I bolted.
I ran all the way back to Nirvana and bowled through Sully’s villa not caring that I woke Louise on her cot by the deck.
I didn’t stop until I slammed my hands on either side of Sully’s head and pressed my fists into his pillow. Rage poured through me. Injustice and fatigue and thwarted tangled love.
With my lips hovering over his, I growled, “Make the choice, Sully. Make the damn choice and return to me.”
His eyes didn’t open.
My anger boomeranged into me, making me bleed. “Please, Sully. Come back to me. I’m begging you.”
My plea fell into a void.
Tumbling like a copper penny to plink into an empty well.
A spent wish that would never come true.
I fell to my knees and cried.
* * * * *
Sully didn’t wake.
Not that night or the next night or the week after.
By week four of his excruciating silence, I couldn’t take it anymore.
I needed off the island. I needed some space to scream or sob. I needed to be free from the twitchy hope that he might wake up followed by the dismal darkness when he didn’t.
As the sun broke through the rainclouds that’d drenched the island in a thunderstorm last night, I summoned Pika to stop harassing the sparrows on the bird table outside Sully’s bedroom and plucked Skittles from her place on my pillow.
Today, two things were going to happen.
One, my special friend would fly again, and two, I was leaving this mausoleum and embracing life.
Carrying Skittles into the bathroom, I glanced at Nirvana as it spilled its crystal droplets into the clear pool. My skin often craved the coolness of its waters, but I hadn’t had a swim. Yet another thing I couldn’t do because I’d done it with Sully, and I didn’t want to colour over our memories together with ones only of me.
“Sit still,” I commanded as I turned on the vanity lights and cast Skittles in illumination. Her green feathers fluffed, and her apricot and black head cocked. But she didn’t move as I carefully grabbed a pair of sharp scissors for personal grooming and concentrated on snipping away her splint.
Dr Campbell told me her wing should be healed two days ago when I visited Jess on my daily rounds. I’d been afraid to remove the brace in case he was wrong, but I couldn’t deny her flight anymore.
The second the splint fell away, she chirped and hopped to the sink. Pika shot into the bathroom, landing beside her and skidding from his speed. He nipped at her, his eyes cheeky and goading her to chase. He took off again, doing his best to instigate a game of cat and mouse.
Skittles watched him flap around like a green tornado before looking at me and squeaking.
“It’s okay. Give it a try.”
For a moment, I thought she would. I wanted her to soar into the sky and swoop around the island because that would mean another invalid of Drake’s evil had healed. Cal was better, Jess was better, everyone was better apart from Sully.
But Skittles hopped to my hand and scrambled her way up my arm using her talons and beak.
I sighed as she settled into her place on my shoulder and chattered nonsense into my ear.
“Not today, huh?”
She squeaked again, and I balled my hands.
The anger I felt toward Sully hadn’t left. The fear I felt had become a mutant, polluting my entire body with a crawling, cloying madness.
I didn’t want to be angry.
This wasn’t his fault.
None of this was his fault.
But I couldn’t stop the taunting voice inside my mind.
He didn’t choose you.
He’s not going to wake up.
He’s gone.
My rage turned into a dagger.
I was either going to destroy this bathroom or destroy myself.
Dropping the scissors, I backed away from the mirror showing an unhinged, heartbroken girl with wild eyes.
I need to go.
I need to breathe...just for a little while.
* * * * *
Skittles sat on the throttle of Singa Laut.
I’d told Cal I was borrowing Sully’s speedboat, Sea Lion, and he’d followed me to the wharf to show me how to operate the craft. After his lesson and stern warnings not to be too long or go too far, I glowered at him until he’d left.
I was hanging on by a thread, and company would only cut me loose and not in a good way.
I was so black inside I didn’t even appreciate the colossal differences in my life since arriving in Goddess Isles. Previously, this had been my prison cell. Now, I’d inherited every parrot and property. I was free to go where I wanted. Free to use Sully’s toys and call them my own.
However, I’d gladly go back to being imprisoned if it meant Sully would open his damn eyes.
Stop thinking.
Just go.
Pika flew beside me as I added speed and learned how to navigate a rudder instead of a car. Not that I’d driven in a long time, what with travelling and then kidnapping, but it was nice to be in control of something, even if I couldn’t be in control of Sully’s decision to wake up.
It took longer to cut across the turquoise sea and skim over peach coral reefs than when Sully had captained us, but I found some resemblance of peace.
Another banded sea snake slithered through the wake. A pod of dolphins out to sea sprayed water, transforming droplets into blinking rainbows. Jewelled fish darted beneath the hull, and the sun massaged my tense shoulders with thermal fingers.
This was still utopia...even if the devil in its midst was dying.
Damn you, Sully.
I love you dammit! You can’t die!
The urge to turn the boat around and hammer on his chest until he woke up was crippling.
Breathe, Ellie.
Just...breathe.
Pika did an air roll, and Skittles twittered in a sweet song. They kept me grounded. They helped commandeer my worry, and I did my best to appreciate everything I had. There was so much to be grateful for. So much to live for.
I forced myself to inhale properly and not the ragged sips of the past few weeks. I drank in air and leaned my head back, letting the sun colour me and soothe some of my heartaches.
Can you feel me, Sully?
I’m still here.
I’ll wait for however long you need.
Pika landed beside Skittles just as I pulled into the small bay of Lebah.
I tied the boat like Cal showed me, adding an extra knot to be sure it stayed secured, then stepped onto Sully’s garden grove.
The atmosphere was different here.
His main island no longer held prisoners or greedy guests and had turned into a reflective, peaceful paradise, but this island...it burst at the seams with life.
Determination from freshly planted seeds to break through the soil. Aspiration from seedlings to sweep as high as they could toward the sky. And the bounty of fruits and vegetables as they transformed sunlight into nutrition that kept so many things breathing.
This was what I needed.
To see life in progress.
To witness the stubbornness of existence and inhale fresh oxygen from their leaves.
I strolled through the orchards and helped myself to sun-warmed berries. I collapsed beneath a hazelnut tree and watched Pika attack a nut while Skittles practiced flapping her newly knitted wing.
I stayed on Lebah until the enraged helplessness loosened its net of despair and dismay around my heart, just a little.
Skittles took her first flight from the almond grove to the berry greenhouse, and I once again focused on being grateful instead of fixating on what I’d lost.
Sully...
Please, I need you.
I’m not ready to say goodbye.
Drawing my knees to my chin, I buried my face into my hands and wept.
At least, these tears were cathartic. I was able to purge instead of suffocating beneath torment.
I cried for Sully and for me.
I cried until a gentle hand touched my shoulder and ripped my head up.
Self-consciousness made me swipe at my tears, and propriety made me stand in a rush. My navy dress fluttered around me as I made eye contact with someone I never expected. “You.”
“You not dead.” The girl who’d been on the boat with her grandfather and brother, who’d brought me back at Drake’s command, eyed me in the dying sunlight. Her pinched disapproval had faded, and an openness in her dark eyes hinted she felt pity for my tears.
Ignoring her curiousness of my state of existence, I rubbed dirt from my dress and glanced around the orchard. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to be in the—”
“Is fine. You not in the way. No worry.”
I let my shoulders drop and wiped away my final tear. “Are you harvesting?”
“Harvest all time. Crop rotation mean always ready.” She eyed me, her body language hinting that she didn’t know how to address our past and preferred to just focus on the now.
There was history between us, but it seemed as if we both wished to forget how we first met. I wanted to ask how her grandmother was. Did she have enough for the medicine she needed? But instead of dredging up painful things, I merely asked something simple. “Do you enjoy working here?”
“Yes.” She smoothed her olive uniform with its logo of a banana leaf over the breast pocket with the initials SSG. “It...eh, English word? Relax.”
I nodded, glancing at the edible greenery all around us. The splashes of colour where fruits hung and the glossiness of vegetables waiting to be collected. “It is relaxing, I agree.”
“Why alone?” She smiled as Pika and Skittles darted over her head and descended onto my shoulders. “I change my question. Why you not with him? My boss?”
Pika chattered and chirped, and Skittles puffed from exertion, her endurance weakened from healing. I flinched and looked away. I’d come here to escape pain, and instead, I’d run straight into another version of it. “He’s not well.”
“No?” Her forehead furrowed. “He should eat more fruits. Make better.”
I smiled sadly. “He’s not capable of eating much at the moment.”
“Need make him eat.” She put her hands on her hips, reminding me of the fierce girl who’d told me I would die if I jumped overboard and fell into Drake’s hands.
I hadn’t died, but Sully...
Please, Sully!
Make the choice to stay.
Moving away, the girl plucked a blackberry off a vine that’d crept across the ground in the nut orchard. “Feed him this. Big vitamin. Good for body.” She placed the oozing berry into my palm. Pika promptly fluttered down and smeared the black sweetness all over his beak. Skittles joined him, squabbling over the dessert.
I sighed with a worn-out smile. “He can’t eat.”
“Then drink?” She mimicked squishing the berry and making wine. “Liquid many vitamin.”
“He can’t swallow. He—”
I froze as ideas unravelled.
Plans concocted.
Fate once again intervened.
Senses.
Flavours.
Reasons to live and indulge.
I’d forgotten the most important thing.
The rules of Sully’s Euphoria were based on changing perception with sensory deception. Sound, taste, smell, touch, and sight.
Sully was locked in a Euphoria of his mind’s making. It’d blocked him from sensation. It’d muted and deafened his world.
But what if I could break that?
What if I could slip past the deadening of his mind and give him a final taste of what he was giving up?
He couldn’t drink or eat or move.
But...there were ways.
There has to be.
I have to try.
My fist closed around the sticky berry.
Pika and Skittles took wing with a squawk.
And I ran.
I didn’t say thank you.
I didn’t pick holes in my flimsy plan.
I ran and sailed and flew back to Sully’s side.
But on my way, I made a detour to the kitchens.
I grabbed blenders and berries, ice and tropical delights.
I was a witch making a potion.
A witch with one last trick to try.
Chapter Thirty-Three
SOMETHING WRENCHED ME FROM the infernal darkness.
I thrashed toward the grey, desperate for light after so much black.
I’d made the choice.
I’d vowed to never make the same mistakes and find some way to atone.
I’d chosen to live.
To return to her.
To fight for happiness even if I might never earn such a thing.
But instead of granting me a second chance, something had grabbed my ankles and sucked me deeper. An entity, an evilness—something monstrous was inside this blackness with me, and it’d dragged me down, down, down until I’d been shackled inside a dungeon where no light, sound, or air could reach.
That cruel presence was still here, slinking in the shadows, gliding through my mind, but there was something else.
Something refreshing as rain and as life-giving as the sun.
Something that was the opposite of the evil within me and it smashed the shackles and hoisted me higher into consciousness.
It made me aware.
More aware and alive than I had been in weeks.
Eleanor!
I fought harder. I swam in muck and molasses. I kicked and crawled.
I opened my mouth and bellowed.
Eleanor!
Could she hear me?
Could she feel me fighting?
Could she see how much I wished to keep her?
I was trapped.
Trapped in this cranial cage with no fucking way out.
And I wanted out.
Fuck, I wanted out.
I wanted to make amends. To free those girls. To banish those guests.
I froze as sensation broke through the stifling silence of nothing.
Temperature.
I groaned.
I never thought I’d almost cry at the ability to differentiate between hot and cold. To know I had skin. To feel the body that hadn’t forsaken me. A body that I couldn’t manipulate or return to the helm, but a body that still fed me senses.
I gasped as it came again.
Coldness.
On my lips.
I groaned at the sheer delight.
Not just cold.
Ice.
Freezing snow upon my lips being pushed into the hot cavern of my mouth.
Stripped of every extremity and faculty, denied every pleasure receptor and passion within this vacuum of blankness, that single taste of sleet undid me.
I shivered with need.
I grew hard for a single sensitivity.
Hunger slammed into me with another sensation.
I had a stomach. I had muscles. I had an appetite that’d been denied for so fucking long.
The ice vanished on my tongue, melting into a non-distinguishable temperature.
I mourned it instantly.
I had nothing to break the monotony. Nothing to rip off my blindfold or pull out my gag or unplug my ears. I was empty without noise and sight and her. Empty and cornered, being pulled down into the blackness.
Things hissed and slithered. Nightmares rolled in. Numbness resettled over my awareness.
No!
Christ, no.
I wouldn’t survive if I slipped again.
That dungeon was my coffin. A coffin that would slam shut with a padlock that would never reopen. If I let the evil have me, I would never see Eleanor again, never talk to her, kiss her, look at her.
NO!
I went berserk.
I did my best.
I enlisted every weak skill and broken power to wake up.
Wake up.
WAKE UP!
Something
cackled in my mind. The blackness thickened. And I—
Ice on my lip.
Oh, thank God.
It interrupted the suction; it gave me vividness to cling to. A violent tear in the never-ending ether.
I crawled toward the lighter grey.
More ice melted on my tongue.
More.
Please, more.
It came again, this time the frost didn’t just coat my lips but dribbled down my chin.
I felt that.
I tracked the slow-moving trickle. I relished in the intensity—in the sheer magnitude of survival.
I want to survive.
I want to wake.
I searched every crevice that I’d already searched before. I scratched at the blackened corners. I reached for the endless ceiling.
I lost myself to fighting and almost missed the gift that switched grey into red, granting the first blaze of colour in so long.
Colour!
I blinked at the blinding pigment.
Violent crimson and bittersweet scarlet.
Sanguine and vermillion.
Words spilled from my mind that’d forgotten speech and intellect.
A colour wasn’t just a colour. Colour was what painted the world with dimension and depth. It was what gave life purpose and precision—the honour of being alive to witness such saturation of self.
I inhaled with lungs I couldn’t see and bathed in the colour of red.
It felt warmer than black.
It promised to keep me awake, all while another sensation thunderstruck my anesthetized world.
Taste.
Sweet.
Sharp and fresh and perfect.
Berries.
I closed my eyes and allowed the third gift to wash through me. To grant another tear in my paralysis, to slowly bring me more aware.
So long since I’d tasted.
Just like colour, flavour gave meaning to the world. It made eating more than perfunctory but pleasurable. Flavour was a goal, driving us to cultivate and experiment, to create recipes and source new ingredients.
Flavour was another rung on my ladder, allowing me to creep higher from the darkness. To cling to the scaffolding. To have something tangible when the claws of darkness wrapped around my ankle and tried to claim me again.
I’d been reduced to nothing but three things.
Fifth a Fury (Goddess Isles, #5) Page 23
