21
LAKE WOULD NOT ALLOW US to arrive at the red carpet too early. “You know who shows up early to red carpets?” she asked once our limo finally started toward the venue. “Has-beens and D-list reality TV show wankers. We are the Effigies. We hold the security of the world in the palm of our hands. Now pass me my phone. I need to take some selfies.”
The windows were tinted so none of the Torontonians jaywalking across the street could see how ridiculous I looked squirming into Lake’s photo, or the terrible kissy face I made with my lips because she said it was a popular pop-star pose. Chae Rin and Belle stayed resolutely out of the picture, a comfortable distance away from us and each other. The series of pictures that Lake uploaded was on the Doll Soldiers forum in under a minute.
Soon, we were on Queen Street. My nerves were shot as the screams bombarded us from all sides. Under the gray, sunless sky, fans stretched their hands out at our limo from behind a set of barricades glowing neon blue, almost like the metallic lights that skidded up a fully powered American Needle. Maybe it was antiphantom technology. Toronto was well protected because of the extra security they had around the city as well as the rail system protecting most of Canada’s small population. At least I knew I didn’t have to deal with phantoms tonight, but as our driver parked our limo right on the red carpet and we stepped out into the chaos, I almost wished I’d been sent on another mission.
“And look who just pulled up to our red carpet!” I heard the woman’s voice speaking into a microphone, but I had no idea who she was. “Looking as badass as ever—I’m about to be joined by the always-hella-epic Effigies. Make some noise for the Effigies!”
The crowd did. We were immediately swarmed by giant video cameras, staff, and security. Lake had stepped out first and she was already waving to the crowd, posing with her best angles in a short, off-the-shoulder red dress that matched her earthen skin tone. Lake had ordered us all the same one in the correct sizes and colors—peach for me, silver for Belle, black for Chae Rin. Had to look unified but distinct, she’d said. I hadn’t actually realized how much work and effort she’d put into this event in the midst of all the Saul chaos until this moment as I watched her confirm with event staff where we needed to go. She had the poise and control of someone who’d done this before, someone who fed off the energy like a willowy, starving plant soaking in the sunlight.
“Here we go—we’ve got the Effigies with us!”
Oh, so she was the interviewer. She was tall and busty with a beige dress on and her blond hair slicked back behind her ears. Lake ushered us forward, but my heels were too high and thin for a straight, smooth walk, so the second I tried to twist around to face the right way, I stumbled and nearly fell over.
“Oops, looks like she’s having a little bit of trouble there!”
Chae Rin grabbed my arm and helped me walk. I was sure that the one-second gaffe was already online, but what could I do about it? I had to keep smiling even as my cheeks hurt, even as I continued to scan the crowds for any sign of trouble.
“Hi!” the interviewer said, and only Lake and I bothered to respond as jovially as we could. “Ladies, hi! Wait a second, let’s turn around here and face the camera.”
We did. It felt strange being herded like sheep, but that was probably the normal condition of a celebrity on a red carpet.
“What an entrance,” she said as Lake stood closest to her. “A limo. Very classy. You girls seem to have gotten used to luxury!”
“Well, Kacey, they don’t call us warrior princesses for nothing,” Lake said into the mic, and I was sure the camera caught my cringe. I tried quickly to warp it into a mangled smile.
“Absolutely! Who else could make world security look so glamorous?” There was something so glassy and cheesy about Kacey’s grin; she probably wasn’t even half as excited to see us as she looked. “Awesome, awesome. Now, you guys are not only presenting today, but you’ve been nominated for Favorite Badass Role Model, and with all that fighting evil you guys do, I bet you’re not surprised.”
“Oh, we were surprised!” Lake said genuinely. “I mean, it’s really an honor to be recognized by people who look up to you—right, girls?”
“Yes! Absolutely! It’s so exciting!” I bobbed my head up and down, my eyes wide-open with that deer-in-headlights look that made me wonder suddenly why I had any fans at all. Belle and Chae Rin already looked over it, but they smiled serenely for the sake of the cameras.
“And, Maia, how’s your training going?”
“Good.” I tried not to make my fidgeting too noticeable. “It’s being put to good use.”
“Yeah? You were just at a fund-raiser over in the UK and now you’ve been whisked off to Canada for the TVCAs—where do you have the time to do any actual battling these days?”
That was a strange jab. The quiver in Lake’s expression told me she thought so too. Was it a trap?
“Well,” Lake said, recuperating, “we’ve just gotten back from a mission outside Glasgow. And we’ve been hard at work doing other stuff that unfortunately the cameras aren’t always privy to. But we’re always happy to come to events like these for the sake of anyone who looks up to us. You know, we want to show girls that anyone can be heroes, and—”
“Wait!” The interviewer was already looking past us. “Is that—is that who I think it is?”
We turned. Four of the biggest, loudest Harley-Davidsons, each painted pure neon pink, drove up to the red carpet like a motorcade. Each driver was muscled and topless as if they’d been dragged out of a bachelorette party in the middle of performing. And behind each man was a member of Britain’s current top girl group, GBD.
Kacey was beside herself. “What an entrance! Cameras, can we get a closer look at those motorcycles?”
Lake looked furious as the crowd went wild and Kacey started calling the girls over. Joanna, Hailey, Misha, and Cara. Their latest brand change had finally taken off when they started this latest “Scandalous” era with their heavy chola makeup, tank tops, high-waisted jeans, high ponytails, and the heavy spray tans concealing their originally pale skin. It was certainly a far cry from the cutesy, teenybopper, kids-next-door image they’d originally been given by their label back when Lake was part of the group. I guess some music exec figured Girls by Day was more fit for made-for-TV movies targeting the middle school market. Well, the rebranding had done wonders. “Scandalous” was now number one on the Billboard Hot 100—a point Kacey would surely bring up when she invited them to join our interview.
“Kacey, hi!” Jo was as tall as Lake, but built like a linebacker. She bumped her broad shoulders into Lake, maybe purposefully, as we all shuffled to make room for one another and yet still catch the camera. Chae Rin and Belle certainly didn’t mind stepping out of the frame. “Oh, Victoria, how are you, love? When’s that single dropping? Any day now?”
Lake’s lips thinned into a straight line, her brown eyes dripping with malice as she laughed cutely enough for the cameras to believe it. She tapped Jo a bit too hard on the shoulder.
“Wow, look at this: ex-groupmates meeting again for the first time in years—are you getting this, guys?” Kacey needn’t have worried; two more cameras swarmed us. “Lake, how does it feel seeing your old group again after so long?”
“I’m shocked, to be quite honest.” Lake tilted her head and made a show of staring at Jo’s outfit. “So much has changed. You’re almost as dark as I am now. Bit too long in the tanning bed, then? Strange, considering how you always used to manage your real skin tone by avoiding the sun.” Lake giggled into her hand. “Like a vampire.”
“Yes, love, I avoided the sun like your singles avoided the charts. But anyway!” Jo said as Lake bristled. “So excited to be here.”
“Yes, I know, so you’ve got several nominations,” Kacey said, and I could see Lake flinching at her emphasis. “And you’re performing ‘Scandalous,’ which has been number one on Billboard for, like, three weeks straight.”
“They’re saying it’s totally going to be the song of the summer!” chimed one short, stalky member, her black hair tied in a huge bun with a blue ribbon. Misha? Maybe Cara. One of them.
“And since you two are finally here, together on the red carpet for the first time in years, Jo, what do you think of your old group member getting nominated for Favorite Badass Role Model?”
Another trap—a barely concealed one. Lake kept her smile plastered on her face as she waited for the attack.
Jo’s light brown ponytail swished as she tilted her neck and considered it. “Well,” she said, “personally, I’m just excited for her. And to be honest, I’m a bit surprised, too. I mean, little Vicky being nominated as a role model?” Her “friendly” laughter had a knife-sharp edge to it. “She’s really come a long way from faking injuries and illnesses to get out of fighting as an Effigy. I like to think of her as a little butterfly that finally spread her wings after years of being . . . well, whatever butterflies are first. Worms?” She smiled.
“Lake,” Kacey said, “we all know you had some kind of breakdown in Milan. Is it true you faked all that just to get put on leave?”
The veil fell. Lake looked terrified. Even with all the constant screaming, there were some members of the crowd watching the interview intently. Kacey must have gotten word from her producer through her earpiece, because she suddenly shifted.
“Okay, I see I’ve kept you for too long—well, enjoy the night, ladies! And, GBD, I have a few more questions to ask about your hit single!”
Lake composed herself as we continued down the red carpet, but I could tell from the creeping redness in her eyes that she hadn’t been prepared for that particular attack. Showbiz cattiness was all about the dog whistles and low-key shady remarks. But this was live, and regardless of what the truth was, the idea that Lake had purposefully wrangled herself out of her cosmic duty in favor of embracing what many called a failed celebrity life had now been televised.
“Lake, are you okay?” I held her hand when she stumbled a bit over her high heels—something I’d never seen her do.
“It’s true. So what? My parents didn’t want me to fight,” she said in a low whisper. “They still don’t. They don’t want me to die. What’s so wrong with that? Jo . . . She couldn’t possibly understand.”
I squeezed her hand as we continued down the red carpet through the glaring flashes. Lake tried to recover by taking selfies with fans and signing autographs. I followed suit the best I could.
“Chae Rin! Chae Rin!”
We looked for the voice. It was faint, but soon we could see someone pushing her way through the crowd to the barricade. Chae Rin’s whole body seized up, her lips parting as soon as the girl broke free from the rest, her hand touching the glowing metal bars.
“Unnie?” Chae Rin dropped her clutch purse and rushed to the metal bars. “Oh my god!”
The girl looked very much like Chae Rin, though her sleek black hair was longer and rather limp over her buttoned-up blue blouse—a little stuffy for an event like this. She was only slightly taller, and a bit chubbier, her round cheeks as rosy as the girl whose fingers she clasped. I’d seen her face before in Chae Rin’s electronic file, which Rhys had shown me on the way to Montreal. She was one of four faces on Rhys’s tablet screen as he told me all about Chae Rin’s family.
Her sister?
“Unnie!” I’d never heard Chae Rin’s voice like this, almost childish as she jumped up and down and hugged her big sister. “What are you doing here?”
“I know I’m not supposed to contact you, but I saw that you were nominated and I had to try to get here.”
She had a slight accent, which I could only assume came from living in Daegu for longer than Chae Rin had. She looked at us, her eyes stretching into beautiful crescents as she grinned. “You’re the other Effigies, right? I’m Ha Rin, big sis. Thanks for keeping my little sister in check.”
“Hey, nobody keeps me in check.” Chae Rin folded her arms brattily as her sister rubbed her head, messing up her hair.
The only thing I knew about Ha Rin was that she was studying to be meteorologist at the University of British Columbia. She certainly looked the part with her professional dress blouse, thin white sweater, and black dress pants—an odd combo in the middle of sweaty, screaming children in rocker T-shirts.
“Seriously, though, what are you doing here? Did something happen?” Chae Rin looked suddenly concerned when her sister’s smile fell. “Mom. Mom’s okay, isn’t she? Or did she have another—”
“I can’t explain here—I’ll meet you in your hotel room after the show, okay? Text me when you’re done. Don’t worry, it’s nothing really bad . . . ,” she added, though unconvincingly, when she saw Chae Rin’s expression begin to twist with worry. “You’ll be up onstage, right?” she added quickly. “I’ll try to work my way there.”
“How?” I said. “I’m sure the pit’s already completely occupied.”
“I have my ways. Okay, kids, move it!” What her mousy blouse didn’t show was the sheer brutality of the sharp elbows concealed within the fabric.
I laughed, hoping Chae Rin would follow suit, but she stayed quiet down the rest of the length of the red carpet.
• • •
The rest of the evening passed by like a dream. Backstage, celebrities I’d only seen before on television came up to me, asking me what it was like fighting monsters, telling me how cute my dress was, though obviously there were others who didn’t seem that willing to share the spotlight even if there were no cameras around. That clique of willowy socialites-turned-models every girl at Ashford High was obsessed with completely ignored me when I said hello. And that one British blue-eyed soul singer was too busy throwing his half-empty coffee cup at a volunteer’s face to even notice me trying to talk to him. At least pop sensation Aaron Jacobs spared me a minute. He’d gotten much nicer after coming back from rehab.
It was all well and good. Belle was off being chatted up by a young actor who’d once professed to be her fan, not that she seemed very engaged in the conversation. Chae Rin was off by herself, eating half the tray of tiny sandwiches left on a table full of food platters. It was a little bit of respite from everything I’d been through in the past few weeks. Taking pictures with celebrities, watching people go crazy online. For a few blissful hours, I could forget that there were monsters chasing me. I could go back to being just a fan again.
Maybe it was all the noise, but my head was suddenly throbbing. I grimaced and bent low. GBD had just returned backstage from performing “Scandalous,” and in the midst of glaring at Jo, Lake noticed me wincing.
“You okay?” Lake asked when I pressed my hand against my forehead.
“Yeah, I’m fine.” I’d have been more worried if it were the back of my neck again. This was probably just the aftereffect of the mind control. “I think I’m just tired.”
“Well, it’s almost over.” Lake seemed relieved at the thought as the mechanical female voice called out the nominee list over the sound system. The crowd went wild after every name, but they gave a resounding cheer when the Effigies were listed. Even though I was backstage, I was still streaming the show on my phone—I could see images of us fighting phantoms spliced together in an awesome montage they showed on the jumbotron.
“And the winner is . . .” The presenter of our award paused for effect. “The Effigies!”
“Yes!” Lake pumped her fist in the air. “Yes! I told you, bitches!” she said, turning and giving Jo the finger before grabbing me and pulling me up the stairs.
Everything hit me at once. The lights. The biting cold. The herd of fans, the sound of their screams echoing in the night sky. The jumbotron behind us had a split screen of our profiles, our faces plastered against different-colored backdrops with our names scrawled under each one. The host handed Lake some kind of strange silver trophy as Belle, Chae Rin, and I lined up beside her.
Lake was babbling her thanks as the rest of us posed and just tried our best to look good. That’s why we were here, at the end of the day. Be pretty. Be a role model. Be a celebrity. Gather your fans and make the Sect look less menacing. That was the task we’d been given, and even knowing what we knew about the Sect, it was too late to skip out on the event Sibyl had okayed. Lake wouldn’t have let us, anyway. I could see how much holding the trophy and waving to her fans meant to her. She clung to the moment as tightly as she clung to her new award.
“Ugh.” My head was throbbing again. Even in front of so many cameras, I couldn’t stop myself from wincing.
Maia . . .
No. My hands fell at my sides. I could hear her. Natalya. I thought I’d buried her deep after that last time she’d tried to take me.
Maia . . . Don’t be fooled. . . . Pay attention. . . .
Panic seized me as another wave of pain crashed against my skull from the inside, like she was pounding against the bone with her knuckles.
“Stop.” I winced again, shutting my eyes. Next to me, Belle shifted her head, confused as she watched me struggle.
Don’t be fooled. . . . Pay attention!
My eyes snapped open. Quickly, I looked at the crowd. Something was wrong. I scanned the army of bodies until I found Ha Rin close to the front of the pit behind the glowing barricades. She was waving at us, trying to get our attention. But no, something was wrong. What was this feeling? What was Natalya—
A rush of cold slipped down my body, freezing me to the bone.
Vasily.
His stringy, unwashed blond hair draped over half his face from beneath a black hoodie. He looked at me and smiled.
My heart thumped so painfully it was difficult to breathe. In that moment, he’d slipped out from between a pair of screaming fans to stand behind Ha Rin. She didn’t notice. Nobody noticed. Nobody could see because nobody was paying attention—not the fans, not the staff, not the celebrities, not the other girls.
His skin was sallow and bruised, but I knew he was hiding worse injuries beneath his clothes. He looked wired and ready, like a rabid dog that had been starved too long.
He looked hungry.
Ha Rin was still trying to get her sister’s attention, but Chae Rin was distracted by Lake, who’d shoved the microphone in her face to get her to say a few words. She didn’t see Vasily float his two fingers near her sister’s temple without touching it, his index and middle finger pressed together and his thumb in the air in the shape of a gun as his eyes locked with mine.
No, no, no. The blinding lights, the shrieking crowd. In that moment, my senses were off-kilter, panic surging through me. Vasily’s emaciated face sparked with malice. And through it all, Natalya was screaming.
Don’t be fooled. . . . Pay attention! Pay attention!
Vasily’s hands, quick as a flash, flew into his left pocket.
“Stop!” I screamed suddenly, and, as the music began playing us off the stage, I erupted into flame, the pole of my scythe forming in my hands, its blade glinting in the night. Everyone onstage jumped back to avoid being touched by the flickering fire.
“What are you doing?” cried Lake after tripping and falling to the ground. “Stop it!”
Camera phones were flashing, and while some gasped in fear, there were more excited screams echoing in the night as if I were showing off my power for their amusement. Vasily’s hand was out of his pocket, but it took me a moment to realize that he wasn’t holding a weapon—it was a remote control. He fiddled with a few of the buttons before slipping it back inside his pocket and, with a wink, disappearing into the crowd.
The screen of the jumbotron behind us fizzled out, our image replaced by static snow. The scythe dissipated in my hands as we turned and watched.
“What the hell is going on here?” Another host looked around for help, but the staff was too busy running around trying to get the jumbotron working. With a frustrated shrug, he brought his mic up to his mouth, pasting a phony smile back onto his face. “Okay, folks, we’re having a little bit of technical difficulty, but hey, it’s live TV! You know what that means, right? Despite our best efforts, anything can happen.”
He was trying to spin this as some kind of wild ride typical for teenager-targeted TV, but I could see the beads of sweat dripping from his face. He was worried. He was right to be.
A few staff members in black clothes rushed up to us. “Ladies, please come with us. We need to get you offstage,” one said.
But before we could move, the screen turned to darkness.
The crowd fell silent.
“Good evening, everyone,” called a voice from the screen. My breath hitched.
Saul’s voice.
The darkness receded to show bright lights shining from the ceiling before the camera panned around the room. From what I could tell, it was a cabin: The walls and floors were made of logs. As the camera panned, I saw first a chair, then a tall standing lamp. But the camera didn’t linger. A hung oil painting of an old man eating soup with Death. Boarded-up windows. A potted plant . . .
Then the camera panned around to the desk, where Saul sat with his legs crossed on the chair in front of it. He was surrounded by phantoms in the shape of wolves, snapping at his feet. Those wolves . . . It’d been a long time since I’d seen them. Like the ones he’d used to attack me in New York and Argentina, their mouths frothed as they snarled. His metal hand tapped the armrest in a steady rhythm. The knife in his other hand glinted underneath the ceiling lights.
So did the white stone of the ring he wore.
An old man in a respectable suit lay bound and gagged at Saul’s feet, his chest heaving, his gray hair shaking with the rest of his body. His eyes bulged as he watched the black wolves leave Saul’s side and circle him silently.
“Oh my god!” The host dropped his mic, and the sound interference split my ears.
Lake scrambled back to her feet. “What’s happening?” She tugged my arm. “What’s going on?”
“I recognize that man,” whispered Belle. “I think . . . Is he not . . . the Ontario premier?”
I had no idea one way or the other. Belle paid more attention to politics than I did. I could see her hands twitching, aching for her sword, aching to fight, but she couldn’t fight an image on-screen and she knew it. Frustration crinkled the skin around her eyes.
Chae Rin immediately turned to us. “We can catch him. We should try to figure out where he is. We can save him, can’t we?” She grabbed Belle’s arm and a little too violently yanked her around to face her. “Come on! We have to do something!”
Belle didn’t appreciate being manhandled, or maybe it was the tension of the situation itself. She pulled her arm out of Chae Rin’s grip and shoved her back.
“What?” Chae Rin spat, once her feet stabilized onstage. “We’re just going to stand here looking like morons? Oh, I guess if it’s not about Natalya, you don’t give a shit, right?”
Belle responded to Chae Rin with a livid glare, which Chae Rin matched.
“You know me. My name,” Saul said, grabbing our attention once more, “is Saul.”
His voice, though forceful, carried with it the kind of well-mannered, gentlemanly lilt I’d associated with Nick. But this brutality . . . The premier’s face had been bludgeoned; his saliva was dripping over the white binds in his mouth. That was Alice.
The last time I’d faced Saul in France, he’d made it clear that the drives of both were the same: to find the rest of the stone from which the rings had been made. To find Marian. To make a wish. Even if their wishes were different, both personalities, the body and the Effigy ghost inhabiting it, had proven well enough that they were willing to do whatever it took to achieve their goal. A relationship that had started out with antagonism now seemed to have become a begrudging partnership—the kind Natalya and I had shared, for a fleeting moment, before she’d tried to take me over again. Nick’s calm, calculating personality with Alice’s vicious bloodthirst.
“My name is Saul,” he declared again. “I am an Effigy.” He shoved the point of the knife into the desk behind him, his eyes never leaving the camera. “And you should fear me.”
In that moment he raised his arms. Black smoke dripped up from the floor, limbs forming before our eyes. More shadow wolves shivered into existence, their dead flesh clinging to their bones, the smoke curling off of their black furry hides into the air over the trembling body of the poor man I knew we wouldn’t be able to save.
“I come to tell you that I am not acting alone. I come to give you a message.”
I clenched my hands into fists.
“And that message is this.” Saul sat back in his chair and folded his arms. “The pain and terror you’ve experienced thus far is only a shade of what lies ahead of you. And the people you’ve foolishly trusted to protect you can’t save you. No. They won’t save you. They’ll betray you.” He flicked a hand and his wolves descended on the senator.
His screams rattled the walls as the wolves tore apart his flesh.
No. I looked away, my heart rattling, my body limp and heavy as his screams joined that of the crowd. And through it all I could hear Saul’s promise. It was unmistakable. “You’ll see. In seven days, we’ll come. And death will follow.”