Preston smirked at me. "I told you I'd get the best of you one day, Gypsy. How stupid of you not to believe me."
I glared at him. "Oh, please. You wouldn't be standing here right now if it wasn't for Vivian, and we all know it. She's the one who's done all the work. She's the one who got you out of the academy prison."
I looked at the other girl. "Bravo on that, by the way. And the rest of this elaborate scheme. You've managed to pull it off quite nicely."
She brightened at my snarky tone. "I have, haven't I? Not that I'm one to gloat, but I really have outdone myself this time."
"Oh, just go ahead and tell me all about your evil master plan," I muttered. "You know you want to. That's why you haven't killed me already. The villains in movies and comic books always want to gloat, too."
I didn't add that that gloating was also always the villains' downfall-that cliche was the only bit of hope I had right now.
Vivian laughed. The sound grated on my ears just like the roc's talons had raked across the floor. "Well, that's one of the reasons, anyway. I'm not quite through with you yet, Gypsy, but we'll get to that in a few minutes. As for how I tricked you, you're supposed to be a clever girl. You were smart enough to defeat Preston, although that wouldn't take much doing. So why don't you tell me how I tricked you?"
I looked at her for a few seconds, then around at the room again. Thinking. The longer I kept Vivian talking, the longer someone might have to find and rescue me. Of course, I didn't know exactly who that someone would be. Nickamedes would probably think I'd just slipped out of the library early, instead of realizing that something had happened to me-if he even bothered to look for me. Given my history with the librarian, he'd probably be glad to come out of his office and find me gone.
"Gypsy?" Vivian asked, snapping her fingers in front of my face. "Are you still with us?"
Red sparks streamed out of her fingertips like raindrops. It was something I'd forgotten about these past few days, but during the fight at the coliseum, I'd thought the Reaper girl had to be a Valkyrie, given how strong she was and how much it had hurt when she'd punched me. But I'd never seen Vivian throw off sparks of magic like Daphne or the other Valkyries did.
I nodded at her fingers. "How did you hide that? The sparks and the fact that you're really a Valkyrie? Everybody at Mythos thinks you're an Amazon."
She shrugged. "The same way I hide everything. You want to know a secret?"
I always wanted to know secrets, and most especially hers, but I didn't say anything. Vivian leaned forward anyway.
She stared at me, and a flicker of red flashed to life in the depths of her golden gaze. "You're not the only Gypsy at Mythos, Gwen."
My mouth dropped open, and all the air left my lungs. I was just that shocked. Grandma Frost had told me there were other Gypsies out there, other families gifted with magic by the gods just like ours had been. She'd also told me that not all of the Gypsies were good like us, that some were lazy or indifferent or were even Reapers.
So far, I hadn't met any other Gypsies, but here I was, face to face with the most evil Gypsy of all-Loki's Champion. For as good as the goddess Nike was, Loki was equally bad, which meant that his Champion would be just as vicious and ruthless as the evil god was.
"What-what kind of magic did Loki give your family?"
I forced myself to ask the question. If I knew what kind of magic Vivian had, then maybe I could find some way to turn it against her and escape.
Vivian smiled. "Why, the most wonderful magic of all-chaos magic."
"What's that?" I'd never heard of that kind of magic before, and I hadn't seen any references to it in the myth-history books I'd been using to research my own touch magic.
Beside Vivian, Preston snorted. "It's not chaos magic. For the most part, it's just regular old telepathy."
"Telepathy?" I asked. "You mean like reading minds and planting thoughts in people's brains?"
"Exactly," Preston said. "Vivian can make people see and hear things that aren't there. Big whoop, if you ask me."
A dangerous light flared in Vivian's eyes, and that spark of Reaper red I'd seen before burned a little brighter at Preston's mocking words.
I thought of the Reaper red flashes that I'd noticed in Savannah's eyes and the hate that had filled her face whenever she looked at me. Vivian had done that, I realized, had made me suspect the other girl was a Reaper so I wouldn't focus on Vivian. That was probably how she'd changed her voice, too, so I wouldn't hear her talking and realize who she really was. I wondered what else she'd done to me this week. I had a bad, bad feeling that I was about to find out-and that it was going to get a whole lot worse.
"Actually, Preston's right," Vivian said. "I can make people see things that aren't really there, plant thoughts in their heads, even get them to follow my commands. Illusions, confusion, chaos. It's all the same really, but Loki made my family's telepathy magic particularly vicious. If I want to, I can look into a person's brain and make it seem like her worst nightmare has come to life. Would you like to see that, Gwen?"
My heart dropped into my stomach at her cold, cold words. My Gypsy gift had shown me so many awful things over the years. If Vivian looked into my head with her magic, she'd have plenty of nightmares to choose from.
"Of course you would," Vivian said.
She pushed off the desk and headed toward me. Vivian stopped in front of me and smiled-and then she turned around to stare at Preston.
He frowned. "What are you doing-"
That's all he got out before his face turned white, and he started screaming.
Preston screamed and screamed and screamed like he would never stop. Desperate, he lurched forward, like he could get away from Vivian's magic if only he could move. Preston's knees hit a table. He staggered back, then tripped on a rug and fell to the floor. He curled into a ball, covering his eyes with his hands like he could block out whatever it was he was seeing. But the defensive posture didn't help him, and Vivian smiled as his shrieks of terror filled the room.
"Preston's worst nightmare is quite interesting," she murmured, staring down at him. "It's you, actually. Apparently, he was never so scared in his life as he was when you told him there was nothing he could do to stop you from touching his hands and riffling through his memories with your psychometry magic. Preston's something of a control freak, you see."
Vivian kept staring at the other Reaper, and I felt this force rolling off her-an ugly, angry, malevolent force that got stronger and stronger with every one of Preston's screams, almost like his fear was giving her even more power, like his terror was making her happy. I could almost see the evil force in the air, slithering over and coiling around and around him like a snake with venom dripping off its fangs-venom that was penetrating Preston's brain and poisoning his mind with vision after horrific vision.