Leminscate as-2

by Jennifer Murgia

  “How long have you been here?” I tried to control the shake in my voice.

  “Days.”

  Days? I had felt it, the soft lingering of him creeping closer with each dream, each day that I spent away from Garreth. I couldn’t help pulling Hadrian closer to the brink of my reality.

  “I felt your mind.” Hadrian interrupted my thoughts, answering the why that lingered on my lips.

  “You felt … my mind?” I couldn’t let Hadrian know how long my emotional wall had been crumbling; that I had become weak, defenseless, letting thoughts of him, the “what-ifs,” seep out into the universe. That guiltily, I was waiting for this. I should have been more careful.

  He appraised me for a moment, his eyes studying my face.

  “I thought it was an illusion, the lucid dreaming that comes with being confined, shaming me into delirium. Hours turned into weeks, I truly believed I was going insane,” he chuckled deeply. “Then again, I’ve always been a little off, haven’t I?”

  An invisible pole held me up just then because I was still having trouble digesting the fact that I was face to face with Hadrian. Hadrian. The dark angel the other guardians had feared. The very one who had planned the corruption of the angels and the destruction of the humans left behind. The one responsible for the disappearance of my father, and most likely Claire’s accident. The one who had taken Garreth …

  And yet …

  I was truly convinced that somewhere buried deep inside him, his soul slumbered, waiting for the moment when the light would come through once again and awaken the guardian that only I seemed to believe he could be.

  He stood still in front of me.

  “Where were you?” I asked, trying to keep my voice steady.

  “You don’t want to know,” he answered huskily.

  “Try me.”

  “Hell.”

  The answer shook me. Images of fire and misery flashed before me. It’s not somewhere I’d want anyone to go.

  “How did you get out?”

  “Does it matter?” He was agitated now and I couldn’t help but take a couple steps back.

  “I … I was just wondering.” My pulse pounded heavily in my ears as I struggled to meet his eyes. I was the one who let go of his hand that night in the woods. The one who sent him into the darkness. Did I send him there? To hell?

  Hadrian cocked his head to one side, as if listening to the rumblings inside my head. “It was Mathur,” he said, as if meaning to put my guilt at ease.

  “Mathur?”

  It had never occurred to me to question Mathur’s responsibilities. The high-ranking guardian in his flowing white robes had been a solace to me. He had enlightened me with the truth of my own judgment, existence, and purpose after I had followed Garreth to the realm of guardians, but my trail of thought was interrupted.

  “Does this surprise you?” Hadrian asked.

  “A little.”

  “Mathur was generous with my sentence, but I deserved worse.”

  I opened my mouth to protest, but his sharp eyes silenced me.

  “You know firsthand what I am capable of; never forget that.”

  Then he softened his voice, “Images of you plagued me day and night. I realized, this was the price I was to pay for interfering with your life.”

  “My life? What about my friend Claire’s life? My father’s?”

  “I admit to creating chaos, but I no longer find it amusing.” Hadrian’s eyes met mine cautiously as the fury I held deep inside threatened to burst. “I cannot control the havoc I create once it starts.”

  “Can’t or won’t?” I interrupted fiercely. I thought back to the night in the woods. The night of the fire when my hand let go of his and I remembered the look of remorse on his face as he plummeted away from me.

  The space between us seemed to glow. The moonlight was fading, bringing the dawn closer, and I could see him more clearly now. His face was drawn, but still perfect. His eyes, dark at first, now reflected the golden tints floating through my window, allowing me to stare into a liquid emerald pool.

  “You can’t be here, Hadrian,” I whispered. “I love Garreth.”

  “Really? Then why am I here now?”

  If I looked at him again, I would weaken. Trying to stay centered and strong, I stared at my bare feet, now numb from standing in one place for too long.

  He shifted one leg forward. He would be within inches if he wanted, towering over me, making me feel helpless. Stepping backwards, I tried to hide the wobble in my legs, which had grown unsteady under my still weight. He was quicker than me and I felt him gently grab hold of my shoulders, his eyes searching mine, reaching into a part of me only he knew existed. I couldn’t break down, knowing if he looked deep enough he would find what I was trying to hide. Seconds away from losing it, I thought of Garreth, how he could manifest himself into the middle of this, but he was MIA.

  “There are many layers to me, Teagan,” Hadrian whispered. “I know a part of you believes or wishes that I could reform. But to deny all the darkness that remains inside me would be living a lie.”

  Hadrian took my scarred hand and traced his fingertip across the sweaty skin I had been clenching tightly. My mark greeted us in a swirling glimmer of light. It scrolled and extended, revealing itself in full splendor.

  My mark meant “unity.” I was the bridge between the realms, the societies. Angel and human. Heaven and earth.

  Images of Garreth bombarded me, flooding my conscience. My first true love. But now, it was both painful and, dare I say, enlightening, that the truth was finally gripping my heart—that perhaps, I wanted Hadrian too? Part of me was like him in so many ways. The more I realized who he was beneath the dark façade, the clearer my inner self became.

  I wanted to tell him I believed he wasn’t as hollow and dark as he believed himself to be. I knew deep in my heart, no matter how guarded I had kept it from him, that despite everything he had done, he was probably more human than the average person. He understood the dark and the light each of us held inside ourselves. He understood that without one, the other couldn’t possibly exist. We just needed the strength to see past the blackness and not give in to it. Hadrian was the blending of both and I wondered, could he possibly be the only guardian in existence to understand that?

  Somehow, I always seemed to draw Hadrian back to me like a magnet. I found myself not wanting to choose between the two of them again. If I were to have two guardians—one light and one dark—was it to balance the light and the dark I have in myself?

  I looked up at Hadrian, realizing he knew too.

  He held my hand up higher.

  “Have you not questioned the configuration of the mark you hold? Think, Teagan, what could it possibly represent?”

  I stared at my mark, the one Hadrian seemed to know so much about. At a glance, my hand appeared scarred. Burned. But beneath the puckered, pink skin were three tiny open-ended circles, closely situated, in the formation of a triangle. Three scrolls coiled in the center of my palm, to be exact. They were connected by a thin line, much like a natural crease, embedded in my skin. I had often wondered why these markings had appeared in my hand.

  More importantly, why there were three. But I suppose I always knew. There was one for each of us. Me. Garreth. Hadrian. It was inevitable that the three of us should be linked.

  “You once did the courtesy of saving me from myself. I need your help again.” His voice, thick with emotion, charged the air.

  I stared at him, not wanting to ask the inevitable.

  “What have you done this time, Hadrian?” I whispered.

  “Not me. Him.”

  My eyebrows knit together questioningly. I opened my mouth to ask, but Hadrian saved me the trouble.

  “Lucifer.” Hadrian’s voice nearly broke on the last syllable, his eyes searching my face. “He’s coming for us.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  I shivered. My room faded slightly. “What did you say?”

  “The o
ne I have renounced as my brother seeks revenge, not only for the control I have tried to take from him, but for what I have become of late.” My brain stumbled over his words, trying to process them. Was it possible that a greater darkness had indeed washed over Hopewell?

  I had been contemplating a lot of things lately but nothing this frightening. Lucifer wanted to take over the corruption Hadrian had started … and then finish what I had started. Which was getting rid of Hadrian.

  As unsettling as it was to have Hadrian stay with me while I worked his words through my head, it was also comforting my fear, and I was eventually able to get a little rest. When I woke, I was alone and realized that sometime during the night, a startling clarity had settled over me.

  I needed two angels.

  Simply allowing myself the guilty pleasure of feeling something for Hadrian was ripping me in half, literally. I swore Hadrian still had a soul, that he could be helped, and I didn’t want anything to happen to him. But each and every time I felt myself being pulled closer to Hadrian, I felt the knife slicing me and Garreth apart. Even now, my feelings for Garreth were still so fresh. The fact that he was turning into something else couldn’t erase my love for him.

  And I missed him desperately. To make matters worse, I still had Brynn to worry about. Somehow, I put myself in this position. Torn in all directions.

  Maybe I deserved this?

  I slogged my way through the first half of the school day. Taking notes, smiling here and there, appearing as normal as I possibly could.

  During lunch, Ryan and I agreed to meet under a large spruce on the corner at seven-fifteen that night. Dinner would be long over. Brynn’s wonderfully original topping bar would be praised for the umpteenth time and cleaned up by then. Probably by me. The evening would unwind, Brynn would grow restless, eager to meet her friends for the night and Ryan and I would perform our first act of breaking and entering. Really, what kind of person was I becoming?

  Fate seemed on my side today when I encountered Emily in the same bathroom around noon. I had uncurled the wire from my spiral notebook in the bathroom stall and inflicted a nasty tear in my tights. Emily was mortified when I emerged sporting a run the size of the Andreas Fault line and a dead cell phone. She promptly encouraged me to borrow hers to call home for a replacement. While she was busy lint-rolling her own pristine pair of hosiery, I made a quick text to Brynn’s phone about the party tonight. The one her friends were planning without her. I was hoping this would buy me and Ryan some time. Brynn would be vying to win back her position as head snob, while he and I rummaged through her house in search of the journal.

  I crossed my fingers that it would work.

  By the time the eighth period bell rang, I had decidedly set my brain into action mode. First and foremost, I had a ruthless beeyotch plotting to do me in and I needed to fight back. My angels would just have to wait, so I pushed my thoughts of them to the back burner and began to plan.

  During my free period, I headed outside to clear my head and made myself comfortable on the bottom bleacher of our football stadium to mentally map out this evening’s heist. I had been a guest in Dr. Dean’s home only once and I was having trouble remembering the layout.

  That’s when my hand started going crazy.

  The energy crackled high above my head, filling the air around me. I could feel the pull yanking me in two separate directions and turned my head to locate the chaos. Half of the football team out for practice was huddled near the far gate speaking to someone through the chainlink fence. That someone was Garreth. My Garreth. Even from the distance that separated us, I could see he had changed in the time that had lapsed since his authoritative hallway appearance. He seemed huskier. His hair was longer, which I suppose was normal, but he had a wildness about him that seemed to accompany his unkempt appearance.

  Suddenly, it felt like the universe slowed, pausing for a moment. The guys continued their banter, seemingly unaware. But I felt something. And so did Garreth. His blue eyes found mine and only he and I were in motion. My spine tingled. There was recognition but no warmth.

  After feeling guilty about projecting Hadrian back into my reality, I spent hours planning what to say should Garreth and I come face to face. Well, this wasn’t exactly what I imagined, but it was close enough. All the questions, the thoughts I had prepared simply melted from my mind as I stared back at him.

  And then the air stirred again.

  I looked into the cool breeze. Beneath an elm at the opposite end of the school’s property stood a tall, lean figure in black. I shook my head, mouthing the word “no,” which fell silently from my lips as my books slipped soundlessly from my lap, my papers scattering beneath the bleachers.

  By the time I exhaled the breath that had been lodged in my lungs, they had already crossed the field to each other. Derek Arnold was still and confused as he looked from Garreth, then back to the fence he had just been on the other side of. I made my way down onto the field, not sure if that was a smart idea but unable to stop my feet from moving closer to them.

  Stunned, I tried to head off the confrontation. But what shocked me most was the look on Garreth’s usually serene face. His jaw was set and his eyes, they were the worst. This newly found rage had transformed the iridescent aqua into a deep and smoldering storm.

  Garreth turned to face me. I stood trembling, realizing his anger was now directed point-blank at me.

  “What have you done?” His tone was ice.

  I shook my head. What could I say?

  I felt a presence behind me, then felt Hadrian’s hand rest protectively upon my shoulder. I wanted to shake it off; to prove to Garreth I was still his. To prove I was sorry. But I couldn’t find the strength to do it.

  It instantly registered what I was witnessing. Garreth was jealous. He was fuming and Hadrian was reveling in it.

  If only I hadn’t believed that Hadrian still existed. If only my mind could have locked the door I never wanted to reopen … for Garreth’s sake.

  For my own.

  But I believed there was something good about Hadrian. How could I ignore the truth?

  Now I was the one paying for it.

  “I see you’ve made a choice, Teagan,” Garreth said, bitterly. I barely recognized my guardian when he spoke.

  “But,” I began stammering. My feet were firmly rooted to the ground beneath me, yet I felt like I was falling. His blue eyes, so tender a few days ago, glared back at me.

  “What choice have I made, Garreth? Tell me. Because I wasn’t the one who walked away.” I was angry now. Calm down, Teagan. Stand your ground; he’ll come around.

  The look on his face was unrecognizable, but the pain in his eyes was deeply familiar. It was my pain, and it mirrored back to me now. It was obvious that Garreth was more changed now than either of us could have ever expected. There was no more room inside him to see the good in things, to see all sides, to give anyone else a respectable chance. Instead, it was all about him. His new emotions were raging through him like teenage hormones.

  Uncontrollable. Lethal. He saw only one thing now.

  That I had made a choice.

  And it wasn’t him.

  While I was busy trying to make right out of wrong, light out of dark, doing all I could to make sense of who I was … he was changing. This was way beyond what we anticipated. I thought he was pretending for me, trying to fit in. When all along right under my nose he was undergoing his own transformation.

  “You’ve gone too far, Teagan.” Garreth gave his head a sharp nod, pointing to Hadrian behind me.

  Hadrian.

  The culprit.

  The instigator.

  “Just couldn’t let him go, could you?” He shook his head at me, then turned to look at his new friends; the rowdy football bunch, waving their arms and high-fiving each other. Only Derek stood a few feet apart from the others, confusion still evident in his eyes. But Derek wasn’t the brightest light bulb in the box; he would soon stop questioning how Garret
h managed to pass through a seemingly impassable aluminum fence.

  I wanted to defend myself, but my voice was nowhere to be found.

  Before I could process a response, I was staring at the back of Garreth’s broad shoulders walking away from me.

  What the hell just happened?

  And then I remembered I wasn’t alone in watching my guardian’s exit. I turned around, expecting to see victory in Hadrian’s dark eyes, but instead I was greeted with the most magnificent green, welled with sympathy and regret. Sometimes, Hadrian’s eyes were black, obliterating the distinction between pupil and iris. Now they were emerald and clear with a scattering of intriguing gold flecks like an antique kaleidoscope. They were more stunning in the light of day than the green I had witnessed last night in the moonlit veil of my room.

  I remembered seeing the first bit of his true eye color, when I felt him slipping away from my grasp. That night in the woods was one I would sooner forget, but for some reason, this moment seemed far worse.

  The whooping and hollering grew fainter on the other side of the campus. Their voices blending together. I didn’t even bother trying to find Garreth’s; his voice was no longer his own. I instantly felt forgotten. With blind rudeness, I turned and began walking away from Hadrian. My walk turned into a sprint and Hadrian’s confused voice was getting smaller by the second.

  What did he expect me to do? I needed to be alone right now. I didn’t belong here.

  But this is my world, I thought to myself as angry tears formed. I looked at my hand.

  Stupid mark.

  I slowed to a stop, leaning over with my hands on my knees to catch my breath. Slowly, I tilted my head to look at the sky and shook my head, not sure where I belonged anymore.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Before leaving school, Ryan passed me in the hall giving me a “knowing” nod, and although the plan had been mine, I felt shaky and scared. Friday had come all too quickly, ending a week I swore was going to pass as slowly as molasses because of Garreth’s absence. But Garreth had shown up in places I never could have foreseen and admittedly, my thoughts had been elsewhere.