Ethan gave a low cough and groaned. “Whatever it is you’re going to decide to do, let’s do it quick. I’m running out of gas while you’re busy chatting away.”
I turned as he went to his knees, wet coughs wracking his body. “You’re this sick? You should have stayed in the House of Wonder!”
“I couldn’t let her down again,” he whispered, grimaced, and shook his head. “No matter what it costs.”
Rory pulled Ethan up, slinging his arm across his shoulders. “Follow me. There’s a place not far from here where we can hunker down, at least for the night.”
I nodded. “Take Ethan and Pete, Rory. Gregory and Orin can stay with me, and we’ll catch up.”
“You don’t even know where we’re going to be,” Rory pointed out.
“I can find Ethan and Pete,” I said. “I can sense them.” Okay, so Ethan wasn’t quite as strong as Pete, and I wasn’t quite ready to tell Rory that I could feel him on the edges of my mind either.
I’d leave that for Wild to tell him.
Rory gave me a quick look. “If you don’t find us in thirty minutes, I’m coming back for you.”
I smiled, understanding why Wild loved him—there was a fierce loyalty in him. He matched her in a lot of ways. If only he hadn’t screwed it up. “Done.”
He didn’t ask why I couldn’t sense Wild. I had a feeling I knew why—she was blocking her side of the connection to keep us safe. Maybe she didn’t even realize she was doing it.
As soon as the three guys were out of sight, I motioned to Jasmina.
“Help me roll her over.”
“What are you going to do?” Gregory asked as he took hold of one of the director’s arms.
I bit the inside of my cheek. “The statistical probability of what I’m about to do is low, a little less than ten percent success rate.”
“Except for your family,” Orin said.
I drew a deep breath and slowly let it out. “Yes, except for my family.”
Gregory’s big eyes widened farther. “What’s that success rate?”
“Ninety-nine percent,” I whispered.
I put my hands on either side of Jasmina’s face. Skin-to-skin contact was the most important part of this. My death magic rose up around me. My eyes were only open a little, but the burgundy red color filled my vision as it wrapped around Jasmina, digging deep into her. I didn’t dare tell Orin I’d never done this before, but I had trained for it. Scratch that, I hadn’t trained for it exactly, but I’d watched my father and mother practice this on other necromancers and vampires. Especially vampires. It was all about control.
This was the very reason I’d never let my father see my full strength. I didn’t want to be this person.
“Bend,” I whispered the word, and below me Jasmina heaved upward, mouth open in a silent scream.
“Bend,” I said a little louder, and her throat tightened suddenly, lips working.
She spoke, but the voice was not her own. “You are stronger than I realized, perhaps Wild did pick the best after all. But this one will not Bend to your will. She can’t. You cannot Bend what is owned by another Chameleon. You can only break them.”
I looked up at Orin, who shook his head but said nothing. But the look in his eyes suggested that we both knew exactly who this was speaking through Jasmina.
Frost.
“Why do you want Wild? Just because she killed your boyfriend?” I didn’t think the odds of that being the case were good, but I asked anyway.
“No. The minute I realized what she was, I wanted her power. Do you know that if you take another Chameleon’s power, it can keep you alive for a hundred years? Pity I couldn’t catch Lexi before she died. If I’d controlled her, I would have two young ones . . . ”
Lexi? Who the heck was that?
“We aren’t going to let you kill her,” Gregory said. “And we’ll figure out how to heal the sickness you made and keep it from spreading too.”
Jasmina laughed, though it sounded as if her vocal cords were tearing from the effort. “Oh, ye of little faith, look to your own house before you cry foul on another.”
“What are you talking about?” Gregory shook his head and I shrugged. I had no idea either.
“Wild is already on her way to me,” the voice whispered.
“No—”
“I already have someone who has given her a clue, a way to find me,” Frost whispered, the jaw she spoke through cracking with the effort. “And a reason . . . she believes I have something she loves dearly.”
Jasmina’s mouth snapped shut, and foam bubbled out from between her lips, flowing down her neck. From my right side a shadow appeared, flowing and immaterial, his hood covering the empty eyes I knew were in there. Death bent his hand and took her, his hand sliding through her chest and pulling her soul free from her body. Her soul twisted and writhed in his hand, reaching back toward her slumped figure. Death’s hooded cloak turned toward me and his voice reverberated through my skull.
Be careful, little queen, the tides are darkening. Even you are not immune to my touch.
I scrambled backward away from the body and from Death. “The chances of things getting worse are beginning to coincide with the odds of something going wrong in a dinosaur park that opens too early. We have to find Wild, now more than ever.”
Gregory held out a hand and helped me to my feet. His oversized ears were drooping. “She can’t possibly mean that the sickness came from the House of Unmentionables, does she? What would we have to gain by making anyone sick?”
“Killing off the House of Wonder would do, pardon the pun, wonders for your status in the world,” Orin said. “Could it be that simple? Or is this just another way to divide us?”
Gregory rubbed at his ears. “I . . . I don’t know.”
I dusted off my clothes. “Let’s go, the other three aren’t that far ahead of us. We have to tell them what we found out.” I could feel the pull to Ethan and Pete, and I locked on to that sensation inside my head.
Frost was setting Wild up to come to her. Which meant we had to find Wild and stop her before that happened. With our connection to her blocked, the how of that task was beyond me at the moment.
It took us twenty-five minutes to get to where the boys had stopped—a large brick building that led into a youth shelter. Castoffs and Outcasts. That was a rather uninspiring name if you asked me.
I saw Pete first as we stepped into the brightly lit main room, but there was no sign of Ethan or Rory. “Is he okay?”
A woman sat behind a rickety wooden desk on the far side of the room, her hair pulled into a messy bun on top of her head that gave her a few inches. She pushed a pair of glasses up her nose and cleared her throat. “My name is Mary—”
I held up a hand, stopping her, seeing her for what she was in the glimmer around her skin. “House of Wonder, where are my friends? The blond one in particular. Looked terrible. Does that ring a bell?” I stared hard at her and she blanched. I wondered if I was pulling off one of Wild’s infamous bitch faces. My friend was rubbing off on me.
She tipped her head. “Yes, I am from the House of Wonder, though I was exiled years ago for my inability to truly use magic in a way that my house saw fit. And your friend has already left.”