by Anna Argent
“I’ll see if anyone is in your neck of the woods,” she said. “But we’re stretched thin.”
“It’s okay. I’ll handle things here.”
“You only have a couple of hours,” Harold said. “Have you completed the circle?”
If Echo didn’t find the locket in time, it wasn’t going to matter whether or not that doodle was finished.
“It’s under control,” he said. “Try not to worry.”
Marvel’s usually cheerful voice lacked all humor. “We have a lot riding on this, Stygian. All of us. If you can pull off this spell and trap the bad bitch, we all have some hope that it can be done again. Think about what that means for people like Starry.” Her voice wavered with emotion. “We could save her. We could save all those tortured souls we keep locked up.”
Harold chimed in. “Of course, we’d have to find the proper vessels to trap each soul and the associated incantation.”
“But it’s a chance!” Marvel practically shouted, then quieter, “It’s hope. We haven’t had that in a long time.”
Stygian’s heart squeezed for Marvel and the longing in her voice. Some deep, suffocating part of himself was just as frantic as she was to be free of the darkness inside of him. Not just Hazel’s shards, but all of the others as well.
His mother had killed herself. His father had been murdered not long after. He’d never known a life without shards. He’d never been free to be his own man, find his own path. He’d always been a pawn in a game started long before his birth.
How good it would feel to be there when the last move was played. How amazing it would be to look into the face of evil and say, “Checkmate.”
“We won’t let you down,” he said to both Marvel and Harold. “If Echo can find the locket, we will cast the spell and cage Hazel.”
“I hope so,” Marvel said, her voice small.
“I believe in you,” Harold said, though he was no longer quite so loud. No longer quite so certain.
Hazel piped up and said, So do I.
“Stay safe,” Marvel said. “We’ll check on you again soon.”
She hung up.
The time for waiting was over. Chained or not, he needed to do something.
There wasn’t much he could reach from the stairway, just one small table that had on it a lopsided clay bowl filled with a couple of loose keys. A child’s small fingerprints were clearly visible in the shiny blue glaze.
Next to the bowl was a lamp, an old pushbutton telephone and a notepad with no pen.
Stygian stretched himself to reach the leg of the table. His fingers were barely able to curl around the leg, but he managed to get a tight enough grip to drag it closer to him.
The lamp wobbled, but didn’t fall. The sound of wood scraping over wood was loud in the silent house, reminding him of just how alone he really was.
I am always with you.
He ignored the witch in his skull and kept pulling the table closer until he was able to reach the single drawer.
Inside it were some spare pennies, a hammer and screwdriver, a dressmaker’s measuring tape, a doll’s plastic bottle, a few screws and nails, an opened pack of petrified fruit snacks, and a half-empty box of crayons.
Bingo.
He pulled out one of the crayons and crouched so he could draw on the floor. The knots in the hickory boards stared back at him, accusation clear in the misshapen eyes.
He’d never drawn on the floor before, or the walls, or much of anything else. Crayons had not been part of his childhood. Grandfather believed in discipline over art, in training over creativity.
The little wax stick felt odd in his grip. Fragile and fleeting. As the first dark green streaks of color stained the floor, he felt the strangest sense of loss rising in his chest.
He couldn’t tell if the feeling was from defacing a perfectly good floor, leaving a mess someone else would have to clean up, or if it was something more. Deeper. Maybe his grief over never having a real childhood, never having a mother to dote on him or a father to beam at him in pride.
Stygian had been raised with hatred. Loathing. He’d always known that he was an abomination—a child of violence, of rape. Unwanted. He was the thing women feared. He was the burden his grandfather carried because no one else would. Toxic sludge.
He hadn’t thought much about his childhood since he’d left it behind. It was of little use to him now—a waste product to be discarded and forgotten.
But now here, holding this crayon in a home where the visible proof of children was left scattered everywhere, he couldn’t help but look back and compare.
What if his grandfather had loved him? What if he’d been raised with kindness and color instead of fear and loathing? What if he’d been born free of shards, able to form his own mind, rather than always being influenced by others?
Would he have ended up different? Would he have become warm and loving like Echo? Would he have been brilliant and witty like Marvel? Would he have been selfless and loyal like Garrick and Holt?
They all had shards, but they’d also had something else he hadn’t.
They’d been loved.
Echo’s face bloomed in his mind like spring, warm, bright and hopeful.
He loved her. It might not have been the pure, clean love of a man who’d been allowed to be a child, but it was strong. It was consuming.
If he hadn’t hurt her this morning, if Hazel hadn’t slipped past his self-control, what would have happened? Would she have opened her pale teal eyes and greeted him with a smile? Would she have opened her arms and her body to him, letting him fill her physically in a way he never could otherwise?
He had destroyed any chance he had of holding her trust, but that didn’t stop his wayward mind from imagining how it could have been.
Much like he’d imagined as a child how it could have been if his mother had loved him, if she’d lived.
Stygian braced himself out of reflex, waiting for his grandfather’s blow to come. It had been more than a decade since that man had struck him, but he still remembered his lessons all too well.
Duty is all you have, all you will ever have, his grandfather had told him.
It wasn’t true. Stygian had the Riven. He had a family. He had a home.
It wasn’t enough.
He wanted Echo. He wanted her more than he wanted his next breath. He wanted her at his side, safe and happy. He wanted to hear her sweet voice laughing and see her eyes sparkle with joy. He wanted to hold her close and keep the darkness at bay.
She was never going to be his.
At least not while Hazel still controlled him.
Stygian checked the image on his phone again and sped up his drawing. If this was his one chance of having Echo in his life, he wasn’t going to waste it.
When a young woman showed up at the front door with blood staining her clothes, he was shocked for only a split second.
You do not see her, Hazel said.
And just like that, the woman vanished.
He could hear footsteps moving through the house, up the creaky stairs, but saw no one.
She was never here, Hazel whispered. Power laced through her words and wove around him, binding his mind tight.
“Who was never here?” he asked.
Echo’s sister.
But her sisters were dead. Weren’t they?
There is no need to worry, Hazel said. We will all be together soon.
Stygian’s worry fell from him like a silken bath robe. It pooled on the floor, forgotten and unimportant.
All that mattered now was finishing this drawing, getting every sigil perfect, every line exact.
He checked his phone again, zooming in on a particular detail. The time caught his attention. They had only until eight-fifteen to cast the spell. It had taken him two full minutes to recite the incantation. He had to do so three times. That meant they needed at least six minutes to pull this off.
It was already after seven. Echo wasn’t back. They were almost
out of time.
Chapter Twenty-three
Hedy hid in an upstairs closet as she’d been told to do.
The thing growing inside of her—the thing fertilized by the power of the man she’d killed—had finally had enough time to shape itself, to speak again.
It called itself Hazel. Hedy had carried a small piece of Hazel inside of her for years, but not enough to hear her voice, until the dead man’s final gift. One more piece of Hazel, big enough to give her presence, power.
She showed Hedy the truth—a truth Phoenix had been hiding from her.
The shadows clouding Hedy’s memories were lifted. She remembered all those lost years she’d spent in captivity, dying over and over again.
She’d thought Phoenix had saved her, but that wasn’t the truth. Phoenix had found her the night Mom died, gathered Hedy up and taken her away. She’d locked her in a cell and brought to her a man named Sebastian Reznik.
On Phoenix’s orders, Sebastian had tortured her to death. She’d died screaming in pain, begging for help.
Phoenix had stood by, watching her die, her beautiful face impassive, cold.
Over and over again this had happened. Sometimes they asked her questions, which she answered without hesitation, praying that she’d given them what they wanted so they’d let her go.
But they didn’t.
Every day she woke up, alive and whole again. Even her tortured throat was fine, as if she hadn’t died screaming only hours ago.
Phoenix would come, Sebastian right on her heels. He’d go to work on her again, hurting her, slicing or stabbing or punching. Choking her, ripping her limbs apart. The torture changed, but the outcome was always the same.
Hedy died screaming in pain, begging for this to be the last time.
Then one day, Phoenix came alone. She walked into Hedy’s cell and told her to forget that they’d ever met. And just like that, Hedy had.
Phoenix set her free that day, pretending as if she hadn’t been the one to cage her, to have her tortured and killed countless times. She pretended that they were friends, that Phoenix had rescued her, cared for her and wanted her to be happy. She told Hedy she had a purpose. A destiny.
Hedy had believed the lie. She’d fallen for everything Phoenix had said, devoting her life to the woman in a way she hadn’t done since Mom died.
Hazel had opened Hedy’s eyes to the truth, and for that, she owed the woman everything.
Hedy didn’t know if Phoenix had predicted her memories would return when she’d given her the gift of that man’s life, but the new, brilliant intelligence now inside of Hedy told her that it didn’t matter.
Phoenix was no longer giving Hedy orders. That was now the job of someone else. Someone new. Someone far scarier than Phoenix could ever hope to be.
Hazel said in a crone’s voice, I know what you want, what you need. Everything you seek shall be yours. Follow me and I will lead you to what you want most.
“What do I want?” Hedy had asked only hours ago when the voice had surfaced.
You want Harmony, the crone said.
“What do I want her for?” Hedy asked, because she was no longer sure. At one time, she wanted her sister for comfort, for company. She’d wanted Harmony—Echo—to save her from the endless string of death she endured. And then, later, when Echo never came, Hedy’s desires began to change. She didn’t want Echo. She wanted revenge.
Rather than answer in words, the crone showed her something.
It could have been a memory, but wasn’t. Not quite. It was her and Echo playing with a puppy, laughing and running across green grass under a shining sun. They collapsed into a pile on a colorful quilt. The puppy jumped and licked at their faces. She and Echo giggled. Then, as the laughter died down, they simply lay side-by-side, staring up at the flickering canopy of leaves overhead. Echo put her sweaty hand in Hedy’s, and they stayed there, breathing in the fresh air.
They were happy. Free of fear and worry. They were together and they were filled with joy.
Hedy’s stomach tightened. Something in her chest seized. She couldn’t breathe in the face of so much raw, visceral want.
Yes. That was what she wanted. Happiness. Safety.
Peace.
There was no blood, no blades, no fear. No voices in her head.
Hazel said, We are not all bad. Some of us want you to know the truth, to be happy, to be at peace. To sleep.
Hedy remembered what it was like to sleep in peace, back when Mom was alive. She remembered waking rested, refreshed. She remembered greeting each new day with hope and excitement.
Today she had woken to blood, believing that Phoenix loved her.
No more, the voice crooned. Listen to me and all the blood and pain will be behind you. You and your sister will be together, forever.
It sounded too good to be true, but what if the woman was right? What if this time, things were different?
The woman had been right so far. She’d said that a man would be here in this old house, and that he would see her and not see her at the same time.
That was the only way to describe the blank, empty look the man had given her when she’d walked in. His eyes had focused on her, but he acted like she was merely a pane of glass to stare through. He didn’t react, he didn’t try to stop her.
He simply stood there while Hedy went upstairs and found a place to hide.
How could Hazel have known that would happen?
Harmony will be back soon. It is almost time.
“For what?” Hedy asked.
I will show you. Tonight, we will become one. Forever.
***
From his hiding place inside a thick growth of brush, Bernard watched Hedy walk into the old farmhouse like she’d been invited.
She’d followed him here, to this isolated place where Echo waited for him. He didn’t know how Hedy had managed to stay on his tail, but even her changing vehicles hadn’t fooled him. He’d known she was back there the whole time.
The question wasn’t what did she want, but rather how was she going to get it? They both wanted the shards Echo carried—the ones that should have been his years ago when he’d killed her family. But Hedy wasn’t going about getting those shards the way a sane person would.
Then again, the chick was batshit crazy, walking in there without even hesitating, her clothes covered in dried blood.
He could feel that Echo was nearby. That guard dog she kept chained to her side had come with her. His Mustang was parked out front. There were two paths through the tall weeds covering the front lawn, leading right to the door. If he was inside, then Hedy was probably already dead.
Bernard shrugged. It didn’t matter. The more shards Echo and her dog collected, the more he would get when his rats took them down.
He summoned three of his pets from the back of his van. They scampered through the brush to report for duty. Their whiskered faces gave him little rat grins, like they were glad to be chosen, glad to be of service.
Maybe they were. Rats were loyal like that.
He kissed them each on the nose, then moved away from the farmhouse before he summoned his power. It was going to take some time and great effort to create an army of three so soon after the last batch, but that’s what he was going to need if he was going to take what was rightfully his. It was also going to make more than a little noise. He didn’t want anyone inside to hear his rats’ screams and realize he was coming for them. He had to be smart, careful. Phoenix was no longer on his side. He was all on his own.
Bernard could hardly wait.
After tonight, the shards that Phoenix had promised him years ago would finally be his. Along with a few extra.
He was considering it interest on payment due.
***
Eliana had managed to get to the rundown apartment in time to save the big man’s life.
As always, the sight of her took Garrick’s breath away. He didn’t know how he could love her like he did and not let some of it out in
words.
And yet those three words had the power to ruin everything. Especially now, when she needed to concentrate. The work she had ahead of her was going to be grueling.
She wanted to heal Garrick’s eye first, but he refused. He knew what the job of saving the man’s life would cost her. He didn’t think she had it in her to take care of his eye as well as repairing the damage the glass had done to the big man’s neck. He wasn’t even sure his eye could be saved. One glance in the mirror had warned him of that likelihood.
He didn’t think about it. Not now. Later, when everyone was safely back at Asgard, then he would let himself dwell on what he’d lost. Not a moment sooner.
Her white-blond hair was pulled back in a ponytail, showing the perfectly sculpted lines of her face. Her skin seemed to glow, even though there were circles of fatigue under her eyes. Her tall, lithe body was wrapped in soft denim and cotton from ankles to wrists, but he could see that she’d lost weight recently—too much.
She needed a vacation. Maybe he’d take her on one himself, whisking her away somewhere tropical with no cell phones or Internet access.
As soon as the idea formed, it died. He knew better than to think he could ever leave the people who counted on him alone to deal with the threat the Vires posed.
They sedated the patient so he couldn’t fight once he was healed, then Eliana knelt over him to heal him with the magic running through her veins.
Garrick held a clean cloth tight around her throat to staunch the bleeding before it began. Holt slowly pulled out the glass while Eliana healed the wound closed in their enemy’s neck.
As she took on that wound, she began to bleed. Thick, pulsing rivulets of blood soaked the cloth. Garrick tried not to panic and concentrated on keeping the pressure firm enough to keep her blood in her body, while not squeezing so hard to make her pass out.
That would have been a very bad thing.
The job was done in moments, but felt like it had gone on for hours. She fell limp against his chest, breathing hard as if she’d just run a mile uphill.
Every time he witnessed this selfless act of hers, he promised himself that he’d never let her do it again. And yet, he knew he would. This was her gift, her curse. Without her, they would have lost dozens of friends and allies.
