“Do you have to be an asshole about this?” I ask him. He smirks. Yes, apparently, he does.
“Your sister was here,” he tells Mercy.
“Sister?” She shakes her head. “I don’t have a …” She gasps, her hand clamping down over her mouth. Lowering her hand she says, “She was here? With you?” Mercy’s eyes are wide and frantic. “What happened?”
“I’ll let Gage fill you in on the juicy details.” Nathaniel’s delight in my agony is annoying.
“I can’t …” Mercy inhales and exhales in rapid bursts. “I can’t breathe.” Her knees buckle, and before I can unglue my feet from the floor, Nathaniel is there, guiding her to the couch.
The scene quickly changes, and it’s no longer about a brotherly squabble—it’s about keeping Mercy from jumping.
“Relax,” Nathaniel tells her. “I’ve got you.”
“I’ll get the kit,” I say, springing into action. The hall closet is just a few feet away, and it doesn’t take me long to locate the black box containing the binding agent we need.
I am only gone for thirty seconds, tops, but in that time, Mercy has gotten much worse. Nathaniel cradles her head and eases her into the cushions as her whole body begins to convulse. “Please don’t do this,” he says to her, his voice pained.
Pulling off the cap of the syringe, I flick the tube to make sure the liquid is ready. Nathaniel holds Mercy by the wrists while I dip the needle into her arm. Within seconds her body quiets, the tremors slow. She’s no longer shaking. Her breathing steadies. Nathaniel props a pillow beneath her head.
“Did it work?” I ask him.
“I don’t know,” he answers tersely. “Mercy, can you hear me?” Her head lolls to the side.
I pace, wearing steady tracks into the carpet.
“Sit down,” Nathaniel instructs. I obey.
Panic. That’s the emotion I feel at precisely this moment. My skin crawls while my left leg jiggles. The relentlessly slow tick of the clock on the far wall drums in the silence. Five minutes. Ten minutes. Still no sign of her.
“What do we do, Nathaniel? How long do we wait?”
Calmly, Nathaniel strokes Mercy’s cheek with his thumb. Then he says to me, “You’re coming unglued.”
He’s right. “I’m never going to survive being human. How do you do this?”
Nathaniel stands and walks to the wet bar. When he returns, he’s carrying a bottle of whiskey and two tumblers. “You adapt,” he says. He pours himself a drink, and then he pours me one.
“You’re suggesting I become a drunk?”
“I’m suggesting you calm down. This helps.” He clinks his glass to mine, and with one quick tip to his lips, the brownish liquid is gone.
Grumbling, “Fine,” I mimic his movements. Chugging the liquid sets the back of my throat on fire. I cough as the whiskey warms my insides. After a minute or two, my muscles unclench. But then I look over at Mercy, still unconscious, still unmoving, and my heart leaps back into my throat.
Mercy inhales suddenly, coughs, and tries to sit up.
“Easy,” Nathaniel tells her.
She shakes her head and clears her throat. “I’m okay,” she says. “It worked then?”
“The binding agent?” I shift toward her. “Yes. It kept you from jumping.”
“I still can’t believe that type of thing exists,” Mercy says.
“Rae’s project,” I tell her. “We have a limited supply. For now. I’m working on making more.”
“My brother. The chemist.” Nathaniel’s mockery is both irritating and demeaning.
Mercy inhales and exhales deeply. “I’m sorry.”
“Not your fault, love.” Nathaniel runs his hand up and down her arm.
“Are you saying it’s my fault?” I’m on my feet and ready to battle.
Nathaniel stands. “Your words. Not mine.”
“She surprised me. I didn’t know,” I say, defending myself.
Mercy jumps up from the couch. Slightly unsteady, she wobbles before she is firmly rooted. “Guys! It doesn’t matter. I’m fine. Everything is fine.” Woozy, she teeters and then sits back down.
“What are we going to do about her?” I ask.
Nathaniel backs down from his attack stance. “Well, we can’t have her running all over town impersonating Mercy.”
“Yeah. That would be bad,” Mercy echoes. “What if she shows up at my house? Or worse, school?”
“We’ll take care of her,” Nathaniel says reassuringly. “Don’t worry.”
The room is quiet for a few ticks of the clock.
Mercy sinks into the couch and tugs at the bottom of her shirt. “Do you think this was Isadora’s first move?”
Nathaniel and I both nod.
Suddenly, Mercy wraps her arms around her stomach. “Something’s wrong.” She expels a cry of pain. Her face contorts as she squeezes her eyes shut. Her jaw is clenched and strained.
“What is it?” I ask.
She moans. Dread sweeps her face distorting her beautiful features. “It hurts.” Her eyes plead with me. “Gage, it hurts.”
I kneel before her. “What can I do?”
“What’s happening to her?” Nathaniel yells at me.
“I don’t know!”
Mercy keels over and moans. “Make it stop!”
Adrenaline pumps through me as my heart hammers against my chest. “What do we do?”
Nathaniel knocks me over as he lunges toward Mercy. He’s holding her by the back of her neck as her body shakes.
“Son of a bitch!” I curse.
Chapter Three
Mercy
The back of a hand connects with my cheek, and I reel backwards, my eyes popping open, my face smarting. I should’ve fallen, but my hands are clamped by handcuffs, which are bolted to a table. My legs are bound at the ankles. The thick chains chafe my skin. Gage and Nathaniel are gone. I am no longer in their house. Where am I? I don’t know. What’s worse, I don’t know who I am either.
“I’m only going to ask you this one more time.” A woman with close-cropped hair, no make-up, and a square jaw wags a finger in my face. “Where is the money?”
I steal a glance at my surroundings. I’m in a small, dark room with a large mirror. The woman glaring at me wears an ill-fitting pants suit and sensible, clunky shoes. On the waist of her pants hangs a shield. She’s an officer or a detective or something. The pieces click together, and I realize where I am.
Holy shit. I’m in jail!
“Quit messing around!” Afraid she’ll hit me again, I flinch. She exhales, and her short blast of tobacco breath hits me in the face. “Where did Louis hide the money?”
“I want my lawyer!” I blurt out, praying that all those hours of watching Law & Order reruns on the USA Network are about to pay off.
The detective reclines in her chair, nonchalant, like it doesn’t matter what I’ve said.
“I want my lawyer,” I repeat. “I’m not saying another word.” I suck in my lips for added effect, which I realize too late, probably makes me look like toddler throwing a tantrum.
She wraps her knuckles on the two-way mirror behind her.
The door opens. Two hulking guards, thumbs tucked into their utility belts, approach me. One kneels and unshackles my ankles from the table while the other unhooks my wrists. I feel only momentary relief. They yank me from my seat and shove me out of the room.
Though they propel me forward, but I can’t make much progress with my ankles still cinched together. Doing all I can to not fall flat on my face, I press on down a long corridor lined with cells. This is so much worse than being in the interrogation room.
Jail on TV is nothing like jail in real life. The smell of bodies all jammed together, of toilets that haven’t been scrubbed—I have to force myself not to vomit when the odors assault my nose. The other prisoners, all female, in bleak, gray hospital-style scrubs eyeball me. A girl with a tattoo of a spider web on her left cheekbone winks at me, and a cold shiver ripp
les through my spine.
One of the guards digs his nails into my shoulder as he stops me in front of a cell. He slams me into the bars and holds me there while the other guard removes the ankle restraints. When he finishes, he barks at someone, whom I assume is my cellmate, to step back. The guard holding me jams my face and chest against the cold steel door and unclasps my handcuffs. Something sharp pierces my neck.
“What the hell was that?” I yell.
The guard holding me hustles me inside and locks the door. Without so much as a word, I’m left alone in jail with a girl that looks like a cracked-out version of Natalie Portman after she shaved her head for that movie. She eyes me as I slide over to the bunk beds. Since she’s perched on the bottom, I guess the top is mine.
Climbing up, I crawl onto the barely-there mattress and fall against the pillow. I will not cry. I will not cry. I will not cry, I chant to myself until my resolve thickens. Below, Natalie Portman’s lesser self chews her nails and spits them on the floor.
I have to get out of here.
Concentrating, I try to separate myself from this body. I imagine myself floating above, releasing into the air like steam, but when I open my eyes, I am still solidly attached to this body. What the hell?
Gage and Nathaniel have to be searching for me. But without the warehouse, without all that fancy technology, and without his Hunter’s mark, Gage is without the skills and resources he needs. My hope falls to Nathaniel. He found me before, maybe he’ll find me again.
I roll over onto my left side and find myself eye to eye with Faux Natalie. “Jesus Christ!” I sit up, scrambling to flatten myself against the wall.
Slowly, eerily, she tilts her head to the left. “There’s something different about you.” She rests her chin on the edge of my mattress. “You have a secret.” She drums her fingers against the metal bed frame. “Someone’s got a secret,” she sings in a childish voice that reminds me of a scary movie.
Trying to sound brave, I threaten, “Back off. I mean it.”
She responds by batting her eyelashes. “Or what?” The tingting of her nails against metal frame makes me shudder. “You’re no fun,” she whines. “I’m only playing.”
My legs are shaking. They won’t hold me in this defensive, squat position for much longer. “Just leave me alone.”
“Come on. Play with me.”
Every hair on the back of my neck stands on end.
Her eyes flash wildly. She spins around, dancing to a melody only she can hear. Swaying and laughing, she snatches the pillow from her bunk, and in a seductive and beyond creepy way, she reaches into the pillowcase and removes a long strand of plastic material. She twirls the strand like a lasso over her head and sings a song I don’t recognize.
“No need to get excited,
The thief, he kindly spoke,
‘There are many here among us,
Who feel that life is but a joke.
But you and I, we’ve been through that,
And this is not our fate.
So let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late.’”
She wraps the strand around her wrists until it’s taut like a cord.
“Oh shit,” I say as I realize what she’s about to do. “Put that down!”
Smiling wickedly, she loops the noose around her neck and squeezes. I jump off the bed, lunging for her, but she’s quick, and I miss. I crash to the ground and my wrist hits the concrete with a sickening crack.
“Stop!” I scream as she pulls the noose tighter and tighter. Her eyes bulge out of her head, and her face turns purple. “Stop!” Scrambling to the door, holding my injured wrist against my stomach, I yell down the hall, “Help! Someone help!”
She’s on her knees now; the job is almost finished. I resume my cries for help. Finally, I hear someone coming toward us. The guards throw open the door. One of them pulls my obviously broken wrist, and I yelp as he secures my hands behind me. The other guard attends to my cellmate. She’s limp and clearly not breathing. The guard holding me makes a plea using his walkie-talkie, and it isn’t long before more people come running. A blur of uniforms pass me. Eventually, I am ushered from the scene.
My feet drag as I beg, “Please, my wrist is broken.”
“Shut up!” the guard barks as he urges me forward. He opens a solid door at the end of the hall, unclamps my wrists, and tosses me into a very small, very dark, and very damp room. The slamming door cuts off my cries for help.
There’s no bed, not even a cot, in this room. No windows, no light, nothing. Cradling my wrist against my body, I sink to the floor and pull my knees to my chest. My breath comes in short, rapid bursts, and I know what’s about to happen. I am going to jump. Thank God! I close my eyes and give myself over to the urge. But nothing happens. When I open my eyes, I am still in the cell, still in this damaged body.
Shit!
I try again, thinking back to when I’d ended up in a dead body, and Nathaniel found me. He told me to concentrate on him, to reach for his hand. He isn’t here in the cell with me, but I try to reach for him anyway. I imagine him coaxing me out of the body. But again: nothing.
Frustration builds, and I stomp, which makes my whole body jerk. I am in agony. My wrist needs to be treated. They can’t just leave me in here. Can they?
It’s unbearable, the sensation of needing to flee and being unable to. My skin crawls. Perspiration trickles and pools in my armpits and down my back. I shiver even though my palms are clammy, and my face is drenched in sweat. I lean back, close my eyes, and surrender to exhaustion.
When I wake, I’m curled in a ball on the dirty floor. My wrist is grossly swollen and purple, and though the pain is duller, it’s still horribly uncomfortable. My mouth feels as though I’ve been sucking cotton.
I need to vomit. Scooting over to the toilet that, given the smell, hasn’t been washed in decades, I dry heave until bile burns its way to the surface and spews forth. With my good hand, I wipe my mouth, and then I quickly retreat from the stank odor.
Completely disoriented, I have no idea how much time has passed. For all I know I could’ve been asleep for hours, or worse, it might have only been minutes.
The door opens, and someone barks, “On your feet!” It’s slightly difficult to get off the floor using only one hand, but I manage. “Turn around. Hands behind your back,” the guard instructs as he charges into the room. I try, but my broken wrist won’t cooperate. “I said, hands behind your back!”
“I can’t.” I whimper and hold up my wrist. “It’s broken.”
He shoves me against the wall and yanks my arms behind me. White-hot pain flashes through me.
Down the long hall I walk with the guard hot on my heels. Tears splash my cheeks. Snot dribbles from my nose. I don’t care. The guard leads me back to the interrogation room. He secures me to the table, but mercifully, he leaves my broken side unrestrained.
The guard moves to the corner of the room and stands watch. A door on the opposite end of the room opens. Isadora casually enters.
She addresses the guard. “I’ll need a moment alone with my client.” He exits, and we’re alone. Gingerly she cups my wrist. “That looks like it hurts,” she says, feigning sympathy.
“What are you doing here?”
She balks. “Would you rather I leave?”
Sadly, no.
Isadora sets a black briefcase down on the table, and then she sits across from me.
“How did you know where I was?” I ask. “Did you do this to me?”
Isadora smiles. Her green eyes light up like lightning bugs against a night sky. “It’s my duty, my obligation, to know where you are at all times, Mercy. You are very precious to me.”
In truth, I probably am precious to her, but not in a good way. Although Isadora is my aunt, she doesn’t love me. She isn’t worried about me in the slightest. She only wants to use me, to use my power.
“Did you do this?” I ask again. “Did you set this up?”
She pr
etends to look hurt. “Why would I do that?”
“But how? Gage and Nathaniel …”
“Injected you with binding agent?” Isadora laughs. “Yes, well, there are ways around that.” Isadora lifts my sleeve and shows me a tiny scar I never noticed before.
“What is that?” I ask.
“A tracker,” Isadora answers. “It makes you accessible to those powerful enough to call you.”
“Take it out.”
“All in good time.”
What a bitch.
Isadora smiles pleasantly, but there is nothing pleasant about her. “I’ve come to discuss the terms of our agreement,” she says.
“Just tell me what you want so I can get out of here.”
“Of course, Mercy,” she coos. “I wouldn’t want you to suffer for one minute longer than necessary.”
I’m tempted to point out that my suffering shouldn’t be necessary at all, let alone have time limits.
Isadora stands. She comes around behind me and whispers in my ear, “Remember our deal, little girl. You do as I say and no harm comes to your family. Break that promise and you’ll suffer in ways you never thought possible.”
“I know. Tell me what you want.”
“I want you to kill The Assembled.”
What? “You are The Assembled.”
“Obviously, I’m not talking about me.”
She’s a lunatic. And it’s beyond eerie to me that she and I want the same thing. The only part of Isadora’s plan that differs from mine is she would like to exclude herself from the kill list. My intention was definitely to bring down The Assembled. But I can’t let her know about my power, about how I reached into my mother’s chest and started her heart. If she ever finds out, she’ll be even more certain I can do what she asks. So I lie. “I can’t. No one can. It’s not possible.”
Isadora pouts. She eyes my prison uniform and shrugs. “Well, then. I guess you’re lucky gray is your color.” She fiddles with the handle of her briefcase and slowly slides it off the table as if she’s going to leave.
“Wait! Tell me why. Why do you want to kill The Assembled?”
Into the Light Page 2