I opened my mouth to respond, couldn’t think of anything to say, and shut it.
Ms. Terwilliger’s eyes lit up. “That sounds fascinating.”
“You want to come see it with me?” he asked. “I’m going again this weekend. Fifth time.”
As they exchanged phone numbers, I glanced over at Brayden, who was staring openmouthed, holding our drinks. At least I wasn’t alone in my reaction. I took out the Love Phone and texted Adrian.
Ran into Wolfe. He asked Ms. T out.
Adrian’s response was about what I expected: . . .
I then delivered the coup de grâce: SHE ACCEPTED.
Adrian was still unable to get past symbols: ?!?
I was at a loss for words on the way back to Amberwood, made worse by Ms. Terwilliger’s dreamy expression. “Ma’am,” I said at last. “Do you think going out with someone like him is a good idea? At last count, he had eleven Chihuahuas.”
“Miss Melbourne,” she said, reverting to her old nickname for me, “I offer no critique on your dubiously sound romantic choices. Don’t question mine.”
Flirting with Wolfe had eaten into more of our time today, but to her credit, she didn’t delay in making use of our remaining twenty minutes. We pulled some desks together and huddled over one of Inez’s books, along with a small bowl of dirt. She pointed to a diagram in the book that depicted a palm with four small clumps of dirt arranged in a diamond.
“There’s no real incantation for this,” she said, sprinkling the dirt on my palm in the appropriate pattern. “It’s one of those that’s more meditative. Only you aren’t trying to accomplish any concrete result so much as connect with the dirt’s essence. What do you think of when you think of dirt?”
“To not wear white.”
Her lips twitched, but she stayed on track. “Shift yourself into a casting trance and think of all that earth is in the world and even the role it plays in the spells you know.”
I was familiar with casting trances, but simply using it to commune with a substance was a bit more difficult. Nonetheless, I closed my eyes and focused my breathing, entering an odd state where my mind felt both clear and concentrated. The dirt was cool in my hand, and I envisioned damp, mist-covered forests, like one of the redwood parks up north, where trees anchored themselves in the earth and the smell of wet dirt hung everywhere. Dirt itself wasn’t always present in spells, but many things that hid within it were: jewels and plants and—
“Open your eyes,” said Ms. Terwilliger softly.
I did and saw a faint luminescence surrounding my hand holding the dirt.
“Try to put it in your other hand and hold it.”
The light had no substance, and I had to contain it with my mind. I tipped my hand, and it poured into my other one. The glow began to slip out between my fingers, dissipating into the air as it did. I closed my hand, trying to grasp those last shreds of light.
The door to her classroom opened, and I jumped, losing all mental hold of the remaining light. It vanished.
“Sydney?” Zoe stuck her head in.
“Come in, Miss Ardmore,” said Ms. Terwilliger coolly, shutting the book without looking down. “Although, please, next time, do us the courtesy of knocking.”
Zoe flushed at the rebuke. “I’m very sorry, ma’am. I was just excited to see Sydney.” She wasn’t offended so much as embarrassed. Like me, she’d been raised with very strict rules of etiquette and politeness. Her eyes lighted on the desktop. Ms. Terwilliger had made sure the book’s unmarked back cover faced upward, but my dirty hands were right there in the open. “What are you doing?”
Ms. Terwilliger scooped up the book and bowl and walked over to her desk, as I wiped my hands together. “Being silly and sentimental. I collected some dirt outside the Parthenon on my trip to Greece last summer and saved it as a souvenir. I was enchanted with the idea of holding on to something that had been present throughout the advancement of a great civilization.”
It was far-fetched but a lot less weird than using the dirt to extract the magic of earth’s essence. I swallowed and tried to run with the story. “Yeah, and you know how I want to go to Greece, Zo. I wondered if maybe touching it would give me some connection to history.” My laugh was brittle. “But it just felt like dirt.”
Ms. Terwilliger joined me with a chuckle of her own. “You and I are both given to romantic flights of fancy, Miss Melrose. Someday you’ll just have to visit for yourself. For now, this will simply return to my collection.” She reverently set the bowl on her filing cabinet. I’d seen her fill it with dirt from one of Amberwood’s flower beds when we’d come inside earlier.
Zoe had a frown on her face, but she finally nodded because really, what else was she going to do? “Okay . . . well. Since school’s over, I wondered if you wanted to go run errands with me. We haven’t been able to hang out much, and I need new shoes for PE. The ones I brought are worn out. No one else needs us tonight.” The subtext was clear to me. There were no feedings at Clarence’s, and Jill was staying at the school, safely ensconced.
I could sense Ms. Terwilliger watching me, waiting for my cue. If I claimed I had to do some project for her, she’d agree. But Zoe was right about one thing: We hadn’t spent much time together. Not only was that making my time away suspicious, it was also hurting my relationship with Zoe. She was still my sister, after all, and I loved her. I wanted to have a good relationship with her. I wanted things to be like they used to be, though that seemed to become increasingly unlikely with each passing day. At least a trip to the mall seemed normal and sisterly on the surface, even if it didn’t feel that way in my gut.
“You’re lucky,” Zoe said as we neared the mall. The car’s blind-spot detection had just chimed. “It always tells you when there’s a car there. In driver’s training, we always had to check blind spots ourselves. Those cars were junk.”
I couldn’t help a laugh. “You should always check, whether you’re driving junk or not. I usually see the other cars before it warns me.”
She gave a mournful sigh. “I wish I could drive. I just got my permit back in Utah.”
“You can’t drive without a parent there or in California,” I reminded her.
“Yeah.” She slouched into her seat, looking very much like an ordinary girl, not one part of an ancient and world-spanning organization that covered up the supernatural. “Maybe someone could mess with the paperwork and get you legal guardian status. I mean, how else am I supposed to get a license? Unless someone just makes ‘Zoe Ardmore’ a fake one. I’m a good enough driver.”
“You’ll have to ask Dad,” I said, feeling a pang of guilt. It actually wouldn’t be that difficult to work some Alchemist connections to make that kind of thing happen. If we did it without checking with our dad first, we’d probably be chastised, and if we did ask . . . well, something told me he’d probably think it was superfluous. “If he hasn’t brought it up, then he probably just wants you to focus on learning other stuff. Our job takes priority.”
She couldn’t argue against that. After a long moment of staring out at other cars, she said, “Speaking of priorities . . . have you ever thought that maybe what you’re doing with Ms. Terwilliger isn’t appropriate?”
I flinched, even though I knew she couldn’t possibly be talking about magic. “What do you mean?”
“I don’t know exactly. It’s just, you’ve already finished high school. You’re here to do Alchemist business, but you seem really into your classes—especially that thing with her. It seems personal too, like you’re just hanging out as friends. I mean, talking about her vacation? It wouldn’t be a big deal if it was just inside class hours, but you’re always doing work for her that doesn’t seem like work. Nothing wrong with wanting friends or social time . . . but you can’t do it at the cost of the assignment. What would Dad say?”
I kept myself very still and thought for long moments before my answer. “You’re right. I do have to be careful. It’s just hard when we talk about Greece, when I want to go there so badly. I love her stories. Still, that’s no excuse. I guess I just forget that when everything’s so quiet with Jill and the others. I’ve got to do something to pass the time, and I certainly can’t spend it with them.”
“You could spend it with me,” she said hopefully.
I glanced at her long enough to give her a smile. “I will. We’ll do more things—not just talking about the assignment. Getting out like this is good. I’ll try to make it happen more often—though I don’t want to act too uninterested in my classes. I can’t risk getting in trouble for slacking off.” In truth, my teachers thought so highly of me, I could probably skip the rest of the semester.
My story was good enough for Zoe, though, who looked delighted at more sisterly bonding. Most importantly, she didn’t mention our dad again. Like her, he wouldn’t suspect magic, but he also wouldn’t like me having any sort of personal life. I sealed the deal when I told her, “We should stop for ice cream after we get the shoes. See if we can find some praline pecan.”
She grinned at the reference to an old restaurant near where we’d grown up. The menu had always said, “Ask about our daily ice cream special.” But every day, it was always praline pecan. When my dad had pointed this out to the elderly owner, she’d shrugged and said, “I can’t find anything more special. Why change it?” It had become a joke with the rest of us and even a sort of family tradition.
To my amazement, the ice cream at this place was almost as good, and we took our cones out to sit on the curb. As we ate, an idea suddenly came to me. “Are you serious about driving?” I asked her.
The light in her eyes answered before she did. “Yes! Will you try to get me a license?”
I munched on a pecan, my thoughts spinning. “Well, you know, the whole point of a permit is so you can practice before the license.”
“But I don’t need to—”
I gave her a stern older-sister look. “Rules are rules, and there’s a good reason for them. I can’t expedite the license, but if you want to practice, you could do it on private property—parking lots and things. With a licensed driver,” I added.
She wrestled with the idea and then nodded eagerly. “Okay, I’ll do it. We’ll have fun.”
“Well,” I said delicately. “I may not be able to always practice with you—I’m still tied up with things at school. But we can find someone else.”
“Who?”
Moment of truth. I had two licensed drivers at my disposal: Eddie and Neil. Girls seemed to find Neil’s accent charming, but I wasn’t looking for someone to charm Zoe. I was looking for someone approachable and friendly who’d show her not all dhampirs were evil creatures of the night.
“Eddie,” I said.
Her eyes bugged out. “Eddie? But he’s . . .”
“I know, but he’s a good driver. I mean, if you just want to wait until I have time . . .” I let a meaningful pause settle between us. “I understand. You won’t get as much practice that way, but it’s not like we’re going anywhere for a while.”
Silence fell, and I finished off my cone. My performance had been flawless; I knew that. She had no clue my offer was anything but sisterly concern. Now it was time to see if I was as clever as I thought I was.
I’d been thinking about this for a while, how I might get her to start seeing dhampirs and Moroi in a different light. Her walls were strong, and I knew I couldn’t force her into doing—or rather, believing—something she didn’t want to. But driving? That was something she wanted, and if she could enter into this thinking it had been her own decision, then maybe there was a chance of cracking those rigid rules she’d been instilled with. It was a small, fleeting hope, but I had to try. After all, that was how it happened to me: a series of events that forced me to work with Moroi and dhampirs and truly get to understand them. That, and I liked to think my ability to think for myself played a role.
“Okay,” Zoe said at last. “I’ll do it. But you will try to be there most of the time?”
I nodded solemnly. “You bet.”
She relaxed a little and twirled the remains of the cone in her hand. “I guess it’s a good thing he’s dhampir. They look human, at least.”
“Yes,” I said, trying to hide a smile. I’d told myself the same thing when I’d been forced to travel with Rose Hathaway in Russia. Maybe this plan was crazy enough to work. “They certainly do.”
CHAPTER 7
ADRIAN
I WAS WORKING ON THAT STUPID SELF-PORTRAIT AGAIN.
My latest attempt was about to be discarded, not because of any spirit-induced pessimism, but because it just wasn’t any good. I mean, it was passable, and I probably could’ve come up with some plausible crap story about symbolism for my teacher. She would’ve bought it, and I could’ve gotten a decent grade. But I’d know the truth. This one was no good.
My mood was a little touchy today, mostly because I hadn’t slept well. I’d tossed and turned, unable to find deep sleep. Things had been made worse because Sydney wasn’t coming over today. She’d decided to stick around so that she and Zoe could do something immediately after classes ended. I understood the logic of keeping Sage Junior pacified, but that didn’t ease the ache of missing Sydney. At least we were scheduled for Friday dinner at Clarence’s tonight, but it was never the same when others were around.
The phone rang, jolting me out of my maudlin moment. I had to go on a mad search to find where it had slipped between the couch cushions and just barely managed to catch it before voice mail picked up. The caller was a total surprise.