Snakes and Shadows Read online

  Mark swung again. This time, Tobias didn’t dodge. He just punched faster. The crunch of cartilage turned Penny’s stomach, and Mark’s howl of pain sent her heart skidding into her throat.

  Someone screamed, a high-pitched shriek of horror.

  “I’m the leader this group needs, Mark.” Tobias’s needling use of the other man’s name grated on Penny’s nerves.

  He’s manipulating him, she realized. He’s been doing it for ages. She knew the type. Tobias was a guy who could slide a poisoned barb across a crowded table and let no one see it except the recipient. He’d probably been working on the angry, insecure Mark since they’d met, undermining him in tiny ways, hoping he would eventually snap.

  “Bastard!” Mark lunged, tackling Tobias. The two men grappled, then Mark landed on his back. He gurgled and spat out a mouthful of blood, the mess hitting Penny’s shoe.

  Tobias leaned down, and the room fell silent. “You cross me, and you will feel the wrath of gods, Mark. Now, leave.”

  Mark scrambled backward, coming unsteadily to his feet. “Fuck you, Tobias. This is my group.” He beat his chest, voice wobbling. “It’s my house!”

  Tobias spread his hands. “So? You think anyone cares about your dingy little cottage? They don’t care about this place any more than they care about you.” He smirked. “Don’t believe me? Go. Take your precious followers. I’m not stopping anyone from leaving.” His eyes glinted as he ran them over the room, resting briefly on Felicity. Her mouth trembled, and she looked sick.

  “Come on.” Mark turned to go. He looked back when nobody moved. “COME ON!” he screamed.

  Silence answered.

  Mark sniffed, wiping at the steady dribble of blood coming from his smashed nose with his sleeve. He staggered back, then whirled and slammed his fist into the wall before storming away, calling out a last “Fuck you all!” as he slammed the basement door.

  Penny turned back, expecting to see Tobias chuckling as his nemesis left. Instead, he had wrapped Felicity in his arms. The girl was wooden, unwilling to fully accept the embrace.

  Tobias ignored her discomfort. “I’m sorry you all had to see that.” His voice was heavy, as though he hadn’t been taunting Mark just moments before.

  “What happens now?” The girl who spoke up flinched when Tobias looked at her, but the smile he turned her way brought a small one from her in response.

  “We meet with the East Coast liaison. Just me; it’s how they work, just one contact with one group. Safer that way.” Tobias stroked Felicity’s back. “Then...then, my friends, we begin the real work.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  “What do you mean, you can’t do anything?” Amelia snapped. “We risked our lives to get you that information!”

  Agent Crenel shook his head in frustration. “I know, I know!” He threw his hands up. “The only thing that might incriminate them in anything illegal is the meeting with the East Coast people. They might be connecting with a terrorist cell that’s active over there, but there’s no evidence of that, and honestly, your guys are small potatoes. I don’t think our persons of interest task force would deal with them.”

  “They were talking about sending the world back to the dark ages,” Penny pointed out.

  “Did they offer any concrete plans for doing so?” Crenel asked. When the girls both shook their heads, he shrugged. “It’s not illegal to want the world to end, only to take steps to make it happen.”

  “Can’t you access the email address the girls have, at least?” Dean March steepled her fingers against her chin, lips pursed.

  Crenel shook his head. “It’s one thing to hack the communications of a genuine suspect, but we’re talking about a seventeen-year-old girl, Jessica.”

  “A seventeen-year-old terrorist is still a terrorist,” Amelia pointed out.

  “Show me the law that says it’s an act of terror to summon a ghost, and I’ll make it happen,” Crenel shot back. He ran a hand through his graying hair, making it stand up at odd angles. “We got lucky at the Theatre. They were in public, so we managed to make public disturbance charges stick on one of them. Other than that, we’re talking about American citizens who are, for all intents and purposes, innocent.”

  “When will our induction take place?” March asked.

  Crenel lifted his head, showing surprise at the change of topic. “Not for a few weeks. Why?”

  She shrugged, ignoring Penny’s curious look. “No reason.”

  “What are you talking about?” Penny asked.

  “You’ll see.” Dean March stood and walked to her door. “Girls, thank you for your efforts. For now, I must speak with Agent Crenel in private.” She opened the door and held it.

  Penny squeezed the arms of the wooden chair she sat in, then left out a defeated sigh. “Fine. Well, try and get something more condemning next time.”

  “Next time?” Amelia had started to rise already but shot to her feet at Penny’s words. “Are you crazy? That Tobias guy is a serial killer in the making. He’s gonna have all those girls pregnant by the end of the month, ready to drink poison at his say-so.”

  Penny looped her arm through her friend’s. “That just means it won’t be boring.”

  They headed for the door, but Crenel grabbed Penny’s free arm. “Don’t go doing anything stupid. Promise me that anything you come up with, you run by me first.”

  Penny hesitated, then nodded. “Fine.”

  She left beneath the worried gaze of the FBI and the evaluating eye of the dean.

  The protestors had, for the most part, been chased off or arrested for disturbing the peace and damage to private property, thanks to a well-aimed rock thrown at an Academy window. Despite that, an aura of restlessness hung over the Academy, and classes that week were subdued.

  “Assignments are due by midnight on the twenty-seventh,” Professor Marcus said as she handed out their tasks. “You may work in teams of any size if you wish. The grade will be based on the cumulative difficulty.” Marcus gave Penny a pointed glance. “Simply taking a photograph of a friendly party god or a pet snake will not be enough to secure a passing mark.”

  Penny grabbed her piece of paper and scanned it. It confirmed what Professor Marcus had already said.

  The task, in a nutshell, was to obtain proof of the Mythological Invasion. They had flexibility as to what that might entail—anything from a video of a Myther to an actual artifact—they had to be prepared to defend their evidence against a skeptical evaluation. They would also need to submit a five-thousand-word essay on the subject.

  Movement caught Penny’s eye.

  She glanced at Cisco, who was gesturing for her attention.

  When he saw she was looking, he displayed a string of hand movements that looked like a drunken game of charades.

  Penny lifted her hands and mouthed, “What?”

  Cisco pointed slowly at her, then Amelia and Red, finally bringing his finger to his chest.

  He wants us to work as a team, she reasoned. That’s not a bad idea.

  Then he held up both hands and brought them together.

  Um, maybe he thinks we should work closely?

  He punched one hand, waved fingers at his hair, and opened both hands like a book.

  He wants to summon Fabio, knock him out, and write a book about it?

  Unable to come up with a reasonable translation, Penny just shrugged and tapped her watch. Class would be over in a few minutes, and they could talk then.

  Indeed, Professor Marcus soon wrapped up and released the students. As they filed out, Amelia squeezed past Corey and Jason to speak to her. “So, we’re all working together?” she asked, looking at Cisco.

  “At least someone got it,” he grumbled.

  “Yeah, it was clear enough. I don’t know how to find Samson, though. Do you have any inside info on that?” Amelia waved at Red to join them.

  “Samson?” Cisco looked as confused as Penny felt.

  “Yes, Samson. You want to cut his hair
off so we can kill him, right?” Amelia watched Cisco’s face change from confused to exasperated. “Then what the hell was with all the hand waving?”

  “Wait until we get to the dining room,” Penny advised. “As much as I want to find out the meaning behind Cisco’s mime performance, Jason is eavesdropping, and I don’t want to give our ideas away.”

  “I am not!” Jason huffed.

  “Then how did you hear that?” Penny waited until he scowled and walked off before giggling. “I swear, that guy is dumber than a box of rocks.”

  The group of four was soon settled at a spot in the dining room. When Penny looked up, however, they weren’t alone. “Clive, whatcha doing here?” she asked, trying to sound casual.

  He shrugged, eyes straying over to where Mara and Kathy sat together, their books out as they chatted closely. “I just… Can I join your group?”

  “What group?” Red asked far too innocently.

  Clive lifted an eyebrow. “I’m not stupid. I know you guys are going to work together. I don’t know if I can do this on my own, and…”

  “And?” Penny prodded.

  Clive didn’t answer, just lifted one shoulder.

  “And he’s too scared to ask Mara if he can pair up with her,” Amelia said.

  Clive winced, and Penny could swear that even under his dark skin, she could see a rising blush.

  “Give me a minute.” Amelia dropped her fork and stood. She went over to Mara’s table, leaned down and said something, then returned to them.

  As Amelia shoved a forkful of slaw into her mouth, Mara appeared. She grinned nervously. “Hi. Um, can I talk to Clive for a minute, please?”

  Clive’s eyes shot open, and he jumped up fast enough that the scrape of his chair on the floor drew every eye in the room. “Sure.”

  The two moved off, and Penny tried her best not to look like she was straining to hear their whispered conversation. It wasn’t a long one—Mara soon left to rejoin Kathy, and Clive sat down with a thump.

  “Still want to join us, Clive?” Amelia asked slyly.

  He shook his head. “Uh, thanks. I’m pairing with Mara and Kathy.” He stared at his plate for a minute before asking, “What did you say to her?”

  Amelia shrugged. “I told her that if you hadn’t found a group for the assignment by the end of lunch, I was going to ask you to pair up.”

  “Why would she care?” Red asked.

  Amelia reached out and ruffled his hair. “Because she likes him, you doofus. Come on—if Cisco told you he was gonna ask me to partner with him, would you jump in first?”

  “No, because we’re all teaming up together.” Red looked around, still confused. “Aren’t we?”

  Amelia dropped her head on the table. “I give up.” She lifted it, but only high enough to rest her chin on her hands. “Between you and Cisco, I give up.”

  “Hey, what’d I do?” Cisco asked.

  “Failed mime school,” Penny told him. “What were you trying to say in there?”

  “Oh, that!” Cisco shook his head. “I can’t tell you. It’s...confidential.” He shot Clive a pointed look.

  “Oh. Right. Uh, sorry.” Clive stood and picked up his plate, giving Amelia a shy grin. “Thanks for the help.”

  Once Clive had wandered off to sit with his new class partners, Cisco explained. “We should use Tobias to help us summon something big. We’d get huge points for that!”

  Amelia and Penny just stared.

  “What was the hair thing?” Amelia asked, imitating Cisco’s earlier gesture.

  “And this bit,” Penny asked, doing the motion that looked like opening a book.

  “We,“ Cisco pointed at the four group members, “should team up with Mark,”—the hair gesture—“and Tobias”—the punch—“And get the Book of Thoth or what they have of it, and summon a monster for the assignment,” he finished, using book-opening hand signal for the Book of Thoth.

  Penny shook her head in awe. “That was terrible, Cisco. Never, ever play charades with me. Not unless you’re on the other team.”

  “Are you done insulting me?” he asked, clutching an imaginary wound on his chest. “I don’t think I can take it anymore.”

  Penny tousled his messy hair the way Amelia had Red’s earlier. “Poor baby. I’ll stop.”

  Cisco bit into his burger.

  Today’s menu was spicy chicken filets on crusty buns with an assortment of side salads, and Penny was thoroughly enjoying it. She didn’t even mind the slight bite in the chicken. Her recurring confrontations with Doritos were beginning to harden her taste buds.

  “So, what’s your plan?” she asked through a mouthful of food.

  “My plan?” Cisco wiped a smear of mayonnaise off his face with the back of his hand, then wiped that on his shirt. “That’s your job. You’re the clever one.”

  “Hey, it was your idea to start with.” Penny reached down to pull a small notebook from her bag. “What have we got so far?”

  “I don’t get the feeling we’re going to be invited back anytime soon,” Amelia admitted. “I mean, Tobias seemed pretty controlling of those girls. I don’t think we fooled him into thinking we’d be pushovers like that.”

  “You’ve got a point,” Penny agreed. “But what if we have something he wants? Information or something?”

  “Or, we could just turn up.” Red waved his phone at Penny. “You didn’t just get that text?”

  Three phones appeared on the table. “Nope, nothing.” Amelia looked at Red’s phone. “Who did you give your number to?”

  “That Felicity girl.” Red ducked the hand aimed at his head. “Hey, she said it was for meetings!”

  “Maybe she forgot she added you,” Penny mused. “It was just before the guys turned up, right?” She remembered the two of them talking, heads close together for a moment before they were interrupted.

  Red nodded. “She jumped up so fast I thought something bit her, so she could have forgotten, I guess. Either way, we know where the next meetup is.”

  Next Friday, Paddy’s bar downtown. $5 cover charge, don’t worry, they’ll accept our ID.

  “A bunch of teenyboppers in a bar on a Friday Night,” Cisco groaned. “What could go wrong?”

  “We can go incognito,” Penny said. “Stay out of sight, listen in, then figure out our plan.”

  “What if they’re summoning something?” Amelia asked.

  Penny shrugged. “We take our kits. Worst case scenario, if we blow our cover, we lose our lead. Look, at the end of this semester, we’ll be a quarter of the way through our course. In two years? It’ll be us against the Mythers. If we can’t handle something little now, what hope do we have then?”

  Red shrugged. “She argues like an Irishman.”

  “Is that a good thing?” Penny asked.

  Red grinned. “Sure, and it is. I’m in.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  The days flew by quickly, and soon Penny was faced with the decision whether to tell Agent Crenel of their plans.

  He paced the defense training room as the students watched. “This is not a game,” he lectured. “The weapons we’ll be training with are real. They can injure you, or even kill you if you aren’t careful. All students must be fully armored, and if I see one person goofing off, you’re gone. Agreed?”

  A murmur of assent ran through the class, and Crenel nodded in satisfaction. “Suit up. When you’re done, I want Cisco and Red to help lug this crate upstairs. We’ll be outside today.”

  Penny pulled the heavy pants over her jeans, immediately feeling her body temperature rise. “Are all these layers really necessary?” she asked.

  “I’m going to drown in a pool of my own sweat,” Heddy called. “Seriously, can’t we skip the vest, at least?”

  “No.” Crenel didn’t leave himself open to any arguments. He turned to help Kathy strap her vest on instead. Once it was secure, he passed her a visor.

  “No worse than home,” Penny mumbled. She realized it really wasn’t
. She’d often trudged through swampy scrubland in heavy jeans and long sleeves. The protection was essential when the sun was hot enough to fry your skin, or when snakes were as plentiful as blades of grass.

  “Boots?” The serpent gave up trying to fit into Penny’s visor and lifted her head. “You might have to sit this one out.”

  With an irritated hiss, Boots dove back into the visor, knocking it over in her haste and spilling herself onto the floor.

  “Need a hand, Penn?” Amelia grinned behind the hard plastic faceplate on her visor. She was already strapped into her armor.

  Penny realized she was one of the last students to finish getting ready.

  “Dammit! Yeah, help me with this strap, will you?”

  Amelia happily obliged, and Penny was soon dressed and helmeted. They jogged out of the room, moving awkwardly under the weight and restrictions of the padded clothing, their vision obscured by the visors.

  Penny had hoped to catch the agent on their way upstairs, but he was too far ahead of them. By the time Penny emerged from the Academy building, the students were already lined up and accepting their weapons.

  “RIGHT!” Crenel bellowed. “This game has rules! You’ve got five minutes from my mark to scatter. Stay within the bounds of the Academy. If you get hit, you come in. If you hear the bell, you come in.” He raised a hand and jangled an old bell loudly. “Don’t aim for the head. Yes, we have helmets, but they’re not impact-proof. You’ll be marked on survival time, kills, and other criteria.”

  “Like what?” Jason asked.

  Crenel smirked and touched a finger to the side of his nose. He handed Penny and Amelia their paint guns. “Final rule. You can use the building, but do not get paint on it.” A hint of a smile played on his lips. “That’s an automatic loss, and the dean will be on your ass for defacing Academy property—and she’ll be on mine for letting it happen, which means I’ll be making your life miserable too.”