by Chloe Garner
The man turned and walked the length of the building, pulling open the door to the manager’s office and looking over at Jason, face half-lit where the light from the office spilled over him, then shook his head and went into the office.
“Freak,” Jason said under his breath. He went into the room, where Sam was sitting on his bed, lost somewhere.
“You suppose he hangs upside down in the closet?” Jason asked. Sam smiled, then closed his eyes.
“I don’t feel right, Jason,” he said. Jason took off his shirt and stretched, headed for the bathroom.
“We’ll find her tomorrow. You said it was afraid of her, just waiting for her to sleep, or whatever. She’s too strong for that. She’ll give us the time we need to find her.”
“It’s not her,” Sam said. “Carter’s right. It’s darkness. I just want to lay down and not get up.”
“You’re upset. And you shouldn’t listen to that psychopath,” Jason said. “He’s probably the reason Sam’s freak-nuts in the first place.”
“Maybe. But it’s like there’s a rock on my chest, and it’s just getting bigger. I don’t know if I care if we find her or not.”
“Then let’s just give up,” Jason said. “Let Carter take care of it. There’s a drink stand on the boardwalk in South Carolina I’ve been itching to get back to for a while now.”
Sam looked at him with alarm, and Jason folded up his forehead in pity.
“You do care. You’re just upset. And maybe there’s some other stuff going on, too. Whatever. We’ll figure it out once we get her back.”
He motioned with his head.
“Get some sleep. We’ll pick it back up in the morning.”
“I don’t want to sleep.”
Jason smiled.
“I promise to set the alarm early enough that it hurts, if that makes you feel any better.”
“Before first light,” Sam said. Jason nodded.
“Yeah. You’ve got it.”
<><><>
Carter’s knock on the door beat the alarm. Sam opened his eyes, but the room wasn’t any better lit than the back of his eyelids. Things scratched in the walls, scratched under the floor, scratched somewhere in the places in his brain that he hadn’t known existed. They weren’t just watching any more. They were whispering. And the grin watching him was smug now.
A crack of orange light from a lamp outside sliced across the ceiling and Sam arched his back, nearly throwing himself on the floor trying to get away from it.
“Any day now,” Carter said.
“I’m ready. Let me get Sam,” Jason said. He closed the door, and Sam launched himself out of the bed.
“Wait,” he said.
“What?”
“Wait. Carter. Wait.”
Jason opened the door and called Carter back.
“Let me see her,” Sam said. Carter frowned. “Let me see her again.”
Carter stepped into the room and turned on a light, and Sam threw an arm across his eyes.
“Really should tie him down,” Carter said.
“Let me see her,” Sam said, holding the arm up over his eyes.
“Sam…” Jason said. Sam shook his head violently.
“Now.”
Carter put one thumb in his mouth, then the other, and Sam closed his eyes.
Samantha was slumped lower on the floor, her breathing shallower. She looked up at him.
“Hello, Beloved,” she said, her voice rough. She coughed and struggled against the wall, but her arms were trying to lever around a body that wasn’t responding. She looked down at her own body, then back up at Sam.
“I dozed off for a second, and he touched me again.” Her voice was soft. Frighteningly soft. “I can’t feel my heart beat.”
She sighed.
“Twice, last night. You were close twice. I don’t know if it helps or hurts, but I did yell.”
There was a hissing noise over in the corner, and she looked over at the demon and made a hissing noise back.
“You won’t have my fear,” she said. “You may take my body, but you won’t have my fear.”
She looked back up at Sam.
“Don’t come again.” She pressed her lips together. “You being here is a comfort to me, but I don’t want you to come and watch me die. Find me or not, you standing there while I die would break my heart.”
She swallowed and nodded.
“Adieu, Beloved. To God.”
Again, he tried to find a way to back out of the room, calling on the feeling from gliding across the Texas desert, but even more quickly than last time he was standing in the motel room, blinding light making his brain thrash against the back of his skull.
“Well?” Carter asked. Sam stumbled backwards, wildly trying to find the chair that had to be there somewhere. Jason helped him sit.
“She’s giving up,” Sam said. “She told me not to come back.”
Carter muttered something harsh-sounding under his breath.
“But she’s alive,” Jason said. “We’ll find her.”
Sam dropped his head over his knees, seeking darkness.
“Turn off the damn light,” he said. “I can’t think.”
“Dark won’t help,” Carter said. “We should go.”
Jason walked over to the lightswitch and the world relaxed again, just enough.
“It’s only been a day and a half,” Jason said. “We’ve got time.”
“How much did she drink at dinner?” Carter asked.
“Sorry?” Jason asked.
“You said she slept all day, then you stopped for dinner and came here. How much did she drink at dinner?”
“She was still sleepy,” Sam said from between his knees, his voice echoing uncomfortably against his head. “I don’t think she got through an entire glass of water.”
“We need to go now,” Carter said.
“Three days is the rule on water,” Jason said. Sam heard Carter’s foot spin on the carpet.
“Before you die, yeah, not before a demon can kill you. Water is a major source of natural magic. If she’s powered down far enough that a parasite like this can take her, her body’s water supply is probably about the only thing between her and it.” There was a pause. “You really don’t know anything about symbolic magic, do you?”
Something was teasing at Sam through the darkness of his mind. He tried to remember what Samantha looked like, sitting against the wall in the basement of a random house in Memphis, and even his memory was dark and colorless. Something red-tinged and intentional poked at him. Feeling like he was wobbling on a diving board and going to fall either way, he grabbed at it.
White-hot light seared through his brain and for a moment he couldn’t even feel gravity. In the next moment, he was already outside of the motel room, running. It was like strings ran from somewhere else, through his brain, down his arms, and out through the palms of his hands, pulling him. It was exquisite and the most painful thing he had ever experienced. Somewhere behind him, the still-human part of his brain knew that Jason and Carter were following him, and Jason was yelling. He ran.
The human part of his brain knew that he could run a mile in seven minutes. The psychic part skipped that part. He was standing over her backpack, where it was wedged under a manic bush that wanted to be a tree at the front edge of a short yard in front of an abandoned house. He picked up her backpack and held it to his chest, looking up at the building. It was pretty. Samantha would have walked up the path to get a closer look at it, seeing that it was abandoned and therefore not inappropriate to do so. The demon had surprised her, in the darkness, and her backpack and fallen on the ground, then rolled down to the bushes. He didn’t know how long he stood there before Jason caught up, panting. Sam realized that his heart was racing with exertion, and he was also panting. Samantha’s backpack rose and fell under his chin with his breath. Carter was a ways behind Jason.
“These…” he said, “are five… hundred… dollar… shoes.”
Sam
stood, unconcerned, looking at the house. There was a door. And then there were stairs. And then there was another door. And then there was Samantha. The fact that darkness had claimed his brain, or that he could see like it was broad daylight in what was actually the light of a barely-hatched dawn were unimportant. He started forward. Behind him, he heard Carter speak.
“You two just get her out of there. I’ll take care of it.”
“No way, man. I’ve got your back,” Jason said. Carter snorted.
“Worst thing possible. Just get her out.”
He might have concerned himself with the demon, if he had been there on his own, but he wasn’t sure. It didn’t matter. He opened the front door. It was locked and bolted, but one moment he was outside of it and the next moment he was inside of it. It was open. He walked to the door at the top of the stairs. He hadn’t counted this one. It opened, as well. Behind him, there was a crash as it hit the wall. The last door opened on both sides at the same time, falling flat. Open. He walked to the center of the room, and the hot white trail ended. He was in the dark again. Something hissed. Spoke what might have been words. Behind him, Carter answered them. Sam walked over to Samantha and picked her up off the ground. She didn’t respond. He held her against his chest - somehow her backpack had ended up on his back - and put his face against her forehead, lifting her shoulders up high so that he could reach her lolling head. Jason checked her pulse.
“She’s alive, Sam. Let’s go.”
Behind him, as he headed up the stairs, there was the sound of a scuffle, and the sheer ringing of a metal blade.
<><><>
Samantha woke in a giant, soft bed, in a cream-colored room fit for a fairy queen. She closed her eyes and took a breath, the familiar, if not commonly-noticed, sensation of her own heart beating taking the central focus of her world for a few seconds. She opened her eyes.
“Carter,” she said.
“You’re an idiot,” he answered.
“Sam,” Jason said, standing. He walked to the side of the bed and sat down next to her. She scooted up into the pile of pillows behind her and took a deep breath.
“No harm done,” she said. He smiled.
“You really had the two of them worried for a bit there,” he said. She shook her head playfully.
“But not you, huh?”
“Never,” he said. “I told them you were too stubborn to go out like that.”
She smiled.
“Didn’t know you were that big a fan.”
He leaned forward and kissed the hair over her ear, holding her head against his face for a moment.
“You are never going back to New York,” he said softly. “Ever.”
She nodded.
“No. I didn’t figure.”
She looked over to the corner of the room, where Sam was huddled in a chair, head bent over his shoulder to face the corner.
“How long was I asleep?” she asked.
“Do you remember us coming for you?” Jason asked.
“No.”
“We got to Memphis two nights ago. It’s about seven p.m. now.”
“Two days?” she asked. He nodded. She motioned him away with her head, then looked back at Sam.
“Sam,” she said. He shuddered. “Beloved. Come to me.”
He stood, his head hung low and turned to one side, like an ashamed animal, and walked to the bed. He didn’t sit. She reached across the bed to take his wrist.
“Sit. Please.”
He closed his eyes and his head dropped straight. He sat.
She reached up and rubbed his back, settling back into the pillows, and slowly his posture returned to normal.
“Are you okay?” he asked. “Really?”
“Yes, Beloved. I’m here.”
He turned and looked at her, then sighed and fell back against the pillows next to her.
“I was afraid,” he said.
“I was, too,” she said.
“So you’re curing psychic sickness, now,” Carter said. Samantha didn’t blink.
“Preventing it is more accurate, under better circumstances, but yes.”
“You’re going to make him weak,” Carter said. Sam’s eyebrows came in, but she shook her head at him and he relaxed.
“I’m letting him take his time,” she said. Carter stood.
“Gentlemen, and I use the word in the loosest possible way, would you please give us a minute?”
“No way in hell,” Jason said. Sam simply didn’t move. She smiled at him.
“It’s okay,” she whispered, then sat up.
“Guys, this is my mentor. I lived with him for five years, and he taught me… Well, he pretended to teach me everything I know. He isn’t going to hurt me.” She glanced at Jason and winked. “Even if he tries.”
Sam sat up, but Jason stood his ground. She looked at him and smiled slyly.
“I’d tell you that his bark is worse than his bite, but it isn’t true. He does bite. But, as it happens, I bite worse.”
Jason glanced at Carter, who opened his hands.
“I won’t argue if it will make you go away.”
Jason and Sam exchanged a glance.
“We’ll be right outside,” Jason said. She waited until the door closed, then looked at Carter.
“They’re charming,” he said.
“Carter, it touched me. They’re not supposed to be able to do that.”
“Did you believe that at the time?”
“Right up until he actually did it.”
“Are you sure that was the order? They play mind games. You know that for a fact a demon can’t paralyze you, too, right up until he convinces you otherwise, then all of a sudden you can’t walk. Fear sets in, you spiral. Sam, you know it’s about faith, better than anyone. Belief. Shake it off.”
Samantha lay back in the pillows.
“Abby says hello. Made me get you the room upgrade.”
Samantha looked at the ceiling.
“Love you too, babe.”
She looked at Carter.
“Nice doesn’t suit you,” she said.
“Come back with me,” he said.
“No.”
“You don’t belong with these provincials. Come back and do real work again.”
“I’ve made a commitment. I’m staying.”
“To the sniffy one who just woke up? You know that you don’t have what it takes to train him. And he… Sam, he doesn’t deserve what you’re giving him.”
“He’s psychic, and I’m going to help him. End of conversation.”
“Fine. Bring your toy poodle back with you. Just come back.”
“Nice. Nothing has changed.”
“You’re powered down so far that a class three could end you,” Carter said. “I can’t believe you’re being this irresponsible.”
Samantha sighed and looked away.
“Carter… You ever think that maybe that was the point?”
Carter was silent.
“I’m so tired of watching everything I do. Of living up to perfection. Knowing is exhausting, Carter. I’ve spent the last two years wanting it to be over.”
“And now?”
She sighed.
“I’m taking care of my fingernails again.”
“It’s a start.” He sat down on the bed and narrowed his eyes at her, dropping his head after a moment, still watching her.
“I’m not going to lecture you on life. They’re all your arguments, to begin with. You should listen to them.”
She held his gaze.
“I’m tired, Carter. But I have a job to do, now. Run back home to your nest. I’m not going with you.”
He stood.
“How much are you willing to sacrifice your potential to avoid putting them at risk?” he asked. She shrugged.
“I’m not even worried about it. I’ll keep them out of it.”
He shook his head.
“Not good enough.”
“Best you’re going to get. Go home, Carter.
”
“I’m not leaving,” he said. She smiled.
“Have you noticed the pair of brutes I keep around, these days?”
He grimaced.
“You know I don’t like being the short one.”
She grinned wider.
“I do. Sam! Jason!”
Jason opened the door as though he had been standing against it.
“Everything okay?” he asked.
“Carter is leaving.”
Carter looked up at Jason on one side, then even higher at Sam on the other, then straightened his collar.
“Rest well. I’ll be in touch.”
Jason jostled him.
“Is that a threat?”
“No,” Samantha said. “It’s as affectionate as he gets. It means he isn’t going to stop thinking about me the moment he walks out of the room. It was good to see you, too, Carter.”
Jason walked Carter out and Sam lay down next to Samantha again.
“We need to talk,” he said. She nodded.
“Undoubtedly. But right now I’m about a quart low.” She sat up and waited for Jason to come back.
“Who wants room service?”
Sam and Samantha sat on the couch, staring at a muted television. Jason had gone downstairs to the bar twenty minutes earlier and Samantha had turned on the television. She leaned against Sam’s shoulder, mind floating with a renewed need to sleep, but she propped her eyes open.
“You should probably tell me what happened,” she said. “In as much detail as possible.”
“When?”
“Jason and Carter were giving you space. Jason hasn’t made fun of you once, tonight. Something happened.”
“I was the one who found you.”
She smiled absently.
“I knew you would be.”
I just woke up that morning and…” he turned his head to look down at her, then shifted his arm. She settled in against his chest. “I felt really, really bad.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Is that what’s normal?”
“Yes.”
“You’re keeping me from feeling like that all the time?”
“That’s just the front edge,” Samantha said.
“Wow. I didn’t feel like me.”
“Leading theory says you aren’t you.”
“Yeah. But I was sitting there, and Carter was talking about how you were going to die… And…”
