Betrayal

13


On Saturday, we trained with Simon all morning. Then when Lukas and Natalie headed off for a run together, I worked with the Rake all afternoon. At least with him I could insist on hooking my new iPhone to the stereo, even though he hated every single song except for a couple by Outkast. Go figure.

I couldn’t beat him with a dagger—not without using my powers—but I’d come pretty close a couple of times. When he finally sheathed his sword and vanished, my arms ached and my shirt was damp with sweat. But for the first time in weeks, I didn’t feel completely spent after a spar. Maybe I was getting stronger.

I showered and threw on some clothes and knocked on the study door to talk to Simon, but he was buried in a book, as usual. Celeste was busy tidying, and Anatole was in a rage over seitan—some kind of meat substitute. I couldn’t find Nicholas anywhere, to play video games or marbles.

So I dragged my laptop up to Bennett’s room in the attic. I hadn’t been up there in a while and it made me miss him all the more. Just the way the room looked was so him. Sort of casual, but classic, with its antique bed and dresser, childhood books and old video games. Though I wanted to snoop through his stuff, I knew he wouldn’t like it, so instead I plopped onto his bed and stared up at the A-frame ceiling with its exposed beams.

I considered researching the amulet. Or Neos’s final resting spot. Or trying to contact my parents again. Or checking into the mythology of the sirens. I still needed to figure out how I was going to tune her out.

Instead, I read a graphic novel I found in the bookcase. About twenty seconds after I finished and turned on my laptop, Natalie burst into the room.

“Do you even know how to knock?” I asked, embarrassed to be caught in Bennett’s room.

“Why bother? It’s not like you’re ever doing anything interesting. Get dressed.”

I eyed her. She was wearing black matchstick jeans, knee-high leather boots, and a magenta sweater that fell off one shoulder.

“Isn’t your shoulder cold?”

“My shoulder is cold,” she said, “but I am hot. C’mon, get dressed.”

“Why, where are you going? Emphasis on the ‘you.’ ”

“We,” Lukas said, stepping inside, “are going to a party.” He was dressed in his usual T-shirt and jeans. Not that he didn’t make them look good.

“I dunno,” I said, fiddling with my laptop, as Lukas eyed the room. He’d probably never been up here.

“C’mon,” he said. “Get out of your black hole.”

“It’s comfy in here.”

“Simon says”—Natalie gave the words a little spin—“we can’t go without you.”

“You mean he trusts me?” I said.

“Yeah. That’s how un-fun you are.”

I frowned. Considering me their chaperone was kind of insulting.

Natalie tossed a black miniskirt and tights at me. “Put this on.”

“Fine,” I said, shutting my laptop.

Lukas dutifully left the room, and I slipped out of pajama bottoms and into my tights and skirt. Natalie handed me a black long-sleeved T-shirt with red exposed seams.

“Not too much black?” I asked.

“Not for you,” she said. I wasn’t sure she meant because of my blond hair and fair skin or my personality. Better not to ask.

I took one last lingering look at Bennett’s room, wishing he were here to go with us. Then I descended the stairs and shut out the light.



We took the Yaris. I drove, and Natalie gave directions across town to the strip of coast, almost like a causeway, that led to the Neck, the beyond-rich part of town.

“It’s on the Neck?” I asked, worried we’d run into Harry and Sara, who both lived over there.

“No,” she answered. “Turn here.”

I took a right into a beach parking lot. There was a chain across the entrance, but someone had knocked over the wooden post it was attached to, leaving the chain on the ground. The Yaris rattled over the metal links.

“Are you sure this is right?” I asked, parking among a scattering of cars. “Whose party is it?”

“Anna from my Chemistry class,” Natalie said. “She said they’d be over by the bluffs.”

Outside, a chill sea breeze whipped at us, and I immediately regretted wearing my tights and peacoat instead of my jeans and down jacket. “Why didn’t you tell me we were going to be outside?”

“Because you would’ve worn ratty jeans and that gray sweater. What’s the point of a party if you’re not going to look cute?”

I glared at Lukas in his jeans, big winter coat, and fleece hat.

“Sucks to be a girl,” he said, smugly.

We plodded through the sand toward the bonfire blazing down the beach.

The thing about Harry’s parties was that all the kids from Thatcher were invited. You never felt like you were crashing, even though his house was bigger than six average mansions combined. Everyone felt welcome, because everyone was there, even the kid who wore the green tracksuit over his uniform. To parties he wore red.

But a party on the beach was something more intimate. A dozen people sat around a fire built in the sand. Rocks and shells lined the pit they’d dug and filled with driftwood. Britta and her friends shared nips from a designer flask, and the guys cracked Rolling Rocks. A joint passed between two linebackers I recognized from watching football practice when Coby was on the team. I was sure they were big fans of mine.

The thing that really stopped me, though? Harry and Sara, sipping from a thermos they handed back and forth. I guess a flask wasn’t big enough.

“Well, this was a bad idea,” I said, backing away from the firelight before anyone noticed me.

Even Natalie paused. “Possibly not one of my best.”

“Cowards,” Lukas muttered.

“Maybe we should just go home,” I said, hopefully.

“They’re only human.” Natalie bit her bottom lip, then turned to Lukas. “Dude, take one for the team. Suck up to Britta, so she doesn’t pick on Emma.”

“And what, you’re gonna flirt with the linebackers?” he said.

She grinned. “If I absolutely must.”

“They’re not half as scary as Britta,” he said.

Still, he obediently went in for the kill. There was something predatory about him as he prowled over and threw himself at Britta’s feet. She made what was clearly a cutting remark, which he answered with what was clearly a joke. One of her friends giggled, and in another minute he had Britta leaning toward him, looking gorgeous in the light of the fire. I pitied him for the terrible sacrifice.

Meanwhile, Natalie spotted Anna and dragged me over to say hi. Anna was the type of girl who grew up to be a soccer mom. Cute and nice, yet very conscious of the social pecking order. She was pleased to see Natalie, not so much me.

I gave her a weak smile, aware of Harry and Sara staring at me across the bonfire. The smoke distorted their unfriendly expressions and gave them a sickly cast despite the warm glow of the fire.

I lowered my head, grabbed a beer from the cooler, and took a seat as far from them as possible, where the firelight faded into dark shadows. I nursed my beer as a dozen more kids arrived at the party, a few of them even sitting with me for a minute. Well, Kylee from Fencing did, and two boys who I’m pretty sure thought I looked desperate for a little attention.

I shivered and watched the ocean swells, checking out Harry and Sara every few minutes; they were getting progressively drunker. Then hammered. Then beyond wasted.

I wanted to leave, but Natalie’s laugh sounded through the night a few times. She lived for parties, she loved dancing and laughing and flirting. She deserved a little uncomplicated fun. Lukas didn’t deserve anything, because he was still flirting with Britta, but I figured I’d give them another hour before I made them leave.

Sitting with my second beer, I watched sparks from the bonfire rise in a swirling column toward the dark sky, then fade away. I hugged myself, wishing Bennett were here to keep me warm. I wondered where he was, if he was missing me. If he felt as lonely as I did without him.

Then I heard Harry’s forceful, cultured voice suddenly rise from the chatter. “No man is an island, entire of itself.”

He took a deep swig and continued speaking, but I couldn’t make out the words. I didn’t have to. I knew the poem by John Donne—I’d read it in English Lit last year. Leave it to Thatcher to have a class drunk who spouts poetry. He turned toward the water and lifted his thermos high and raised his voice, shouting at the ocean until the other kids quieted.

Then he staggered toward the lapping water and despite his drunkenness his voice rang out in the cold evening air:

Any man’s death diminishes me,

Because I am involved in mankind.

And therefore, never send to know

For whom the bell tolls;

It tolls for thee.

He drained his thermos and tossed it into the waves. Then he started shoving through the frigid water after it, speaking again, though his words were lost in the surf.

He looked almost comical, walking fully dressed into the waves—but that water was freezing. I felt a deep stirring of unease. Something wasn’t right. I looked back at the kids around the bonfire. Nobody seemed worried. Where were Natalie and Lukas?

I called to Sara: “Tell him to come back.”

A girl I didn’t know said, “Shut up, QBK.”

“Don’t be mean to Emma,” Sara croaked in her deep voice. “She only wantsh to help.”

Then she laughed hysterically. If possible, she was even more wasted than Harry.

“Sara,” I said, trying to rub the tingle of impending disaster from my arms. “He’s going to drown.”

“Shtop whining.” She threw an empty beer bottle at me, though she was so drunk she missed by twenty feet. “And start beering.”

She found that hilarious, and the other kids around the bonfire laughed with her. I trotted into the darkness toward the water’s edge, yelling for Harry, who was wading deeper and still reciting an inaudible monologue.

My shoes sank into the wet sand. I followed him along the shore as the tide dragged him further down the beach, calling for him and for help.

And I finally heard someone say my name: Emma.

“Natalie!” I said. “Harry’s drunk, we need to—”

I’m here. I’ll help you.

“Thank God! Go tell—”

And I realized I’d been hearing the voice inside my head. That it wasn’t Natalie. The voice continued, Don’t worry. There’s nothing to fear. You’re fine, Emma—you’re more than fine.

For a moment, I thought it was my mother’s voice—then Martha’s. It was kind, with an undertone of strength, gentle and soothing as a lullaby.

“Where are you?” I peered down the beach, but couldn’t see anything in the darkness under the dim sky.

I’m here. I’m here with you. Your family and friends, they’re all gone, they left you, but I’m here. I’m always here for you.

The bitter wind stirred, and pretty lights shimmered beside me. The voice took on a girl’s form. She was a few years older than me, with short dark hair, wide eyes, and scarlet lips. The girl from my dream. She smiled at me with even, white teeth, and I felt I knew her. She was like an older sister, who understood everything about me. She could take all my pain, my failures and responsibilities, and make them disappear.

That’s right, Emma, she said. You don’t need anything except me.

“We need to help Harry.”

I’ll take care of everything.

I smiled as my worries drifted away. For the first time in a long time, I felt at peace. I didn’t know what I’d been worried about. She’d take care of me; she’d take care of everything.

From the corner of my eye, I saw Natalie approaching. “Emma?” she said, slightly breathless. “Are you okay?”

“I’m great.”

“Do you feel that? There’s a wraith nearby.”

“That’s no wraith.” I smiled.

Save him! the ghost woman said. Harry’s in trouble.

“We need to save Harry.” I stared into the waves and didn’t see him. “Oh God—where is he?”

He’s drowning, Emma—he’s sinking under the waves.

“Harry’s fine,” Natalie said. “He’s back at the bonfire. It’s you I’m worried about.”

She’s lying. She tempted Harry into the water. She won’t let you save him; she’s drowning him. It’s her fault Coby’s dead. She’s trying to kill Harry, too. Stop her, Emma—stop her!

Omigod, she was right. Simon had warned me about a traitor—how could I have been so blind? It was Natalie. I’d thought she was my friend in California, but it was all just a setup to lure me to Echo Point. She betrayed me once. How could I not think she’d do it again? Was she still working with Bennett? Were they in this together?

“I was so stupid. I never should have trusted you. You set that trap with Neos,” I snarled at her. “You’re the one who called the wraiths to the mausoleum. I tried to stop you, but … what else have you done? Betrayed Martha and Coby? How could you?”

“Emma!” She reached for my arm.

I grabbed her wrist and flipped her onto her back in the sand. She gasped as the fall knocked the wind out of her, and tried to push me away.

Get her, I told the ghost woman.

She clamped her hand on Natalie’s shoulder and dragged her into the oncoming waves. Natalie struggled as the cold water touched her. Her eyes widened as the ghost woman made herself visible to her.

“Hey!” Lukas yelled, sprinting closer. “Stop her.”

With his fists balled, he summoned his compelling powers—and if he’d been a ghost, he would’ve been dead, because I would’ve shot him with the worst dispelling energy I had. Anything to stop him from hurting that ghost and ending her soothing voice.

Instead, I flung myself at him and knocked him to the ground.

“Emma! What the hell? What are you doing? She’s killing Natalie.”

“Natalie’s the traitor. The ghost woman’s saving us.”

He twisted roughly and I caught a glimpse of the ocean. The ghost stood barefoot in the tide, wearing a short-sleeve black dress that came to her knees, impervious to the cold. She had Natalie by the shoulders and was forcing her head underwater. Natalie struggled, but was no match for the ghost’s strength.

“Emma, snap out of it. She’s drowning her!” Lukas shouted.

“Natalie betrayed us,” I snarled, and punched him.

He drew more energy into himself, and I punched him again. Then he loosed a stream of power that caught the ghost behind her knees and flipped her into the water.

Natalie rose coughing from the waves, and Lukas, now lying on his side, compelled the ghost with a desperate barrage of force. When Lukas’s blast hit, the ghost shimmered, and I pinned him to the ground, but he kept pouring his energy into the ghost until she faltered.

I get stronger every time they beat me, the ghost said into my mind. Next time, I will save you. Once and for all.

Then she escaped into the Beyond. And even as my mind returned to my own control, I felt her calling for me, so loving and intense that I regretted seeing her go.

Lukas shoved me off him, and I lay in the sand stunned by what had happened. What had I done?

Lukas helped Natalie from the water. He didn’t bother waiting for me, but threw her over his shoulder and carried her toward the car. I trudged through the wet sand after them.

“Is she all right?” I asked, when I caught up with them at the car.

“Still breathing,” he said. “No thanks to you.”





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