I dreamed of working in the kitchen at military school. Everyone took turns, cooking, cleaning, dishes, laundry—a requirement to teach us responsibility. Many of the other boys traded favors to get out of a particular job they hated. Most of them hated cooking and cleaning the kitchen. Since I enjoyed cooking, often the task fell to me.
As dreams sometimes do with memories, this one had been distorted. I couldn’t recall what I’d cooked for dinner, though in the dream there were piles of dishes everywhere and a broken dishwasher—as was the case more often than not at school, but the endless sea of plates scattered over the stainless steel countertop was a gross exaggeration.
I filled the sink and began washing dishes by hand while outside the kitchen doors the noise of people could be heard. Laughter, talking, and the shuffling of feet all reminded me that I was not a part of their world. It sounded like a party. I couldn’t recall if it had ever really happened that way since kitchen duties had been assigned to no less than five people at once. But the door opening and Matthew stepping inside was enough of a lightning bolt to my heart that I knew that had to have happened. Probably more than once.
“Aren’t you done yet? I want to have some fun.” He walked up behind me and grabbed my hips, grinding his groin into my butt.
I shoved him away. “I’m working.”
“You can work on me anytime, baby.” Matthew laughed and gripped my arm, turning me so he could kiss me and press my back into the sink.
I pushed at his chest, but he wouldn’t budge. “Let me finish, Matthew. I’ll come find you when I’m done.”
His eyes narrowed. I knew that look. And just like I was back there, his expression stirred a fear in me that reached through my dreams and dug all the way into my core. He pulled away and shrugged like it didn’t matter. “Whatever.”
When he walked out the door, I let out a deep sigh of relief—though there would be no avoiding him later. I went back to work, cleaning and scrubbing pots that never seemed to dissipate. Where were all these dirty dishes coming from?
The dream shifted and suddenly there was silence and I was lying in my bunk instead of working in the kitchen. Something had awoken me. The door opened and Matthew stood beside it for a moment, his shadow looming large in the dark.
“I thought you were going to come find me?” he asked.
I held the blanket in front of me like a shield. “I fell asleep.” It sounded like the truth even though I didn’t even recall how I’d gotten from the kitchen to my room. He stepped aside and a couple other guys from the upper class entered my room. “I’m sorry,” I told Matthew immediately. Please make them all go away , I prayed.
“Since you like to spend so much time in the kitchen, I thought we’d have a bit of a party there.” He waved his hands at the other boys, who then surged forward to grab me. I fought against them, kicking and punching, but there were four of them and only one of me. They carried me out of my room, through the vacant, dark corridors of the academy, and to the kitchen. The fluorescent lights gleamed off the clean gray counters and appliances.
The group slammed me onto the wide prep table on my stomach. The cold metal bit into my arms as Matthew climbed on top of the table. He ripped at my clothes, and I knew what was to come when the others laughed and goaded him on.
He slapped my ass. “Be sure to clean the kitchen when we’re done. We gotta prepare food on this table.”
I woke up when Gabe shook me. He kissed tears off my cheeks that I hadn’t realized had fallen. “You must have been having a nightmare. You were begging someone to stop,” he said.
“Just a nightmare.” Had that happened or was my brain mixing the memory of Brock and Matthew? I sucked in deep breaths and closed my eyes. Gabe’s strong arms around me lulled me back to sleep. Though I must have only dozed, because when I awoke, only another hour had passed and Gabe was gone. He left a note saying he’d be back soon. I got up and decided to do something other than stare at the ceiling of Gabe’s bedroom.
I opened my e-mail and found another note from Matthew, this one explaining in detail what he wanted to do to me. It was an eerie recounting of the dream of the kitchen. Maybe that had really happened and I’d just blocked it out. Like the last e-mail, I deleted it and moved on. I pulled up a few online games and played until Jamie showed up at five to make breakfast. It was Tuesday, and I had class, the only ones I had to show up for: Ethical Advanced Magic, followed by the one I had to teach on counter-hexes and curses.
The Dominion had assigned Curses to me as punishment for using a lethal hex and becoming Pillar without approval of the Council. Even though it had been to save my life, the Dominion had to be seen as strict and wise. So instead of jail time or death, I got to teach a bunch of kids and would be graded on how they performed in my class.
Jamie paused in the doorway, taking in that I was awake and at the computer. “Come let me check your hands.” He looked over both bandages and made me a light breakfast of fruit-filled crepes. Sipping his coffee, he appeared to be working hard at playing casual. “Do you want to talk about yesterday?”
“No.”
The word made him suck in a deep breath, and his face shut down. “I’d like you to find a different doctor.”
“Dr. Tynsen is nice.” Even if she did get in my bubble and sometimes seemed to ignore me. Plus she’s been sort of thrust upon me by the Dominion. I didn’t think asking for a change was going to be as easy as asking.
“Why are your meetings with her taking hours now?”
I shrugged. “Working through stuff. Remembering things. That’s all.”
“Yesterday was working through a memory? Of what?” He set his cup down.
But I’d already told him I didn’t want to talk about it. “Kelly has class today too, right? Maybe he can pick me up.” And maybe Jamie would stop asking me questions I didn’t want to answer.
Jamie’s coffee cup tipped and flooded the countertop.
I raced to the paper towels but he was already there. “I got it.”
Memories of the kitchen gang rape filled my head. It hadn’t just been a dream or even a mixed-up memory. It had happened. I remembered scrubbing the countertop after it happened and it never felt clean again to me.
The pressure built in my gut, and I swallowed back bile. Jamie used a towel to soak up the brown liquid before spraying the counter to wipe it down. The counter was clean even though my brain kept showing me stains. They were in my head, maybe on my body, but not on Gabe’s immaculate counters. I counted backward, breathing and watching, making sure he cleaned the entire counter, even parts untouched by coffee.
The buzzer coming from the call box woke me out of my stupor. My whole body ached. How long had I been standing there?
“It’s Kelly,” Jamie said.
Hadn’t we talked about asking him to take me to school?
He buzzed Kelly in, and I waited for the elevator to descend while feeling Jamie’s eyes on me. “Are you going to get dressed or wear pajamas to school?” It was just after seven. Where had the time gone?
I raced to the bedroom to change while Kelly came in. His chipper voice carried through the apartment like bells at Christmastime. “I promise to abide by the Jamie Protection Protocol,” he joked. “Public appearances to a minimum, and I will walk with him between classes as much as I can.”
I threw on the first things I could find in the closet, which were just jeans and a sweater, then hurried into the living room. “Sorry.”
“No rush, Sei. We’ll get there on time.” Kelly had on his winter coat, and vaguely I recalled the temperatures were supposed to have dropped.
“Are you okay with Kelly taking me to school?” I asked Jamie.
“Weren’t you listening to anything I said? I did call him for you, and here he is.” Jamie handed me my coat, his expression a lot like Gabe’s got when he didn’t want me to know what he was feeling. “Dress warm. It’s barely two above.” He helped me put mittens over my bandaged hands and wrapped the scarf around me.
Kelly picked up my schoolbag. “Ready?” At least he looked happy to see me.
“Do you need me to pack you a lunch?” Jamie asked.
“We’ll eat on campus,” Kelly told him before I could open my mouth. And then we were off, headed to the car. We were pointed toward school before the first wave of exhaustion hit me. Kelly rambled about something.
I must have fallen asleep, since when he shook me awake, we were already parked on campus. “Are you feeling okay?”
“Haven’t been sleeping well.”
“Don’t sleep through class. Professor Wrig will never let you hear the end of it.” Kelly hoisted my bag over his shoulder. I followed him to class, where he dropped me off. “I’ll be back to pick you up for lunch.” He handed me my stuff. “Jamie wants me to follow you around, but I think you’re pretty safe on campus during the day, right?”
I nodded. The halls were too crowded for trouble. If Kelly had to find me between classes, he’d be running from building to building. That was silly. “I’ll be okay. I’ll probably be in the library.” My book-bag weighed a lot today, but maybe I’d wrenched my shoulder out of place with all my late-night flailing.
The professor approached me as I was pulling my mittens off with my teeth. “Everything all right, Mr. Rou?” Wrig asked, probably noticing the bandages. “Do you need someone to take notes for you?”
I shook my head. “I brought a digital recorder. Can I put it on your desk? My brother will help me type up notes later.” Gabe had put the recorder on top of my stuff last night, telling me it was charged and ready to go.
“Sure.”
I had to use my hands as a sort of shovel to get the recorder out, but the professor took it and placed it on her desk. It would hold up to two hours of audio.
The class went by pretty fast. The professor handed me back my recorder and actually helped me pack up my bag. She reminded me of a paper due at the end of the week and asked if I needed an extension. I had forgotten the paper. Didn’t even have a topic yet.
After promising to complete it on time, I headed to the classroom I used to teach the class the Dominion had set up as my punishment: Counter-Hexes, Curses, and Magic Nullification.
There were actually more than forty students in my class. Some of them were male, and as far as I knew, not enrolled in magic studies in general. The class was good for one elective credit, which was probably why so many had signed up. I pulled out my notebook and took my place in front of the class. “Morning, class,” I greeted.
“Morning, Mr. Rou,” half a dozen students piped up. The girls rarely talked; the guys were vocal. But everyone always seemed to be listening and taking notes.
“Can I have a volunteer to write on the board for me today?” I asked.
Sam Mueller raised his hand from his spot in the front row. He had a sort of eerie resemblance to me, being a somewhat small, Ameri-Asian male with dark hair, though his eyes were green and hair short. Like me, he was a little more on the pretty side of male rather than handsome. He was also the loud sort, but seemed to pay attention.
“Thanks, Sam.” I gestured to him to take the chalk. He got up from his seat and went to the board. “Today I’m going to be talking about nullification.” Jamie and I had created this lesson plan more than a week ago. Sam wrote nullification on the board in big letters and underlined it.
“Unlike counter-curses and hexes, nullification is not a spell. You can have an enchanted object with a nullification effect, but you can’t cast a spell to nullify something that’s already been placed on you. Can anyone tell me why?” I asked the class.
No one raised their hand. Sam’s rose next to me.
“Sam?”
“Nullification is something you are, not something you make.”
“Correct. It’s not an actionable spell. So if you have a nullified object, you can use it to counter all the magic in the room, actionable or otherwise. But the only way you can make it actionable is to throw the object or move it.” I motioned to Sam. “Write non-actionable down, please.”
He did as I’d asked.
“There is a rare exception to the rule. And that is when the spirit”—I made Sam write—“that gives us our power, like my earth ability for example, provides an individual the power of nullification.”
One of the girls in the back raised her hand.
“Alana?” I asked her.
“So instead of having an elemental power, a person is born resistant to all magic?”
I nodded, happy that they really seemed engaged today. “Correct. The Dominion believes that less than one percent of the population has the ability. Nulls are used to enter dangerously active areas to make it safe for witches to put an end to a curse or a hex. They can’t cast spells since their power negates them.”
“But you can buy nullified objects. How do they make those?” Alana asked, frowning at her notebook.
“There are some objects that come with inherent null powers. Some types of rocks or minerals and some areas of the Earth have larger containments of these properties. We use these to create nullified objects, often an amulet or a bracelet. They are not made by a person with nullification abilities.” I let them digest this.
“But if you took the blood of someone who had nullification abilities, that would be the same concept, right?” Sam asked. “I mean, can they cast off their powers at death like a regular witch by using the inheritance ceremony? Or does their power come from somewhere else that when they die, it dies with them?”
“That’s a good question,” I told him. “According to Dominion law, nulls are buried in a different place than normal witches, because their power remains with them in death. There is no way for them to ‘cast it off’. However, using another human’s remains for purposes such as creating a nullified object is against the Dominion Code.”
I’d learned a lot myself from these classes about counter-hexes and nullification. Not that any of it really would have changed the outcome of Brock’s attack. I suppose if he’d known more counter-hexes, he could have kept me from killing him, which meant he’d have killed me.
“So maybe the areas that have large null fields are because someone who was a Null died and was buried there,” Sam pointed out.
“It’s possible. We do have records dating back a few centuries about where nulls have died. Often those areas are off-limits for digging.” Though there was a good probability that a Null from a few hundred years ago could create a ground saturation that would last for a millennia or two.
“Cool.” Sam said.
“We only have two classes left. I’d like for each of you to pick a topic that we have discussed in the past few weeks and create a presentation on that topic. Remember, no magic is allowed on campus without a certified professor to oversee it. So if you’d like to use real magic, please let me know ahead of time so I can make arrangements. No more than ten minutes per presentation, and you can choose a partner, but no more than two.”
A bunch of hands rose. The clock read five minutes to the end of the hour. I put the notes sheet Jamie and I created on the edge of the desk. The assignment was listed on the bottom of it.
“The assignment sheet is up here. For those who have questions, please form a line and I will answer them as you leave.” Hopefully it didn’t take long, because the next professor to use this classroom got cranky if I was late wrapping things up. The final presentation would be in the auditorium with several Dominion members reviewing the results of my five-week teaching project.
A handful of students had quick questions that I answered, and they made their way out the door, assignment in hand. The last few lingered until the next teacher came to the door. Her frown had me stuffing everything back in my bag. I passed her in the doorway, grumbling a sorry. Sam followed me out the door.
“Can I do my presentation on Nulls?” he asked me.
I shrugged. “Sure, but it’s a very broad topic. Please pick a narrow focus to keep your presentation time to ten minutes.”
“Do I have to work with someone else?”
“No. You can work alone if that’s what you prefer.” He followed me halfway down the hall, making me more than a little nervous. Other than Kelly and a few of the instructors, no one conversed with me at school.
“What did you do to your hands?”
“I had a chemical accident in the kitchen at home,” I told him curtly, really not wanting him to follow me to the library. “Have a good day, Mr. Mueller.”
This time he took the hint and wandered off toward whatever next class he had. I made my way to the library, wishing for my fingers back to send Kelly a text message. He had classes until noon.
* * *
B y the time he arrived, I’d checked out two books and downloaded three articles on equality within the Dominion. Our assignment for EAM was to write a charter that would change something for the better. I was going to propose all children of the Dominion, female or male, should be allowed to go to witch camp. Didn’t every kid need help building self-esteem?
“Hungry yet?” Kelly asked, his easy smile brightening the day a little.
“Starving.” After last week’s exchange at the vending machine, I hadn’t ventured farther than the restroom. In fact, I sat at the tables nearest the librarian’s desk and even asked her for help more than once, since typing was pretty hard with my fingers being taped together. The stares weighed heavily on me today, but no one approached with the staff lingering so close.
Kelly packed up my bag and slung it over his shoulder. “Off campus for food, or cafeteria?”
“Off, please.”
We headed to Grand Avenue, a mecca of shopping and food, for lunch. Had to park a good three blocks away from the restaurant, Café Latte. The walk was brisk, but the cold kept me awake. We only had to wait a few minutes before being seated. I took the opportunity to browse the baked goods case. They often gave me inspiration for new things to try at home.
“The chocolate cake looks amazing.” Kelly drooled over the three-layer devil’s food monster that sat on display. The chocolate cherry torte looked about my speed.
Once we had our seats, our sandwiches, and dessert, he chatted again about some sport thing for a while before asking, “What were you working on in the library?”
“Paper for Ethics. Have to write a charter.”
“Like first-year English? I didn’t think we’d ever use that.”
“You will if you take EAM.”
He groaned, feigning dramatic angst, hand on his forehead and all. “And I’ll have to, right? Now that I’m in the magic studies program.”
I smiled and dug into my torte.
“You must be so happy you’re almost done. Any idea what you’ll do when you graduate?”
My mom had talked about me serving the Council. I didn’t think I could handle the constant sneers. “Not yet. I may go for a master’s or another degree.”
“You should go to culinary school.”
“I’d spend the whole time cleaning.” I waved my white-covered hands at him. Again I was reminded of the nightmare of the kitchen rape, but I glanced out the window to try to hide my flinch. I didn’t think there was a chance I’d ever spend another moment in an industrial kitchen.
He laughed. “True. So did you really not feel anything when it happened?”
“Just the need to clean.”
“Yeah, compulsion is like that. My psych class had a chapter on it. I think I’m going to write a paper on OCD for the final. But only if that’s okay with you.” Kelly took a big gulp of the milk he’d gotten with his cake.
“Write about whatever you want. Doesn’t bother me.”
“How did Curses go today?”
“It was okay. Gave out the final project. I hope they’ve been listening.” I offered Kelly a bite of my torte. “I don’t want anyone to fail, but also don’t want to give everyone easy A s.”
He took it and savored it for a second. “Yum. Wish I could have taken that. I bet you’d make a great teacher.” He offered some of his cake to me. I shook my head, too much flour. “But if a few of the people in the class don’t do well, that’s their fault, not yours.”
“If most of them don’t do well, it will be my fault.” And that really worried me.
“What will happen, then?”
“The Dominion will decide on another punishment for me, I suppose. At least capital punishment is off the table.” I scraped the last of the cherry topping from my plate.
“No kidding, right? You’d have to blow up a hospital or something to get that now. Even then they’d have to wait until they had another earth Pillar backup before they started the pyre. We’d all help you escape somehow,” he said seriously. “You don’t plan on blowing up any hospitals, do you? Working on any evil mastermind plots when we’re not looking?” He grinned at me. “Didn’t think so.”
I laughed. “You’re a dork.”
He pushed his plate aside. “We should go to your place and have a movie day or something. Ready to go?”
“Sure.”
We headed back to the car, stopping briefly at the Aveda next door so I could buy Gabe more of his favorite stinky shampoo. Kelly carried the bag and kept beside me so the unusually high crowds of the day couldn’t get between us.
“So have you thought about what you want to do for your birthday?” he was asking as we rounded the corner to the car. Flashing lights and the people scattered around the small alley made my heart sink. The last time I’d seen the cops descend like this, they’d arrested me for Professor Cokota’s murder.
“What the hell?” Kelly asked.
We both approached with caution. A ring of cops kept people back. But whatever had happened had begun with Kelly’s car. The sedan was crushed and smoldering. Glass littered the road, and despite the cold, cloudy day, the crowds grew with curious onlookers.
“That’s my car!” Kelly told one of the cops.
The cop paused to ask him a few quick questions. We were led off to the side by one of the buildings while one of the cops went to get whoever was in charge.
“I hope you had insurance,” I told Kelly.
“Liability only.” He sounded grim. “Work-study doesn’t pay much.”
“You can use my car.” My junker would be better than no car at all, and I couldn’t drive it. “Good thing we carried our stuff with us.” I shifted the backpack on my shoulder. Kelly’s was much smaller than mine and he had more classes. I wondered how that was fair.
A cop waved to Kelly to come over.
“Stay here,” Kelly told me. He grabbed his phone and sent a quick text. “I asked Jamie if he can pick us up. Let me go find out what the hell happened.” He moved away. I waited closer to the alleyway, near where we’d parked, to stay out of the crowd.
The spray-painted letters made the intent obvious. It read “Faggoted freaks die.” At least they could spell. I wondered if it was the same guy who had called my old phone number. If it was, it meant he was following me somehow, and now Kelly was a target too.
My phone rang. I froze, listening to the melody jingle in my coat pocket. It finally stopped, then started again. By the time I’d gotten it out of my pocket and pressed the button to answer, my hands shook with fear.
Unfamiliar number.
“Hello?” I whispered into the phone.
“Miss me yet, baby? Bet you can’t wait to see me.” Matthew’s voice came over the line strong and clear. “Your friend is cute. He can play with us too.”
My heart skipped a beat. How would the old me handle this—the guy Brock had killed in that stupid hidden room on the pier of the Mississippi? “You left me, remember? Why don’t you get a clue and move on?”
“Ah, baby. Don’t you remember how good we had it? I’d fuck you several times a day. You always begged me for more, insatiable little nymph that you were. I had to keep bringing friends to keep you happy.” Matthew sounded as calm and assertive as always. “Step back three feet, sweetheart. You wouldn’t want to get hurt now, would you?”
I sucked in a deep breath. The alley was behind me. Three feet would probably put me out of sight from most everyone standing there.
“Time’s ticking…”
Gulping, I stepped back three times, heart pounding in my chest.
“Now one to the right.”
I did as he directed. A car whipped around the corner, and a heavy popping filled the air just before screams blocked out everything else. The car sped off, leaving behind a spray of bullets. People were on the ground everywhere. I’d peered around the corner looking for Kelly. Oh, please let Kelly be okay.
“See, baby. I’m always looking out for your best interests.” The phone clicked off. I shoved it in my pocket and headed into the chaos.
Kelly tackled me halfway to his battered car. “You okay? I thought they’d hit you!” He wrapped me in a hug that almost mirrored the bone crushing Jamie could do.
“You?” I asked him, searching for blood or any damage.
He let go and shook his head, spreading his arms out to show he was okay. “The cop shoved me down just as the bullets started flying.”
The wail of several ambulances roared in the distance. Apparently not everyone had been so lucky. Kelly and I were herded to one side while the injured got attention, and everyone was questioned. By the time the cops got to us, I was shaking so bad he called for a medic. The shiver running through me was more temperature related than fear because I really just felt numb internally, kept hearing the echo of Matthew’s voice. He would had to have been watching me to tell me where to move. How close was he? I scanned the crowd, fearing I’d see him.
“Funny how these things seem to be attracted to you, Rou.” Andrew Roman’s voice interrupted my brooding.
“Come to accuse me of damaging the car and then shooting people?” I asked him. “You’ve gotta make sure all the real criminals get away, right?”
He shook his head. “It’s only a matter of time before the world sees you’re not as perfect as you pretend to be,” he said as he walked away.
“Whatever.” Perfect. What bullshit.
Kelly looked at me with a curious lift to his brow.
“He’s the vampire who wants Gabe dead.”
“But it’s light out and he didn’t look on fire to me.”
“Yeah. Go figure.”
“He’s one of the heads of the Ascendance. He never talks. Not like the others. He’s always just sort of there at the meetings.”
I shrugged. Andrew Roman was a mystery to me. He seemed so intent on equality among witches but wanted to kill Gabe for a woman who betrayed him two thousand years ago. He had to know that there was more to the story. I was glad when Kelly let the conversation fade. I really didn’t want to be on Andrew Roman’s radar any time soon.
By the time the police released us and Jamie appeared in the crowd, I’d lapsed into some sort of trance, almost napping, leaning on Kelly’s shoulder with a blanket borrowed from the medics wrapped around my shoulders.
“Are either of you hurt?” Jamie asked, sounding far away. “It took me forever to find somewhere to park. They have the streets blocked off for miles around. And no one would tell me anything.”
“My car is trashed. I don’t get it. Why vandalize my car? Is it just some sort of hate crime?” Kelly ranted.
“Who knows how crazies operate?” Jamie scooped me up, pulling the blanket off and wrapping his large jacket around me. “Sei, you okay?”
I nodded, but couldn’t look at him. Could he see the damage inside my head all over my face? Had Matthew wrecked the car? Planned the shooting? How many people had been hurt? Was this his way of showing me how he could still take control of my life? The memory of his voice in my head just kept replaying like it was on repeat.
Thinking back, I wondered how I’d ever loved him. Maybe it hadn’t even been love, rather just infatuation coupled with fear toward the first person who paid me any attention. With his return, my whole world seemed to be unraveling.
When we got back to Gabe’s apartment, he was already awake and pacing. He crossed the room in several large steps and pulled me into his arms. His breath was hot, and the dampness of his tears wet my face while he kissed me. It took a lot for a vampire to cry. It wasn’t blood like in the movies. They had real tears, but it used a lot of blood to make them so he’d need to eat again soon.
I wrapped my arms around him and whispered comforting things. Had there ever been a time when I made him worry so much? How much more could he take? Loving someone was so much work. I wondered how often Gabe regretted pushing me until I final admitted my feelings for him. He’d chased me for years only to find I was bug nuts.
“I’m going to take Kelly home,” Jamie told us, and they left.
“I’m going crazy,” I told Gabe. “Matthew called me. He told me to step into the alley behind the building before the shots were fired. He’s watching me. I keep seeing him everywhere and hearing his voice. But it can’t be real, right? It’s in my head. It has to be in my head.”
Gabe took the phone from me, found the number, and dialed. After a moment he said, “It’s blocked. I’ll have someone trace it.”
“So it’s him? It’s really him?” My gut hurt like I’d swallowed a lead weight.
“It can’t be. Matthew Pierson is dead. I checked years ago when you first told me about him.”
“Are you positive? I saw him.” He’d been at my doctor’s office. But no one else had seen him there, either. Maybe I really was going crazy. Whether from Brock’s attack or ascending to Pillar of earth, something was fucking with my head.
“Where did you see him?”
“At the doctor’s office. But then he was gone and Jamie was there.”
“Maybe it was just someone who looked like him.” Gabe went to the computer and typed in a few things. “He sounded like a pedophile, so I had to be sure he wasn’t out there hurting other kids.” He turned the computer screen toward me. I looked over his shoulder. “The stuff he did to you wasn’t love, Sei. I hope you realize that by now.”
The article was about a car crash that had killed three teens, including Matthew Pierson. The picture next to the article looked exactly like he had when I saw him yesterday. But the story was five years old. “Maybe he’s a vampire,” I whispered.
“He’s not registered with the Tri-Mega,” Gabe replied. He would have checked. He was thorough like that. “It’s hard to bring someone over on their deathbed. Not at all like the movies make it. When I looked into his past, he seemed pretty normal. Though there were dozens of reports from other boys at your old school accusing him of things that were swept under the rug. If he hadn’t already been dead, I would have made sure he was charged with anything I could find that would stick and put him away for life. But Matthew Pierson is dead.”
“And coming back to haunt me.”
“I think you’re mixing him up with Brock. Your head is so filled with guilt and grief over killing Brock—even though he deserved it—that memories of Matthew are returning. Likely because he made you feel much the same way.” Gabe gripped my hand.
“I really am going crazy.” I blinked back tears. Why couldn’t I just be normal?
Gabe wrapped his arms around me, drawing me into the warmth and comfort of his embrace. In his arms I was safe. “You’re not going crazy. I think Brock’s attack did more than harm you physically. And the power of being Pillar is more than you’re used to. The hate groups won’t let up. They don’t like change, and you represent all that is change. Someone must have heard about your past and decided to play a game. A very cruel game.” He glanced at his computer. “Who else knows about your school years? Randy maybe?”
I shook my head. I’d never told Randy, and he had come to the school after Matthew left. There had been hundreds of other guys that I’d attended with. Some who knew me, had me thanks to Matthew, but none that I was still in contact with. I wondered if most of them even remembered my name.
“I’ll do some digging,” Gabe told me. “If I pull up lists from your school for the years you registered, do you think you can tell me who you remember being involved with Matthew?”
I didn’t like the idea of reliving more memories. But I’d been doing just that lately. Endlessly. “I can try.”
Gabe’s expression said he knew how much it hurt me. “I wouldn’t ask if I thought there was another way. If this is an actual person, we need to put them to rest so we can continue slaying your emotional demons.”
Of course every time I thought I gotten a handle on something, another issue cropped up. So much for all that expensive therapy solving my troubles. “Can you call my doctor for me? See if she can come tomorrow?” I asked him. “Maybe she can explain what’s going on with me.” I gripped his hand. “Be there please. But don’t watch.” I hated the thought of letting him see me fall apart again. “I don’t want you to see me like that.”
“Sure. I can stay in the utility room for the day. It will be fine. We’ll get through this together.”
Once again, all I had was hope.
* * *
W hen Dr. Tynsen arrived the next morning, Jamie insisted on being there. He promised he’d sit in another room. Gabe had locked himself in the utility room, which was soundproof and had an escape route in case of fire. Since vampires were most vulnerable when they slept and he didn’t know the doctor, none of us were taking chances with his life. Just knowing he was close by helped keep my breath from shaking.
I took the chaise and banished Jamie to the bedroom, told him not to watch me since I was already nervous. Having to explain the hypnotism to him was hard enough. He had not been happy, but didn’t protest.
“Do you want to explore your issues with Brock again?” Dr. Tynsen asked.
“No,” I said and heard Jamie reply in kind from the bedroom. “Shush, Jamie.”
“Perhaps we should look deeper into your relationship with your mother,” the doctor suggested.
I sighed. “She’s really scary.”
“Who would be scarier if you had to face them right now? Brock or your mother?”
Matthew. But he hadn’t been an option. I had years learning how to dodge my mother. None of my recent nightmares were about her. “Brock.”
“All right. Are you comfortable?” she asked.
“Yes. You can start.” I settled firmly into the chaise, blanket wrapped around me, Gabe’s towel from drying his hair this morning in my lap. It smelled of his god-awful shampoo, and I hoped that would keep the nightmares of Matthew away. The shake in my hands hadn’t started yet, and that gave me a bit more willpower to keep pushing through all the crap. There had to be something better on the other side, right?
The memory began fairly peacefully. It was summertime. I positioned a handful of plastic soldiers in strategic places in a tree near our patio. Being among the trees or grass always made me happy. I’d always had a kinship to the Earth. And in those early days the simplest way to connect was by physically touching it. Most of my younger years were spent outside enjoying the Earth as much as possible. My mother never interfered with that, and in fact had often looked pleased when a seed I’d planted grew large and beautiful or when the trees seemed to respond to my presence. Only as I got older did the discrimination of society begin to drive a wedge into the comfort I found from the Earth.
My babysitter was a teenage girl named Rana. She was pretty in a Janis Joplin sort of way: oval face, long hair, pretty eyes. Rana was not a witch. Every witch my mother had brought to the house to look after me told me how worthless males were to the Dominion. My mother wasted her life raising me, they all said. But not Rana, who smiled and watched me from her place seated on the patio. She had a book with the picture of a man and a woman on the front. When I asked her about it, she said it was a story about people falling in love. Love was such a foreign concept I figured my soldiers would be much more exciting.
“Do you want me to read you some?” Rana asked.
“Does it have powerful guys with guns in it?”
She laughed and said, “It’s historical. It’s set in a time when there were castles and dragons, no guns. Do you like dragons?”
“They breathe fire?”
“Sometimes.”
I shrugged. “I can play and listen at the same time.”
“Okay.” She read for a while, her voice strong and clear. Though the memory of the words was vague, I remembered the story. It was about a Celtic lord who sailed a ship to steal riches from faraway lands. With the riches, he had stolen a woman. That didn’t sound very nice.
“Do people do that?”
“Steal people from their lands, you mean? Not anymore. At least not in America,” Rana replied.
“But they used to.”
“Laws keep people from doing that sort of thing now. But this is a story. Fiction, meaning it’s made up. Anna falls in love with Henrick. So it’s okay,” she informed me.
“Henrick is a terrible name for a boy. Is that him on the cover? He has long hair, why?”
“Because people long ago didn’t have barbers to cut their hair for them. In some cultures long hair was a symbol of wealth and status.”
“That sucks.” I made a face. My mom hated when my hair got long. She got downright crazy about it sometimes.
“It was also a symbol of manliness and strength. Like the biblical story of Samson,” she pointed out.
“What happened to him?”
“Some lady cut off his hair, and he lost all his strength.”
“That’s just weird.”
Rana laughed and read a little longer. My mom arrived home a little after five in the evening. She found us still on the patio. I had moved all my little soldiers to the hard concrete at Rana’s feet while she read. Henrick had just fought off an army of men who wanted to take Anna away from him. None of those men had sounded much nicer, so I figured Anna had it pretty good with Henrick.
“Good evening, Ms. Rou. Did you want me to go or make him dinner first?” Rana asked my mom.
“Go. I will take care of dinner.” My mom’s voice was oddly cold. She’d become that way more and more over the years.
Rana gathered up her things. “Bye, sweetie. See you again soon. Win some battles for me.”
I smiled at her and nodded. My mother escorted her to the door and was back in a flash. “Pick up your toys, Seiran. Come inside. I have guests arriving soon.” My mother pulled me up while I scrambled to gather all my soldiers. There were caterers moving around the kitchen and the dining room area. Was there going to be a party?
Moving my army to the stairway was better for strategy, anyway, I decided. We could see the enemy approaching. Today’s enemy was a Ken doll one of my mom’s coworkers had given me. He wasn’t much of a soldier. Soldiers didn’t smile like that. Or if they did, I never saw them like that on the cartoons. I positioned the figures around the stairs and railing so we had a good vantage point for the incoming guests and that creepy doll—which sat on the table beside the door.
I brushed hair out of my eyes and watched my mother greet a lot of strangers. Dominion. All of them. That they were witches wasn’t all that unusual. Mom had witches over all the time. These were unfamiliar witches, and they dressed funny. Like they were going to a party. My mom didn’t really have parties. She brought people over and served food on occasion, but nothing that would have needed the pearls and fancy gems these people were decked out in.
“Is that him, Tanaka?” one of them asked, glaring up at me. “Looks like a girl. You sure they got the sex right?”
“Yes, yes. He’s very pretty. Come to the dining room, have a seat. We have much to discuss over dinner.” My mother ushered them in. “Seiran,” my mom hissed at me a few minutes later, coming back to the stairway alone. “Go get something for dinner, and go to your room.”
I opened my mouth to protest that I hadn’t done anything to deserve room time, but her glare made me swallow those words. After gathering up my soldiers again, I made a sandwich for myself in the kitchen, peanut butter and potato chips, with an apple on the side. The caterers asked if I wanted something, but everything they had looked gross—aka fancy—so I declined.
I listened to the conversation while pretending to make my food really slowly. Not that they were trying to hide what they were talking about. Dominion witches were loud, like they had a hard time hearing or something.
“I don’t think you’ll find a family willing to do a betrothal. He’s far too pretty, delicate even. Any sign of power in him?” one of them asked.
“Of course not, he’s a boy,” another replied. “You should have had another child, Tanaka.”
“The Rou family comes from a very long line of powerful witches…” my mother was saying.
“We all know the power of the Rou line. We wish it hadn’t stopped with you.”
I climbed the stairs, sandwich in one hand, toys in the other, trying to hear what they said.
“I can’t have another child. That should not be news to the Council. Seiran’s birth came with a lot of complications,” my mother told them.
“You should have aborted when you knew it would be a boy. It’s sanctioned now. We made sure the law was changed almost twenty years ago.”
If my mother replied to that, I didn’t hear her. Did anyone want to know their parents wished them dead? I shut the door to my room and began to make my little battalion a home on the windowsill. At least I could still smell the trees and earth.
Several hours later, I’d already changed into my pajamas and was half asleep when my mother entered the room. She never came into my room. Not to wish me good night like the kids on TV or even wake me in the morning for school.
“Mom, what’s wrong?”
She had a scissors in her hand as she crossed the room and sat on the bed beside me. Instead of replying, she grabbed a chunk of my hair in her fist and yanked me across the bed. Pieces fell away, and she pulled and snipped tirelessly at my hair. It took only a minute or two for me to stop struggling and let her do it. I felt the heat of blood on my scalp and wiped it away when it ran down my neck.
“Why did you have to be born so pretty? Why couldn’t you be a girl?” she asked in that no-nonsense voice.
“I don’t know. I’m sorry,” I replied out of habit.
“Don’t you dare cry,” she told me as she often had before.
“I won’t, Momma,” I whispered and fought back the sniffle the pain brought. Maybe this had been what Samson had been through. No wonder he lost his power with his hair. I felt powerless too in that moment.
Less than a week later she’d enrolled me in military school. Told me I’d be like those little plastic toys that I’d always played with. She had no idea how right she’d been.
“You’ve mentioned before being imprisoned by your mother. Tell me about that,” the distant voice instructed, taking me to the memory of my senior year of high school.
I’d still been at the academy then. Matthew had vanished from my life years before, taking most of the stress of school with him. I worked hard, could run longer and faster than others, lift my own body weight, and swim miles without tiring. We were trained to follow orders, and classes were taught in a no-nonsense sort of way. I picked up information easily and was at the top of the class. That year they’d stopped enforcing the short buzz cuts we’d sported as kids, and my hair had grown around my ears for the first time in almost eight years.
“I wanted to go to school for nutrition and health sciences. I spent a lot of time researching and experimenting with my diet and workout regimes in school. It made sense to me,” I told the voice. “I felt better when I ate right and worked my body in the right way. Cardio, some weights, yoga.”
“Why not magic?”
“It wasn’t even on the radar. I’d grown up knowing—being taught—that boys couldn’t be witches. They could come from witch families and marry into witch families, but males were not witches.”
“When you told your mother, what happened?”
It hadn’t really been all that unexpected. I went home every weekend. Ran in the mornings, sometimes swam if the weather was nice, and taught myself yoga to keep some of the stiff pain out of my limbs. My mother had come into my room halfway into senior year while I was doing a yoga routine.
Stupidly, I felt that overwhelming pride of doing something right since I’d applied to the school of my choice and had been accepted. Even with a partial scholarship, I could have afforded it on my own with a decent job on the side. I felt the urge to share with her, as I never really had before. It was a niggling sense of hope that maybe she would finally be proud of something I’d done since I would no longer be a burden to her.
“I got my acceptance letter today. They are reviewing my information for possible scholarships,” I told her.
My mother looked shocked. “For where? Studying what?”
“Metro. I’ll be studying health sciences. Fitness, nutrition, overall health.”
“No.”
I blinked at her, not understanding what she was saying. “I’ve already been accepted.”
“You will apply for the University of Minnesota as an earth magic major.”
“Only girls can do that. They won’t even let me test.”
“They will, and you will.”
“Mom, I want to do fitness stuff. I’m not a kid anymore. This is my choice.”
“Pointless. I’m not going to debate this with you, Seiran. You are a Rou. You will study earth magic,” she told me. I watched her leave the room with an angry set to her shoulders I knew meant trouble.
“How did she get you into the white room?” the voice asked again.
“Drugged me. I had a chai mix I kept in the fridge for on the weekends when I was home. I drank it three times a day like clockwork. Bang, that night I passed out and later awoke strapped to that damn gurney.” The memory still made me shudder. I could smell the stink of days and the gnawing hunger. I also never drank chai again.
The pain from being separated from the Earth had been almost unbearable. Thankfully, I’d been released before the new moon. But I’d spent nearly three weeks in that room.
“Sounds like she planned ahead. Not many have a gurney, a spare room, or drugs to get a child to cooperate,” the doctor pointed out.
I’d never thought about it, but that was certainly true. “I’d always followed her rules. I don’t know why she would have expected otherwise.”
“Maybe she had it prepared for someone else.”
Like who? I had no siblings. She was never involved in any relationships I saw. “I don’t know.”
“Yet you believe she will someday kill you.”
“Yeah. When she’s done with me.”
“What do you have to offer her now? Someone is having your baby, right? And you’ve kept the honor of the Rou name because you’re now earth Pillar.”
“I don’t know. Now she’s probably too worried about what would happen if I died. Like a major earthquake or something. Gabe won’t let her kill me. He promised. He loves me.”
“Does he have the power to stop the Dominion?”
“He’s a very strong vampire.”
“All vampires are strong, Seiran. But not stronger than the Dominion.”
But she didn’t know Gabe. He’d flee with me to the ends of the earth if I asked him to. I sighed and let thoughts of him calm me. For all my fear and head tripping, he really did stick with me. Maybe the sex portion didn’t matter so much. We had plenty of other ways to get off.
“Count backward from one hundred.” And we counted together until the subtle gray walls came back into focus. “Someone called. Your brother left. He put a note for you on the counter.”
I felt pretty groggy again but tried to get up to retrieve the note. Hopefully, nothing bad had happened. Jamie had been pretty insistent on staying here today while the doctor was here even though Gabe was ten feet away. I had the key to his hideaway in my left sock just in case I needed it. When I got to my feet, a sudden case of vertigo rolled through me and had to sit down again.
“Are you all right?” Dr. Tynsen asked.
“Yeah, just dizzy,” I told her.
She reached across the counter and handed me the note. “Sometimes when you go deep into your psyche, it can cause a head rush like that. Relax for a few minutes and you’ll be fine.” She packed up her bag. “How are your encounters with Gabe going?”
I sighed. “No change.”
“It’s early yet.” She patted me on the back. “Don’t push yourself too hard. It takes time to get through these things.”
But I didn’t want it to take time. Didn’t understand what was wrong with me anyway. Sex had always been a hobby for me. I enjoyed anal probably more than most. It felt good. Something just kept turning on that filter in my brain that said “pain is coming, prepare.”
“I can stop by again later this week if you need, though you have met the time required by the Dominion.” Dr. Tynsen picked up her bag and headed for the door.
“I’ll call. Maybe we’ll do a normal session, work on that list more,” I promised her. If she could help me get better, I had to keep trying.
“Call me whenever you need” was the last thing she said before she left.
I opened the note from Jamie. It read:
Went to get Kelly, be back soon.
Why? It was Wednesday. Kelly usually had class all day. I dug out my tape recorder and sat on the chaise, listening to it. Maybe sleep wasn’t finding me at night because I kept dozing during the day. The voice of Professor Wrig put me to sleep less than a third of the way through her lecture.
“Come to me, baby.” I heard the voice but didn’t feel strong enough to rouse. “Come to me. I’m waiting.” It sounded vaguely like Matthew. The sudden thought made me pop my eyes open in a hurry. But the apartment was empty. The elevator dinged. My heart beat terribly fast waiting for it to descend.
The door slid opened. Jamie and Kelly stepped out, making me sigh in relief.
“Doctor left already?” Jamie asked me.
“Yeah.” I clicked off the recorder and slid to the end of the chaise. “Can you rewrap my hands? They feel funny.”
“Sure. Come sit at the counter. You too, Kelly,” Jamie instructed as he went to retrieve his first aid kit.
I looked up at Kelly and realized he was trying to hide a black eye and split lip. “What happened?”
He shook his head. “Nothing.”
“Some asshole at school decided to use him as a punching bag,” Jamie told me, his tone of voice saying he’d like to kill the aforementioned.
“Didn’t the teachers do anything?” How many times had I experienced something similar only to have teachers look the other way? “Did you hit him back?”
Kelly laughed and showed me his scraped-up hands. “Yes. Trust me. I hit back. What I don’t get is that he asked me to meet him there. Like a date or something. It didn’t seem malicious until he started hitting me.”
Hearing him recount events eerily similar to several attacks on me my freshman year made me want to wrap my arms around him, pack up Jamie and Gabe, and fly to somewhere where there were no people. “You probably shouldn’t date anyone from school now that you’re ‘out’ as a witch,” I warned him.
“People did crap like this to you too?” Kelly asked.
“Yes.”
“Well, shit.”
I totally agreed.