Submerging Inferno

by Brandon Witt

  We sat in silence, both of us lost in our thoughts. By the distant haze behind her eyes, I knew she was reliving her nightmare as clear as if it had happened yesterday.

  After a time, I attempted to stretch out closer to Brett, as he seemed more restless. As I lay back, I gasped and reached over to clutch my ribs.

  Cynthia narrowed her eyes in suspicion. “What is it? What did you do?”

  I sighed. “Let’s just say, I may not have found a vampire, but I still managed to hurt myself.”

  Her brown eyes widened again. “How?”

  “Might have broken some ribs.”

  “How in the world did you break your ribs?”

  I gave a noncommittal shrug and didn’t meet her eyes. “Just trying a spell that didn’t go so well.”

  “What kind of spell was that?”

  “Cyn, please! Can you just help me out here?”

  She glared at me, but she came around the bed and moved her hand to tenderly replace mine on my ribs. “Well, truthfully, it serves you right for putting me through so much worry today.”

  Without another word, she closed her eyes, and I could instantly feel her inside my body, a warm, soothing, balmy wave of power. Heat radiated outward from my ribs, a not unpleasant tingling pulsating around them. Within minutes, Cynthia’s eyes opened, tired and worn. “You’d done a pretty good job on them yourself.”

  I nodded at the compliment. “I’ve never been strong at the healing side of things like you.”

  She neither denied nor acknowledged the truth of the statement. Instead, her gaze wandered from my fingers intertwined with Brett’s, traveled over his body, and came to rest on his face. “What about him?”

  I steeled myself, unsure where she was going with her question. “What about him?”

  “What are you thinking? Are you hoping for a relationship?”

  I shrugged. A gesture I knew didn’t convince either of us. “I really like him, Cynthia.”

  “He’s beautiful.” Her eyes returned to me. “Of course you like him.”

  “Well, yeah, he is. But it’s more than that.”

  She waited, smiling gently.

  “He’s such a mixture of confidence and bravado and quiet uncertainty. Like this little kid inside the body of a huge man.” I felt foolish as my eyes got moist. “I don’t really know what it is. I just feel… feel… well, I feel safe with him. At home. And I want to protect him, all at the same time.”

  “Oh, sweetie. At home? You barely know him.”

  From anyone else, such a comment probably would have earned a snappy retort, but not from her. “I know. I know. I can’t describe it. And if someone else was saying these kinds of things about a guy they’d barely met, I’d call them a fool, but it’s true, Cyn. It feels right. Like I might actually have everything I’ve always dreamed of but never dared to really hope for.”

  She gave me a sympathetic look and kissed me on the cheek. Her voice was hushed. “I love you, little brother. If you’d gotten yourself killed today, I’d have killed you.”

  With that, she slid fluidly off the bed, padded to the door, slipped through, and closed it behind her.

  Curling up, my body fitting tightly into Brett’s, I vowed to not leave his side again for any reason until he woke up.

  Chapter 19

  BRETT WRIGHT

  I DON’T remember leaving my house or getting into Finn’s truck. I’m not sure if I checked the bathroom or my room to see if I could find Sonia’s body. I don’t remember if I tried to clean up the blood or turn the furniture upright. I vaguely recall Finn’s voice speaking in hushed panic into his phone as the truck sped us into the night, but the words are unintelligible in my memory. I remember seeing my reflection in the rain-splattered truck door window with every streetlamp we passed, my face slack and dull, the eyes of a stranger.

  I WAS in a bed. The lights were off, but there were a few small candles flickering across the room. Often, I was aware of hands rubbing my back, pulling blankets around me, arms circling me, and a body pressing into my back. Other times, I knew I was alone. I must have passed out at some point, for the next thing I knew, there was light shining through the drawn curtain. I looked at the white comforter wrapped around me, traced the small stitches that made swirling patterns that circled in on themselves before shooting off to make more dandelion tufts whirling through an imaginary breeze on the surface of the fabric. The soft whiteness of the bedspread captivated my world.

  After a time, I realized that the voice imploring me to eat and the hands I sometimes felt against my skin belonged to Finn. Without thinking of it, I knew I was in Finn’s home, in his bed. I didn’t look around. I saw nothing of the room, outside of the eddies of the blanket. I didn’t feel the pressure of Finn’s body as he got in and out of the bed. Occasionally, I would notice that the window was dark and the candles were lit once again. I’m sure I had to have gotten up to use the restroom, but I don’t remember ever leaving the safety and warmth of the blankets.

  I knew that if I stood up, if I lifted off the blanket, if I unwrapped my arms from around my torso, that my chest would rip open, my heart crush into thousands of pieces and fall out in a cascade of ashes onto the floor. I couldn’t even see her face in my mind. I couldn’t remember the exact hue of violet of her eyes, the shimmering of her hair, or the curve of her lips as she smiled. I couldn’t even think her name. All of my consciousness was centered on the gaping hole slashed through my core. Breathing felt like more effort than I was able to give, yet somehow each breath was followed by another one, each ripping the hole deeper.

  The candles had been lit and extinguished at least two different times when I felt a tear leak out of my left eye and make its way across the bridge of my nose and down my right check. I heard a deep, guttural moan and felt my throat crack. After the bed creaked, I felt the arms once again circle around and a hard body press into my back, warm breath against my neck. The sobs wracked my body until it felt as if not only would my heart splinter, but my entire being would fragment, every particle splitting and ripping asunder.

  It would seem that the tears were finished, that there were no more that could possibly come, when a fresh wave of agony would overtake me and the tears would pour out again, putting to shame the ones that came before.

  In time, not only did her name return but so did her face, her contagious laughter, the playful sarcasm in her voice. Each breath I exhaled spoke her name. Each thought another reminder of what I had lost. Sonia wasn’t just a friend. Nor was she only family. She was the one person who had stood by me through everything. The one who had given me strength to face life on my terms, the one who loved me when the rest turned their backs.

  She was gone. It didn’t make any sense. I couldn’t imagine a world without Sonia. I couldn’t imagine me without Sonia. The fact of her existence was as sure as the sun rising each day. She couldn’t be gone. It simply wasn’t possible. There was no choice but for the universe to fold in on itself and return her to her proper place.

  The past couple of times I saw Sonia started replaying through my mind. Her excitement over Derek. Her thrill of finding someone who she thought she could start something real with. Derek! What about Derek? What would he be thinking? What would he do when he found the house in shambles, her blood everywhere?

  With a shake of my head, he flew from my mind, Sonia too powerful to be kept out. I saw her eyes twinkle at me as she took in Finn for the first time. Saw her float through the room at Rascals, delivering beer and cheeseburgers. Heard the concern in her voice as I talked to her about the strange things happening in the ocean as I swam.

  The hole in my chest ripped deeper as I realized I would never be able to tell her about the new world I had discovered. The new me. She would never know that I was more than I appeared to be. Never know that there was magic. Never know about all the amazing things we never thought really existed. With bitterness, I realized that wasn’t true. She did find out that there were creatures that wer
e out of our fairy tales, out of our nightmares.

  She died not knowing I was a demon. She died without knowing there were vampires, at least until it was too late. She died without knowing she was in danger just by knowing me.

  In an instant, the hole burst fully open. Unlike what I’d expected, however, my heart didn’t spill out. It didn’t crumble. It exploded. Anger, like I never knew I could have, coursed through me. I felt my skin grow hot, felt my body convulse in rage. I swept the blanket off of me and pushed myself out of bed. I caught a brief reflection of myself in the mirror as I crossed the room to the door. It was enough to make me pause. I could see the steam wafting off my bare chest and shoulders. However, it wasn’t my smoldering skin that caught my attention. My eyes shone like blue flames. Even in my state of mind, they caused me to stop and take in a breath. For a moment, I felt a stab of fear. Those eyes weren’t human. They didn’t look real. They didn’t look from this world. They were alien. They were terrifying… they didn’t matter. I tore my gaze away from the mirror.

  The front door was visible from the bedroom, and I rushed toward it, swiping the keys off the back of the sofa. I didn’t pause to close the door as I threw myself into the driveway, tore open the door to Finn’s truck, and jammed the keys into the ignition. The truck roared to life and peeled out, tilting precariously as it turned into the street.

  I had driven several miles and had somehow gotten to the Five before I realized I had no idea where I was going or where I had just been seconds before. After a time, I remembered that Finn had said he lived close to his parents, so I had to be in Encinitas.

  I had to find the vampire. I had to rip him into pieces. Stamp his emerald eyes into the dirt. Burn him until he was nothing more than a pathetic pile of ashes in the street that I could piss over.

  For a split second, my mind asked, then what? I shoved that thought aside before it had finished forming and felt the rage begin to overtake me again. I had no idea where I should start looking for him. I closed my eyes and gripped the steering wheel tightly, seeing if I could get a sense of where he was.

  It was the smell and the sound of sizzling that made me open my eyes, not the blaring of horns from the cars around me on the highway. Instantly, I saw black smoke rising from the steering wheel. I pulled my hands off it. As I did, thin inky tendrils clung to my palms. On the steering wheel there were deep impressions of my hands. I was melting the steering wheel. For a second I couldn’t think what was happening.

  I hit the window button with my elbow and shoved my hands out into the breeze, steering with my knees.

  Calm down, calm down. You’re not doing her any good like this. Save it for that fucker, to melt his face off. Breathe, breathe. After several moments, I returned my hands to the inside of the cab and tenderly touched the steering wheel. I didn’t notice any more smoke, so I took that as a good sign.

  I realized I was heading back home. My stomach dropped as I thought of walking through the doors. Could I handle being back there? It didn’t matter. I had to handle it. Period. I had no other idea of where to begin searching for him. I doubted he just stayed lurking around the alley in Old Town, but if I couldn’t think of anything else, I’d go back there too. Maybe there would be some clue at the house, something he dropped, something Sonia had ripped off of him. The thought made me cringe. Maybe she’d found a way to leave me a clue.

  Turning into Hillcrest, I realized that it was daylight. I hadn’t thought about it, but unless the vampire was part of the Royal Family, he wouldn’t be out in the daytime. The thought made me breathe easier. I hadn’t even been aware that I was partly afraid I would find him at the house. On the one hand, it was all I wanted. The sooner, the better. The sooner, the quicker Sonia could be avenged. But what if I couldn’t win? What if, despite everything, he did that ridiculous voodoo with his eyes, and I followed him around like a housetrained puppy? For a moment, I considered going back to Finn’s. Maybe warlocks were immune to whatever powers of compulsion vampires had.

  No, this was my fight. I needed to be the one to avenge Sonia. I would be strong enough. I had to be.

  I SAT in the driveway, staring at the house. Sonia’s car was still parked where it always was, the red paint sparkling like candy in the sun. The house was quaint and charming as always. If things had not been happening like they had been recently, I would have thought I had made it all up, that I would walk in and the house would be just as it always was, that Sonia would be inside talking on the phone or getting ready to go to work, that there weren’t demons, that I wasn’t a demon.

  I knew better. If anything, seeing Sonia’s room the other night had made it clear that I not only knew I was a demon, that there were parts of my past I couldn’t even imagine, but that nothing in my life would be the same again, ever.

  With heavy feet, I made my way to the front door. I started to reach in and get the keys out of my pocket, but my hand couldn’t find its way into the pocket. I glanced down. I’d forgotten. I only had on the sweatpants Finn must have put on me. My bare feet stuck out of the folds of fabric at the bottom. I glanced around to see if anyone had noticed me standing half-naked on my doorstep. I couldn’t see anyone. As I turned back, I positioned myself so I was hiding the doorknob. I had never tried anything like this before, but after everything else, I didn’t question it. I took it firmly in my hands, gave it a sharp twist, and felt it crack. I felt a twinge of disappointment as, with a gentle pull, the door handle slid out into my hand. I guess part of me had been hoping I had made it all up, that I couldn’t smash a doorknob as easily as crushing popcorn.

  Taking a deep breath, I pushed open the door, steadying myself against seeing our home broken and desecrated.

  I stepped through and stared in bewilderment. For a split second, I thought I had broken into the wrong house. There was nothing out of place. The chairs were back in a standing position around the kitchen table, which was no longer split in half. There weren’t any papers or broken glass scattered over the floor. Even the hole in the wall was gone. I walked over to it, cautiously touching it with the tips of my fingers. It hadn’t been patched or freshly painted. It was just whole, like it had always been.

  Glancing into the kitchen told me the same story. Not only was nothing out of place, but it had been cleaned up. The constant pile of dishes in the sink was gone, the counters free of all clutter. Perhaps if it hadn’t been so perfect, so neat, I could have truly believed it really had all been a dream, that Sonia was here, that I was just normal Brett once again. The absence of untidiness screamed as loudly of Sonia’s absence as had the torn-up house.

  I knew what I’d see when I walked into Sonia’s room. For some reason, knowing made it worse. The walls were clean, brand-new. The mattress was bare of sheets, but it was no longer stained with blood. The closet door was reattached. There was nothing that spoke of the travesty that had occurred here. Nothing that spoke of the fate Sonia had met. Nothing to show she had put up a fight. Nothing to honor her death, let alone her life.

  Without searching, I knew there would be nothing here that could lead me to the vampire. Even if he had left something behind, or if Sonia had found a way to leave a clue, it would be gone, just as surely as she was.

  All my fury left in a gush of wind as I sank onto her mattress. The absence of everything brought Sonia’s death home in a harsher way than shuffling through our destroyed house would have. No longer did I feel the surety that I could find the vampire, or that I had any hope of making him pay for all he had done. I curled into a ball against Sonia’s headboard and watched the shadows on the wall gradually shift positions as the sun traveled its course outside.

  “BRETT, sweetie, wake up.”

  I felt a warm hand on my face, a thumb caressing my cheek. I opened my eyes. The room was awash in a pale orange light. I craned my neck to glance out the window. Sunset. I must have fallen asleep.

  “Do you know where you are, Brett?” I turned my head to find Finn sitting beside me. He forced
a small encouraging smile.

  Did I know where I was? In the room of my dead best friend. In the room of the person who had been my rock. Yeah, I knew where I was.

  I managed a nod.

  “You scared me to death, you know. You hadn’t moved in a couple of days. I step out to the bathroom and return to find you gone and the bed on fire.”

  A couple of days? I had to process his words before they made any sense. “The bed was on fire?”

  He nodded. “Yeah. Luckily I didn’t decide to read a magazine while I was in the bathroom. By the time I got back, it would have been like a forest fire.”

  Even as I said it, I felt stupid. “Did I do that?”

  He shrugged. “Dunno. Did you get angry?”

  I grimaced.

  A crooked smile cracked his face. “Then my money is on the partial fire demon setting the bed on fire. What’s your bet?”

  Scrunching my eyes shut, I muttered, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.” I forced my eyes to return to his face. “Did you get it out?”

  “I’m not a warlock for nothing.” He gave me a wink. I could feel he was doing his best at trying to ease the situation—not draw more attention to the fact we were in my dead best friend’s room.

  I started to sit up, but it seemed like too much effort. I lay back down and closed my eyes. Finn sat beside me, his hand making wide, slow circles on my back. The motion made me think of Sonia and how many times she had sat beside me and comforted me when it seemed the rest of the world was out for blood.

  After several minutes, I looked up at Finn. “How did you find me? Do you have a locator spell or something?”