A Beautiful Dark (20 page)

“Get off of him!” I yelled at Devin, tempted to rush at him and pull his hands away myself. But I knew how stupid it would be to get in the middle of a fight like this. “If you hurt him, I’ll hurt you so badly you won’t be able to
find
your other realm!” He glanced up at me, faltering. He loosened his grip.

It was the moment Asher needed. He twisted in Devin’s grasp, spinning him around and gripping his neck in the same choke hold Devin had him in moments before. “You’re going to wish you hadn’t done that!” Asher yelled.

“I don’t believe in wishing!” Devin shouted gruffly, throwing all his weight against Asher’s chest.

None of us had noticed that heavy clouds had rolled in, and the sky had grown black and grim. Lightning flashed, and the very atmosphere around us seemed to reverberate. “I’ve had enough of you,” Asher spat as Devin struggled against him. Freezing rain began to pelt against the cold concrete.

“If you kill each other, you’ll deserve it!” My whole body sang with anger. My heart was pounding and my nerves were raging—I could feel the heat rising in my cheeks and up the back of my neck. As Asher and Devin struggled, I could feel something brewing inside of me
.
It felt like I should be able to control it, but instead it was controlling me. And before I had a chance to do a single thing, to figure out the slightest way to control whatever surged within me, there was a thunderous crack as the side of the water tower split open like the simplest seam and water burst onto the roof.

The two rogue angels stopped in mid-fight and stared. I couldn’t tell what either of them was thinking, but I didn’t care. I was overcome with a sudden wave of exhaustion and fell like a rock to the flooding ground.

Chapter 24

T
he last light of day seeped in under the cracks of my eyelids. The rain had stopped, and the light was a normal, late-afternoon kind of color. My head pounded with an unforgiving rhythm.

Slowly sounds and voices began to crystallize around me.

I could make out Asher cursing. “Hold the water back!” he shouted as his strong arms scooped me up, and I was lifted off the ground, someplace—

My eyes shot open.
Off the ground?

I looked up and found myself staring into Asher’s face. His massive black wings flapped once, twice, and my vision was a rush of inky feathers. As we soared above the school, my stomach dropped, and I threw my arms around his neck. I closed my eyes tight, burying my face against his chest. When my body had gotten used to the swooping, jerky motion of flying, I opened them again, tentatively.

Asher glanced down at me, and I could see in his eyes a glimmer of worry. His grip tightened around me, and he leveled his gaze to see where he was going. The wind whipped past us, and the cold air felt crisp against my face. I strained my neck to catch a glimpse of Devin—who had stayed behind us on the roof—just in time to see a roiling wave of water flow back into the open seam in the water tower, and the seam seal itself back up like the petals of a flower closing in on itself.

Then it was too dark to see anything.

“That’s enough for today.” Asher’s voice sounded far above the wind rushing past us. “I’m taking you home.”

“Stop protecting me,” I demanded weakly. “I’m fine.” But I didn’t have the strength left to argue.

We flew in silence. Below us, the valleys and fields stretched and yawned as little lights sprinkled on in the houses below and cars snaked like toys along winding mountain roads. I tucked my head under Asher’s chin and felt him swallow. Being this close to him made me feel dizzy, like the closeness was a drug and I had to be careful or I might do something reckless. I’d never felt that way before.

Through the fuzziness in my brain, I tried to process what had happened on the roof. I didn’t know who had been responsible for causing what, but for the first time, it really felt like what Asher said was true. Something was inside of me, waiting, just waiting, for the chance to get out. And when it did . . .

We stood outside of my front door. The windows were dark, not a surprise since Aunt Jo had left that morning to take another group out. I was grateful she was away. How would I explain all this to her tonight?

Asher had placed me down gently on the ground just moments before, and the memory of feathers against my skin made me flush. With the slightest of self-conscious looks, he folded them behind his back, and they vanished. The sky instantly looked lighter.

“Are you okay?”

I nodded tentatively

“What happened up there—what stopped us—was that you?” A trace of a mischievous smile flashed across his face.

I realized that I’d been taking it for granted that I’d see Asher and Devin every day—but I had no idea where the two of them were living. Maybe they lost their corporeal, human form at night. Maybe Devin crossed over into the Order’s realm, and Asher flashed to the Rebellion’s camp. The night was freezing and my teeth were chattering, my hair still damp from earlier. After everything we’d been through that day—the past few weeks—I didn’t have the energy to keep talking outside. I was numb.

“Do you want to come in?” I asked.

Asher looked uneasy. “Um. Sure.” As I fumbled in my jacket pocket for my keys, he looked distracted, his eyes darting everywhere except at me.

The heat flared up almost immediately when we walked in.

“Whoa,” Asher said quietly. “What was that?”

I took a deep breath. I wasn’t afraid of sounding crazy anymore. “I
think
it was me. I don’t know for sure. It could have just been static electricity—”

“You know it wasn’t,” he said.

I deflated even more. Yeah, I knew it wasn’t. “So okay, I short-circuited the thermostat a couple of weeks ago and it’s been wonky ever since.”

“You’re getting stronger.” It wasn’t a question. Asher looked too grave.

“But obviously not more controlled,” I joked, trying to keep the mood light. My voice hung in the air of the empty hallway. “Come on, this way.”

The full moon cast a white beam of light through the windows of the living room, and even though the lights in the house were off, we could see where we were going.

We walked up the stairs to my room. It was cozy in there, with the rest of the house so quiet and empty. I went into the bathroom, grabbed a couple of towels, tossed him one, and began to rub the other briskly over my hair to get it dry enough that I was no longer shivering.

Sitting on the edge of my bed, I clutched the towel in my lap.

Asher took off his jacket and draped it over my desk chair. “Jeez, Skye, you wanna turn down the heat a little? It’s roasting in here.”

“Um,” I said, “I don’t exactly know how to, uh, reverse it yet.”

What I didn’t want to say was that I was pretty sure that my accidental powers tended to flare up when I was feeling emotional—especially this weird thing I had with heat. I figured that the reason the heat had blasted when we walked in the front door had more than a little bit to do with my being alone with Asher.

I wondered if he knew this.

Could he somehow tell? Were my eyes flashing silver?

“Here.” He came over to me, took the towel, tossed it aside, and brought me back to my feet. “I’ll help you. Close your eyes.” I did, and I felt him take my hands in his. I could sense the room growing even warmer. Something passed between our hands. A spark. I knew he felt it, too, because his hands twitched in mine. But he didn’t take them away. “Just pretend that everything inside you is lots of unfiltered electricity. Imagine what you want to do with it. And then imagine flipping a switch—and turning it on.” He paused, and I opened my eyes and looked at him. His eyes were searching mine, impossibly deep. I had to control myself. “The Gifted,” he said, “start small. They focus on nuances. A whisper of a breath. A hair out of place. They manipulate each and every small thing on this earth. And every little thing has an effect on something else. Just think of what a big change can do: It could sway the path of someone’s life, the outcome of battles, the course of history.”

I swallowed, hard, mesmerized by the look in his eyes.

“It’s our job, as the Rebellion, to stop them from controlling what they have no right to control. You could help us do that.”

A warning bell went off in my mind. I broke away from Asher, and he didn’t try to stop me.
Was he just using me?
The room was too warm. I took off my jacket and then pulled my sweater over my head. Suddenly I felt self-conscious, standing there in my tank top in front of Asher, when I was so used to piling on the layers of sweater and fleece and Gore-Tex. I glanced over at him. He was staring.

“What?” I asked.

“Nothing,” he shot back. His eyes darted again, this time focusing above my head on the bookshelves behind me. “Oh, hey. Let’s play checkers.”

“A Beautiful Dark” It was one in a stack of games left over from when I was a kid. I hadn’t played in years.

“Sure, it’s a game of strategy.” He went to my shelf and pulled down the red-and-black cardboard box. “It’ll help.”

He spread the game out on the rug, and we sat down, facing each other. I crossed my legs.

“Well,” he said, reaching for a black piece, “see if you can handle this.” He made his first move and for a little while we were neck and neck, anticipating each other’s strategy, moving and then counter-moving. Neither of us could pull ahead. I knew the game would end in stalemate.

“You’ll never win this,” I bluffed.

“I’ll go down trying,” he replied.

I looked up and caught his eyes. They flashed for a second before darting back down to the board.

“Nice move,” he said.

“It’s not my first time playing.”

I don’t know what it was. Maybe the fact that I was sitting there in my tank top and jeans across from an angel with black hair and incredible eyes or the overwhelming heat in the room, but I realized I was flirting with Asher. And then I realized something else.

For the first time in a year and a half, I thought I might actually be falling for someone.

And it had to stop. As if I needed my life to be any more complicated.

I stood up. “I’m tired,” I said. “I slept like crap this weekend, thanks to you.”

Asher stood up slowly, too.

“Yeah,” he said. “Listen, I’m sorry about that. And about today, the fighting. It all got out of hand. I . . . this mission is . . . hard, the hardest, and. . . ” He paused, running his hands through his hair. “It’s been stressful for all of us.”

“Gosh, has it been stressful for you, too? I’m so sorry. Maybe try spending half a minute in
my
shoes. In case you haven’t noticed, I have no idea what I’m doing!” My temper flared.

“Skye, come on, I’m sorry.”

We stood there staring at each other. After several seconds, I could make out a tapping noise growing louder and more impatient. I looked down and realized it was Asher’s foot.

“Stop it,” I said. “What’s with you tonight? You’re being weird.”

“Nothing,” he said. “I mean no, I’m not.” I challenged him with a hard stare. The light from my lamp cast a soft glow on his face, and I felt so much for him right then that it hurt. It would never work between us. He was a player, like Jordan. He’d try to use me. He wasn’t even human. But in the heat and the dim light of my room, it was nice to just
feel
something. Asher took a step toward me and stopped.

“Look, I’m not going to kiss you, okay?” he said, beginning to pace. “So you can stop trying to get me to.”

“What are you talking about?” I panicked. Maybe he
could
tell after all.

“You—you’re doing that, that
thing
. With the tank top. And the checkers. And inviting me up here—”

“Ex
cuse
me? You’re the one who wanted to play checkers.” I tried to regain my control.

“—well, forget it. I’m not doing it.”

“Good!” I shouted, my face red. “Who says I want you to?”

“Oh, you want me to, you
definitely
want me to.”

“I
so
do not!” I yelled. “Especially not when you’re
driving me crazy
!”

He paused. And looked at me.

“You don’t?” he asked. “I am?”

Then all of a sudden he’d taken two giant steps toward me, and before I knew it, had taken my face into his hands and the rest of me into the darkness of his wings, and he was kissing me and I was kissing him and we were kissing each other in my little bedroom, in my little house, in my little town, while the mountains soared into the sky.

I could sense the earth rumbling quietly beneath us. Something was moving, but all I knew right then was that it wasn’t dangerous.

For now, there was only Asher.

Chapter 25

A
fter he left, the house was silent. I was too excited to sleep, even though fatigue pulled at my body like gravity—threatening to topple me at any second. I wandered around absently, ducking into empty rooms, peeking out the windows at the full moon. I felt like if I stood still for more than a second, I would drown in its light.

My cell phone rang, nearly giving me a heart attack. I looked at the number and was flooded with relief. How had Aunt Jo known that I needed her?

“Hey,” I said as I curled up in a chair.

“Hey, yourself. I just wanted to check in since I had cell reception tonight. You doing okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“I’m sorry I have to spend so much time away lately.”

“I’m a big girl,” I said.

“I guess it’s good for us,” she mused. “Gives us a preview of what to expect when you go off to college.”

“Yeah.” If I went off to college. I was having so much trouble lately concentrating on my schoolwork, and I still had that stupid paper I needed to do for Ms. Manning.

“I’ll be with this group until Wednesday afternoon,” she told me. “Best behavior till I get back.”

“Promise.”

After several I-love-you’s, she hung up. The house echoed in the silence.

I wondered if my mom had ever told Aunt Jo about her life as an angel. Probably not. I hadn’t told Cassie about all the strange things going on in my life. Some things were impossible to explain.