Page 76 of Dead Beat

That seemed to reassure her. Mercy nodded, then gave a full-body shudder as if the memory of the night had just rushed in. She bent her knees and rested her forehead on them.

Alex hesitated, then placed a hand on her shoulder. Mercy shrugged her off. Alex had known it was coming, but that didn’t make it hurt less.

She sat back in her chair. She wasn’t Dawes. She didn’t know how to comfort and soothe. But she did know how to make people pay. “Do you want to tell me what happened?”

“I flew.” Mercy’s voice was muffled against the blankets.

“What?”

“I was walking by the Dramat. A girl with red hair asked me if I could help prop the door open.”

Nell.

“She said they were loading in scenery for a show.” Mercy looked up, her eyes on the cross above the television set. “She said she knew me from church. I didn’t recognize her, but I wanted to help … Then I was flying. Somebody grabbed me and I was … in the air. I tried to scream, but he put his hand over my mouth.” Mercy covered her head with her arms, as if sheltering from a storm. “I started praying. He laughed at me. He prayed along with me. He knew the Lord’s Prayer. He made the words sound like a joke, like it was the funniest thing he ever heard. He said…” Her voice hitched. “He said he would make himself my god. I started crying. I think he liked that.”

Alex stayed quiet. What was there to say? Sorry wasn’t going to fix this.

“He told me he was going to kill me. He said it was only right. Penance for my sins. How did he know?”

“He didn’t,” Alex said. “He was just … Demons like to play games.”

She shuddered again. “I need to leave Yale.”

“Mercy, this is all temporary.”

“Is it?”

Alex fiddled with a bent corner of the paperback. “Maybe not.”

“Whatever this is … the lies … the secrecy … it’s built into this place. I want to go home. I can live with my parents for a while, go to a UC. At least I’ll graduate with a slightly less crushing pile of debt.”

“Just … think about it for a bit, okay? You’re not going to leave midsemester, so finish out the year and then you can decide. Things might look different soon.”

“Better?”

“I hope so.”

“But you can’t promise.”

Alex shook her head. “Nope.”

“He drugged me, Alex. I can’t remember what happened. I … I don’t know what he did.”

It was Blake all over again. Another violation. Another predator the societies had helped to set loose. And Alex hadn’t stopped him. Reiter might not have fed from Mercy, but the night would mark her anyway.

“I shouldn’t have pulled you into this—”

“But you didn’t, did you?” Mercy’s laugh was harsh. “You said it yourself. I begged to be a part of Lethe. I was jealous of you.”

“You have got to be kidding.”

“I know, okay? But you were on an adventure.”

Alex felt the need to laugh bubbling up inside her. She shoved it down. She didn’t think it would be a friendly sound. “You saw what magic did to me.” Some of it, at least. Not all the years of loneliness and humiliation that had come before. “You saw the bite mark in my side. You were the one who dragged me out of the Hutch and made me go back to class and be normal.”

“What bite mark? You were sick. You didn’t—”

“It doesn’t matter.” Alex was losing track of what she’d revealed and what she’d kept secret. “I screwed up. I didn’t want to keep lying to you. I thought I was getting it right when I told you about Lethe, but I got it wrong.”