Watercolour Smile (36 page)

It wasn’t hard to see that every Zevghéri had a purpose.

The foot soldiers were the foundation; they paid their taxes to the Klovoda through strategic labour… but even
they
were different. They had to be, to get to where they wanted to be without moving up any higher, fighting off any competition at the same time. They had to be the best, irreplaceable, yet unnoticeable. It was impossible. It was ingenious.

“So…” I was suddenly extremely uncomfortable sitting at this table, with a man who was not only Zevghéri, but
Klovoda
. Poison’s lessons on Zev hierarchy were only now truly beginning to sink in. “The Komnata… was it built to protect the Zevghéri?”

“In a way. It would not have been wise to rally all of our people to the one area, but we needed a way to protect the Voda and his chosen people. There are three rules governing the Komnata, only three. First, you must be
invited
; without an invitation, the doors will not open. Second, you must be
willing
; without your willing consent, the doors will not open. And thirdly, you must be a Zevghéri.”

“How does the Komnata invite people inside?”

“It doesn’t, don’t be stupid; it’s a building. The Klovoda chooses who to invite. They send out an emissary to bring back whomever they like. If the person agrees, they are admitted. That is all we ask of you, initially. Agree to come, when we call you.”

“What do you want me to do once I’m there?”

“Keep an open mind. Try not to freak out. Keep quiet about everything you see, everything I say.”

Even as he spoke, he was raising his finger in the air. He pointed it at Webber this time. I turned, watching as Webber’s mouth dipped into a tense frown, before his whole face went lax, drooping with the sudden pressure of whatever Jayden was doing to him. When Jayden’s finger moved from Webber to Quillan, I tensed in my seat. Quillan didn’t look away from Jayden, but his face suddenly took on the same expression as Webber.

“And if I don’t want to go?” I asked, still watching Quillan.

“We will wonder why.”

And there it is
.

“I have a few conditions,” I finally said, turning back to Jayden as Quillan and Webber both seemed to regain their composure. “I want to be able to bring one person with me when you call me in.”

“Assuming that you are talking about one of the men you’re ‘not’ dating, I believe we can accommodate that stipulation. They are all seasoned Zevg
hé
ri agents, Silas more so than the rest of them. If they interfere even once, however, you will lose the privilege. Anything else?”

“You said you’ll protect me from the messenger?”

“We will do what we can.”

“Can you post protection to the school instead of me? Make it look like Principle Webber has hired extra security? I already have enough people following me around.”
And I don’t trust you
.

“Webber?” Jayden looked toward the Principle. “Is this acceptable to you?”

“It is.”

“Very well then.” Jayden stood up, shrugging into his jacket. “We’ll be in touch, Miss Black. They’ve assigned me to your case, so consider me your official handler.”

I crinkled my nose. “Right. What does that mean?”

“It means I’ll be checking up on you, making sure the assignments aren’t having any adverse effects on you, and assisting you through your first operations. It also means that I’m the person you come to if you have any issues or questions. Here’s my card.” He fished a black card out of the inner pocket of his jacket, handing it over.

There was a faint blue line through the middle, his name in silver above the line and a single phone number below. I turned the card over and saw that a silver
K
had been emblazoned onto the back, set slightly into the card so that it made a dip as my finger ran over it.

“Okay.” I slipped the card into my bag.

“I’ll be in touch,” Jayden promised. I watched as the men posted about the room flocked to him, converging in a cloud of sorts to carry him away.

Jayden lied.

The truth was out. My cover was suddenly, utterly, and thoroughly blown. People knew my real name, they knew that I wasn’t an Adair, and they knew that the extra security posted around the school was all my fault. Jayden had said that he wouldn’t have people follow me around, but his agents were everywhere I went.

The only thing that had managed to stay a secret was the bomb incident. Either Jayden simply didn’t have the power to contain the Zevghéri gossip mill, or else he had deliberately blown my cover. Whatever the reason, I blamed him for how suddenly uncomfortable my life had become.

“Once you’ve finished banging the Adairs, you can come and be my sister!” someone shouted at me on my way out of the school on Friday.

Cabe and Noah had laughed.

By the time Saturday came around, I had entirely forgotten about the group date with Poison, Mike and Danny. It seemed like a lifetime ago. A different life, where Klovoda agents didn’t shadow my every movement, where Cabe and Noah stuck by my side because they wanted to and not because they believed it was their mission. It was cruel that the messenger had foreseen that a truer separation could only be achieved by reinventing the reason that they were so close to me in the first place. If he had torn me away from them, or them away from me… we would have found a way back.

This…

This was worse.

I saw Poison’s car from my window, and rushed outside to meet her, deliberately leaving my musings behind.

“Hey,” I panted, leaning against the metallic blue corvette, “I’m sorry. I totally forgot.” I’d never seen this particular car before. Maybe it was new… or maybe she had a whole garage full of cars, just like the Adairs and Quillans.

“Don’t blame you,” she muttered, her eyes strangely downcast. “We don’t have to do this, if you don’t want to.”

“Do you think it will be that bad?”

I glanced around, catching sight of the agent that had obviously been tasked to watch the mountain house. He was pretending to inspect the bushes.
Ugh
, he was about as subtle as a gunshot. There were no neighbouring houses, and Abe did the gardening himself, limiting the need to hire help. There was absolutely no reason for him to be there. Just as he caught my eye, his phone rang. He pressed it to his ear and walked around the side of the house, out of ear-shot.

“No…” Poison answered me. “I just… they’ve started acting weird, that’s all.”

I set my jaw, pulled open her passenger door, and sat down stubbornly. “I’m going.”

I need them on my side
.

Maybe I was lying to myself. It was possible that I couldn’t bear to sit back while Noah went on a date with someone else, after having completely forgotten about our connection—but it was equally as likely that I wouldn’t be able to claim that thought if it were to leave my mouth in the form of an excuse. I didn’t want to act as though I owned any one of the guys—more than that, I didn’t want to own them, period. They weren’t stray dogs, waiting around for me to reward them with treats. They were each just as unwilling a participant in this cruel Zevghéri game as I was. It would be wrong to ignore that. I glanced up to my bedroom window as we pulled away from the curb, and was surprised to see Cabe standing in the place that I had vacated. He was frowning, his eyes focussed on me until he disappeared from view. He was more observant than the Klovoda agent, who must have still been around the side of the house.

My phone vibrated in my pocket and I pulled it out, unsurprised that Silas had felt me leave.

You’re about to get grounded. Mother Quillan has noted your absence.

It vibrated again before I had a chance to reply and I navigated to Quillan’s message.

This is a bad idea.

Frowning, I tapped out a response.

Have a little faith, Bossman.

I waited for the response, and then smiled when it arrived—as awkwardly funny as could be expected from Quillan in a stressful situation.

I have faith that this will be a total disaster
.

I exited the screen and clicked on Silas’s message again.

I drew a picture of Noah kissing his ex-girlfriend, so Poison helped me organise a group date to run interference.

I stared at my phone in trepidation after sending the message, wondering if it were such a good idea to be so open and honest with Silas. He was very unpredictable. My trepidation melted into a dread that bubbled in the pit of my stomach upon receiving no reply from Silas whatsoever. Poison drove to her house and stayed subdued while marching me to her bedroom. She silently tossed items of clothing at me from her own closet, and I was too worried about her silence to fight the choices. I pulled on the black skinny jeans and grey midriff top, managing to snag a see-through lace blouse to wear over the top while she wasn’t watching. A pair of heeled boots narrowly missed my head, and then she was grabbing my hand and assaulting my fingernails with black nail polish.

“Um—”

“No talking,” she interrupted me. “I’m thinking.”

“You’ve been thinking for an hour already,” I said gently, watching some of the tension drain out of her skinny shoulders. “What thought takes an hour to work through?”

“I can’t figure out what’s changed. You’re acting weird, the Adairs are acting weird. Suddenly the whole school knows who you are, the Klovoda has deployed a small army to march the corridors… and you haven’t told me a single thing.”

“I told you about the bombs. That’s why the Klovoda are here.”

“There’s something big you’re not telling me. Don’t you trust me?” It wasn’t a question so much as an accusation.

She finished the first coat of nail polish before setting aside the little bottle. Her eyes were still trained downwards, and I realised that there were tears spiking her lashes. One of them escaped, slowly forging a line of mascara down her cheek. Even her tears looked rebellious. For just a moment, I was too shocked to act.
Poison was crying
?

“I trust you. Of course I do.” I reached out and caught her hand, smudging some of my nail polish. She made a sound of admonishment, but clung to my hand as tightly as I was clasping hers. “I just… the messenger is getting to my head. I feel like he’s always listening or watching. I don’t want to say something to make him angry. I got a message—it was hidden in Clarin’s makeup case. I think it was a warning not to talk about the messenger anymore… and here I am, talking about him again. What if he gets his revenge by attacking you? Or going for Tariq? Tariq isn’t a Zevghéri. He’s probably the only non-Zevghéri at school. He’s more fragile than the rest of us. I kept him away for as long as I could, but he’s here now—in the perfect position if the messenger wants to grab him.”

“But that doesn’t make sense.” Poison frowned, standing and pulling her hand from mine. “Tariq
should
be Zevghéri. Our magical blood gets diluted over time, the further away a person gets from their Atmá ancestor, but it doesn’t make a person any less Zevghéri. There have been some cases of Zevs pairing up with humans—and the children of those unions are considered human, but it’s impossible for one of your parents to have been human. An Atmá can only come from powerful magical blood, usually another Atmá, or a member of a pair.”

I frowned. “Right.” I didn’t understand. My parents had been normal, as far as I knew. Well… maybe not normal. But normal in the non-magical sense, at least. “Well maybe Tariq is a Zev. Maybe our parents were Zev, too. They let him into Hollow Ground, right? They probably wouldn’t have let him in if he wasn’t one of them.”

“Us,” Poison corrected distractedly, “not them. Anyway, there
is
one way to tell,” she spoke as though she were only considering the possibility as the words travelled across her tongue. “The Voda swears in every new Zev when they start high school, but the ceremony will only work on someone with Zevghéri blood. You should have been sworn-in already. I wonder why they held off. Maybe they couldn’t find you.” She paused, apparently finding that concept to be amusing.

“What does the ceremony entail?”

“Blood,” she said, a wry smile twisting her lips.

“Ugh.” I made a face. “Of course it does. Do they cut their hands and shake on it?”

“Nah, nothing so weird as that. They get an injection of the Voda’s blood through a transfusion, and then he can control them from that moment on. The blood of the Voda is extremely adaptive—it’s a pretty good projection of the Voda himself, actually. The Voda is the most powerful of our people, he—and I say
he
, because that’s what it has been for the last hundred years or so—has the power to adapt like you won’t believe. He can learn a new language in the space of a month; he can pick up just about any instrument and learn to play it; he doesn’t get as cold or as tired as normal people do. Hell, he even has creepily advanced emotional intelligence. He can be anything, do anything, and his blood is no different. It’s more magic than blood; it adapts to a person’s system, and even though the blood cells die, the magic remains. Once the Voda dies, so does his influence, and the new Voda has to donate to the entire Zev population.”