Awakened

“What?” I said.

“Like we can leave you alone?” Aphrodite rolled her eyes. “Seriously. How clueless are you? Neferet managed to cut off Jack’s head without actually being there. Darius and I aren’t leaving you alone to comfort Erik the Douche.”

I looked at Darius, but he shook his head and said, “Sorry, Zoey, Aphrodite has a point.”

“Could you at least stay back here out of earshot?” I asked in exasperation.

“Like we want to hear Erik’s crybaby crap? No problem. Just hurry up. No one needs to be kept waiting for a douche bag,” Aphrodite said.

I didn’t even bother to sigh as I walked away from them, making a path to Erik. Okay, seriously. The guy didn’t even know I was there. I was standing in front of him. His face was in his hands and he was crying. Really crying. Knowing what an excellent actor he was, I cleared my throat and got ready to be semi-sarcastic, or at the very least passive-aggressive.

When he looked up at me everything changed. His eyes were puffy and red. Tears soaked his cheeks. Snot even ran out of his nose. He blinked a couple of times, like he was having a hard time focusing on me. “Oh, uh, Zoey,” he said, and made an effort at pulling himself together. He sat up straighter, and wiped his snotty nose on the back of his sleeve. “Um, hey. You’re back.”

“Yeah, I landed a little while ago. I’m going to light Jack’s pyre. Wa

A sob erupted from deep within him. Erik bowed his head and began to weep.

It was totally awful.

I so didn’t know what to do.

And I swear I heard Aphrodite snorting off in the distance.

“Hey.” I sat next to him and awkwardly patted his shoulder. “I know it’s terrible. You guys were really good friends.”

Erik nodded his head. I could see he was making an effort to get himself under control, so I sat there and babbled while he sniffed and wiped his face on his sleeve (eesh).

“It really sucks. Jack was too darn nice and sweet and young and everything to have something like this happen to him. We’re all go

“Neferet did this.” He spoke quietly, and I saw him glancing around like he was scared of being overheard. “I don’t know how. I don’t fucking even know why, but she did it.”

“Yeah,” I said.

Our eyes met.

“Are you going to do something about it?” he said.

My gaze didn’t falter one little bit. “Absolutely everything in my power.”

He almost smiled. “Well, that’s good enough for me.” He wiped his face again and ran a hand through his hair. “I was leaving.”

“Huh?” I said brilliantly.

“Yeah, going. Leaving the Tulsa House of Night for L.A. They want me there—in Hollywood. I was supposed to be the next Brad Pitt.”

“Was?” I asked, totally confused. “What’s stopping you?”

Slowly, Erik raised his right hand and held it, palm out, toward me. I blinked several times, not really understanding what I was seeing.

“Yeah, it’s what you think,” he said.

“It’s Nyx’s Labyrinth.” Of course I recognized the raised sapphire-colored tattoo that filled his palm, but it was like my mind was having a hard time catching up with my eyes, and I wasn’t getting it until Aphrodite’s voice came from behind me. “Oh, for shit’s sake! Erik’s a Tracker.”

Erik’s eyes shifted from me to Aphrodite. “Happy now? Go ahead and laugh. You know this means I can’t leave the Tulsa House of Night for four years—that I have to stay here and follow a damn essence and be the asshole who is there when every kid for the next four years is Marked and finds out he might or might not die, but for sure has to change his life forever.”

There was a moment of silence and then Aphrodite said, “Is that what’s bothering you? That you’re the new Tracker and it’s a tough job, or is what’s really bothering you that you have to put off Hollywood for four years and in that time there’s sure to be ‘the next Brad Pitt’?”

I whirled around and faced her. “He was Jack’s roommate! Do you remember what it’s like to lose a roommate?” I saw her expression shift and soften, but I just shook my head. “No. You and Darius go on. I’ll follow you.” When Aphrodite still hesitated I spoke directly to her Warrior. “As your High Priestess I’m commanding you. I want to be alone with Erik. Take Aphrodite and meet me at Jack’s pyre.”

Darius didn’t hesitate for another second. He bowed solemnly to me, then he took Aphrodite by the elbow and literally pulled her away. I sighed deeply and sat down next to Erik on the bench.

“Sorry about that. Aphrodite means well, but like Stevie Rae would say, she’s not very nice sometimes.”

Erik snorted. “You don’t need to tell me that. She and I dated, remember?”

“I remember,” I said quietly. Then added, “You and I dated, too.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I thought I loved you.”

“I thought I loved you, too.”

He looked at me. “Were we wrong?”

I looked back at him. Really looked back at him. Goddess, he was hot in a seriously Superman/Clark Kent kind of way. Tall and dark and blue eyed and muscly. But there was more to him than that. Yeah, he was controlling and arrogant, but somewhere inside him I knew there was a really, really good guy. I just wasn’t the right girl for that guy.

“Yeah, we were wrong, but that’s okay. Recently I’ve been reminded that it’s okay not to be perfect, especially if you learn from your mess-ups. So how about we learn from ours? I think we could make better friends anyway.”

His gorgeous lips turned up. “I think you might be right.”

“Plus,” I added, bumping him with my shoulder, “I don’t have enough pretty straight guys as my friends.”

“I’m a pretty straight guy. I mean, a really straight guy who is also, as you say, pretty.”

“Yep, you are,” I said. Then I held out my hand. “Friends?”

“Friends.” Erik took my hand in his and then, with a rakish smile, he dropped gracefully from the bench to one knee. “My lady, let’s always be friends.”

“Okie dokie,” I said, kinda breathlessly, ’cause, well, no matter how much I loved Stark, Erik was seriously hot and a super good actor.

He bowed and kissed my hand. Not in a creepy I’m-trying-to-get-into-your-pants way, but in a real old-school-gentleman way. Still on his knee, he looked up at me and said, “You have to say something tonight that gives us hope and helps Damien, because right now lots of us are just floating out there wondering what the fuck—and Damien is seriously not doing well.”

My heart clenched. “I know.”

“Good. No matter what else, I believe in you, Zoey.”

I sighed. Again.

He smiled and stood up, pulling me up with him. “So please let me escort you to this funeral.”

I took Erik’s arm and stepped into a future I couldn’t have begun to imagine.

* * *

It was an awesome, sad, incredible sight. Unlike the last time a funeral pyre had burned for a vampyre at the House of Night, the entire school was there. Fledglings and vampyres made a huge circle around a benchlike structure that had been built in the very center of the school grounds. I could still see the charred grass that bore witness to the fact that not long ago Anastasia Lankford’s body had been consumed by the Goddess’s fire in that very same place. Only the school hadn’t come out to witness and show respect for her then. Too many of them had been under the control of Kalona—or just downright scared. Tonight was different. Kalona’s control had been broken and Jack was getting a Warrior’s sendoff.

My eyes found Dragon Lankford even before I looked at the funeral pyre. He was standing behind Jack in the shadow of the closest oak tree. But the shadows didn’t cloak his pain. I could see tears falling silently down his chiseled face. Goddess help Dragon, was my first prayer of the night. He’s such a good man. Help him find peace.