake Thorn,” she said.

“He’s just a boy,” Xavier replied. “How frightening can he be?”

“He isn’t just a boy,” Ivy said. “We have felt his aura—it is growing stronger now. He is aligned with dark forces that no human can understand.”

“What are you saying? That he’s a demon?” Xavier asked incredulously. “That’s impossible.”

“You believe in angels. Is it so difficult to consider we might have evil counterparts?” Gabriel asked.

“I’ve tried not to think about that,” Xavier said.

“As surely as there is a Heaven, there is a Hell,” Ivy said softly.

“So you think Jake Thorn is a demon?” I whispered.

“We believe he may be an agent of Lucifer,” Gabriel said. “But we need proof before we can act to stop him.”

The proof came when I unpacked my school bag a little later on that afternoon. A familiar coil of paper was tucked inside the zip. I unrolled it to reveal Jake’s distinctive script: