“Silence!” Her voice goes off like a gong. She picks up a stainless ax and barrels in my direction. “It takes all of my will not to dismember you hourly. Save the questions for someone who cares.”
“I need to go home,” the words speed out of me. “Marshall!”
Her eyes bolt around the lab, at the endless trays of diced up cadavers, the blood stains on my dress, my hands, and shakes her head in frustration.
“Come,” she takes off down the hall.
The white slick floor gives way to a dull brown carpet. The cool air is exchanged for humidity as a familiar cobalt glow envelops us.
We step through the area housing a plethora of watery glass caskets and into a conjoined room the size of an airplane hangar. It’s congested from floor to ceiling with the tubular structures. They go on forever in seemingly endless rows. Most all of the tubes contain bodies sporting bright blue wetsuits with floating hair and hands as the cobalt water stirs into a whirlpool.
Normally I would freak out and try to run or scream my head off. But on this day, at this strange hour, I can’t help feel like I’ve just got the world’s biggest promotion.
“What do you do with them?” I’m fascinated.
“Feed them to you for dinner,” her shag of wild hair flexes when she says it as though it has a life of its own.
I seize at the thought.
Her lips pull into a line, and for the first time, not only did Ezrina speak to me without yelling, I think she just took a stab at humor. I pray she took a stab at humor.
“Funny.” My voice sounds thick. I hadn’t heard my voice in anything but the chop shop for what feels like a small eternity. I was getting used to the echo produced by my own vocal cords as though Ezrina and I were becoming a single species. “What’s my job?” I ask dutifully.
She steps toward the back of the room, lined with three rows of steel drawers, sliding out the one in the middle. It’s a girl about my age. I blink back surprise. She’s whole as far as I can tell. She wears a t-shirt and jeans. Her long, straight hair is encrusted with blood, a clot the size of a silver dollar lies along the temple. She has a pretty face and looks decidedly serene despite the fact she’s very much dead.
“Bathe her.” Ezrina continues to pull the drawer out until long metal legs hit the floor like a gurney. The next thing I know we’re wheeling her down the hall into yet another room. She hooks her up to the sink. “Undress her. Fill the tub with keeping liquid. She needs to soak before we store her.”
“Keeping liquid?” The blue water, it keeps them. I get it, but gross.
“Synthetic plasma used for preservation,” she sighs it out as though I had worn her down before leaving the room.
We’re going to store her. Dear God. What the hell is going on?
I place my palm over her forehead—barely feels cold. Fresh blood sits curdling on the side of her face. Then I do the unthinkable. I pinch her nose, lean in, place my lips over hers, and breathe. I push in twelve solid breaths before giving up and panting over her lifeless body. As a Celestra, daughter of Caelestis, I should have been able to save her. I’m useless—nothing more than a tool in Ezrina’s cadaver cafe.
It takes forever to wrestle her clothes off. I feel bad manhandling this poor dead girl who looks like a giant sleeping doll—a naked sleeping doll, but that’s beside the point. I fill the bathtub up to her face. I can’t stand the thought of submerging her, killing her again by way of drowning if only in my imagination.
Ezrina returns with a wet suit, and we struggle to get it in place. Afterwards, we wheel the girl over to a table with a glass tube lying on its side. She slips her into the opening at the top with little to no effort. Ezrina erects the tube upright, and hooks a hose over the top that expels a gush of blue solution.
“Is the keeping liquid the same as the blue fog?” Not only were the Counts surrounded in it, but it’s come from Mom and Tad’s room before.
“Yes. It rejuvenates cellular structure.”
“So they need it.” Knew it. I bet Tad and Mom sniff it up every morning before breakfast. I bet they’d drink it by the gallon if they could.
“Regenerating plasma. A small amount inhaled is enough to rebuild the connective tissues and restore cell reproduction.”
“Who thought of this?” I wash over her as though she were a genius. “You?”
“I.” She softens into me with a hint of pride. It’s in that moment I see something inside her, beneath the ugly façade, the cantankerous brawling anger she resorts to so quickly. For the first time Ezrina actually feels human to me.
The tube fills with the bright blue liquid at an accelerated rate. In less than a minute, she’s floating, hair dancing in every direction. Ezrina pulls a metal seal off the table and smears the back with paste.
“Adhere this to the bottom,” she says, holding out a metal tag.
I take it from her, careful not to get glue on my fingers, examine the name—Laken Stewart. I bend over and place the tag where I was instructed.
“Ezrina? What happened to Laken?” I look up at the girl. She glows like an angel, peaceful and beautiful.
“Laken is here, Skyla.” Ezrina doesn’t answer the question. Instead, she tips her head up at the girl. “She will attempt to conqueror—much like you.”
Like me.
Ezrina knows things. I give a repressed smile at the thought.
“Nice to meet you Laken,” I whisper, waving my hand over her face. “Sorry I couldn’t save you.”
The last few hours of the day, Ezrina is off doing God knows what, and I’m getting tired of undressing dead people.
“Leave,” she says, rattling into the room. She shares the same warm sentiments at the end of every day.
“Why are you so bitter?”
She looks up with a jolt of surprise. “Would you like me to quarter you?”
“No,” I take in a breath at the thought. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to insult you. I—”
“I was just like you,” she whispers. Her hand reaches forward and caresses the side of my face. “I am your future.”
My heart gives an unnatural thump. For the first time since I’ve been here, I feel afraid.
And I’m damn sure I’m leaving tonight.
Chapter Five
Gage
Blood orange sky. Rain falls like javelins, personifying the desperation of the demonic world outside my window. Thunder rattles the dishes, shakes the infrastructure of the Transfer—no lightning, no moon.
I miss Paragon. Silent tears fall. I miss Gage, ache for his smile, his touch. I want to be released from this stranglehold. I’d do anything, face the Counts, face Logan the most wicked Count of all.
“Maudlin, are we?”
I spin around to find Marshall walking through the door, dressed in sharp black clothes that accentuate his features as though he just stepped off a runway.
I race over and jump up on him, latch my legs around his waist, and let him twirl me. It feels good holding Marshall like this. I let the room spin me dizzy while enjoying the strange buzzing sensation that trembles from his flesh.
“It’s Christmas eve in your world,” he whispers in my ear.
“What?” I hop down, horrified at the thought.
“I’m sending you home. It’s my gift to you,” he softens into me with all his Sector glory.
“Traditionally, you’re lousy at gifts.” First, he exposed just about everyone I love, and Tad, as Counts. Then he gave me a gorgeous white dress all the better to see me with while he tried spearing me with a thousand arrows. And, now, he’s sending me back to the spinning stone of death.
“I promise no spinning and no death. I’ll have young Oliver meet you. The way he goes on and on you’d think I kidnapped you myself.”
“You sort of did. And, you can hear my thoughts?” I’m a foot away, and we’re not touching. I find this unnerving.
“I can hear everything here.”
“I was thinking earlier about som
ething strange that happened.” I tell Marshall about the dream I had a few weeks back. I was near a large flat stone, and Brielle pulled a goat from out of nowhere. I find it interesting that it transpired with just a few odd details out of place.
He chews the inside of his cheek, roves his eyes around the ceiling as though he were reading the answers off some invisible scroll.
“You, my love, are absorbing the gift of knowing.”
“I am? Is that a part of my Christmas gift?” I give his shoulders a hard squeeze. “That’s like the best gift ever!”
“Collect yourself,” he removes my arms, placing them gently at his waist. “You’re acquiring this on your own.”
“Can I get more of it? I want to know. I want to know everything.”
He presses a kiss on my lips, propelling me to turn my head. Even if Gage isn’t here, I don’t plan on letting Marshall molest me.
“I wouldn’t be so quick to ditch my affection. That, my dear, is how you’re acquiring your newfound skill.”
“Kissing you?”
He nods rather proud.
“Because you have the gift of knowing? Kissing you produces the effect in me?”
“Something like that.”
“So, that means I can kiss Gage and yield the same results,” I say it as fact.
“No, Skyla,” he gives a sly smile. “You see, Gage would be considered a back road clogged with overturned trees, impossible to navigate—however, yielding the effort from me would be equivalent to a superhighway.”
“So—I’ll just kiss Gage a little longer.”
“It will take twelve lifetimes for you to achieve what you can with me in a much more reasonable timeframe.”
Never mind.
“Well, I’m off to a great start,” I say. “I may not need anything else from you.”
“You won’t need more, but you’ll want it.”
I pull back and take him in. Marshall is my portal to the gift of knowing.
“You didn’t give me a vision when we kissed in the field.”
“You didn’t deserve one. Would you like one now?”
“No. I want to go home. Take me to Gage.”
“Very well.” Marshall wraps me in a tight embrace, whispers something in a foreign language that sounds Latin in nature.
The floor sways and gyrates, and the light in the room eclipses to nothing.
***
Sharp pelting rain, hard as biting nails, pounds against my flesh as my lids begin to flutter.
Cold granite lies beneath me. An oppressive moon greets me from above. I’m back on the stone right where I left. Not one Count in sight.
I sit up and scan the illuminated landscape for signs of life. Nothing but a barren field encircled with evergreens as tall as skyscrapers.
“Gage?” My voice dissolves under the tyranny of the storm—lightning ignites the world bright as noon, less than a second later, thunder explodes in dull roaring jags.
I scoot off the smooth surface. The sweet scent of earth penetrates through the rain.
“Gage!” I bear down and howl, letting his name burn like fire from my lungs.
Tail lights!
At the bottom of the clearing, his truck traverses along a dirt path.
He’s driving away.
“Marshall!” I scream.
I’m so freaking pissed. He said he’d send Gage, and now I’ve missed him. I’ll be all alone, drowning in one of the worst storms Paragon’s yet to experience. “Marshall, damn it make him see me,” I hiss.
I jump in the air and wave my hands. The night ignites in a spectacular blaze of glory. Lightning dazzles the sky with all of God’s vengeance and touches down its crooked torch on a lone pine to the left of the clearing.
The truck stops.
“Gage!” I scream, running down the hillside, tripping and turning my ankle in the process. Rain fills my mouth, blurs my vision as I laugh on the way.
A light emits from his opened door.
He hears me. It’s going to be OK.
My entire body craves his arms.
Gage gets out of the truck. His familiar frame illuminates a gentle hue of blue as he runs to meet me.
“Skyla!”
“It’s me!” The words jostle in my throat with joy.
The seconds drag out, each its own eternity as we race towards one another in the downpour.
“Gage!”
The sky ignites as we connect in a strong electric pull.
My arms collapse over his back as he twirls me into the night.
He’s here. He’s real.
Gage kisses me, drops kisses down my neck, across my face.
“I love you,” I cry as I say it. “I never want to be apart from you again.”
“God, I missed you,” he pants.
I thread my fingers in the wet slick of his hair—dig in deep with my lips pushed hard against his.
We fall to the ground, roll into a puddle of mud, and indulge in one another under the watchful eye of the moon.
I’m back—back in the dirty world, wet and alive with Gage. Nothing seems impossible or unbearable like this with him.
“It’s Christmas Eve,” he shouts over the rain between kisses.
“Merry Christmas,” I bite his lower lip as I say it, secure him over me, and don’t let go.
“Everyone’s at your house.”
I shake my head at the thought. Everyone most likely includes Logan.
“No,” I finally say. I’d rather spend another year playing with Ezrina’s corpses than see any of them—of course, with Gage by my side. I dig my nails into his back. I’m not leaving him again, ever.
Gage hikes up on his elbows, gives an effortless smile that depresses his dimples. I pull up and kiss each one in turn.
“We should go,” he looks genuinely sad to insist. “Your mom is worried sick. Everyone wants you home, safe. Tonight’s the perfect night for miracles.”
“I already have my miracle.” I press into the small of his back and have him relax over me in the mud.
I want to stay like this forever with the harsh storm pelting us, rain like bullets, attempting to drown us with all its fury.
Something tells me this is going to be the worse Christmas ever.
Chapter Six
All is Not Calm
Landon manner is lit up with colorful bulbs that scallop the edge of the lower eaves. I filled Gage in on all that happened at the Count ceremony and how I involuntarily became the sacrificial lamb—including every last detail of the haunted Transfer.
“Logan told me why he did it,” Gage warms my arms as we lean against his truck in the rain.
“He’s a pathological liar. I doubt we should believe, ‘hello’, should it fly out of his mouth. What did he tell you?”
Gage arches his head back in frustration. “He wants to tell you himself. I’m not defending him or throwing him under the bus. You’re here now, and that’s all that matters to me.”
I’d like to throw Logan under a bus—a semi, both.
Peals of thunder, flashes of lightning escort Gage and me as we make our way up the stairs. The Hawthorne bushes have grown up over the railing, and the pines that barricade our property from Brielle’s have thickened. I can’t believe how different everything looks in such a short amount of time.
Gage offered to take me to his house first to shower, change into his sweats if I wanted, but I decided I would offer the Counts in my life the full effect of the aftermath of rolling around in the storm. Besides, if Mom focuses on how disheveled I am, she may not be so upset over the fact I’ve been MIA for two whole weeks. I still have no idea what I’m going to tell them.
The door is unlocked, so we head on in.
The house is alive with unfamiliar scents—cinnamon, traces of turkey lie thick in the air, a layer of candles burning, the spice of wood from the fire awakens my senses. It’s funny how life goes on without you. How your family could bake a turkey and fill in all of the holiday blan
ks without you, once they think you’re gone.
Gage pulls me through the hall. I can hear laughter emitting from the family room. Mia thanks somebody for something then laughs.
We step into the room unapologetically. All heads snap at attention, their eyes lock on me as though I were an apparition. Nothing but a circle of shocked expressions stare back. Mom and Tad, Mia and Melissa, Drake, Brielle and her mother—Marshall—figures. The Olivers are here. Emma pulls a bleak smile—Logan sits wild-eyed, overeager as though he were about to pounce.
Then the decibel level in the room explodes. Bodies descend upon me, arms, and lips, the girls tug at my hair in an effort to get to me.
“Skyla Laurel Messenger!” My mother screams. “Oh, my God!” her hand comes up over her mouth as she takes me in.
Logan plucks me away. He doesn’t wait for my mother to finish, instead, his arms lock over me so tight I can’t breathe. He lets his lips glide across the side of my face in a heated rush.
I thought I could save you.
He pulls a kiss off my lips. Digs in with his roaming tongue, hot as a fever. I love you, Skyla. I love you more than—
“Holy shit!” Gage explodes, tearing us apart like a bouncer. He sends Logan flying back into the Christmas tree, decorations shoot off the branches, causing the lights to blink several times before cutting to black. Gage charges at him once more, sending both Logan and the tree to the floor. Glass bulbs shatter into tiny slivers. They scatter to the four corners of the room as the dangerous glittering shards lie in wait to cut us.
“Enough!” Marshall barks as he rights the tree once again. “Where is your civility?”
“Well, Merry Christmas, Lizbeth,” Tad balks, panning his hands around at the mess. “You got your wish. The whole family under one roof.”
“Everybody calm down,” Dr. Oliver secures his hands over Logan and Gage and demands they take a seat.
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