Page 27 of Delinquents Turned Fugitives
“I mean it. Not risking my ass—”
“Not asking you to.”
“You should just stay inside.” He held onto the door, which was hardly ajar more than an inch.
I looked up at him. He had a grandpa feel about him, and despite all his protests I could tell he actually wouldn’t be able to resist trying to protect me, even if he wanted to—he was a protector at heart. “Gunther, I appreciate it.”
I gently pulled the door open and walked into the parking lot. The door slammed shut behind me and I heard theshinkof a deadbolt sliding into place. The van door was cracked open.
What? What was Evan thinking? Part of me wished I’d borrowed that sword.
I forced my feet to go faster despite the nerves that crawled around my stomach. It was better to move than freeze up. I held my breath as I yanked the van door open. My heart nearly froze when Evan’s wand jabbed at my eyes.
“Fuck! Hailstorm! Don’t do that to me!” he gasped, clutching his chest.
“Sorry. But why the hell did you crack open the door when there are vampires on the loose?”
“They’ve been rounded up,” Evan said, pointing at his phone, which was streaming some kind of news program in a low gurgle.
I let out a breath of relief and then climbed into the van next to him. I knelt next to Andros’ head. “So, verdict?”
Evan licked his lips. “It’s a level ten spell.” He pushed his notebook toward me and turned it so I could read the Latin phrase and I noticed his fingers were stained with ink from all his notes.
“Indurasti cor et omnem partem it lapis. Harden your heart and any part. Hmmm … well that seems straightforward,” I furrowed my brow.
Evan shook his head. “It’s not. It can also be translated as a question. Have you hardened your heart or any part to stone?”
“Okay. That’s weird.”
“I think it’s a trick.”
“Why?”
Evan blew out a deep breath and ran his fingers through his hair, leaving a little blue ink smudge right at the base of his hairline. “It’s meant to be open to interpretation. Which is bad. It means if I interpret the spell incorrectly, then I’ll unravel it incorrectly. Maybe even make it worse.”
“Crap.” I picked at my lip, possibilities lighting up inside my head like bingo squares on the big board where my grandma used to drag me on Sunday afternoons when she’d watch me in the summertime.
I spoke out loud even as my eyes studied Andros and I kept plucking at my lip. “Most spells work like computer code. You give a command, they execute it.”
“Right, that’s a good metaphor. But … with this question … I’m kind of thinking it’s an if/then type of command. So, the magic literally hovers in the air with the if, searches you for the answer to the question—”
“Searches how?” I let go of my lip and ran my eyes across the words once more.
“Well that’s the trick. Heart can mean an organ or an emotion. So, is the question whether Andros hardened his heart as in theactualbeating heart—which would seem physically impossible—or the emotion, like he closed it off?” Evan plucked the notebook out of my hands and my eyes met his blue gaze. It was alight and energized, as though puzzling this out lit him up inside. “Now, I think the obvious answer would be emotions … but I think that would be the wrong one.”
“Because Claude was a bastard who wouldn’t know emotion if it bit him in the dick?” I asked.
“Because of ‘the other part’ in the translation. What does that mean? If you can’t harden your heart literally but can harden other things…” He looked at me.
It dawned on me what he meant. “No.”
“I think so.” He tilted his head.
“That’s fucking gross. And immature. No old dude who has to take little blue pills—”
“I think that’s exactly why I think it might be the right answer. Because that would be most people’s reaction. That it’s too ridiculous to be right.” Evan leaned back and his eyes scanned the original spell once more.
I closed my eyes and pressed my lips together and tried to slip into whatever twisted mentality I thought Claude had. “Harden any part … Dammit.” My blue eyes flew open and I shook my head. “Try it.”
