Burning Darkness

by Jaime Rush

  “Like you?” He smiled, easing the moment.

  She smiled, too, and looked at the ceiling. “You made me like you. Oh, yeah, you definitely made me like you.”

  A soft knock on the door preceded its opening. Magnus stepped in. “Did you find him?”

  “We haven’t started yet,” Eric said.

  Fonda jumped at the chance to move out of a conversation that had her teetering on the edge of either running from the room screaming or throwing herself into Eric’s arms. Of all the risks she’d taken, admitting what he’d come to mean to her was the biggest, and not one she was ready to take. Yes, she was scared that those feelings were based on what he’d done for her. Even scarier was the sense of just how deep they went.

  She rolled onto her back. Much safer to focus on the psychic creep than those arctic eyes she’d once thought masked Eric’s feelings. So not true.

  She pictured Westerfield’s face, his taunting voice when he talked about smelling her fear. She went through the familiar process, and then she was in a room, like a lab of some kind. She stood behind a man sitting at a desk on the far side. Westerfield. Seemed odd to find him doing something mundane like paperwork. She stepped farther out of his view.

  Tacks were stuck in a random pattern on a map of the D.C./Maryland area on the wall. No indication of where this place was, though. Eric needed a location before he could remote-view. Interesting that he could talk while he did so. She tried to describe what she saw but was completely disconnected to her physical self.

  She walked around a tall shelving unit filled with notebooks, intending to go through the wall. Westerfield stood there, looking right at her. Her heart jumped. Get out!

  “Got you,” he said.

  She saw a blinding flash of light, felt something close in around her. Can’t see anything. Get back, now! She felt an odd tightening sensation, as though a cloud had surrounded her and now squeezed from all sides. She’d never felt pain in her etheric form before, but now she did. The humming was more like a searing buzz, vibrating through her being.

  She couldn’t get back. No!

  The buzz lessened in its intensity and the cloud thinned. Okay, she was going back. It was just different this time. Different . . .

  The cloud dissipated. Eric’s face was warped. No, not Eric. Westerfield! He was smiling at her, that much she could see, but the image was stretched and shiny. Glass. She spun around and saw glass all around her. Fear gripped her, pounding as fast as her heartbeat. She was trapped in a glass jar. Judging by the size of his face, she was small. He’d grabbed her soul! And shrunk her.

  Eric wouldn’t be able to find her. How long could Westerfield keep her? What would happen to her body? Was there a way to get back to it? To Eric? She tried, focusing on that gorgeous face and his expression when she’d said she forgave him, as though she’d given him a precious gift.

  Nothing. Whatever this was, it blocked her from leaving.

  Everything tilted when Westerfield picked up the jar. He shook it, sending her crashing against the sides. His mouth was moving but she couldn’t hear what he was saying, only a murmur. What she could see was how pleased he was. Could he smell her emotions here? She steeled herself, cramming down her fear and anger. One feeling got through, though: grief at not being able to contact Eric. At the thought of not seeing him again.

  That’s what got to her most of all.

  Eric watched her body tighten, her breath come in an airless gasp. She hadn’t done that last time. He looked at Magnus, whose eyebrows furrowed. What happened next worried him even more. Her body wilted. He could feel the absence of her, like an emptiness that sucked the air out of the room.

  He grabbed her hand and felt her pulse. Light and thready. “Fonda!” He shook her and kept screaming her name. No response. He gave Magnus a desperate look. “How do I get her back?”

  “What you’re doing is how my father said to do it. That’s how we got Lachlan back.” He sat on the other side of her and slapped her cheeks.

  Eric kept hold of her hand, squeezing it hard, leaning down next to her ear. “Fonda, get back here, now! Come back to me!”

  Not a twitch, not a sign that she was in there.

  Magnus looked concerned. “I’m getting Lachlan. He knows more about astral projection than I do.”

  He ran out of the room, his footsteps heavy down the hall. Minutes later two sets pounded back toward Eric.

  Eric didn’t care if Lachlan was an angry asshole. He’d been one once, too. He met the man’s dark eyes. “Help us. How do we get her back?”

  Lachlan looked at Fonda. “How long has she been gone?”

  Eric looked at the clock. “Five minutes. She’s already been gone for five minutes.” Too long. The words beat through his head: Too damned long.

  Lachlan perched on the edge of the bed beside her. “Dad told me there was a chance something could go wrong. What happened to me was different. I was partially connected to my body, acting out what my soul was experiencing.” He picked up her hand and let it drop. “That’s not what’s happening to her, obviously.”

  “She’s not here at all.” Eric heard the strain in his voice.

  Lachlan shook his head. He also felt her pulse at her wrist. “She’s barely here physically.”

  “What did Wallace say could go wrong?”

  Lachlan was studying Fonda’s face. “He intuitively felt there were dangers, aside from the psychosis. Once, he’d gone to a place he couldn’t describe. It was like nothing he’d ever seen before, a world like ours but not quite. Something pulled at his soul, like a magnet. He had a struggle getting back. When he did, he was shaken, something my father was rarely. He felt that if that thing had grabbed him, he wouldn’t have come back.”

  Eric’s mouth moved and words came out, but he had no idea where they were coming from. “We have to find her Essence, her soul, and bring her body to it. If we don’t within an hour, she’ll die.”

  Both men looked at him, and Eric knew his expression was probably as surprised as theirs. It wasn’t like Jerryl’s voice in his head, not an order. It was not something he’d ever experienced before.

  “How do you know that?” Lachlan asked.

  “I don’t know, but I know it’s true. How do I find where she is? I can’t remote-view without having some idea where she went.” The answer came to him from his own mind this time. “I took Amy with me once, when I remote-viewed Lucas, by connecting our souls. He was being held prisoner, and she needed to see him.” He straddled Fonda’s body, putting his hands on her face, leaning low over her. “I’m going to go to her the same way.”

  He closed his eyes, merging his energy with hers. The void he felt scared him, almost enough to bring him back to the surface, but he focused only on filling her with his energy, becoming one with her in a way he could never do physically.

  He left his body, flying through the ether, following a faint trail that looked like the stream of clouds a jet leaves in the sky. Her trail, and it was fading fast. He clung to the last particles that led him into a thick white cloud. He dove into it, scrabbling for those last crumbs of her. One more. He reached for it, tumbling, breaking through the cloud.

  In a room. Westerfield at a desk, on the phone. He strained to hear. Sounds were always muffled or warbled.

  “I’ve got her Essence. It worked just as it did for Simeon. I’ll watch her fade away, as I did with him . . . yes, I’ll let you know when she’s gone. Then we’ll find the other one.”

  Her Essence, the word his mind had conjured up. Or someone else’s mind. Eric frantically searched for her. His heart plunged when he saw the jar at Westerfield’s elbow, a small version of her ghostly presence in the glass cylinder with a metal rim on the top and bottom. The bands bore hieroglyphic symbols engraved in the metal. One of them was the Eye that he had tattooed on his arm. How had Westerfield captured her? Could he get her out?

  Eric wanted to try to communicate with her, but Westerfield would either capture him or
send him hurtling back to his body. More important was figuring out her location. He floated higher, above a remote building in the woods like Wallace’s compound. He found the nearest street sign, and then another. That was enough. He pulled out.

  “He’s got her,” he said, fear and exhaustion permeating his voice. “He’s got her Essence in some kind of glass container. She’s going to die if I don’t get her back to her body.”

  “I’ll go with you,” Magnus said.

  Before Lachlan could protest, as he was about to do, Eric said, “I’m not exposing you.” Like Fonda had exposed herself to Sayre.

  “Look, mate—”

  “I can handle this. If I need help, I’ll call you. What I do need is a computer connected to the Internet. I saw a couple of street signs.”

  “Give me the names, and I’ll print out a map for you,” Magnus said. “Rest for a few minutes. You’ll need all the strength you can get.”

  Chapter 20

  Eric had thirty minutes left to reunite Fonda’s soul to her body. He drove, his gaze going to her limp body on the passenger seat. She looked so small, like a child asleep. Had she gone through what he was now suffering: worrying, scared to frigging death? If what he heard her say was any indication, yes. Except he had a time element to deal with.

  This place was closer to D.C., and out in the woods off several rural roads. He kept looking at her, at the clock, the map, her . . . he was hardly looking at the damned road.

  Westerfield would be there. The question was, would he be expecting him? Count on it. He paused at a stop sign and looked at the satellite map. He’d recognize the building, chair-shaped from above, when he saw it.

  He pulled down a gravel road marked with more ominous NO TRESPASSING signs than the Wallace compound. He parked a few hundred feet in. From the map, the building appeared to be a quarter mile from the road. He walked around to the passenger side and opened the door.

  “We’re here, baby. Hang on.”

  He brushed her hair from her face, then gently picked her up. She weighed next to nothing but wasn’t as vulnerable as she looked. That gave him hope.

  Several minutes down the road he heard a noise, like a door closing. He searched the woods. He hadn’t spotted the building yet and saw no one moving in the distance. Only heard the breeze rustling through the leaves and his footsteps.

  How close did her body need to be? He’d gotten the answer to the time limit, so he cleared his thoughts and heard Fifteen feet. Sort of his voice, but not his knowledge. He looked around again. That was creepy as hell, having someone putting thoughts in his head. Maybe it was Cheveyo, the mysterious Offspring who helped them but had never talked to anyone but Zoe and Petra. He seemed to know a lot about this stuff. Or maybe it was his imagination. Still, it made sense that she needed to be near her physical body. The hard part would be getting hold of the jar.

  The building came into view, blending well with the trees. He paused, remote-viewed, and saw Westerfield still sitting at the desk. Damn. As he neared the building, he looked for cameras. Nothing he could see, but who knew what the guy had in place, both physically and psychically? He knew he had to be ready, and he sure as hell didn’t want Fonda in his arms if the dude came out.

  “You killed her,” a voice said from behind him, wrapped in a southern accent. “Now why’d you go and do that? I was looking forward to having some fun with her once you were out of the picture.”

  Eric’s heart slammed as he turned to see Sayre standing only a few yards away.

  “Shut the hell up,” Eric whispered.

  “Is this your hideout? The famous place Darkwell couldn’t find?”

  “You don’t know what you’re into here. The guy in there is more of a badass than Darkwell ever was. Than you are.”

  Sayre laughed. “Nobody’s more of a badass than me. You saw what I did to Nicholas, didn’t you?”

  Eric wanted to kill him, to just torch him right then. But no way could he take the chance of setting a fire with Fonda here. He set her down next to the building and stalked toward Sayre, his hands twitching to go around his throat and shut him up.

  “Well, well, I’ve got company,” another male voice said.

  There went his element of surprise. Eric hoped Westerfield hadn’t seen Fonda’s body.

  “Who the hell are you?” Sayre asked, not looking the least bit perturbed.

  “Shouldn’t I be asking you that, since you are, after all, on my private property?” Westerfield smiled. “You’re one of them, the one who’s wanted by the police.”

  “Nah, that’s my twin brother. I’m the good guy.”

  Eric stepped very slowly toward Westerfield as the two men talked. Maybe he could get inside—

  Westerfield turned and held out his hand, squeezing his fist at Eric. Pain exploded in his head. He dropped to his knees, fighting all the way.

  “Hey, that’s a cool ability you got there,” he heard Sayre say.

  Then Sayre’s scream of agony. Through blurred vision, Eric saw Sayre crumple to the ground, too, clutching his head.

  Can’t die. Got to break that jar, release her.

  Everything went dark.

  He opened his eyes, with no idea how much time had passed. Still not dead. His eyes snapped fully open and he tried to get to his feet. Except he couldn’t move. He was staring at the ceiling, lying flat on his back. He couldn’t move his limbs and felt cuffs strain against his ankles and wrists. His fingers wrapped around the edges of a metal table.

  “Good. I didn’t use too much force.” Westerfield stood beside him, looking down. “It’s a fine line between incapacitating and slaughtering.” He breathed in, his nostrils flaring. “Only a little fear. That will change.”

  Eric’s gaze went to the jar, still on the desk: inside, Fonda’s ethereal form was shrunk as small as a Barbie doll. Her hands were on the glass and she was facing him, but he couldn’t see the details of her face. She was more transparent than before. Fading. Got to get her out of there. He searched and found a clock on the wall. Less than fifteen minutes to save her.

  “Ah, not fear for yourself,” Westerfield amended. “For her. How sweet. But how did you know to bring her body here?”

  That struck even more fear into him. He knew. Eric frantically looked for her body but couldn’t see it. “What do you want with us? Let her go. She’s no threat to you.”

  “You are all threats, just by your existence. And for me, you are a curiosity.”

  A groan pulled his and Westerfield’s attention to the floor. Eric lifted his head and saw Sayre slumped there, cuffed to a metal loop in the wall. Sayre pulled against the cuff. “What the f—” He narrowed his eyes at Westerfield. “Now, that wasn’t very nice. I mean, it was okay doing it to that son of a bitch, but you and me, we ain’t got no beef.”

  “You didn’t come here together to save Fonda Raine?” Westerfield said to him.

  “Save her?” Sayre pointed to Eric. “He killed her. I followed him here and saw him carrying her body.”

  “Interesting.” Westerfield’s smile grew. “Yes, this could be very interesting indeed. How will two adversaries react?”

  “What the hell are you talking ‘bout?” Sayre said.

  Eric was taking in the room, all the while testing his own cuffs. They were solid. The clock ticked louder and louder with each passing minute. He had to break that jar and release her. At least then she’d have a chance of surviving. And he had to do it soon.

  He saw newspaper clippings tacked to a huge bulletin board. All he could read were the headlines: ‘QUIET’ MAN GOES ON RAMPAGE, SHOOTS FOUR COWORKERS; ‘FAMILY MAN’ MURDERS WIFE, TWO SONS, THEN SELF; PEACEFUL CULT MEMBERS TURN ON ONE ANOTHER, BRUTAL BLOOD FEST.

  Westerfield was infecting people with something that made them turn on other people, even their loved ones. Now he was going to use it on them—that’s what he’d meant about the adversaries remark.

  “What was in those canisters on the plane?” Eric asked. “Was it B
lue Moon?”

  Westerfield scoffed. “That’s what the botanist called it. Somehow that man got hold of it and then was insane enough to ingest it. Now you carry it in your bodies. We can mask it when we spray it on people so no tox scan will pick it up. But it’s in your DNA. Can’t be masked there.”

  “What is it?”

  “You have the Essence of someone’s life in you.”

  “Extraterrestrial life.”

  Westerfield only smiled. “Is that what you’ve deduced? Martians, maybe? Green beings with huge eyes?” He made circles around his eyes with his fingers, then laughed. “Well, it won’t matter much longer.”

  Sayre said, “Are you saying we’ve got some alien stuff in us? Is that what you are, some freaking alien who can look like us? What did you do to us out there? It felt like a brain freeze. Shit, it was a mind probe thing, wasn’t it?”

  Westerfield turned toward him, his voice deadly low. “You talk too much.”

  “I want answers, dammit. You squeeze my head without touching me, cuff me, and you ain’t even told me why. Now you’re saying you’re some kind of alien freakazoid who—”

  Westerfield flung his hand toward Sayre, whose head jerked with a crack. His eyes widened in pain and he tried to say something and grimaced in even more pain. He put his free hand on his jaw like he was holding it in place.

  Lesson one: don’t talk too much. Eric already knew he had to play it cool if he was going to have a chance of saving Fonda.

  Westerfield picked up something that looked like a steel fire extinguisher. He knelt down and unlocked Sayre’s cuff. “I trust you’ll cooperate now. I do love making people’s brains and guts explode in grand and spectacular ways, but I have something even more fun in mind.”

  Sayre couldn’t talk, but he went along toward a room Eric could only see if he lifted his head. There was a large window to the left of the steel door where Westerfield led Sayre. As they moved away, he tried desperately to break free, but couldn’t budge the cuffs. Then he heard the door slam and the lock click shut, followed by a spraying sound.