The Eternal

by Bianca Hunter

  “I am really sorry, I really am, for all of those people, for my family, and for Kate, but I am not walking around with whatever Dark Soldiers are, I can’t live like that,” I said, trying to raise my voice.

  “Evelyn, why are we even talking about this? Do you want to die, is that it?” Blake spat and for the first time, I finally glimpsed the ruthless and taciturn immortal Tristan and Ravenna had described to me. It was, of course, reasonable that he was getting angry; he didn’t understand what I needed to do, and I couldn’t tell him either. Fight him, don’t let him win this.

  “Maybe dying isn’t such a bad thing, and if I’m lucky, whoever kills me can do it twice so I don’t have to come back here,” I yelled, feeling like an absolute wretch. Come on, Evelyn, drive it home. If you don’t see this through, you’ll never get out of here again. They’ll protect you until they die.

  “I think we just need to all calm—”

  “No.” I jerked my head toward Tristan. “Neither of you own me. I am not part of your ridiculous village. I don’t care how old either of you is, and frankly, I don’t care if you die.” I looked at Blake and it felt like I swallowed a vat of poison. “You’ve lived long enough anyway.” I turned away from both of them and started walking toward the black iron gate, biting the insides of my cheek. I had been too much of a coward to look at Blake’s expression after I said all of those horrible things. Did I just tell him that I didn’t care if he died? God, why did you say that? To protect him. To save them all from Serena.

  “Evelyn, wait,” I heard Tristan call. A second later he was at my side as my hair waved in the breeze his movement had created.

  “What?” I said, turning to him, my arms still crossed over my chest.

  “I know you were faking that arguement, so you can drop the attitude,” he whispered. “Find Nero. But, Evelyn, promise me you won’t go after him alone.” He thought I was doing the right thing.

  I took a deep breath. “Okay, I won’t. I’ll call you or Ravenna.” I allowed myself to glance to where Blake was standing, but my eyes met with nothing but an empty courtyard. “Where did he go?”

  “Somehow, I don’t think he took what you said too well. I could hear you were faking it, he couldn’t.”

  God what if I never see him again and this is it?

  “You’re going to see him again, and you can apologize—profusely. Let me at least drive you back to Kate’s house” Tristan said gently, his eyes narrowed with concern.

  “Okay, but I’ll wait here,” I said and glanced at the iron gates. I couldn’t bear bumping into Blake at this point. Forcing one argument was about all I had in me.

  “I’ll bring the car round,” he replied. He disappeared in front of my eyes, and I didn’t bother trying to follow his movements.

  My guilt and sorrow turned into full despair as I waited for Tristan.

  What am I going to do? You have to find Nero. But how? Go to that ridiculous party tonight and find Lorenzo’s house. Fayme. How many people are still going to die because of you?

  “Come on, America,” Tristan’s voice called from the car, which was suddenly next to me. I nodded and got into the passenger side.

  “Why did you lie to Blake?” I asked, turning to him as we drove through the gates.

  “Because I lived your dream, and I agree with you. If we tell Blake, things are going to get worse.”

  “So what do you know about Nero?” I asked, a glimmer of hope in my chest.

  “I haven’t seen Nero for over three hundred years, but, he is not to be trifled with, Evelyn,” he replied, keeping his eyes on the road as we made our way back down the hill.

  “What do you mean?” Cold nerves crawled down my arms.

  “Let’s just say he makes his dad look like Gandhi,” Tristan sighed as we reached the bottom of the hill.

  Crazier than Lorenzo? Wonderful. What kind of family did Astara have?

  “How am I going to find him?” I mumbled, shaking my head.

  “You’re going to go to Lorenzo’s house tonight. You’re going to follow all the clues that Astara has left you,” Tristan replied. “I’ll send Ravenna to help you.”

  “You can’t help too?”

  “I owe Blake my life, Evelyn. Lying to him today was about the lowest thing I’ve ever done. When it comes to siding against Blake, you’ll have more of a chance with his sister.”

  “He saved your life?”

  “He did. We’re almost there. You do realize you don’t have any furniture in the house?” Tristan said as we pulled onto the road the old house was on.

  “Astara was clear, don’t tell Blake, he’ll die. I’d rather sleep on the floor for the rest of my life than watch one more person die because of me,” I replied determinedly. “He needs to stay away from me anyway.” I was trying to negate my guilt somehow. As we waited for the iron gates to open, I turned to Tristan. “His dreams—he’s seen my future. You can read minds, you must have seen them too?”

  “I have,” he replied simply as we drove past the forest and toward the house.

  “Tristan, you have to tell me what he dreamt of,” I said with a tone of desperation when he didn’t respond.

  He parked his car next to the Q2. The only snow left on it was on the windshield. He killed the engine and turned to face me. “Blake dreamed that you would be the end of the immortals, all of them, that you would come and destroy us all.”

  “How?”

  “We don’t know, or at least, Blake is concealing that bit.”

  “That’s why he’s so afraid that I’ll become immortal myself,” I mumbled.

  “Yes and no,” Tristan replied, now looking at the boarded-up house.

  “What do you mean? “I could barely breathe now.

  Tristan nodded and turned to me again. “In the dreams, Blake is in love with you, so much so, that even when he can stop you, he chooses not to.”

  My stomach lurched, and my heart pounded. “What?”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  My chest grew so heavy I struggled to inhale. “How is any of this possible?”

  “I don’t know, none of us do,” Tristan replied, pursing his lips. “But from the moment Blake saw you in Latin that day—well, let’s just say he’s conflicted.”

  I didn’t know what to say. Just a month ago, had anyone told me that any of this—the dreams, the immortals, Serena—was real, I would have called an insane asylum and had them committed. Yet, here I was. You have to find Nero, and then you have to get the hell out of Greyhaven, if Blake’s visions are true___ you just can’t even take the chance, Evelyn. But how would I be able to destroy every immortal? Just go inside, wait for Bastian, find Nero, help Astara, and then you can leave forever.

  “I—I should go in. I need to meet Bastian in the next hour,” I whispered, pushing the passenger door open.

  “Evelyn,” Tristan called after me just before I could shut the door. I leaned down and looked directly into his eyes. “Take this,” he said, holding out an iPhone. “The passcode is 1498. Ravenna’s number is in there. Call her if you need anything.”

  I took the phone. “You don’t want to delete all your stuff first?”

  “You don’t actually think I’d give you my phone, do you? I set that one up for you this morning.” He grinned.

  “Yeah, okay, but Greyhaven doesn’t have any signal,” I said, remembering what Kate had told me on my first night here.

  “That one has it. It even connects to the Wi-Fi available across the entire town, you lucky kid you.”

  “I thought there wasn’t any signal here at all?”

  “There is for a select few. You weren’t part of the cool-kid club, but I’ve upgraded you.” He smirked.

  I rolled my eyes, and a moment of silence passed.

  “Are you sure you’re not going to be at the Halloween party?” I asked,
suddenly hoping that he would be.

  “Nope, but Ravenna will be there for you. I’ll see you soon, America.”

  I nodded and shut the door. He reversed the car as I turned toward the house and made my way to the front door, which Gwenn and I had freed from the boards. I looked at the time on the phone: 3:35. How had so much time passed since Tristan had picked me up from school? I opened the door and walked into the dark entrance hall. The red velvet curtains were open, just as I had left them the day Blake showed up and compelled Gwenn to forget me.

  Okay, Ev, car keys and then you can drive to Bastian—you don’t know where he lives.

  I unlocked the iPhone and opened contacts. Bastian Cromwell. Would that be him?

  “Let’s send you a message,” I whispered. It’s Ev, forgot to ask you for your address. I walked up the stairs and paused at the painting of Blake and Ravenna or Astara.

  “Time to take you down I think,” I whispered as I grabbed the frame on either side and lifted the heavy painting slightly to dislodge it from its nail.

  As I lowered the painting to the ground, an old envelope slipped down. I placed the painting against the wall and was about to reach out for the envelope when the phone vibrated in my pocket.

  Bastian.

  “Hey,” I breathed, now bending back down to grab the envelope.

  “Hey, where are you? I’ll come get you. We live on the other side of town. You’ll never find it unless you’ve already been here.”

  “Kate’s house. Actually, Bastian, could you give me some time? Can we maybe go straight to the party from here a bit later?”

  “Yeah, no worries. I’ll ask Mom for a few costume choices for you. I figure you didn’t bring any Halloween stuff with you from the States. I’ll come and pick you up at five.”

  I smiled. “I didn’t. Thanks, Bastian. I’ll see you later.”

  I put the phone back in my pocket, relieved that I wouldn’t have to try to find my car keys. The envelope I held looked old, ancient, in fact. I stepped back and allowed myself to sink down onto the third step. I turned it over.

  Astara.

  My hands shook slightly as I opened the envelope and pulled out the single sheet of folded paper.

  Dearest,

  You must see what this is doing to me, what your actions do to me, darling. They fill me with despair. We must have our desired end. Ravenna, Viktor, and Blake cannot give you what I can. You must abandon this life and come to me. We must end what we began.

  Serena

  She was alive when she last held this note in her hand. Astara was alive. My heart hammered against my ribcage. Serena wanted Astara to leave her family and run away with her?

  I couldn’t tell how long I sat with that letter in my hands, staring at the words Serena wrote five hundred years ago. I touched the old ink writing with my fingertips and took a deep breath. If this wasn’t all so twisted, it might have been a love story. But was Astara also in love with Serena? She didn’t leave her family in the end.

  You should look behind the rest of the paintings and photos.

  It turned out there were over five hundred photos and paintings through Kate’s empty house, and not one had anything behind it.

  “Evelyn, you here?” I heard Bastian call from the entrance hall.

  “Yeah, up here. I’ll be down in a second,” I cried, replacing the last painting of an angel on the wall in the study. I sped down the hallway and the stairs, disheartened that I hadn’t found anything else. I was going to have to find Nero the hard way after all.

  “Hey,” I said as Bastian placed some Halloween costumes on the gossip chair—the only piece of furniture they hadn’t taken.

  “Is the whole house this empty?” he asked, turning to me as my feet hit the wooden flooring in the entrance hall.

  “Yep, there is one gossip chair and a whole bunch of old paintings.” I nodded. “I’ll have to figure something out for tonight.”

  “Not staying at the manor anymore?”

  I looked up and Bastian’s eyes met with mine, “It was—too complicated.”

  “That bad, huh?”

  “Blake and I, you know, with his mother, the dreams, it’s just. I’m just—”

  “Tired?”

  “Worried,” I sighed, walking to the gossip chair and picking up a white ball gown that was torn up and bloodied.

  “Undead Marie Antoinette.” Bastian grinned.

  “How’s Gwenn?” I asked, turning to him and then biting my lower lip.

  “The only thing she remembers about you is that she’s scared of you,” Bastian replied, his eyes fixed on the pile of costumes.

  “Great,” I breathed. What were the chances of Blake returning Gwenn’s memories to her after I pretty much told him I didn’t care if he died? “I’ll just wear this one.” I shook the Marie Antoinette outfit.

  “I guess I’m Louis then.”

  I suddenly lost every ounce of energy I had left and sat on the rest of the costumes. I put my hands on my forehead and my elbow on my knees. I felt Bastian sit next to me.

  “I just want to wake up from this. I just want to wake up and be in my bedroom back home and smell the pancakes Dad is burning and the coffee Grace is brewing. I want to fight with Justin about the amount of time he spends doing his hair in the bathroom. I want to drive to school and go to cheerleading practice, even though I really hated every minute of it, and I really just want to go to prom with all my friends—God, I didn’t even want to go to that stupid prom when I was there, and now I would give everything, everything to go,” I mumbled into my legs. Bastian placed his hand on the small of my back and gave me a little pat.

  “I don’t want to be immortal,” he said, breaking the thick silence.

  I lifted my face out of my hands and looked over at him. When Ravenna told me that Bastian was part of the immortal line, I took for granted that he wanted that life.

  “You don’t?”

  “I really, really don’t. I hate it here,” he said, waving his arm around the house, indicating Greyhaven rather than Kate’s old house. “I want to be mortal. I want to leave and become a doctor and live with mortals, with normal people who aren’t obsessed with abilities, money, and power, and living forever.”

  “What would happen if you chose a mortal life?”

  “You get old and die,” he replied, shrugging. “You die of old age.”

  “So, if you and I don’t purposefully die—”

  “Nope, if you die in an accident, if you’re murdered, if you die of any diseases, you come back, at any age,” he said, shaking his head and rolling his eyes. “If you happen to make it to a ripe old age where your body just shuts down, that’s when you go forever.”

  I snorted. “If this past week is anything to go by, I’ll be immortal by the time Christmas comes around.” Don’t even joke about that, Evelyn. You know that can never, ever happen.

  “How many mortals go through their lives without getting sick or needing to be resuscitated?” Bastian asked.

  I shook my head. “I don’t know. I mean, I rarely hear of anyone dying of old age,” I admitted, trying to think of one person.

  “I don’t exactly want to be an immortal stuck in an eighty-year-old’s body forever.” Bastian snorted now.

  I giggled. “No, that would be pretty bleak.”

  “Let’s get dressed and get to this party. At least we’ll have alcohol there.” He grinned.

  The last time I got drunk, three people died. That was Serena, not you.

  “Actually, I may take a quick shower. Are you okay to wait here?” I asked, standing and grabbing the Marie Antoinette dress again.

  “Yeah, sure. I’m probably going to need at least half an hour to get myself into this ridiculous get-up anyway. Mom sent some extra fake blood for us.”

  I smiled. “I’ll be back
down in twenty minutes.” I walked toward the stairs.

  It took us forty minutes to get ready. Bastian looked like Louis XVI after they had sent him to the guillotine.

  “Let me add some blood to your neck,” he said as I presented myself in the entrance hall. I had pinned my hair up in a French style. I didn’t have any makeup with me, so blood would have to do.

  “Can we also add a few drops coming out of my mouth?” I asked, and Bastian poured the thick fake blood on my neck. Find Him, appeared in my mind. Had that been Fayme’s blood? My chest constricted.

  Don’t think about that now.

  A few minutes later we were in Bastian’s Lexus SUV driving toward the cemetery.

  “I’m going to hang around for a few minutes and then go find Lorenzo’s old house,” I said as Bastian parked with the rest of the cars on the grass field about half a mile away from the cemetery.

  “Sure. Do you want me to come with you?” he asked as we left the warmth of the car.

  “No, I think Ravenna is coming to help me. I don’t really want you anywhere near Serena if we can help it. Got to get you to medical school, not the morgue,” I muttered.

  Bastian and I walked arm in arm across the field toward the cemetery, following the music as it got louder and louder. When we caught a first glimpse of the graveyard, my mouth fell open. I couldn’t believe that people had been able to set this up here; huge red, green, and blue floodlights surrounded the entire cemetery, and a foot of synthetic mist crept along the ground. Fake cobwebs hung on trees, and eerie music filled the background through massive speakers encircling the entire site, making the field shake.

  I clung to Bastian’s arm as my heels caught in the muddy grass. As we got closer, we noticed about twenty life-size coffins, some filled to the brim with candy, some overflowing with punch, and some topped up with champagne. Tombstones propped up mummies, and plastic skeletons were scattered along the grass, peeking through the mist.