MESSAGES FROM THE MESSENGER

The explosion in Chicago was on every channel. It didn’t matter whether she flipped from CNN to ABC, there was the same live image: smoke rising into the sky, and an enormous pile of wreckage on the corner of a block. It was a mess of crumbled rock and steel girders, dust and flashing red and yellow lights from fire trucks and rescue crews. Some of the neighboring buildings had been hit too, and wore dangerous-looking cracks snaking up their sides. Before the bomb it had been a small, restored warehouse, converted to house a consultancy of some kind. No one was sure yet how many had died. Estimates varied wildly from twenty to several dozen, depending on the network. There were other casualties too: people who had been walking on the sidewalk or driving past. There were surprisingly few injuries. It killed you, or it left you alone.

“It’s terrible,” Cassandra’s father said. He and her mother had been watching the coverage since he’d come home from work. The smoke reflected in his eyeglasses and was made tiny. “It’s going to cost the city a hell of a lot to rebuild.” He shook his head and sighed. That’s what the world is coming to, the sigh said.

“Who would do that?” her mother asked. Reporters cried terrorism but were having a hard time pulling together a motive, and the only groups who had come forward to claim responsibility were the ones who came forward to claim responsibility for everything. One program suggested the consultancy was actually a high-end escort service. That at least would make it a more likely target.

Cassandra sat on the couch beside Henry and stared at the screen. She hated it. Hated everything about it, and whoever had done it. The feeling coursed through her like liquid metal; she felt it in her wrists. Hate. Frustration. Every time a reporter named groups who might be responsible, she wanted to scream. They’d done that. Dying gods. Aidan’s malignant family. They’d done it on their way to her.

“If it turns out it was a brothel, this news coverage is going to get a whole lot uglier.”

“Why?” Cassandra snapped. “Are the reporters going to start saying that they deserved it? That they deserved to get blown into a million pieces, because they were whores?”

“Cassandra!” Her parents looked at her, mouths open as she stalked out of the den and headed for the backyard. The smell of meatloaf in the oven made her want to break a window. It was so domestic and unaffected. Business as usual. When she burst into the backyard, she almost hit Henry in the face with the door as he followed with her jacket.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey, what?” He didn’t try to touch her as she paced, just tossed her the jacket and let her walk it off, watching as the rage leaked out through her feet and through the steam of her breath in the cold air.

“There were no words. No names. No sense of place. Not even the weather. I didn’t know where it was.”

“There wasn’t anything you could do.”

She slowed. “Then why did I see it? What’s the point?”

“Maybe there is no point. You just know things, and they just happen. That’s how it’s always been.”

“Henry, that is so not good enough.” And it wasn’t right, either. Something was coming, just around the bend. She felt it, an odd sense of increasing, like the world starting to spin faster.

“You’d better get back in there and tell Mom you’re okay,” said Henry. “She’s been asking if something’s up with you.”

“I know, I know. I should eat meatloaf and smile. Talk about school.” Cassandra took a breath. The itchy feeling in her wrists was gone. Only vague tiredness remained.

“Well, yeah. That’s what Aidan said, right? Act normal.”

Act normal. Don’t make waves or trip anyone’s radar. He seemed so silly, suddenly, thinking that they could hide. Thinking there was any way around what was going to happen.

“Would you tell Mom and Dad I’m going over to eat at Aidan’s?” she asked. “Tell them we had a fight or something, and that’s why I flipped. Do you think they’ll mind?”

“I think Dad’ll be thrilled. He’s been waiting for you two to fight for a year.”

* * *

Aidan lived in a two-story house on Red Oak Lane. It was less than a half mile from Cassandra’s. The wind cut through her jacket as she stood out front, urging her to walk up the driveway with cold fingers against her back. Inside, Aidan stood in the dining room, clearing the table and talking to his mom.

His adopted mom. His mom who is nothing close to his mom.

She watched the way they talked, easily and always smiling. Gloria Baxter was a petite woman with narrow hips. She wore corduroy pants in different colors and kept her hair dyed golden blond, the same shade as her adopted son. She worked as a bookkeeper for a lawyer’s office in town, and Cassandra had known her longer than she’d known Aidan.

Gloria put her hand on Aidan’s shoulder and kissed his cheek. He said something that made her laugh. It looked so natural. She’d seen them act that way countless times. She’d seen them argue too. All of those exchanges flickered through her mind as she watched this one. It was all playacting. None of it was real.

Aidan saw her through the window and waved. Gloria turned and waved too, and moments later, Aidan walked her up the driveway to the door. Inside smelled like marinara sauce and Parmesan cheese; the kitchen and dining room windows were still slightly fogged from the steam of boiling water.

“Hi, Cassandra.” Gloria smiled. “You just missed Aidan’s spaghetti. But there are plenty of leftovers. Are you hungry?”

“There really is a lot left,” said Aidan. “Too much for my dad to eat.”

“No, thanks.” Cassandra smiled a little weakly. Aidan slipped his hand beneath her hair onto the back of her neck.

“You okay with dishes, Mom?” he asked.

“Sure. You cooked.”

Aidan led Cassandra up the carpeted stairs to his bedroom and closed the door behind them.

“Hey,” Aidan said. “I saw the way you were watching us.”

“I don’t know what you mean.” She skinned out of her jacket and tossed it on the bed.

“Sure you do. And I get it. But she is my mom, Cassandra. She didn’t raise me, but I love her just the same.”

Cassandra nodded. Just the same. What did he know? But he had lived a hundred lives. He might have had a hundred parents. So maybe he did know. Maybe he knew even better than she did.

She looked around the room like she’d never been there before. The green quilt on Aidan’s bed always smelled like Tide. His laptop sat closed on his desk, the top covered with stickers. Some of them were ones she’d given him. On the back of the door hung a vintage movie poster for Vertigo. Beside it on the wall was one of Radiohead and, next to that, a closet full of hooded sweatshirts. She gestured to the movie poster.

“You always did like vintage stuff.”

He nodded.

“Were you there for the filming? Spend a lot of time with Hitchcock?”

“Cassandra.”

“Or maybe you hung out with The Doors.” She looked over her shoulder at a poster of Jim Morrison. “Any of their songs about you?”

“Don’t do that. If you want to know anything about who I was, I’ll tell you.”

“Not about who you were. About who you are. I’m trying really hard not to feel like this room is one big prop. Even the messiness.” She toed a pile of dirty clothes lying by the foot of the bed. “It all feels very … quintessential teenager.”

“You still know me, Cassandra.”

“I know. I know you, and I don’t.” This was shaky ground. Until very recently, she’d thought her life was only just a little strange. Aidan sat on the bed and touched her cheek. He pushed his fingers into her hair. The feel of his hands was so familiar. How many times had he laid her back on this bed? How many times had he told her he loved her? She didn’t want anything to change. No matter how strange it was, he still made her feel so safe.

“I’m sorry I lied. But I think you can see why I would.”

“Would you ever have told me, if this hadn’t started happening?”

“Well, I would have had to, I guess. In about twenty years when I still wasn’t ageing.”

Cassandra smirked and pushed him. “Jerk.”

“I’m sorry! I don’t know when I would have told you. I was scared to.” He looked away, shoulders slumped. “I didn’t want you to look at me the way you’re looking at me now.”

Cassandra frowned. He was still Aidan. He’d never been anything different than what he was. She just hadn’t known. And she did understand why he would lie. It wasn’t the sort of thing you printed up on a t-shirt. There wasn’t really anything to forgive. “I just … have to get used to it.”

“Okay.” He nodded. “What about Andie and Henry? Will they get used to it?”

Andie and Henry. They talked to him, but with strange looks on their faces. Sometimes there was so much sheer concentration on Henry’s face, she thought he was going to pop something.

“I think so.”

“What? What are you thinking?”

“I’m just wondering, about my—” She gestured toward her head.

“Your prophecy?”

“Yeah.”

“What about it?”

She hesitated. “Do you … Do you know anything more about it? Why it’s there?”

Aidan smiled. “No. I just like it, that’s all. It makes you special. And don’t ask if it’s the only thing that makes you special. You know it’s not.”

“It’s just—you’ve always been so proud of it—”

“I haven’t been proud of it. I’ve been proud of you.”

She blinked. He’d cut her off so fast, almost like he was offended. “It’s just brought up a lot of questions. About everything.” Her teeth clenched. “And I don’t want you to be proud of it anymore. It’s a curse. That’s all it ever has been.” She stared at him, hard. She shouldn’t feel guilty for saying that. Even if his face looked like she’d just broken his favorite toy.

“Okay. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. Just promise that this is the only secret you have. You’re not also a secret agent, or married, or actually my great-great-grandfather.”

He looked into her eyes. “I promise.”

* * *

Blood coated the entire chest and collar of her shirt. It came from a gaping wound that wrapped around her neck in a grotesque second mouth. Blood spilled out from it, running in thick drops over her white button-up and down the front of the maroon waist-apron that had been part of her uniform at the Java Joint coffee house that summer.

Cassandra stared into the mirror at her dead reflection. Her face was powdered pale to the point of being tinged blue. She touched her hair and her fingers stuck to it and came away streaked with red.

“I told you I didn’t want a head wound.”

“Don’t whine,” Andie said from behind her. “It’ll dry, and it’ll all wash out.” Andie fussed at the blood and squirted more of it into Cassandra’s hair, then down the front of herself. The two-ounce squeeze bottle of FX blood was almost empty. About time too. They were already late to Sam’s annual Halloween party.

“Do my guts look okay?”

Cassandra turned. Andie wore a dark blue corseted dress. A pile of intestines and other inner organs lay across her lower midsection. She’d squirted some of the fake blood over the top of it and smeared it around so it looked sickly real. She was dressed as Mary Kelly, the last prostitute dissected by Jack the Ripper.

“I think they still look like rubber.” Andie sighed and tugged at the edges of her dress, trying to make it seem like the intestines were coming from inside, rather than lying on top.

“They look good.” Cassandra wiped blood spatters from the sink with one of the dye-stained towels they used when they tried to put highlights in their hair. Mary Kelly was supposed to have been her costume, but she didn’t have the stomach for so much intestine. It was gross, even on Andie. And all the makeup had a sour, faintly medicinal smell. It was weaker than the smell inside of a rubber mask, but worse, because you couldn’t take it off to get away for a minute.

“I don’t know why we couldn’t have just gotten the Slutty Bo Peep and Slutty Cleopatra costumes like I wanted.”

“Because Halloween is for guts. It’s not a fricken Victoria’s Secret audition.”

“This from someone whose dress is pushing her cleavage up into her chin. You’re not historically accurate, you know. I’m pretty sure when they found Mary Kelly, Jack had sliced both of her boobs off.”

Andie looked horrified. “Sick.”

“Well, yeah. He was Jack the Ripper.”

Aidan was going to the party as Jack. He and Cassandra were supposed to be a matched set, but the costume fit Andie just as well. Cassandra glanced at her friend’s corset. Truthfully, Andie had a little bit more up front to fill it out. A knock on the door preceded Henry’s head, clad in a pirate hat.

“What’s taking so long? Aidan’s downstairs already, and if we don’t leave soon we’ll have to walk for blocks.”

“What are you supposed to be?” Andie asked. Henry gave her a look, and so did the stuffed parrot on his shoulder.

“I don’t know what’s going to scare people more,” he said lightly. “Those guts, or the sight of you in a dress.” He ducked out the door just in time to avoid a spray of blood. Cassandra wiped it from the wood.

“Cheer up,” Andie said. “Sam’s Halloween parties are legendary.” Cassandra didn’t know what was so legendary about fog from dry ice and punch with spiders floating in it, but there was always a DJ and an impressive array of food that might or might not be a prank in disguise. And Andie’s expression was so hopeful. Cassandra smiled.

“You are going to surprise a few people in that dress.”

Andie tried to squirt her, but the bottle of blood was empty.

Aidan and Henry waited in the entryway, talking to Cassandra’s mother, who was dressed as an enormous yellow canary. She was Tweety Bird, complete with orange tights and huge orange feet. Her parents were going to a Halloween party of their own, something thrown by the higher-ups at her dad’s marketing firm. Somewhere in the house, a man-sized Sylvester the Cat was lurking.

“Oh.” Cassandra’s mother smiled, her face coming out of the bird’s mouth. “You girls look disgusting.”

“Thanks, Maureen,” said Andie.

“It’s my handiwork,” said Aidan. He wore a long black cape and top hat. A long-bladed fake knife was tucked into his vest.

“You kids are pretty sick,” Maureen said. “Here. Have some Snickers and Milky Ways before you go.” She reached for a Tupperware megabowl filled with fun-sized candy bars. The contents had already dwindled; most of the neighborhood kids had been through earlier that evening, ringing the doorbell in packs of witches and superheroes.

They grabbed their candy and headed for the door. On the way out, Cassandra’s mother caught her arm and whispered, “I’m glad you and Aidan made up.”

“Me too.” Cassandra smiled.

“Have fun. And be careful.” She watched them through the window until they pulled out of the driveway in Henry’s Mustang, then let the curtain drop.

* * *

“For a scrub in a stocking cap, Sam has a really nice house.” Andie whistled through her teeth. Sam’s house was a gigantic stone monstrosity that was basically a mansion. It sat at the top of a pine-covered hill, near the end of a winding street lined with similar stone beast houses. The curve of the horseshoe driveway was already packed with cars and more were parked along the curb. Henry muttered “I told you so” and hunted for an empty space. When he tried to parallel park between two SUVs, he misjudged the distance and braked hard. Andie jerked forward in the passenger seat.

“Watch it. You’re going to wrinkle my intestines.”

“If you hadn’t taken so long with those stupid things, we’d have been able to park in the driveway.”

“And if you had your eyes on the road and not on my décolletage, you wouldn’t be trying to park in a space that’s too small.”

Henry blushed. “Just don’t get any of that stupid blood on the seat.”

They found a space and walked. It was cold, and they weren’t wearing coats. The temp had dropped down below freezing and it was threatening to snow. Andie shivered as she tugged at her rubber innards, but she had to be less cold than Kjirsten Miels and Leslie Denton, who ran past dressed as some kind of risqué fairies with yards of exposed skin. As they approached the house, the music pumped bass through the frozen lawn, and screams from cheap scares drifted through the brick. Andie tucked a curl of intestine behind a lobe of plastic liver and knocked on the door. Sam swung it wide, dressed as the Headless Horseman. He had a black stick horse under his arm, and the bloody stump of his neck glistened wetly above his head. He looked them over and his eyes widened.

“Boobs, Andie!”

“Shut up, Sam. You should’ve put your stocking cap on your stump. You look weird without it.” He laughed and let them pass. Something was said to Henry about having a peg leg in his pocket or just being happy to see her, but Andie and Cassandra pretended to not hear.

Sam put an arm around each of them and pointed to the food, the drinks, the DJ. Cassandra looked over her shoulder at Aidan just as the door closed and thought she saw something move in the driveway, a flash of something between a maroon Explorer and a tan Malibu. Aidan caught her eye and smiled. She smiled back and let Sam lead them through the foyer.

The temperature change inside the house was extreme. The proliferation of bodies had heated the rooms far more than the thermostat intended. It felt oddly like walking into their overheated school.

“There’s the punch,” Sam said, preparing to leave them in the kitchen. “If you want anything spiked, let me know.” He mounted his stick horse and spun away.

Andie went to the punch bowl and filled a plastic cup while Cassandra looked suspiciously at a bowl of some kind of pasta salad.

“Think it’s a prank?”

“Yes, I think it’s a prank. Who has pasta salad at a Halloween party? Stick to prepackaged foods.”

Another pirate spotted Henry and yelled. There was a small group of them dressed that way, all eye patches, peg legs, and gold teeth. Beneath the makeup, Cassandra recognized some of the varsity players. Henry waved but didn’t leave.

“You don’t have to stay glued to me all night,” Cassandra said.

Henry glanced at Aidan and smiled. “I’ll be back in a bit.”

Cassandra took a deep breath and chewed on a cracker. The kitchen smelled like pizza; three boxes sat on the table. Cassandra went to grab a slice of Canadian bacon and caught a whiff of alcohol. A puddle of something clear dripped onto the floor. She mopped it up with a napkin and sniffed. Vodka.

“Hey, Cassandra.”

“Hey, Megan. Careful, something spilled.” She grabbed the girl’s shoulder when she slid. Megan’s costume was Slutty Bo Peep, her blond hair in pigtails and a cotton bonnet on her head. She used her sheepherding cane to prop herself up and took a slice of pizza.

“I really need to eat something, or I’m going to pass out. Can you hold my sheep?” She handed off the small inflated animal, blue eyes painted onto white plastic. Then she picked up a napkin and walked off, forgetting her livestock entirely. Cassandra set it on the table.

“How can she be that drunk already?” Aidan asked, watching her wobble back to the dance floor.

“How could I have suggested Andie buy that Bo Peep outfit?”

Aidan shrugged. “It would’ve looked nice on you.” He wrapped his cape around her shoulders and stole a bite of pizza.

Getting to the party late was a good idea. They’d missed the awkward start-up, when only a few people were there and the music echoed through the space. Now it was packed, and people danced and crowded the furniture. Not a single chair or sofa arm was unoccupied and the noise stuffed itself into their ears: cackled laughter and constant conversations weaved through the beat of music. It seemed like everyone had come in costume; there were so many masks and layers of makeup it was hard to tell who was who. Girls were mostly flash and glitter, lipstick and sequins. At least five wore fishnet stockings.

Andie stood surrounded by girls from her hockey team. They pulled her toward the back of the house and up the stairs, where Sam had set up a haunted house.

“Aidan! Cassandra! You coming?” She gestured up the stairs.

Cassandra waved her off. Maybe later. Though the haunted portion of the house probably wouldn’t exist later. Whoever was doing the scaring upstairs would get bored, and people would start using the dark rooms to make out.

There was an odd synchronicity to her thoughts as a giant human condom passed by en route to the punch bowl. Cassandra laughed.

“What?”

“Nothing. Giant human condom made me laugh.”

Aidan grinned and watched the condom walk away. It was basically a huge square of gold foil with legs.

“I’m glad we came. I missed the sound of you laughing.” He put his hands around her waist and pulled her close.

Color rose into her cheeks, visible even beneath the smear of white makeup. She swallowed. Being touched by him was different now, even if she didn’t want to admit it. The heat in his hands, and the strength, made her heart pound. He kissed her and she forgot where she was and wrapped her arms around him. He lifted her like she weighed nothing. When her feet hit the floor it took an extra second for her brain to catch up.

It’s like he’s never touched me before. Like he was holding back the whole time. And now everything’s different.

“That was hot.”

They looked across the table. Megan stared at them with wide eyes. “Sorry. Forgot my sheep.”

Cassandra giggled into Aidan’s shoulder. “Let’s just … go find Andie.”

* * *

Somehow they managed to snag a corner of sofa in the living room, far enough away from the DJ that they could carry on a conversation. Andie sat on the arm, careful to keep her bloody entrails off of the leather, in case it would stain. A few feet in front of them, the Quentin twins showed off their new matching tattoos. The pulled-down sleeves of their costumes revealed twisting black tribal marks. Amy’s was on her right shoulder, and Angie’s on her left. Standing face-to-face in identical clothing, they were like mirror images.

“They only dress the same on Halloween,” Andie mused. “It’s weird. I wonder if they have a secret twin language.”

“Not every set of twins has weird secret twin languages,” said Aidan. “Artemis and I didn’t. Though I could read her mind sometimes.” He paused and looked down. Andie blinked and basically ignored him. Cassandra squeezed his hand. One day it wouldn’t hurt to talk about Artemis. Or maybe it always would.

Andie went back to studying the tattoos.

“Twin symmetry aside, it’s sort of cool looking. Not something I’d get, though. I don’t think I could get a tattoo. It’d be there forever unless I sprang for the laser treatments. And I hear those hurt like a bitch.”

Cassandra nodded and watched a bunch of werewolves ogle Andie’s chest from across the room. There was no shortage of skin for their eyes to feast on, but Andie’s skin was a surprise. Even Sam had stopped by more than once to put an arm around her and tell her something or other.

“Hey,” Cassandra said. “Boys are staring.”

Andie scowled. “Hey! I’m a murder victim.” She pointed to her exposed guts. The wolf howled and his friends laughed. “Perverts. What kind of sicko gets turned on by a dead girl? I’m going to find your brother.”

Andie walked away, bobbing and dodging through groups of people and dancing bodies. The way some of them were gyrating, you’d think they were trying to turn the party into a bacchanal. Cassandra’s mind slid back to Aidan and the kiss they’d had in the kitchen. She turned and whispered in his ear.

“I think it’s time we checked out the haunted house.”

He smiled, and the heat from his body jumped. “Follow me upstairs in a few minutes.” When he got up, his fingers trailed along her leg.

Take a breath. This is bordering on unhealthy.

With Aidan gone, she looked around and tried to be inconspicuous. In the corner of her eye, someone sat in a porcelain mask, dark eyes watching her through the cutouts. But when she turned, there was no one there. Cassandra blinked.

Probably just my imagination.

Everyone seemed to be caught up in their own conversations, and no one had asked her to do the coin trick yet, which was nice. She wasn’t in the mood.

How long had it been since Aidan had left? Long enough to go after him? There weren’t any clocks on the walls and she hadn’t checked her phone for the time. She stood and walked toward the hallway. More than likely she’d stumble into the wrong dark room and get yelled at by some couple. Or she’d open a door and have a skeleton jump up and rattle in her face.

The music changed to some song that sounded like a remix of My Morning Jacket. The closer she got to the music, the more people shouted to be heard, and through the crowd she saw Henry’s face rise up over the other faces like the dorsal fin of a shark. She veered away toward the stairs, so he wouldn’t see her sneaking off to meet Aidan. But then he also didn’t see someone grab her from behind and pull her through an open door. Her yelp of surprise was drowned out by laughter and music, which itself was muted when the door closed in front of her.

“Shh,” a male voice said into her ear. “And don’t struggle or you’ll fall down the stairs.”

She looked down. Her feet balanced precariously on a stone staircase leading to the basement. The light where they were was dim and yellow, thrown from a single blurry bulb. It smelled like stone and was kept cool enough to make her arms prickle. After the heat upstairs, it felt almost good.

“What are you doing?” she asked. It was the first thing she thought to say. After the initial surprise of being grabbed, her heart began to thump its way back to normal. She was at Sam’s house, at a party. Someone had grabbed her to play a prank or something. It was probably someone she knew.

Except it isn’t. The strength in these fingers is like the strength in Aidan’s fingers.

But it wasn’t Aidan. If it was, she wouldn’t still be tense, ready to grasp the railing should whoever it was decide to throw her down the steps like she was a pile of rags.

“I’m not doing anything. Just making introductions.” His grip loosened, and she twisted to look behind her. She found herself staring into a white harlequin mask, the cheek painted with gold glitter tears. Green and purple feathers adorned the head. It was something you’d see at Mardi Gras, or Carnival in Rio.

“You were watching me,” she said. The eyes behind the mask regarded her without blinking. She didn’t recognize them. When they swept up and down her body, the movement was unnaturally quick, curious. “What? What are you looking at?”

“I’m not sure. To be honest, you aren’t quite what I expected. I thought you’d be taller. Or that you’d be sparkling.” He smiled, revealing beautiful white teeth. The movement highlighted the gauntness of his face. His clothes were slightly loose and the mask was the only costume piece he wore. The rest of him was clad in jeans and a navy-blue t-shirt.

“Who are you?”

He leaned close, gave her a sniff. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. Or maybe you would. Odysseus did.”

When the door opened behind them, his hands were on her faster than she could blink. He drew her down the stairs until he hit the wall at the bottom. Glass clinked and rattled. He’d run up against a rack of wine bottles. More bottles lined the walls of the small room to their left. They were in a wine cellar.

Aidan stood on the stairs above them; the cape of his costume swayed against his knees.

“Let go of her.” The way he said it left no question that he knew who he was talking to. The grip on her shoulders tightened slightly, but a soft bark of laughter shot past her ear.

“Look at you. I don’t believe it.”

“Shut up. Let her go.”

He did, and backed down the stairs, farther into the cellar. Cassandra found herself farther inside too when Aidan walked forward. The staircase was narrow and didn’t allow room for her to pass. The boy who’d grabbed her still smiled, and he reached up to push the mask off his face.

Cassandra looked from one to the other. The stranger was thinner, and his hair was chestnut brown, but the bone structure of his face and the shape of his eyes were the same. Even the way they stood. They could have been brothers.

They are brothers. They’re family. This is Aidan’s real family.

Aidan held his hand out and drew her toward him, putting himself between her and the stranger. A ripple of fear coursed down her spine and she tugged on his hand. They should run. Whoever he was, he was dangerous, even if he did look like he hadn’t eaten in weeks.

“Get out of here, Hermes,” said Aidan.

“Hermes?” He smiled. “So she does know. That’s excellent. Big sister will be very pleased.”

“Who’s ‘big sister’?” Cassandra asked. She stepped out from behind Aidan. Their voices rang loud against the stone walls. The slightest shuffling of her feet was loud, even over the muffled music coming through the cellar door.

“Don’t talk to him, Cassandra,” Aidan whispered. “Please don’t.”

Hermes looked from one to the other, eyes narrowing. “You haven’t just gotten here. You haven’t been looking for her like we have. What are you doing?”

“Shut up, Hermes!”

“You’ve been living here. Like one of them.” His eyes traveled over Aidan. “And you look so healthy.”

“You don’t. And I gather that she doesn’t either.”

“She looks good. Sturdy. Just like always.”

Aidan smiled. “Jumping to her defense? She must be worse off than I thought.”

“That smile. There’s the Apollo I remember. Cocky and vain.”

Cassandra held her breath as the two verbally circled. The wine cellar felt tighter by the minute. Beside her, Aidan seemed taller suddenly. Stronger.

“Cocky and vain. And stronger than you.”

Hermes shrugged. “It was a mistake to grab her; I see that now. Athena told me not to. She warned me. Stay back.” He jerked backward as Aidan leaned forward. “Tsk, tsk. If I get my limbs torn off now, I’ll never hear the end of it.” He took another hasty step backward and knocked against the bottles. Glass rattled like a nervous titter running through a crowd. “I was just saying hello.” His eyes darted to the staircase.

“You should have stayed away.”

“Do you know what’s happening? You should be glad I got here first.”

Cassandra grasped Aidan’s arm. “Wait. He knows what’s going on?” Aidan shook her off like he hadn’t heard. “Aidan.”

Hermes’ brows knit. “Aidan?” He grinned. “It’s nice. I like it. And I can see that you love the girl, so I’ll be on my way.”

“And you’ll never come back?” Aidan’s arm shot out and grasped a bottle by the neck, then dashed it against the wall. Red liquid and green glass exploded and splashed onto the floor; the sharp smell of alcohol flooded the air. He still held the neck of the bottle; the jagged edge dripped wine.

Adrenaline went through Cassandra like a gunshot. He was going to kill him, or at least try. “Aidan—”

“Go upstairs, okay? Find Andie and your brother. Take them home.” He edged her out of the way.

She looked at the glass in his hand. “No.”

Hermes had lost all traces of levity. He stared at Apollo with dread and more than a little exhaustion.

“Are you choosing sides?” he asked.

“There are no sides,” Aidan replied. “Not for me. There’s only her.” The shard of glass twisted in his grip.

“What’re you going to do with that?”

“I’m going to slice you open. Bleed you out onto the cement. That ought to slow you down for awhile.”

Hermes’ mouth opened and closed. “I can see that nothing I say is going to matter. Whoever you are, you’re not the brother I hoped for. No ally. Nothing but a traitor.” He looked at Aidan with disgust. “And from the look of it, you’re not even dying.”

Light flashed on the glass in Aidan’s hand. “Maybe I am. Come closer and find out.”

Hermes glanced toward the door and Cassandra nodded slightly.

Go. Get out of here before you ruin everything.

He smiled. “Uh-uh. It’s been a few thousand years, but if I remember correctly, I’m no match for you on my own.” He looked at the sharp glass. “If I come any closer, most of my spleen is going to end up skewered on the end of that bottle. I can almost feel it already, sliding into my guts. No thank you.” He looked at Cassandra. “Sorry, sweetheart. You’re sort of a pretty girl, very nice I’m sure. You’ll forgive me for this later.”

Hermes pulled a wine bottle from the wall and threw it at her head. Cassandra screamed, but Aidan jumped in front of her and caught it. It gave Hermes just enough time to rush past them and leap over the railing onto the stairs.

“Big sister’s on her way,” he said. “I’m going to love watching you explain this to her.”

Aidan growled and leapt for him. The tip of the broken bottle sliced through the back of Hermes’ shirt and into the skin but went no farther. He was out of the cellar and fleeing before Aidan even regained his balance.

Aidan ran up the stairs and out into the party.

“Aidan!” Cassandra shouted. She vaulted up the stairs and caught him at the open front door, staring into the night. “Don’t!”

He looked at her frightened face and dropped the bloody shard of bottle, then pulled her close.

“Are you all right? Did he hurt you?”

“No.” She shook her head, and he felt her arms and down her back. “But he was one of them, wasn’t he? One of you. Where is he?”

“The fast-footed prick is probably a half mile away by now.”

She glanced over his shoulder. Andie and Henry had heard her yell; they were coming through the crowd, their faces concerned.

“I have to go after him,” he said.

“No.”

“I’m stronger than he is. I promise.”

“What about your sister? The big one he talked about.”

“I’m stronger than her too.”

She narrowed her eyes.

“Come on. It might not be a lie. She’s dying, after all.” He kissed her quickly and ran out the door, black cape flying ridiculously behind him.

“Hey.” Sam poked his head out beside her. “What’s up? Where’s he going to so fast?”

“Family emergency,” said Cassandra, and walked down the front steps with Andie and Henry not far behind.

* * *

Andie snored. It was loud on a regular night, worse after having her lungs shoved into a corset for three hours. She slept in Cassandra’s bed while Cassandra lay on the floor in a sleeping bag, watching the pale light from the bulb over the driveway basketball court float up through her window. The dull thud of a rubber ball hitting pavement assured her that Henry couldn’t sleep either. She stared at the glowing red numbers of her alarm clock. They hadn’t advanced much since the last time she’d looked. Aidan hadn’t called, but she thought he was okay. She hoped he was. No certainty of his death had leaked into the dark space between her ears, anyway.

Cassandra sat up and threw the covers back, then grabbed her bathrobe and went downstairs to join Henry by the basketball hoop.

“Can I play?” Cassandra asked, closing the front door softly.

“Sure.” He tossed her the ball and she almost dropped it.

Basketball wasn’t their game. They were both surprisingly bad at it. But chasing down missed shots seemed like just the thing to tire them out and hopefully drive them to sleep. Cassandra made it all the way to S in a game of HORSE before either one of them brought it up.

“I still don’t think he is what he says he is.” Henry took a shot and made it off the rim. “I mean, I know he jumped out that window, and he’s definitely strong. Superhuman, even. But a god? Come on.”

“You didn’t see them tonight,” said Cassandra. “You didn’t see the way Hermes moved. Or hear the things they said.”

Henry scoffed and threw a shot up into the backboard. It bounced off and Cassandra chased it down the driveway. She took her own shot, missed, and blew into her frozen hands. Touching the cold ball was starting to hurt.

“So what do you think he is, if not a god?”

Henry shrugged and dribbled absently. “A government experiment maybe. And now he’s got amnesia about it, or paranoid fantasies or whatever. It happens all the time.”

“Where?”

“TV.” Henry smirked. “To be honest, Cassie, I’m trying not to think about this too much.”

That was well and good for him. But she had to think about it. Because big sister was coming, whoever that was, and she was coming for her. “Henry?”

“Yeah?”

“You know how I won’t be psychic for much longer?”

Henry bounced the basketball, nodded. “Sure. Eighteen or whereabouts you always said. It’d just go up like a puff of smoke.” He drew up and took a shot; the ball dropped through the net and bounced off the driveway into the dead grass. “What about it?”

“Well, what if I was wrong? What if that dark spot in the future isn’t me not being psychic anymore? What if it’s me not being around anymore? What if I just—” She held her hands up and let them fall. “Die?”

Henry took a breath and let his shoulders slump. He still had traces of pirate eyeliner under his eyes and it gave him the look of a cartoon villain.

No. A dark, reluctant hero, maybe. But never a villain. Henry doesn’t have a villainous bone in his body.

It didn’t surprise her that he was the one having the hardest time accepting Aidan being what he was. He was always so grounded, solid, and practical. A six-foot-tall rock people leaned on. Sometimes Cassandra wondered if he believed in her psychic stuff at all, or if he just said he did because he loved her.

After a second, Henry retrieved the ball from the grass. He shook his head.

“Nope.”

She smiled. “Nope, what?”

“Nope, that’s not going to happen.” He dribbled and passed her the ball. The impact stung her fingers.

“How do you know?”

“I just know,” he said, and took a defensive position, trying to get her to drive past him. “Maybe I’m psychic too.”

* * *

Aidan stood in the backyard of his parents’ house, leaned against one of their pine trees and listening for movement. The only thing he heard was a gentle wind and the soft squeak of his mother’s porch swing swaying slightly back and forth.

His adopted mother. The mother who was thousands of years too late to be his real mother. He’d never thought of her that way before. She’d always been Gloria, the woman who loved him enough to call him her son. And Ernie was always just his dad. But everything was coming unraveled. The way that Cassandra had looked at them through the window that day; he couldn’t get it out of his mind.

There wasn’t much time left. He’d fought against believing it ever since Cassandra’s visions had started. But denial didn’t do anyone any good. Not even a god. Especially not a god, when Athena was on her way. A fight was coming to him, and he had no idea whether he could win, no matter what he said to the contrary.

He looked down at his clenched fists. For the first time, they seemed pathetically weak. Maybe he’d been hiding for too long, passing as a human when he was anything but. He used to be one of the strongest gods to walk on Olympus: the god of the sun, the god of prophecy and the arts. But he was out of practice. Not so long ago, he would have had that little rat Hermes skewered and roasting over a pit with a snap of his fingers. He flexed his fists again. Maybe he really was growing weaker. Maybe he hadn’t escaped the curse that was killing the others after all.

“You’re not thinking of taking her away from here, are you?”

Aidan turned, ready to rip Hermes in half, but his anger dissipated as quickly as it came. It wouldn’t have been possible anyway. Hermes peeked out from behind another pine, his legs loaded on springs. If Aidan so much as pulled his fist back Hermes would run, too fast and too far to ever be caught.

“It would be a waste of time,” Hermes warned. “And she wouldn’t be safe.”

Aidan smiled ruefully. “Is she safe here?”

“She’s not safe anywhere.”

He looked at Hermes. The god of thieves had changed over the centuries, but not much. He wore his hair shorter, and he dressed like he’d fallen out of a Hilfiger catalog. And he was thin, so painfully thin. The kind of thin that eventually killed you. But the mischievous light in his eyes was familiar and so was the curve of his mouth. The stance too, edgy and tense, was so much the same that he might as well have had wings on his feet.

“You look like shit,” said Aidan, and Hermes smirked.

“You’re one to talk. What are you supposed to be, anyway? A seventeen-year-old Bela Lugosi?”

Aidan pulled the cape off his shoulders. It did seem ridiculous now, standing before his eternal half brother. Like playing at children’s games. “I’m sorry I tried to kill you.” He looked up in time to see Hermes’ quick shrug. “But you can’t have her.”

Hermes crossed his arms. “I think Athena’s going to have a different opinion.”

Aidan clenched his jaw. Athena. Always proud and haughty, always Daddy’s favorite. She was used to being strong and getting what she wanted. But the gods were dying. He knew that much. If Hermes was any indication, Athena would be weaker than she used to be. She’d be fading. He wondered what her death was, whether it made her angry, or crazy, or both.

“I’ll fight you,” Aidan said quietly. “I’ll fight you with everything I can.”

Hermes nodded, considering. “You know, Apollo,” he said finally, “Athena would like to save you. But if you make it come down to a choice between her survival and yours, I think we both know which way it’s going to go.”

Aidan looked down. Resignation weighed on his shoulders. The stance felt unnatural. The god of the sun should never hang his head.

“What’s it like?” Hermes asked. “Living with them? Loving one of them? It’s been quite a while, for me.”

Aidan smiled a small, regretful smile. “It’s amazing. I never thought anything would matter as much as she does. Just one mortal girl.”

“One mortal girl,” Hermes repeated.

“Hermes.”

“Yeah?”

“Please leave us alone. I’m asking you, if we ever really were brothers. Get her to stay away.”

Hermes blinked. For a minute Aidan thought it had worked. That hearing him beg and say they were family had shocked Hermes into compliance.

Hermes sighed.

“We are brothers,” he said gently. “So I hope you’ll believe me when I tell you that I wish that was a choice we had.”

A soft rush of air passed Aidan’s cheeks. When he looked up at the tree, Hermes was gone.

Date: 2015-12-18; view: 585