"What was I doing?"
"You were signing me up," said Jesse. He pointed at the board. "See?"
She looked down, startled. "Why is your name first? Didn't you just get here?"
"We were here earlier and checked in. You told us it was okay."
She looked down again, clearly puzzled. She didn't remember them coming earlier - because they hadn't - but she apparently couldn't figure out why Jesse's name was at the top now. A moment later, she shrugged and must have decided it wasn't worth overthinking. "Stand with the others, and I'll call you next."
As soon as Jesse and Ralf came near us, I turned on them. "You just used compulsion on her," I hissed.
Jesse looked panicked for a fraction of a second; then his normal swagger took over. "Whatever. I just convinced her, that's all. What, are you going to try to tell on me or something?"
"Nothing to tell," scoffed Christian. "That was the worst compulsion I've ever seen."
"Like you've seen compulsion," said Ralf.
"Plenty," said Christian. "From people prettier than you. Of course, maybe that's part of why yours isn't as good."
Ralf seemed highly offended at not being considered pretty, but Jesse just nudged him and started to turn away. "Forget him. He had his chance."
"His chance at - " I remembered how Brandon had attempted weak compulsion when trying to convince me his bruises were nothing. Jill had said that Brett Ozera actually had convinced a teacher that his were nothing. The teacher had dropped the matter, much to Jill's surprise. Brett must have used compulsion. Lightbulbs went off in different parts of my brain. The connections were all around me. The problem was, I couldn't untangle the wires quite yet. "That's what this is about, isn't it? Your stupid Man? and its need to beat up on people. It's got something to do with compulsion...."
I didn't understand how it all fit together, but the surprised look on Jesse's face told me I was on to something, even though he said, "You don't know what you're talking about."
I pushed forward, hoping some blind hits would make him mad and say something he wasn't supposed to. "What's the point? Does it give you guys some kind of power trip to do these little tricks? That's all they are, you know. You seriously don't know the first thing about compulsion. I've seen compulsion that would make you do handstands and throw yourself out a window."
"We're learning more than you can even imagine," said Jesse. "And when I find out who told - "
He didn't get a chance to finish his threat because he was called over to the feeder just then. He and Ralf stalked away, and Christian immediately turned to me.
"What's going on? What's a Man??"
I gave him a hasty recap of Adrian's explanation. "That's what they wanted you to join. They must secretly be practicing compulsion. Adrian said these groups are always royals who have some plan to change and control things in dangerous times. They must think compulsion is the answer - it's what they meant when they told you they had ways to help you get what you wanted. If they knew how crappy your compulsion was, they probably wouldn't have asked."
He scowled, not liking me reminding him of the one time he'd attempted - and failed - to compel someone at the ski lodge. "So where's the beating-people-up part come in?"
"That's the mystery," I said. Christian was summoned over to feed just then, and I put my theories on hold until I could get more info and take action. I noticed which feeder we were being led to. "Is that Alice again? How do you always get her? Do you request her?"
"No, but I think some people specifically un-request her."
Alice was happy to see us, as always. "Rose. Are you still keeping us safe?"
"I will if they'll let me," I told her.
"Don't be too hasty," she warned. "Conserve your strength. If you're too eager to fight the undead, you may find yourselves joining them. Then you'd never see us again, and we'd be very sad."
"Yes," said Christian. "I'd cry into my pillow every night."
I resisted the urge to kick him. "Well, I couldn't visit if I was Strigoi, yeah, but hopefully I'd just die a normal death. Then I could come see you as a ghost."
How sad, I thought, that I was now making jokes about the very thing that was freaking me out lately. Alice found no amusement in it whatsoever. She shook her head.
"No, you wouldn't. The wards would keep you out."
"The wards only keep Strigoi out," I reminded her gently.
A defiant look replaced her scattered one. "The wards keep anything that isn't alive out. Dead or undead."
"Now you've done it," said Christian.
"The wards don't keep ghosts out," I said. "I've seen them."
Considering Alice's own instability, I didn't mind discussing mine with her. In fact, it was kind of refreshing to talk about this stuff with someone who wouldn't judge me. Indeed, she treated this as a perfectly normal conversation. "If you've seen ghosts, then we're not safe anymore."
"I told you last time, the security's too good."
"Maybe someone made a mistake," she argued, sounding remarkably coherent. "Maybe someone missed something. Wards are made of magic. Magic is alive. Ghosts can't cross them for the same reason as Strigoi. They aren't alive. If you saw a ghost, the wards have failed." She paused. "Or you're crazy."
Christian laughed out loud. "There you go, Rose. Straight from the source." I shot him a glare. He smiled at Alice. "In Rose's defense, though, I think she's right about the wards. The school checks them all the time. The only place guarded better than here is the Royal Court, and both places are overflowing with guardians. Stop being so paranoid." He fed, and I glanced away. I should have known better than to listen to Alice. She was hardly a reputable source of information, even if she'd been around for a while. And yet... her weird logic did make sense. If wards kept Strigoi out, why not ghosts? True, Strigoi were the dead who had come back to walk the earth, but her point was sound: All of them were dead. But Christian and I were right too: The wards around the school were solid. It took a lot of power to lay wards. Not every Moroi home could have them, but places like schools and the Royal Court had theirs maintained diligently. The Royal Court...
I'd had no ghostly encounters whatsoever while we there, yet that had been incredibly stressful. If my sightings were stress-induced, wouldn't the Court and encounters with Victor and the queen have provided great opportunities for them to occur? The fact that I'd seen nothing seemed to negate the PTSD theory. I hadn't seen ghosts until we'd landed at the Martinville airport.