Love Beyond Lies

by Rebecca Royce

  It cocked its head to the side again. “You will come with us.”

  They popped out of one location and into another. It took her a moment to catch her breath. She was in a human body. Popping around wasn’t natural to her cells in this form. She bent over, hands on her knees. Somewhere nearby sirens blared into the night. She lifted her head, the scent of smoke making itself known to her brain all at once. Humans were really different. She’d never realized. In her own body, she’d have come to understanding what was around her much faster.

  It didn’t matter.

  Something was on fire. She backed up. A brick building had black smoke pouring out of it and red flames danced around the windows. Three fire trucks lined up on the street, while around her she also heard whistles. What was that? She’d never been this close to fire before. It was much more Raquel’s domain than her own.

  “Explain.”

  Explain? She shook her head. “The world is burning down. The Father of all demons is destroying everything and until recently I was hidden away to keep you away from Colin. I love him. That’s why I did that.”

  “No.” Shadow man nodded toward the building. “Explain why she weeps.”

  Like a scene from a nightmare, Gia realized what she was witnessing. A woman screamed and tried to rush into the flames. The firemen held her back. She yelled. It was a language that Gia didn’t understand through her human ears. Outsiders could speak all languages but she didn’t have that ability right now.

  She could barely get the words out. “Someone she loves is still inside. Probably dead.” Her heart rate kicked up. “She’s despondent. There won’t be any consoling her, ever. There won’t be a way to ever make it right. That kind of loss, there is no coming back from it. There’s…”

  Oh hell, why was she standing here explaining it to a creature so evil that they had to get a demon to deal with it? She rushed toward the building. No one saw her coming until she was at the door. She grabbed her shirt and covered her face, keeping her head down. Gia didn’t even know what she was doing. Who was still inside? The firefighters were much better equipped to deal with this than she was, and yet even in her human form she was an Outsider.

  She didn’t rush from flames. She ran into them.

  Always.

  Six

  Isabelle

  Lying on the floor of the bathroom, Isabelle tried so hard to catch her breath. She had to make sense of what she just witnessed. The end of everything. Tears flooded her eyes. She thought she’d been prepared for the idea that none of them were going to get out of this, that not even in death would she be okay. But, she hadn’t been. Not really.

  When this was over, if they lost, and it seemed now that they would, the darkness would flood the universe and there would simply be nothing left. She got to her knees. Stumbling forward, she gripped onto the door. Where was Kal? She had to explain it to him.

  “Isabelle?” He shouted her name.

  Yes, he’d find her. He always did. That was their bond. Their link. But it wouldn’t survive what was coming. They would be separated and they’d never find each other again.

  She closed her eyes. The light was too much. She’d time traveled before, but it had never hit her like this. “Kal.”

  He pushed open the bathroom door. “Fuck. Isabelle. Are you okay?”

  She shook her head. “There’s nothingness. That’s all that’s coming.”

  He took her in his arms. He smelled like home. He always had. From the moment she had met him, she believed in the impossible. They’d been through hell together and always came out the other side. He made her stronger and she made him softer, and somewhere in the middle was the truth.

  Wow, her brain was really rambling right now.

  “You were in the nothingness?”

  She nodded. “I was, but you were nowhere. Maybe that’s the least of it. I mean the whole world was nowhere but you weren’t there and that mattered more.”

  He kissed her forehead. “I was here. I was not nowhere. And you know that’s just one future. The past is set. The future is not.”

  Isabelle shook her head. “We’ve lost, Kal. This is Earth’s Armageddon.”

  “Hello?” A shout sounded and it took Isabelle a second to realize it was Alexa. “Hello? Who’s here?”

  Isabelle took a moment to stare at Kal and he stared right back at her. Alexa? What was she doing here?

  “We’re in the bathroom,” Kal answered.

  There was a pause before Alexa responded. “Together?

  Isabelle groaned. “I transported back here. Never mind. What do you need?” They used to be close but in this lifetime Alexa was certainly not Isabelle’s favorite person. She felt for the woman. The abuse she’d endured had been astounding. But the world was ending and Alexa had decided not to care. If Alexa had come to whine about how life sucked, Isabelle might lose her frickin’ mind.

  The door swung open and there was Alexa with a little girl in her arms. Isabelle opened and closed her mouth.

  Kal cleared his throat. “What are you going to do with that child?”

  Alexa narrowed her eyes. “That’s what you ask? What am I going to do with her? I saved her life. Now I don’t know where to put her. I figured you’d know. One of you. Where is safe?”

  Isabelle didn’t know what snapped inside of her but something did. Something hard and unbreakable suddenly became soft and not only able to bend, but to break. She jumped from the floor. Grabbed the child and she hoped—carefully—shoved the child at Kal who took her fast. Then she launched herself onto Alexa. They both hit the floor.

  “Where is safe? Where is safe? Where is safe?” With each question she got increasingly louder.

  Alexa blocked her face. She could blink away and yet she didn’t. “Isabelle, sheesh, this isn’t you. I asked a general question.”

  “This isn’t me? Guess what, honey, this isn’t you either. The Alexa I knew was a fighter. The Alexa I knew wouldn’t leave these people to die. The Alexa I knew would be here with us.” Isabelle got up but she wasn’t done. She might never be done. “I used to be a social worker so I get this, okay? I’ve taken the psych classes. I am not dismissing what that demon did to you. You’re angry. You’re scared. You were violated. You want to talk and talk and talk about it when this is over? I am game. I am more than game. I want to wrap my arms around you and never let you go. But I can’t do that because we are in Armageddon and when this is over there is nothingness. No future. None. Do you understand that? It all ends. So please be the Alexa I knew. Soon.”

  She stepped back, wiping her face. When had she started to cry? Kal held the silent girl stiffly in his arms. Alexa panted, staring at Isabelle with an open mouth. Okay. She swallowed. Okay. So that was her freak out. Okay.

  Alexa finally spoke. “What do you mean nothingness?”

  “Just what I said. This is the final battle. You’ve heard this before. There is nothing if we lose.”

  Alexa looked down at the floor. “Sometimes, thanks to this filth all over me, I hear things but I don’t really hear them.”

  “Well, hear me now. There is nothing. No time to make amends. No redoing anything. No second or third or fourth chance. If we don’t win, we all cease to exist.”

  How many more times did Alexa need to hear this before it sunk in? Right then, the little girl started to cry. She went from quiet to loud, pulsating screams. Kal held her tighter. He’d always been good with kids and with a few sways back and forth, she put her head on his shoulder and promptly fell asleep.

  Isabelle let out a breath she’d been holding. “Look, I don’t mean to insinuate that you don’t have legitimate reasons to be very, very upset. I’m asking the impossible but…”

  “Where is Leonardo?” Alexa interrupted her.

  Isabelle blinked. Did Alexa want to cause him bodily harm? “Why?”

  “Because I think he and I should speak and I can’t feel him.” She looked away. “We’re not connected that way. He can find me
, I think. But not the other way around, right now. So I need to know where he is.”

  Kal looked up at the sky. “I could use a transport. Drew. Gabriel.”

  “I can pop myself. I just need to know where he is.” She put her hands on her hips. Alexa always did pissed off better than anyone else she knew. Even when she wasn’t coated in evil.

  Kal raised his eyebrows slowly. He and Alexa never been the best of friends even though she and Isabelle had been. “Well, I don’t know where he is. I’m not able to pop, but I bet Drew or Gabe will since they would have—you know—popped him somewhere.”

  That the tone Kale used when he didn’t want to yell. She never had it personally directed at her, but heard it a lot toward other people.

  Drew appeared. “Hey, man. Eden saw that you needed me and…” His voice trailed off. “Alexa.”

  “Everyone is so happy to see me.”

  “Are you happy to see us?”

  She ran a hand through her hair. “I could be. I need to sort things out. I need to help. This is Armageddon.” She side-eyed Isabelle. “I need to do something.”

  “That so?” Drew looked between Kal and Isabelle. “Feels like I’m missing something.”

  Kal indicated the child in his arms. “Can you take this one to the nursery that Loraine set up?”

  Isabelle pointed at Kal. “So there is a place. I knew you people had made a place.”

  Drew slowly took the sleeping child. “Come on Alexa. Let’s not talk. Let’s go see Leonardo.”

  “You’re always such a jackass.”

  They disappeared from the room and Isabelle let out a breath she held. “Wow. I attacked her.”

  Kal put his arms around her from behind. “You were pretty badass.”

  “Is it wrong that I think I might have gotten through to her by throwing her on the ground?”

  He sighed. “I think that actually helped. The child did, too. Maybe time.”

  For the first time in a long while, Isabelle could feel hope traveling through her veins. A warm, easy, quiet sensation that didn’t make her feel like she wanted to throw up. She’d come back from nothingness to… the possibility that maybe they could pull this off.

  “Frustrates the hell out of me that it all comes down to them.” Kal spoke quietly. “I beat down zombies for you. And those two can’t manage to pull their shit together.”

  A vision of Leonardo during that time flooded her mind. He’d killed for them, too. Only the death he’d delivered had been a forbidden one. There was so much pain. How were they ever to move through it?

  She breathed in Kal. “So Colin and Gia are worked out?”

  “They’ve been in their bedroom a long time. Not that I’m focusing on that, but…”

  Isabelle nodded. “It’s a good sign.”

  Still, the nothingness remained at the corner of her mind. The very idea that when this was over, it was really over and everything they did amounted to… absolutely nothing at all.

  Gabriel

  The humans walked through the large stadium area. The Outsiders had designated it as a safe space for them to all hide out. It was also a makeshift orphanage, for now. His soul mate stood back against a wall as her magical dog, Futon, barked to make the children laugh. That border collie was something… Gabriel had just never figured out exactly what that was.

  He’d certainly never seen the dog bark bark bark like that before. He was clearly distracting the children. Was he some kind of angel? Gabriel shook his head. He’d never know why he was alive, anyway. As for angels, his soul mate Loraine certainly qualified. He’d seen a future where she was an old woman. She’d time traveled to see him, but now? Who knew what was left?

  She spotted him and walked over to him. “All okay, love?”

  “No, not particularly.” He shrugged. “But, yes, now that I’ve seen you, much better.”

  She leaned into him. “I can feel you’re tired.”

  “I’ve been jumping from one location to another all day. Way too much. But there’s no time for me to pass out.”

  She shook her head. “You could right now.”

  “If I close my eyes someone will need me. Give me the information here. What’s the status?”

  Loraine’s eyes scanned the crowd. “More people every hour. We can’t keep this safe too much longer. Marina has it warded, but we all know the Father won’t be kept out if he wants in. He doesn’t, for now. We’re in the middle of nowhere. He’s still focused on cities.”

  That much he knew. “Are we in the middle of nowhere?”

  She narrowed her eyes. “You don’t know where you are anymore. Gabe, that is not a good sign.”

  “I’m fine. I just thought of you and went. I’ll always be able to do that.” He ran a hand through her ringlets. “What about the rest of us? Any casualties?”

  He was always waiting for it. One of them was going to die. He was just going to see to it that it wasn’t Loraine. Not without him, anyway. Whatever happened they were in this together.

  “Eden crashed. I mean crashed and Samuel panicked—not something I’d ever seen him do before. Jason had to talk him down. I think he thought she might be dead. She’s not. Just out cold. Samuel’s sitting in one of the back rooms counting her every breath. I don’t know where Charma is. She just wants to fix the pain of every person who comes in here. That’s obviously going to be a problem.”

  He couldn’t possibly imagine. “Marina? Raquel? Zane? Christophe? Ruby?”

  “I have no idea.” She stepped away from the wall. “Come on. You need to rest, too. The world won’t end. I won’t let it until you wake up.”

  Gabriel grinned at his love. Other people missed her sense of humor. He never did. “Because you wouldn’t want me to miss it.”

  “Exactly.”

  Marina

  Missing Drew this much should be illegal, but there wasn’t anything Marina could do about it except ride wave after wave of pain. Her problems were small. There was no good way for the world to end. She closed her eyes as the pain of the universe pressed into her again. Her shoulders sagged. There was nothing left for her to do.

  “Small kindnesses.” Raquel took her hand. “That’s what we can do. One person at a time. I burn the demons. I burn the zombies. I burn and burn. But I don’t know if it matters as much as when I get someone some food or make sure they have shelter.”

  Her friend was right. Not that it helped. “I’m seriously powerful. You know that, right? Like super-duper powerful. I’m practically a superhero. And yet I’m useless.”

  Raquel rocked back on her feet. “Yep, totally useless and, sure, you’re the queen of all powers, Marina. All hail you.” Raquel held out her hand and a little bit of fire appeared there before it vanished. “I can’t do anything at all.”

  Marina cracked up. She loved playing like this with Raquel. “Okay, maybe you rock a little bit.”

  “I do.”

  Shivers wracked through her. “Zombies are coming.”

  So much for all the fun they were having. “Where is Zane? If he’s down there by himself I’m going to holler at him.”

  Zane was a scary dude, but he was a little bit afraid of his soul mate. That was okay, everyone needed someone they were intimidated by. It kept the world running at the right pace.

  Or it did before the end of times. “I had one job, you know? Keep the world from ending. And I failed.”

  “We all did. We all failed at this together.”

  Marina chewed on her lower lip. That wasn’t true. As much as she hated to admit it, they hadn’t all failed. They were a team, but from day one things had been clear to her. Those of them who had the luck to spend most of their childhood with Veli—knowing they were Outsiders, understanding their destinies—had a special place in the fight. They’d tried to have normal lives when they should have been searching, when they should have been starting this journey.

  The others had been spread out and unknowing, so the responsibility of the end of the wo
rld fell on the shoulders of Leonardo, Kal, Charma, and herself. Marina shared a quarter of the blame for the end of the world.

  Don’t do that.

  Drew’s voice. Yes. She shivered with relief. He lived. He was in her mind. Don’t do what?

  Don’t blame yourself. Blame the powers that be who took this challenge to begin with. Blame our parents who screwed up a spell and brought us here too early. Blame all sorts of people, but not you. Never you. Not just you. Blame me. I got caught by the demon and had to stay away from you. Not you. You’re goodness and light.

  Marina stepped away from Raquel. Her friend needed to concentrate and it always bothered her to have private internal conversations with Drew around other people.

  How can you have been in my head so much and still think that?

  He didn’t answer and she stopped moving. Drew? When he didn’t answer again she tried again. Drew?

  “Sorry, Marina.”

  She whirled around to see her love standing there. “You scared me.”

  “I had to drop off an orphan Alexa saved. I thought Leonardo was here but I don’t see him just yet. I had to deal with Alexa on that. It took me a second.”

  She wrapped her arms around him. He smelled like the ocean. “Alexa rescued a kid?”

  “Yep. Miracles do happen, it seems.”

  Marina didn’t want to think about Alexa at the moment. She wanted to drift in the smell of Drew. “When the end comes. The very end. And we’re sure we can’t do anything else to save anyone, can you pop us to the ocean. A boat on the ocean. I want to float with you there when the earth ends.”

  He sucked in a long breath. “There are things I wish we could have had.”

  At least he wasn’t trying to tell her she should be optimistic. She appreciated everyone’s good intentions but too much more of this was going to make her sick. “Like what?”

  “Children. A real human life. My ring on your finger. You in a white dress. A honeymoon. More sex. Wine. Cheese. More of that, anyway. A human life. I appreciate that I’ve had so much time with you and I know that it makes me selfish, to want more. But I think that I could have really dug the whole not being born to fight over and over thing. I could just love you and the people we made together.”