thought it was still in the Hummer. It was probably shallow of me, but I spent quite a few minutes stressing that if my purse was lost I'd have to get a new driver's license and cell phone, and wondered briefly if I'd remember the exact right shade of the cool Ulta lip gloss I was going to have to replace.
Sometime after I put on the scrubs (while Darius's back was turned) and started worrying about my purse being missing, I realized I was sitting on the bed staring off into space and almost falling asleep.
"How are you feeling?" Darius asked. "You look..." His words trailed off as I'm sure he tried and vetoed words like "crappy" and "hideous."
"I look tired?" I volunteered helpfully.
He nodded. "You do."
"Well, that's a not-so-amazing coincidence because I am tired. Really tired."
"Perhaps we should wait and--"
"No!" I interrupted. "I meant it when I said I wanted to go. Plus, there's no way I can get any real sleep as long as we're here. I just don't feel safe."
"Agreed," Darius said. "You aren't safe. None of us are safe."
Unspoken was the understanding that we would still not be safe even if we managed to get away from the House of Night, but it was better for morale if neither of us mentioned that.
"Alright, let's get the others," I said.
I checked the clock on the wall before we left the room and realized that it was a little after 4:00 A.M. It was a shock to see how much time had passed, especially since I must have been out for several hours, even though I didn't feel rested at all. If things were normal at the House of Night, fledglings should be finished with classes. "Hey," I told Darius, "it's about dinnertime. They might be in the cafeteria."
He nodded, moved the propped-up chair, and opeuo;t y z3ned the door slowly.
"Hallway's empty," he murmured.
While he'd been peeking down the hall, I'd been checking him out. So, instead of following him out of the room, I grabbed his sleeve and held him back. He gave me a questioning look.
"Uh, Darius, I'm thinking that we really need to change clothes before we make a grand entrance in the middle of the cafeteria, or even my dorm. I mean, you're more than a little bloody, and I'm wearing what looks like a big green trash bag. We're not exactly inconspicuous."
Darius glanced down at himself, taking in the dried blood that was splattered all down his shirt and jacket. The blood plus the newly closed laceration on his face plus my hospital scrubs definitely equaled conspicuous, a conclusion Darius obviously came to easily.
"Let's take the stairs up to the next floor. That's where the Sons of Erebus are housed. I'll change, then get you quickly to your dorm so you can be rid of those." He gestured at my outfit. "If we get lucky we'll find Aphrodite and the Twins in the dorm and will just have to scout out Damien and then slip from the school grounds."
"Sounds good. I never thought you'd hear me say that I was looking forward to getting back to those tunnels, but right now that feels like the best place to be," I said.
Darius grunted what I assumed was guy language for agreeing with me, and I followed him into the hall, which really was deserted. It was just a short way to the stairwell. Okay, going up a flight of steps just about did me in, and I ended up leaning heavily on Darius's arm. I could tell by the worried glint in his eyes that he was seriously considering picking me up and would have (despite my protests) if we hadn't gotten to the next floor about then.
"So," I said between gasps, "is it always this quiet up here?"
"No," Darius said grimly. "It's not." We passed a common area that had a fridge, a big, flat- screen TV, some comfy couches, and a bunch of guy stuff like free weights, a dartboard, and a pool table. It, too, was deserted. His face set into unreadable lines, Darius led me to one of the many doors that opened off the hall.
His room was just about as I'd imagined a Son of Erebus's room would be--clean and simple, with hardly any knickknacks. He did have some trophies that were for winning knife-throwing competitions, and a whole collection of Christopher Moore's hardback books, but no framed pictures of friends or family, and the only art on the