Chapter 22 — In Her Image

  “By tattoo, dye, silicone, or magic, the outer self is a canvas to be filled by your whims without limit. The inner soul is a demanding demon of desires forever beyond your control. Neither defines you. Your true identity lies somewhere in between.”

  ~Cinza, the Rallsburg Diaries

  Wait… Wait… okay, it's clear. Go.

  Go!

  Natalie hesitated, even while she screamed at her legs to move. The sun had already gone down and the city was dark again. Every shadow seemed to leer up at her. Every street was full of monsters waiting to leap out and devour her. Every person was watching her, following her, biding their time until they could steal her away and take her into the black vans where they'd do horrible experiments on her. All because she once read a piece of paper she found in the woods.

  There's no one. The street is totally empty. You have to go. You can't just stay here.

  She saw it in her head, as clear as day. Saw the little girl step out of the shadows and be set upon by faceless golems, or men in black suits, or even just the featureless mass of random people. They surrounded her and fell upon her in a huge mass, and she couldn't fight back. She couldn't escape.

  You're not that little girl anymore.

  Natalie opened her eyes and looked down at her hands, clenched in two tight fists.

  Define who you are.

  She bolted.

  A horn blared the moment her foot hit the pavement. Natalie twisted around in mid-leap, but her momentum was already carrying her into the street. A delivery truck bore down on her, barely visible through the harsh headlights flooding the street.

  She reacted without thinking. A wall of force expanded outward from her outstretched palm. With a sickening crunch of metal, the car slammed into an invisible wall. Natalie kept running while an alarm blared behind her, filling up the street with noise. She twisted around slightly, trying to see if the driver was okay, but she couldn't tell—and she couldn't stop moving.

  Get out of here. Go. Now.

  It didn't matter anymore if she was seen. They would all know who she was in only a few days. Natalie started tapping into the flame of magic flickering inside her chest, so close to her heart. She felt like it was the only thing keeping her warm. Each step became a leap forward as she bounded down the street, practically flying past the few people on the sidewalk. They turned as she leapt past, watching her flick by in a blur of motion, but all they could see was someone in a forest green army jacket, jeans and a thick hood. Nothing identifiable, or so she hoped.

  You have to hide, and you can't do that if anyone follows you there. Remember what Boris taught you.

  Natalie felt like the voice keeping her company and reminding her what to do was someone else entirely. It was so much louder today. Maybe it was Gwen's voice, somehow, projected across the forests and cities to keep her safe. Or maybe it was Rachel, giving her a plan and a mission to follow.

  Or maybe it's her. The huntress. Teaching me.

  Natalie stopped to catch her breath at the corner of the next street, where she could sit beside a short staircase out of sight. That's just silly. She's not real. Elves aren't real either. But… magic is real, and I bet they didn't know that. So maybe she isn't so imaginary after all.

  Her hand moved to her bag, about to open it and fish out the card.

  Natalie shook her head. No time. She got back up and started moving again. She couldn't risk being found. There wasn't any time to waste.

  She pulled out her phone while she kept moving. To her dismay, there still wasn't a single response from anyone on the website. Cinza and her people were totally silent. Hailey, too, but that didn't surprise her anymore. Hailey seemed so preoccupied with her own stuff lately. Probably didn't want to talk to a little kid anymore… Boris and Dan hadn't been online since they were on TV, but she'd heard they were okay. She missed Hector, but he barely ever showed up on the website. He wasn't the type to talk online.

  Even worse, she hadn't gotten anything new from her friends. Mitch, Tyler and Steven were presumably still keeping up the charade at Steven's place. Kelsey had texted her back, but since she was still trapped in the back of Steven's closet, she didn't have anything new for her. Mostly just confused reactions to the news, intermixed with complaints about some game she was playing while she was waiting around bored.

  The news… There's gonna be a book about us. About everything that happened.

  About me and my dad.

  Natalie knew how it was going to go. She was the daughter of the traitor. She'd be infamous for that, especially since she'd fought back. They were on opposite sides of the story. Not for the first time, she wondered what might have happened if she'd just told him about magic. Rachel hadn't outright told her not to, but she hadn't seemed okay with it either.

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  Natalie hadn't really wanted to tell him either. Sometimes, her dad was weirdly strict on things. Like when they'd first moved to Rallsburg and he hadn't let her out of his sight, ever. She was a lot smaller back then, but it lasted for years. After he'd finally let her go do things on her own, she still had to check in constantly, and he wouldn't let her talk to anyone. It was months before she finally got caught talking to Hector, and her dad grounded her for a month for it.

  In the end, though, he'd relented and let her have the run of the town, and even the forest around it, just so long as she was home for meals and got all her homework done. So maybe he would have been okay with magic too. Maybe he wouldn't have talked to Omega instead. Maybe he wouldn't have… killed so many people.

  And maybe I wouldn't have killed anyone either. What does that make me?

  Their faces were still in her head. The furious crowd of people in Rallsburg. The guys in the abandoned warehouse in Seattle.

  I didn't want to. They made me do it.

  But she still did it. She killed them.

  Natalie got up and kept running. She leapt straight over the entire street, flinging herself high into the air with magic as cars whipped by underneath. A few passerbys gawked at her. Landing was a bit harder, and she stumbled as she touched down, but she kept running. Her hood didn't slip an inch from her head as she blitzed down the next street, and the one after that.

  A siren kicked up in the distance. For a brief panicked moment, Natalie thought it was coming for her—but it was getting quieter. Nothing related to her. Just another loud, inescapable part of the city she hated so much.

  Keep moving.

  She was alone again, but she wasn't going to fall into the same trap as last time. She knew where she was, and she still had all her things. Nothing like that would ever happen to her again.

  Don't think about him. Don't.

  Natalie nearly plowed over an old man as she hurtled around a corner. He shouted something rude as she passed, and she mumbled an apology. She doubted he actually heard it, but it made her feel a bit better. But she was getting tired. She'd been running non-stop, and while magic was staving off exhaustion by helping her move at top speed, and she was in pretty good shape, Natalie hadn't eaten anything since the package of cookies she'd won back at Steven's place. She needed food.

  A convenience store seemed to pop into existence right in front of her. Without thinking twice, Natalie made a beeline for it. Another loud horn and another car that nearly slammed into her, but she threw herself into the air and out of the way, landing on the sidewalk and falling to the ground.

  "Whoah…"

  A hoodie-clad teenager leaned against the wall next to the door. Something like a cigarette fell from his open mouth. He rubbed at his bloodshot eyes, blinking heavily. Natalie pulled her hood back on tight and hurried inside, before he could decide if she was real or not.

  Something I wanna know myself, sometimes…

  Natalie's knees were feeling a bit knocked about. She'd landed pretty hard that time, although at least she hadn't had to hit the car like before. If that other driver was hurt…

  I can't think about them right now. I didn't mean to, but I gotta keep moving.

  She picked up a few bags of chips, donuts, anything that looked appetizing. Remembering the looks she'd gotten last time, Natalie pulled out her cash and counted out the right amount out of sight of the counter. The guy from outside was standing by the counter as she came back, but he didn't seem to be waiting for her or anything, just buying a bag of chips for himself. She waited until he was gone, then hurried up and dumped her entire haul on the countertop.

  She still got an odd look from the cashier, and not just the usual unsettling glance at the scar. Is it because I'm young? Or because I'm buying so much stuff?

  Or does he know who I am?

  The moment he handed over the receipt, Natalie gathered everything up in her arms and fled. One precarious bag fell off as she left the store, but she caught it with a quick spell and floated it right back into her arms again. As soon as she was out of sight, she dumped most of the snacks into her bag, keeping a granola bar to chew through as she walked. Her legs were starting to get tired, and her sides were cramping from running.

  It's only two blocks away. You shouldn't have stopped. Keep moving.

  You'll be safe there.

  Natalie wasn't so sure about that, but she really didn't want to be on the street anymore, and it was the only place she could think of. Somewhere she knew was totally empty, that definitely wasn't in any of the forbidden parts of the city, and with just enough familiarity for her to feel comfortable. Even if she'd never been there.

  It was a single door in a row of identical condominiums, buried inside an enclosed city block on a raised section of pavement. Cars lined the place, and a few people were walking nearby to their own condo. Natalie wasn't really sure what the difference between that and an apartment was, but it didn't really matter much for the moment. She needed to figure out which one was his, and how to get in.

  A nameplate adorned the side of each door.

  Well, that was easy. She started down the row, avoiding the gaze of a passing couple heading out to dinner, hand-in-hand and standing close together. Natalie watched them walk away, all the way out to the car waiting for them down by the sidewalk. She imagined they were going out to a nice dinner, just the two of them, maybe with candles and silk tablecloths and a jazz band playing in the background.

  She turned back to the wall of doors again, hurrying down the row. It wasn't on any of the first floor of doors. She had to go up. On the second floor, a balcony with another row of doors identical to the first, she finally found the small bronze engraving she was looking for.

  Kincaid

  There was a front window, with curtains drawn so she couldn't see anything inside. The door had a brass knocker right in the center, but it wouldn't really do her any good since no one was inside to answer. Natalie looked under the mat and the little rabbit statue by the door for a key, but she wasn't that lucky.

  Never lucky, really… I'm sorry, Quinn.

  Reluctantly, she felt out the door from the opposite side with her mind, trying to find the lock. She didn't want to break in, but it was the only way. After a few tries, Natalie finally found something that felt about the right shape. She twisted it around, and heard a satisfying click as the lock snapped open.

  The door swung wide. Natalie took a nervous step in, closing the door behind her carefully. She'd never been to his house before. The address was right there on his profile, since they were friends, and it was so close to the school that she could have walked there any day — but she'd always been a bit reluctant to. Especially now that they were… something else.

  Don't think about it. Focus on what's going on now. The secret's out. You need to stay hidden.

  Except… she was hidden. No one would be in this house for days. She could finally, finally lay down and relax for the first time all day.