Mom nods. “I started my tour with Jabel, but after a few months I decided…” Here she pauses for breath. “I decided I didn’t want to go back to the pride.”
I straighten. “How come I never knew this?”
Her lips twist. “Clearly, I came back. I didn’t need everyone to know that it took a bit of arm-twisting.”
Then I get it. I understand who did the arm-twisting. “Dad,” I say.
Her smile softens. “He never toured, you know. There wasn’t any point. He never wanted to be anything but draki.” Her lips wobble and she touches my cheek. “You’re a lot like him.” Sighing, she drops her hand. “Anyway, he visited me once a month in Oregon…and every time he tried to persuade me to come home with him.” Her smile grows bleak. “He made it very difficult.”
She looks me squarely in the face. “I wanted to get away from the pride, Jacinda. Even then. It was never for me, but your dad didn’t make it easy. So I ran. I came here.”
“Here?”
“I figured your dad wouldn’t find me here.”
I rub one of my arms. My skin already feels dry and chalky. “I should think not.”
“Almost at once my draki began to wither. Even when I broke down and risked flight a few times, it wasn’t easy to manifest. It was working. I was on my way to becoming human.”
“But you went back.”
“I finally faced reality. I wanted to give up the pride, but I missed your father. He couldn’t live without being a draki, and I couldn’t live without him.”
I stare out at the water’s surface, still and dead without the faintest ripple of wind, and try to imagine loving someone that much. So much that you would give up all you ever wanted for yourself. Mom did that.
Couldn’t I make a sacrifice for those I loved? For Mom and Tamra? I’d already lost Dad.
Did I really want to lose them, too?
The hunter, Will, flashes in my mind just then. I don’t know why. Maybe it was because he let me go. He didn’t even know me, but he let me go…even though he was trained to do the opposite. He fought what doubtlessly came naturally to him. Hunting and destroying my kind. If he could break from his world, then I could break from mine. I could be that strong.
Mom’s voice rolls over me. “I know it’s hard to accept right now. That’s why I chose this town. The desert will take care of things for you. Eventually.”
Eventually. I only have to wait until my draki is dead. Will I be glad then? Will I thank Mom one day like she seems to think?
She squeezes my knee. “Come inside. I want to go over some things with you and your sister before we enroll you in school.”
My chest clenches at this, but I stand, thinking about all Mom has given up for me, all she’s lost. And Tamra. She’s never had anything of her own. Maybe it’s finally time.
Time for both of them.
“Jacinda Jones, come up here to the front and introduce yourself.”
My stomach twists at these words. It’s third period, which means it’s the third time I’ve had to do this.
I slide out from my desk, stepping over backpacks as I move to the front of the room to stand beside Mrs. Schulz. Thirty pairs of eyes fasten on me.
Mom enrolled us last Friday. She insisted it was time. That attending high school is the first step to assimilating. The first step to normal. Tamra is thrilled, unafraid, ready for this.
All last night, awake in my bed, sick to my stomach, I thought about today. I thought about the pride and all I was giving up. So what if daylight flight was forbidden? At least I could fly. The rules I chafed against with the pride suddenly pale beside this new reality. I’m not even sure why I resisted Cassian so much anymore. Was it only for Tamra? Or was there something within me other than loyalty to my sister that opposed being with him?
Teenagers surround me. Human teenagers. Hundreds of them. Their voices ring out, loud and nonstop. The air is full of false, cloying scents. A draki’s worst hell.
It’s not that I never expected to live in the outside world. Among humans. I would probably have taken a tour. But no one tours during adolescence. Only as an adult, as a draki strong and fully developed, and never in a desert like this. All for good reason.
I resist the urge to scratch my arm. It’s only spring, but the heat and dryness make my skin itch. Beneath the buzzing fluorescent glare, a sick, wilting sensation coils through me.
Clearing my throat, I speak in rusty tones. “Hi, I’m Jacinda Jones.”
A girl near the front twirls a strand of her hair. “Yeah. We already know that.” She smiles, her lips obscenely glossy.
Mrs. Schulz saves me. “Where are you from?”
Mom drilled these answers into me. “Colorado.”
An encouraging smile. “Lovely, lovely. Do you ski?”
I blink. “No.”
“Where did you go to school?”
Mom covered this, too. “I was homeschooled.” It was the easiest explanation to get us enrolled. We can’t exactly ask the pride to forward my school transcripts.
Several kids laugh outright. The girl twirling her hair rolls her eyes. “Fuh-reak.”
“Enough, Brooklyn.” Mrs. Schulz looks at me again, her expression less welcoming now.
More resigned. Like I just confessed to reading at a first-grade level. “I’m sure that has been an interesting experience.”
Nodding, I start for my desk, but her voice stops me, holds me hostage.
“And you have a twin sister, right?”
I pause, wishing the interrogation would end. “Yes.”
A boy with a patchy red face and small ferret eyes mumbles, “Double the pleasure.”
Other kids laugh. Boys mostly.
Mrs. Schulz doesn’t hear, or pretends not to. Just as well. I want this over so I can slink back to my seat and work at being invisible.
“Thank you, Jacinda. I’m sure you’ll fit right in.”
Sure.
I return to my desk. Mrs. Schulz dives into a one-sided discussion on Antigone. I read the play two years ago. In its original Greek.