kevincemerson - Emalie's Account

Emalie's Account

One of the major subplots of Oliver Nocturne is Emalie's journey into the dark, mystical world of the Orani. There wasn't space in the books to get to everything I imagined for one of my favorite characters, so I wrote these two stories: Emalie's Account Parts 1 & 2. These are journal entries written by Emalie in the time between books 1, 2, and 3. Many characters from the Oliver Nocturne books make appearances, including a fan favorite! I hope you enjoy them.

LINK TO EBOOK COMING SOON

Part I

From Emalie's Journal

Between Oliver Nocturne Books 1 and 2

January 1, 1:15am

        Hey, it’s me.
        Happy new year…
        Dean is gone. There. I said it.
        But saying it doesn’t help. Saying it doesn’t change what happened:
        I killed him. I killed my cousin.
        I could lie to you and tell you that a vampire did it— but I know better.
        Vampires are just creatures… like a dog, or my new cat Amey. If you put milk in front
of Amey, she’s going to lap it up. And she’ll hiss at you if you try to stop her before the bowl is clean, empty, dead...
        A vampire is no different.
        So who’s fault is it? The one who drinks the blood, or the one who puts the dish right
there at its feet? I know how it feels to me. I’m the one who put my cousin in front of Oliver…
        IT.  Oliver = it. Don’t forget that, emalie.

January 3, 2:45pm
        Ms. Davis is a toad! Actually, she’s worse. Scientists wonder what’s living down in the
deep dark bottom of the ocean, down where there’s no light and no warmth, but they don’t even know that one of their mystery creatures has crawled up onto land to run North Seattle Middle School’s newspaper club.
        ‘I’m sorry emalie… la la la… but I just don’t think we should publish an article about
your cousin’s death… la blah lala,’ croaks the toad, ‘I know you’re upset, but vampires?… too de-loo de-loo… Maybe I should talk to your father…’
        She says it like she’s so caring, but she’s just another demon. With those giant glasses,
like two fishbowls, with a brown piranha in each one, leering out at me. We know it’s your fault, they say. Thanks.
        I
        HATE
        HER.
        Well, Amey and Jade (my other new kitty), I’m in a rage now. Been down here in the
basement tearing up pictures of its house… Shredding them, watching them fall to the floor like snow, along with my tears. What a stupid girl who took these photos. What a stupid believer.
        And do you want to know the worst part? I still believe!!!! Idiot!!! After I tore apart all my silly vampire pictures, do you know what I couldn’t do? Tear up the one thing I should.
        Because I went to the library last week and did some research, and found an article about the night its parents died, the night I saw in the portal. Oliver’s name used to be Nathan. And his parents were Howard and Lindsey. And I’m asking myself: why does knowing he was human make it any different?
        Because there’s something not right about the night Dean died. I mean in addition to the everything that’s already so, so wrong about it. I feel like there’s something else. Like I’m remembering it wrong. I wish I could explain it more.
        Oh, dad’s calling. Gotta run…

January 3, 10:13pm
        You won’t believe what happened this afternoon:
        When dad calls me upstairs, I expect it to be something I don’t expect. That’s how it is with dad: Cole Joseph Watkins, son of Jonathan and Irene Watkins of Anchorage, Alaska. Once-upon-a-time, in black and white pictures, he was a kid called C.J. Then he met what Irene called a ‘wild girl.’ That's my mother, Margaret Browne. And then he was an adult named Cole, and then he was a father, and a computer programmer, and a homeowner. But then his wife left him, and it was goodbye to all that, and to dad.
        It’s not that it feels like he’s not there for me. He is. It’s just that when he is, he’s not all there. Does that make any sense?
        So then today I’m walking up the stairs, and I’m ready, because it could be any kind of
weather in the kitchen: a hurricane of frustration and throwing the empty milk carton. There is just no way to keep on top of all this! he’ll shout, and I’ll feel like it’s my fault for being born, even when I think I know that’s not how he means it…
        Or it could be a tornado of laughing at a comic in the newspaper. Emalie you’ve GOT to see this! he’ll say, and I’ll look and laugh even though it’s not really that funny…
        Or, worst of all, it could be an afternoon rain of quiet speaking. Emalie have you finished your homework? he’ll ask with the red eyes that look like they were just rubbed hard to clean up the tears…
        Of course the one kind of weather I don’t expect at all is a bright sunny afternoon.
        “Hey kiddo,” he says, standing by the door putting on his jacket. The first thing I notice is his face has no stubble. His hair is just-showered-wet and sticky with gel. He looks like he popped out of a time vortex from two and a half years ago, before mom left.
        And then more surprises:
        “Your aunt Kathleen called…”
        Whoa. That’s mom’s aunt, my great aunt.
        “They’ve got a job opening down at the docks,” Dad is saying. “They want me to
interview.”
        I look at him sideways. Careful, emalie. This is feeling good. What’s the catch? “So?”
        He almost laughs. “Well so we’re going down for the interview. Kathleen wanted to see you, too. It’s been awhile.”
        A shaved face and a job interview? I’m thinking about collapsing to the floor and then
maybe jumping up and making pancakes and drinking syrup straight from the bottle. Instead I just look around our kitchen, at the boxes that are still half-unpacked after three months of living here, at the one frying pan on the stove that never comes quite clean. If my dad had a job we could get nonstick. Nonstick. It sounds like the future.
        But I show nothing on my face. Just look out the window by his shoulder and say:
“Okay.” I am good at this. Emalie who doesn’t get her hopes up.
        I grab my vest, scarf, hat, gloves, and we grab the bus down to Ballard. We are the same old quiet on the way, dad staring out the window, me with headphones on. But I am watching him. I still can’t get over the shaved chin. It’s so smooth. There is a zit there. He’s not that old, this Dad of mine. I’ve never thought of him as not-so-old before. He fidgets in his seat like it’s his first day of school. Do adults still have first days of school?
        On the way, I daydream: if this job pans out, maybe we could have nonstick and one of those pepper grinders. With the multi-colored pepper. Oh man, that’s the good stuff! I would grind that thing straight into my mouth. Pepper. Syrup. Pepper. Syrup…
        We get off the bus on Leary and head down toward the canal. Crossing streets of
windowless warehouses and forgotten train tracks, the pavement lumpy around the smooth steel lines. The sky is pool blue, the sun brilliant white, and cold breeze that smells sour like the ocean ripples our clothes and makes us squint. You can’t breathe too deep because everything is tense against the cold wind. The sun is barely over the top of Queen Anne hill and there are four-month-long shadows between the warehouses. The dirt alleys between them have puddles that will be there all winter.
        We reach the canal, lined with these giant fishing boats streaked with rust. There is one sliver of the water that you can see, and the universe is nice enough to stick a kayaker in the middle of the sparkling blue right as we walk by. A little brown dock sticks out into this space. I wonder if there are crabs clacking around on its posts. To the left of the dock is a tiny line of sailboats, wrapped tight in plastic for the winter, huddling like ducklings in the shadow of a huge white fishing boat. To the right is a low wooden building sticking out into the water on a wharf. It is made of warped boards, and has a pattern of scraped doors and cloudy windows.
        Dad stops at one of the doors and I watch him do the deep-breath nervous thing. I know that thing. It’s the same thing you do before you walk out on stage for a chorus concert, or climb through a vampire’s window—
        Blammo. That makes me think of… Dean…Whoa, watch out, Emalie. almost walked
into the sad mood trap. I shake it off. Gotta focus on Dad.
        “Good luck,” I say to him.
        He turns, almost like he’s surprised that I’m there. Then he smiles big, and nods at me
like we’re partners. “Thanks.”
        Inside is a small office with dark wood walls. There are two desks, a neat one and a
sloppy one. The sloppy one has an empty chair, and pink crinkled papers smeared across it.
        Behind the neat one, all the papers arranged at straight angles, sits my great aunt
Kathleen. She’s a big lady, and is wearing a flowery pink shirt that makes her look bigger than she is. She has hair that is supposed to be blonde but looks more like orange, and then gray at the roots… but her eyes look like Mom’s. Which is weird.
        “There you are,” she says to Dad, but looks over to me so fast I get a rush of nerves. It’s almost like I’m the one she’s been waiting for.
        “Hey Kathleen,” dad says, sounding nervous. I wonder if he notices the mom-eyes too?
        Kathleen is standing. “I’m so glad you guys could come down,” she says, and waves at the two brown chairs on the brown rug in front of her brown desk. We sit down.
        “So,” Kathleen goes on, “It’s like I told you on the phone, C.J.: We have a small salmon-catching fleet, three boats. You’d be in charge of overseeing the catch and processing, as well as keeping us in line with the good ol’ Fisheries department—”
        “Buh.” a wiry, gruff man walks into the room from the back hallway. He has a patchy
blonde beard and curly hair sticking out from a black hat. He’s wearing rubber overalls all splotchy with blood. He sneers and says: “Fisheries department. Those sons a—”
        “Careful, Zeke,” Kathleen warns, flashing her eyes at me. “There’s innocent ears in the
room.” She smiles at me.
        I try to smile back but I think: Innocent?! More like murderer’s ears! No. Don’t think
about that, Emalie. Almost walked into another sad trap. Have to be careful, cause the traps are everywhere…
        Zeke shrugs and sits at his messy desk. He reaches in his pocket and then drops a new
crumply pink paper onto the mess of other pink papers. “Sorry.”
        “C.J., this is Zeke. He runs the docks. You’ll be working with him.”
        “Hi,” says my dad.
        Zeke says hi back with his eyebrows.
        “Zeke can explain way more about what you’ll be doing than I can,” Kathleen says.
“Why don’t you two take a walk around the boats? Zeke, you can show C.J. the in’s and out’s, and I’ll catch up with my niece, here.”
        “Don’t you want to see my resume?” dad asks.
        Kathleen just shakes her head. “You’re family.” She glances at me. “That’s the only
resume you need.”
        Dad follows Zeke out the back. I sit there, and I feel Kathleen looking at me. It makes
me nervous. Almost like she wants something.
        “Want to take a walk out on the pier?” she finally asks.
        “Okay.”
        We head back outside and past the long line of beat up doors and grimy windows. At the end of the building is an open deck, squinty bright in the sun. We walk out to the end and lean on the warped railing. There’s water all around, covered in sparkly diamonds. Off to the right is a rusty boat, and I hear Zeke talking to dad over there.
        “So, how are you Emalie?” Kathleen asks.
        “Fine,” I lie. I don’t like this. It feels like she knows something…
        “I’m sorry about your cousin,” she says. And then: “And about the vampire.”
        Even in the bright sun I shudder. How does she know? “What are you—” I start to say.
        But she cuts me off. “It’s okay. It’s understandable that you were curious about
vampires. Though they’re based in evil, they are connected to the forces of the larger universe, to the spirits… Just like you.”
        I look up at her, trying to figure out what she’s talking about, but at the same time my
heart is pounding like an angry fist against my ribs. “What do you mean?”
        And then she says it: “Do you find yourself feeling sad a lot, like, sad for the people
around you, for the world?”
        Okay this is too much. How does she know that? “Yeah, like, forever.”
        “Well, Emalie,” Kathleen puts her big, soft hand on my shoulder. “You’re not making up those feelings. You are connected to the emotions and spirits of the world in a way that very few people are— But I am, and so was your mother.”
        I can’t believe this.   I am staring at the water and counting the diamonds because what am I supposed to do, or say, or even think?
        Kathleen goes on. “You would never know this, but we— you, your mother, and me—
are descended from a long line of women who are able to sense the spiritual world. We can use this sense in powerful ways, sometimes even to predict the future. We’re called—”
        “Orani,” I say, without even knowing I’m going to.
        “Yes,” Kathleen agrees.
        I realize that I’ve been holding onto that word since Dead Desiree said it in the
Underground. She told Oliver I was an Orani, but then didn’t say any more about it. And I was going to ask Oliver, but…
        Aunt Kathleen is going on full steam ahead. “Our bloodline traces all the way back to
ancient Mesopotamia.” She is blowing my mind, but I feel like I already know what she is
saying. “Not every woman in our family has it, but those who do must keep it secret, and be trained. Your mother and I weren’t sure about you, but I think you and I can be pretty sure now. Especially after you joined Oliver in that Portal vision. No ordinary human could have done that.”
        I’m spinning. How does she know any of this? It’s almost like she’s reading my head—
        “You’re wondering how I know all this.”
        I practically laugh, and yet, it’s relief, too. “Yeah.”
        “I can sense it, in the emotions and energy radiating off you. You would never know
this, but even from across town, I felt the precise moment when you entered that Portal. If you know what forces to watch, you can see an Orani’s interaction with the spiritual world. They make ripples like a finger touching water, and you’ve made a lot of ripples lately.”
        My brain is racing past what she is saying. I’m imagining the training: us taking off for a mountain-top retreat, and wearing robes and learning how to make objects float and only eating sushi and—
        “No,” Kathleen says, “It’s not like that. You have to learn about your Orani powers on your own. I can only get you started.”
        I look over to see Kathleen holding out her hand. In her palm is a little rolled-up green paper. I take it. It’s a sticky note. I peel it apart and unroll it. Inside is a small oval of red. It
looks kind of like a jewel, but maybe more like a hard candy.
        “It’s a scarab,” Kathleen explains as I turn it over in my fingers. One side is curved and smooth, and on the other is carved like a beetle. The surface is worn and scuffed. “It’s a charm from ancient Egypt.”
        “This thing is ancient?” I ask. I thought only movie heroes got to have ancient things.
        “Mmm. Scarabs have been used to hold charms. This one is called a Conduit.”
        I stare at the tiny beetle carving and notice there’s a hole in the top.
        “Oh, here.” Kathleen is holding out a tiny silver chain. “So you can wear it. Now… the
paper tells you where to begin.”
        The paper has writing on it:
        Corner of Market and 22nd, 3:17pm.
        “What’s this?”
        “Listen carefully, Emalie. Go to that spot tomorrow. At that exact time, hold this scarab between your palms and blow on it gently. As you do so, relax your mind. Then your journey as an Orani will begin.”
        “My journey? But—”
        “Hey guys!” we both turn fast like guilty criminals, to see my dad and Zeke standing by the door to the office.
        “Just a sec!” Kathleen says all cheery, but when she turns back to me, her face is dead
serious. “Emalie, listen: Something big has begun to happen. Powerful forces are aligning. Your mom knew it, but…”
        “But she left,” I say darkly, my words as sharp as the pain in my gut.
        Then Kathleen’s eyes get red and wet. “Emalie, no. Your mother would never have left you.”
        I feel the world crowding around me now.
        “Your mom’s disappearance was not her idea… not at all,” Kathleen says. I want to say something about this, but my mouth and brain no longer work. Kathleen pats my shoulder. “We’ll talk more soon. Now that your dad has this job, I’ll have a reason to see a lot more of you. In the meantime… Tomorrow. Will you take the conduit charm and do as I ask?”
        “Okay.”
        Kathleen suddenly smiles at me with a warm glow that makes me look away. “Thanks,
Emalie.” And then she turns and starts back toward Dad, leaving me to carry the fifty ton weight of everything I just heard all by myself.
        I mean, wow.
        I’ve been sitting down here in the basement tonight, flipping this little scarab beetle over in my hand, wondering about everything. I think I even went a good whole five minutes not thinking about how much I miss Dean, or even how much I might miss him = it. It’s exciting to have something. That’s how dad’s been acting, too. I can’t wait for tomorrow, to use these powers of mine (come on, really? do I really have powers??). Maybe I should be scared or nervous, but I’m not at all. I’ve had enough of that lately.

January 4, 8:36pm
        Or maybe I should have been. Scared, that is.
        I leave school as soon as the bell rings.   I’ll have to walk fast to get to the address in
time, which is easy now that I have, well, no one to slow me down… It’s a thick cloudy day and there’s actually a warning for snow. That would be something. It barely ever snows in Seattle, and when it does, even just an inch can turn the world upside down.
        The air is still, waiting, and wouldn’t you know, and as soon as I’m stepping off the bus
in downtown Ballard, thick flakes of snow are zigzagging their way to the pavement. The bus was actually on time today, which is like winning the lottery— it so doesn’t happen very much.
      So I actually have time to stop into Cupcake Royale and get a mini cupcake. My favorite: white cake/chocolate frosting. Eat the frosting in one lick, then pop the little cake in your mouth and be all fat cheeked like a chipmunk for a minute, and always get noticed by some cute boy looking up from his iPod at just the wrong moment — BUT anyway…
        Then I’m back outside and crossing over to Market and 22nd and it’s really coming down. There’s a tingle on your cheeks as the fat flakes hit, but also in the air as everyone hunches and rushes. Do they feel the excitement of snow? Or just how it messes up their day?
        I get to the corner and the wheels of cars are spraying slush. A woman passing me slips in her silly heels and goes down to her knee. Flakes on my shoulders. Flakes on my hat. Flakes on my striped gloves that don’t have fingertips. A gift from my grandma, btw: no fingertips, that way you can text your friends in winter comfort! Too bad poor little me doesn’t have a phone or the friends. Right now I just wish I had fingertips on my gloves. But what poor little me does have is an ancient scarab charm…
        I pull out the beetle and hold it in my fist, then I check my wristwatch, the one I never wear because if I wear it I always check it, like time is a drug or something. 3:16. I wait.
        A horn honks. A bus sloshes by. Flakes on my nose. Wet through my purple sneakers.
        3:17. Okay. I hold up my hands, pressing the scarab between my palms. I try to clear my mind, but my mind is like that scrolling line across the bottom of the news channel: Dean, Oliver, It’s your fault!, mom, Orani, Portal, You’re a monster! , Dean…
        Re. Lax. Emalie. Somehow I do, and close my eyes, and put my lips up to my hands and blow between them…
        And it’s hard to describe what happens next.
        It’s like someone turns up the volume, but it’s not the sounds of the cars or the slush that gets louder, it’s all whispering voices, everywhere, like I can hear everyone around this busy intersection — and my body is moving— no, I’m moving, my body is staying where it is, but I’m rushing through the whispers, across the street, among the snowflakes—
        Then I stop. Now there’s only one voice: ‘Can’t believe he didn’t like any of these gifts. Ungrateful brat. Why do kids have to become teenagers?’
        I’m seeing the sidewalk on the other side of the street— walking out of Sonic Boom
Records…
        And I’m in someone else’s head. That’s the plain and simple truth. But it doesn’t feel
plain or simple. An older woman, walking along kinda bent over.  ‘We should just save ourmoney, if he doesn’t like anything he gets for Christmas, then why even have it?’ You’d think I might be laughing at hearing this, but I’m not, because I’m not just hearing this woman’s thoughts. I’m feeling them. It’s like her emotions are mine, too. I am suddenly filled with this sad, empty feeling. It’s almost like something I’ve felt before, but darker, more sour. Like something that’s been left out in the rain and gotten all rusty, that’s what this woman’s disappointment feels like. I don’t like it. I want better for her, but I also want to get that feeling out of my heart—
        And then I’m back out in the whispers. Gliding between the snowflakes, a rush of wind and noise, then into another person— A man this time, by the mailbox, holding letters: ‘Just mail them, get it over with. Who cares if they’re two weeks late? No one will read them, anyway. Nobody cares about you… Is it noon yet? Maybe the pub is open…’ I’m swallowed up by his doubt, his shaking desire for the clear brown whiskey in the tiny glass that he’s imagining—
        Back out and through the cold, the whispers seem like whipping winds, grabbing at me, into the next one— A small child: ‘Big cars, hold my hand mommy carry me! I don’t want tocross the big street!’  Her fear shakes me, the cars are big, they are scary—
        Into the next one— a boy my age, walking very fast: ‘Can’t let them find me. Can’t let
them know. If I can just find Selene. But how? Have to hurry…’ Wait a minute. This one is different. I want to know more. There’s something familiar about this boy’s head. I don’t know him, but his feelings seem so like mine. For the first time, I want to stay for a minute—
        But then I’m out again, rushing, this time into a dark, cramped mind. I’m looking out
through a truck window. I’m in the driver’s head. The truck is approaching the intersection. I can even see me over on the corner, standing there like I’m in a trance. And then I hear this man’s thoughts: ‘There he is. That’s the one. Come on Murray, all you have to do is make itlook like an accident. The snow is the perfect excuse. Okay, he’s heading for the street, gottatime this perfectly…’ I look out of his eyes and see that boy whose head I was just in.
        This man’s mind is hot and crowded and dark, but suddenly I am freezing cold. Because I know what’s about to happen. This truck driver is about to…
        ‘No!’ I scream with all my power. The truck driver doesn’t hear me, but suddenly I am rushing back through the wind, into another head— my head, I’m back.
        I’m woozy for a moment, eyes popping open, still blurry, dropping the scarab back
around my neck and thinking: where’s the boy?!
        There. He’s on the other side of the intersection. Waiting for the walk light. It blinks
from red to white. The boy starts into the crosswalk with some others, but he’s walking faster. He gets out ahead.
        I turn to the left. The truck. It’s short, white, wipers pushing snow out of the way.
inside, the silhouette of the thick driver. The murderer. It’s not slowing down as it reaches the red light. I can hear its engine roar just a little louder. He’s not going to stop…
        “Hey!” I shout into the street.
        The boy has his chin tucked in the collar of his frayed brown coat. He’s hunched and
hurrying. He doesn’t hear me. The truck rumbles right into the intersection.
        I run. Leaping off the curb, slipping in the slush but still moving. “Watch out!” I scream.
        Finally, he looks up, sees me. His eyes go wide. Looking left— all I see is truck
headlights, and wet metal grill.
        Somewhere close a man shouts: “Hey watch out!”
        “What?” the boy says and then I am slamming into him, as hard as I can— our chins hit and pain floods my head. And we’re flying backward, stumbling and falling, and I think: ‘Youwon’t get far enough the truck will run you down—’
        But then we are crashing into a woman and tumbling and hitting the pavement.
        “Ow what are you—”
        I hear the roar and twist around— the truck is passing within inches of our feet. For a
second, I see the driver staring out his window at us, scowling, confused. Then the truck speeds away.
        “What are you doing?” the boy is gasping underneath me. I look down and see that his face —kinda cute— is inches from mine… and I roll off and to my feet as fast as I can.
        He sits up, his jacket soaked. He has gloves with no fingers too, but that’s because his
are old, black, torn. His hair is dark black. There are people crowding around us.
        “Are you two okay?”
        “That truck almost ran those kids down!”
        He looks at me with wide brown eyes.
        And I get out of there. The whole minute is catching up with me. I can barely breathe. My chin is killing me and I’m shivering all over. I push through the crowd and head for the sidewalk. I am just stepping out of the street, still breathing hard, when I hear:
        “Wait!” the boy grabs my arm. “Stop.”
        I almost don’t, but then I do. We stare at each other. I want to ask him why someone
would be trying to kill him. I want to ask him about those thoughts he was having, but then it feels almost wrong that I know his thoughts like that. And wouldn’t I sound crazy saying those things to him?
        But then he has crazy things to say to me: “Do I know you?”
        “No,” I reply, “Not really, I, um…”
        “You just saved my life, didn’t you?”
        Like an idiot, all I can do is shrug. “Guess.”
        I’m not sure what I expect him to say, but it’s not what he says: “You’re the one who
knows the vampire kid.”
        I’m stuck like a skipping CD. “What? You mean—” I lower my voice. “Oliver? I don’t,
I mean not anymore, I—”
        But now this boy is looking at me differently. He almost looks… worried. And he’s
thinking hard.
        “What’s your name?” I ask.
        “Horacio,” he says.
        “I’m Emalie,” I tell him, even though he doesn’t ask. “Who was trying to kill you just
then?”
        “I—I’m not sure. They’ve been after me since I had the vision. Every time I leave the
house…”
        “What vision?” I ask, but he’s still looking at me like I’m something weird. “Why are
you looking at me like that?”
        “I should go,” he says. “I have to keep looking.”
        “You mean for Selene? Who’s that, anyway?”
        But now I did it, because Horacio is backing away from me, looking shocked. He starts to talk and I figure he’ll ask me how I knew that, but again, it’s more surprises: “You have to stay with him.”
        “Who?” I ask.
        Horacio is reaching the crosswalk again. “The vampire.”
        Okay. Huh? “What? Why?”
        The light blinks to ‘walk.’ “Just, if you don’t, it’ll be your fault.”
        “What will be?”
        Horacio looks at me one last time, so worried. “The end of the world,” he says, then
rushes across the street. All I can do is stand there, letting him go, stuck to carry another five tons of confusion by myself.

January 22, 10:08pm
        Haven’t been able to write in awhile. I thought maybe I’d wait until I’d figured out what happened in that intersection. What Horacio meant. Thought it would come to me and I’d fill page after page. So far, it hasn’t.
        But I have found some clues. Yesterday I was in the basement, not really sure what to do with myself or the confused thoughts in my head. I pulled out the big box where my mom’s photography equipment goes. My dad, the newly employed and shaven one, took my broken camera into a shop, and found out it was ruined beyond repair. He says we can go shopping for another one, but I don’t know, I don’t even really want to. That camera started all this, from taking pictures of where vampires might live, all the way to being told, by a boy whose life you just saved, that the end of the world might be your fault.
        Anyway, I started packing up the developer when I noticed this stack of notebooks in the box. Mom’s notebooks. They never interested me before, but the other night I pulled them out and it turns out they’re full of Orani notes, and directions for how to do enchantments. There’s other stuff, too. Special candles, glass jars of different powders, some dried flowers. I don’t know what all of it is, yet, but I’m going to find out.
        I have been reading mom’s notebooks for days. I lie on the basement floor after dinner, making a warm spot with my belly on the old yellow rug, flipping the pages— falling asleep, waking up again. I don’t notice when it gets dark.
        I found notes on the conduit charm that Kathleen gave me. It lets you enter people’s
heads, to observe and feel what they feel. I guess the conduit will naturally seek out the
strongest, most intense feelings in an area, and that’s what led me to Horacio and his killer. The bigger question is: did Kathleen know that I’d find that boy? She must have. She must have wanted me to save him. I won’t know until I talk to her again.
        The other questions are: who was Horacio? What was this vision he was talking about? Who is this Selene that he was searching for? And what did he mean about me needing to stay with Oliver, otherwise the end of the world would be my fault?
        It doesn’t make any sense. Just like so much lately. I feel like my whole world has
changed. But all I can do is try to figure all this out one step at a time. And I have to start at the start… at Dean…
        See, I found something else in this notebook. Something powerful, something I’m
probably not ready for as a young Orani… Except, it’s something I can do to start solving all these questions. And something that might make me feel better about what happened to Dean.
        I’ll keep an eye out for Horacio, but for now, whatever he was talking about will have to wait. I’ve got something else planned, and it’s going to keep me out long after dark…

Continued in Oliver Nocturne #2: The Sunlight Slayings

Part II

Between Oliver Nocturne Books 2 and 3

April 6, 5:45am

Hey, it’s me.

Long time no type. I’ve been a little out of sorts since Valentine’s Day. Some girls get a romantic dinner at a fine restaurant. I got the fine restaurant, and a romantic… blood draining? I barely got out of the Space Needle with my life. If it hadn’t been for Oliver…

He gave me a new camera, too! A nice old clunky one. Just between you and me, that was sweet of him. As you can see, I’m not calling him it anymore.

A lot’s happened since I last wrote. We proved that Oliver didn’t kill Dean. Someone was watching and waiting that night in the school, and he killed Dean, then hid his work behind a false memory. That someone is Dean’s master, and we don’t know who he is, or what he’s up to… yet. We’re using a master location enchantment, once a month, to try to find him. No luck so far.

There was more trickery, too. While I was searching for Dean’s killer, the Brotherhood of the Fallen hired a wraith to possess me, and used me to try to slay Oliver. That slimy Braiden Lang character seems to think Oliver’s destiny is a danger to humanity. We don’t know why that is, yet, either.

All we know is that we’re friends again, and we’re all in danger, so we need to have each other’s backs. Oliver’s parents don’t want him to see me, but that doesn’t stop us from hanging out. Mostly we go to Dean’s house, where everyone is welcome.

It’s spring now here in Seattle, but only in secret. Green has returned, and we feel better because it’s not as dark. Dry, dead-looking stalks are pushed aside by emerald buds sprouting up through the soil. Kind of like my cousin. Back from the winter grave.

Things are better at home, too. Dad’s been working on the fishing fleet all winter, for my great aunt Kathleen. Remember her? She’s Orani, like me, like my mom.

She gave dad a job and now we’ve been in this same house for six months, and that’s a record for the Watkins duo since Mom left. The other day we even unpacked the boxes with the photo albums. Whoah. You know you mean business when the photo albums with their fake leather spines go out on the shelves. Also ‘cause those albums are where Mom lives. So seeing dad put the albums on the shelf means that maybe he’s got the shelves in his head sorted out a little better. I think he does. But putting the albums on the shelf also points out all the places where Mom is not.

Like at the kitchen table reading her archaeology magazines, or adding up her mileage benefits from being a flight attendant, and calculating all the cool places the three of us could go. “And once we’re in Delhi, we can travel for less than ten dollars a day!” she would say, scribbling on maps.

Or, like, when she’d be on the couch, and she’d notice me when I walked by, and I’d huff at her cause she noticed me cause it’s like: mom leave me alone—

No, wait. I never meant really leave me alone. You knew that, right mom?

Aunt Kathleen says she did. She says Mom never meant to be gone this long. She left on a quick trip to search for someone named Selene, and didn’t come back.

“I spoke with the Circle,” Aunt Kathleen says.

We are in the basement. She came over for dinner, then asked to see my latest photos. This is our code for getting down to Orani business. Once we are downstairs, I pull out Mom’s old notebooks and we practice enchantments. We also try to figure out where Mom is. Most of what we know comes from the last page of the last notebook. It says:

It all leads back to Selene, but who is she? Where is she? Without her, there is no way to know for sure if the Endline has arrived…Have to find her. Kalea may know…

And that’s it. Then, goodbye mom.

I run my finger over the words again, smudging the pencil a little. As that gray on my fingertip sinks into the ridges of my skin, I hope that a trace of the energy from mom’s hand, seeping through the pencil wood and into that very graphite, will touch me.

Aunt Kathleen rubs my shoulder. “They put me in touch with Kalea,” she says. She is talking about the Circle of Six. Those are the six oldest living Orani. They don’t, like, actually get together in a circle or anything— in fact, they purposely stay apart, scattered in remote places across the world, staying connected through spirit channels. And Facebook.

“Kalea is Orani?” I ask.

“Yes. A third cousin of Margaret’s, as it turns out. Her real name is Violet.”

Aunt Kathleen’s Orani name is Quella. I want an Orani name, but I’m not old enough yet. There is a rite of passage that an Orani must train for. Oliver and I have joked about this. What is it with these coming-of-age rites of passage? Like life isn’t dramatic and uncertain enough without these freaky all-or-nothing events.

For Oliver, it’s getting his demon and opening some gate; for me, it’s something called the Precession. Its name comes from the wobble of a planet’s orbit. On earth, this imperfection makes the stars seem to move backward in the sky. I have no idea how the Orani Precession works, or what it has to do with orbits and stars, and of course, Aunt Kathleen won’t tell me that part, cause I’m… wait for it… not ready yet! Ugh.

But she does tell me other things. “Kalea lives in London,” she says. “Margaret visited her two days after she left Seattle. Your mother wanted to know where to find Selene. Kalea had done research. There are virtually no records of Selene— not even in the Orani archives— but Kalea heard that she might be in a town in Italy, called Fortuna. She warned your mother against going there.”

“Why?” I ask.

“She wasn’t sure. But your mother went anyway. She told Kalea that Selene was the key to learning about something called the Endline.”

“She wrote that in her notes, too,” I say. I start to feel the burn. The one that makes the walls bend and shrink in. “So, that’s it. That’s all we know.”

Aunt Kathleen rubs my shoulder again. I want to shove her hand away. “Only for now. School will be out for you in a couple months, and I have enough work to keep your father very busy…” I look up to find Kathleen smiling. “Sounds like the perfect time for an aunt-niece trip to Europe, don’t you think?”

“No way,” I say, feeling a rush— the thought of trains, chocolates, ancient churches— but also a tremble. Mom always wanted to take me there. “Really?”

“We can go for a couple weeks, see the sights, and most importantly: first stop, Fortuna.”

I smile. “Sounds like a plan. But what do we do until then?”

“Well, what about the boy?”

I immediately think of Oliver, but then realize Aunt Kathleen means someone else. Horacio: the boy I saved from getting flattened by a truck back in January. He was thinking about finding Selene, too. I’ve been looking for him since then. “I’m getting closer,” I say. “Did the Six know who he was, or who was trying to kill him?”

“No. When I gave you the conduit charm, all we knew was that someone was in danger, and it seemed to be related to Selene and your mother’s disappearance. There seems to be something important about him. And he knew about Oliver, and his destiny. He may have information that can help us.”

Stay with the vampire, was what Horacio said to me, or it would be my fault if the world ended. No idea what that meant, either. “It’s too bad the Six never have more specifics,” I say.

Aunt Kathleen sighs. “Yes, well, it’s often that way. Predicting the future is a very inexact art. Have you been using the echo enchantment?”

“Yeah.” I pull the tiny, ruby-colored scarab charm from around my neck, its silver chain playing between my fingers. It’s a conduit for entering people’s minds. Aunt Kathleen has taught me a new use for it.

“How is that going?” she asks.

“Good,” I report. “I’ve gotten better at it. I’ve found traces of Horacio on Capitol Hill: at the Value Village, Atlas, but mostly at a record store. I was going to try again tonight.”

Aunt Kathleen nods. “You’re strong, Emalie. Every enchantment I teach you, you pick it up fast.”

“Thanks,” I say. I look up with a smile. Only Aunt Kathleen is incomplete. I can see worry there, too.

She leaves around 8pm, and I head upstairs to do homework. Only what I really do is drop right to sleep.

The “Important Doctor People” say that you should get 8 hours of sleep. But they’ve had no experience being friends with a vampire and a zombie. I need to be both nocturnal and a normal kid. So, here’s Emalie’s magic do-it-all sleep equation:

4-7am (3 hours)

+Math class (45 min)

+4-6pm (2 hrs, before dad gets home)

+7-9pm = (2 hrs supposedly doing homework)

= Only fifteen minutes short! Well, I’m two hours off tonight, because of Aunt Kathleen’s visit, but that’s easily made up for with Red Bull when I wake up at 9, and then a double americano from Ladro on my way to catch the bus.

I’ve got three alarm clocks now, each set for one of my wake up times. The 9pm one plays the radio station KBYT, vampires only, cause I gotta keep up on my friends’ tastes. Oliver gave me a special clock with a sub-frequency radio to tune it in. It’s so cool, a tiny crystal rectangle, runs on magnets or something.

So I’m up again, and after the Red Bull comes a shower, dress for action, pack my bag, and then appear in the living room:

Scene: Emalie enters.

Emalie: (Yawning) I’m so tired. Time for bed for this soldier.

Dad: Alright, Em. Goodnight, kiddo, love ya.

Emalie smiles, trudges upstairs, yawning again as she goes…

Then I hop right out the window. I reach up to the eave and uncoil a rope that Oliver tied there. He did it by standing beneath the roof like a bat. He’s so weird! The rope has easy-to-shimmy-down knots, and I drop to the yard and I’m off into my nighttime world!

I take the bus downtown. We pass North Seattle Middle School, and I can see the faint glow of candlelight in the windows. Oliver is up there, in school right now. Dean has school tonight, too. I feel a little wave of guilt. If they knew I was out, they’d want to be with me, especially if they knew what I was up to. Like I said, we have to have each other’s backs. They’d want to help me find Horacio.

But, the truth? I haven’t actually told Oliver and Dean about Horacio. Is that weird? It feels weird. I don’t know why I haven’t. Would it bother Oliver? They would definitely be worried that it was dangerous. But Oliver has his prophecy, and Dean has his mystery master. This Horacio thing is what I have. And sometimes, I like just having my own story, and not having to always be part of someone else’s.

I transfer busses and soon I’m up on Capitol Hill. I head up Broadway to Everyday Music.

“Hey Emalie.” The girl behind the counter is Beth. She’s here most nights during the week. Her coffee brown hair is in pink barrettes, keeping it off of her thick, black-framed glasses. She is wearing a lime green vintage dress, with a collar and strange embroidery. It looks so retro and cool and like the kind that I could oh-so-never find at the thrift stores. There is Orani magic, but then there is Beth-fashion-finding magic.

I know her because she commented on my camera, and how it was cool that it was old and uses film. We got to talking. Turns out she writes for Three Imaginary Girls, which is my favorite music site.

“Hey,” I reply.

“Still working on that story?” Beth asks. She’s flipping through a stack of CD’s that someone is selling back. She holds up an Elton John album and scowls.

“Yeah,” I say. I told her I’m doing a story on independent record stores: how they’re doing, which ones are cool.

Black-painted kids flick through the CD’s. I loiter over by the vinyl, where it smells like mold. Dad says vinyl sounds better because it sounds worse, or something. Who knows. What matters is that there’s no one over here, and so I can get to work.

I pull a small black bag from my pocket. I let my hand fall casually by my side, and a light rain of rose-colored gypsum falls. My hand sways, creating a protective circle on the floor around me. Then, I pull the scarab from around my neck and hold it to my mouth.

So, Orani 101, the echo enchantment: I focus on my memory of Horacio. What he looked like, his emotional presence, how he seemed. I hold it in the front of my mind. It is all I’m thinking. Next, using the conduit charm, the great Emalie will now attempt to leave her body, and find other memories of Horacio among the people in this room. It’s not likely that any of these people actually know him (I’ve asked Beth, and she doesn’t), but it is possible that they’ve seen him. And even just a glimpse tells so much about a person. Thing is, most people don’t pay attention to all that knowledge they’re getting. Not the way an Orani can.

Breathing in deep, I close my eyes…

And detach. It’s kind of like I’m pulling away from my senses, leaving my body. The room gets blurry, and the other people become these luminous things, with energy streaming around them.

I’ve gotten better at seeing people’s energy. Each person has this presence that streams ahead of them and lingers behind them. We think of ourselves as solid objects, our bodies these steel traps that we live inside, but the Orani can feel that we’re not. Really, we’re these wrapped up balls of energy, with loose strands dangling forward and backward in time. When we’re young, the energy mostly streams forward, like tentacles, reaching ahead, hoping for the next thing, dreaming of the future. As we get older, and some doors close, dreams don’t work out, love turns into loss… the tendrils stretch backward too, streaming like the wake behind a boat, churning with regret, longing, guilt. And our tendrils mingle. We are affecting each other all the time, but we’re aware of so little of it.

There are nine others in the store. The key is to float among their jellyfish tentacles of emotion without getting tangled. There’s no avoiding the occasional sting. Back in January, when I left my body for the first time, I got sucked right into the most intense presences, the tentacles sucking me in. I’ve learned since then to keep my distance.

I float around, just touching each person’s flowing energy, soft and waving like hair underwater, and each time, I whisper with my mind: Horacio, and imagine that boy as hard as I can. It’s like a little thought magnet. If others in the room have ever seen Horacio, their memories of him will be drawn out.

Once I’ve suggested him to everyone, I return to my body. Feel the limits of skin and bone again. The moldy vinyl smell around me. The pain above my eye from a sinus full of snot—stupid spring allergies. In the store, the energy tentacles disappear and people stop glowing. Things look normal… Except for him.

I look around the store and spy three pale figures, flickering like projections. They stand frozen as the world moves around them. These are memories of Horacio. Three people have seen him here recently. Two of the projections are bent over the CD racks. The third is standing at the counter. That must be Beth’s memory. Horacio is standing there, hand fishing in his pocket for money. He has dyed black hair, and that same frayed brown coat. This is the brightest memory of him I have seen. It is recent. Strong. He made an impression on Beth’s subconscious, even though, if you ask her, she has no memory of him.

I kick the gypsum sand at my feet and cross the store until I am standing next to Horacio’s ghostly image at the counter.

“What’s up, Emalie?” Beth asks, still sorting the sell-backs and having no idea that I can see one of her memories right in front of me.

“Nothing,” I reply. I look Horacio over. He looks weary, and he still looks kinda cute, and…

Bingo.

Leading away from his frozen image are luminous white footsteps, like little glowing puddles on the ground. They head right out the door. No one sees them but me.

“See ya later,” I say to Beth.

This was the goal of the echo spell: If Horacio had been in the store recently enough, then people’s memories of him would also include a bit of his spirit energy. We all sense each other’s moods, even if we don’t consciously recognize them. When you’re Orani, you can read that energy, and predict what where it will lead, what it might do next. The memory of Horacio suggests that he would walk out the door, and head down Broadway.

I follow the glowing footprints. A block later, they turn off Broadway, leading into a long, grassy park.

The steps take a wide track around a fountain, where shadowy figures are hanging out. Sinister laughter erupts from the group. Could be vampires. I keep to the shadows beneath old trees. Aunt Kathleen recently taught me a new enchantment called negation. You think yourself out of sight. It works on the undead. I don’t quite get it yet, but I try it now as I pass the fountain.

The footsteps reach a small, concrete building: public bathrooms. They reek of old urine, of unwashed bodies. A black iron gate is locked shut across the Men’s Room door, but the gate in front of the Women’s hangs open.

Horacio’s footprints lead inside, but don’t come out. I pause at the door, trying to keep my breath silent. It’s not easy. I can feel fear in Horacio’s energy. But for some reason, he had to come here…

I reach into my bag with clammy hands, and remove two objects. One is a small figurine, woven of straw, on a leather strap. A protection charm. I place it around my neck. The other object is my wooden stake, the one I made from a hammer handle. It’s the only weapon I have, and I want to have something, just in case.

I peer into the dark bathroom. Faint streetlight seeps through frosted windows by the ceiling. I’m just about to whisper Horacio, when I hear his voice:

“I brought you water…”

There’s a sink, then two stalls. The second is larger, and its door is missing. Now I see Horacio, kneeling beside a figure sprawled on the floor. A woman, dressed in a heavy, dirty coat, wearing torn up pants and boots. She looks like a homeless person, her face unwashed, her hair knotted and long. She radiates fear, too. It is pricking my senses. The room smells sour, like neglect.

“Thank you, dear boy,” she croaks wearily.

“It should be safe here,” Horacio says to her. “No one will bother us.”

“Someone already has,” the woman says.

Horacio spins and sees me. “Hey!” he shouts. He leaps to his feet.

“Wait, Horacio, it’s me.” I step around the corner, slipping the stake into my belt and holding out my hands.

He peers at me. His gaze is lethal, like a cornered cat, but then he recognizes me. His face is splotched with dirt.

“I’m Emalie,” I say. “Remember? Back—”

“You saved me from the Harbingers,” says Horacio. His face softens. He turns to the woman. “Mom, this is her.”

Horacio’s mother gazes at me. She is propped against a large backpack. “The Orani,” she says weakly. Her voice sounds relieved. “This is the one you spoke of,” she says to Horacio. “The demon girl who aligns with the chosen vampire.”

I flinch at that. Demon girl? “I’m not—” I begin.

But Horacio cuts me off. He has stepped closer. “Don’t,” he says quietly. “It’s okay. She gets confused. She’s not well.”

“What happened to her?” I ask. “What happened to you both?”

Horacio shrugs. “It’s a long story. What are you doing here?”

“I’ve been looking for you,” I say. I am feeling a little flustered, because he’s staring at me again. “I— I was worried about you. And, about what you said. You know, about the end of the world. Also, about Selene. My mom was looking for her, too.”

Horacio nods. He almost looks disappointed. But he also feels less fearful. The entire room has relaxed.

“What?” I ask.

“Nothing, I was just hoping you came to find me because I was… I don’t know, nice or something.”

I try not to react to this. I glance past Horacio, to his mom. “Can I help you guys out, somehow? Get you, like, food, or something?”

“Nah, we’re fine,” says Horacio. “I’m good at getting what we need. We’ve been on the run like this for over a year now. It’s nothing new.”

“From Harbingers,” I say, trying to fill in gaps. “The ones who tried to kill you.”

Horacio shrugs. “That was only the latest time.”

“Well, who are they?” I ask. “Why do they have it out for you guys?”

“Because of what we know about the Gate,” says Mom.

I turn to her. “The Gate? You mean, like, Oliver’s gate?”

“The Gate at Nexia,” she says, “which the vampires seek to open, but they don’t know its true nature. We do.”

I look back to Horacio. “What’s that mean?”

He just shrugs.

“Come here, demon girl,” says the mom. She struggles to sit up. “I will show you.”

I glance at Horacio, and he nods, so I step over to the woman. The smell around her is rotten, and strangely like meat, or something, it’s weird— but then she’s taking my wrist in her cold hand. She runs a fingernail along my veins. It feels hard, sharp.

“Forces are like bloodlines, worlds like cells, currents running through them,” she says. “Ah, yes, this is the one, my dear boy, the Endline demon girl.”

Her grip on my wrist grows tighter. The Endline? Wait. Something is changing. I glance back at Horacio. But… I can’t see him.

“Feel that power,” the mom says, her grip on my wrist tightening… “Such nourishment…

Where is Horacio? He isn’t there, wait, he is— but faint. He seems to be flickering, becoming part of the shadows. What little is left of him shrugs. He looks at me like he’s about to say goodbye. “I’m sorry,” he says.

Danger. Fear. Horacio disappears, like a movie projector turned off, and there is scurrying. On the floor where he just stood, a shiny black lizard scuttles across the floor. It leaps up onto the shoulder of its—

Mother. Oh no. The hand on my wrist has become a black claw, dirty nails, scaly skin. The body on the floor is no longer a woman slumped on a backpack, but some kind of creature, in flowing robes, a hood over a black face with gleaming red eyes.

“Did you like the disguises?” Its slippery voice asks, sounding only vaguely like the woman, the woman who was a trick. The lizard hisses with delight. “My pet makes a lovely boy, does he not?”

“Let go of me!” I scream.

“And you, demon morsel, fell right into the trap.” The figure is standing, a giant shrouded demon, like the Merchynts I have seen in the underground. It smiles and there are glistening black teeth. “You will nourish me for an eternity,” it growls. “The Orani sustenance, the sweet nectar of the demon girl. And none more powerful than the Endline!”

Far, far too late, I am understanding. Oh, Emalie, this is a trap. All of this was a trap. This demon baited me, baited us all, even Aunt Kathleen and the Circle, knew enough about me to reel me in…

The lizard that was disguised as Horacio shrieks and flicks its pink tongue. Maybe there will be a scrap of me left over for him.

“No!” I scream.

I yank with all my might, but the demon hauls me closer, and the smell of unwashed clothes has given way completely to the stench of burned flesh, charred bones.

Beneath the giant creature’s cloak, the floor is dissolving, becoming a black vortex, a doorway of some kind, to some awful other world.

Its head looms over me. Larger, the mouth spread wider, one bite and I’ll be gone—Oliver! Dean! I am screaming in my mind. But no, I wanted to have my own story. And this is how it ends.

Wretched breath against my face… Emalie, fight! I reach, flailing to my belt, pull out my stake, and swing as hard as I can upward— there is a loud tearing of leathery flesh and the demon bellows in rage. I yank the stake out of the fissure I have broken open beside its mouth, ripping a chunk of its leather cheek free.

Before I can strike again, it tosses me like a doll. Across the room, I slam against the concrete wall, breath gone, crumpling to the floor.

“Feisty snack,” the demon growls, and sweeps toward me. I try to move, but nothing works anymore. I took my best shot, I—

“Come on, stupid!” Hands grab me by the shoulders and yank me out the door. I am back out in the cool evening. The hands prop me up to face a new attacker standing right in front of me—

Grinning. Long black hair with a blaze of neon pink down the middle—

“What’s up, Oliver’s disgusting girlfriend?”

It’s Bane.

“N—” I start.

“Hold that thought,” Bane says, then shoves me away, where I tumble to the grass. Looking up, I see his friends: Randall— who is still missing most of the arm that he lost hunting, well, me— and Ty, both glaring at me.

“Come on, gents,” snarls Bane, “It’s show time.” Bane reaches beneath his coat and pulls out a short Kodachi broadsword (Oliver’s shown me the family collection), then charges into the bathroom, his friends on his heels.

I lay there, breath painfully returning, my stake clutched in white knuckles, a black, oil-like substance dripping from its tip. There is a giant crash from inside the bathroom, then a roar.

“Oh yeah!” I hear Bane shout excitedly. More slamming, tearing. The clanging of metal. A series of thuds. “Again!” Bane screams with delight. A sink flies out the door and crashes beside me.

Silence.

Bane, Ty and Randall walk out, grinning, their eyes gleaming. Bane’s clothes are splattered with the black goo. With one hand, he sheathes his sword. With the other, he tosses something black toward me

“Here’s a souvenir,” he says. . It thuds to the grass beside me. One of the demon’s hands.

I want to scream at him, want to run, but instead I just slowly stagger to my feet. There’s one thing I have to say first: “Thank you.”

Bane rolls his eyes. “Yuck. Don’t ruin it, snackpack. That empatica demon was hogging a perfectly good hangout. I’ve dragged many a hapless human like yourself in there.”

“Did you kill it?” I ask.

“Nah, that would have been bad form.” Bane eyes the severed hand. “We just served it notice, and sent it on its way.” His grin fades. “Now, two things, before we hopefully never see one another again…”

“Okay,” I say.

Bane cocks his head toward Randall, who is glaring at me, rubbing the stub of his arm. “You are not forgiven for that.”

“Alright,” I say hoarsely.

“But,” Bane goes on, “we are willing to defer your painful retribution, just as long as you never tell my stupid lamb brother that I helped you tonight. Of course, telling him would mean admitting that you got yourself played, drawn in, and practically eaten by that empatica, who would have feasted on your freakish energy for eternity. So maybe you weren’t planning on it, anyway.”

Bane is annoying, because he is right. I just nod.

Bane keeps looking at me. He rolls his eyes. “Um, I’m finished. Why haven’t you left yet?”

“I—” I turn to go but then stop. “Why did you just help me?”

Bane’s grin returns. “That’s for me to know, and you to never ask again.”

“Okay,” I say, and start away.

“Safe travels, snackpack,” Bane calls after me.

I make it all the way to the edge of the park before the shudders, tears, and doubts overwhelm me. It is a long bus ride home.

So, there’s that. There are vampire prophecies and hidden zombie masters in this world, but there are dangers for an Orani, too. I’m powerful. I guess that makes me a target. That empatica demon invented a boy, staged the whole thing, and led me right into its trap. Worse, it knew which buttons to push. Knew to mention Selene, Oliver, everything. It must have been watching me for months. Just to get a chance to dine on me, because of my power.

But it said something else, too. The demon girl? Aunt Kathleen hadn’t said anything about their being a demon side to being Orani. Maybe that was just another lie. But it also mentioned the Endline… Called me the Endline. Could that mean that whatever my mom left for, whatever she was searching for Selene to find out, had to do with me?

And to top it all off, I get saved by Bane. Why was he there? Had he been following me? And why would he have any interest in saving me?

Speaking of that, this is the second time that I’ve had to be saved from danger. I need to be more careful, but also, I need to learn more… because I am not okay with being the silly damsel in distress.

It’s almost dawn. Time for bed. If I can sleep with all these questions. And these newest ones… I’ve promised never to tell Oliver and Dean. Only now, I really wish I could.

I have my own ‘Emalie questions.’ Just like I wanted.

Be careful what you wish for.

More later.

-e

Continued in Oliver Nocturne #3: Blood Ties