Legends of Astræa: Cupid's Arrow Book 1 (Legends of Astræa Series) Page 14

  My feet in motion, I paid no attention to those who pointed fingers at me. No one stopped me. They read my determination even when it was an act. Internally, I was scared and exhausted. Either that, or they were shocked or scared of what Tiffany and some of the girls had told them. It didn’t matter. Not anymore. I had to get out of there, go to France.

  I found myself surrounded by the grand arches of the convent as I stepped into the rose garden. Taking a deep breath, I closed my eyes, feeling the sun washing over my face like a warm blessing and literally smelling the fragrant roses, marigolds, and lavender blooms for the very last time. My heart lightened and saddened. This was the last time I would see it. It was Mother Clarisse’s favorite place.

  I moved toward the gate. A large black crow stood over it. I recognized him. He had been present at the funeral. I noted, as I carefully scrutinized him, he was unusually big for a crow, too, about the size of a small raccoon. He was eerily crowing in distress at me as if he didn’t want me to leave. I snorted at my pudden-head imagination. I was leaving for good. Period. Then I heard something rather peculiar.

  A whistling hiss.

  Abruptly, something knocked the air from me, a burst of energy flooded my being. My eyes opened wide. I fixed my sight in the area on my chest where I’d felt the impact. My heart—well, I guess technically, my hearts. Crap.

  Don’t panic, I told myself, but then I saw a gold thing sticking out of my chest—a golden arrow. No. No. No. I panicked. My hands held it and tried to yank it out as fast as I could, but I couldn’t really hold it, for it was dissolving into some kind of golden light. The more I struggled, the faster it penetrated my body.

  Surprisingly, I realized I wasn’t hurt from it.

  But something had shifted within me. Something new, like a humming inside me. It was like a longing feeling of something missing in my life, something I wanted more than anything in this world. I swore the feeling lit like a light bulb inside my chest just to vanish a couple minutes after, leaving no visible trace. No one could say I had been struck by a golden arrow that had been, for most part, imaginary. Funny.

  I must have looked more deranged as I broke into a disconnected laugh without a punchline. I was laughing because I felt good. I felt buoyant and oddly unconfined. I was laughing because nobody could ever understand the surmountable excitement I was experiencing. I laughed and needed no reason to laugh. In fact, it made me feel better, so much better.

  Even happier.

  I glanced around the Cloistered garden. My lids rested again as I absorbed, breathing all these new experiences. Once I sobered enough, I decided it was time. My to steal away to France sounded like a promising idea, and I smiled positively at the warm touch of the sun.

  My head turned at the sound of Mother Superior’s and Mr. Tarbelli’s raised voices, walking toward me on the far west end of the convent. I had never seen Mr. Tarbelli raise his voice at any of the Sisters until today. I wished I could stay and enjoy the event. Mother Superior must not have been very happy that Mr. Tarbelli could match her authority. There was no use thinking about it, I had to get out.

  Very stealthily, I stepped out of their sight with Demyan Greco’s card in my hand. I moved toward the vegetable gardens and out of view of the rose garden where Mr. Tarbelli and Mother Superior were heading.

  I crept over to the decrepit old wrought-iron gate where I always met Gavril. Conveniently, no one used this gate in the convent. It was partially hidden behind a vine-covered wall, so no one could see part of the door. It made a little screech as it opened. Crossing my fingers that no one had been aware of my departure, I opened it and closed it really fast.

  Without looking back, I left behind my past as I stepped out. I gave a deep inhale for courage and then ran across the grassy knolls where the farms were.

  Beyond it lay the dense forest. The forest I wasn’t supposed to go into. I knew I shouldn’t be out at all, and yet, I considered the cleared acres right outside the convent to be fair grounds. After all, the school and convent owned the whole island. Inauspiciously, the churning in my gut wasn’t listening to technicalities.

  If I kept moving west, it would be too late for anyone to notice. I’d be truly gone once I’d gotten on the ferry. I continued my journey, keeping myself near the main road. I had to figure a way to travel to France. I wondered if anyone would give me a job while I was still wearing the ugly as sin academy uniform, which was the single thing I owned at the moment. What kind of job, I asked myself. I could work in a kitchen, as I had with the tutoring of Sister Joana. Or I could find one of those nanny jobs where I could live in someone’s home. I could work my way until saving enough. I would figure it out later.

  I was so anxious to leave, I never took provisions, like water or food, and I was dead tired and beyond disappointment. I was confused by the more than strange exchange between Mr. Tarbelli and Demyan. He was responsible in some terrible way for my father’s fate, and I had the feeling that also—in some indirect way—for mine. Oddly enough, with every thought of Demyan, there was this nagging and very annoying feeling inside my chest, like an ache, a longing. Like a beat and a humming that were faint but annoyingly persistent, pulling me in very different directions.

  The arrow, my mind seemed to say, but I blamed my episode with Ash for all the hallucinations. There was no such thing as a golden arrow. I was just suffering from some kind of post-traumatic stress syndrome. All I needed was to get away from this place, and everything would be all right. Right? However, the humming was there. I felt it. Could it be my imagination?

  Either I had to quit blaming my imagination for everything unexplainable or claim insanity. Not insane. I was not insane or evil. Was I? I couldn’t doubt myself right now, not when Ash was waiting for my soul to turn to the dark side. Nothing was logical, not even close. That included everything that had happened to Mother Clarisse, Ash showing up in my dreams, Demyan finding me through my dreams, and now this thing that I’d seen go inside my body.

  A howl interrupted my endless stressing cycle. A wolf—Gavril. The sound had come from somewhere near the academy area. My head was not a friendly place to be, and unlike the problems I was now facing in my life, Gavril was something I could do without. I had to keep moving and set out into the forest beyond the grassy knolls.

  Suddenly, I was standing in front of the tightly knit trees, staring deep into the forest ahead as if begging permission to enter. I felt a compelling sense of respect from my first footfall upon the forest floor. The sun was muted under the canopy of branches; its rays were softer, less brilliant. I took in the colors with unshielded eyes and used my hands where the path rose in steep, uneven rocky steps.

  As I marched, the sight of fallen old birch and oak trees, and many others, from storms long forgotten made my trek much more difficult than I’d anticipated. The roots crisscrossed and gnarled, some with fungus on rotting tree stumps. Branches entwined and interlocked from every height and angle, and conspired to divert my direct route, harrowing my every step. The wonderful happy rapture after the arrow incident was all gone. It was nothing but a memory now, a crazy one.

  Yes, the entire thing was inconceivable, but then again, so was making wind whirls with electricity, levitating, listening to people’s thoughts, or meeting someone as evil as Ash. I could no longer deny myself the fact that really odd things were happening and that I, for one, withheld some cursed powers. There were so many questions, and no one to answer them for me.

  Except Ash. Well, I supposed we weren’t going to have chitchat anymore, like old pals. Not that he was going to tell me the truth of anything. Wasn’t he supposed to be here, waiting for me? I chuckled a moment too soon.

  My feet crunched in the thick layer of dead leaves and pine needles as my gaze caught sight of the main road beyond cluster ferns, a wide and civilized forest path. I continued my difficult trek, wishing I could use the road instead, but that would be the first thing the Sisters and Mr. Tarbelli would search on once I was found
missing. Swiftly, the forest seemed not as bright and colorful as it had been moments before. A layer of low clouds had settled over the island, and the sunlight was gone, but I kept moving.

  I touched the rough bark and pine needles of a red pine in my hands to smell them. The scent of pine mingled with the air. An eerie calm affected the forest, disturbed just by the sound of the rustle of the top branches over me, making the trees moan as they swayed. The unnatural, choking mist that swirled and sprawled on the forest ground was the first thing that spoke of a strange sort of wrongness. Curious sounds of twigs snapping and eerie whispering noises held little hidden secrets that only the forest knew.

  A chill ran up my spine at the memory of Mother Clarisse’s written plea that I not leave the convent. I clenched my teeth when I lost sight of the road that led to the ferry pier.

  The air suddenly chilled, each breath made a small cloud into the colder air. My intuition screamed at me that this wasn’t an unwelcomed, gnarly autumn on its way. This was a different type of cold. It was evil.

  It was too early in the day to be this dark, and I could not see far into the trees. Darkness and fog seemed to have swallowed them, yet the almost claustrophobic blackness got me to wonder whether darkness had fallen beyond the woods. There was something evil ruling over the light or, I rather say, the dark. I shook off the impervious feeling there might be something in the forest staring right back at me. I prayed it wasn’t any of the light-sucking monsters I faced that same unholy morning.

  I rubbed the goose bumps on my arms. The hair on my neck prickled, and the tingling in my shoulder was persistent to a warning point. Both augured as a bad sign. The ground crunched louder with every step. Maybe I was being paranoid, but whatever was out there in the forest was giving me the jitter-creepers.

  Howling. My ears followed the very close location of the source in the dark forest. I prayed it was Gavril. I came to a halt at the sight of wolves, even when my gut said to run as fast and as far from them as I could. Not only was Ash stalking me, but there were seven wolves staring at me. The larger one was a black wolf. I supposed he was the alpha leader. His black crest hackles raised and his ears flattened at the sign of threat. They were crouched with muscles tensed, tails held rigid and teeth baring. The alpha snarled once, low and with intent. I became aware of the sheer size of the animals surrounding me. Huge. Crap.

  What had looked like a great idea was now looking rather moronic. Crap. It wouldn’t be the first time I wished for the power of invisibility, but I was out of luck.

  Ailie. The somewhat familiar voice in my head interrupted my upcoming panic attack. Ailie, don’t panic. It’s me, Gavril, he said. Right. I recognized within the shadows of the forest Gavril’s white peppered, furry body approaching me very slowly.

  It was one thing to be able to speak to him, but seven large wolves was a different thing entirely. Of course, the first thing I did was the opposite. I panicked and ran, even when my legs felt shaky.

  Ailie—stop. You are in terrible danger, Gavril commanded.

  “Sure, seven wolves chasing me.” Or the dreadful feeling of the malevolence in the forest after me… I wondered if I was going to regret not listening to him. I swallowed hard.

  Please trust me, My brothers and I will not harm you. You are still my dearest friend, wolf Gavril said. I trusted him—so much—but I was still upset at him. His brothers… well, they kind of scared me. They were significantly larger than Gavril.

  Friend? Friends help each other, I said, fighting for a wisp of breath, understanding that I couldn’t outrun the wolves. This craziness had to stop—now.

  You should have not left St. Mary’s, he scolded me.

  I broke into a hysterical laughter, gasping for more air as I stopped running. He couldn’t begin to comprehend that I feared Ash more, who could easily find me at St. Mary’s, than the forest or the wolves. Ash made St. Mary’s as dangerous as any other place.

  If I am your friend, then you must help me. I watched the wolves’ breaths and mine misting in the air. The air had dropped maybe ten or twenty degrees more, and I shivered.

  Sentient silence and dread wrapped around us. A burning itching on my left shoulder tattoo spread to my arm, and my instincts screamed at me. Something was truly wrong… something unfamiliar and terrifying.

  Suddenly, the rustle of branches and leaves above us, along with the creepy dark ominous feeling, made me shudder with chills.

  One of the other wolves howled as a warning. Gavril’s silver eyes gleamed and narrowed as he opened his mouth. I swore it was a human word that came twisting out of Gavril’s Canidae muzzle.

  “RUN.”

  Chapter 16

  RUN, Gavril urged me, and I wasn’t a dummy.

  I sprang into action. I didn’t need further explanation. Whatever was up there wasn’t normal or even human. Instinctively, I knew the wolves had gone chasing after whatever was hunting me in the air. I ran until noticing I was trapped in one of my God-awful nightmares.

  The forest all looked the same in every direction.

  No matter how many maps I’d seen before, there was no way of telling which way was west or south, and there were no hills or any distinguishing features to guide me. The redwoods were so tall, I couldn’t see the position of the sun. The sky was now covered with a thick haze, and the light was grayish. I felt almost like I was moving in a black-and-white, slow-motion picture. The controvertible and unwelcomed part of this was that the more I ran, the longer the path extended.

  Things like that wouldn’t happen to normal people. God, I was lost in the forest. No one would ever find me if I got lost, killed, or else.

  If you lose your path—pray, came a whisper in the air.

  It was almost as if I could hear Mother Clarisse’s words. I prayed then. At once, I heard Gavril’s voice in my head.

  Run faster. Keep going. We’ll protect you, Gavril said, but I knew his mind connection was farther away from me. I wondered if we were running in opposite directions. But I followed his advice. I ran even when I was clearly lost.

  And I ran as the darkness had taken over the forest. The eerie rustling of leaves and branches directly above me, following my direction, kept me on pins and needles.

  Although Ash hadn’t made his appearance act yet, somehow his presence within the dark forest was latent. With almost certainty, I knew it was him stalking me. I clamped down hard on the fear that was threatening to choke me, even though this would not be the first time it almost killed me. Ash was playing games with my fears. It was very upsetting.

  Be as it may, I stopped in my tracks, feeling angry at him. I had enough for a dreadful day.

  “Ash, you BULLY. Here I am. You want a piece of me?” I shouted at him in the inhabited forest.

  Where did I get the guts?

  I would never know. Frankly, I was upset.

  A heavy thump sound on the ground, that felt like a soul-threatening earthquake, made me jump out of my skin. The epicenter was maybe twenty yards away. But I saw no one. I turned around for my eyes to hastily examine the forest, the trees, beyond the shadows. Nothing. However, no one had to tell me Ash was standing there invisible, in front of me, looking straight at me.

  “SHOW YOURSELF,” I commanded him, in spite of my bravado that actually scared me blind. It was hard to fight something you couldn’t see.

  “Coward,” I muttered. He still didn’t show himself.

  Unexpectedly, a violent heat wave slammed my body so intense it burned under my skin for a split second. It felt like anger, pure and unedited anger that left a bitter, ugly taste in my mouth. Although the emotion was familiar, it wasn’t mine this time around. I knew then this anger was irradiating from Ash. He was a very angry person. Well, technically, I did not know exactly what he was.

  Evil, the little voice in my head said.

  Gratefully, a golden incandescence projected from my chest and wrapped itself like a shield around me. I gaped at the light shield. It had come from my ches
t and was pushing away Ash’s energy blast. I realized then that the golden light from the arrow was deflecting it away.

  Not a moment later, every cell in my body registered even darker blazing waves, each larger than the one before. I didn’t know how I stayed on my feet, why I didn’t faint, or if somehow I could find a way to extricate myself from that moment.

  Fainting was under serious consideration. Not that I could. Crap.

  What did I expect, a welcoming party in the forest?

  Once again, the light shield was as strong as if it were made of real steel, holding up against his hatred. I gathered myself and ignited what was left of me after my outburst in music class. I aimed, flailing at the empty space.

  Why couldn’t I see him? It wasn’t remotely important. I felt a thundering roar basting the forest and everything within like a sonic earthquake pulsing from its vortex.

  Ash.

  I fell on my knees, unable to outlast the rumbles and earth shakes standing up. My hands held onto the earth itself. I could now feel my two hearts distinctly, as if I’d always known they were there and just needed the knowledge to unlock the understanding that the double beats were indeed from two separate organs. They thrummed inside me, beating so fast they thudded into each other, blurring into a hummingbird-like thrum of pure fear. Then the humming calmed them into quiet submission, warming me with an intense feeling of peace and confidence. My instinct said the golden light had caused me to regain my guts.

  Abruptly, all sound and quakes ended, as if vacuumed.

  The feeling of eerie silence in the forest permeated. The sole sound was that of my loud pulse reverberating in my head. There were no more heat waves. I had the vague inkling Ash had left. He could have done anything with me, but he didn’t.

  Why? Why he didn’t attack me more?

  Instinctively, I looked at the red woods rising high into the dark treetops above, that let almost no light through to the ground below, praying Ash hadn’t changed his mind. Frost covered the ground. I rubbed my arms, surveying the forest. A loud crow from behind me made me jump out of my skin.