Still looking at the ground, his tie wrapped around his hand, Alexander gave an entirely humorless huff of laughter.
“It’s flattering to know I fooled you, Harper Price, it truly is.” He looked up at me, his green eyes sharp despite the obvious devastation there. “What a Paladin you would have made.”
“I am a Paladin,” I answered without thinking, and he smiled again. This time, there was something like fondness in it, and to be honest, I think that freaked me out more than the whole sardonic-in-the-face-of-destruction thing he’d had going on.
But then he looked back at the tie in his hands, heaving a sigh. “We can’t last without the Oracle, you see. Her—or in this case his—power feeds ours. We’re all very, very old men, no matter how dapper we appear.” He gestured to himself, and I thought it would probably be mean to point out that he wasn’t exactly rocking it on the dapper front right now.
“Without the Oracle, we wither. We die. It’s why we were so desperate to find him.”
Bee and Ryan still stood by the car, watching, and I gave them a little wave to let them know that I was all right. Then, clutching my skirt in my hands, I sat down on a cinder block next to Alexander, watching him carefully.
“The Peirasmos?” I asked, and Alexander heaved a sigh, grinding the heels of his palms into his eyes.
“Had you completed them, the trials would have increased your powers enough for me to use you if I had to. Ephors gain most of our strength from the Oracle’s magic, but the Paladin and the Mage help as well. Not enough, not nearly enough, but some.”
I took a deep breath. “That’s why you stripped Ryan’s powers. It wasn’t so that he couldn’t help me. It’s because you were draining his . . . his Mage energy or whatever.”
With another one of those humorless laughs, Alexander nodded. “Indeed. All of this had been an elaborate ploy to keep myself alive, and”—sitting up, he placed his hands on his knees, the headlights from Ryan’s car winking off the heavy gold ring on his pinky finger—“you see how well it has gone for me.”
“So the house was an illusion?” I asked, and Alexander shook his head.
“It was real enough. Created by magic, yes, but real.”
My head hurt. My heart hurt. And while I wasn’t sure how it was possible, I was pretty sure my soul hurt.
“If you were dying or . . . fading, how did you get enough power to set all this up?”
Alexander looked down again. His normally shiny shoes were covered in dust, and he poked at a loose stone with the toe of one. “Blythe proved useful.”
They were only three words, but they sent a finger of ice down my spine. I hadn’t liked Blythe—I’d hated her for taking Bee—but the idea that Alexander had killed her to take her magic . . .
Shaking his head, Alexander chuckled. “God, what a mess this is. And to think, all we wanted was to have things back the way they should’ve been. The way they’ve been for millennia. A powerful Oracle at our side, a brave Paladin, a crafty Mage. Now we have nothing.”
The night was warm, but I was nearly shivering now, wrapping my arms around myself. “Will you go after him?” I asked, and Alexander looked off into the distance. It was probably just my imagination, but I could swear his cheeks looked more hollow, the lines around his eyes deeper than they were when we started talking.
“There’s no point,” he said. “I won’t last long enough to find him, and whatever he did to blow through my wards seems to have drained the last bit of magic from me.”
He smiled that ghoulish smile. “So you see, Miss Price? I am just a sad old man now. You are just a pretty girl in a silly dress. Your friends are now simply your friends. Oh, you’ll all retain some powers for a while, but they’ll fade over time, and all will go back to the way it was.”
His smile turned fierce, almost a grimace. “Isn’t that what you wanted?”
It had been. I’d spent all this time trying to make my life resemble what it had been before, trying to convince myself that I could balance it all. Paladin and SGA president, Oracle and boyfriend, family and duty. Now I had what I wanted, but as my chest ached and I thought of David, speeding off into the darkness, the cost seemed so high.
Placing his palms flat on his thighs, Alexander heaved himself to his feet, and I heard the creak of his knees. “I suppose this is my cue,” he said, and I stood up, too.
“Harper?” Bee called, and I held up a hand.
“So this is done?” I asked Alexander. “My powers will . . . go away, and Bee’s and Ryan’s will, too?”
“Oh, it’s very done,” he assured me. “For you, for your friends, for David, and most certainly for me.”
And with that, he fell to the ground, his eyes open.
Unseeing.
Chapter 36
“DO YOU HAVE David’s jump drive?”
I glanced up from my desk to see Chie standing in front of me, a sheaf of papers clutched to her middle. I hadn’t thought there was anyone in all of Pine Grove who looked as wretched as I did, but she was coming in at a close second. Her dark eyes were huge and bloodshot. Apparently she hadn’t been sleeping either.
Shaking my head, I murmured, “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” but then she nodded at the bag by my feet. David’s bag. I’d found it in Saylor’s house that last night. There hadn’t been anything else of his, other than a couple of sweaters too not-ugly to bother taking, I guess.
Maybe I’d taken those, and maybe they were hanging in my closet right now. I wasn’t admitting anything.
But I’d been using David’s bag since he’d left, not caring what anyone thought. Ryan had done one of his Mage tricks, convincing everyone David had taken an early acceptance at some college up North, so no one questioned my whole grieving-girlfriend thing.
Chie was watching me with an unreadable expression as I pulled the bag into my lap, and as I rifled through it, she said, “I miss him a lot.”
Her voice was soft and quiet and it made me look up at her. There was no universe in which I’d thought Chie and I could ever be friends, but seeing my own loss reflected in her face felt . . . good. Or at least comforting.
I’d been keeping my stuff in the main part of David’s satchel, but I hadn’t looked through the little pockets. That’s where I found the jump drive, there in one of the tiny pouches inside the front flap.
It was the same bright blue as The Doctor’s TARDIS, and looking at it made my eyes well up. Still, I handed it over to Chie and watched her make her way over to one of the computers in the back.
It was bizarre how . . . normal everything felt. Ever since Homecoming, I’d been wishing for normalcy, trying to shove my anything-but-ordinary life back into the box where I’d lived my actual ordinary life. And now everything was normal again, and I hated it.
Opening my notebook, I did my best to outline a story I wanted to write for next week’s edition of The Grove News. It was about the chemicals they use to keep the lawns so green, and I thought it would make Chie happy.
It would’ve made David happy, too, probably.
For two weeks now, I’d been waiting for some feeling, some idea of what was going on with him or where he might be. I had that same faint sense that I’d always had, a weird awareness of him, but all it told me was that he was far away from me.
And moving farther.
I was so involved in sketching out my idea for the story that I was almost startled when Chie suddenly appeared in front of me again, holding out the drive. “Thanks,” she said, and when I took it back from her, she hesitated for a second. I glanced up and saw her chewing on her bottom lip, watching me cautiously.
“You should look at that,” she told me, gesturing toward the bright blue stick still in my hand. “I didn’t read it,” she went on to add quickly, “but it seems like there’s something on there for you.”
I almost went to one of the computers in the back and plugged it in then and there, desperate to know what David had left for me. Was it an explan
ation? Or a clue to where he’d gone?
But I was afraid it might not be either of those things, and I couldn’t stand the idea of bursting into tears in here, in front of these people who were trying to be nice to me, but weren’t really my friends.
No, there was only one place I wanted to read this. And only one person I wanted with me.
• • •
“You’re sure?” Bee asked, her hand on my shoulder.
We were sitting in David’s house, at the computer in his bedroom. I still had a key to the place, although with Saylor dead and David gone, none of us had any idea what to do with it. But for now, it sat like it always had, most of David’s things still in his room.
Including his computer.
Nodding, I plugged in the drive and clicked on “Open.”
It took me a minute to find what I was looking for. I was scanning the various documents looking for my name, so the first time I saw it, my eyes actually drifted over the file meant for me. It was Bee who leaned forward and tapped the screen, saying, “I think it’s this one.”
Egregious Felicitations.
With a choked laugh, I shook my head, murmuring, “You idiot.”
Bee gave my shoulder a quick squeeze, and then went to sit on David’s bed, leaving me alone with the computer.
I opened the file. Pres, it started, and then the tears were on my cheeks, splashing onto the desk. I know you’re going to say this is dumb, and I know you won’t understand. Which is why I asked Bee and Ryan for help. Don’t get me wrong, I like fighting with you, but there are some things you just can’t argue. This is one, and I hope you’ll come to accept that.
I have to leave Pine Grove. I have to leave Alabama, and I have to leave you. After tonight, that’s all completely clear to me. This whole situation is so effed up (hope you appreciate my discretion there), and it’s clear to me now that the only way to un-eff it up (do I get bonus points for that one?) is to take myself out of the equation. Without me, you, Bee, and Ryan can just be you, Bee, and Ryan. Not Paladins or Mages. People. With your own lives.
It’s like you said at that time at Cotillion practice—you want to be a good woman who chooses the right thing for everybody. Well, so do I. (Minus the woman part, obviously.)
Have a good life, Pres. I love you. Always.
D
I read the note two more times before closing the document and turning away from the computer.
Bee sat on the edge of the bed, watching me, her long blond hair caught in a braid over one shoulder.
“Well?” she asked.
“You did the right thing,” I said, even though the words hurt, hitting my heart like broken glass. “You were the Paladin I couldn’t be, I guess.”
At that, Bee stood up, her skirt swishing across her knees as she crossed the room to stand in front of me.
“No,” she said, shaking her head vehemently. “I wasn’t his girlfriend, so it was an easier choice to make.”
When I didn’t say anything, Bee sighed, folding her arms across her chest. “So what do we do now?” she asked me.
I got out of David’s chair, picking up his bag, but leaving the jump drive in his computer. When I walked out into the hall, Bee followed me, and we stood there, looking back into David’s room. There was a steady ache in my chest, and I had no idea if it was some residual Paladin thing—if David was in danger, but too far away for me to feel that normal crushing, burning sensation—or if it was just my heart breaking all over again.
I wrapped my fingers around the doorknob and turned back to Bee.
“We go back to normal,” I said, letting the door click shut.
Bee gave a little snort at that, looking around at Saylor’s house, still strewn with books about Oracles and magic and history, all these weird, incongruous things tucked alongside the china figurines and ugly paintings.
“Can we do that?” she asked, and I made myself walk down the stairs, my eyes on the front door.
Have a good life, Pres.
“We’re going to try.”
Acknowledgments
WRITING A BOOK involves a fair amount of mayhem, and I’m lucky enough to have a bunch of fabulous mischief-makers on my side.
Thank you to my amazing editor, Ari Lewin, who gets me and my books so very well, has been such a champion for me and Harper, and never minds when I send her pictures of People I Find Attractive. You are a rock star, and I love making books with you!
Thanks, too, to the amazing Katherine Perkins, who is so smart I’m a little afraid of her, and whose notes on this book were insightful and encouraging and sharper than Harper’s favorite high heel.
This is the sixth book that I’ve been lucky enough to thank Holly Root for, and I could fill up six more books just explaining why I feel so fortunate to have her as my agent. Everyone should have a Ninja-Angel like Holly on her side.
Massive thanks to the people at Penguin who have done so much for me and my books and who make me so grateful to shout “TEAM FLIGHTLESS BIRD!” on the regular. Special thanks to Anna Jarzab and Elyse Marshall for being both amazing at their jobs and just amazing humans in general.
Thank you so much to all of my readers, especially the Rebel Belles on Tumblr who have embraced Harper, Bee, David, and Ryan and made such lovely things to go along with the books. Best Readers Ever!
For me, these books are about the power of ladies and the special bond that is Lady Friendship, and I am, as the kids say, #blessed to have so many wonderful ladies in my life. I have to single out one of those ladies in particular, Julia Brown, for all her encouragement when I was working on Miss Mayhem, and for the ridiculous amounts of Happy she’s brought into my life. Lady Bros 4-Ever.
As always, all the love to my family. Y’all are the reason I get to make up things for a living, but you’ve made the world I live in an even better place than all the worlds in my head. I love you.
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