I pushed Heath to the wall and stepped in front of him as I turned to face the closing circle of ...
Eesh! They were the most disgusting things I'd ever seen. There were probably a dozen or so of them. Their faces were white and gaunt. Their eyes glowed a dirty red. They snarled and hissed at me and I saw that their teeth were pointed and their fingernails! Ugh! Their fingernails were long and yellow and dangerous-looking.
"It’sss just a fledgling," hissed one of them. "The Mark doesn't make her a vampyre. It makesssss her a freak."
I looked at the speaker. "Elliott!"
"I wasss. I'm not the Elliott you knew anymore." Snakelike his head wove back and forth as he spoke. Then his glowing eyes flattened and he curled his lip. "I'll ssshow you what I mean ..."
He started to move toward me with a feral, crouching stride. The other creatures stirred, gaining bravery from him.
"Watch out, Zo, they're coming for us," Heath said, trying to step around in front of me.
"No they're not," I said. I closed my eyes for just a second and centered myself, thinking of the power and warmth of flame—the way it can cleanse as well as destroy—and I thought of Shaunee. "Come to me, flame!" My palms started to feel hot. I opened my eyes and raised my hands, which were now glowing with a brilliant yellow flame.
"Stay back, Elliott! You were a pain in the ass when you were alive, and death hasn't changed anything." Elliott cringed back from the light I was producing. I took a step forward, ready to tell Heath to follow me so we could get the hell outta there, but her voice made me freeze.
"You're wrong, Zoey. Death has changed some things." The crowd of creatures parted to let Stevie Rae through.
CHAPTER 29
The flame in my palms sputtered and faded as shock broke my concentration. "Stevie Rae!" I started to take a step toward her, but the truth of her appearance hit me and I felt my body go cold and still. She looked terrible—worse than she had in the dream vision I'd had. It wasn't so much her pale thinness and the awful wrongness of the smell that clung to her that made her appear so changed. It was her expression. In life, Stevie Rae had been the kindest person I'd ever known. But now, whatever she was—dead, undead, bizarrely resurrected—she was different. Her eyes were cruel and flat. Her face devoid of any emotion except one, and that one emotion was hatred.
"Stevie Rae, what happened to you?"
"I died." Her voice was only a twisted, malformed shadow of what it had once been. She still had her Okie twang, but the soft sweetness that had filled it was totally gone. She sounded like mean trailer trash.
"Are you a ghost?"
"A ghost?" Her laugh was a sneer. "No, I ain't no damn ghost."
I swallowed and felt a dizzy wash of hope. "So you're alive?"
She curled her lip in a sarcastic sneer that looked so wrong on her face it made me physically sick. "You'd say I'm alive, but I'd say it's not that simple. Then again I'm not as simple as I used to be."
Well, at least she hadn't hissed at me like that Elliott thing had. Stevie Rae is alive. I held tightly to that miracle, swallowed my fear and revulsion, and moving so quickly that she didn't have time to jerk away (or bite me or whatever), I grabbed her and, ignoring the horrid way she smelled, hugged her hard. "I'm so glad you're not dead!" I whispered to her.
It was like hugging a smelly piece of stone. She didn't jerk away from me. She didn't bite me. She didn't react at all, but the creatures surrounding us did. I could hear them hissing and muttering. I let go of her and stepped back.
"Don't touch me again," she said.
"Stevie Rae, is there someplace we can go so we can talk? I need to get Heath home, but I can come back and meet you. Or maybe you could come back to the school with me?"
"You don't understand anything, do you?"
"I understand that something bad has happened to you, but you're still my best friend, so we can figure this out."
"Zoey, you're not going anywhere."
"Fine," I purposefully pretended to misunderstand her threat. "I guess we could talk here, but, well ..." I looked around at the grossly hissing creatures. "It's not very private, and it's also disgusting down here."
"Jusssst kill them!" Elliott snarled from behind Stevie Rae.
"Shut up, Elliott!" Stevie Rae and I snapped at him together. Her eyes met mine and I swear I saw a flash of something in them that was more than anger and cruelty.
"You know they can't live now that they've sssseen us," Elliott said. The other creatures stirred restlessly, making evil little noises of agreement.
Then a girl stepped out of the pack of creatures. She obviously used to be beautiful. Even now there was an eerie, surreal allure about her. She was tall and blond, and she moved more gracefully than the others. But when I looked into her red eyes I saw only meanness.
"If you can't do it, I will. I'll take the male first. I don't mind that his blood has been tainted by Imprint. It's still warm and alive," she said, and she seemed to dance toward Heath.
I stepped in front of him, blocking her path. "Touch him and you die. Again," I said.
Stevie Rae interrupted her hissing laughter.
"Get back with the others, Venus. You don't strike until I tell you to."
Venus. The name triggered my memory. "Venus Davis?" I said.
The pretty blonde narrowed her eyes at me. "How do you know me, fledgling?"
"She knows a lot of stuff," Heath said, stepping around me. He was using what I used to call his football player voice. He sounded tough and pissed and totally ready for a fight. "And I'm about sick of all of you fucked-up creatures."
"Why is that speaking?" Stevie Rae spat.
I sighed and rolled my eyes. I agreed with Heath—I was totally sick of all of this scary weirdness. It was time we got out of there, and it was also time my best friend started acting like the person I'd glimpsed hiding in her eyes. "He isn't a that. He's Heath. Remember, Stevie Rae? My ex-boyfriend?"
"Zo. I am not your ex-boyfriend. I'm your boyfriend."
"Heath. I told you before that this can't possibly work out between us."
"Come on, Zo, we're Imprinted. That means it's you and me, baby!" He grinned at me as if we were in the middle of a prom instead of in the middle of a group of undead creatures that wanted to eat us.
"That was an accident, and we're gonna have to talk about it, but this is definitely not the time."
"Oh, Zo, you know you love me." Heath's grin didn't fade one bit.
"Heath, you are the most stubborn kid I've ever known." He winked at me and I couldn't help smiling back at him. "Fine. I love you."
"What’sss happening …" the gross Elliott creature hissed. The rest of the horrid things that surrounded us moved restlessly, and Venus glided one step closer to Heath. I forced myself not to shiver or scream or whatever. Instead, a weird calm came over me. I looked at Stevie Rae, and suddenly knew what I needed to say. I put my hands on my hips and faced her.
"Tell him," I said. "Tell all of them."
"Tell them what?" She narrowed her garnet eyes dangerously.
"Tell them what's happening here. You know. I know you do."
Stevie Rae's face contorted, and the words sounded like they were being wrenched from her throat. "Humanity! They're showing their humanity." The creatures snarled like she'd just thrown holy water on them (and please, that's such an untrue cliché about vampyres).
"Weakness! It's why we're stronger than they are." Venus curled her lip. "Because it's a weakness we don't have anymore."
I ignored Venus. I ignored Elliott. Hell, I ignored them all and stared at Stevie Rae, forcing her to meet my eyes, and forcing myself not to look away or flinch as hers glowed hot and red.