by Wendy Cole
Brady’s eyes flashed red. “I’m going to do everything I can to get us out of this, but if it seems like I’m losing, go—” His words died as another ball of light met his back, bursting around us light falling embers. He whipped around and used his arm to push me further behind him, then sent an array of blue barreling towards each and every one of the jinn in front of us. I stared in a mixture of fear and awe as he attacked. Brady was unstoppable, a force to rival all others, truly glorious to behold and terrifying to imagine having to face.
A king.
One after the other, beings burst apart, disintegrating as he swiftly and accurately made each hit. His motions were fluid, like a dancer’s, and he didn’t pause, even when the many blasts from the other side would combust against his stiff frame.
The jinni behind Owen seemed stunned by his skill, many of them looking worried, but it soon diminished when Owen began to bark out orders, egging them on. “Don’t just stand there! This is for your race! Will you have us all be made powerless, watered down by integrating with human cattle?!”
The moment he said it, the attacks grew more frequent, more organized. Each hit Brady took seemed to affect him more than the last. He slowed down, and no longer did he appear indestructible, but on the verge of collapse.
“Brady!” I clutched his back as he stumbled backwards, sandwiching me to the door with his heavy frame.
His eyes met mine, wide and full of emotion. “Go inside!”
“No! I’m not leaving you!”
Another hit, bright red, then green, then orange, all coming together to send him flying backward once more. The air whooshed from my lungs, his full weight landing upon me as we crashed to the concrete.
For a moment, Brady stayed limp, and with his massive form upon me, I was powerless to do anything. “Brady!”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him. The moment he fell, Owen approached us, each step pointed, drawn out like a taunting pendulum up the walkway. His eyes were bright red and full of victory. The smile on his face was what nightmares are made of. “I win.”
“Brady! Get up!” I slapped his chest, then pushed against his back.
He stirred, and a groan rumbled out of his chest, but his body remained dead weight.
“Get up!”
Owen made it to the front steps, less than two feet in front of us, then held out his hand as a bright ball of red began to form within his palm.
We lost. It’s all over. My heart broke, falling apart inside my chest, combusting, shattering.
Not yet, Sweetheart. Not you.
Brady jerked up, his arms stretching wide. A tidal wave of light burst forward, filling the yard, rushing forward and taking with it each and every one of the remaining threats. I watched with wide eyes as they all disappeared, leaving us there.
Alone.
Safe.
I hugged him tight as relief filled me. “You did it!”
Brady slumped forward and hit the ground hard.
“Brady!” I crawled forward and rolled him over.
His chest moved, but his face was pale, too white compared to his usually dark tone. Lines marred his features, drawing a picture of pain.
“Brady? Say something.” My heart continued to constrict, my lungs burning from lack of oxygen. I ran my hands over his chest and stomach, searching for injuries but finding none. “Tell me you’re gonna be okay.”
His eyes peeled open, and the small action seemed to take all of his strength. He lifted his hand, finding mine and squeezing tight. “That house, the one you were at when I was a demon?”
His words took a moment to make sense past the panic in my mind, but I eventually realized what he meant. Red’s friends. The night with the Ouija board. “Yeah? I remember, but what does that—”
“Go there. Don’t leave until it’s safe.”
“I’m already safe!” I insisted, unwilling to accept what he was saying. “You’ll keep me safe.”
He flinched again, then shook his head from side to side. “I can’t keep you safe. Go there. I warded it. I’ve been warding every place I’ve found you at, and that one is the least likely to be known about.”
Tears filled my eyes, and a sob that felt more like a scream locked into my throat. “No.” The word came out raw.
“I’m sorry.” His grip loosened.
It was then that I noticed it, his body fading away right before my eyes. His feet were gone, his legs slowly following.
The sob I held ripped out of me, and I get ahold of his thighs, fighting to stop it. “No! No! No! No!” It continued up, my hands falling through to the concrete like I’d clutched an apparition.
Brady gripped my hair, pulling my face over to look at him. He wore a smile, still pained but soft. “I love you. Promise me you’ll go there. I need to hear you say it, Sweetheart.”
My eyes blurred as another sob shook my frame. “I can’t leave you! You can’t leave me! Don’t leave me!”
He gripped my neck harder, and his eyes flashed, intense and full of desperation. “Say it!”
The bite of his tone made me immediately nod my agreement. “I love you.” I fell forward, clinging to him as the fading continued. “I love you!” The emotions inside me broke free, spilling out as all the hope inside my body broke apart, splitting me at the seams. It felt like I was dying, and if I could have, if I could save him and give myself instead, I would have done it. I wanted to do it. Another sob broke my lungs, and the pain was too much. “Please. I love you.”
Brady held my head limply, lightly caressing until he couldn’t any longer. “I know, Sweetheart. I never deserved it.”
My eyes shut tight as I felt him disappearing until I was nothing more than a crying mess laying face first in the grass.
Alone.
Broken.
When I opened my eyes, it hurt to see the empty ground, to know that he was gone. My soul felt missing, my body hollow without it.
Like a shell, I pulled myself to my feet and started the long walk to find a phone and call a cab. I couldn’t go inside. I couldn’t face my mother. If it were up to me, I’d have found a dark corner to lie in until I rotted away, but I couldn’t do that. I’d promised.
It was the least I could do, for him, but it didn’t matter if it worked. I’d go to that house. I’d stay there, but I didn’t care if they found me. It didn’t matter, because what’s the point in protecting a corpse.
I was already dead.
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
Grief can do all kinds of things to people, and when it hits someone, no two people handle it the same. Everyone’s different, and I was no exception.
My grief, however, was all-consuming. It didn’t just hurt, it smothered me, stealing my breath but never allowing me the relief of suffocation. That’s how I felt, like a fish out of water, an empty shell with no substance.
A Brady loving zombie that had no Brady.
Everything about myself felt foreign—my body, my heartbeat. Even my voice sounded like a stranger’s as I called the cab, paid the fair, and eventually found Red and told her where I needed to go.
She hadn’t even argued, and neither had Rick when I imposed myself upon his house. I suppose I must have looked as bad as I felt. They hadn’t even questioned handing me whatever I’d asked for, and they hadn’t pushed when I’d refused to explain what had happened.
But that was a week ago. A week. Seven days since he left me here to waste. Seven days in Rick’s spare room, on the bare mattress, on the bare floor, staring at the bare walls and feeling…bare.
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw him, and every time I opened them again, for that blessed few seconds, I’d be alive. But then reality would hit, reopening the wounds and dumping salt into them.
Then I’d suffer in my pile of self-pity for another day. So was my routine, and each day death didn’t come, another would return to take its place. Like hell, left to replay that night—his vanishing body over and over again.
Red visited of
ten, but I never responded to anything she said. She brought me food I never ate. Supplies I rarely used. A pile of them occupied one corner of the room. Toilet paper, bags of chips, snack cakes, a toothbrush, toothpaste, shampoo.
She’d sit and talk, on and on, telling me about her day, about what had happened in her classes or some other mundane thing just to make me listen to another human speak. Occasionally, she’d ask questions, like what had happened, but I’d just shake my head and turn away.
I couldn’t say it, but I couldn’t say anything else either, so I just didn’t speak.
That was until Red had enough.
“Get up!” Red shouted as she stormed into the room. “You’re not eating, and you smell like ass. I don’t know what happened, but I’ll be damned if I’ll watch you waste away to nothing!”
I turned away and tried to pull the blanket over my head like I did every time she pushed too hard, but Red wasn’t having it this time. She jerked it back, then yanked my arm until I was sprawled out across the floor.
“Shower,” she grunted, already dragging me.
I heard the water running the moment she opened the bedroom door. “No, Red. I don’t want to.”
“Oh, so you can speak. That’s nice. Doesn’t change the fact that you’re washing that stink off.”
I grabbed the doorframe, but my heart wasn’t in it. Red dragged me down the hall like the corpse I was, and I didn’t even feel guilty for making her do it. I couldn’t feel anything past the crippling pain inside my soul.
She slid me onto the tiled shower floor, fully clothed, and I realized I could feel something, and that something was ice cold.
I gasped as the icy water shocked my system, and I tried my best to scramble away from the spray.
“No, you don’t!” Red said, holding me still as she adjusted the temperature.
I breathed a sigh as the water heated to warm and allowed my body to slump back against the wall.
“Tell me what happened.”
I shook my head, but the moment I did, Red removed the warm water and froze me once again.
This time, I managed to make it past her grip and out of the line of fire. “What the fuck, Red!”
“That’s it! Get mad! Anything is better than this shit you’ve been doing lately.”
I shoved her back, sending her falling onto her ass, but Red didn’t stop. She hopped back to her feet like a woman possessed and blocked me from escaping. “Tell me what happened!”
“No!” I tried to move past her, to make it back to my sanctuary where I could slowly die in peace.
Red held firm.
“You’re not leaving this room until I know what the hell’s wrong.”
Something inside me exploded. “He’s dead!”
She flinched back as if I’d hit her, and her determined expression fell into one of confusion. “What?” Her voice was soft. “Who?”
“Brady.” I clutched my chest the moment I said his name. It felt like a knife had suddenly been plunged into my heart, twisting and turning as the image of his face filled my mind’s eye. “I can’t do this.”
Red engulfed me, unconcerned with the fact that I was dripping wet. “Holy shit,” she hissed. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”
The combination of her embrace and her words broke whatever was left of me. I sobbed, gut-wrenching sounds that caused me to double over on myself. My knees buckled, but Red caught me before I could hit the floor.
She didn’t let go. She clung to me as I purged the pain inside myself. Sobs turned to screams, desperate, tortured cries that haunted even myself.
Red rocked me back and forth for a long while, then stretched one arm out to snatch a towel from the rack and draped it over my shoulders. “C’mon. Let’s dry you off.”
I nodded, but the sobbing didn’t end. It was like the part of me that Brady filled had been ripped open that night, leaving behind a gaping wound that’d been left to fester each day since. Red’s insistence had forced it open, and the infection that’d been slowly eating me alive was spilling out in the form of my tears. But I knew, no matter how hard I purged the pain, I’d never heal.
Red removed my clothes as if I were a child and replaced them with dry ones. She took the towel and wrapped it around my hair before holding me once again. “You need to eat.”
“I can’t.”
“He wouldn’t want you to starve.”
Her words felt like iodine, I knew they were what I needed, but that didn’t stop the sting. He wouldn’t want that. He’d make sure I ate. He’d feed me himself, just like he had— I sobbed again, and Red squeezed me one last time before laying me down and pulling the covers over my frame.
“I’m going to go get some real food. Maybe it will help. Regardless, you have to eat something.” She stood for a long moment, seeming unsure before finally turning to walk away.
I didn’t care. All I could hear was his laugh. All I could see was his teasing smirk, his neon blue eyes as he stared down at me with so much love. How much time had I wasted? How many days, hours, minutes, seconds had I fought him?
How many more memories could I have now, if I hadn’t been so scared?
How many times had I hurt him with my denial?
“You look like shit,” I heard a voice say, distinctly male and deep.
I twisted around just in time to see the burst of green light and the man appear on the opposite side of the room. “I don’t think the shower worked.”
“Back off!” I scrambled backward until I hit the wall then studied him through narrowed eyes. He was tall, with dark hair, at least middle-aged, and the look on his face let me know he had no intention of leaving.
“I’m afraid I can’t do that. As a matter of fact, I’m going to need you to get up, try to stop crying, and come with me.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
I figured it would eventually come to this: that one of them would find me. I’d thought about it, dreamed of it, and every day I’d wasted away, I’d wanted it.
But now, with this strange man standing before me, something changed. Brady wouldn’t want this. He’d given his life to save mine, and I couldn’t tarnish that sacrifice by allowing myself to be beaten so easily. If I did, if I let this man take me away, his death would have been for nothing. “I’m not going anywhere.” My voice was even, lacking any and all fear and full of the anger boiling just beneath the surface.
Rage burned me, heating my blood, making my skin feel too tight for my body. Brady was gone, stolen from me just because of my species. It wasn’t fair. They didn’t have the right. He was mine.
One corner of the stranger’s mouth lifted. “Are you sure? He’s going to be upset.” He took two small steps forward and pretended to inspect the room.
Who’s going to be upset? “What do you mean?” I asked slowly.
His smile widened, and his eyes cut over to me in mischief. “Brady.”
A jolt hit my chest, as if his claim were a defibrillator kick-starting my body back to life. I swallowed hard, fighting against the hope, the intense desire to believe. It wasn’t true. I saw him fade right in front of me. “You’re lying.”
“Am I?” His brows lifted. “No. He sent me to take you to him.”
“If Brady were alive, he’d be here right now. He wouldn’t send someone else, especially someone I’ve never met before.”
“He would be here, but he’s laid up at the moment. Apparently, someone kicked his ass.” He started to approach me, his hands coming forward like an owner after their distraught cat. “Now, we really don’t have time for this.”
I darted off the bed, then as far as I could go in the opposite direction, which wasn’t far with him blocking the path to the only exit. Instead, I found myself pressed into the corner amongst all of Red’s supplies. “Stay back! I swear, if you touch me, I’ll—”
“You’ll what?” His eyes twinkled. “You’re a very interesting human. You know that, right?”
I didn’t think. He was movin
g closer, and I had no escape. In a desperate last attempt, I grabbed the first thing within reach and chucked it at him.
The roll of toilet paper hit him dead center of his face, then fell to the floor in an uneventful thud. His smile fell into a flat line, and everything about him turned dry. His face, his stance, then his voice when he asked, “Why did you do that?”
Damn, that shit’s absorbent.
“What can I say? When I see something shitty, I put toilet paper on it.”
His lips twitched, but only for a brief second. “That was cute, but I lack patience.”
He lunged forward, grabbing me faster than I could react, and a burst of bright neon green engulfed me. I held my breath as the world tilted, so much different than when Brady did it. My stomach didn’t just lift but seemed to shake around inside my body like a cocktail, the rest of my organs doing the same as turbulence shifted me every which way possible.
It also took much longer. By the time my feet settled down upon a flat surface, the nonexistent contents of my stomach heaved out onto the ground in front of me. “You suck at that,” I said as I dry heaved again.
The man didn’t reply, and when I looked up to see what he was doing, my eyes widened.
Colorful light surrounded me. The ether realm. This wasn’t good. The last place I needed to be was where all the creatures who wanted me dead were. It was like being the victim in a horror flick, and purposely trying to find the killer. “I shouldn’t be here.”
“That’s true, so we should probably get moving.”
I looked around at the plain narrow path and the expanse of grassland stretching out on either side. “To where? There’s nothing here.”
“Then probably to where something is,” he drawled, already turning away.
I didn’t move at first. This could be a trap. But then I realized that he’d already brought me somewhere I couldn’t possibly find my way back from, so running didn’t feel like a viable option. I chewed on my lip as I eyed his retreating back, then reluctantly jogged to catch up. “Hey! What’s your name?”
