Outcasts

by Claire McFall

Genres: YA Contemporary

Synopsis

I’ll be beside you. Every step until the last. Dylan and Tristan have escaped death and conquered destiny. But their actions have caused an imbalance. The afterlife is owed two souls – and it wants them back. Exiled from the world of the living, Dylan and Tristan face a loss worse than death: each other. Their love has got them this far, but can it survive a final heartrending sacrifice?

Release date: October 31, 2023

Publisher: Walker Books US

Print pages: 274

Sample

Prologue

 

SOMETHING WASN’T RIGHT.

The wraiths could feel it. A weakness, a flaw in the veil between the dead and the living. The holes that had pierced it were closed . . . but it wasn’t the same. Not quite.

Driven into a frenzy by the tantalizing draw of real flesh, real life, the wraiths pounded the veil again and again. It rippled and warped, but held. Barely.

They renewed their attack, pushing and clawing, thinning the boundary until one creature, snarling and writhing, fought its way through.

The veil snapped back instantly, holding firm against the rest of the swarm, who screeched with frustration, but the damage was done.

Disoriented, the wraith stuttered through the air before steadying, sniffing. Searching through the darkened countryside for the intoxicating lure of blood pulsing through veins. Of life to feast on.

 

ONE

AT her reflection in the full-length mirror. Her eyes were wide, ringed with a thick border of black eyeliner topped with smoky-gray eye shadow. It had a slight shimmer to it when she turned her head just right. Yeah, her eyes were OK. But the rest . . .

Her hair had been pulled and twisted and teased until it stood out from her head in what could only be described as a rat’s nest. The lipstick that had been smeared across her mouth was a garish shade of red that made her look like a vampire after a quick snack. And then there was the dress. It was taffeta. Taffeta. Until Joan had frog-marched her into the Special Occasion section of the big department store at the bottom of Sauchiehall Street, Dylan hadn’t even known what taffeta was. She did not like it. Especially not in this hideous shade of peach that made Dylan think of overcooked salmon. There were bulbous sleeves and tight tucks down her midsection that pinched in all the wrong places. The skirt was apparently meant to swirl in beautiful, graceful swishes around her legs as she walked, and maybe it would, if the tights Joan had shoved at her as she was getting dressed weren’t rubbing against the bloody taffeta and creating enough static electricity to power the whole Central Belt.

I look absolutely hideous, she thought, shuddering with enough force that her reflection vibrated subtly in the mirror. She’d been overjoyed when her parents had told her they were getting married, and even more excited when Joan had told her she’d be a bridesmaid.

That was before the dress shopping.

“Oh, darlin’, you look absolutely gorgeous!” Dylan’s great-aunt Gladys sat in a chair in the corner of the hotel room, a handkerchief clutched in her swollen, arthritic fingers and tears glistening in her eyes. She did have cataracts, which might explain the old woman’s assessment. Or maybe this look had been on-trend when Great-Aunt Gladys had been young. Sometime before the Vikings invaded.

“Thanks, Aunt Gladys,” Dylan managed to say.

“You’re the prettiest girl in the whole town, do you know that?”

Dylan grimaced. Heat was rising up her neck, clashing with her gown. She could not go out there looking like this, she just couldn’t.

A knock at the door made

her jump.

“Dylan, you ready? It’s almost time.” Dylan spun to the door to see the gleaming brass knob begin to turn. “They’re waiting for—”

“Just a minute!” she screeched. The knob stopped turning and, mercifully, the door stayed closed. “I’m not quite ready, Tristan. Hang . . . hang on.” Panicking, Dylan turned to Great-Aunt Gladys, but there would be no help from that quarter. The old woman was rearranging her walker, beginning the laborious process of standing up.

“Come in, boy,” she hollered. Boy. That’s what she called him, despite Tristan introducing himself clearly—and loudly—and Dylan correcting Great-Aunt Gladys three times since.

Tristan opened the door, and Dylan turned away from him, hoping to spare herself the look on his face when he saw her done up like this. It was a futile effort, because she could see him in the reflection of the mirror as he stood in the doorway, and her eyes instinctively fixed on his face. He stared at her, his gaze raking up and down her back before looking into the mirror to see the front. He kept his expression carefully blank, Dylan noticed, only his lips twitching slightly.

“Wow,” he said.

“Speechless, are you, boy?” Great-Aunt Gladys hollered. “There you are, young lady. I told you, you look stunning.”

“I am,” Tristan agreed. “I’m speechless.” He gave Dylan a tiny grin. She offered him a wry smile of her own, which widened a little as she took in the gleaming shoes, smart black pants, and bold blue shirt that Tristan was wearing. She’d never seen him so dressed up; it was a good look for him. Especially the shirt, which made his cobalt eyes seem to almost glow, more striking than usual today because his slightly unruly blond hair was swept back from his face.

“You look great,” Dylan told him.

“Out of the way, then.

 Aunt Gladys used her walker to maneuver Tristan out of her path as she inched step by step out the door. “I’ll go and get myself sat down. No, don’t bother to offer to help me, boy. It’s not as if I’m ninety-two.”

“I . . . um . . .” Tristan shifted awkwardly, clearly searching for an excuse. Dylan bit her lip against the smirk that wanted to break free. It wasn’t as if he could tell Great-Aunt Gladys the truth: the large function room downstairs where the wedding was taking place was just too far away. The bond that tethered Dylan and Tristan together would rip and tear at them, leaving them breathless with pain if they tried to put that much distance between them. It had been bad enough having Tristan get ready in the hotel room next door; she’d known he was there, but she couldn’t see him.

Luckily, at that moment Dylan’s father, James, appeared behind Tristan.

“Tristan.” He clapped his hand down on Tristan’s shoulder by way of greeting, possibly a little bit too hard, going by the grimaced “hello” he got back. “Hey, beautiful, you look lovely.” The words came out of James’s mouth before his gaze settled on Dylan, but even then, his smile didn’t falter. Dylan didn’t think there was anything that would remove the grin from his face today. Undeterred by the fact that his daughter looked like a giant salmon meringue, he turned to Great-Aunt Gladys. “I just came to see if you needed a hand getting to your seat, Gladys. We’re starting soon.”

“Well.” Great-Aunt Gladys looked somewhat mollified. “At least someone here has manners!” Shooting Tristan a disgusted look, she started shuffling away, leaning heavily on her walker but swatting at James when he tried to take her elbow to steady her.

“I don’t think she likes me,” Tristan told Dylan once they were both sure the old woman was far enough away not to hear. For ninety-two, she had ears like a bat.

“Well, she thinks I look good,” Dylan confided in a stage whisper, “so I wouldn’t rely on her judgment too much.”

There it was, Tristan’s opportunity to confirm what she knew—that she looked like she'd

had a makeover from a hyperactive five-year-old. And she was going to have to go and stand up in front of over a hundred people . . . dressed like this.

“I think you look . . .” Tristan ran his gaze over her outfit once more, clearly hunting for something nice to say—and failing miserably. “Well, your eyes are very pretty.”

“Great,” Dylan snapped, feeling her eyes well up a little, which was even worse. She would not cry like a baby on top of everything else. “I’ll just put a paper bag over the rest of it, then, shall I?”

“You’ll need a big bag,” Tristan mused.

For a moment Dylan just gaped at him, aghast. Then she laughed.

Then she thumped him.

“Very helpful.” She mock-glared at him.

“I try,” Tristan replied, smirking. He sobered and reached out to take her left hand. “Honestly, I think you’d look beautiful in whatever you wore,” he said, “even a paper bag. But I feel the need to remind you that it’s your mum’s big day, not yours. Everyone will be looking at her, I promise.”

“Right,” Dylan said, eyeing him dubiously. “I’ll just blend in with the background.” There was no way anyone could fail to notice Dylan in the Giant Peach. “Maybe I’ll get lucky and I’ll match the wallpaper or the curtains. If I stand in the right place, I might just disappear.”

“That’s the spirit!” Tristan grinned, leaning forward to kiss her lightly on the forehead.

Just then, the door across the hall from Dylan’s room opened and her aunt Rachel reversed out of it, peach-covered bottom appearing first as she bent over, fussing with something. A second later she moved out of the way, and Joan stepped through into the hallway. Dylan gasped. Joan’s normal attire was a starched navy-blue nurse’s uniform. At home, she wore comfortable clothes, more often than not smothering her body in an assortment of ugly woolen cardigans.

Today she was transformed.

High heels meant she stood several inches taller than usual. Her slim figure was hugged by the satiny cream knee-length dress. There was a single thin strap that wound around the back of Joan’s neck and disappeared into a wide banding of beautiful pearl-studded lacework.

In her hands, she grasped a delicate bouquet of pretty purple flowers surrounded by small

sprays of baby’s breath.

“Mum!” Dylan clapped her hand over her mouth and, to her surprise, started welling up.

“Oh no, don’t you dare!” Joan pointed a finger in Dylan’s direction, the nail glistening with pearl-colored polish. “Don’t you get me started!”

But it was evidently too late. Joan snatched the handkerchief that Aunt Rachel held out and started frantically dabbing at her eyes.

“This isn’t supposed to be a day for crying,” Aunt Rachel commented. Her own eyes were tear-free, her lips slightly pursed.

“Oh, please,” Joan sniped back. “I remember on your wedding day you locked yourself in the bathroom for an hour, bawling because your hair wasn’t sitting right.”

Aunt Rachel opened her mouth, her eyes lighting up in outrage, but no sound came out. It was just as well Dylan was used to the little spats that constantly broke out between the two sisters and knew it wasn’t unusual for them to descend into all-out catfights.

The little squabble seemed to have steadied Joan, however, because she sniffed and drew herself up, then beamed at Dylan. “Are we ready?” she asked.

Dylan glanced down one more time at her bridesmaid’s ensemble and thought she’d never be ready, but, like Tristan had said, this was Joan’s day. Not hers. “Shouldn’t you be in your seat?” Aunt Rachel asked Tristan, the sharp tone giving away her irritation over Joan’s well-aimed jab.

“Rachel, Tristan is escorting my daughter,” Joan answered back.

She’d softened toward Tristan immeasurably over the past few months, but Dylan knew the comment was more about silencing her sister than defending her daughter’s boyfriend.

They were a quiet group as they took the elevator down to the hotel’s ground floor and then traversed the gleaming lobby to the entrance of the event room. The double doors were closed, twists of white netting pinned around the door frame and tied in bows around the handles. A smartly dressed hotel worker waited for them, ready to let them in.

“Perfect timing.” He smiled at them. “They’re just about ready for you.”

Joan nodded and Dylan watched the slightly tense frown melt from her face, replaced by an eager anticipation that made her look years younger. The traitorous tears threatened to burst forth again as Dylan rearranged her grip on her bouquet, a smaller version of Joan’s. It was about to happen, she realized. Her parents were getting married; she was going to have a complete family for the first time. Tristan’s warm hand on her back, meant to steady and reassure her, almost tipped her over the edge. Because he was there, too. Standing beside her.

Aunt Rachel sighed, and Dylan scowled at her. If she said something to ruin this moment for Joan . . . But the look on Aunt Rachel’s face was wistful. “It’s a shame Dad isn’t here, to walk you down the aisle,” she said quietly.

Sadness flitted across Joan’s face for a heartbeat, but then her gaze settled on Dylan and it faded. “It’s all right,” she said. “I’d much rather be escorted by my baby; she’s all I need.”

Joan had no idea, no idea at all, how close she’d come to losing Dylan. James understood some of it, but they’d had to keep it a secret from her mum—how Dylan had died, fought her way back to life, and then had to fight again to stay here. Joan’s words hit deeper than she could have realized, and Dylan sniffled, swallowing hard against the lump that had suddenly lodged in her throat.

“Thanks, Mum,” she croaked out.

Joan smiled at her, then gestured with one hand. “Front and center, young lady,” she said. “You’re leading the way.”

Dylan turned, positioning herself in front of the closed double doors just as the first notes of “Here Comes the Bride” began. Tristan stood beside her, ready to slip into his seat when the bridal party started down the aisle.

Sudden nerves gripped Dylan, and she yanked in a deep breath. Then the doors were opening and, as one, the gathered guests turned to stare at them. At her, standing frozen in the doorway, garish in peach taffeta. A hundred pairs of eyes and the long, long stretch of aisle waiting before her.

“Oh God,” she whispered low enough that only Tristan would hear. “This is hell!”

 

TWO

HOUSE and glowered at the smattering of wraiths that swirled and swooped outside. The bloodied glow of the sun burning in the sky cast his face into eerie crimson shadow, his eyes dark pits beneath furrowed brows.

“Shut the door,” Susanna advised, watching him with the unhappy mix of guilt and responsibility that had plagued her in the seemingly endless time they’d been hiding out here. “Don’t look at them.”

She sat on a low, lumpy sofa, as far from the door as she could get. That wasn’t very far, the safe house resembling a small hut with stone walls, thatched roof, and only a single room. There was no place for privacy, no place to escape each other. In fact, the sofa was the sole large piece of furniture available, a spindly kitchen chair the only other place to sit. When they quarreled—as was inevitable, stuck in such close confines—there was nowhere to go. A single step outside would mean agony for Susanna as the ever-present wraiths tore into her.

And it would mean something worse than death for Jack.

They’d been living this torturous existence for . . . Susanna wasn’t even sure how many days had passed now since the Inquisitor had banished them back to the wasteland: the real wasteland, where the land burned bloodred and the wraiths were free to hunt any soul foolish enough to step outside.

On the back wall of the safe house was row upon row of neat little lines scratched into the stone. Each mark represented a day that she and Jack had survived within their wasteland prison. She hadn’t counted them recently, but there were too many to guess at a glance, and she’d stopped adding new markings some time ago.

“Jack, shut the door,” she repeated.

Jack pursed his lips—he still hated taking any kind of orders from her—and leaned forward instead. For a heart-stopping moment, Susanna thought he was really going to do it, was going to step outside and end the stalemate

they were trapped in, but he only waited until the wraiths, sensing the movement, snarled and screeched in triumph before yanking himself back and kicking the door shut.

“You shouldn’t do that,” she chided as he strolled over and dropped down beside her. “You’ll just anger them more.”

“I think they’re already pretty angry,” Jack commented, the frustrated hisses of the wraiths outside attesting to his words. “And it’s something to do.”

Susanna sighed. That was their problem. Simple boredom.

They didn’t need to eat, they didn’t need to drink, but at some point soon they were going to have to get out of here—simply to stop themselves from going insane.

How many more days would it be before Jack stepped outside the door for real?

She took a deep breath, determined to broach the subject, but Jack beat her to it.

“I’ve been thinking,” he said, staring down at the floor as he spoke. That was enough to snap Susanna’s mouth shut. It wasn’t like Jack to avoid her gaze. To act so . . . hesitant. Uncertain.

“About what?” she asked when he fiddled with the hem of his T-shirt rather than continuing.

“I think—” Jack dragged in a breath and then blew it out. “I think we just need to go for it.”

“What? You mean—”

He flicked his eyes up, and Susanna could see what he was hiding. Fear. It was warring with determination for control of his expression—and losing. Just.

“We can’t stay here forever,” he said.

“We can,” Susanna corrected.

“No, we can’t.” He glared at her, daring her to contradict him a second time. She didn’t. “We need to just do it. Get it over with. If we don’t make it . . .” He shrugged.

“If we don’t make it, you become one of them,” Susanna reminded him, nodding to where the wraiths could still be seen through one of the small

windows.

“And you,” Jack countered.

“No.” Susanna shook her head. “I won’t. I’ll end up reassigned, sent to collect another soul. They can hurt me, but they can’t kill me. They can’t take me and turn me into one of them. But they can do that to you.”

Jack gave another little shrug, as if trying to shake off her words. Deny them. Then he sniffed and shifted his jaw. Sat up a little straighter. The bravado he had slowly shed over the long days and nights he and Susanna had been together suddenly snapped back into place.

“So what? If it happens, it happens.”

“Jack—”

“At least you’ll be free.”

Susanna blinked, certain she hadn’t heard those words.

“What?” she asked.

“You’ll be free,” Jack repeated. Susanna could feel the tension radiating from his body beside her. “If I make it, well . . . great. But if not, at least you’ll get out of here. Right?”

Susanna didn’t know what to say. “I won’t be free,” she said slowly. “I’ll have to go back to being a ferryman, like I was before.”

“But you’ll be out of here.”

“Yeah,” she agreed, “I’ll be out of here.” Out of this cage that was their sole point of safety in the hell of the true wasteland. Away from Jack and the guilt that had her insides twisting every time she looked at him.

And then, every single time she saw a wraith, she’d wonder if it was Jack. If there was any spark of him left inside the creature that was trying to savage her and kill the new soul she was ferrying. She’d wonder if he was suffering, living an endless torment because of her. He’d probably enjoy the chance to get a little revenge, she thought wryly. The idea made her snort out a quiet puff of laughter.

“What?” Jack asked, watching her with a quizzical tilt to his head, looking to share in the humor.

It was a good look on him. Made him look younger, friendlier. It softened the harsh, angry lines that so often hardened his face. Susanna couldn’t pinpoint

 when he’d started looking at her like that, but slowly, over the agonizingly long hours, days, and weeks that they’d spent together, they’d found a way to coexist. To accept each other. To talk—really talk—and even laugh, and find their own strange kind of rhythm. To become friends.

That’s what she’d be losing if Jack was captured by the wraiths, pulled down and turned into one of them: a friend. But more than that, someone who looked at her and really saw her.

“I was imagining you as a wraith,” she admitted. “You’d be able to get back at me for everything.”

Jack grinned, though it really wasn’t all that funny, Susanna knew.

“I’d stalk you all the way across the wasteland,” he promised. “Your own personal wraith to dog your footsteps.”

“Thanks,” Susanna told him dryly. “I appreciate that.”

The small spark of amusement extinguished. They sat on the sofa in silence, watching the sky darken to a deep burgundy as the sun set and the night approached. ...