Wraithsong

by E. J. Squires

  Chapter 29

  I wake up in Anthony’s arms, resting on his warm chest, his heart beating steadily against my ear. The scent of him is enough to awaken life in me, and having him this close, feeling his body heat against mine, only intensifies my feelings. I run my fingertips along his bare arm. He shifts, and I look up into his wakening eyes.

  “Good morning,” he says.

  I smile. “Good morning.”

  “Sleep well?”

  “Yes, thank you.” Our hands interlace and I burrow the side of my face into his neck. I don’t want to get up and end this blissful moment since we probably won’t have too many of these moments again. The future is too uncertain and there are no guarantees that we’ll live through this ordeal. I could die, Anthony could die, my mom could die, and it will be as if none of us ever existed.

  “What are you thinking about?” he asks.

  “I was just thinking about how wonderful this is, and how we might never—” I can’t complete the sentence. Saying it out loud makes it sound so much more real and I don’t want to bring the hopelessness of our reality into this perfect, but all-too-brief moment.

  “So let’s enjoy it for a few minutes.” Anthony kisses my forehead and at that, I creep closer and kiss him on the lips. “I hope we’ll have a happy ending.”

  “The ending will be happy if I’m with you,” I say. “And my mom.” I’m surprised how easily the confessions of my heart come now. “There has to be a way we can win,” I say, sitting up.

  “Let’s think about that in a minute,” Anthony says. “I want this to be a beautiful moment without worries of what might or might not be.”

  I lie back down onto his chest and nuzzle into him. “Me too.” Though I want to, I can’t fully enjoy lying here in his arms because I’m worrying about what’s happening to my mom.

  “So tell me something interesting,” Anthony says.

  “Like what?”

  “Well, you never told me how you found out that I was a Huldu,” Anthony says.

  I chuckle lightly. “Okay, first it was the fact that I was attracted to you. I’ve never been attracted to anyone before, and I thought there was something wrong with me since I hadn’t, you know, liked anyone in that way.”

  He laughs.

  “The second clue was the fact that my flair didn’t work on you. I asked my mom if anyone was immune to a Huldra’s flair and she said only other Huldras and Huldus, and elves. So I thought you could be one of those, unless my Huldra flair was just pathetic.”

  “Well your Huldra flair was far from pathetic, especially since it worked on me,” Anthony says.

  “But I didn’t know for sure until you told me.”

  “That wasn’t a very pleasant moment.”

  “No,” I say, remembering the intense car ride away from the ballet where we’d gotten in an argument. “The first time I thought you might like me was when you kissed me on the couch in your house. I felt it in your kiss that you wanted me.”

  “Yeah, I couldn’t hold back any more, and it was really hard for me to not…take you up on your advances that night.”

  My heart leaps in my chest.

  “I tried to make sense of my feelings for you because I’ve never been fascinated by another human and your aura was so beautiful compared to any other human’s I’d ever seen,” Anthony says.

  “Really? It seemed to me that you wanted to get rid of me.” I look up at him.

  “Well, initially, yes, I did, because like I told you, Maureen wanted me to get to know you when she suspected that you were a Huldra, and she wanted to take you for herself. I didn’t want to be part of that.”

  My cheeks flush with blood. Coming from him in this moment and in this way, his words and deep voice entrance me and keep me wanting more. “So when did Maureen realize that I was a Huldra?”

  “After you visited my house the first time, Maureen knew. She has the ability to know exactly what a being is. She said you were special and that she wanted to have your fifth Huldra gift.”

  “But you said you had spied on me for months? Didn’t she know before that?” I ask.

  “I did spy on you before that, yes, but we still didn’t know for sure if you were a Huldra or not. That’s why Maureen wanted to meet you, so she could know.”

  “Stalker,” I say.

  “It wasn’t like I was hanging out at your house night and day. I had to balance school, work, and soccer too.”

  “Stalker.” I hit him in the chest.

  He laughs. “Sorry, that was the old me. One day, and before Maureen knew, I saw your mom, and she didn’t carry the human aura. I didn’t tell Maureen because I still wanted to get to know you somehow.”

  “Did you set Principal Jenkins up to make me weed with you?”

  “Well, I had asked him to find someone to help me weed the front of the school, but that was mainly so I could spend more time—stalking you to see if I could figure out if you were a Huldra or not,” he says.

  “Did you use your Huldu flair on Principal Jenkins to make me have to weed with you?” I ask.

  “No, it just happened to work out on its own, assisting my plan in working out perfectly, even better than what I had planned.”

  “Fate,” I say.

  “I don’t believe in fate,” Anthony says.

  “Our ancestors, the Vikings, did, and I think I do too.” I pause to hear his reaction.

  “Most people don’t know what they believe in and just flow through life like driftwood,” Anthony says.

  “I believe I was fated to meet you.”

  Silence. “And I you,” he finally concedes.

  A knock at the door interrupts our conversation and Anthony gets up to answer it.

  “Are you Anthony?” I hear someone ask. The voice sounds a lot like my mom’s.

  There’s a moment of quietness, and then I hear rushed, angry whispers.

  I shoot up and out of bed and run to the door. There, I see my mom and cry out because I’m so happy and relieved to see her. There’s something strange in the way Anthony and my mom are interacting and it almost seems like they know each other and are arguing about something.

  “Mom, how did you escape?” I say, hesitant to approach at first. When she sees me, her eyes light up, and when she opens her arms wide, I jump in to her embrace, all my hesitation gone, clinging on to her as if she could vanish at any moment. The agony of having lost her melts away with the tears running down my face. “Are you all right? Did they hurt you? You look so weak.” I pull back and search her eyes, but to my horror, I find no peace there. Instead, I find desperation that I haven’t seen since my dad died.

  My mom has bruises on her face and arms, and though her clothes looked fabulous before, they’re now dirty and torn. I remember that in one of my dreams, Olaf had broken her arm, but to my relief I see no injury.

  “Listen to me very carefully, Sonia,” she whispers and then pulls me with her to the living room away from Anthony. “Anthony isn’t who you think he is. He’s the one after your fifth Huldra gift, not Maureen.”

  At first, her comment doesn’t register because of course it can’t be true. I shake my head a little. “No, he’s helping me find you, helping me save you.” I know my mom would never lie to me about this, keep secrets, yes, but not lie, no. Maybe she’s delusional because of all the torture or has somehow been misinformed.

  “Sonia, I promise you it’s true,” my mom says.

  I can hardly get myself to consider the words she has just spoken. Disbelievingly, I look at Anthony.

  “Sonia, she’s lying! This isn’t your mother; this is an imposter, a Darkálfar. She has shape-shifted so she looks like your mother, but it’s not her.” He storms toward my mom as if he intends to assault her, but I step in front of my mom, creating a barrier between him and her. “Stop!”

  When Anthony stops, I look back at my mom. She looks exactly like my mom, her expression, her smile and even the soft creases around her blue eyes.<
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  “Sonia, this is ridiculous. You know it’s me,” she says. “Don’t listen to him, for he’s the Darkálfar—the liar, and he was the one who kidnapped me, and kept me imprisoned, not Maureen or Olaf. Come with me so we can travel to Wraithsong Island to start your training with Maureen.”

  “Anthony has been training me,” I say.

  My mom turns me around to face her, grips my arms and stares in to my eyes. “He’s after your gift, do you hear me? Now let’s go before he grabs his gun and shoots us both.”

  “I’m not after Sonia’s gift. Sonia, don’t listen to her, this is a set up!” Anthony says.

  I don’t know what or who to believe. My mom takes my hand and pulls me toward the door, but Anthony steps in front of the door, preventing us from leaving.

  “Let us go, Darkálfar,” my mom says.

  “I am not a Darkálfar,” Anthony says.

  My mom turns toward me again. “Sonia, I was so worried about you,” she says, caressing my hair. “I didn’t know if Anthony had done something to hurt you, or—” Her eyes fill with tears and she sniffles and wipes a tear from her cheek. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay; you don’t have to apologize,” I say, stroking her upper back. “We’re together now, so everything will be fine, but you have got to believe me when I say Anthony is helping me—helping us.”

  “Sonia, this woman is not your mother,” Anthony says, huffing while grabbing his temples. “I don’t know how to prove this to you, but she’s lying,” he seethes, still standing in our way in front of the door, his behavior making me afraid.

  “I know how to prove it,” I say. Just then there is a knock at the door. Anthony answers it and the Lightálfars enter.

  “Who have we here?” Ross asks.

  “This is my mom, Hedda,” I say.

  “No, it’s not,” Anthony interjects. “This is Layla, a Darkálfar who has shape-shifted to look like Sonia’s mother.”

  “No it’s not, it’s my mom,” I say, taking her hand in mine, feeling the need to protect her from everyone here. “But since Anthony is so skeptical, I’ve figured a way to prove that it’s her.”

  “How?” Ross says, stepping closer to my mom, his eyes unwelcoming.

  “By asking her questions she and I would only know the answers to,” I say.

  “Do you think she’s a Darkálfar?” Skuld says to Mani, her hand reaching for the gun underneath her trench coat.

  Mani nods and at that Ross pulls out his gun, cocks it, and places it against my mom’s forehead.

  “What are you doing?” I yell.

  “I smell something rancid, and I think it’s Hedda. We don’t know if you’re a Darkálfar or not so prove it to us!” Ross says.

  Skuld walks over, placing his hand on Ross’s shoulder. “Ross, put the gun down and let’s resolve this in a peaceful way.”

  But Ross doesn’t put the gun down. “Did you search her before you let her in? Did you? Sonia, you are putting all of our lives in danger by letting her be here because this impostor might not be your precious mother at all. How did you find us anyway, Hedda or Layla, whatever your name is?” Ross says, not backing down.

  “I didn’t find you; Maureen just told me to come here to get Sonia, and of course that’s what I would do—she’s my daughter,” my mom says. “I swear to you that I’m not a Darkálfar. Ask me any question you want, Sonia, about your childhood, anything…” My mom’s hands, which she’s holding above her head, are shaking.

  “This is my mom, Ross. Don’t you think I would have known if she wasn’t? Drop your stupid gun. You’re scaring her—and me!”

  When Ross doesn’t drop his weapon, I ask, “Mom, who was my first grade teacher?”

  “Mrs. Thompson,” my mom answers.

  I nod fervently. “Exactly, and where did we go on vacation when I turned eight?”

  “Disney World,” my mom says.

  “And what was Dad’s favorite song?” This will be the telling question because only my mom will know the answer to that.

  “Just tell him to put the gun down, Sonia, I can’t think!” my mom screams as her hands flail.

  “Answer the stupid question, woman,” Ross says, pressing the barrel harder against her head.

  “I—I—can’t think with that thing pointed to my head.” My mom cowers.

  “Mom, just focus, you can do this. What was Dad’s favorite song? It was the song you played at your twentieth wedding anniversary party, remember?” My eyes focus on her. Surely she can remember?

  “The song was—” my mom pauses, looking confused. The air in the room feels as thick as sand, and I think for a moment that it has darkened, but my mom still doesn’t name the song. Instead, she changes from my mom to someone else, a being with silver hair, black eyes and rich chocolate skin. She grabs Ross’s hand, twists it and shoots five bullets into one of the windows facing Central Park. The window explodes open, sending gusts of wind through the room. The Darkálfar kicks Ross hard enough to make him fly across the room into the stainless steel kitchen. He lands with a crash and then the Darkálfar grabs me by the hand and tries to pull me with her out the window.

  “No!” Anthony yells, clutching my hand and pulling me back—but his grip is weak compared to the strength of the Darkálfar.

  My heart races, and then it feels like it stops completely when I fly out the window. I’m falling to my death, clinging onto my enemy for dear life. I see Anthony reaching for me as I plunge towards the ground, shattered glass falling with us. Sounds of the city in the distance and people screaming below us are all that I hear.

  “Sovn, sovn,” the Darkálfar says as she moves her free hand in a circular motion in front of my face. Everything goes black.