her in. She’s a bona fide, partially resurrected, once-upon-a-person about our age with clothes shredded to pieces from the natural wear and tear that only several decades could bring. Her dark hair is splayed out like cotton candy, and she looks as if mud baths were a part of her normal routine.
My natural inclination is to take Flynn and Coop by the hand and run the hell out of this demented den of the ungrateful dead, or kill both Hattie and her little monster before they kill us.
“She’s here’s to help.” Flynn holds out a hand in the event Coop is motivated to beat me to the slaughter.
“Which one?” I say it sharp, my voice resonating boldly through the woods. “Because neither of them is human.”
Flynn shakes his head. “This one.” He slaps his arm over the Spectator’s shoulder, and her collarbone spears out as a jagged white shard. “Dude.” Flynn backs up heavy with remorse. “So sorry.”
“How’s it going to help us?” Coop asks, not giving the Spectator any gender-related dignity. I suppose compartmentalizing them is necessary since he’s been assigned to slaughter the malfunctioned scientific ventures. The Counts are morons for trying to immortalize themselves to begin with. Although if they hadn’t, Wes wouldn’t be here and neither would I.
“She’s going to help us locate Hattie’s family,” Flynn says, glancing back at the decomposing being like he’s truly smitten. “She’s got the low-down on the who’s who of Spectator society—says she can locate the right people for the right price.”
“And what price might that be?” I’m almost positive US currency holds as little value in the Spectator underground as it does in the real world.
Flynn cuts a glance from me to Coop, the whites of his eyes reflecting like beacons. “She wants a cure. She’s agreed to undergo any experiment necessary to make her normal again.”
“How old was she when they did this to her?” I walk around her in a slow circle, mostly inspecting her for weaponry.
“Sev-un-teen,” she grunts, barely discernable. “Ma name is Pearl.”
Cooper
Pearl.
I blow a stiff breath from my lungs as I scrutinize the walking corpse with her hair waving in the breeze like threads unraveling from a sweater. She seems harmless enough with her large bruised eyes, her lips split in three places. Her fingers have reduced to bone, making her look older than the seventeen years she proposed.
A horrible sadness grips me as I inspect what the Counts are capable of. Pearl is a walking example of why the Countenance needs to be stopped. This could easily be me one day, Marky. And now they want the Spectators eliminated for simply being an inconvenience. All that the Spectators want is their lives back. The Celestra involved were never allowed to choose whether or not they wanted to be resurrected. They were simply murdered and brought back to life like some D minus science experiment.
“Do you belong to Countenance?” I ask point blank. I’m not sure if it’ll matter to Ezrina, the troll-like creature who works for the Counts, but in the end I’d like to know whom I’m dealing with.
“Celestra.” She glances down as if it were a defeat to mention it.
“Even better.” Laken wraps her arm around my waist from behind, using me as a shield in the event the creatures in our presence decide to go ape shit.
“I like the idea of saving a Celestra rather than a Count,” she says. The words vibrate over my spine like an erotic Morse code. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” She whispers hot in my ear.
“We’ll take her to the Transfer tonight.” I give a slight nod. “Flynn, why don’t you take Hattie back to Austen, and we’ll meet up with you guys in the morning. Good work, man.” I add that last part with sincerity and hit him with a knuckle bump.
If Ezrina has the ability to restore Pearl to her former glory then it might spare me of having to eradicate an entire race, not to mention, it would free the Tobias family.
Coop, Laken presses into me, still peering from over my shoulder. I may have tried to kill our fake friend Hattie earlier by way of cooking utensils.
It takes everything in me to hold back the laugh brewing in my chest.
“Apologize,” I cough it out. The last thing we want is for the Fem to know we’re onto her.
Laken steps out from behind just as they head back toward the dorms.
“Hattie, Flynn?” Her voice sounds fragile, still apprehensive as to