Legends of Astræa: Cupid's Arrow Book 1 (Legends of Astræa Series) Page 3

  The girls backed away from me as Miss Valentine approached, still sneering, totally oblivious to the fact that I could have just hurt them badly. I didn’t know exactly how it would have manifested, but I knew to my marrow that they could have been badly hurt, and it would have been my fault.

  Cursing myself for my weakness, I walked over to our ballet teacher.

  Miss Valentine wiped her nose with a white handkerchief that contrasted with her black dress. Her dark blonde hair, tight in her customary bun, pulled the skin around her eyes taut. I wondered, ludicrously in that moment, if she got headaches from it. Her usually sunny smile was absent from her face today. She appeared sad, and she didn’t even seem to notice Mr. Tarbelli for once.

  I heard Mother Clarisse’s voice echo again in my head. “He is so beautiful...” I shivered and narrowed my eyes. Mr. Tarbelli could definitely fit that description. He had every female at St. Mary’s practically eating out of his hands, but he seemed not interested in anyone except me. As if sensing my gaze, Mr. Tarbelli’s eyes came up and met mine. I looked away but could feel the intensity of his scrutiny from behind the obscuring glasses he wore.

  “Yes, Miss Valentine?” I said, my voice not much more than a hoarse whisper, pointedly ignoring Mr. Tarbelli’s intense stare. It was the strangest feeling. It was like he knew something was not right about me, and he was set on discovering what I was hiding from him and the rest of the academy. Almost as if he knew about my cursed secret, even though no one really believed in such things. I couldn’t find enough reason to trust him.

  I decided to follow Mother Clarisse’s advice, never trust anyone, and stayed away from him.

  So beautiful.

  Could he be Mother Clarisse’s murderer?

  Could he be the invisible evil?

  The thought was somewhat illogical.

  Come to think of it, even ridiculous. It wasn’t like he was out to give bad grades after unfair amounts of homework. How evil could Mr. Tarbelli be if he taught literature and Latin at St. Mary’s? He was a fair teacher. Judging how he rolled his eyes with his lids closed and gave deep inhales every time we answered something completely wrong, this was more of a capital punishment for him than for any of us.

  Now, if I was to judge his precision-perfect ironed pants and shirts or his shoes, impeccably shined every morning, or his ugly, thick glasses, vintage 1950’s—and, who wore silk bows in the neck and wool vests these days?—it was as if he was somewhat disconnected with the twenty-first century. I knew that much from the high-fashion magazines the girls snuck in. He worked too hard on his appearance. I had a nagging feeling he was hiding something himself.

  Well… Nuh. His ostensible crime was to be the only young and good-looking man available in the entire academy, hence his popularity, but he wasn’t exactly a god of beauty. Not with those ridiculous thick and dorky glasses that helped him stare silently at every girl in the academy, with a final obiter dictum for all of us as a group of dullards.

  He was just too perfectly unpolished. I groaned inwardly. I didn’t even make sense in my own head. I had to stop this nonsense. I had no grounds to judge him. It was pure madness.

  “Oh, Ailie. I’m so sorry. I know how close you were with Mother Clarisse,” Miss Valentine said. I could not look up. The pity in her voice had brought the tears horribly close to the surface, and I fought them down. Out of the corner of my eyes, I noticed Mr. Tarbelli left.

  If only I knew what had happened to Mother Clarisse! Not knowing was only making me more afraid and paranoid. I was beginning to see evil everywhere. I shook my head to clear it and focused on what Miss Valentine was saying.

  “—and I thought you’d like to have this. I found it when we were packing up Mother Clarisse’s effects.” She pressed a small, worn old book into my hands and lowered her voice. Dolefully, I recognized Mother Clarisse’s favorite book of poetry. Milton’s Paradise Lost. The original leather seemed worn from the many times I would read it to Mother Clarisse. I wondered why she had chosen it. It spoke of man’s first disobedience and the fruit of that forbidden tree.

  “There’s a letter addressed to you inside. I, uh, well, I thought you should have it.” Her hands gently squeezed mine as an act of moral support.

  Stunned at this display of kindness, I was touched and humiliated at the same time. However, I couldn’t handle anything aside my sorrow. There was just not enough room for it today.

  I nodded, gratitude choking me and making it impossible to speak. She patted my shoulder and seemed to understand that any more kindness would break me apart. She took her hand away and just stood there next to me quietly. Miss Valentine and I watched as the gravedigger worked his shovel. Every thud had a heart-wrenching ending note, filling the grave with moist, heavy dirt. A cold breeze touched the treetops around us, as if taking the last of Mother Clarisse’s spirit away.

  “Ailie, uh, perhaps you could keep the book somewhere safe. Some of the Sisters didn’t think that you should have it.” I focused on Miss Valentine and nodded again to let her know I understood.

  She was speaking of Sister Magdalene, our temporary headmistress. Time after time, I had repeated to Sister Magdalene my nightmare and what had happened that horrendous night. I’d explained how I dreamed of the gates of hell and the evil shadows that had visited prior Mother Clarisse’s death. However, what she’d wanted was a full-blown confession. I’d overheard her say it at one point. She believed I had murdered her. So I could see why she thought I didn’t deserve anything that belonged to Mother Clarisse.

  I could be tried as an adult at sixteen, and much to her disappointment, not before that. Since I was only days from being sixteen, she had considered turning me into the authorities as a suspect for the death of Mother Clarisse. Be that as it may, the medical examiner determined that only being run over several times by either heavy equipment or a large vehicle could have caused such injuries, exonerating me from the authorities but not from everyone’s harsh judgement.

  Miss Valentine patted my shoulder again and, having said what she wanted to say, turned on her heels to go, leaving me holding the book and the letter. Again, her kindness had crumbled any vestiges left of pretended strength. Somewhat ashamed of my weakness, I watched as she walked briskly but with the distinguished grace of a trained ballerina. She headed toward Sister Agatha who was rounding up the stragglers as the last of the gathering streamed out of the cemetery grounds, most barely able to conceal their relief that they could get on with the rest of their day.

  My gaze locked on the treasures she had given me. A sob rose in my chest, but I pushed it down as I opened the old poetry book. Inside was a small envelope with my name in Mother Clarisse’s familiar handwriting. And the terrible reminder she was no longer with me stabbed me like a hot knife into my heart.

  I closed the book with the letter inside and turned to hide it under my cardigan, hoping it would not slide out as my arm pressed it against my body. I had no pockets. I was wearing Amanda Walter’s old dress—a luxury “the beggar didn’t deserve,” as Sister Agatha had said when she handed them over with the shoes I was to wear to bury Mother Clarisse. She truly hated me, and I didn’t know why. It all had started since I was just a child.

  I walked a few steps back toward the grave as if Mother Clarisse might come back. I stood there, wishing I could rewind and undo everything. I knew it was impossible, but I had never wanted anything more in my life than to feel her arms around me one last time. I might have stayed there forever except I had no more tolerance for anything else. I had reached my emotional limit.

  “Ailie!” Sister Agatha shouted after me. Her wrinkled skin over jutting bones, the fanatic dark gleam in her eyes, the tautness in her thin lips that curled over her receding gums and exposed her long toothy roots full of gaps all reminded me of Miss Gulch in the movie the Wizard of Oz. “Come back here this instant. You have kitchen duty in thirty minutes.”

  Crap. I ran the opposite way.

  In the early days of my
childhood, the Sisters used to embrace me as one of their own. Unlike the blue bloods at the academy, I had assigned chores as well. I helped in the gardens and the kitchen. Actually, these tasks were always enjoyable. Truly enjoyable. It gave me the opportunity to be part of something, to feel like I belonged. Unfortunately, I realized now, all of that changed.

  “Ailie, you wicked, wicked child! Come back here!” Sister Agatha’s shouts faded in the distance. I sighed.

  I’d be punished. Demerits for being late, demerits for disobeying a Sister, demerits because the sky was gray or the chickens weren’t hatching. It seemed that she would find a reason, any reason these days to get me into trouble, and in her mind, I was, if so, only one step away from being a murderer. I’d go without dinner for a week for this. But I would have foregone dinner for a year to have ten minutes alone with Mother Clarisse’s letter.

  I had to get away. Sister Agatha would take the book and the letter away from me for sure. Miss Valentine had said as much. Just then, the thunder rolled, and the back of my neck prickled. I shivered again, but the cold shiver in my bones wasn’t from the bad weather.

  I always disliked storms. I couldn’t help feeling terrified with lightning. This was one of those times. Adrenaline shot in my body and my feet found a way to move faster.

  The sky opened, and the rain drenched my arms within seconds, the way it does in the Atlantic Northern Islands during the end of summer. As the sun went down, temperatures dropped drastically, and even on the warmest summer days, nights were often chilly. I needed to take cover from the deluge.

  The old chapel.

  I could read the letter in the old chapel. Instinctively, my hands reached for the book I had slipped under my cardigan.

  Chapter 3

  I was heartsick, grief-stricken, and filled with self-loathing so intense it was almost palpable when I ducked into the old building. I pulled the poetry book out from under my soaked cardigan. The leather paste had mostly protected it from the dampness.

  I was sweating a little under my drenched cardigan. The pesky, light tingling on my left shoulder made me want to scratch it again, so I pushed the old wooden door shut against the wind and the rain, shucked off my sodden cardigan, and scratched the tingling itch. There was nothing worse than itching wet wool. I found some relief as I scratched it.

  I wrung the cardigan out and laid it on one of the sturdier pews next to the book. I knew it would not dry but wearing dripping wet clothes was almost guaranteed to bring on hypothermia. Gratefully, the dress hadn’t suffered the same fate. It was a little damp over my shoulders but mostly dry.

  My gaze traveled the interior of the small chapel. I loved this old chapel—dilapidated as it was, almost in ruins and hardly used anymore. Mother Clarisse had shared her desire to refurbish it. This was part of the original convent. I wondered if our new Mother Superior would. The pews were mostly still standing, although a few were too wobbly to bear my weight, and the wind whistled in through cracks in the stone walls and holes in the roof. But I was grateful that no one would come here but me, now that Mother Clarisse was gone. It was hard to tell where evil would show up. But for some extraordinary reason, I couldn’t explain why this was the one place in the world I felt safe.

  Although, the new building on academy grounds was stunning and had everything money could buy. This included a larger place of worship which was used for daily prayers, since the old chapel was too small for the use of the entire academy and the convent.

  This little old stone chapel made me feel something that the big fancy building never did. I felt close to God here. I dragged myself from the left side of the chapel where the carved stone niche showcased Our Lady of The Stars—for whom the convent was named after—limbs trembling and teeth chattering. The old marble statue was worn by the centuries but was still beautiful to me. Our Lady of The Stars stood with one hand over her heart, another reaching for the heavens. She seemed somewhat out of place inside the humble stone chapel. It occurred to me that she ought to be in a museum instead and made me wonder why Mother Clarisse hadn’t moved her inside the convent.

  A howl in the distance reminded me of my only friend, Gavril. The only one left in the world who I hadn’t seen since the night before Mother Clarisse’s dreadful death.

  He had been my first large patient seven years ago. At first, I had thought he was a stray dog, but I eventually realized he was a large wolf. I looked closer… a wolf pup actually, not quite fully grown. Skinny, half-limping, and hurt, but a wolf. I somewhat recalled not being afraid of him but feeling sorry for him. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d healed a wild animal. A healing sometimes seemed to sort of call other injured things.

  “Shush, shush. I only want to help you, my friend. My… what a large nuzzle you have,” I said, talking him sweetly into calmness and trying not to chuckle about the quote I had made from Red Riding Hood’s story. The wolf quieted for a short moment, reacting to the soft sound of my voice, but his intense eyes cringed when he tried to limp. He was in terrible pain.

  Sighing in anticipation of the scolding I would get, I shucked off my old kitchen and garden apron, the one that Sister Bernice had fixed for me because it fitted me large at my age. My common sense screamed at me to stay as far away from those gleaming teeth as possible, but I wasn’t going to listen to it. No. I had to help the poor animal. Although, he was significantly larger than me at nine years old, and it seemed almost impossible to carry him. He almost doubled my size.

  Gathering all my strength, and against his disapproving temperament, I closed in on him from behind his head. He snarled between pain pants, warning me he wasn’t in the best of moods. However, he was too weak to make much of a fuss. I took this as an opportunity and quickly inserted my apron between his teeth and pulled it tight toward the back of his neck and back again around his nozzle. Once I had his teeth and head under control, I grabbed his two back legs, and I winced as he cried out and yipped under the muzzle when the movement pulled at his front-right leg wound. The entire leg dangled in the wrong way. Right then, I was sure it was broken.

  “So sorry, so sorry.” I didn’t know why I kept apologizing, as if he could understand. He was a wild animal for God’s sake. I could feel he was in agonizing pain and I was just making it worse for him as I dragged him over the rough ground, stepping all over the vegetable garden patch, muddying my only pair of decent shoes. God, sister Bernice had sent me to shower without dinner that night after they saw me covered in dirt and mud.

  I dragged him toward the rough-hewn doorway of a forgotten tool shed inside the convent walls where I could take care of him.

  When he saw where we were headed, he tried to scramble from my hands. His legs buckled when he tried to lever himself up, and he fell back onto the ground, but I tried again. The movement was making it harder for me to pull him over the ground. He redoubled his efforts, though, and I sighed at my romantic ideas that wild animals could understand me. He was panicking as I pushed open the wrought-iron gate, and as I fought the rusted hinges, he tried to push me inside as if he wanted me on the other side of the gate and away from him.

  “Stop that. You, mangy dog!” I growled at him, and he cocked his head at me, for all the world like a curious house dog with cute begging eyes. I softened my tone and continued as if he could understand me. “We don’t have time for this. We don’t want the Sisters to find out. I am responsible for bringing you here. So you better let me help you.” I dragged him across the dirt. I couldn’t allow any of the Sisters to find me bringing a wolf inside the convent grounds. I prayed for his obedience and his fast recovery.

  However, as we crossed the gate together, something odd happened when I was holding his back legs. An orb, the size of a baseball, floated between us. At first, I thought it was a soap bubble one of my classmates had blown away. I tried to pop it with my finger, but it avoided my touch. It was beautiful, and it radiated a strange iridescence. I knew he felt the presence of the orb too. It followed us all the
way into the tool shed, where I kneeled next to him. The small orb continued to hover over his heart. The wolf transfixed on it.

  “Let me help you with your leg,” I told him.

  He became quiet, almost understanding. Praying for strength, I steadied myself and poured my life force into my hands. They sparkled a deep emerald green, darker and stronger than I’d ever seen it.

  I was going to need every bit of extra strength I could get, or we were both going to be in deep trouble to say the least. I felt his pain melding with my energy. Time lost all meaning in a healing trance. It was the rush of blood, racing from broken bones to ruptured tissues. At the same time, the orb danced with my energy as if looking for something. I swear I remembered seeing water running down the side of Gavril’s furry face as the orb found its target. His heart.

  But my energy at nine wasn’t an infinite battery, and mine was soon coming to an abrupt halt. I had poured everything I had. My own heart sped up, pumping erratically, and my vision darkened. I barely had the strength to break the meld when I’d pulled myself out, even though there was more minor damage left.

  I came back into my own body screaming, cramped from being in the same kneeling position for who knew for how long. I tried to stand up and stretch my legs, but black squares crowded my vision. I felt a rushing sensation as I reached the ground fast, and blood flooded out of my brain.

  Then I knew nothing at all.

  My last thought was that if I had succeeded in healing him, he would wake up very, very hungry, and I would hardly be in a position to fend him off. I tried to fight my way back to consciousness, but it was hopeless.

  The leaden weight of exhaustion dragged me under.

  I woke to the feeling of an insistent rough, wet, and spongy thing dragging over my face. I tried to pull away but managed only to lift my hands to my face and push it away, only to discover that I was pushing back the muzzle of the enormous wolf. I had no way of knowing how long I had spent next to the wolf with my face plastered to the floor of the dank, forgotten tool shed. I straightened up, knowing the wolf must have been ravenous from the healing. My own stomach complained bitterly, but I was grateful he hadn’t eaten me while I was defenseless.