by Vicki Leigh
“My mom used to take me with her to New York sometimes when she’d go for medical conferences. Rule number one: it helps to have a pretty girl by your side.” She pulled open the back door of the yellow vehicle with a grin.
I snorted and raised an eyebrow. “That was impressive.”
“Not the first time I had to help an old guy learn something new.” A goofy grin split her face, and her hazel eyes sparkled.
“Oh, I see.” I grabbed her sides and squeezed. She shrieked, slapping my hands away as she laughed. I let go, grinning, and we climbed into the cab.
’d chosen the Lincoln Memorial as a good place to start; the area was teeming with people. Several times, we’d had to duck out of the way of cameras or avoid running over a child who’d zipped in front of us on the pathway. Between the blazing sun, body heat, and muggy, August air, I’d sweated through my shirt by the time we reached the Reflecting Pool. There, on the lawn, we sat and pretended to be taking a break from a long day of tourism.
I checked in with Seth, who was riding the subway system all day with Tabbi. Anything, yet?
Nah. Just lots of tourists and government peeps. She’s already popped four Excedrin, though.
The number of thought patterns Tabbi was weaving through had to be overwhelming. All right. Keep me updated.
She says, “Lots of sex.” Everybody’s thinkin’ about sex, yo.
Thanks, mate. I shook my head. One of these days, I had to convince Tabbi to let Trishna Unify her.
I glanced at Kayla. Her knee bounced, and she bit her bottom lip, her face taut in nervous concentration.
“So, how does this ‘feeling’ thing work?” I asked, trying to calm her. Maybe if she reviewed the mechanics, her confidence would grow.
“Apparently, whenever I get close to another witch or warlock, it’ll feel like”—she sighed, blushing—“a vibrator. Nolan’s words. Not mine.”
I grimaced at his name.
“And then your kind… I guess you kind of feel like a cold spot.”
Well, Protectors were no more than angelically-animated corpses. Albeit, we still functioned like the living; we still bled, got hungry, needed sleep, etc. But we didn’t age, and our souls were gone. Only our thoughts, dreams, and memories remained, left intact by some angelic power. Hence why, upon our second death, we just slept—eternal blackness. No soul, no Heaven.
“All right. So, we practice. Can you feel me?” I asked.
Kayla closed her eyes and breathed deeply. For seconds, she sat there, unmoving. My heart raced. The last thing I wanted was for someone to ask if she was all right and draw attention to ourselves. But then her lips parted, and she gasped.
“Okay. This is really weird. Your frequency, or whatever, is like a chilly breeze at the ocean. Like, I can almost feel it blowing my hair,” she said.
Good to know. “Try opening your eyes.” When she did, I asked, “Still there?”
She nodded, meeting my gaze.
“All right. So, maybe reach out to others like you did to me?”
She blinked rapidly, taking a deep breath, and then her gaze wandered the park. After two minutes of silence, she growled and rubbed her temples. “How did Nolan do this for four weeks? I’m seriously getting a headache.”
Was this how Nolan and Samantha had found the sixty recruits who’d joined us in Caelum? It made sense. My gaze darted around the area. There had to be at least one Protector or Magus in this group of hundreds. Whether they were with Richard or not, we’d find out.
“I have an idea,” I said, standing. Kayla took my outstretched hand, and I pulled her to her feet. “Let’s weave through the crowd. Maybe you need to be within a certain range.”
Kayla’s eyes brightened, and she nodded, taking a deep breath. Slowly, we walked hand-in-hand through the pack. I watched her gaze flicker from person to person as minutes passed. Her brows tightened as tears pooled in the bottom of her eyes. I squeezed her fingers. You can do this, I sent to her. With her free hand, she wiped a bead of sweat from her forehead before continuing forward, her shoulders sagging. I was about to suggest we take a break when she tugged on my fingers.
“I think I have something,” she said. “It’s another cold spot, a Protector. Like your frequency but slightly different.”
Interesting. We each must have a fingerprint-like frequency—every Protector had one, but each was unique to the person.
“Who is it?” I asked, hoping she’d somehow worked out how to see Protectors. She could see Nightmares, after all. Unlike her, I couldn’t tell my kind apart from the living; they all looked the same to me. There was no beacon telling me who was dead and who wasn’t.
“I… I don’t know. They’re in that group.” Kayla pointed to where five people huddled near a college-aged guy painting, what looked like, an abstract version of the monument. This was going to take some finagling.
“How many people are you able to see in the huddle?” I asked.
“Four.”
Wonderful—I saw five, which meant the Protector was staying invisible. All we had to do was narrow it down. “Genders?”
“Three female, one male.”
“Hair color?”
“Black.”
“Got him.” The person she couldn’t see—our Protector—had brown hair and was the size of a bodybuilder.
After two hundred years of fighting alongside Dreamcatchers, my ability to read people had become second nature. This bloke’s eyes were hard and angry, like a man who’d seen far too much in his lifetime. This Catcher had been around for a while. Maybe longer than me. I swallowed. If he was on Richard’s side, at least I’d be quicker than him, given my smaller size. He just better not hit me first.
Coming up beside him, I tucked Kayla behind me so he couldn’t see her face. “Hey, mate.”
His head turned, and his cold, green eyes locked on me, unfaltering.
“I thought this was my post today,” I said. Giant flies danced in my stomach.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he replied, his voice as deep as a sub-woofer.
My heart raced. “This is where Richard told me to go. Am I supposed to check in with you or something?”
One corner of the Catcher’s mouth twitched. “I thought I recognized you, Daniel.”
Shit.
The Catcher went visible and yanked my arm before I had a chance to react.
Run, Kayla! I shouted through our bond.
She spun around, her hands up to fight. But in a split second, the Catcher slapped a metal cuff on my wrist and evaporated, taking me with him.
We landed in a dark cell.
Somebody protect Kayla! I called to my team as I elbowed the Catcher in the face. He grunted, dropping my arm. I tried to evaporate but found myself in the same dungeon. Damn.
A strong fist punched me in the nose. Momentary blackness shot through my vision as blood gushed from my nostrils. Heat flushed through my body. Baring my teeth, I kicked the Catcher in the stomach as hard as I could. He bent over. I struck him in the temple, and he tipped. I reached out to strangle him—
He evaporated.
How the hell?
Reappearing behind me, the Dreamcatcher grabbed my head and slammed it against the stone wall. I yelped as my skull cracked. He punched my kidney, and I crumbled to the ground. My gaze caught the silver bracelet around my wrist. Hieroglyph-like markings were carved into the cuff. Was this how I was being kept here?
“All right. That’s enough,” a familiar Welsh accent filled the cell.
A shiver ran down my spine. “You’ve got to be kidding me.” I rolled onto my back with a cough. Richard stood in the doorway, a smug look on his face.
“I’m afraid not.” He stepped into the room. “If I wanted to tell you a joke, you’d be splitting with laughter.”
“Oh, shove off, you worthless piece of shit.”
“Ouch. I’m hurt. Alan, close his mouth for me, would you?”
Alan went to slam his foot
into my face, but I grabbed his leg and pulled him to the ground. He hit with an echoing thud. Take that, asshole.
Richard laughed. “All right, now, that was pretty funny.”
Daniel, I’m fine. Where are you? Kayla yelled in my head.
With Richard. I don’t know where.
I pushed myself into a seated position, resting against the wall. My head spun, and my face throbbed. Blood trickled from where my head had split, and I wiped my nose. “If you’re going to kill me, just get it over with.” I shoved my knuckles against the concrete floor, hiding the shakiness in my hands. I didn’t want to die, not before I made sure Kayla was safe.
Richard raised an eyebrow. “I’m not going to kill you, Daniel. I put a steep bounty on your head for a reason.”
I pressed my shaking hands harder against the ground. “Why?”
“Well, you did take my arrow, did you not?” He wiped my blood from the wall and rubbed it between his fingertips. “I need to make sure the effects of Margaret’s poison were successful.”
Margaret? I’d assumed the poison was his.
“Now, Alan, be a dear and hold out your arm, please.” Richard drew a knife from his sleeve.
“What?” Alan asked.
“Hold out your arm.” Richard’s eyes flashed yellow as he stepped toward me.
My pulse spiked. Could it be this easy? If I moved fast enough, I might be able to get that knife off him and take him down before he realized what happened.
I readied to attack, hair lifting on the back of my neck. It was now or never. This bastard wasn’t going to gut me while I could still fight.
When he got close, I pushed myself off the ground. I swung a leg out to trip him, aiming to grab the blade out of his hand as he fell, but Richard raised a palm and shot a volt of electricity through me. I swore, flattening against the wall, cringing as every inch of me sizzled. Richard sliced my leg with the dagger.
“Well, that was easier than I thought,” he said, stepping away. Tipping the knife so the droplets of my blood didn’t roll off, he nodded at Alan.
Alan’s nostrils flared, but he rolled up his sleeve. Richard sliced a small gash into the Catcher’s forearm, mixing my blood with his.
“See, I’m guessing that Trishna thinks she healed you of Margaret’s poison,” Richard said. “But you were sick for maybe, what, three days? And all of a sudden, you woke up and the veins were gone.”
A chill shot down my spine. That’s exactly what happened. Three days of unconsciousness, and then I was fine—or, so I thought.
Alan fell to his knees with a shout. From his wound, dark, spidery veins spread up his arm. My heart raced.
“In reality,” Richard continued, “you’re still carrying the disease. All it takes is a little blood contact, and it spreads. Now, Alan will be ill for three days, and if his body’s strong enough, he’ll wake up. Just like you did.”
“You’re mad.” My hands clammed, and I dug my fingertips into the ground.
He shrugged. “Some would argue I’m brilliant. I mean, come on, Daniel—how many times do I have to explain that I’m trying to open the world for people like you and me? To walk freely, unafraid to be who we really are?”
Alan rolled onto his back, shaking with seizure. Black foam filled his mouth as his eyes rolled into his head. He screamed one last time, then stilled.
Richard pressed his fingers to Alan’s neck. “Guess his body couldn’t take it. Oh well. At least I know the poison works.”
My nostrils flared. Whatever he had planned needed to end now. I didn’t care if I died—I was taking him down.
I jumped off the floor, fighting the nauseating pain in my head, and tackled Richard. Pulling the knife from his hand, I aimed for his throat, but Richard blasted me off him with a burst of air. The metal only scratched his cheek.
I flew into the ceiling. The impact knocked the wind out of me, and I crashed to the floor. My right arm snapped beneath me. I shouted as bone pierced through skin, then rolled onto my back, clutching my arm to my body.
Unwanted tears burned my eyes. I’d never be able to fight him now. How many people were going to die because I’d failed to stop him? If he kept me locked in here, planning to use my blood to sicken God knows how many people… I couldn’t let that happen. Somehow, I’d have to find a way to end it—to end me.
Richard stood, brushing himself off. “Well, I was going to be a nice guy and clean you up before sending you back to your friends.”
What? A shiver ran down my spine. Somehow, knowing he didn’t need me was more terrifying.
“But after that, I’m not feeling very generous.” He rolled his neck. “In fact, I think I’ll give you a little preview of what’s to come.”
He snapped his fingers, and from the ceiling dropped a Nightmare, larger than the one that had thrown me into the window in Kayla’s hospital room. My heartbeat thrashed in my ears. I winced, sinking as far into the wall as I could, trembling from head to toe. Without my Dreamcatcher blades, I had no way to protect myself—the Nightmare was going to rip me to pieces.
Heat rolled up the back of my neck. I’d rather Richard had outright killed me.
“Until now,” he said, “Nightmares had no effect on your kind. But I’ve been in your head, Daniel. Oh yes. That nightmare you had was me. I know the poison worked on you. Now, see what will happen once the sickness has infected everyone, including all you Protectors.” He spat out the last word.
The Nightmare gripped my head between its clawed hands, the points of its nails digging into my scalp. I squirmed, whimpering through clenched teeth. Its scaly mouth opened, hovering over mine, its cold breath a nauseating wave of pure sulfur. Bile burned my throat as terror filled my body, hot and stabbing, like I’d overdosed on morphine. Was this what Kayla had felt every time I failed protecting her?
Kayla, I’m so sorry, I sent off, praying she would hear me. A soft, grayish glow flowed from deep in the Nightmare’s throat. I squeezed my eyes closed as a single tear broke free.
What are you talking about? What’s happening? she replied.
I love you. Don’t ever forget that.
What? Daniel, no, don’t let go!
A chill, so cold that it burned, exploded in my head and chest. A primal roar ripped from my throat as a hooded person with bright yellow eyes bound me with chains and ripped Kayla apart before my eyes, piece by piece. Her wails tore a hole in my soul. Flames scorched my feet, but I didn’t die. My raw, blistered, blackened body was tossed in a shallow grave and covered with dirt until it filled my lungs. Until I suffocated on the earth and my blood.
I gagged as the Nightmare played my worst fears on a loop, choking on my screams as tears fell from the corners of my eyes. “Kill me, please!” I screamed. Again, Kayla’s cries followed me to my grave. “Please! I’m begging you.”
The Nightmare backed away. I slumped flat on my back, weak and useless, every ounce of energy zapped from my cells. Rasping breaths entered my lungs as I fought for control over my racing pulse.
Richard lingered over me, grasping my shirt in his fist. “Not today. But you can count on it.” He grabbed the wrist that wore the metal cuff—the arm I had broken. The shackle fell from my joint. I yelped, pain forcing white spots in my gaze. I didn’t know how much more I could take.
“Now, go join your friends,” he said. “And do tell my daughter I said hello.”
t took me a few seconds to collect the energy to evaporate. Picturing Kayla in my head, I blinked slowly and willed myself to land wherever she was. The quick whoosh of teleportation fluttered around me, then my back touched ground. I stared at a hotel ceiling through watery eyes, lying on the carpet between two beds.
Kayla sat on the one to my left. I tried to call out to her, but I just tasted blood. I’d wrecked my voice with all my screaming. It was Lian who spotted me.
She swore in Mandarin then spun toward my best friend. “Seth, get Trishna now. Screw the evaporation rule.”
Kayla’s hea
d turned. All the color ran from her cheeks as she glanced down. She covered her mouth. When I saw her beautiful eyes and the love and concern on her face, my stomach twisted. Only minutes ago, I’d heard her deafening screams.
My heart shattered, like a bomb detonating in my chest. I squeezed my eyes closed. Someday, I truly could lose her. I’d pushed the thought out of my head for so long, kidded myself into believing I was enough to protect her. But the Nightmare’s torture forced all my emotions—all my fears—to the surface. I wasn’t omnipotent; I’d screwed up before. Who was to say I wouldn’t fail her again?
I swallowed a cry and pressed my fist to my forehead.
Seth returned with Trishna a second later. “I need to heal him in the van,” she said. “Now that you both have evaporated here, Richard’s people will follow in minutes. Help him up.”
Ivan and Seth helped me from the ground, and my knees buckled. I shouted and gripped Seth’s shirt tight in my good hand. The room spun as my brain pounded against the inside of my skull.
“You can’t seriously think Richard knows when we evaporate,” Samantha said.
“I don’t think,” Trishna replied. “I know. We’ve already run into trouble. Get him to the van. The rest of you, grab your things. We leave now.”
With my good arm draped over Seth’s shoulders, he took a set of keys from Nolan and evaporated to the parking lot. I climbed into one of the seats in the middle of the vehicle with a loud growl. Seconds later, the rest of our team popped in. Kayla, Tabbi, and Seth climbed onto the bench seat in the back, and Samantha joined Nolan in the front. Trishna sat in the captain’s chair next to mine. Seconds later, we took off.
“How did this happen?” Trishna asked, laying a hand on the side of my head that had cracked against the dungeon’s wall.
I yelped when the fracture in my skull healed and my nose repaired. “There was a bounty.” I swallowed as sandpaper ripped my throat. “All of Richard’s followers were looking for me.”
“That makes zero sense,” Nolan said.
“He was testing a theory, and since I got hit with the arrow, I’m the one who got nabbed.”
