The Hierophant (Book 1 in The Arcana Series) by Madeline Claire Franklin

Author:Madeline Claire Franklin [Franklin, Madeline Claire]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2013-06-17T22:00:00+00:00

— 35 —

I’m late to school Monday morning, even though I don’t have class first period. I try to make it into my second period study hall to hang out with Kyla most days, but these last few weeks it’s been hard. I’ve been so tired most mornings, I just sleep in.

It doesn’t really surprise me that she’s already ensconced by her senior class friends by the time I get there. I take a breath and try to seem totally comfortable and natural taking a seat at the same table. I smile and wave to Kyla; she smiles a tight-lipped smile back, and I know something is wrong.

The period passes in a wash of other people’s conversations. Kyla doesn’t say a word to me. No one does. I pretend to do homework, feeling even more uncomfortable than usual. When the period ends, I have to stop Kyla before she leaves with everyone else.

“Hey, Kyla. What’s going on?” My brow furrows. “Are you okay?”

She looks at me strangely. “Yeah. Are you?”

I swallow, and everything in me goes rigid, like the air around her has turned to barbed wire. She’s lying to me. My best friend in the whole world is lying to me.

I nod.

She nods, too, and gives me another close-lipped smile, before she hurries out the door to catch up with her friends.

I feel a thickness come over me, like I’m drowning. In eighth grade, when my mother was dying, I used to have this feeling in waves—powerlessness, abandonment, absolute crisis and a supreme need for isolation. I would hide in the locker room and cry, sometimes for an entire class period. It was easier to miss the whole class than come in half way with no hall pass.

I’m considering taking up the habit again, when Kyla—transformed—comes storming around the corner into the empty cafeteria.

“Fuck this shit,” she snaps, glaring at me. “Where the hell have you been this past month, Anastasia Flynn?”

I stare at her, mouth agape.

“I feel like I haven’t even talked to you since you almost drowned. Which, to be honest, I was kind of hoping would have the opposite effect.” She crosses her arms over her chest. “All of a sudden you’re so goddamn busy with homework all the time, which is a joke because you’re failing most of your classes and we both know it. Shit, you spend more time with Andy Pavlovic than with me these days. What the hell is going on, Ana?”

I shake my head, words, lies, and truths escaping me. There is so much I haven’t told her. How can I start now?

“Kyla, I’m so sorry,” is all I can say. “Honestly, time has kind of gotten away from me. I’ve been in a weird place for a while now, and…I’m sorry.” More lies? Not really, but not exactly the truth, either.

Kyla looks at me like I’m made up of hieroglyphs. “And what else?”

“Andy told me some things. About my mother’s clan. I had to digest it, I guess.”

“Without me.”

“Kyla…”

“Or, should I say, with Trebor?” She stares at me.

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