by H G Lynch
Steeling himself for whatever awaited him, he raised his fist and knocked quietly on the door. He waited, counting. One heartbeat, two heartbeats, three…seven heartbeats, eight, nine. No answer. The room on the other side of the door was eerily quiet. He wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. Maybe Ember was sleeping, or maybe she’d gone out to her tree...she might have gone back to the stables.
Images of last night flickered through his head. Ember, sitting on the ground with hay in her hair and mud on her jeans, looking up at him with tear-filled eyes and an expression that had made him want to crawl into a hole and rip his heart out of his chest. The anger in her eyes, flooded over with hurt and sadness as she fought not to cry in front of him. The heart-wrenching sound of her soft sobbing as she buried her face in his chest, even though he knew she wanted to snap his neck at least as much as she wanted him to hold her. He’d been telling Sherry the truth; he hadn’t slept last night. Mostly because of the guilt, but a little part of it was because he’d had nightmares again.
Without Ember next to him, the nightmares came back. Only they were different now. In his latest nightmare, Ember was still there in her cage, but she wasn’t screaming. She was frighteningly silent, watching as The Society guards sliced him apart with rune-marked knives. There was something empty in her eyes, in the dream, that he thought might’ve been worse than her screaming.
Shaking away the remains of the nightmare, Reid focused on the present and took a deep breath, getting ready to bolt with all his vampire speed if he needed to. He twisted the door handle and pushed the door open slowly, gritting his teeth as the hinges gave a little whine of protest. Cautiously, he peered around the door and instantly, something slammed into the wall just inches away from his face. He flinched and looked down at the offending object. It was a book. A thick hardback at that. It lay limply on the floor, the pale pages sprawled open, like a wounded pigeon. Well, that gave him a good idea of how this was going to go at least. If she was angry enough to be throwing her precious books, she was likely to start throwing fire next. In the back of his mind, he wondered if Ricky had any burn-cream in the seldom-used first aid kit in their room.
His gaze moved to Ember’s bed, where she was crouched in a pouncing position. Her expression was one of blind fury, her fangs were out and she wasn’t trying to hide them. There was a low hissing sound emitting from her throat. He’d been wrong about the feral tiger after all. Instead, he was faced with another kind of feral animal, one that made a tiger look like a kitten. It was no surprise to see the tell-tale flicker of flames sliding over Ember’s clenched fists and up her wrists. Reid braced himself and took a step inside, closing the door behind him. Ember’s eyes tracked his movement like a predator tracking prey. It was disconcerting to say the least. He wasn’t used to feeling like food-to-be.
“Uh,” he muttered warily. “Ember, can we—”
“Get the hell out before I rip you apart, you ssson of a bitch!” she snapped viciously, her blue eyes flaring.
Well, that answered that. So much for talking. That was Plan A shut down. Plan B was…non-existent. He’d have to make it up as he went.
Raising his hands, palms out, he tried again. “Please, Emz, just talk to me. Talk to me. I get it. I screwed up and I’m sorry. Just tell me what I can do to fix it. I’ll do anything. Just don’t…don’t do anything you might regret later. I love you, Emz, I never stopped loving you. If there’s any way to make this better, just tell me and I’ll do it.” He wanted to use his nickname for her, but he had the feeling that calling her firefly wouldn’t go down well right now. She might decide to really make fire fly…right toward him. He wanted to avoid being flame-grilled for as long as possible.
Ember slunk slowly out of her pouncing position, but it didn’t ease his nerves any. He froze, locking every muscle in place, scared that a single twitch would have him reduced to ashes. He didn’t even dare breathe. Sliding off the bed, Ember stalked up to him with a dangerous grace – a soft, menacing grace that she hadn’t possessed before she’d Turned. She came so close that the scent of her skin and blood, the smell of grapefruit and sandalwood, flooded his nose and he had to fight to remain rigid. He was so used to relaxing into that scent. Up close, her eyes had turned that metallic, icy blue that meant her vampire side was firmly in control – just to assure him, if he hadn’t gotten the message from the extended fangs and the hissing. Ember began, very slowly, circling him. For possibly the first time ever, he was actually scared of the possibility that she might bite him. Normally, it was pleasurable, but there were ways around that. He knew because he’d done it before, made people writhe in agony from his fangs. You just had to know how to strike the right vein, the right depth of the bite, the right angle. Also, repeated biting could be excruciating because it tore the flesh.
“You want to know how to fix things, Reid? Here’s an idea. Get a rope…” Ember paused by his ear and leaned in to whisper, “…And hang yourself with it.”
Her breath brushed across his ear and neck and he fought not to shiver. It wasn’t a pleasant shiver either. Her voice was like ice, the coldness seeped through his skin and into his blood. So this was how humans felt right before they got chomped on. It was a horrible feeling. Maybe he’d have a little more sympathy next time he decided to snack on some poor bugger in the forest. That was, if Ember let him live that long. At this point, it was a tenuous possibility at best.
Okay, he needed to regain control of the conversation, before she began thinking of more creative ways to get revenge. He already knew she could be very creative when she wanted to be. Example: That prank she’d pulled when they’d first engaged in the Great War of Wits, with the posters of him plastered all over the school. That had been a clever twist on the usual stealing-the-clothes-from-the-locker-room trick. If she was feeling particularly evil, he was certain, she could come up with some really nasty torture devices. Torture by The Society was one thing, but torture by his furious girlfriend? Waaay worse.
“Look, Emz, if you feel like you need to snap my neck or hang me from a tree or whatever, fine. Do it. Do whatever it takes to get past this anger so we can talk about this and, hopefully, fix it. I need you, Emz, and I promised I’ll do anything. That includes letting you kick my ass all the way to Easter.” Honestly, he was gambling on reverse psychology to save him here. Unfortunately, Ember wasn’t in the mood for mind games.
“Good. At least we’re on the same page then.”
She was back in front of him, wearing a savage smirk that could have scared a Navy Marine witless. Part of it was the glinting fangs, and part of it was the pure intent behind the smirk. He could see it bubbling up in her eyes. But before he could muster the good sense to move, her hand was on his chest…and then it was in his chest. He gasped in both pain and surprise, looked down in shock at her hand, buried wrist-deep, in his chest, right where his heart was.
Oh crap.
He could feel her fingers closing around his beating heart, his nerves screaming. Somehow, she’d managed to slide her hand between his ribs, so at least there were no broken bones, but hell, if you’ve ever had someone plunge a burning poker into your chest, you’ll know how much it damn well hurts. And it did feel like a burning poker, because Ember was obviously sending a fair amount of heat magic through her skin, just to add that little extra personal touch.
That’s it, he thought distantly, I am never taking Sherry’s advice again.
Now he tried desperately not to move a muscle, not to budge an inch, certain that the slightest movement could cause serious damage to his heart. Okay, yeah, technically his heart didn’t need to beat for him to live, but he was pretty sure that he needed it to be inside his body. It was where most of the magic that kept him ‘alive’ lived. Plus, a beating heart was necessary for certain recreational activities. Blood needed to pump through his veins. If his heart didn’t beat, he would be living on pure magic, meaning his compulsion and telekinesis would be limited since his magic would be f
ocused on keeping him animated, keeping the wires in his brain sparking the right signals. Plus, he’d need to drink a whole lot more blood to keep his muscles alive. Otherwise, he’d become a zombie, essentially. Zombies ate brains for the nutritional value, because they couldn’t get it all from blood or food. He did not want to be a zombie with fangs.
“Ember,” he gasped, struggling to talk when he couldn’t breathe without risking certain zombification – breathing involved your chest moving. Therefore, breathing was a bad idea. “Ember, please, don’t. Please just...let go.” His voice was faint, rough, about two octaves higher than usual. For all the trouble and danger he’d gotten into over the years – hell, over the last five months even – this was possibly the closest he’d come to actual death – such as death was for a vampire. Maybe second only to when he’d gotten staked by that moron from The Society. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he supposed he’d always known this girl would be the death of him; she’d affected him differently from the very start and from the moment he’d gotten her name, he’d been hooked on her. Addicted to the poison she sent spilling through his brain every time she was near. He’d just never guessed she’d use her hands to actually kill him.
Ember tilted her head as she looked up at him, her expression no longer one of dark fury, but of simple quizzicality. There was a look in her eyes, just like in his nightmare, of emptiness. It chilled him like ice water in his veins. Ember was gone. There was a pure, born, predatory vampire standing in front of him now, wearing Ember’s face, with her hand in his chest. He’d done it this time. He’d made her snap, pushed her too far. He’d heard of things like this happening before. Usually only to full-blooded vampires, but with Ember’s volatile temper, he wasn’t too surprised it had happened to her. What happened to those vampires was they got so furious, so full of rage and pain and guilt and whatever other strong emotions came to them in whatever situation they were in, and it pushed them over the edge of their humanity. It was usually temporary, but they rarely remembered what they’d done while infuriated after they came back to themselves. Sometimes, the vampire nature just got out of control and if you were a particularly emotional vampire, this happened.
It was clear that Ember’s inner vampire had snapped its leash and was running rampant. And he had no idea how to push it back. This was one of those rare times when he wished he could compel her. God, he wished it desperately right now. He was panicking, his heart hammering frantically under Ember’s slender fingers. Crap, he needed to do something right this second, or else he was going to be screwed six ways from Sunday.
Ember blinked, her eyes filling, a fragile, broken smile spreading across her lips, and for a second he thought she’d fought back her vampire, but her next words, in a painfully sweet voice, shattered that hope. “You break my heart, I break yours.”
Right at that second, just as her slim fingers began to curl around his thrashing heart, the door flew open to reveal Cris. He was carrying a bundle of papers, his camera was on a cord around his neck, and he was flipping through photos on top of the papers as he spoke. “Hey, Emz, you know that guy in the year above us who’s going out with Sarah Allan? Turns out he’s actually—” Cris looked up, grinning, and instantly shut up. His grin fell away, replaced by an open-mouthed expression of shock. His jade-green eyes went wide under the messy pale blond hair falling over his face. Ember hissed at him, obviously not happy about the interruption, and Reid thanked whatever forces were at work for sending in one of the two people able to compel an elemental.
“Cris,” Reid wheezed, locking eyes with the other boy, hoping he would see that this was no little lovers spat. This was serious. Ember had gone off her nut. “Compel her. Now. Do it.”
Cris got the message and didn’t even hesitate. He got in between Ember and Reid as much as he could without nudging Ember’s arm, and while her glare was fixed on him, he compelled her with his Fae magic. Reid didn’t hear what exactly he said, because he was too busy trying not to pass out, but was still conscious enough to feel it when Ember’s hand slid free from his chest. He collapsed almost immediately, like Ember had taken all his energy with her when she’d removed her hand from around his heart. The rough carpet scratched his cheek and palms, but he couldn’t find the inclination to move. He was quite happy right there on the floor. If he was getting blood on the carpet, he didn’t care. His head was throbbing, his heart felt like it would explode, and there was a fist-sized hole in his chest that was ever so slowly healing itself. Right now, a nap sounded like a nice idea.
He must have passed out for a moment because the next thing he knew, he was being lifted off the floor. Even with eyes shut, his head swirled with dizziness and he groaned. Why did his chest hurt so much? Jeez, did someone stake him again or something? Voices filtered blurrily to his ears, slowly becoming more distinct. Two close voices, males, and a third, female, further away. It took him a moment to figure out what they were saying. He was dumped onto, what he assumed, was a bed and just lay there on his back, listening, too tired to bother moving or even opening his eyes. Could he go back to sleep? He wanted to go back to sleep. Maybe that burning in his chest would be gone when he woke up again.
“What happened? I just felt a wave of iciness through the link, like she was being swallowed by a glacier,” one voice said.
“I don’t really know. I just walked in and she had her hand wrist-deep in his chest. I mean, I’ve seen her angry before, but it was like…it wasn’t even like she was outwardly raging or anything. She just looked savagely cold, like her only thought was killing him. I have no idea. I can’t imagine what could push her that far, make her that angry at him,” voice two answered, sounding confused and shaken.
There was a long pause, during which Reid could hear background noises of shuffling and breathing, and beyond that, running water and a scrubbing noise, topped by a high-pitched whining. Then, finally, voice one spoke again. “I thought you’d already know by now. I saw him kissing Liandra in the forest yesterday,” voice one said quietly, something sharp in the edges of his voice.
There was another, longer silence. Then a stream of curses muttered under someone’s breath. Something clattered on tile slightly further away, accompanied by a yelp, and then the continuation of the whining noise. Curious and confused, Reid found the energy to pull his eyes open. The first thing he saw was white, dissected by thin lines of brown. The ceiling of Ember’s room. Why was he in her room? His chest still hurt. He looked down and saw a ragged hole in his t-shirt, stained deep crimson with blood. Under the t-shirt, there was a healing hole in his chest, through which he could see his pectoral muscles sewing themselves back together. That explained the burning. Also, with the sight of his blood, came memory. He remembered what he was doing here and what had happened.
“Crap!” He didn’t really mean to say it, but it slipped out, followed by a fit of coughing. When he took his hand away from his mouth, it came away red. He wiped the back of the hand across his mouth. More red. He was coughing up blood. Wonderful. Then he became aware of eyes on him and looked up at Hiro and Cris, both staring at him as if they weren’t quite sure whether to hate him or not. Sure he’d kissed Lia – technically, she’d kissed him. That did make a difference – but he’d also just nearly had his heart torn out – literally – by his insane girlfriend. Surely that counted for something?
Something clattered on tile again and he realized it was coming from the bathroom. So was the high-pitched whining. Ember. It had to be Ember. He had to talk to her, make sure she was okay, make sure she was herself again. Carefully, he started to get up off the bed, but Hiro moved to the doorway of the bathroom and Cris moved to put a gentle, but restraining hand on his shoulder. Reid glared up at him. Cris just gazed back, his mouth in an uneven line. He looked like he wanted to say something, but wasn’t sure how to phrase it.
“I need to make sure she’s okay,” Reid said, his voice rough from coughing up blood. His lip stung and it took him a second to work out that h
is fangs were out. His upper jaw ached, too. Bloodlust was gnawing at him and he needed blood soon. But first, he needed to see Ember.
Cris gave him a hard look, not quite a glare but not a nice look either. “I’m pretty sure she isn’t,” he said bluntly, using a harsh tone that sounded especially threatening in his Irish accent. Disapproval was written all over his features, darkening his green eyes. So this was what Cris looked like angry. Good to know so he would recognize it in future. But, right this minute, it just bugged him.
He shrugged off Cris’s hand and got to his feet, trying not to wince as the muscles in his chest twisted. Cris glared but stepped back. Reid tried to bite back his aching fangs. “It’s none of your business, Cris, so just let me deal with it,” he said evenly. He moved toward the bathroom, where the door was hanging open just a little, but Hiro didn’t look inclined to move for anything less than a bulldozer. His jagged red hair shadowed his amber eyes, pointed to his sharp cheekbones, making him look oddly sinister. His thin lips curled back from his pointy, white teeth and he emitted a low warning growl. The violent urge to chop up and feed the fox-boy to a werewolf swept over Reid and he ignored it. Sherry was right. It wasn’t Hiro’s fault, it was his own. He’d screwed up. Hiro had only been being loyal to Ember by telling her that her boyfriend was a cheating moron – even if he wasn’t. Okay, so he was technically but…that wasn’t the point.
“Hiro, please man, let me talk to her. I just want to fix this. Look, I know you just did what you had to. Now I need to do what I have to. That girl is my life and if I can’t fix this…you can tie me to the nearest train tracks if you like. Just let me try.” At this point, he felt no shame pleading with Hiro. They didn’t like each other much, but they both wanted Ember to be happy, and if there was the chance that Reid could still make Ember happy, Hiro had to let him try. It was like an unspoken agreement between them.
