It took a couple seconds for my heart to climb down out of my throat. “Jesus Christ!”
“Nope. Just me.” A crooked smile lifted the corners of his lips. But his dark eyes were serious, and there were bruised-looking rings underneath them. “We don’t have much time, Dru. Come on.”
You know, any other day I probably just would have gone with him. But not today. I was tired of following people around, tired of being led by the nose. “Where? Does what’s-her-face want to see me again?”
Dylan sighed, an aggravated, familiar sound. The sleepless rings under his eyes matched the tension around his mouth, and his hair was messy too. “You should hope not. Come on, Dru. Please. I’ve got something to show you.”
I folded my arms and refused to budge. “Why should I hope not?”
“Because I’m not so sure Milady can be trusted.” He stepped back, retreating from the sunlight. “Are you coming, or do I have to wait for another time when I’m on duty to watch you?”
“You were on duty?”
He shrugged. “Why do you think I let you out with your little friend? At least I’m sure he and his wulfen won’t kill you, even if they are delinquents and thieves.” Another two steps back. Dylan’s eyes glittered, the aspect sliding over him and retreating in waves, sending fingers of ebony highlighting through his hair. “Dru. Believe me. You want to see this, and it’s not safe to talk up here.”
Up here? I sighed. It was what everyone said: Trust me, Dru. Believe me, Dru. Let me do what I want, Dru.
I was helpless, the way I’d been all along. And the idea that Christophe maybe wasn’t coming back for me, that he was using me as bait, that I might be stuck here for a while, it was enough to take the fight right out of anyone.
My shoulders slumped. The dampness on my cheeks clung to my fingers as I scrubbed at it.
I followed.
CHAPTER 18
I was spending a lot of time following boys through stone-walled halls. Dylan didn’t speak for a long time, just took me into the north wing. He moved soundlessly in his heavy engineer boots, with the peculiar grace of the Kouroi. I got the idea his jacket only creaked for effect, too.
I finally had to open my mouth. “The wulfen. They’re not going to get in trouble, are they?”
“Of course not. I’m not one of the proud.” He unlocked a wooden door and paused for a moment, breathing in deeply. “There’s so much more than you’ve been told. I wondered why they sent you here, and I wondered even more when the directive came that you needed ‘time to recover’ and shouldn’t be held to a teaching schedule, and that no allotment would be made for tutors or bodyguards this quarter.” His tone turned bitter. “Then Milady started meddling even further. And when Milady meddles, beware.”
Milady? “You mean the chick who was here the other day.” The one who thinks it’s really important that I hate Christophe. He called her that, too.
“That ‘chick’ is the queen of the Order, Dru, and the head of the Council. Svetocha are precious. Milady was saved from the nosferatu about fifteen years before your mother was, and I think those years gave her a taste of ambition. I wonder…” Maddeningly, he stopped short, so I didn’t get to hear what he wondered. “At the main Schola, you would be given everything your heart desired. Here we’ve had to make do because of funding restrictions. I thought you’d be sent downstate as soon as arrangements could be made. I thought you’d at least have a battery of tutors, not to mention a bodyguard or five like Milady herself. But it would draw too much attention, the directive said. You were better protected when you were less protected, because it wouldn’t bring attention to your survival, and Sergej would be looking for traces.”
When he said it, the name didn’t make the air turn chill and unwelcoming. But it still sent a bolt of almost-pain through my head. That doesn’t make much sense. “That doesn’t make any sense at all.”
He bared his white djamphir teeth in a wide, mirthless smile. “That’s what I thought. But I’ve already been demoted to running a tiny little reform school for cannon fodder out here in the sticks. Mine is not to question why, Dru.”
Oh, comforting. Not. “Wait a second—”
A shrug and a quick motion, brushing the past away. His leather jacket creaked. “When you bring in the fact that Christophe found you, there’s also the question of his loyalty. And the fact that you are… who you are.” He pushed the door open and motioned me through. “I’ve been stuck here for a long time. My own loyalty, to your mother and to Christophe, was professionally expensive, to say the least.”
“So—” I wanted to get a word in edgewise. Unfortunately, I had no word to get in. I tried again. “Okay. Can you do me a favor and start from the beginning? What the hell am I doing here?” Am I bait?
But I felt the heat of Christophe’s body against mine again, and didn’t believe it. Couldn’t believe it. No matter how much sense it made.
The room was long and low, windowless, and full of metal racks with boxes stacked on them. It went back for a long while, and the only light came from bulbs in thick, wire-crossed glass shields wrapped with cobwebs. It looked like an abandoned bomb shelter, and the rows of shelves receded to infinity.
“I think you’re here because someone is biding their time. It’s the oddest thing, but I can’t get through to any of my regular contacts over the state line. This entire node is being held as a blackout zone. Now, that could be to protect you. But it’s looking more and more like nobody even knows you’re here. Nobody at the main Schola, nobody in the Order except Augustine and Milady, and nobody’s heard from August recently. He’s missed his last two call-ins with his handler, who is, incidentally, one of my friends.” Dylan swung the door shut, turning back to face me as I edged nervously away. “And Christophe is unreachable too.” His eyes asked a question; did he suspect I’d taken his note to Christophe?
He had to suspect it. Which meant he was playing a game too. Just what kind of game I couldn’t guess yet.
“August is missing?” My throat was closing down to a pinhole, I had trouble getting the words out. Augie was Dad’s friend from way back, and the person I’d called to verify Christophe’s story.
Right before everything went to hell with the dreamstealer, the sky turning dark in the middle of the day, and Sergej.
I shivered. The sweat dried on my skin itched and reeked. It was a sour scent I was pretty used to by now.
It was fear.
I didn’t even remember what it was like not to be terrified anymore. Dylan examined me for a long ten seconds or so, and I was suddenly, scorchingly aware that I was down here alone. Nobody knew where I was. And he was telling me an awful lot of stuff about how I wouldn’t be missed by anyone who had the power to do something about it if I just up and disappeared.
But Christophe had told me to go find Dylan if there was another attack. He’d said Dylan was loyal. He’d told me he was coming back for me, too, and if I doubted that there were all sorts of things I could doubt.
Oh crap. I don’t trust anyone anymore. Not even myself.
“I’ve stolen this from the armory.” Dylan’s hand made a small movement, and I stared at the gun.
It was reversed, the butt offered to me. It was the nine-millimeter I’d handed over when the helicopter landed in the snow, to take me to the Schola and what I thought was safety. My heart pounded high and hard in my throat. “If what I suspect is true, you’re not safe here. You’re not safe anywhere, but especially not here.”