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There are so many things occupying Rachel’s thoughts that when she comes back to herself she’s already on the other side of Shadow Grove, driving past the abandoned train station, the steelworks, and closed down factories. Soon, she sees the sun-bleached sign hanging askew across the entrance to Pine Hill Trailer Park, where small houses and mobile homes stand alongside each other, stacked too closely together to be comfortable. A dog barks madly somewhere along the fence, while a few indignant shouts fill the otherwise quiet day.
The neglected, solitary apartment building—located at the very edge of Shadow Grove—rises out of the earth. Ashfall Heights is an eyesore the town council simply can’t get rid of—it’s a mistake made two generations earlier, when a promising baby boom had been interrupted by the Great Depression and World War II. Wilderness surrounds the unsightly H-shaped building, which has been left to crumble for close to two decades. Yet, for reasons she can’t begin to explain or understand, the more she visits, the fonder she grows of the place.
Rachel steers into the oversized abandoned parking lot, avoiding the deep potholes scarring the asphalt and construction debris littering the area. She parks at the entrance, across two spaces, and unclicks her seatbelt.
She reaches around the seat to find her bag. She slings her bag over her shoulder, climbs out of her car, closes the door behind her, and crosses the distance between the parking lot and the graffiti-riddled entrance of Ashfall Heights. She barely notices the grimy interior of the foyer anymore, hardly thinks twice about entering the elevator that sounds like it’ll crash back to earth if she breathes too loudly. The doors close and the gears feebly grind as the elevator ascends. She searches for Orion’s apartment keys on her keychain.
Six weeks earlier, Rachel had found the keys and a hastily written note in Orion’s handwriting lying on her pillow. The note simply read: Please check on my greenhouse. How it had gotten into her bedroom, she doesn’t know, but ever since then she’s spent most Saturdays in the quiet apartment—making sure the watering system is functioning, reading through the various handwritten journals in the greenhouse to familiarize herself with the exotic plants, and trying not to kill any of them before he gets back from wherever he is in the Fae Realm.
The elevator slowly opens and Rachel marches down the ninth floor’s corridor, passing the faded red doors with their black numbers. She ignores the smells and sounds, the yellowing walls and worn linoleum flooring underfoot. At apartment 9-M, Rachel unlocks the door and enters. It’s stuffy and dark inside, and she blindly feels around for the light switch, which she flips on. The artificial light brightens the sparsely decorated living room with its few pieces of furniture and the posters hanging on the walls.
The closet door sits on the left side of the entryway, across from the kitchen. She opens the closet and walks up Ashwell Heights’ forgotten stairwell to the tenth floor. The entire tenth floor has been commandeered by Orion to become an indoor greenhouse. It is full of foreign and beautiful Fae plants, most of which Orion uses to manufacture his signature designer drugs.
The medicinal plants section is in the center of the greenhouse, surrounded by hundreds of other plants she hasn’t had a chance to study yet. She heads directly to the desk, which is littered with numerous mason jars and handwritten journals. Each mason jar is marked with its contents—harvested Stardust, Nacht-Lilies, Ocean Roses, and Droom Leaves, among a variety of other unpronounceable names. Rachel ignores the unprocessed herbs and reaches into the top desk where Orion keeps his stash.
She rifles through the plastic baggies, searching for the goldmint. Though it’s not the most popular drug Orion produces—that honor goes to the various sexual enhancement drugs—goldmint is still plentiful. The thirty-five pills, which Rachel will need to pay Orion for, are already likely to cost a small fortune. She carefully counts out the pills, grabs another unused Ziploc bag from the desk, and seals them up. Next, she writes an IOU and slips the note into the goldmint folder, which she returns to Orion’s desk.
Rachel pulls off the blood-soaked tissue she’d wrapped around her thumb and looks at the angry, red wound. With her free hand, she searches through the mason jars for the Stardust and loosens the lid. She sprinkles the Stardust onto the raw, jagged gouge on her thumb, and bites back a yelp of pain. A pinch of the Fae herb is all she needs to allow the wound to heal at inhuman speed. It’s a small injury compared to the one she’d received when the Night Weaver impaled Orion with her darkness, but it’s still remarkably tender as the magic goes to work. She feels her flesh slowly knit together, the skin growing taut as it stretches across the wound.
Rachel grabs her sling bag and heads down the stairs. A minute later, she’s locking up the apartment and making her way back to the elevator.
By the time she climbs inside her car, pulls on her the seatbelt, and starts the engine, Rachel is already worrying about the consequences of borrowing drugs from a powerful Fae prince, of being caught with the pills, of handing them over to Mercia. So many things can go wrong. Still, she can’t go toe-to-toe with a Miser Fae without some magical back-up, and she doubts Mercia is a narc.
Rachel makes a wide U-turn in the parking lot and begins the drive back to the road, her heart racing and palms sweating. Not fear due to having to face a dangerous Fae in the not so distant future, but because the sheriff’s deputies love to camp out, waiting to pull over anyone who looks even a bit suspicious.
She passes the trailer park, the closed down factories and steelworks, and the train station without seeing any official cruisers lingering about. Even as she heads straight to Main Road, Rachel can’t find a way to relax.
When she arrives back at school, she’s a nervous wreck. There’s no way of knowing if she’ll even be able to spell her name correctly on the test, let alone get a decent grade. If she doesn’t show up for the test, though, Mr. Davenport will make her wish for death.
Can today just end already? She gets out of the car and keeps her hand pressed against the sling bag. As she makes her way back into the school, she sees Cam walking ahead. What is your deal?
He glances over his shoulder and flashes a smile before coming to a stop.
“You came back?” she says, walking up to him.
“I actually studied for the English test.” Cam shrugs. “You heading that way?”
“Mhmmm.”
They fall into step along the main hallway to get to Mr. Davenport’s class. “You look concerned,” Cam says.
“I’m having a terrible day,” Rachel mumbles.
“Want to talk about it?”
“Nope. Not unless you start spilling your secrets.”
“Touché.” Cam pushes his hands into his jacket pockets. “Well, if you’re really having a bad day, I can always get you out of this test. Just say the word and I’ll make it happen.”
She raises an eyebrow. “I’ll be fine, thanks.”
“Yeah, keep telling yourself that.” He reaches out to open the door and allows Rachel to enter the empty classroom first.
The action irks her for some reason. Usually, she doesn’t mind when Dougal does it, but with Cam, it’s a whole other matter. A tiny voice inside her warns her not to trust him. Why, though? He’s just a regular guy, isn’t he? Yeah, he has his quirks as most people do, but something about him gives her pause.
She walks to the middle of the classroom and takes her seat, keeping her sling bag firmly gripped between her ankles. Rachel plants her elbow on the table and rests her forehead in her palm, mentally readying herself for the test.
She feels eyes on her, making her uncomfortable.
It’s nothing, she thinks, but glances to the side, anyway.
Cam sits across the room at his own desk, grinning at her.
Why do I always attract the creeps?
Mr. Davenport’s accident takes the form of another fall—a misstep that has him slipping as he enters the class with the English tests clutched in his hands. He hit his head so hard against the tiles, Rachel’s certain she hears the back of his skull crack. The test papers fly into the air as a flurry of activity commences. Students either panic or take action to help the most despised teacher at Ridge Crest High.
Faculty members arrive in droves, trying and failing to regain order.
The class is eventually dismissed, the English test postponed until a later date, and the ambulance is called.
Rachel passes Mr. Davenport’s desk and sees a figurine lying in the open top drawer.
“Yup,” she pops the ‘p’, her theory proven right. This time, Rachel doesn’t pick up the totem, simply exits the classroom along with the rest of the students.
Cam stands across the hallway, seemingly waiting for her.
“Was that your doing?” She eyes him suspiciously.
“Sorry?” Cam looks genuinely surprised by the question, but that’s not saying much.
Rachel stares at him, not sure if she believes him or not. She takes her place beside him, watching the EMTs rolling the gurney out of the classroom with Mr. Davenport strapped in tight.
“It’s surprising how easily our peers are traumatized. There wasn’t even a drop of blood and look at them.” He juts his chin in Bianca Novak’s direction, who’s bawling her eyes out on Ronald Steven’s shoulder.
There are others in a similar state of despair, either crying or in complete shock. Best friends, Tammy Richards and Valeska Howes—for example—are several shades paler than they had been when they’d first entered the classroom. Tammy is crying in a pretty kind of way, a single teardrop trickling down her cheek. Her response is very subdued, almost ladylike. Valeska, on the other hand, catches flies with her ‘O’-shaped mouth, gaping as she looks between the gurney and the classroom.
“I’ve always said they don’t watch enough horror movies,” Rachel says.
Cam snorts, but manages to suppress his laughter before he can draw attention from the others.
As Rachel takes a step forward, ready to follow the EMTs out of the building, he says, “You don’t really think I’m responsible for Mr. Davenport’s fall, do you?”
Rachel studies him for a long moment, before she says, “Weirder things have happened.”
Instead of arguing with her, Cam simply shrugs and walks down the hallway.
