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I raised my chin and looked him in the eye. The flock, being smarter than the average gang of winged bears, went still.
Slowly, I stood up and walked closer to Fang. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Total slither beneath a bed, saw Gazzy quickly pull Iggy into the boys' room next door.
Until last year, I'd been taller than both Fang and Iggy. They'd not only caught up but had shot several inches past me, which I hated. Now Fang looked down at me, his eyes so dark I couldn't see where his pupils were.
"What?" I asked, deceptively mildly. I saw a flash of pink tutu as Angel and Nudge crawled with quick, silent efficiency into the boys' room.
"The air shows are too dangerous," Fang said equally mildly. I heard the connecting door between the two rooms ease shut with the caution of prey trying hard not to attract its predator.
"I can't let my mom down." This close, I could see his thick eyelashes, the weird glints of gold in his eyes.
He let out a breath slowly and clenched his hands.
"One more show," I offered.
His hands unclenched as he weighed his options. "All right," he said, surprising me. "You're right—we don't want to let the CSM down."
I looked at him in narrow-eyed suspicion, and then it hit me: Dr. Brigid Dwyer, the eighth wonder of the world, was part of the CSM. She'd planned on meeting us in Mexico City, our next show.
That was why Fang had agreed to just one more—so he could get all caught up with his favorite brilliant, underage scientist.
I walked stiffly to the bathroom, locked the door, and turned on the shower as hard as it could go. Then I buried my face in a fluffy towel and shrieked like a banshee.
6
I'M NOT a great sleeper. When you've spent your whole life facing imminent pain and death, you tend not to sink too deeply into the arms of Morpheus. So it was nothing new that I lay awake for hours that night, turning this way and that.
I know what you're thinking: how do the wings fit into the whole sleeping thing? Well, even though our wings fold up pretty neatly and tightly along our spines, we're generally not back sleepers. We're mostly side or stomach sleepers. Little bit of insider bird-kid info for ya there.
Right now I was flopped on my stomach, my head hanging off the side of the bed I was sharing with Angel. Nudge won the Flock Member Most Likely to Cause Injuries by Kicking During Sleep award last year, so she got a bed to herself.
My wings were unfolded a bit, and I reached around to pull a twig out of my secondaries. Here's what I was thinking about:
1) Who this new threat was
2) The air show in Mexico City
3) My mom and my half-sister, Ella
4) How to get Total to quit milking his tail injury, because enough was enough
5) Fang
6) Fang
7) Fang
I've grown up with Fang, from the very beginning, when our dog crates were stacked next to each other in the lab of experimental horror that we called the School. I know, just another typical romantic story about the boy next door.
Then we'd been rescued by our bad guy, turned good guy, turned bad again, turned I don't know what lately—and Fang and I had been like brother and sister with the rest of the flock, hidden away in the Colorado mountains.
Then Jeb (see description above) disappeared, and I became flock leader. Maybe because I was the oldest. Or the most ruthless. Or the most organized. I don't know. But I was the flock leader, and Fang was my right-wing man.
This past year, things had started to change. Fang had been interested in a girl (see Red-Haired Wonder, book two), and I'd hated it. I'd had my first date with a guy (possibly evil, not sure), and Fang had hated it. Then, last month, he'd gotten all cozy with Dr. Brigid Dwyer, the twenty-year-old scientist who'd been part of the research team down in the land of ice and snow and killer leopard seals. And—get this—she'd sort of flirted back with him. And he's—practically—just a kid!
In the midst of all this, Fang had kissed me. Several times. So now I was freaked and tempted and terrified and worried and longing—and also angry at him for even starting this whole thing to begin with. But it was started and couldn't be unstarted. (Again, his fault.)
And now I was trying to brush my hair, you know, when I thought about it, and looking at myself in mirrors, wondering if I was pretty. Pretty! A year ago, when my hair got in my eyes, I hacked it off with a knife. The only thing important about my clothes was whether they were too stiff with whatever to move fast in battle. And Fang had been my best friend and an excellent fighter.
