The Gathering

by K. E. Ganshert

  She goes still, a subtle crease forming between her eyebrows.

  I hold up her ball. “We had to grab this off the middle of the fairway.” My attention shifts upward, toward the sky, which continues to darken, as if the dream is alive. As if the dream knows. “When’s the last time you saw the sun? Or windows without bars? Think about it. Why would a clubhouse on a course this nice need bars on the windows?”

  “Sweetie?” The voice belongs to the same man who called to her earlier. “Did you find your ball?”

  At the sound of his voice, Cormack begins flailing again. Cap tightens his grip over her mouth and around her waist.

  I glance in the direction of the golf course. “Is that your husband?”

  She nods wildly.

  “Your husband is dead. He died of an aggressive form of testicular cancer sixteen years ago. It’s not possible for him to be golfing with you right now.”

  The faintest pulse of clarity flickers in her eyes.

  “We’re here to help you. We can’t do that unless you let us.”

  “Sweetheart?” Her fake husband’s voice draws nearer. “Where did you wander off to?”

  The wind stirs, rustling the tree branches.

  Cormack has gone very, very still. Slowly, Cap removes his hand. She stares at me, her chest rising and falling quickly. “If my husband is dead, then who is that?”

  “Nobody you can trust.”

  There’s another shout from the man. “Abigail, answer me now, please!”

  We try retreating further into the woods, but the brush grows taller, denser. Forming an impenetrable barrier of snarls and thorns.

  “What’s happening?” Cormack asks.

  “It knows we’re here.” I set my hands on her shoulders and squeeze until she looks me directly in the eye. “We don’t have much time. Listen carefully. Your body has been hijacked. You’re being held prisoner inside a dream.” I give her a rattle, like Link did when he awakened my grandmother and Clive from their drug-induced stupors.

  Surprisingly, she doesn’t object.

  “We are here to set you free. Your country needs you more than ever.” I give her another rattle. “When you wake up, trust nobody but Adam. He’s one of your bodyguards and he’s on our side.”

  The clouds press lower. The wind strengthens, making the trees groan and sway.

  All three golfers call the president’s name now.

  “Adam will get you to safety. He will explain everything.” I shake her again, gathering her attention. “Trust nobody but Adam. Do you understand?”

  “I-I think so.”

  It’s not good enough. I rattle her as hard as I can, the wind whipping our hair about our faces. It howls so loudly, I have to yell. “Only Adam!”

  “Only Adam,” she repeats.

  The ground begins to vibrate. Luka grabs my hand. I grab Cormack’s. The thickening trees push us out into the open, but Clive’s cloak holds steady. Dark mist swirls with the clouds, forming a funnel that stretches toward the ground. The hijacker is trying to kick us out.

  Luka grabs the trunk of a tree, his arm locked around my waist. With superhuman strength, he pulls me closer so I can grab on, too. I hold on for everything I’m worth. If I let go, I’ll wake up in my bed, Cormack will remain here, and our chance will be lost. If we don’t do this now, the king will be so heavily guarded there will be no hope of another rescue.

  Clive grapples to hold onto a nearby tree, but it rips up by the roots and hurtles toward us. Clive and his cloak disappear. He vanishes into thin air. Cormack screams. Luka throws a shield that deflects the tree like it’s nothing bigger than a twig. He curls his hand into a fist and pounds the grass. A blast of light ripples through the ground and shoots up into the tornado, blowing it apart in an explosion of darkness and light.

  The wind stops.

  The dream goes still.

  Cap, Lexi, Connal, Felix, Luka, and I stand out in the open, exposed. Cormack stands with us, her eyes round with shock. My muscles coil, preparing for attack. At any moment, the hijacker will appear. I’m sure of it. My heart pounds out the seconds. It thuds in my ears like a gigantic, amplified countdown—ten, nine, eight, seven, six …

  Felix turns, surveying the course. Lexi stands up a little straighter. Connal’s attention darts back and forth.

  My heart reaches two and a light appears. It grows out of nothing, taking shape until it’s as beautiful and stunning as I remember. It’s the being that sang to me after I destroyed Scarface. The same one that stroked my hair and lulled me to rest. It smiles at me approvingly. Proudly. “Well done. Your work is finished.”

  What?

  I look around, my body filling with hope. Is it really? Am I done fighting?

  “You have won. Victory is yours.”

  Lexi looks as transfixed as I am, but Luka’s hand tightens around mine. “Tess.”

  The being grows brighter, bigger. More magnificent. So beautiful I ache to touch. I want to step closer, but Luka won’t let me.

  “Tess,” he says again. His voice is far away, even though he stands right beside me. “We have to go. We have to move.”

  I close my eyes. I don’t want to listen. I don’t want his words to be true. I want this war to be over. I want this angel to be right. I’m so tired. And afraid. But something tugs at my bellybutton. The doorway.

  That’s right. We have to destroy the hijacker and pass through the doorway.

  As if sensing my thoughts, the ground turns into a thick mucus that swallows my feet. Panic coils as tightly as my muscles. The same panic I felt when I met with Scarface. The same panic I felt when Clive’s cloak wrapped around my legs. I let the sensation build in my hands until it’s impossible to hold and then I throw it out. A shield that sets captives free. A shield that chases the darkness away. Only this time, it chases away the beautiful angel in front of me.

  The mucus binding my feet lets go.

  I grab Cormack’s shoulders. “Remember what we said! Trust nobody but Adam!”

  The sky begins to crumble.

  I take off running, yelling for the others to follow. The ground quakes violently, pitching us up and down. It splinters open and swallows Felix whole. I sprint faster, urging everyone on toward Link, who stands at the doorway with Felicia and Bass. The dream is about to collapse. The doorway will shut. I scream for everyone to go, go go! Get through! I throw one final shield. It rips open what’s left of the dark sky and just before it all shatters into light, I grab Luka’s hand and we dive.

  Chapter Fifty-One

  The Prophecy Fulfilled

  The air crackles and pops, emitting heat like a furnace. Flames crawl up the drapes, inhaling the room’s oxygen, exhaling plumes of thick, black smoke that eddy and churn toward the ceiling, obscuring visibility.

  Cormack screams in bed.

  A door crashes open. Two secret service agents run inside, coughing and sputtering, covering their noses and mouths with the crooks of their elbows as the flames grow, feeding off the fresh bout of oxygen.

  “Adam!” Cormack shrieks. “Where’s Adam?”

  The taller one makes his way toward Cormack’s bed. “I’m here!”

  There’s a glint of metal as the agent in the doorway pulls his gun. Adam doesn’t see. He’s too busy getting to the president, who shouts his name, paralyzed in her bed. The agent lifts the weapon and aims it at Cormack.

  No.

  She will not be killed. Not now, when we’re so close. If any mission has to succeed, it’s this one. I run and dive at the man with the gun, my emotions so heightened I barely have to expend effort to focus them.

  We tumble to the ground.

  The gun fires.

  Adam spins around, sees the secret service agent sprawled on the ground, and without hesitating, he shoots. The crack of the gun makes my heart seize. Cormack screams louder. I scramble off the ground. The man’s glossy eyes stare at nothing. There’s a bullet wound in the center of his forehead, a wedding ring on his finger, a
nd the mark on his neck. He was hijacked. Innocent. And now he’s dead.

  Adam scoops Cormack into his arms and carries her toward the door. Luka and I run ahead of them, ready to clear a path and fight away the enemy, except there’s nothing but black smoke and fire. It curls up the walls as Adam hurries toward the exit, his face twisted with determination as he steps over bodies. All of them secret service agents. All of them dead or grievously injured. All of them with the same mark on their necks. Adam keeps going. He doesn’t see us. He can’t see us. But we are there, prepared to fight.

  A chandelier crashes to the ground, throwing glass shards everywhere. Adam hugs Cormack tighter to his chest. A flaming beam slams to the floor behind me, but in front of Adam. He dodges it and hurries through the foyer, out into the night, away from the inferno that has become the president’s home in Camp David.

  All of us pour onto the grounds, away from the popping and hissing and crackling. Luka stands beside me. Link, Cap, Connal, Lexi, Glenda, Sticks, Non, Claire, Rosie, Ellen are here. Others, too. Link pulled at least fifty through. Smoke billows into the star-spotted sky. Sirens sound in the distance.

  Cormack collapses on all fours, her body wracked with coughs, her nightgown covered in soot. She’s out, but she’s not safe. Not yet. An army of white-eyed men form a wall up ahead, blocking Cormack’s escape. And in front of them all—the angel of light from the dream we just left. From the dream I had after destroying Scarface. It’s impossibly large and bright and beautiful.

  Felicia bursts through the door, pulling Bass out with her. She skids to a stop on my left, her expression as fierce as Adam’s.

  It happens so fast, I don’t have time to react.

  The angel throws out one of its gargantuan arms. A ball of black flame hurtles toward me. Luka throws a shield. The black flame ricochets off the side and hits Felicia square in the chest. She makes a sound like she’s been sucker-punched in the gut and clutches the spot. Tentacles of black slowly spread down her arms, up her neck. Her blackening face freezes in wide-eyed shock and she crumples in the grass.

  I watch in horror, my mouth completely dry, waiting for her to disappear like Clive and Felix so she can wake up in her bed and comfort Henry. But she doesn’t disappear. The attack didn’t happen in Cormack’s dream. We already crossed through the doorway. Her unmoving form remains in the grass, as still as death.

  The angel laughs a spine-tingling, mirthless laugh that sucks every drop of heat from the air. The creature grows, morphing into a sinister something I’ve seen before—the horned beast I doodled on my folder back when I lived in Jude. Its mesmerizing beauty is replaced by a vile ugliness unlike anything I’ve ever seen.

  “Do you think you can beat me, Teresa Eckhart?” The beast holds up its hands and spins another ball of black flame between them. “Don’t be a fool. Forfeit now, and I’ll spare the ones you love before they end up as dead as your father. As dead as your mother. As dead as your brother.”

  No. It can’t be true. They can’t be dead. This monster is lying. It’s a liar like Scarface. “My mom and Pete are alive.”

  It lets loose another bone-chilling laugh and twirls the flame faster. “For how much longer? I’ll give you to the count of three to decide. One … two …”

  My ears pop. The air seems to shrink, pressing in around my skull.

  “Three.” The beast throws the ball of fire. Only it doesn’t zoom at me; it zooms at Link. I watch in horrific slow motion as his warm, amber eyes widen like Felicia’s.

  A scream tears up my throat.

  Light hurtles toward the black, but it doesn’t come from me. It comes from Luka, who’s protecting me. Always. Forever. By saving Link. His shield collides with the black fire right before it hits its mark and explodes, blasting Link off his feet, onto the ground where he lies beside Felicia.

  The beast commands its troops to charge.

  I let out a savage cry and with fire raging in my heart, I sprint headlong into battle, Luka right beside me, the others following behind. We collide in a mass of chaos. I twist and turn and spin—throwing knees and elbows, feet and fists—taking out ten, fifteen, twenty at a time, determined to get to the beast. To kill it like I killed Scarface.

  I race ahead of Luka, who throws his shield again and again—so powerful, it blasts the white-eyed men apart. Even so, there are too many. We are impossibly outnumbered. They keep coming at me, closing in until I’m completely swarmed. I want them to bind me so I can throw my shield. So I can chase this darkness away. But they don’t. It’s like they know what I’m capable of and how to avoid it.

  Luka sprints toward me, but they come at him, too. No matter how many shields he throws, he can’t get to me. We’re losing. It’s hopeless. All around, our side is brought down and bound—Jose, Rosie, Ellen, Bass, Sticks, Non, Claire, Connal—who thrashes in a desperate attempt to escape—and Lexi, who’s doing everything she can to get to him.

  The beast stirs up more fire and lightning and a fierce wind. Adam and Cormack lay flat on the ground, his body covering hers from flying debris.

  “Tess!” Luka’s eyes find mine, and this look crosses his face. It’s the same look Gabe wore before he died, when it was Luka we were fighting for.

  Don’t, I want to scream. Don’t give me your life!

  The enemy brings Lexi down.

  Cap, too.

  Luka lifts his arms.

  “No!” The word scrapes its way out, ragged and raw.

  But it’s too late. A blinding flash of light illuminates everything and hurtles toward me.

  Some people say a person’s life flashes before their eyes moments before death. I don’t know if I’m going to die, but snippets come. A reel of images that play in fast forward. It’s not just my life. And it’s not just things that have already happened. It’s a mixture of the past and the future. Felicia, dead in the grass. Henry, growing up without a mother. My father, murdered in a lonely prison cell just when he finally believed. Luka on my first day of school. Link and me, watching the birds and eating popcorn. My mother’s tight, trembling embrace when she found out Pete was going to live. Luka, carrying me out of the Edward Brooks Facility. Leela sitting on my bed, painting her toenails. Clive, saying he wants to give his children a world worth living in. Entire refugee communities, wiped out. Mass graves. Innocent lives. Gabe dead. Jillian murdered. The gun between my hands. My grandmother crumpling to the ground. And Luka’s life, hurtling toward me.

  I brace myself. I don’t have to accept it. It’s my choice. This is what I know. I can save Luka. I can keep him alive. He doesn’t have to die. I don’t have to lose him.

  Fear only has power when you let it make your choices.

  This I know, too. My grandmother’s blood might run through my veins, but that doesn’t mean I have to make her choices. With Luka’s eyes fastened on mine—filled with confidence and victory and all the love that’s left in the world—I open my arms wide and with a strength that doesn’t belong to me, I accept his sacrifice.

  I absorb it.

  I take it in.

  Luka’s life fills everything. Every atom. Every corner, every crevice of my soul, even the dark parts. It’s a thousand times more intense than Gabe’s. So hot and powerful I have to throw it out immediately. I heave it from my hands and it rushes forth in a sonic boom, consuming all traces of evil in its path, and it doesn’t stop. It keeps coming.

  My heart shatters into a million pieces as I fight. For my mom and my brother and Leela and Link and Cap. For my father and Jillian and Felicia and Gabe and Dr. Roth and all the innocent people who’ve been murdered in secret. I fight for the dead and I fight for the living. I fight for Luka. I will be everything he believes me to be. Brave and strong, a warrior who chooses light over dark, good over evil, no matter the cost. Even when it’s impossible. Even when what waits on the other side might kill me.

  I heave out what’s left of his transurgence. It chases down the horned beast and splits it wide open. A shaft of light ri
ses up out of its chest, into the clouds, stopping the wind. Stopping the lightning. There’s an atrocious, ear-splitting sound—like the screams of a million people writhing in agony. The beast shatters into jagged pieces, like my heart. They fly apart and fade away. And then it ends and all the darkness is gone.

  Flashing lights and sirens surround the property.

  Adam lifts President Cormack to her feet and rushes her to safety.

  I take several staggering steps toward Luka and drop to my knees by his still form.

  We won.

  Victory is ours.

  And my Keeper is dead.

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  To Die is to Live

  Firefighters pour out of firetrucks and start dousing the flames with large hoses, unaware that a battle just ended. Unaware that people are scattered about the grounds, shell-shocked over the sudden end. At first, everyone stands in a confused daze, looking around for something else to happen. When nothing does, they fall into relieved celebration. Lexi scrambles to her feet and throws herself into Connal’s arms. Sticks kisses his wife. Declan and Jose thump each other on the back. Ellen rubs the top of Rosie’s head, then draws her into a hug. Two women I don’t recognize approach Felicia’s lifeless form.

  I stay where I am, on my knees. Unable to move. Unable to breathe.

  Cap bends over Luka on one knee with his head bowed, like one honoring a fallen soldier.

  A tear tumbles down my cheek, carving a wet path through the grime and the grit. I scratch the inside of my wrist. It’s numb. I can’t feel it. But this isn’t a dream. This is all very real. Luka Williams—the boy who changed my life forever—is gone. There will be no rescue mission. No last-ditch effort to get him back. His life is over. He gave it all away.

  Mori est Vivire.

  To die is to live.

  But he’s not living. Not anymore.

  A hole rips open inside my chest. I cup my hand over my mouth, trapping the sob inside. Link kneels beside me. He’s alive. He’s okay. Because Luka saved him. Luka saved us all. Link wraps his arm around my shoulders. I turn my head and cry myself ragged into his chest. His grip tightens as if he can hold me together. But it’s too late. I’ve already broken apart.