Dark Frost

For a moment, I just stood there, not quite believing I'd done it, that I'd actually found the dagger. A grin spread across my face, and I wanted to let out a wild whoop of triumph, but I clamped my lips together and pushed those thoughts away. I had other things to focus on, like what to do with the dagger now that I actually had it.

Nickamedes, I thought. I'd go back into the library and show the weapon to Nickamedes. He'd call Metis and Ajax, and then, we could figure out how to hide it again-

"Well, Gypsy," a low voice said behind me. "Thank you so much for finding the dagger for me. I was starting to wonder if you were up to the task."

Something rustled behind me, and I spotted a shadow sliding over the frost, rushing toward me. I whirled around, but it was already too late. The Reaper girl's fist connected with my face, and the world went black.

The first thing I was aware of was the throbbing ache in my cheek.

Pulse, pulse, pulse. It was a slow, steady pain, keeping perfect time to the beat of my heart. It hurt so much, but I focused on the pain, moving past it, shoving it into the back of my mind. Even though things were still fuzzy in my brain, I knew that I was in Big, Big Trouble. I could feel the hate emanating from the other people around me. The ugly emotion pressed down on my chest like a lead weight, suffocating me. I couldn't tell how many of them there were, but they all despised me. My stomach twisted at the rage that just kept flowing off them like waves slamming into the shore.

"Well," a familiar voice said. "I think the Gypsy is finally waking up."

I knew that voice, I thought, still feeling a little dazed, but I couldn't quite believe it was her. She'd seemed so nice, so much like me, but she was a Reaper, and she'd used me to help her find the Helheim Dagger. That much I knew, even if I didn't know exactly how she'd tricked me into doing her bidding.

I opened my eyes to find Vivian Holler perched on the desk in front of me.

"Hello, Gypsy," Vivian said. "Surprised to see me?"

I shook my head, but that just made my face ache even more. I wiggled my jaw, trying to get the worst of the pain over with. Slowly, the sharp, pulsing throbs faded into softer, more manageable twinges, and I was able to look around without a haze of white stars blurring my vision.

I was tied to a chair in an opulent living room filled with dark wooden furniture, antique sofas, and crystal vases full of roses. The overpowering scent of the black and blood-red petals permeated the air, making me gag, but I kept scanning the area. I turned my head and found myself staring at a gold statue shaped like a bird, its wings spread wide. An enormous painting featuring the same sort of bird with the same wings hung on the wall behind it. I realized where I was-in the living room I'd seen when I'd first touched the Reaper girl's-Vivian's-map of the Library of Antiquities.

"Wings," I mumbled, eyeing the statue next to me. "What's with all the wings?"

Vivian arched an eyebrow. "That's what you want to know? Not how I tricked you into finding the dagger for me? Really, Gypsy, I thought you'd say something more interesting than that. But if you absolutely must know, I'll be happy to show you."

Vivian let out a low, sharp whistle and turned toward a set of doors that led out onto a balcony. Even though it was dark outside, I could still see the black shape of something drop from the sky and land on the balcony. Vivian walked over, opened the doors, and stepped back.

A second later, a Black roc hopped inside the room.

The roc was enormous, easily as big as Nott-if not bigger. Its wings were a slick, shiny black, shot through with glossy streaks of red that gleamed like rivers of blood, and the roc's black, curved talons looked like they were almost as long as my arm. In myth-history class, Metis had once said that rocs were Arabian creatures that were strong enough to grab people and fly away with them. I'd thought the idea was ridiculous then, but now, I totally believed it. The roc definitely looked like it could eat me with two snaps of its sharp, pointed beak.

The roc's eyes were a bright, shiny black as well, but that ominous, Reaper red spark burned in the inky orbs. I shivered and looked away from the creature.

"You don't like my pet?" Vivian asked. "What a shame. My family has been raising them for generations, you know. Practically all the Reapers get their rocs from us. We're quite famous for breeding them to be especially vicious."

She let out another whistle and pointed at the balcony. The Black roc hopped outside, its talons scraping against the floor. Vivian shut the door behind it, although I could still see the roc lurking outside, peering in through the doors like it wanted to peck its way through the glass to get to me.

Footsteps whispered behind me, and a few seconds later, Preston stepped into view. Vivian resumed her perch on the desk, and Preston went over to stand beside her. Preston's orange jumpsuit was gone, and he was dressed in expensive clothes once more. Boots, designer jeans, a luxurious cashmere sweater, a leather jacket. All black, of course. Just like his rotting soul.

Preston smirked at me. "I told you I'd get the best of you one day, Gypsy. How stupid of you not to believe me."

I glared at him. "Oh, please. You wouldn't be standing here right now if it wasn't for Vivian, and we all know it. She's the one who's done all the work. She's the one who got you out of the academy prison."

I looked at the other girl. "Bravo on that, by the way. And the rest of this elaborate scheme. You've managed to pull it off quite nicely."

She brightened at my snarky tone. "I have, haven't I? Not that I'm one to gloat, but I really have outdone myself this time."

"Oh, just go ahead and tell me all about your evil master plan," I muttered. "You know you want to. That's why you haven't killed me already. The villains in movies and comic books always want to gloat, too."

I didn't add that that gloating was also always the villains' downfall-that cliche was the only bit of hope I had right now.

Vivian laughed. The sound grated on my ears just like the roc's talons had raked across the floor. "Well, that's one of the reasons, anyway. I'm not quite through with you yet, Gypsy, but we'll get to that in a few minutes. As for how I tricked you, you're supposed to be a clever girl. You were smart enough to defeat Preston, although that wouldn't take much doing. So why don't you tell me how I tricked you?"

I looked at her for a few seconds, then around at the room again. Thinking. The longer I kept Vivian talking, the longer someone might have to find and rescue me. Of course, I didn't know exactly who that someone would be. Nickamedes would probably think I'd just slipped out of the library early, instead of realizing that something had happened to me-if he even bothered to look for me. Given my history with the librarian, he'd probably be glad to come out of his office and find me gone.

"Gypsy?" Vivian asked, snapping her fingers in front of my face. "Are you still with us?"

Red sparks streamed out of her fingertips like raindrops. It was something I'd forgotten about these past few days, but during the fight at the coliseum, I'd thought the Reaper girl had to be a Valkyrie, given how strong she was and how much it had hurt when she'd punched me. But I'd never seen Vivian throw off sparks of magic like Daphne or the other Valkyries did.

I nodded at her fingers. "How did you hide that? The sparks and the fact that you're really a Valkyrie? Everybody at Mythos thinks you're an Amazon."

She shrugged. "The same way I hide everything. You want to know a secret?"

I always wanted to know secrets, and most especially hers, but I didn't say anything. Vivian leaned forward anyway.

She stared at me, and a flicker of red flashed to life in the depths of her golden gaze. "You're not the only Gypsy at Mythos, Gwen."

My mouth dropped open, and all the air left my lungs. I was just that shocked. Grandma Frost had told me there were other Gypsies out there, other families gifted with magic by the gods just like ours had been. She'd also told me that not all of the Gypsies were good like us, that some were lazy or indifferent or were even Reapers.

So far, I hadn't met any other Gypsies, but here I was, face to face with the most evil Gypsy of all-Loki's Champion. For as good as the goddess Nike was, Loki was equally bad, which meant that his Champion would be just as vicious and ruthless as the evil god was.

"What-what kind of magic did Loki give your family?"

I forced myself to ask the question. If I knew what kind of magic Vivian had, then maybe I could find some way to turn it against her and escape.

Vivian smiled. "Why, the most wonderful magic of all-chaos magic."

"What's that?" I'd never heard of that kind of magic before, and I hadn't seen any references to it in the myth-history books I'd been using to research my own touch magic.

Beside Vivian, Preston snorted. "It's not chaos magic. For the most part, it's just regular old telepathy."

"Telepathy?" I asked. "You mean like reading minds and planting thoughts in people's brains?"

"Exactly," Preston said. "Vivian can make people see and hear things that aren't there. Big whoop, if you ask me."

A dangerous light flared in Vivian's eyes, and that spark of Reaper red I'd seen before burned a little brighter at Preston's mocking words.

I thought of the Reaper red flashes that I'd noticed in Savannah's eyes and the hate that had filled her face whenever she looked at me. Vivian had done that, I realized, had made me suspect the other girl was a Reaper so I wouldn't focus on Vivian. That was probably how she'd changed her voice, too, so I wouldn't hear her talking and realize who she really was. I wondered what else she'd done to me this week. I had a bad, bad feeling that I was about to find out-and that it was going to get a whole lot worse.

"Actually, Preston's right," Vivian said. "I can make people see things that aren't really there, plant thoughts in their heads, even get them to follow my commands. Illusions, confusion, chaos. It's all the same really, but Loki made my family's telepathy magic particularly vicious. If I want to, I can look into a person's brain and make it seem like her worst nightmare has come to life. Would you like to see that, Gwen?"

My heart dropped into my stomach at her cold, cold words. My Gypsy gift had shown me so many awful things over the years. If Vivian looked into my head with her magic, she'd have plenty of nightmares to choose from.

"Of course you would," Vivian said.

She pushed off the desk and headed toward me. Vivian stopped in front of me and smiled-and then she turned around to stare at Preston.

He frowned. "What are you doing-"

That's all he got out before his face turned white, and he started screaming.

Preston screamed and screamed and screamed like he would never stop. Desperate, he lurched forward, like he could get away from Vivian's magic if only he could move. Preston's knees hit a table. He staggered back, then tripped on a rug and fell to the floor. He curled into a ball, covering his eyes with his hands like he could block out whatever it was he was seeing. But the defensive posture didn't help him, and Vivian smiled as his shrieks of terror filled the room.

"Preston's worst nightmare is quite interesting," she murmured, staring down at him. "It's you, actually. Apparently, he was never so scared in his life as he was when you told him there was nothing he could do to stop you from touching his hands and riffling through his memories with your psychometry magic. Preston's something of a control freak, you see."

Vivian kept staring at the other Reaper, and I felt this force rolling off her-an ugly, angry, malevolent force that got stronger and stronger with every one of Preston's screams, almost like his fear was giving her even more power, like his terror was making her happy. I could almost see the evil force in the air, slithering over and coiling around and around him like a snake with venom dripping off its fangs-venom that was penetrating Preston's brain and poisoning his mind with vision after horrific vision.

Finally, Vivian shook her head and turned away from him. The ugly, invisible force vanished, and after a moment, Preston quit screaming, although his whole body shook with violent sobs.

"Too easy," she said. "His mind is so simple. That was hardly a challenge. But you, Gypsy, you've been much more interesting to play with."

While Preston wept on the floor, I thought about everything that had happened the past few days.

"You planned this whole thing, didn't you?" I asked. "The attack at the Crius Coliseum, letting me see you there after the fact so I'd notice how shaken up you were, the creepy voice in the Library of Antiquities, even hiring me to find your lost ring. You did it all just so you could keep track of me while I was searching for the Helheim Dagger."

Vivian reached down and plucked the dagger off the desk. I blinked. How had I not noticed it lying there? She turned the dagger this way and that, making the bronze flecks in the marble shimmer. For the first time, I realized what had bothered me so much about the memories I'd gotten off the map that Vivian had dropped-the fact that she'd been wearing her Reaper mask in them to protect her real identity. Something she wouldn't have done if she hadn't been planning to leave the map behind the whole time.

"You dropped that map on purpose," I said. "You wanted me to have it. You wanted me to flash on it. Why?"

Vivian shrugged. "Some of the other Reapers had determined that the dagger's location was somewhere in or around the Library of Antiquities, but it would have taken years to search the building and find it, especially given my obvious limitations as a student. So I decided to let you find it for me. But since you didn't seem to know the dagger was in the library, I decided to give you a little push. Everyone always waits until the last second to do his or her homework. I figured you'd probably be at the exhibit the day before school started, so I convinced Savannah to go with me to finish my myth-history assignment."