I looked at the house, at the familiar front door, quietly stating, “Kassie must die.”
“Good. You’re ready.” The other me clapped me on my shoulders, proud of my decision. “It’s finally time to awaken and change the world.” He smiled, his teeth whiter than white. In a flash, his skin was grey and he sprouted wings. The world around me faded to black.
I was alone.
The beeping of machinery entered my ears, and as my eyes flew open, I found that I was alone in a hospital room. The last time I woke up alone in a room like this, I spent the next however long with a scowling version of me. Although, now, I could see what he was constantly scowling about.
I was stronger than I was before; I didn’t remember much, but that I knew for certain.
Sitting, I yanked the tubes out of me. A nurse happened to be walking by, ran in to try to stop me, but I shut her up with a single look. One look and her face went blank, slack-jawed. I held up a finger to my lips as I went to the window, feeling a breeze on my backside. I needed clothes, but I wasn’t going to get them here.
The smell of a hospital was disgusting.
I broke the glass, ripped the screen, and jumped out long before the nurse recovered herself enough to alert a doctor. I headed through the parking lot, knowing where I was going, even though most of my memory still failed me.
The sarcastic boy who woke up in that hospital bed all that time ago was gone.
I wasn’t sure what I was, now.
A tool, to be used by the other me?
Crossing intersections, dodging cars, walking along sidewalks that, during the daylight, were mostly empty. The house where I parted from the other me was in sight, and I took my time heading up the driveway, already anticipating what I’d come to see.
Her death.
It was an odd sense of calm I had about it, like it was inevitable, meant to be.
I headed up the front porch, moving to the front door. A pretty house, but it wouldn’t be so pretty inside. I went in.
And, just like the other me showed me, a man stood above Kassie, dagger in hand. He had it lowered against her throat, about to cut it wide open with a deep, quick gash, when his eyes looked up and he saw me.
He faltered. He wasn’t expecting me.
I was supposed to let her die. I wasn’t supposed to interfere. The other me told me what I had to do, what I should do, in order to become my true self. He was, in a word, manipulating. I couldn’t remember what I loved about life, but I knew it wasn’t being toyed with on strings. I was no marionette.
“Gabriel,” the man said, eyes wide.
Right. That was my name.
I searched through my mind for his name. My memories were foggy, jumbled together in a mess that would take time to sort through, but eventually I came upon it: “Michael.”
He must’ve sensed the difference in me. “You know.”
“I do,” I said. In a blink, I was beside him, my hand gripping the one that held the dagger above her throat. She was passed out, completely oblivious. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” I said, increasing the pressure on his wrist.
“She has to die,” Michael said.
“That’s what everyone keeps saying. But, you know, I’m tired of people telling me what to do,” I whispered. In a moment, the pressure on his wrist was too much. He dropped the dagger, and I threw him back, across the living room, straight through the windows that overlooked the backyard. I went to the broken window, stepping on the glass with my bare feet. If I was cut, I did not feel it.
I hardly felt anything.
“I’m done listening to you,” I told his unconscious form on the grass. “I’m done listening to everyone. For once, I’m going to do what I want to do.”
And what I wanted—what I really, truly wanted—was a sandwich.
I moved past the couch, pausing to glance at Kassie. No, at…Kass. I didn’t call her Kassie. At least, I didn’t think I did. Her eyes were slits, and her mouth whispered, “Gabriel?”
I could hardly look at her, after the things the other me revealed.
I turned away, ignoring her, even as she fell off the couch, calling after me, crawling after me.
It wasn’t going to end well, so why pretend otherwise?
Chapter Thirty-Two – Crixis
It was a bad day. Maurice had moments of clarity—rare, as they were—and since I was not his David, just a nameless imposter, I had to compel him and convince him otherwise. I didn’t feel too good about it, but oh, well. Had to be done. I was growing fond of my Hawaiian shirts and my training sessions with Kass.
Never thought I’d think that.
As I sat down to have a cup of coffee, which was not my first choice of beverage, for I preferred something a bit redder, my senses piqued. He was back—Gabriel. I could feel him, Vexillion could feel him, feared him, just as other Demons feared me. I flashed to the front door, tossing it open, watching as the boy stepped inside the house across the street.
Should I go over there, or should I just let whatever happen, happen? I wondered, not usually one for such uncertainty.
I lingered there, waiting, until my ears heard the sounds of glass shattering, and it was decided for me. With a gust of wind, I was in their house, standing in their living room. A hideously-decorated space, with a lot of wide, open spaces. I wasn’t a fan. I liked being cozy.
I saw Gabriel near the broken widows, saying in a voice that reminded me of my own, “I’m done listening to you. I’m done listening to everyone. For once, I’m going to do what I want to do.” And then he turned and walked past Kass on the couch, stopping for only a second as he looked at her.
She whispered a weak, “Gabriel?”
An expression of disgust crossed his features, and he turned away from her, not stopping even after she fell off the couch in a bid to go after him. He was before me in the next instant, looking down on me from his superior height. He examined me, frowning, sneering, a face I’d never before seen on the boy.
Vexillion quivered inside me. He wasn’t a boy any longer.
He shook his head, bumping into my shoulder purposefully as he made his way to the kitchen.
I couldn’t stand there and do nothing. Perhaps it was the meeting with Kass’s mother, but I felt the strange urge to help her. In a flash, I was beside her, cradling her, moving her back on the couch. She smelled rancid, and she looked like a skeleton. Her skin ice cold, a deep gash in her cheek.
“What mess did you get yourself into now, little Purifier?” I questioned as I moved my sleeve to get at my wrist.
“Gabriel…” She was practically incoherent with whatever sickness she had. Her eyes were cloudy, unfocused, reminding me of Maurice. Kass wouldn’t last much longer like this, and I knew of only one thing to do to help her—the one thing she swore to me she didn’t want.
My blood.
Irises flashing red for a split second, I felt my teeth grow as my lips neared my wrist. I bit into myself, hard enough to make the blood flow freely. I moved my bleeding wrist before her mouth, and she didn’t take it; not immediately. “Before it heals,” I ordered.
Kass tried to send me what I assumed was a frown, but her face hardly moved, and she eventually gave in, suckling from my wrist like a newborn babe. This was something I never thought I’d do, saving Kass, giving her my blood of my own free will. What was I turning into?
From the archway that led to the kitchen, Gabriel stood, eating a sandwich with disinterest. He saw us, our position, what we were doing, and scowled. “Isn’t that sweet?”
I shot him a glare, though it probably did not look very menacing. What had changed in him during that short coma? Why did he seem so different, darker and ruder and uncaring toward the girl he always swore he’d do anything for?
“That should do it,” I said, withdrawing my arm from her, licking my own blood off my skin, the wound stitching itself together before our eyes. I studied her. “How do you feel now?” She had a bit of blood still around her lips, but other
than that, she looked healthy. Her skin was normal, and she was cognizant. The wound on her face was already stitching itself up.
Kass nodded once, whispering, “Better, but I’m going to have nightmares for a long time.” She finally spotted the third presence in the room, and before I could warn her of Gabriel’s difference, she was on her feet and sprinting to him, throwing her arms around him and exclaiming, “Gabriel.”
But he did not return the embrace.
I was a captive audience to one of the most awkward encounters I’d ever witnessed, so, wanting to turn away and not stare at them, I went to the window and found that whoever Gabriel had spoken to was no longer there.
Thirty-Three - Kass
Drinking Crixis’s blood…was disgusting. I wanted to vomit for a whole different reason. But, I had to admit, it did make me feel better. The coldness that enveloped my body for the last few days vanished almost instantly, and the weariness that had seeped into my bones faded. I hated to admit it, but without his blood, I might’ve died.
I vaguely recalled seeing Gabriel, but I might’ve just made it up in my near-death state.
After Crixis healed himself, he looked at me, those eyes—eyes I still very much hated, eyes that I would always hate for the things he’d done to me—seemed oddly kind as he said, “How do you feel now?”
“Better,” I told him, “but I’m going to have nightmares for a long time.” Part joke, part truth. I had Rain’s blood once, after Crixis beat me up, and I never wanted to do it again. In this line of work, though, you didn’t always get what you wanted.
Somebody came in from the kitchen. At first, I thought it was Michael or Claire—where did the girl go? I wondered, but my thoughts trailed off when I saw that it wasn’t Michael or Claire standing there. It was the one person I’d wanted so desperately to return to me, the boy I missed with all my heart. The one I couldn’t stop thinking about, the one…the one Crixis said I was in love with.
Running to him would just prove Crixis right, but I didn’t care. I whispered “Gabriel” and was off the couch, moving faster than I had in days. I flew into the hug, wrapping my arms around his stomach, putting my head against his chest. It wasn’t the first time we’d been in a position like this, but it was the first time he tensed up.
It was the first time he muttered, “Get off me.” So low, so quiet, he didn’t even sound like the Gabriel I knew.
Stunned, surprised, I stumbled back, gazing up at him. He looked different. His skin was free of the thin, intricate tattoos that had been on him, even in the hospital. His eyes seemed a darker blue, and his hair, which recently had been growing whiter and whiter, was now a dark, sandy blonde.
He frowned at me before taking a bite of his sandwich. “Don’t touch me again.”
The words hurt worse than any physical injury I ever got. The breath was knocked out of me, and all I could do was stare up at him, blink, and wonder why.
I shouldn’t continue to stare at him, for he might just decide he didn’t like that, either, and walk out. So instead, I turned to where Crixis stood, near the windows to the backyard…or, where the windows used to be. I moved closer to study the broken wall and shattered windows, careful not to step on any stray glass. “What happened?” I asked.
Gabriel was the one who answered, “Michael.”
My head spun to him, and I opened my mouth to ask what he meant by that, but once more, the blonde’s appearance startled me into silence. This wasn’t the Gabriel I knew.
“He was going to kill you,” he added, finishing his sandwich. Wiping his hands together, he sneered, “I should’ve let him.” And then, without another word, Gabriel went up the stairs, leaving me to wonder if I’d stepped into another alternate reality when I wasn’t looking.
“Do not listen to anything he says,” Crixis advised. “He’s not—”
“He’s not my Gabriel,” I whispered, feeling the bizarre, hormonal, teenage urge to cry. I blinked my watery eyes again and again, knowing that, while he wasn’t acting like my Gabriel, he was my Gabriel. That hurt worst of all. “And Michael? He really tried to kill me?”
Crixis shrugged. “I cannot say. I got here after the fact.”
I couldn’t even picture it. Michael, trying to kill me? Why? He was our Guardian. I’d known him for years. I trusted him. He’d never try to kill me; this had to be a huge misunderstanding.
“You said you were at lunch when Gabriel fell unconscious.” Crixis narrowed his gaze. “Did he eat the school’s food, or…”
“No. Michael packed our lunches.”
“Do not mark my words, for I don’t know the entire story, but it never looked like you had a cold or the flu. It looked like you were slowly being poisoned.”
“You’re saying that Michael poisoned us?”
“Maybe, though I have a suspicion that you were his only target.”
I grew angry. “Where do you get off saying something like that? How do I know that you didn’t do all this? How do I know that all this isn’t because of you?” I felt like a raving lunatic. If it was him, he’d had plenty of chances to kill me when I was alone with him in the attic of a house, and no one knew where I was. Poison didn’t really mesh with Crixis’s skillset, anyway.
“I did not poison you, and I would never even dream of poisoning your boyfriend.” Crixis looked away. “I don’t have a death wish, unlike you.”
Running my hands through my hair, I wanted to scream. “Why? Why would Michael do something like that?”
“If I had to guess, it would be to awaken Gabriel.”
Right. Because after I died last time, he went berserk. He turned into something terrible.
I crossed my arms. “What are we going to do?” I didn’t particularly enjoy talking with Crixis, but now, who else did I have?
“Your friends must be told of what happened. The house needs to be fixed. While that happens, I will take care of Michael.” The evil Daywalker was so assured in himself, and with everything I knew about him, I also knew that he was the right Demon for the job.
Still, I found myself asking, “How?”
His bright green eyes looked at me like I was stupider than a box of rocks, and his voice spoke as if it were the simplest thing in the world, “I’m going to kill him.”
The Nightwalkers Saga: Books 1 - 7 Page 121