Everbound

by Brodi Ashton

Page 20

  I turned around to see an official-looking dark sedan.

  My dad’s car.

  TWENTY

  NOW

  The Surface. My dad’s car.

  Before I could figure out what to do, my dad jumped out of the passenger seat.

  “Nikki!” He paused for a moment as he took in my red-caked pants, and then his arms were around me. “Where have you been?” he said into my hair. Then he pulled back to look at me. “What happened?”

  My mind couldn’t work fast enough to tell a believable lie. “I don’t know. ”

  “You don’t know? Then where were you?”

  “I … How did you find me?”

  He pushed some of the hair from my eyes and then held my face in his hands. “Your phone. ”

  I glanced down at the phone in my hand and then back to my dad. “What, like GPS?”

  He didn’t admit it, but he looked guilty. “What do you expect, Nikki? Your strange disappearances? Your missed appointments? And then last night your signal disappeared. I’ve been waiting for it to reappear every since. ”

  I shook my head, still staring at my phone. My dad pulled on my elbow. “Come on. Get in the car. We’ll discuss this on the way to Dr. Hill’s. ”

  “What?!”

  “I called her on the way. She’s squeezing you in, and you need it now more than ever. ”

  I jerked my arm free and backed away. “No! Dad, I’m sorry; I can’t explain right now, but I have to go. ”

  “You’re not going. ” He no longer had me in his grip, but there was nowhere for me to run. I looked at his eyes. His tired eyes. He didn’t understand that this was life or death. Jack’s life, or his death. I’d been hiding the truth for so long. Was this one of those times when only the truth would work? I don’t know if it was my exhaustion or my desperation, but I blurted out the first honest thing I’d said in a long time.

  “I know where Jack is! He’s trapped, and I have to go or he’s going to die. ” It was simple. And it was the truth, and yet the words still had the power to cut me to the core.

  He froze. “Where is he?”

  How to explain? “He’s … not here. He’s somewhere else. And I was on my way to find him last night—”

  “When you got caught in a paint fight?” He was eyeing my red-covered pants, and his tone was more sarcastic than I’d ever heard from him. A sign that he was frustrated.

  He didn’t believe me. Of course he didn’t believe me. But I had to get rid of him before Cole came.

  “Dad. Look at me. ” We were eye to eye. “Trust me. Believe in me. Jack will die if I don’t get to him. And I’m the only one who can. He’s in … sort of an alternate reality. I know it sounds crazy, but look at me. Do you see my pupils dilated? Do you see any other signs that I’ve lost it? You have to give me forty-eight hours. Alone. I can save Jack. But I need to go. ”

  It was working. I could see it in his face. He believed me.

  He turned toward his car and called to the driver. “James. Can you get me a bottle of water?”

  Water. It sounded so good. James came around the car and handed it to my dad. My dad twisted it open.

  “Here,” he said, handing it to me. “Drink. ”

  I gulped the entire thing down without pausing for a breath. My dad sat on the ground next to me and leaned his head against the wall. I handed him the empty bottle.

  “I’m sorry I’ve been so crazy. But once I find Jack and bring him home, things will get better. ”

  “Just relax, Nikki. You’re back now. ”

  I leaned my head against his shoulder. He needed to know I wasn’t back for good, but the words to explain weren’t there. I was tired.

  So tired.

  When I woke up I was on a couch. I rubbed my shoulder. “Ow. ”

  I heard the squeak of someone shifting on leather. “Sorry, Nikki. James accidentally bumped into the wall when he was carrying you in. ” Was that Dr. Hill’s voice?

  “I’m not supposed to be here. ” My mouth felt like cotton.

  “Drink some water. ”

  The water. My dad had given me water. “What was in it?”

  Dr. Hill frowned and set a glass of water aside. “I’m afraid your father did something rash. He put Valium in your drink. He was worried about you, but he shouldn’t have done that. ”

  “My dad drugged me,” I said, incredulous. “And here I was thinking he believed me. ”

  “Believed you about what?”

  I shook my head, trying to clear the cobwebs inside. I’d slept, but I hadn’t dreamed. Was it because it was an artificially induced sleep? “I have to go. ”

  “Of course. After we talk for a bit. After you start telling the truth. ”

  The truth. If the past few hours had taught me anything, it was not to be honest.

  She clicked her pen open and shut a couple of times and then held it again to the yellow legal pad resting on her lap.

  “What happened to you?”

  I shrugged, glancing at the windows in her office and wondering if I could maybe squeeze through one. But we were on the second floor.

  She inhaled loudly. “Nikki, your father found you on the side of the road, your pants covered in … something, and talking incoherently about alternate dimensions. I know you don’t feel safe with anyone; but if you want to get out of here, you’ve got to give me something. ”

  I thought about it. “I don’t know where to start. ”

  “Close your eyes. Count backward from ten. Let your mind go. ”

  Dr. Hill called this a guided imagery exercise. She had me do it at every appointment. It was supposed to get the conversation flowing. I nodded and then did as instructed.

  “Now open your eyes. ”

  I did, but it wasn’t Dr. Hill’s therapy face that caught my attention. It was something else, in the corner of the room. Behind Dr. Hill’s rolling chair. A hand, pale and ghostly, coming out of the floor.

  A phantom hand. Crap. Maybe I am crazy.

  “Talk, Nikki. ” Dr. Hill was losing patience.

  I tried to keep my eyes on her, but the hand was waving toward me, as if it was trying to get my attention.

  “Nikki? You have to give me something. ”

  The hand pointed to the side wall, opposite the entrance, where the bathroom was. I tried not to stare directly at it and risk Dr. Hill seeing it. Or maybe it really was a hallucination.

  The hand made insistent gestures toward the bathroom.

  “Um … may I please be excused?” I said.

  “No more excuses. ”

  “I can’t help it if I need to use the restroom. I won’t be able to think until I do. ”

  She glanced at her watch. “Make it quick. ”

  I stood from the couch and started walking toward the door, and the hand followed me, slinking along the floor and up the one step that led to the bathroom.

  What the … ?

  I went inside and shut the door, and the hand came through the wall. It reached out, fingers together, thumb up, as if it would shake my hand. I crouched down and noticed markings around each of the fingers on the hand. Tattoos.

  I hadn’t seen them before because the hand itself was practically translucent. There was only one person I knew with those tattoos.

  “Cole?”

  The hand went limp, as if exasperated, and then gave me an exaggerated thumbs-up signal.

  I stood up to consider. Would I really be able to get to the Everneath from my doctor’s office bathroom?

  And how would my doctor explain it?

  I was pretty sure there would be a manhunt after this; but Jack was down there, and Cole was waiting.

  I had no choice but to grab the hand.

  I took it as if I were shaking it; and within an instant I was gone again.

  TWENTY-ONE

  NOW

  The Everneath. The Ring of Water.

  I landed hard on the dirt pathway, my lungs compr
essed painfully. I coughed a few times.

  “You okay, Nik?” Cole patted my back.

  My eyes watered, and I sniffed. “No. ” I pushed myself up. “I am not okay. What happened? What did you do to me?”

  “I told you we’d have to kick you to the Surface for the nights. ”

  “But without warning?”

  He pointed to the red lake. “You were covered in blood from the Lake of Blood and Guilt. ”

  My chest constricted at the memory of that drowning feeling. “The Lake of what?”

  He stared at the lake with a faraway look in his eyes. “The Lake of Blood and Guilt. It’s an apt description, really, since it’s made up of blood. And guilt. ”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Max interrupted. “We need to get moving, Cole. Considering how long it took us to get here. ”

  “I know,” Cole said. He went to grab my hand, but I yanked it away and he gave me an exasperated look. “I’ll tell you what happened, but we need to keep moving. ”

  Ashe was standing by one of the four entrances that led to the lake. He seemed to be pacing in his mind, throwing occasional anxious glances toward Cole.

  The four entrances all looked alike. Even as I studied them, I couldn’t be sure which one we had taken to get here.

  “Did all of you stay here the whole time I was gone?” I asked Cole.

  He nodded. “It was the safest place, because the Wanderers avoid the lake. But this place wears on us too, so everyone’s pretty much ready to leave. Like now. ”

  Ashe looked at his watch. “What time is it?” I said.

  “One o’clock,” Cole said.

  One o’clock? My heart sank. So much time gone.

  Cole nodded as if I’d spoken. “It took a long time to find you. Which means we need to go,” he said. “Where’s your token?”

  I pulled the note from my pocket. It was stained red from the lake, but it didn’t matter. Once it was in my hand, my tether appeared. The night on the Surface must have refilled the more positive emotions, because the tether glowed bright and true, and it pointed away from the lake, toward the leftmost entrance. But the night away didn’t do anything for my energy level. I felt as if I was moving at half speed.

  “This way,” I said.

  We started off in the same formation as before, with Ashe in front and Max in back. The walls were still running water, and I wondered if we would ever get to the Ring of Wind, let alone to the bull’s-eye. A whole day had already passed, and we hadn’t even gotten through one ring.

  Cole walked beside me. His face looked worn, and there were dark circles under his eyes that I’d never seen before.

  “You’re tired,” I said.

  He gave a sad smile. “The Lake of Blood and Guilt will do that to a person. ”

  “What was that? What happened?”

  I hadn’t realized I’d started to veer to the side, and Cole pulled me toward the center of the path again.

  “When the Wanderer … fed on you”—he struggled to get the words out—“I’m guessing that the strongest emotion left in you was your guilt. It was even stronger than your connection to Jack, hence the second tether. Guilt’s kind of a big thing around here. So big that all of the collective guilt from the sacrifices in the Everneath pooled together and formed a lake. The Lake of Blood and Guilt. ”

  I thought about the symbolism and remembered something I’d read. “Wasn’t there a Frozen Lake of Blood and Guilt in Dante’s Inferno? It’s made of blood, because blood symbolizes guilt so well. ”

  He almost smiled. “You have been doing your research. In Dante’s poem, it’s the farthest place from warmth and light. The worst sinners are frozen there. Faces out. Mouths sealed shut. ”

  “But my lake wasn’t frozen. ”

  “Dante always did like to romanticize everything. Besides, like most of our enduring myth makers, he was working off of a rumor of a rumor. But he did have one thing right. ”

  “What’s that?”

  Cole smiled. “It’s an eternal punishment. It’s hard to escape it; and if you’re not careful, every path leads back to it. We just have to hope your tether to Jack is stronger than our attraction to the lake. ”

  I wouldn’t have believed him if I hadn’t experienced it myself.

  Beside me, Cole yawned. He looked so exhausted, so sickly compared with the last time I’d seen him. “The lake hurts you too,” I said.

  He gave me a sad smile. “Everything in here will affect me. The lake draws out my guilt. Brings it to the surface. ”

  “I thought one of your charms was that you never felt guilty for the things you’ve done. ”

  “Not true. I just keep it buried as far as possible, down inside what you would probably refer to as the ‘black hole that is my soul. ’” He glanced at me sideways, and I feigned nonchalance and shrugged. He grinned. “The lake is like a magnet for the guilt. But your guilt was already strong. Your tether to Jack and your own guilt fought for your attention, hence two tethers. And you chose guilt. I didn’t realize where you were leading us until you decided to take the world’s most melodramatic swan dive. ”