by Safari Spell
I learned to linger in it so that the next wave, the next stab, would hurt a little less. But Sage’s eyes were filled with a pain I had never known – not watching my frail mother wail as the cancer spread inside her bones. Not watching my father scrub mud on his body as he knelt in front of our burning house. I had known pain, but Sage knew something beyond that.
My fingers rested on the cross around my neck while Sage closed his eyes and kissed me. It was so tender and loving that I nearly dissolved in his lips. We were seamless, he and I. The lips were a portal of goodness – every laugh, every kiss, every kind word spoken. Every beautiful bit of us was in that perfect kiss. I was his, he was mine, and we were happy.
When the kiss came to an end, reality rushed in so fast it made me dizzy. Without Sage’s warmth, I was overcome with a debilitating hollowness. He was saying goodbye to me, to us. His tears were still on my face when he brought his hands up to my jaw, cupping it like he was afraid to push too hard into my skin – like it would break.
And it probably would have. He was searching me with unparalleled intensity and focus, like he was looking for the last time and wanted to remember every single detail. I stood there in his arms, trying not to die. There was such agony in his face at first, but soon the corners of his lips started to soften. Peace seemed to take him, and the longer he looked at me like that, the more it spread to me.
“Remember us,” he said.
“What?”
“It’s ok,” he urged, letting his hands drop away.
“Have you lost your damn mind?” said Ash, sneering.
“Sage, you know what’ll happen to you. You know what’ll happen to her,” Tom said, leaning in.
Sage knew what my leaving would mean. He had been willing to fight for me just that afternoon. He’d been willing to die for me only a few minutes before. But now he was just fine with me being whisked away by his enemy? I was stunned. Hurt. Broken. It jerked my heart around in my chest. Whatever peace I had a minute ago, it was dissolving, and fast, too.
“Ash, Tom – please do something,” I begged.
I was met by only sympathetic stares. They would always do whatever Sage told them to, and he was saying to let me go. I didn’t want a life without him in it. It wasn’t in me to do what he wanted.
I started shaking my head so hard I was sure it would fly off. Something switched inside him. He wanted me to leave? I wouldn’t do it. I started to choke up as he took me in a hug and leaned his lips against my ear. His voice was so calming.
“Don’t be afraid to cry often. Cry hard. It will keep you alive. As long as you’re alive…”
He didn’t finish his sentence. He just ran a hand down my cheek. Shaking his head, he stepped arm’s length away from me, kissing my hand and shutting his eyes tight. His smile started to fade now. Maybe he was finally realizing what he was telling me to do.
“Remember how I loved you. Let that hold you in the dark,” he said, letting me go.
Once the last bit of his skin separated from mine, my blurry, tear-filled eyes turned towards Rami. The seal under my skin started to illuminate, and the longer I tried to refuse it, the more intense the longing. Rami stretched a hand towards me.
“It is time, my love.”
I reached up and touched the tears Sage left on my cheek. Holding the remnants of them in my palm, I brought my hand to my chest and brushed them across my skin. I savored the fleeting comfort of knowing they were once his and they were a part of me now.
When I got a foot or two from Rami, I stopped. He gave a satisfied smile as he closed the distance between us. When I looked up, he brought his lips against my forehead. The kiss struck me right in the heart this time.
A rush traveled across the surface of my skin to my wrist, bubbling up as the letters disappeared and the seal reemerged like braille. It was no longer a brand. It was one with my skin. Organic. Alive. Rami took my hand in his and kissed my open palm, catching me in a gaze I couldn’t shake. I watched his lips take shapes, transfixed.
“Siren, enjoy your last days while I enjoy my wife.”
Sage collapsed to the ground as Mika, Tom, and Ash all gathered around him, affording whatever comfort they could. Blood and tears drenched his wobbling arms, dropping thick to the ground like a holy rain.
When he raised his head, I could see the beautiful hazel I had grown to love already dimming. In that moment, the foggy final words of his serenade played across my memory.
If confused I ever be
About just who you are,
I’ll know you by those eyes so bright
They caught a falling star.
As much as I wanted to run to him – to hold, save, and comfort him – when Rami started walking, my feet took me in the opposite direction. I could feel some part of me remaining with him, beating in that precious heart of his bleeding out on the ground. He was dying, we were dying, and still I moved forward.
But that’s what you do when death comes – you move forward and leave your soul behind. Some people call that dying, but that’s all living is to me.
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CHAPTER 1 of FOR THE AGES
The cold cry of dead leaves underfoot. That’s what I focused on. It was better than the annoying voices of Mannix and Nico, who were behind me carrying on a conversation made entirely of cackling. I just watched my feet move forward, amazed they could continue when I only wanted to crumple up in a heap and die.
Before long, we stopped at a stringy dirt road between fields. I kept my eyes down while I waited for the pull from the wretched braille seal that stained my wrist and my soul. Rami’s name in my skin was an invisible chain both seductive and sickening in its manner, like a feather with razor edges. I should have guessed the fallen angel the name belonged to would treat me exactly the same way
Keep your cross hidden.
The words felt like wind moving inside me, so I obeyed and quickly tucked my cross necklace under my sweater. They were the last words mom said to me. Even broken and numb, I obeyed her from a memory.
Meanwhile, Rami’s cackling henchmen trudged past me on one side, hauling a stumbling pair of jeans along. It took me a minute to realize the jeans were Jesse. I could only assume that they were bringing him along to keep me compliant, but holding my best friend’s brother as a hostage wasn’t part of the deal.
“No, wait,” I croaked, calling after them.
But they were already gone. As far as I knew, they were going to murder him in the fields on the edge of Beaty Mansion. If I’d had one more ounce of courage, I’d have demanded Jesse’s release. Instead, I wiped my chapped nose again with my numb fingers.
The late December wind was brutal as it swirled through the open field around us, stinging my eyes with its bitterness. A new year was merely days away and I was going to spend it in a world without Sage.
As I wiped a worthless tear from my cheek, Rami and I caught eyes. His were shining again in that creepy way of reminding me he wasn’t human. The longer ends of his wavy hair were whipping in the wind across his bearded cheek and over his collar, looking like black fingers reaching out from their graves. Reaching for me. We held the gaze for several seconds before his tall frame moved forward once again. Shivering, I dared look over my shoulder towards Cypress, almost expecting to turn into a pillar of salt as punishment.
As much as I hated my hometown because it’s where mom died, it felt like my heart was being buried alive as I left. Even though mom was gone, Dad was well again thanks to Sage’s healing. It was cruel that I finally had him back and I would probably never see him again. Knowing I was only a mile away from Azalea’s house and everything so familiar made my heart flutter and ache all the way down to my tingling toes.
I could try running back to everyone. They weren’t far. Sage was probably still bleeding out on the ground, still alive for a little
longer. But he was the siren, and there was only one way to kill one. I had done that willingly. Instead of making a run for it, I turned back towards Rami and saw him waiting for me just inside a crop circle about fifteen feet away.
“Have no fear,” he said, offering a hand.
When I looked at the lines glowing at my feet, I was absolutely sure the ground was breathing. As if that wasn’t terrifying enough, everything outside of the symbol seemed dark and foreboding. Evil seemed to descend all around in the dark spaces I couldn’t see, and my wrist assured me that to be with Rami was the only way to be safe.
As soon as I stepped inside, a quivering jolt shook me. It felt like being baptized with fire in my bones, and for a moment my nostrils clogged with water. Fire and water were together inside and all around me, so I panicked and flailed, certain I’d just walked into a supernatural landmine.
I lurched inside the crop circle, gasping and whimpering as I touched my face to be sure I hadn’t burned. I only relaxed when I saw that I was completely unharmed. When I looked up, I saw Rami smiling at me in this tender way. At the time, I thought it was because he enjoyed watching me break, but that wasn’t it at all.
As I gathered myself and took trembling steps towards the center, the crop circle began to shrink behind me. There was no going back now. Rami wanted me to know that. When I was only a few feet away, there was a momentary glow like a flash of lightning behind me.
I whipped around to see a wall of air and energy that moved like glass. It was a sort of doorway for sure, and I knew that’s what I’d passed through. When Rami whispered to it, the mirrored veil shivered before dropping into the earth at our feet. The water fizzled out like fire, scorching the ground.
Seconds later, the ground began to shimmy and groan. It was so violent, my insides vibrated. My focus shifted quickly as things began to change all around us. The earth began bending and turning, scenery changing and cracking, folding like origami all around us.
My first instinct was to grab something, to hold on, but there was nothing, not even the ground. While the world around me was flipping and switching, Rami and I remained perfectly still and supported as though the ground was still under our feet. Still, my chest tightened; afraid the next motion would bury us.
I couldn’t understand how it was happening. The earth didn’t work like this. Layer folded over layer and slammed down into place, a kaleidoscope of fields, streets, even buildings. Finally, the furious turning slowed to stop and the crop circle faded away. With it went the light. But I knew where we were, and there were lamps overhead lighting the pathway down.
We were standing on the steps of Radium Springs, one of the most haunted and beautiful places in Cypress. It scared anyone with sense. I'd only been once or twice in my entire life; mostly because water that temperature probably gave more than a few people hypothermia. People had been disappearing from here for decades, and suddenly I knew why.
The water’s eerie black shimmer chilled my core. It’s said there is a cave system at the bottom of the beautiful abyss; complete with frozen bodies of lost divers. At least, that's the stories we always heard growing up. Someone was always drowning in the springs, but of course they could never find a body. The city finally closed down this entrance several years ago.
Weeping willows hung over the foreboding water, daring only to dangle breathlessly just out of reach. Even they wouldn’t tempt the wicked pool. Massive rocks lingered below the shivering surface like earthy icebergs latched to the edge of the world.
Large shadows seemed to move through the moonlight under the surface, making my blood thicken like icicles pushing through the veins – a burning hollow.
Rami walked down the cragged steep stones a few feet and stopped. Somehow he sensed I wasn’t following.
“Come, my love.”
Heart beating wildly, I stood on the edge of the hypothermic murder pool.
“I almost drowned once.”
“I know.”
I wanted to ask how he knew, but I didn’t. I watched the water push away from him by a good foot on all sides. Water was falling up, so I decided if the water did that for him, I shouldn’t push my luck. I didn’t want to, but I knew my only choice was to follow. He led me through the deepening, darkening cavern. The only light was the moon glowing through the waters around him, bewitched with his power.
I nearly slipped on the steps once or twice from trying to move too carefully, as odd as it sounds. Once we stepped into the first cave, Rami raised his hand and brought the water down. It crashed back into itself, thundering loudly as it covered the pathway and slammed into an invisible wall in front of us. The cave walls ruptured and shook, but none of the debris hit us.
It was humbling to witness, but I tried to act like I wasn’t holding my breath over every single thing he was doing. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed a glistening spider web extending across the entire cave up ahead.
It didn’t look like a normal spider web. Forget that it would require a gigantic underwater spider to patrol it. It moved like the glass in the crop circle. Rami walked through it as though it wasn’t there, so I did the same. No jolt this time.
Once through, I looked back out into the dark water still churning from being pushed back. As shadows sailed by, their empty eyes landed on me. Gaping mouths gave silent screams, making me stumble back. Rami just looked at me and then at the water. I felt stupid as I gathered myself, and we continued in silence.
The cave had more turns than I expected, and every time I looked back, the water had begun to quietly rise behind us, filling the spaces with darkness. It was so alien down there, I worried that maybe Jesse was the lucky one. Maybe I was the one to die. Maybe that’s all the Grigori ever really wanted. No one would ever find me in Radium Springs.
After what felt like forever, out of the darkness there appeared in front of us several men standing around talking. There were at least half a dozen of them, and they had a glow about them like the sons before an evo. I stood and stared at the enemies of God and man. It was surreal seeing them in person after hearing so much legend and mystery.
There was nothing terrifying or menacing about them. They looked like a group of men talking together after coming out of a restaurant. They were all different nationalities. Some were dressed in suits, others in casual street clothes.
When we approached, they all fell silent. I glanced up quickly to see eyes of fire. You wouldn’t know there was anything different about them at all if it weren’t for the burning behind the eyes. It’s a burning even the blind can see; every color reflected and refracted through an ancient anger. Unyielding, unsettling, and fixated firmly on me. I shut my eyes as tight as I could, praying they wouldn’t burn through.
Rami spoke to them in some strange tongue made up of sounds jumbled like a puzzle to the senses. I’d heard the band speak it (I learned it was called Yahweh-Elata), but never in full sentences, just words. It was odd to hear a new language – or rather, the oldest one. I stood a few feet behind them, but once Rami finished whatever he was saying (probably how they should murder me), he turned and ushered me forward.
“Some of my brothers may speak to you now. Do not fear them.”
I came a foot or two closer and did something like a nod. Not quite a nod because I didn’t want to agree to talk to anyone. Suddenly it hit me again that Sage was lying across town dying. Dying because I didn’t stay. Dying because I went with Rami. Dying because of me. It took everything in me not to cry.
“It’s a lot to handle in one day, isn’t it?” asked one of them, offering a handkerchief.
I took it, catching a quick look at him as I did. He wasn’t imposing; he was a comfortable presence with a tender, vague sympathy in his eyes. Eyes that didn’t burn. They were dark brown.
“Your name’s Talor?”
I nodded, wiping my nose as daintily as possible. I didn’t want to dirty up his gesture of goodwill by wiping my emotional snot all over
it.
“Ah, Ta-hime. I’m Okabe,” he said.
I stared at him, not sure what to say. Did he expect me to comment on his name? He shrugged as he pointed to the handkerchief.
“Don’t be shy about using that, Ta-hime. You’ve got a situation.”
“Thank you,” I mumbled, wiping my nose more liberally.
Just then, another one approached, but his manner was quite different. His eyes were like gold – reflective, sharp, captivating. Chestnut hair tumbled down the sides of his chiseled face, suggesting a carefreeness he didn’t actually have. There was this perpetual look of disgust disguised beneath masterful layers of regal neutrality.
“Rami, she’s too young and she has blood on her soul,” he commented coldly, staring like he was trying to explode me with his mind. It seemed a bit rude considering we’d never met, but I wasn’t exactly in the place to argue about manners. He looked like someone you had to pick your battles with, so I stayed quiet. That was wise.
“I know, Saiza,” Rami said.
The one he called Saiza tilted his head as he looked me over again – a little less murderous this time.
“She will be troublesome to you.”
Rami didn’t respond. He just glanced at me. In the uncomfortable silence, Saiza straightened and shifted his focus to Rami.
“You could have a more suitable wife. This one is –”
“My choice. This one is my choice, Saiza.”
Saiza ran his hands lazily up his forearms, pulling back the sleeves.
“Let us take the siren now while he is unhidden and weak. Let us end your pain, brother. You have suffered long enough.”
Rami took in a deep breath. One corner of his lips curved up as he narrowed his eyes at me. Whatever he said next made everyone murmur. Saiza turned towards me, scrutinizing a little harder. He brought a hand to his chin and started rubbing it thoughtfully.