Touch of Death(37)

"What?" Abby was horrified. "Am I …  like the …  servants?"

"No," Victoria said. "Relax. You are still you and very much alive. Jodi saved you."

"No!" Abby shrieked, looking at me with more hatred than I'd ever seen.

I rolled my eyes. "You're welcome. And just so you know, Medusa doesn't care much for you. She said you disgraced her name. She didn't want to help me bring you back. She only helped me because I begged her."                       
       
           



       

"Why?" Abby tried to stand up and stumbled. "Why did you bring me back? You should've left me dead. I'd rather be dead than saved by you!" She stood and ran upstairs, pushing me out of her way in the process.

"Glad I could help," I yelled after her.

"Don't worry about her," Victoria said. "She'll get over it."

Troy narrowed his eyes at me. "How did you bring her back? What did you do?"

"I mixed my blood. I've been able to do it since I first touched both sides of Medusa. My blood boils and mixes on command." I left out that it sometimes happened without me wanting it to.

"The statue must have mixed Abby's blood," Alex said.

I nodded. "And it killed her."

"Which means we won't ever be able to bring other Ophi back to life." Alex stared at me. "Only Jodi can."

"Yes, well, more reason to be happy she's here." Victoria put her arm around my shoulders. "Why don't both of you go get cleaned up before dinner?" She and Troy headed off together, no doubt to discuss what had happened.

I didn't see Abby for the rest of the day. She skipped dinner, and her bedroom door stayed shut all night. I wasn't sure why, but I hoped I'd run into her in the hallway. I wanted to make sure she was okay. That she'd come back normal. I mean, I'd brought the guy from the cemetery out of his grave, but that was different. He was under my control. What I'd done for Abby was completely different; I'd brought her back to life, not made her a living dead. It was so far beyond raising the dead servants. I felt good. Even if Abby wasn't happy to be alive, I was happy she was alive. I'd found a way to use this power for something good.

I went to sleep glad to be me for the first time since I found out I was an Ophi.

On my way to breakfast the next morning, I saw a servant bringing food up to Abby's room. She wasn't taking any chances of running into me. Who would've thought saving a person's life would make them hate you more? It was like Abby couldn't deal with the thought of me saving her. Maybe it was the fact that a drop of my blood was in her body. Maybe she didn't want to feel indebted to me. I wasn't sure I'd ever find out because she was doing a really good job of avoiding me.

Alex was different around me today. Almost shy. I wondered if our almost-kiss had left him feeling as strange as it had left me feeling. We ate in silence until Victoria walked over to us, placing one hand on each of our shoulders. "Jodi, I think that, in light of recent events, we need to increase your training."

"Increase? But why? I thought I was doing well."

"You are. That's why I want to further your training." Her face fell. "I've been hearing of attacks on Ophi. Hades isn't happy with us. We think he may want to do away with us all together. So far, we've been okay here, but we need to be prepared. You are our best weapon against him."

I didn't like the idea of being a weapon, even if I was only for self-defense. But I'd had no idea things were getting worse for the Ophi. With my new power, I could help.

"We're counting on you, Jodi."

I nodded. "I'll do my best."

"I know you will." Victoria squeezed my shoulder and went back to her seat.

"Well, it looks like we'll be heading to the cemetery after breakfast." Alex spooned more mac and cheese into his mouth. I could deal with him eating that for lunch and dinner, but it was more than a little weird at breakfast.

"What about Mr. Quim-Tony's-class?"

"Trust me, increasing your training means double duty on active use of your powers. You're getting a pass on the boring lecture portion of your day."

"Can't complain about that." I downed the rest of my orange juice. "Shall we?"

"Yeah, I'm good. Fueled with mac and cheese and ready to raise some dead."

"How can you eat that at every meal?" I asked as we headed outside.

Alex lowered his eyes. "Before we got servants, Mo-Victoria-used to attempt to cook for us. All she could make was mac and cheese." He smiled, lost in a distant memory.

"You used to call her ‘Mom,' didn't you?"

"When I turned ten, they decided I needed to grow up. Act like a man. So, they told me to call them Troy and Victoria. When I complained, they said they didn't want the other kids to think they were favoring me because I was their son."

My heart broke for him. His mac and cheese obsession was a cry for help. He was trying to send a message to his mother, yet she didn't seem to get it. I could tell he didn't want to say anything more on the subject, so I switched topics. "What do you have in store for me today?"

"Raising the dead, of course."

"But I did that yesterday. I thought it went pretty well." Really, I didn't want to keep feeling the torture the souls experienced when they were forced back into their bodies.

"Well, yesterday you raised one soul. Today, we're trying for two. At the same time."

My breath caught in my throat. Two? At the same time? That was twice the torture, and it would be pulling at me from different directions. I felt dizzy, like I might faint. I stopped and grabbed on to a headstone next to me. "I don't think I can do this."

"Sure you can. You're more powerful than all of us-maybe combined. I've raised two souls at once before, and if I can do it, you definitely can."

I didn't want to point out that he couldn't feel what the souls felt. That privilege was apparently reserved for me. The others had no idea what they were putting the souls through when they raised them. It was easy to ignore the suffering if you couldn't sense it. Still, I nodded and followed him to two graves, side by side.

"This is it. Mr. and Mrs. Died-a-long-time-ago."

I squinted at the names on the headstones. I thought maybe things would be easier for the souls if I could call them by name, but that wasn't going to happen because the names had worn away.

"Okay, that's enough jokes," Alex said, reprimanding himself for the crack about the dead people. He got so serious and hardcore when we trained.

"Tell me what to do."

"Raising two souls isn't that different than raising one. You're going to drip some blood on each grave and command the drops to find the bodies. That's the easy part." He stared at me. "This will take every ounce of concentration you have. You actually have to split your attention between both bodies. Commanding them together doesn't work. And if you let your focus rest on one, the other will be free to act on its own. Believe me, the second they feel you losing control, they will take advantage of it."

This seemed impossible. "How am I supposed to split my attention? I can't give two sets of directions at the same time."

"Yes, you can. It takes some practice, but it can be done."

"Well, could you at least tell me how? Because I don't have a clue." I wasn't feeling like the Chosen One anymore. I had no idea how to do this. Yet, Alex said he'd done it before, so why couldn't I figure it out?

"It's kind of like stepping back and letting your vision pan out. You have to be able to see each body. Once you have them both in your sights, you can send out simultaneous commands. But they have to be simultaneous. No commands directed at ‘You two' or anything like that. Got it?"                       
       
           



       

No. Simultaneous commands? What was that?

"Let's get started." Alex wasn't bothering to wait for me to figure things out. I was going to have to learn through trial and error. I just hoped the error part wouldn't be too devastating.

He handed me his pocketknife, and I pricked my right finger, spilling a single drop of blood on each grave. I closed my eyes and said, "Find the body that rests in this grave." Since I didn't know what simultaneous commands were, I said the same command again and hoped for the best. I put one hand on each headstone to steady myself for what I knew was coming. In my mind's eye, I could see the drops of blood working their way through the soil, past the caskets, and into the bodies. I heard the terrible cries as the souls were pulled back into their bodies, saw the flesh re-form on the bones. Like last time, my cheeks were wet with tears. I was glad I had the headstones for support because I could barely stand.

"Push their pain from your mind," Alex said, helping me to stand up straight. "You can't feel their pain if you don't let it in." How did he know? He didn't have this ability. No one else did. But it was worth a try. I pushed the pain away, literally taking my hands off the headstones and pushing the air out in front of me. The pain subsided. I could still tell what the bodies were doing, but their rage wasn't consuming me anymore.