Darkhaven

I didn’t have to worry about Cecelia hassling me any more. Exams loomed like a thunderhead on the horizon, and she became frantic. She spent every lunchtime in the library, leaving me in an awkward position: go and study with her, which I sorely needed to do, or hang out with Zenna, which, while less daunting than Cecelia chanting muscle attachments or reciting laws of physics at my side, was tense for different reasons. Neither option felt right while I was neglecting the other. Most of the time I opted for the study-in-the-library approach, since if I didn’t start catching up it wouldn’t so much be a matter of explaining to everyone why I’d not been brilliant despite all my apparent work, but rather of explaining how I’d managed to fail Year 12, period. I begged Zenna to come and study with us, but she was not as quick to forgive as Cecelia.

She can stew in her own bitchiness. And you haven’t said sorry either.

I didn’t answer. She hadn’t pressed me for an apology before Cecelia and I made up.

‘Really, I don’t mind,’ Cecelia said as she copied chemistry notes onto flashcards, ‘go and hang out with Zenna. I’ve got plenty to do.’

‘I need to study too,’ I replied, doodling on my notebook.

Cecelia eyed my progress darkly. ‘I think you’ll be better off getting some fresh air. And not distracting me.’

I flipped my Human Biology book open. There wasn’t anywhere else to go. I enjoyed my own company just fine, but the barbed glances that sitting on the lawn or in the cafeteria alone attracted did ruin the solitude.

‘Can we do something this weekend?’ I asked, knowing the answer, but wanting to make a point. Cecelia didn’t even pause. She just shook her head and carried on working.

‘I just think we’re putting a lot of work in, we deserve a bit of a break. Need one, even.’

She didn’t answer. I stared, unseeing, at a diagram of muscle cells, then turned to my phone. I typed a text to Keraun – Want to hang on Saturday? – and paused, tapping my pencil on the desk.

Cecelia’s bony hand clamped down over mine.

‘Gabby, I love you, but if you’re not going to work, please find somewhere else to be.’

I sighed and packed up my stuff.

***

Stephen called while I was still in bed on Saturday morning. I’d forgotten all about the make-up session. I sent Keraun a profuse apology and raced to Lartte, a busy cafe a block from Alex’s. I hadn’t been to a cafe like this since the car accident at the Shack. The venue bustled with chatter and clinking cutlery. My nerves felt like they had petrol poured over them and a match might be thrown at any moment. I jumped as someone scraped a chair across the floor.

‘What,’ Stephen asked, ‘are the chances of your uncle spotting us here?’

I shrugged, trying to look relaxed. ‘I don’t know, I’m not clairvoyant.’

‘I’m not asking for a prediction, just your hunch.’

I considered. ‘Not high, but possible. He sometimes comes here for lunch.’

Stephen shook his head. ‘No reasoning. Just the feeling.’

I got out of my head and rummaged around in my gut. ‘Dodgy. The feeling is dodgy. But you already know that.’

Stephen chuckled. I wondered why he was in such a good mood. A waitress came up and handed him two takeaway cups. He passed me a hot chocolate as we headed out the door. It was sunny, but with a chilly breeze, and I was grateful for the solid warmth between my hands, calming me. ‘Thanks. What are we doing?’

‘Going for a drive.’

I felt my muscles ease slightly. The car was safe.

‘How is your driver training going?’ he asked as we buckled seatbelts.

‘Not as well as I’d like. I don’t have a lot of time.’ I didn’t mean it as a complaint. It was just true. I didn’t want to reschedule my test, but Darkhaven took priority. School was a distant second. I rarely got to a third item. Alex and I had not settled on a car – I wanted an orange 86, but Alex thought a Golf was an excellent, reliable choice. Of course he held the trump card: access to Dad’s bank account.

Stephen smiled broadly. ‘I figured as much. I thought today we might do something about it.’

My nerves switched from worried agitation to excited delight. I hadn’t had a driving lesson since before the invasion of the TISC handbooks.

Stephen drove us out to an old gravel pit where a white W-RX was parked, and he tossed me the keys. Too late, I reached out to catch them and missed. With a prolonged rattle, they slipped down between my seat and the console. Stephen snickered as I wound my hand down to fish them out. ‘We have some work to do on your reflexes. Which is partly why we’re here.’

I straightened up, keys in hand. We switched to the Rex, and Stephen started me with simple things: changing gears, braking, reversing. When he was convinced that I wasn’t a total beginner, he had me demonstrate a hill start and reverse park into a space that he marked out with some rocks. Both manoeuvres were flawless.

Not convinced that I hadn’t fluked it, or maybe because I celebrated with an outburst of ‘Nailed it!’, he had me do it all again, and I stuffed up the hill start the second time. We spent the rest of the morning daring each other to execute perfect hill starts on increasingly steep inclines until I tried to drive up a hill that even the all-wheel-drive rally car simply couldn’t manage.

‘I think you’ll pass,’ Stephen said, laughing as we rolled down the slope to a halt. ‘But we’re not done yet.’

He unbuckled his seatbelt, got out, and leaned back in the window. ‘Drive out of the pit and follow the road south-east.’ He pointed.

My gaze followed his hand across the gravel to a dirt track disappearing into the bush. ‘Where am I going?’

‘You’ll know when you get to the end, there’s a flag. Drive as fast as you can, and don’t stop until you get there. No matter what happens. Got it?’

‘Drive to the flag.’

‘No matter what happens. As fast as you can.’

He turned and climbed back into the Corolla, driving off the way we’d come in. I grumbled to myself as I put the Rex into gear and steered towards the track at the end of the pit. Whatever this was, I would have preferred to have known something about it. If it was some vague test of intuition, I had nothing.

I crawled onto the road in first gear, trundling along cautiously, nerves bristling. Nothing happened. Maybe it was just a driving exercise. I shifted up to second, about to accelerate, when a thud on the roof startled me. I slammed on the brakes. The car stopped almost instantly and my body whipped forward as a large black-and-white shape rolled over the bonnet and onto the ground. Keraun sprang to his feet, grinning, and hurried around to the passenger seat.

Irritation battled with an eager flutter in my chest. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘You wanted to hang out.’

‘Until I said I was busy.’

He pulled the door closed and wound down the window. He wasn’t wearing his sunglasses today, and his eyes were, for now, a normal human brown. ‘You want me here for this. I’ve seen the course, I can be your navigator.’

I folded my arms. ‘What if I was meeting a boyfriend?’

Horror flashed over his face, followed by a faint yellow glow about his eyes. ‘Oh. Um. Sorry.’ Without looking at me, he leapt out of the car and shut the door. ‘Sorry,’ he said again through the window. His face creased in puzzlement as I cracked up laughing. ‘What’s so funny?’

‘You’re in luck.’ I tried – and failed – to straighten my face. ‘The guy didn’t show.’

He stood awkwardly, fidgeting with the chain at his neck, then shoving his hands in his pockets and staring at the ground.

‘Get in,’ I said. I revved the engine a little.

‘But what about…’

‘I was messing with you. Are you going to be my navigator, or what?’

He shuffled for a moment, then opened the door and climbed back in.

‘How did you get here?’ I asked as he adjusted his seat, sliding it back. His eyes still burned with what I suspected was embarrassment. Serve his presumptuous arse right. ‘We’re in the middle of nowhere.’

‘Magic,’ he muttered. My stomach gave a little leap –

BANG. I jumped so high I actually hit my head on the roof of the car. Without another thought, I rammed the car into a random gear and floored it. The car jerked along until the revs were high enough for second, then sped off with an increasing whine. In the rear-view mirror, a cloud of dust rose from what must have been some kind of explosion.

‘Change gear!’ Keraun called over the keening engine, breaking through the mask of panic filling my brain. Donovan had given me a complex about explosive noises.

‘What?’ I glanced at the tacho. ‘Oh!’ I quickly changed up to third, then fourth and fifth as I kept accelerating. Another explosion shattered the dirt behind us. I found a groove though, and even a moment to be a bit pleased with myself as I deftly swung around a corner, then another one. It didn’t last. The next bend kept curving around, until the back end of the car flicked out to the side. Without thinking, I went to brake, lifting off the accelerator.

‘No brakes!’ Keraun reached across to put a firm hand on my leg, stopping my movement. I clutched at the steering wheel, trying desperately to hold the car straight. The car slowed enough for me to get it under control just as another explosion fired. I took a deep, shuddering breath, speeding along the now straight road. I also became aware of Keraun’s hand, a warm pressure on my thigh. ‘Uh,’ I began.

‘Oh.’ He snatched it back to rest casually on his own leg. ‘Sorry.’

I came around another corner, slightly slower and in better shape than last time, to see a billow of smoke obscuring the road. It was too late to stop, and besides, I had a sense that the explosions behind us weren’t finished. Smoke filled the air. My eyes adjusted rapidly to the diminished light, but I felt trapped by the lack of visibility, somehow even more acutely now that my vision was supposed to be sharper. The explosion earlier had left me feeling unsettled and out of touch with my intuition. I still struggled to push down the rising panic.

‘On your left,’ Keraun whispered. He seemed to know that if he yelled, I would lose my grip on self-control.

I glanced to my left just in time, swerving to avoid an object looming out of the smoke. Then another on the right. I wasn’t quick enough. I clipped it with the corner of the car, flinging it away with a solid thud. I just missed a third on the left, but this one I could see in the smoke, and I reeled with horror. It was the shape of a person, standing on the edge of the road.

‘Breathe,’ Keraun said.

‘They’re people! I hit one!’ Another explosion crashed behind us. I should go back. I couldn’t go back.

‘Think about it,’ Keraun said. I took another deep breath, finding the calm intuitive place that Liam had taught me to cultivate. It was tiny, almost impossible to reach, but things came into focus. Stephen had set this up. It wasn’t real.

‘This is an exercise,’ I said. ‘They’re mannequins. But what are the explosions?’

‘Mostly smoke and noise. Stephen’s not really tearing up the forest.’

I gritted my teeth and kept going. I didn’t want to admit it, but Keraun’s presence was calming, and I kept my hold on my intuition.

‘Don’t think so much. Just drive,’ Keraun suggested. I relaxed my vice grip on the wheel and let my chest soften so I could breathe without forcing it through an iron cage. Driving and dodging the mannequins became a little easier. The smoke cleared, and I was only half-surprised when Stephen’s Corolla flew into view on my left. It crept up on me, threatening to push me off the road. I accelerated and gave in to my reflexes. I still had some dodgy moments on the corners, but it was better. After I nailed a particularly gruelling bend, I found myself beaming.

‘Yes!’ Keraun whooped. I laughed with him, but it was short-lived. I ran over a branch on the road, shooting sideways as I jerked – too late – at the steering wheel. I wasn’t prepared for the immediate sharp left. I went in too fast and too close, and I knew before it happened that I couldn’t recover it. The car spun around, narrowly missing a tree, and stalled to a halt facing the way I had come. Stephen pulled up in a cloud of dust in the Corolla and waved at me to continue. I started the engine, did an awkward three-and-a-half-point-turn, and drove on, picking up speed as Stephen harried me, tailgating and zipping from side to side behind me. He blared his horn.

‘I think that’s an indication that you’re failing the time trial,’ Keraun said.

I grunted, putting my foot down. The road was starting to get all twisty again. I scrabbled at the steering wheel, trying to balance intuitive reflex and careful driving. There was a roar of an engine, and a motocross bike flew out of the trees. The figure on it was clad entirely in tight black leathers and a black, dark-tinted helmet, but I could guess who it was.

I lost my calm place.

Donovan rode right up beside me, so close she could have reached out and touched me. She was riding with one hand. In the other hand was a gun. She fired. I ducked, swerving across the road. Cracks splintered through the driver side window, but it stayed in place.

‘Faster!’ Keraun yelled. For the first time, I heard a hint of fear in his voice.

I flattened the pedal. Donovan dropped back, still shooting at me. I hit a deep pothole in the road. The window shattered out of the door, bits of glass falling into my lap. My mind fogged over, sinking into panic, and I flailed at the steering wheel as it slipped under my sweating palms. Keraun reached across and grasped the wheel, but I couldn’t drive any faster. A chequered racing flag up fluttered up ahead – the finish line! I knew if I could get there, my pursuers would stop. Keraun held the wheel and I gunned it for the flag. Donovan drew alongside me and fired again.

The shot punched me in the side, throwing me against my seatbelt as the burning metal lanced my chest. Blood soaked my shirt and I gasped, trying to find air somewhere in the blooming pain. I couldn’t. I sagged in the seat, blackness creeping into my vision, my hearing muffled. We swerved across the track. Keraun was almost in my lap now, pressing on my side, muttering about getting the bullet out. Pain fired through my body. The last thing I heard before I passed out was Keraun’s voice, saying something pointless about everything being okay.