Page 137 of Cherish

“Oh, Macy.” Hudson and I are dealing with the consequences as well—the whole paranormal world is—but in some ways, we’re more removed. Yes, we’re both trying to find our way as good rulers of the Gargoyle Court, and Hudson is doing…whatever he’s doing with the Vampire Court, so in some ways we’re right in the trenches. But in other ways, we aren’t.

I never thought about what it would be like for Macy, who doesn’t have that position of power. And who is getting thrown into schools where she has no relationship to anyone. Of course some of the people were loyal to Cyrus. Of course some of the people wanted to see us fail in our attempt to liberate the Vampire Court from his abusive hold. And of course some of those people are all too happy to take it out on a barely seventeen-year-old girl.

Like leader, like follower, apparently.

I search for something to say, to try to make this nightmare sound better, but I’ve got nothing.

Which might actually be for the better, because Macy takes my silence as encouragement and continues. “And the teachers let it happen, because they’ve got their own issues with the Courts or the Circle or my parents or your parents or me. I don’t know.” She runs her hands through her hair in a universal gesture of frustration. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. My mom tells me to just keep my head down and not make a fuss, but how am I supposed to do that when they’re constantly stealing my shit and casting spells to fuck with me or coming at me in a group under the bleachers? I shouldn’t have to take that.”

“No, you should not.” Outrage moves through me at the thought of Macy getting messed with that way. Of her being outnumbered under the bleachers or in some corner of the school somewhere, with a bunch of assholes fucking with her. “I didn’t know it was like that.”

“I didn’t want you to know. It’s humiliating.”

My heart breaks for her, and I have to fight the urge to go to the schools she’s been kicked out of so far this year and teach everyone what a real power imbalance looks like.

But since the low road isn’t exactly an option here, I start by saying, “There’s nothing humiliating about being singled out and bullied, Macy.”

“There is when five months ago you were helping to save the entire paranormal world. And now you can’t even go to Advanced Portals without getting ganged up on and sealed inside one.”

“What the hell? They did that to you?” Screw teaching them a lesson. I want to obliterate the entire school off the face of the earth. “What did the headmaster say when you finally got out of it?”

“That using a spell to set their shit on fire wasn’t a proportional response.”

“You’re damn right it wasn’t,” I snarl. “Settingthemon fire would have been closer to proportional, in my opinion. Those portals fucking hurt.”

“They really do,” she agrees with a laugh. It’s still a sad sound, but at least she isn’t crying anymore.

I, on the other hand, am about to start crying. I can’t believe this has been happening to Macy and I didn’t know. Yeah, she didn’t tell me what was going on, but still. I knew something was wrong, and I didn’t push to figure out what it was.

I didn’t want to upset her, didn’t want her to feel like I expected her to deal with everything that had happened to her on some kind of a truncated timeline. I know what it feels like to try to grieve when the people around you think you should be able to just move on. I didn’t want her to think that’s what I expected her to do.

So I didn’t push. I tried to be delicate, tried to respect her feelings. And instead, I went too far in the other direction and let her feel abandoned. I let her be tormented and tortured by other paranormals and didn’t have a clue it was going on.

I feel like such an asshole.

“This is why you’ve been kicked out of so many schools since the year started?” I ask. “What about just staying home until Katmere is ready?”

She shrugs, and we both pause to listen as Hudson finishes Coldplay’s “Yellow” and launches into “Bad Habits” by Ed Sheeran.

“At least he gets to finish his concert,” Macy comments with a snort.

“It’s always like this when he’s in the shower,” I joke. “He really is a one-vamp karaoke show. Of course, the days when he does his Beatles tribute are when it gets really interesting.”

But we’re not here to talk about Hudson—or his musical proclivities. “You never answered my question,” I remind Macy after a few seconds of silence. “About Katmere?”

“Oh, Katmere won’t be ready to actually open its doors until next semester at the earliest.” Macy gives me a sad smile. “It’s pretty much rebuilt, but there’s a whole lot of politics going on around it right now with all the different paranormal groups. And instead of laying down the law, my dad is trying to please them all.”

“Which isn’t a recipe for disaster at all,” I tell her dryly. If being gargoyle queen has taught me nothing else, it’s taught me that.

“Exactly.”

“So what are they going to do, then? They’re really just going to ship you off toanotherschool?” I ask.

She shrugs. “Apparently.”

“But how is that going to solve the problem?”

“It’s not. But my parents don’t seem to care.” She ducks her head so her moss-green bangs fall into her face, blocking her eyes from me.

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