Untamed House of Night - By Kristin Cast Page 0,46
you needed one." "Thanks," I said through a full mouth.
Aphrodite grimaced at me, delicately plucked a fry off my plate, and then plopped down on her bed. She let me eat for a while and then, in a voice that was uncharacteristically hesitant, she asked, "So, you kissed him before he died?"
I couldn't look at her, and the burger suddenly tasted like cardboard. "Yeah, I kissed him."
"Are you okay?"
"No," I said softly. "Something happened between us and . . ." My voice trailed away as I couldn't find the words.
"What are you going to do about him?"
I did look up at her then. "He's dead. There's nothing--" I stopped. How could I have forgotten? Of course Stark's being dead wasn't necessarily the end of things, not at this House of Night, not lately. And then I remembered the rest of it. "I told him," I said.
"About?"
"That it might not be the end for him. Before he was gone, I told him that lately fledglings have been dying and then coming back from the dead to go through a different kind of Change."
"Which means if he does come back, one of his first thoughts will be of you, and the fact that you told him that death might not be the end for him. Let's hope Neferet isn't there to hear him."
My stomach clenched, partially with hope and partially with fear. "Well, what would you have done? Let him die in your arms without saying anything to him?"
She sighed. "I don't know. Probably not. You care about him, don't you?"
"Yeah, I do. I'm not sure why. I mean, sure he is, uh I mean was a hot guy. But he told me stuff before he died and we kinda connected." I tried to remember exactly what all Stark had told me, but it was all jumbled up with kissing him and watching him bleed to death in my arms. I shivered and took a long drink of brown pop.
"So, what are you going to do about him?" she persisted.
"Aphrodite, I don't know! Am I supposed to march down to the morgue and ask the Sons of Erebus to let me in so I can sit with Stark until he maybe comes back alive?" As I said it, I realized that's exactly what I wished I could do.
"That's probably not a good idea," she said.
"We don't know what happens, how fast, or if it will at all." I paused, thinking. "Wait, you said you saw Stark in one of my death visions, right?"
"Yeah."
"So what was on his face? A blue crescent, a red crescent, or full red tattoos?"
She hesitated. "I don't know."
"How can you not know? You said you recognized him from your vision."
"I did. I remember his eyes and that sinfully hot mouth of his."
"Don't talk about him like that," I snapped.
She actually looked guilty. "Sorry, I didn't mean anything. He really got to you, didn't he?"
"Yes. He got to me. So try to remember what he looked like in your vision."
She chewed he lip. "I don't remember hardly anything. I just got a quick glimpse of him." My heart was beating hard, and my head was dizzy from the sudden rush of hope that washed over me. "But that means he's not really dead. Or at least not all the way dead. You saw him in a vision of the future, so he has to be around in the future. He's coming back!"
"Not necessarily," she said gently. "Zoey, the future is fluid--it's always changing. I mean, I saw you die twice. Once alone because you were isolated from your friends. Well, they're back to being your moronic Three Musketeers." She paused and added, "Sorry. I know you've been through a bunch of shit tonight. I didn't mean to sound so hateful. But here's the deal. Because the nerd--I mean because you're not isolated anymore, the Zoey-being-killed-alone vision is probably null and void. See, the future changed. When I had the vision that Stark was in at that time he might have been going to live. That could be all changed now."
"But not necessarily?"
"Not necessarily," she agreed reluctantly. "But don't get your hopes up. I'm just Vision Girl, not an expert on stuff like fledglings coming back alive."
"Then what we need is an expert on this whole dead/undead thing." I tried not to sound too hopeful, but I could tell by the sad way Aphrodite looked at me that I wasn't hiding much from her.