The Shadow Prince

chapter sixteen DAPHNE

“Wow, this place is perfect, isn’t it?” I say to Tobin as we walk on one of the lake paths.

He’d given me a tour of most of the places in town that could be reached on foot. I wheeled my old bike along as he carried Gibby and pointed out different places of interest. My favorite so far is a street of small, boutique-style shops that Tobin said is called Olympus Row. Each of the stores had been designed to look like a shop you would find in a Greek village, with the white stucco walls and blue roofs and doors. It made me feel like I’d been transported to another world. We’d stopped for gelato, and ate it while we watched a group of kids splashing in a fountain before heading for the trails that wind around the lake.

“Don’t let it fool you,” Tobin says.

“What do you mean?”

“Nothing is ever as perfect as it seems,” he mumbles. A strange black note drifts off him. It clashes with his warm vibe.

“What, is this town ripe with conspiracies and secret societies?” I say, trying to lighten his mood.

“Hey, I’m just saying you never know.…” Tobin strums a few bars on Gibby. The sound muffles whatever emotive notes he might be putting off at the moment. He sings a couple of lines from a song I don’t know and then stops walking. “Hey, speaking of secret societies,” he says, his voice much lighter now, “there’s this party next week.…” He trails off, and I’m not sure I’m following his segue.

“Are you telling me that the Skull and Crossbones are holding a recruitment meeting? Or is it a Masons sort of shindig?”

“Aliens,” Tobin says. “It’s an alien rave.”

“Ohhhh,” I say with a laugh. “Hey, what’s over there?” I point at the smaller island of the lake, even though I know very well it’s the grove. “You haven’t shown me that place yet.”

“What? Oh, that’s the grove. I thought you said you went there earlier today?”

Oh yeah. I had. “I must be all turned around,” I say, sheepishly. “Let’s go check it out again.”

“Uh,” Tobin says. “It’s just a bunch of old trees. Once you’ve seen them, that’s kind of it. Nobody even goes there. Anyway, about this party …”

“The alien one? Come on, let’s cross the bridge.”

“Yeah, that one. Except without the aliens. I was kind of hoping.…” He lets his sentence trail off again, like he isn’t sure what to say next.

I’m not sure what to say, either. Crap, had I totally been oblivious again? I’d read Tobin’s vibes toward me in nothing but a friend-zone sort of way. But as CeCe had already established, I totally suck at this sort of thing. So much so that I don’t date. I’d always been too focused on my music to care whether or not I got asked out, and I never felt like I had the time to spare when I did. Truth is, the idea of dating has always seemed like it’s in opposition to my goals. My mom had let herself get sidetracked by a guy, and look where that landed her. I know I’m hesitating too long, so I say what comes to mind first. “I, um, don’t really date.… It’s got nothing to do with you.” I cringe, knowing I sound completely lame. “I just feel like I need to stay really focused on the music department.…”

“Oh. Yeah, I get that,” Tobin says. “Totally focused here, too. The party is for the music department. My mom likes to throw a big shindig for them after the first month of school. It’s supposed to help everyone bond as a group, you know. She’s kind of overly invested in my social life. I just wanted to make sure you knew about it.… So you could come. Alone. Of course.” He gives me a sheepish grin. A tinge of pink highlights his cheeks. I listen carefully to make sure his friendly tone is still there, and feel relieved when I still hear it under the wavering notes of embarrassment. I would hate it if my social lameness had messed up my first—and possibly only—potential friendship in this place.

“In that case, I’ll be there. Assuming I even get into the department, that is.”

“Believe me, you’re getting in.”

“So let’s go explore this grove place,” I say, eager to change the subject. I grab Tobin’s arm and try to pull him down the path toward the grove, but he literally digs in his heels to stop me.

“Seriously, Daph. Nobody goes there. That place gives me the creeps.”

So Marta hadn’t been making it up that nobody ever went there.

“Why? Do weird things happen there or something? Or are you just chicken?” I ask, trying to sound nonchalant and jokey, but I really do want to know. Maybe I wasn’t the first person to have encountered something strange there.

“Call me a chicken all you want. It’s starting to get dark. How about we go get cupcakes back at the row. My treat.”

“Come on, ya dork. It’ll be an adventure.” Tobin’s resistance is starting to freak me out, but I need to go back to the grove. I’d left Gibby’s case behind—which, yeah, I could probably easily talk Joe into replacing for me—but I had also left my tote bag. Along with it, my cell phone, wallet, my school registration forms, and various other bottom-of-my purse junk. Which means Mr. Creepy Eyes could possibly have access to the contact information for all of my friends in Ellis Fields, my Pomegranate Bliss lip gloss … and my new address. I could only hope he hadn’t noticed my tote and had left it there. I need to get it back before he, or anyone else, happens upon it.

“Then I guess I’ll have to check it out on my own,” I say, and head toward the bridge that leads to the island. Tobin could either follow or let me go alone. I’m pretty sure he’ll follow.

“This place has the creepiest vibe ever,” he says as we get closer, his reluctant melody echoing on the bridge.

I don’t know what he is talking about. The only thing creepy I had found about the grove was the stranger. Its vibe had been what had drawn me to it. I don’t know how it can repel anyone else. Then again, they can’t hear it singing the way I do.…

As we near the grove, I notice that something is different about the grove’s song this evening. I stop and listen for a moment. Instead of being a soothing lullaby, it sounds off. Like it’s full of broken, discordant notes.

“Something’s wrong,” I say, leaning my bike against the bridge’s railing. “With the grove.” I jog toward the ring of poplar trees.

“If something is wrong in the grove,” Tobin says, huffing with Gibby in his arms, trying to keep up, “shouldn’t we be running away, not toward it?”

“Not in the grove. With the grove. I can hear it.”

“You’re kind of weird, Daphne Raines.”

“I know.” I pass between two poplar trees into the dark grove of aspens and laurels. I gasp. This place barely resembles the beautiful grove I had sung in this morning. Several of the smaller trees are broken, and mounds of earth have been upturned. One of the aspens looks like it’s been struck by lightning: its trunk is scorched, and one of its large branches has been turned to ash.

“What happened here?” I whisper, more to the grove itself than to Tobin.

“This damage looks fresh,” he says. “I didn’t think anyone came here. Not since …”

I jog over to the laurel tree that’s shaped like a tuning fork. It’s one of the few trees other than the poplars that are undamaged. I find Gibby’s case, but my tote bag is gone—along with all of my personal information.

“Not since what?” I ask Tobin, realizing he didn’t finish his sentence.

He leans my guitar against the scorched tree. I follow him as he follows the path of destruction, which slopes down the steep side of the island toward the lake.

“My sister,” he says. “She used to hang out here. She’d come here to run lines—she was on the theatre track. She’s the only one I ever knew who came here.”

“Used to? Did she go away to college or something?” But by the way Tobin’s tone has changed, I know that whatever made Tobin talk about his sister in the past tense isn’t something pleasant.

“She ran away. Six years ago. I haven’t seen her since.”

“Oh,” I say. “I’m sorry.” I really am. Here I’ve dragged him into a place that reminds him of something painful, for my own selfish purposes. I feel like such a jerk. “Hey, we can go back now if you want.”

Tobin stops abruptly and takes in a sudden breath. “Is that someone … down there …?” He takes off running down the slope. I follow at a slower speed, trying not to trip on a rock or branch and go tumbling into the water head over heels. I come up short when I finally see what he saw. Light from the lamps, which line the jogging paths across the island, reflects off something lying in the water at lake’s edge. It looks like the body of a girl, submerged almost up to her chest. Tobin splashes into the water, wing-tip shoes and all, and kneels in the mud next to the girl. He presses his fingers against her throat. I hold my breath while he searches for a pulse.

“She’s still alive!” he says, scooping her up. I almost protest his moving her, but it’s not like we can just leave her in the water. “It’s Pear,” he says. “Pear Perkins.”

I know that name. “The girl who missed the auditions?”

“I guess we know why,” Tobin says, grave notes marring his voice. “I think she’s been unconscious for a while.”

I climb down the hill and help him lay her down on the sandy bank away from the water. He pulls off his jacket and covers the girl’s upper body, but before he does, I see that she has four deep gashes in her arm, just above her elbow. The gashes make my stomach churn, but it’s her shoes that make me think I’m going to be sick. Pink and silver platform sandals. Just like the ones the girl I’d hit with my bike had been wearing. I hadn’t realized it when it happened, but as I replay the memory in my head, I see that the girl had jogged off in the direction of the grove. I place my hand on Tobin’s wet elbow. “I think I know who did this,” I say. “And I think it’s my fault that it happened.”