by M. Leighton
Although I doubted I would ever have any more insight into why he looked and dressed the way he did, I was at least given a very personal look into what the scythe was for. As I watched him loom above my prone body, I saw what he was looking at. My tethers. I could see the red tendrils waving lazily in the space between my ethereal form and my physical body, connecting one to the other in a normally-invisible manner.
When the Grim Reaper raised his scythe, I felt a jolt, like a shock to my soul, over what he was about to do. Instinctively, I knew he was going to use his deadly blade to sever the connection, slicing through the tethers and freeing my soul from my body. The worst part was, at that moment, I had no desire whatsoever to stop him. I was ready to go, ready to escape.
Until Trace arrived.
From my vantage point, I saw him as soon as he left the doors of the school, my gaze drawn to him magnetically, as it always seemed to be. Although he looked every bit as haggard as I’d noticed him looking earlier, there was a fire in his eyes that I hadn’t seen since his father had done something to him. He looked alive again. He looked like Trace again. He looked like he cared again.
I watched him push his way through the crush of bodies, even shoving Brady out of the way to be able to reach my body where it lay on the ground, still and unmoving. He dropped to his knees and lifted my lifeless head to his chest, cradling my shoulders with one arm as he stroked my hair with his other hand.
“Ohmigod, Peyton! Peyton!” he called, emotion spilling from his tone like invisible tears falling onto the asphalt. “Peyton, please be alive! You have to fight it. You have to fight them. Please, Peyton! Ohmigod, please! Not like this! Don’t go!”
Movement of the Grim Reaper drew my gaze. As if in slow motion, I saw the scythe swing like a pendulum, cutting through the space between my body and my soul, ripping through the diaphanous threads of my life. It was at that exact moment that I felt Trace open unto me.
It washed over me like sunshine. And moonlight. And water. And fire. It was more powerful than all the second natures I’d felt and twice as intense.
I closed my eyes to bask in the warmth of it, in the beauty of it, not needing to see the thick black tendrils streaming from his chest to know that they were there. I could feel them. More profoundly than I could feel my own soul, my own life and what little I held of it, I felt it. Deeply. I felt Trace’s hold on me like I felt gravity holding me to the earth when I walked. They both held me safely, held me securely. They both held me within the bounds of a silent promise that assured me no force in heaven or on earth could take me from them. And I knew it was true.
A berrrring rang out in the in-between space that I occupied. It fell flat as if the sound traveled no further than my ears. Curious, I opened my eyes just in time to see the intimidating blade of the scythe rise and fall once more, passing through the tendrils of my soul where they were joined with Trace’s.
I felt the heart in my body stop for one single beat. Stunned, devastated, and breathless, I waited to see what death would truly feel like.
But it never came.
The smoky wisps of my soul reformed right before my eyes and they curled their reddish vines around Trace’s darker ones, forming a steely bond that I could perceive as much as I could see.
I watched the Reaper raise his scythe again and drag it back and forth through my tethers. And once more, I watched him fail to free my soul from my body. It was not my time to go. And not even Death himself could take what wasn’t his.
A burning heat seared my lips and I looked down at my body. Trace’s head was bent and his mouth was pressed to mine. I didn’t need to be completely connected to my body to feel his touch. I felt it in my soul, in some part of me that existed beyond the physical, in that part of me that was bound to him for all eternity. And it brought me back to life.
Instantly, I opened my eyes and I was in Trace’s arms, looking up into his beautiful amber eyes. Long, tawny lashes closed over them as he squeezed his lids shut and pulled me closer to him, burying my face against his neck.
I raised my arms to wind them around his back, half expecting them not to even work. But they did. And they were strong. Stronger than ever maybe. I felt like I could leap up from the ground and run a ten-mile marathon.
My heart thudded in my ears as my cells swelled to take in what was pounding at me for entrance. I took in all the powers around me and I made them my own. And this time, they didn’t hurt me.
Trace released his hold on me, letting me fall slightly away from his body so that he could look down into my face. He stared at me for several long seconds before he spoke.
I knew what I wanted him to say. But as much as I wanted to hear it, I wanted even more for him to need to say it. I wanted for him to be bursting with it, unable to contain it. Nothing less would do. And so I remained silent. And I held my breath. And I waited.
“Peyton, I…I want you to know that I…”
I was so anxious, I wanted to finish the sentence for him. But I couldn’t. I had to let him come to it on his own.
“I, um, I’m so sorry for the way I’ve acted. I hope you know how I feel about you, despite the way it might’ve seemed. I just…I don’t…” He stopped on a sigh, unable to find the words to express himself. Or the words to tell me he loved me, although I desperately hoped he did.
“Please don’t apologize. I know you haven’t been yourself.”
“Can you ever forgive me?”
I smiled at that. “I forgave you as soon as it happened.”
“I don’t know how, not after the way I’ve treated you.”
“You forget, I know you. Really know you. And I know you’re not that guy. You’re better than that.”
“I’m so sorry,” he said, contrition crystal clear in his voice. “So, so sorry.”
“Don’t be. It’s over. Water under the bridge.”
One side of his mouth twisted up into a wry grin. “I don’t deserve you.”
“No, you don’t,” Brady chimed in, much to my chagrin. He was bound and determined to interrupt all sorts of important moments between Trace and me.
Although his words were snappy, his tone was completely absent of malice, so neither Trace nor I took exception to his comment.
At that point, a truly unwanted voice intruded upon the quiet intimacy of the moment.
“Enough with the cutesy comments. I think you owe us an explanation,” said Amity in her bitter, nasty voice.
“Back off, skank!” came Lacey’s warning. She was just then arriving on the scene, trailing Amity by only a few seconds. I couldn’t help but grin. All Lacey needed was an excuse to unleash on Amity. If Amity was smart, she wouldn’t give her one. I wouldn’t want to tangle with an angry Lacey. She had quite the claws when provoked.
“I told you she was hiding something from you,” Amity said loudly, turning to direct her comment to the subdued crowd. “She has the answers you’re looking for. Are you just gonna stand there or are you gonna make her talk?”
As I watched, I realized it wasn’t Amity’s words that were inciting the masses; it was something else. Another gift. She, too, had more than one aspect to her second nature. Not only was she a dream walker, she was a telepath as well and she was implanting dark, angry thoughts in the minds of those around her. And the thoughts were aimed at me. So was the darkness, but Amity wasn’t the original source of that. Someone else was.
Like a slap to the face, I felt the rise of power hit me in one harsh wave as every person around me instantaneously succumbed to her influence. Even Brady was struggling to control his vampiric nature. Lacey and Trace were battling theirs as well.
Shifting in Trace’s arms, I pulled my feet under me and rose unsteadily to stand before Amity. She turned to face me fully, her expression daring me to try and stop her. For a moment, the world tilted as my head swam. I heard the collective gasp of Brady, Lacey and Trace. I paused, holding my breath as I waited to see if I was wrong, if I would buckle under the power agai
n.
But I didn’t. Instead, I felt it and knew it as though I had been born with the second nature of every person in the vicinity. And I could control them all.
I felt the corners of my mouth twitch as I raised my right arm, letting it hang dramatically in the air for several seconds before I whispered, “Shut up, Amity.”
Sweeping my arm in a mock backhand, I imagined that I was connecting with Amity’s flesh and, as if I actually was, she flew into the air and then went skidding across the grass to come to a crumpled stop thirty feet away. Luckily, there was a telekinetic in the bunch, too.
A hush fell across the horde. It was as though the darkness recognized something in me that it respected. Or feared. It was then that I knew exactly why I was wanted outside the invisible walls of Two Lakes.
I could take anyone else’s power and make it my own. And outside, in a world full of powerful people, I would be the most powerful of all.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
I spun in a slow 360 degrees, taking in all the faces, all the eyes staring at me in rapt attention. I could hear the buzz and whisper of their thoughts like a thousand voices in my head. I knew that was something I’d borrowed from Amity for the moment, although I felt like there was at least one more telepath in the group, but not one nearly as strong as she was.
I debated the best way to explain what I knew, to show them what they would likely never believe without visual confirmation. Then it occurred to me that I might be able to show them all at once what I was seeing and feeling and hearing and experiencing.
“This is what I know,” I said simply, clearly, speaking to everyone in the crowd with my audible voice. Then, after taking a deep breath, I pushed into their head one word, a word that was given to me not so long ago. “See,” I said with my mind.
I heard their hushed questions and explanations, but I put them out of my head as I closed my eyes and concentrated. As I’d done with Brady and Lacey and Trace, I sifted through my visions and memories, flipping through them like pages in a magazine. Each one that showed me seeing someone’s second nature or experiencing someone’s power, I let flow out of me and into the channel that was like an open highway between my mind and the minds of those in the crowd.
I let them see. And they saw.
I could feel it in the way their thinking shifted, in their awe and panic, in their disbelief and in their belief. I felt them struggle with the idea first and then I felt them accept it as truth. In some, it settled in their heart comfortably. In others, they resisted. But in all, they knew what they were seeing was real. Deep down, in places they dared not question, they knew it.
When all the minds began to quiet, began to digest this new information, I opened my eyes, wondering what to do next. I didn’t wonder long, however, as the whispers that only I could hear began to guide me in the right direction.
“There are things outside the boundaries of Two Lakes that would hurt us. There are forces at work out there that would take us and use our powers in a battle of wills, a battle between gods. But our God, the one true God, has a different plan. He would have us to fight them, to resist them and to put an end to their manipulation. But we have to be ready. We have to stick together and learn to use our powers. They can’t hurt us in here. We can’t hurt each other in here. Not really. But we can learn. And we need to learn.”
The hum of dozens of questions began to rattle around inside my head and I immediately felt overwhelmed. I had very few of the answers they sought. And it wasn’t helping that I could hear their thoughts. I knew I needed to get out of there so that the only voices in my head were either mine or the whispers I’d learned to rely on.
As if sensing my need, my growing desperation, I felt Trace’s fingers slide across my palm and lace with mine. He didn’t say a word and I didn’t look back at him. Then again, I didn’t need to. I felt his comfort and strength like a steel blanket, warm and protective.
I wondered absently if I should tell everyone about the meadow at the edge of town, wondered if there would be any purpose in it. If they saw what we’d seen that first night…
That decision was taken out of my hands, though. Accidentally, of course, but irrevocably nonetheless.
“Then lets meet there tonight,” Carly Simon said.
I was stunned for a moment, wondering if she meant what I thought she meant and how she’d known what I was thinking. But then I realized that I’d inadvertently let that thought flow out of me where it could be perceived by the others. And now they knew.
The rest of the group started clamoring about meeting there and I knew that they would be going with or without me. I figured it would always be a good idea for us to stick together as much as possible, so I went with it.
“All right, tonight then. We’ll meet at the meadow. Ride together as much as you can so that there will be fewer vehicles there. And whatever you do, don’t leave the meadow!”
My classmates began to talk amongst themselves after that, plotting and planning and wondering aloud. They began to separate into the small groups I was more accustomed to seeing them in, like the cliques every school has. I felt that the group would’ve broken up soon after that anyway, but we weren’t given the chance. Just then Mr. Salenger burst through the doors, threatening us all with detention if we didn’t move our butts to class.
As bodies scattered, Trace, Brady, Lacey and I took the opportunity to move in a different direction, making our way quickly to Brady’s Jeep and then off the school grounds. We were quiet for the first leg of the short trip home, each of us lost in our own thoughts about what had happened and what the future held for us. It was Lacey who broke the silence.
“That went well,” she quipped, sarcasm dripping from her tone.
Trace and I looked at each other in the back seat and then I met Brady’s eyes in the rearview mirror before we all burst into laughter. As usual, Lacey herself was the perfect tension breaker.
I sighed. “I’m sorry, guys. I just had to get away from all those minds, all those thoughts. I don’t know how Amity stands it.”
“She’s a nutbird, that’s how. And don’t even get me started on how I think she’s been putting thoughts in people’s heads all these years. I knew there was a reason no one sensed her pure evil soul. Now I know how.”
Although we all snickered at Lacey’s comments, I couldn’t help but wonder if she wasn’t at least partially correct. Amity had obviously learned to use her powers early. Maybe some people could tap into their second natures before Brady triggered them. Or maybe Brady just triggered an anger in them that brought it out in a physical way, a way that I could see.
“Great!” Brady announced with a frustrated sigh.
It only took me a second to realize what had agitated him. There was a red Volkswagen Jetta parked in the driveway at our house.
Aunt Julia was home.
Brady had stopped in the street at the end of the driveway, the engine idling in indecision.
“Just keep going. We can go somewhere else. She doesn’t have to know we were even here,” I suggested.
Before the last word had even left my lips, the front door opened and Julia stepped out onto the stoop. I held my breath, hoping she wouldn’t look up and see us, but she did. She looked straight at the Jeep and pinned us with her stare. It was almost like she knew we were out there.
No one said a word as she motioned for Brady to pull into the driveway. Obediently, he did so, though I could almost hear his gulp of dread. There were few things over which Julia ruled with an iron fist. Skipping school happened to be one of them. It was something she simply did not tolerate.
Reluctantly, guiltily, we all piled out of the Jeep and made our way slowly toward Julia. Brady and I stopped in front of her first, glancing nervously at one another as we waited for the axe to fall.
“Come inside,” she said bluntly. “We need to talk.”
Once again, Brady and I glanced at one another, this time puzzled. Julia’s tone sent fingers of
unease skittering down my spine.
“About what?” I asked, not wanting to go one step further without knowing what lay ahead. I was that apprehensive.
“About what you are,” she answered simply. “What you all are,” she added, her eyes taking in Trace and Lacey as well. She turned to walk back into the house without waiting for us. She knew that, after an answer like that, we would be hot on her heels. And we were.
The four of us followed Julia into the living room. We all remained standing, fidgeting uncomfortably as she lowered herself down into an armchair. She crossed her legs demurely as though she were awaiting a tea cart from the butler, not a care in the world.
She glanced up at us and nodded toward the couch. Obligingly, we each took a seat—Lacey and me in the middle, Trace and Brady on either end. No one said a word. I think we were all afraid to. But then Julia spoke and we wanted nothing more than to listen.
“Let me tell you a story. It begins with two fallen angels, both very powerful in this world. One had power over the sun, the other over the moon. Their influence was minimal in the beginning, affecting only the oceans and the plants. Then they realized they could have an effect on humans to some degree—their personalities, their physical traits. Many scoff at their sway, calling those who study it—astrologers—quacks and lunatics. But here in Two Lakes, the two gods are undeniable, for this is the nexus of their power. We are those most influenced by them. We are the few who are gifted with a second nature.”
Although I was loathe to interrupt, I had to ask Julia, “What is your second nature?”
Julia looked at me and smiled. “I am a witch.”
I nodded, not knowing what else to say to that, not knowing which of the hundreds of questions that flooded my mind to ask next. As a result, I simply held my tongue and waited for Julia to continue.
“Most of your parents have a second nature, which is how you ended up here. They sent you to Two Lakes to mature, to be gifted with your own abilities.”
“Sent us? What do you mean?”
“No adult here is who you think they are.”