by Kristie Cook
“I could only say based on pictures I’ve seen, not actual experience,” I admitted. “I’ve seen nothing here to say for sure that we’re on Earth. And if we are, there’s still no telling about civilization.”
“There could be people around, but that doesn’t mean they’re civilized,” Brock added.
“Then I say we find shelter for the night and hope we can learn more in the light of day.” A shadow passed over Hayden’s face, and my heart jumped. The last time darkness blotted out the light, a gozzard had dropped from the sky. This time it was only a cloud that had moved across the moon. More clouds were building in the distance and lightning flashed. “Looks like we better hurry, too.”
We followed Hayden’s lead, who might not know Earth, but had much more experience than the rest of us in living off the land. Because the rest of us had none. Using branches, palm fronds, and other foliage he could find, he and Brock built a shelter barely big enough for the four of us to cram into. Just in time, too, as the storm crashed overhead. We huddled together like four human balls, water dripping through the leaves here and there and sliding down our heads and backs. My body ached and jolts of pain shot through my hips and knees from old dance injuries feeling the strain of today’s run and the humidity. My eyelids felt like five-pound weights hung from them, pulling them down over my gritty eyeballs. But nightfall and the storm had brought a chill to the air, and I couldn’t sleep with the wet cold making me shiver. Without breaking the forms of our scrunched up bodies, Bex and I squirmed closer together, and the guys tried to warm us from the sides but with cold and clammy skin, they weren’t exactly space heaters themselves.
After what felt like several dreadful hours of lightning, thunder, and downpours, the rain let off and the clouds began to thin, the moon’s light shining through.
“Does your moon usually stay in the same place so long?” Hayden wondered as we still sat on the sand under the shelter, our legs stretched out in front of us now that it wasn’t raining.
I rubbed my forehead as his meaning set in. The moon still hovered over the horizon, reflecting off the water in the same place it had been when we’d first emerged from the jungle. Granted, a cold, wet storm could make minutes feel like hours, but I’d seen for myself that the moon had risen in the sky while Hayden and Brock had built the shelter and Bex and I had collected firewood (that was now soaked).
Brock growled. “It’s not the same moon.”
He jerked his head toward our right, where another round, white light hung much higher in the sky. A third shone from a place over the tops of the jungle trees behind us. My heart sank, and tears pricked. We weren’t on Earth. For all I knew, I was no closer to Jeric than I’d been on Erde.
“Should have known it wasn’t her,” Brock muttered under his breath before he pushed himself to his feet and strode down the beach.
“Asia?” Bex asked from beside me.
“I can only assume so,” I said. “He thought he’d felt her a couple of times. I thought I’d felt Jeric, too, so I know what he means. In our souls.”
“Not if we’re nowhere near them,” Brock said as he paced back toward us.
“Was it while we were in the Gate?” Bex asked. “Maybe a connection through there?”
Brock growled and shook his head. “It’s been more than once.”
I watched him pace a few times, then rose to my feet and did some yoga poses we used to do to stretch after rehearsals. While doing a standing forward bend to loosen my hips and back, a thought occurred to me.
“Maybe we’re feeling them through the Book,” I said to my shins. I lifted my head and looked up to see if anyone heard me. Brock had stopped his pacing, his head cocked. I slowly pulled myself upright to find all of them staring at me, the moons’ light reflecting off their faces. “We already know we can communicate through the Book, right? I mean, Hayden, you sensed us when we were writing and drawing in the Book. You even knew what Bex looked like. So maybe Jeric and Asia finally figured it out, and they’re trying to do the same. Maybe they’re feeling us at the same time we’re feeling them.”
“I could feel you, yes, especially my Twin Flame,” Hayden said. “But I’m not sure what you mean by this book. You’ve mentioned it before.”
“Is this the same book you’d dropped in my car?” Bex asked. “The one with the drawing of Hayden? All of the Nathaydens?” She gasped. “It is, isn’t it? And Jacey’s story … I remember now! That Bex was me! Leni, we’d been best friends and roomies before.”
I gave her a small smile as she began to recall.
“We’ve been sisters before, too, haven’t we?” she said. “No wonder I felt close to you.”
“I’m still confused,” Hayden pointed out. “I vaguely recall what a book is. There are printed words in them, yes?”
We confirmed Hayden’s memory of a book, and he explained they didn’t exist on Erde. They’d been banned generations ago. I told him, as well as Bex, more specifically about the Book of Phoenix and what I thought it could do. Hayden rubbed his chin and stared out at the water while I spoke, and I thought he hadn’t been listening.
“The Book seems important to Enyxa,” he said after I finished by telling them how the Book had brought us to Erde, but it had remained on Earth. “I can’t remember why, though …”
We fell silent as we all seemed to consider this seemingly unhelpful piece of information. What could Enyxa want with the Book of Phoenix?
“I think we were all involved in creating the Book, so maybe if we all keep our thinking caps on, we’ll remember more about it,” I suggested. “But we definitely need to keep trying to reach out to Jeric and Asia. They may be our only chance of going home.”
With the weather calm and the tide low, we finally settled down for sleep after deciding on shifts. Brock took the first one. I fell asleep faster than I thought possible, only to be awoken a while later by a heart-wrenching scream.
“NOOOOO!”
I bolted upright, my heart in a gallop. Bex was already sitting up, too, but her arms and legs thrashed about.
“NO!” she screamed again, terror filling her voice.
“Bex, love,” Hayden whispered, now also awake and sitting on her other side. He tried to put an arm around her to calm her down.
Her eyes, vacant and distant, widened and filled with fear. She shoved him away. “No! Don’t you touch me!”
“It’s me, love,” he said, his voice soft and soothing. “You’re okay.”
“LEAVE ME ALONE!” she screamed. She jumped to her feet and spun to face us, her knees bent slightly, her hands out in front of her, her fingers curled in like claws. And her blue eyes wild with fear.
Hayden looked over at me, at a loss.
“She’s going to attract animals,” Brock hissed from where he sat a few feet away from the shelter, his katana laying next to him. He was on his knees, as though he’d begun to get up to help her, but had decided against it. Probably a wise decision.
Being the least likely to be mistaken for Mason, I sprang to my feet and wrapped my arm around her shoulder. “Bex, honey, it’s me, Leni.”
She tried to fight me at first, but I grabbed her chin and turned her head toward me.
“Look at me. See? It’s just me. You’re okay.”
The wild look in her eyes began to fade.
“That’s right,” I soothed, rubbing my hand up and down her back. “You’re safe. You’re with me, and Brock, and Hayden. That’s all. Nobody else. Nobody here wants to hurt you.”
She looked around and nodded, but only when her eyes came back to me did they show any trust. Along with a deep sadness. Her hands reached out and clutched my shoulders. She threw her full weight on me, her knees buckling, and dragged us both to the ground. I wrapped my arms around her and held her as she cried.
“It’s
okay, you’re okay,” I repeated over and over, tears filling my own eyes. I honestly didn’t know if she’d ever be truly okay.
“I’m not,” she choked out at one point. “I’ll never be okay again.”
“Yes, you will,” I whispered in her ear. She shook her head against my shoulder. “You will, and you know why? Because you’re strong. You’re stronger than that bastard. You won’t let him ruin your life. You won’t let what he did to you define you. Right?”
She sniffled and eventually nodded.
“And your love with Hayden is strong, too, right? Stronger than anything you face.”
She sniffed again and pulled away from me, looking over my shoulder at where her Twin Flame sat.
“Oh, Hayden,” she cried, “I’m so sorry.”
I shifted to the side so she could crawl to him.
“Nothing to be sorry about, love,” he said as he took her into his arms.
“There’s everything to sorry about!” Bex’s voice took on a new tone, one of total despair. “I’ll never be right for you. He took that. He took everything.”
“No, love—”
She pushed away from him, but not out of fear now. Something else filled her eyes.
“Yes! He destroyed everything! He destroyed me! I can’t be with you, Hayden. I can’t be with anyone. There’s nothing left in me worth fighting for.”
“Bex,” I said, “that’s the Darkness talking. You and Hayden haven’t been Forged yet, so it’s getting to you, too.”
She shook her head vehemently. “It’s the truth.”
“It’s the Darkness,” I said more firmly. “Don’t let it win.”
“Funny thing about Darkness—it has a way of bringing the truth out,” said a taunting female voice.
We all jumped to our feet as Enyxa emerged from the jungle, the moonlight bouncing off her white and black hair and sleek, form-fitting outfit. She grinned at the looks on our faces.
“You didn’t think I’d let you stay in one of my worlds without another warm welcome, did you?” she asked. My heart sank at this knowledge, and she beamed even bigger. “Oh, yes, this world is mine, too. Not quite as dismal as Erde, but the souls are all mine.” She turned bodily toward Bex and reached a hand out toward her face. “Are you ready to be mine, too, dear?”
Hayden jumped between them, a knife in each hand, one of them slicing toward Enyxa’s outstretched arm. She jerked her hand back and hissed. Hayden fell to his knees. He pressed his fists to his temples and let out a feral, snarling sound. His face twisted as though he were in physical agony.
“No, please, stop!” he moaned.
“Oh, aren’t you cute,” Bex seethed at Enyxa, and then she went down, too, the fear and pain returned to her face. She curled over her thighs, moaning and sobbing.
Brock had moved to the evil bitch’s back, his katana in hand. He silently swung it upward into position. Before he could move another inch, though, the long blade slid from his fists. He grasped his head and fell to his knees screaming, just like the other two.
Enyxa finally turned toward me. My heart pounded in my chest, but I tried to show nothing but calm. She had a weakness. We only needed to figure it out.
“What do you want from us?” I demanded as I stood with my feet shoulder-width apart and my hands clasped behind my back. They trembled, but at least she couldn’t see them.
Her black eyes narrowed. “Your souls, of course.”
I tilted my head. “I think there’s more.”
Her lips slowly tilted up into a smile. “You should know, Jacquelena. Maybe if you tried hard enough, you’d remember. If not—” She shrugged. “I’ll give you the memory one of these times. For now, I just want to watch you all suffer as I did so many eons ago. Watch the Darkness take over you little by little, in the most painful way possible.”
She disappeared then, along with the whole other world we were on. I was back in the ballet studio, with its scruffy hardwood floors, floor-to-ceiling mirrors, and the bar that stretched across the middle of two walls. The studio was empty and mostly dark except for the light that shone directly over me as I stood in front of the mirror in fifth position en pointe, wearing a light pink leotard, tights, and toe shoes. My round butt protruded significantly, hard and defined under the leotard. My breasts were full, too, so I was probably about seventeen. Something thin and sharp whipped out and cracked against my thighs. Through gritted teeth, I maintained position and held in the scream, but a whimper still escaped.
“You need to lengthen,” Mama said as she ran the edge of the yardstick down my back and over my butt. She brought it to my front and pressed it against my breasts as though trying to slice them off. Their newness already made them tight and tender, but the pressure of the ruler made me bite my tongue against the pain. “Your lines are unacceptable. You are unacceptable like this.”
The words hurt more than the sting of the yardstick as she once again whipped it against the backs of my thighs. Only after she walked away into the darkness, leaving me alone, did I crumple to the floor and cry. The insults of my own mother would echo in my mind for the next several years as I tried in vain to please her, while binging and purging behind her back.
Before she left, Enyxa made me feel one last hurt, and it wasn’t mine. It was the pain my mother felt every time she looked at me and knew I’d never be the ballerina she’d devoted so much time and energy into raising.
And that hurt my heart more than any of the memories.
When my lucidity returned, I found myself curled in a ball on my side, staring at the water with a heaviness in my heart and soul I’d never felt before. I felt tainted. Stained. Darkened. I’d never meant to hurt my mama, or even disappoint her, but intentions meant nothing to her. My very existence had been the biggest agony of her life, and now Enyxa made sure I felt it.
The moans and cries of my friends around me subsided as the sun rose over the water and the sky lightened. None of us moved, though, too weighed down by the Darkness.
“We need something good to think about,” I said, my voice thick and raspy. “Something light and with love to push this Darkness away.”
“Not much of that for me to share,” Hayden said.
“I’ve got nothin’,” Bex agreed. She rolled to her back and turned her head toward Brock. “What about you, Brock? What’s your and Asia’s story?”
He snorted from his position on his back as he stared at the gray sky overhead. “It’s not light and lovely.”
“We know it has a good ending,” I hedged.
“Does it?” he muttered.
I sighed. “Point taken.”
“That’s all you need to know.”
“Come on, Brock,” Bex pushed. “Tell us the whole story.”
“Leave him alone,” Hayden said. “Decent guys don’t kiss and tell.”
“We already know the beginning,” Bex countered. “I know ya’ll have been gettin’ it from Asia like I have, right?”
She looked at Brock, then Hayden and me. I nodded. Besides the parts Enyxa gave me, I’d been feeling their story from Asia. Almost as if she were right here telling it to us. I could only hope that meant she was using the Book, and we were receiving her communication.
“Then get the rest from her,” Brock grumbled, confirming that what we’d been feeling had been pretty accurate. At least from Asia’s point of view. “Because I’m not telling you shit.”
We all lay in silence for a few minutes, and it was almost as if Asia could hear us, because her story continued, giving us what we needed—an escape from our miserable present.
Chapter 11
10 months ago
My curiosity about the secrets the book held had grown to ridiculous levels since finding the lock open last night after Brock had left. I’d promised him in a
text message that I’d wait to open it until he could come back over tonight, but I was admittedly weak and had peeked inside the front cover before I’d even gone to bed. I knew it was a journal, and although part of me thought we shouldn’t pry into some stranger’s privacy, another part of me pointed out how ancient the book looked and that the Jacey and Micah mentioned on the first page could be old or even dead, for all we knew. Whoever had dropped the book in the driveway certainly didn’t seem to miss it since nobody had come by to claim it.
Hope had left me to work alone all day so she could write, which was good. I didn’t know what Brock might have told her last night after they’d left … after her knock on the door had interrupted our kiss. I hoped he’d told her nothing, that he’d given her some excuse for being at my place. I needed this job and kissing the boss’s son probably wasn’t a good idea. I was grateful I didn’t have to face a humiliating warning to stay away from him today. I’d already given one to myself and dreaded the awkward but necessary we-can-only-be-friends talk.
So as I waited for Brock, curiosity and anxiety warred within me. He’d said he’d be over no later than 5:30, and when my phone showed 5:40, my foot was already bouncing. By 6:00, I began to think he had second thoughts about coming over, which was probably good, and by 6:15, my stomach was growling. I’d just finished making myself a peanut butter sandwich when there was finally a knock at the door.
“I’m really sorry,” Brock said as soon as I opened it, standing there with purple smudges under his eyes and his dark hair disheveled as though he’d had a tough day. Thankfully, he wore a shirt this time, although the lavender polo did little to disguise the perfection I already knew hid beneath. “Mom was on a roll with her writing, and I learned as a kid to never interrupt her unless there’s a fire or profuse amounts of blood. And I didn’t want to bother you with Connor.”
“He wouldn’t have been a bother,” I said automatically around a bite of sandwich.