“Why are you hiding from what you’ve done?”
And I scream as raven feathers fill my lungs, as Brad bites my collar, presses hips to mine as Munin buries himself into my chest.
I woke up feeling like I hadn’t slept in weeks. Fragments of my dreams filtered between my fingers as I pushed myself up to a sitting position. My alarm buzzed on the shelf above my bed, playing Carmina Burana because I liked pretending my mornings were epic, rather than just me dragging myself from a stupor into a caffeine-induced high. Elisa, as usual, was already up and showering in the bathroom. Despite this, the room was quiet and dark in the heavy winter dawn. Definitely not inviting. Why had I forgotten to turn off the alarm before passing out? I silenced the music and tried to curl up tighter into the covers. Sleep drifted back, slowly.
At least until Elisa came back in and threw Toastie at my head.
“No oversleeping,” she said in her most cheery yet demanding voice. “You know how grouchy you get when you miss breakfast.”
I sighed and opened my eyes, sticking out my tongue at her while her back was turned. I must have passed out longer than I thought—her hair was already dry and she was just slipping into a fluffy Icelandic sweater I envied (and had stolen on many occasions, which accounted for the small ink stain on the sleeve).
“Fine,” I muttered. “But I blame this all on you. You never told me Prehistoric Zombies was two hours long.”
“You never asked,” she replied. “Besides, you started snoring halfway through. If anyone gets to be sleepy today, it’s me.”
“I don’t snore,” I lied.
“Breakfast’s over in thirty,” she said. She slid into her parka and grabbed her book bag. She was one of those girls who set out everything she’d need for the following day the night before. How she and I managed to live together in harmony was anyone’s guess. “Last minute” was often the name of my game. “I’ll save you a cinnamon roll.”
I moaned. Saturday mornings were always cinnamon roll mornings. It made going to school on a technical weekend bearable, which is probably why they did it. I also guessed they put drugs in the frosting. To keep us pliable.
She left a moment later, leaving me to drag myself out of bed. Today was definitely not a makeup day—the world could just rejoice in me putting on clothes. I slid into a pair of jeans crusted with ceramics and paint, and a T-shirt in roughly the same condition. Painting Studio later today basically meant “dressing up” was an exercise in futility.
Last night’s dream scratched at the corners of my memory, but I couldn’t quite place it. When I was dressed and had the day’s stuff together, I took a cursory glance out the window, just to see if it had snowed any more during the night. Sure enough, a fine dusting coated everything, turning the pine branches into lace and the ground to cotton.
And there, on the snowy windowsill, was a set of bird prints.
My stomach gave a little twist as I remembered pieces of my dream, of a raven piercing my chest. Not just any raven—Munin. Why the hell is he back?
The worst part about learning how to read omens wasn’t knowing that bad things would happen; that was just a part of life. It was the fact that you never knew what the omen entailed, exactly, or when the event would strike. Or how disastrous it would actually be.
But if Munin was involved, it couldn’t be good.
Today was going to be a great day.
? ? ?
The morning dragged by in that expectant blur I’d grown far too accustomed to—waiting for Painting Studio was almost like waiting for Christmas, but today was different. Because today, I’d be spending half of that four-hour chunk in critique, which I was pretty certain was a special level of Hell. Depending on the moment, I was both excited and terrified to be back in that room in a semicircle of easels, staring at a still life and trying not to look too hard at Chris.