Shadow Rising

If I’d been struggling to get to grips with everything that had happened at school today, the events of the evening had left my mind reeling. I mean, I’d literally communicated with my dead dad in Limbo and then to top it all off, my crush had almost kissed me. I’d need a whole evening of Gus-chat to process it all. What I wouldn’t give for my BFF to be freed from fat camp right about now…

Nik remained silent the whole ride home—not hard considering Retta didn’t actually stop speaking. She went on and on about illegal shapeshifter potions and the creepy-ass séance and my dad’s warning—“Vanpari ally? Like what the hell does Vanpari ally mean?” By the time I walked in the front door, I was actually relieved to have a bit of space from them both.

“Theia? Is that you?”

Mom was calling me from the living room.

I went over to the archway and poked my head in. I was so exhausted I had to prop my shoulder against the wall.

Mom was sitting on the couch with a glossy wedding magazine splayed open on her knees. When she looked up at me, she gasped. “For Belenus’s sake! What happened to your face?”

I’d completely forgotten about the purple shiner Trevor had given me earlier. I must have looked a state. Wow, and Nik was still going to kiss this face? He must be really into me.

“A slightly overzealous competitor in Battle Class,” I told her, only half lying.

She eyed me suspiciously but didn’t push it. “You missed dinner.”

“Sorry,” I said, shrugging. “I had a thing. An after-school thing. Extra credits.”

I was a bad liar. Mom added a raised eyebrow to her suspicious glance. But she didn’t challenge me. She’d given up on trying to get me to tell her anything about my personal life years ago.

“Where’s Geiser?” I asked, trying to sound innocent.

“Still at work,” Mom said, sighing. “There’s so much to get done in the run-up to the election.” She smiled, looking very content with herself. “Just think, in a few days’ time, I’ll be the fiancée to the sun mayor of New York City.”

I felt my insides knot. Poor Mom. She was the fiancée to a murderous psycho, more like. And somehow it was up to me to expose him and get us both out of this mess.

“I’ve got a ton of homework,” I said, trying not to let the anguish sound in my voice. “Night.”

“Night,” Mom replied, her dreamy gaze already back on the magazine.

I hurried upstairs feeling all kinds of awful. Mom, for all her faults, did not deserve to be deceived by her partner in this way. No woman did.

I hurried inside my room and slammed the door shut behind me. I could just make out the faint shimmer of Nik’s spell. At least I had that.

Quickly, I shucked off my clothes. I left them in a pile on the floor and pulled on a nightdress. Then, with my bow in my arms, I slid under my cover and pulled it all the way up to my ears. Yup, I was sleeping with my bow. Talk about a security blanket.

But even with my bow and Nik’s spell, I couldn’t help but feel afraid.

Seeing my dad today had left me rattled. Drained. If Dad was stuck in Limbo because of this, then there was so much more going on than I’d even fathomed. Geiser wanting me dead was just the tip of the iceberg.

I wrapped my arms more tightly around my bow, trying to feel some kind of connection to Dad through it, like Cora had. I yearned for him. If only I had the power to rewind the hands of time, to go back to last year when Dad was alive and my only worries in life were whether I’d graduate and how annoying my mom was.

As my mind raced, it must have only been sheer mental exhaustion that let me sleep at all.

But even that didn’t last long.

A strange noise woke me. A creaking sound. The sound of my door being opened.

I sat bolt upright, grabbing my bow, and turned toward my door. It was ajar. There, in the crack, I could see the silhouette of a person and the glint of a knife.

My heart flew into my throat.

Whoever was attempting to get inside my room kicked the door. The force was so great that it banged open, slamming against the wall.

The stranger raised their knife high above them and went to lunge for me. But they collided with the invisible barrier and stopped dead. The magic spell Nik had placed on my room was enough to hold them back.

Without missing a beat, my wannabe attacker turned and hightailed it into the corridor.

I ripped off my covers and sprang out of bed. I ran for the window. My room overlooked the back garden, which would almost certainly be the intruder’s escape route.

I heaved my window open. Across the lawn, I saw the lights were on in Nik’s pool house. He was awake.

It took me half a second to calculate the distance from my window ledge to the ground. Then I leaped, soaring out the window like a cat.

I hit the ground hard, my knees buckling enough to cushion my blow, then gracefully rolled across the dewy grass.

I sprang up to my feet and bolted for the cover of shadows, pressing my back against an elm tree, my bow by my side.

My heart was drumming in my chest. I steadied my breath, keeping my Elkie focus sharp. There’d be time to work out what the heck was going on once I’d dealt with this asshole.

Just then, I heard the sound of the back door opening. It was followed by the thudding footsteps of someone on the run. Just as I’d predicted, the home invader was coming right this way.

I leaped out from behind the tree and planted my feet, raising my bow and arrow into a shooting stance. But before I got a good look at the face of the intruder, a huge flash of light immediately blasted me backward.

I flew through the air and hit the ground with a loud “oof.” My bow flew from my hands, skidding across the wet grass. I stretched for it but my fingertips couldn’t quite reach.

Suddenly, the would-be assassin loomed above me. Their features were so concealed by the shadows of the elm, I couldn’t even tell if it was a man or woman, a Daimon or something else. What I did know was that I’d reached my limit of being attacked for one day. Trevor. The Incubus. Now this? Seriously?

As they lunged for my throat, I used my Elkie speed and strength to leap up onto my feet. My ribs felt like they’d been shattered by the fall and I winced.

I pulled my hands up, ready for some hand-to-hand combat, and glanced quickly to the right to see that my bow was lying several feet away from me. There was no way I’d be able to get to it without exposing myself. But I still had a full quiver slung over my shoulder. A sharp enough arrow with a strong enough force behind it was basically a dagger.

Gritting my teeth, I grabbed an arrow and lunged.

The intruder reacted immediately, dodging to the side. My arrow slammed into the tree trunk. The attacker ran.

“Shit.”

I grabbed another arrow, swirling on the spot as the attacker hightailed it across the lawn, heading for the wall.

I took off after them, snatching up my bow as I went, sprinting as fast as my legs could carry me.

“Nik!” I screamed, remembering that the lights in the pool house were on.

Barely a second later, the glass door to the pool house slid open. Nik peered out, looking bewildered at the sight of me in nothing but a thin camisole, pounding across the lawn.

Heat crept into my cheeks—because apparently even in life-and-death situations, my raging hormones didn’t wanna quit.

“There!” I cried, pointing at the dark figure hurrying for the wall.

Quick as a flash, Nik streaked after my attacker.

I planted my feet, pulled up my bow, positioned the arrow and drew back the string ready to fire.

The intruder jumped for the wall and Nik grabbed him by the ankle, pulling him down to the ground. They began to tussle. I couldn’t get a clear shot.

I dropped my arm and ran toward the spot where the two of them were grappling, ready to throw myself into the fray.

“Stay back!” Nik yelled. “I’ve got this!”

He clearly did not. The intruder was pummeling him with their fists in a frenzied manner.

I reached forward to grab the attacker by the shoulders, to find out who this fucker was once and for all, when suddenly, something strange caught my eye.

I stopped, frozen to the spot with shock.

Coming from Nik’s gums were long teeth.

Vanpari teeth.

I gasped and recoiled.

Nik’s eyes locked with mine.

In the split second of us staring at one another, the attacker wriggled free. They were up on the wall in a matter of seconds, muttering in Latin, before leaping through a gap that appeared in the barrier.

I shook myself back to the present moment and leaped up, grabbing onto the edging of the wall and heaving myself up. But as I drew myself to standing, the rubbery barrier of Geiser’s curfew spell pinged back into place. I slammed into it. Hard.

“Shit,” I barked, frustrated, watching as my attacker became an ever-shrinking blob.

It was over. We’d lost them.

With the urgency of the fight now gone, adrenaline started to fade from my body. I turned back around and leaped off the wall into the garden.

Nik was sitting against the wall panting. He looked up at me with worried eyes as his Vanpari teeth receded back into his gums.

So Nik was Vanpari. Or at least part Vanpari. And for some reason he’d decided to hide it from me. I felt stung that he didn’t trust me enough to let me in on his secret.

“I was going to tell you…” he said in a defeated voice.

From the other side of the garden, the back door flew open. Mom appeared, dressed in a silky nightgown. There was a guard at her side—a Marchosias Daimon, presumably, by their wolfish face and serpent tail. They both started running down the steps.

I looked down at Nik, disappointment swirling in my gut. “We’ll talk about it later.”

He nodded slowly, looking ashamed.

Mom reached me, her arms outstretched. “Theia? What’s going on?” She pulled me in for what must’ve been the first hug we’d shared in years.

The Marchosias guard came up beside us, speaking into his walkie-talkie, summoning the other guards.

Hovering at the open patio doors was Geiser. His arms were folded and he was glaring at me. The eyes of his condor familiar were just as piercing.

I didn’t even have to second-guess myself. It was so obvious he’d arranged to have me killed. The look on his face—of a stroppy, petulant toddler who’d just been denied candy—told me everything I needed to know.

Geiser had tried to have me killed in my sleep.