Pandemonium breaks loose below. The thorny vines whip down and wrap around each raver’s ankles and wrists, so they can’t hide their eyes or run, forcing them to look at the screens. Their auras pique to a grayish yellow—the color of pure terror. Somehow, the light from their halos bleeds into the vines, filling them with illumination all the way into the chandelier’s base in the ceiling. Screaming, fainting, and wailing hammer my ears. The glowing-vested employees gather around their quarry—joining with the acrobats who leap upon the imprisoned ravers, feeding off what’s left of their light. The victims gyrate as if convulsing.
A flavor awakens on my tongue, a memory of an essence I’ve only savored once but want to taste again.
Jax whimpers beside me, reminding me he’s there. He covers his eyes, trying not to view the screens and the Phantom’s tragic face still singing the final, mournful notes of his song.
I turn Jax around so he’s facing me and the elevator at my back. “It’s okay, Jax.” I shake his shoulders gently. “Just look at me.”
He blinks, his glazed expression clearing. “Rune?” He steps back. “Your eyes. They’re glowing. Like ... his.” Horror strains his features.
I try not to notice how my mouth is watering . . . try not to remember that Ben’s face looked the same when I was feeding on his terror . . . try to forget that heady flavor of power. But I can’t think anymore. All I can do is act.
Lifting to my toes, I wrap my arms around Jax’s neck and force him against me, pressing our lips together. Groaning into my mouth, he pulls me closer, deepening the kiss, both of us riding waves of music, passion, and dread.
I attempt to drag myself away when he drops to his knees, losing his breath. But his desperation only feeds my gluttony. He tastes like Ben: singed, sugary, and unnatural—roasted autumn, sulfur, and copper wrapped in sweet, dark candy. I’m too weak to resist; I go to the floor with him, still siphoning that delicious pulsation of life.
The ping of the elevator registers behind me. I ignore it, locking Jax’s jaw in my fingers so he can’t escape.
Strong hands grip my shoulders and break us apart. Jax hunkers on the balcony floor, gasping for air as I growl and kick to escape the set of arms holding my spine immobile against a solid wall of chest muscles.
“Don’t be greedy.” Etalon’s deep rasp is muffled, his breath filtering out in a stream that warms my neck. “Learn to know when you’ve had enough.”
I stop struggling, though my tongue still stings with electric scintillation. He drags me across the balcony and deposits me, slumped, inside the elevator. I roll over to watch his broad back as he activates the brake and steps out again. He’s wearing an employee’s uniform—hooded, glowing vest with black pants and shirt. He retrieves Jax’s unconscious body and settles it next to mine on the carpet then releases the brake.
As the elevator doors shut us in and the motor carries us down, Etalon drops his hood, revealing thick, dark, disheveled curls that graze his shirt collar. He studies me from behind a full black satin mask, then kneels, those expressive brown eyes shifting to Jax. Fishing a syringe from his fiber-optic vest, he aims the needle at my friend’s bared arm.
I struggle to sit up. “Please, don’t hurt him.” I attempt to push him away.
Etalon stops my wrist with his bare hand. A jolt passes between our skin and lights up our veins in synchrony, hot and rejuvenating. In that moment, deep inside, I know without question he’s not going to hurt Jax. He’s trying to help. I jerk free, shocked by the potency of our connection. Etalon’s silence stretches out like a shadow—leaving me bewildered and astonished.
Eyes glinting like copper coins, he looks away and injects Jax with the syringe before straightening my friend’s rumpled clothes and covering the top of his face with a blindfold. When Etalon holds up a blindfold to me, I shake my head.
“It’s for your own safety, Rune,” he speaks at last, his accent dusting each gravelly word with French decadence. “I’ve been lying to you and don’t deserve your trust. But you’re going to have to give it to me one more time. It’s the only way to get you out of here before the Phantom realizes you’re gone and unleashes his wrath on us all.”
17
THE ARTIFICE OF PRETENDING
“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful what we pretend . . .”
Kurt Vonnegut
“All right, Miss Nilsson, les charges de poo!” The glee in Madame Bouchard’s call from the stage curdles inside me like heartburn; her every syllable and consonant echo with bravado along the rafters of the theater as she awaits her star pupil.
Kat steps from her row but stops to grimace at the right side of the auditorium, where, triggered by Bouchard’s “loads of poo” expression, snickers erupt among the junior-year students. They still can’t rein in their juvenile reactions, even after being taught the meaning behind the saying. Back in earlier times, audiences took carriages to the opera house or theater. The bigger the attendance, the more horses—each one fully stocked with a supply of manure. So to convey success to the performers, what could be more appropriate than wishing them a full house, i.e., loads of poo?