Through Glass

by Rebecca Ethington

  “More than just killing them?” I asked, my brain moving faster than my words.

  I pulled away from him slowly and my eyes narrowed curiously. Testing different ways to hurt, to kill. That’s what he pictured when he looked at me, what he was going to do to me, what “testing” he would accomplish.

  “Yes, ways to defeat them. To become stronger than them. He wasn’t supposed to experiment on the survivors, but he found a way around it…” Travis stopped, the muscles in his jaws working as he looked around us, almost as if he expected the blackness to hold the answers he needed. “That guard, Jamie. He was not a Tar. He never was, but he turned to ash...”

  I swallowed the bile that had risen in my throat, willing it to stay down, but knowing it was useless. I had just turned two men to ash, men who had been mutilated into something more. More than what he had planned to do with me. I was only a monster in his eyes. However the others had been people; living, breathing humans.

  I looked toward the gun slowly, the cold piece of painted metal suddenly felt like lead in my hands. It was more than that, though. It wasn’t that the gun had malfunctioned…

  “He was a Tar…” I said, my voice a whisper.

  “Somehow, yes, and I suspect Abran made him that way.”

  “But why? Why would anybody do that?” I asked, my chest seizing at the very thought. My eyes flickered away from Travis to the darkness that surrounded our orb of light. Fear clenched through me at the thought that someone might be standing just outside of it.

  “I don’t know,” he whispered, his voice distant. “Attack them, defeat them and become greater than them. I have some ideas, but this is so much deeper than what I had originally thought. There is something more to it, something I am missing. I know Abran, he hates the Tar more than anyone. But to become them? I didn’t think anyone would see that as progress.”

  He ran his hand through his hair and looked around him, stress leaching off him as all his ideas swirled around only to increase his stress. “I need to find out what Abran has planned,” he said into the darkness, his voice getting swallowed up by the black that surrounded us before he turned back to me.

  “Any thoughts on how to start doing that?” I asked, the sarcasm in my voice mixing awkwardly with my fear.

  “I need to find out what these things are, Lex.” Travis rushed toward me, his hands wrapping around mine as he lowered to my eye level, his brown eyes digging into me. “More than what I have seen, more than what the others have said. I need to find the answers before you turn; before it’s too late for you and for everyone. Before Abran leads his army against them.”

  “His army? What are you talking about?” I shrieked, everything in my body tensed. Travis’s grip on my hands increased, something I was sure was supposed to be comforting, but it only put me more on edge.

  He looked at me for one more moment before he dropped my hands, his shoulders stiffening as he straightened himself. A jitter of fear trailed up my spine. I watched him, waiting for the worst to come. “In one month, we were supposed to empty out their main compound. What we believe is the Tars storage facility, where they turn the humans they have captured. I don’t think Abran wanted to just clear it out any more. If I had to place my best guess, right now, he is looking for supplies.” Travis spoke very slowly, his eyes unfocused on something behind me.

  I listened to his words and tried to make sense of them. I had heard of this attack on the very first day when I’d sat with Bridget around the fire. She had spoken of it like a war, as if it was the ending to everything. The way Travis spoke, it was more like it was the beginning.

  “That man, he stood in the light. He turned to ash. What’s to say he couldn’t change into one of them? Abran gets rid of one enemy, only to reveal another.” Travis’s voice was hard as he began to pace within the small circle of light we stood in. I watched him as he moved, his hands clenching and unclenching, the movement only adding to my own stress.

  “He wants to rule where the Tar does now? Take over the world?” I whispered, my voice awed as everything began to make sense.

  “Well, not that simplistic, but yes, that is the general idea.” Travis didn’t even look at me, he simply continued pacing with his hands gesturing wildly as he spoke.

  “He can’t do that!” I practically yelled, the fear that had only been increasing inside of me supercharging my emotions.

  “He will. In one month.”

  Travis stopped pacing to face me, his eyes boring into mine as he watched me. I stood as still as I could and tried to regulate my breathing as everything pumped through me. I met Travis’s eyes, the hard lines of my face increasing at the determination I saw mirrored back to me. We needed to stop this.

  “We need to get to Blood Rose. Abran won’t be able to contact them and tell them about us, about you,” he said simply. “They will have enough people to fight and stop this. We need to get there and stop this before it is too late. It may be foolish, but we need to do something to stop him.”

  Travis turned from me, the light still held in his hand as he moved to walk out of the alley and toward what I did not know.

  “Travis?” I asked, needing more clarification.

  He turned toward me slowly, the light in his hand casting odd shadows on his face. His face was haunted as he smiled, the light making him look more wicked than I knew he was.

  “Let’s start by getting Cohen back.”

  I had been listening to the rumbles for hours, the shake of the building I had been restrained in was loud and menacing. I didn’t care, though. I had no reason to. I stayed still on the same bed they had strapped me to more than a month ago, the same white light shining in my eyes.

  The light was supposed to take away my thought, take away my reason to care. I had heard them say it when they came in, heard them tell me how I wouldn’t feel anything after a while. In a lot of ways, they were right. I didn’t feel anything. I didn’t care.

  Except I did.

  I cared about her. She was all I could think about. So much had been taken away from me, however as the light burned into me, the brightness scarring my brain, she was still there.

  Her smile, the fiery red color of her hair, the way she tasted when I kissed her. The way my fingers moved when I painted her.

  Alexis.

  I could feel every other memory, every other thought in my head, they were still there; I simply didn’t care about them anymore. It was like when you lose interest in a television show. It still goes on only without you.

  My life had gone on without me.

  All except Alexis.

  Another rumble followed the first and the light above my head turned off. Everything stiffened in me as I waited for the door to open, for them to come in. It was how I knew they were coming; they couldn’t be in the light.

  The darkness reached to every corner of my eyesight. My eyes were unable to adjust to the darkness after the light burned away my sight.

  I lay still as I waited for the sound of the door to come as it always did when the darkness took me, the creak of the hinge coming only a moment after the light extinguished itself. Footsteps followed that, the click of the woman’s high heels loud in my ears.

  “Well, Mr. Blakemore,” she said, her sweet voice heightening my fears rather than calming them as I am sure they were meant to do. “It seems we are out of time. The choice has been made to complete the procedure on you today rather than wait until you are fully prepped.”

  I said nothing. Not like I had a choice. I had learned that long ago. I stayed still, my lips staying closed around the tube they had put in my mouth. I felt her cold touch against the warmth of my bare stomach, her palm hot against my hip bones.

  I tried to fight against the touch, but the restraints I was held down with held me tight, not letting me deviate as much as an inch.

  “Calm down, pretty boy. It will all be over soon,” she said as her fingers trailed up my chest and down my arms, her long nails caressing the skin on
my wrists.

  I opened my eyes, but I couldn’t see her through the darkness. I saw nothing other than the scorching white retina burn from the light, the edges pitch black and unusable.

  “It will all be over in a moment,” she said, the sickly sweet voice of hers unwanted in my head. “Just a pinch, Cohen. That’s all.”

  Her finger moved off my wrist as something cold and distinctly metallic was placed over them, the cold metal felt like a bracelet around my wrists.

  The cold clamps pressed against my wrists for only a minute before pain shot through my skin. The heat of pressure followed as something sharp cut into my skin repeatedly, slow and steady the blades cut into me.

  I screamed as the pain shot through my arms, the sound muffled and taken away by the heavy tube that I couldn’t get around. My writhing was restrained by the bands that held me down.

  I fought and screamed as one slice after another cut through me, something wet and warm splashing over my skin.

  Deeper and deeper the knives went, the pain growing with each swipe. My screams increased until they managed to escape the tube and filled the air around me.

  The pain only grew until I could feel myself give up and my body stopped fighting, but the screams still came. I felt the wetness on my skin along with the smell of motor oil in the air.

  I felt nothing else.

  I knew, distinctly, that I wasn’t me anymore.

  “Alexis.”

  Broken Fragments

  Book Two in The Glass Series is coming

  January 2014

  About the Author

  Rebecca Ethington has been telling stories since she was small. First, with writing crude scripts, and then on stage with years of theatrical performances. The Imdalind Series is her first stint into the world of literary writing. Rebecca is a mother to two, and wife to her best friend of 14 years. She was born and raised in the mountains of Salt Lake City, and hasn’t found the desire to leave yet. Her days are spent writing, running, and enjoying life with her amazing family.

  Also Available by Rebecca Ethington

  The Imdalind Series

  Kiss of Fire

  Eyes of Ember

  Scorched Treachery

  Soul of Flame (12/2/13)

  Dawn of Ash (Jan 14)

  The Second Book in The Glass Series, Broken Fragments, will be available January 2014

  Follow Rebecca on her blog at:

  www.rebeccaethington.com

  On GoodReads

  On Twitter:

  @ RebEthington

  On Facebook:

  Facebook.com/rebeccaethington.author

  #TheTarAreTheDead

  Acknowledgments

  There is a whole world full of people who helped with this book, a whole world of people who deserve my thanks and affections. There are authors who supported me, and showed me the ropes. Beta readers who read it first and fell in love with Alexis when she was still a little too flawed. Bloggers who fawned, and who I now count as some of my bestest friends. Artists who created a magnificent cover and a beautiful interior to match. And countless others who supported and helped me to become something more. Family who cheered, even when mommy had to sleep with a light on.

  And then, of course, there is you. Who took a chance, and took a step into the depth of my imagination. I hope you enjoyed the ride.

  Thank you.

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