Vanish

Chapter 10

Why don’t you come back to the house? We can roast some root seeds and watch movies,” I suggest as Tamra and I walk back from the field. My body still tingles, awake and alive from our recent flight in a way that I haven’t felt since… I frown, forbidding the memory to intrude and ruin my new sense of peace.

“Sure,” she says.

I smile, thinking about all the late nights when Mom, Tamra, and I would squeeze onto the couch and watch movies — and then I remember how little I’ve seen Mom lately. She’s probably asleep, wiped out from her long shift. When I left her after dinner she mentioned she might go to bed after her shower.

“Maybe Mom can join us.”

“Yeah,” I hedge, “if she’s still awake.”

Tamra sends me a look. I know what she’s thinking: Mom always used to wait up for us if we were out doing anything. But that was before. Back when she felt she had some control over our world.

I open my mouth to explain the situation with Mom but stop… close my mouth and listen, peering into the waves of milky fog rolling around us, thicker than usual.

“Jacinda?”

“Something’s wrong,” I say quietly, holding up a hand.

Even though no alarm sounds on the air, something is off. The township is an eerie quiet. It’s still half an hour until curfew but no one is out walking except those of us returning from the flight field. They were having a jako tournament tonight at the rec center, but as we pass the center of town, the building is dark. The clink of gems used in the game can’t be heard. Nor can the usual shouts of defeat or victory when someone’s gem knocks another player’s gem off the board.

Then, through the mist, one of the elders appears. It’s almost comical to see his dignified figure running. “Tamra. You’re needed. Go at once to Nidia’s. Hurry.”

It doesn’t cross my mind to stay behind. We race through town, leaving the elder behind. Our steps thunder on the path. A small crowd stands gathered before Nidia’s house. Severin and another elder, two guards with their blue armbands, Nidia and Jabel.

It’s the combination of Nidia and Jabel that alerts me to the situation, jerks me to a halt. Someone has trespassed into the pride.

Tamra continues a few feet and then stops when she notices I’m not with her anymore. She looks back at me and then to the group, clearly uncertain. I can’t speak. Can say nothing. My body won’t move.

Nidia and Jabel only ever come together for one reason — when a trespasser enters the pride. Nidia may be more valued for her ability to shade the mind, but Jabel is useful, too. As a hypnos draki, she mesmerizes, planting lies in a human’s head to fill the vacant gaps Nidia leaves.

The beating of my heart takes on a desperate rhythm. Heat flares, a wild, fiery burn in the back of my throat.

I strain for a good glimpse of the trespasser. Most of his figure is blocked by the others and a thick fog of mist. I identify his back, the outline of broad shoulders. I swallow against the scald in my throat and take a step closer, my hands balled into fists so tightly that a nail breaks and splinters against the tender flesh of one palm.

Footsteps rush behind me and I look over my shoulder. Several others have followed us. Cassian, Corbin, Miram, and Az…

“Tamra!” Severin sees her then. He shouts at her like she’s an animal to be commanded, waves sharply with one hand. “Come!”

Tamra moves ahead into the group and blocks what little view I have. Frowning, I draw closer, my steps slow, stilling to a stop when Tamra whirls around. Her gaze collides with mine.

The blood surges in my veins.

Her face says it all.

No. No, no, no…

It can’t be him.

I start to shake my head, wanting to deny it, but most of all wanting Tamra to turn around and act natural so Severin and the others don’t become suspicious.

And then the crowd shifts and I see Will. My gaze devours him, eyes staring so hard they ache. The stubborn honey brown hair still falls over his brow. The hard-set jaw looks as implacable as ever. He’s here. Will kept his promise to me. And then I think, no. Will can’t have remembered that promise. It’s impossible. Tamra shaded him. Maybe he’s here accidentally. Maybe he got lost from his group and stumbled into our midst….

My lips move, but say nothing. I dare not. Shaking my head, I wonder if I’ve imagined him, conjured him where he’s not likely to be.

For a moment, joy swells inside me, before the terror of seeing him here, in the township, mere feet from Severin, slams into me.

He turns to answer something Nidia asks him — probably the details of how exactly he got lost, alone, this far up on the mountain, away from any major road. I stare hard at him, make out the carved lines of his features in the deep shadow of evening, in the perpetual swirl of fog.

Then he sees me, and I know it’s not just simple recognition there. His hazel eyes gleam with such deep satisfaction that I know he remembers. Somehow. Someway. He remembers everything. He remembered his promise to me, and he’s keeping it.

He’s here for me.

Thankfully, my sister stops gawking at me before anyone notices and starts to wonder at her behavior. I give my head a swift shake, warning Will to take caution, to show no recognition. He shifts his head, the most imperceptible of nods, and I know he understands.

Every fiber of my being burns and pulses to cross the distance separating us. My hands open and close at my sides, yearning to touch, to feel him. To feel that it’s really him. Here. Now. For his voice to ripple through me as it used to do. That stroke of velvet revived me in Chaparral, got me through my time there, filling the stretch of my days then, and filling my dreams since.

Everything else slips away as I stare at him. Where we are. The danger that still threatens…

Deep down, I know Tamra won’t reveal Will’s identity, and not just because of her loyalty to me. My sister’s not a killer, and she knows one word from her would end his life. Right or wrong, she wouldn’t do that. It’s not in her.

But that hardly means he’s safe.

The air stirs as someone steps up next to me and I turn to see Cassian staring across the distance at Will. For a moment, I had actually forgotten there was someone else who could recognize Will. I follow his gaze, the air hard to breathe, too thick to drag inside my constricting lungs as I process that Cassian is staring at Will—here on his turf. The boy he nearly killed when they rolled off a cliff. Sick misery coils like a serpent in the pit of my stomach.

Nothing’s stopping Cassian from finishing that fight. He’s not like Tamra. It’s in him, down to his very essence, to kill. Onyx draki have been killing for thousands of years. That’s what they do best. Right now, in this moment, I’m caught in a living nightmare.

I look back at Will. Two armed sentries that I went to primary school with flank him like he’s a prisoner. If he’s lucky, they won’t see him for what he is… what he means to me. Nidia will simply shade him — useless as that seems to be — and send him on his way. As long as I stay calm. As long as Will gives nothing away. As long as Cassian doesn’t say or do anything.

I sneak a fearful glance at Cassian, silently willing him to say nothing — to hold silent and spare Will’s life.

His expression is tight, almost pained as he stares intently at me. “Please,” I mouth, all I dare risk as Miram steps up, her arms folded across her chest in a militant pose.

“Hiker?” she asks.

Still staring at me, Cassian answers, “Looks like it.”

“They gonna try Tamra out on him?” Corbin wonders aloud.

“Probably,” Miram says, stretching on her tiptoes in an attempt to peer into the group to see the hiker.

I resist moving closer, not about to look too curious and alert them that Will and I aren’t strangers.

“He’s young,” Miram muses. “Cute, too.”

Az snorts. “For a human, I guess.”

“For a human,” Miram agrees, sending me a sly glance. “What do you think, Jacinda? You’re the expert on cute humans. How does he compare?”

Heat tingles in my face, and I fight to look blasé, calm in the face of her jibes.

“That’s enough, Miram,” Cassian snaps.

“Look,” Corbin quickly says, “they’re taking him into the house.” He laughs low. “That guy won’t know what hit him.”

Will doesn’t look in my direction as he’s led inside the cottage, but I know he’s as aware of me as I am of him. My entire body hums in response to him. What was he thinking? He had to know how dangerous it would be to come anywhere near the pride. The truth is painful to face. As much as I tried to forget him, he never forgot me. Did that make him stronger than me? Or weaker?

Everyone goes inside except the two guards. They remain just outside the door. If all goes smoothly, Nidia will do what she does best, assisted by Jabel. Tamra, too, I suppose. Then the panicked thought hits me that Jabel’s talent will work on him. What if she succeeds and he comes out of there confused and bewildered, with a head full of lies, unable to discern reality from fiction?

I twist my fingers until they ache. There’s nothing I can do except wait. And hope he remembers again.

And what then? He knows where the pride is… where I am. He’s seen me. He’ll come back. If he’s caught again they’ll know he’s different — that shading won’t work on him.

“C’mon.” Cassian takes my arm. “I’ll walk you home.”

I resist only a moment. Of course I should go. The last thing I should do is linger here and give anyone cause to suspect that the trespasser means something to me.

Turning, I let Cassian lead me away. One thought pounds through my head in beat with my thundering heart: He kept his promise. He came for me.

Unable to help myself, I start to look over my shoulder, but Cassian’s voice stops me. “Don’t look back, Jacinda.”

I force my gaze forward. He’s right. The fact that Will remembers and came for me changes nothing. I can’t go with him. I won’t let my heart overrule logic. Nothing has changed. We’re a dangerous combination. Like fire and oil.

Cassian says nothing else until we reach my house. “Where’s your mother?” he asks.

I motion for him to wait as I go check on Mom. She’s asleep with the television on in her room, her features relaxed in a way I never see anymore. I quietly ease past the bed and turn off the TV. Closing her door, I return to where Cassian paces the living room.

His liquid-dark gaze cuts to me. “How did he find—”

“I’m sure it was simple luck. He got too close to the township and patrol picked him up,” I quickly insert, not wanting him to realize that Will might be resistant to shading.

He shoots me an exasperated look. “Jacinda, he’s no innocent hiker.”

“Yeah. I know.” I fold my arms across my chest. “He’s a hunter.” A heavy silence stretches as I stare at him. “So why didn’t you say anything?”

“How do you know I won’t?”

“Will you?”

He sets his jaw at a stubborn angle, like he wants to say yes, but then he blows out a deep breath and briefly looks away, and I can’t tell whether he’s angrier with me or himself.

“So you can hate me? So I can watch them kill him? I would get no satisfaction in that.”

I can only stare, no longer so surprised that Cassian might truly care for me. Me and not simply what I am. He’s not my enemy. I believe he wants to help me. Why else would he bother protecting a boy I shouldn’t even care about?

“You have to let him go, Jacinda.”

I nod, but the motion is painful, makes my temples throb. “I know.”

“But he needs to know that,” he says, his voice heavy with meaning.

I meet his gaze, understanding dawning slowly. “You want me to speak with him?”

“Once he’s a good distance from the pride, you need to confront him and explain to him that it’s over between the two of you. I know he might be confused after being shaded, but you need to get through to him.”

I can’t look at him just then, not with what I suspect — that Will can’t be shaded. Would Cassian be as willing to let him go if he thought that?

Cassian steps closer and turns my chin to look at him. “Tell him to convince his family that this area is dry. That there aren’t any draki here anymore. We’ve moved on. They’ll listen to him.” The implication hangs there unsaid. They’ll listen to him because of the blood. Because he’s connected to us. Cassian lowers his face so close I can feel his breath on my cheek, and the memory of our kiss intrudes. If that isn’t enough to make me recoil, then his next words are. “If I see him here again, I won’t hide the truth anymore — whether you hate me for it or not. I won’t protect him again. Understand?”

I nod, a lump clogging my throat.

“C’mon.” He opens the front door to the misty night.

“Where are we going?” I ask.

“They’ll probably drop him in the usual spot. I want you waiting for him when he comes out.”