Legends of Astræa: Cupid's Arrow Book 1 (Legends of Astræa Series) Read online

  “Not even a single tear for the woman who took her off the streets,” I heard Sister Magdalene say aloud, reminding me how pitiful I was. Her somewhat scrawny figure moved uncomfortably in her seat as Father Peter cleared his throat. She had obviously missed the memo from Father Peter.

  I held my breath at this injustice. I felt my anger kick at the door of its cell, begging to be freed. I fought my anger back into the mental cell I had built for it and slammed the door. The effort left me shaking and sweating, as much as if I’d physically wrestled the beast to the ground.

  The main reason I attended the ceremony was inside that coffin. I shouldn’t forget that. I focused instead on the sound of the rustling of the treetops. A whiff of ionized cold air that usually preceded rain hit my face. The skies, a monochromatic gray, were turning into darker shades. A storm was coming.

  I closed my eyes briefly. Then I felt a wave of dizziness emerge, and my eyes ached, sandy from lack of sleep. Exhaustion was wearing down my defenses, and my eyes burned as I fought back tears again. It wasn’t just grief and anger that had kept me awake at night for the last four days. I was afraid, night after night, wondering if whatever had attacked Mother Clarisse would come for me next.

  Despite the dizziness, I forced deep breaths and curled my hands into fists, driving my nails into the calluses of my palms. I flinched at the sharp hot bite of pain, but the tears receded.

  Even though it would make no difference in how my classmates, the Sisters, or the academy’s staff felt about me, I would not let them see me cry. I would not give them the satisfaction of adding “weak” to their lists of my failures as a human being. So I was guilty of pride, something that sister Agatha assured me is one of the most terrible capital sins.

  The thought of the old chapel hit me with a longing so powerful it made me gasp. The one place I could be alone. The one place I could let myself cry. I just had to make it through the service.

  Father Peter bowed his head and began to intone the “Dies Irae.” I closed my eyes, grateful for the chance to rest them and, as always, fascinated and awed by the beauty and power of the ancient prayer. “Dies Iraq, dies illa solver Davilla, teste David cum.—”

  My eyes flew open as I felt fingers with sharp nails pinch the tender skin on the back of my upper arm.

  I flinched away, moving closer to Father Peter on my left but I stopped short as Sister Clementia, in a squalid black habit, showed up in front of me. She wore her crazy uneven frizzy hair without the white starched coif that the rest of the Sisters wore so neatly. The night Mother Clarisse had died, in one of Sister Clementia’s recurrent acts of insanity, she had cut her hair clearly without the use of a mirror. Today, her glance was empty, eyelids blotchy red from incessant crying and her lips slack.

  I stiffened with equal degree of compassion and horror, as Sister Clementia recognized me, smiling grotesquely at me with broken yellow teeth. She had escaped her isolation room. We all feared her. She was kind of deranged, today more so. Perhaps she was the most affected by the loss of Mother Clarisse. I swallowed hard as her eyes locked on mine. Her unexpected and tragic spectacle forced the gathering into silence.

  Mother Clarisse had been the one to calm her in her moments of crises. I wondered who would take care of her now, the same way Mother Clarisse did. Then I wondered who would protect and love me from now on.

  She waggled her wrinkled gray cheeks at me, mumbling through her shriveled lips and pasty, dry tongue something in Latin:

  “Non esse velle tener agnae. Malum veniet tibi.” Her face moved closer to mine. I held my breath as she poked my chest and continued her rant.

  “Ipse est diabolus. Currite! Currite tener agnae!”

  What had Sister Clementia been saying? The silence ruptured into a multitude of muffled whispers. Obnoxiously, I could hear the disrespectful titter and mock giggles behind me that ended as fast as they’d begun when Sister Magdalene’s small, beady eyes fixed one of her fear-inspiring stares at Tiffany Miller and her retinue of followers. I tried not to pay attention to them. I was too busy trying to make any sense of Sister Clementia’s admonition.

  Something about run little lamb and evil coming? My whole being felt dizzy again at the meaning within those words. I stepped back, eliciting more pinches from Tiffany’s clique. Unfortunately, the stinging and insistent pain broke my concentration.

  The moment was gone.

  Sister Bernice’s robust and matronly figure moved, opening a path through the crowd. When she reached us, she pulled Sister Clementia’s arm, almost as if she would at an errant youngster at the academy. Sister Clementia blinked, breaking her connection with me. Her gaze traveled slowly as if wondering where she was. For one instant, her expression was clear of trouble, then she mumbled incomprehensible litanies mixed with crazy moaning that interrupted the funeral further.

  “Come with me, Sister. It is time for your daily prayer.” Sister Bernice continued to drag her from the congregation. Then, obligingly, she mindlessly turned toward Sister Bernice’ voice, holding onto Sister Bernice’s arm like a helpless child.

  Two other Sisters came to help poor Sister Bernice, leading Sister Clementia away from the graveyard. My heart still drummed fast as I watched her going away. Father Peter cleared his throat. He nodded at the gatherers to continue with the ceremony, intoning and waving the aspergillum to sprinkle holy water over the coffin and the grave.

  “Solvet sæclum in favilla, teste David cum Sibylla. Quantus tremor est futures.” His poor Latin pronunciation destroyed much of the beauty of the verses. I translated in my head. Heaven and earth in ashes ending! David’s word with Sibyl’s blending, how great will be the quaking.

  “What was the he-brid-dian doing outside her cage?” Simone Thornton, Tiff’s BFF whispered. The Hebrides were islands in the western coast of Scotland. I rolled my eyes.

  “Hebephrenic,” Tiffany corrected her, making Father Peter give her a hushing reprimand for her unkind name-calling.

  They had many names for the rara avis (the anomalies) like Sister Clementia or me. They thought they were ultra-cool or super smart using unique names that few could take offense to. However, Simone would lose a battle of wits to a leech and could not fix the fact that her elevator was kind of empty on the upper floor. I sighed. I wondered if she knew her besties made fun of her behind her back.

  “Are you going to cry, orphan?” Tiffany, being a big bully by the force she was putting into it, was twisting the skin on the inside of my upper arm through the thin cardigan I wore. No, no, no, I can’t break in front of everyone, I told myself, taking deep breaths.

  The orphan had a name. I was Ailie. Even if it was only one name.

  Why couldn’t they give me a moment of peace or pick a place to stand farther away from me? Tiffany always put the most effort into wringing a response from me. Why couldn’t she stop for one minute and realize that we were all confounded by the unexpected appearance of Sister Clementia or sad because we were all attending a funeral?

  But nothing could get past the immense emptiness inside of me, the horrible feeling of nothingness where Mother Clarisse’s love for me had always been.

  “Crucem passus: tantus labor non sit cassus.” Father Peter’s voice droned on. The Latin dirge ran through my head as the girls behind me taunted me with “Is the little orphan with freaky eyes crying?” No, I wasn’t. I chose to ignore their insults. I didn’t choose the color of my eyes when I was born. My irises were ice blue that obscured with an unusual deep violet ring when I felt emotional. Tiffany let go of my skin, and the gray skies closed dark just like my mood at that moment.

  My world might be ending, but I’d be damned before I let any of them see me crumble with their cruel taunts. I thought of the old chapel and let my mind fall away into the cadences of the familiar Latin prayer once again. Tiffany’s voice faded, the whole world faded into a numbing blankness. I don’t know how long my mind floated, my gaze on the black coffin covered with white roses. Mother Clarisse’s fa
vorites.

  Time stopped.

  And then it skipped a beat, and I could hear Father Peter’s voice, but I no longer felt the bite of the cold New England air. I heard the words as if they were rushing into my head from a tunnel, gaining speed and power as they came for me. I tensed as though I was about to be hit, and then I knew what I was hearing, and dread filled my body and mind.

  My mouth grew dry, and I focused on the words I was hearing: Confutatis maledictis, flammis acribus addictis: voca me cum benedictis. My stomach twisted, and I felt sick and dizzy. When the wicked are confounded, doomed to shame and woe unbounded, call me with thy saints surrounded.

  “No,” I whispered to myself.

  No. No. No.

  But it was no use. The memory rose and choked me.

  Chapter 2

  The last time I’d heard those words were as Mother Clarisse had choked them out, her mouth filling with blood. In the commotion, I hadn’t remembered they were part of the “Dies Irae.”

  In my mind, I was once more hearing the shocking sound of her bones crushing slowly, very slowly. Arms, ribs, legs… as if an invisible and gigantic hand had closed around her, holding her frail body in the air.

  I replayed the horror of being helpless at the mercy of this—whatever it was—powerful force. The same force that had taken her captive had pushed and confined me against the opposite wall. I relived the helplessness that had come after fighting and struggling to free myself so I could do something—anything. There was nothing I could’ve done to stop this evil from murdering her. I was horrified, subjected to watch her dangling body being crushed as she spoke in the name of God, keeping those demons and nightmares away from me. She was the only mother I had ever known. I loved her so much. My being soared with love for her. Love. I had felt it at that moment. The evil force left her, and she crashed like a sack of potatoes over the stone floor.

  At the same time, the evil force released me, and I rushed to Mother Clarisse’s aid. I didn’t care if the presence was still there or was gone. I had to help Mother Clarisse first.

  Beyond the bounds of reason, I had tried to heal her fragile, mangled body that horrible night, even when I didn’t know if I could. Her life was flowing away so fast. I remembered how I had gathered my healing power, my hands sparking with the faint greenish glow. I was about to begin when I felt her hand close, butterfly-thin and fragile, on my arm.

  “No, child,” she had said, her words garbled as blood began to fill her lungs.

  “But… please, let me…” I begged as time ran out for her like the last grains inside a sand clock. I could still feel the acute anguish and desperation of those last minutes.

  ”I am not afraid. It is my time. Remember your promise, to never use your power for evil. Waste is a form of evil. Do you understand, my child?”

  I didn’t.

  I wanted to save her, regardless of any consequence. I had to try, even when I didn’t know if I could. I’d never tried to heal someone nearly as badly injured before.

  As a child, I had spent myself a few times, and as a consequence, I had been seriously weak. We both had discovered that healing even minor injuries had drained me severely.

  I realized that creating a healing link from me to her broken body could drain my life force and perhaps still not be enough to save her. Understanding this did nothing to quell the pain I felt as I watched her gasp for each last breath.

  “So beautiful, Ailie. He is so beautiful,” she said through a breath.

  Her glassy gaze fixed on the empty space above us. I thought she had seen God, but then bony hands with fingers twisted and swollen with arthritis—the most amazing loving hands in the world—suddenly rose like claws, grasping at my night shirt. She pulled me down with strength unnatural for a dying eighty-nine-year-old woman.

  “Hear me, child.” Her voice rose, no longer shaking and weak but strong, powerful, and echoing like an unearthly chorus. It was the most frightening thing I had ever heard.

  ”He is the Devil. Do you hear me?” She shook me. My teeth rattled in my skull. A tiny part of my mind wondered how she was doing this. I had seen the broken bones. The rest of me struggled in terror.

  “He will come for you. Never ever trust him—never trust anyone.” Her eyes were dull and dimming away. I gasped.

  “He will come for you,” she repeated, before collapsing with a sole, strained exhalation. I fell beside her, gathering her into my arms as she coughed up mouthfuls of blood as she coughed out the line:

  “Pie Jesu Domine, dona eis requiem. Amen.”

  No-ooh. No. No. The memory hung vividly under that horrid cold gray sky. I knew somewhere in the fabric of time I was still screaming inside, but it made no sound in the vast, terrible void that had opened in my heart.

  Five days had passed since the night she was murdered. That terrible night had been the very first time in my life that I had experienced hate. Oh, how I hated this evil thing, even when my love for her was greater. Such powerful opposite emotions.

  Father Peter granted his last blessings. The funeral was over.

  Everything came to a sudden dead calm, a deafening silence inside of me. It felt like I could be stuck there for eternity, lost in a single mindless howl of grief and loss and denial. Some part of my mind fought for a way back to myself, and I never thought I’d have to be grateful to Tiffany, but suddenly, I was.

  Soft but unmistakable snickering brought me back to reality, breaking the silence that was louder than any sound I’d ever heard. I stiffened, forcing my body to remain still even though my scalp and skin prickled with atavistic horror. My muscles were clenched so hard, I shook.

  On cue, Tiffany Miller’s voice hissed, “Oh my fricking God. Aren’t those Amanda Walton’s Pradas from like three years ago?” She, like the rest of the girls at St Mary’s Academy, was a true member of American aristocracy. The Sisters left my side to speak with Father Peter, the teachers who might have stood up for me were gathering away from the grave, and Tiffany must have noticed that I was especially vulnerable.

  “She probably stole them, the dirty little thief.” Simone’s whispered words washed over me. I felt like her words were a million miles away. Their scorn would have hurt me before, but today, I felt almost nothing at their taunts. Today, their petty torments were nothing compared to the whirlwind of agony inside of me.

  The sky rumbled as the gravedigger filled in the grave. The thumping sound of the earth hitting the coffin like an awful beat made this nightmare more real. Mother Clarisse was lying, still and cold, inside that coffin. She had protected me until her death. I stood there with the intensity of the memory, the pain of my loss, and the exhaustion I felt all combined. Strangely, it left me empty somehow and cold, very cold.

  Tiffany shoved me hard and I stumbled, sobering me from the nightmare of my reality. Her girls circled around me. “You killed Mother Clarisse. It’s all over the school that you beat her and were found with her body. You’re evil. If you died the world would be a better place.”

  I knew Tiffany was just being mean about the idea that I had actually killed Mother Clarisse, but it was just an excuse in her mind to continue her entertaining and capricious torture games toward lesser beings like myself. It was just a lame personal sport of sorts as she grew bored of the academy. They all knew there was no proof I did it. They all knew I loved Mother Clarisse as the only mother I ever had.

  I clenched my hands into fists at the unfairness of her accusation. My rage whipped out of the locked room in my mind, and I let it. I had to stop it before it would be too late. The crowd of mourners had thinned. God help me.

  I inhaled deeply, trying to take hold of the power. I shook with the effort of holding it back and felt my control start to slip, threatening to lash out. I felt some nameless form of condensed power rise inside me. Unlike the healing power I was just learning to control, this power was fueled by all the hate and loneliness and grief and anger I felt. It coiled like a snake, and I felt it look for a t
arget. My fingertips had charged and sparked with power.

  Some part of my mind was shouting at me to lock it back down, that something bad could happen, and that Mother Clarisse wouldn’t want that. I felt chilled to my core from the time I had hung in that unspeakable void. But Tiffany was not quite finished.

  “The only thing you could do that would be good is to kill yourself. No one would miss you. I’d even help you. Call it a public service… If you had done it a week ago, Mother Clarisse would still be alive.”

  Crap. I stood there like a statue, frozen.

  Despite the anger I felt, the reminder of how Mother Clarisse had died—in agony, because of me—killed it and left me drained, and I wanted to weep. A cold gust fluttered our skirts, but I shriveled at her ignoble words. True, no one would miss me. My own parents had left me at the convent when I was just hours old.

  Horror and shame assaulted me. They were the perfect company to my guilt. If only I hadn’t come to Mother Clarisse in the middle of night, seeking refuge in her arms.

  If only…

  I realized that the girls were all looking at me now, as if it were my turn to respond. I had nothing to say. No defense. Gratefully, at that precise moment, the electric field in my hands retracted and the mental fog cleared from my head. Sometimes, I thought I was such an effin idiot.

  Deep in my gut, I knew that something evil had killed Mother Clarisse because of me, and I didn’t know the reason—yet.

  However, even in my despair, I decided that there was a noteworthy difference between deserving to die and wanting to die. I didn’t want to die even if I was evil. And I was pretty sure that there was something wrong with me. Evil, whispered the voice in my head, and a shiver ran down my back. No one good, or even normal, would have the kind of satanic nightmares I’d had since I could remember.

  “Ailie.”

  The last thing I needed was doing something terrible in front of everyone. I had no idea exactly what would have happened if I had let my control slip, had Miss Valentine not called my name. Mother Clarisse wouldn’t approve of my behavior, I reminded myself.