Valkyrie

by Raythe Reign

  Their mother was stiff in Cameron’s arms for a moment. She was undoubtedly stunned by his actions. But she relaxed just a tiny bit.

  “Cameron, how did you know I was here?” she asked. “Has something happened?”

  Something in what she said had Cameron stilling in her arms. “Happened? Uhm, yeah, I mean you would know what’s happened —”

  “I meant to you not me,” she said.

  A trickle of unease went through him. “Why would you think something had happened to me?”

  He felt the lie before she said it, “No reason. I just … Nothing at all. I’m glad you’re here though. How did you know to find me here?”

  “I heard it at the bar. I came over right away,” he lied, too.

  “Well, I’m fine.”

  “Fine?” Cameron kept his voice light instead of sharp as he said, “Mom, your idea of fine is different than mine because it looks like you got the worse end of a fight.”

  “I was pushed down a set of stairs. It looks worse than it is,” she said and gently pulled away from him.

  Liam immediately took his hand again the moment that their mother disengaged from him. Cameron was both relieved and hurt by her withdrawing. It was typical of her and him.

  “Just getting pushed down a set of stairs? You look horrible so I’m thinking that your pain is pretty damned bad, too,” Cameron said, his voice slightly tighter.

  “Compared to …” Her gaze swung towards an open door just across the way to a patient’s room.

  Cameron turned to look at where she was facing. Juan Munoz was lying still in the bed. His handsome face was vacant. His normally bronze skin looked leached of color. He had been put into a gown and a powder blue blanket was pulled up to mid-chest. It looked like his heart was being monitored, but he was breathing on his own.

  “What’s wrong with Juan, Mom?” he asked.

  His mother though was staring at Liam and Nafari. She squinted as if she thought she saw something but then she shook her head and focused on him again.

  She could see through their magic if she wanted to. But she doesn’t want to. She wants to remain blind forever.

  “What happened to Juan?” he repeated with more urgency this time.

  She stared at him a moment more and Cameron half expected her to tell him that she couldn’t discuss an open investigation like he was a member of the public or the press. But instead, she said slowly, “We went to tell the parents that their son had been killed. I hate — hate doing that so I asked Juan to come with me.” She rubbed her hands together and then on her pants. “I knew something was wrong before we went inside.”

  “Then why did you go in?” he asked aghast.

  She let out a high pitched laugh, but almost immediately bit her lower lip to keep the sound in. “Because I’m the sheriff, honey. I have to go in places that no one in their right mind would want to. I just wish that I hadn’t brought Juan.”

  Her haunted gaze went to Juan’s room again.

  “Were these people in trouble with you before? I mean did they abuse the kid or something?” he asked.

  She shook her head. “No record of them having done so, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible. Yet to have done this …” Her gaze drifted off. “You just don’t kill a child like that without having done something terrible before. Many terrible things actually. But, then again, we’ve had a history of people doing inexplicable things.”

  She meant Reggie. No one could believe he’d jumped from local weirdo to serial killer so quickly, but he had. Because of the Gash.

  She drew a hand to her forehead where the bruise was blackest. “We just need to find the mother and then this nightmare will be over.”

  “You think it’s over?” Cameron couldn’t keep the disdain out of his voice.

  Liam and Nafari shot him a repressive look and he closed his mouth, pressing the lips together to keep the words in.

  “Cameron.” Their mother stepped over to him, suddenly looking concerned. “I know that this must be bringing up a lot of feelings from when Liam … But these people, for some reason, just cottoned onto Reggie’s crimes. And they used their own child to recreate one of them. But as soon as we catch the mother it will be over soon, Cameron.”

  She put a tentative hand on his arm and he shrugged it off, irrationally angry that she didn’t know the truth. That she wouldn’t acknowledge that her oldest son was standing right in front of her. But she was blocking the knowledge out. She thought she was keeping the town safe by getting the mother of dead child when it wasn’t really the mother any longer, but the Gash. She didn’t know what she was up again. She wanted to remain in the dark and that was unforgivable.

  A flash of hurt crossed their mother’s face, but she smoothed out her expression again, “Cameron, I need to ask you about those bikers you met at the bar.”

  “You mean Liam?” he found himself almost taunting her with her son’s name.

  “Cam,” Liam said quietly. It was a chastisement and their mother’s head jerked towards him, but her gaze slid away from him.

  “Yes, Liam, Elda, Nafari and Lihua,” she remembered their names. “I need to speak to them and I need you to stay away from them.”

  “What? Why?”

  “They’re …” She licked her dry lips and one hand fluttered towards her injured forehead. “They’re mixed up in this somehow. I don’t know how, but they’re not safe for you to be around.”

  Cameron let out a sharp laugh. “You have no idea …”

  “About?” she challenged.

  “Anything at all.” He swallowed and walked away from her into Juan’s room. He couldn’t suddenly bear to be near his mother or feel his brother’s love for her. Love, he didn’t think she fully deserved.

  She didn’t follow him in and neither did Liam or Nafari. Both Valkyrie stared at his mother as if trying to find out what she knew just by watching her. He let his awareness of them drain away and his hearing tuned into the soft beeping of the heart monitor.

  His own heart twisted as he saw Juan stare up at the ceiling, not noticing him at all. He drew the single chair up by Juan’s bedside. He wasn’t surprised that none of Juan’s family was here. The deputy wasn’t married nor dating anyone. His sister lived in Boston so she would have to fly here. Probably wouldn’t be here for hours. Their parents were dead.

  He took Juan’s nearest hand in his. The palm had calluses. It was a hand used to hard labor and gun practice. It was also a hand that had always been gentle with him. Whenever he and Mom had gotten into it, it was Juan who had stepped in to smooth things over between them.

  Taking over Liam’s role.

  He glanced up at Liam through the door. He was amazed at how his mother was reacting to Liam even though she didn’t know he was there. She was practically almost leaning against him. His gaze went back to Juan’s face then and he stood up so quickly that the chair went flying back and hit the wall.

  “Cam?” Liam called.

  But Cameron couldn’t speak. His eyes were riveted to Juan’s. The normally deep brown eyes were black. All black from one side to the other. There was a smile on Juan’s face. It wasn’t a nice smile. It was not one that the deputy had ever worn in life. The hand he was holding was locked on his. The fingers were strangely hot and slick. The thumb caressed the back of Cameron’s hand.

  “Cameron,” Juan said in Reggie’s voice. “How I’ve missed you.”

  “Juan?!” Their mother’s voice sounded strangled as she pushed into the room.

  But Juan - no, not Juan, not Reggie, the Gash - ignored her. It kept a firm hold on Cameron’s hand. Liam was suddenly by his side. He gripped Juan’s wrist and tried to wrench it off.

  “Let Cameron go!” Liam demanded.

  “How did you — where did the two of you come from?” his mother demanded to know of Liam and Nafari who were now clearly visible to her.

  “We never did get to have our alone time together.” The Gash continued to caress Cameron’s h
and, resisting Liam’s efforts to pull his hand away and Cameron’s own tugs.

  “Juan, stop it! Stop it this instant!” their mother shouted. “Nurse! Nurse, he’s awake!”

  “I’ll get the nurse,” Nafari said and Cameron wondered if he would or if he would keep the nurses away from this creature that had invaded Juan’s body.

  “Let him go!” Liam growled.

  “But we will have our time. I’ve been planning about what I’m going to do to you for ten long years,” the Gash continued and then it’s black eyes slid to Liam. “And I’m going to make you watch, Liam.”

  Rage ignited in Cameron then and the room went terribly cold. Frost crawled over their joined hands and the Gash howled, trying to wrench its hand away then, but this time Cameron held on tight and leaned down and hissed, “And I’ve been waiting ten years to destroy you.”

  “Cameron, it’s Juan!” his mother shouted. “Don’t hurt him!”

  And in that moment the black rolled away from Juan’s eyes and they were only a deep brown. The deputy let out a loan moan of pain and Cameron immediately released his hand and the cold left, too. Juan’s eyelids fluttered shut. But all of them were looking elsewhere. They watched as a black shadow peeled away from underneath the bed and slithered out of the room.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN: RECOGNITION

  As the strange shadow slithered out of the room, Nafari let out a shout of rage and chased after it down the hallway, but Liam remained behind. He clutched Cameron to him. His little brother wound his arms around Liam’s neck and he buried his head against his chest. Liam murmured words of comfort in between kisses of Cameron’s head. His little brother’s soft as silk hair clung to his lips.

  “Are you all right?” Liam repeated over and over again. “Please tell me you’re all right.”

  “I’m fine, but Juan … I’m not sure if I hurt Juan. We need to check,” Cameron said and then both of them twisted around to look at the deputy in the bed.

  Juan’s eyes were closed and he looked to be asleep. The EKG showed a steady heart rate to Liam’s layman’s gaze. Juan’s skin seemed a less pasty gray than it had been when he’d been possessed. Cameron was checking Juan’s hand, looking for frostbite.

  “He looks okay,” Liam said tentatively. “Maybe he’ll recover.”

  That had never happened before. Once the Gash took over someone they always died. But he’d never actually seen the Gash leave a person willingly before.

  “Yeah. I don’t think the cold did any permanent damage either.” His little brother let out a sigh of relief and leaned back against Liam’s chest. Liam’s hands went to Cameron’s shoulders.

  “Liam?” their mother’s voice was the first thing to remind Liam that she was actually there.

  He’d become so focused on Cameron that their mother’s presence had faded away for him. But the way she said his name - with knowledge, with understanding, with shock - had him snapping his head towards her. Her lips were parted. Her eyes stared at him without blinking. She extended one hand towards him and it hovered there, shaking like a leaf.

  “Liam?” she breathed his name out like a prayer.

  “Sheriff …” Liam began and then stopped. Though “Liam” was the name that Cameron had given him, his biker boyfriend, she wasn’t seeing the boyfriend. She saw him, her son. She was really seeing him. He remembered Loki’s words about her realizing who he was. It had happened all too soon. While before he had wanted her to recognize him now he didn’t. Now things were so much more complicated. Now all he wanted was Cameron and the life together that she would not approve of.

  And when she realizes that Cam and I are together whatever love she has for me will curdle and she’ll regret that I ever came back anyways. It would have been better if she’d never realized anything.

  A cold knot formed in Liam’s stomach. If he had ever hoped that his mother or even Nafari would see the deep love that he and Cameron had for each other like the Aesir did, that hope dwindled. He could already imagine her face changing from this shocked, welcoming, loving expression to disgust.

  Cameron seemed to realize all of this, too. His little brother’s body tensed under his hands. Cameron actually reached back and clutched Liam as if he was afraid their mother intended to wrench Liam away from him.

  If she knew what was between us she would do that. She might even get out her gun and shoot me. I’m supposed to be protecting Cam, not taking advantage of him.

  And that’s when he thought about pretending he wasn’t her son, of saying that he really was just “biker boyfriend Liam” and any similarities to her dead eldest son were just coincidences. He thought of somehow making this moment pass and for confusion to rain down on her. He opened his lips.

  “Liam, it is you, isn’t it?” She touched her face, rubbing her cheeks and then her eyes as if that would clear him from her vision. “Or have I finally gone mad? But no, we all saw the shadow leave Juan. And I can … I can see you. I …”

  The fear that he was causing their mother the least worry that she was going crazy decided it for him. He would tell her the truth about who he was. There was no other choice. He couldn’t do this cruel thing to her.

  He squeezed Cameron’s shoulders, trying to assure his little brother that he was only leaving him for a moment, and then he stepped towards her. Her right hand rose again towards him, shaking and uncertain, and he took it and put it against his cheek like he used to.

  “Mom, it’s me,” he told her.

  She let out a soft cry and grabbed him. She clutched him to her and a long, wrenched sob came out of her. She repeated his name over and over again like a prayer. Her joy was tempered with shock and grief. Was he ghost? Was he really her Liam? Would he disappear again? Had her mother’s madness suddenly been visited upon her?

  Liam had tried to be her helpmate after their father had died. He had tried to be the responsible one, the one that caused her no pain, the one that picked up the messes, didn’t make them. But could he really say that about himself any more?

  “Mom, it’s okay. It’s going to be okay,” Liam told her even though he wasn’t sure that was true.

  “How? How are you here? You’re dead!” Her breath was hot against his skin as her words puffed through his shirt.

  “I came back,” he said simply. The explanation for how, why and why now were too much to go into.

  “You came back?” she repeated and let out a little warbling laugh. “You came back! Of course! You would come back for your brother. You would always do that.”

  Tears swam in his own eyes as she jerked in his arms with sobs that she wouldn’t let out. He stroked her back, trying to get her to let go of the emotions that she tried to physically reign in. She was so much like Cameron in some ways. Both of them felt things so keenly. And both of them repressed their emotions brutally. They would viciously stop feeling something if it got in their way, tuck it away, and not look at it again unless it burst out like some terrible Jack-in-the-Box. He held her closer to him, engulfing her in his large arms, and tried to be the helpmate again.

  “Liam, you’re back and Cameron … his hands glowed like blue flame and … I don’t know what’s happening,” she said, her voice clogged with emotion. “It’s like the world’s gone insane with some of it good and some of it bad, so bad … but you’re here. I don’t understand it! How are you here? Liam, how is this possible? How —”

  “Does it matter?” Cameron snapped. “He’s back. He’s here. You’re touching him, for fuck’s sake. But all you can do is question and worry about your precious sanity!”

  Surprised at the anger in his little brother’s voice, Liam glanced up at Cameron. He was standing about five feet away. His arms were crossed tightly over his slender frame. His blue eyes were icy with disdain for their mother.

  “Cam, what’s wrong?” Liam asked, frowning.

  Considering what their mother had experienced that day, topping it off with this, her reaction was almost tame. But there was so much
rage in his brother’s stance and voice. Liam had gotten the sense that things had gone sour between Cameron and their mother, but not that it was this bad. That Cameron would criticize their mother for not realizing that Liam was back from the dead spoke of cold fury. That her tears would enrage him indicated a bitterness that was ocean’s deep.

  “Cam?” he asked, uncertainly.

  Their mother pulled back from Liam’s chest to look at Cameron. While she couldn’t have failed to hear what he’d said or the tone he’d said it in, she reached towards her youngest son, tears on her cheeks, tremulous smile on her lips. This was more emotion than their mother showed in a year let alone all at once. Surely, Cameron wouldn’t reject her. Not now.

  “Cameron, come here,” she beckoned. “We have Liam back. We have —”

  “I know.” Cameron ground his teeth. “I’ve known who he was for awhile now. I’m not blind like you are. You were so eager to put him in the ground, but you were slow as molasses to realize he was back even when he was standing right there in front of you!”

  “Cam!” Liam’s voice rose up in warning.

  Cameron’s eyes filled with tears even as his body looked even more rigid with fury. “You don’t know, Liam! You don’t know what she’s been like since you died! She gave away your things! She tried to erase you.”

  “People grieve in different ways, Cam,” Liam reminded him gently. “I’m back now. My things aren’t me and —”

  “They were all I had! I kept the Bopper. I wouldn’t let her get rid of that though she tried,” Cameron growled as tears dripped down his cheeks.

  Liam reached for his little brother, too, trying to draw him into a three way embrace, but Cameron was having none of it. His arms tightened around himself and he ignored the proffered hand.

  Their mother continued to cling to Liam, but her voice was more in her normal, controlled register, “I thought it would help us both if I did that, Cameron. I know you are angry with me —”

  “Angry?” Cameron flicked the tears away even as more fell. His face was stained red with anger and pain. “You have no idea. None! And you have no right to — to have Liam back again. Liam’s back for me. Not you! Me! And you’re not taking him from me!”