“That’s up to you to discover, but I can tell you what it does…or at least what it did for your mother.” She reached for my hand again and lifted it high, tracing the grooves around the cloudy stone. “Though it’s beautiful, it’s not only an ornament. See how the slits carve up and under the stone?”
I nodded before realizing she couldn’t see the movement. “Yes,” I said.
“If you follow those grooves and pull up on the stone, it’ll unhinge. Depress it again, and in that moment, you’ll have the power to call anyone to you, no matter where you are, and no matter what the circumstances.”
I’d known there was a way to call enemy agents to you, though call was a deceiving term. Invoking an enemy’s name would reveal your location by loosening your scent on the wind, so we trained to dampen our emotions and keep this from happening. It’d never occurred to me to draw them to me on purpose. And, I thought, studying the ring with renewed interest, it’d never dawned on me that there might be a way to call allies to your side as well. “You mean…like a get-out-of-jail-free card?”
She almost smiled at that, and inclined her head. “All you have to do is think of that person, and they’ll be there.”
“That’s awesome,” I said, studying the ring with new-found awe.
“Yes, but…”
I sighed, dropping my hand. “There’s always a but.”
And now the smile came. “And this time it’s also a condition. You can only use this ring once. After that it loses all powers and must be passed onto someone else.”
But one shot was all I’d need. I knew exactly who I’d call…and Rena did too. She shook her head and gave me a sorrowful smile. “Your decision cannot be made lightly, Olivia. You were given this ring for a purpose, and regardless of what you want, that purpose must serve the troop and the citizens of this valley. It’s a great honor to be gifted with a physical totem. You must choose wisely.”
I sighed, my heart sinking. Why’d there have to be a friggin’ lesson in everything?
Glancing back up at Rena, I saw some of the tension had left her body. Obviously if the locker was showering me with gifts of this magnitude, she’d trust I was still doing my best for the troop. Now to convince her that keeping silent would do the same. “Please, Rena. I need a little more time.”
Rena’s look was both patient and critical. She’d been a mother for a long time. “You keep doing things on your own and you’re going to find yourself with all the time in the world. Alone.” She took a symbolic step backward, and I suddenly felt just that. “I know you’ve had only yourself to depend on in the past, but you have to learn to work within the structure of this group. You can’t keep going off on your own because you have a hunch you think might help.”
“I’m trying to work with the group. If you haven’t noticed, I’m the one who’s been left behind.”
She said nothing, which I found encouraging.
“Just…” I blew out a long breath, trying to figure a way to explain myself without giving anything away. “There are things I know…or not know but feel, because of my Shadow side. Warren wants me to pretend it doesn’t exist, and Tekla wants me to stomp it down until it really doesn’t, but if restrictions are put on us for a reason, Rena, then so are abilities. What good is such a skill if I don’t use it for Light?”
Rena’s lips thinned as she searched for an argument. “We’ve always gotten by without the help of Shadow intuition before. The power of Light has always been enough.”
“Yes, but have you ever seen anything like this before?” I said, throwing an arm out to the chute, and the world above. I didn’t say the second sign of the Zodiac had been fulfilled, but I decided to hint at it. “You know we’re the real targets, don’t you? These mortals are only collateral damage. They’re coming for us, they’re coming here to the sanctuary, and they won’t stop until every child of yours burns.”
Rena gasped and I winced, knowing she was putting the scent that lingered in the air together with the faces she’d traced beneath her fingertips every day.
“Shouldn’t we use any tool available to see that doesn’t happen?” I said, softer now that I saw her wavering. “Even an instinct derived from the Shadow side?”
She made me wait for her answer, but finally heaved a sigh, causing her gold hoops to jangle. “All right. I’ll keep silent,” she said, before holding up a finger. “But only because I scent a grain of truth in what you’re saying.”
And because of the ring, I thought, though I wasn’t about to question it. I opened my mouth to thank her but she held up her hand. “And only for a short while longer. After that-”
“I know,” I said, nodding. “You’ll have to tell Warren. I understand.”
“Oh no. You don’t understand.” She shook her head, and that fierce resolve returned, her voice hot in warning, fear, and the frustration of finding herself stuck. “After that, you’ll have to tell him. He’ll decide what’s to be done with you and your instincts.”
Another day passed before Warren told the rest of us there’d been nothing the troop could do to help the mortals of Las Vegas. They’d spent their days easing the suffering of those victims found still alive, and hid as many of the bodies as they possibly could.
Why hide them?
Well, first, each body the troop stumbled on had to undergo a thorough examination, and it wasn’t of the open-your-mouth-and-say-ah variety either. If unofficial autopsies started showing up all over the valley, it would send up red flags to both the mortal authorities and the Shadows. Additionally, if we could keep the perceived number of deaths below the expected tally, maybe it would draw one or more of the Shadows from hiding to see what was going on. But that hadn’t happened. And knowing what I did about the use of initiates in such situations, I knew it wouldn’t.
But what was most discouraging was the number of victims.
“How many?” I gasped, when we’d all finally gathered back in the briefing room. Hunter was missing-he’d been out in the field twice as long as anyone else, and seen so much he didn’t need to be briefed-but everyone else seemed rested, showered, and calmed, if not exactly chipper.
“Two thousand, seven hundred, and thirty-one,” Micah said tersely. A cursed battlefield. He then flipped open a notebook and began to read from it, putting whatever was written there in laymen’s terms so the rest of us could understand it. “Basically, it’s an extremely rapid breakdown of the body’s tissue upon contact with something else. Food, maybe, because of the mouth. Or it could be some sort of flesh-eating disease, but I don’t think so.”
“So not burn marks?” Felix asked, leaning on his back chair legs.
Micah shook his head. “From what I can see it looks more like the decaying process that occurs after death. There’s a systematic breakdown occurring in the tissue in three distinct areas-mouths, hands, genitalia-though that alone shouldn’t be fatal.”
That made me pause. Strange that the virus would affect only three parts of the body. Why hands? Was it symbolic because we didn’t possess fingerprints? Because the Shadows didn’t want the mortals to discover this anomaly if an agent of Light were to fall? Whatever it was, I needed to speak up now, let Micah know it was a virus so he could focus on answering these questions himself…and work to find a cure.
But how to let them know without giving away what I’d done…and without jeopardizing what I needed to do next?
While I wondered, Chandra spoke up. “What about a biological attack?”
My head shot up. Yes. Closer…
“You mean like anthrax or ricin?” Micah shrugged and flipped his notebook shut. “Something like that could certainly affect a large group of people, but it would start in a contained area. Or at least have a point of origin we could trace it back to. These victims are spread all around the valley. Different social classes, workplaces, lifestyles. Nothing to unite them at work, play, or socially.”