by Tara Brown
"I don’t really want to talk about this." Ari drops them and walks past me. I follow her up the stairs.
She slams a door to a room. I don’t know which one to go to, so I walk to the bathroom and pour a bath. I strip my blood soaked clothes off and climb in.
"You can't possibly think I would find that woman attractive."
I smile at him. "Why? I find her attractive."
He laughs and it's like my favorite song. I can't even be angry with him. He stands with his back to the door. I fight my smile. He points at me. "You on the other hand, did something dangerous."
I look down. "It was a regular day, Aleks."
"Lorri will tell me if it was or wasn't." His tone is edgy.
"You're not my dad."
"No, I'm your partner."
"I was pissed you were checking out that trashy blonde."
"That's a pretty big tub. I need to get one of those installed at my place."
I smirk. "Not big enough for you and me.
"You can sit on my lap."
I hear his clothes drop to the floor. My face flushes as his feet cross the huge bathroom to the large two-person tub.
Chapter Six
Ophelia
"There are hookers everywhere. I don’t even know where else to put them." Trist shouts overtop of the shouting women all speaking different languages.
"This one is from Monte Carlo. Her family has money. I'm going to flash her to the hospital there and wipe her mind," Phillip shouts.
I stand there and watch it all.
"O, honey you need to help out."
I glance at Lydia and shrug. "I don’t know what to do."
Trist shakes his head and shouts at a Japanese girl who is sobbing and hugging herself. "Honey you can't sit there without underwear. That couch is an antique."
I laugh and want to cry at the same time.
"Tristan, you ever feel like maybe we are too young for the shit we deal with?"
He rolls his eyes. "O, this is not the time to get melodramatic."
I laugh again and turn away from the chaos.
I walk out the front door and out onto the street.
Instantly he is there. "You shouldn’t be out here."
I shake my head. "I can't be in there. They found some house my father had in Rio. It was full of young teenage girls. I can't watch it." My hands tremble.
He grabs me and pulls me into him. His warmth and mass surround me.
It's silent.
I look up to see greenery everywhere.
"Where are we?"
"Peru."
The air is warm and wet, rich almost. Breathing it in makes me feel high.
"Where?"
"The Andes. There is a village down the hill where I once hid for five years."
I look up into his beautiful face and smile. His blue eyes almost kill me. "Why?"
He kisses my lips softly. "To hide from your father." His words are a warm breath against my lips.
He takes my hand and pulls me through the bright green forest. "He was crazed. His gifts were meant to pull the sickness from the blood. That’s how he was to use them. We were each given something as a gift from our father as we fell. Mine was used to pull sadness and misery from the soul. Emotional pain. When I went dark with your father, I grew to love the taste of them dying in my arms." I pull back a bit, but his huge hand envelope mine and pull me along the hillside. I am afraid of him. I feel the natural magic inside of me brewing.
"I couldn’t stop myself anymore. I pulled and sucked until they died every time and I never gave it another thought. Your father is, well, charismatic. He had me believing that we were better than them. Dorian too. We had fun, a lot of fun. But then Dorian and I met a young man named Marcus. He was also a charismatic young man, sarcastic and funny though. Not snobbish like your father."
He pulls me to a huge tree. It's the most incredible thing I have ever seen. He covers my eyes with his hands and I feel the air move. When he takes them from my eyes we are high above the ground. My heart beats widely. I grip the rough bark of the tree. I can see for hundreds of miles. The mist is settled in amongst the mountains and hills.
"Wow."
"I know." He points to the village. "Marcus was smarter than the other humans we had been around. He caught on to what we all were very quickly. He wanted the immortality and the power. He helped Jonathan convince Ethan, Henry's brother, that the dark magic was the only way to punish the man responsible for his daughter's death. Once Ethan turned dark he made many mistakes. One was teaching Marcus and Jonathan how to enslave his own brother. Marcus wanted the magic of the Fae, he wanted the immortality. Jonathan offered him his blood and swore he would make him the highest of the vampires. Marcus didn’t want to be below Jonathan. Instead he went after Henry. Dorian was tired of the evil ways of Jonathan and went back with Lorri. Marcus used the guilt Dorian had over his dark deeds, to convince him going after Henry's magic was the only way to kill Jonathan. That was how we met Aleks. Well after he died, we met him. Marcus told Aleks that taking Henry's heart was the only way to get the power to kill Jon, Aleks's father. Henry, thinking he was much older and considerably smarter than them, caught them in the act and cursed Marcus. He didn’t realize what he had given him, was the very thing he wanted. Realizing a mortal had tricked him, Henry was livid. He found his brother and murdered him, taking his magic."
I shake my head. "That’s sick. Marcus is a bigger shit than I imagined."
Oliver smirks. "He is incredibly smart and wicked. His brain is ridiculous. He is a doctor, a chemist, a botanist, a pharmacist, a lawyer, my god I can't even imagine them all. I know he's written novels under assumed names. It's frightening really. Anyway, we all had more respect for Marcus then. Jonathan wanted him dead. Somehow he convinced Dorian and Aleks that Henry's loyalty was of great importance. Henry was on a rampage and ready to kill them all and Jonathan wanted them dead. So they used the things they had learned from Ethan and stole Henry's heart. His heart is inside of Marcus, as we all know. Henry doesn’t know it, thanks to Ari."
"We should free him."
"No. He is volatile. He is dangerous. It's best if we let Marcus keep him under wraps. The children of your mother, the ones born of the Fae, they're not stable."
I sigh. "I don’t feel stable either."
He kisses my head. "You aren’t."
"Why did you hide in the village?"
"Your father knew I helped them. I helped Marcus and Aleks and Dorian. I too had turned to Lorri. The saying 'Hell hath no fury' actually came into existence because of Lorri and your dad. She loved him, a long time ago. When we fell he went for Lillith, seeing opportunity and power."
"He left her for my mom, even though my mom didn’t want him?"
He nods. "Yup. Lorri loved him for a long time. She kept making excuses for him and expecting him to come back to her. He was her weakness. When he didn’t she started the hunt for him. Unfortunately, by the time she had gotten around to him he had built a very large army for himself. Most of the archangels that have fallen and all the nephilim but a few, agree with him. This is our playground. Here we have freewill and the ability to choose. We are immortal. The gates of heaven will never open for us anyway. We have fallen."
"We will kill him together." I squeeze his hand.
He squeezes back. "I want you to do a spell for me though. Just in case. This is going to be our meeting place. You can make a port here. This tree is magical. It's spelled by the village shaman."
I frown. "Why?"
His eyes sparkle. "In case you need to run."
I look out over the view and nod. "What do I do?"
"Close your eyes and hold the tree tightly. Call the tree and mother earth and the power and light of the spirits. Mark the tree as yours. Visualize a door shaped in the air that you can walk through from anywhere. The rest will come to you."
I swallow hard and close my eyes. The earth magic fills me instantly. Like mother earth and I are connec
ted. My body hums. The rough bark heats in my hands until it is the same temperature as my hands.
I focus on the doorway. Flashes of the shaman blessing the tree fill my mind. His skin is old and dark and wrinkled. He speaks something I don’t understand. His eyes are completely white and his dark skin is sweaty. He rocks and chants and smoke is coming from somewhere.
His white eyes dart at me. He smiles and puts a hand out for me. I feel myself letting go of the bark and reaching for him.
My sisters stand in front of him, blocking my view of his face.
The blue sisters shake their heads. I push past them and find him again.
"O, don't do this. This is dark magic." Their voices float in the air but I swat at them and sit beside the man. He crosses his skinny brown legs. I cross mine too. He closes his eyes and takes my hand. His skin burns mine. I scream out but I can't take my hand from his grip.
I can smell my skin burning. He pries open my hand and rubs it into the ground. My eyes fly open. My lips are parted but no sound escapes them. The sun has set. It’s dark. I'm standing in the tree still. My hand is still gripping the branch. I pull it back but the burnt skin from my palm sticks to the branch. I cry out and stop pulling away. My hand shakes.
"It's okay, O. Just pull it back slowly and then heal it." Oliver is still with me.
"Did you leave?"
He shakes his head. "You did."
I peel my hand from the branch. Tears stream down my cheeks. When I finally have it off I turn my hand over. A circle with a line through it is burned into my palm. The skin is red and blistered. I place my other hand over it and pull the healing from the tree we are in. The hand heals instantly but the scar is the circle with the line through it. The pain is still mildly present.
"It still hurts."
He nods. "It will for a while. You've left a piece of yourself here. It's the only way to make a port. It's so that you can find this place again. Your piece of you will pull you here." He takes my hand and kisses the palm. The air moves and we are on the road out front of Lydia's.
I don’t want to leave him but I know I must. Ari is standing on the front steps. She needs me.
"See you later." He squeezes my hand again. He lets me go and steps back and then he's gone.
I miss him already. I feel bleak and weird about the things he's told me.
I glance at Ari and try to smile. Trist comes bursting through the door. "O, it's like Pretty Woman meets a Miss Universe pageant in there. Phillip has taken ten of them home but there are still like twelve girls we don’t know where to take. They come from poor countries. It's chaos. Giselle is up and about too. She already almost ate a nice girl from Africa."
I look at the scar on my hand and almost wish I were back at the tree. Instead I walk through the door. Phillip flashes into the hallway beside me. "O, not cool. Leaving us to deal with all this."
"Guys, mellow out. She's going through some shit." Ari scowls and grabs my hand. She drags me through the house to the back door. The cool misty day makes me shiver. When we reach the bench at the dock in the backyard she lets go of my hand and sits. She stares at the water like she sees something I don’t.
"You okay?" I ask.
She shakes her head. "It's a mess. It's all a mess. Aimee and Ben and Luke are miserable without Sam. Hanna is a disaster. Her heart is so broken, my dad said she is blacking out again. Marcus is hiding it from Lorri. Giselle is eating anything she can touch, literally eating. Shane is being brain washed every week because somehow he finds his way back to Aimee. Even Annabelle is dying inside without the little kids. Lydia barely looks at me. Somehow we all have to come together and fight your dad. It just isn’t going to happen."
I sit beside her and can't fight it. "I agree. We need to find the missing link. Where it all went wrong."
"Sam. We need him. He is the key to killing your dad. Lydia and Annabelle agree. We need Sam back. Hanna is a mess because of it. Even if he and her weren’t together, her guilt is eating her alive. If Aimee wasn’t here, if she had a normal life, we wouldn’t have the Giselle issue and Aleks would be hunting his dad fulltime. We would have gotten Sam and the kids long before. Lydia told me she wasted a lot of time on helping Aimee control herself. They knew about the kids but never went for them. They were all here helping Aimee. I love her more than I love Lucas, but she is it. She needs to go back. If I can control the push, I can ensure this isn’t her future. Dorian can make a different soul sucker. It didn’t have to be Aimee. She was just a victim."
I nod. "I can do it. Let’s just go do it."
Ari laughs. "Guess we're driving."
I frown. "Dude, Phillip. Isn't that how you got here from Maine?"
Ari shakes her head. "Yeah, but no one can know. You need to put a spell on Aimee so she doesn’t remember anything and Giselle. So when they go back everything is normal."
"Blake too," I add.
She nods. "Let's do this. I'll text Aimes to come to the house and see Giselle. You can do the mind thingy there and then when we go do the push we can hit Blake."
"Okay." I stand and walk to my room. I pull the book from under the bed, the book no one knows I have. I turn the old fragile pages slowly.
"That’s dark magic O."
I look back at my sisters and shake my head. "I'm not doing it. I'm looking for something. I need to fix things. You guys stay with Trist okay?"
"Ophelia, dark magic pulls the darkness into you. Every piece you take in kills off some of the light."
I frown. "I need darkness to kill my own mother anyway."
"Not the same way. Please be safe little sister. Our freedom lies with you."
I sigh. "I will. Everyone's freedom and happiness and everything sits with me." I look over the page once more and close the book. I push it under the bed and spell the area again. Even Tristan couldn’t find it.
I close my eyes and walk to the room, practicing using the air around me to guide me, like Annabelle and my sisters do. Their eyes technically don’t work.
Opening the door to Giselle's room, confirms it all for me. I am certain that we are making the right decision. She is a hot mess.
Ari walks in behind me and stops when she sees Giselle.
"Yikes," she whispers.
I nod. "We need to do this fast. Did you text Aimes?"
She nods.
"So we driving there after this?"
Ari smirks.
Aimee interrupts us. "Driving where?"
I look back and smile sweetly. "Ari doesn’t know how to drive. I learned from my dad, like my dad, dad. I was gonna teach her. You wanna come?"
Aimee shakes her head. Her eyes never leave the tossing and turning monster on the bed. "I have to get back to Aleks. He's almost done going over the last few hundred years."
I touch the side of her face. She turns sharply. I lock her gaze with mine and hold her arm. Her grey eyes stare blankly at me.
"The compulsion Giselle put on you to remember everything when Ari pushes is gone. You won't remember this moment either."
My magic burns from my fingers. It creeps into her arm. I can feel it leaving me like a vine growing out of my fingertips and flowing into her. Her eyes flutter for a moment. I don’t know for certain if it will work on her. It worked on Oliver once. I drop my hand and wait. Ari eyes me up nervously.
Her eyes stop and she looks around the room. "So you, uhm, what?"
I smile. "You need to get back to Maine you said."
She nods weakly. "That was weird." Her eyes settle on Giselle. "How is she?"
Ari shakes her head. "Bad. She tried to eat one of the girls we rescued. She just can't seem to quench the thirst."
Aimee's eyes lower. "I better get back."
Ari looks like she is about to cry. "See you in a bit. I'll get Phillip to bring me back in like an hour. I need to see if I can help Lydia with all the girls." Her voice breaks a couple times. Aimee looks at her. Their eyes meet, it's as if they both know it's the last time they will e
ver see each other.
Aimee is gone just as Ari's eyes fill with tears.
Ari doesn’t cry. I've noticed it before. Her tears feel like razors cutting into my heart. I walk to Giselle and do the same thing I did to Aimee. Just as I finish, Phillip opens the door.
"What are you two doing in here?" I glance back at him.
"Just making sure she is okay. Wanna give us a lift somewhere?"
