by Kelly Creagh
Isobel tightened her grip on his hand, and her own went numb from the connection.
“Sometimes . . . ” Isobel paused, then started again. “At least once every hour of every day . . . I find myself wondering how things might have been if . . . if your parents hadn’t come home early. If we had kissed then. Do you ever wonder the same thing? If any of this would have turned out differently?”
A beat passed in which he said nothing. Then, suddenly, Varen’s hand tightened around hers. “Read me something?” he said. The sound of his voice, the question itself, startled her.
Isobel’s eyes fell to the pages open in front of her as, slowly, the white space began to fill. She scanned the text as it formed, recognizing the poem by its title as one of Poe’s.
She remembered Varen mentioning this piece several times, though she’d never once read it. This had to mean two things: that Varen knew at least a portion of it by heart, and that he was the one making it appear.
Drawing a shaking breath, Isobel did the only thing she could do. She began to read out loud. To him.
“It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;—”
Varen clenched her hand tighter, but she didn’t look up and she didn’t stop reading.
“And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.
I was a child and she was a child
In this kingdom by the sea;
But we loved with a love that was more than love—
I and my Annabel Lee—
With a love that the winged seraphs of Heaven
Coveted her and me. ”
Isobel stopped there. Because that was where the words dissipated.
She frowned, feeling the thump of her heart grow heavy while she waited. The right-hand page remained bare. Could it be that was all he recalled of the poem?
Then Varen spoke, picking up the lines from the memory that hadn’t failed him, after all.
“But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we—
Of many far wiser than we—
And neither the angels in Heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee. ”
He stopped there. Pulling his hand free of hers, he rose.
As he did, the boards beneath them began to loosen, softening into . . . sand?
Isobel gasped when the support at her back vanished, and she would have fallen if not for the hand that caught hers just as a surge of warm water rushed in around them.
When Varen pulled her to her feet, sunlight—blinding—broke through the dissolving walls, illuminating the crystalline waters that now enveloped her legs.
Varen drew Isobel to him, and she saw that his clothes had changed. In place of his long coat, he wore an old-fashioned charcoal waistcoat and, beneath it, a white stiff-collared shirt, sleeve cuffs rolled to the elbows.
Isobel pressed her hands to his chest, stunned and entranced by how much the timeless style seemed . . . right. Almost as if she’d always known him this way.
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At her legs, she felt clinging folds of fabric much longer than her tattered pink party dress. She looked down to see that she now wore an off-the-shoulder gown the hue of white wine. Small burgundy bows held gathers of the fine material, pinning it around her in elegant drapes.
Touching her brow, her fingertips found a crown of velvet-soft flowers.
In a flash, she remembered the statue she’d found next to Varen in the courtyard and realized he’d transformed her into the living version.
A new wave surged in around them, and as it did, Varen swept her up and out of the water’s path. He swung her in a slow circle as the water rolled and crashed, frothing white.
Isobel’s heart swelled with the sea. She felt weightless in his arms.
Enwrapping his neck, she leaned in close, laughing as the spray of water sprinkled their skin and beaded in his dark hair like minuscule diamonds.
Pastel-yellow rays sliced through the puffy pink-and-blue-bellied clouds that gathered overhead. Straight as arrows, the light shot down to meet the glittering sea.
Perched at the zenith of a high rock, Varen’s castle cut a striking outline.
No longer menacing but regal, the ivory fortress—all turrets and waving green banners—seemed to watch over them, as if awaiting their return to its grand halls.
Isobel clung closer to Varen, holding tight to him and to this moment that felt so much like a fairy tale.
Varen tilted his head toward her, his lips brushing hers as he spoke.
“‘For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams of the beautiful Annabel Lee. ’”
Isobel’s smile returned. Finally she got it.
The poem. He’d taken them right into the middle of it—this ballad that felt as if it told the story of a previous life. One they’d shared together, just like this.
“‘And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes of the beautiful Annabel Lee. ’”
As though taking command from his words, the daylight faded and the sky swirled sherbet. The sun sank into the shimmering sea, giving way to a lunar glow that swept the dreamscape in tones of deep blue and shining silver.
Tilting her head back, Isobel watched the sky fill with innumerable stars.
When she looked to Varen again, she was so startled by the sight of the two jade spheres gazing back at her that she nearly let go of him.
“Varen. You—”
“Shut up,” he said, tilting his head as he leaned in, “so I can kiss you. ”
32
Dissever
He pressed his lips to hers.
Immediately Isobel’s hands went to his face.
She held him there, too afraid he might try to pull away. Or that she’d wake up somewhere without him.
Gently, as the tide rushed out from under them, Varen set her down. But he did not break the kiss; encircling her waist, he drew her in closer.
Isobel rose onto tiptoes, bare feet sinking into the pliant sand.
With another rolling surge, the warm waves returned, swelling higher this time, past their knees.
Varen’s silver lip ring teased as it caressed, lulling Isobel’s mind as it beckoned the rest of her toward abandon.
Watching him through the lashes of lids that had dropped on their own, Isobel found herself locked in a bittersweet battle, torn between never wanting this moment to end and needing to look into his eyes again. To be certain she hadn’t imagined the return of their polished jade hue.
She pressed her palms to his chest but could not bring herself to push him back. The fever of his kiss, the strength of the arms that held her to him—the power of the spell he’d cast over them both—won out.
Giving in, Isobel permitted her thoughts to float off without her. Her lips matched his painstaking pace, trading brush for brush and stroke for stroke.
Varen lifted both hands, hooking them under her jaw. His thumbs grazed her cheeks as he took his turn to hold her in place.
He kissed her as if doing so was the one thing that could keep him, all of this, from unraveling—again—into pandemonium.
She knew how he felt. Lost and found. Freed and captive. Calm and desperate . . .
She knew, because she felt it too.
So she let the fabricated dream continue, trying to keep the nagging truth at bay for one more moment. Then another, and another . . .
But when the water’s warmth began to fade, when the current grew stronger with each sigh and heave—when the sensation of pins and needles crept into her awareness, growing strong enough to drown out the sensation of his li
ps—she had to stop.
Isobel froze. Her eyelids lifted.
Grimacing, Varen parted the kiss that had already ended.
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He pressed his forehead to hers, and Isobel relished the sensation of his hair catching in her lashes. She saw that he held his own eyes shut, clenched tight, and she knew his fear had returned.
That had to be why the water had turned cold so quickly. Why, in the passing seconds, the darkness surrounding them had grown more absolute.
Already the tide had risen to mid-thigh. But . . . he couldn’t still be doubting her, could he?
“Open your eyes,” Isobel urged, tucking silken bits of hair behind his ear, though the strands wouldn’t stay. “Please?”
“You’ll leave,” he murmured, his voice hoarse with the emotion he was trying hard to keep bottled.
“Never,” she said. “Nevermore,” she corrected in a whisper.
She stayed silent for the next few seconds, watching him, giving him time to trust.
When Varen finally did open his eyes, he kept them fixed on her hamsa charm. She could feel him holding his breath as he grabbed her shoulders and squeezed.
Isobel ignored the pain of his fingers digging into her flesh, because she knew what he was trying to assure himself of. That when he looked up, he would not find a dead girl staring back at him.
Then his clear green gaze flicked to Isobel’s, igniting a smile that sprang, involuntarily, to her lips.
“There you are,” she said, taking in the sight of those twin emeralds, whose color she could detect even in the dark. “I knew I’d find you. ”
Varen scowled in pain as though her words had cut him. But she could feel relief, too, in the breath he exhaled as he pulled her against him.
With fierce strength, Varen’s arms wound around her, and he clutched her tightly. Isobel surrendered to his hold and, laying her head to his shoulder, yielded to the rush of bliss that she could not have fought off if she tried.
But even in his embrace—on the other side of fulfilling her promise—she knew they both had to be thinking the same thing. How, as beautiful as this was, as real as it seemed, it wouldn’t last. Couldn’t . . .
“Please,” she said, pushing back against him gently, enough to find his gaze again. “Say you’ll come with me. ”
“Where?” he asked. But he sounded so uncertain.
“Home,” she said with a nervous laugh. “Where else?”
His brow knitted in confusion. “Home,” he repeated, as if the word was foreign to him. “You mean . . . heaven?”
The question, as startling as it was sobering, stole her already faltering smile.
She let her arms slip away from him.
Though it was clear that Varen now believed she was real, that he understood she’d come here to get him, it suddenly became equally clear that somehow, he still thought she was dead.
And if he was asking about heaven, did that mean he assumed they both were?
The memory flashes. The writing on the wall. Varen’s horrified reaction after her words about conquering death—now it all made sense.
He still believed that he’d killed her. It was the only way he’d been able to reconcile Isobel’s presence in the dreamworld.
“Varen, I’m . . . ,” she started, but as a look of dark concern clouded his features, her voice stalled in her throat and she thought better of trying to explain.
If keeping the truth to herself meant he would follow her more readily, if it gave her a better chance of luring him out of this realm—of convincing him that, with her, he could leave its boundaries—would it not be better to go on letting him think she was . . . what? A spirit sent to collect him?
An angel, she corrected herself, remembering the pair of statues standing watch at the altar, the stone seraphs populating the courtyard. The bust of the helmeted warrior girl stationed above the purple chamber’s doors. A guardian angel.
“Tell me you trust me,” Isobel said, peering into his eyes again. “Do you?”
His gaze narrowed on her, and he gave no answer. She could tell he knew there was something she wasn’t divulging. Something he was missing.
Another wave bowled into them, hard enough to knock Isobel off balance. Varen reached for her and held her steady. They watched the wave as it tumbled to the shore, crashing there with a low boom, hissing as it spread its way up the long bank of sand.
The tide had begun its nocturnal conquest of the beach, giving the illusion that, though she and Varen hadn’t moved, they’d drifted farther out.
“Are you doing this?” Isobel asked.
“No,” he said, jaw flexing, his focus still on the shore.
A beat passed before he spoke again. “It’s not over . . . is it?” he asked, looking down at her.
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Isobel grasped him by the sleeves.
She bit her bottom lip and dug deep for what to say, wishing she could tell him that the nightmare had ended, that they’d reached their forever and there wasn’t anything left to be afraid of.
For one blissful instant, it had certainly felt like they had.
“Do you trust me?” she asked again.
Varen watched her with concern, brow knitted, his stare suddenly sober, searching. Slowly, he nodded.
“Then come with me,” she said, taking his hand. “And don’t let go. ”
Gathering her soaked skirts in her free hand, she tugged at Varen.
He didn’t ask any more questions, and when Isobel started in the direction of the shore, he followed behind.
Black waters lapped at them, pearly pockets of white moonlight mottling the surface that seemed to lengthen as they headed toward the beach. Step after sinking step, Isobel trudged ahead, but the coast drew no closer.
Dread gripped her, but she pressed on. She squeezed Varen’s hand, peering back at him once, and then again when she noticed him staring at something.
She whipped her head forward and saw what it was that had stolen his attention.
Eddies of white fizz left by the crashing waves swirled and spun on the shore. Emerging from the froth, a slender figure lengthened upward.
Sea foam became glowing gossamer. The delicate swathes of material unfurled in folds and drapes, clinging to the specter’s distinctly feminine form.
Haloed in a glow that shamed the moon stood Lilith, her beetle-black eyes watching them through the shield of her transparent shroud.
Isobel felt Varen freeze when, gliding toward them, Lilith waded into the ocean, her train of veils dragging behind her, rising to float like trails of smoke.
The demon opened ivory arms over the water, and as she did, the ocean surged up to Isobel’s neck and Varen’s chest.
Isobel bounced on the ball of one foot to stay afloat. Keeping the demon in her line of sight and her hand fastened to Varen’s, she tried to think of somewhere to take them, some way to shift them away from her.
But she couldn’t make a door in the water. And with the waves now swelling to her chin, threatening to swallow them both, she couldn’t concentrate. She couldn’t—
Isobel sank below the next wave, and this time, her foot found no purchase. Plunging deep, through the place where the sea floor had existed moments before, she released Varen in a burst of panic.
Crying out, gulping seawater, she scrambled for him, groping blindly through the murk.
Her hands passed through empty water while the current carried her away and the sodden skirts of her heavy dress dragged her down.
She threw her arms out, kicking to propel herself up toward the swiftly rising surface.
Something soft brushed her naked shoulder. Whirling, she reached for the hand that wasn’t there and found herself in the midst of countless luminous white veils. They wound around her throat like tentacles.
Unleashing a muted, bubbled scream, Isobel thrashed against the webli
ke material.
Her lungs, now empty, burned for air.
Yanking a fistful of veils free, she felt a faint snap at the nape of her neck.
Isobel released the wad of gauze and scoured her throat for the hamsa, nails clawing her own flesh.
Gone.
Spinning in search of the amulet, in search of Varen, she quickly lost her sense of which way led up and which led down.
Then, like a beacon, a pale face appeared in the gloom. Netted by a screen of black hair, it floated toward her.
But it was not Varen’s.
This face—waxen, skeletal, hideous—belonged to a monster.
33
Yet Unbroken
A pair of wasted hands reached for her, their curved black nails like barbed hooks.
At the center of the creature’s sunken eyes flashed two pinpricks of light.
Isobel flailed to get away, but with lungs pleading for air and muscles numb from exhaustion, her efforts came weaker now.
Closing in on her, the demon curled a hand almost tenderly around Isobel’s bare throat, claw tips scarcely pricking the nape of her neck.
As Lilith’s emaciated form coasted to a slow-motion stop, her loose ebony hair rushed around them both. Innumerable black threads intertwined with the clouds of floating veils, tickling Isobel’s shoulders, blocking her surroundings from view.
Isobel saw no sign of Varen. Only inky tendrils, billows of white, and straight ahead, that pinhole gaze.
Like a spider preparing to wrap its prey, Lilith pulled her nearer.
Isobel strained in the demon’s grasp, yearning for the strong, gentle grip of Varen’s hand. But it never came, and she knew he’d lost her just as she’d lost him.
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The demon’s pale and shriveled lips peeled back to display a needle-toothed grin.
Death would come next. Isobel had no doubt. And there was no stopping it, or what would happen after.
She would become a Lost Soul, like Reynolds, bound body and spirit to this realm—to Lilith—for eternity.
Gwen had been right, and, enemy or not, Reynolds had been right too.
She’d never stood a chance.
Cold and caressing, the creature’s knuckles trailed Isobel’s cheek, brushing over her scar before sliding up to her temple. There, the wraith’s talons wove their way into her hair, causing Isobel’s crown of flowers to dislodge and drift off.
Though Isobel tried to wrench her head away, the demon tightened its grip at the back of her skull, holding her face to its own.
With lungs now threatening to explode, Isobel ceased her feeble side-to-side twists. She waited, anticipating the piercing pain of those spiked teeth, the ripping sensation of having her throat torn out. The clawed hand that would contract and crush her windpipe.
