by Tracy Wolff
“Including you?” I shoot back, even as a shiver works its way down my back at his warning.
“Obviously me,” he agrees, sounding bored and annoyed. “But my point is, I’m not the only one.”
I don’t know how to respond to that, don’t know if he’s just messing with my mind or if there really is some truth to what Hudson is saying. Before I can decide, he steps away from the wall. But instead of coming toward me, he moves farther back into the shadows of the room.
“Here comes one now,” he whispers deep in the recesses of my brain.
“What do you mean?” I ask, just as softly.
He shakes his head, refuses to say anything else.
And it’s not until I turn away, not until the Bloodletter calls my name, that I realize that the ball Hudson tossed up in the air? It never came back down.
34
This Place Isn’t
Big Enough for
the Both of Us
“Grace, are you awake yet?” The Bloodletter’s voice seems farther away than expected.
“I’m awake,” I tell her, pushing myself into a sitting position and leaning back against the pillows. “I’m sorry. Hudson…”
“What about Hudson?” the Bloodletter asks, leaning forward with watchful eyes.
For the first time, I realize that the shadows were hiding bars that are between her and me. Even worse is the realization that I’m on the wrong side of those bars.
I bolt upright then, my gaze searching the shadowy darkness until it collides with Jaxon’s. “What’s going on?” I demand in a voice made shrill with fear. “Why am I in a cage?”
“It’s okay,” he soothes.
“It’s not okay. I’m not some animal in the zoo, Jaxon. Get me out of here. Now.”
I start to reach for the bars, then think better of it, since they’ve got this weird, electric glow to them and I can’t help wondering what that means…not to mention what it will mean for me if I touch them.
“We can’t do that, Grace. Not yet,” the Bloodletter answers.
“Why not?” For the first time, I start to wonder if Hudson’s words were actually true. If he wasn’t just saying those things to mess with me.
“Much as I enjoy messing with you, Grace, I’m not in the habit of issuing warnings for no reason,” Hudson admonishes from the shadows.
“Stop talking to me!” I practically shout back. “Can’t you see I’m in trouble here?”
Jaxon and the Bloodletter exchange a surprised look.
“Who are you talking to, Grace?” Jaxon asks.
“They can’t hear me,” Hudson reminds me, and I clamp my jaw tight.
“It’s okay,” the Bloodletter says. “I know Hudson is in there with you. I’m the one who put you to sleep when I realized just how strong Hudson’s hold on you is.”
Part of me wants to ask how she knows, but then I figure, why wouldn’t she? What’s the point of being that old if you don’t know a lot about a lot?
“Oh, please.” Hudson lets out a long-suffering sigh and steps away from the shadows again to pace in the narrow space next to my bed. “She makes me sound like a cult leader. I haven’t forced you do anything you didn’t want to do.”
I turn to him in shock. “You mean besides stealing the athame and trying to kill Cole? Oh, and the fact that I’ve now blacked out three times in as many days?”
“To be fair, Cole deserved it. And we didn’t try to kill him.”
I watch as the Bloodletter grabs Jaxon’s arm and pulls him away from the cage bars to tell him something privately. Fuck my life. More secrets.
But I use the space to hiss quietly back at Hudson. “You’re right. We didn’t do anything. You did.”
He sighs and leans against the ice wall again. “Potato, po-tah-to. But back to the situation at hand. I warned you not to trust her.”
“You warned me after she’d already put me in a cage. What good is that?” I snipe back.
“And besides, you’re the reason I’m even in this cage, so you’re the one I should be blaming.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Same song, different singer.” He waves a careless hand.
“I have no idea what that means.”
“It means more powerful people than you have bent over backward trying to absolve my little brother of guilt. I don’t even know why I’m surprised that you’ve turned out to be just like the rest of them.”
“I’m not trying to absolve Jaxon of anything!” I whisper-shout. “I’m just trying to get out of this damn cage. How did you come back without a body so that I’d be lucky enough to have you trapped in my head in the first place?”
“I came back with a body.” He shakes his head and glances at Jaxon, still conversing with the Bloodletter. “I was confused, too, but I know that much. The last thing I remember is my brother trying to kill me and I was moving on instinct, fading toward him to protect myself. When you turned to stone, I’m pretty sure you took my faded body that was still re-forming with you. And, well”—he spreads his hands wide—“here we are.”
That makes a twisted kind of sense to me, even though I don’t want it to be true. But what else could have happened? I didn’t shift to my gargoyle form on purpose—I didn’t even know it was possible. But if he was fading into me at the exact same time, maybe it messed with how I shifted. Or maybe I messed with how he faded. Either way, it really might be my fault that he’s trapped in my head. Ugh. So not what I wanted to realize.
I turn back to the Bloodletter with that knowledge churning in my head and try to get her attention again. “What do I need to do for you to let me out of here?”
The Bloodletter and Jaxon walk back to the cage bars. Jaxon’s face looks extremely worried, and I suddenly have the urge to hug him, to tell him everything is going to be all right.
“You’re the one in the cage, and you want to ease his suffering. Point fucking made,” Hudson growls, but I ignore him, holding Jaxon’s gaze instead.
The Bloodletter interrupts. “You need to let me teach you how to build a wall so you can lock Hudson out. You have to put a barrier between the two of you, Grace. Hudson can’t be trusted.”
“I know that.”
“Do you?” she asks. “Do you really? Because I don’t think you can fully understand until you know him. Until you see how he operates, up close and personal. You may not believe it, but the time will come when you want to empathize with him.”
“I would never—”
“Oh yes, you would. You will. But you can’t. You have to stay strong, to be on your guard at all times. No one in your world is more dangerous than Hudson. No one else can do what he can. He’ll tell you anything you need to hear, everything you want to hear. He’ll lie to you, he’ll trick you, and when you lower your guard, he’ll kill you. Or worse. He’ll kill everyone you love, just because he can.”
Hudson stops pacing, his face turning to stone as he waits for my reaction. Only his eyes are alive, a vivid, storm-tossed blue that delves into the very heart of me.
“I won’t let that happen. I swear,” I tell her, even as panic races through me. “How can I lock him out?”
“That’s what I want to show you,” she says. “If you’ll let me.”
“Of course I’ll let you. I thought that was the whole reason we were here—so you could teach me how to get rid of him. I just don’t understand why you felt like you needed to lock me up.” I turn to Jaxon. “Or why you thought it was okay to let her.”
He looks sick. “I didn’t—”
“He doesn’t have a choice. And neither do you. It’s bad enough that Hudson could take over your body. But now that he’s started talking to you, we have to find a way to create a partition between you and him before it’s too late. This cage will give us the freedom to do that, since he’s behind bars, too.”
I n
otice that she doesn’t mention that it protects anyone inside the cage from his power—namely me—but I don’t call her on it. Not when my stomach is doing a triple somersault in the worst possible way and I have bigger, more important things to question her about. “Too late?”
“Yes, too late,” she reiterates. “The longer we wait, the greater the chance that the next time he takes you over…” She pauses and glances at Jaxon before turning back to me. “The next time, you might not be able to find your way back.”
Her voice echoes ominously throughout the cavern, her warning hitting me like a wrecking ball. “That can’t really happen, can it?” I whisper through a throat tight with horror.
“Of course not!” Hudson starts pacing the room again. “I mean, seriously. Who would actually choose to spend their life as a Jaxon Vega fangirl?”
I ignore him.
“It’s absolutely possible,” the Bloodletter assures me. “And the longer he stays in you, the harder it’s going to be for you to get him out—especially if he decides he doesn’t want to go.”
Hudson runs a hand through his hair, his fingers tangling in the longer, wavy strands on top. “Believe me, that will not be a problem, Grace. I want out of you at least as much as you want me out.”
“What happens if he decides to stay?” I ask. “I mean, how does it happen?”
The Bloodletter studies me for several seconds, as if weighing how much she wants to say. “First, he’ll start to control you more often—and for longer periods of time. When he lets you go, it’ll be harder for you to remember who you are, harder to fit back into your everyday life, until it will seem easier to just let him take over. Until one day you just give up completely.”
“I wouldn’t do that to you, Grace. You have to trust me.” Hudson sounds almost as frantic as I feel. “Don’t build the wall. Don’t let her lock me up.”
I turn and stare into Hudson’s eyes. He’s stopped pacing now, and we both just hold the other’s gaze for what seems like minutes. I can’t tell what he’s thinking, but as he’s proven, he can hear every one of my thoughts. I wish I could trust you, but you know that’s impossible.
His shoulders slump, but he nods. “I know.” He must think the words this time, because his lips don’t move, yet I hear each one like a gunshot.
“Don’t listen to him,” Jaxon tells me urgently. “Whatever he’s saying to you is a lie. You can’t trust Hudson. You can’t—” He breaks off all of a sudden, his eyes wide with shock as he presses a hand to his chest.
“Stop him, Grace.” The Bloodletter’s voice slices like a lash.
“Stop what?” I demand as Jaxon stumbles forward a few steps before falling to his knees.
“You’re killing him,” she answers hoarsely, and that’s when I realize my hand is outstretched toward Jaxon, power like I’ve never felt before racing through my body.
I gasp, drop my hand. But Jaxon continues to clutch at his chest.
“Stop it!” I yell at Hudson. And when that doesn’t work, I beg. “Please stop! Don’t hurt him. Please don’t make me hurt him.”
And just like that, the flow of power evaporates.
“Jaxon?” I whisper as he slowly drops his hands back to his sides. “Are you all right?”
“You’re a coward,” he answers, looking at me with such contempt that it bruises something deep inside me. At least until I realize it’s Hudson he’s talking to, not me. “Hiding inside a girl who doesn’t even understand her own power yet, using her to do your dirty work. You’re pathetic.”
“Fuck you!” Hudson snarls, and he sounds like a totally different person—one more than capable of doing all the terrible things Jaxon once told me he did. “You don’t know anything about me!”
I don’t repeat what he said to Jaxon. In fact, after what he just used me to do, I refuse to acknowledge him at all.
“How did he get through the cage?” Jaxon demands as he turns on the Bloodletter. “You said we had to put Grace in the cage to neutralize his powers. How did he get through?”
“I’m not sure, though I would imagine it has something to do with the mating bond. Even magic this strong”—she gestures to the bars between us—“can’t neutralize the bond completely. He must have found a way to use it to reach you.”
“But walling him up will stop him, right? He’ll never be able to hurt Jaxon like that again?” I choke out the words.
“It will stop him,” the Bloodletter answers. “For at least a week, maybe even two. Hopefully it will be long enough for you to do what needs to be done to banish him completely.”
“Don’t do it, Grace,” Hudson tells me. “You can’t trust her.”
Maybe not, but I can’t trust you, either, so I’m going to go with the person who can help me the most.
“This is not how things were supposed to happen.” He shakes his head. “Why won’t you trust me?”
Maybe because you’re a raging psychopath, and I am tired of doing your bidding.
I turn to the Bloodletter. “I’m ready. Show me how to build the wall.”
35
I’m Going to Wash
That Psychopath
Right Out of
My Hair
The Bloodletter assesses me for several seconds before she answers. “Every single paranormal finds a different way to build a shield inside them. They do what feels natural—what feels right—to them as they explore and grow into their powers.
“At a different time, that’s how you would learn to build your wall. As a shield to keep your powers from adversely affecting the people around you.”
“But I don’t have any powers,” I tell her, more than a little confused. “I mean, except the ability to turn to stone. I’m still skeptical on the flying part.”
She smiles a little at that and shakes her head. “You have more power than you know, Grace. You just have to find it.”
I have no idea what that means, but at this point, I’m willing to try anything. Especially if it means Hudson can’t hurt Jaxon again—or anyone else. “Is that how I build the wall or the shield or whatever you want to call it? By channeling my power?”
“Not this time. Because you’re not trying to keep your powers in. You’re trying to separate yourself and your powers from Hudson and his powers. So while we would normally be talking about a shield, right now, we have to talk about a wall.”
“Inside me.”
“Yes. It won’t last forever—as you just saw, Hudson’s power is too great to be contained for long, and eventually he will break the wall down. But hopefully we’ll be able to buy you some time before that happens. Maybe a week or two, I’d guess.”
I look from her to Jaxon. “Time to do what?”
Now Jaxon is the one who answers. “Time to get what we need to perform the spell that will get Hudson out of you once and for all.”
“There’s a spell for that?” Relief swamps me, and I sink back onto the edge of the bed. “Well, why don’t we just do it right now?”
“Eager much?” Hudson drolls.
Once again, I ignore him. He’s not worth talking to, especially not after the shit he just pulled.
“Because, like all magic, it has a price,” the Bloodletter tells me. “And that price includes certain accoutrements that you don’t have yet.”
“What kind of accoutrements are we talking about here?” I ask as I picture eye of newt and wing of bat and God only knows what else. Then again, before Katmere Academy, most of my knowledge about witches came from Hocus Pocus and Charmed, so maybe I don’t have the clearest picture of it all. “And where do we get them?”
“When you were…gone, and I was looking for a way to help you, I found the spell Lia used to bring Hudson back,” Jaxon says. “She had the items she needed, but they didn’t hold as much power as she needed them to. Plus, she had to bring him back from the
dead and not just re-form him from fading, which is all we’ve got to do.
“Lia didn’t have enough power on her own to get the job done, so she needed mine to complete the spell…of course that definitely would have killed me. So this time, I’m all for finding the most powerful objects we can, just to make sure no one has to die. Except maybe Hudson, but I’m okay with that.”
“I’m fine doing it Lia’s way,” Hudson interjects. He’s back to lounging indolently against a wall near the bars.
“That is shocking,” I agree, then get mad at myself for answering him, giving him the attention he obviously wants. Especially since he’s now got a ridiculously smug look on his face.
“Yeah, well, Lia was totally unreasonable when it came to Hudson, even when he was alive,” Jaxon mutters. It takes me a moment to figure out what he’s talking about, but then I realize he thinks my last comment was to him. “But she knew how to do her research. The full spell calls for at least four powerful items.”
Four items. That doesn’t sound so bad.
The Bloodletter adds, “Well, four to bring him back as he was, a vampire. Five if you want to bring him back as a human, stripped of his powers.”
Even better. “So how do we get all five?” I ask.
“Wait a minute!” Hudson is up and pacing again, indolence replaced by a quiet kind of desperation. “You don’t need five to get me out of here. You only need four.”
Maybe, but five will make sure you never hurt anyone again, and right now, that sounds pretty good to me.
“You don’t get to make that choice!” Hudson tells me.
Considering you just used your powers to attack my boyfriend and you’re in my head…yeah, Hudson, I’m pretty sure I do.
But I am curious. “Why five items to bring him back human but only four to bring him back?”
The Bloodletter narrows her eyes on me, clearly not enjoying being questioned.
“If you wouldn’t mind,” I tack on nervously.