Everlife Trilogy Complete Collection: Firstlife ; Lifeblood ; Everlife

by Gena Showalter

He attempts another distraction. “You should drop Sloan. She’ll always put her wants above your needs.”

  “Someone else’s actions will never decide my own.” A facet of my free choice. One I embrace wholeheartedly.

  The blue light flashes on his wrists, and he curses.

  “A message?” I ask.

  “Yes.”

  “You aren’t going to respond?”

  “No. It’s from Madame.”

  “Madame…what?”

  “Madame Arse Pain.” His teeth are clenched, his tone filled with disgust. “She’s my Leader.”

  “Don’t like working for a woman, huh?”

  “Don’t like her, period.”

  “What’d she do—”

  “Oh, no. I’m not airing my dirty past with her. You still have to deal with her.”

  Ah. Madame Bennett.

  The light flashes a second time, and he slaps his wrist. “She wants another progress report.”

  Another. Just how many of our interactions has he shared with her? “Full disclosure. I’m walking away from you when we land.”

  “Me? What’d I do?”

  “What you know, Myriad knows and what Myriad knows, my parents know.”

  “Your parents haven’t been told of your escape…yet.”

  That’s something, at least. “Why the reprieve?”

  “Prynne has only informed parents of the deceased, and I requested Myriad keep quiet about you. Your parents…annoy me. Your mother is hiding something, and your father is an adulterous prick.”

  Shock and horror nearly choke me. “He’s cheating on my mom?”

  Killian goes still. “You didn’t know?”

  I shake my head as the plane hits another nasty air pocket, the nose dipping. My internal organs shrivel and for a moment, my mind spins round and round on a carnival ride.

  He tightens his grip on my shoulders. “Turbulence is natural, lass. We aren’t going to crash.”

  “Don’t use the C-word!”

  His chuckle is as beautiful as the rest of him. “I think everyone in the realms heard you. But don’t worry. I’m the big strong manly man and I’ll keep my weak little girl safe.”

  “Jerk,” I mutter, but I begin to relax against him. I won’t think about my dad’s infidelity and the mental hatchet job it must be doing on my mom.

  Killian leans down, his mouth hovering over my ear. I think he’s going to kiss the lobe but he whispers, “Do us both a favor and sign with Myriad.”

  My heart hammers as I lift my head. “Killian—”

  Our gazes connect, the air between us heating, crackling. He presses his forehead against mine and cups my nape, his thumb stroking up, into my hair and down, under the collar of my shirt.

  “I don’t just want you,” he says. “I want you.”

  “I don’t understand the difference,” I tell him honestly. Even still, his admission makes me tingle.

  “The first I can easily walk away from. The second…you make me feel—you make me feel.”

  The words aren’t pretty, but they’re ragged. His tone isn’t sweet, but raw.

  I’m nearly undone. Is he being for real? Or is this just another con to win me over?

  The plane jiggles again, but at first, I don’t really care. Not anymore. When it continues, growing increasingly more violent, I freaking care. I freaking care a lot. The bin above us pops open and my backpack spills out as the nose of the plane dips at a more acute angle. If not for our seat belts, we would have pitched forward.

  This isn’t normal.

  I’m nearing full-blown panic when the pilot steps from the cockpit, a bag slung over his shoulders. He moves swiftly, avoiding our gazes.

  Killian releases me, saying to the man, “What are you doing?”

  The pilot wrenches open the side door and I’m blasted by a cold punch of wind and a hard kick of shock. My hair slaps at my cheeks as he—

  Jumps!

  “Help! Help! Killian, Ten. He hit me!” Sloan’s screaming voice cuts through the brutal bellow of the airstream. “He’s gone!”

  Yes. He’s gone. He, our only means of landing. The shock collides with panic, and my brain nearly shuts down. I focus on Killian. “What should we do?”

  “Stay here.” He jerks at his seat belt, his expression grim. “And sign with Myriad. Verbalize your agreement to the terms I presented. Don’t risk your Everlife, Ten. Please. If I can’t land the plane…” He shakes his head, as if he’s unwilling to consider the possibility. “Please,” he repeats.

  I remind myself I’m no longer a damsel in distress. I can think this through. What I can’t do? Base my decision on fear. Because, while I might be free to make my choice right now, I’ll never be free from the consequences of that choice. And I think I’d rather wind up in Many Ends than in Troika, warring with Killian, or in Myriad, warring with Archer and Clay.

  “D-do you know how to fly a plane?” I shout over the squall.

  He remains grim-faced. “As a Laborer, I’ve trained for all kinds of situations.”

  I’ll take that as a no.

  His buckle finally gives, but the plane has taken another dip and dive. He bangs into the wall that divides front from back. A wall he grips, pulling himself around the edge; a Herculean task considering the gale-force wind.

  He disappears from sight and a few seconds later, Sloan peeks out from behind the wall. Foolish girl! She’s going to be sucked out!

  I lean over and stretch out my arms. “Grab the hooks on the bracelets!”

  As soon as she has a firm hold, I tug while she kicks at the wall. Midair, her body begins to edge toward the opened door. I yank with all my might, using a reservoir of strength I didn’t know I possessed.

  She plows into Killian’s vacant seat. Shaking, she buckles up. She’s pale, her cheeks stained with dried tears.

  Eyes haunted, she asks, “Do you think we’re going to die? Say no, and I’ll believe you. You never lie.”

  I meet her gaze and remain silent.

  She covers her mouth with an unsteady hand. “We should pick a realm, either realm. Many Ends…”

  “Yes,” I tell her. “Choose.” Not knowing what else to do but remembering Archer’s final words to Clay, I whisper, “Archer. I’m asking you for help. Please.”

  There’s no bright light, and he doesn’t magically appear.

  Sloan must have read my lips. A tremor rocks her against me. “Where is he? Ten, where is he?”

  Her panic is kindling for my own, but I manage to tamp it down. “We don’t have to see him to know he’s here.” I’ve learned the hard way.

  “What if he’s only allowed to help Troikans?”

  “We’re potentials. We qualify.” We must.

  “I want to see him. I need to see him.”

  I…don’t, I realize, shocked. I trust him. Despite everything—or maybe because of everything—I know he’s doing everything within his power to save us. The real question is—will it be enough?

  The plane continues to plummet. My pulse points race harder and faster, as if I’ve been injected with a thousand vials of baiser de la mort.

  I glance out the window and see no sign of clouds—only land. Green. Lush. Pretty. We are going to crash. There’ll be no stopping it. Any moment now…

  “Brace for impact,” I tell Sloan.

  “Ten.” Tears cascade down her cheeks.

  “Have you chosen?”

  Long locks of her pale hair slap her cheeks as she shakes her head.

  Some people say your entire life flashes inside your head just before the end. Mine doesn’t. I don’t have an amazing epiphany with all the answers. I know only that I’m not ready to die, and that I won’t—I can’t—allow courage to fail me. To
day I fight to live and live to fight.

  I won’t die.

  I tuck Sloan against me and wrap myself around her and notice—

  No. Dang him, no!

  Killian struggles to return to us. The blue flecks in his eyes are completely overshadowed by the darkness of his pupils.

  “Leave,” I shout. “Leave now.” I won’t let him die inside his Shell. “Go. Go!”

  He doesn’t, using his leeway the same way Archer did.

  “Sign with Myriad. Please.” He throws himself over us—

  Boom!

  I’m pitched back and forward almost simultaneously, the force so powerful I’m surprised I’m not snapped in two. Metal grinds and crunches, the sounds an assault to my ears. Fire dances through the belly of the plane as both engines explode. My adrenaline is so high, I shouldn’t feel a lick of heat or the bite of the belt or the slam of my body into the seat in front of me as the plane compacts, but the pain…it consumes me in an instant, swallows me—

  I open my mouth to scream for help, but end up swallowing a mouthful of water. Water? We crashed into an ocean?

  Crazy thought: Now I can surf.

  I laugh hysterically as dizziness sweeps over me. Darkness is fast on its heels—

  * * *

  I come to with a realization that I’m floating…no, I’m dropping, down, down…thud.

  Lying on my back, I crack open my eyes and discover I’m in the middle of a moon-drenched jungle, gnarled trees and thick foliage all around me. The only light comes from thousands of lightning bugs, many of which are buzzing around me.

  Ouch! Several land on my arm, burning me. Not lightning bugs, after all. I think they are…living embers? I wave my hands to shoo them away and find blisters in their place.

  The air is dry, white-hot, and sweat is pouring from me. Screams, so many screams, waft on the breeze. They are pain-filled, agonized, a story as certain as numbers—this is suffering in its purest form. Snakes, their forked tongues hissing at me, slither along branches that are stretching, stretching in my direction. Some kind of monkey-like creatures are highlighted by the ember-bugs and they are staring at me from between leaves that look like they have razor-sharp teeth.

  Where am I? This doesn’t look like anyplace I’ve ever been.

  “Sloan?” I call her name as I scramble to my feet. “Killian? Archer?”

  There’s no response.

  The monkeys jump to the ground a few yards away from me, and I realize they aren’t monkeys, after all. They have the bottom half of a giant spider—which is a nightmare all its own. Eight legs, each hairy and lined with sharp ivory horns.

  I take a step back. They follow me.

  This isn’t part of the Land of the Harvest, is it?

  Could this be Many Ends?

  For once, an answer is easy. No. This isn’t Many Ends. I’m not dead; I’m very much alive.

  Boom!

  The ground shakes so hard I’m knocked off my feet. The monkey-spiders dart behind the foliage, many of the stems now withdrawing into turtle-like shells. I turn to see a thick, horribly dark cloud mushroom toward the sky, and when it reaches yellowed clouds, it tips over like a waterfall and rains down, down, down upon the tops of the trees, where it breaks into a million pieces, those pieces darting in every direction, the smoke somehow morphing into big, black birds with skeletal bodies, spiked beaks and metal claws.

  Snakes are grabbed with those claws. Monkeys are snagged with those beaks. I swallow a scream and run, counting my steps and turns. Eight steps, right turn. Eleven steps, left turn. I’m not sure how I got here, or how I’ll leave, but I need to know how to return to the spot I first arrived. Just in case it’s the key to going home…home… Where is home?

  Twenty-three steps, another right. Some patches of air are shimmery, like curtains, but I feel no different when I pass through them, so I’m not sure what they do.

  Six sharp pinpricks spear me in the back as I’m swept into the air. I scream and flail, panic threatening to overtake me. Ember-bugs slam into me, leaving blisters behind.

  What should I do? What should I do!

  Fight!

  Right. I palm my scalpel—zero! I came with the clothes on my back, but not my weapon. Okay, it’s okay. I grab hold of a branch as we pass, our momentum allowing me to rip off the tip as well as the skin on my palm. Which doesn’t bleed, I notice, but leaks a thick, shimmery liquid.

  Lifeblood.

  I am dead. And this…this is Many Ends.

  The knowledge rips through me, tearing my insides to shreds. I reel, the shock of my new reality almost too much to process. This means… No, no, no. My Firstlife is over, and I’ve officially entered the Everlife.

  I can’t… I don’t… I need to…

  Get it together!

  A freak-out isn’t helping. My strength is draining—hemorrhaging—and I have to act quickly. I can worry and lament whenever I’m free.

  I twist as best I can, take in a face that is nothing but a thorny beak and pitted bone, and swing up my arm, stabbing the branch into the creature’s side. A squawk rings out, as warm, black liquid gushes over my hand, burning like acid. Those claws open, at least, and slide out of my back. I drop.

  When I slam into a patch of gnarled treetops, I lose my breath and quickly roll into branch after branch…finally landing on the ground with a thud. A rock has gouged my side, stealing what little oxygen I managed to suck in.

  Though the dizziness has returned with a vengeance, I’m able to sit up and take stock of my new location. I frown. Nothing is different. Same gnarled trees, same toothy plants now slithering toward me—it’s as if running and turning this way and that and being flown roughly three hundred feet took me right back to where I started.

  A groan escapes me as I stand. A flock of the bone-birds squawks overhead.

  Sticking with my calculations of three hundred feet, I backtrack. Bugs buzz around me—lizard-like bees, flies with saber teeth—and I pass through countless shimmery patches of air. The placement of trees and the fall of branches remain the same.

  Go somewhere, yet go nowhere.

  My ears twitch as a high-pitched scream pierces the air, one that is louder than all the others. One that is closer to me. Is someone else here?

  “Sloan?” I call. Guilt slaps me. Did I lead her here?

  A rustle of tree limbs. A hard weight slams into me from behind, pushing me facedown. I gasp, but when I look around, there’s nothing and no one there. More rustling sounds. Another slam, slam, as if I’m being punched. I wheeze and spit dirt and—water gushes out of my mouth.

  I’m forced to my side as I cough, my throat coated in acid, my lungs on fire.

  “That’s it. That’s the way.” Hard hands continue patting at my back, and I expel another gush of water. The black fades from my vision, revealing a rocky beach, a large body of water with metal and debris, smoke rising from the top, curling toward a wealth of skyscrapers. “You’re alive. You’re alive now.”

  I am? I died and came back to life?

  Again, my shock is almost too much to process. This time, I can’t stop my freak-out. I was dead. I was dead, and I was in Many Ends. Many Ends is real. A real place. A gruesome, awful place.

  I don’t want to return. Ever.

  “Sloan,” I manage to croak.

  The hands smooth over my back more gently, offering comfort now. “She’s alive.” Archer’s voice registers.

  He came! Sloan survived!

  “You died,” he says, as unsteady as I am, “but you’re back. You’re back, and you’re all right.”

  Tears of relief burn my eyes. I’m all right, I’m all right. The words echo through my mind, but I’m not sure I believe them. And oh, no, no, no, did my bowels release? I jerk my gaze down, expecting th
e worst. I’m soaked with ocean…lake?…water but I’m clean. My spirit must have stayed connected to my body, despite the distance between the two.

  “My friend Deacon is seeing to Sloan’s care,” Archer says.

  “Killian?” I ask.

  A pause. A pause that grabs hold of my heart and squeezes. Then—

  “His Shell is toast, and his spirit isn’t in the area.”

  I almost grab him, almost shake him. “Tell me his spirit survived.”

  “I…can’t. If he disconnected from the Shell before impact, there’s hope. Did he disconnect?”

  I swallow a sob. The boy who once considered Firstlife a nuisance did his best to save mine. He stayed with me every second, keeping his strong arms wrapped around me.

  He didn’t want me to wind up in Many Ends. And he might have lost his Secondlife for it.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  “If you can see or feel it, you can change it.”

  —Troika

  I’m not ready to move or stand but Archer says, “We need to go before the authorities arrive,” so I do both. With the movement, the cuts I’ve sustained tear deeper into muscle, and my bones vibrate. My limbs are waterlogged. They weigh two tons, at least.

  “The plane was on fire when it crashed into the water,” Archer says. “If we hadn’t buffered you, you would have died.”

  “Thank you.” The words aren’t good enough, but they’re all I’ve got. I grind my molars as pain shoots through me. “Where are we?” Had the pilot gone off course?

  “East Coast. New York.” He leads me to Sloan, who’s seated inside a circle of rocks, her knees drawn up to her chest as water froths around her feet. There’s a cut on her forehead and obscene streaks of blood over each of her cheeks. Her gaze is focused above, where rainbow beams of light dance through the sky. Either the northern lights have moved or there’s another realm battle going on.

  “The pilot told me he was sorry, but he’d been offered the only thing he ever wanted.” Her chin trembles. “I didn’t understand at the time. He hit me, and when I opened my eyes, he was gone and we were…we were…”

  “I know.” He willingly, purposely signed our death warrants. But…why? “Who would want us dead before we’d signed away our futures?”