Chaos (Kardia Chronicles) (Entangled Teen) (34 page)

One way or another.

“We’ll get there in the middle of the night, but they’ll still see us pretty fast. They’re anxious to talk to you.” He slid a glance my way, and his gaze settled on my breasts, which made me wish I’d listened to Mac and gotten some bigger shirts. “Then again, stopping might not be the worst idea…”

His creepy smile was anything but comforting, and I curled my lip at him in disgust, yanking the edges of my coat together and tugging the zipper high enough to touch my chin.

“On the contrary, it actually
does
sound like the worst idea.”

The smile dimmed and his nostrils flared. “Seemed like you wouldn’t have minded so much when we first met, and you were hot for it at the dance. You’re only being a bitch because I spilled the beans about Finnegan fucking you over. Until then, you were all about getting a piece of the Rafe-man.”

His calling me a bitch pissed me off. His accusing me of being “hot for it” realllly pissed me off. But what pissed me off more than both those things was the way he referred to himself in the third person. I wish he’d done it the day we met, because I would have known he was a raging tit-biscuit beyond redemption right from the start. Rafe-man indeed.

I was about to lay into him, but what good would it do me? Besides, he was a means to an end and once this was over, I’d never have to see his face again.

So instead, I focused on the upside. He’d said that the Council wouldn’t make me wait until morning, which was a huge relief. Until then, I’d had visions of sitting in a holding cell for days awaiting some sort of trial or something. The last thing I needed was all that time to change my mind, only to realize it was too late. I settled back in my seat and closed my eyes. I wouldn’t be able to sleep, but I could sure pretend.

Three hours into our dead-silent ride, I was still playing possum but wide awake. Rafe, on the other hand, had started swerving on the road and I had to break character and poke him in the arm a couple times to jar him awake. After all but frying my motherboard to blast Mac, I couldn’t help the weak little surge of power that oozed out, latching on to Rafe’s vitality for just a second, searching for love to replenish my depleted stores of energy. Instead, something blocked me, before something else dark and sticky clung to me even as I drew back into myself. I tried to observe it but it sizzled away into nothingness.

“Don’t touch me,” he snarled and jerked his arm away, nearly swerving into the curb. The tires squealed, and I smacked hard against the door.

What the hell was that about? We’d danced together the night before, and he sure seemed all right with it then, so I’d assumed he was like Mac. Impervious to my touch, if not my newer, splashier powers. Apparently not. But I’d gone with him willingly. He had to know I wasn’t out to get him. So why did he look so nervous now?

“What’s your problem? I was just trying to wake you up,” I asked, a funny feeling worming its way into my gut.

He didn’t answer and that didn’t make me feel any better. My nerves were jangling louder and louder as I tried to work out what his damage was. Maybe he didn’t fear me hurting him as much as he feared me
knowing
him. His mind. His heart. His intentions. And if that was the case, why? He sure wasn’t trying to hide his true colors from me anymore. So what was he protecting?

Mac’s warning rang in my head. What if he really was going to take me to some farm out in East Bum-fuck and kill me? Or worse…

I sucked in a breath and lunged at him, clamping my fingers over his forearm. Then I funneled the last little store of energy his way. It was wild, out of control, springing from me like an attack dog unleashed. I couldn’t have stopped it if I’d tried.

Rafe screamed and jerked to the left, plastering himself against his door. His face was a mask of fury as he fought to shake me off. When that didn’t work, he sent a balled fist into my stomach, and damn, it hurt, but I fought through the pain, pushing harder, making a thin crack in the block he’d erected. And there it was. One crystal-clear memory at the forefront of his mind.

The kid is so weak anyway, it won’t take much. That’s too bad. The fight is half the fun. A rush of pleasure coursing through me as I tug the tubes and mash the pillow over his pasty face. The bitch is going down for this.

The memory fizzled and disappeared with a snap. A second later, excruciating pain as something that felt like an anvil connected with my temple, and then I was knocked out cold.

…

Rafe killed Eric.

That was my first realization upon waking. That twat-bucket had killed a kid and blamed it on me. It didn’t change the fact that I’d put Eric in the coma. That part was still on me, but Rafe had killed him.

If I had the strength to cry, I would have. I was a lot of things, some of them not good, but I wasn’t a murderer.

My second realization was that I was on my knees, chained to a wall, with a pounding headache and so weak I could barely hold my head up.

Flashes of what had gotten me to that point ran through my mind. A fight. Rafe and I had duked it out, then at some point I’d woken up to find myself in the trunk of the car, bound and probably concussed. That part was a blessing because I had passed out again before I could fully comprehend that I was locked in a tight, dark space with little hope of getting out alive.

Sort of like now.

I jerked against the chains, but they barely moved. I tried to control my breathing in hopes of staving off my second panic attack in less than twenty-four hours.

Had he brought me to the Sacred Grove like he promised or to his secret basement slaughterhouse where he was going to keep me as a pet? I racked my brain, trying to remember what had happened next. I remembered seeing leaves, lots of leaves as I’d bounced around, my stomach jammed against something hard. That was it. Rafe had carried me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes for a long while before barreling into a thatch of low pricker bushes like they were nothing but a patch of dandelions.

By the time we’d gotten through the bramble and came out the other side, I was riddled with tiny, stinging scratches, but I couldn’t even make my mouth move to protest. What had he done to me?

Eventually, we had stopped in front of a wall of trees. He laid a hand on the bark and suddenly, they parted, forming an inverted
Y
with enough space for us to walk through. It was still full daylight, but the opening was black as night, and when he stepped through, I tried to struggle. He could have been tossing me off a cliff into a dead drop.

A free-fall into the bowels of hell, for all I knew.

His laugh had made me wish I hadn’t bothered trying. “Lithium. Your kind can’t handle it. You’ll be useless for hours. I should have given it to you from the start,” he muttered.

With no choice but to let myself get dragged into that fathomless blackness, I had turned to stare back until the trees closed behind us, eclipsing the very last sliver of sunshine because what if I never saw it again? A very real possibility, getting realer by the second as I stared around at my tiny prison.

Four stone walls. No window. If my choices were this or death, I hoped they killed me. The sadness came again, sharp and clear through the fog. I thought of my mom and said a silent prayer that this didn’t break her. And then there was Mac. On his knees, begging me to listen, and I’d walked away.
Fucking idiot.

“Time to rise and shine, bitch.”

Rafe stood before me and pushed an ancient key into the lock. It tumbled and the door swung open. I had grand delusions of finding something to bash his murdering head in with and then making a break for it, but even if I could’ve gotten free of the chains, I couldn’t have walked away, never mind ran.

He knew that, and he wasted no time in shoving me onto my face on the stone floor, so he could unlock the shackles around my wrists. I saw stars, and a burst of white light flickered behind my eyelids. Bastard.

“The Council is ready for you.”

So not in his basement, then. I wanted to cheer because, of the two evils I’d imagined, that was by far the lesser, but I didn’t have the strength to do more than dangle uselessly against him as he half dragged, half carried me from my cell through a dank, dark chamber. Just when my eyes had started to adjust and I could make out the craggy walls, the light flooded in again.

I blinked hard and slowed, panic lapping at me as I fought to see through the haze of red and white from the sudden brightness.

“Ready?” he asked, pushing me away from him and sending a cold, questioning glare in my direction. But underneath it was a hint of fear. Did he know what I’d seen in his head? Did he know what I knew?

He held my gaze for a long time, waiting for…something. I considered my options and decided to stay quiet. Accusing him of killing Eric would only tip my hand, and if I really was going to see the Council, I didn’t need him prepped ahead of time for what I was about to tell them.

He stepped toward me, feet apart, one loose fist by his shoulder, the other near his chin in a way I recognized. Fighting stance. Like he thought—or hoped, maybe?—that, even though my power was useless, I’d be able to muster the will for some hand-to-hand combat. I didn’t even have the energy to laugh.

“I asked if you were ready.”

I shook my head, sending a blast of pain through my temple, sharp enough to make my ears ring. “Nope.”

His smile was pure ice. “Too fucking bad.”

He grabbed me almost off my feet and shoved me forward into the sunlight.

The scent of fresh air and pine trees filled my nostrils, and I sucked deep breaths in greedily, hoping it would clear my muzzy mind. It didn’t, but just getting some distance from the claustrophobic caverns and my cell made me feel less panicky.

When my eyes adjusted completely, I took in my surroundings and stopped short. It was like a dream. Tall, hulking chunks of granite that looked like they’d been plucked straight from Stonehenge were strewn around to encircle a large clearing, big enough to host a sporting event. A second tier of lush fauna bisected the space like the balcony of a theater made of ferns and plants. In the center of it sat a thick slab of marble and three chairs.

It was like we’d fallen through the looking glass and nothing was totally familiar. There was grass covering the ground, but it was the oddest shade of green, almost emerald, and had an incandescent quality like something from another world. Even in my sorry state, it was hard to stop myself from crouching low to touch a shimmering blade.

Fat mushrooms dotted the carpet of grass and flowers bloomed left and right, kissed with tiny drops of dew. Dew, not frost? Only ten hours away from New Hampshire in January, and it was as pleasant as a September morning. Part of me was expecting someone to cue some Enya music.

“Step forward.” Rafe interrupted my scattered thoughts, elbowing me in the ribs before I even had a chance to react to his command, and the blow sent me stumbling a few feet to the right.

When I’d almost caught myself from falling, he pressed a rough hand to my shoulder and forced me to the ground. The pretty grass was all show, slicing at my skin like tiny razors through the rips in my jeans.

In my semi-delirium, I vowed not to order the mushroom soup, and a tickle of laughter bubbled up my throat. Shit, not now. I was already a mess and hysteria wouldn’t help the matter. Plus the grass fucking hurt, and I wanted up, like, now.

“Can I just—” I tried to stand but he wasn’t having it, shoving me down again and wrenching my arms behind my back to cuff me.

Pain wracked through my shoulders, and I swallowed a sob. God, my body ached. My mind ached. My heart fucking ached so much, I felt beat. Lost. How was I going to convince the Council of anything? I had no proof, no strength, and I could barely stand, never mind fight for my life and freedom.

A rustle of leaves caught my attention, and I gingerly raised my head in the direction of the sound. Three women dressed in flowing white robes filed through a narrow space in a copse of trees toward the balcony at the center of the clearing. The one leading the pack was a thousand years old if she was a day and clutched a book in her wrinkled hands. The other two looked younger, around my mother’s age. They made their way up what seemed to be a hidden twenty-foot-high staircase snaking up the side of the raised seating area. Lovely. They would literally stare down at me, judge me from on high, and then pass down my sentence. Intimidating much?

I wished death by lopping shears on Rafe for not at least letting me stand up. I felt like a sitting duck, complete with Peking sauce.

“This is Maggie Raynard,” Rafe pronounced needlessly. They obviously knew who I was, but he seemed anxious for praise like a blockheaded retriever wanting a pat for delivering his master’s morning paper. Dickbag.

I glared at him from my kneeling position, wishing I could give him a fucking head pat of the
kardia
Aphrodite variety, but since that was the whole reason I was there, it probably would have been bad form anyway.

“Maggie,” the one in the center said softly as they settled into their seats. “We’ve been waiting for you. I’m Bryony.”

The slimmer of the younger two leveled me with a cold stare. “Floryn.”

“And I’m Marigold.” She was the prettiest of the three, with flaming red hair and ivory skin, and she was the only one who offered a smile, albeit a tight one.

Bryony leaned forward, set her book down, and folded her hands together on the long table in front of her. “I won’t mince words. We’ve discussed our options, and based on your recent attack upon one of our emissaries, in addition to the intelligence we received regarding the condition and subsequent death of one Eric Nelson, we’ve decided there is no need for further investigation.”

I closed my eyes and let her words soak into my weary brain.
Not good.

“I know you’re anxious, and this is a stressful time, so I won’t prolong this any further.” She shifted in her seat and clutched her hands more tightly together, but her voice was as steady as the marble slab in front of her. “Our laws are very clear on this matter.” She patted the leather tome reverently. “And I’m afraid we have no other choice. You’re hereby sentenced to death by hanging.”