The Mortal Sleep (Hollow Folk Book 4)

by Gregory Ashe

  I guessed I had twenty yards left.

  I guessed I had made it maybe five since Temple Mae seized.

  I guessed I was going to get a million tons of construction-grade steel piled on me.

  Something pinged against my cheek, sharp enough to slice the skin and draw blood. It ran down to my chin, warm and then cool all of a sudden. Something else pinged. Something exploded in glass and steel just a few yards to the side. Something hit with a massive thunk. Something winged my shoulder, and I staggered. Something groaned above me, and then that little drizzle of debris became a rainstorm, and I tried to go faster.

  Something hit me on the head, and my knees turned like little clockwork pieces, and I was on the ground.

  This was it. The end.

  Only it wasn’t.

  The hail of steel and glass and stone ended. Abruptly. Instantly. My pulse pounded in my ears, and in the sudden silence, it roared. It was like a crowd cheering in a stadium. It was like fifty thousand voices shouting that I was alive. For a minute longer. For less.

  Someone grunted.

  Someone that wasn’t me. Someone that wasn’t Kaden. Someone that wasn’t Temple Mae.

  Then another grunt.

  And I knew that grunt. I knew that voice.

  It had been, how long? A day? Less?

  It couldn’t be him.

  I slithered out from underneath Kaden’s weight, letting him sag onto the floor, and then I flopped over onto my belly. I was too tired to stand. I was too tired to think. I was too tired to do anything except stare and try to process what I was seeing.

  Emmett was on one knee, one fist pressed to the floor, head down. He looked like something sculpted, something Greek, all the perfect lines and broad shoulders and beauty. The rubble shifted and skittered overhead, and I glanced up, glimpsed a flicker of pearlescent sheen. A dome. Some kind of barrier. Emmett grunted again.

  “Em?” I said, and it sounded so dumb, so utterly fucking stupid, that I wanted to take it back as soon as it left my mouth.

  He shivered like I’d run my finger down his spine. And then he seemed to brace himself. Not against the weight of the building, but against something else. Against me. Against looking at me.

  But he turned his head, and I bit my lip so hard that blood ran down and pattered the vinyl.

  They weren’t scars, not yet.

  I had seen him a day before. He had been so perfect. The kind of beauty that stopped my heart when I turned too fast, when I forgot to brace myself, like catching a lightning bolt with my eyes open and wanting to do it again and again for the rest of my life. And he was beautiful, still.

  They weren’t scars, not yet, but the wounds were deep and vicious and twisted along half his face. A perfect, exact half. His right. It was as though someone had drawn a line down the center: forehead, nose, lips, chin. And everything on his right had been shredded with claws. My heart gave a kind of hiccuppy skip. Claws. Or scissors. Or a steak knife. Or a screwdriver. And they were mostly healed, which was impossible.

  If the wounds hurt him, he gave no sign. His mouth curled in a familiar smirk. “I like you on your hands and knees, tweaker. And I appreciate the offer. Really, I do. But don’t you think we should get out of here first?”

  WHEN WE WERE CLEAR, when Emmett released the barrier holding up the debris, the rest of the building sagged and collapsed, tumbling down to fill the hollow space where Emmett had saved my life. Our lives. Dust sneezed out, a cloud that licked the wet pavement and stained my sneakers, and then it was over.

  The only tally I could keep, the only tally that made sense, was the tally of the people I knew who had survived: Austin, Becca, Jake, Jim, Kaden, and Temple Mae. Jim was strapped to a gurney and unconscious; Kaden and Temple Mae were both out for the count, and to judge by the way Jake grabbed Temple Mae’s face and shouted for help, she wasn’t in a good way. Kaden didn’t look much better.

  Austin and Becca stood on the edge of the parking lot. Austin’s face looked like steel in a blast furnace: a degree of white that was going to give me a screaming headache if I looked at it too long. Becca was holding him up, and when he saw us, he ran, and nothing ever felt better, ever, than when he hit me at twenty miles an hour and carried me a few yards, like some sort of romantic adaptation of one of his football moves. I wasn’t going to complain; aside from the battering my nose took, I liked it.

  “Are we in a fight?” he managed to say, his whole body shaking, the words buried in my shoulder.

  I shook my head and gripped him tighter. “No. No fight.”

  Everything from the last day—the recording of him talking to Ginny, the conversation I had overheard with Kaden—popped like a soap bubble. He was here. He was warm. He was mine. He squeezed me until my spine cracked, and then he shook me, and he still hadn’t said anything.

  Sometimes I think it’d be so much easier if he weren’t here.

  The words slithered at the edge of my subconscious. Ok. Maybe everything from the last two days wasn’t gone completely.

  When the kissing started transitioning into the shaking and the squeezing and the yelling about taking stupid risks, I grabbed his hand, and Becca, Austin, Emmett, and I moved away from the crowd, huddled against shock and the spring chill. The April sky was the color of a razor. The sun had disappeared behind steel clouds again.

  The bigger tally—the tally that went beyond me and what I could hold in my head—was the number of the dead. My limited exposure with the Bible and religion had not impressed me, but the phrase wailing and gnashing of teeth came to mind, and it fit in the worst way. There was a lot of wailing. A lot of screaming and crying and moaning and weeping. There were firetrucks and ambulances. There were dazed men and women, some staff, some patients, some visitors, some passersby. I remember a man, he looked ancient, with his hospital johnny fluttering in the icy April air, his bare ass chapped and red in the cold, one slipper scuffing along the pavement, the other foot bare as he dragged an IV pole. No bag. No IV. Just the pole. He got all the way to the highway, and he crossed the green, and then he was gone down the hill on the other side. I couldn’t have gone after him if I wanted to.

  Emmett moved in next to me and tried to get an arm around me.

  Austin shoved him out of the way. His fingers gathered clumps of sweater like I might try to sneak off. Or like he wanted to make it very, very clear who I belonged to.

  “Missed me,” Emmett said, rubbing his chest.

  “Don’t touch him. Don’t fucking come near him.”

  “You’re not very grateful. I just pulled his white-trash ass out of that anthill.”

  “Emmett,” Becca said, shivering against another slap of April air. “What happened?”

  That sneer again. “I took a trip.”

  The wounds on his face looked worse in the daylight. They made me dizzy, and not just because I could only imagine how painful they had been. There was a pattern to them. A nightmarish symmetry that wasn’t really symmetry at all. Only—my eye would follow the deep cut that ran from the corner of his mouth, and a part of my brain would latch onto the ragged fissures that ran along his temple. Or I’d find my vision looping a long, spiraling cut at the center of his cheek, and I’d have to swallow and look away because otherwise I’d throw up. If you’d tried to do it mathematically, with parallel lines and mirrored images, you’d say there wasn’t any coordination. There wasn’t a pattern to all of it. Only there was a pattern. You’d say there wasn’t a reason behind the madness. Only there was. The madness was the reason.

  I wasn’t the only one looking; Austin studied him for a long moment before turning his attention back to me. Becca would glance and then her gaze would slide away.

  “Take a fucking picture.”

  I looked away again, my cheeks heating, and Austin tightened his arm around me. “I’ve got to go after them.” I pried at Austin’s hand, but he just clutched me tighter, pressing me to him, and that rich, cedar smell wi
th a hint of tobacco filled my lungs, and a tremor ran through me. “I’ve got to go before he—”

  “You’re not going anywhere.” Austin pulled me against himself, both arms around me. “Vie, you’re not taking a damn step.”

  Sometimes I think it’d be so much easier if he weren’t here. It rode a dark carousel at the back of my head, swinging into view and then just as suddenly vanishing again. And when it came around, it didn’t come alone. I could hear Kaden’s voice: but if it makes you get this freak show out of your life. And then the carousel would spin, and I could focus on Austin, really see him without any of the last two days clouding my sight.

  I wanted to sink into him. I wanted to bury my face in his shoulder, breathe that cedar-smoke smell, breathe his skin and his sweat and the heat of his body, and let him stroke my hair the way he was now, let him kiss my ear the way he was now, let him take away some of what hurt the most.

  Sometimes I think it’d be so much easier if he weren’t here.

  I owed Hannah and Tyler more. I groaned and tried to pull away. Austin, shushing me, ran his hand along the back of my neck.

  But if it makes you get this freak show out of your life.

  That touch, and the way his breath tickled my ear, and the feel of him around me, against me, it was weakening me. It was softening the hard edges. My eyes sparked, and I squeezed the lids shut. If I started bawling, I was afraid I’d never stop. The carousel spun again at the back of my head.

  . . . Sometimes . . .

  No.

  . . . but if it makes you . . .

  No. No. No.

  Maybe it wasn’t a carousel. Maybe it was the cylinder in a revolver. Maybe this was a double-down version of Russian roulette. I forced those worries aside. I thought of Hannah and Tyler dragged off to God knew where at the mercy of Urho and the Lady. I shuddered. “Aus, let go. I’ve got to—

  Austin’s arms tightened around me. “You’re not going anywhere. You’re beat six ways to hell, baby. You need medical help. You need to rest. We can talk about . . .” He was still speaking, but the words blurred into sounds I couldn’t understand. A thought came through, as sharp as the razor-blade sky: he wouldn’t let me go. Not willingly.

  And just as sharp and clear as the first thought, I knew what I had to do.

  I broke his grip more by surprise than strength, and when he followed my backstep, I planted a hand on his chest.

  “What the fuck are you doing?” I said.

  “What are you doing?” he said back, in that calm, even, oh-so-Austin voice.

  Just a little, I told myself. Just a little. Just enough that he backs off. And then you can make it up to him. Just the very littlest bit so he backs off.

  “I said what the fuck are you doing?”

  “Vie, baby—”

  “Baby,” Emmett snickered.

  Austin was coming at me again, and I fended him off, taking another step back. “Jesus Christ. Did you think I’d forget?”

  He froze then. It was a kind of lurching half-motion that ended with a huge look of surprise and pain. It was the way somebody might stop if you shoved a spear through him and pinned him right to the spot.

  What happened next was worse, though. He didn’t raise his arm; I think he was still too shocked, still in those few stunned moments before the pain really hit him. So he didn’t raise his arm. He didn’t reach for me. But his hand turned, this tiny cupping gesture like a kid might make, like he was begging and he didn’t even know what he was begging for.

  “Are we—” He had to stop. “Babe, are we in a fight?”

  “Damn right we’re in a fight. You’re up in that fucking hospital room, with fucking Kaden, fucking talking about how you fucking want to date him, and now you want to hold me and hug me and call me baby?”

  The whiteness in his face was the color before steel melts. I had to squint against it. I had to blink.

  Just a little, please, just let it be a little, just enough that he’ll get angry and let me go and I can still come back and make things right.

  Austin wobbled, but he didn’t move. People had died like this; impaled. That was the word. Like I’d impaled him on my words. People had died screaming. It had taken days. I had to keep blinking; I didn’t know what was fucking wrong with my eyes.

  “That’s not what happened. What’s going on with you? What’s wrong? Why are you acting like this?”

  The firmness of his voice, the certainty behind it, the absolute fucking lie of it hit me like a wrecking ball. It smashed through my pain. It smashed through my fear of hurting him. It smashed through every goddamn barrier in my head until it was just me and that black hole and Kaden’s voice saying, I never really thought about guys like that before, but if it makes you get this freak show out of your life, yeah, I’ll think about it. And then I wasn’t just thinking about hurting him a little bit. I went full speed. I went for all of it like a goddamn fucking moron.

  “I heard you. Both of you. He’s going to think about it. He wants you to break up with me. He’s so fucking desperate to get rid of me, he’s willing to fag it up with you. And you’re so fucking desperate to get rid of me, you don’t even care that he’s not really gay. All you care about is getting his cock—”

  “Shut up.” Austin wavered again. The Wyoming wind had picked up. At least, I thought it was the wind. Something was shrieking in my ears, making it hard for me to hear. And Austin was wavering like he was about to fall. So it had to be the wind. What else could make a noise like that?

  “What did you say to me?”

  “All right, guys.” Becca danced between us, her hands flapping at each of us like she could bat us into separate corners until we could cool down. “Let’s all take a breath—”

  “Take a breath, sure, that’s what Austin’s always telling me to do.” I shouldered past Becca, ignoring her squawk until I was chest to chest with Austin. “I don’t want to take a fucking breath. I want you to look me in the eyes and tell me. When did you finally decide? When did you figure out it was worth taking a risk? Were you guys stoned, and he was doing some of his typical cocktease bullshit, and you finally broke down? Were you wrestling and you popped a boner? Were you hosing each other down in the locker room—”

  “I said shut the fuck up. Shut your fucking mouth, you fucking faggot.”

  That wind. That goddamn wind. It was so loud, it was like the background hiss on a cheap stereo. It was the sound of an ocean of blood, the surf pounding in my ears. The words went through me like a yard of rebar. Right through my gut.

  “That’s enough,” Emmett said. Beneath those horrible wounds, his face was twisted into an expression I didn’t recognize. He grabbed at my arm. I hit him hard enough that he fell on his ass.

  “What did you say?”

  Austin was crying now, and he gave a tiny little jerk of his head, and his eyes wouldn’t meet mine.

  “What did you say to me?”

  “We’re done. You and I are done.”

  “Fine. That’s just fine with me. You can go fuck Kaden now like you’ve been dreaming about—”

  “Just stop it, all right?” Becca screamed. She was crying too, ugly, silver tears that spilled down her face.

  I reached for my bag. I wanted to shove that cassette down his throat. I wanted to make him choke on plastic and magnetic tape and his own fucking words. But I didn’t have my bag. I didn’t have anything. Jesus Christ, my eyes, what the fuck was wrong with my eyes, I didn’t have anything. I didn’t have anything. I didn’t have anything.

  “You know what? You’re right.” I tried to shrug, but all my muscles were locked with some kind of jittery electrical signal, and all I could do was jerk and jump like I was Frankenstein on a hot wire. “It’d be so much easier if I weren’t here. You’re right. You’re absolutely right.”

  Austin sagged. He hunched a little, his upper body caving forward as though he were trying to protect himself.

  Emmett
had picked himself up, and he grabbed a handful of my shirt and shoved. I stumbled, skidded on loose gravel, and caught my balance.

  “What the fuck is wrong with you? Get the fuck out of here, tweaker. Just get fucking lost, all right?”

  I stared at him. Behind those deep cuts that twisted half of his perfect face, Emmett stared back at me like he’d just kicked over a shithouse and watched everything spill out.

  I gave him the finger.

  “Fuck you too. Jesus Christ, tweaker. Austin, hey. Come on. Let’s get you out of here.”

  I was still staring as Emmett hooked an arm around Austin and guided him away. Becca, wiping at her cheeks so that silver smeared the heels of her hands, just kept shaking her head. She looked at the sky. She looked at her black flats. She looked at the heels of her hands and made a bubbly, disgusted noise in her throat. And then she looked at me. It lasted maybe ten seconds, and then she started crying again and shook her head and left.

  Just a little bit. The words echoed emptily in my head. What the fuck had happened to just a little bit?

  I FOUND THE IMPALA. I slid into the seat, started the car, and was surprised that it still started. Under the gray blade-light of the April day, the world had passed into some kind of apocalyptic wasteland. The fact that the Impala still started, the fact that anything still worked the way it was supposed to, made no sense at all. The world had ended. Didn’t everybody else get the message?

  Emmett looping his arm around Austin. Come on. Let’s get you out of here.

  I drove. I don’t remember driving, but I drove. At one point, I ended twenty miles up the Bighorn River, the car nose-out toward the edge of the bluff. With the engine in neutral, I let my foot down, and the motor roared. All I’d have to do is bump the gear shift. I’d done it before, dived into the river before when I’d gotten to that spot at the center of the black hole. Only this time, Emmett wouldn’t drive along by chance. Emmett wouldn’t swim in and pull me out.

  Emmett looping his arm around Austin. Come on. Let’s—