CHAPTER 7

IN WHICH SEVERAL MORE BELLS RING

RYAN. BETWEEN THIRD AND FOURTH.

“Okay!” Ryan d’Maughn said, as soon as they exited the Algebra classroom into the hallway, where the other student’s noise would cover up their conversation. He started chanting, “Corvid auguries, corvid auguries!”

“Excuse me, what now?” Evan Cadell said with a protracted blink. “Corvid auguries? Someone got a corvid augury?”

“Angie did, and so did your new buddy,” Ryan asked.

“What now?” Evan asked again, this time unamused. “Who’s that?”

“You silly, your new hunting bud!” Ryan said, the shit-eatingest grin on his face. He was a jerk sometimes, he knew. He supposed he should work on that.

“Gramyre, okay,” Evan said, with a big sigh. “Whatever. Can you just give me space on him right now? I did hard work having a civil conversation with a stranger. It’s already been a fucking morning, man.”

“Whatever,” Ryan said. “So, these auguries… How’d they happen? Who got one first? What were they?”

Angie shrugged. “We each got two, actually.”

“What!?” Ryan said. He gave a low whistle. “Two? At once? Or one after the other, either way, basically at once?”

“Yeh,” Angie said, nodding once. “The magpies were in fine form when it came to their repartee, too. Just real trash tongues. They augured me first, four of them.”

“A boy,” Ryan said, a concerned frown gracing his brow. “Gramyre?”

“Yeah. I think they were auguring at us, not me,” Angie said. “One of them actually said something useful, it was like, ‘You couldn’t be four, you needed to be three, but now your fifth is here,’ or something like that. And it said the boy had a birthday.”

“Of course! Why didn’t I realize?” Ryan exclaimed. “His birthday! It’s—”

MEGAN. BETWEEN THIRD AND FOURTH.

“Lauren Bakili, you stop right there!” Megan O’Sadie cried from atop a large stump in the quad. It had, she knew, been left there for students to sit on. She remembered the tree from being there with Virginia when she was little.

She’d come out of the locker rooms just in time to see, from down the hall, Lauren and Katie Kay halfway across the atrium. She’d trotted as fast as her dignity would allow, reaching the atrium as they reached the doors, but it was too loud for her to bother calling to them in the echoey room, and there were too many other people for them to notice her. It was a good thing they were both tall, or she might not have even seen them.

She’d rushed across the room, people thankfully getting conveniently out of her way when she needed them to, whether they noticed her or not. Lauren and Katie Kay weren’t that far down the walk, and with less of a crowd and less noise, she could yell at them. So she’d mounted the stump.

Lauren did indeed stop right there, freezing into total motionlessness for long enough for Katie Kay to spin around and cry out a fake excited, “Megan!” She had a different outfit on, as did Lauren—their replacement outfits were much more casual, merely really nice jeans and chic tops handsewn by exclusive tailors. Kay had a real show-off of a halter top on, so to speak. Lauren’s blouse was trimmed with lace— intricate, gorgeous, and (Megan knew) feather soft. Kay continued, “It’s so great to see you! Sorry I had to—”

“Shut your shit-filled mouth, Kay!” Megan said as she stepped off the stump and marched up to them—it was the worst language she’d ever used with Kay. Kay shut her mouth with a snap, looking utterly stunned.

“Lauren, what the everloving fuck have you done?” Megan went on, using gentler language than she could have, less vulgar than Lauren deserved.

Lauren looked frightened. She stared at Megan wide-eyed, taking shaky breaths, for long seconds, then managed to croak, “What I thought was necessary to help you. I’m, um, not so sure I was right, now.”

Megan tried to keep her voice down, starting out low and angry, but it rose in both volume and pitch as she went on. “How could you do this, Lauren? How could you do it without asking me? How could you keep this from me?”

“Megan, I didn’t know how you—”

“Bad, Lauren, it’d have been bad, but this is worse! How could you punish people for not going along with you!? Why would you? How could you imply to people that Beth and I wanted this?! How could you think I would want this!? That I’d be happy with you when I found out!? What is wrong with you!?” Megan finished, and took big deep ragged breaths for several seconds.

Lauren spoke, “Megan, please, I just wanted to help you, and you seemed to be relieved, so I thought—” at the same time Kay said, “Megan we were helping you. You needed us to do this, and it was the right—”

“Katie, close your puking mouth,” Megan said, more quietly than she’d been speaking. She hoped she hadn’t been too loud. The gawkers all around didn’t deserve to hear the conversation. Fuckers. “How, Lauren?” She was all but pleading, now. “How? How could you do this to my best friends?”

Lauren went as pale as Megan imagined she could get, grayish and sick looking. She said, “I don’t—”

Kay snapped, loudly, “Best friends!? Best friends?!? Fuck that, Megan! Those three are rotten garbage and they were dragging you down! Megan, who you spend time with matters. You shouldn’t be hanging out with kids like that! Look at you now! You’re already celebrated by the entire freshman class, known before you even got here in the other middle schools! You should thank me for convincing Lauren to do it!

“Megan, you’re better than them,” Kay went on as Megan tried to get a handle on her sudden rant. “Your father is a Vice President at Joshi Investments! Your mother runs the ER at the largest hospital in Bellevue! Ryan doesn’t even know the face of his mother! Angie’s mother is a shopkeep! And Evan’s mother is a cleaner.”

“Katie!” Megan snarled, turning toward her, “I have been friends with them for half my life! We were friends with them for more than half our lives! More than that, with Angie! No one ever had any problem with who I chose to be friends with before!” She paused a moment, then threw in, “And Angie’s mother is an enchanter with her own store! You fucking know that.” Katie opened her mouth to respond and Megan cut her off with, “Also, shopkeep? You’ve been hitting the Regency romances too hard again, Kay.”

Kay’s brown eyes flashed. “Shut up!” she all but yelled. “We’re not children anymore, Megan!”

“Angie was my best friend, Katie!” Megan said, her voice creeping up in volume again.

“Bullpiss!” cried Katie Kay, her voice louder than ever. They had so much audience now. “I’m your best friend! I’ve always been your best friend! No one’s supported or loved you more than me!”

Megan stared at Kay, stunned. Lauren did as well, clearly just as disbelieving. From behind Megan, a mild tenor voice, smooth and pleasant, with a gentle southern (or at least southernish) accent, put words to her thoughts before she could. “Uh, I’ve never heard someone have to argue that they’re someone’s best friend to that someone before.”

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She turned to face the speaker, who seemed to have just stepped out of a bubble of space the crowd had left for him. It was That Boy. The New Light Bearer. Chris Gramyre.

Up close, he took her breath away. He was quite a bit bigger than her. Maybe three or four centimeters shorter than Evan, but much broader, his shoulders broad and his arms thick and well defined beneath his tight shirt. He was almost pretty, in a really appealing way. His clothing was clearly handmade, the tailoring incredible. The green of the shirt and the blue of his jeans were rich and striking, the dye jobs masterful. The silver lanterns on his belt, she could see, were true works of art, traced with sigils and symbols in gold. His hair was rakishly shaggy, and it seemed to be even blacker than Lauren’s, somehow. And he wore a bell shaped charm on a chain around his neck, just like Megan did.

But more than anything, his eyes were like nothing she’d ever seen. Even from a distance of two-and-a-half, three meters, they were impossible not to notice, and she could see them clearly. They were two distinct colors—mostly a sea-glass green, but a thin band of bright gray, almost silver, encircled the pupils, with narrow spikes of the gray jutting into the green at various points. Megan knew, instantly, she would dream of those eyes. Probably every girl in the school would.

What was she doing, again? She was angry at Kay, right? It took her another second or two to remember what was going on.

In the meantime, Kay said, her mouth spreading into a horrified rictus of a grin. “Chriiis!” she exclaimed. “Uhhhh, hi! Didn’t see you—”

“I mean,” Chris Gramyre said, in the tone of someone trying to figure out a crossword puzzle, with the faintest trace of a frown gracing his brow, “It seems to me that would be a damn hard thing to convince someone of, if they don’t already consider you their best friend.”

Somehow Megan found her voice, despite his presence. “She’s definitely wrong,” she said, giving Kay a dark look. So she wasn’t staring at Chris entranced, as much as anything.

Directing the statement at Katie before she could formulate a response, Chris said, “When I met you at the welcome party, I would have never guessed you’d be the type of person to shout at some other girl in the middle of the courtyard between classes. Not in an aeon. Let alone something as crazy as that.”

Leaving Katie to crumble into ashes, he stepped up next to Megan and said to her, “Hey, do you need to get away from this? If you’re busy I can step out.”

Megan, full of many conflicting emotions at the moment, considered that, realized that she probably didn’t have enough time to get into this anyway, and said, “Yes, actually. Lauren… this isn’t over. I’m going to calm down, and we’re going to talk about this. You should see if you can get Katie to tell you anything actually true about what she and you have done. She’s a shit-lipped liar.” Lauren nodded rather tremulously.

Kay was very pale as Megan turned on a heel and walked the wrong direction, but at least it was away. Chris kept pace with her in silence for a few dozen seconds, then paused. Megan paused too when she noticed him disappear from her peripheral. He was facing her when she finished turning, and held out his hand.

“So, just let me introduce myself,” Chris said. “I’m Chris Gramyre. Pleased to meet you.” His voice was intense and appealing.

Megan’s heart was beating very fast, she noticed vaguely as she took his hand. His hand was warm and firm, and she felt mortified, because her own hand felt weird and clammy. But she couldn’t take her eyes away from his, and he didn’t react negatively. Then he bowed, bringing his face down toward her hand—she thought he would kiss her hand, but he simply bowed his head and brought her hand close to his face, before straightening up and smiling at her as he released her hand. She shivered, goose pimples rushing across her back, neck, and arms in a wave.

A corner of Megan’s brain screamed at her, that this wasn’t the time to be lost in those amazing eyes, that she was supposed to be mad at Lauren and devastated about Angie and the boys, that she certainly shouldn’t get distracted by some guy. But another part of her brain was like, ‘We said we’re calming down, right? We need to think. Lauren needs to think. Just enjoy the pretty boy’s attention. Also respond.’

“Megan!” she blurted. His eyes widened, and his smile broadened to a startling degree. “That’s me,” she went on. “I’m Megan.” This was not her. She didn’t do this. She pulled herself together and tried to salvage things with a smile. “Megan O’Sadie. That’s my name.”

“Mst. O’Sadie, it’s a pleasure to meet you,” Chris said. His eyes just did not leave her, it was starting to make her self-conscious. “I like your charm,” he said with a grin, hooking a finger through the chain around his neck and raising his own slightly.

“Oh, um, thanks,” she stammered. “I like yours too.”

Chris nodded. “So, that all seemed… not fun? And like it might make you late?”

“This morning’s been a real shitshow,” Megan said, and felt a little more like herself.

“Seems like that’s going around,” Chris said, sounding a little speculative. He glanced at a totally gorgeous watch on his wrist, and said, “Well, we don’t have all that long until the next class, so I doubt you want to talk about it. Unless you’re going to lunch, but I have class.”

Megan shook her head. “Freshman Common-tongue.”

“Hey, perfect! Me too!” Chris said brightly. “We can just walk on over together, then.”

Megan felt faint at the idea. “Great?” That came out totally wrong. “Uh I mean, great!”

“Probably!” Chris replied, grinning. Which took Megan completely off guard, and she couldn’t help it—she burst out giggling. Chris started chuckling as well, and for several moments there was nothing in the world for Megan except the two of them, looking at each other and laughing.

As their amusement tapered off, Chris shook his head, smiling in a way that suggested he didn’t quite know how he’d gotten to that moment in his life. Megan could empathize.

“So I hear your dad’s a vice president at Joshi Investments?” Chris said after a moment of companionable silence. “What’s that all about?”

Megan had to laugh again. She couldn’t help it. “You heard? Just now from Katie Kay, yeah?”

“I mean, I don’t want to divulge my sources,” Chris replied, a twinkle in his beautiful eyes.

This made her laugh again. She felt warm and fuzzy, like everything was going to be okay. She felt like he’d make it okay. After several moments of giggling, she managed to compose herself enough to say, “Of course, that’s fair. You wouldn’t want to compromise their decisions. The Russics have eyes everywhere.”

This in turn took Chris off guard, forcing several peals of laughter out of him, genuine and joyous. “The Cold War ended way before we were born! Who are you, Anastasia Nikolaevna reincarnate?”

Megan slowed, staring at him, baffled and impressed. “I don’t know who that is, sorry.”

“Oh, uh, Princess Anastasia from that animated movie? The one you’d think was a Dorsney flick, but it’s not? Only she disappeared or was murdered or something in real life.” He gave a lazy wave of one hand. “I just have a knack for remembering names. I don’t know that much about her. Or Russia, for that matter.”

“Really?” she said, studying him, intrigued. “Is it true then that you’re planning on learning the name of every kid in the school by the solstice?”

That got another big laugh from him. “By Solstice? By Star Solstice I’ll have learned everyone’s name whether I try or not. By Spirit’s Feast. Even that’ll only take a mild effort.”

Megan took a moment to process that. “For real?”

He nodded.

“That’s really impressive,” she said. “How?”

“It’s just a thing,” he said, raising one palm upward. “I wish I could apply it to studying maths. It doesn’t even work with memorizing, like, the names of different species of birds or foreign language vocabulary. It’s literally just learning people’s names.”

“Still useful, though. It’s so embarrassing to forget someone’s name when you’ve met them before,” Megan said.

Chris nodded. “I suppose that could be. Though, like, people shouldn’t beat themselves up about it. I have a hard time remembering plenty of stuff. It can’t hurt to ask again.”

“I guess. So you’re in Freshfolk Common. You’re a freshfolk?” She knew he was a freshfolk. Why’d she ask that?

“Do I look sixteen?” Chris asked. “Just an old, wrinkly upperclassman already, am I?” He grinned as he said it.

She whacked him playfully on the arm. “Don’t be silly! I couldn’t be sure. You’re really muscular!” She said it without thinking about it, then felt blood rush to her face immediately as she realized what she’d said.

By the grace of the Powers Above and in spite of the Powers Below, he didn’t seem to notice her turn pink. He instead looked thoughtful, as if this was new information he had to consider. “Yeah,” he said after a bit of a pause, “That’s true. That’s what ten years of combat training gets you.”

That should have been a braggy statement, but he clearly wasn’t intending to brag. It was just a statement of fact. They were approaching the hall their class was in. “Anyway,” Chris said with a shrug. “Yup. Freshfolk, as charged.”

“Um.” Megan had to gather her thoughts, and she stopped walking. He went a couple more steps, then turned around to look at her. “That makes you our class’s official Light Bearer. There wasn’t one before. Each of the upper classes has one. We were the odd class out. You’ve come to our rescue.” She smiled as she said that, liking the image.

He nodded appreciatively. “Good to know. I’ll have to touch bases with the others, get a sense of their normal turf.” He tilted his head toward the building. “We better keep walking.”

“Oh, sure.” As Megan jolted into motion, her overwhelming sense of wonder continued. “You… um. You’ve gone out hunting?”

“Yeah,” he replied. “A lot since I turned fifteen back in June. Gone out thirty-nine times.”

“You’re kidding!” Megan’s head whipped toward him, amazement spiking into her wonder. He was younger than her! That seemed so weird! “You didn’t turn fifteen until June?”

Yup,” he said, his tone wryly glum. “June nineteenth. I’m almost definitely the youngest person in our year.”

“Get the fuck out of town!” Megan cried, heart exploding in excitement, stopping and spinning toward him, leaning in, absolutely blown away. “The fucking nineteenth! Are you for serious?! Interrobang?!” There was no room in her brain left to consider how weird this response was going to make her seem.