Hunted (House of Night #5)(12)

"And last but not least is Kramisha."

A black girl twitched out of the group. It was a testament to how distracted I'd been with Venus and Aphrodite and Stevie Rae that I hadn't noticed her before then. She had on a form-fitting bright yellow shirt cut low to show the top of her black lace bra and a pair of high-waisted, skintight cropped jeans that were cinched up with a wide leather belt that matched her chunky gold shoes. Her hair was cut geometrically into a short poof on her head, and half of it was dyed bright orange.

"Let's get it straight right now that I'm not sharin' my bed with no one," Kramisha said, weaving her head around and looking bored and pissed off at the same time.

&ld UR me ofquo;Kramisha, I told you about a zillion times, don't make an issue outta somethin' that isn't one," Stevie Rae said.

"I just want to be clear about myself," Kramisha said.

"Fine. You're clear." Stevie Rae paused and looked up at me expectantly. "Okay, that's my group."

"And these are the extent of the red fledglings?" Darius asked before I could launch into my introductions.

Stevie Rae chewed the inside of her cheek and didn't meet Darius's eyes. "Yeah, these are all of my red fledglings."

Ah oh, that's her I'm-not-telling-the-whole-truth look. I knew it, but when she met my eyes, hers so clearly begged me not to say anything that I decided to keep my mouth shut and get the whole story when we weren't the focus of everybody's attention.

But me putting off questioning Stevie Rae didn't put off the feeling that had come back, alarm bells ringing inside my head, loud and clear, at her evasion. There was definitely something going on with the red fledglings, and I didn't think that something was going to be good.

I cleared my throat. "Well, I'm Zoey Redbird." I tried to sound polite and normal in a situation that didn't feel either.

"I've told y'all about Zoey. She has an affinity for all five elements, and it's through her powers that I was able to Change and we were all given our humanity back," Stevie Rae said. I noticed she was looking directly at Venus.

"Well, it wasn't just through me that happened. My friends had a lot to do with it, too." I nodded at Aphrodite, who was still drinking directly from the bottle of wine. "You guys obviously know Aphrodite. She's a human now, but let's just say she's not normal," I said, completely avoiding the subject of her fresh Imprint with Stevie Rae.

Aphrodite snorted, but didn't say anything.

"This is Erin and Shaunee, the Twins. Erin has an affinity for water, Shaunee's affinity is fire." The Twins nodded and said hi.

"Damien and Jack are a couple," I said. "Damien's affinity is air. Jack is our audiovisual guy."

"Hi," Damien said.

"Hey there," Jack said. He lifted the bag he was still carrying. "I made sandwiches. Anyone hungry?"

"Can someone explain why that dog's in here?" Venus said, totally ignoring Jack's friendly overture.

"She's here 'cause she's mine," Jack said. "She stays with me." He reached down and petted Duchess's soft ears.

"Duchess stays with Jack," I said firmly, giving Venus a hard look and thinking that I could happily strangle her with Duchess's leash before I continued with the intros. "And this is Erik Night."

"I remember you from drama class," Shannoncompton said, her cheeks turning pink. "You're really famous."

"Hi, Shannon." Erik smiled easily at her. "Nice to see you again."

"I remember you, too. You were with Aphrodite," Venus said.

"Not anymore," Aphrodite said quickly, giving Darius a look.

"Obviously. You're not a fledgling anymore," Venus said in a silky voice that sounded way too interested. "When did you Change?"

"Just a few days ago," he said. "I was on my way to the Europe an acting academy when Shekinah asked that I take Professor Nolan's place temporarily at the House of Night."

"Wow, I knew that High Priestess looked familiar. That was actually Shekinah!" Shannoncompton said. "I saw her just before she started toward that winged guy and--" She stopped talking and picked at her lip worriedly.

"And she was killed by Neferet," I bluntly finished for her.

"Was she? Do you know that for certain?" Darius asked.

"She's dead and I saw Neferet do it. I think she killed her with her mind," I said.

"Queen Tsi Sgili," Damien murmured. "It's true then."

"I need all of this explained to me," Darius said curtly.

"And this is our Son of Erebus warrior, Darius," I said.

"He's right," Stevie Rae said. "We need what happened to night explained to us."

"Not just to night's happenings," Darius said. His gaze rested on the group of unusual fledglings. "I need information if I am to protect you. I must know everything that has been going on."

"Agreed," I said, glad beyond words that we had an experienced Son of Erebus in our group.

"We could eat and talk," Jack said. When I looked at him, he gave me a big smile. "It always helps to eat with each other. A meal makes things better."