by Devon Monk
Somewhere in the center of my brain, my dad raged.
“I did,” I said, my mouth tasting of wintergreen and old leather, and not feeling nearly enough like it belonged to me. “It’s wonderful, Violet.” I tried to smile, but wasn’t sure I did it. “Shame’s right. You should get some sleep.”
Then there were nurses, striding into the room, moving briskly, doing things with the tubes that ran in and out of Violet. They told me she’d be fine, but needed me to leave so she could rest.
I turned and walked out of that room, leaving Violet and my unborn sibling to their care, and took my father and his pain as far away from them as I could.
Chapter Eighteen
Shame and I made it down to the car without any arguments about stairs. I didn’t care if he took the elevator-I needed to stomp, to move, to stretch out and feel my body as my own again. The stairs suited me perfectly.
We made it to street level. I straight-armed the door, and practically ran across the street to the parking garage. Fear, hate, and, yes, anger got me where I was going-anger at my father. For doing this to me. For using me. Again.
I was so done with it. I didn’t care what it took-I was going to get rid of him. He wasn’t going to stay in my mind and use my body, my thoughts, my emotions, ever again.
You, I thought, are going down.
A hand caught my elbow and yanked. Hard. “Slow the hell down.” It was Shame, breathing hard, looking even more like death, if that were possible.
“You are going to get yourself killed.”
A car, horn blaring, rolled down the parkade ramp.
“That car almost hit you. Allie? Are you in that noggin somewhere listening to me? Or is there another Beckstrom I’m addressing?” Shame’s grip was punishing, and the pain cleared my mind.
“I heard you,” I said. “Holy shit, Shame. I am so fucked-up.”
He blinked, gave me a weird smile. “And?”
I didn’t know what to say. Didn’t know what to do. Zay was in a coma. Violet could lose the baby. My dad was raging in my mind. The storm was coming, Stone wasn’t working very well, and someone out there had disks of magic that could kill us all. I’d forgotten to ask Violet about the break-in, but there wasn’t a herd of elephants that could drag me back into her room right now.
How come I had to be the one to fix everything? How come I had to be the hero? I sure as hell didn’t feel like a hero.
“No hero does,” Shame said.
I must have said some of that out loud.
He tugged my arm again, this time gently, and pulled me into a hug. He was a little shorter than me, thinner than Zayvion-the last man I’d been this close to-but strong, and careful. It was a simple, brotherly gesture. I had to work hard to not cry for the comfort of it.
“You,” Shame said, not letting go of me, “are going to save Zayvion. Not because you’re a hero, or he’s a hero. Not even because you’re Soul Complements. But because you love him, he loves you, and you deserve the chance to be together. Whatever that takes. Don’t give up on him. Don’t give up on yourself. You can do this. All of this. For him. For you.”
I inhaled, caught the deep burn of tobacco on his clothes, the spice of cloves beneath it. Shame was half dead, his heart pounding slow and hard, a slight tremble shaking his body. But he was standing there, giving me the strength he had left. So I could save Zayvion. So this could somehow turn out happily ever after.
“Thanks,” I whispered. It wasn’t enough. There weren’t enough words to say how much I needed him to be here for me, this way, right now.
He let go of me, searched my face. I wiped the tear off my cheek, waited for his approval. He nodded.
“You did notice I didn’t grope your ass,” he said.
I rolled my eyes. “You always have to take a good moment out at the knees, don’t you?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He started toward the car. “I just want it on the record when Jones wakes back up. I did not grope your sweet bits. And I had ample opportunity, what with how you were pawing at me.”
“Keep digging, Flynn. Six feet makes a grave.”
We got in the car, and Stone turned his head. He was moving even more slowly.
“Hey, boy. Have a nice nap?”
He opened his mouth and clacked. It sounded like his gears were missing a few cogs.
“That’s okay.” I turned around and rubbed his head. “You rest.”
He put his chin back on his arm. Shame started the car, but I stayed twisted in my seat, petting Stone’s head.
Shame’s phone rang. He dug it out of his pocket. “Flynn.”
I had good ears. But I couldn’t quite make out the words. I knew who the speaker was, though: Terric.
I recognized his voice, and also I knew it had to be him from the way Shame tensed up.
“Where?” A pause. “Unbelievable. Fine. We’re stopping by Mum’s place first.”
He snapped his phone shut and stuffed it back in his pocket.
“I hope you didn’t have plans for today.”
“Other than hunting down Greyson and Chase?” I shifted so I was sitting facing forward again and buckled my seat belt.
“Sedra has ordered everyone to go out to St. Johns.”
“Why?”
“They’re setting up some kind of storm rod, to try to divert as much of the storm as they can and to channel it into one place when it hits. St. Johns, probably because there is no magic there. It’s the one place that could handle a huge blast without blowing out the networks. I have to admit, it makes sense.”
“You’re surprised Sedra is making sense?”
He licked his lips. Stared at traffic for a second or two. “She’s been. . different. I don’t know if it’s the storm, or your dad dying-which, by the way, I’ve been meaning to ask you-what the hell happened back there with Violet?”
I rubbed at one eye. “I’ve told people he’s in my head. I’ve told you. Jingo Jingo doesn’t believe me, so no one else in the Authority does-”
“Jingo is a one-man freak show. And he’s been lying this entire time about not knowing your dad is in your head. I believe you. After seeing your dad glaring out from behind your eyes? Oh yeah. I’m convinced.”
“Good. Now help me get rid of him.”
Shame shook his head. “Magic. And not even your pretty pink crystal can hold enough for the kind of magic it takes to draw a soul out of a body. Even if the soul doesn’t belong there in the first place. Plus, it will hurt. A lot.”
“I don’t care about the pain. Greyson did it, and I held up pretty well.”
Shame glanced over at me. “Greyson did what?”
“He sucked Dad out of my head.” Should have left you in him. Let him eat you, I thought.
“So he’s really in Greyson?”
“No. He’s in me. And maybe some of him is in Greyson.”
My dad shifted in my head, as if uncomfortable. That was how I knew it was true. Part of him was still in the Necromorph, in the man who had tried to kill him. Who had tried to kill Zay.
Shame was quiet a moment. “You know how you said you were really fucked a few minutes ago?”
“Yeah?”
“I’d like to change my response to ‘and how.’”
“Wonderful. Thanks for that, Mr. Good News.”
“If your dad is in Greyson, or a part of his soul is in Greyson, then you are tied to Greyson through him. He’s spanning two minds, two lives. It makes for an interesting state of being for him. I can appreciate the advantages, though.”
My dad in my head went very still. He listened to Shame like he had just found an expert in the one subject he could not figure out.
Yes, that scared the hell out of me.
“Uh, I’m not sure that you should tell me right now. Dad’s listening.”
Shame laughed. “You are such a creepy girl. Not that I mind. But I just never expected Jones would go for the whole goth-chick-possessed-by-the-dead-guy thing
. Talk about Daddy issues. And I’m not at all sure what that says about Zayvion, psychologically speaking. Tell me, does your dad know when you and Jones are, you know, doing it?”
“Do you want me to puke in your car? ’Cause if you keep it up, I will destroy your upholstery.”
Stone, in the backseat, growled.
“And then my gargoyle will eat you.”
“Aw, c’mon. A hint?”
“Zay’s been helping me find ways to block him.”
“Ooh. Nice. Can you block your dad without him?”
“Yes. Most of the time.”
“But back with Violet?”
“It’s always worse when I get around her. Dad. .” I couldn’t believe I was about to say this out loud. “He loved her. And even though I do not know why, Violet loved him too. So when he sees her, hears her voice, we get into sort of a wrestling match over who gets to run my body.”
“Do you always lose?”
“Not for long. We’re not going to St. Johns, are we?”
“I don’t think skipping out on this party is an option.”
“Then you go. I have a Necromorph to hunt.”
He wiped his hand over his face, then rubbed his palm over his jeans. The pressure of the building storm was growing strong enough now, I was starting to feel it like a migraine behind my eyes.
“I want Greyson dead,” he finally said. “No questions. But if we don’t deal with the magic, with the storm, we’ll lose the chance to get Zayvion back. Until the wild magic passes, all bets with magic-how it’s going to work, when it’s going to work-are off.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “I can handle myself. With or without magic.”
“I know. And if you’re set on it, on the hunt, then I’ll go with you.”
“That’s not how this works. I’m making this decision for myself. Alone.”
“That is exactly how this works. You don’t go anywhere without me. You don’t go anywhere alone. I won’t let that happen. Like it or not.”
“Get off my back, Flynn.”
The corner of his mouth quirked up. “You’d rather I get on your front? What would Zayvion say?”
“He’d tell you to shut up and hunt.”
“Planning on it. But even he wouldn’t be stupid enough to go into a hunt without weapons. And until we have magic-until both of us have magic at our disposal-hunting Greyson is a waste of time.”
He had a point. And it finally soaked through my stubborn head. Magic first. Because once I had magic, was filled with it again, it wasn’t going to take me any time to find Greyson and kick his ass.
“Fine,” I said.
“Fine,” he agreed.
“Why are we going to Maeve’s and not straight to St. Johns?”
“I need to pick up a couple things.”
I was glad. After having my dad run roughshod over my body and emotions, I wanted to look in on Zay. Tell him I was okay. Tell him he was going to be okay too, and to not give up on us. Tell him I hadn’t given up on finding Greyson, no matter what I told Shame.
It didn’t take long to get across town to the other side of the river. But even in that short time, the sky changed. Clouds, lots of them, all the shades of gray and black, gathered. Some of them tinted with a watercolor wash of green and blue and burnt orange. There was magic in the sky. And it was coming to kill us all.
Shame pulled up beside his mother’s inn. The inn seemed to be doing business as usual. A dozen or so cars were in the parking lot, and when we walked through the front door, the dining room had only a few empty tables. The one thing that was different was I didn’t see Maeve anywhere in the room, talking to patrons, or pouring coffee.
One of the other girls who worked the place, Kathy, looked up at us. Shame still had his hood up. He raised his hand in greeting, and she nodded. We walked along the outer edge of the room and through the arch to the hall beyond. I started up the stairs that led to the rooms above.
“You coming?” I asked when I didn’t hear Shame’s footsteps behind me.
“Downstairs first. See you outside?”
“Five minutes?”
“That should do.”
I took the stairs a little faster. If I only had five minutes before I went off to fight a storm of wild magic, I wanted to spend those five minutes with Zay.
I hesitated at the door to his room. Thought about knocking. Knew it would only hurt more when he didn’t answer, so instead, I just opened the door.
The light was dimmer in here, making the strange-colored clouds hanging outside in the darkness seem even more eerie.
Two beds. The one I’d been in was empty and had been remade.
But in the other bed was Zayvion. I walked over to him, trying to be quiet, and feeling stupid about that. I wanted him to wake up. So why was I being so careful not to disturb him?
I walked up to the head of the bed.
Even sleeping, he was a handsome man. In the low light, his skin looked like burnt bronze, his hair a dark tangle of midnight. I brushed my fingers through his hair, then down his cheek. Finally, I brushed my finger over his lips, hoping he could feel my touch.
The cool, steady exhalation of his breath against my fingers gave me hope. He was still breathing. On his own. There was very little medical equipment hooked up to him, an IV, and something that ran under his blanket, to attach to his chest. His skin was warm to the touch.
He looked alive. My sleeping beauty.
But I knew he was not in there, not in his body. And no matter how long his body breathed, without his soul, his spirit, or whatever part of him that had been shoved into the gate between life and death, I knew he would never wake up.
I didn’t know how long they would keep him like this. How long until they gave up on him.
Shame said it was possible to open a gate as soon as magic normalized. I didn’t know if that would help Zayvion find his way home, but it was all I had to hope for right now. And if that didn’t work, then I’d find something else that did.
But first we had to take care of the storm.
“Don’t think you’re getting out of this,” I said to Zay. “You still owe me that horses-on-ice-skates thing. I plan to collect.” I brushed my fingers across his lips again, thought about kissing him.
“Just don’t die,” I whispered. I concentrated on projecting my words, my thoughts, to him though my fingertips. Willed them into his mind, his heart. “Don’t give up on me. We’re going to St. Johns to take care of the storm. And after that, I am going to find a way to get you home. A gate. If you see a gate open, all you have to do is step through it. I’ll be waiting on the other side.”
I knew this wasn’t a fairy tale. Still, I bent, kissed him on the corner of his mouth, ignoring that, yes, he was motionless, unresponsive, not even a flicker of his awareness stirring at my touch. There wasn’t any magic in the kiss, but there was something just as strong: a promise that we were in this together.
I straightened and the crystal in my pocket clunked against the side of the bed. I dug it out.
It was warmer, pinker, the shadows dusty blue. It was filling with magic, though I didn’t know how it could collect it when even the best magic user couldn’t tap into the cisterns and networks right now. Maybe the crystal had a default mode that allowed it to collect whatever scraps of magic it could find to fill the emptiness.
Maybe it could help Zay. I thought about leaving it here. The crystal might act as a beacon for him.
My dad, who had been wisely silent this entire time, brushed the backs of my eyes gently.
The crystal is passive, he said. It holds magic and gives it up when tapped correctly. It will not call a soul, save a soul, or hold a soul. It carries magic, deep, natural, but it works no magic on its own.
I didn’t want to listen to him. I was heavy into hating him for what he had done to me. But his thoughts were weary, as if he had lost the hope of making me believe him, but tried anyway.
Will it hurt him if I lea
ve it here?
No, but there are those within the Authority who may take it for themselves.
He was right about that. One of the reasons I kept Stone under wraps was because when the Authority found out I had him, they brought him here and were going to keep him for study. And even though the crystal was smaller, it was no less amazing than the gargoyle.
Dad was telling the truth. And it seemed to be a truth that would help rather than hinder me.
Weird.
That still didn’t make it okay for him to run me around like a puppet.
I put the crystal back in my pocket.
“Allie?” Shame pushed on the door. “Ready?”
“Has it been five minutes?”
“More like fifteen.” He stepped in and leaned against the wall. From the way he moved, I knew he had stashed more weapons on his body. A lot more.
“Do you know where Zayvion’s sword is?” I asked.
“Probably. Why?”
“I want to take it with me.”
“This is a peaceful gathering. We’re setting up storm rods, or something-Terric wasn’t very clear about that. But it’s not going to be a fight.”
“I’d feel better with a sword on me. As soon as we deal with the storm, and get Zayvion back through a gate, I won’t have to make a special stop to gear up before hunting Greyson.”
“Thought you might have that in mind.” With a little contorting, Shame pulled Zayvion’s blade out from the sheath he had strapped to his back.
Peaceful gathering, my ass.
“His knife?” I asked. I took the blade-not the machete Zay usually used on Hungers and for other magical threats, but a beautifully balanced sword, his katana. I’d used it a couple times in practice. It fit my hand and reach better than a machete, but it was harder to convince a police officer why it was in the trunk of a car. So for quick dirty hunts, a magic-worked machete was best.
I don’t know where Shame pulled the knife out of, but I was glad he had it on him. Zayvion’s blood blade was long, slender, deadly, centered with a beveled crystal and glyphs that were carved into the metal and glass, ash black against the shiny dagger. It was familiar, the first weapon Zay had given me, trusting that with it I would be able to protect myself.
