Marked

by Dean Murray

  My back had stopped hurting, and even the burning across my chest seemed to have subsided into something that could almost be ignored. There was no way of knowing for sure whether that was because I was dying or if the thorns were just coated with some kind of numbing agent. Either way, I didn't have much time left before I'd no longer be able to act.

  I looked down and realized that my sword was still dangling from my right hand. I took a deep breath and then slashed through the two-foot trunk of the tree just below my feet. Even as I did it, I knew that my actions were insane.

  The jolt as the free end of the trunk dropped down and slammed into the ground took my breath away. For a second I thought the tree was going to fall over in my direction and crush me, but after a second that seemed to stretch out to eternity, the tree slowly started toppling to the side.

  Just before the top of the tree crashed into the ground, Alec reached Dream Stealer and the two of them exchanged raking slashes. Alec was moving more slowly now, while Dream Stealer even seemed to be regenerating the arm that I'd cut off. There wasn't any time to waste.

  I laboriously pulled myself off of the thorns, but my right leg refused to work when I tried to climb back to my feet. I nearly despaired until I saw the tiny thread that ran between Alec and I. The pulses of light moving between us offered a possible solution. I reached out with the same part of my mind that was responsible for manifesting my sword, and used it to reach for the energy pulsing on the other end of the thread.

  The thread suddenly brightened nearly to the point where it was painful to look at, and something in my pelvis shifted as nerves that had been severed reconnected. The feeling was pure bliss and a part of me wanted to pull more power down through our link, wanted to drink it all in until I glowed brighter than the sun, but in that instant Alec stumbled, his light dimming, flickering as more light was pulled from the rest of the threads running from his body out to the real world.

  That stumble nearly cost Alec the fight. He'd been charging forward in an effort to get inside the reach of Dream Stealer's upper arms, but his misstep robbed him of valuable speed and even I could see he wasn't going to make it in time. Alec twisted away at the last second, jumping over one of the lower appendages, but he still wasn't able to escape completely unscathed.

  Dream Stealer connected with another blow—this one more glancing, but still more than enough to knock Alec back into the temple, and Alec was slower to get back to his feet. I heard screaming and realized it was coming from me as I sprinted forward on my newly-healed leg.

  Alec was in motion too, moving with a hitch that told me that last impact had broken one or more of his ribs, but still moving with a speed that I'd never seen anyone in the real world match. Somehow, in the middle of the fight, Alec had figured out how to modify his own body and grant himself more speed and strength.

  Dream Stealer launched a blindingly fast swipe at Alec that seemed impossible to block or dodge either one, but Alec threw himself into the air and landed on Dream Stealer's right arm, digging in with the talons on both feet and the claws on his left hand.

  I expected Alec's claws to rip free of Dream Stealer's arm just like they'd done a few seconds before when Alec had shredded Dream Stealer's back, but Alec must have returned them to their normal level of sharpness because rather than tearing free, they provided him with the leverage he needed to scramble further up Dream Stealer's arm.

  Dream Stealer brought his left arm over, intending on using his newly-regenerated claws to impale Alec. I screamed a warning, but Alec simply brought his right hand up before him and in the split second before impact I saw Alec's claws lengthen out to more than double their normal length. They sliced through Dream Stealer's flesh with the ease of a monofilament edge, and then Alec screamed as liquid fire washed over him.

  I knew the agony he was enduring—I fully expected for Alec to lose hold of his grip on Dream Stealer's arm, but instead he launched himself forward, the massive muscles in his left arm and both legs propelling him like an arrow towards Dream Stealer's throat.

  For one perfect second I thought Alec was going to succeed. Not even Dream Stealer could survive a beheading and there was no way that Dream Stealer was going to get either hand in position to knock Alec away. An instant before Alec's claws would have sliced through Dream Stealer's neck, large spikes of what looked like obsidian shot out of Dream Stealer's shoulders, neck and upper chest.

  Aimed as if by magic, the glassy thorns impaled Alec and then continued growing so that they lifted him up and away from Dream Stealer's vulnerable flesh. The scream that was torn out of Alec was partially pain and partially rage at having been bested. Still sprinting, I watched as Alec flailed helplessly away against the spikes immobilizing him. His claws, even the monofilament edge of his right-hand set, didn't even mark the dark glass, and the slick black material didn't provide enough friction for him to lever himself off of the cruel points.

  "And what about you, little one?" Dream Stealer turned towards me as I reached my goal. "What will you do now that young Graves is finally helpless?"

  "He's not helpless as long as he still has friends!"

  Dropping my sword, I reached up and closed my fist around the cable-like mass of glowing threads that connected Alec to the bars, and then clamped down with every ounce of strength I could muster.

  The effect wasn't quite instantaneous—not to my amped-up time sense—but there was a noticeable dropoff in the light from the billions of threads that made up the substance of the jungle around us. More importantly, with me stopping the flow of light away from Alec, he brightened noticeably and the flow of some of the threads connecting him to the real world reversed direction and energy started flowing away from Alec rather than solely towards him.

  Most importantly of all, the black light and flame coming from Dream Stealer immediately started dimming.

  "No! How are you doing that? It's taken me weeks to figure out how to tap into his power, how are you stopping the flow so easily?"

  I gave him my best cold smile. "Wouldn't you like to know?"

  Dream Stealer charged towards me with a howl of rage, but I reflexively pulled more light along the thread connecting me to Alec and it was suddenly child's play to skip to one side, effortlessly avoiding the four-foot claws that otherwise would have ended my life. Dream Stealer spun in place, somehow less than he'd been even just a few seconds previously, but still very much capable of ending me if he got his claws on me.

  Alec seemed to have reached a kind of equilibrium. He was brighter than I'd even seen him before, but most of the light coming in from the outside world was being redirected back out along other threads that were likewise running to the outside world.

  Dream Stealer took another swipe at me and this time I jumped over the attack and ran partway up his arm before I felt something moving underneath his skin. A new set of obsidian spikes burst free from Dream Stealer's skin, moving faster than even the ones that had succeeded in spearing Alec, but I was already sailing away from Dream Stealer, completing a perfect backflip and then landing with the threads between Alec and the exit still tangled around my fingers.

  "What happened to your sword, little one?"

  Some of the concern had disappeared from Dream Stealer's voice. We were locked in a stalemate, but it was a stalemate that favored him on every level. As long as I maintained my grip on the threads that had been powering him, he would continue to shrink back down to something closer to his real size and strength, but as long as my only hand was occupied with the threads I couldn't attack him. I was fighting a purely defensive war, one where I had to dodge every blow in order to go on surviving. He only had to get lucky once.

  The next attack came even closer still and I reeled away with fresh trickles of blood running down my left arm.

  "How long can you keep this up? You're slowing already. It's only a matter of time now, little one."

  He was right, but not in the way he thought. I was slowing, but the real problem
was that my real body was still gasping for breath, still on death's doorstep. I needed to finish this now.

  I reached through the thread connecting me to Alec once again and gulped down all of the power I could hold. It was a heady feeling. The world around me slowed even further as Alec, still writhing in pain on Dream Stealer's spikes, dimmed back down to a dangerous level.

  Dream Stealer charged me again, but this time I ran forward to meet him. I waited until the last second and then threw myself down as though I was sliding into home plate. His claws passed over me, mere inches from my face, and then I was passing under him—too fast for even me to take advantage of the moment.

  Still drinking down Alec's light, I let go of the threads I'd been holding onto and conjured my sword with one clean motion. On one level it was ludicrous to think that something as tangible as my sword could shear through the intangible cable that Dream Stealer was using to drain Alec, but my sword wasn't just a sword, it glowed with the same pure, white light that I did.

  Out of the corner of my eye I saw Alec's light dim even further as a blinding flash of energy shot down the thread I'd just released, but most of my focus was on the silvery thread that connected me to my sword. I pushed light down that thread at the same time that I envisioned a weapon that was sharp enough to cut through spirit as well as the coarse matter that I'd originally created it to rend.

  The light from my sword was blinding as I whipped it through the air, but even through the afterimages it left on my retinas I was still able to see it slice through the threads that bound Alec to this nightmare.

  I started turning back around to face Dream Stealer, my sword held high and a smile on my face, when I felt a slight tugging at my chest followed by an inability to breathe. My impossible speed hadn't been enough to save me, not when I'd held still to cut the threads, not once Dream Stealer had—even momentarily—access to the enormous well of power inside of Alec.

  I'd turned thinking I still had plenty of time to get set before Dream Stealer would be able to turn around and attack me, but I'd been wrong and the sight of his claws ripping through the right side of my chest, my blood shimmering in the air, was enough of a shock to make me lose my grip on the energy I'd been siphoning away from Alec.

  The light and power that could have saved me shot back down the thread, racing to Alec and leaving me a weak, dying husk of what I'd been. That jolt of energy, combined with the backlash from the thread I'd just cut, momentarily turned Alec into a being of such incandescence that I expected to feel heat coming off of him. I turned away, even my unique vision overloaded as I heard the sound of fine crystal shattering.

  When I was next able to look at Alec he was standing in front of Dream Stealer, shards of obsidian still protruding from his body where he'd cut himself free, and his fist inside of Dream Stealer's chest. The two stood there frozen for several seconds, Alec taller and more powerful than I'd ever seen before, and Dream Stealer a dark, tiny shadow of the thing that we'd been fighting just seconds before.

  "What I do now is merely justice. The crimes you have committed demand death to restore the balance."

  Dream Stealer laughed weakly. "I begin to see why he's so scared of you. Again and again we underestimate you. We all thought Brandon was merely a fluke, but then you killed Cyrus. I should have known better, but I was so blinded by rage that I thought I could beat you by myself."

  "Who's scared of me? Who are you talking about?"

  I wanted to smile, wanted to cheer for joy, but I just didn't have the strength. I could feel my life leaking away from me, both inside the dream and in the real world, but I forced myself to stay there, forced myself not to go into the yawning void I could feel opening up underneath my feet. More than anything else I wanted to see Dream Stealer die, wanted to know for certain that I'd been successful, that Alec was finally safe.

  As I watched I could see the darkness bleeding out of Dream Stealer. It wasn't a burning fire any more—it was really little more than a mist that evaporated away as it left his body. Only the longer I watched the more I realized that wasn't right. It wasn't evaporating, it was soaking into Alec. I felt a moment of terror at the idea that Dream Stealer might be trying to possess Alec, but then I realized that the mist was turning from darkness into light in the moment that it touched his skin.

  With each droplet that Alec absorbed he became brighter and taller, and Dream Stealer became smaller and more feeble. Dream Stealer started coughing violently and then when he looked back up, Alec's hand still buried in his chest, he was no longer a creature of shimmering darkness, he was merely a man.

  I couldn't have said how I knew that the tired, old face was Dream Stealer's, but I knew it. Even stranger, I felt as though I'd seen those careworn, Native American features before now, felt as though they were as familiar to me as my father's face had been before he'd been taken away from me.

  Alec grabbed Dream Stealer's right shoulder, sinking his claws into Dream Stealer's flesh as he shook him. "I want a name. Who's scared of me? Whose orders are you taking?"

  Dream Stealer started to laugh, but that triggered another weak coughing fit. "I don't actually know his name, none of us do. I call him the Scientist, but I do have a name for you—mine. It's Taggart. I want at least one other living person to know it now that Cyrus is gone."

  Dream Stealer—Taggart—looked over at me and smiled. "At least I deprived you of her. He's convinced that you can't win without her."

  Alec shook his head. "You came very close to breaking me, but in the end you gave me access to power I never realized was possible. Look at her and see your hopes dashed as you dashed the hopes of so many over the centuries."

  It started out small, no more than a feeling of warmth in my stomach, but it rapidly grew into a fire of such heat that I thought I was going to be consumed. I looked down and saw light pouring into me from the thread that connected Alec and me—healing, life-giving light.

  For the first time in minutes, I opened my eyes and saw more than just threads and darkness. I saw Alec looking at me with gratitude and determination. I started to pull myself to my feet and then nearly fell when my left arm refused to respond.

  Alec's brow furrowed even more and the amount of light flowing down the thread doubled and then redoubled again. It was far more power than I'd been able to pull in myself and my form started to waver as though I was nothing more than a mirage, but my arm still refused to respond to my will.

  I looked up at Alec and shook my head, but that merely caused him to send even more light to me. I was shaking now and it felt like my skin was losing the battle to keep the raging energies inside of me, but even through the euphoria I was still able to see Alec's light faltering, was able to see some of the threads powering him begin to flicker.

  "Stop! It's not worth it, Alec. I'll be fine like this."

  Forcing the words out was one of the hardest things I'd ever done, and not just because being full of light was the most addicting feeling I'd ever experienced. There at the end I'd felt sensations start to shoot up and down my left arm. Now that I'd gone for days without the use of my arm I wanted it back more than ever, but I was fairly certain I knew what was on the other end of all those threads and I wasn't going to sacrifice one of my friends simply to regain the use of a limb.

  I looked up at Alec with tears in my eyes, but I forced a smile on my face so that he would think they were tears of joy. I got a hesitant smile back in return and then realized that I could feel Taggart slipping away.

  "His heart! Now, Alec!"

  Alec ripped his claws free of Taggart's chest, but I could still feel Taggart turning to metaphysical mist. I acted out of instinct, willing him into place, refusing to acknowledge a reality in which he was able to escape. What I was attempting was beyond me, but I wasn't just relying on my natural abilities, I was still full of light and energy. Not as much as I'd been holding just seconds before, but still far more than any human should ever be offered.

  I clamped down on
Taggart's essence and rooted it to this reality, to the jungle where he'd tortured Alec and paralyzed me. He could feel what I was doing—I could feel him fighting, but he was weak and dying.

  He turned towards me and gave me a sad smile. "And so I am truly bested and the world will be shattered as a result. Beware the werewolves. When they start acting in inexplicable ways you'll know that the end is near."

  I watched the light in Taggart's eyes go out and couldn't explain why I was crying. Alec finally lowered the limp body to the ground and I threw up an instant later.

  Dream Stealer had been a terrible person, but somehow my world felt a little smaller and colder than it had been before his death.

  Epilogue

  Adriana Paige

  Galt Oil Field

  Western North Dakota

  By all accounts I should have died—or at the very least woken up in a hospital under a police watch—and Alec should have died with me. Alec and I had come back to ourselves at the same time, surrounded by silence so profound that I'd been worried James hadn't survived.

  I'd been wrong—James was okay, albeit a little worse for the wear after having been electrocuted and then ejected from a moving vehicle. Both Alec and I were healed from all of our injuries, everything but the paralysis in my left arm—that was still unchanged.

  Drake, the guy Oblivion had wiped clean and then abandoned, came back to consciousness about the same time that James did. Interacting with him was odd in ways that I was still getting used to. Oblivion seemed to have taken more from Drake than he had from Jess. Drake knew how to walk and talk, but other than that it was like dealing with a small child. He had zero background knowledge, which meant that he was very disoriented, but he was also incredibly trusting. I told him our names and then gave him the option of coming with us or us leaving him somewhere safe and he asked to come with us.