Midnight Frost (Mythos Academy #5)(13)
Author: Jennifer Estep

I finally found my voice. "So sorry to disappoint, Viv. But I’m not dead yet."

Oliver’s eyebrows shot up in his face at the realization of who I was talking to.

But Vivian must have been just as surprised to hear my voice as I’d been to hear hers because she didn’t say anything. Instead, I heard a faint rasp-rasp-rasping sound. I frowned. It almost sounded like she was jogging across a lawn or something.

"Well, that’s too bad," Vivian finally sniped. "Do me a favor, though. Put Jason on the phone. I want to tell him exactly what I plan to do to him for his failure to poison you."

I stared down at his body. "That’s going to be a bit difficult, since he’s already dead."

"Good," she snarled. "You’ve saved me the trouble of killing him."

I didn’t respond.

"Oh, come on, now, Gwen," Vivian said. "Why are you looking so glum? You’ve managed to make it through another day. Even if Oliver is the one standing next to you, instead of your precious Logan."

I whirled around, my gaze zooming from one side of the quad to the other. The streetlights along the cobblestone paths cast out golden glows, but shadows cloaked the rest of the area. Still, I knew Vivian was here somewhere – watching me. That was the only way she could have known Oliver was outside with me.

Oliver tapped me on the shoulder. What’s wrong? he mouthed. I shook my head. I didn’t want him darting off and trying to find Vivian. It would be all too easy for her to ambush him – and me too.

"Logan’s fine," I said, trying to make my voice strong and confident. "He’s waiting inside the library for me right now."

"Liar," Vivian countered. "I know he’s not at Mythos anymore. In fact, I know exactly where he is – with Agrona and the rest of the Reapers. She captured him yesterday morning."

Logan captured by the Reapers? It was my nightmare come true all over again. Still, I tried not to let her hear my panic.

"You’re lying."

Vivian laughed. "Sure, go ahead and believe that. Whatever helps you sleep at night, Gwen. Anyway, I gotta go. Catch you later. Or maybe I should just say kill you later."

She laughed again and hung up on me.

Once again, I searched the quad, looking for any movement in the shadows, but I still couldn’t spot her.

"Gwen?" Oliver asked. "Are you okay?"

I whirled around to face him. "Where’s Logan? Where is he right now?"

Oliver shrugged. "He’s with his dad. That’s all I really know. Why?"

I told him everything Vivian had said. Oliver listened, then shook his head.

"Relax, Gwen. Of course, she was lying. She was just trying to rattle you. I was texting with Logan earlier. There’s no way the Reapers have him."

"But how can you be sure it’s really him?" I persisted.

"Because I can tell by his tone and the things we’re talking about. Stuff only Logan would know. So relax, okay? Vivian is just messing with your head. Logan is safe. Trust me."

Oliver put his hands on my shoulders. Sincerity and surety blazed in his green eyes. After a moment, I forced myself to nod. He was right. Vivian was jerking my chain – nothing else.

Oliver bent down, picked up Nyx, and cradled her in the crook of his arm. She let out a happy yip and licked him on the cheek. He rubbed her head a moment before looking at me again.

"Now, come on," he said. "There’s nothing else we can do here. We both know Vivian is long gone. So let’s go back inside, find Nickamedes, and tell him what happened."

Oliver was right, but that didn’t keep me from searching the quad a final time for the Reaper girl before sighing and following him up the steps and back inside.

Oliver and I made it back to the main part of the library. Coach Ajax, Aiko, and a few other Protectorate guards had converged in the center of the room and were examining the part of the aisle where I’d fought the Reaper. Nickamedes stood behind the counter, talking on his phone. Ajax nodded his head at me and Oliver. We waved back at the big, burly coach.

Most of the students had cleared out, and the few who remained were gathering up their things. Helena Paxton shot me a pointed, nasty look as she picked up her book – the one I’d hit the Reaper with – from where I’d dropped it on the floor. I ignored her. I had other things to worry about right now – like why Jason had tried to poison me.

Okay, okay, so I knew why. Well, sort of. The Reapers wanted me dead because they had this strange idea that I was going to kill Loki – something that Nike believed, as well. If I was dead, then obviously I wouldn’t even get the chance to try to kill Loki – as if I even knew how I was supposed to do that in the first place.

No, what I really wondered was why now? Why here, tonight, in the library? Why had it suddenly become so important to murder me? But in the end, I supposed it didn’t really matter. Jason wasn’t the first Reaper who’d tried to kill me, and he wouldn’t be the last.

Still, I eyed my poisoned water bottle. It was sitting on the counter where Jason had left it. If I hadn’t been upset, if I hadn’t gone up to the second-floor balcony, if I hadn’t seen what he was doing, I might have picked up the bottle and chugged down the rest of the water before my psychometry kicked in. Then, I would have been as dead as Jason was. This wasn’t the first time I’d escaped death, but the knowledge that it could have just as easily been me lying outside on the quad made me shiver all the same.

Vic’s eye snapped open at the shuddering motion that swept through my body. I was still clutching the sword, and he looked at me, then at the water bottle.

"You fought well tonight, Gwen," he said, picking up on my dark thoughts. "You did what you had to in order to survive – that’s all. And there was nothing you could have done to change that boy’s mind."

"Vic’s right," Oliver chimed in. "The Reaper made his choice – not you."

Nyx let out a low, serious yip, agreeing with them. The wolf pup was still secure in the Spartan’s arms.

I shrugged. Maybe that was true, but it didn’t feel that way. Yes, I’d wanted to kill Jason, but now that he was gone, I just felt hollow and empty inside. A boy was dead because of me – but not in the way I’d expected.

Oh, I’d killed Reapers before in battle, and I’d even used my psychometry to pull all of the magic, all of the life, out of Preston Ashton so I could heal the mortal wound he’d given me. I’d done those things in the heat of the moment, because it had been them or me, and I’d just wanted to survive, like Vic had said. But this – this was different. Jason had free will, the same free will we all had, the same free will that Nike and Metis were always going on and on and on about. But I’d forced him to make a choice between surrendering or death – and he’d chosen death. I didn’t know if that made things better or worse, but right now, it felt like worse.