Dust and Roses: Book Two of the Dust Trilogy (14 page)

We shook on it and he disappeared into the
janitor’s closet. Now I had to figure out how I was going to get Imani to stay
quiet about what she’d seen.

Tuesday I spent most of the school day
alone. Imani had managed to ditch me even in biology, the class we had
together. As soon as she walked in, she’d asked Mrs. Lang for a pass to the
nurse’s office. I couldn’t blame her. Maybe it was for the best since I had no
idea what to say to her anyway. How could I possibly explain what she had seen?
What if she’d already told people? I had compromised the lair and it was all my
fault. Worse, I had put Imani’s life in danger.

When I didn’t find Imani at our usual spot
during lunch, I knew where she would be—in the library, specifically the
mystery section, poring over books.

 Sure enough, I spotted her in the
back with one yellow pencil sticking out of her braids, and one between her
lips. She frowned as she moved a finger back and forth across the page of a
book. A half-eaten sandwich rested on a plastic Zip-Loc bag beside a stack of
books. Mrs. Zoloft, the librarian would have had a fit if she saw it.
No
food in the library
was number one on the extensive list of rules posted on
every wall.

I stood in front of the table and cleared
my throat. She looked up at me and closed the book she’d been flipping through.
“Hey.”

I slid myself into the chair across from
her. “Hi. I think we should talk about yesterday.”

She frowned and opened the book again.
“Yesterday? What happened yesterday? Oh, the two Ambers got in a fight in the
locker room. It was a draw. Neither one of them can throw a decent punch. Are
you talking about that?”

I sighed. “You know what I’m talking
about. You saw.”

“I saw what? A secret passage filled with monsters
and all kind of weird things that can’t possibly exist? No. That didn’t happen.
That couldn’t have happened. I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Imani—”

She slammed her book shut. “What the hell,
Arden?”

I glanced around us to make sure no one
was listening. The coast was clear. No one in their right mind would spend
their precious lunch time in the library except for Imani.

Taking a deep breath, I let it all out. I
couldn’t candy-coat it. I couldn’t give her the softened version. I gave her
the stone-cold truth. “It’s like this, that place
is
a monster’s lair
and all sorts of creatures live there. They might seem horrible and scary, but
they’re really not. All they want to do is exist and survive. They keep to
themselves and they don’t hurt anyone.”

Imani twirled her pencil between her
fingers, locking eyes with me. She said her father had taught her to be a human
lie detector. If that was true, she was believing me. “Go on.”

I cleared my throat. My mouth felt dry.
“Well . . . I’m one of them.”

The pencil dropped onto the table making
me jump even though I’d watched it happening.

Her eyebrows raised. “What?”

“Yeah. I mean, I don’t look like them. I
look like a Human, but I’m not.”

“Then what are you?”

“I’m part Banshee and part Wendigo.” I
explained to her what both of those things meant. “That’s why you had to leave
that night because I didn’t want to hurt you but I think I’m beginning to
suppress that part of me. I’m becoming more Banshee than Wendigo which is a
great thing, well, it’s a better thing.”

“That’s how you made those scythes fly in
the air like that?” she asked in awe. I was glad she seemed more fascinated
than creeped out. Imani was my first Human friend and I’d been so worried about
losing her, maybe that wouldn’t happen after all. She sat back in her chair.
“Wow. I always knew there was something different about you, girl.”

I contemplated telling her about Fletcher,
and then decided that I could trust her. Even though she couldn’t help, I needed
to get it off my chest. I told her about Geminis and how Fletcher was mine and
how he was dying because of me.

She sat up in her seat. “We’re not going
to let that happen. We’re going to find a way to fix this. Every problem has a
solution.”

I appreciated her enthusiasm and her
desire to help, but there was nothing she could do. She didn’t understand our
world. Hell, I barely understood it. I had only been a part of it for a few
months.

“I don’t know how to stop the curse.
That’s what I need to find out.”

“You have to talk to them—those things.”

I shook my head. “I can’t go back there. I
broke the code by telling you about the lair and then I threatened to kill them
and that wasn’t the first time.” For all I knew, scythes could have still been
soaring through the hallways.

When I first learned about my gift/curse,
the others tried to use me as a weapon. They tried to make me kill Lacey. I
couldn’t do that, not even to her. I had to threaten them to let both me and
Lacey go.

Imani looked at the clock and picked up
her sandwich. “Well, who can you talk to about this? Fletcher?”

If Fletcher had any ideas on how to stop
the curse, he would have said so. That being said, I knew exactly who to speak
to.

“Since when?” shouted a sharp, croaky
voice from behind me. “Since when is it okay for students to bring food into
this library?”

Ugh. Mrs. Zoloft. She acted like the
Everson High Library was the Taj Mahal.

“Sorry,” Imani muttered with a mouth full
of cucumber sandwich.

Mrs. Zoloft scribbled furiously on a
yellow pad she had pulled from her dress pocket. “Be sorry in detention. Rules
apply to new students also.”

Imani huffed. “Can’t you just give me a
warning?”

Mrs. Zoloft pointed to the wall across
from us. “You see those rules posted? That was your warning.”

Imani snatched the detention slip from
her, rolling her eyes.

Then Mrs. Zoloft had the nerve to rip off
another sheet and shove it in my face. “And you should really know better, Ms.
Moss.”

“Hey, what did I do?”

She slammed the slip down on the table.
“Guilty by association. Did you remind your friend of the rule?” Mrs. Zoloft
clicked her tongue at us and waddled away.

I glared at Imani as the bell rang and we
gathered our things.

“I am so sorry. I’ll make it up to you. I
swear, I’m going to help you with this Gemini thing. There has to be a
solution.”

I agreed. There had to be a solution. The
question was, would we find it in time? Every moment could be the difference
between life and death for Fletcher.

Only five kids had after school detention
that afternoon, and Mr. Hall, who was supposed to be watching us, had better
things to do.

“Sit down and keep quiet,” he ordered
before becoming engrossed with something on his laptop. He acted as if there
were a million other things he would have rather been doing than babysitting
teenagers who had done dumb things and were even dumber for getting caught.

Imani and I sat at the very back of the
room where she whipped out her tablet. She typed for a few moments and then
passed it to me.

Now we have three mysteries to solve: Ms.
Melcher, the carnival catastrophe, and how to stop the Gemini Curse---hey! What
if they’re related????

She was right of course. They were
related. I handed the tablet back to her and dug into my homework. No matter
what was going on, flunking classes wasn’t an option. I needed out of that
school ASAP.

The room was quiet as the five of us
worked. A clink came from the wall beside my desk. Mr. Hall looked over his
laptop for a second and then went back to what he was doing. The grate near the
floor had been removed. A tiny, pale hand stuck out and dropped a note.

Violet. It had to be her. She was the only
one small enough to fit through the school’s ducts. I glanced around. No one
was paying attention to me so I snatched up the piece of paper and unfolded it.

Come today—alone this time

I didn’t know how it was possible, but the
handwriting seemed angry. I was sure they wanted me down in the lair so that
Mr. Mason could yell at me or worse. Whatever it was, it wasn’t going to be
good.

I sighed and stuffed the note in my
pocket. Once detention was over, I told Imani the truth about where I had to
go. No more lies. Things would be easier that way. I wasn’t going to keep my
friend by lying to her.

“Good luck.” Her brow was furrowed with concern.
“They’re not going to hurt you are they?”

“No, well, I don’t think so.” I hoped not
at least.

 We said our goodbyes and I answered
my summons.

***

I stood at the end of the hallway, frozen,
dreading what was coming.

“She’s here!” someone yelled from the end
of the hallway.

Wes. He stuck his head out of the control
room. “I knew I smelled you. I’m sure you know where you need to go. Good
luck.”

I did know where I needed to go. Straight downstairs
to Mr. Mason. Down the elevator and a long hallway to his dark dismal office,
which I’d consider to be a dungeon. At the great steel door, I knocked and
waited. The door slid open on its own.

Inside, Mr. Mason sat in a huge armchair,
the back of his chair reaching far above his head and folding back like a
flower petal. Unfortunately, Cadence was also in the room sitting in a chair
with her feet propped up. She rolled her large eyes when she saw me.

“Have a seat,” Mr. Mason said dryly.

Cadence patted the chair next to her.
Slight amusement flashed in her eyes. I nestled myself into the seat. If I was
about to be reamed a new one, I should at least be comfortable.

Mr. Mason sighed and rubbed his chin. “It
seems we have a problem . . . again. Why is it that you have so many problems,
Ms. Moss?”

I shrugged. I didn’t know. Dumb luck?

Mr. Mason looked from me to Cadence, who
was probably savoring every second of this. Why did she have to be there?

“Anyway, you have broken the code, one of
the most important and sacred rules at that. What were you thinking telling
that girl about us?”

He had every right to be angry, so I
didn’t bother to argue. “I didn’t mean to. When I told her, I made it sound
like it were just a made up story. No Human would really believe it. Then on
Monday, that was stupid. I had no idea she would follow me down here. I didn’t
mean for any of this to happen.”

Mr. Mason narrowed his eyes at me.

“What happened after that was worse,”
Cadence said. “You tried to kill us for her. You put our lives in danger
again
to save a Human. How many times are we supposed to forgive you for that?”

It sounded awful when she put it that way.
“I wasn’t going to hurt anybody but I wasn’t about to let them hurt Imani.
She’s defenseless against you guys. I just wanted to scare you. She’s never
done anything to anyone. All she’s guilty of is being nosey.”

Mr. Mason waved his hand dismissively. “No
matter. My son has taken care of her.” Hollis must have lied to his father. I
owed him big. Hollis had done a lot for me. “Anyway,” Mr. Mason continued.
“Aside from you giving away our location, your ridiculous stunt could have
killed every creature in that hallway. There must be a punishment for your
infractions, this time. The next time there will be no forgiveness.”

I swallowed hard. “What kind of
punishment?” It had been ages since my parents had grounded me, given me extra
chores, or anything like that. Something told me Mr. Mason’s punishment was
going to be much harsher.

“You’re coming with us to find snapperwhips
in the woods,” Cadence announced cheerfully.

“What?” So many things about that sentence
just sounded wrong.

“Snapperwhips,” Cadence repeated. “They’re
the only things the Chupacabras will eat and we can only find them in certain
parts of the woods. They’re incredibly disgusting and hard to find. I’m in
charge of the weekly collection. You’ll be joining me and the others the day
after tomorrow. I hope those shoes are comfy and you will be getting that
pretty dress dirty.”

Mr. Mason removed a small hour glass from
his top drawer and slammed it on his desk. “That’s letting you off easy. Of
course, you will also have two days of solitary.” He pointed to the hour glass
and light blue sand began to fall from the top half to the bottom half. “We
have already notified your father so he will know not to expect you.”

I sat up in my seat. “What? What do you
mean solitary?”

Mr. Mason scribbled something on a pad as
if he were done talking to me. “You. In a room. By yourself for two days to
contemplate the stupidity of your actions. We must think before we do things,
especially you, when your thoughts can be deadly.”

I leapt to my feet, almost knocking my
chair over. “I’m not doing that. You can’t make me stay here. I have to go to
school and . . . stuff. I’m going home.”

Cadence chuckled and the door slid open. A
massive creature walked in with the head and body of a boy, but the feet like a
horse—a Cecrops. Roughly, he pinned my arms behind my back and pulled me from
the room. Down the hallway I went with him, kicking and screaming to a dark
room at the very end. Grunting, he shoved me inside, switched on the light, and
then slammed the steel door shut behind me.