Dark Nebula (The Chronicles of Kerrigan) (30 page)

Meet me at
9pm.
Same spot
outside
.–K

Kraigan

She checked her watch.
Almost nine now.
Rae stood in the middle of her room, undecided what to do.
Devon
might call but was she the kind of girl
to wait for him to contact her?
His record wasn’t too hot in that category. Maybe Kraigan
needed to get something off his chest
. It would be silly not to go. However, what if Dean Wardell thought she was sneaking out with another guy,
he would
accuse her of cheating on
Devon
or something worse instead of being happy she wasn’t with his son.
This is ridiculous
!
Kraigan’s
just trying to discover who he is as a person, like I had to last year.

Tossing her backpack and books on her
bed,
she closed
the door behin
d
her. N
ot seeing anyone in the hallway,
Rae
dashed down the stairs and outside without
stopping.
She slowed when she hit the sidewalk and turned right to walk along
Aumbry
’s building.
Using
Devon
’s tatù ability, s
he spotted Kraigan leaning against a tree. She glanced behind her and saw no one so she burst into a sprint using a tatù and stopped easily in front of him.

“I just got in from studying and saw your note. What’s up?”

He dropped his backpack off his shoulder and
unzipped it to pull out
papers
. “
Nothing really
.”
He looked uncomfortable.

“What’s going on?” Rae could tell he wanted to say something or ask her a question and apparently didn’t know how to start.
“Hey, if I’m going to be your mentor, you need to be willing to ask me stuff you want to know. Even if you don’t think you’re going to like the answer.”
He needs a mentor.
T
he least I can do is try to help.

Kraigan hung his head, shuffling the toe of his sneaker into the dirt, a nervous habit Rae immediately recognized as one of her own. “I heard the headmaster last year was a good guy. What happened at the spring dance last year?
No one wants to say exactly, but t
he way people talk, it’s not hard to figure out something happened between him and you.”

Rae sighed. Carter,
Devon
, Julian and Molls were the only people who really knew.
And probably the entire Privy Council.
No one had asked her and Carter had done a great job at covering everything up.
Truth or lie?
“It’s kinda complicated.”

“
I’d like to know if you’re willing to share.”

“Lanford seemed like a really good guy. He really tried to help me deal with my tatù, set
Devon
up as my mentor.”
Probably knew I’d be attracted to him and was hoping we’d hook up.
“He really pulled one over on me, on
everyone
at
school. It turned out he worked for my father and had hoped to brainwa—convince me to continue my father’s plans. It didn’t work out in his favor.”
There. Basic
truth,
with little detail.

“And he got killed?” He stared at her
,
and
she
nodded very slowly. “Is he really dead?
You know that for sure?
” Before Rae’s heart could add another beat, he spoke again. “
What about your dad?”

Rae scoffed. “He didn’t like me very much.”

Kraigan’s eyebrows rose. “You really think that? Maybe he was just mad you weren’t a boy. Maybe he thought like Guilder and believed guys held more ability with their tatùs.”

“Guilder used to think like that. They don’t anymore.
Simon Kerrigan was like…like a dark nebula. With him, nothing was as it seemed. He had everyone fooled and kept everything hidden.” Rae shook her head. “
It’s frustrating to not have known what he really was, and now
have everyone expecting you to turn into
the
monster
he was
.
Everyone is always waiting for me to turn into that chic from
The Exorcist
or something. Sometimes, I just can’t stand it.
”

“You a
re not a monster
!
Far, far from it.” Kraigan
stuffed whatever
papers
he had
been holding
back into his
knapsack
. “You’re more like a kitten.”

Say what?
The statement caught her off guard, but it also lightened the mood a little.
“Thanks, I think.” She laughed. “It doesn’t matter what other people think in the end. The only person you need to answer to
,
at the end of the day
,
is yourself.”

“But don’t you think that with our tatùs,
we
have a right to do something with them
? I mean, why have these powers otherwise?
Man didn’t
evolve without reason. They evolved to ensure survival, to rise above other life forms.
Tatùs are the same
! Otherwise, what’s the point?
”
Kraigan gestured wildly, making it obvious this was something he felt strongly about
. It gave Rae a moment’s pause.

She
took a few seconds to carefully formulate her next words. She
understood his questions and concerns
—
she had
often wondered
these things
herself. It was easier to talk to Kraigan about this than
it was with
Devon
.
Kraigan
seemed more open minded
.
So it was easier to tell Kraigan what she thought, even if she didn’t think it was prudent to spill all.
“I think that’s why the Privy Council exists
,
and other agencies like
it
around the world. It gives us a chance to do something good
with our powers
, without being exposed
.”

Kraigan scratched along his jaw line. “I’m not so sure about the Privy Council.
No one knows anything about them. How do we even know what their true motives are? Maybe they’re the dark nebula.
”

Dare she share her opinion?
Rae weighed the pros and cons. In the end, sharing didn’t seem to pose much of a risk.
“Maybe you’re right. But maybe everyone is
,
to a degree. Guess we’ll find out as we get older.”

Kraigan glanced up behind Rae.
She turned around to look as well. Someone was walking towards them. She squinted. “It’s Madame Elpis.”

“She’s tight with curfew
,
isn’t she? Get going and I’ll hold her off. She shouldn’t be able to recognize you
from that distance
.
I’ll cover for you.” He grinned. “I owe you one.”

“Thanks.” She didn’t want to deal with a
lecture from Elpis
,
or
to have
any rumors to start flying around that she was meeting Kraigan.
Last thing I want is people thinking we’re on the sly and
have
that get back to
Devon
,
when it’s so far from the truth.
“See you around tomorrow then.
I’m glad we talked tonight. It’s nice to know other people wonder about stuff like me. A…A lot of students, who’ve been here since being a kid, seem a bit more close
-
minded
.” She slipped into the forest and took off running. Once she cleared the other side of
Aumbry
House she cleared out of the trees and ran to the front of the building. Slipping as quietly as she could to the stairs, she levitated up and into her room.
At the
window,
she stared down. Madame Elpis walked on her own around the building, glancing left and right.
Safe – for now.

The
rest of the
week
took an eternity to pass.
The entire
, long, drawn-out, boring
summer of awaiting her return to Guilder
had
moved quicker.
Rae tried to fill it by
keep
ing
busy with
schoolwork
, a challenge in itself since her education courses came easy and she
had no trouble
ke
eping
up with all her assignments.
She thought a lot about her conversation with Kraigan and wished
Devon
was around to ask him what he thought. Thinking about
Devon
only made her miss him more and make the time go slower.
In the end, the only thing she could do was give herself extra homework.

She practiced the skills and challenges
she
had
learned
with
Devon
and Julian
,
but they were boring to do alone.
She talked Nicholas into scrimmaging with her
,
but after
one
session and Nicholas’ black eye the next day, he refused to
practice
again
.

One night, a
fter dinner
,
as
Rae strolled
up the stairs to her
room
, she
heard
the phone in her room ring
.
Funny, no one’s ever called me on it.
She paused as it r
a
ng again
, trying to consider who might be calling and how important it might be to take the call
.
Uncle Argyle!
She dashed down the hall,
frantically
trying to get her key into the lock before the phone stopped
ringing
.

Worry filled her
.
What if
something
terrible has
happened t
o
him
in
New York
?
Uncle Argyle and
Aunt Linda
were the only family she had left.
She flew
in
to her room.
Flicking the light, she grabbed the receiver and tried to catch her breath.

“
I’m here! It’s me
, Rae. Uncle Argyle
?
Are you there?
” she shouted. “
H
ello,” she
tried again
in a normal voice.

S
ilence
greeted her
.
Rae swore under her breath
.
Shoot! I reached the phone too late.
Yet, she didn’t hear a dial tone.
She kept the phone tight against her ear. “Is somebody there?”
Walking
towards
her desk,
she squinted and cocked her hea
d, thinking she heard a swirling
noise
.

The
churning
sound
grew
louder, along with
a weird
continuous
bashin
g, like something slamming against a wall.
Rae switched
the phone to her other ear
.
Her heart pounded against her rib cage and she glanced frantically around.
Is
someone trying to scare me?

“Rae?”

Devon
?
His
voice shouted thro
ugh the phone, above the noise.

“
It’s crazy noisy here.
Can you hear me?”

“Yeah
,
” she shouted back
in relief
, and then
lowered her voice,
“
E
verything
okay
?
Are you alright?
”

“
I’m fine.
The conn
—
n
ection here’
s terr
—
ble
,
and between the wind and crashing waves, even with my tatù, it’s hard to hear.”