Released (Eternal Balance)

by Jus Accardo

  I rolled my eyes. “That tells me nothing.”

  The demon sighed. “I suppose it is my home.”

  “Home?” I lifted the flap on the nearest box, one numbered 1908. It was full of black and white photographs. “Jax never mentioned this place.”

  “He doesn’t know of its existence.”

  I let the box close. “I don’t understand. If it’s his house, how would he not know?”

  “You misunderstand me. It is mine.” Azi walked past me and traced the top of the box I’d opened. “They are filled with pieces of the past.”

  “Pieces of the—” I ran my finger over the front of another box. When I wiped away the dust, I saw the number 1862. “Years… The numbers are years.”

  “Of course.” It looked at me as though that should have been the natural conclusion, the expression on Jax’s face all Azi. “Enough about the boxes. We are here to find the Brim Stone.”

  I stepped away from the pile and threw up my hands. “Oh, right. I’m supposed to find it.” I spread my arms. “Is the answer in one of these boxes I’m not supposed to be talking about? Am I pulling it out of my ass, or do you have a better plan?”

  “Use your energy. The stone is powerful. Pures are attracted to power. Upon death, they gravitate toward it.”

  “I’m not dead,”

  “But you are activated. Your power has been unbound from your soul. It is the same thing.”

  I wanted to argue, but I could see it would have been pointless. Jax was stubborn. I’d dealt with it all my life. But Azi? It took the whole thing to new levels. “Well, how exactly do I use my energy?”

  That question stumped the demon. It cocked Jax’s head to the left then, a moment later, to the right. “Simply do it.”

  “I have no idea how to simply do it. Ask me to make you an Extra Fuzzy Alien or a killer Sex on the Beach, and I’m golden. Tell me to light up my alleged otherworldly mojo and you’re shit out of luck.”

  “Then you must learn. We will remain here until you locate the stone.”

  “Better get comfy then. We’re gonna be here a while.”

  The demon caught my gaze and, in a way that was all Jax, said, “We don’t have a while.”

  …

  By the time eight p.m. rolled around I was seriously considering taking a hatchet to Azi—never mind that the demon was residing in Jax’s body. It had been standing over me for the past few hours, tirelessly demanding that I tap into my energy. Forget the fact that I had no clue how to do that, or that the only thing I wanted to tap into was a nice big keg.

  “You need to focus,” the demon roared. It had taken to pacing from one end of the small living room to the other. “You are wasting time we do not have.”

  “You’re the one wasting time. Instead of pounding the pavement hunting this thing down the old fashioned way, you’ve got us holed up here waiting on something that’s never going to happen.”

  It stopped pacing and came forward, looming over me. “Perhaps you lack proper motivation.”

  “Trust me,” I said, cool as ice, “my motivation is solid.”

  “If Zenak gets the other half of the stone, there will be nothing on earth to stand in its way. It will kill me and hell will reign.” Azi leaned in closer and tapped the side of Jax’s head. “It will kill him.”

  “And your point is…?” Obviously I didn’t mean the careless tone, but the demon never missed an opportunity to remind me that Jax was gone. For good. If that was the case, why would I care? “Not like you’re going to vacate the premises.”

  “I still do not see why you complain. He is in here, as I was. You have not lost him. We are the same. Nothing has changed.”

  “Nothing has changed?” The last thread of my patience broke. I shoved the demon hard and punched my fists against Jax’s chest. In that moment, it didn’t occur to me that I might hurt his body. It didn’t matter that he was buried somewhere inside and might feel the pain. All I saw when I looked at his face was Azi. “You are not the same.”

  “Enough of this.” Azi shoved me away from Jax and folded his arms. “If you truly love my human—Jax—then you will do as I tell you. Now.”

  I had two choices. I could walk away and let Azi do what it wished with Jax’s body, though it probably wouldn’t let me out of its sight, or I could try to figure out how to work this mojo. The demon had a point. If Zenak destroyed Azi, then Jax would be killed as well. A lot of people would probably die right along with him. The whole point of me living in this hell was to get him back.

  “Fine.” I sighed. “Then give me something.”

  “Such as?”

  “I dunno.” I stomped my foot. “Tell me what a Pure can do.”

  I didn’t think the demon would answer me. For what felt like an eternity, it just stood there, staring. It stood still as a statue, the subtle rise and fall of Jax’s shoulders barely visible with each breath. “I cannot answer that. Not the way I imagine you would like.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “You are unlike your predecessors. They were nothing in life, and in death were merely powerful sources of transferrable energy. They had no access to it. A Pure wasn’t able to do anything. They were simply a means to an end. A device that could be used to complete a massive task or achieve a Herculean goal.”

  I let out a growl of frustration. This was getting us nowhere at light speed. I needed a different tact. “Okay. Then what could the lucky bastard that claimed the Pure do?”

  The demon frowned and cocked Jax’s head. “Whatever they could do before—only better. More powerfully.”

  I stomped my feet again and screamed at the top of my lungs, vaguely happy that the cabin was in the middle of nowhere.

  The demon took a seat across from me and gestured to the chair on the other side of the room. As I sat, the expression on Jax’s face changed. His lips weren’t set in such a grim line, and his jaw wasn’t as tense. He looked more like…himself.

  “Now that you are activated, I believe you have access to every portion of your brain. Humans are, admittedly, interesting creatures. They have much potential but have only just begun to tap into it.” The demon slid off the couch and settled on a knee in front of me. Moving slowly, it took my hand and turned it over so that my arm was gently twisted, elbow up. “This bruise for example. You can make it disappear.”

  “Yeah.” I snorted. “It’s called makeup.”

  “You can make it truly disappear.”

  “As in, heal it?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m starting to think some of the funny fumes Jax and I smoked when we were younger are affecting you. I can’t heal myself.” Right? If I could do that, I’d know. I mean, something like that would have been pretty hard to miss considering some of the shit we’d been through lately.

  “You can,” the demon insisted. “You have only to focus. Concentrate on the bruise. Visualize the broken blood vessels repairing themselves.”

  “Visualize,” I repeated, closing my eyes. I visualized. I concentrated. And after a few minutes, I was focusing so hard that I thought my brain might implode. When I opened my eyes, of course, the damn bruise was still there. “This is impossible.”

  Azi mumbled something that didn’t sound like English. It moved in a blur, suddenly standing and dragging me up as well, and it had a blade pressed against the inside of my wrist. “Perhaps you lack the proper motivation.”

  Again with the motivation—

  I bit back a gasp as Jax’s hand tightened around my arm and the demon jerked the blade across my skin. For a second nothing happened. The cold steel caressed my wrist and left a lingering chill that made the hairs on the back of my neck jump. It itched a second or two—then the blood began to flow, at first appearing as a thin line of red, then thickening and dripping faster.

  “What the—are you insane?” I tried to pull free, but the demon’s grip was like iron. I struggled and lashed out, kicking at every part of Jax’s body I could
get to. The attacks did nothing.

  Azi held my arm at an angle so that the blood ran down my forearm and pooled at my elbow momentarily before hitting the small braided rug at our feet. “Stop the bleeding.”

  How long before things got fuzzy? How much blood loss would it take for me to pass out? To die? A bubble formed in my chest, making it hard to breathe. No. Azi wouldn’t kill me. The demon wouldn’t let me die. But the determination I saw etched in Jax’s expression, one not his at all, said otherwise.

  Fear turned into full-blown panic. There was a right way and a wrong way to slit your wrists. Which gave more bang for the suicidal buck? Sideways? Horizontal—vertical? My mind raced, but I couldn’t focus on a single thought.

  He’d made the cut horizontal.

  Maybe that was the wrong way.

  Maybe I wasn’t in danger.

  But there was already so much blood…

  I twisted and thrashed, but he wouldn’t let me go.

  “There’s only one way out of this,” the demon said.

  No choice.

  I closed my eyes, gave into Azi’s madness, and tried to focus. I pictured the skin whole and unmarred, the blood gone and the itching sting vanished. Of course, the demon was absolutely insane in thinking I could magically heal myself, because nothing happened. I opened my eyes as the panic reached new heights. “Don’t do this, Azi.” The blood thundered in my ears, and I was starting to get dizzy. “I’m scared—”

  “Historically, fear is the ultimate motivator for your kind.” It lifted my arm a little higher and tilted Jax’s head to the left. “You should calm down. I can hear your heartbeat. The more agitated you become, the faster the blood will flow. You will bleed to death much faster that way. Now, heal the wound.”

  The wave of terror grew more potent, the air around me turning icy. Calming down was pretty much off the table at this point. I struggled even harder as tears of frustration stung the corners of my eyes. “If you don’t let me bandage this, I’m going to die!”

  Thoughtful for a moment, the demon then sighed. “He is very agitated.”

  “Jax?” I stopped thrashing and forced myself to take a deep breath, trying to even out my pulse. It’d made a good point. Logic. I could focus on logic. Struggling would only make it worse faster. “Can’t imagine why.”

  For the longest moment, it didn’t respond. Finally, it lowered my arm and reached behind us to grab a towel from the couch. Tying it uncomfortably tight, it said, “He fights for control, believing that I will harm you. Contrary to what you believe, I do not do this to cause either of you pain.”

  “Well, you’re not doing it for the warm fuzzies either,” I snapped, cradling my arm. “You just slit my fucking wrist!”

  “You do not understand the weight of our situation. There are multiple outcomes—only one of which is favorable to us.” The demon sank onto the couch. It leaned forward, balanced both elbows on Jax’s knees, and fixed his eyes on mine. “I will strike a deal with you. Find me the stone, and I will consider releasing the human.”

  Even though I should have known better, hope swelled. It was irrational and potent, and I knew I should rein it in before it grew out of control. But I couldn’t. “You’ll give him back control?”

  “I will consider it.”

  Alarm bells should have been going off, flashing neon red and strongly worded warnings. Instead, all I saw was hearts and confetti. “Okay. Okay, I’ll try.”

  The demon nodded and stood. “Get some rest. We’ll try a different kind of motivation in the morning.”

  Chapter Five

  Azirak/Jax

  Silence wasn’t always an issue for me. As volatile as my life was, and with the cries of those I’d hurt echoing through my brain on repeat ten thousand times a day, I’d never had a chance to feel truly disconnected. But since the demon had taken over, the extended periods of nothingness had started to wear on me.

  The demon might not have needed sleep, but my body did. Each time it drifted off, I ended up here—the white room. It was a weird place, even by my standards. Stark ghost walls were covered in framed pictures of Sam. Well, half of the walls. The room had an invisible line. The half I was on—the one I couldn’t seem to leave—had the pictures. Everything from our lives together growing up, to moments I’d spied after leaving Harlow, occasionally looking in on her life in secret. Once in a while I’d notice a new picture on the wall, a snapshot from something that happened after Azi took control. Those were different from the others. Encased in a black frame with cracked glass, they had an odd shimmer to them, like the canvas was dusted in super fine glitter.

  The other half of the room was bare, for the most part. There were two things on the walls. A steering wheel—it looked like it’d come from a car—and a pencil imbedded halfway to the eraser. Like the thing had wounded the wall, it seeped blood, fresh pools of it trailing down to puddle at the floor. The puddle never seemed to get any bigger, spanning a space only about the circumference of a volley ball, but I could see it actively dripping down the wall.

  But the worst part? There were no windows and no doors—and no sound. Several times I’d felt like something was watching me, but I saw nothing. I assumed it was Azi. Tonight was one of those nights, but it felt different somehow. The air was charged, and it was almost as though there was a cool breeze blowing across my skin.

  I leaned back against the wall and slid to the floor. My gaze fell to a picture of Sam on my right, one from after I’d left home. She was wearing a sleek red dress—one of my favorite colors—and stood watching with a mildly bored expression as Chase pinned a single red rose to her strap. Prom night. I remembered it all too well. She’d looked amazing, the most stunning thing in the room, but her expression had been vacant. Dead. She’d laughed at Chase’s jokes, danced to loud music—even attended an after-party rave—but anyone with eyes could see she wanted to be anyplace else. I’d almost gone back that night. The pain in her eyes had cut deep enough to make me consider doing the unthinkable. In the end, though, as I watched her settle into her room in the early morning hours, I decided she was better off without me.

  I was an ass.

  “Whatever the fuck it is you want, I’m not interested.”

  From the corner of my eye, I caught sight of something. The opposite side of the room had darkened, and tufts of black smoke wafted off the wall beside the pencil. “You must tell me how to gain Samantha Merrick’s cooperation.”

  I scrambled upright as the smoke began to take shape. It took a few moments, but soon a black shadow stood before me, shaped like me, but not quite solid. Wisps of feathery black twitched around the edges, making the thing look like a dark cloud. I could barely make out my own features through the murk—which was creepier than I would have expected.

  “Lemme guess,” I said. “Santa Claus?”

  “You understand that we will both perish, do you not?”

  “I understand that you made me a prisoner in my own fucking body!”

  The churning smoke twisted and surged, racing at me with a horrible howl. Obviously the demon wasn’t restricted to a single side of the room like I was. “You killed my mate.” The words bounced off the walls, and I fell to the ground, ears covered as the sound reverberated through my entire body like ten thousand razors cutting into my skin.

  A few moments later, Azi reformed in the corner and the pain faded. “We must work as one. If Zenak wins in any capacity, Samantha Merrick will die.”

  I righted myself again and used the wall to stand. “And you care so fucking much?”

  “If I was not concerned for her, I would not be forcing her to find the stone using such unpleasant methods.”

  “Have you met Sam? No one can force her to do anything she doesn’t want to.”

  “Not true,” the demon said with a laugh. The smoke around it cleared for a moment, giving me a quick glimpse of my own dark features. “You can.”

  “I can’t—and neither can you.” I stalked forward, forge
tting about the invisible wall. When I reached the barrier, it was like someone had kneed me in the face. “If you fucking touch her again, I’ll—”

  “Fine,” it said with an odd sense of satisfaction. “Challenge accepted.”

  The smoke exploded, and wisps scattered in all directions before dissipating completely. The force of it knocked me back into the wall. There was a rushing sensation and the white room fell away. A sound filled the air. It was familiar, but it took a second to realize that it was my voice.

  The demon bolted upright, and my body went rigid for a moment as the last remnants of an agonized roar tore from my throat. I—we—were awake.

  There was a thud on the other side of the room, followed by Sam’s bare feet slapping against the groaning, ancient hardwood. “What? What happened?” She flipped the lamp on and light flooded the room.

  “It was—I—” The demon maneuvered my body sideways and Sam came into full view. She was still wearing her jeans and T-shirt, but it was immediately obvious that she’d removed her bra. The thin cotton of her shirt clung to the perfection beneath, shifting with tantalizing allure with each movement she made.

  It was impossible not to notice—even in spite of my situation. I was a fucking man, after all, and this was the girl that had haunted my every wet dream. Unfortunately, I wasn’t the only one who noticed. My muscles flexed, my body reacting not only to my desire, but to the demon’s. Azi inhaled. The scent of Sam’s concern, tinged with just the smallest trace of lust, was like a drug. A drug we both wanted more of.

  “Sammy,” it said, shifting a few inches closer. It brought my hand up and trembled slightly as it touched the tips of my fingers to her cheek. The heat from her skin was an inferno that threatened to singe the deepest parts of me.

  Rage welled up as I realized what the demon intended to do, and I fought like I never had before.

  Don’t you fucking dare!

  I might not have been in control of my physical body, but I felt the ripple none the less.

  Sam’s eyes widened. I waited for her to back away, to see though the bullshit, but she didn’t move. A burst of hope, bright pink and faintly acidic, lifted from her shoulders and into the air.