Foretold Page 9

  I flip through the magazine, the reality of what I’m going to Theban Group to do, to learn, hitting me again. “Do you mind if I borrow this?”

  “Go for it. I have a ton of back issues at the dorm, too, that you can borrow. I collect them. Re-read them constantly. My mom always calls Fortnight Foresight a tabloid rag, but honestly, it’s the best way to keep up with what’s happening in the scrying world.”

  “What’s happening in the scrying world,” I repeat. Regan takes it for a question.

  “Oh, you know, some old predictions came true recently, and there were a few new biggies announced, but those’ll take a hot second to happen so who knows. There was an article on new scrying techniques in this issue, too… I mean, yeah, there’s some Oracle gossip in there too, but it’s not a tabloid.”

  “Ah. Right. Your mom is a scryer?” I ask.

  “Nah. Her mom was, though, so she knows all about it. Skips a generation in my mom’s family, and only girls get the gift. My dad’s side was just him and some rando ancestor further up the family tree.”

  “How did you find about this place? Did your family tell—”

  “Uhm… I’ve legit always known about this place. My mom’s side of the family, back when my grandma was young, moved into the big HQ for a job her dad got here. That was like a gabillion years ago. But since my mom isn’t a scryer, I didn’t grow up on-site. I’ve been inside, though, back when I was a baby, but I don’t remember it at all. My mom says my Dad brought me here to show me off…” She trails off.

  I open my bag to stash Regan’s magazine with a smile of thanks.

  “Ugh, is that the MV-77?” she asks, pointing to the paperwork poking out of my bag. “How’d you do with it? Disaster. I binge ate an entire box of chocolates after filling it out.”

  I glance down and push the form back in. “Good, I hope. Lot of weird questions.”

  “Weird with a capital ‘W,’ for sure.”

  I debate asking the question I’ve been kicking around. I couldn’t find anything in Pict’s books about it, but I worry how my ignorance will be received by this girl. Will she laugh at me? She seems the type to laugh at everything, but maybe not maliciously?

  “Can I ask a dumb question?”

  “I live for dumb questions.”

  “Okay. Where do our…” I lower my voice. “Abilities, or whatever, come from?” I pause, a cringe waiting in the wings of my blank expression. She doesn’t laugh, though.

  “My grandma always said it was a gift from the gods, and all that,” she says, affecting a booming deity-like voice. “Mom says my dad always called it a curse. I don’t know. I read a pretty cool article on this stuff a while back in Fortnight Foresight—see, not a tabloid rag, Mom. It had some panel of scryer scientists. Most of them said it was maybe hypersensitive instincts or something. That people’s brains are forever filling in blanks all day long, in the background, in the subconscious, but our brains just go the extra mile and let us see things in our conscious mind, or fragments of things, or whatever. Some other lady disagreed and said she thinks it’s actually something about our tie to the Coil instead… or something. I can’t remember. But whatever, the others all laughed at her, anyhow.” She shrugs and grins. “Whatever it is, we’re so badass, I can’t even stand it.”

  We pull up to Theban Group’s blink-and-you’ll-miss-it entrance, and everyone rushes to disembark into the brick alleyway. The bus driver assures me she’ll see my bags in, and Regan hooks an arm under my own, pulling me along. “You have a badge, right? God, your pic looks like mine. Deer in the headlights. It’s ridic they don’t give you any warning. Look, I’m a hot mess in mine, too.”

  Theodore, the sleepy Santa, checks all badges and gives us the combination to the elevator. As I pass his desk, he winks one heavily-browed eye. “Nice to see you again, Ms. Morai. Seven-eight-two today.”

  We file through the cubicle room, with Regan whispering she’d rather die than take a job in this area of Theban Group, and the first batch of our group passes into the elevator. I look around as the doors close behind them and we wait our turn.

  “How do the jobs get assigned?”

  “The Agon. There’s tests and stuff,” Regan says.

  The elevator doors open, and the rest of us file in. One of the boys waves me in. He smiles, calling even more attention to the wispy and pitiful collection of hair strewn across his upper lip. “After you, princess. Thanks for the colossal time suck.”

  I grimace, and Regan rolls her eyes. “Shut up, Dill. Just enter the code,” she says.

  He punches in the code, and the back panel of the elevator door opens on the stained glass-domed expanse.

  “Isn’t this the coolest? This is the friggin coolest,” Regan says. “This is ours now!”

  Friggin coolest doesn’t even begin to cover it. The boy’s verbal jab fades to the farthest corner of my mind as I lift my face to that jewel-hued dome. It was real. This was real. I shake my head and laugh out loud, Regan joining me. My eyes feel as if they’ve grown three times their size just to take it all in once more, and my hummingbird heartbeat is out of control as we move through the colorful caravans, Regan pointing out all the retail therapy targets she plans on hitting.

  We emerge from the caravan crush a few moments later, and a gaunt drill sergeant of a woman approaches from beyond the fountain, the light rotunda crowd parting for her. She’s followed closely by a heavily armed guard.

  “Hey, what’s the deal with the guys in green?” I ask Regan as we slow to a halt, watching the woman approach.

  “Oh, the security guys? Not everyone loves peeps who can see the future. Wasn’t too long ago they were motherflipping burning us at stakes,” Regan says cheerfully.

  The woman nears. Her dark pantsuit is crisply pressed, and she has a face like a hairless cat topped by an iron-colored helmet of hair. The sharp edges of that bob saw at the dark hollows beneath her cheekbones as she moves.

  “Come with me, if you please,” she says. “I know not all of you have settled into your dorms yet due to a minor inconvenience—” Here she stares directly at me. “—but Orientation is about to begin. You can address your housing after your mentor meetings. If you still need a room assignment, you can visit Scryer Services then. We’ll have it sorted for you.”

  She turns on her heel and stomps away. We shuffle after her.

  “That’s Agatha Triggs,” Regan whispers. “She’s Welborne’s right hand. Fortnight Foresight did a profile on her last year. I have that issue upstairs if you want to read up.” Regan proceeds to recite everything she can recall from said article as we trail Triggs and the others farther into the guts of a building that doesn’t make any sense.

  I only got a taste of it on my last visit, and that was with the sands of shock thrown in my eyes. A second viewing doesn’t make it any less disorienting. My surroundings are definitely weirder as we walk deeper into the building. Different styles, architectural details, and time periods are knitted together thoughtlessly, as if the original building swallowed up its neighbors with every expansion. Modern museum-like expanses give way to cramped, damp cellars, which in turn open to a vast library. We pass through the library into a cave-like space. I’m about to point out that the distance between us and our group has grown a good amount when Regan squeals, stopping me in my tracks.

  “Oooh, this has to be… Yes! This is the Momentorium!” Regan shouts. “I read about this place!”

  “Momentorium?”

  Beyond the point where the rough cave walls end, a long red gallery begins, stretching ahead of us. Pedestals topped with glass display cases, lit from within, line both sides of the crimson rug running the length of the hall. Framed mirrors in every size, material, and shape hang haphazardly on every bare spot of the high walls and even on the ceiling, giving the place the feeling of a majestic but eerie funhouse. Our steps slow as we take it all in.

  Regan races into the center of the room as the last of our group departs the other end, an
d she peers at the contents of the glass box atop one of the pedestals; a small charm dangles from a chain and glints as it catches the light. “Holy crap. This is the pendulum Godfrey Royce used to scry out the European start of the Black Death in the 1300s!”

  “How do you know that?” I gaze at her in admiration.

  She smiles cheekily. “There’s a sign.”

  I peer in closer. “Oh, he died right after this prediction.”

  “Yeah, of the Black Death,” Regan says.

  I nod and bite back a smile. She notices.

  “Funny, right? Just because you see the train coming doesn’t mean you can get out of the way.” She roams farther into the echoing gallery, leaving me to chew on that.

  “Ogham staves!” Regan says, pointing at some underwhelming notched sticks. “Altan Dar used them to predict Caesar’s sacking of Alexandria!” She pinballs from display to display, exclaiming over anything that captures her attention.

  “This is the mirror Detective Niyati Patel used when she was hunting that serial killer. The dude who was mounting heads on his walls? She was such a badass.”

  “Should I be worried you’re so into disease, war, and serial killers?” I ask, attempting to joke as I trail after her.

  “Oh. My. God. Come quick!” Regan wildly waves me over. I look into the display, and dramatically lit up is… a dog-eared copy of a small furniture catalog. “I’m totally fangirling out.” She wriggles her hands at the wrists and jumps up and down. “This is what Tuck Bryson used to predict the script that got him his award for Best Director!”

  “Okay…”

  “I know what you’re thinking, bibliomancy isn’t the sexiest way to scry, but he makes it look sooooo good,” Regan says with a huge sigh.

  She has no clue what I was thinking, since I’ve never heard of Tuck Bryson. She must see something in my expression, though, because she grimaces. “Do I sound like a lunatic? You must think I’m mental. It’s just… this place!” She wheels around, arms wide. “I’ve dreamt of being here for years. Years and years and years. I count crystal balls instead of sheep when I sleep. I’ve read legit everything I can get my hands on about scrying. About Theban. Every scryer biography. Studied the Oracles like a psycho ex-girlfriend. Everything on the rituals, on the craft. My dad used to yell at me when he’d catch me reading them under the blankets with a flashlight, but I didn’t care. I wanted to be… this! This is everything,” she says fiercely, as her eyes mist. She laughs and wipes at them self-consciously.

  I awkwardly pat her arm, simultaneously wanting to erase her embarrassment and understanding the feeling of wanting to be someone else. Someone better.

  “I know, I’m a tool. I was even super sure I’d marry Bastian Welborne someday.” At my look, she says, “Welborne. Like Sebastian Welborne? The Sebastian Welborne? Jordan Welborne’s so-hot-your-teeth-sweat son. You don’t know who that is?”

  I open my mouth and close it, shrugging helplessly.

  “You are so lucky you met me.” Regan laughs, no trace of tears to be found now. She once again links arms with me and pulls me along. “Strap in, chickadee. Your education is about to begin.”

  Chapter 10

  Enormous windows drench the Orientation reception room in sunshine. I stand on my toes to see if I can spot Regan at one of the elaborate buffet tables or among the laughing faces that pass, but the riptide of the mingling crowds separated us not long after we entered. It’s fine. You don’t really know her, so you don’t need her.

  I return my attention to the small group of big personalities I’ve washed up on the fringes of like driftwood.

  “You okay?” the girl closest to me—Tessa—asks. She reminds me of a sunflower, with her short yellow-blonde hair and all the inches she has on me height-wise. And she’s outwardly super confident when eyes are on her. But I notice her shoulders keep rolling forward slightly, as if that self-conscious hunch is her real natural state. She gives me a kind smile with a mouth full of braces.

  I blow out a breath and smooth a hand down my black tee and pants, wishing I had dressed up… or down… or differently. Or just that I was different. “Yeah, just… this is…” I widen my eyes, and Tessa understands immediately.

  She looks around us and then whispers, “I’ve had nightmares every day for ages, worrying I’ll do something to mess this up.” The girl next to her draws her attention, and Tessa squeezes my arm in support before turning.

  Here and there, I try to double-dutch my way into their conversation, but mainly I just contribute well placed nods and half-smiles—nothing to draw too much attention. I’ve mastered melting into my surroundings over the years. Only thing tripping me up right now are the askew veggie platters on the table near the door. I’ve straightened them twice now, but people keep bumping them out of place.

  This worry is not real. You do not need to straighten those dumb platters. They won’t make a difference. Get a hold of yourself.

  No one knows me here. No one knows what I used to be like or what I’ve become. No one knows about my stupid urges. I can reinvent myself, create my own mythology… take the training wheels off of Mrs. O’s “fake it until you make it” theory and pretend I’m a confident, bubbly… I would excuse myself from the group, but no one is paying attention to me anyway, so I just march to the table and push the offending platters into place.

  Dad didn’t want me with Aunt Bree. He thinks I’m at a camp. What if he finds out? Why didn’t he want me with her? A thought occurs, one that should have long before now: does he know about this scrying thing? How do I ask him without letting him know I directly disobeyed him? And who the hell is Madame Grey anyway? What was she hinting at about Theban Group? It’s too late to turn back now. Or maybe not? This place is so far outside my comfort zone I can barely see it from here, but it’s technically only a handful of subway stops from my house. I need, suddenly and fiercely, to get out.

  No. I’m here to help Colin, his sweet smile in the moonlight. I’m here to help Mrs. O, to save her place. You’re doing this for them, you coward. Fake it until you make it.

  “Is this stuff that good?” a boy asks. I back away from the platters, glad he’s mistaken me for a glutton instead of pinning down what I was really doing. I give a small pursed smile, hoping it’ll pass for an answer.

  He has a collection of perfectly fine features—smooth warm brown skin, broad forehead, straight nose, eyes the color of weak tea—but combined they give him a kind of social camouflage I’m almost jealous of. He’s wiry, but not so much it’s super noticeable, and he’s wearing jeans and a faded canary polo shirt, a color that also helps the eye skip over him like a stone on water. He hesitates, clearly as comfortable starting conversations as I am, and runs a hand over his short sable hair before saying, “Sorry, I wasn’t groaking you. Just saw you came back a third time.”

  “Groaking?”

  “Ah, yeah… my great-grandma lived with us, so sometimes my vocab can be extra special,” he stammers. “It means, like, staring at someone eating and…you’re Cassie Morai, right? I was on the bus your aunt sent.” He points to the badge strung around his neck. “I’m Noah.”

  “I’m kind of obsessed with a board game where ‘extra special vocab’ words come in handy. You’ll have to toss a few my way,” I say, trying to set him at ease even though I’m barely there myself.

  I tell him about Trivinometry and we exchange pleasantries, the dance of two gawky souls in an unfamiliar place robotically latching onto a point of intersection in one another. I took for granted how easy it was gelling with Regan, since she handled the heavy lifting. I look around, wondering where my social grease went.

  “Oh my God, there you are! If I had to spend a second more with those awful guys, I’d die.” Regan rushes up to us, her face flushed with excitement and pure drama. She launches into a hug. I stiffen before hugging her back with the teensiest amount of relief. “They’re not all awful, probably. The guys, I mean. But you know what they say—you are who you s
tay with. I try not to be judgy, but if they’re hanging around with Griffin, then they must be idiots too.” She gestures toward a group of boys posted up by a shrimp display boasting a Poseidon ice sculpture. I only recognize Dill by what Regan called his pedophile ’stache. I have no clue which one might be the offensive Griffin or what he’s done to rile Regan up.

  “Regan, this is…” I turn, but Noah has melted away, no hint of pale canary yellow in the crowd to betray where he went.

  “Could he be any more gorgeous?” Regan asks. I look over, baffled by her Griffin-change-of-heart, before realizing that she’s fixated on someone in the complete opposite direction.

  “Who?”

  “That snack, my friend, is Sebastian Welborne.”

  There are about twenty people in the direction she’s pointing, but I know instantly which one is Sebastian. He’s leaning his shoulder against a doorway, his legs and arms crossed nonchalantly but his green eyes, chips of sharpened sea glass, are watching, waiting. I know he’s a little older than me from Regan’s gossip, but he seems even older surrounded by that giggling gaggle.

  Sebastian dips his head to listen to what one of the girls next to him is saying, and the guy to her left shoots eye daggers at her for the crime of capturing Sebastian’s notice for a split second. There are five of them there, gladiators fighting for a haughty king’s eye, armed with biting quips they blurt out while anxiously watching Sebastian for his reactions; I can tell in the way their laughter erupts and dies almost as quickly. There’s even an outer ring of hangers-on whose constant glances tell a tale of longing for the right opening in the conversation, or just for the courage, to penetrate that inner circle.

  Gross. All of it.

  I mean, I get the physical appeal, I guess. He’s solidly built, with shortly cropped dark blond hair. And despite his obvious arrogance, he has a mouth that makes you think of first kisses. I probably shouldn’t notice, but his arm muscles bunch up nicely under his blue button down. But since my mom died, I’ve had a lot of time to watch people at school. Guys like him… okay, there are no guys like him at my school, but all of the popular boys have that same obnoxious “worship me” energy. And the desperation radiating off of the ones fawning over him? All for the crumbs of someone’s attention? Seen that before, too. So sad.