Dance of Fire by Yelena Black Read Free Book Online Page A

now, it didn’t feel that way.
    One of Svetya’s shoes was lying in the middle of the floor. Frustrated, Vanessa kicked it and it hit the wall with a satisfying thud. She sighed, then picked up the shoe and set it back where it was. Piece by piece, the demon was taking her life away from her.
    With new resolve, she set her toiletry bag on her bed and unzipped her suitcase. There, staring back at her, should have been Margaret’s ballet shoes.
    Only they were gone.
    Two And A Half Years Earlier
    From the Diary of Margaret Adler
    March 2
    It was just after four in the morning when I woke up, startled.
    The engines had fallen quiet. After six days of that steady vibration in my bones, its sudden absence was like the loudest alarm clock.
    Erik’s voice came from the upper bunk. ‘We’ve stopped.’
    â€˜Is that OK?’ I asked. I pictured us adrift somewhere in the North Atlantic, bearing down on an iceberg, about to pull a Titanic .
    I had only gone up on deck once since we’d departed from Trenton, New Jersey, and I hadn’t enjoyed it. The sea hadn’t beenromantic at all – just a cold, never-ending plain of white-capped grey – and all of the sailors were running around or shouting at each other in Portuguese, smears of motor grease ground into their overalls.
    â€˜Of course it’s OK,’ Hal said with a yawn from his bunk. ‘It means we’ve arrived. Lady and gentleman, welcome to dear old Blighty.’
    â€˜Blighty?’ I asked. ‘Is that the city we’re in?’
    Erik laughed. ‘No, we should be in Southampton. “ Blighty ” means “England.”’
    Hal switched on the overhead light. ‘It’s what British soldiers in World War Two called England when they got homesick.’
    Homesick. I had to blink away tears. Maybe it was Hal telling me earlier that I could never contact Vanessa or Mom and Dad, but at that moment home seemed further away than ever.
    I swore to myself then – and I repeat my vow here, on paper – that I will find a way to talk to Vanessa again. Somehow I will get word to my family that I’m OK.
    I owe them that much.
    It was surprisingly simple to leave the boat. We just had to dodge some of the sailors and head down a railed gangplank to the dock, a wide road made of cement and asphalt. Street lights led the way to a bright, low building.
    â€˜We have to pass through customs,’ Hal explained. ‘Everyone, be cool.’
    That early in the morning, no one was in a rush to help us, and it was only after the third time Hal explained that we were students who had booked a cheap passage to England aboard a freighter that someone took our papers.
    The customs agent looked a bit like my grandma if my gran were built like a sofa. She raised her eyebrows. ‘You’re eighteen?’ she asked me.
    â€˜Yes, ma’am,’ I said, trying to stand taller. It was obvious that no matter what Hal had put on my fake passport, I still looked fifteen. I needed to find some way to come across as older than my years. ‘You going to take all day with that?’ I went on. ‘I’m dying for a cigarette.’
    The customs agent just scowled and stamped my ­passport. The machine made a satisfying thunk against the page, and I was officially Margot Adams.
    Handing it back, the woman said, ‘You kids look younger all the time, but you never get any smarter, do ya? Tobacco will kill you. Shift along now.’
    And just like that, we were outside on an empty street. Though it wouldn’t be empty for long. Already up and down the road, shutters were being raised with a rattle – businesses opening up for the day.
    â€˜What was that all about, crazy girl?’ Hal asked. ‘Are you trying to get us arrested right off the boat?’
    Erik laughed. ‘No, that was smart. Just enough to bother her, but not enough to get us into trouble.’
    Hal’s shrugs