Beautiful Darkness by Kami García, Margaret Stohl

could get out of. Could she really choose to be Light or Dark? Was it that easy? Since
The Book of Moons
was destroyed in the fire, the
Lunae Libri
was the only place that might have the answers.
    Then there were the other questions. I tried not to think about my mother. I tried not to think about strangers on motorcycles and nightmares and bloody lips and golden eyes. Instead, I stared out the window and watched the trees pass by in a blur.

     
    The Dar-ee Keen was packed. Not a big surprise, since it was one of the only places within walking distance of Jackson High. In the summer, you could pretty much follow the trail of flies and you would eventually find your way here. Formerly theDairy King, the place had gotten a new name after the Gentrys bought it but didn't want to fork up the money to pay to put all new letters on the sign. Today everyone looked even sweatier and more pissed off than usual. Walking a mile in the South Carolina heat and missing the first day of hooking up and drinking warm beer at the lake wasn't anyone's idea of a good time. It was like canceling a national holiday.
    Emily, Savannah, and Eden were hanging out at the good table in the corner with the basketball team. They were barefoot, in their bikini tops and supershort jean skirts — the kind with one button left open, offering up a powerful flash of bikini bottoms without ever completely falling off. Nobody was in a very good mood. There wasn't a tire left in Gatlin, so half the cars were still sitting in the school parking lot. All the same, there was plenty of loud giggling and hair flipping. Emily was spilling out of her string bikini top, and Emory, her latest victim, was loving it.
    Link shook his head. “Man, those two wanna be the bride at the weddin’ and the corpse at the funeral.”
    “Just so long as I'm not invited to either.”
    “Dude. You need some sugar. I'm gonna get in line. You want somethin’?”
    “No, thanks. You need some money?” Link never had any money.
    “Naw, I'm gonna get Charlotte to hook me up.”
    Link could talk his way into and out of almost anything. I pushed my way through the crowd, as far away from Emily and Savannah as I could get. I slumped down at the bad corner table, beneath the shelves of soda cans and bottles from around the country. Some of the sodas had been there since my dad waslittle, and you could see the different levels of brown and orange and red syrup, disappearing to the bottom of the bottles from years of evaporation. It was pretty disgusting, I guess, that and the fifties soda bottle wallpaper and the flies. After a while, you didn't even notice it anymore.
    I sat down and looked at the disappearing dark syrup, my mood in a bottle. What happened to Lena back at the lake? One minute we were kissing, the next she was running away from me. All that gold in her eyes. I wasn't stupid. I knew what it meant. Light Casters had green eyes. Dark Casters had gold. Lena's weren't completely gold, but what I'd seen at the lake was enough to make me wonder.
    A fly landed on the shiny red table, and I stared at it. I recognized the familiar churning in my stomach. Dread and panic, all turning into a dull anger. I was so mad at Lena, I wanted to kick out the glass window next to our booth. But at the same time, I wanted to know what was going on and who that guy on the Harley was. Then I'd have to kick his ass.
    Link slid into the booth across from me with the biggest freeze I'd ever seen. The ice cream rose about four inches above where the plastic cup ended. “Charlotte has some real potential.” Link licked the straw.
    Even the sugary smell of the freeze was making me sick. I felt like the sweat and the grease and the flies and the Emorys and Emilys were closing in on me.
    “Lena's not here. We should go.” I couldn't sit around like everything was normal. Link, on the other hand, could. Rain or shine.
    “Chillax. I'll suck it down in five.”
    Eden walked by on her way to refill her