Tormen - By Lauren Kate Page 0,64

the dark-glorious golden wings, too. Steven was magnetic and charming, just like Cam--and, she reminded herself, just like literally steamed--but the dark-glorious golden wings, too. Steven was magnetic and charming, just like Cam--and, she reminded herself, just like Cam, a demon.

"Why are you helping me with this?"

"Because I don't want you to get hurt," Steven barely whispered.

"Did that really happen?"

Steven looked away. "It's a representation of something. And who knows how distorted it is. It's a shadow of a past event, not reality. There is always some truth to the Announcer, but it's never the simple truth. That's what makes Announcers so problematic, and so dangerous to those without proper training." He glanced at his watch. From below them came the sound of the door opening and closing on the landing. Steven sti ened when he heard a quick set of high heels clicking up the stairs.

Francesca.

Luce tried to read Steven's face. He handed her The Republic, which she slipped into her backpack. Just before Francesca's beautiful face appeared in the doorway, Steven said to Luce, "The next time you and Shelby choose not to complete one of your assignments, I will ask you to write a ve-page research paper with citations. This time, I let you o with a warning."

"I understand." Luce caught Francesca's eye in the doorway.

She smiled at Luce--though whether it was an o -you-go dismissal smile or a don't-think-you're-fooling-me-kid smile, it was impossible to tell. Trembling a little as she stood and ung her bag over her shoulder, Luce made for the door, calling back to Steven, "Thank you."

Shelby had the re going in the hearth when Luce got back to her dorm room. The hot pot was plugged in next to the Buddha night-light and the whole room smelled like tomatoes.

"We were out of mac and cheese, but I made you some soup." Shelby ladled out a piping-hot bowlful, cracked some fresh black pepper on top, and brought it over to Luce, who'd collapsed on top of her bed. "Was it terrible?"

Luce watched the steam rise from her bowl and tried to gure out what to say. Bizarre, yes. Confusing. A little scary. Potentially ... empowering.

But it hadn't been terrible, no.

"It was okay." Steven seemed to trust her, at least to the extent that he was going to allow her to continue summoning the Announcers. And the other students seemed to trust him, even admire him. No one else acted concerned about his motives or his allegiances. But with Luce he was so cryptic, so di cult to read.

Luce had trusted the wrong people before. A careless pursuit at best. At worst, it's a good way to get yourself killed. That was what Miss Sophia had said about trust the night she'd tried to murder Luce.

It was Daniel who'd advised Luce to trust her instincts. But her own feelings seemed the most unreliable. She wondered whether Daniel had already known about Shoreline when he'd told her that, whether his advice was a way to prepare her for this long separation, when she would become less and less certain about everything in her life. Her family. Her past. Her future.

She looked up from the bowl at Shelby. "Thanks for the soup."

"Don't let Steven thwart your plans," Shelby hu ed. "We should totally keep working on the Announcers. I am just so sick of these angels and demons and their power trips. `Oooh, we know better than you because we're full-on angels and you're just the bastard child of some angel who got his rocks o .' "

Luce laughed, but she was thinking that Steven's mini-lecture on Plato and giving her The Republic tonight was the opposite of a power trip. Of course, there was no telling Shelby that now, not when she'd dropped into her usual I'm-on-a-tirade-against-Shoreline routine on Luce's bottom bunk.

"I mean, I know you have whatever going on with Daniel," Shelby continued, "but seriously, what good has an angel ever done for me?"

Luce shrugged apologetically.

"I'll tell you: nothing. Nothing besides knock up my mom and then totally ditch both of us before I was born. Real celestial behavior." Shelby snorted. "The kicker is, my whole life, my mom's telling me I should be grateful. For what? These watered-down powers and this enormous forehead I inherited from my dad? No thanks." She kicked the top bunk glumly. "I'd give anything to just be normal."

"Really?" Luce had spent the whole week feeling inferior to her Nephilim classmates. She knew the grass was always greener, but this