Starling by Lesley Livingston
“Hi,” he said.
The sound of his voice made Mason’s breath catch a bit in her throat. She looked up into his eyes, trying to read in them what he was thinking. The scars on the side of his face were healing cleanly. But they would never disappear entirely. The draugr had marked Cal for life.
“I wanted to come by and wish you luck,” he said, and smiled at her.
“Oh …”
Two weeks earlier, and Calum Aristarchos seeking her out like that would have meant the world to Mason. Now she wasn’t sure what to think. He wasn’t competing—his arm was still in a light sling—and she hadn’t really even been expecting him to show up that night. But there he was, with that same devastating smile he always had, only marred now by the way the scar tugged at the corner of his mouth. Mason tried her best to smile back.
Cal lowered his eyes for a moment and then looked back up at her from under the shock of sun-kissed bangs that fell in front of his forehead. She’d always wanted to reach up and brush them back from his face. For as long as she’d known him. She wanted to do it now.
“I’d really like to see you win tonight, Mase.”
“Thanks, Calum,” she said. “That means a lot to me, you know.”
“And I thought that maybe, after the competition, I could take you somewhere. You know … just the two of us.”
Mason felt the blood rushing to her face. “I …”
I can’t. Fenn is here. She knew that Fennrys would be somewhere, waiting for her. Watching her compete. He’d promised that he’d be there for her, and they’d already planned on going somewhere together after.
“I can’t, Cal.”
Mason had to look away from the flash of hurt in his eyes. She dropped her own gaze and busied herself with shrugging out of the pullover kangaroo hoodie she’d been wearing over her athletic tank. When she glanced back at Cal, she saw that the look in his eyes had gone from hurt … to cold anger.
“Right,” he said. “I get it.” He was staring fixedly at the iron medallion that she wore around her neck. “I thought you were going to give that back,” he said, a tightness in his voice. “To him.”
Oh, god, Mason thought. Here we go again …
“I did,” she said.
“Really. And so that’s why you’re wearing it around your neck.”
She turned back to her gear, trying to get her temper under control. She didn’t have time for this. Not with tonight’s competition roaring down on her like a freight train. If she wasn’t about to let the prophesied end of the world distract her, she sure as hell wasn’t going to let Cal Aristarchos do it. She needed to have her wits about her, or she was going to blow another bout.
No. You aren’t. Just remember the work you did. With Fennrys.
Mason took a deep breath and said calmly, “I returned it to Fennrys a couple of days ago. And then he gave it back to me for good luck tonight. Is that such a terrible thing?”
“It is if you’re seeing this guy often enough to start exchanging little love tokens.” Cal’s face twisted in an ugly, angry sneer that was exaggerated by his scars. “That is the only thing you’re doing with him, right?”
“Excuse me?” Mason gaped at him, eyes wide in astonishment. “What the hell do you even care, Calum? It’s not like you have some sort of claim on me. As a matter of fact, you’ve made it pretty freaking clear that you haven’t wanted anything to do with me lately. So what is this?”
“Mason—”
“If you really want to know what I’ve been doing with him,” she snapped, “I’ll tell you. I’ve been practicing. He’s been helping me, Cal. You know, the way you said you were going to? Before you got all pissy and decided that I wasn’t worth your time?”
“Wait—you weren’t worth my time?” Cal’s face flushed an angry scarlet. It made the claw marks stand out even more, and Mason winced and turned her gaze away. Cal noticed. “Yeah. Right. I think it’s probably the other way around.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Mason sat on the bench and undid her street shoes, tugging angrily on the laces until one of them snapped.
“No. Of course not.” Cal scoffed. “Why would I? I’m not the hero. I’m just the guy with the scars on his face.”
“Oh, please, Cal—”
“No, Mason! I’ve seen it. I’ve seen the way you look at me. Or should I say—the way you don’t look at me.”
Mason stared at the running shoe in her hand as if her eyes could burn a hole through the sole of it. Cal had a point. She knew it—knew that every time she looked at him now, all she saw were the draugr’s claw marks—but it wasn’t that she saw Cal as ugly. Rather, the scars were more of a constant reminder of what had happened that night. The night that started all of the weirdness and terror and—if she was going to be completely honest with herself—occasional bouts of wonderfulness over the last few weeks.
“Look … Cal …” She gazed back up at him and forced herself to look at him—really look at him—and not look away. “I’m sorry you got hurt that night, but you have to stop taking it out on me. It wasn’t my fault.”
“Wasn’t it?” he said quietly.
So quietly she thought for a second she’d misheard him. But then she knew she hadn’t by the way he was looking at her. By the dull, blunt force of the accusation in his eyes.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” she asked in a cold, dangerous voice. “It was not my fault. And you are not allowed to make me feel guilty about it. You’re not allowed to make me feel guilty about Fennrys, either. He’s not my boyfriend, Cal. And just because—”
“You hesitated.”
The words stopped her dead, the rant dying on her lips. Mason felt her throat close up. “What?” she said, her voice ragged. “I what?”
“That … thing … had me in its claws,” Calum hissed savagely, “but you were right there, Mason. You had time. You had a sword. You just weren’t fast enough, and I’m the one who gets to suffer the consequences. You just couldn’t handle yourself in a fight.”
Mason couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “A fight? You make it sound like it was just some kind of schoolyard brawl! That thing—”
“Got the drop on you!”
Suddenly Calum threw her gauntlets down on the bench and pointed violently toward the gymnasium. Mason had almost forgotten she was about to compete.
“And that stuff out there tonight?” Calum snarled. “It’s just make-believe, but I’m betting you can’t even handle that. You hide behind that fencing mask and avoid the real world and pretend everything’s fine. Normal. You pretend that … that guy is normal. But he’s not. And it’s not. And you can’t avoid what’s happening, Mason.”
Mason stared at Cal. Suddenly he wasn’t just talking about the two of them anymore. He wasn’t talking about a fizzled school romance or hurt feelings or even the competition. “Just what do you think is happening, Cal?” she asked.
He opened his mouth and looked like he was about to answer her. But then he just shook his head.
“What?” she asked again.
A deep frown creased his brow behind his bangs. He stepped toward Mason and grabbed her by the arm. “All I can tell you is that something bad is coming down the pipe, Starling. Something really bad. And you better grow up pretty damned fast and realize your protected, privileged ‘daddy’s little girl’ status isn’t going to keep you safe for very much longer. And neither is your barbarian tough guy.”
“Shut up, Cal!” Mason tore her arm from his grip, suddenly terrified by the fevered intensity in his eyes. And by the things he was saying. “You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about!”
Things were fine. She’d decided that last night—made up her mind that everything was going to be okay. Cal didn’t know what he was saying, and it wasn’t as if it was the end of the world. “Screw Ragnarok,” she’d told Fennrys. She had better things to do. But this didn’t feel better. This felt terrible.
“I t
“I did,” Cal said. “I just don’t know if you can.”
He turned and walked away from her. Again.
A few minutes—and a lot of deep breaths—later, Mason stalked into the gym and over to the Gosforth team bench. She nodded to her teammates and then sat and tried to empty her mind of all the things Calum Aristarchos had said to her.
Tried … and failed.
She made it through the first two of her three five-touch pool bouts—but only just barely. She was sweating profusely behind her mask, and her whip-thin saber felt heavy as a lead pipe in her hand. All of the tension Fennrys had worked so hard with her to release out of her body came thundering back. She was stiff and jerky in her movements. Her parries were desperate and her attacks tentative. And the lights blinking on, registering touches on the scoring box, went less and less to her. Mason fought on with desperation, but her balance was all off and her aim was wonky. But what was worse … she was hesitating.
Just like Cal said—
With a shocking suddenness, Angie Delnorte lunged, knocking Mason’s blade aside, and whipped her own around, tagging Mason’s left shoulder with a stinging slash. The green light flashed, signaling a fifth point for Angie, another bout lost for Mason, and—just like that—Mason Starling was eliminated in the first round of competition. Something that had never happened to her before.
“Are you okay?” Fennrys asked again. She hadn’t answered him the first two times. He put a hand on her shoulder. “Mase?”
“Oh, yeah! I’m freaking peachy!” Mason stuffed her mask into her gear bag and stripped off her overglove and the leather gauntlet beneath with sharp, angry movements. Back in the gymnasium, they could hear the sounds of cheering for the fencers who were still competing. Mason had fled the gym at the first opportunity. Fennrys had watched her go from where he’d stood hidden by the end of the bleachers and had followed in her wake.
“C’mon,” Fennrys tried to soothe her. “It wasn’t—”
“What?” She rounded on him. “Wasn’t that bad? I just made a complete ass out of myself in front of most of the school and blew any chance I ever would have had at making the Nationals team. You know. That’s only the thing I’ve been working toward for pretty much my whole life.”
“Mason—”
“The only thing that was mine. The only thing I cared about.”
“The only thing?”
“Don’t.” Mason turned a blazing glare on him. “Do not even go anywhere near there, Fennrys.” She pulled the elastic band savagely from her ponytail and shook her head, her midnight hair falling in a tumble all around her face. “I’ve wanted this since I was a kid. And then everything happened and I started to think it just wasn’t important, you know? But after last night, after everything Rafe said about living our lives, I realized it was. I realized that dreams are important, and when he said what he said, I thought it was all going to be okay. I thought I could just go ahead and be normal. With this. With you …”
“There will be other competitions, Mase.”
“No. Not for me there won’t be.” She threw her fencing jacket into her bag and tugged on a hoodie with the Gosforth crest. “Cal was right—I never should have gotten involved with you in the first place. Everything that’s happened over the last few weeks has been one giant crazy-making distraction, and I am now out of the running and off the team and a giant laughingstock. Life as I know it is pretty much over for me. So if you don’t mind, I’m just going to go somewhere and be sad and pissed off until the rest of the world comes crashing to an end to keep me company. Wake me up when it really is Ragnarok.”
That said, she stalked off down the hallway and pushed through the double doors out into the back parking lot without a backward glance. Fennrys stood there, feeling as though someone had punched him in the chest with a hammer. He had no idea what had just happened, but there was no reason Mason should have been acting the way she was. Even after what had happened in the park the night before, she’d been ready for that competition. She’d been perfect. It didn’t make any sense, unless …
“Cal was right,” she’d said.
Which meant Cal, who’d apparently been actively ignoring Mason since the night in the Gosforth gym, was suddenly talking to her again. Fennrys wondered just exactly what he’d had to say. He’d seen him lurking around near the gym stage before the match had started, but at the time he hadn’t thought much about it. The kid’s face was still something of a mess, and Fennrys figured that he was just doing a Phantom of the Opera thing. But now he suspected that Cal had been there to confront Mason. And if he’d done it right before her bout, then that could have been what threw her so badly. Fennrys turned on his heel and headed off to find Calum Aristarchos to have a few choice words with him.
“Starling!” Heather called out from somewhere behind her.
Mason kept walking.
“Mason … wait!”
The other girl’s footsteps were pounding across the pavement. Mason had never known Heather to run for anything, and so she stopped and turned, waiting in the shadows between two campus buildings for the other girl to catch up with her. It was cold, and a chill wind blew bits of trash in swirling eddies around them.
“Hey,” she said dully as Heather jogged to a halt in front of her and stood there panting heavily, her cheeks flushed from exertion. “Where’s the fire?”
“I don’t know,” Heather gasped, bending over. She braced her hands on her knees and shook her head, her long honey-blond hair curtaining her face. “I don’t think it’s started just yet. But listen, I just had a very long talk with a crazy girl named Gwendolyn Littlefield, and you are in a massive heap of trouble, Starling. Or at least you will be …”
Mason stared, unblinking, at her, waiting until Heather could catch her breath and tell her just what exactly that was supposed to mean. The moment never came. Suddenly there was a rustling sound from just over Mason’s shoulder, and a large canvas bag descended over her head. She heard Heather cry out, but the sound was truncated by another noise—a dull thud—and Heather went silent. Mason was too panicked to scream as the canvas bag encased her completely. The material was thick and stiff; it blocked out all light and made it hard to breathe. It stank of stale rubber and sweat. From the smell alone, Mason knew that it must have been one of the carry bags for the basketballs that were stored in the CU gymnasium—not that knowing where the bag had come from helped in any way. It wasn’t enough to give her any kind of clue as to what was happening to her. But then something else did: Mason heard muffled voices and strained to make out what they were saying. She felt the blood in her veins go ice-cold when she realized who was speaking.
“What d’you wanna do with the spare?” The voice, nasal and unpleasant, was unmistakable and belonged to the captain of the CU football team, Taggert Overlea. “She’s out cold.”
“I don’t care what you do with her,” Mason’s brother Rory answered. The cold cruelty in Rory’s voice made Mason want to weep.
“Maybe I should bring her along....” Tag sounded unsure.
“Fine. Just keep her up front with you,” Rory said as Mason felt herself being unceremoniously dumped into what felt like a small, confined space. “And keep her out of my way. We’ve gotta get out of here.”
Oh, god! Mason thought frantically as she felt a scream crawling up her throat with agonizing slowness. No. Not this. Anything but this … She heard and felt the slam of a lid and knew with devastating certainty that Rory had thrown her in the trunk of his Aston Martin. He knew all about her raging claustrophobia, and yet he had done this. To her. To his baby sister. Mason had been right all those years ago when she’d told Roth that she suspected Rory hated her. She’d been right. And now he was going to punish her by driving her mad for something she’d done wrong. She didn’t even know what that was.
The scream that had been building inside her became a h
XXXI
“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about!” Calum said through clenched teeth as Fennrys slammed him back against the gymnasium wall for the second time. He was suspended several inches off the floor, and the blond, muscular young man who held him up by his jacket front didn’t even look like it was a strain to keep him there.
The Fennrys Wolf glared flatly at him. “I’m pretty sure you do.”
“Hey, Cal,” came a voice from over Fennrys’s shoulder. The voice was low and deep. Casual and yet capable of menace, if need be. “This guy bothering you?”
“No, Roth, we’re old friends,” Calum grunted, glancing over to see Mason’s older brother. “What does it look like?”
“It looks like he’s pretty pissed at you. But whatever you say, man. I don’t want to come between … old friends.” Roth shrugged, and the two guys in bike leathers standing behind him both tried unsuccessfully not to smirk. “Don’t let me interrupt. I just wanted to ask you if you know where my sister is.”
Suddenly Cal found himself once again standing on solid ground as Fennrys abruptly let go of him and turned to face Roth Starling. The two young men stood staring at each other like a pair of alpha wolves coming face-to-face in the forest.