“You think that lets you off the hook?” Jason made a sound of disgust and stalked through the chapel door. He looked back once over his shoulder. “If you want the truth so damn much, maybe you should think about offering it in return.” He vanished into the dusk.
Alia moved to follow, but Theo laid a hand on her shoulder. “Maybe give him a minute. If there’s one thing Jason hates, it’s feeling out of control.”
“You shouldn’t have done that,” Alia said to Diana. “You shouldn’t have used that thing on him.”
Diana coiled the rope at her hip, using the time to quell some of her anger. Alia was right. Maybe Jason was right, too. But he was also a hypocrite. The whole time he’d been badgering her for information, he’d been keeping his strength a secret.
“Well,” said Theo into the silence. “I guess now I know why he always wrecked me at basketball.”
Alia cast him a skeptical glance. “I’ve seen you play basketball, Theo. He beat you because you’re terrible.”
With great dignity, Theo stated, “I’m good on the fundamentals.”
Nim hooted. “And I’m the queen of the Netherlands.” She glanced in the direction Jason had gone. “It kind of makes sense, though. Alia, has Jason ever been sick a day in his life?”
Alia shook her head slowly. “No. Never missed a day of school. Never took a day off work. I thought he was just…I don’t know, Jason being Jason. Like a cold wouldn’t dare be caught by him.”
“Also, his sweat smells like pinecones,” said Nim.
Alia’s gaze snapped to her. “What?”
Nim blushed and shrugged. “Why do you think I liked his dirty T-shirts so much? He smells like a sexy forest.”
Jason did have a pleasing scent. Almost better than new car. But Diana didn’t intend to discuss it.
Alia gagged. “You’re disgusting.”
“I’m honest,” Nim said with a sniff.
“Well, there’s no way I’m going to stop giving him crap about his cologne,” said Theo.
It was almost fully dark now. Diana sighed. “It would be best if Jason didn’t stray far.”
“I’ll go,” Theo said.
“Great idea,” said Nim. “Maybe you can find a ditch to fall into.”
Alia pulled the parachute-tracking screen from her pocket. “Here,” she said, handing it to Theo. “The screen is pretty bright. You can use it as a flashlight.”
“I wish I could use it as a sandwich. Next time we throw ourselves out of a plane, remind me to grab a bag of pretzels.”
Alia pointed toward the grove. “We have olives and also olives.”
“Maybe we can cook and eat Nim,” he grumbled as he headed out the door.
Nim ran a hand through her black hair. “I would be delicious.”
Diana considered offering to go after Jason instead of Theo, but she knew she wasn’t quite ready to apologize, and she doubted he was ready to hear it. Besides, someone needed to remain with Alia.
At least there was one apology she could make and mean. “I’m sorry I lost my temper,” she said quietly.
Alia blew out a long breath. “I’m mad at him, too,” she said. “I’m just so glad he’s alive, I’m having trouble staying mad.”
Maybe that was part of what Diana resented, that horrible moment of watching Jason vanish, of believing he’d been lost for good. She thought of the soldiers they’d left behind on the jet, of Gemma Rutledge, someone she’d never met, a blond girl in a party dress lying dead beside Nim. She thought of Ben’s chest pocked by bullet holes. She’d never known someone who had died. She’d barely known Ben, and yet she felt the weight of loss pressing down on her, all that courage and easy humor gone forever. Jason was right. Death was too easy here.
They bedded down against the cold, packed earth. Eventually, Theo returned with word that Jason would take the first watch.
“Let him sulk,” he said with a shrug, curling onto his side a short distance from Nim and Alia.
Diana wasn’t quite ready to trust Theo. Once the others were breathing deeply, she slipped out of the chapel and crept silently through the trees and underbrush until she spotted Jason’s shape in the dark. His back was to her, his head tilted up at the stars. He looked like a figure carved in stone, a statue of a hero, still standing as everything around him fell to ruin. Or maybe just a lonely boy keeping watch with the stars. What had it been like for him to hide the truth of himself even from his best friend, his sister?
Diana didn’t ask. Without a sound, she turned and made her way back to the chapel. She lay down beside Alia and let herself fall into a deep, dreamless sleep.
—
Jason woke her sometime after midnight. He said nothing, and wordlessly, Diana left to take up the watch as he bedded down on the chapel floor.
The hours passed slowly with nothing but her thoughts and the ceaseless buzz of the cicadas to keep her company, but at last the sky began to brighten, and gray dawn light spilled across the grove below. Diana made her way back to the chapel, eager to begin the day’s journey. She pushed open the decaying door and saw Alia sleeping peacefully on her side, Jason on his back, brow creased as if expressing disapproval even in his dreams.
And Nim crouched on top of Theo, her hands locked around his throat. Theo was clawing at her arms, his face red with suffused blood.
“Nim!” she shouted.
The girl turned her head, but the thing looking back at her was not Nim. Her eyes were hollows, her hair a mane of star-strewn night, and from her back sprang the filthy black wings of a vulture. The image flickered and was gone.
Diana launched herself at Nim, knocking her off Theo and rolling with her over the chapel floor.
“What’s going on?” Jason said blearily as he and Alia came awake.
But Theo was already shoving to his feet, coughing and gasping. He roared and rushed at Diana and Nim.
In a heartbeat, Jason leapt up and seized Theo’s arms, holding him back. “Stop!” he commanded. “Stop it.”
Theo thrashed in his grip. “I’ll kill that little bitch—”
“You should have died in the crash!” shouted Nim, hissing and spitting as Diana attempted to restrain her without hurting her. “You shouldn’t even be here! You’re as worthless as your father says!”
Theo snarled. “Fat, ugly, stupid co—”
Jason snagged Theo’s jaw in his hands and clamped it shut, silencing him forcibly. “Shut your damned mouth, Theo.”
Diana hauled Nim off her feet and slung her over her shoulder, hearing the breath go out of the tiny girl in a disgruntled whuff. At least she couldn’t keep shouting insults. But Nim did not cease her snarling and struggling until they were several hundred yards away in a stand of cypress trees.
Diana dumped her onto the scraggly grass.
“Nim,” said Alia, coming up behind them. “What the hell?”
“I…” Nim panted. “I…” She unballed her fists, a look of horror dawning on her face. Her shoulders slumped, and she burst into tears. “I wanted to kill him. I tried to kill him.”
Alia met Diana’s gaze. “It’s getting worse, isn’t it?”
Diana nodded. Maybe the terror of the past few days had made Theo and Nim more susceptible to Alia’s power, or maybe it was simply the coming of the new moon. Only one thing was certain: They were running out of time.
“We have to find some way to keep them separated,” said Alia.
“You’re not leaving me here,” Nim said, wiping the tears from her eyes.
Alia offered her a hand. “That wasn’t what I was suggesting, you nerd. But we have to do something before you guys murder each other.”
“We’ll just have to try to keep them apart as much as possible,” said Diana.
“Being near you helps,” Nim said.
Alia’s brows rose. “Are you saying that because you enjoy being carried like a sack of flour by a cute girl?”
Nim planted her hands on her hips. “I’m serious. As soon as she separated me from Theo, I could feel my mind start to clear. It just took a little while for the rest of me to catch up.”
“It’s possible,” said Diana. “Remember how you were healthier when you were near me on the island?”
“Okay,” said Alia. “But we have to watch them. I’m not going to be responsible for my friends killing—”