The Warrior

by Kay Camden

  *

  He comes out again about an hour later. “I need details.”

  No, he really doesn’t. Not the details I’m thinking about right now. Like that absent way she’d sneakily slide her hand in mine, almost like she didn’t think I’d notice, or was afraid of what I’d do if I did. Or how she’d lean forward a little when I’d try to sign. How she’d just go with it, not correcting me, not criticizing. She’d figure it out and respond and not say a damn thing about how stupid I am. Or how I’m wondering if it’s possible for a fifteen-year-old to have a heart attack because I can’t sit here anymore and guess at whether she’s improving or not. My heart is fit to explode.

  “I need to know what got her into this state.”

  So he doesn’t know what’s wrong? Not comforting at all. I thought Bevans were supposed to know everything.

  “She cured my family—all of them. Stole their hate. So it’s stuck inside her now, and—”

  “She stole their what?”

  “Hate. It’s some kind of black magic thing. I don’t really know.”

  He turns away from me, stares across the yard. Coyotes slip from the forest as if summoned, awaiting orders. “You’re saying she’s full of Moore evil?”

  “Yeah.” And it needs to come out now. Doesn’t he know how to get it out of her? “It’s used by black magic, but I don’t think she knows how to use it, or—”

  “She didn’t want to release it back into the world.”

  I nod at him. I don’t even think I realized that. He goes back inside.

  And something occurs to me. All that hate was contained in a whole bunch of people. Now it’s in her. It needs a new carrier. A new host. It’s only fair that Moore evil go back into a Moore. And just like that, my purpose is laid before me. It’s meant to be. It’s written into prophesy. One of us destroys the other. I—my family—tried to destroy her and failed. That’s proof it should be me. I’m the one to be destroyed.

  I bang on the door. A different woman, with Sloane’s thick dark hair, her long bangs—only cut even, not rebellious. Holy oak, Sloane’s mother. I’m momentarily speechless, too fascinated to have Sloane’s home life so easily revealed. I used to dream about coming here. Not like this, though, as a peon waiting on the porch. Something more along the lines of home invasion slash mass murder.

  “I’m sorry, Rex, I wish I could—” She turns to glance inside the house as if checking to see if she can get away with something.

  “I need to talk to him again.”

  She disappears. He returns in her place.

  “Put it in me,” I say.

  He comes outside with me, closes the door.

  “It belongs to my family. It should be mine. Put it in me.” I hate how desperate I sound. Be a man, Rex. Don’t screw this up.

  His eyes turn to slits and he leans into me, just enough to make me want to step back. “What is this?”

  I stay put. Try to appear at ease. “I’m not who you think I am. Not anymore, anyway.”

  He starts to say something, rubs a hand over his mouth instead. It shouldn’t be so unsettling.

  “It’s too much for one kid to handle,” he says finally.

  “But not for your daughter?”

  Scrutiny comes again, so intense I wonder if those five words gave away more than I wanted to. Controlling the gritty desperation in my voice has defeated me. I’m too exhausted, too sober. I need both an upper and a downer. I need a year of sleep. And yeah, I’m desperate. Desperate beyond words.

  He reaches. I flinch against the shoulder squeeze I only ever get from Aaron, too shocked to move away. He’s probably altered it just enough to pinch some hidden nerve that’ll cause my brain to slowly swell and kill me in my sleep. I’m tragically in love with his daughter. He probably should kill me.

  The door opens. Is that Christian Moore? My luck can eat shit.

  “Everything okay out here?” he asks, glancing between me and him.

  I’m not going to answer such a complicated question. Apparently no one is.

  “Why don’t you two bring it inside? You’re making the ladies nervous. They seem to think you need supervision.”

  We say nothing. Christian goes back in the house, watching me as he closes the door like I’m a victim he can’t save. I don’t need saving. It’s Sloane who needs help. I drove her here because this is her last hope. Someone needs to do something. I need to do something, if only he’ll let me.

  “If you want to take this on, I won’t stop you,” he says.

  “You have to tell me how.”

  He turns away, knocking a fist against his leg. The coyotes are back, nearly invisible in the thick grounded darkness that’s overtaken all I can see. If not for the white light of a waxing gibbous moon, I’d have no idea I was being stalked by so many eyes. They left for a while, but they’re here now like they need a briefing. Yes, I’m still here. Yes, I’m still not welcome. No, your queen is not awake yet.

  He pushes into the house, holding the door open for me. I don’t move because c’mon, I’d rather spare myself from that bucket of awkward. Then he jerks his head and I’m marching in as if that motion was a crack of a whip. The warmth inside is bliss. I’m suddenly aware of how hunched and stiff I’ve become against the chill out there. He takes me into a microscopic kitchen and makes me sit in a chair at the table. The woman who walked down the driveway comes in to replace him, taking up a position against the countertop. Arms crossed, hostile look even more serious than before.

  “Are you my keeper?”

  She says nothing. In the reflection of the sliding glass door, I see him and the granny go into a door. Their feet creak on stairs, moving down and away. I pretend I’m not under sadistic surveillance and allow my shoulders to slump, my arms to settle on the table, and my head to crash on top.

  *

  I wake up jumping from the chair. It’s just me and him again. Someone’s killed all the lights, leaving only a dim bulb on over the stove. He sets something on the table. I blink and rub my eyes so it comes into focus: two small cubes wrapped in brown paper and tied with a string.

  He offers a folded piece of paper to me. I take it. Open it. Spell words in Irish.

  “Do you want to get some sleep before you do this?”

  “I just did.”

  I pick up the two wrapped cubes. He leads me out of the room, down a narrow hall, and stops at a closed door. It’s only about ten paces, the house is so small.

  With his hand on the knob, he turns to me. “I know Sloane trusts you. She gave you that.” He points at the lump under my shirt made by the amulet. No idea how he knew that was there. It’s been hidden the whole time. “Don’t let her down.”

  It’s the extended pause afterward that gives the statement so much threat. I say nothing because I don’t trust my stupid mouth.

  We enter a room of flickering candlelight and rippling shadow. Sloane lies flat on her back on a tiny bed against the wall. A little kid sleeps curled next to her legs like a dog. Her mother sits in a chair at the bedside, her hand resting on Sloane’s limp one.

  “We took a shortcut with the magic. Her grandmother seems to think your minds are already bound.”

  Since I’m sure both confirming and denying that would get me in trouble somehow, I stay quiet. And I’m also not sure Sloane would want him to know she drew a black magic symbol on my forehead and hers, or how many times she’s done that on others.

  He goes to her. Brushes her bangs aside, kisses her forehead. Then he picks up the sleeping boy and follows Sloane’s mother out of the room.

  I unwrap both cubes. Part her lips, tuck one inside on her tongue. Take one on mine. Then I read the words from the paper, and I’m drawn in and away so fast I’m not sure if I’ve finished them or not.

  My limbs dissolve. I have no sense of up or down. But there’s a famil
iar sensation all around, burying me. I push and kick and dig and—there. There. I think her name but I can’t sound it out. My tongue doesn’t work right in this world.

  The familiar blanket of hate hits me hard. Instead of struggling against it, I make a blind grab, pulling it in like tug-of-war with an imaginary force. It spills in, familiar yet foreign. An old part of me I’ve learned to live without, returning like an old friend. I yank and gather and tug and there, back there, it’s her. She’s there, she’s behind all this. I need to suck it in and away and free her, make her right again.

  Resistance. No, Sloane, quit that. I dig in my heels and take more, more, more. It’s clearing up what I see ahead. I’m weighted and buried, but I keep fighting until it’s all mine, gathered into me, stolen from her.

  *

  I’m on all fours, gagging, choking, gripped by a savage, invisible creature. My body’s trying to throw it off like an opponent in the ring but it’s a no-go. I’ve lost this one. I need to just let it have me.

  I get to my feet, still bent, crippled under the toxic mass swarming in my guts, my blood. I reach for a dresser to stabilize myself but my arm slips, bringing objects crashing to the floor.

  She’s sitting up in bed.

  My vision doesn’t last long enough to enjoy it. I’m on all fours again, feeling the floor but not seeing it. I need to see her, to get some kind of payoff for this mess I’m in. I crawl to where I think the bed is and hit something soft. Then I feel hands on my arms, her hair brushing my cheek. She’s helping me up. It’s just enough to get my feet under me. She pulls me toward her. I drop onto the bed.

  Her arms around my neck. The tip of her nose pressing in. Her smell, her smell.

  Inside, the mass presses in, crowding my chest, my heart. Expanding down both arms that are now shoving her. I try to control the level of shove but it gets away from me.

  “Away,” I choke out. “You have to get away.”

  It’s taking over again. Replacing that bright ecstasy that lights up with her smell with things I’ve been taught. Stories I’ve been told. My training. Our hate.

  She reaches. I stand, stumble away. Get my hand on the doorknob, twist it open, fall into the hall.

  I’m in their house. Here to save their daughter but majorly unwelcome. I drove across a fucking country for them and this is the hospitality I get? My boots can’t get any traction on this floor, and I need to get up, get out. I crawl out the end of the hall then use a nearby armchair to help me stand.

  He materializes in the doorway to the kitchen, Sloane’s mother behind him. Not even a thanks from Bevan trash for what I’ve done for them. I make a break for the front door, falling against it, twisting the knob. I miss the step and I’m down again, rolling off the edge of the porch.

  I just need to stop fighting. Embrace it. This isn’t just hate but power. It’s what drives us, what fuels our survival. Without it we’d be as pathetic as the Bevans, living like savage animals, content in our inferiority.

  It spreads through me, a cool perfection. The comfort of an easier time. A favorite jacket found at the back of a closet, shrugged on, zipped up, fitting even better than before. I’m upright now. I feel righteous. I’m glowing. The trees are bending at the tops but fuck them. They won’t come down. Not on me. I’ll set them on fire.

  Feet pound gravel behind me. I spin, annoyed I left every weapon in the car. It’s only her, though, one hand raised, spelling my name. If only the return to normalcy could’ve purged all that knowledge too. Recognizing the letters is a complication I don’t need right now.

  She reaches. I take a step back. I’m surprised I don’t need to kill her anymore. The return to normalcy didn’t fix that either. I’ll have to work on that. She tightens her mouth like she’s clamping down on tears. I’m washed through with some kind of stomach-gushing panic. It might change something if she does any more of that. I need to go.

  Too late though. She’s surged forward, her arms around my torso, her face against my chest. My new stable ground shifts, crumbles beneath me. She’s eroding it. I can’t return to that crippled mess I was inside that house. I peel her arms, pry her loose. Shove her back. “I have to go.”

  Big tears now. Her eyes are endless wells. I turn away and walk off the panic, ignore the gush that floods me with each pound of my heart. It’s an illusion. She’s done this to me, and it will only get worse until I get far away.

  The R5 is waiting, boxed in by those two cars. I inch out and around, floor it up the hill to the road. Think about home. Don’t think about her. Drive, Rex. Drive.

  Epilogue

  Sloane

  The summer solstice arrives too fast for what I’m about to do. Five years of crafting magic will finally be put to the test, and I’m not ready. Nervous stalling would’ve gone on forever, though, so yes, today’s the day. No more excuses, no more waiting.

  I pack my supplies into the trunk of my hand-me-down Camaro. These last couple years spent living so far from my family would’ve been more lonely without such a familiar piece of my dad here, even though I’m living in his cottage. The version of him who lived in this house has been purged with every room I’ve painted and each light fixture I’ve replaced. Cottage chic has replaced dated and depressing. Instead of hauling away the old abandoned furniture, I updated knobs and colors and polished with new life. Hand-sewn gossamer curtains now hang in every room along with Marcas’ framed artwork, surprising me in the mail one piece at a time. On every wall is a view of home. Pencil-sketched coyotes, their expressions captured with precision. Dappled sunlight sparkling through the pines in full color. Each time I start feeling lonely, he sends a new one.

  Aaron hired a crew to rehab the cottage’s exterior with new white siding, mint green shutters, and a copper roof. He tried to hire landscapers too, but I wanted to clean up the yard myself. The overhaul of my dad’s rose garden took the two full years I’ve lived here to return to health, and it wouldn’t please me so much if someone else had done the work. And new last year: a vegetable garden to rival my dad’s. We trade pictures of our harvests, a contest he always lets me win. I think he’s only showcasing his runts.

  I slam the trunk lid and go back inside for my family’s texts, now packed full of bookmarks and sticky notes. On top I lay my notebook filled with the handwriting of four different Bevans: mine, Dad’s, Aunt Tara’s, and Grandma Sloane’s. Once we arrived at a breakthrough, I took the group effort over as my own, perfecting the magic until it couldn’t fail. I have only one chance. I don’t think I’ll get another.

  Sitting beside the stack of my notebook and family’s texts, I start the Camaro’s engine and lower the windows to release the buildup of steamy Virginia heat. Someday I’ll return to my cool mountain air. But first, I have a job to do.

  I drive with the windows down, allowing the wind to tangle my hair. Heat from the engine seeps through the vents. The killer temperature and beating wind keep me distracted from where I’m going and what I’m about to do.

  The drive is much too short. And also a million years long.

  Ivy has consumed the wrought-iron gate at the entrance of the estate, the Moore nameplate overtaken, choked out. I pull next to the access keypad and tap in Aaron’s code. The gates swing open. Ahead, the driveway is nearly overgrown with underbrush spilling from the forest. No longer the landscaped perfection in my memory, this place has become a forgotten ruin.

  At the end of the driveway the house sits proudly, even though it’s stained with disrepair. Weeds cling to stone walls, climbing so high into the heat they’ve gone dry and brown. Dirt and grime dull the window panes. It’s as sad and uncared for as my cottage when I first moved in. It looks like I might have another house to rehabilitate here too, on a much larger scale.

  I park the Camaro out front and gather my stack of texts. Up close, I see some maintenance has been going on. The front steps are clean and the doors ha
ve a shiny coat of polish. That could be Aaron’s doing. But some of the tiles have broken out of the porch floor, and the wooden ceiling panels hang loose. Clearly he’s not here enough to make a dent in what needs to be done. And since all but one person have moved out, there aren’t any others to demand the lawn be mowed or the mold be washed off the house. Rex released most of the staff without consulting Aaron. He’s a king over no one, with self-prescribed captivity and seclusion as his only friends.

  Which is why I’m surprised when a man opens the door and relieves me of my stack of texts. He speaks; I point to my ears and shake my head. On my phone’s screen I see, It’s nice to have a visitor. Is Mr. Moore expecting you?

  If I didn’t already know how lonely this place has become, I’d easily gather it from the surprise he’s unable to smooth from his face. I shake my head and type my name into my phone, wondering if I should use a fake one. Rex will probably tell the man to make me leave. But no, I’m not playing games. I’m here to see him, and if I have to fight my way to him, I will.

  Anything in the car to be brought in?

  A few boxes in the trunk. I hand him my car key.

  Mr. Moore won’t come down for visitors, so we must go to him.

  I nod. It’s perfect really. He won’t be warned. I wonder if this man knows Rex’ll turn me away, so he’s conveniently removed that option. He leads me up the stairs to the third floor, one story higher than the one that held me captive five years ago. I remember little from this house, perhaps because I never saw it in daylight with an unburdened mind. The man drops me at a set of doors at the farthest corner of the house. Carved into the door is a wreath encircling the letter M, vines twisting all around. He knocks, opening the door to call inside. A moment later he gestures for me to enter.

  It’s this simple? I was prepared to fight dragons in moats.

  I pocket my phone and take my stack from the man before he leaves. I cross a large room, its furniture covered in ghostly sheets. A second set of doors waits, slightly open, darkness painting the crack between them. I’ve been ignoring my pounding heart until now. Its spasm moves front and center, makes my palms sweat, steals all my attention. I shift my stack, nearly dropping it.