A Banshee's Wail (The Banshee Curse #1)

Chapter One

VULNERABILITY.

That's what had been in my mother's voice when my father had been shot in the back of the head. Vulnerability and terror and horror. All three had been in my mother's voice at once, her shock had left her frozen. But only for a moment.

     It was becoming increasingly harder to stay asleep, what with the recurring nightmare and all. In all actuality, it wasn't a nightmare. More like a recurring memory that came to me in the form of a dream. It sucked. What sucked more still was the fact that I seemed to have an irrational fear of looking anywhere but at the ceiling after I woke in a panic-filled state, huffing and puffing like I'd just run a marathon and my eyes wild as I tried to remember where the heck I was. Which the answer would always be the same—for the next few years or so, anyway:

     St. James's Academy for Orphans.

     It'd been my home for eleven years so far—and the one I'd probably remember clear as day when I left. I wished I remembered more of my parents, but because I'd been so young when they'd died—excuse me, when they were murdered—I only remembered the most traumatic parts of my life before coming here. At least, that's what my psychiatrist, Dr. Sterling, always told me. She also said I'd start remembering things less fear inducing when I felt it was time that I moved on and could handle remembering the less traumatic events.

     I had a slightly different take on it. I loved and missed my parents, of course, but I'd decided it would be good for me to move on a long time ago. That didn't happen, however; if it wasn't completely obvious from my nightmare. When I'd decided I was done with being depressed and the kid that was hung up on her parents' deaths, the man in the window—better known to everyone else as the Grim Reaper—decided that he needed to make more appearances. I was around twelve at the time, so four years ago.

     Now, I found myself struggling to keep from making a frightened noise every time he popped up for no reason at all—at least, that's what I always told myself. The freaky part was, he always appeared right before someone or something—the last time was actually a cat—was about to die. I still say I'm a little on the cuckoo side, but I'm not going to go around and tell everyone that I see the Grim Reaper right before the death of an animal or person. I'd be locked up for sure. No, I think I'll just stick with telling Dr. Sterling that I'm fine and that I won't do anything stupid. The quicker I can get out of here, the better.

     Noticing that I could tell the color of the ceiling, I turned my head until I could see the alarm clock that was situated on the nightstand Sam and I shared. The best thing about living at St. James's was that we didn't need to get up very early before school started, because we lived a building over from where classes were held. It was six o'clock, which meant it was an hour and a half before school started and half an hour before the alarm went off. Everyone—except maybe Rachel—would be asleep until the alarm went off, but there was no way I was going to get back to sleep.

      Throwing my sheets off, I got up and padded quietly to the bathroom, closing and locking the door behind me. Even though I was about to take a shower, I splashed cold water on my face to help me wake up and glanced in the mirror, cringing at the sight I was given. I looked horrible. My red hair was a tangled mess of knots and my green eyes were bloodshot. I shivered at the image and hurried to get into the shower, hoping the steam and warm water would give my pale skin some color.

     With a towel wrapped firmly around my midsection and my hair, I opened the bathroom door and shivered at the blast of cool air the air conditioner sent my way. “Rachel!” I squeaked the moment my eyes landed on the slight brunette standing in the doorway. “Do you really have to stand right there?”

     Rachel regarded me with cool eyes, her expression less than impressed. “Yes, otherwise someone else will get to the bathroom before me,” she snapped, her foot tapping impatiently against the ground. I glanced behind her at Sam and Rachel's sister, Jane, who were still asleep, but thought better of pointing this little detail out to Rachel herself. “Are you going to move or not?”