A Boat Made of Bone (The Chthonic Saga)

by Grotepas, Nicole

  “So, uh, what happened, exactly?” she asked. Rather than answer, he pulled his phone out of his pocket.

  “Ooh, time to open the store,” he said and pushed off the wall and crossed the roof to the ladder.

  “Right. That’s cool. You don’t have to tell me,” Kate said, following him. The rain had picked up again and it fell in her eyes and coated the rungs of the ladder. Ferg climbed down first—claiming that if Kate fell, he could catch her. She scoffed.

  “I climb rocks, remember? I’ll be fine,” she reminded him. “In fact, I should be going first to catch you.” He was already down, so it didn’t do much good.

  “But do you climb rainy, wet rock?” he asked.

  Kate made it just fine, managing to only feel like her grip was tenuous once. As they headed through the back door into the store, Ferg told her he had some stuff he wanted her to mail.

  “What?” she asked.

  “You won’t believe it, but we’ve sold a few items online.” He smiled. “Looks like it might work.”

  Kate grinned, elated at the news. “That’s great. I can’t believe you didn’t tell me sooner.”

  He shrugged. “The crap with Emily has managed to eclipse it.”

  “It shouldn’t. You know, last time I talked to her, she acted like she was still into you. I mean, she didn’t say that. But I could tell.”

  “Why, what did she do? I mean,” he said, catching himself. He shoved a hand into his pocket and cocked his head, trying to appear cool about it. “What—what made you think that? That she’s still into me?”

  “Just a feeling really. She was nice to me, and there was this look in her eyes, like this glint, as though she was hoping I’d say something she wanted to hear without having to ask me.”

  Ferg’s forehead wrinkled and the corners of his mouth twitched downward. “That’s it? A feeling?”

  “Uh, yeah.” At the front of the store, Kate tugged on the chain to switch on the ‘Open’ sign. Ferg unlocked the doors and then stood between the metal detector pylons and stared at her, his mouth pressed together in a firm line.

  “Well, I was hoping for more. But I guess that’s something,” he said.

  Kate went around the counter and punched her cashier code into the computer to log in. “Sorry. I wish I could say there was. My point is, just talk to her. I doubt she’s dating that guy. It was probably a one-off. Maybe they’re working on a project for school together.”

  “Yeah, maybe. She’s not in school. Maybe it’s something else. I just—I couldn’t stomach it if it were more,” he said, clutching his torso as though to demonstrate how sick it made him.

  “Don’t be melodramatic, just do it,” Kate said, eyeing him skeptically.

  ***

  “Kate,” Ty’s voice came excitedly through her phone. She was sitting in her room, researching near-death experiences and astral projection. She had no idea why. It was the only thing she could come up with that might explain Will’s experience if he wasn’t dead, like he claimed.

  “Yeah?” she said.

  “Great news! There’s going to be a full moon this weekend.”

  “Oooh, that is good news,” she said. “Uh, why is that good news?”

  “It will make our climbing trip perfect.”

  “Our climbing trip? What climbing trip?” This was the first she’d heard anything about a climbing trip.

  “The one I’m planning, that I designed just for you. It will be a few miles outside Vegas at a super sweet climbing spot. And then, at night, we can hike a little. Desert hiking in a full moon is absolutely gorgeous. Have you ever done it?”

  “Uh, no, but I have work this weekend,” she said, checking the schedule in her Google calendar on her laptop.

  “You can’t get someone to cover for you?” he asked, sounding disappointed.

  “Maybe, but—” do I want to? He didn’t even ask. No, he just took the liberty of planning it without asking if Kate wanted to go.

  “Audra said she’d like to go, and Malcolm will be there too,” Ty said, as though that should appeal to Kate.

  “Audra?” Knowing Audra would be there did make Kate want to go. However, Malcolm’s presence . . . definitely a deterrent. She sighed inwardly, still sort of paying attention to her research and highlighting a section of a website that spoke of demonic visitations by people who’d died and then came back to life. Malcolm. Damn. That’s what she got for pretending to like someone whose personality grated on her so badly.

  “Yeah, I ran into her when I went to the Home Warehouse for a bolt-cutting tool—ours broke when I was trying to get a hold down. The head of the bolt was stripped. Malcolm and I had been talking about the possibility of getting away this week. Audra said she’d be in if we ended up doing anything.”

  “So she didn’t actually say she’d be going for sure?”

  “Uh, not exactly, no.” He laughed. “But I’m betting she’d be into it.”

  Kate sighed. Ty was cute. He smelled good. He liked her. What would she do if she stayed home? Work, possibly see him if he didn’t go on the trip without her, and try to research how to find and rescue Will? She didn’t even know if anything Will had told her was true. For all she knew, he was a demon, trying to lure her into a hell-mouth or something. In her dreams, it all felt so real. She felt like she really loved him. When she woke up, she remembered how perfect the dream was, and she wanted him. But enough to throw away the possibility of something with a real, human man who was a mere phone call away?

  “Let me see if I can get Luke to cover my shift,” she said, smiling hesitantly. Vegas. The desert. It all sounded very tantalizing suddenly.

  “Great,” he said, his voice full of anticipation. “Call me when you know for sure. We’d want to leave Friday morning and come back Sunday afternoon.”

  She hung up and stared at her laptop screen. She still knew nothing about Will’s situation and she had no way to figure out what she might need to do to save him.

  The dream still had a grip on her. She continued to feel the sense of outrage that he was alive and trapped somewhere—the way it felt in the dream when he told her—but the immediacy had faded. She now felt pulled between figuring out what to do for him and making things happen with Ty.

  Her phone rang again before she could resume her research. This time it was her mom. She sighed and accepted the call.

  “Hi,” she said, sounding cheerier than she felt when talking to her mom.

  “Well, there you are. I think this is my twentieth call.”

  Kate grimaced. “Sorry. I’ve just been busy. Trying to find a new job, trying to keep the store from closing, dating . . . you know. Life’s a whirlwind.”

  “Dating? You’re dating?” Her mother’s voice went a little shrill asking that. “This is the first that I’ve heard you’ve been seeing someone.”

  “No. I mean, sort of. Just a few people. For fun. Nothing serious.” There was no way Kate wanted to delve into that subject. Curses! Why had she dropped dating into that casual list? She’d run out of things to say, that was why. She no longer had the excuse of schoolwork to fall back on when her mom brought up Kate’s virtual absence from family life. “Just, some of my friends have set me up on blind dates. That’s all. I haven’t even gone out with the same guy more than once . . . so, um . . .” She trailed off, uncertain if her mom was buying it.

  “Anyone you could bring to dinner? This Sunday? You missed the last dinner when your brothers were here—they were very distraught about that.”

  Kate knew this was a lie. Just another guilt-inducing tool in her mother’s medicine cabinet of control devices. Kate had exchanged a couple of texts with Owen since the dinner and he’d merely teased her about missing the dinner—a few jabs that he knew why Kate never went home. He joked about not wanting to go home either, but he did. Because he was a good son. A better son than she was a daughter, he’d ventured. Kate scoffed at him with a simple mwah ha ha ha.

  “Yeah, sorry about that mom
. I had to work, last minute. And this weekend I just made plans to go down to Vegas with my friends. Sorry. I’d love to be there, you know. I miss you and dad.” That wasn’t a lie, but the dinner invitation solidified her resolve to be out of town. She did miss her parents. As she said it, she noticed the little chasm in her heart where she hid her longing to be hugged by her mom and hear a bit of praise about how well she’d done in her short life. Not that it was true, necessarily, but still. It wouldn’t hurt to hear it from someone that they were proud of her no matter what. Even more, she’d love to be with her dad a bit without her mom around, henpecking him. It would be nice, she thought, to see her dad without the taint of how he’d let her mom down so much.

  “Well, don’t worry about it sweetheart,” her mom said. “I know you’re busy living a single-girl life. I was young once too. I know the kind of pressure you have on you to meet people and socialize. Which friends are you going with? Just so I know who’ll be there. In case something bad happens, not that I’m suggesting something bad will happen, mind you. Will Audra be there?”

  “Yeah, Audra and some guys that we’ve met at the climbing gym. We’ll be camping. Audra and I will share a tent, probably.”

  “Call me when you get back. Just so I know you’re safe,” her mom said. “Can you do that?”

  “Of course, mom. No problem,” Kate said, suddenly feeling like a jerk for not being free for a Sunday dinner. Again.

  ***

  Kate woke up in the room with Will—their room. She was on the bed when her eyes opened and she stared at the dark velvet ceiling with its gems that glittered like stars or distant galaxies. When she sat up, she heard a thunderclap and was momentarily blinded by a flash of lightning that flooded the room. The smell of rain and electricity overwhelmed her before she had her vision back. As it returned, a figure emerged in the direction she was looking. A man, his back to her, his face turned toward the enormous bay window. The curtains were thrown open and outside the violent storm raged.

  Candles burned in wall sconces and from five-foot tall free-standing sconces and flickered across a black long-sleeve shirt and the dark blue jeans the figure wore. His arms hung loosely at his side, but his hands twitched with a nervous energy.

  Kate believed it was Will, but the man’s posture was unfamiliar. There was something animalistic to the curve of his back, the tilt of his head as he watched the storm. Will was always a bit more fun. Perhaps—if Will was right and he was a prisoner living in some cursed place—perhaps it was that he knew what he was now, a man trapped in a world he didn’t love, unable to die. That might be what was in this man’s stance.

  He looked like he was ready to fight.

  His back arched slightly as he appeared to take a deep breath, and then he stopped, mid-inhalation, and his head turned slightly. Kate saw the familiar profile—his nose, the perfectly proportioned lips, and the angle of his chin. It was Will. He turned around all the way.

  “I thought I caught your smell,” he said, smiling at her. It was soft, almost gentle.

  “What, are you a vampire? Or a werewolf?” she asked, teasing him. She stood up and took a few steps toward him, but she stopped before she got very close to him because of his grim expression.

  “Maybe. I feel like a demon. A black angel. I can neither live nor die. At least, I can’t live in the world I wish to live in.”

  “What world is that?”

  “Yours,” he said, frowning slightly, clasping his hands together as though to restrain some emotion he didn’t want to feel. “With you.”

  “And you’re sure it’s not my world you’re in?”

  His nod was punctuated by a burst of wind that threw the rain against the window in a machine-gun attack. “I remember more, this time. There are others with me. We live in a city called Necropolis. Uh, you know of any city on Earth that goes by a name like that?”

  Kate almost laughed. “Necropolis. Wouldn’t that be like, ‘City of the Dead’?”

  “So I’m told,” he said with a sigh.

  “Can you take me there? Now, in the dream?” Kate whispered.

  He walked toward her, slowly, without answering. When he reached her, he took both of her hands in his. His eyes burned with an intensity she’d never seen before. Lightning flashed and thunder boomed through the room, shaking the windows and startling her. She jumped and Will pulled her tight against him. When the momentary blindness cleared, he tilted her chin up to look into his face. His touch was as electric as the storm. Chills scurried through her and her face felt electric from his fingers. Her heart pounded against her chest, against him, he was holding her so tight. Maybe he is a demon? she heard herself wondering far down inside her head. Instead of scaring her, the possibility only increased the thrill of being held up to his body like he was afraid she’d slip away.

  “It’s a place of half-light, of endless mines where many slave away to build the city for the overlord. It sounds like a nightmare, silly even, except that it’s real. And I don’t know if I can take you there, Kate,” he said quietly. “But I know that if you don’t come for me, somehow, this may be the last time I ever hold you.”

  “No,” she said.

  He kissed her. His lips were as soft as rose petals in the sunlight. Their warmth spread through her like a desert breeze. Kate had never been kissed so gently, so humbly, in her life. Even his tongue was hesitant as it moved slowly, carefully into her mouth. Before the kiss could cross over to ravaging, he pulled away and glided his lips over her cheeks, her jaw line, moving to her neck. Each flutter of his lips and nick of his tongue turned her body into a lightning rod. Kate was lit up from within.

  The candlelight guttered in a sudden burst of wind outside the room, as though the window panes had broken and the storm raged inside the room with them. Thunder crashed, lightning blossomed and illuminated the room. Will kissed her collarbone, and pushed the neck of her shirt down over her shoulder, caressing her skin with the tips of his fingers. His mouth moved over the jagged edge of her shoulder where the bone protruded. The roaring in her abdomen for him increased at the sensation.

  The storm outside was at its loudest, most tumultuous. Will stopped and glanced over his shoulder, seeming worried. When he turned back to look at her, Kate was surprised to see tears in his eyes.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked. Whatever it was, it must have been bad for Will to cry. Kate was unsettled by it.

  “Just a feeling,” he said. His breath was hot on her forehead. He tilted her back and put an arm under her legs to lift her up and carry her to the bed. He laid her down, then lay down beside her. His hand moved beneath her shirt, touching her stomach so tenderly. The tears were still in his eyes, and instead of wanting to make love to him, she wanted to know why he was crying.

  “Tell me why you’re upset,” she said, touching the side of his face.

  “The storm—it worries me. Kiss me, Kate, don’t talk, just let me hold you,” he leaned toward her and stopped her from speaking with his mouth on hers. The action became fervent, passionate, as though he was trying to overwhelm something—his thoughts, Kate’s inquiries, the storm outside.

  Something was happening. Kate’s fingers began to slip through him, as though he were dissolving.

  “Will! Will, what’s happening? I can’t touch you!” Her eyes widened, Kate grasped at a mist that only resembled Will.

  “Kate,” he said, his voice fading as his image dissipated and dispersed like fog in the rain.

  “Will!” she shouted, standing up on the bed. She spun around, looking for him in the room, but all that was left were the candles, the shadows, and the storm outside. “Will!” She gave one last yell, suddenly feeling cold and alone. Abandoned. Was this how it felt when Kate was the first to go? Or when she went, did he always go too?

  She slipped off the bed and went to the bay window. Outside the tempest raged on, angry, violent, like it was livid about something. She must be dreaming, she thought and laughed darkly at the thought. K
ate was giving an inanimate atmospheric event emotions. Dreaming for sure.

  She was hollow inside and the dream and their room was an empty shell without Will to give it life. He had been upset, as though he knew something bad was going to happen. And he wouldn’t show her where he was living, almost as though he was afraid to let her see it. Afraid. Or embarrassed.

  Or maybe he was incapable of taking her there.

  Part 2

  “Now thro’ the noiseless throng their way they bend,

  And both with pain the rugged road ascend;

  Dark was the path, and difficult, and steep,

  And thick with vapours from the smoaky deep.”

  Ovid, The Metamorphoses

  22: Taking Chances

  Malcolm was once again pushing Kate to climb lead on a route that he was “freaking positive” she could do, and Kate’s performance anxiety was in full force. Nervous energy bloomed like a creeping vine in her gut as she stared at the route. She found herself more than a little pissed that her handicap cropped up while out climbing with boys—who she wanted to impress—but it never bothered her during a gig. So far.

  “Come on Kate, I’ve seen this one done before by chicks who were half the climber you are. You have it in the bag. Look, Ty will totally have you covered. He’s the best damn belayer this side of Yosemite,” Malcolm was saying as she stood there fidgeting with the belt of her harness and shaking her head to indicate that she wasn’t keen on the idea. He wanted to attach the rope to Kate for a lead climb. No one else had done it yet. They’d been here an hour in which they set up their tents at the campground and then drove along some dirt roads to the area to tackle a few routes.

  “What, so you’re saying there are better belayers in California? Ha!” Ty responded from beside Kate. He’d just buckled up his harness. “Anyway, lay off, Mal. You hate it when people pressure you to do climbs you don’t feel up to, don’t do it to her.”