by D. N. Hoxa
No, the Council wanted me alive.
McGraw shook his head, coming to his own conclusion, and he didn’t say anything else. He didn’t answer my questions. Instead, he opened his robe. It looked like the small talk was over. I was burning inside, and for a second, I thought about taking him hostage just like he had done with my family. But even I wouldn’t stoop that low.
So I pushed the curiosity aside, and I concentrated on him, the man I trusted for so long that it seemed like I was living another life now. He had small glass bottles in some sort of an inner belt tied to his grey robe. He took two of them out and spilled the liquid on the floor.
As soon as the drops touched the floor, I couldn’t see. It got foggy around me, and then something hit me, causing burning pain to spread all over my chest. I stepped back until I saw McGraw on the other side spilling another two small bottles on the ground between us. The second the liquid touched the ground, thick smoke erupted from it. It got hard to breathe, and my eyes filled with tears immediately. I dodged the smoke, moving to the left, but the old bastard was quick.
Another two bottles emptied between us, and the purple dusty smoke touched my left arm. It paralyzed it immediately. I jumped farther away just as blue liquid spilled in front of my feet and filled my vision with blue smoke. I turned on the other side and ran for him, but something sparkly shot from his hands and my vision blurred. I backed up a few feet, trying to go around the smoke at the other angle, but silver dust was already waiting for me there.
I felt sick and dizzy and so damn tired all of a sudden. Almost completely drained, and I wanted nothing more than to let go and fall there on the floor, let the darkness take me. But I couldn’t do that. Not yet.
The bastard was surrounded by clouds of smoke in every color filling the space around him, forming a perfect protective circle.
He smiled an ugly smile. I had no way around him. The few colors of smoke I touched had either paralyzed me, hit me, blinded me or suffocated me. I was stuck, my mind working, seeing nothing but McGraw’s gleaming eyes.
“You should have taken the deal, stupid girl. You should have agreed to serve the Council,” he said, laughing that scratchy laugh of his that hurt my ears. All the while, he kept looking around, probably waiting for the Guards he was so sure would come to help him.
I smiled. “Looks like they left you all alone, old man.”
Panic grew in his eyes by the second, and I never took my eyes off him as I thought about every possibility I had before it was too late.
Going through the smoke was impossible. I would be paralyzed before I reached him, and he’d need no more than a small knife to end me. Waiting it out didn’t sound good, either, considering his inner belt contained a lot more of those flasks.
I was running out of options and fast.
Seeing no other way, with very little hope and every cell on my body standing in high alert driven by the need for revenge, I closed my eyes and felt the air around us. It was my last hope.
The air came to me faster this time, the whispering clearer in my ears. My mind had nothing in it but the horrible need to kill. I begged with everything inside me for the thick, alive layer of air to respond to me, to form for me, to blow for me.
“Pathetic!” McGraw shouted, but his voice couldn’t have come at a better time. It fueled the rage inside me, clearing my mind easily. I clung to those words like they were the strings of life.
The air’s presence grew around me, became more solid. It was telling me that it was there for that, that it wanted to help me, but when I tried to tell it to do what I wanted it to, it didn’t listen.
It made me angry. So angry that I was so close to him and yet so far away. That was why, the next time I focused on the air that was begging for my attention, I didn’t beg anymore. I ordered it. I ordered the air to blow against the smoke that surrounded McGraw and clear my path to him. Now, I told it with my mind. Right now.
Half a second after, wind blew inside the castle. I felt filled somehow, full of sizzling energy. Strong wind left my body like a million small rockets launching from every pore of my skin. It blew hard on the colorful smoke in the room, chasing it through McGraw and through the bars to the wide hallway outside.
The smile that broke my face was wide and evil. McGraw was on his knees, one hand on the floor and the other on his chest. He looked up at me, dumbfounded.
“No,” he whispered looking at the door behind me, the one he hoped the Guards would use to come to his aid.
I walked slowly to him, Bob in hand. His face showed horror, his mouth opened wide.
“Oh, yes!” I said and pushed Bob in his chest, straight through his heart.
Ironic how the very thing he’d given me as a gift ended his life.
Yeah, irony was a real bitch.
He gasped for air, and when it wouldn’t come, he begged me for it with his eyes. I watched him exhale his last breath in astonishment, his eyes still on me until he fell with his chest on my knees, lifeless.
I stepped away, disgusted, and his wrinkled face hit the floor.
Dead. He was dead.
I sighed.
My legs gave and all strength left me.
But it was okay. I could go in peace now. The hard floor greeted me as I fell against it. I welcomed the darkness.
A strange sound and footsteps as light as feathers came toward me before my eyes closed for the second time that night, knowing well that the Royal Guards would find me and end me right then and there.
Still, it was okay.
22
——————————
My head hurt so much that it felt like someone was pushing and pulling a long, sharp knife inside my skull every second. My body felt heavy. When I couldn’t move my hands, I panicked.
Where am I?
My eyelids felt like they were attached to the skin under my eyes, and all I could hear was a murmur of voices in the background, coming from somewhere far away. I lay like that, unable to move even a little finger, trying to get my mind around what had happened and where I could be.
Was I dead?
I remembered McGraw, his wrinkled face and his eyes dimming as life left him. I remembered the second Bob tore into his chest. He was dead. I wanted to smile.
The potion! My heart started to pound. I didn’t destroy the potion that, according to the video, was on McGraw’s table of flasks.
I was there and didn’t destroy the damn potion.
A nasty sting of guilt pierced through me. I made myself focus, trying to make out my surroundings. I couldn’t be dead, simply because I felt nowhere near peaceful. And death was supposed to be peaceful, wasn’t it?
I was lying on something soft. Blocking away every thought that was bouncing around in my mind, I focused solely on my ears. I couldn’t make out the words, but I recognized the voices.
It was her voice. Ella’s. And Dad’s.
My heart nearly exploded with joy. They were with me. I forced my eyelids open. They were so, so heavy, it felt like I was trying to lift a truck, not my lids, but eventually, they gave. All I could see was white light. Too much white light.
The voices stopped. Footsteps.
“Star?” Dad’s voice reached my ears, almost crystal clear. I tried to say something. I couldn’t move my lips.
Just focus on the eyes, I told myself, and when they were finally wide open, I had to blink a couple of times before they adjusted to the strong light of the room I was in. I looked around me, vision still blurry.
Dad was bending over me on one side, and Ella was sitting in a chair on the other, completely frozen. My eyes stayed on her as I blinked away the blur and could finally see with clarity. She looked so good, so alive. They both did.
“Oh, Star,” Dad cried and hugged me, his head on my chest. He was crying big warm tears like a little boy. I closed my eyes, still unable to move anything else but my eyes. “We thought we’d lost you. We thought we’d lost you,” Dad whispered over and over a
gain as he caressed my face and hair.
My eyes searched for Ella again. She hadn’t moved an inch. Her eyes were still wide as she took all of me in, and the blood was completely drained from her face.
My face was already wet. Tears rolled down my cheeks as if they were in a contest. Without warning, I broke into a sobbing, my eyes never leaving hers.
I wanted to hug her, hug them both, tell them that I was fine and that everything was okay now. They were alive and well. I wanted to tell them how much I loved them and how sorry I was for everything that had happened.
Instead, all I could do was cry. I couldn’t control or stop my sobbing.
Ella’s tears fell in silence, and we cried like that for a while, the three of us, together again. Everything I kept inside from the day I walked out on them came back at me with a rush. The emotions were so strong they made me dizzy and threatened to suffocate me. I would never forgive myself for everything that my family had been through because of me.
I felt like I was floating on air helplessly while every single thing I’d done and each one of the lives I took fell on my shoulders all over again. I opened myself wide and let their weight crush me because I deserved it. I’d disappointed my family, myself, and most importantly, my mother, who was probably looking down at me with a broken heart.
I cried like I’d never cried before in my life.
Eventually we stopped. I couldn’t take my eyes off Ella.
“You have a lot of explaining to do, young lady,” Dad said, his tender smile never leaving his face. “But for now, I’m just happy to have you with us.” He hugged me again.
I tried to call for Ella to come closer. Why wasn’t she by my side?
“E…” My throat was so dry. I was dehydrated. “Ella?” My voice was nothing but a scratchy whisper.
She gasped and her mouth fell open. The next second, she stood up, turned on her heels and left the room, closing the door behind her.
“Just…give her some time. She’ll come around,” Dad said, tightening his grip around my hand.
Ella wasn’t speaking to me. Tears warmed my eyes again. I turned my head away.
“Rest, baby. Rest,” he said, caressing my hair.
But I didn’t want to rest. I didn’t want to live in a world where Ella wouldn’t speak to me.
I fought the tears and tried to ignore the voice in my head that reminded me how I’d brought all of this on myself. That didn’t mean I couldn’t wish with all my heart that it was all just a dream, that I’d soon wake up and Ella would be there, hugging me, talking to me, smiling at me again.
* * *
I woke up at the sound of a door closing. My eyes opened a lot easier this time. I felt better, too. I could even move my hands.
Aaron was standing at the end of my bed. I sighed in relief as a bunch of crazy butterflies invaded my stomach.
Thank God. He was okay.
“Hey.”
I opened my mouth, but not a sound came out. My throat was dry. I smiled and forced the word ‘water’ with barely a whisper out of me. He walked to the side of my bed, took an empty glass and filled it with water from a plastic bottle on the nightstand. He sat on my bed and brought the glass to my lips.
Only after I finished the second glass did my voice get almost back to normal.
“Thank you,” I whispered. He looked so good in his pale blue shirt and jeans. He’d just shaved, too. But his smile didn’t reach his eyes.
“How did I get here?” I could tell from the many bulbs on the ceiling that we were at the RR base.
“I came back for you,” Aaron said. He seemed nervous as he grabbed a chair to sit in.
“You did?” My head was still a mess but I did remember hearing the light footsteps just before I’d lost consciousness. I’d been so sure that they would be Royal Guards.
He nodded. “I took your sister and your father to Jack in the cave and came back for you.”
“Thank you,” I said. I owed him so much. Not just for my family, but who knew where I would have woken up if it weren’t for him? “For everything.”
My voice was getting stronger and clearer with every word. I wished I had the strength to stand up and hug him. I was forever in debt to him.
“No need to thank me. I was doing my job,” he replied dryly. He wouldn’t meet my eyes, and he was cold and distant. Well, more cold and distant than usual. I knew he didn’t like me, and he’d made it clear on more than one occasion, but never so strongly.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, just when it hit me.
I knew the answer already. He’d come back for me after leaving my family with Jack. He’d heard everything I said to McGraw.
For a second, my breath caught in my throat, and my heart started pounding heavily against my rib cage. I felt sick. “You heard.”
He nodded and stood up, turning his back to me.
The silence that followed was thick, extremely uncomfortable. I imagined what it must have been like for him to hear me say those words. I couldn’t even begin to understand how on Earth he could take me back to safety after that.
“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry,” I whispered. Just when I thought I couldn’t feel any worse…
“I was right not to trust you,” he said, his words a slap to my face.
“Aaron, I really am sorry.” More than words could ever say.
“That’s not what you felt when you were in Lyndor. When you told the Headmaster about your brilliant plans, you weren’t sorry, Star. You were disappointed.”
Tears stung my eyes. I wanted to slap myself. What did I expect—him to say thank you? Idiot. I blinked away the tears as fast as I could. I wouldn’t cry, not in front of him. He didn’t even believe I was sorry. And I was! God, I was so fucking sorry! I wanted to tell him again, but the look on his face told me he didn’t want to hear it. I didn’t blame him, so I kept my mouth shut. Enough damage was already done.
After a second, he cleared his throat and straightened his shoulders. When he met my eyes, I felt so small, and when he spoke again, he did so in the bitterest voice I’d ever heard him use.
“You’ve been asleep for five days. You’ll need another week to recover completely. You are welcome to stay here if you like, but everything will be ready for your departure then.”
He turned around to leave with a curt nod.
“You’re right,” I said before I could control myself. Aaron stopped walking. “I was disappointed, yes, but not because of what you think. I was disappointed in myself.” It was the truth and I hoped he could see it.
Slowly, he turned to face me and perhaps I was seeing things but his face didn’t look as cold as just a second ago.
“I know,” he finally said.
“No, I mean it. I didn’t—”
“I know, Star. I know how you felt.” Oh.
“How would you know how I felt?”
A small smile turned only one corner of his lips. “Your eyes tell me.”
“I wish things had been different,” I said. Between us. I wish I’d been a different person when it came to Aaron, one he could maybe fall for.
“Me, too,” he said and finally met my eyes. “I wish you’d remained the person I always thought you were for so long before I met you.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means you’re not. And I don’t know what to make of it. Yet.”
Well, fuck me. If I thought I was confused before, I was deep in shit now.
“Aaron, what—”
“You need to rest,” he said, and I waited for the rest of that sentence, but it never came. Aaron turned his back on me and left the room.
What the hell was that? I asked myself. What did he mean?
But I already knew I was never going to find out. I was leaving—a fact I’d completely forgotten until Aaron brought it up.
I’d slept for almost a week. That confused me. I’d been injured worse before, and it took me a day—two tops—to heal completely. All super
naturals were fast healers. Except for vampires, who were super-fast healers.
I could only guess what caused me to go under for that long. The potion. I’d drawn it to me, sucked it from Ella’s mind to mine. In return, it left me in bed for five days.
The room started spinning, and so I closed my eyes, wishing again I’d wake up and find that all was just a dream, a nightmare, that Ella was there by my side and Aaron didn’t hate me. But even I knew that some wishes were just never meant to come true.
* * *
“Make it stop.”
The air was so thick and heavy around me that I had to struggle to draw it in my lungs.
“Make it stop, Star.”
I turned to look at the little girl on my lap. She’d just turned eleven a few months ago and was the most beautiful kid I’d ever seen in my life. Her voice was as smooth and as relaxing as a lullaby. Her words, however, cut the deepest parts of my heart. Because I couldn’t. I couldn’t stop it.
Mom was lying on her bed in front of us. I was sitting on the chair next to her, and Ella was sitting on my lap. Dad was working. We had to stay alive somehow and as much as he wanted to stay by her side all the time, he knew he couldn’t.
We watched her, watched the pain in her hazel eyes. She was screaming on the inside, I knew. She tried to keep it in whenever Ella was in the room. Hearing your mother scream in pain and not being able to do anything about it can be pretty disturbing for an eleven-year-old. It was pretty disturbing for me, too, even though I was almost seventeen. It had been eight days, and the doctors said there was nothing they could do anymore. Her system wasn’t accepting painkillers. Not even the strongest ones worked. She was in so much pain…
I held my tears for Ella’s sake. She had her small hands wrapped around Mom’s fingers, and she was looking at our mother with so much love and so much fear at the same time that it made me dizzy. Even though Mom wasn’t screaming, Ella knew how she felt. She dropped her gaze from Mom’s face for a second to turn to me.
“Make it stop, Star,” she pleaded again, as warm tears rolled down her eyes. My heart broke into so many small pieces that I was surprised I was still standing on my own.