by Cheree Alsop
“Better now than never,” I replied.
She fell silent.
I glanced at her. “Too soon?”
She rolled her eyes with a begrudging smile. “It’s always too soon for dying jokes. Now focus on what you’re doing.”
My fingers shook as I tried to thread the needle. Ceren and I both breathed a sigh of relief when the thread finally went through.
“Pink?” she noted.
“Only tough guys use pink,” I replied.
That brought a small laugh from her.
I used several of the small alcohol wipes to swab the thread and needle, even though I doubted an infection was my first concern. The khavis had slashed through my side with all four claws, laying a wide swath open. It would require stitches through all of the slashes to stop the bleeding. The thought made me nauseous.
“Here it goes,” I said, steeling my nerves.
I had stitched myself up many times during my life, but it would never rank on my top ten list of favorite things.
“Just breathe,” Ceren said quietly. “You’ve got this.”
I shoved the needle through the first edge of skin. My breath rushed out. I sucked it back in through my teeth.
“That’s it,” Ceren said.
Her voice was muffled. I looked up to see her hiding her face in her hands. Immediate regret for putting her through all she had seen that night made me ache. I clenched my jaw and shoved the needle through the other side.
Black spots filled my vision. I rested my forehead on the desk and willed myself to keep breathing.
“What’s wrong?” Ceren asked. She caught herself and said, “Besides the obvious. How can I help?”
I squeezed my eyes shut. “I need a distraction, something to take my mind off this so I don’t pass out.”
Ceren was quiet for a moment before she said, “Have you ever had a girlfriend?”
That bought a snort of laughter from me. “Really? That’s what you ask?”
“I’m keeping your mind off it, aren’t I?” she replied. “Answer the question.”
Her demanding tone actually helped. I blinked and focused on my side, shoving the needle through again as I spoke.
“No, but I have issues with falling for girls,” I told her tightly. “I think it has to do with the wolf thing.”
“Wolves choose one mate for life,” Ceren said.
I stared at her, the thread forgotten for the moment. “You know that?”
She nodded. “I was attacked by a dog when I was little. My dad encouraged me to face my fears, so I used to read everything I could about dogs and wolves and coyotes and things.”
That explained her reluctance around the pit bull. “Did it work?” I asked curiously.
She shook her head. “I’m still afraid, but I’ve learned a lot.” She gave me a small smile. “My cousin has a little dog and we got along pretty well.”
I shoved the needle through another section. The stitching was horrible and I hadn’t even tried any knots, but at least the blood was slowing. I hoped that didn’t mean I was running out.
“In the Lair, we weren’t allowed to care about anyone.” I spoke through gritted teeth as I shoved the needle through the next section. “That way we were focused wholly on protecting the Master. But it felt wrong.”
My hands were numb. I found myself staring at the blood that coated them.
“What did?” Ceren asked, jarring me back to the present.
“Not caring about anyone,” I replied. “I think it broke me.”
“Because you want to care?”
I fell off the chair and landed on my back.
Ceren gave a little squeak of shock and knelt next to me. Her hands fluttered as though she wanted to touch me, but knew she couldn’t.
“Zev, Zev, are you alright? Speak to me.”
It took a lot of effort to open my eyes. “I need to sleep.”
“No,” she protested. “You could die!”
“I can’t…keep my eyes open anymore.”
She looked around the room. “We need to get you to the moonlight.”
I tipped my head back to see the light that pooled on the floor beneath the windows. It could have been on another planet for how far it looked from where I lay.
“Come on, Zev. You can make it,” Ceren urged.
I sucked in a breath and pushed up to my knees. I held my side. At least when I pulled my hand away, the bleeding had slowed.
“Why is love so bad?” Ceren asked.
I glanced at her. “You mean besides the fact that I’m a monster?”
She lowered her gaze. “I shouldn’t have said that. You’re not a monster.”
“We’ve been over this,” I replied. I crawled a few feet forward. “Being a monster has gotten me this far.”
“It might save your life,” Ceren said in a tone I couldn’t read.
I pushed myself a few more feet and collapsed in the square of moonlight. “It might,” I admitted. “Right now, all I want is sleep.”
“Sleep,” Ceren told me. “I’ll protect you.”
The fact that a ghost was watching over me so I could rest made a weary smile cross my lips.
“And Zev?” Ceren said.
I cracked my eyes open just enough to see her form kneeling near me. “Yes?”
She gave me a little smile. “You’re pretty amazing, for a monster.”
“I’m going to remember you said that,” I replied.
She gave a little laugh. “Take it easy now, tough guy. Get some rest.”
I drifted off to sleep wrapped by the memory of her smile as she guarded me from danger.
Chapter Twelve
I awoke in a patch of sunlight. When I rolled over, Ceren was watching me.
A warm, relieved smile spread across her face. “Hello, sleepyhead.”
I smiled at her. “Hey. How long did I sleep?”
“A couple of hours. You could probably use more,” she noted.
I chuckled. “You sound like Virgo and Professor Shipley, and, well, everyone, if I’m being honest.”
“It’s the truth,” she said with an answering laugh. She motioned toward my side. “It’s looking better.”
I followed her gaze and saw that not only had my pathetic excuse for stitches held, my side had started to heal. The wound was tender to the touch, but at least I could move without feeling as though I was about to pass out.
I pushed up gingerly to a sitting position. “Progress,” I said. My thoughts sharpened. “My pack might have found the jakhin. I need to get to them.”
I used a desk to pull up to a standing position. My head swam lightheadedly and I wavered.
“Take it easy,” Ceren urged. “You’ve had a rough night.”
“But what if they’re in trouble?” I asked.
“They can take care of it,” she replied. “They’re werewolves, remember?”
I glanced at her in surprise. “You sound like you’re not so disgusted by us.”
She nodded with an apologetic expression. “Well, one did save my life last night, or whatever being a ghost is called that passes for a life.” She shrugged. “I guess I’ve learned to appreciate them a bit more.”
“I’m glad to hear it,” I told her.
I glanced around at the classroom. Dried blood marked the desks I had passed and a puddle of brown crusted the floor where I had lain through the early hours of the morning. I put my hands in my pockets. “I guess I have some cleanup to do.”
Ceren smirked. “You don’t want Professor Shipley showing up to a war scene on Monday?”
“I don’t think he’d appreciate it,” I replied. “Especially considering the bones in the bathroom.”
Ceren gave a visible shudder. “I’ll leave that to you.”
“Thanks,” I replied in a dry tone that made her laugh.
I pulled my hands out of my pockets and a paper fell out. I picked up the folded sheet and opened it.
I heard Ceren’s breath catch
as she looked over my shoulder.
“What is that?” she demanded.
I stared at the picture of her. The feeling of the weathered paper was rough beneath my fingers. The ripped tabs where the numbers had been taken looked ragged and worn.
“I found it hanging on the wall of the gas station,” I told her. My throat tightened when I admitted, “Your brother saw me take it and tried to chase me down.”
“What?” she asked in disbelief. “What did you tell him?”
I could feel the wrongness of my actions building with the tension in the room.
“Nothing,” I admitted. “I didn’t know what to say.”
Tears filled her eyes. “It says missing. Is he still looking for me?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know.”
She stared at me. “How do you not know?”
I lowered my head into my hand. It felt heavier than it should have. “It was a crazy day. People were looking for me after a video from a bus accident, and I was on my way to work. Your brother caught me by surprise. He was mad when I took it down.”
“Of course he was,” she replied defensively. “Obviously, he’s looking for me! Why didn’t you say something?”
“You were gone,” I shot back. “You did one of your disappearing things and by the time I saw you again, it was when we found out about the khavis.”
“You should have told me,” she replied flatly.
I nodded, feeling like the idiot I knew I had been.
“What did he say?”
I swallowed and admitted, “He was shouting at me and it messed with my instincts.” I couldn’t look at her when I said, “It had already been a confusing day and I knew I would fight him if he pushed me any further.”
“So what did you do?” she asked in an accusatory tenor.
“I ran,” I admitted.
She stared at me. “You what?”
I couldn’t help my defensive tone when I replied, “What did you want me to do? Tell him the ghost of his sister is haunting me? How crazy does that sound?”
She was quiet for several seconds before she said, “About as crazy as it is.” She moved toward the door.
“Where are you going?” I asked.
She didn’t look back at me when she said, “I’m not haunting you any longer, Zev. I don’t want to be a burden in your life.” She gestured toward the bloody desks. “Any more than I’ve already been.” She paused at the door, her outline fading. “Thanks for saving me. Saving me for what, I don’t know, but I’ll figure it out without you.”
“Ceren, wait!”
I pushed up from the desk and limped toward the door. Every step hurt my side. I gritted my teeth and pushed myself faster, but by the time I reached the hallway, she was gone.
I leaned against the door frame and stared at the disaster that had once been a normal college hallway. Giant gouges showed where the khavis had stalked me and bloody footprints revealed my slow, sliding footsteps to Professor Shipley’s classroom. I was tempted to peek in the bathroom and see what kind of horror waited there, but the memory was graphic enough without revisiting it.
Guilt for the way I had spoken to Ceren hounded me as I made my way slowly to the doors of the school. I should have told her about the poster. I couldn’t believe I had forgotten it. And I definitely hadn’t handled her brother well. Who could blame him for chasing after the one who stole his sister’s poster? Accusing Ceren of haunting me would hang over my head as an all-time low. I really was a monster, and that didn’t mean in the physical sense.
I put my shoulder to the front door and pushed it open. It took more effort than it should have. I could have used far more moonlight, maybe a week’s worth. As it was, the ache in my side and the weakness of my body told me how very close to death I had been.
I closed my eyes and basked in the warmth of the rising sun as if it was the very first time I had felt it. The crisp morning air filled my nose with smells of dew, robins, moist earth, and the lingering scents of the students who had walked into the school on Friday.
The fact that I had sat in one of the desks in Professor Shipley’s classroom the day before was mindboggling. It felt like an age ago, an age in which I had gone from having a friend in Ceren closer than I had ever experienced before, to ostracizing her with my stupid actions about the poster. I should have told her. It should have been my highest priority that day. Of course she would want to know that her brother still held onto the hope of finding her. After so many years, it would have meant a lot to have not been forgotten.
Ceren’s words came into my head from our conversation the other day. “My room is like a shrine. Nothing’s been moved or touched since I died. It’s like…it’s like they hope that by keeping everything the same, I’ll just appear there as if I never left.”
A ripple of energy brushed across my skin. It felt as if a very important thought was just at the edge of my mind waiting to be discovered. I eased down onto the cement steps and rested my head in my hands. It felt too hard to sort through the whirlwind of ideas in my mind. With the loss of blood and stress of the night, I couldn’t get anything to fall into place. It felt like swimming through tar.
I exhaled and pushed all of the thoughts away in a practice I used to use to calm my nerves before a fight at the Lair. I sucked in a breath through my nose and let it out through my mouth. Slowly and steadily, I counted to ten, one number with each breath. By the time I reached ten, the anxiety I felt had faded. I focused on the single thought of Ceren’s room. I pictured it like the shrine she had described, with pictures of her on the walls, her bed untouched, her clothes where she had left them.
Her family still mourned her. She wished they could move on after all these years.
Something Professor Shipley had said stood out. He had been talking about Kristen’s interactions with ghosts. “She did mention that time in the plane the ghosts are on acts differently than here. Ceren may just be passing the years until she’s supposed to leave.”
The opposite thought struck me. What if it felt like years to her, but was only hours here?
I pulled the poster back out of my pocket with a bit of difficulty. Flattening the creases on my knee, I stared at it. As weathered as it was, and with all the phone number tabs missing, it appeared old and worn. Yet when I put it up to my nose, the ink smelled fresh.
Electricity prickled across my skin. Ceren’s brother had been watching the poster, hoping someone would see it and recognize her. If she hadn’t been missing very long, it would explain why he had chased me. He was desperate!
I read the short paragraph beneath Ceren’s picture. Please help us find Ceren East. We are desperate to find our daughter! If you have any information at all, please call the number below.
Certainty filled me just as the sound of a familiar truck reached my ears. I pushed up to my feet when Virgo pulled to the curb. He shoved the door open and didn’t bother to close it again before he jogged toward me.
“Zev, thank goodness! I’ve been all over the city!” he exclaimed. “Your pack tracked down the jakhin, but we lost it near the…Zev, what happened?” His steps slowed when he neared me.
I followed his gaze to the shredded side of my shirt and the dark blood that soaked my pant leg all the way down. It looked nearly as bad as it had been.
“I found the khavis,” I told him. “Well, actually, the khavis found Ceren and tried to eat her, we had a pretty brutal battle, and there’s a mess in that bathroom that will probably have this campus under lockdown and possibly quarantine.” None of that felt important compared to what I had just found out. “But Virgo, I need you to do something for me.”
“Zev, you need help,” he said, his eyes wide.
“There’s not time,” I told him. “We’ve got to get going!”
I stumbled on the curb and he grabbed my arm. His expression was serious when he said, “Listen to me. We’re not going anywhere until you get patched up.”
“I tried,” I protested.
I was alarmed at how easy it was for him to keep me from heading to the truck. “Look.”
I pulled up my shirt.
His face paled. I glanced down. “Well, it looks worse in this lighting.”
“The only kind of lighting that’s going to look good in is no lighting at all,” he muttered. He looked closer. “Is that pink thread?”
I sighed. “Fine. Grab Shipley’s kit.” When he headed off toward the building, a thought struck me. “Don’t go in the bathroom,” I called after him.
I had managed to maneuver myself onto the edge of his tailgate by the time he came back with Professor Shipley’s first aid kit.
His face was paler than before.
“You looked in the bathroom, didn’t you?” I accused.
He opened his mouth to speak, then shut it again and shook his head. Without another word, he opened the bloody first aid kit and pulled out gauze and bandages. I winced at the pressure and the roughness of his fingers as he wrapped long strips around my side to hold the gauze in place. A bit of blood colored his fingers, which I felt bad about, but I couldn’t bring myself to say anything. By the time he was done, I had to admit that it felt better.
“Thanks,” I said.
He tossed the mostly empty first aid kit into the floor of the truck. I made a mental note to replace the professor’s supplies the first chance I got.
“Climb in,” Virgo grumbled. “This is just temporary to get you to the Willards’. You need some real patching up if you plan to survive that.”
“I can’t.”
He paused with one hand on the open door and gave me a hard look. “What are you talking about?”
“I can’t leave,” I said. “I think what I’m looking for is here.”
His eyebrows drew together and he looked mad enough to take on a jakhin by himself. “I come here to find you half dead, the college torn apart, and what looks like a gruesome murder scene in the bathroom, and you’re telling me you can’t go home and get the real doctoring you need so you don’t drop dead?”
I shook my head. “If I leave, she’ll die.” My thoughts raced. “I mean, I think she is dying. I think that’s why nobody else can see her and why she’s gone most of the time, and don’t get me started on the Ankou. I just—”