“Sorry.” I cover my mouth to stifle a laugh. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
His bright blue eyes are huge as he presses his hand to his heart. “You scared the shit out of me. Jesus, Gemma.” He allows his fangs to retract as he lowers his feet to the floor.
“Sorry.” I lower my hand from my mouth. “But why are you sleeping at my computer desk?”
“I’m on Gemma duty.”
“Gemma duty?”
“Yeah, Gemma duty.” Laylen fiddles with his lip ring, sucking it between his teeth. “You’ve been out for almost three days and we were getting worried about you…that maybe the rush was too much for you. You’re heart’s been racing way too fast so they put me in here to try to calm you.”
“With your gift?” I ask and he nods and it makes my stomach flutter just a bit. “Wait. What’s a rush?”
Laylen swivels in the chair. “It’s the rush of adrenaline you get when your Keeper’s mark first appears.”
My arms go limp at my side. “My Keeper’s mark?”
He offers me a smile but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “Yeah it’s on your shoulder blade.”
I dash over to the mirror and yank down the upper part of my t-shirt, turning around. Circling the center of my shoulder blade is a ring of fiery-gold flames, centered by a circle. “Wait.” I give him a suspicious glance. “How did you guys find the mark on me?”
He gave me a devious smile, waggling his eyebrows. “How do you think?”
I pick up a pillow off my bed and throw it at him, even though I wouldn’t really mind if he had looked. I trust him enough.
He catches the pillow effortlessly. “I’m joking. We just checked the obvious places—the arms, the ankles, your shoulders. If we wouldn’t have been able to find it, we would have waited for you to wake up and let you check the rest of your body.”
I touch the mark on my shoulder. “God, I can’t believe I’m a Keeper… I didn’t even think it could happen to me.”
“You didn’t think those awesome fighting moves came from nowhere, did you?” Laylen says, cocking an eyebrow at me.
“So, you knew what was going on back at the castle?”
“I assumed as much.”
“You seem in a good mood,” I say, picking up a CD from the desk and absentmindedly turning it around in my hand, something Sophia forgot to pack up.
He shrugs. “It’s weird, but as soon as you got your mark, your blood stopped being like a drug to me.”
“So you don’t crave blood anymore?” I wonder. “All because I got the mark.”
“Well I still crave blood,” he says, standing up. “And yours still smells extra mouthwatering, but it’s not as mind consuming as it was.”
“Is it normal for you not to crave a Keepers blood as much?”
He nods. “Yeah, it’s one of their many defense mechanisms.”
I set the CD case down. “So you’re happy I’m one then?”
His happiness diminishes. “I never said that.” He scratches the back of his neck. “Honestly, I was kind of hoping it’d skip over you. But not because I don’t like you now… I just really liked you before and sometimes getting the mark changes people.”
“I still feel like the same person,” I tell him. “Just stronger.”
He smiles again, nudging my foot with his. “I’m sure you’ll stay the clumsy, emotional, caring Gemma I first met.”
“I hope so.” And I really do, but I can’t help but think of Stephan and wonder what he was like before he got his Keeper mark. Perhaps he was once good, too. “So what’s been going on for the last few days while I was out?” I ask, changing the subject.
“Not much.” He tucks his hands into the pockets of his jeans as he sits down on the edge of my bed. “In fact, it’s been pretty quiet.”
“What about my mom?” I ask, taking a seat beside him. “How’s she doing?”
He hesitates, plucking a loose string on one of the throw pillows. “Everyone thought it would be best, including her, if we locked her up until we can figure out what to do with her. We don’t want her sneaking off and doing something like what she just did.”
“It wasn’t her fault. It’s the mark’s fault. She can’t help what she does. Trust me, I know what it feels like.” I touch the spot on my arm where the mark once was. “Even though I erased the vision, I can still feel what I felt like while I was possessed.”
Laylen sets the pillow aside. “I know it’s not her fault, but we have to be careful. And Aislin’s trying to figure out a spell to remove the mark,” he says. “She’s been searching the internet like crazy for the last few days, but no luck yet. The problem is we don’t know who to trust to go to for information. She can’t just go walking into a witch store and ask how to remove the Mark of Malefiscus. Aislin also went pretty spell crazy; she put like a ton of spells all over the house, trying to keep us protected from unannounced visitors. And thankfully there are no signs that Marco and Sophia have been here in a while. The mail and newspapers are piling up. Aislin tried to do a Tracker Spell and either they have a protection charm on them or… or they’ve died because they’re not showing up anywhere.”
“Died?” I’m not sure how I feel about that.
He sighs and comes over to me. “Are you going to be okay?”
I shrug. “I’m not sure, I think so, but…” The prickle is erratic on the back of my neck, but I don’t know what it’s telling me. To be sad? If it’s that, it’s not working because I just feel numb. All those years of living with them, but practically invisible. The emotional bond never formed and now I can barely remember them at all.
“What’s wrong?” He puts a finger under my chin and angles my head up so I’m looking at him.
“It’s just that it’s so weird to be in here again,” I say, glancing around the bare room. “Nothing about this room feels like me, yet it’s the room I grew up in.”
He takes in the bareness of my room. “Maybe that’s because this room isn’t you. I mean, all those years you spent living here you weren’t really you.” He gives me a hug and then we leave the room and go downstairs. On our way down, he tells me how Aleesa is recovering and that Alex and Aislin seem to be reacting to her okay.