“That’s true.” She smiled, letting him take her hand in his own. They walked in silence for a few moments then until Jaycen spoke, “It’s good your case has been dealt with though. At least one of our messes has been dealt with.”
“Mmm” was the only acknowledgement that he’d heard her.
“What does that mean?” she pushed, frowning slightly.
“I saw your face back there, in the hearing, I know me getting off bothered you.” Thornton slowed his pace and kept his eyes staring straight ahead.
“No.” She shook her head, and then actually thought about what she was saying. She was mad, just not at him. “Actually yeah, I was mad. But not at you. I was angry that that was even possible. That with just a word from your family the charges against you were dropped. I mean, they were bogus charges anyway, but still.”
Thornton opened his mouth to talk but stopped and frowned as Benedict marched towards them.
“Thornton, take Jaycen to her room now, I don’t want anyone entering or leaving. Do you understand?”
Thornton nodded immediately without question.
“Are you really going to talk about me like I’m not here?” Jaycen pulled her hand from Thornton and shoved them into her trouser pocket as she noticed the tension in Benedict’s shoulders. “What’s happened?”
“Please, just do as I’m asking you and go to your room. Lock the door and don’t open it again until I come and get you. Okay?”
Just past Benedict, she could see people slowing down and gasping as they stared at something out of her sight.
“Not until you tell me what’s happened.”
Thornton placed a firm hand on her lower back. “We should head back to your room, Jaycen.”
“What? How are you not the slightest bit curious?” More people were gathering now, and it was killing Jaycen to not know what they were all looking at. But whatever it was, it wasn’t good.
“I don’t have time for this,” Benedict stressed out. “Please just get to your room where I know you’re safe.”
Jaycen weighed up options. Or more accurately weighed up the odds of her running past Benedict without him catching her before she saw what everyone was looking at. The odds were not in her favour.
“Fine. But I want to see you as soon as you can, and I want you to tell me everything,” she conceded.
Even with how stressed he was Benedict smiled. “You do realise that I don’t have to do as you say, right? That although it feels like it, you’re not my boss.”
“You do realise that I also don’t have to do what you say, right? I could stand here all day.” If she could or not was beside the point.
“Point taken. I’ll be up as soon as I can.” Benedict left then, dragging his hand over his hair and rolled his shoulders as he entered the now rather large group of people at the end of the corridor.
“Come on, I’ll wait with you.” Thornton waited until Benedict was out of sight before making a move to walk in the opposite direction.
Jaycen smiled. “Yeah, I’m not going to my room. What I’m going to do is find out what’s happened. Want to help?”
Thornton shook his head and stared at his shoes. “I knew that was too easy.”
“Glad we’re on the same page, partner, now is there another way to the end of that corridor?” Because Jaycen didn’t know her way around The Cure at the best of times, all she’d end up doing was get them lost.
Thornton really thought about his choices, or the lack of them, before saying, “Fine, but we look, and then we leave. Nothing else, got it?”
Jaycen held up her hands. “That’s it. I swear.”
Letting out a loud breath Thornton nodded. “Fine. But we have to be quick.”
He led the way in the opposite direction of the growing crowd, keeping his head down as people passed him. Jaycen did the same but had to jog to keep up with Thornton’s pace.
They’d been walking for a few minutes when Jaycen asked, “You do know where you’re going right? Because it feels like we’re walking in circles.” And she could have sworn she’d seen this corridor before, or maybe not, they really did all look the same.
“The corridors everyone was on leads to a small open area, I’m taking you to the other side of it. Hopefully, we’ll be able to get a look in without anyone seeing us.” He stopped at a fork in the corridor, giving it some thought before turning left.
Jaycen started to hear people, a lot of people talking, and, after turning another corner, they came face to face with a crowd.
“I can’t see anything.” Jaycen stretched on her tiptoes, just as Thornton took her by the hand and pushed her into the crowd.
“Oh sorry, excuse me, coming through.” Jaycen used her elbows as she edged her way forward.
“You’re on my foot.”
“Stop pushing me.”
Jaycen ignored them all until finally, she made it to the front of the crowd.
“Can you see anything?” Thornton asked over the heads of the gathering bunch. Jaycen shrugged as she walked away from the crowd of people.
“Not really,” she called out, noticing that everyone’s attention was on something just around a corner and out of her view.
“You need to stay back.” A woman dressed in black made a move to stop her but stopped when she saw Jaycen’s face. “Oh, Benedict’s over there.” She motioned to another group before turning back to keep the crowd at bay.
“Oh, well, good.” Jaycen nodded, not quite believing how easy that was. Nothing was ever that easy.
Moving quickly and keeping her head down she rounded the corner, and then stopped dead.
Holy hell.
Jaycen Reece is our saviour. Evolve or die.
The words were written in red paint that still dripped down the wall.
“Jaycen, what the hell are you doing here? Why do you never listen to me?” Benedict was at her side then, trying to pull her away.
“Who the hell would write that?” Jaycen let him pull her away, but still couldn’t take her eyes off the wall.
“You need to keep her back, Benedict,” a man ordered as another guy started on cleaning the writing off the wall.
Benedict pulled her in front of him. “Please for the love of all that is holy. Go. To. Your. Room.”
It was then that Jaycen noticed all the stairs, everyone was watching her. “Yeah, I’ll go now.” She nodded slowly and was already turning to walk back to Thornton when she heard someone shout out.
“She wrote it! Jaycen wrote it! Someone stop her.”
Both her and Benedict turned just as a man tackled her to the floor, his large body landing on top of hers.
“I won’t let you ruin us. I won’t let you.” The man inched up just a little, but it was enough for him to get a hit in, and he kept hitting again and again as spit flew from his mouth as he screamed at her.
“Get him off me.” She blocked her face with her hands and tried to concentrate on breathing as his weight pressed down on her body.
“You’re going to end us!” the man screamed, knocking anyone off that tried to pull him away. “For all that is good and right, she must die! She must die!”
“Help me pull him off. Now!” Benedict shouted, he sounded so close but Jaycen couldn’t see anything but the man’s face.
“You’ll ruin us. You’ll ruin us. You’ll ruin us. You’ll ruin us,” he chanted over and over, not listening to anyone or anything as multiple hands tried to pry him off her.
“Get off me!” she screamed again, this time her magic taking over and sending the man flying in the air. It was as if time stood still, and only she could move at a normal pace.
She watched the man’s body fly up in the air, and he would have landed directly on her, so she hit out again, sending him across the room and crashing into the wall opposite. The plaster cracked before he fell to the floor in a heap and cry of pain.
Slowly Jaycen stood, her lungs still burning. “I’ll ruin you?” The laugh that came out s
ounded crazed as she shrugged off a hand that reached out to steady her. “You’ve already ruined yourself.”
The man spat out blood and grinned a wide bloody smile before screaming out. “I have to stop you!” He got up and ran at her again, pushing those people away who tried to stop him. Jaycen didn’t care, this time she was ready.
She waited for him to get closer, Benedict tried to stand in her way but with a flick of her head, he was nudged in the other direction. When her attacker was within arm’s reach she held up her hand, completely stopping him. He froze with one hand reached out to her, ready to choke her.
“Jaycen, don’t.” Benedict stood to her left, not taking his eyes off her.
Her attackers’ eyes widened as it dawned on him just how much danger he was in.
Jaycen closed her fist as her magic slowly took away the man’s air. She needed him to feel how she had just felt, she needed him to panic about his next breath.
No one else knew what was going on, as they watched the small teen and the frozen man stare at each other.
“What, exactly, are you trying to stop me from doing?” She wondered out loud, the man’s face in front of her slowly turning a light blue and purple. And no matter how hard she tried she couldn’t bring herself to let him go. All she could think about was the hatred in his eyes and how it had been solely directed at her.
“Are you trying to stop me from going to school? From having friends? From having a boyfriend? From being happy?” She was screaming now as the man’s body started to twitch in front of her. “Why are you people so bent on ruining my life?”
“Jaycen stop, please.” Thornton pulled her away and into his strong arms. She wasn’t even sure if he was hugging her or restraining her. It didn’t matter anyway, because Jaycen held onto him with everything she had.
Chapter 9
“You could have killed that man today. You could have just got him off you, but you didn’t.” Benedict sat down on the bed next to her. They were in Jaycen’s room now, away from the judgment of the other members of The Cure. Thornton sat on a chair a little further away, giving her and Benedict some space.
“I’m sorry. I–” She stopped, feeling the lump in her throat grow.
“I know, I know.” Benedict reached over, taking her hand in his and squeezed tight. “I know.”
In the silence, they could hear chanting from outside. The news about what had happened earlier that day had traveled far and wide. And a mixed group of protesters had now gathered outside the main doors of The Cure. Some cheering for Jaycen, others screaming that they should arrest her until it was all just a mass of noise. A few members of The Cure that were running for present tried to go out, either to join in and show everyone just how likable they really were or to give a speech, which a few did. Even Thornton’s mother and father went out. Jaycen actually opened her window a tad to listen to that one.
“Jaycen Reece is like family to us,” he had assured the growing rowdy crowd. “And we will stand by her, no matter what. Jaycen’s rights are human rights!”
She wanted to stick her head out of the window and tell him to shut the hell up. Somehow, she’d reframed from doing that.
Benedict stood, effectively bringing Jaycen out of her thoughts. “I need to go and see a few people, just stay here and I’ll be back. Okay?”
She nodded. The noise from outside only getting louder.
“And I’m going to move your room. You shouldn’t have to listen to this crap.” He stormed off, stopping by Thornton’s chair and quietly talking amongst themselves. Giving one last look at Jaycen, Benedict left.
She waited for enough time before she spoke. “Do they know who wrote on the wall?”
Thornton slowly shook his head. “Not yet. But they found the paint it was written in. So that’s something. I guess now they have bigger things to think about.”
“Yeah, I know what they’re worried about now.” Her. She didn’t say it; she didn’t need to. She knew it, he knew it.
“Yeah.” Thornton nodded; his face twisted in fury as he shot up. “That man should be the one prosecuted, he attacked you. We all saw it.” His hand grabbed a piece of his hair, in what looked like pure frustration. His phone buzzed then, stopping his rant mid-flow.
Thornton pulled his phone from his pocket, before closing his eyes and taking a long deep break. “You have got to be kidding me,” he gritted out, his phone still ringing in his hand.
“Your family?” she guesses as he nodded. Then they were silent. And his phone carried on ringing. It stopped for a second but then started again almost immediately.
“For the love of God, take the call.”
“I’ll only be a minute,” he promised as he answered and turned away.
Normally Jaycen would have been listening in, because, well she was nosey as hell. But not today. Today her mind was on that writing. Who and why would anyone write that? Who would think that she was anyone’s future? Whoever it was, they clearly hadn’t been paying attention the past few months. And then it clicked, she cursed herself for not thinking it sooner.
Thornton turned to her then, looking apprehensive. “My dad wants to see me.”
Jaycen nodded. “Of course he does.”
His apprehensiveness quickly turned to disbelief, as it should. He knew her well. “And you’re okay with me leaving?”
Jaycen turned to him, frowning. “When have I not been okay with you going to see your family?” And as soon as she said the words she realised what she sounded like and laughed as she rubbed her face. “And now we sound like we’re an old married couple.”
Thornton chuckled too, his sounding so deep compared to hers, and even with everything going on, it still gave Jaycen butterflies in her stomach.
“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” he promised, smiling lightly.
She held her hand out. “And I’ll still be here.”
Thornton bent and pressed a hard kiss to her mouth before pulling and walking out the room.
She waited for a minute, and then another before she pushed herself off her chair and followed him out of the room, keeping her head down as she walked.
She knew there were people that didn’t like her, she got it. If she was on the outside, she probably wouldn’t like her either. But for someone to not only like her, like the idea of her powers but to think if any way the future of anything had to come from one place and one place only. Her father. Darius Emka. The man that not only created her but designed her and her powers, and a man who just so happened to be in the Cure at this very moment.
So Jaycen stormed down the corridors, taking wrong turn after wrong turn until finally, she made it to the corridor where she knew he was being kept.
Her pace only slowed when she noticed the two-armed guards standing outside. Now, how the hell had she forgotten about that? And how the hell was she going to get past them?
“Oh crap it’s her again, it’s his daughter.” Both guards fumbled with their weapons as one reached for his walkie talkie.
“No no no no,” Jaycen chanted as her arm shot out as she tried to think of something to placate them before she could say a word both the guards' bodies flew into each other before falling to the floor in a huge heap of guard.
What. The. Hell.
Jaycen stood there, completely frozen. What had she done? And more importantly, how? She hadn’t even felt anything.
“Do you really believe you did that?”
She spun around, still a little shaken, to see a guy leaning against the wall behind her with a weird smile on his face.
“No?” Yes, she had totally thought that was just her.
“Contrary to popular belief, you can’t do everything.” He pushed away from the wall and walked around her to Darius’s room and without looking back said, “Are you coming in, or are you just going to stand there?”
Silently she stepped over the, she very much hoped, unconscious guards and into the room.
This wasn’t a good idea, sh
e silently chanted as the door was closed behind her. In fact, this was a plain old stupid idea. No one knew she was there. Darius and this other man could kill her, right there and then, and no one would know about for maybe hours. She needed to leave, right now.
Before she had the chance to turn and bolt out of the room Darius spoke, his rich voice filling the silent room and making the hairs on Jaycen’s arm stand on end.
“Jaycen, my daughter. Welcome.” He sat at a table at the far end of the room, a grand dark wooden table with paper and books piled on top. His room was, in fact, really nice, with a large four-poster bed with large cushions scattered all over it.
“Well, this doesn’t look like any prison cell I’ve ever seen before.” She crossed her arms while eyeing the man who still stood behind her, guarding the door maybe?
Darius smiled, as he rubbed his clean-shaven chin. “This world really is about who you know. Haven’t you figured that out by now?”
She stayed silent as the other man talked around her, and for the first time took note of what the two men in front of her were wearing. Darius’s suits were long gone and replaced with a simple white cotton top and trousers, he kind of looked like he belonged in a cult, Jaycen mused before turning to the other man. It was then that she noticed his dark blue uniform, the uniform of The Cures Guard.
Darius’s influence ran deep. Too deep.
“You’re in prison and yet people are still dying, is it one of your followers?” she asked straight out, just wanting to get her answers and leave.
Darius really seemed to think about her question before saying, “Followers? I doubt it? Family? Most definitely.”
Family. With that one word, everything slowed and Jaycen’s world changed. Because if it was Darius’s family, that meant they were her family too. And they were killing people.
She turned to the other guy in the room. “So you’re another son?”
The guy didn’t smile but nodded once.
“My third born,” Darius clarified, with a wave of his hand as if his son really meant nothing. “But don’t you think we should be talking about you, my dear?”
Jaycen was still staring at the man, her brother, and tried to figure out if she could see herself in him at all. She couldn’t. Just like the other two sons she had met, they all looked completely different.
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