Firelight

6

I hide during lunch. Cowardly, I know, but when I faced the double doors leading to the cafeteria, the volume alone made me feel sick. I couldn’t bear the thought of going in.

Instead, I walk the halls, ignoring my hungry stomach and the guilt I feel at not being there for Tamra. But somehow, I know she’ll be fine. At least I convince myself of this. She’s been waiting for this day since we were kids. Ever since I manifested and she didn’t. When Cassian began to ignore her and became a dream forever beyond her reach.

I find the library. Immediately, I inhale musty books and savor the silence. I slide into a table near the windows that faces the quad and rest my head on the cool Formica until the bell rings.

I float through the rest of the day. Relief seizes me when I make it to the last class of the day. Almost done.

My seventh-period study hall is packed with people who either opt out of athletics or lack the requisite GPA to play sports. This I learn from Nathan, my shadow ever since fifth period.

He slides in beside me. His fleshy lips spit out each word with a faint spray of saliva. “So, Jacinda. What are you?”

I blink, inching back, before I understand. Of course. He couldn’t mean that. “Uh, I don’t know.”

“Me?” He juts a thumb to his swelled chest. “I can’t pass English. Which is too bad, because our football team might actually win a game if I was on the line. What about you?” His gaze travels my long legs. “What are you doing in study hall? You look like you could play basketball. We got a good girls team.”

I tuck a wild strand of hair behind my ear. It springs loose again and falls back in my face. “I didn’t want to join any teams midsemester.” Or ever.

The room is comprised of several black-topped tables. Mr. Henke, the physics teacher, stands behind a larger version of our table at the front of the room. He stares out at the class with a dazed, bleak expression, as if unclear where the overachievers from the previous period went. “Find something to do. No talking. Study or read quietly, please.” He brandishes an orange pad. “Anyone need a pass to go somewhere? Library?”

Nathan laughs as half the class lines up for passes. The bell hasn’t even sounded, but it looks like most of the kids will be gone before it does.

“And there goes the herd.” Nathan looks at me, leans in conspiratorially. “Want to get out of here? There’s a Häagen-Dazs not far.”

“No. My mom is picking me and my sister up after school.”

“Too bad.” Nathan crowds me. I scoot closer to the edge of the table. His gaze flits over me.

My elbow knocks over one of my books, and I gratefully hop off the stool to pick it up. Squatting there on the grimy tiles, my hands reaching for a book, the tiny hairs at my nape start to vibrate. My breath goes faster. I press my lips together, trying to quiet the sound. My flesh pulls and tightens with awareness, and I know it’s him before he enters the room.

I know it. And I want it to be him, even with Tamra’s warning ringing in my head. Wiping a sweaty palm on my jeans, I peer at the door from beneath the table. Recognition burns deep in my chest, but I remain where I am, huddled close to the floor, watching as he steps inside.

I hold myself still, waiting. Maybe he’ll get a pass, too. Disappear with the others.

But he doesn’t get in line. He moves into the room, a single notebook clutched loosely in his hand. Then, he stops, angling his head strangely. Like he hears a sound. Or smells something unusual. The same way he looked in the hall today. Right before he saw me.

I toy with my book, letting the pointy corners bite into the sensitive pads of my fingers.

“Hey, you okay?” Nathan’s voice booms above me.

Wincing, I force myself to stand, crawl back onto my stool. “Yeah.” I can’t hide forever. We’re in the same school. Apparently the same study hall.

I stare straight ahead, at the chalkboard. Anywhere but at him. But it’s impossible. Like forcing my eyes to remain wide-open when biology demands I blink. So I look.

His gaze finds me. He walks toward our table. I hold my breath, wait for him to pass. Only he doesn’t. He stops, the sliding scrape of his shoes on the floor a long scratch down my spine.

This close, I stare into eyes that can’t decide on a color. Green, brown, gold — if I look too hard I get lost, dizzy. I remember the ledge — the two of us, enclosed in that damp, tight space. His hand on my draki skin. The word that I think he said.

Shivering, I break free of his gaze and stare down at the table, concentrate on inhaling slow even breaths. I look back up at the sound of his voice, ensnared in the velvet-smooth rumble.

“Mind if I sit here?” he asks Nathan while looking at me.

“Guess not.” Nathan shrugs, shoots an uncertain look at me as he grabs his backpack. “I was heading to the library anyway. See you later, Jacinda.”

Will waits a moment, stares at the vacant stool before sitting. As though he expects me to say something. Stop him? Invite him? I don’t know.

He turns slightly on his stool and smiles. Just a small smile, but lovely. Sexy.

A dangerous warmth begins to build inside me. Unwanted right now. My skin pulls tight, eager to fade into draki skin. The familiar vibration swells up through my chest. A purr grows from the back of my throat. Instinct takes over and I’m almost afraid that if I do say something, it will be in the rumbling cadence of draki-speak.

Funny. In this desert, I worried my draki would shrivel, die as Mom wants. But around this boy I’ve never felt so alive, so volatile. I chafe a hand over my arm, willing my skin to cool down. For my draki to fade. At least for right now.

In silence, we sit. And it’s the strangest thing. He knows about me. Well, not me. He couldn’t possibly know that this me is that me. He knows about us though — my kind. He saw me. He knows we exist. He saved me. I want to know everything about him. And yet I can’t speak, can’t say anything. Not a single word. I’m too busy focusing my thoughts, on keeping the core of me cool, relaxed. Keeping the draki away. I want to know him better, but without breathing, without speaking, I can’t see how.

The only thing I need to know about him is that his family hunts. I must not forget that. Ever. They kill my kind or sell us to the enkros. In their foul hands, we’re either enslaved or butchered. My skin shrinks, and I remind myself he is part of that dark world. Even if he helped me escape, I should avoid him. And not because Tamra told me to. I should gather up my stuff and move to another table.

Instead, I stay where I am, balancing so carefully on my stool, making certain our bodies don’t brush.

“So,” he says, like we’re in the middle of a conversation. Like we know each other so well. A nerve ticks, jumps near my eye at the sound of his voice. “You’re new.”

I summon the strength to strangle something out. “Yeah.”

“I saw you earlier.”

I nod and say, “Earlier in the hall. Yeah. I saw you, too.”

His eyes warm, slide over me. “Right. And in PE.”

I frown. I don’t remember seeing him during fourth period, don’t remember feeling him.

“You were running around the track,” he explained. “We were up in the natatorium. I saw you through the windows.”

“Oh.” I don’t know why, but it thrills me to know he was watching me.

“You looked pretty fast.”

I smile. He smiles back, the grooves along his cheek deepening. My heart squeezes tighter.

“I like to run.” When I run really fast, the wind hits my face and I can almost pretend I’m flying.

“Sometimes,” he continues, “the guys and girls run together during PE. Although I’m not sure I could keep up with you.” His voice is low, flirty. Heat licks through me, curls low in my belly.

I imagine this scenario, imagine running side by side with him. Is that what he’s saying he wants to do? Air shivers past my lips. Of course, I’d love running with him. But I shouldn’t. I can’t. That wouldn’t be a good idea.

Two guys drag in late as the final bell rings. They look our way. At Will, not at me. I’m beneath their notice.

One with raven-dark hair shaved close to his head walks ahead of the other. His face is elegant, narrow, and beautiful with dark, liquid eyes. Apprehension curls through me. His eyes are dead cold, calculating.

His bulky friend swaggers behind him — his hair so red it makes me squint.

“Hey.” The dark one nods at Will, stopping at our table. I shrink, feeling oddly threatened.

Will leans back on his stool. “What’s up, Xander?”

Xander looks almost…confused. Arching his brow, his attention drifts to me. And then I get it. He doesn’t understand why Will is sitting here. With me.

I don’t understand either. Maybe on some level, Will remembers, recognizes me. Sweat dampens my palms. I squeeze my thighs under the table.

Red gets to the point. “You’re not sitting with us?”

Will shrugs one shoulder. “Nah.”

“You pissed or something?” This from Red.

Xander doesn’t speak. He continues to watch me. That ink black gaze makes me queasy. One word fills my head. Evil. A bizarre thought. Melodramatic. But I’m draki. I know evil exists. It hunts us.

I shift uneasily on my stool. Clearly Xander understands what his friend hasn’t grasped. For whatever reason, Will wants to sit with me. I consider moving to another table, but that would just draw more attention to me.

Natural. Just act natural, Jacinda.

“I’m Xander,” he says to me.

“Jacinda,” I offer, feeling Will’s stare on the side of my face.

Xander smiles at me. Darkly beguiling, I’m sure it works on most girls. “Nice to meet you.”

I manage a brittle smile. “You too.”

“I think you’re in my health class.” His voice is smooth, silky.

“You must mean my sister, Tamra.”

“Ah. Twins?”

He says “twins” like it’s something rich and decadent, chocolate in his mouth. I can only nod.

“Cool.” His gaze lingers on my face in a way that makes me feel exposed. Finally, he looks away, claps a hand on Red’s back. “This is my brother, Angus.”

I blink. They are nothing alike. Except in the menace they emit.

He continues, “And I guess you’ve already met Will.”

I nod, even though we haven’t actually met.

“We’re cousins.”

Cousins. Hunters. Only not like Will.

My lungs expand with smoldering heat. I hold my breath. Suppress the surge of heat at my core, the rumbling vibration inside me. Strangely though, I feel no surprise. Prickly hot alarm has been there since the pair walked into the room. They are different from the other humans surrounding me. They are a threat. Instinct tells me this.

Xander and Angus would never let me escape. They would relish the chance to kill me. I don’t know where to look. Awareness of them, these cruel hunters, crushes down on me. I worry they will see the truth in my eyes. My gaze darts around, looking for a safe place to rest.

“Really,” I say with a muted voice, unable to stop myself from looking at them again. “Cousins. Cool.”

Angus’s lip curls, lifts over his teeth, and I know I sound stupid. A vapid girl.

With a smirk at Will, he shrugs and walks to the back of the room, dismissing me. Relief washes over me, but only a fraction. Xander lingers. With his cunning eyes he is the greater threat. The smarter of the two.

He looks back and forth from me to Will. “Are you coming tonight?” Xander asks.

“I don’t know.”

Xander’s demon-dark eyes flash with annoyance. “Why not?”

“I have homework.”

“Homework.” Xander drops the word like it’s something foreign he never heard before. For a moment, he looks on the verge of laughter. Then, he’s all business, his voice a hard bite as he says, “We’ve got stuff to do. Our dads expect you there.”

Will’s hand curls into a fist on the table. “We’ll see.”

His cousin glares at him. “Yes. We will.” Then, he looks at me. His inky eyes soften. “See you around, Jacinda.” With an idle tap on our table, he strolls away.

Once he’s gone, I breathe easier. “So,” I say to Will, “your cousins seem…nice.”

He smiles a moment but his eyes are grave. “You should stay away from them.” Will’s voice is low, a stroke of warm air that reaches across the distance to my skin.

I already plan on doing that, but I ask anyway. Anything to better pick him apart. “Why?”

“They’re not the kind of guys a nice girl should hang out with.” The tendons on his forearm flex as he opens and shuts his hand. “They’re jerks. Most anyone will tell you that.”

I try for a flirty tone to lighten the dark mood. “And what will most anyone tell me about you? Are you a good guy?”

He turns and faces me. Those changeable eyes pull me in, remind me of the lush greens and browns of the home I left behind. His face isn’t soft. The angles are hard, chiseled.

“No. I’m not.” He swings his face forward again.

Mr. Henke ignores the class, tapping a staccato rhythm at his computer.

My chest feels tight and prickly. Smoldering warm. “Why are you sitting with me?”

The silence stretches so long I begin to wonder if he’s going to answer when he finally admits, “I don’t know. Still trying to figure that out.”

I don’t know what I expected him to say. That on some level he knows me? Neither of us cracks a book. I barely breathe, too afraid that the heat mounting inside me might find a way out through my lips or nose. I take small sips of air and wait for the bell.

Conversation buzzes at a steady drone throughout the room. Mr. Henke’s typing stops. I watch his eyes drift shut and his head bob to his nonexistent neck. His glasses slip on his nose.

I jump at a burst of shrill laughter behind me. I look over my shoulder and see a girl in the back, her chair squeezed between Will’s cousins. Angus tickles her side and she jumps, her long blond hair flying like streamers in the air. She clings to Xander’s arm as if he might save her from the delightful torture.

Xander wears a lazy smile — looks bored. As if he senses me watching, his gaze cuts to me, the smile vanishing from his face. His dark eyes seize hold of me.

“Turn around.”

My pulse jackknifes against my throat at the deep voice. I look back at Will.

His lips barely move as he speaks. “Trust me. You don’t want to be one of the girls Xander notices. It never goes well for them.”

“I’ve hardly spoken to him. I don’t think he—”

“I noticed you.”

A dark thrill races through me. I wipe damp palms on my jeans.

He laughs then. Low and soft. An unhappy sound. “So, yeah. He noticed you.” His lips twist. “Sorry about that.”

The bell rings, its unnatural peal jarring me as it has all day.

And he’s gone. Out the door before I can even grab my things or say good-bye.