Kiss of Frost (Mythos Academy #2)(14)
Author: Jennifer Estep

"True," Daphne agreed. "You did spectacularly piss off her family. Not to mention Reapers in general." The Valkyrie lounged on my bed, eating a cookie with one hand while she typed on her laptop with the other. The motion made the charms on the silver bracelet around her right wrist jangle together. Carson had bought the bracelet for Daphne weeks ago, back when he was trying to work up the courage to ask out the Valkyrie. Now, it was one of her most prized possessions.

"Reapers don’t like it when one of their own dies," Daphne added. "Payback is, like, their life. Are you going to tel Professor Metis what happened?"

Metis was my myth-history professor, and she’d sort of become my mentor. She’d also been my mom’s best friend, back when they’d both gone to Mythos. The professor had told me that my mom had saved her life more times than she could count and that she owed it to my mom to look out for me while I was here.

My eyes flicked to my desk, and I crawled over to it and grabbed a framed photo off the top. Two girls grinned up at me from underneath the glass, their arms around each other. My mom and Professor Metis, back when they’d been about my age.

Not too long ago, Metis had given me this photo of them as teenagers. Every time I slipped the picture out from behind the glass and ran my fingers over the slick paper, I felt al the love that my mom and Metis had had for each other. They’d been more like sisters than friends. Knowing someone else had cared about my mom as much as I did made me feel a little less alone and made my grief and guilt over her death a little easier to bear.

"What am I going to tel Metis?" I said, putting the photo back on the desk. "That somebody tried to run me over near my grandma’s house and then took a shot at me in the library? I don’t have any proof that either one actual y happened. I didn’t get a look at the license plate on the car, and I don’t have the arrow. She might just think I was being paranoid."

"I don’t think so," Daphne said, drumming her fingers on top of her keyboard and making pink sparks flicker in the air. "Metis is more understanding than most of the profs are. I think she’d believe you."

I shrugged. "Maybe, maybe not. You should have seen the look that Nickamedes gave me-like I’d just escaped from Ashland Asylum or something. Who knows? Maybe I have."

I tried to smile at my own stupid joke, but I couldn’t quite make my lips turn up al the way. Knowing that someone was trying to kil me didn’t put me in a smiling mood.

Daphne shook her head, her blond hair spil ing over her shoulders. "I don’t think you’re crazy. If you think there’s a Reaper after you, then there probably is. They pretty much live to kil us, you know, just like we do them."

"Great. Way to make me feel better."

Daphne rol ed her black eyes. "Oh, suck it up, Gwen. It’s not the end of the world. We’re al here learning how to fight Reapers.

You’re just getting a crash course in it, that’s al .

Some of the kids would actual y be jealous of you. The Spartans certainly would. Sometimes I think Logan and his friends would go off hunting Reapers if Coach Ajax and the other profs would let them."

In addition to being the best fighters at Mythos, the Spartans also had a reputation for being the most bloodthirsty. They actual y liked to be in the thick of battle and kil ing things-it was part of their DNA or something. I guess that’s just what happened when you could pick up normal, everyday objects-the cookies Daphne was noshing on, the stapler on my desk, the smal replica of Nike next to it-and automatical y know how to kil people with them.

Logan, Kenzie, and Oliver could grab any one of those things, kil me with it, and not think twice doing it.

Seriously. That’s the kind of freaky stuff they instinctively knew how to do.

"Wel , it’s a course I’m going to flunk," I groused. "Maybe I’l just hide up here in my room until Christmas break.

Sooner or later, the Reaper wil have to lose interest in me."

"Reapers never lose interest. Once you’re on their hit list, they won’t stop coming until you’re dead-or they are." Daphne shook her head again. "And you can’t stay here, especial y not this weekend. Everyone’s going to the Winter Carnival, even the professors and the academy staff. You’d be on campus al by yourself. If there is a Reaper out there gunning for you, you’d just give him an early Christmas present. You know what a total joke the dorm security is." I sighed. "So what do you think I should do?"

"Talk to Metis," Daphne said. "Tel her what’s going on and ask her if she’s heard anything about Jasmine’s family.

If they’re stil in hiding or if the Pantheon has caught up to them yet and has thrown them in prison where they belong." I nodded my head, and we were silent for a few moments.

"You know, it’s just too bad that I didn’t have a bow and arrow tonight," I final y groused. "I could have thought of you and defended myself against the Reaper."

"What do you mean?"

I told the Valkyrie how I’d done better during archery practice this morning just by thinking of her, by cal ing up the memories I had of her at the tournaments she’d won.

"Real y? That’s cool." Daphne tapped her fingers against her lips, deep in thought. "I wonder if you could do that with other things, too."

"What do you mean?"

She gestured at her bulging book bag on the floor. "I’ve been reading up on various magical theories and powers while I wait for my own magic to quicken. There are lots of stories about folks tapping into other people’s powers.

Most of them have some kind of mental magic, like you do.

Telepathy or something that lets them see into other people’s minds. So if you can cal up the memories of my archery tournaments, who’s to say you couldn’t do that with other things?

Or even with other people?" I shrugged. "I don’t know. I never thought of my magic like that before. Usual y I just get flashes off objects. I don’t actual y do anything with the memories I see."

"Wel , maybe you should try to, to see if it works," Daphne said. "Either way you might as wel start packing your bags for the carnival. Because I’m not leaving you here by yourself, not with a Reaper lurking around. You’re going to the carnival, even if I have to drag you kicking and screaming onto the bus myself."

Daphne’s pretty features took on a determined, stubborn look, and more pink sparks of magic flickered in the air around her. We might have only been friends for a few weeks now, but I knew she meant what she said. And with her Valkyrie strength, she’d have no problem twisting my arm-literal y-to get me to do exactly what she wanted.