by Bre Hall
“What went wrong?” Ren asked.
“What do you mean?” Peter turned away from the window, his water glass empty.
“If my soul is Discentem, if I’m alive and kicking, something must have gone wrong,” she said. “How do I exist?”
“The Discentem soul is powerful,” Peter said. “It couldn’t vanish like the Auxilium’s; it was closer to a human soul. Except, with each lifetime, they learned that the soul was piecing itself together again, making them stronger, wiser. That’s why I told you there were people out there that want you dead. The only way to keep their true form hidden is by ending a Discentem’s life before they have time to gain anything of use from their lifetimes. Usually before they’re eighteen.”
“You’re joking,” she said.
“I wouldn’t lie to you,” Peter said.
“I mean, you’ve done it before,” Ren said, thinking of the bracelet.
“That was only to pique your interest,” Peter said. “Otherwise, no. I couldn’t—wouldn’t—lie to you.”
“Why not?”
“Because…” Peter trailed off. He set his glass on the edge of the counter and slipped into the chair beside Ren. Leaned close. Peter took Ren’s hand in his and pecked a kiss on the back of it. She yanked it back. Tried to calm her heart, chugging like a combine reel over sorghum. Peter fixed his eyes on her, a smile creeping across his face. “I wouldn’t lie to my queen.”
She tried to swallow. “I’m sorry?”
“Ren, you’re her,” Peter said. “You’re Samara, the lovely, the just, the powerful. Your people, they need you. I need you. We have to reverse what has been done. Your true form must be resurrected. Samara must return.”
A shiver rattled up her spine. Everything Peter had told her seemed outrageous. From the clocks to the splitting of the Discentem’s soul to the admission that she was Samara. Ren, the most powerful being on Earth? She had one working eye and no driver’s license. She was a nobody. An outcast.
It was all too crazy. It was mad. And yet, it didn’t make her want to rush down the hallway, climb back on her bicycle, and run home. She believed in the bracelet, in Charlotte, so why shouldn’t she believe the rest? No matter how crazy it sounded.
“Why me?”
Peter stuck a new cigarette in his mouth, lit it, and exhaled. “I just told you.”
“Yeah, but why do I need to be resurrected?” she asked. “What’s so important about it now? If I’ve supposedly been dying for centuries, the world turning and turning without me, not missing me, then why haven’t the rest of you moved on? Gotten jobs? Picked up hobbies? Like landscaping or wooden pipe carving?”
“Pipe carving?” Peter’s eyebrows raised.
“You have this serious obsession with smoking.”
Peter looked at the smoldering cigarette in his hand. “One of those human habits I’ve picked up over the years. That, and tattoos.”
Peter lifted the hem of his t-shirt to reveal a tight, flat torso covered in myriad of tattoos. She caught sight of a smoke plume curling out of the mouth of a Chinese style dragon, a row of Egyptian hieroglyphics dotted beneath. If he would only lift his shirt a little bit higher, she could see what kind of bird was connected to the claws of a talon clenched around a limp, dead-eyed fish. She shook her head, bringing herself back to reality.
“Don’t distract me,” she said, her eyes tightening on Peter. His jaw flinched and he dropped his shirt. He looked at the ground and seemed to fight a smile.
“Sorry,” he said. “You were talking about hobbies and dying over centuries.”
“Right.” Her shoulders pushed back and she sat up even straighter in her chair. “What the hell is so important about now? Why me? Why do you care?”
“When do you plan on dying?”
“Huh?”
Peter locked his gaze on her, his lips taut, his eyebrows perfect latitudinal lines above those dark eyes that seemed to prick a vein to the surface of her skin and slide into it, needle-like, stirring up her blood, causing her heart to beat loudly in its cage.
“Would you rather die tomorrow or stave off the sweet scent of earth six feet below your toes indefinitely?” Peter asked.
She had never given much thought to death. Why would a sixteen-year-old girl need to? Even the car accident at the start of the summer had her thinking she might be invincible. But if she had to choose? If he made her think about it? She shrugged. “Second one, I guess.”
“Well,” Peter said. He pressed his palms against the tabletop and leaned toward her. She could taste the nicotine coming off his breath. “Then, I’d say you better let me help you stay alive.”
She swallowed loudly. “How do you know your experiments will work?”
“I don’t,” Peter said, stepping back. “But I don’t think you have any other choice.”
“What if I say no?”
“Then, I’ll just find you in the next life,” Peter said. “Try again. The cycle has to end. The Discentem whose souls were turned dark must rise again.”
“But why?” she asked. “The world has been fine without them. No one even knows who they were, what they did. Apart from me not wanting to die, what’s the point to all of this?”
Peter sighed. “The world has not been fine. War? Disease? The longer this planet goes without Discentem to guide it, to teach its people, the faster it spins into irreversible turmoil.”
“So, the planet is screwed and you need my help to fix it?” Ren laughed. Folded her arms across her chest. “Do you know how many movie plots hinge on that exact scenario?”
“This isn’t a movie, Ren,” Peter said. “This is real life. Your life. Now, you can keep asking all of your silly questions, but it will only bring you to one of two conclusions: In or out?”
“In or out?”
“Will you let me help you? Help everyone?” Peter asked. “Or should I just shack up somewhere with a pile of wood and whittling tools and wait until you incarnate into someone a little more reasonable.”
“I’m reasonable,” Ren muttered.
“Then say it,” Peter said.
“Say what?”
“Maybe this was a mistake.” Peter leaned the back of his head against the cabinets behind him. He brought his cigarette coolly to his lips, his jaw flexing. He inhaled deeply, the tip of the thing turning quickly to ash. Quickly disappearing into oblivion.
Ren drummed her fingers over the tabletop a couple of times. Bit the inside of her cheek. “Okay, fine.”
“Okay, what?” Peter asked as he exhaled the smoke.
“You know what.”
“I do?”
“You really want me to say it, don’t you?” Ren asked.
“Yes, please,” Peter said.
She sucked a breath in through closed teeth, the air hissing like a flattening tire. “I’m in. Now, what do we have to do?”
Peter extinguished his cigarette in a small ash tray above the sink. He turned to her, a sly smile on his face. “Do you have the bracelet?”
“Right here.”
She pulled the sandwich baggie from her jacket pocket and laid it on the table. Peter picked up the baggie and shook the bracelet free. He opened the moon-engraved locket and let the pebble roll onto his open palm. He extended it toward her. “Welcome to the Dark Soul Experiments.”
Her pulse strengthened the closer the bone came to her. Her fingertips itched for its smooth, fibrous surface. She let out a shaky breath, then reached out and touched it.
chapter
9
THE CHATTER OF VOICES RUMBLED through the old mansion and only grew louder as Charlotte drifted down the hallway toward the staircase. Her little brother, Cyrus, had beaten her there. He was barely three years old and still hadn’t lost any of his pudge. His rotund fingers clung to a rung in the banister. His warm, hazel eyes gazed upon black tails, white bow ties, and a swarm of colorful ball gowns. Charlotte picked Cyrus up into her arms. She tried to look beyond his wide cheeks, finding Billy buried
beneath their bulk. She reckoned one day, despite their age gap, they might be mistaken for twins. So long as Billy didn’t wrinkle quickly like their Daddy had.
“You’re meant to be in your room.” Charlotte clucked her tongue. “You’re our little escape artist, aren’t you?”
Cyrus giggled. Their sister, Katherine, was talking by the time she was Cyrus’ age. Charlotte and Billy even sooner. But not Cyrus. All he could do was giggle. She wondered if he’d ever speak. She turned toward the free-standing staircase that cascaded out into the middle of the room, tiled in black and white marble with her mama’s Cotton Balls in mind. She began to descend the steps, careful not to catch her crinoline on the edge and trip. Cyrus, still in her arms, grabbed fistfuls of her dress sleeves in his hands as the noise grew and the guests began to press in.
“This,” Charlotte told Cyrus, “is one of Mama’s famous parties.”
There was dancing and small talk over crystal champagne flutes and a spread of desserts that used to make Charlotte and Billy’s heads spin when they were young.
“Charlotte.” It was the unmistakable shrill of her mama’s voice. As soon as Charlotte turned back toward her, a servant was plucking Cyrus from her hip. Her mama shook her head. “He’s meant to be in bed.”
“He was out of his room,” Charlotte said. “He seemed curious.”
A loose curl hung from her mama’s temple. It must have fallen out of the cluster pinned on the crown of her head. It was the only thing that gave away a fault in her otherwise perfect demeanor. New gown, good pearls. Everything Charlotte should hope to be, according to her mama. A pillar of society.
“The Cunningham boys are over there.” Her mama lifted her chin to the corner of the dining room, the furniture relocated to make room for more people. “They brought their cousin all the way from Charleston.”
“How cosmopolitan,” Charlotte said. The Cunningham boys were handsome enough with their duck-feather blonde hair and strong jawlines they inherited from their grandfather, but she remembered them as boys, always stealing Billy away to play in the woods, insisting there was no room for a girl in their company. That was ages ago, but still her nose turned up at the idea.
“Please,” her mama said. “Let’s not do this tonight. Just go over there and speak with them. Who knows, you might find it pleasant.”
“I doubt it,” she said.
Her mama didn’t stick around to watch her move across the room toward the Cunningham boys, but she knew if she didn’t go, her mama would find out. Somehow, she always did. How she didn’t know about Billy already was a miracle, especially since Alena knew. She bit the inside of her cheek and started toward them.
“Lee’s boys will keep them back,” Jamie Cunningham, who was sixteen, one year older than her, was saying when she joined their cluster.
“Evening, boys,” Charlotte said with a dip of her head.
“Fine party, Charlotte,” said Tommy, Jamie’s younger brother. Tommy had brushstroke skin, too pretty to be stretched over on a man’s face, Charlotte thought. She remembered the time when they were thirteen and he pecked a kiss on her cheek. She could still feel the velvet skirt of his skin every time she saw him.
“Mama knows how to entertain,” she said, flourishing a hand through the air.
“Charlotte, let me introduce our cousin,” Jamie said. “This is Bartlett Leicester.”
Bartlett hardly seemed to notice her. He adjusted thick glasses that made his eyes look enormous and stared straight at Jamie, trying to return to their previous conversation as if Charlotte hadn’t interrupted.
“It doesn’t matter whether or not Lee’s boys will keep them back,” Bartlett said. “The fact of the matter is that the Yankees are down here sticking their big, fat noses in other people’s damn business. The world as we know it has changed, whether or not the war continues.”
“Are you saying defending our lifestyle is a waste of time?” Tommy asked.
“And money,” Bartlett said, holding out his champagne glass. “Look long and hard, boys. I do not see crystal like this in our futures. Let alone soirees as swanky as this one.”
“How old are you anyways, Mr. Leicester?” Charlotte folded her arms over her chest and eyed the Cunninghams’ cousin up and down.
“I’m old enough to enlist if that’s what you’re insinuating,” Bartlett said, glancing at her only briefly. He opened his mouth to pick up conversation once more with Tommy, but Charlotte cut him off.
“Why aren’t you taking up arms, then?” Charlotte pressed. “Fighting for the Cause instead of expressing an attitude that will dissuade any chance of young men like Jerome and Jamie of enlisting when they come of age. An attitude that will smother any chance we have of lighting a fire beneath those Yankees, which could thrust them back to their homes.”
“My eyes keep me away from the battlefield, thank you very much,” Bartlett said, adjusting his glasses once again. His face fell toward hers. It wasn’t an ugly face per say. Rosy cheeks, sharp jawline. But with his lips pinched, nose tilted toward her mama’s ceiling, and those bug eyes narrowed to slits, he looked nothing but mean. “And what attitude do you believe I should have toward this war, Miss?”
“We Southerners are strong,” Charlotte said. The heat was rising from her chest up into her neck. Arms still crossed, she clenched her fists, her fingernails digging into her palms. “We’ve owned this land and lived prosperously on it for decades. We need to prove to Northerners that in the face of adversity we will not falter, but conquer. That we—”
“You’re one of those ‘don’t tread on me’ types, aren’t you?” Bartlett took a sip of his drink, smiling at his cousins as if he were better than Charlotte.
“We all should be,” she said. “And if I could, I’d take up arms to defend this land just as quickly as—”
A scream rang out above the noise and the entire mansion fell silent. Not even the swish of taffeta could be heard. Then, the click-clack of shoes as Charlotte’s mama moved quickly across the room, toward the window, where a woman was standing, staring, shaking.
“Is that?” someone asked.
“What?”
“There,” a man said. “In the distance.”
Charlotte pushed through the crowd and ripped back the curtains laid over the dining room windows. In the darkness of the night a slender streak of orange glowed on the horizon. Just beyond the oak avenue. She thought she saw a figure move in the distance. Then the woman screamed again and everyone pressed against the glass saw what she had. A shadow of a man. The barrel of a rifle. A soldier. It had to be.
Billy.
They were here for Billy.
The room erupted into chaos. Glass shattered as people dropped their champagne flutes, either from shock or because they were knocked out of their hands in the commotion. Everyone fought for an exit. Husbands latched onto wives and vice versa. Children began to shake and cry until mothers and fathers latched onto them, drew them near, and led them away.
Charlotte pinched and squeezed her way through the crowd, into the kitchen, and out the back door. It was pitch dark, save a sliver of crescent moonlight casting a pewter glow over the lawn and the branches of the Live Oak trees in front of her. She had to get to Billy before the soldiers did. She had to warn him. Tell him to run.
She moved swiftly through the woods. Not stopping when she stumbled on a downed branch or bit her toe on a jagged rock. The sound of gunfire rang out, propelling her deeper into the woods. She didn’t have time to think about what was going on behind her. Party guest fleeing. Some caught in the thick of gunfire. Would they all make it to safety? Flee in carriages? Hide in the woods?
“Miss Charlotte,” came a strangled voice behind her. She should have noticed the extra set of footsteps crashing through the woods earlier. She glanced over her shoulder. A mess of blonde curls. A simple dress. It was Alena. “Miss Charlotte, wait.”
“I have to warn him,” she said, her feet tumbling over the underbrush.
&
nbsp; “You can’t.”
“I have to try.”
“No,” Alena said, catching the long sleeve of Charlotte’s dress. She slowed to a walk. Alena kept hold of the sleeve. “I mean you can’t warn him. He ain’t there.”
“How do you know?”
“He came by the house earlier.”
Charlotte came to a full stop. “What? Why’d he do that? He could have been seen.”
“He said he had a bad feeling,” Alena said. “Deep in his insides. Like he’d be a sitting duck out in the woods. He told me to tell you.”
“Why didn’t you get me sooner?”
“As soon as he left, your mama set me to work,” she said. “I hardly had a moment to breathe. Then all the commotion started.”
A rumble shook the ground for a brief moment and a bright light lit up the dark. Charlotte whipped around only to see the mansion in the distance glowing orange. It was on fire.
Charlotte didn’t think. She hiked up her skirt and took off in a sprint for the house. Her shoes snapped twigs like predators snap bones and the fallen leaves from the previous autumn, scattered on the ground, crackled like cedar in the wood stove as she flew over them. If the soldiers were setting fire to the mansion, then they weren’t Lee’s boys. The soldier she had seen through the window before had to be a Yankee.
Flames licked up the siding of the house. Danced through her mama’s rose bushes planted around the wide porch. The gunshots sounded distant. Faint shouts beat through the cotton fields. Most of the guests must have fled by carriage. Or were stopped trying.
“Charlotte?” It was half question, half scream. It came from inside the mansion.
“Mama,” Charlotte yelled. She lifted her skirts and left the tree line just as a parlor chair crashed through the window.
“Miss Charlotte, don’t,” cried Alena from the oaks.
Cyrus, knees tucked tight to his chest, tears searing white streaks down his sooty face, was thrust through the broken window. Her mother said, “Take him.”
She reached up and took her brother in her arms. His face burrowed into her bony shoulder. She felt his tears soak through the fabric of her dress.
