by G. P. Ching
“You’re almost there,” Ghost called from below. “One more like that, Dane.”
With one more leap, Dane found her. Luck was on their side. The three-foot projection had barely been enough to catch her body, and one leg and arm dangled precariously over the edge. He clamped down and swung in to the ledge, then walked over to her, tying off his rope so he could use both hands.
“She hit her head,” Dane called. He lifted her into his arms. The bleeding came from a gash on her head. So much blood. Too much. Her rope dangled next to her body.
“Ghost, I’ve never done this with two people before. How far are we from the bottom?”
“Only about fifty feet.”
“Okay. I’m going to wing it.” He unhooked her from her rope and instead locked her on to his harness. He wasn’t sure how this would work since his hands and feet had to be free to work the rope. With some effort, he tossed her arms around his neck and wrapped both legs around her abdomen. He braced himself on the ledge with one foot and leaned back until he was perpendicular to the ledge and her dead weight was leaning on top of him.
“Here goes nothing,” he said to himself. Dane pushed off. Bonnie’s weight was more than he was used to, and he dropped quickly. He swung back into the wall but couldn’t keep himself straight. Gripping Bonnie with both legs, he braked hard and took the impact, slamming into the rocky wall, first with his shoulder and then with his lower leg.
He grunted from the pain.
“You’re really close. One more like that and I can reach you,” Ghost said.
“Okay. I can do this.” Only, he was dangling precariously by a damaged arm locked behind his back. Awkwardly, he dropped his legs from gripping Bonnie, steadying her with the arm that wasn’t behind his back holding them in place. Then, he wrapped the free end of the rope around his lower leg and used the bottom of his other foot to sandwich the end between the soles of his shoes. Instead of pushing off the wall, he straightened his arm and allowed his feet to do the braking, straight down. The rope burned where it tightened around his calf, and his shoulder bumped painfully down the jagged stone. Somehow Ghost’s lamp appeared before him, and strong arms gripped his harness when his feet hit the ground.
“We’re all okay,” Ghost called to Samantha and Ethan. “Come on down!”
Dane found his footing, and helped Ghost gather Bonnie into his arms, unhooking her from his harness.
“Are you okay?” Ghost whispered.
“Yeah, I think so,” Dane said.
Above them, whispering and then the clattering of equipment marked Samantha and Ethan’s descent. “One, two, three,” Samantha called.
Ethan screamed.
“Are you guys okay?” Dane called.
A laugh echoed through the cavern. “Yeah, we’re okay,” Samantha said. “But Ethan screams like a girl.”
A few seconds later she landed on the cave floor, followed by Ethan. He scowled at her. “Hey, it’s only funny until the portal is something you’re afraid of, half-pint.”
Samantha unhooked herself and raced to her sister’s side. “I thought you said she was okay?” She stared accusingly at Ghost.
“She will be. Let’s get out of here.” He continued down the path.
Now that Dane had the chance to look, he could see a faint light beyond the next turn in the cave. He unhooked himself from the rope and followed Ghost. They all shed their equipment and emerged in the same farmhouse they’d come from, next to a seriously concerned Jacob.
“Holy shit, what happened?” Jacob pulled his phone from his back pocket, thumbs flying across the screen.
“Long story,” Dane said.
“Malini’s on her way. She’ll heal you,” Jacob promised.
“Heal me? No, it’s Bonnie who’s hurt,” Dane said. That’s when he glanced down at himself and saw the blood. His head swam, and he sank to the floor near the wall. Ethan was by his side in a heartbeat.
Ghost unloaded Bonnie on the bed, Samantha swooping in to press a folded t-shirt she’d retrieved from her pack to her sister’s head wound.
Hastily, Jacob returned the geode to the velvet bag. “Long story or not, somebody better start talking.”
Chapter 18
Revelation
Pain. Throbbing, heated pain. Dane clutched his lower leg.
“What’s going on?” Ethan asked.
“My leg.”
Blood had soaked through his jeans and was gradually invading new territory. Ethan crouched down and slowly folded Dane’s pant leg up off the wound. The cloth clung to his skin, and he hissed through his teeth from the pain of the friction burn.
“Crap, Dane. That rope did a number on your shin. I’m surprised you could help Bonnie like this. What were you thinking?”
A heady presence filled the room, causing Dane to look up to where Malini hovered in the doorway, the afternoon light filling the space around her body so she appeared to glow. “Not to worry, Soulkeeper.” She stressed the last word. “I’ll fix you right up as soon as I finish with Bonnie. Her injuries are more serious.” She moved to Bonnie’s side.
The explosive crack of an enchanted staff signaled Grace’s arrival, her shoulders laden with everyone’s bags. She moved into action, dumping her cargo and fishing out a clean towel from the duffel bag full of weapons. She handed it to Ethan to press on Dane’s wound, before joining Ghost and Samantha at Bonnie’s side. The twin was deathly pale, and Dane said a quick prayer that she would be okay.
“Soulkeeper?” Jacob muttered when the room quieted. “Will someone tell me what’s going on?”
With Malini busy healing Bonnie, Grace did the honors. She started by explaining what happened, Dane’s newfound abilities and Cheveyo’s presence among them. She tried her best to relay the incredible story in a somewhat believable way. By the time she got to Auriel’s demands of Cheveyo, Jacob was nodding his head with parted lips.
Malini frowned as the details came out and not just because her arm was covered in painful blisters and blackened to the shoulder.
“Auriel wanted to use Cheveyo to kill all of us and capture me? What does Lucifer want with me?” Malini’s voice came across high pitched and innocuous, a much younger version of herself than Dane had grown accustomed to these last months .
“You’re the Healer,” Grace stated as if the answer was obvious.
“But why wouldn’t he want to kill me too, Grace? It’s true I can’t die naturally until a new Healer is born, but I could be decapitated or dismembered. Why doesn’t he want to destroy me?”
Jacob left the room briefly and returned with a jelly jar full of water from the kitchen. Taking her burnt hand in his, he willed the liquid over her damaged skin and then back into the jar. “You know the answer to that. You just don’t want to admit it,” he whispered to her as her skin pinked beneath his care.
She closed her eyes and shook her head. “Just say it, Jacob. I can’t accept it unless I hear it out loud.”
Jacob nodded. “If he keeps you a prisoner in Hell, you can’t teach or lead the Soulkeepers, including any Healer that might eventually be called to replace you. He’d never let you die, so he’d have the added pleasure of torturing you for eternity.”
“Right.”
Bonnie groaned and fluttered her eyes. Together, Jesse and Samantha helped her sit up. “What’s going on?” she whispered. Grace leaned in to explain what had happened.
Malini walked over to Dane and squatted near his feet, wrapping her hands around his bloody shin. The bleeding stopped, the deep welts filled themselves in, and the purple bruising around the edges of his wound gradually faded. When his leg had healed, she moved to his shoulder. In exchange, Malini’s skin blistered and blackened, her grimace telling him all he needed to know. She could heal, but it was painful. Healing came at a steep price. Thank goodness for Jacob, who used his power to flush her wounds with the water she needed to heal.
“Thank you,” Dane said.
She nodded and gave him a small s
mile.
“I think there’s another reason Lucifer wants you,” Dane sputtered. He wasn’t sure if it was his place to say anything, but a thought had been fighting for the surface since Jacob’s revelation.
Everyone turned to stare at him. He cleared his throat. “When I was in Hell, in Lucifer’s prison, it was obvious that what Lucifer wanted more than anything was control. I think he wants you as a bargaining chip.”
“Bargaining chip for what?” Ethan asked.
“Easy access to Earth. An end to his exile below ground.” Dane glanced between Malini and Grace.
“Did Cheveyo tell you that?” Grace asked softly.
“No. Auriel posed as a Hopi spirit and told him we were evil. He never knew the truth.”
Malini pulled her hair back into a ponytail and tied it with an elastic from around her wrist. Her face hardened, and her amber eyes grew dark with anger. In that moment, Malini returned to the person he knew she was, a warrior, a leader and, as her shoulders pulled back and she stood taller, a force to be reckoned with. Dane enjoyed watching her fire ignite. The Healer was pissed off.
“It makes sense.” She began pacing the room. “Lucifer thought he’d send Cheveyo to slaughter all of the existing Soulkeepers and imprison me. I can’t die until a new Healer releases me. With me in his grasp, I won’t be able to train or lead any new Soulkeepers, including any Healer that might replace me. With no one to thwart him, he’ll send a contingent of Watchers to influence the most powerful government and corporate leaders. He’ll gain control faster than I or any new Soulkeepers can respond.”
Dane was confused until Jacob chimed in an explanation. “It’s in the water. We found a bottling company in Chicago that’s been supplying corporate and government buildings with water tainted with elixir. The most powerful people in the world are already influenced. He just needs to take us out of the equation to move in for the kill. Watchers are cowards. As long as we’re around, none of them want to risk staying topside too long.”
Malini rubbed her hands together and continued. “Obviously, Senator Bakewell’s bill would allow Lucifer to use the corporations to employ slave labor. Food for the next wave of Watchers. The world will keep spinning, but it will be Lucifer turning the crank.”
“God will never allow it,” Grace said. “The fallen haven’t been allowed topside since the flood.”
A deep sigh passed over Malini’s lips. “Exactly, if the terms remained the same. But as Dane pointed out, Lucifer will use me as a bargaining chip, offering me in exchange for new terms. If God agrees, everything could change. God follows the rules but Lucifer doesn’t. The Lord of Lies wanted his Trojan horse to reset the scales in his favor. He’s no longer satisfied with Hell. He’s making his move.”
Stunned, Dane pushed himself to his feet. “Well, seems like Fate wasn’t on Lucifer’s side. Cheveyo’s not in control. I am.”
Grace wrung her hands and moved closer to her daughters. “You can’t put Auriel off. In two weeks, she’s going to come for you. She’ll want proof you’ve killed the others, and she’ll expect you to have Malini.”
“We need a plan.” Jacob rested his hands on his hips. “We can try to take Auriel out, but that doesn’t solve the problem, just delays it. Lucifer will know about Dane.”
“If what you say is true, and the most powerful people in the world are vulnerable, we are one Watcher away from disaster,” Grace added.
“We have three things going for us,” Malini said. “Lucifer doesn’t know that Dane is in control of Cheveyo, we know exactly when and where Auriel will be next, and we have two weeks to come up with a way to use the first two to our advantage.”
“There’s one more thing you should know.” All eyes fell on Dane. He hesitated for a second, wondering if he should share what Cheveyo told him.
“What?” Malini asked.
“It’s very possible that Cheveyo is killing me. The last boy he possessed, Jaden, died from this. A human body isn’t supposed to hold two souls.”
Ethan, who had been lurking in the corner of the room listening, suddenly became interested in the conversation again. “How long had Cheveyo possessed the kid before he died?
“Just about two weeks.”
* * * * *
The ride back to town was conspicuously void of conversation. Ethan drove mechanically, vacant eyes fixated on the country road as Florence and the Machine rocked out of the stereo. Every time the truck hit a bump, one of the speakers would short out. Neither of them mentioned the glitch. Dane had other things on his mind. Like if the silence was due to something he’d said? Or what happened in the cavern? Or perhaps something he didn’t say? The last seemed the most likely.
At the back of his mind, Dane checked the steel door that blocked Cheveyo’s presence. What he had to say was for Ethan’s ears only and hard enough without an audience. “I never fully answered you,” Dane began, “about why telling my dad the truth about you was so important to me.”
With a startled jerk, Ethan glanced his way and then back at the road, straightening in the torn leather bench seat. “Yeah?”
Mustering his courage, Dane dug down deep, trying to be as honest as possible about what he was going through. He needed to do this, for the sake of their friendship.
“I think, sometimes, people are born a certain way and just know who they are. And other people, well, they’re confused about things. Maybe they’ve been raised a certain way and can’t be sure about their feelings because there’s too much at stake to be wrong.”
“What’s at stake?”
“Relationships usually. Important relationships.”
“Are we talking about a nameless nomadic tribe here or someone, say, in the cab of this truck?”
Dane took a deep breath. His cheeks burned, and he couldn’t look at Ethan without feeling that undeniable pulling sensation. So, he chose to look out the window.
“Look,” Dane said toward the glass, “you and I are really good friends. You’re my best friend, really. I don’t want to do anything to mess that up.”
He glanced back to see Ethan nodding his head, so he continued. “It’s important to me that other people give you the respect you deserve, even if it means it makes things harder for me.”
“Thank you,” Ethan said.
The song on the radio changed, and Dane reached forward to turn the volume down. Up ahead, he recognized the outskirts of Paris. Since he wasn’t due home until the next day, he’d be staying in Eden with the rest of the Soulkeepers, which meant sorting this out with Ethan was critical.
“Everything you’ve said makes a lot of sense,” Ethan said. “It’s totally understandable.”
Dane let out a relieved breath. “Thanks.”
“But you need to demand the same respect for yourself that you expect people to give me. That means being true to yourself. I’m gay, and I like who I am. Whatever you tell your family and friends about me, I’m fine with it. I don’t need their acceptance.”
“Good.”
“But I’ve sensed for a while now you’re questioning.”
“Questioning?”
“Like, maybe, not sure how to label yourself,” Ethan said carefully.
“Yeah.” Dane’s heart was making a run for it, pounding against his breastbone.
“It’s okay. There’s no rush. Live your life and figure it out. Or don’t. In my opinion, there are too many labels in this world anyway. Like I said, I’m going to be your friend no matter what.” Ethan’s dark eyes were unguarded, an open window into his soul.
Dane nodded, unable to speak around the lump in his throat. Was he worthy of the kind of unconditional acceptance Ethan was offering?
Too soon, the truck pulled into the service entrance at Laudner’s Flowers and Gifts. Ethan parked, but stared straight out the windshield like he was still driving. Gathering his backpack, Dane popped open the door, an action that took more effort than he expected due to the rust on the big blue truck.
Ethan
cleared his throat. “One more thing, Dane.”
“Yeah.”
The full weight of Ethan’s dark stare hit him like a blast of heat. “If you do figure it out, promise me I’ll be the first to know.”
Dane swallowed hard. “I promise.”
Chapter 19
Stress Management
Dane exited the cab of the truck and slammed the door against the flood of emotions bubbling to the surface. A resounding crack echoed through the alley, and the distraction of Jacob and Malini’s arrival brought him some relief. He approached them, backpack slung carelessly over his shoulder, and tried to bury the conversation with Ethan. Luckily, the bustle of activity behind Laudner’s shop didn’t allow for much introspection.
Ghost arrived with the twins driving Lillian’s new Volkswagen Beetle, something she’d bought with her salary as the new store manager at Laudner’s. Of course, it was a convenient position for a warrior responsible for guarding the gate to Eden, which just happened to be under the floor of the backroom. Lillian met them at the service entrance.
“Dane!” She pulled him into a one-armed hug, patting his back on the recoil. “I heard congratulations are in order. I look forward to taking our training sessions to the next level.” If the grin she gave him were any indication, she couldn’t wait to test Dane’s new Soulkeeper abilities, and she wouldn’t be gentle. A work out with Lillian hurt a little, Soulkeeper or not.
Ethan growled from behind him. “My God, give him a few days to settle into the idea. He’s been through a lot. Barely out of transition.”
Laughing, Lillian rolled her eyes. “Oh, please. I haven’t killed anyone yet, Ethan. Relax.”
“Are we cleared for takeoff?” Jacob asked.
“Yes. John and Carolyn are having dinner at Andrew’s Steakhouse and the store is empty.” She led them through the service entrance and down the winding staircase to the cavern below.
The old wooden boat reminded Dane of a story he read about Charon, the figure in Greek mythology who ushered the newly dead across the river Styx. Age aside, the architecture seemed held together by magic or faith alone. Warwick Laudner created this portal hundreds of years ago. Now that he was dead, how long would the boat last? Dane took a seat at the stern. The wood creaked under his weight. Great. Ethan slid in next to him on the bench, seemingly unconcerned with the way the wood protested. The twins and Ghost sat near the bow, and Jacob and Malini took their usual spots on either side of the mast.
