Revealed

going to be able to go back to the depot soon, so if Dallas and his group could just be kinda distracted, and if our fledglings just didn’t mention that they were sleeping in the basement, well, then maybe we’d have a safe spot here at the House of Night Neferet doesn’t know about.”
    “It is always wise to have a safe place to rest,” Darius added.
    “So, like I said before, can you think of anything you could do to help us keep Dallas distracted and not nosing around while we get the basement cleared out and our kids moved down there?” I finished, deciding that all three of us were pretty crappy liars.
    “There is the fledgling’s funeral,” Kalona said. “Though she used to be one of your group, everyone is aware that recently she changed her allegiance to Dallas. Would it not be a kind thing for you to ask that Dallas tend to the building and even, perhaps, the lighting of her pyre? That should keep him preoccupied, and he would, naturally, ask his group to assist him.”
    “That’s actually an awesome idea,” I said. “It’ll definitely keep Dallas and his buddies busy, and it’s honestly a nice thing for us to step aside and let him publicly light her pyre and say good-bye. It’ll show that we believed he really cared about her.”
    “If he’ll do it,” Stark said. “You heard him yesterday. He said he’d tell Erin good-bye in his own way, and that meant he didn’t want anything to do with us.”
    “Which is the reason I should approach him instead of Zoey,” Kalona said. “I will tell him that Zoey has declined Thanatos’s invitation to conduct Erin’s funeral and so the job has been left to me.”
    “That’ll piss him off,” Stark said.
    “That is my intention,” Kalona said. “He can direct his anger at me as I supervise the building of the fledgling’s pyre.” The immortal’s lips turned up in a wicked smile. “I do like a good pyre. Such a shame humans ended that tradition. I can’t imagine even enjoying a modern human funeral. It’s sad, really.”
    “Kalona, it’s a problem when what you say reminds me of Neferet,” I said.
    Kalona’s smile widened, and I thought he looked like a little boy, as in the kind of little boy who would set fire to his family in the middle of the night and then say his sister’s Barbie made him do it.
    “Z, don’t overthink it. Kalona will keep Dallas busy, and that’s all we’re worried about right now,” Stark said.
    “Except for the reporters and the police and—”
    “Stark is correct,” Darius interrupted me. “You overthink.”
    Reluctantly, I stood. “All right. I’ll focus on the here and now. I’ll tell Thanatos what’s up as soon as the reporters are gone, and also clue in Stevie Rae. She can have the kids pack up their stuff and lay low until the basement’s ready for them. Then they can come in the back way and avoid the middle of the campus grounds where Dallas and his friends should be busy building the funeral pyre.”
    “It will be done as you say, Priestess. Will you be moving to the basement as well?”
    “No,” Stark answered for me, which was super annoying.
    “I’m going to stay in my old room with Stark,” I continued, because I actually
can
speak for myself. “Stevie Rae and Rephaim will probably stay in the dorm, too.”
    Kalona nodded thoughtfully. “My son needs a place from which he can come and go easily.”
    “Yeah, and we decided it’s not a good idea for all of us to stay in one room together,” Stark said. “Especially when that one room is a basement with only one way in and out of it.”
    “I agree,” Kalona said, standing. His hand resting on the desk drew my eye down and I noticed something weird about the wood. I kept looking and realized what I was seeing.
    “Is that a handprint?”
    “Is it?” Kalona replied to me. “I hadn’t noticed.”
    My eyes met his and I realized I might not be the only bad liar in the room.

CHAPTER SEVEN
Zoey
    I’d been right about one thing—Thanatos had made sure Chera and her crew interviewed a few kids, got some shots of our cafeteria—and then she’d had Damien explain (on camera) his class schedule as the Fox News team was quickly and politely herded off campus. It’d all happened in less than thirty minutes and Thanatos said our segment would air on the evening news as well as the Internet. I’d told her that it had been genius to have Damien be our school spokesman, then I caught her up on our Plan.
    “And Kalona