Copyright © 2021 by Jacqueline Brown
All rights reserved. Published in the United States
by Falling Dusk Publishing.
www.Jacqueline-Brown.com
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Cover art designed by Aero Gallerie
Also by Jacqueline Brown
The Light, Book One of The Light Series
Through the Ashes, Book Two of The Light Series
From the Shadows, Book Three of The Light Series
Into the Embers, Book Four of The Light Series
Out of the Darkness, Book Five of The Light Series
“Before the Silence,” a Light Series Short Story
Awakening, Book One
To receive your FREE copy of “Before the Silence,” please join the mailing list or visit
www.Jacqueline-Brown.com.
To the Church Militant:
Take heart—the war is won.
Table of Contents
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-One
Twenty-Two
Twenty-Three
Twenty-Four
Twenty-Five
Twenty-Six
Twenty-Seven
Twenty-Eight
Twenty-Nine
One
My father held the gas can on his right side. The black tip of the long plastic lighter protruded from his coat pocket. The rest of us kept still, watching as he made his way through the snowdrift that had gathered at the base of the inn. The snow covering the inn reminded me of Thomas, of how quickly something or someone could change. In a little over a week Thomas had changed from the boy I had gone to church with my entire life, to someone who allowed evil to take control of his whole being. The inn built by my great-great-grandparents had done the opposite. It had changed from a place of evil—to a place of empty history. Now draped in snow and the smell of fresh salt air, the inn reminded me nothing of the place that held the terror of Thomas’s last moments on earth.
Luca and his aunt, Sam, stood beside me, motionless. Their gifts were beyond what any of us could fully understand. Each felt evil and good with such intensity that the evil dominating the inn for generations had almost killed Luca. Now neither one was cringing in pain or sickness, the evil of the inn no longer crippling their bodies. My father unscrewed the cap of the red gas can and splattered gasoline on as much of the desolated wooden structure as he could reach without stepping onto it. He refused to touch any part of it, even with the soles of his shoes.
Immediately after Thomas’s death, my father wanted to burn down the inn. He wanted it gone, off our property. Jason, Luca’s practical, no-nonsense uncle, reminded us the inn was a crime scene. My father accepted his caution, waiting over a month until the full investigation was over—until Thomas’s parents stopped outwardly questioning their son’s last hours on this earth. After the questions and the investigation ended, the winds started. No rain or even snow had fallen since Thomas’s death. The thirsty, barren woods would be kindling in high winds, so my father waited.
He had no choice.
Yesterday there’d been heavy snow. Today the winds were still. Today was also the day of Thomas’s funeral. This coincidence at first made my father pause—to burn the inn on the day of Thomas’s funeral in some ways felt wrong … in others, right. It was my grandmother, Gigi, who finally said there should be no more delays.
Thomas died six weeks ago. Since there was no body, there was no rush for a burial. His parents never thought they would be burying their son—no parent ever does. It had taken them this long to accept that he was gone, or at least to plan the funeral.
We all agreed with Gigi. It was fitting that we were saying goodbye on the same day to both Thomas and the place that led to his death. If his parents were in their right mind, they’d appreciate that we were burning down the place. Since they were not, we hadn’t told them. We had not told anyone. Who would we tell? Thomas’s death had made many things clear. Darkness is real; no amount of pretending will change that. And friends are rare. My family and I were ostracized every day, more and more.
Perhaps, as my father seemed to secretly hope, our lives would return to normal once the inn was gone. Whatever normal may be, or at least how things were before Thomas killed himself on our property. It was not our fault. I reminded myself of this often; rarely did I believe it.
Guilt hung over me and over each of us. No, we had not killed Thomas, and no, we never wished for him or anyone else to die, but somehow we were not quite innocent.
There was something about the splintered wood building in front of me that made us guilty, not of murder, but of something.
Gigi did not know the story of her grandparents. She didn’t know what made them come here, to our small town, or why they were so vile. Only that her grandmother’s parents had been innkeepers, and so her grandparents became innkeepers as well. The building in front of us was not large. The rooms, which I’d never seen, were tiny—big enough for a single twin bed, nothing more. The mattresses, Gigi assumed, were still in there, rotten from decades of damp ocean air.
Though how her grandparents came to our town was unknown, why they chose this cove to build their inn was an easy guess. The quiet cove had deep water where ships, large and small, could safely harbor. The inn, a place sailors could have stayed in, would provide a break from the sea. Later, the quaint, quiet cove gave respite to vacationers seeking the therapeutic sea air. With its view of tranquil waters, the building attained the status of a destination inn. How this happened was beyond Gigi’s knowledge, but her mother said it was true. Great-grandmother Dorothy told her young daughter that strangers came from all around to stay in The Hidden Inn. Hidden because it was far removed from the dirt road—even from the sea, the building could not be seen. Not until you entered the cove could it be discovered, either by land or water.
When Gigi and her mother arrived, it was exactly as Great-grandmother Dorothy had told her: a destination inn with a grand hotel being built. It was so fully booked with guests during the summer they arrived that Gigi and her mother slept outside in a tent her great-grandparents had erected for cooking. It provided much needed added space to the popular inn. Now, it was hard to imagine it that way. So long had it been run down … so long had it been infused with evil.
“That’s enough,” Gigi called to my father, who was still pouring the gasoline.
Her voice had returned to normal a few weeks ago when the swelling around her nose subsided. Even the dark circles under her eyes have faded and were easily hidden by makeup.
Dad obeyed his mother … he always did these days. He screwed the lid onto the plastic gas can and carried it away from the building to ensure no flames would reach it. He was constantly cautious, aware of every threat.
After setting the can on the ground, he went back to the inn, taking the lighter from his pocket. He stretched his hand toward the building. Fire erupted as soon as the tip touched the gas-soaked wood. He stepped back, hesitating for a moment before coming toward us, picking up the red canister on his way. His features were difficult to make out against the bright flames behind him.
The day was cold and gray, the same as when Thomas died. But today
there was no rain, nothing to stop the flames as they spread through the dry building.
Dad didn’t look behind him until he reached his mother. She took his arm, leaning her head against his shoulder. He was a good man, a kind man. She’d raised him well—she’d be the first to tell you this.
The flames grew, the centuries-old wood snapping as it burned. The porch was already engulfed. The flames were now on the inside, growing brightest at the windows and doors. The fire climbed from the first to the second floor. The roof caught as the walls began to crumble.
Was this what Luca’s house had looked like when Thomas set it on fire? By the time we saw it, all that remained was a skeleton of burned wood. Had Thomas hidden in the distance, watching it burn like we now watched the inn burn?
Unlike Luca’s house, no one went to the inn … no one wanted to save it. In some ways, this was sad. Something that had been in my family for five generations had nothing good associated with it. Gigi’s grandparents—their life—their memory was despised.
Perhaps that was what they wanted. In the end they created their legacy; they chose how they would live and how they would be remembered. They could have filled their home with kindness and love. They could have cherished their daughter, Dorothy, and later, their granddaughter, Gemma, but they didn’t.
The roof collapsed, an eerie cry exhaling from the burning wood—as though all those who were once hurt by this place were calling out together into the billowing black smoke on this gloomy morning. Sorrow threatened to suffocate me.
“If this place had been different, you wouldn’t exist. None of you would,” Luca said as if reading my thoughts.
His amber eyes, set against his brown skin, were a bright spot in my darkening world.
He’d been told as much of the inn’s story as I had. I leaned toward him, my thick coat brushing against his, the coat Gigi had bought for him.
“No,” I replied, “we wouldn’t.”
Perhaps we were the good that God brought from the evil. I didn’t feel that within myself, but I could not deny the goodness in Gigi or my sisters. Before all of this, I would have included my father in that list. Now … I was not as sure.
“It’s done. That horrible place is gone,” Dad said, with far more relief than I felt.
“Yes,” Gigi said, squeezing his arm, “we are free.”
“Are we really?” my littlest sister, Avi, asked, her young voice so altered since she last stood here—the place where we watched Thomas fall to his death.
“Oh yes,” Gigi said, holding Avi’s hand. “We are free, the darkness is gone.”
My other sister, Lisieux, and I did not speak, but we caught one another’s expressions. We shared the same doubt as our littlest sister.
Our father’s face beamed a broad smile of triumph, one that made me uneasy. To smile about any of this felt fake. But many interactions with my father felt fake these days. Despite what Luca had told me about my dad recalling things while I slept, Dad hadn’t remembered much … only that he’d spent time at the inn with his great-grandmother. He couldn’t remember what they did or what they spoke of, only that he came often, despite his parents’ insistence that he stay away. What his role had been, no one could say, but that he had played a role was clear. Even Gigi didn’t doubt this. But where I placed blame, she did not.
My dad was not perfect. She realized that, while refusing to acknowledge anything except the good in him. This trait made her a loving mother, though seeing only the good was not realistic.
I wondered what part of reality she had ignored when he was a boy—and now, a man. There was something about him, something I didn’t fully understand. He was different. I couldn’t describe the difference nor explain it, but I felt it the same as I felt the burning flames in the distance.
The snow and ice between the inn and us had melted. It had no choice but to give in to the heat encroaching upon it.
Two
I dried myself and wrapped the towel around my dripping hair. The bathroom tile felt cold against my bare feet. I stood in my open closet, the steam from the bathroom creeping in around me, adding warmth to the space between me and the dress hanging away from the others. Gigi had picked it out, and the tags still hung from it; it was dark gray, with long sleeves and a gentle flair at the waist. I’d say it was a pretty dress—if it were not the dress I was going to wear to Thomas’s funeral.
I lifted it from the rack in the closet and carried it into the bathroom. I didn’t want to wear this dress; I didn’t want to go to Thomas’s funeral. The last funeral I had been to was my mother’s.
I inhaled sharply.
“This funeral will not hurt as much,” I said to the pale red-haired girl in the mirror. “There’s no way it can hurt like that.”
I opened the bathroom drawer and found the scissors. I cut the tags from the dress, throwing them in the trash. I hung my damp towel beside the dress, the bright yellow a stark contrast to the dull gray. I’d wear my hair down; it would add color to a colorless day.
Pulling the wide-toothed comb through my wet hair caused knots to form. Every few inches I stopped, using my fingers to separate the tangled strands—some snapping, most slipping free. From the bottom drawer of my vanity, I pulled out the hair dryer and plugged it in. The heat warmed my bare skin. My hair was already straight; I was drying it to keep it from wetting my dress or turning into icicles and breaking off in clumps.
After a few minutes, my hair was dry, or dry enough. I sniffed it; before my shower it stunk of burning evil; now it smelled like roses. How easily the past could be masked by the perfume of the present.
I stepped into the unzipped dress and pulled the zipper up. I stared at myself in the mirror. The elegance of the dress made me look older—perhaps not older than I was, but older than I felt. In a few weeks I’d be eighteen. An adult. Would that change me? Would the world be different?
I unscrewed the top of the waterproof mascara and gently ran its brush through my pale red lashes. I brushed on a thin layer of foundation powder and ran the lip gloss across my lips. In my closet, I slipped on the black tights that Gigi had suggested I wear with the dress. I carried the tall black boots back to the bathroom and sat on the toilet lid to zip my legs into them. I brushed my hair one last time, turned off the light, and left the bathroom.
I went to my window, a matter of habit that long ago stopped being necessary. Our yard below held only the movement of chickens. In a futile attempt to delay the inevitable, I watched them pecking at the ground. I lowered my gaze and turned from the window.
I forced myself to the door of my bedroom, then to the landing, then down the stairs. I had no doubt I’d be forcing myself to move through the rest of this day.
In the kitchen, Gigi was twisting Avi’s flaming red hair into a tight braid. Typically, it flew out in all directions, like a physical representation of her personality. Now, like Avi, it was tame and quiet. She was the one most changed by the events of the last six weeks. She’d had the most innocence to lose. Deep within, the exuberant child still existed—we saw her from time to time—but mostly we saw a different child. She was no longer excited by life, only passively accepting of it.
“Your braid is beautiful,” I said lovingly.
“Thank you.” She didn’t raise her eyes to mine.
Gigi kissed the top of her head. “You’re done, my dear.”
Avi slumped her shoulders against the back of the barstool.
Dad entered the kitchen from his office, which had gone from being a place used mainly by the family in the evenings to a cave he often occupied alone. He was handsome in a black suit with a dark red tie. His brown hair, speckled with gray, was combed neatly back. His eyes gave him away, the sleepless nights resulting in dark circles. His cheeks were not as full as a few weeks ago.
Though Gigi placed no guilt on my father, he assumed all of it. The truth, I sensed, lay somewhere in the middle.
“Are we ready?” Dad asked as Lisieux entered the k
itchen.
Her brown hair fell in soft waves lying neatly against her dark purple dress—the perfect color for her. She looked beautiful. She was beautiful, and so was Avi. I wished we were going somewhere else … anywhere else.
Avi didn’t move; she remained staring at the countertop. Lisieux walked dutifully toward the coats, like a soldier going to battle.
Silently I stood as Dad handed me my coat. I felt bad for my sisters. They were completely innocent in all of this, yet they were lumped in with us, the guilty ones.
“Where’s everybody else?” Avi asked.
Dad was helping put her coat on. “They decided to stay home,” he stated as he buttoned her coat.
Lisieux and I exchanged a look.
“Stay home?” Avi asked, her green eyes brimming with panic. “But Sam promised.”
Gigi placed a hand on Avi’s shoulder. “We thought it best if they didn’t attend the funeral,” she said firmly.
“Why not?” Lisieux asked our father. She sounded as upset as Avi at the prospect of being away from Luca, Sam, and Jason.
After Thomas burned down their house six weeks ago, they’d been living with us. Having them here made it feel as if they were part of our family. To my sisters, Luca was like a big brother, to me a best friend—an only friend. I craved his presence. He was like the air I needed to survive. He and I had never spoken of this, yet somehow we understood it. That was one of the many beautiful things about Luca; so much was understood without needing words.
After a glance at her son, Gigi answered. “We thought it would be too difficult for Brenda and Phil to see them today.”
“Then why are we going?” Lisieux asked in an angry tone—which she used most of the time these days.
Gigi removed her new coat from the hook. She had purchased it to replace the one soaked with her blood on the night Thomas died.
“It’s a difficult day for all of us,” Gigi said. “Sam and her family don’t go to our church. The connection they have with Brenda and Phil is that they were there when their son died. That is the only thing that will enter Brenda’s and Phil’s minds when they see them.”
Gifted (Awakening Book 2) Page 1
