by WB McKay
"Owen!" I called, holding my hands up to make it clear that I wanted silence. I listened to my own voice echo down the tunnels before me.
"Sophie!" Owen's voice called from the tunnel to the right.
It was the one that sloped down at the steepest angle. I would have praised Zoe, but she was too far behind me by then. I came to another branch in the tunnels. "Owen!"
"Sophie!" replied Owen.
I barreled down the tunnel to the left. I could hear feet slapping on floor behind me. Someone had caught up. Phoebe said nothing as she fell into step beside me. Her grin was enough.
Another branch in the tunnels, another call and response routine. The same thing happened over and over again. I lost track of how many turns and which direction I'd taken. Getting out was a problem for later.
The light changed after the last branch in the tunnels. It was only then that I realized I shouldn't have been able to see at all. I turned back to see how I'd found my way through the tunnels in the dark. The ceiling of the caves were peppered with little green points of light. Strange, but something to be interested in when I didn't have a boyfriend to locate.
I entered a new tunnel lit with torches. Two Orani stepped into view, swords clutched in their hands.
I didn't even have time to react. Vines flew out, wrapped around their necks, and bashed their heads into the wall of the cave. The sound was horrible. I ran past them like they were garbage on the street.
"Owen!" I shouted.
"Sophie!" His answer was close. So close.
I rounded a corner and found Owen huddled in a pile of furs on the floor of the cave. He clutched a black fur in his arms like a child with its blanket. I tried to run to him, kneel down, and wrap him in my arms. It came out more like a football tackle.
"You're alive," I said, over and over again. "I can't believe it. I missed you so much."
"Maybe you won't disappear this time," Owen said, softly. He sounded so defeated. "Stay with me?"
I pulled back to look him in the eyes. Tears trailed down his cheeks. "What have they done to you?" I asked.
"Oh, you know."
"No, I don't."
He sighed tiredly. "They ask me questions. Questions from your mouth. Questions from Ava's mouth. Questions from Mom and Dad's mouths. Always with the questions. Don't worry. I'm not going to answer anything you ask. You wouldn't, if you were here, would you? It would only give more fuel for the illusions. I think that's true. I think that's what you would say. Has anyone ever held you prisoner before? I don't remember if I ever asked you that. That seems like something we should have talked about. "
I looked up at Phoebe and she shook her head. Zoe was just behind her. Her face was blank.
Ava ran in at top speed and skidded to a halt when she saw Owen. For a moment, she looked happy, then she took in the way we were huddled together and the frantic look in Owen's eyes. "What's wrong?" She looked like she was torn between joining our pile on the floor and turning away to cry.
I heaved a sigh and looked up at Ava. "They've been messing with his mind. I don't think he believes we're here."
"No one ever comes," confirmed Owen. "No one real. All fake." He was quiet for a while. "Or maybe they're all real and don't want to save you." He wrapped his arms over his head. "Can't think like that. It's so much harder not to think when you're here."
Ava fell suddenly still. I wanted to do the same. My arms felt heavy, but I lifted one to cup his face gently. "Owen, I'm going to take you out of here now."
"No." He shook his head fiercely. "You can't fool me again! It's a trap. If I leave this spot, I'll be lost in the caves for days and they won't bring me food or water. If I stay here, I stay alive." He looked me in the face, his eyes wide and solemn. "I can't give up. I have to be smart. I have to stay here until… until something else happens. Don't confuse me. I won't let you confuse me."
I stood and pulled Owen's hand, trying to bring him to his feet. He pulled back against me, clutching his fur blanket to his chest. He believed he needed to stay. So, that was how they kept him in there without any bars or chains. The guards outside wouldn't be anything for Owen to fight against if he was of the mind to. They were probably meant to keep people like me out, and to alert the home base if anything happened. No, the problem was the caves were an impossible maze, they could make him see anything, and they only brought food and water to this spot. From the looks of him, he was half starved and dehydrated, so his mind and body were suffering. Added in with the mental tricks of the Orani, convincing him that people he cared about were visiting him and saying confusing things, they'd built a cage inside his own mind.
I cleared my throat, suddenly finding it difficult to breathe. "Owen, we have to go," I croaked, and cleared my throat again. "I don't know how long it will be until they send more people down here."
"All lies," Owen whispered into his blanket. "None of the people I know are real."
I rolled his last statement over in my head. "Zoe, come over here."
Zoe crouched in front of us. "What can I do?"
"Owen," I said, brushing a hand through his hair. "Look, I have someone here that you don't know. Why would they use somebody you don't know against you?"
Zoe picked up on where I was going. "Hello, Owen. My name is Zoe. It's nice to meet you."
Rather than softening, his features turned down into a scowl. "Who are you? Why are you here with Sophie?"
Zoe gave him an encouraging smile. "Good question. Sophie needed help, so she went to my mother, Greta. I volunteered to help in my mother's place."
Owen leaned forward and quickly gave Zoe his attention. "You do smell like a dragon," he admitted. His grip relaxed on his fur blanket, but his scowl remained in place. "Why did Sophie go to Greta?"
It was a test. I held my breath. I wasn't worried that Zoe would answer correctly. There was just no way to know how Owen was going to react. They'd really messed with his mind. I wanted to go back and kill those two guards Phoebe had taken out again.
"Greta owed her a favor for releasing her from the clansmen who had captured her and drained her power," said Zoe. Her smile broadened. "That's the first time Sophie rescued you. You picked a good one in her."
Owen finally returned her smile, though it was dimmer than I remembered ever seeing from him. "Yes, I did." His smile dropped almost immediately. I could see him shift back into calculation mode. I normally found the little crease he got in his forehead when he was thinking cute. This time it made me sad. He shouldn't have to think so hard about something so simple. "They didn't know anything about Greta. Even if they did, why wouldn't they conjure Greta herself to torture me? It makes no sense to send someone else claiming to know her. Why didn't Greta come herself?"
Zoe nodded as if expecting the question. "She would have if I hadn't requested to go in her place. I volunteered because, while she's physically fit, she hasn't yet recovered her full magic. I felt she would be too vulnerable on a dangerous campaign such as this."
Owen's frown turned sad. "That makes sense. It took me a couple of days to fully recover, and I wasn't there that long." He let the fur blanket drop into his lap. "I think I believe you." Owen's gaze immediately shot to me. He stared intensely into my eyes, his suspicion waning. "It's really you?"
"It's really me."
He wrapped his arms around me. "Sophie, if this is really you, I want you to know I didn't give up. I'm not giving up."
"Oh, Owen."
"This isn't like last time," he promised. "I didn't give up." He was talking about our big Faerie adventure. I'd been ensnared by an enchanted necklace that stole dragon magic. As soon as I was free of it, he'd taken it. He knew he'd be held prisoner, but he didn't care. For a reason I still didn't know, he'd wanted his magic to be taken away. That had been worth everything to him. He'd wanted to be rid of his magic so badly he'd given up on himself.
Scared for too many reasons, I asked him, "Why did you last time?"
He brushed the hair from
my face, leaning closer than he normally would as he inspected the details of my face. "Sophie doesn't ask me questions like that," he observed.
"Sophie shouldn't be asking now," I whispered. "Sorry about that."
"The magic usually knew better than that." He smiled faintly. "The illusions got the sense of your magic wrong. Especially with the Fleece on, especially the scent. You've been using lots of magic; it's all over you. That makes sense. That's right. You'd have to do lots of magic to come get me."
"I had a team," I said. "We didn't just tear Oscura apart, we blew it to bits."
"Good." I stayed very still as he ran his fingers through my hair and breathed me in. If an army was coming for him, let them come. I'd deal with them. He needed a minute. He deserved a minute. "That's my Sophie." His lips were dry and cracked against my forehead. "I wanted to get rid of my magic. That's why I gave up before. I'm not like you. You have all of this magic based in pain and death and you keep it under control. You find ways to use it well."
I jerked away from him then. "Owen Kinney, what in the world are you talking about? I lose control of my magic all the time, and I have never seen you lose it once."
"You forget. My apartment. When you broke in."
I tilted my head to the side. I'd been there to steal a book from him. I didn't exactly "break in", I tricked my way in. And then, when I was caught stealing his books, I fought him. I got away when, in the middle of fighting, he'd produced fire and panicked. He told me to run, so I did. "That's why you freaked out."
"Yes," he confirmed. "I stayed away from situations where I might feel too much. So it would never happen again."
"That's why you wouldn't use your magic in fights when I met you."
"Yes."
"Because a bad thing happened, you lost control, and then you didn't trust yourself to control it anymore." I brushed at a smudge of dirt on his face, but it didn't go anywhere. "You know, when your magic flared and your hands lit up with fire? Right then, I'd just reeled back in my death lights."
He looked at me quizzically.
"I was stealing that book so I could learn more about my magic, so I could learn to control it," I said. "You look at me and you think I'm so much better, but I'm not."
"You don't understand." He scrubbed his face with his hands.
Ava finally stepped forward. "Owen."
"Ava?"
"You've been doing better, little brother."
"I didn't give up," he said. "But I don't know if it's ever better. I mean, it shouldn't be, right? I shouldn't get to feel better. Sometimes I go on and start living like a normal person, but then it comes back and it's like… it's like this. It's confusing. Nothing makes sense, you know?"
"I'm so sorry, Owen."
"Why are you sorry?" he shook his head, rejecting the idea. "It was me."
"It was him," said Ava.
Owen shook his head again. "It was me."
"I didn't know you thought of it this way," said Ava. "Lana and David blamed me."
"It wasn't your fault," he said.
"It wasn't yours either."
Something passed between them while they stared at each other. I don't know what, but when he broke contact, he looked me in the eyes and said, "We used to have a cousin."
I felt Ava step away from me so she stood at her brother's back. "Owen was fourteen. Our cousin was my age."
"None of that matters," said Owen. "I got mad and I couldn't control my magic."
"Our cousin was yelling at me," said Ava. "This was normal for him."
"That's no excuse," said Owen. "Don't say things to make it okay. Mom and Dad did that. I can't stand it. It wasn't anyone else's fault. It wasn't what was meant to be. It happened. I did it. It shouldn't have happened. He was a jerk, but he didn't deserve what happened to him."
"That may be true in some people's minds, but not others." Ava looked at me then as if she was daring me to disagree.
"So," I worked my tongue around my mouth, "Owen was a teenager and your seventy year old cousin was saying bad stuff to Ava and Owen lost control."
"None of it happened that quickly," said Ava. "Our cousin escalated the situation. He continued yelling at both Owen and myself, while becoming physical with me, even after he saw that Owen was losing control. Owen used to be arrogant." I guess she saw my eyes widen because she said, "Much more so than he manages to be as an adult. It is my belief that our cousin underestimated Owen's magic and the danger of Owen losing control because of Owen's age, and because he simply didn't believe Owen could have the magic to back up his arrogance." Owen cringed. "Owen's strength of magic has always been a source of pride for our parents. After decades of disappointment with me, he was the light of their lives. They brag of him often."
"Ava, you can stop convincing me that Owen isn't evil," I said. "I think I understand enough of the basics here. Owen. I killed Leandra."
"In self defense," he said. "That's different."
"Because you say it is." She'd had me against a wall and I couldn't breathe. In the moment, it felt like she was killing me. Maybe she was. But maybe she'd intended to let me go once I passed out? Or just another second or two to weaken me? How could I ever know? All I really knew was that she was dead, and I hadn't really meant to do it. My magic had popped out to protect me. And she was dead. All because I'd shown up to collect a dangerous magical object. It should have been a simple thing. "You're never going to feel good about it. You're always going to remember it and feel awful. But you move on and you go on living. Like you've done." I tried to catch his gaze, but he wouldn't look at me. "You didn't give up in here, Owen. You fought. You kept going. You've been strong. And yet, you're telling me about your past like you're making an argument for putting down your sword and calling it a day. I don't understand that."
"It…" He looked around the cave. "I've done a lot of things before coming to this cave. I've been using my magic and it's felt right, like I can control it. I've been doing all the things I used to want to do and getting my life together. And yet even after all that, here I am." He tapped the side of his head. "I'm not in control in here. I've done bad things, no matter what anyone else says about it, and I don't know that I won't do bad things again." He tapped his head again.
"Of course you've done bad things, Owen." He looked up at me, startled. "We've all done bad things. We go around the world and we try not to hurt people. We try to do the right things. But the truth is that if you're getting involved in anything at all, if you're bravely out there living your life, you're going to hurt other people. It's the worst thing in the world. It probably happens all the time that we don't even know when we hurt others. We can ruin someone's day without noticing. Everything we do has a ripple effect, and we can't control it, and it's awful. But you can't just quit. You kept going in here. There was a reason for that. Do you understand why you keep going now?"
"I might have, but honestly at this point I don't remember."
"What is it you've been thinking about to keep yourself going?"
"When I first got here, I was thinking about the things I'd do when I went home. My new job. Jobs we'd work together. I thought about repainting my office at the club. I planned date nights. Our vacation, someday, when we can make that happen. Cheeseburgers." I choked on a small laugh. His lip quirked up, and then fell, like he didn't remember how to hold a smile. "Things got less specific after a while. Now I just kind of hold a feeling."
"A feeling that…?"
He searched the floor before finally saying, "A feeling that it can be better than this."
"Hope," I confirmed.
He rolled his eyes. "That sounds ridiculous."
"That's what it is." I squeezed his hands. "You don't give up, because you hold onto hope. And even when life is good, and you have more than hope, you still keep that with you. You put it out in the world and while you're bumbling around, fucking things up left and right, you do as many good things as you can in the hope that they make things a little better
. That doing things like making your nightclub a fun place for people to work and hang out, it gives them a little of something they need. That researching and pulling dangerous magical objects off the street protects other people from despair wherever possible. That buying your friend a beer reminds them that someone gives a crap about them. And then, when you're forced to look at a list of all the stuff you've done that you wished you hadn't, you accept it. You say, 'I won't do that again' and you do what you can to do better, and you keep going. Just like you did right here in this awful place. You kept going. You did good." My smile was watery. He dropped his head on my shoulder. "Can I help you up now?"
"Yeah," he said, but then stood on his own and pulled me up instead, wrapping me up in a hug that felt like home after the worst stretch of days. "I knew you'd come for me," he whispered in my ear. "I always knew you would come and they used that belief against me."
"They're dead," I replied, my throat threatening to close up. "Let's get the fuck out of this place."
I could feel Owen's whole body slump against mine. I pulled back so I could look him in the face. He looked dejected. "We'll never find our way out." He looked around the small nook he hid in as if truly seeing it for the first time. I knew we had a long road ahead of us, but I meant what I said about all the hope stuff. We'd get him home, and eventually, somehow, he'd find his way through this.
I let go of one of Owen's hands, and Ava quickly grabbed onto it. "It will be okay," she said. "I made sure we can get out of here. Don't you worry little brother."
Owen let go of me and threw his arms around his sister. They hugged for a long time while Zoe and I exchanged sad looks. Greta had been strong in front of me after her incarceration, but I imagined her daughter had seen the real fallout. This had to be bringing up bad memories.
"Well, that's enough of the touchy-feely crap," I said, a little more harshly than I intended. Nobody batted an eye. It made me smile. They really knew me. "Let's go. I don't think I ever want to see Faerie again."
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
I'd love to say I brought Owen home without incident, but that's not the way my life works.
