Burning in a Memory

by Constance Sharper

  “They are going to wait to turn him until he is weaker. It’s likely they’re going to come get me first, and when I’m out of the pit I’ll start the biggest fight I can. I suspect the others have come on a rescue mission for you and, with my distraction, it’ll give them a better chance to get you out,” she said.

  He faltered under her touch.

  “What?”

  “The shades heard something around the manor. It’s got to be the others coming for you. So really, now is the time to reconsider your stupid suicide mission and be with your family.”

  He closed the distance between them abruptly and took her by the shoulders. He leaned forward and their foreheads touched.

  “What did they say, Adelaide?”

  “They heard something in the woods…”

  “What did they say about you, Adelaide?” he interrupted her, directing her.

  She stole a gulp of air but had trouble saying what was next.

  “They’re going to turn me into a shade. I’m afraid it won’t be long now until they do.”

  Thirty-one

  Adam sat next to her in the small confines of their prison but Adelaide had never felt farther removed from him in that moment. Her world felt numb and she felt alone in her painful thoughts. She rested her chin on her knees and kept her eyes closed.

  Their spell earlier had been broken for some time and they did not touch. Adelaide wasn’t sure how much time had passed since they’d been in the dark pit, but her body told her it’d been too long. Her stomach had long since begged for food and her muscles ached from the cramped space and hard floor. When Adam finally spoke, she was surprised.

  “Were you close to your cousin?” he asked. His voice sounded genuine so she didn’t let his question go unanswered.

  “Not really. I think we might have been but she was a teenager when she was turned. I was only four or five. I never got to know her outside of what you saw up there, but she did save me when I was kid. For that, I feel bad,” she said. Letting out a breath, she felt an unfamiliar emotion surge through her. The words actually felt liberating, even if Adam wasn’t the best audience to hear them.

  “Well, I’m sorry. One way or another, it’s hard to lose family,” he said.

  The emotion of liberation faded quickly. Her mind returned to what she’d nearly done to Leon and it left her with a sinking feeling in her stomach.

  “I’m sorry,” Adam added. “I might have judged you harshly on the front. If I was alone as a mage, I don’t know what I’d do.”

  She resisted the urge to scoff. If he were alone, he’d run into a shade’s lair on a suicide mission to save his family. Fast-forward to them sitting in a dank dungeon, starving and delirious from dehydration before they were taken to the chopping block. The shades hadn’t mentioned Adam’s fate, but she knew it was only one of two things. The guilt grew worse. She struggled to answer him coherently.

  “Don’t worry about it. It’s my fault on that front, too. I was taken in by a human family and had no aura. I could have lived an awesome life, but I let curiosity get in my way. I kept hunting for clues until I ran into the Hawthorns. I caused every bad thing that’s happened to me.” Mistel had told her that weeks ago but now it seemed bitterly true. Adelaide struggled to shake the mental image of her dead cousin.

  “It doesn’t sound like you just stumbled upon some books and thought it was cool. You wanted to know what happened to your real family—your coven, I mean,” he pointed out.

  She nodded slowly, though he couldn’t see her.

  “I did want to know what happened to them. I wanted to find people who could do the things I could do. Growing up with humans didn’t mean I could avoid coming into my powers. ”

  She suddenly flexed her fingertips. With a gentle pull on her exhausted aura, a flicker of fire lit above her palm. The pit lit up in the dim red hue until she let it go out. The light actually burned her eyes. She curled her fingers back into her chest.

  “How did you first figure out you have powers? Did you light something on fire?” Adam asked.

  She laughed weakly.

  “No, but I figured out how to make my glass shatter. It sounds strange but I thought, at first, I was some telepath from the X-men.”

  She’d broken her mirror with magic by accident once. Then she tried it out on her window. Her mother kicked down the door, wielding a broom like a weapon and screaming. That mental image finally made Adelaide smile, as the conversation turned to something besides their looming fate.

  “I couldn’t imagine what that made being a teenager like,” he quipped.

  “I still am a teenager,” she pointed out.

  “You’re still a teenager…” Adam repeated quietly.

  She hurried before their conversation took on a dark tone again.

  “My mother was a smart woman, but she didn’t know much about magic. She just helped me hide it. She was always afraid something would happen to me like it happened to my coven. Of course when she told me that, I couldn’t let my curiosity go. After I left for college, it became easier to look. I dropped out and did it full time. I guess I didn’t see my destiny involving student debt and paper degrees.”

  Adelaide paused. She hadn’t considered it before, but now she realized that her family would never know what happened to her down here. They would never know why she wasn’t coming home. The thought was crippling. Desperate to stop the sullen thoughts from overtaking her, she engaged Adam.

  “Did you ever go to college?” she asked.

  Adam took awhile to answer.

  “I did. I have a bachelor’s in microbiology, but with the family issues, I never got to use it.”

  “Oh, kind and smart,” she said without thinking. Adam shifted from his spot on the wall. She noticed he now sat another inch away from her. She clung to the free flowing conversation.

  “Adam, can I ask you something kind of weird?”

  “What?” he cued, sounding uncertain.

  “I mean, I know some things about shades but maybe there’s something that I don’t know. You say that most shades kill automatically, that they give no mercy. If that’s true, I feel like being near Mistel was more than dumb luck sometimes. Even statistically speaking, I couldn’t be that lucky,” she explained.

  “What are you thinking?” he asked.

  “Mistel had ample opportunity to hurt me and never did. Upstairs, I was almost certain she was trying to help me, in her own twisted way. I wonder now if there’s anything left of the person when the shade takes their body. I wonder if part of Mistel was still in there, resisting because she knew me.”

  Adam stayed silent for a long time. When he answered, he answered quietly.

  “Even if I thought it was possible, do you really want to think that’s what happens to them?”

  His question abruptly made her whimper.

  “Yea, you’re right. They’re going to turn me into a shade. I always thought it’d be like automatically dying. What do you think it’s like to die?”

  Adam abruptly cursed. His loud shout of words filled the tiny pit and returned to them in echoes. She jumped from surprise.

  “I just heard you screaming up there and was convinced they were torturing you!” he said then. “I have never panicked that much in my life and now you’re asking me what its like to die?”

  She recoiled a bit and nudged the last subject.

  “Adam, you brought me here knowing that was a damn good chance. Hell, it was your plan! Why are you freaking out about it now?” she asked.

  She never intended to hit a sore spot, but she clearly did.

  “I wanted so much to hate you. I didn’t even know exactly what you did but I knew it was bad. I knew it involved my brother and it made me angry. I wanted to hate you and I would have been okay with you dying.”

  It was her turn to collect herself before talking.

  “Well, it did involve your brother. You probably should hate me, Adam,” she whispered. He interrupted her bef
ore she could say more.

  “For the first time ever, I think I see the real Adelaide, and I don’t like how much I like her. Don’t you understand? Stop talking. Stop making yourself seem like a real person.”

  She scoffed, but he cut her off again. His hand reached out this time, and before she could shift to avoid the contact, he had her by the wrist. At the hot touch, the remainder of her self control barreled down with it. When he pulled, she gave. His arms swept around her in a tighter, closer embrace. It felt bizarre but she didn’t fight.

  “Adelaide, I’ve been struggling with you forever. I don’t know if I can fight it anymore. And I don’t know if I can listen to you die,” he said and his voice broke on the last few words.

  She went still in his embrace. Her chest burned when she couldn’t take a breath. Being in his arms would never feel right again.

  “Let me tell you why I came then. You won’t mind so much,” she whispered and her head felt like it was floating. She felt a thousand miles away from her body at that moment.

  “It doesn’t matter now. Don’t bother. If the others are coming then maybe we’ll all get out.”

  He moved and caught her chin between his fingers. Adam’s an idiot, she thought. Almost as bad as she was, in this moment, for letting him kiss her. His lips met hers with a bruising force. He kissed greedily. She opened her mouth and allowed him access. He bit at her bottom lip and she moaned against him. His grip tightened at the sound of it.

  She gasped when he broke away, cold and empty.

  “You can’t be kissing me right now,” she whispered.

  “I can do what I want,” he said back.

  “What a time to be stubborn. Adam, you can’t forgive me. You can’t care about me. Especially not now,” she explained. Her words strengthened her own resolve and she pushed away from him.

  “I want so much to be with you, Adelaide. Let me figure this out.”

  He was working her over without knowing it. She clung desperately at the resolve she had left.

  “I tried to kill your brother,” she blurted. She couldn’t see his reaction but it gave her the courage to continue. “I was hired by the Hawthorns to do it in exchange for my own life. But I knew I couldn’t get to him because he was too protected. So I did some research and found out you existed. I knew that meeting you and getting in with you would lead me right to him. I was right. Adam, I picked you up because I thought you were the weakest link. You were the nice guy and you’d fall for my charms.”

  Something insane possessed her now and she completely broke away from him. More words spilled from her—they were the absolute truth. It felt wild and liberating. The pain in her chest finally manifested into the story.

  “You were just supposed to be a pawn in my game. Things changed and I thought about staying and living with you as a human. I knew I liked you then, but that stupid shade in the basement was going to out me. So I went upstairs to kill Leon by using the Hawthorns’ poison. I didn’t know at the time that the poison wasn’t intended to kill him. I tried to run away and, well, you know the rest.”

  The last of the story escaped her and she clutched her heart.

  “Weakest link?” he whispered.

  “You know the truth now. All of it. And you won’t forgive me, but you will escape when they take me up there. Now I can die with a clear conscience.”

  She didn’t know what she expected from her statement, but she wasn’t too surprised when he got angry. His aura flailed dangerously and Adam stood now too.

  “You selfish prick,” he snapped. The comment took her aback. “I told you not to tell me that!”

  She lifted her chin in defiance.

  “You deserved to know the truth.”

  “I deserve for you to respect me and my wishes for once!” Adam suddenly moved to her and pinned her in a cage between his arms and the wall. She flinched.

  “Adam, I’m trying to help you. You don’t want to like me because I am not getting out of here and even I’ve come to terms with that. If you can’t listen to me die, then you better start covering your ears now!”

  He growled darkly but released her from his cage. The metal lid of their prison shifted, surprising them both. The silhouette of shades became visible from above.

  “Time’s up, I guess,” she announced with much more confidence than she felt. “Now I’m going to fight and create as much of a distraction as I can. If the others can rescue you, don’t come back. Just run!”

  “Adelaide! Adelaide!”

  Adam’s words were sounded out by the catcalls from the shades above. He grabbed at her but she pushed him away. The shades retrieved her from the pit and her feet touched the basement floor again. The courage that brought her this far wavered when she saw all of the shades’ faces. They dragged her back up the stairs, back down the halls.

  “Leon!” she screamed when she saw him again. The shades dragged her through his hallway. He twitched, seeming suddenly more coherent. His slurred voice responded. “Kathy?” he asked.

  She growled.

  “Leon, do something. Help! Help your brother; he’s in the basement! Help!”

  The shades quieted her with a strike to her head. Her vision blurred and the shades carried her on from there. Leon never responded as she was taken away. The last ounce of hope slipped from her. A door shut somewhere behind her and they dropped her to the ground. This was it. She had to fight. Adelaide tapped an aura but the shades were stronger. In a short battle, they ended it. Two secured Adelaide by the arms and held her tight.

  “Don’t cry,” one of the shades said, “you’ll find it healing.”

  “Let me die,” Adelaide offered instead. “I can’t lose myself! I don’t want to die! ”

  “Don’t beg. It’s unbecoming of a soon-to-be Hawthorn.”

  Adelaide thrashed until her energy gave out. Then she looked around the room. It was better lit than she expected and not nearly as dank. This place hardly made up her nightmares. She wondered then if the place they took Mistel was as nice. At least, Adelaide hoped it had been. It wasn’t so bad.

  “Open your mouth and remember to breath. This won’t hurt a bit.”

  The shade lied.

  Thirty-two

  Adelaide opened her eyes to see the ceiling. She gripped her elbows, surprised she wasn’t in pain, and sat up. Glass crunched beneath her body and she cringed. Seeking out the source of the debris, she spotted a series of broken windows in the corner. Moonlight slipped in just enough to bathe the serrated sill in a blue glow. The light drew her to her feet and she walked to the window to peer outside. Sparse trees littered the area and stretched out as far as the eye could see.

  Remembering the rest of the room, she whirled to take it in and found herself alone. The door waited for her at the opposite side. The door wasn’t locked and she opened it slowly. Then the scent of smoke spread into the room. She took a step outside and found the place covered in soot. The room felt hot as if still burning somewhere. She walked carefully, half expecting the ground to give out from under her.

  The entire place looked abandoned and partially destroyed. Shadows stained the wall where missing furniture had once spent its lifetime. Carpet had been torn to shreds and the frayed remains coated the dirty ground. Her boots crunched over more broken glass as she headed out of the front door.

  For the first time since opening her eyes, she recognized where she was. Twenty or so steps from the house were bushes. Behind the thick row of bushes were a curb, a street, and a well-manicured park. She walked there slowly. The place wasn’t as cold as she remembered but the sensation of seeing it again was shocking. She walked beyond the bushes and stopped in front of the park. It still surprised her how close her first home had been to this park. This was the park where her human mother had found her.

  “Adelaide!”

  Her head whirled to follow the voice, but it was too faint to pinpoint. She listened for it again but heard nothing but whistling wind. Maybe she’d imagined it. A
lap around the park and she returned to the same spot. Her knees felt weak. She wanted to go back into the house but felt nauseated thinking about it. She stood outside with the wind and the faint voices within it. The curb next to the bushes looked more appealing by the second, and caving, she sat down. She sat and waited.

  She could have waited forever but something tugged at the back of her mind. She thought of someone, her fingers itched to touch, but whose presence was invisible. It struck her with a sudden migraine headache. She clutched her skull. Adam, she remembered. How could she have forgotten? Her world went black. The odd sensation of waking up seized her, even though she never recalled going to sleep.

  The world changed on her, morphing before her very eyes, until she stared at barren brown landscape illuminated by a fading gold sun. Her fingers rested on the cold sill and she smelled the bitter remains of a fire. She realized after a delayed moment that the sun resetting again meant nearly a day had past. It didn’t soften the blow of the next realization. Her boots clicked over a hard marble floor, as her body walked to a mirror.

  For the first time since seeing the real world again, she saw it as if only through a pane of glass. She felt her body move but never had attempted to move it. She felt her body’s sensations but through a dulled haze. She felt utterly removed from her body, even while staring out through her own eyes. Her body stopped in front of the mirror.

  Adelaide’s headache exploded into agony, but she couldn’t look away. Her reflection stared back at her—or its reflection stared back at her. Nothing about her oval face, brown locks of hair, or sideways smile seemed familiar to her. The small rim of crimson around massive pupils in her eyes told the remaining story. She’d dreamed of this moment, had roused from nightmares about it every night. Unlike her dreams though, she wasn’t waking up.

  “You look beautiful,” the vaguely familiar voice of Zachary commented from somewhere behind her. The shade inside Adelaide took a long moment to agree. It seemed fixated on Adelaide’s windswept hair, the cling of the corset top to her body, the show of skin revealed. All of the filth from the past few days had been carefully cleaned from her and she practically glowed to look her best. The shade’s examination ended after another minute and long after Adelaide wished it would end.