by Scott Tracey
“Ash doesn’t belong to you, she’s mine!”
Okay, this was clearly more than just some sort of lovers’ quarrel. Justin pulled a knife out of his jacket pocket—where the hell did he get a knife—and it wasn’t just a knife but one of the black-hilted athames Quinn kept locked up in his room. All the guardians had a ritual knife—it was the reason they could stand up against creatures stronger than they were.
So what was Justin going to do with his?
“You need to calm down,” I said, holding up my hands, palms facing him. I tried to relax my body, to project every I am not a threat vibe I could. This wasn’t like Jenna’s first spell at all. This was worse.
And it had to be Jenna. She’d already used magic against me, maybe Justin had said the wrong thing and now she’d targeted him. I knew random attack of conscience was a front. She was just playing me, buying time until she could finish cobbling together her new spell. Only this time it had turned out worse than expected. If Justin killed someone or hurt them seriously, he’d never forgive himself.
I’d never forgive Jenna either.
“This isn’t you, Jus. Take a deep breath. No one’s trying to take Ash from you.” And where was Girl Friday when all this was going down? If she’d been there when all of this started, why wasn’t she here now?
“I’m not after your girlfriend, Daggett. I promise, I’m not into her.” Kevin had adopted the same pose as me: nonthreatening. Calming.
“No, you’re just trying to get between us,” he said, voice shaky and yet sure of his words. “I won’t let you take me away from her. She doesn’t belong to you.”
“She belongs to you,” I agreed. “And she doesn’t want you to do this. Kevin’s her friend. Just her friend.” I swallowed, and prayed that Kevin could keep a straight face. “Kevin’s with me. Remember the other day, how weird he was acting? Jenna made that happen, but afterwards we talked.”
“You—you talked?”
“Yeah, we talked. So he’s with me. He’s not after Ash.” I held out my hand, prayed to something I didn’t believe in, and almost smiled when Kevin slipped his hand into mine. He was going to owe me so big for this later. Seriously, it was too bad I wasn’t into him at all. Or that he wasn’t into me.
“So you don’t have to do this,” I said calmly. “Okay?”
A war raged on Justin’s face, the power shifting with every flicker of his eyes. They would latch onto our linked hands and waver, but as soon as he looked away the rage took hold again. And then he’d look back, and struggle. He was still in there, and whatever was controlling him hadn’t totally won him over.
“If I don’t do this,” he finally said, “then she won’t know how I feel. She won’t understand.”
Just as Quinn and Nick appeared at the corner of my eye, just as Kevin pulled his hand free of mine and shouted out a spell, or a warning, or a plea; just as my body froze up and my mind refused to process what was happening, just as someone lingering in the parking lot screamed …
… Justin turned the knife on himself, and plunged it deep into his own stomach.
seventeen
It took twelve covens summoned from the seven corners of the world to free the town of Hamelin from the Abyssal’s grip. But it was too late for their children, swept into a hidden world never
to be seen again. That is the price Hamelin
pays for making bargains with monsters.
The Princes of Hell
Justin dropped, just like that. I caught him just before his head smacked against the concrete, cradled his head even as I panicked at the sight of the knife. Correction: the hilt. It was the only part I could see.
I screamed, I yelled, but I couldn’t remember if you were supposed to take a knife out or leave it in. It didn’t matter. Someone called security, or begged for help, or lit a rescue fire or something. Either way, once someone realized what had happened, nurses and trauma personnel streamed out of the hospital and collected Justin like ants on the hunt for food. It happened fast, like the world was moving twice as fast as I was.
They dragged him back inside, and disappeared down into the ER. It wasn’t until after he was gone that I realized I might have just seen my brother for the last time.
Hours passed.
No one told me a thing. There was a lot of movement around me, a lot of serious tones and sharp actions. But I didn’t care about any of it. I knew Quinn and the others had a job to do, but I didn’t care. It took me over an hour to realize that the two visitors waiting by the doors weren’t visitors at all. They were guards.
The waiting rooms were exactly the same as the ones where Luca was being kept, the same walls painted the same shade of Depression Off-White, and the same untouched coffee cups on the end table. Quinn stayed at my side, probably afraid I was going to do something drastic (if it was Jenna’s fault I was going to kill her) while Nick coordinated everything else.
Every time something happened to one of us, something happened to all of us. Wherever they were right now, Witchers were locking down the other three, making sure they were safe and stayed under guard. It was a toss-up how much they were being told—a lot of the time we didn’t find out there had been an attack until much later. But I doubted any of them knew Justin was even in the hospital. Or why.
It was past midnight, and even though the rational part of my brain kept wanting me to slow down, to take a rest, I was too keyed up to even consider it. I leapt up out of my chair, determined that this time I was just going to walk through the double doors that separated me from answers, and demand that someone tell me what the fuck was going on. The hospital was full of witches, so why was I still waiting?
Quinn blocked my path. I grunted, pushing him out of my way, but as I did, he grabbed my arm and held on.
“Let go! They have to know something by now.”
“We’ll know something when they want us to know something.” I tried again to shake his hand off, but he grabbed harder, refusing to budge. “You need to stay calm.” And then when I didn’t seem to be reacting fast enough, he added a sharp, “Malcolm!”
“Justin could be dying,” I pointed out. There were a lot of things I hated about my life, but there were far fewer things that I feared. Few things that made me want to grab my things and find a dark, quiet space where I could trap myself where no one would ever find me.
Justin couldn’t die. That just … that wasn’t possible. The curse wouldn’t let him die, right? Attempts to separate us, attempts to harm us, and most especially attempts to kill us always fell back on the attacker. In a manner of speaking, it was like we were invincible. But I’d never once stopped to wonder about what would happen if one of us tried to kill ourselves. Was there a loophole in our parents’ design?
“You can use magic to heal him,” I pointed out as Quinn led me back to my seat. Witchers could do that: use magic to heal. Cole barely had a scar from the last attack. Quinn had done that himself.
“They can,” Quinn admitted, “but that’s only part of it. Justin perforated organs—did damage to his body’s systems. Magic can close up the wound and speed the healing, but it can’t un-pierce a kidney or a liver. The doctors have to do their part first.”
Magic was useless.
Justin could be dying, dead, in there and I didn’t know. I should know. We were all supposed to be connected. The connection had defined our lives from the beginning. So why was I still waiting.
Imagine what you could have done, if you’d learned to access the Coven bond. Maybe you could have stopped him. Saved him. Or maybe you’d know exactly how he was right now. All that knowledge was right there at your fingertips, and you turned it away. It was Jenna’s voice in my head, Jenna’s and my own. I couldn’t tell which voice loathed me more.
I’d already thrown up once, but I wasn’t ruling out a repeat performance. Seeing him … with the knife. It slid into hi
m so easily it looked fake, but the force that must have gone into it. There wasn’t any hesitation at all.
“They should be here,” I muttered.
“You know why we can’t do that,” Quinn said, just as patiently as ever. “You shouldn’t even be here right now. I’m supposed to evacuate you until we know more.”
It was a long night. I dropped off somewhere around two, only to startle awake every time a pair of shoes squeaked on the tile. When I looked down at the coffee on the table next to me—a coffee that had been there for six hours at this point—the cup was still freshly steaming. I’m hallucinating, that’s all. No big deal. But when I reached out to touch the side of the cup, it was warm against my skin.
Quinn nudged me in the side. I looked up, followed the turn of his head and saw Illana walking out of the double doors with a white-coated doctor. I was so busy studying his face for signs of Justin that I barely even noticed the woman at his side. There was another woman in her wake, doddering behind with a strange gait, though she worked valiantly to keep up. She listened intently as Illana spoke quietly with the doctor, a conversation that dwindled and drifted away as they approached.
“Justin will make a full recovery.” Those were the only six words I needed to hear, and the moment I did, I slumped back down into my chair. I hadn’t even realized I’d come to my feet in the first place, the trip back down unsteady enough that my vision blurred. An exhaustion I hadn’t paid enough attention to was suddenly roaring in my ears, but how was I supposed to sleep?
Justin was going to be okay. I swallowed because there were things that needed to go back down, thoughts and feelings that needed to be chained up and dropped back into the ocean where they could sink to the bottom.
“I think that will be all for now, doctor,” Illana continued, making a shooing motion with one hand. She moved in front of me, although all I could see of her at the moment was her black and purple skirt that hung down to her ankles. I put her out of my mind, though, and focused on pulling myself together. My head throbbed and I couldn’t tell if I’d been ignoring a headache for the last few hours, or if Illana’s news gave it permission to finally come out of hiding.
Okay, I needed to go home. Figure out what to tell the others and what to do about Jenna. “I have to go. The others need to know he’s going to be okay.”
“The children are all probably asleep,” Illana said dismissively. “First we need to—”
“No, they’re not.”
She didn’t seem to mind the interruption. “And how can you be so sure?” she asked smoothly, like she’d asked for my perspective in the first place.
“You’ve met them, right? Bailey always knows when something’s wrong. And even if she doesn’t, I’m sure Jenna’s climbing the walls already.” Though they weren’t actually twins, Justin and Jenna acted like it often enough.
“Yes, I’m aware of that, but I still don’t understand … ” she trailed off and looked to Quinn.
There was a silent conversation between Illana and her grandson, before he finally shrugged out a do whatever you want look. She sat across from me, taking care to arrange her skirt just so. “Malcolm, I want you to meet a very old friend of mine,” Illana started.
The other woman scoffed and interrupted her. “Very old. Bite your tongue, Illana Bryer. That boy doesn’t need any reminders of how many years I’ve spent trying to keep your behind out of the fire.”
Something very nearly like a smile flickered across Illana’s face. It only lasted for a moment, so I could have been mistaken, but she almost looked normal for a moment. It was eerie, like seeing a shark smile. “Malcolm,” she said firmly, “this is Adele Roman. She’s one of the foremost historians of—”
“—Moonset,” I finished. “Yeah, I know.” I eyed the woman again, this time paying more attention to the sharp awareness in her eyes. Illana was definitely a shark, but this woman was something else. Something that didn’t mind lying in wait for her prey. A crocodile, maybe.
“It’s been a long time, Malcolm,” Adele said. She remained standing, just barely taller than the seated Illana. “We met once after you were rescued. Of course, you wouldn’t remember.”
Rescued. It was funny how things were remembered. Like we’d been prisoners, the subjects of horrible war crimes, and the Congress had stepped in and saved us. The truth was that it was a capture. When Moonset left their hidden compound in order to surrender, we’d been left behind in cribs and playpens, just waiting for someone to find us.
“I was barely three,” I pointed out, “so no, it’s all a bit hazy.”
“Illana asked me to come after your encounter the other day,” Adele said. Her demeanor shifted quickly, becoming more energetic and focused. I almost didn’t notice the limp. She moved, and her arms gestured as she spoke, and her words became crisper and more careful. “I know a great deal about Moonset, but I’m also something of an expert on the subject of the Abyssal Princes.”
Ahh. So that was it. I felt my guard go up, some lingering reaction to the sound of the Prince’s voice in my head. There was nothing she could tell me that I needed to know. Now wasn’t the time.
“She’s also informed me of a few discrepancies in my own account,” and with this, Adele shot Illana a dark look that the Coven leader pretended not to notice. “It seems that history was indeed written by the victors, wasn’t it? Maybe if your parents had been recognized for their efforts to halt the Abyssal’s curse, we might have met under different circumstances.”
“What curse? What are you talking about?”
Adele waved a hand. “The Abyssals used to be Fae: chaos-wielding miscreants if there ever were any. But when the Abyss remade them in its image, it placed a hunger in their bellies that can never be sated. To be in this world, an Abyssal must feed. What your father and the twins’ father noticed was a listlessness in their fellow students. Children who once loved art, or sports, or even each other, suffered from melancholy and depression. Nothing could pierce their malaise.
“We believe that each of the Abyssals fosters something in their victims, that a connection forms between them as they come more and more under its sway. And when the connection becomes strong enough, he can collect all of them at once, and feast for years to come.”
“You already know this story,” Illana added quietly. “From the history books. The Pied Piper of Hamelin wasn’t a gifted musician at all, it was an Abyssal. It stole the children away after making itself the center of their worlds.”
“I don’t know what that has to do with anything,” I said, looking between all of them. “How can you be sure this wasn’t Jenna? She just attacked me the other day, and made everyone fall in love with me. She must have done the same to Justin.” But in my head, I knew that no matter how angry she was, Jenna would never have attacked Justin like that.
“Justin tried to kill himself to prove his love,” Quinn said gently. “That’s something stronger than spells. Jenna’s spell made people want to like you. Some were uncomfortable, some were happy to go along with it. But none of them were consumed by their feelings the way Justin was. His rational mind was completely suppressed.”
“So you’re telling me a Prince did this?”
“That is what we’re telling you,” Illana agreed.
“What the Abyssals do is an infection. It will spread. It probably already has. But the good news is that we have time to stop this,” Adele added. “In the meantime, Justin will be kept safe.”
“Kept safe where? Here?”
“Your brother has been passing this plague on to God knows how many people.” Illana pursed her lips together. “We’ve established a quarantine around the town. Wards and fascinations to keep the humans from asking too many questions. Everyone will be on the lookout for new infections, and we’ll bring them here until this matter is settled.” Her voice had an iron finality to it. There was only one way thin
gs would be settled here, and they’d end with something in a grave, one way or another.
“I don’t understand. How the hell do you quarantine an entire town? Are you kidding? You’re not the CDC.”
“We’re the next best thing,” Illana replied with a haughty sniff. “Magic can make any number of problems disappear, if you know how to approach it best.”
“Can it bring Justin back?”
At this, all three of them turned away, looked down, looked anywhere else. “What?” I asked, aggrieved. Now wasn’t the time for them to bite their tongues.
“As far as we can tell, the spell is only broken with the death of the Abyssal.”
I thought back to the monster who lamented his inhumanity. The moment of understanding I’d felt—like I was the only person in the world who could understand him. Who got it. “Oh. Okay then.” And with only a moment to process, I made my decision. “So we kill him. Tell me how to do it, and I’ll do it myself.”
“It’s just,” Adele started, flummoxed for words. “That is to say … there aren’t any records of how Moonset killed the last Abyssal Prince. All we know is that there were once seven, and now there are six.”
“This is why the Abyssals are considered so dangerous,” Illana added. “They escape so rarely they are almost myths, but when they do, they are nearly unstoppable.”
“Okay,” I said, thinking about the blossoming trail of red as it had spilled out of Justin. The look on his face, sincere and fevered in his quest. “Okay.” I took a deep breath. It was one thing to wish for another life, but it was another to do so at the expense of the old life. “Okay.” Third time was the charm. I closed my eyes, feeling a lifetime’s worth of buried feelings struggling to reach the light. There were many good reasons why I was the way I was. And not a single one of them mattered a damn.
All I could see in my head was Justin and the knife, and how casually he’d almost thrown his life away.