“I went into town and got you some things,” boomed Clancy’s voice from across the wide expanse of lawn. Fear and rage spilled into my blood. I looked up but didn’t move. Gráinne, however, sprinted toward him. He handed her a large green bag. She ran off to a nearby bench, sticking her scrawny arm in to the elbow to root around.
I held perfectly still, hoping he wouldn’t see me, but he walked over to where I sat beneath the swaying fronds of the willow. “There’s my little silver spark,” he said as he parted the green curtain of leaves and held out a bag.
“You can see my aura?”
“No. Arrazi can’t see auras. I can feel it. It’s a siren calling to my blood.”
I tried to remain calm in the face of his blinding white aura. Apparently, their auras looked normal until they were well fed. I shivered and crossed my arms over my chest but forced myself to hold his stare. “Unless you brought me a ticket to California, I don’t want anything from you.”
“May as well drop the sullen bit, pet. We’ll have the rest of your life together, and I’d rather not dislike you.” He tossed the bag at my feet and turned away. A bouquet of daisies flopped out. I looked up at him in shock, and Clancy smiled, satisfied, sick. “Did you like the flowers I sent to your hospital room, Daisy?” He turned to go, but then stopped. “Oh,” he said over his shoulder. “And I’ve left a surprise for you on your bed.”
I definitely didn’t know him well enough to read the secretive smirk he cast me, but its malicious glint put me on edge.
Griffin brought us lunch in the garden: slices of tangy Irish cheddar, warm bread, and chunks of juicy melon. I ate like a prisoner of war. It wasn’t hunger fueling my appetite but a desire to fortify myself for whatever lay ahead.
Shortly after lunch, we were led out of the garden to the door that would take us back inside and return us to our rooms. Gráinne was quiet but peaceful. In her arms, she carried the basket of cut flowers and both her shopping bag and mine, which she had retrieved from under the tree when she saw I’d left it lying on the grass.
Like the door that led to the garden, our inner door had a security keypad as well. Griffin punched in the code and shoved us inside, slamming the door behind us. I had watched his movements carefully, looking for habits I could exploit, lapses in attention. I had visions of snatching his knife from him. I wasn’t so sure what I’d do if I got it, however. I’d have to be quicker than his ability to suck me dry.
A loud thud startled me and I spun. Gráinne’s basket had dropped to the floor of our rooms, flowers strewn around it. Her hand flew to her mouth. I looked over her slim shoulder and shock and disbelief numbed my limbs so that I was unable to move for a moment, or even breathe.
Giovanni lay sprawled across my bed, bloody and very badly bruised. Dried blood caked the roots of his blond hair above his forehead, staining it a gory, rusted pink. A raspberry-colored lump marred his temple like a large marble had been wedged under his skin. His cut lips were open slightly. He was so perfectly still, so…lifeless, that the entire room seemed to hush in wait for his next breath.
I rushed to him. With shaking hands, I fumbled for a pulse on his neck because I saw no silver emanating from his body. He looked like his light had been beaten out of him. “I—I can’t feel anything.” My voice quaked. “I don’t think he’s alive.” My hands were unsteady. My own pulse thudded so loud in my ears that I couldn’t find any whisper of his. Seeing the lightless form of someone I knew, of someone like me, filled me with complete terror. If the Scintilla were so damn valuable, why’d they do this to him?
Gráinne came to my side. She didn’t look at me. In fact, her eyes were closed. Holding her hand an inch or so above his body, she moved it in small circles over his torso. Her hand slowed and hovered above his lower abdomen. “It’s there,” she whispered. “He’s in there. I can feel it.” Her eyes opened and met mine. “But barely.”
Forty-Six
“W hat do we do?” I cried. He looked so helpless, so weakened that I didn’t know if he’d be able to pull himself out of it.
“I found a dead bird once,” Gráinne muttered. “When I was a little girl. I tried to make it better, but it stayed dead.”
“He’s not dead yet. Maybe he’s strong enough.” I wanted to believe it. He certainly looked like he had put up quite a struggle before he lost the battle. I squeezed his fingers, proud of the fight in him. It explained Griffin’s welt.
Heaviness draped over my back like a lead cloak. I sighed and curled my knees to my chest. His being here was bad news. I hadn’t even realized until then that I had harbored a little bit of hope. Now all hope was gone. And Clancy had his prize, three of us. Whatever that meant.
Gráinne put her delicate hand on my shoulder as I sat on the edge of the bed with Giovanni’s limp hand in mine. A warm tingle of energy infused me where her hand rested. It gave me an idea.
“Can we help him?” I asked. “Giovanni showed me we could give to people to make them feel better. Can we give him enough energy to save his life?”
“The bird stayed dead.” Her hand slipped from my shoulder. “Maybe you could. I don’t know. I won’t. Forgive me.”
“Together we might be able to help him. He’s one of us. He needs us!”
She covered her heart with her hands and backed away. “Mine is mine. Mine is mine.” She kept up her incantation as she stepped farther away. I stared helplessly at his still form, wanting to believe I had the capacity to give even when I’d been taken from so cruelly. If I couldn’t believe in my own light, if I let the darkness win, then I might as well give up.
So instead of giving up, giving in to darkness, I thought of the old me. My old life. And the people I had loved.
My father, whose love was stifling but well intentioned. Even when I cursed him, I loved him. And now I knew why he had lied to me all those years, what he had sacrificed to protect me. His love and protection had been the most constant thing in my life.
Even if I did suspect some Arrazi in her bloodline because she exhausted me within moments of being around her, in her own frenetic way, Janelle had tried so hard to stand in as a mother. I didn’t make it easy on her. She also loved my dad, despite the fact that she knew she was a stand-in for his first wife. Anyone who could love so hard from second place was deserving of my love in return.
I adored my cousin Mari with her big mouth and fierce individuality. She was like a sister to me. If I had any bravery in me, it was because she showed me how.
I felt the love I had for Dun, for his loyalty, his goofy smile, his happy light. I smiled, thinking of that little boy sitting against the tree, crying into his scrubby knees, one big toe poking out of those old moccasins, and how he had grown into an almost-man. He could always make me laugh with his stupid jokes. He was the person who taught me how to laugh at myself.
I remembered the compassion I had for little Max and all of those kids at the Boys & Girls Club who needed the world to lend them some extra love and strength until they were strong enough on their own. Giovanni had grown up under worse circumstances. Alone, with no parents at all. He was so courageous. He’d had to be.
I closed my eyes and let all the beauty rise up in me. Feeling love was risky. But instead of being weakened by it, I was surprised to realize the love strengthened me.
I held both of Giovanni’s hands and thought of the powerful nature of love. How it was like water. It settled into the low, hidden places and seeped into my crevices, breaking me open. It eroded my fortresses and shaped me into something new. And even when I thought I’d had it wrung out of me, it could rain back down and satisfy a thirst I didn’t know I had.