Riven: Young Adult Fantasy Novel (My Myth Trilogy Book 1)

by Jane Alvey Harris

  Tell him about the butterfly, Emma.

  “The last time it was a butterfly. Silver. She was beautiful, fluttering up in the corner of Mom’s shower. Have you ever seen a butterfly dance? I hit my head on the tile wall and almost slipped but then Mom kicked at the bathroom door so hard it broke her toe but she didn’t stop kicking and beating even though she had bruises on her shoulder until the hinges came off and the steam pushed the butterfly out into the hall and there was yelling and screaming. By the time I got there she was already on the ground in her green terrycloth robe with her back against the wall crying and my little brother Aidan in just his diaper was covering up her swollen tummy with his arms and Jacob stood in front of her like a knight in his snap-up overalls until He left. I lay down against her with unborn Claire kicking against my naked-wet back and fell asleep to the rhythm of Mom’s sobs. I promised myself that when the faeries came again I would be ready, that I wouldn’t be afraid. But that was the last time. They didn’t come back until...”

  See, Emma? They didn’t come back until NOW.

  My traitorous throat closes at last, leaving me on this couch out in the open, completely exposed. I press in towards my knees and close my eyes, praying something will make them stop, the images and feelings and knowings.

  Gabe’s hand is on my back. “Emily, you’re hyperventilating. You need to breathe. Slowly, in through your nose, out through your mouth.”

  I’m trying, I really am. I’m sucking air in through my nose. I can feel it going in. My chest expands but it’s stuck, I can’t exhale. My lungs are over-inflating. This isn’t like the panic attack in the parking lot. I know this. This is asthma. I’m choking on my own breath.

  “Emily, listen to me.” Gabe gently touches my wrist, setting off an explosion that hurls me back off the couch and sends Gabe flailing over the coffee table.

  “DON’T TOUCH ME!”

  I huddle against the wall, crazed, tortured. I can’t hear what Gabe’s saying, the rasping from my strained lungs grates in my ears. “In…haler…” I wheeze, pointing to the kitchen.

  He’s on his feet, throwing open cupboards, knocking things aside. He’s found the medicine cabinet and is back with my old blue inhaler, already shaking it, already placing it between my lips, already depressing the plunger, already opening my airways, already slowing my breath.

  With my breath come tears, leaking down my face. Poor Gabe. He doesn’t know what to do or where to put his hands. He’s bleeding from a gash above his ear. But he doesn’t leave. Thank God he doesn’t leave.

  I haven’t used my inhaler in a year. It must have expired eons ago. I can’t ignore these things that are happening to me anymore. Something is wrong with me.

  “Emily, do you need more?”

  “Gabe. I’m so sorry. You’re bleeding. There’s a new first aid kit in the…”

  “In the medicine cabinet. I saw it.”

  He comes back with the clear plastic bin in one hand and a pill bottle in the other. Kneeling next to me he holds out the bottle.

  “I can’t believe I upset you like this again, Emily. Please, take one of these. It will help you calm down. I had no idea, Emily, I swear. I wasn’t trying to pry. Just take it, please. I promise I’ll go away and I won’t come back if that’s what you want. This will just help you calm down so you can rest.”

  “Calm down?” I grab his wrist. “You don’t understand. Remember when I said my Dad’s been away for a while? Well he has. For ten years. He’s in prison, Gabe, and he’s coming home next week. My mom’s Aunt and Uncle own this house. They send us money every month. Mom lost her job two months ago. She’s probably passed out on Oxycotin right now. How can I calm down?”

  He’s staring at me like I’m from a different planet and for the hundredth time I wonder why I can’t keep my stupid mouth shut.

  He opens the bottle and shakes out a pill. It’s small and round and yellow with a heart cut out the middle.

  Not a heart, you stupid girl. A ‘V’. For Valium.

  “I’ve never taken Valium.”

  Take it. You’ll feel better in the morning. Forget this nonsense.

  My whole body responds to that thought. That’s all I want: to forget. To pull sleep up to my chin like Claire’s soft blanket and wrap myself in forgetfulness. I take the pill from his hand and swallow it dry. “Thank you.” The anticipation of relief is potent. I reach for the wound on his head, brave with knowledge of escape. The cut is shallow, just a nick.

  He’s still like a statue, afraid to make a wrong move, I guess, which makes me smile. I twine my pale fingers through his tan ones and look at him, shy but steady. “I’m pretty sure that’s as weird as I can possibly get.”

  “Bring it on.”

  There’s something so gentle in his voice, so not judgmental. I tug him closer. He fills the space next to me against the wall like he belongs, shrinking the distance between us. I lean into him, resting my head on his shoulder. He’s stronger and safer than any blanket I can imagine. I feel safe.

  “I’m just going to stay until you get tired. Is that all right? Then you can lock the door and go to bed. But you have to call me in the morning, promise?”

  I nod against him. “Promise.”

  “You’re so brave.” His voice is a whisper. “I know everything will be okay, Emily. I know we met for a reason. We’ll get you help, for your mom, for you brothers and sister. I’m not going to let anything bad happen to you, understand?”

  “I tried so hard to take care of everything. I’m just not strong enough.” My voice is weak and I am small sitting here in the sleeping house pressed against Gabe.

  “Are you serious? Is that what you think? That you aren’t strong? Emily. This isn’t your job. You’re a kid. You’re supposed to be hanging with friends and trolling Starbucks. Your parents are supposed to protect you, to take care of you, not neglect and abu…” My hands ball into fists again and he takes them, smoothing them out between his. “Yikes. I’m an idiot. Wow. Forget about that.”

  A loud thud jerks my head up to stare at the ceiling.

  It came from Mom’s room.

  Ten

  I stumble up the stairs. My knees are clumsy but they’re MY knees and I’m determined. Gabe is right behind me. I’m glad, because I miss a step, and without his hands supporting me I’d be sprawled on the landing with my head split open.

  I focus my energy out in front of me like a searchlight. The night splits open, soft wood under an axe. I shove Mom’s door open and flip on the lights.

  Strange auras surround the ceiling fan, spilling dark colors over the empty bed. Where is she? Heavy weights hold my feet to the floor as I search the room, willing her into my vision.

  She doesn’t appear.

  Gabe crouches in the bathroom by the toilet. Is he sick?

  No. No no no no. NO.

  Mom is crumpled on the bathroom floor, smaller and thinner than the memory of her in my head. There are no sobs this time, no green terrycloth robe.

  “Mom?”

  “Emily. Call an ambulance.” Gabe’s voice is distant.

  This isn’t happening.

  It is happening and it’s YOUR fault for upsetting her.

  “Emily!” Gabe says, urgent.

  I wade through toxic shadows to the bathroom. There’s blood. Blood everywhere.

  “Emily, I think she’s overdosed.” Gabe’s finger searches for a pulse at her throat, he holds an empty pill bottle in his other hand.

  “Where is all the blood coming from? We have to stop the bleeding!”

  “Emily, she’s not bleeding. There is no blood. I need you to call an ambulance.”

  “Please, Gabe! Help me turn her over, we have to find where the blood is coming from!” I strain at her shoulder trying to tug her onto her side but it’s like she’s filled with uncured concrete. “Please, Gabe!”


  He’s ignoring me, on his cell phone. “508 Paris Street. I don’t know how many there were. No. It says ‘Roxicodone’. I don’t know, maybe a hundred and twenty-five, a hundred and thirty pounds.” To me he asks, “How old is your mom?”

  “Thirty-five.” Why won’t she turn over? Where is the blood coming from? Did she hit the back of her head? I scrape the hair off her neck, delving for a wound.

  Nothing.

  There’s too much blood. I take a deep breath and heave hard. Her lifeless body finally rolls forward onto her stomach. Her loose pajama top sticks wetly to her back, drenched in dark blood, but it isn’t torn. I push her top up as far as I can. I still can’t see where the blood is coming from. I pull off my cardigan, using it to soak up the blood, trying to find the wound.

  My sweater hits a snag.

  Something’s stuck in her upper back by her shoulder blade on the right side of her spine.

  Bewildered, I touch it with the tip of my finger and pull back instantly, lanced by needle-sharp pain. Is that glass?

  I press down on her back with the sweater, careful not to touch the glass, hoping to staunch the flow of blood. I try to focus, but the Valium delays my response time. Gabe has disappeared.

  The bleeding slows under the cardigan, but more blood oozes from somewhere else. It pools in the valley between her shoulder blades.

  Continuing pressure with one hand, my other hand fumbles for a towel on the rack. It too is quickly saturated with blood.

  Another protrusion exactly opposite the first juts out on the left side of her spine. Pressure. More pressure. “Gabe! Please, I need help!” Where has he gone?

  I wait as long as I can stand it before lifting away the sweater and towel to look.

  Two identical razor-sharp blades extend a fraction of an inch above Mom’s ruined back. They’re both several centimeters long, running parallel to the inside angles of her shoulder blades.

  A loud scraping at the window above the bathtub steals my breath.

  What was that?

  Something’s trying to get in the house.

  Wrong.

  Something is in.

  Metallic liquid oozes from the corners of the window, spilling down the wall, flowing weirdly across the floor.

  No. It isn’t liquid. It’s limbs…

  Not limbs.

  Antennae.

  Hundreds of black and green cicadas skitter into the tub. Their thousand segmented legs scrabble sickeningly up over the porcelain and down the other side. The ground undulates as light glints off their too-slick bodies squirming over one another. They head straight for us.

  Cocooned in a straight jacket of Valium I watch, terrified, as cicadas climb up Mom’s bare arms and legs, tangling in her hair before finally converging on her back. They crowd around the two blades poking up from her torn skin and begin eating her flesh.

  “Get AWAY!” I shriek.

  They chirr in reply. Louder and louder their shrill song grows until it’s vibrating in my chest.

  The room brightens. Mom’s entire body lights up from within. Runes like the ones on my arm crisscross her exposed skin, appearing, disappearing, re-appearing.

  My mind somersaults. Movement in the corner of the ceiling pulls my attention away from the grotesque scene on the floor. Something small flutters up in the shadows. A gray moth descends from the dark.

  It’s not a moth and it isn’t gray.

  It’s the silver butterfly.

  The cicadas’ mandibles shred Mom’s back as the silver butterfly drops like a stone to the countertop.

  My eyes won’t stop blinking…

  It’s a faerie.

  No! It ISN’T you ridiculous girl. It’s the DRUGS. You’re HALLUCINATING. Faeries aren’t real. THIS isn’t real. WHERE IS GABE?

  But it is. The butterfly has transformed into a brilliant white faerie. I’ve never seen a real live insect-sized faerie in human form like this in my entire life. My mouth won’t stay shut. She is very very small, no taller than the length of my hand. Her wings shine with the same iridescent light radiating from Mom.

  The White Faerie stares at me. “They must work faster.”

  She’s talking about the cicadas. What does she mean, work faster? Their exoskeletons are slick with Mom’s blood. They’re gorging themselves on her.

  “GABE!” I scream. No answer. I ignore the White Faerie with all my might.

  I can see the blades poking out of Mom’s back more clearly now. They’re longer than they were, extending several inches above her skin. They’re growing.

  The ground heaves.

  Those aren’t blades.

  They’re wings.

  The cicadas aren’t devouring her. They’re chewing through layers of skin and muscle to free her wings.

  But the White Faerie is right. Mom is fading. Her skin is gray, her body bent. The runes that crisscrossed her arms and legs have dimmed, barely visible anymore.

  “Help her. She needs you.” The White Faerie flits to my knee, looking up at me.

  I can’t ignore her anymore. “Please. Tell me what to do!”

  “They’re coming for her wings to give to their Master.”

  “Who? Who is coming? What Master? Tell me, please!”

  “Their Master needs the Blaze in her wings to open the Doorway to the First Realm so he can return home.”

  Feet pound up the stairs.

  “Emily, quickly!” the faerie says. “They’re here, hide!”

  The bedroom door bangs against the wall, but it’s only Gabe.

  “They’re coming, Emily,” he pants. “They’ll be here any minute.”

  “I know! I don’t know what to do! They want her wings, Gabe, for their Master!”

  Gabe’s shoulders droop. He shakes his head. His voice is quiet when he speaks. “I’m sorry, Emily. This is my fault. I shouldn’t have given you Valium. You’re hallucinating. You can’t be in here when the paramedics arrive. I need you out of the way.”

  He tries to pull me to my feet.

  “No. What are you doing? I’m not leaving! Let me go!” I struggle against his grip. “Gabe. You’re not listening to me. Look at the cicadas, look at the wings! I’m not just going to let them take her wings!”

  “You’re high, Emily…”

  “I. KNOW. I know I’m high! But this is REAL.”

  How do you make someone believe you when the things you’re saying are insane? Hopelessness trickles into my gut because I know: no matter what I say, no matter who I tell, I know this more than I’ve ever known anything: No One Will Believe Me.

  I believe you.

  The voice is quiet. It sparkles. At first I think it’s in my head but it’s her—the White Faerie. She’s vanished except for her voice in my ear.

  Gabe stops pulling. I fall back to the floor.

  He’s beside me in an instant, kneeling. “Emily.” He’s talking like I’m five. “The ambulance is coming and you are in the way. They’ll need to concentrate on your mom. Aidan is awake. Probably Jacob and Claire, too. They’ll be worried, Emily. They need you.”

  He’s right. I’m not even torn anymore because there’s no contest. If push comes to shove—choosing between protecting them or Mom?—I’ll choose them every time. They don’t have anyone else.

  Eleven

  The hallway is dark. There are no sirens, but lights from an approaching ambulance turn the entry hall below into a silent fiesta. Aidan stands stock still against the wall, waiting for me to tell him how to feel, what to do.

  Don’t freak him out by saying anything crazy. Keep your hallucinations to yourself.

  For once the stern woman says something useful.

  “Emily. What’s going on.” Aidan’s voice is flat.

  The front door crashes open. I take my brother’s hand and lead
him further down the hall to Claire’s room. “It’s Mom. She passed out.” I skip the part about her wings. “Gabe called an ambulance.”

  Claire peeks out from behind her door. Tears wet her cheeks. Jacob sits on her bed looking lost. I shut the door behind us and try to stop the world from spinning around me.

  “What happened to Mom? Is she dead?” asks Claire.

  For once the boys don’t shush her. They just look at me, solemn.

  “No.”

  “Is she dying?”

  I don’t have an answer. Part of me wants to scream ‘No!’ but is that right? Is false hope kind? The truth is, I don’t know. Maybe she is dying.

  What would it mean, if she did?

  Something about her sprouting wings and the arrival of the White Faerie make me think it would be really stupid and selfish of her to die now. Then again, stupid and selfish sometimes win.

  “Of course she isn’t going to die, Claire. The paramedics are here. It’s going to be alright.”

  Jacob’s optimism grates. I want to tear my hair and stomp my feet and throw things. Is he really so naïve? Things haven’t been ‘alright’ for a very long time. How will they ever be ‘alright’ again?

  “Right Emily?”

  He wants me to comfort Claire, to protect her from uncertainty and fear. But whip-thin threads of stubbornness stitch my lips together because in this moment I question what protection means. Is it reassuring my little sister that her absentee mom, who just tried to kill herself, didn’t quite manage the job and is for now still somewhat alive? My tongue cleaves to the bottom of my mouth, refusing to say ‘right’.

  “It’s okay, Claire.” Jacob never once takes his eyes off me. “Dad will be home next week and Mom will get better.”

  Despair lodges at the base of my throat—a stuck pill that won’t go down—radiating pain with every breath.