Oliver moved close to her, grasped her elbow.
"Abby, I think you should sit down. You're white as a ghost." He tried to nudge her toward a chair, but she resisted.
It took all of her strength, but finally she broke her silence.
"I need a minute, Oliver. Alone. I'm going to take a walk," she pulled away from him and opened the library door.
"I'll go with you," he said.
"No." She stared at him, hard. "I said alone."
Pretending to walk toward the castle doors, Abby stole a glanced behind her as she moved through the golden hallway. Oliver had watched her for a moment before closing the door to the library. Abby changed direction and ran to the stairway at the end of the hall. Rushing down, she sought the dungeon room that contained dangerous items of magic. She had hidden the amulet there and knew Faustine would have placed the ring and the dagger there as well. In the room, she plunged her hands into boxes, disregarding all of her training. If she touched an item bewitched with dark magic, it could injure her, but she didn't care.
Already knowing the amulet sat in a black velvet box on a high-shelf, she saved that for last. Someone had placed the dagger in a glass box, suspended inside with tiny golden clamps. Prising the box open, she grabbed a black cloth from the work table and wrapped the dagger within it. Despite the cloth, meant to hinder the magic inside, she felt heat emanating from the dragon. The sensation of holding the dagger brought her back to the terrifying night when she first encountered the Vepar, Tobias. She had nearly died that night. What would have become of the curse if she had?
Shaking her head to clear the questions, she began her hunt for the ring. She stumbled upon it on the work table, somehow having missed it moments before. It sat on a piece of glass. Though the ring appeared as a pearl, the glass reflected flashing white and black rings as it revealed its magic.
Carefully, using another cloth, Abby wrapped the ring as well. She plucked the velvet box from the shelf and stopped by the door. The ax that Julian had retrieved from Sky Mothers stood there. The blade glinted, and Abby hesitated, remembering the story of the man-killing tree the ax had been discovered with. She took a deep breath and picked it up. It was surprisingly light. She slipped into the hallway, turning for the stairs.
"Abby?" a voice startled her, and she nearly dropped the items clutched in her hands.
Lydie stood at the hall's end, her shoulders swathed in gauze. In the light of the candelabras, Abby saw the glaze in her eyes. Lydie teetered on skinny legs, putting a hand against one wall.
"I'm not dreaming, am I?" Lydie asked.
Abby shook her head, bending down and setting the items on the dungeon floor.
"No, Lydie. It's me. I just came down to grab a few things. Let's get you back to the Healing Room."
Abby led Lydie into the Healing Room and settled her back on the bed. She covered her with a warm blanket.
Lydie blinked at her, reaching a trembling hand to Abby's cheek.
"I dreamed of Sebastian, Abby" she told her, a little smile crossing her face quickly followed by a frown. "But he was surrounded by snakes."
Lydie's eyes closed. Abby placed a lavender eye pillow on her face and returned to the hallway. She snatched the items and performed a vanishing spell before racing back up the stairs to hide them in her room.
****
"It was always you," Victor whispered, leaning so close that Sebastian could smell the rank of his breath. He had changed, grown larger, hulking even. His breath smelled of death and decay. He also looked haggard. The skin on his face and shoulders appeared burned, huge blisters shiny and sore covered his neck. His eyes had a yellowish tinge. One of his shoulders drooped, the result of Oliver's arrows.
He thought to ask the man, the once witch, what had turned him into such a monster, but Sebastian already knew. He had given in to that dark desire and it had swallowed him whole.
Sebastian twisted away, but a steel cable bit through his shirt and tore at his skin. Victor had bound him to a thick wooden rail. He grimaced and jerked his head further away from Victor's.
He had no memory of Victor capturing him, but realized with growing unease he had likely come willingly. His last memory included the rush of wind beneath his wings as he sliced through the night sky. Had Victor been calling out to him? Or was it not Victor at all, but Clyde who now spoke?
"Surrender Sebastian. You're so close. I can feel it. I feel your walls breaking down, collapsing. Let go."
Victor's words slithered into Sebastian's ears, coiled like a snake on the floor of his brain. The snake rose, sharp fangs dripping. His head grew thick, fuzzy and then as if the serpent truly lived within him, he felt it lash out and strike.
Sebastian howled and again jerked away, but a heavy steel cable cut into his chest. He hung, limp, sweating, exhausted. The pain traveled from his brain into every cell of his body. His fingertips hurt, his toes, the skin on the back of his neck. He couldn't find a single spot that didn't shriek with pain.
"Ask for it to be over," Victor continued. "Say the words and I'll set you free."
Sebastian said nothing. He clenched his teeth together to keep from crying out.
Victor stood back and watched him. His black, hungry eyes made Sebastian's skin crawl.
"I didn't take you, Sebastian," he continued, pulling back his lips to reveal sharp white teeth. His teeth seemed to be the only thing not rotting on his body. "You came to me, to Clyde, your father."
Sebastian spit at Victor's feet. "You're nothing," he roared.
Victor or Clyde moved closer, touched Sebastian's arm.
"Such a strong, healthy body," he groaned. "This is what happens when you call a witch to power," Clyde muttered touching a piece of his own singed skin. "Barely a week in this body and already it's destroyed." He shook his head as if disgusted.
Clyde occupied Victor's body, not Victor. But where was Victor during the possession? Did he cease to exist?
"You can't escape your destiny, Sebastian. No more than I could escape mine. We are bound you and I, by blood, by the dark dream that was born within us long before we came into the world. Our power lives in fulfilling that dream. You want it. I feel your desire pouring off your body, leaking from your thoughts. I can taste it." Victor's black tongue darted between his red lips.
Sebastian closed his eyes and tried to search for the root of his power. Somewhere within him that strength waited to be tapped, channeled. But how did he access it?
"You don't have to give it all up, Sebastian. Abby, Vidya, even the witches of Ula. You could protect them forever. It's the ultimate sacrifice. No one could ever hurt them. You could fear nothing. Abby could fear nothing. You could change the world. You can change the world."
The words seeped in. They slithered and danced. What did he want more than an end to the fear? An end to the constant anxiety of what would come next, what new evil would arrive at their door? He needed to say no, started to say no and then...
"How?" he croaked, surprised to hear his own voice ask the question.
Victor smiled, revealing those sharp white teeth. His eyes gleamed with triumph and Sebastian wanted to shout that he hadn't spoken that word, that it wasn't him that wanted to know, but his lips stayed sealed tight against the words he needed to speak.
"It's so easy, Sebastian. It's already within you. Open yourself to me, to Clyde."
Sebastian didn't understand. But the moment he allowed the thought, a well of black opened. It stretched forever, beyond Sebastian, into a realm where light could not penetrate. There, deep in its center, a voice called out. It was not a voice with words, but a sound that reverberated through his being. It wanted Sebastian's resonance. They could be one, Sebastian and that sound, if only he surrendered.
"Surrender," the sound seemed to pulse. "Surrender."
And he did.
****
Oliver waited downstairs and Abby walked into her bedroom, closing the door behind her. He had accompanied her to grab a f
ew things from her house in Trager: clothes, bottles for Vidya and toiletries. Pausing at the bed, she picked up one of Sebastian's crumpled t-shirts and held it to her nose. The smell was so familiar, so perfectly Sebastian that it brought her to her knees. She sank onto the floor, stuffing the shirt into her face and soaking it with her tears. It was going on twenty-four hours since he'd rushed into the night. Abby had stayed at Ula after he left, but sleep had been impossible. She had been biding her time to step back through the mirror, not wanting to alert the other witches to her plans. Setting the t-shirt aside, she forced herself back up. She had to keep it together for Vidya.
On her bedside table, she saw the note, folded and propped against a water glass. When she opened it, Sebastian's familiar scrawl greeted her.
"Meet me at the sand dune. Please forgive me for running away. It's all going to be okay. I know what to do. Bring Vidya. Tonight 8pm."
She read it a second time. He referred to the sand dune they'd visited just weeks before during one of those perfectly normal days where they pretended that the world was not collapsing around them.
Bring Vidya the note said.
"Abby?" Oliver called from downstairs.
"I'm coming," she yelled back, quickly stuffing the note in her jeans pocket. She gathered her clothes and Vidya's bottles and met Oliver in the foyer by the mirror.
****
Abby held Vidya and sang "Somewhere over the rainbow," as she hiked through the forest that led to the sand dune. She had slipped away from Ula after dinner, offering the excuse that she and Vidya both needed to sleep. While the library was empty, she stole through the mirror into her home in Trager. She had left Clyde's artifacts safely in her and Sebastian's bedroom. Now she moved with fearful anticipation. Sebastian waited for her at the sand dune. She had already sensed him. What would she say if he wanted to run away? Take Vidya and flee from Trager, Clyde, and the curse? Could she leave Ula behind? If it meant protecting Vidya, herself and Sebastian, she thought yes, she could.
When she moved up the sandy bluff, she saw him. He faced away from her, his shoulders broad beneath a black t-shirt. As the sand crunched beneath her, Vidya let out a little cry.
Sebastian spun around. He did not smile when he saw her and Abby paused, afraid.
****
"How are you feeling, Lydie?" Elda asked, massaging aloe over Lydie's wounds.
"Better," Lydie murmured, grimacing when she bent forward and saw her hand still bandaged. "But I'm worried about Sebastian."
Elda paused, but did not reveal Sebastian's disappearance. Had someone else told Lydie?
"Why is that?" she asked.
"I dreamed he was surrounded by snakes and skin-walkers," Lydie said, her eyes huge in the firelight. "I told Abby when I saw her last night."
"You saw Abby?" Elda asked. "Down here?"
Lydie nodded.
"In the hallway. She had a bunch of stuff in her hands, and an axe, but I must have imagined that. I was pretty out of it."
Elda pursed her lips and glanced at the door.
"I will send Bridget down to check your shoulders. Okay? I need to speak with Faustine."
Elda stood and left the Healing Room, but she did not immediately go upstairs. She stopped in the room where she knew Faustine had placed the items needed to end the curse. The moment she stepped into the space, she detected Abby's presence. The young witch had been in the room. Elda looked at the glass on the table and saw the ring no longer sat on its surface.
****
Sebastian looked different. The light had gone from his eyes, and Abby took a step back, ready to turn and race back into the forest.
He held out a trembling hand, gesturing for her and she watched a single tear slip over his cheek.
"Oh, Sebastian," she choked, moving towards him, her own tears breaking free.
"Please, can I hold Vidya?" he asked.
Abby paused, feeling the tiny being pressed against her, but then she saw the sorrow in Sebastian's face and she could not resist him. Tenderly, she pulled their sleeping daughter from the baby carrier and hander her over.
"What now?" she asked, but the words had barely left her lips and Sebastian was running.
He turned and fled, exploding from the sand dune. One moment he was the man that she loved and the next he was a skin-walker. Black wings blotted out the sun as he disappeared over the lake.
****
Abby fled down the steep dune, stumbling, falling. Her outstretched arms hit the sand, and she tumbled. She tasted sand in her mouth, felt it in her hair and began to cry. The sand stuck to the wetness on her face, and she rose to her hands and knees.
"Vidya!" she screamed, choking on the word. She buried her face back in the sand, crying, not caring that it stuck to her eyelashes, slipped into her nose.
"Please, please," she whispered, not to anyone, or perhaps to that infinite someone who everyone prayed to in moments of despair. "Please, help me." She stood again and ran, continuing down the dune. Reaching the water's edge, the power surged through her and in her grief, she screamed at the tranquil lake. A spire of water exploded and rained upon her. She fought it. She wanted it to be Victor, Alva, Clyde and one more image rose at the thought of them, but she shook her head, jerked it no. Sebastian was not evil. They had not taken him from her. Sebastian had not stolen their child to give to an evil monster. He loved Vidya. He loved Vidya with the same desperate intensity that she did. He would never hurt her.
She ran down the beach, her feet sinking in the soggy ground. It was too slow. She'd never get home. She had to. She had to get to the house where Oliver and Helena and Julian would be. They would help her. But what would she tell them? How could she tell them that Sebastian had taken Vidya?
She slowed and stopped, fell to her knees and sobbed into her hands. Oh, how it hurt. Had anything ever hurt so much? As if her own heart had been ripped from her chest. She thought she could die right then. What if she never held her child again?
She thought of the diary that Dafne had left behind, of the story she told. The anguish as she walked the beach alone, all of her friends dead, her lover having betrayed her. The part of Dafne that died when she left her child with the midwife, walked out on the only hope she might have had at happiness during her lifetime.
Abby felt herself dying inside, shrinking and slipping away.
She couldn't stand up, she couldn't continue without Vidya and Sebastian.
"Abby?" the voice echoed to her across the water. She jerked her head up, searching and heard it again, further away. An echo from a world not a part of her own. It had been Sydney's voice. Sydney calling out to her. Sydney giving her strength.
She stood and ran for home.
Chapter 28
Oliver met Abby at the edge of the woods. Sweaty, streaked in sand and exhausted, she collapsed into his arms.
"Abby? Where's Vidya?" he whispered into the top of her head. Her curls were wet and matted. Tears streamed down her face and it took several minutes before she could speak.
"Sebastian," she choked. "He... he took her."
"He took Vidya?" he asked. He picked her up and ran for the house. Julian flung the door open before he reached it and Oliver stopped.
"Is she hurt?" Julian asked, meeting Oliver.
Abby looked wild-eyed. She jumped from Oliver's arms and charged into the house.
"Sebastian took Vidya," Oliver told him, following Abby, but she raced up the stairs and slammed her bedroom door in his face.
Abby spun in a circle, momentarily lost in her grief and fear. Vidya's purple baby blanket lay crumpled on her bed. A pair of Sebastian's worn tennis shoes sat by the bathroom door. Everything about the room looked ordinary. The occupants had just stepped out, maybe for dinner, they would return and all would be right in the world, but even as Abby allowed the crazy thought to pass her by, the truth reverberated through her like a shock wave. Sebastian had taken Vidya from her arms. He had turned into a skin-walker and carried her daughter
into the sky.
Running into her closet, she crashed shoe boxes to the floor. She had tucked the concealment bag from Ula in her closet. It contained the amulet, the dagger, the ring and even the axe, but fit into a neat little shoebox. She yanked open the box she'd used and slipped it into a backpack before running to the window.
****
"What's she doing?" Julian asked, but before they could knock, they heard the window open and the sound of feet dashing across the roof.
"Shit!" Oliver yelled, running back down the stairs and hoping to intercept Abby before she leapt from the roof. She was already down and in the driver's seat of her car. Oliver reached for the door handle. She started it and squealed down the driveway.
He chased her down the driveway onto the road, losing her as she sped away.
Julian pulled next to him in the VW bus.
"Get in," he yelled.
Oliver jumped for the passenger handled and yanked as Julian slowed, but didn't stop. He plunged into the seat and pulled the door closed behind him.
"Go, go," he screamed, waving Julian forward.
****
Abby gasped, rolling over on the beach at Snake Island, struggling onto her hands and knees as another wave crashed over her. She pitched to the side and swallowed a mouthful of water. Sputtering, she stood and stumbled forward as another wave hit from behind. Her eyes blurred and her throat felt raw. The backpack had slipped off, but she pulled it back onto her shoulder.
As she left the turbulent shore, the light of the moon revealed thousands of snakes, gold and black and green, they slithered over one another, some of them sensing her and rearing up to bare their fangs. She had expected them and yet they appeared more lethal than her previous visit to the island.
Born of Shadows- Complete Series Page 135