Darkness Savage (The Dark Cycle Book 3)

by Rachel A. Marks

  “Shit, man.”

  “Yeah. Not good.” But then he seems to realize something, and backs up with a worried look surfacing on his face. “Hey, wait. What’re you doing here?”

  “I just snuck in for the night. I’ll be gone before sunrise.” I couldn’t sleep at Eric’s place. I tried, but after I talked to Rebecca, it wasn’t happening. I kept seeing the nurse’s shocked face, hearing her scream, every time I closed my eyes. My brain knows that was the demon screaming, knows her dying wasn’t entirely my fault, but my spirit can’t seem to rest.

  Out, damned spot . . .

  Connor raises his brow. “So, you needed a little action, huh?” He pats me on the shoulder with a wink.

  My body jolts and a feverish tingle washes over me.

  Connor stumbles back, cradling his arm to his chest. He hisses in pain and grumbles, “Shit.”

  I back up and hold my hands out like a warning. “Fuck, I’m sorry.” What am I doing to him?

  He shakes it off, like he’s trying to rid himself of the feeling of my power. “No, I’m fine.” But he’s not convincing and red sparks in his eye. “I probably shouldn’t touch you until we . . . do that spell or whatever.”

  “Yeah.” I study him as he makes his way out of the kitchen. His breathing isn’t steady anymore, and the relaxed energy that surrounded him when he came in is long gone. “Really sorry,” I repeat. Apologizing doesn’t help, but I don’t know what else to say.

  Because what can I say?

  He’s almost to the staircase when I realize I meant to ask him something. I walk into the entryway, keeping my distance. “So, what do you know about Tray?”

  “He’s Jax’s brother.”

  “I know, but that’s all I know.” Jax was asleep already when I snuck in, so I couldn’t ask him for any details. “Is he cool?”

  Connor shrugs. “He and Kara were close for a while, a year or so ago. She was going over there all the time, visiting Miss Mae, and he’d always be around. He’s a bit of a slick dick if you ask me.”

  The idea of Kara hanging out with anyone related to Jax, in the way that Connor’s hinting at, makes me cringe inside. “You mean, he’s another Jax?”

  “Older, less of an ass, maybe. But I never trusted him with Kara.”

  “You never trusted me, either.”

  “Yeah, and look how that turned out.” There’s no humor in his voice and I wonder if he’s still worried.

  “Is Tray like Jax in other ways? Like, does he have gifts?”

  He thinks for a second before he says, “Not sure. But Sid asked him to be a part of the house, too. He said no, that he needed to take care of his mom. Or maybe he’s just not a joiner.”

  “I wonder why Sid never mentioned him. He might be a Light.”

  “Wouldn’t that be ironic?”

  I raise a brow. “Why?”

  “Well because, you know”—he motions to the landing where Kara’s bedroom door is—“he was all tight with the Chosen One’s girl.”

  “Don’t call me that.” I release a sigh and try not to think about any of it. Jealousy is a luxury I can’t afford right now. And if I don’t trust Kara at this point, I never will. Besides, it’s more important to focus on fixing this thing, getting my power under control. “Can you get me in contact with him?” I ask.

  “He’s not the Mafia, dude. We can just go over there. He’s always around the courts in the afternoon.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “He stands around the dealer’s corner when his mom gets off of the night shift so he can stop her from buying drugs.”

  Mrs. Marshall gently kisses the top of Ava’s eight-year-old blonde head, and I avert my eyes, pretending it doesn’t bother me. I have to force myself to not let jealousy take over at the motherly way the kindhearted woman gazes down on my sister, like she’s claiming her.

  “We don’t need to talk about the broken window anymore, Aidan,” she says, stopping the questions I had just started asking. “Let’s have fun at the beach and not upset our little Ava bird on her birthday.” She gives me a tight, shut-up-kid smile.

  I have to bite my tongue so I won’t growl out my frustration.

  Adults don’t like it when you have an opinion. And even though Mrs. Marshall is super nice, she’s kind of clueless. She still doesn’t understand after all these years that Ava and I aren’t like other kids—well, she must be suspicious, but I can see her shake it off whenever I’m around. Which is more often now—now that she isn’t worried I’m a bad influence or something.

  She leans over and reaches into the bag at the edge of the beach blanket, pulling out a Ziploc full of red grapes. “Let’s just have a snack and play, since the sun will be going down and we’ll have to be getting you back home soon, Aidan. We don’t want to waste our birthday time at the beach fussing over things that can’t be changed.”

  But she’s wrong—something’s wrong this time. Mrs. Marshall can pretend it’s just broken glass, but I can see in the way Ava won’t look at me that it’s more than that. I can tell by the way her eyes got red with held-back tears when she whispered to me about her bedroom window cracking after she got mad. She looked scared, she smelled scared. And this is familiar, just like her sixth birthday. She’s focused on her bucket and shovel now, though, and won’t say anything else. Like she’s ashamed and just wants to hide what happened from Mrs. Marshall.

  I stand and brush sand off my too-big swim trunks that my foster mom got from the Rescue Mission thrift store. “Hey, let’s go find some hermit crabs.”

  Ava’s head tips but she stays focused on the shovel for a few more seconds before she nods at the ground. Then she stands, picks up her bucket, and follows me to the edge of the surf. We start to walk, balancing our way over the rocks in the tide pools. We stop every now and then to search the current for life, a silent exploration, as if we’ve belonged to the sea all our lives. And maybe we have. Mom always loved the ocean, like she wanted to disappear into it. Instead she disappeared into her mind, leaving us long before her body was crushed.

  Once I think Ava and I are far enough away from Mrs. Marshall, I crouch down and pretend to look more closely at one of the larger pools. Really I just want to get Ava relaxed enough to open up to me.

  She sits on a rock beside me and plays with her bucket, acting like everything’s fine and this is just another day at the beach. Not her birthday. Not the six-year anniversary of our mom’s death. That violent, horrifying death.

  I hold in the shivers that fill me, and shove my nausea down as the memory of blood rises, vivid and crimson.

  Don’t be sad, Ava says with her mind. Mommy isn’t in pain anymore.

  I move a blonde curl that’s fallen in her eye, tucking it in her butterfly barrette. I know. I just want to keep you safe. It’s my job.

  “It’s not really your job,” she says, a sigh in her voice. “Not anymore.” She sounds resigned. And a hundred years old.

  “I’m afraid it is, Peep.”

  She shrugs and plucks a hermit crab from the pool. “Did you know that these glow blue? All the ocean friends do.”

  “Glow?” I look around the tide pool, but the only light I see is from the sun reflecting off the water like diamonds scattering the surface.

  “It’s called an a-ur-ra. Or something.”

  “You mean, aura?”

  “Yeah, I think so. It’s in Mom’s book. It talks about energy and, um, stuff.”

  That familiar chill related to all things Fiona and her casting works over me. “I thought I told you, you need to bury that thing.”

  Ava shrugs again, then says absently, “Yeah.”

  I take her small arm in my hand, trying to let her feel my fear. Promise me. It’s dangerous.

  She blinks up at me with her wide silver eyes. I know. Mom told me.

  The sky is still dark when I open my eyes, feeling disoriented. A part of my mind is still there on that beach, the day before the Marshalls died. I wonder why I dreamed
about that, the first time Ava mentioned speaking to our mother’s ghost. The first time she mentioned reading the grimoire. I thought she buried it soon after the Marshalls’ death. I made her promise.

  Now she’s living in the Darkness, captured by the madness that took our mom. And I’m as helpless to save her as I was to save Fiona. I have no idea how to find her and stop her. No clue how to even start.

  I look out the window at the night sky, and my chest aches. Ava’s likely killed the green witch by now. Another person lost their life because I failed. It was an impossible task, though—I had nowhere to start. I have no clue why she thought I could do it; I’m obviously missing something.

  I reach over and pull my pants off the chair, taking both notes out of the pocket. There’s no new message burned into either of them, but Ava seems close right now. Almost as if a part of her just sent me that dream, trying to remind me again of how it’s supposed to be: her and me together.

  I know one thing for sure. Ava was right in the dream when she said I wasn’t meant to protect her. I’ve certainly done a shitty job.

  My chest aches as the weight of the past mingles with the weight of the present. Everything I’ve done up to this point has only made things worse and put people in danger. Looking for another Light probably won’t end any differently, but I have to do something while I wait for Ava to make her next move. Is it stupid to let myself hope that it might be Tray? That the search will be that easy?

  The bed shifts and Kara sits up, propping her head in her palm, grumbling, “Wow, your stress is loud.”

  “Sorry,” I whisper, and lean in to kiss her brow. “I have to go back to the club anyway, so you can sleep.”

  She curls into my side and rests her head on my chest, running her fingers over my mark. She skims along one circle after another with her delicate touch. My power simmers to life a little, yellow sparks flickering at my shoulder and down my arm. “You’re not helping with the leaving,” I whisper as my body responds.

  She props herself on her elbow again and gives me a wicked grin. “Oh, darn.”

  Then she’s leaning in, and we’re kissing, finding ourselves tangled together in seconds. Kara’s sky-colored essence is cool against my skin, following the trail of her hands, spilling off of her shoulders, down her arms.

  My own power entwines with hers, seeking comfort as it finds its way across her back and up her neck, caressing her with invisible fingers. The colors bounce off the walls in blues and yellows like a reflection of water, flickering with each caress. And I wish that she could see it, see with her own eyes how much my heart needs her. Because there are no words to describe it all as things escalate quickly, the unspoken communication between us taking over, our bodies having only one goal, one need, touch and unity. And even though I should leave, I fall into it and let the world slip away.

  Which makes it take a second or two before I feel the odd tingle.

  A warning buzz echoes in the background of my mind. Followed by a scraping sound coming from somewhere outside.

  I break away from Kara and sit up a little, listening intently as a sinking dread mingles with the lust in the room. In an instant, all my senses tick into high gear. I feel the block on the house and move it aside, then I hear something that sounds like someone gasping, and smell a sharp zing of fear.

  “What is it?” Kara asks, breathless.

  I focus on the location. “I sense something . . . I think it’s out back.”

  She sits up beside me. “Sid,” she says, her voice sharp with panic.

  We fumble into our clothes and run downstairs. It’s clear no one else heard or felt anything. The house is sound asleep as Kara and I rush out the back door. And as we’re approaching the shed, I realize something’s very wrong with the casting magic in its walls. The vibration I usually feel when I’m close has changed, become even more twisted—if that’s possible. It calls out to me, the gravity a million pounds against my skin.

  I stumble as it hits me, but keep my feet.

  Kara finds him first. “Oh, God,” she moans. “Sid, oh my God, no.”

  I come around, and my hand goes to my mouth. Sid is on the ground, back hunched, just outside the shed’s doorway. He grips the frame with white knuckles and huffs air in and out laboriously through his rattling lungs.

  The tall green grass around him is speckled with fat drops of crimson rain.

  He heaves again, leaning over, vomiting blood at his feet.

  “Help me get him back in the shed!” Kara cries.

  The way it’s pulsing at me, no way anything living should be in there. It wants dark things. It wants death and blood. The door is wide open, and I realize the casting seal has burned through from the other side, still sending up threads of smoke from the charred wood. And there’s a new symbol just underneath it, a curse, written in what appears to be a mix of chalk and blood. The paint underneath the chalk seems to be blistering.

  “No,” I say. “He can’t go in there.”

  Kara starts to argue, but Sid sits up a little and takes her arm. “Aidan’s right,” he whispers through trembling lips. “Take me to the house.”

  Kara blinks at him with tear-filled eyes and then gives a jerky nod.

  I go to his other side, taking him under the arm to help him up. “We’ve got you,” I say.

  We manage to get into the house as the sun breaks violet over the horizon. He has to throw up again and stumbles to the sink as we enter the kitchen. The blood splashes up as it hits the fiberglass. Sid’s thin body shakes as Kara and I hold him steady. His arm, his shoulder, is glass in my grip. He teeters on the edge, and death seems to move closer.

  I knew it was coming, but it’s happening too soon, far too soon. What’s gone wrong? Someone drew that curse on his shed. Someone . . .

  But I know who it was.

  Kara grabs a rag and wipes his face, her tears falling.

  Sid reaches up and touches a bloody finger to her cheek, trying to brush the evidence of her pain away. “This is right, Kara. It’s how it was meant to be, don’t forget.” His breath rattles through his words, and she just stares at him, her face draining of color.

  “We need to get you on the couch,” I say.

  I grab a large mixing bowl from one of the cupboards as we pass it and one of the towels hanging from the oven handle.

  Once he’s sitting, his rasping breath seems to steady. Kara runs to get a blanket, then comes back and fluffs up the pillows, helping him get situated. “You’re going to be okay,” she keeps repeating. I see flashes of red in her eye each time the words emerge, each time she lies to herself. “And if you leave us, Aidan can just bring you back with his powers.”

  “No, Kara,” he says, “I told you I will have no real body to come back to. Time is tearing me apart.”

  She shakes her head, not listening.

  I had decided the same thing; I planned on trying to resurrect him. But my power only unites body and soul. If his body is decayed or ruined, I’m not sure a resurrection would even work.

  “So proud, I’m so proud of you both,” Sid says, “and so thankful to have seen what you’ve become.”

  “Be quiet with that,” Kara mutters. “You’re not going anywhere.”

  He grabs Kara’s arm, stopping her words, stopping her from fussing with his blanket. He takes my wrist, too. His peace is a steadying force in the room, calming me.

  He looks back and forth between us, the shadow of a smile on his bloodstained lips. Then he brings our hands together, gripping them with more strength than he should have right now. “This is why we breathe. This.” He shakes our entwined hands. “This is why you will be fine once I am gone. And you will see why I have done what I have done. And perhaps you will forgive me. Perhaps you will.” His eyes seem to grow heavy, and his body sinks farther into the cushions. “I will rest now,” he whispers in Chaldean, and his hands release ours, going limp in his lap.

  Kara crumples at his side with a sharp sigh. She rests her fo
rehead on the cushion beside him and seems unable to move. I stand over them, watching Sid’s chest rise and fall slowly, counting each long pause between breaths.

  “He’s just sleeping,” I say to reassure Kara. Reassure myself.

  After a few drawn-out seconds of silence, she lifts her head and says, “He’s not safe out of that shed for much longer, I don’t think.”

  “He won’t be safe in the shed anymore,” I say. She gives me a questioning look, so I add, “There was a curse on the door. A new drawing. And something about the energy is different, stronger, more . . . ravenous. The seal on the door was burned through, too. Whatever the casting was meant to do, that curse twisted it into something else. Blood magic can do that—the beginning purpose isn’t always the ending force. It felt to me like the curse may have made the initial spell turn on him.”

  “A curse? But how—?” She stops asking her questions, realizing the answer quickly. She seethes for a few seconds and then says, “Ava’s not going to let up at all now, is she?”

  I can only shake my head and swallow the ache in my throat.

  She takes Sid’s hand again. “I would be dead if it weren’t for him. I never would’ve met you.” She looks up at me, her tears only dry salt on her cheeks now, but the misery is still clear in her eyes. “We need to help him.”

  “This isn’t something we can change, Kara. He made the choice to stay. Even if Ava hadn’t cursed the shed, he’d be leaving us soon, anyway.”

  “Do you think . . .” She doesn’t finish, like she’s nervous to say the words.

  “What?”

  “Your father,” she says, making my breath lodge in my throat at the reminder of the ancient prophet. “Could he help us with this? Wasn’t Sid his student?”

  “I think Sid would have said something if it was that simple.” Sid was shocked when I told him about Daniel. Shocked and sad, as if he was disappointed Daniel hadn’t contacted him yet.

  “Do you have a way to reach him?” she asks, standing up. “Didn’t he go to the Middle East or something?”