COME, THE DARK: (Forever Girl Series Book Two)

by Rebecca Hamilton

  She clears her throat and says something so fast and rushed that it takes a moment for my mind to make words of the sounds.

  “Bye, Cordovae.” This is what she’d said.

  “Bye,” I whisper.

  The air thickens; it’s harder to breathe. I want to say goodbye to William—I feel him staring at me—but I can’t look away from Tess. Though Adrian had betrayed her, he’d also helped save us. And I’d taken him away from her.

  “Tess—”

  “Screw it,” she says, turning toward me, tears in her eyes. She crosses the distance between us impossibly fast and wraps her arms around me, pulling me into her. “Fuck you, Cordovae. You’re really leaving us.”

  Tears pinch my throat, and I’m suffocating. I wrap my arms tightly around her and bury my face in her shoulder. “I have to, Tess. Anna needs me.”

  She pulls back and wipes her eyes with the back of her wrist. “Yeah, I know. I’d hate you if you didn’t leave, too.”

  I smile sadly, and a small smile breaks through her turmoil as well.

  Tess tilts her head toward William. “The hardest part, huh?”

  She walks away before I can answer, and I let my gaze fall into William’s. This is the moment I have dreaded. The moment where I must acknowledge the decision I am about to make. I am forced to choose between the only man who has never betrayed me and a daughter I can’t fully remember but will never forget.

  But as hard as it is to leave, my decision is easy. Anna needs me. Her life depends on my return, while William and Tess will be fine without me. And if I don’t return soon, there will be no undoing time, no undoing all that has happened and will happen to her in my absence. In the end, it comes down to one irrefutable fact: I can live with losing William, but I cannot live without my daughter.

  The choice is not difficult to make, and yet, acting on it painfully cripples my heart.

  “We never had a chance here,” I say.

  “No...” he says, and there’s more hanging there, but his frown presses too tight for any more words to slip through.

  My heart rate picks up in my chest as I try to find the bravery to ask him the scariest and most important request before I leave. “Come with me,” I say. “You and Tess.”

  His head drops back, and he lets out the saddest bark of laughter. “God, Cord, you’re killing me.” He shakes his head and takes both my hands in his. “It’s not that I don’t want to. I hope you know that. But we can’t go where we never belonged. Understand?”

  “I know you’ve traveled outside of this time,” I tell him. “things you have said, things that belong hundreds of years from now.”

  He nods. “I have—when the Universe has needed me to. I wish more than anything they needed me to go with you. But, Cord...they don’t. I can’t...leave here.”

  “Then I’ll bring Anna back here,” I say. “If I can. If I’m still Ankou when I get there.”

  I already feel defeated. What if once I travel home, I can never travel back again? What if I lose all of my abilities once this is really over?

  “Will I be?” I ask meekly. “Will I be Ankou when I return?”

  If I am—if it’s possible—then I could save Mama and Pa. I would never be able to look at them again, but I could save them. I could make them whole again.

  “I don’t know,” he says quietly. “Normally, no. Because it is Abigail’s body that is Ankou, not Rose’s. But things are different for you.”

  “So then maybe I might be able to come back.” I don’t feel the excitement I should. William’s expression is so forlorn. If I could come back, wouldn’t he be happier?

  “Anna doesn’t belong here, either,” he says finally. “And even if you could bring her here, would you, really? Would you want this life for her?”

  “It’s not worse than where I come from,” I say.

  William presses his fist to his mouth and sighs deeply. “I’ll never forget you.” I shake my head, but he doesn’t stop. The words just keep pouring from his mouth. “I fell in love with you even when I knew I shouldn’t.”

  And for some reason, that is my breaking point.

  All this time, I have wanted him to tell me how he feels, but now I desperately want to stuff those words back into his mouth, to undo them, to make them never happen so I can leave this place without knowing I am leaving someone who loved me back.

  I can barely speak. Barely squeak out the whisper of words. But eventually, they come. “No one falls on purpose.”

  And I know this. I know this because I love him, too. I don’t know when it happened, but I know it’s been happening since the day I met him, since that first spark that eventually ignited to a fire that can’t be ignored.

  Except I need to ignore it. I need to leave.

  “All this time,” he says, “I thought I knew my greatest weakness. That my capacity to love was what endangered my obligations in this world. But I was wrong, Cord. It was my fear of losing. You showed me that when no one else could. And as much as it pains me to see you go, I would never, never ask you to stay. Because I love you. And because I know your daughter will bring you a happiness I cannot substitute.”

  My shoulders tremble, and I wipe tears from my eyes. “Why would you tell me this now, William? It’s cruel. Couldn’t you just—”

  He presses his finger to my lips. “Shhh. Shhh.” He pulls me into him and strokes my hair. “I would never ask you to stay here for me, but I couldn’t let you leave without telling you how I felt. I’m sorry if it makes this more painful for you, but I know you are strong enough to still do what you need to do.”

  “Right,” I whisper. It’s all I can get out.

  I feel his Adam’s apple bob against the top of my head. “Please understand that I deserve to follow my heart, too,” he says. “I had to tell you how I feel or those unspoken words would have haunted me forever.”

  His words only make my love for him burn deeper. Burying my face into his shoulder, I can still smell the wood smoke on his clothes from the campfire earlier. I can still smell his sweat. Still smell me on him.

  “Don’t fall apart now,” he says soothingly, brushing an amber wave of hair from my eyes. “I was wrong about you, you know. I said you were selfish, but really, no selfish person would make the sacrifices you have. But now it’s time for one more of those sacrifices.” He holds me at arm’s length. “Great love can both take hold and let go, Cord. And now it’s time to let go.”

  I swallow and shake my head, but in my heart, I know he is right. I turn to face the open clearing. As badly as I want to get back to Anna, I don’t know how I’m going to do this. I don’t know how I’m going to run from the man I love. The guilt over feeling this way is only another weight holding me where I stand.

  A butterfly floats by on the warm breeze and settles on a dandelion by my feet. It has waited all this time to make its flight, and now it’s free. But I cannot relate. I am destined to never learn the feeling of freedom.

  “Go,” William says from behind me. When I don’t move, he shouts. “Go!”

  I tense, then take a deep breath, centering my thoughts on Anna. Remembering the way the earth felt between my bare feet as I ran to save her from Pa. I take another breath, breathing in the pain I felt that day. In my heart, in my lungs, in my womb.

  I take the first step.

  Though my stiff and achy body has begun to relax, tension is already returning as I fight the magnetic pull I feel toward William and Tess. I push through it and take another step.

  Then another.

  I’m scared. Terrified, really. I can’t imagine going back. I can’t imagine what awaits me there. Can’t envision it at all. Salem has a magnetic pull on me that I can’t explain. Leaving feels unnatural.

  Shouldn’t returning to my daughter feel like the most natural thing in the world?

  I feel trapped, and each step I take I have to push through that feeling. I have to accept that part of my heart will always belong here, but it’s not where I b
elong. With Anna is where I belong. Only her.

  It’s always been her.

  I take two more steps.

  And right now, she’s alone with Pa. I can’t leave her with him.

  My steps turn quicker.

  Five more steps.

  I miss her, and I love her, and the love of a mother is stronger than any other kind of love. Finally, I’m returning to her. To my Anna.

  Ten steps, then with my next breath, I am breaking across the clearing.

  My hair whips back, out of my face, like flames on the wind behind me. Tears are streaming my face as I run, but my heart is soaring ever closer to her. I can feel it. Back to where I belong. Back to Anna.

  I run harder, my legs burning, until I break through space. Through darkness and light.

  And then . . .

  April 1692

  I’m still here. I’m still with William and Tess. I’m still in this clearing with the chirr of crickets and the light thudding of deer running in the fields behind us and the soft roll of thunder that threatens a storm.

  I crumble to my knees in the clearing, and my calf rubs against a fallen log with bark softened from an earlier storm. I press my forehead into the ground. Sobs heave from my body. I’m going to be sick.

  William and Tess run over to me. I hear them shouting at me, but it’s all a haze.

  “Cord! Are you okay?”

  “What happened?”

  I don’t even know which of them is talking. William puts his hand on my back, but I just feel numb where he touches me.

  “I did everything I was supposed to,” I mumble through my tears. “I need to get back. Anna needs me! I did what you said. Why am I still here?”

  I grab fistfuls of the fresh spring grass and cry against the earth and hate the moon for casting her miserable light on my failure.

  I’m angry and I’m upset and I’m ripped up inside and out and my heart and my soul and my mind all want to explode. I can’t do this. I can’t take anymore. I can’t bear being alive. I can’t stop crying, I’ll never ever stop crying.

  If hope is gone, I have nothing.

  William and Tess are talking, but I can’t make out anything they say. It’s all muffled, drowning. The words are mushed and warbled.

  I cry until I fall asleep. I wake up in the night again, crying. William and Tess help me to my feet. My mind is foggy and my vision blurs, but I stumble with their help toward wherever we are going.

  To wherever we could possibly go from here.

  The next day, I’m well enough to hear William and Tess speak, but I’m only willing to listen if they’re trying to help me get home. I no longer care about leaving them. I hate myself for having ever felt that way. I hate them for existing.

  Tess hands me a cup of tea made from nightshade that she brewed over a small campfire just outside the cave we’ve taken shelter in. I sip it gently, and my stomach gurgles its thanks as the tart, poisonous berries that flavor the water start to recoup my body. The heat of a nearby fire warms my face and ears, and I drop the blanket from around my shoulders—early spring and already I feel overheated, perhaps from all the crying.

  “Maybe you’re still torn about where you want to be,” Tess says quietly. I can tell it wasn’t easy for her to suggest this, but I glare at her just the same

  Her words also pang my heart, feed my guilt. I may be torn, but I’m not unsure. Part of me may have wanted to stay with William, but all of me wanted to return to Anna.

  “You might just need time to give it all more thought. Meditate for a little and try again.”

  This time, William glares at her.

  “There is nowhere,” I say, not attempting to hide the edge in my voice, “that I’d rather be...than with Anna. If it’s too late to return, then what did I fight for? This world is dead to me without her.”

  Tess stares at me in pity, and I both love and hate her for it.

  “You don’t think...” I swallow around the painful lump in my throat. “You don’t think it’s too late, do you? It can’t be, not now. Not after all that.”

  Tess makes a sound—the start of a word I’ll never hear, because William lifts a hand, effectively silencing her. He stares down at where I lie, and I can’t tell if he’s angry or if he’s hurt, but he’s clearly not happy. And I don’t care.

  “We’ll take you to the Chibold,” he says. “They might help.”

  Tess scoffs. “Don’t do this to her, William. Don’t give her false hope.”

  I bolt upright, life returning to my body at these words. “It’s better than no hope,” I say. “When can we go to them? Can we go there now?”

  Tess throws her arms up in the air and rolls her eyes. “You’re an idiot, William. A real idiot.”

  He pulls her aside. I can’t hear what he says, but I hear Tess’ not-so-quiet whispered reply: “She needs to accept her fate, just as everyone else has. We can’t risk taking her to them.”

  “She deserves any chance she can get,” he says, loud enough that I know I’m meant to hear. “We can’t deny her that.”

  * * *

  The Chibold William knows don’t live the same elusive life of the Oracle, but William seems to think they will be equally wise in solving my problem. We find them not living hidden in some cave, not tucked away in some forest up in the mountains, nor any other inconspicuous location. Instead, they live in a small colony of ordinary Strigoi. We travel, even before nightfall, under the protection of my wings.

  Under the shadow of the early evening, the small town is gloomy and eerily calm. The fog lends a muddy darkness to the atmosphere, and I beg the darkness to come early, to hide every feeling I have, to leave me be to feel it alone and unseen.

  My body aches with every step. Even the fabric of my dress is like sandpaper on my skin. I’m freezing, but the cold comes from a feeling of loss instead of the lingering chill not yet overcome by the moist, early spring evenings.

  “Can they really help?” I choke out quietly.

  William wraps his arm around my shoulders. “If they don’t have the answers, they can get them.”

  Tess clears her throat and gives William a sideways glare.

  He twists toward her, never letting me go. “They’ve always been receptive to helping us in the past.” He turns back to me. “I’m sure they will do their best.”

  “But there are no guarantees,” Tess says daringly.

  William growls beneath his breath. “There never are.”

  We cross a small creek over a rickety bridge and reach a small house with cracks in the window and jars of the elements on the sills. Jars of salt. Jars of stone. Jars of various herbs. And, oddly, even a jar of light, though I cannot see where this light originates from.

  I could get lost staring into that jar, but William whisks me inside, through a thin wooden door to a cozy kitchen of a family I don’t know. He hasn’t knocked, and the family inside seems unconcerned. I’m instantly comforted by the familiar aroma of smoke and the taste of charred cold air wafting inside the walls of their small home.

  “Cord, I’d like you to meet Jessup and Eleanor,” William says.

  I reach my hand out to the older woman, and she laughs, then points to the children beside her.

  “This is Jessup and Eleanor,” she says, before attending the whistle of a nearby kettle.

  I freeze, unable to process her words. Jessup is a boy of perhaps seven years, and Eleanor about two years his elder. The boy is sandy-blond and pale and Eleanor brunette and freckled and a good half of a foot taller. Both have unsettling dark eyes.

  William leans into me and whispers in my ear, “Chibold appear as children, remember?”

  I nod slowly, staring at these poor children. I still can’t get over the Chibold looking like children yet having such knowledge beyond their physical years.

  I force a smile. “Hello, Jessup. Hello, Eleanor.”

  Eleanor grins mischievously. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost! You must come to take things as they
are and not as they seem, yes?”

  Jessup leads us into a small sitting area and sits awkwardly beside me, while Eleanor plops down close, as though we’re old friends. She sweeps some hair from my face, and I half expect her to start braiding my hair, but instead she pinches my ear firmly and stares into my face.

  “William says you are here to learn why you cannot return to where you belong.”

  “That’s right,” I say, resisting the urge to pull back from her and get her hand away from my face.

  “Take Jessup’s hand,” she says. “I need him to complete the charge.”

  I don’t bother to ask for an explanation. If all goes well, I will be leaving this world and leaving behind the need to understand the way all these things work. I try to ignore that this is my world, too, that the life I came from was only unaware of its existence. I want nothing more than to return to my ignorance.

  I take Jessup’s hand, and he closes his eyes. My hand burns slightly, enough to cause to discomfort but not so badly that I can’t tolerate it for a short while. Eleanor takes my other hand with one of hers and closes her eyes as well. The fingers that pinch my ear start to trace the edges of my earlobe, trickling down and stopping just behind my ear. Leaving her pointer finger there, her thumb slides across my jawline, and now it’s as though she cradles my face in the most unnatural way possible.

  My eyes find William’s, and he offers a small smile and reassuring nod. My throat closes and my heart races and the moment hangs in the air like a dandelion weed in a light breeze, unable to reach ground and plant its seed.

  Eleanor breathes deeply through her nose. “You’re a Forever Girl?”

  “My spirit joined with a Chibold who was. We weren’t able to save her in time.”

  “No.” Eleanor shakes her head. “You already were. This is why you so easily became one with Cordovae above your connection with Abigail. Abigail is but one of the many lives that descended from Cordovae—a Forever Girl spirit. There were so few of them then...it’s not something I often have the opportunity to reveal!”

  She sounds absolutely giddy. I cannot share her excitement. “You’re wrong. I didn’t have any abilities before this.”