The Final Seven (The Lightkeepers, #1)
Erica Spindler
Prologue
New Orleans, Louisiana
Saturday, July 6
2:43 A.M.
Angel Gomez hurried across the Tulane University campus. She shouldn’t have let Fran talk her into this. A rockin’ party, her friend had promised. Not to be missed.
Instead, Fran had slipped off with a sketchy looking dude, leaving Angel alone with a bunch of drunken fraternity types. Their antics had annoyed her and she’d been bored out of her mind.
Then her side had begun to hurt. Not an ache; a burning sensation—on her left side, directly over her latest tattoo. She’d scurried for the bathroom to check it in the mirror.
Nothing. No sign that anything was wrong with it.
Why did she even try to fit in? She never had and never would. Even the nuns had said so. She was too much of a weirdo.
Her side still burned and she brought a hand to the spot. Fran’s desertion had left her with no ride home. Angel stopped a moment to get her bearings.
She figured she could catch the St. Charles Avenue Streetcar at Broadway and ride it all the way downtown. From there she could duck into the Quarter and home.
Angel crossed from Tulane University’s campus onto Newcomb College’s. The quad was deserted. Dark, except for the dim glow of the lamplights.
But she wasn’t alone.
The hair at the back of her neck prickled. She glanced quickly over her shoulder. She swept her gaze over the area, the line of trees and shrubbery that bordered its edges. Nothing. Just the dark silhouette of the statue at the center of the quad, the spotlight on it casting a long, oddly shaped shadow.
Like a B-movie monster, she thought staring at it, half expecting it to rise up, take on three dimensional form.
Get a grip, Angel, she scolded herself. A couple of the frat boys had followed her, hoping to scare her.
Immature assholes.
She increased her pace anyway, moving closer toward the edge of the yard and the buildings that circled it. A sudden breeze stirred the trees and Angel shuddered, gooseflesh racing up her arms. A chill wind in July? Impossible. Yet here she was, feeling cold clear to the bone.
She must be getting sick, she thought, bringing a hand to her head. The pain from earlier, the chill now. The flu? Angel hoped not. She didn’t have the time or money to—
She caught a movement from the corner of her eyes. She stopped and turned. “Who’s there?” she called. “It’s not funny. You’re just being stupid.”
The foliage rustled in response. The tree limbs above her groaned. The pain in her side intensified.
Whimpering, she glanced back at the statue once more, its shadow.
Longer. Deeper. Stretching toward her. Reaching . . .
She brought a hand to her head. She didn’t feel right, she realized. Light-headed. Tingly, as if she had been sucked into a bubble of static electricity. Save for her tattoo. The symbol she’d dreamed in pieces: a heart being eaten from within by fire, surrounded by seven constellations. She’d had it tattooed onto her left side. To join the others.
Angel blinked, working to clear her mind. This wasn’t the flu. She’d been drugged. At the party. Someone. Something in her cola. The frat pack had thought it a hoot that she didn’t booze. But she hadn’t set it down, had she? Left it unattended?
When she went to the bathroom, she remembered. To look at her tat.
Another movement from the corners of her eyes. A stirring. A sound with it.
Run!
She responded to the voice in her head. Zig-zagging. Heart thundering. A black cloud passed overhead. A bird, she thought. Prehistoric. Giant wings, a creaking sound, like new, stiff leather.
No matter which direction she went, it followed. Hanging above her, a bird of prey.
That way! Right.
She turned sharply, stumbled across a planting bed. A parking lot, she saw. Its safety light calling to her.
Sobbing with relief, she raced for the light. Almost within its reassuring circle, it went out.
“No!” she cried. “Help, someone! Please!”
At the far corner of the lot, a car door flew open, light spilled from its interior. A man stepped out. “Here,” he called, waving her over.
Angel darted toward him. As she passed under it, the safety light flickered, then came back to life. She saw the man was young, twenty-something, fair-haired.
Her knees went weak with relief. “Someone’s following me!” she cried as she reached him.
“Where?”
“The line of trees,” she said. “I didn’t see him, but I heard him!”
He reached into his car and retrieved a flashlight. He aimed it toward the trees, then directed the beam across the quad.
“I don’t see anything. You wait here, I’ll go—”
“No!” She grabbed his arm, terrified for them both. “Please. I just want to get out of here. I want to go home!”