For the Hopeless

Chapter 17: Traitor

"Where did everybody go?" Hayden asked curiously as she descended the stairs.

Tawny straightened from her crouch beside a barely breathing woman and turned to the girl, frowning. "What?" she asked, her voice raised a bit louder than necessary. She controlled her volume when Hayden made a face, a slight blush coloring her cheeks as she explained, "Your mind is kind of cluttered. I can't hear what you're saying over all the background noise."

Hayden wanted to laugh at that, but she merely smiled sweetly. "Where did everybody go?" she asked, both aloud and in her mind, once she'd forced her thoughts to quiet for a moment.

"Samara is in the bathroom getting cleaned up, Bailey is in her room resting, and Aven and Dameon went out to dinner," Tawny answered, and her blush began to fade at a painfully slow rate. "I'm not sure where Madeleine and Samara's cat are. They were in the front yard the last time I saw them."

Hayden frowned, but Tawny was too busy gazing at the front door thoughtfully – no doubt wondering where the pair of cats may have gone – to notice any change in the teenager's expression. "Oh, all right. Thanks." She rushed back up the stairs, and the front door opened quietly behind her, followed by a gentle call of "Madeleine, are you out there?"

Great, she thought bitterly to herself, heading into her room and nearly slamming the door behind herself. The two with the weakest minds are gone, and all I have to work with is a telepath and a freaking cat. Now how the hell am I going to get rid of Bailey? She paused, blanching, when she heard the front door close, having completely forgotten that Tawny could hear her. She waited for a moment, not daring to so much as breathe, but Tawny never came. Either she hadn't been paying attention, or Hayden's mind had become too cluttered to hear anything clearly – likely the latter.

Goddamn, am I stupid. She made her way to the desk pushed against the far wall of the room and flopped into the chair, throwing the spell book open to the first book-marked page even as she sat. If she figures me out, I'm done for.

Now, what to do, what to do? She stared down at the pages spread out before her, a spell for mind control on the right and a potion for mind control on the left. Honestly, she couldn't quite figure out how the potion would work, so she intended to utilize the spell – eventually. I can't do it now, can I? But then, Wouldn't now be the best time to do it, though? Dameon is the second strongest member of the household. Wouldn't it only make sense to do this while he's out? Then again, Tawny's mind is probably like a fortress. Am I even strong enough to penetrate it, let alone control it? She sighed, drumming her fingers against the page as she became impatient with her own unsure thoughts. Who knows if Bailey will ever be this vulnerable again? It's not every day she fights a devil. It would be best if I did it now, while I have the chance.

Filled with a sudden resolve, she took a deep breath, focused all of her attention on the spell before her, and began to sing.

-?-

"Thank you for healing Bailey," Dameon said after his and Aven's small talk had subsided into silence. They were seated across from each other in a lovely little diner, loud with the chatter of truckers and other couples much like themselves, but pleasantly so. "I don't know what would have happened to her if you hadn't offered to help. Whatever that devil did to her had her healing much more slowly than she should've been." His grateful smile was sincere, softening Aven's ire at the fact that Bailey had already been mentioned, and they'd only been in the restaurant for a few minutes. They hadn't even gotten their drinks yet.

Forcing a pleasant smile, the woman said, "It was nothing, really. I told her that I wanted to help the Guardians in any way I could, and healing is really the only thing I can do." Her weak smile turned into an apologetic wince, and she added, "I'm sorry that I couldn't do more for her, though. She was very, very injured, and I only have so much energy."