keep from crying, “what are you involved with? What the hell is going on?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
There was a sound in the hallway, and we all looked toward the door.
“May I come in?” Gregor asked.
“Yeah,” Turk said.
But he didn’t move until I croaked, “Okay.”
Then he walked over to us stiffly.
“Mom, Dad, this is Gregor Dimitru. Gregor, these are my folks, Jack and Beth Elliot.”
Gregor bowed to my mother. Then he took Dad’s hand.
“Rest beneath the shadow of my wings,” he said.
His accent was thick the way it was when he was angry.
“You are all right?” he asked Turk. “No one told me you were hurt. No one—”
“What do you want?” Turk asked.
“This morning I received a phone call,” Gregor said. “It was in class, so I did not answer it. But I do not get phone calls, so I listen when class is over. Someone I do not know tells me you are here, and I come.”
“And why would someone tell you?” Dad asked in his lawyer voice.
“Because I help with the center of arts,” Gregor said. “And because of what I am.”
“And what exactly would that be?” Dad asked.
“I am a noble of Burgundy,” Gregor said. “Of the Dimitru-Dracul line. Do you know what that means, sir?”
“Not yet. But you’re going to tell me,” Dad said.
Gregor wasn’t intimidated.
“It means that I have power among the jenti. This attack on these two was a warning to them, and an insult to me. A very great insult.”
“Back up,” Dad said. “Why would anyone do this? What’s really going on?”
But just then Ileana and Justin came in.
Ileana looked like a queen. A very serious queen. She looked around the room, took us all in, then came over to my bed and said, “Dear Cody, I am so—”
But Gregor had leapt on Justin and was holding him against the wall.
“I am going to buy myself a dog, Warrener. A large dog. Then I am going to tear out your throat and feed it to him. The rest of you, I will send to your friends. That will be my answer to the Mercians.”
“Let go of him, Gregor,” Ileana said.
Justin didn’t even try to fight back.
“Go ahead,” he said. “I deserve it.”
“What?” I croaked.
A couple of nurses came in to tell us to shut up.
Dad went over and closed the door to the room.
“Okay,” he said. “I’m a lawyer, and that’s my son in that bed. And I want answers now.” He crossed his arms and leaned against the door. “Cody, Turk, I’ll start with you. What’s going on in Crossfield?”
Neither of us could talk for long. We took turns filling Dad in on the mill, the break-in, the scratches over the storeroom. I told him about the Dumpsters. Turk covered the help from Ms. Vukovitch.
“Thank you,” Dad said. “Now, which of the three of you can explain most quickly why my son and my niece have been beaten?”
“He can,” Gregor said, looking at Justin. “Ask him now, while he still has his throat.”
“Mr. Elliot, I’ll tell you everything I can,” Justin said. “But I don’t know all of it. I’m new in the Mercians. All I know for sure is they don’t want the arts center to open. Partly it’s because it’s in Crossfield. But I’m pretty sure there’s more to it than that. There has to be. Otherwise, this would never have happened.”
“And what exactly is a Mercian, Mr. Warrener?” Dad said.
“A kind of organization some of the old English jenti families belong to,” Justin said. “You have to be invited to join. They asked me just a couple of months ago.”
“Congratulations,” Dad said. “Now, apart from beating teenaged children into unconsciousness, what are the activities of this group?”
“It’s just supposed to keep an eye on things,” Justin said. “Make sure nothing bad happens in New Sodom. Back in the old days, they were the jenti militia. Now it’s more of a social group. Like the Masons.”
“So this social group that seeks the betterment of New Sodom decided that an arts center represented a threat to the community, and that the way to prevent its opening was to put my son and my niece in fear for their lives, is that correct?” Dad said.
You could tell he was furious by how calm he was.
“It’s not really like that,” Justin said.
“Cody didn’t put himself in that bed,” Dad said. “And Turk did not do that to her own face. Which leads to the question, what did you do to help bring this