The 13th Sign Part 4

"If you wish to live. And congratulations. You just defeated Taurus. Only eleven more Challenges to go. Yours truly included, of course." She tapped at the base of her throat with a shiny fingernail and raised an eyebrow at me.

I looked over Gemini's shoulder at the musician, still drumming on his knees under the bus shelter. He looked at his watch, then up the empty street for the bus. What I wouldn't give to be only worried about the stinking bus right now.

Gemini sighed. "The Keepers don't know you mean no harm, Jalen. Most other Challengers, you see..." Her words trailed off. She cleared her throat.

"Your goal is to find Ophiuchus-and quickly," she continued. "If earth pa.s.ses out of the House of Ophiuchus before you find the sign it will become a fixture in the zodiac. The personality changes will become permanent, and Ophiuchus will become vulnerable. Jalen, great power is at stake."

"How long is that?" Brennan asked, his voice a squeak. "Before earth pa.s.ses..."

Gemini smoothed her hair. "Twenty-three hours."

Just under a day-about 8:30 tomorrow night. Earlier, Gemini had said that Ophiuchus was with the one who needs healing. That had to be Nina, at the hospital. I calculated it quickly-she was about nine miles away. Nine miles in twenty-three hours. I could do this. I realized then that I had been pacing.

Was this all true? I had to defeat all twelve signs of the zodiac-including, apparently, our guide, Gemini-and find Ophiuchus? Nina always said, "Crazier things have happened!" But this was top-level crazy.

I looked back to see Ellie removing The Keypers of the Zodiack from her messenger bag. "It's this book!" she said. She chucked it into a nearby trash can. "I'll just dump it, and then we can go home. Right, Jalen? Home?"

Home. It did sound good.

"Hey, hey, hey!" the musician said. He jumped off the bench and ran to the garbage can. He dove into it headfirst. "You can't throw away a book!" His voice echoed inside the can.

He stood, the book in one hand, and shook a piece of lettuce from his long blond hair. "Someone will read-hey!" His gaze landed on Gemini. A slow grin spread across his tanned face like honey on peanut b.u.t.ter. "All right! A toga party! Where? Let's go! ToGA! ToGA! ToGA!"

Gemini walked up to the musician and plucked the book from his hand. "Thank you," she said, and whirled back to us. "The bus isn't coming. I think we should-"

"It's happening again, again, again. Again, again, again."

We heard the words coming from the shadows before we saw who said them. A disheveled man, dirty and crumpled, limped under the flickering streetlight. The buzzing lamp threw odd shadows down onto his face, shadows which looked like his face was morphing. Like the man we'd just battled, Taurus. The hairs on my arms stood up.

"It's happening again, again, again," he mumbled, pounding his ears with his fists, as if beating the demons out of his head. "Again, again, again..."

The musician's forehead wrinkled. "Hey, bud," he said softly, approaching this guy who was obviously a Keeper. The musician reached out his hand.

"Sir," Ellie said, a warning in her tone. "I wouldn't-"

But the musician waved her off, turned back to the disheveled man from the shadows. "Bud, you're right. The bus is sometimes late. Happens a lot. You need help getting somewhere?"

The closer the musician's hand got to this mumbling man, the wider the man's eyes grew, the louder and faster the murmuring became. "Againagainagain, againagainagain..."

The musician's fingertips lightly landed on the murmuring man's dusty coat. The man tossed his head back and howled like he'd been touched by a branding iron. My every muscle tightened, readying for what looked to be my next Challenge.

But the man twisted from beneath the musician's touch and scurried up to me, locking eyes with me. He gripped both my arms, pinning them to my sides. I clenched my fists. "He is and she is," he mumbled through gray teeth, his breath stinking of rot. "He is and she is and he is and she is and..."

And the mumbling man scurried away, back into the shadows of the night. "He is and she is and he is and..."

Gemini huffed a sigh. "One last thing. As each Keeper surrenders, it will offer you a birthstone. You must chant, 'sic itur ad astra'-'thus you shall go to the stars'-to cast them back to the heavens with their stone. Doing so ensures you've won the Challenge. Now. We really do need to get going. And it looks like we'll be on foot."

On foot. Suddenly that nine miles seemed so much farther away.

Do I continue?

I walked over to the bench and leaned my head against the cool plastic of the bus shelter. Through the clear roof, I could see the full moon, the stars. Ma.s.sive ink-black splotches filled the sky. Empty voids where stars had once shone. The constellations of the zodiac-missing. It looked deep, dark, deadly, the clear nighttime sky with just a handful of stars.

I wished Nina were here to help me decide. Nina, once-brave Nina, who was now in terrible pain in her hospital bed. I thought of Nina giving up the fight, of giving in to the pain because she was a different person now.

Or my rock-solid mom, now crumbling apart, leaving to go-where? I wished she could be here, tell me exactly what needed to be done and when, like the mom I loved.

I should be thankful, I supposed, that I had the help of two friends. And yet these two friends were now, for all purposes, strangers.

It's all so different. Too different.

Yes. I continue.

I stood. "Let's go."

"Jalen!" A voice came at me.

I spun around.

The black Lincoln, the two men. The ones who had sliced the tip of my ear in two. The ones who thought we'd destroyed Brennan's truck. And they knew my name.

The musician s.n.a.t.c.hed up his tuba. "Follow me!" he yelled. A quick look fired between Brennan, Ellie, and me. He seemed to know exactly what to do, so we followed.

We ran over two blocks, up one, and the black car slid around every corner. With each pound of my feet, my brain thrummed: They know my name. With each pound of my feet, my ear throbbed. With each pound of my feet, I prayed they wouldn't lodge an arrow in my ribcage.

They had to be Keepers.

I thought it was my heart I heard pumping like mad, but it was that musician's tuba, thump thump thump, against his leg, the whole time we ran.

Brennan sprinted up beside the tuba player and jerked his head right. The musician nodded. Brennan took off between two houses, ducking under backyard play sets, jumping chain-link fences. The three of us followed him.

After fifteen minutes or so of running through other people's lives, we stopped. We'd lost the black car, we'd lost the whizzing arrows with their deadly points, but we had no idea where we were.

As we caught our breath, the musician pounded Brennan on the back. "Dude, you jump fences like a horse! Where'd you learn that?"

Brennan shrugged, and if it weren't night, I believe we'd have seen him blush. "Toilet-papering yards, I guess. Stupid stuff."

The tuba player nodded, then hunched again, resting his hands on his knees. He took longer than we did to catch his breath; he might've been in his late teens or early twenties. He looked up from his stoop, long blond bangs falling across his amber eyes. He shot us a brilliant white-toothed smile.

"Y'all in trouble or something?" he asked between pants.

"No," I answered.

"Yes," Ellie said.

I raised my eyebrows at her. The musician chuckled, then straightened. "Where's your friend? In the toga?"

Brennan pursed his lips. "I wouldn't exactly call her a friend," he mumbled.

The musician looked at each one of us, sizing us up. I felt for a moment like a piece of meat, being inspected, sniffed. But then he smiled, and his smile lit up the night. Dazzling. I couldn't help but grin back.

"I've done some stupid things, you know?" he said. The twinkle in his eye told me that, yes, troublemaking from this one was likely. Ellie nodded at him eagerly. Maybe too eagerly.

"Looks like y'all could use a hand. Where're you headed?"

"Nowhere," I said.

"Touro Infirmary," Ellie said.

I shot her a blazing look again. The musician chuckled again. "The hospital?"

I huffed and nodded. He stuck out his hand. He had calluses on his fingers, I a.s.sumed from punching tuba b.u.t.tons. Daddy always said you could trust a man with calluses on his hand. I shook it. It was the perfect amount of handshake-not too tough, not too mealy. Just right.

"I'm Dillon," he said, flashing a grin. By the sound of her tiny gasp, I felt certain that Ellie, behind me, caught that grin of his. "I'm going to help you get to the hospital."

"Jalen," I said in return. I thought of the nine miles, the eleven Keepers between Nina and me. "I hope you do."

Brennan hadn't been watching our alliance form. "It's too dangerous," he said.

I withdrew my hand from the handshake. "What?"

"I said it's too dangerous, walking on the main roads," Brennan said. He turned around, his face creased with confusion. "If we can stay off roads altogether, that'd be best."

Ellie led us to a street sign and put the name of the road into her cell phone. "The river's just three blocks over. That way." She pointed into the night.

The banks of the Mississippi River were dark. They were lined with a mix of neighborhoods and concrete, mud and docked barges. Walking along the river would take much longer; the curve of the Mississippi might add as much as a mile to our journey. But the Keepers chasing us in the car might rule out the river, because walking alongside it would take us so much longer than crossing over land. It didn't make much sense for us to go there. And so it was perfect.

The next hour was relatively quiet: We were chased by a few snarly dogs, we glopped through patches of mud, Ellie tore her sweatshirt hood on a fence post. Dillon told her it made her look punk. Ellie grinned goofily, totally wiping out any traces of being "punk." Brennan and I rolled our eyes at each other.

It was easier sneaking through backyards than through industrial areas. The industrial parks glowed under fakey yellow streetlights. Many were surrounded with fences so high, it made me think they were carrying dangerous criminals on those barges, instead of barrels of oil and cages of seafood.

"Can we stop for a minute?" Dillon asked after about a mile. "I think I have a rock in my shoe." He started unlacing his black Converse hightop.

We were in a backyard, a friendly one with a swing set and dog toys scattered around. We had clamored through several yards whose signs had shouted, PRIVATE LAND-NO TRESPa.s.sING at us before we'd trespa.s.sed. This yard had no signs and was welcoming by comparison. We waited for Dillon to tie his shoelaces.

The floodlights on the corner of the house flicked on, blinding us from above like searchlights.

"Oh, me! Are y'all all right?"

A woman stepped into the circle of light. She had to be a mom-she was very mom-like. Rather, I should say, like Every Mother-the mom stereotype. Right down to the pearl necklace, the ap.r.o.n, the perfectly coiffed hair, the lipsticked smile. Until she took a deep drag off a cigarette.

"We're fine, thank you, ma'am," Brennan said. "Sorry to bother you."

The woman exhaled smoke from her nose. She flicked her cigarette into the gra.s.s and tapped out the glowing cinder with her shiny patent-leather pump. "No bother at all! Won't y'all come inside and call someone who can come pick y'all up? It's too late to be wandering around."

Y'all. She sounded like a native. "No thank you, ma'am," I said. "Sorry again."

But she'd already opened the door into her kitchen. Out wafted a warm cloud of heaven: soft yellow light flickering from the fireplace, the scent of baking chocolate chip cookies. I closed my eyes and inhaled long, cozy conversations with my Nina.

"Come on in, y'all," she drawled. "Y'all look like y'all could use a little mothering."

The way she said it made my heart twist. I could use a little mothering. My own mom had been so tough for so long. Soft cookies and soft firelight was exactly what I wanted right now.

"Okay," I said, drifting toward the shaft of warm light dancing from the kitchen.

And then, I saw her.

Nina.

She was inside by the fire, and she was holding out a cup of cocoa, just for me.

"Jalen," she said. "Come in."

I blinked. This was-impossible? How could she be better? How could she be here?

Maybe it was a miracle! This night had been full of strange things after all. Crazier things have happened. My heart sang. "Nina?" I breathed.

She nodded. "Come in."

The way she said it. It was too cold. Not full of honey and light at all. But my heart pulled me forward anyway. "You made cookies?" I asked.

"Sure, Jalen."

"Cookies?" Brennan grabbed my wrist. "I smell bacon!"

"Unh-uh, cinnamon," said Ellie, eyes closed.

Brennan stepped in front of me, grabbed my chin. "Jalen, it's a trick! Wake up, Jalen!"

"Hmmm?" I couldn't pull my eyes away from my Nina sitting at this table. All I wanted was to be inside next to the fire with her and her friend, that nice mama. I could do that, right?

"Jalen, we all smell something different! It's not your Nina. It's a trap! Wake up!"

"Mmmm." My feet moved through the soft gra.s.s. Just a few more steps and I'd be safe inside. Tucked away and warm at last.

"I'm sorry to do this, Jalen."

A smack sounded, and my cheek exploded in white-hot pain. My eyes shot open, orange daggers aimed at Brennan. "What the-"

"Let's go!" Brennan pulled me to the edge of the yard, out of the light and the cozy smells. But I had to pause at the edge of the yard once I heard the screaming.

Nina stood and upturned the kitchen table with a roar, scattering cookies and cocoa. "Cancer, you idiot!" she screamed. The mama person leaned against the house and struck a match off the brick.

Nina thrashed around inside the tiny home, smashing plates and cups. "I told you, we only needed to lure the one kid, not all three! You stingy, stingy thing. This is just like you, Cancer, trying to trap them all!"

The mama-Cancer-took a long drag off a new cigarette and exhaled, the smoke curling through the night sky like an acrid snake. Cancer flicked the lit match in Nina's direction. Nina's skin started bubbling and boiling. Mist rose off her flesh, making her look like an evaporating ghost. I reached out, but Brennan held me back. "Nina!" I shouted.

She turned and saw us still in the yard-Dillon sitting, jaw hanging open. Brennan gripping my elbow at the edge of the light. And Ellie, alone near the door.