Fallen 2. Torment(52)

was using the real shadow of the tree as camouflage. Parts of it kept twitching.

"It looks sick, or skittish, or, I don't know ..." Shelby trailed off, curling her lip.

"There's something wrong with it, right?"

Luce was looking past Shelby at the staircase winding down to the ground level of

the lodge. Below them were a bunch of unpainted wooden supports that propped up the

deck. If Luce could get hold of the shadow, Shelby could join her under the deck before

anyone saw anything. She could help Luce glimpse its message and they could make it

back upstairs in time to rejoin the class.

"You're not seriously considering what I think you're seriously considering,"

Shelby said. "Are you?"

"Keep watch up here for a minute," Luce said. "Be ready when I call you."

Luce descended a few steps, so that her head was just level with the deck where

the rest of the students were busy carrying out their interviews. Shelby had her back to

Luce. She'd give a sign if anyone noticed Luce was gone.

Luce could hear Dawn in the corner, ad-libbing with Roland: "You know, I was

stunned when I was nominated for a Golden Globe. ..."

Luce looked back at the darkness stretched out along the grass. It occurred to her

to wonder whether the other students had seen it. But she couldn't worry about that. She

was wasting time.

The Announcer was a good ten feet away, but where she stood close to the deck,

Luce was shielded from the other students' eyes. It would be too obvious if she walked

right over to it. She was going to have to try to coax it off the ground and over to her

without using her hands. And she had no idea how to do that.

That was when she noticed the figure leaning up against the other side of the

redwood tree. Also hidden from the view of the students on the deck.

Cam was smoking a cigarette, humming to himself like he didn't have a care in

the world. Except that he was covered entirely in blood and gore. His hair was matted to

his forehead, his arms were scratched and bruised. His T-shirt was wet and stained with

sweat, and his jeans were splattered too. He looked filthy and disgusting, as though he'd

just emerged from battle. Only, there was no one else around--no bodies, no anything.

Just Cam.

He winked at her.

88

"What are you doing here?" she whispered. "What did you do? " Her head swam

from the sick reek coming off his bloodied clothes.

"Oh, just saved your life. Again. How many times does this make?" He tapped

ash off his cigarette. "Today it was Miss Sophia's crew, and I can't say I didn't enjoy it.

Bloody monsters. They're after you, too, you know. Word has gotten out that you're here.

And that you like to wander into that dark forest unchaperoned." He pointed.

"You just killed them?" She was horrified, glancing up at the deck to see whether

Shelby, or anyone, could see them. No.

"A couple of them, yes, just now, with my own two hands." Cam showed off his

palms, caked with something red and slimy that Luce really did not want to see. "I agree

the woods are lovely, Luce, but they're also full of things that want you dead. So do me a

favor--"

"No. You don't get to ask me for favors. Everything about you disgusts me."

"Fine." He rolled his eyes. "Then do it for Grigori. Stay on campus. " He flicked

his cigarette onto the grass, rolled back his shoulders, and unfurled his wings. "I can't

always be here to watch over you. And God knows Grigori can't."

Cam's wings were tall and narrow and pulled tight behind his shoulders, sleek and

gold and flecked with brindled stripes of black. She wished they repulsed her, but they

didn't. Like Steven's wings, Cam's were jagged, rough--they too looked as though they'd

survived a lifetime of fights. The black stripes gave Cam's wings a dark, sensual quality.

There was something magnetic about them.

But no. She loathed everything about Cam. She would forever.

Cam beat his wings once, lifting his feet off the ground. The wings' flapping was

tremendously loud and kicked back a swirl of wind that raised leaves from the ground.

"Thank you," Luce said, crisply, before he coasted under the deck. Then he was

gone in the shadows of the woods.

Cam was protecting her now? Where was Daniel? Wasn't Shoreline supposed to

be safe?

In Cam's wake, the Announcer--the reason Luce had come down here in the first

place--spiraled up from its shadow like a small black cyclone.

Closer. Then a little closer still.

Finally, the shadow wandered into the air just over her head.

"Shelby," Luce whispered loudly. "Get down here."

Shelby looked down at Luce. At the cyclone-shaped Announcer teetering over

her. "What took you so long?" she asked, sprinting down the stairs just in time to watch