The Hierophant (Book 1 in The Arcana Series) Read online

  But why is he using all his charms?

  We emerge from the crowd and spill into the kitchen just as a handful of people are leaving, red plastic cups in hand. Andy takes his arm back, meanders to the counter, and starts to concoct a drink for me from the smattering of half-empty bottles of clear and amber liquids.

  It's quieter in here, the roar of the party muted. The swift change in volume is awkward, makes the world too focused, too fast. I wander about the kitchen, pretending to be interested in Amrita’s Indian knick-knacks, anxiously playing with my necklace.

  “That's a cool pendant,” Andy says, surprising me. He hands me my drink.

  “Oh, thanks.” It's just a bronzy piece of hammered metal with archaic inscriptions on it that my mother gave me when I was young. Supposedly, it’s an amulet for protection.

  “Those are runes, right?” His green eyes move between my pendant and my face.

  I cock my head. “Yeah. Kind of.” It's not impossible that he would know about runes, but unlikely.

  “Kind of?” He peers at the necklace. “Glyphs?”

  “Sort of.” I narrow my eyes at him and take a casual sip of my drink.

  He laughs. “I'm just curious. I love ancient cultures—my parents are both anthropologists, you know. I was raised on stories about extinct cultures instead of fairy tales. My picture books were ancient grimoires and shamanic cosmologies.” He hesitates. “I've even studied what there is to study about gypsies.”

  I clench my jaw and turn away, taking a long drink from my cup. It burns going down, both from too much alcohol and too much compensatory sweetness. Curious and charming Andy might be, but a mixologist he is not.

  I nod and look at the pink liquid in my cup. “You know, some people are offended by the use of the word ‘gypsy.’ They consider it a slur.”

  Andy’s eyebrows rise. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it as a slur. I had no idea.”

  I shrug, feeling like I have no right to discuss the subject anyway because I’m not Romani, and I’m not a gypsy, and, really, I’m nothing at all besides descended from people more interesting than myself. “So, what’s the deal? Are you setting me up for a prank?”

  “What?” Andy's brow furrows, then realization dawns on him. “Oh. No. No, I swear.” He sighs. “I know a lot of kids have used your heritage as an insult in the past. I get that you wouldn't trust my motives by bringing it up. But honestly, I'm just really curious about that culture. Besides...” He shrugs and glances back at the partygoers. “We're almost adults now. I think most of them realize it's not cool to mock someone else's culture.”

  I take a breath and almost roll my eyes, but I manage to laugh instead. There are a lot of things he's said that I could take to task, that I could dwell on and feel anxious about if I wanted. But I have learned over the years to pick the right time, place, and topics for my battles, and this conversation, here, tonight, doesn’t fit the bill.

  And anyways, at least he’s being nice—for the second time this weekend, even though he saw me soaked from head to toe and barefoot in the rain the night before. Maybe it's time to take Kyla's advice and open up to some of her friends.

  “Maybe some of them,” I agree, acting like I can forgive them if that's the truth. “But there will always be assholes who think that shit's hilarious.” I bite my lip, realizing how crude I sound next to him.

  “I've never been one of them,” Andy points out, big-eyed and earnest.

  That's true. Andy hasn’t got a single enemy in the world. “Yeah.” I nod. “Well, what do you want to know? I'm not really an expert or anything. I'm first generation gadje—I've never even met my clan. In fact—” I stop myself. He doesn't need to know about how they don't want me.

  “What's gadje?”

  “It's sort of like a ‘muggle,’ I guess. I think our clan—the Ouros—stole the word from the Romani people. It means something along the lines of outsider.” I shrug. “My father was gadje, and since my mother went rogue to be with him, that makes me one too.”

  “So…you're not actually a gypsy?” He says it with irony, referring to the insults hurled at me since I came to high school.

  “No, not really. Just my mother. Which makes using it as an insult doubly fucking insulting.” I frown and blush. Cursing again. Seriously, one drink and half a bottle of wine is all it takes these days?

  Andy chuckles, unfazed by my cursing. “What would you have preferred then? To be a full member of your clan, or have no association with them at all?”

  I blink. I don't know if I've ever thought of it that way. It's not an answerable question though. “My life would have been a lot easier if I had nothing to do with them. But my relationship with my mother...I can't even imagine what it would have been like. It was perfect just the way it was. But then again, if I was raised by the clan, I would have had a lot more answers—a stronger sense of identity maybe. But I wouldn't have had Kyla. Or my father.”

  Andy nods, looking solemn, almost ashamed for having asked.

  “Oh God, I said that out loud,” I realize, fleetingly wondering if he spiked my drink. But no, I’m just rambling.

  He raises his eyebrows. “No worries. I asked. Hey.” He puts a hand on my arm, more firmly than before, and gives me an oddly reassuring squeeze for someone I barely know outside of attending the same school together for three years. He smiles a little. “If you'd rather not talk about it, just say so. I'd understand.”

  I smile awkwardly and shake my head, trying to regain some confidence. “No, it's cool. Sorry for being weird about it. It’s just…no one besides Kyla has ever asked me about the subject without meaning to offend me. You’re fine.”

  His smile widens. “Great. Because I've got a ton of questions—I know you might not be able to answer them, but maybe you can point me to the right books or resources. Maybe we can get answers together.” He pulls his hand back, flushing a little, looking away as if remembering something.

  What was that? I wonder. “Um...”

  “WOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” Kyla's voice bellows through the doorway as she dances into the kitchen, arms curled around Vanessa. The two of them are laughing so hard their faces are red, eyes watering. Kyla twirls Vanessa around, then pulls her in for a kiss.

  When Vanessa sees us, her eyes widen and she pulls back, laughing and blushing.

  Kyla turns to see us. “A! There you are! I was wondering where you'd gone off to.”

  “The wall,” I mumble, and sip my drink.

  She studies the situation and gives me a crooked grin. “I finally got the fire started out back if you two want to head out there. It's way quieter.” She looks directly at Andy. “A is terminally soft-spoken.”

  I finish my drink in a few hasty gulps and try to think of a way out of the setup. I’ve done what she’s suggested; I opened up to someone and let them in (a little). It was a lot for one night. Now I need time to recuperate from the shock, and I certainly don’t think an intimate conversation by firelight with Andy Pavlovic will do the trick.

  “Actually, I've got to make a phone call,” I lie, tossing my cup into the big black garbage bag by the island. “See you later maybe.” I smile and half wave to Andy—and half glare at Kyla—as I stride quickly from the kitchen, pulling my phone out and fiddling with it along the way.

  I see two texts from Kyla.

  KYLA: A, where ua t?

  KYLA: ur not on the wall, im worried lol

  I sigh.

  When I pass the closet, I stop and shove my phone in one coat pocket and grab the half-empty bottle of wine from the other. I steel myself to move through the crowd, take a deep breath, and head for the back door.

  — 15 —

  Woodsmoke meanders through the damp spring air to wrap around me as I lean forward against the rail of Kyla’s back deck. I linger in the shadow of her house, watching the nebulous crowd at the bonfire below. I tell myself I’m not looking for Trebor, but every time I see a dark hooded coat, my heart beats a little faster in my chest. I t
ake a sip from my wine bottle—like a proper lady—and remember I’m supposed to relax.

  “I really hope my neighbors aren’t home,” Kyla says as she strolls up to the railing beside me. Before the party started, she put on one of the dresses she makes herself, converted from one of her mother’s old saris: a red, satin, sleeveless number, heavily embroidered at the hem and bust with gold thread, with tiny mirrors sewn into the scrollwork. Even with the short canvas jacket she wears over her arms, she looks like a dreadlocked Indian princess, observing her subjects from her balcony.

  I lean over the rail, much less interestingly dressed in the clothes I came over to her house in: dark grey skinny jeans and silver ballet flats, and a cobalt blue button-down cotton shirt, buttoned perhaps a notch lower than is practical against the chill. My feet swing in the air as I balance on my abdomen, staring down into the dark where I’m pretty certain I just saw people smoking a joint—at least I smelled it, and saw the glowing red point of an ember. But these days? Knowing me? It could have been anything. Still, convincing myself it’s just some punks from school, I want to shout something down at them, something that seems clever under the rosy fog of the various beverages I’ve been drinking—but when I look more closely, all I see are shadows.

  “So?” Kyla asks, grabbing my shoulder and pulling me back to my feet before I flip myself over the railing.

  “So what?” I wonder, and take another sip from my bottle. The wine is tart and astringent, cool and warm at the same time as it slides down my throat.

  Kyla gives me a mischievous grin. “Have you seen anyone here you might want to go to the dance with?”

  I grimace and look around at all the faces, some familiar, some not, none of them stirring anything inside of me. “I don’t know. I can’t even tell who’s single anyway. Listen, I don’t need a date, Ky. If you really want me to go, I’ll go. I just won’t—”

  “Don’t even,” Kyla stops me, holding a hand up. “Do not tell me you’re going to come to a dance, and not dance.”

  I laugh again, because everything Kyla says is even funnier than normal when I’m a little tipsy. “I was going to say I just won’t slow dance.”

  Kyla shakes her head. “Not acceptable.”

  “Ky, even if I picked some random face from this whole crowd and he actually wanted to be my date for the dance, I probably wouldn’t want to slow dance with him.” I gesture grandly, encompassing the yard. “Slow dancing is supposed to be intimate, not something you share with a total stranger. Or some guy you met at a party, and maybe drunkenly made out with. I mean, unless you’re into that. Which I’m not. Anymore.” I pause, thoughts catching up with my words. “I’m rambling.”

  Kyla laughs. Her eyes actually sparkle when she laughs, not just glisten—it’s like tiny diamonds have been placed under the dark surface of the pools of her irises. “What about Andy?” She points to the tall figure holding court beside the fire.

  He’s everywhere tonight. “Seriously?” I scoff.

  “Well, he’s tall enough, right? And he’s always been super nice to you.”

  “Compared to the rest of the seniors, yeah.” I think about running into him and Trebor last night and feel guilty. I haven’t told Kyla about the man in the cemetery; I haven’t told her about the man with the flashing eyes that I saw the other night, or how Trebor’s eyes flash the same way. I haven’t told her that the Sura are talking to me now, and that they know my name. I don’t know what I’m waiting for, but I know that every time I think of telling her about these new developments, my stomach twists itself into knots, as if these things might be what push her over the edge and finally make her say Ana, you’re insane.

  I clear my throat. “Anyway, it’s only been to get on your good side. You know that as well as I do.”

  Her brow furrows. “I don’t know. I’m out and proud, and Andy practically set Vanessa and me up on our first date.”

  I squint at Andy from a distance. “Ky, I know it hasn’t escaped your notice that most of your friends could care less if I continued to exist. I don’t think Andy is really an exception, other than to study my gypsy heritage, to satisfy some weird anthropological curiosity.”

  “That’s not true, Ana.” Her voice is firm. “They just don’t know you like I do. You don’t let anyone know you. I’m the only one you’ve ever let in.”

  I turn back to her, see her stern expression, and know that she’s probably right. I’m just unwilling to confront it. “They wouldn’t like who I really am, anyway.” I shrug and sneer in one confused and ugly expression of forced apathy.

  Kyla touches my shoulder with hers. “Of course they would. I like you.”

  And Kyla is the queen bee, whether she means to be or not.

  Vanessa comes up beside her, her tall and slender form reorienting itself to Kyla’s orbit. Blond hair spills out from under a black beanie, down past her shoulders. “Hey,” she says, so low it almost can’t be heard.

  “Hey!” Kyla smiles, snaking her arms around her and planting a kiss on her cheek. “What have you been up to?”

  I slink away while she’s distracted, before she can convince me to do any more letting people in for the night, and take my wine bottle and myself down to the bonfire to get warm. The crowd seems immense, though I know it isn’t all that big—I just saw it from above a moment ago. But down in the thick of it, with everyone’s features distorted and their shadows lengthened by the bonfire, everything suddenly feels overwhelming.

  I plant my feet firmly beside the fire and watch a beer bottle turning red hot at the center of the coals. I won’t let the crowd bother me. I’m going to enjoy this night, because tonight, at least, in the circle of protection we’ve cast on Kyla’s property, I’m free of the shadows that have been stalking me.

  But, no matter how determined I am to enjoy the night, the crowd does bother me. Something about it all seems wrong, and in that wrongness, I can’t help but feel different, and alone.

  I see Andy through the flames, on the other side of the fire, talking with a beer in his hand to someone I don’t recognize. He’s looking in my direction when I happen to see him, and he smiles at me through the fire with a nod of acknowledgement. The boy he’s speaking with makes a point of turning away when I look at them.

  I smile and nod back at Andy to be polite, then immediately turn my attention to the ground, where no one is looking at or away from me.

  Ugh. So awkward.

  Before my discomfort levels can make it to unbearable, I take a deep breath and turn away from the fire, moving through the crowd with as much stealth as I can manage. I don’t want to be that girl who wanders off at a party, sullen with the knowledge that no one will notice her absence, but I find myself doing exactly that. I just need to get away from people, find some place to stand where I don’t feel so outside of everything going on around me.

  The creek that runs behind Kyla’s house is flooded along the bank. It’s muddy by the water, a soup of uncovered fall leaves and clay soil. It smells of algae and earth, a loamy, heady scent that I find myself breathing in with a strange need, taking as much into my lungs as I can before I finally exhale. I hop over a pool of water, onto a rock, then a tree root, again and again until I’m standing at the base of a crooked oak tree, staring out over the rushing creek. The creek has grown fat this week from the rain and the last of the melting snow. Water pours past my toes in hurried sloshes and sprays; somehow I feel the surge of its power as if it is my own, awakening a primal memory inside my cells.

  And like that, the visceral thrumming returns to my blood. My body brims with something I can’t quite name, and the more I think about it, the more intense it becomes. I want to run, to jump, to dive into the creek and let it throw my body to the rocks. I want to dance, to feel my muscles burning and flexing and stretching. I want to jump off of a roof, to break something, to hurt, to feel—anything but this wretched sensation of yearning—this eternal moment just before catharsis.

  A shiver runs
through me, and I think: What the hell is happening to me?

  I look down at the bottle in my hand, then back, over my shoulder, at the silhouettes moving around the bonfire. Did any of them ever feel this way? Did they ever feel like the very marrow in their bones was trembling with the need to escape?

  Some of the kids by the fire break away, letting the firelight cast farther out towards the creek. In the faint reach of its illumination, I see there is one silhouette standing apart from the crowd, where the water meets the mud. Its star-bright eyes twinkle at me over a row of gleaming white teeth.

  My stomach tightens, realizing that I’ve ventured outside of the circle Kyla and I cast the other night.

  “Go away,” I whisper, and I’m surprised by the weakness of my own voice—but when I blink, the shadow has disappeared. I wait, turning left and right, for it to reappear like it did last night. But there’s nothing. There’s only me, the many things that keep me separate from that crowd around the fire, and more questions than I will ever have answers for.

  And, of course, there is the urgency inside of me, the hunger I can never sate.

  Heart still pounding and body still thrumming, I stare into the dark mouth of the wine bottle and then lift it to my lips. I drink long and deep, until the last drop is gone and my belly sloshes full of wine. It’s sweet and warm, and quick to diffuse its comfort through my bloodstream. It does dull the pain of whatever madness has infused my veins, but it does not for a moment effectively quell the energy burning inside of me.

  When all else fails, I close my eyes, and try hard not to feel. But it doesn’t work.

  It never works.

  Before I know what I’m doing, I cry out in frustration and smash the wine bottle against the trunk of the tree, a surge of anger burning through me. The bottle splits and shatters—not an easy break at the half point, like in the movies—and leaves only half the neck in my hand. The crunch and explosion of glass is satisfying. I hold up the remaining shard of the bottle to the moon and watch the silvery light play across the jagged edges. I can imagine how it would feel slicing across my skin. Worse, I can imagine how it would feel slicing across someone else’s.