Incubus (74 page)

him, but I stopped myself. I could see his thoughts turning inward, back to the night of Eric’s death.

“He wants to know why she died.”

“Yeah.”

“He wants,” I glanced back at my house before continuing, “he wants to go back to his house. To

see what he can find in Angela’s research.”

Lucas shook his head. “He’s upset. He’s not thinking clearly.”

“But—” I took a deep breath. “What if there is something there?”

“Hale would never let him go back there,” Lucas said. “It’d be so stupid. If the incubus did kill

Angela for her research, Seth would just be painting a target on his back.”

I closed my mouth, suddenly unsure if telling Lucas what we’d planned was a good idea.

“Let’s get to school. A dose of normal life will do us all some good.”

I forced a smile. Lucas gave me one last look before sliding into my car and closing his door. As I

walked around to the driver’s side, I knew Seth and I would be making this run solo.

Hiding my plans from Lucas was too easy. He walked me to class, and we hovered at the door until a

minute before first bell. He stood so close to me I could feel the warmth emanating from his skin.

“Last night, when I heard you scream,” Lucas said quietly. “You have no idea. It was like my

world stopped spinning.” He brushed the backs of his fingers across my cheek.

I lowered my lashes, savoring the touch. “Lucas.” My breath came out in a husky whisper.

“It’s you,” he whispered. “What I want. What I’m fighting for. Whenever I lose the faith, all it

takes to inspire me again is you.”

I drank in the sight of him. Lucas’s eyes gleamed faintly green in the light of the hall. In them, I

could see the depth of his trust. This. If I could only explain this to Seth, he’d understand. Lucas knew

my secrets, knew the danger I posed, and he loved me anyway. He saw in me the person I chose to be,

and he knew what that choice cost me. That’s what Seth didn’t get. Lucas did embrace all of me—the

good and the bad. Where Seth saw something cool, Lucas understood the consequences of the power I

wielded.

Lucas withdrew his hand, and it felt like he’d taken a piece of me with him. “Until lunch,” he said.

“Lucas.” I grabbed his hand, keeping him from leaving. I almost confessed the whole plot to him

right there. But some part of me was just as desperate for the truth as Seth. Lucas looked into my eyes.

“We’re going to get through this,” he said, misinterpreting the pain he saw. He leaned closer, until

his lips almost brushed against my ear. “And everything’s going to be worth the wait.”

I melted into him, risking another caress. I felt him breathe in sharply. His eyes locked with mine,

and I forced myself away from him, battling the desire to simply give in, to lose myself in his kiss.

Instead, I pressed my palms flat against the wall at my back. After a moment, my heartbeat slowed

and I got my breathing under control. I saw Lucas struggling to do the same. “Promise me.” I

whispered. I needed to believe.

“I promise, Braedyn.”

I forced a wry smile. “Then you’d better go.”

Lucas gave me a smile that promised everything. He turned and vanished down the hall.

The bell rang, snapping my thoughts back to the mission at hand. I pushed myself off the wall and

slipped out of the building.

I had to move quickly. If I got caught sneaking off campus, Fiedler would call my dad and this

whole covert op would be over before it began. I made it to my car and pulled out of the parking lot

without spotting another soul on campus.

Seth was waiting on the porch when I pulled up to my house. His face eased when he saw me and I

realized he’d started to worry that I wasn’t coming back for him.

“Get in,” I said, glancing at the Guard’s house.

“They’re not in there,” Seth said. “They got called away about 10 minutes ago.”

“Finally we catch a break,” I said, pulling back onto the road.

The drive to Seth’s house was quiet. Seth drummed his fingers impatiently on the window, lost in

his thoughts. Fine with me. I had my own thoughts to wade through.

I pulled up to Seth’s house. “No,” he said. “Keep driving. We shouldn’t park here, in case—the”

He glanced at me, leaving the fear unvoiced.

“Right.”

I pulled around the corner of the next block and parked under a bare tree, dark as a charcoal sketch

against the bright November sky.

“We can go in the back way,” Seth said.

I followed him down the street. He slipped between two houses, and I saw a small drainage ditch

traveling the length of the block, creating a small alleyway between the rows of houses. Seth sprinted

down the ditch and I had to race to catch up. We stopped beside a cinderblock wall halfway down the

block.

“My house,” he said, breathing hard. Someone had tossed an old milk-crate over the wall a few

houses down. Seth picked it up and turned it over, creating a step for us to make climbing over the

wall easier. He went first, and I heard his feet crunch into the gravel of his backyard. I followed. The

yard was grim and dusty. A few scraggly weeds pocketed the ground, leading us to a covered cement

slab—the back porch.

Seth dug in his pocket for his house keys and let us in.

The house was quiet, dark. The curtains were still closed, blocking out much of the daylight

beyond.

“In here,” Seth said, leading me quickly to his mom’s study. “Be careful of the piles—” he

stopped, stricken. Angela would never know if we messed with her piles. He looked at me, and the

pain of losing his mother rose up again in his eyes.

“Let’s just do this,” I said.

Seth nodded and turned back to the office. “I don’t know if she took her journal with her,” he said.

“She didn’t,” I said. Seth looked at me sharply.

“How do you—?”

“I just know,” I said. “Trust me.” I hadn’t told Seth the details of Angela’s death. It had seemed

too cruel. But I’d lived those last few moments in her head, and as she’d died, that journal had crossed

her mind. I remembered—through Angela—where she’d kept it. I walked to a file cabinet against the

back wall and opened the second drawer down. I was looking for a folder labeled
Insurance.
The

journal was there, right where she’d left it.

I heard Seth breathe out in amazement. I handed the journal to him. He sank onto the floor,

thumbing it open. After a moment, I heard him sniff wetly. I turned away, giving him time alone with

his mother’s last thoughts.

I spent the next hour walking through the office, looking for anything else that might be important.

An ancient copy of The Old Farmer’s Almanac sat on her desk. I glanced at it, and my eyes snagged

on the date printed on the cover. 1793.

Beneath it, half-covered, was a hand-made drawing of the vessel. I pushed the almanac aside. Not

a drawing, I realized. A diagram. Each symbol on the vessel had been separated out and annotated. I

scanned Angela’s handwriting. According to her notes, the carvings on the vessel were some kind of

timeline.

“Winter solstice,” Seth muttered.

I turned, feeling that fist of ice closing tighter on my heart. “What did you say?”

Seth stood, excitement giving him a burst of new energy. “The ritual. It has to be performed this

winter solstice. If we don’t do it this year, we won’t have another opportunity for 20 years.”

“I don’t understand. 20 years?”

“It has to be performed on winter solstice under a full moon,” he explained. He brought the journal

over to me, laid it open on the desk. He stabbed his finger at a passage in the journal. “They’re really

rare. Mom says there have only been nine full moons on winter solstice since The Old Farmer’s

Almanac began tracking heavenly events back in—”

“1793,” I finished. Seth looked at me, surprised. I pointed to the almanac on her desk.

“Yeah. That’s right. So if we don’t figure out this ritual in the next month, we won’t get another

chance to lock the seal for 20 years.”

I turned away from Seth so he couldn’t see my reaction. 20 years. If things kept going the way they

had been, 20 years from now there might not be any Guard left to fight the Lilitu. And yet, that wasn’t

what twisted my insides into a painful knot.

20 years from now Lucas and I would be almost 40. I couldn’t ask Lucas to wait that long. I

couldn’t wait that long. My life was happening now. And to sit on the sidelines for 20 years? As it

was, I was¬ barely able to kiss Lucas without damaging him. What would happen when I grew up? I’d

never be able to marry. Never honeymoon with the love of my life. Never have children. My life

would pass me by as I watched. No. By the next time a full moon landed on winter solstice, it would

be too late for me.

Seth flipped another page in the journal. “Listen to this. She says the vessel holds the secret of the

ritual. It’s like—like a recipe or something—”

A faint crash came from the front of the house, followed by the tinkling sound of glass falling to

the floor.

Seth looked at me, his face going white.

Without thinking, I grabbed Seth and pulled him out of the office. I meant to head for the back

door, but a shadow crossed the threshold from the kitchen. Desperate, I pulled Seth into a half-open

hall closet. Seth still clutched the journal in his hands. But the almanac—and the diagram of the vessel

—were still face up on Angela’s desk.

As I stared at the diagram, a figure crossed into the office. I jerked back, battling the urge to

scream. The stranger walked to the desk, and fingered the pages spread across its surface. He moved to

get a better look, and I saw his face.

Instantly I recognized him as the man in the bookstore window - the man I’d seen when I met

Karayan for coffee. He was in his mid-thirties, compact with well-defined arms, handsome. His short-

cropped hair was brown, but those same platinum highlights gleamed when he passed through a finger

of sunlight poking through the thick office drapes. And there was still something about him—

something not of this world. My heart thudded in my chest. I couldn’t take my eyes off of him.

I felt Seth reaching for my hand, and gripped his tightly in return.

The handsome stranger picked up the diagram of the vessel. His lips thinned in disgust. “Idiot

children,” he muttered. He dropped it back onto the desk. He rifled through the other papers there

before turning to the bookshelves. He searched Angela’s office thoroughly for over an hour. Seth and I

were trapped, unable to flee. The closet where we were hiding was directly opposite the office. If we

moved to open the door, he would see. So we stayed put, spying on the stranger through a crack in the

door. Waiting.

The handsome stranger finally sighed. He pulled a flask out of his pocket. He unscrewed the top,

then upended the flask over Angela’s desk. I smelled the acrid scent of kerosene. The stranger lit a

match and dropped it onto the desk. Fire exploded across the surface of the desk, streaming down the

sides to pool on the floor. The stranger walked out of the office as calmly as if he’d just turned on a

light.

Seth and I shrank back, afraid to breathe. The stranger turned, stopping in the office doorway,

watching as the fire lapped up Angela’s life’s work. He stood there until the heat of the flames was

like a furnace. Then he turned and was gone.

Seth and I sat, terrified, but the heat from the blaze was too much to bear. I pushed open the closet

door, cringing back as a wave of searing air blasted us. The coast was clear. I grabbed Seth’s hand and

pulled him down the hall, out the back door, into the deserted backyard. We ran until we reached the

back wall, then crouched there, sucking in great gulps of cool, sweet air.

I turned to look at Seth. Smoke curled from his clothes, and his face was smudged with sweaty

soot from the fire.

“You look like hell,” he croaked, giving me a lopsided smile.

“Seth?” Worry pierced my adrenaline-fueled panic. Seth looked almost manic.

“I was right,” he said. He turned back to the burning house, eyes shining with a fierce satisfaction.