“No!” she yells, pulling.
We are going to die over a stupid book, but even as I think that, something else tells me to grab it. I quickly reach over and grab it on both sides for traction, placing my hands between hers and the dead hands who seem to have a really strong grip. As soon as my hands fully touch the book, something electric shoots up the corpse’s arms shocking it off. It falls onto the ground.
Fiona screams, “What the hell was that?” She lets go of the book and looks at me accusingly.
“Are you kidding me? I don’t know! What the hell is any of this?” I yell back at her.
Her eyes widen, frightened. “Violet!”
Something grabs my hair from behind me, yanking hard. Without thinking I swing around and smack the corpse across the head with the book. More electricity shoots from it. The corpse has smoke rolling from it on the ground.
“What are you?” Fiona breathes.
“Me? What is your book?”
“Stop answering my questions with a question!” she yells.
“We don’t have time for this - let’s go!”
But there is nowhere to go. Just those few minutes of fighting and we are surrounded. Fully encompassing us is a wall of corpses. Pairs and pairs of undead eyes lock onto us snarling and growling. Fiona stops behind me and taps my arm frantically, a wordless cry of shock for what’s in front of us. I can see through the wall of them, Aaiden and Blythe are surrounded too. Aaiden is trying to cover every side of the whimpering Blythe, keeping her away from every edge of them. They’re moving in slowly. It’s just now that I notice the ground has stopped shaking. It must have quit when the army of undead got out.
“What should we do?” I whisper. Whispering doesn’t help. The undead can hear me and when they do, they all start snarling.
Fiona gives a wordless whine. Her eyes wide open and full of fear. Her gaze moves to the book and back to me. Right! The book! I hold it up and hope it still has whatever electricity its holding. Come on, book, zap those dead things!
One corpse steps forward. I swing. It makes contact, and electricity shoots out making the monster fall. The others back away snarling loudly. I turn in circles around Fiona, just like Aaiden is around Blythe, and hold the book out like a weapon. Poor Aaiden doesn’t have a weapon though and the monsters are closing in. If we can make a way through, I can help Aaiden and Blythe and we can get out of here. I swallow. Fear and adrenaline pump through me. I have to do this; I have to be brave. Break down later, I tell myself. I swing at more of them. I can’t tell Fiona my plan just in case they understand words. I hit another and the books shoots it up with electricity. Over the sparks I see an entire group of huge dark shadows moving through the sky. The group of large shadows fall, landing in the cemetery.
I don’t think we can survive more trouble from whatever just landed.
Chapter Five
Zemira
“You disobeyed a direct order!” Percy yells at Achilles who is still in dog form. Achilles yawns widely in Percy’s direction. He never did much care for orders unless it’s from the girl.
Watching him yawn causes me to yawn in return. Percy’s rants really are boring. It’s not like he can do anything without our zoana’s say so. I stare down at my nails. I need a manicure; three years is too long to let these puppies go. Maybe I can compel the local nail salon to stay open after dusk so I can get them done. How mad would Percy be then? I snort to myself, thinking of the shade of red his face will turn.
Percy’s eyes cut to me. He glares at me before returning to his scolding of our beast. “How many times have we been through this? You can’t just charge in and be her best friend; you have to wait. It’s not like it was. She doesn’t know us. She doesn’t know you. These things, they take time.” His dark beefy hand covers his face in frustration.
Achilles sniffs at Percy and cocks his head, playing the perfect mortal dog. I’m not sure if it’s an homage to his acting skills meant to subdue Percy into believing he will not be a problem, or if he’s pretending to be a dog so he can ignore Percy. Being unable to speak causes the beast to get creative in the ways he expresses himself. Usually it involves ignoring orders and humoring himself at our expense. Immortality has its downsides; we all get bored easily. I prefer to pass the time playing with mortals, when our zoana and Percy aren’t looking that is.
Percy doesn’t fall for Achilles’ perfect pup routine. “Change out of that infernal form!” he yells.
“Oh relax,” Phelix pipes in. I snort again. Getting Percy to relax is like asking a lump of coal to become jelly - it would take an act of alchemy to do so. Phelix knows this as well, but he doesn’t give up. He is a tenacious one. “It’s been months since the awakening, we all just want to get this over with. If you’d let me and Alex just go invite her over for tea—”
“Tea? Who drinks tea?” I couldn’t help my mouth; these boys sometimes forget times have changed. “Let’s just go grab her and force her here. Then we explain. She’s not coming here on her own, otherwise she would have shown up by now.” Despite what Percy says or the fun I’ve been having, Phelix is right: time’s up.
“It doesn’t help the book has gone missing too. That would lure her here,” Alex huffs.
Percy puts a hand up. “I have a plan, a plan that has worked so far. We wait and watch; something will happen. It always does. Forcing the child too soon could cause irreparable damage. Remember Tessa, she completely abandoned her duties because we didn’t approach her correctly and frightened her.”
Alex steps forward. “That was ninety...” he furrows his brow mentally counting the years since Tessa was our zoana, “-ish years ago.”
“More like a hundred,” Phelix interjects. “Tessa wasn’t as hot as this one anyways.”
Smack! Zaphyra hits Phelix in the arm without a word. I laugh.
“What?” He shrugs. "Are you saying you miss the days of poor dental hygiene? Because I sure don’t. You think a girl is beautiful, until she smiles, then poof - m’lady snaggle-face rotten-tooth wants to have your babies.”
“You can’t have babies,” Zaphyra retorts.
“They didn’t know that!” He shudders dramatically. My identical sister smacks him again for good measure, with less gusto. My sister and I are used to being outnumbered by guys.
Alex shakes his head, back to business as usual. “I know you miss Eugene. We all do, but—”
“This is not about Eugene!” Percy snarls through his teeth. The loss was harder on him than any of us. It happens like this every time. One of us usually bonds with a zoana more than the others, and the loss when they pass - it’s hard. We are not creatures who change easily. In some ways these last few months have been good for Percy - more time to heal without having a new zoana rubbed in his face. In other ways it’s worse; he needs to work. We all do. To feel our purpose again. “We need to trust in what Eugene told us to do, to wait. Whatever has been done to her mind, it’s delicate. Violet will come to us as long as we don’t bombard her,” Percy tells us with a finality that implies we are to take it as an order.
Achilles, as if on cue to break the tension, changes form into a three-legged black cat. No matter what form our little shapeshifting beast takes, he can’t bring back his lost leg. He rubs up against Percy’s legs. That’s a bold move, even for him. He’s asking to get kicked. My sister laughs next to me, her cheeks turn a delightful pink that matches her dress, her white ringlets bouncing. She’s not afraid of Percy’s wrath. She’s not afraid of anyone.