Lightbringer

by K. D. McEntire

  “I think so,” Wendy replied dryly.

  “Because it bears mentioning,” Eddie said, insistent. “Over and over again.”

  “I get the point, Eddie.”

  “No, darling, I don't think you really do. But you will. Walk with me. It'll be like old times. I'll drive you home and you, me foine girl, can listen to ol' Eddie talk.”

  The grounds were quickly emptying. Eddie picked up his own bag, slung a loose arm around her waist, and guided her toward the parking lot and his car.

  “See, the fact of the matter is, what Jon said aside, none of us depend on you to be a sane and rational human being. At least not all the time. But sometimes it'd be nice. And if there's something wrong, we like to know about it so we can at least avoid the bitchiness if we can't deal with it.”

  “There's nothing wrong.”

  “Sure there isn't. Right. Chel's the one with the eating problem, but you've gotten werry-werry thin, me foine chickadee.”

  Done playing, Eddie dropped the overblown accent and brushed a tender finger across each of her cheekbones. “You've got a full set of matching bags under those baby browns of yours, and I do believe so much scowling is going to cause early onset wrinklage. At this rate, you're going to be the first MVHS graduate with grey hair.”

  Self-consciously, Wendy touched her head. “I said I'm fine! Drop it, okay?”

  Groaning, Eddie grabbed her by the wrist, shaking it slightly. “Wendy, look, I can totally stand you ignoring my calls, not responding to my texts, deleting my emails. I get that I was the jerk first—I got totally wrapped up in a girl and forgot I had friends for a while, yeah, sure. I deserve a little no-Wendy time. But the twins, annoying as they are, didn't do anything to you they haven't done before. And with your dad gone all the time and your mom in the hospital—”

  “Hey—”

  Eddie held up a hand to stall her protest as they reached the parking lot. “Wendy darling, I love you, but you are going to shut up and you are going to listen to me, if it's the last thing I do in this friendship. You owe me that at least. Now hush up and let me finish.”

  He waited until it looked like Wendy wasn't going to respond and continued on. “Ahem, now, like I was saying, with your mom in the hospital and all, you're like, woman of the house. Hell, screw that, you're master of the house. And you, miss master, haven't been treating the rest of the house particularly well.”

  “I've been busy,” Wendy mumbled as Eddie opened the passenger side door and ushered her inside. She turned her face to the window, refusing to look at him. “With, you know, my special stuff.”

  “Right, well, your ‘stuff’ is going to have to wait for a while, I think.” Eddie shut the door, moved around the car, and slid into the driver's seat. “You get on Chel for using the Phentermine, but don't think I haven't seen those bottles of No-Doz you've been hiding.”

  “Hey,” Wendy protested, stung, “I'm not the one abusing diet pills just to fit into some bleached-sheeple-douchebag club!” She waved her hands above her head. “Rah-rah, sis-boom-bah, gooooo bulimics!”

  “No,” he replied sternly, “you're the one abusing caffeine pills and chugging Red Bull so you can go and hang out with dead people all night. Which is crazier, I wonder?”

  Wrapping her arms around her middle, Wendy groaned and sank back against the passenger seat. “It's not the same thing. I need the caffeine. There've been dreams—”

  “Which I didn't listen to you about,” Eddie said. “And I'm really super sorry about that. But now you've got my full attention. Consider me the Wendy-Wikipedia, okay? I want you to tell me all about everything that's been going on with you, especially these nightmares or whatever. Dr. Eddie is in and I'll even waive the five cent charge.”

  “Not now.”

  He adjusted the rear view mirror, and checked the mirrors on each side. “Fine, when?”

  “Eddie—”

  “Don't ‘Eddie’ me in that tone of voice, Wendy. What in the hell can be so bad that you're afraid of falling asleep? What, you got Freddy Krueger in there, slicing people up? Are you going to drop dead if you fall asleep? Because the way things are going right now, you're going to drop dead if you don't fall asleep.”

  “It's my body, Ed.”

  “It may be your body but I've got a baseball bat. I've got no problem letting you sleep off a concussion. Talk.”

  “Fine. I spend just about every night avoiding sleep and running around town reaping. I still haven't found my mom. Her soul's been threatened by a dead crazy chick with skin like rotting lettuce. I won't find her unless I keep looking so, neatly put, I have to do this, okay?”

  “I get why you're worried about your mom, but last I checked you were back to reaping anyone you came across, not just the bad dudes who chased you down. Is that still the deal?”

  Irritated, Wendy refused to answer.

  “So it's still not just the creepy, rotting bad guys?” He waited for her reply and when it became clear that she wasn't going to give one, he groaned. “Wendy, I've said it before and I'll say it again, why exactly do you think you have to do this?”

  Easing the car out of the parking space, Eddie settled into the line forming at the edge of campus. Around them other seniors threw their things into their trunks or backseats and revved their engines, lining up quickly behind him and shouting holiday well-wishes at one another. The air was cold, not frosty—not in California—but still chill enough to turn cheeks pink and make eyes sting.

  “Why is it that you,” Eddie continued, waving at Pete Abrahms who cheerfully leapt into his dad's van beside them, “have to go around reaping people who're already dead? I mean, doesn't that just seem a touch backward to you?”

  They reached the front of the line. Eddie signaled, turned right, caught the tail end of the yellow light, and within moments they were away from the campus and heading towards home. Wendy, at a loss for words, sulked in silence.

  Eddie let five minutes pass, turning left, right, and left again as he took the back streets home. “Not getting an answer, huh?”

  “It's my job,” she said. “It's my mom's job and it was my grandma's job and it was her grandmother's job, yada yada yada, so on and so forth. If you don't understand that, Eddie, you don't understand me after all.”

  They were passing a park not far from her house where a cluster of elementary kids were learning to skate on the wide paths, holding hands and following a teenage girl in a narrow V like fluorescent-headed ducklings. Watching them, Wendy pressed her fingers to the glass, yearning.

  “Hey, after fifteen years of putting up with your crap I think I understand you just fine,” he protested. “Maybe it's you who doesn't understand yourself. Maybe you just need to—”

  “Stop the car,” Wendy demanded, sitting up suddenly.

  “What? Oh, no, hon, I'm not gonna let you be like that.” Eddie shook his head and slapped his hand down on the auto locks. “After all this crap I don't have to put up with a temper tantrum from you. You don't get to storm off and—”

  “Eds, shut your mouth for one damn second, stop the car, and open the stupid fucking door! I'll be right back!” Wendy snapped. She kicked at the passenger door, cracking the plastic, and Eddie, bewildered, stopped and unlocked the car. Without another word she was out the door and sprinting across a small local playground, fading out of sight within seconds of her feet hitting the grass.

  “Damn it,” he grunted, scowling. “Not again.” Pulling the car along the curb, Eddie parked and waited, eyeing the cracked plastic with a scowl. This could take a while.

  Piotr, eyes closed, waited for the first blow to fall. The blow never came.

  Instead a slow sweep of sound broke through the clearing, sweet and high, vibrating at the top of the range with a crystal tone. Heat began baking his cheeks and face, and where the warmth touched him, Piotr felt his anxiety drain away, felt the soothing sweetness fill him and lift him up. The hands loosened their unbreakable grip on his wrists; the vile tongue s
lipped away.

  When Piotr opened his eyes the Light was blinding.

  The Walkers, lost in the siren song, held open their seeping, mutilated arms and welcomed the Lightbringer's embrace. Piotr began crawling forward, seeking the Light, and saw Specs doing so as well, both making their way as best they could towards the glorious, aching afterlife.

  Before they could reach the edges of the Light, however, the song quieted, faded away. The Walkers were no more, taken with such rapidity that Piotr had hardly noticed their passing, and now only Wendy remained, the remainder of the Light glowing around her edges, eyes wary.

  “Well, that's new,” she said, sinking to her knees, face grave. Wendy held up her forearm. Four parallel slashes, deep enough that Piotr could see the red meat inside, bled sluggishly through the material of her grey overshirt. Wendy stripped the shirt off and wrapped the thin material around her wrist. “Ow,” she complained and glanced at Piotr from beneath her lashes. “Hi,” she said, tying off the makeshift bandage, “I missed you.”

  “You too?” Piotr held out his hand. Before Wendy could reach for it, Specs was suddenly there between them, hands outstretched and eyes wild.

  “Take me home!” he half-screamed, ignoring Piotr completely. It was as if Piotr wasn't even there. “I saw it! You hid it but I saw it! I want to go home! I want my mommy! Mommy!” He grabbed Wendy's wrist with both arms and shouted into her face, spit flying, “I WANT TO GO HOME!”

  A burst of energy—purple-cold and fierce—pulsed out from him in a wave so powerful it knocked Piotr a full fifteen feet backwards. It was like nothing he'd ever seen or felt before, like nothing he could have ever imagined. Wendy, trapped by Specs' tight hold around her wrist, sagged in his grip. Her face, red from the exertion of channeling the Light, bled white within moments and her lips turned bluish at the edges. She began to gag.

  Horrified, Piotr struggled to his feet as Specs released Wendy's wrist and bent over her, shoving his small hands through the flesh of her stomach and pulling something small and round and sharply glowing from deep within her gut. “I see you,” he sobbed. “Let me go home. Please? Please take me home?”

  “Specs!” Piotr called, squinting to look at the intense ball of light in the boy's grasp. “Wendy cannot help you if you're hurting her! Specs! Specs! Listen to me!”

  The boy didn't hear, only clutched the orb and rocked back and forth, sobbing.

  Wendy, face down in the dirt, didn't move.

  Horrified and uncertain what to do, Piotr approached Specs at an angle. Just a glance told him that the ball of light was fragile; he had a sense that if Specs dropped it, the ball might shatter. Gingerly, making sure to keep his movements slow and even, Piotr wrapped one arm around Specs' shoulders and slid the other hand around the orb. It was white-hot in his hand and he hissed a deep breath, shocked by the sheer magnitude of the pain.

  “Wendy, derzhis’. Ne ymiraj,” he whispered. “Stay with me. Do not die.”

  Carefully tensing his fingers, Piotr scooped the orb out of Specs' grip and laid it on Wendy's navel. At first nothing happened, but then, just as Piotr was wracking his brain for some other way that might return the glowing thing to Wendy's insides, it began to sink through her flesh. Piotr's other arm tightened around the boy, both drawing excess energy from him and holding him back. Specs struggled for a moment before faltering, blinking rapidly several times, and shaking his head. “Piotr?”

  “Ny ti i idiot,” Piotr said evenly, rolling and unrolling his hand as Specs' essence worked its way through his system, fully healing his wounds and numbing the excruciating blaze of pain that had enveloped his orb-handling hand.

  “I don't believe that I need a translation for that,” Specs groaned.

  “You are okay? You are calm?”

  A nod. “Yeah.” Specs wiped his hair away from his eyes, licked his lips nervously. “I think…I think that's her soul.” He glanced at the last vanishing remnants of the orb and then looked quickly away, as if not daring to stare too long lest he be mesmerized again.

  “Da,” Piotr said heavily, “I think you are right.” He'd heard tales of certain ghosts being able to pull out souls before, but never imagined that a soul could come in so compact and fragile a form, or that a Lost would have that ability. Pondering over what Wendy had told him before and taking into account what he knew about her soul now, Piotr had a sneaking idea of what had happened to her mother that night. He hoped he was wrong.

  “I saw my mom,” Specs said forlornly. “And my dog.” He sniffled. “I wanna go home.”

  “You and me both,” Piotr agreed, hugging him gently. “You and me both.”

  “Ugh,” Wendy agreed from a few feet away, eyes slowly fluttering open. Coughing, she patted her head, her heart, her hip, then slowly sat up, holding her head. “I feel like I just got run over by a truck.”

  “Sorry,” Specs whispered, hanging his head. “I don't know why I did that. I saw home and I just…I just…”

  Wendy laughed then, softly and sadly, and smiled. “I understand. You wanted to go home. It's okay.”

  Specs wiped his sleeve across his eyes. “It's okay?”

  “I promise. Here.” Carefully Wendy rolled over, tucked her knees underneath her, and gingerly staggered to her feet. “Tell you what,” she grunted. “Give me a minute and I can totally make going home happen for you. But no more of that—” she waved her hand over her midsection, “that tuggy business, okay? That hurt. A lot.”

  “You remember it?” Piotr couldn't keep the disbelief from his voice.

  “Sure I do.” Wendy brushed the grass off her jeans and studiously avoided looking at him. “You put me back.”

  “Put you back?” Piotr swallowed. “Are you saying that you yourself…were the…thing?”

  She shrugged. “I guess? All I know is that I got passed back and forth for a bit. Kind of nauseating, actually.” Wendy winced. “And cold. Really cold. Outer space cold. So cold I kinda still want a jacket.”

  Having no response for that, Piotr sat on the grass and waited for Wendy to collect herself. Specs sat beside him and laid his head on Piotr's shoulder. “Thank you for trying to rescue me.”

  “Ne bespokojsya.” Piotr ruffled Specs' hair. “Can you tell me where the others are?”

  “No.” Specs' face screwed into a miserable expression. “I don't know. They always kept me blindfolded, and after the attack I was separated from the others.” He sniffled again. “I don't know where they are. Only that they moved me often and kept me in the dark.”

  Riffling through her purse, Wendy knelt beside him but took pains not to accidentally brush against him. Popping the top on a bottle of aspirin, she dry-swallowed four, grimacing at their bitter taste. “Why couldn't you sink through a door or something and escape?”

  “The Walkers,” Specs whispered. “Some of them are different now.” He wiped one grimy hand across his face, smoothing away tears. “When I first got taken, they made me meet the White Lady.” He shivered. “She's horrible! She touched me and I was numb for days and days! Then the Walkers took me away. And every time I started to heal, when I might have been able to step through a wall and run away, they'd tie me up and take me to her again. She'd touch me and it'd happen all over again.”

  Wendy cursed under her breath. “Was that where they were taking you today? To see the White Lady?”

  Specs nodded. “It was time for my ‘treatment.’”

  Groaning, Piotr flopped back onto the grass. “Blyat'! So close! If I'd just followed them instead of rushing in like an idiot—”

  “I wouldn't have heard you if you hadn't been yelling,” Wendy interrupted mildly. “And I sincerely doubt you could have snuck past all her guards to free the kids. But this is good news, sort of.” Wendy held up a hand and began ticking off points. “We know that she's saving the Lost for something big and we know that she can strip ghosts of at least some of their abilities. Phasing through walls and whatnot.”

  Then she smiled, a dark
smile that seemed very unlike the Wendy Piotr had previously grown to know and love. He was disturbed by it. “More importantly, we know that they don't keep the kids all in one place, but that eventually they all get taken to one place. To the White Lady.”

  “I see,” Piotr said, growing excited, a plan beginning to form in his mind. “You want us to wait here and maybe ambush them, da?”

  “Exactly.” Wendy sat back on her haunches and nodded, pleased with herself.

  “But what about the others like me?” Specs asked. “Are they going to be hurt?”

  “I won't let them get hurt,” Wendy promised, reaching over and brushing his messy hair away from his forehead. “I'll send them home before that.” Then she straightened and Piotr knew that the moment he'd been dreading had arrived. “Are you ready to travel on, kid?”

  Specs jumped to his feet, all smiles. “Really? You mean it?” Then he paused, worry flickering across his face. “Wait. Is it going to hurt?”

  “Only for a moment,” she promised, reaching down and taking his hands in hers. “A pinprick. Like getting a shot.” Wendy closed her eyes and her hands began to glow.

  “You promise?” Specs asked, but Wendy was fading away and the Light was building. Fearing that this would be his last chance, Piotr rushed over and pressed a brief kiss to the top of the boy's head. “I will miss you.”

  “Me too. Say goodbye to Dora and Tubs for me.”

  Unwilling to tell Specs what had happened to the others, Piotr chose to simply say, “I will.”

  It was difficult getting words past the sudden lump in his throat. Piotr nodded extra hard to make certain he got his point across. “You shall be fine?”

  “Never better. Thanks for taking care of me for all this time,” Specs said, his voice starting to dip and slide, sounding as if it were coming from very far away. “You were cool.”

  “Spasibo. You were cool too,” Piotr agreed, feeling the tug of the Light start to interfere with his thoughts. He turned his face away and closed his eyes. If he didn't look at the Light, it was easier to handle. One note, lovely and sweetly sung, broke the silence and it was over. The warmth faded from his back, the cool returned.