[Strange Angels 02] - Betrayals Page 11

  Like me.

  The taint doesn’t wash out. I found out that much in the increasingly useful two-hour span that was history class. No matter how far back in the family tree the sucker is, it still makes the kids djamphir

  . They get the aspect, the speed, the strength, and the hunger. And they’re all boys, except for the one-in-a-thousand girl. Who rarely ever reaches adulthood, because the suckers find them before they bloom and drink them dry, getting a big old jolt of power from it.

  Nice, huh? I was just special all over the place. Me and Anna. Were there more? There could be.

  I might not be so special.

  It also occurred to me that the wulfen were probably my best bet of surviving. They couldn’t want me dead, really. Right? Because I didn’t matter either way to them unless they were working for Sergej too.

  There was no way of knowing for sure. Which meant the wulfen weren’t that great of a bet after all.

  I had no way of getting out of here. Not for a while.

  Graves didn’t want to hang out that much, and what could I do? Just follow the werewolves around until they took pity on me? What if some of them had a reason, God only knew what, for hating me?

  And did I even dare to figure out how to sneak down to the boathouse?

  I was in history class, again, sitting on one end of the couch. The doors had been replaced and the halls repaired, but you could still see the white gouges in the paneling and the carpet was a glaring mismatch, the only patches of new flooring in the whole school. The renovated bits smelled like formaldehyde, and I pulled my knees up, resting the pad of paper on them. The doodle unreeled under my pencil, long narrow arches and stone walls. I shaded in each block of rock, the grass forcing up through flagstones, and worked all around a huge blank spot in the middle of the page.

  Graves perched next to me, and the kid he called Shanks, dark emo-boy hair brushed sideways across his forehead and hanging in his chocolate eyes, bony wrists sticking out from under his sleeves, engineer boots, and a sideways smile, leaned forward on his other side, elbows braced on his knees. Irving had settled himself on the floor, knees up and arms circling them. Other than that, everyone gave me a wide berth. Even Dibs acted like he didn’t know me in class.

  I caught Graves and the Shanks kid exchanging pointed looks, usually every time Irving opened his mouth.

  Right now Blondie the teacher was droning on about basic rules for interaction between djamphir and wulfen. I filled in another block of shading.

  “Djamphir are trained for tactics and wulfen are trained for logistics. This plays to the particular strength of both. Wulfen lack a djamphir’s sensitivity to nosferat infestation, and djamphir lack the peculiar qualities of consensus and cooperation that come naturally to wulfen. Each is half of a balanced equation, and it was only when we started cooperating that we began to be able to clear entire territories and hold them.”

  “What happened before?” Graves wanted to know.

  Blondie’s teeth peeped out from behind his lips. Very white, but his aspect was nowhere to be found. “Before? We died. We were very close to being eradicated completely, and it was war on wulfen whenever the nosferatu felt like it. Those who weren’t taken were killed, or they lived by the leave of the Blood Princes only. As the Broken.”

  That perked my ears up. Broken to his will, Christophe whispered inside my head.

  I looked up from the paper. “Broken? What does that mean?”

  I immediately felt stupid. It was probably not the best thing to ask in a room full of wulfen. They might be, you know, offended.

  Oh jeez. A slight rustle went through the room. Shanks hunched his shoulders and settled back on the couch.

  “Anyone want to answer that?” Blondie turned in a full circle, taking in the faces all around him. No? Well, I’ll go ahead then. ‘Breaking’ a human being, even a djamphir, is easy. Sleep deprivation, temporary lack of protein, a constant stream of propaganda, it’s called brainwashing, and it’s very simple to do. Doing it to a werwulf, or a skinchanger like Mr. Graves here, is harder, because of their resistance to both physical damage and persuasion.”

  “They’re stubborn,” Irving said, sotto voce, and another ripple ran through the room. It might’ve sounded like laughter if you weren’t listening too closely.

  “They are resistant,” Blondie corrected, in the snootiest possible voice. “Nevertheless, it can be done. The most popular method was chaining in a tatra. This is a stone cube just big enough to allow the victim to stand upright, but not enough to turn around, bend over, or sit. The chain is fastened to a spiked collar, the spikes are turned inward, like so.” His manicured hands sketched the air. “So the victim must move carefully even in that confined space. Then, raw meat is thrown onto the floor or placed just outside. The food scent torments until the meat begins to rot, and every day water is flung in through an aperture above the head. It cascades down, and the danger of inhaling it and developing pneumonia is very real. Then there are the Revelle, the dreamstealers, creatures bred by the Maharaja.”

  That got my attention all over again. Graves tensed next to me.

  “The dreamstealer is brought in close proximity to the wulfen, fed carrion, and allowed to sing. Does anyone here know what a dreamstealer’s song can do?”

  “I know what happens when they stick their tongues in someone’s mouth and start drinking,”

  Graves muttered. “It was singing. I remember that much.”

  I didn’t remember that. I still hadn’t decided if I’d been out of my body or just having a really vivid dream that was my unconscious putting things together and presenting me with memory. But I did remember what happened after Graves tore the dreamstealer off me and Christophe stopped me retching and seizing.

  Christophe. He lied. He didn’t tell me. Bastard. And someone else. Maybe that Anna chick. But she’s svetocha too. It doesn’t make sense. The vampires are the enemy, right? Why would anyone work with them?

  His son. Sergej’s son.

  Blondie paused, visibly deciding not to respond. “A dreamstealer’s song takes hope away and drives its victim to the brink of insanity. Exposure for more than a few hours breaks down the barriers between a werwulf’s conscious mind and the Other, the thing inside them that encloses and permits the change. Leaving the werwulf both psychotic and unable to reclaim his or her human form.”

  “They did this to girls, too?” Someone behind me sounded horrified. I guess chivalry isn’t completely dead.

  But I was thinking of the maddened, insane thing in Ash’s eyes. He’d once been a werwulf like the kids in the classroom with me, all of them shifting uneasily in their seats. And Sergej had done that, chained him in a stone box and turned him into something that couldn’t change back into a boy.

  Blondie now looked pained. I was liking him more and more over the past couple of days, until I remembered he’d disappeared out the door and left me alone to be attacked. But right now, he was the teacher I was getting the most out of. “Sometimes,” he said, quietly, “a psychotic female werwulf is nearly unstoppable. However, it is more difficult to break down a female’s resistance and turn her into a Broken. Other methods were employed to force female wulfen’s compliance. Anyway, once the wulf can no longer shift back into even a simulacrum of humanity, it is collared by its master and becomes an automaton with no free will of its own. It becomes merely appetite and obedience.”

  Wait a second. I sat up straight, the pad of paper sliding on my jeans. “Can you stop it? I mean, can you make someone like that human again?”

  “Reclaim a Broken? it’s possible, if you have a strong enough chain, enough time, and a compelling reason to do so. But the master of such a creature will rarely let it go, and will call it back with such intensity the wulf will often kill itself trying to escape. Wulfen have been known to break their own necks, chew through their own arms or legs—”

  “There were reclamation projects, though.” Shanks folded his arms. “My dad talks
about them.

  There were whole teams of them in the 1920s.” His entire body shouted I don’t like this, from hunched-up shoulders to the uneasy way his fingers flicked and his knees joggled.

  Of course, it was probably uncomfortable listening for a guy who could turn furry.

  “There were,” Blondie agreed. “Most of the projects ended in abject failure, or the death of those who tried to reclaim the Broken. However, when the wulfen and the founders of the Order made their compact, it became much more difficult for the nosferatu to abduct wulfen for their purposes.”

  An odd smile tilted the corners of his mouth. “On this continent, we have the wampyr on the run. Most of the time, that is.”

  “But there is a way to reverse the damage, to fix it?” I persisted. “How exactly would you do it?”

  He gave me a long measuring look. “That’s a question for another time. Class dismissed.”

  Everyone started moving and shuffling, and Blondie gave me one last long look before striding out of the room. I folded up my pad and slid it into my bag, and hauled myself up from the couch with a creak and a sigh. Graves looked up at me, his unibrow peaking once over each eye. His entire face shouted, What the hell are you thinking?

  I felt like I’d just been dunked in a cold bath, every nerve standing upright and shrieking. My next class was Aspect Mastery. I wasn’t even sure who the teacher was, so I could miss it, no problem. I bet there was something in the school library, or even Dylan’s office, that covered the Broken, and I am really good at finding shit like this out. Give me some research to do, and I am all over it.

  It was a relief to find a concrete action to take.

  A cool touch of dread stroked my nape. The note on my bed. My “friend.” Was it the same friend who was supposed to have been getting me to my room when the vampires attacked? Was it Christophe? But what would he be doing in my room while vampires were attacking? Wouldn’t he have heard the noise and—

  God, if I could just stop thinking about it, I might’ve been able to get some sleep, or stop jumping nervously at every little sound.

  Yeah. Like that was gonna happen.

  “Walk you to class?” Graves said, cutting right across the noise in my head.

  “Um.” I blinked. What exactly are you thinking, Dru? But there had to be an explanation.

  Something wasn’t jelling, and… well, it was crazy.

  It was nuts.

  But I was beginning to have an idea. It might even have been a good one, but I was so tired I couldn’t tell.

  Graves apparently took my um for a yes, I guess, because he stood up and tucked his hands in the pockets of the long black coat. He wore the goddamn thing everywhere. “All right. Come on, you don’t wanna be late.”

  “They roast late students over fires.” Shanks bounced up to his feet, collecting his notebook and a couple of textbooks covered with brown kraft paper. He gave me an odd look, and grinned, exposing very sharp white teeth. “But not special ones.”

  “Lay off,” Graves said over his shoulder. “Jesus.”

  “I’m interested, actually. Wanna hear about how to brainwash a wulfen, Dru?” A crackling growl ran under the surface of the words. “Gonna start a breeding stable? They used to do that too. You can get pictures on the Internet.”

  Kids say horrible things to each other every day, in every high school in America. But this was something else. “I asked because I want to know how to fix it.” I glared at him. “What’s your problem?”

  He made a mock-astonished face. “Oooh. You’re going to fix it, like a good little djamphir?”

  “Bobby.” Graves half-turned, his coat flaring out and brushing my knees. “Lay. Off.”

  “Can she actually talk when she’s not sucking up to the teachers?” He leaned forward on his toes, and the growl dropped a notch. “Or playing kissy-face with you? Got her own little loup-garou bodyguard. Why is she even here?”

  Jesus. I’d never talked to this kid. I was kind of beginning to see why. “Come on.” I pulled at Graves’ sleeve. “Let’s go.”

  He shook me off, took two steps forward. He was tall, but Shanks topped him by a good half-head. Still, Graves didn’t look impressed or afraid in the least. “Go fuck yourself. Or get spayed. Either would be an improvement.”

  Oh Christ. Did this have to happen the instant I had an idea of something to actually do, instead of rattling around inside here chewing on myself? “Look—”

  Fur was crawling up Bobby’s thin cheeks. “Hold him back, bitch,” he snarled, his shoulders hunching and hulking at once. It’s always disconcerting to see muscle plumping up on a wulf when the hair pops up all over them and the jaw starts mutating. He was only halfway changed, but that’s enough.

  “Holy shi—” I didn’t get to finish, because Graves hauled off and cold-cocked him. They went over the back of the couch in a tangle of fur and snapping black coat-cloth, and the other wulfen gathered around, making the weird yipping noise they sometimes did to spur each other on.

  Oh, for God’s sake. I dropped my bag and hopped over the back of the couch, then started shoving. The wulfen squeezed together, shoulder to shoulder, shouting, and I actually kicked someone behind the knee, squeezed forward, and pushed another one aside with strength I didn’t know I had.

  They were rolling around, Shanks half-changed and making a lot of noise, Graves growling as his eyes glowed, and then Bobby got in a knee to the nuts.

  And punched him right in the face.

  I heard the fist hit, the crunch of bone, and almost felt it in my own face.

  Graves! Something inside me snapped. The red-tinted rage swelled up, coated my skin, and pushed me aside.

  The world slowed down again, clear syrup hardening over every surface, and I bolted forward.

  This time, the weight didn’t close over my arms and legs, and I had a vague idea that I was going much too fast before I kicked. There was a crunch, weirdly distorted and amplified, as my sneakered foot smashed into the other boy’s face. He went careening back, still in that slow motion, and the fresh swell of rage that flooded me was clean and clear in its intensity.

  It was a tidal wave of pure incandescent anger, turning me into a glass girl full of sparkling red fluid. I hit him twice more before he landed, both good solid shots. He crashed into a tangled knot of wulfen, their mouths open as they yelled. The entire scene was strangely soundless, and the wulfen began to scatter in slow motion.

  I was on Shanks again, my hand closing around his throat and pushing him down through the syrup.

  His arm came up, like a sleep-walker’s. I avoided the claws that would have sheared through my face and deflected the blow with one wrist, slapping it lightly away. The movement continued, my arm drawing back, and I heard Dad’s voice again.

  Put your thumb outside, Dru. Tuck your thumb in and you’ll break it when you punch that sad, sorry bastard. That’s good. Now hit “im hard, and hit “im good! Good girl!

  The weird elongated noises around me drew away. Time slowed down even further, and I knew it was going to snap and speed up soon. I had enough time to hit him but good with my cocked-back fist. I could probably break his nose, or if I punched a little lower I could crush his larynx and he’d suffocate.

  Dru, what are you doing?

  The rage still burned inside me. He’d hit Graves, and hurt him.

  But I was seriously considering a punch that could truly disable someone, even kill them. And this was just a schoolroom brawl. Like every other schoolroom brawl I’d stayed out of, both out in the regular world and here.

  Well, maybe not so much here.

  What is really going on here? Why don’t the teachers intervene more? The answer occurred to me a split second later, they’re teaching them to fight. Teaching them to hate each other, too.

  The fury was still boiling inside me. My temper frayed down to the thinnest of threads spinning over an abyss. The snap to speed everything up was coming. I could feel it, hovering on the edge of my
awareness the way a sneeze tingles in your nose.

  A hand closed over my shoulder, and if I was going to hit the kid I had to do it now. My fist leapt forward an inch, ducked back as the wulfen squirmed slowly, his mouth half-open, blood splattering down from his nose.

  I let go of him, my fingers cramping. Someone dragged me back, fingers biting into my flesh so hard I could feel the bruising begin. I was a regular old punching bag. Jeez.

  Time snapped like a thick rubber band, and this time I felt jarred all the way down to my bones. I’d just been dropped into the world again, a jolt like a car hitting a brick wall. There was shouting and screaming going on, and my hair hung in my face.

  I watched, hypnotized, as blonde streaks slid through my curls. They stretched out, longer and looser, into sleek waves instead of frizz. The golden streaks retreated, darkness eating them up, and my hair was my hair again.

  Holy shit. Was that—

  “Get back!” Graves yelled, dragging me back further as the wulfen closed over Shanks’ still figure, lying on the floor against the bottom of a couch, the blood red and startling. Several of them had turned my direction and were advancing, fur crawling over their skin, shoulders and legs hulking up. “I’m fucking warning you!” It was an actual roar, his entire body vibrating. It shook through me, his voice, and I’d never heard him sound that way before.

  That voice had a snap to it. A bite. I could almost see it shoving the clustered wulfen back.

  Dominant, I realized. That’s a loup-garou “s command voice.

  They halted, all snarling. Even pale, gentle Dibs, who rarely spoke above a scared whisper. Their faces wrinkled up, teeth growing, fur sliding and rippling over their boy-forms.

  Graves pulled me back another few steps. “Stay where you are!” he snapped, still in that shake-the-world voice. Everything actually rattled, including the inside of my head.

  Then I realized I was making a weird sound too, a high keening noise with strange stops when my windpipe closed up and I had to breathe. The smell hit me, copper, hot, and good. It smashed into a place in the very back of my throat I never knew existed before, right next to the spot normal people don’t have. The one that tells me when something weird is going to happen. That red coppery smell reached all the way down and ripped the world apart. I pitched forward again, fighting against Graves’ hands on me, but he’d somehow gotten his arm around my waist and was hauling me away.