by Erin Hayes
But we’re getting there. Maybe Nakir had been right this time. Maybe we have everything we need to get to the Watchtower.
We’re at a Door Stop, one of the more secure, cave-like ones. Thank God for small favors, because after today’s events, I don’t think we could handle being exposed like our last Door Stop. It’s large enough that the horses—what remains of them—are tied up in one corner. I look among them and count only seven—some of the horses must have either run or perished in the firestorm, and my heart sinks and breaks at the thought.
But Alion’s among the ones that remain. I didn’t realize until now how much I’d miss the bastard if he up and left me.
A campfire throws light and shadows throughout the Door Stop, giving both the illusion of warmth and doom. Like we’re safe so long as we stay within the firelight.
There’s movement from the other side of the fire. Nakir comes into view, his expression both relieved and exhausted. He exchanges a glance with Kerem, and the big man moves away from us, leaving the angel and me alone.
“You scared us back there, you asshole,” Nakir murmurs.
The words actually make me smile. “Glad to see that your sense of humor didn’t burn either,” I say blithely.
He chuckles darkly before sighing. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For being a crazy son of a bitch who puts others before himself. If you hadn’t pulled that stunt, I don’t think…” He swallows self-consciously before giving himself a shake. “Well, I think we all would have died.”
I caught his hesitation, though, and I swallow thickly. “How are Jennet and Sena?”
More hesitation from him. More lies, even if he’s trying to protect my feelings.
I try to scramble to my feet, but Nakir catches my arm. His angel strength keeps me from moving, and I whirl on him. “What. The. Fuck. Happened?” I growl at him.
The corners of Nakir’s eyes crinkle a little. “Sena’s power gave out before the wildfire passed over us. And—” He swallows thickly. “And Sena didn’t make it.”
It takes a moment for that to sink in. “But how?” I fumble for words, trying to piece together a question that will give me clarity. Sena can’t be dead. She was just using her power to save all of us.
Nakir sighs and sits back, rubbing his face with his hands. “Sena’s power gave out just before the storm passed. She was burned—badly—before Kerem had a chance to get to her. She died before he could heal her.”
I shake my head. “No,” I whisper. “No.”
Jennet.
Jennet had been right next to Sena when that happened. Maybe a step back, but if Sena been set on fire by the storm…
I grab Nakir roughly by the collar. “Where’s Jennet?” I snarl in his face. “Jennet—where is she? Is she—is she…?”
I can’t even bring myself to say it. Nakir meets my eyes, and for a horrible moment as he opens his mouth, I think he’s about to say the words that I realize frighten me more than a horde of demonlings or a wildfire.
“She’s alive.”
I blink furiously, trying to confirm that I heard what I thought I heard and not that it was what I wanted to hear.
“She’s alive,” Nakir repeats again, putting his big hand over my hand that’s grappling him by the shirt. “She was injured in the fire, but Kerem was able to heal her. And you, actually.”
Something akin to joy soars in my chest, and I try to look around Nakir to get a glimpse of Jennet. “So she’s…”
“She hasn’t woken up yet,” he says quickly. “Kerem thinks she used up too much of herself in trying to transfer your energy to Sena.”
I look at Kerem, who has been standing off to the side, watching me wearily. The healer witch sighs, seeming like he’s too tired to do much. Even though it’s not long after midnight, he must have used up a lot of his energy healing us.
“When is she going to wake up?” I croak.
Kerem lifts a shoulder, averting his eyes. “I don’t know. When she wants to?”
I peer around the fire now, trying to get a glimpse of Jennet’s sleeping form, now that I know she’s not awake with the others. I find her next to Fatma and Nury, who hold vigil over her unconscious body. Nury has an arm over Fatma’s shoulders, and the witch looks like she’s been crying nonstop. Beyond them, Rabia, Murat, and Emre look shell-shocked, their own gazes watching the campfire.
We all look the worse for wear.
“I’m sorry, by the way,” Kerem says softly. I turn back to him, in shock. “I spent most of my energy healing Jennet, so when I got to you, I—”
I shake my head. “No, it’s fine. You did right.”
Because the thought of Jennet in pain is enough to send searing pain throughout my entire body. She’s resting at least now, though. If she wakes up—when she wakes up, she’ll have to deal with the horrible news of Sena’s death.
“You did right,” I repeat.
I move toward Jennet’s form. Neither Kerem nor Nakir call after me. I crawl to the side opposite of Nury and Fatma. Nury watches me as Fatma cries, lost in her own grief.
There’s still hope. There’s still something worth fighting for.
“Yes,” I murmur to no one in particular as I reach out and take Jennet’s limp hand, giving it a squeeze. “I’m just now realizing that.”
With Jennet unconscious, Sena’s death hanging heavily over our heads, and the morale of the Halos at a dispirited low, we stay at the Door Stop for a few days to recuperate and figure out our next move. We don’t speak to each other that much over this time, and the mood is somber at best. It just seems like we’re all dealing with this in our own way.
We bury Sena just outside the Door Stop. Kerem wrapped her body up in one of the rugs we brought along for camp. It’s not the biggest or the best funeral, and there are only a few words that are exchanged, but I feel like she’d understand. I didn’t know Sena that well, but she seemed like a practical woman.
She’d understand. I’m sure of it.
It breaks my heart that Jennet isn’t awake to say good-bye. And she remains unconscious, dead to the world without a way for me to reach her.
I rarely leave Jennet’s side during this time, because I’m too afraid of her waking up without me. I don’t want her to be alone when she finds out what happened to Sena.
Sena’s death has rocked all of us to our cores, especially for Fatma and Kerem. As witches, they were closer than the rest of us to the older woman. I catch them exchanging a few words of condolences and grief to each other. Fatma has Nury to lean on for support, and I can tell that they have grown closer over these few days, including a few times when Fatma has come back to the Door Stop with her hair mussed.
Grief apparently brings people together. I understand that.
Kerem, however, has retreated further into himself. He heals the rest of my wounds the day after I wake up, but other than that, he’s just existing at this point.
I want to tell him that it’s not his fault. Sena didn’t die because he didn’t make it to her—she died because of the curse. But I know that he won’t listen to me. I see his stubbornness reflected within myself. It’s why I haven’t left Jennet.
Rabia, Emre, and Murat seem to be the only ones who are existing with any sense of purpose. They’re the ones who have less to lose. They’re the ones who have lost the least in the past few days.
I’m almost jealous. We’re doing all this for a greater purpose, but yet it’s easier for those who don’t have the deeper ties to everyone.
Nakir takes it harder than anyone, though. I know him well enough to see the tension in his jaw, the way he glances at everyone, the responsibility and the apologies that are sitting just on the tip of his tongue.
He blames himself. And I know I blamed him at the start of all this, and possibly it could be considered his fault…
But I don’t pin it on him. I can’t. I see the guilt in his eyes every time he looks at us Halos. No longer is he the powe
rful fallen angel. He’s doubting himself, and it makes him appear…human. Which is something I never thought Nakir could ever be mistaken for.
And as for me? Our furlough gives me time to reflect on everything that has happened. My inner subconscious has been oddly quiet, too, until it’s just truly Jennet and me sitting here.
“Wake up,” I murmur to her. Wake up.
Jennet’s chest only rises and falls, as she’s lost in her own world. I look over at Kerem, who’s sitting across the Door Stop. His face is grave as he turns away. His unspoken words are enough. He doesn’t know why she hasn’t opened her eyes yet.
I gulp back the lump in my throat and squeeze Jennet’s hand. I hate how lifeless her fingers feel in my own, and I try to rub life into them, willing them to squeeze back.
She doesn’t.
“I was the world’s luckiest kid, you know,” I whisper to her, hoping that my voice can act as a beacon for her. She doesn’t stir, but I keep speaking, rambling really. It’s a one-sided conversation similar to all the others I’ve had with her for days now, and every time, I get a little deeper in my own mind and what’s been wrong with me.
It’s as therapeutic for me as it is for her. Or at least that’s what I tell myself.
“I don’t know what I did to deserve you and Maysa,” I say with a laugh, “but you two were always the highlights in my life. My best friends. And I knew back then that I could love you two. Maysa has my heart in one way, but you…you were the first. And in an entirely different way.”
My throat closes up, and I swallow thickly to try to stem my own rising hysteria. “They always say that there’s one soulmate for a person. And when Maysa and Beste died, I thought, ‘That’s it. There’s nothing left for me in this world.’ It felt that way, too.”
I close my eyes and give myself a small shake. “I tried killing myself, you know. Back then, I couldn’t imagine a world without Maysa and Beste, because they were my world.”
It’s a part of me that I’ve kept buried, that I’m afraid to admit or even remember. Because there was a point a week after I put Maysa and Beste into the ground where I couldn’t stand to look at myself in the mirror anymore. I took one of Beste’s toys, a ribbon on a stick that she played with in the garden, her twirls and jumps always entertaining to watch. I went to my quarters in the Lodge, where I spent the best nights of my life with my wife and some uncomfortable times with my daughter when she had nightmares. Even now, I would give anything to have those memories back.
I couldn’t see beyond my misery, which is why I tied one of the ribbon around a branch of Maysa’s tree and another end around my neck, and…
And…
And…
Yusup found me dangling and turning blue. I hadn’t broken my neck when I jumped—yet another thing I couldn’t do right—and he pulled me down, all while yelling at my staff to come help me. Afterwards, we didn’t speak of what I tried to do. It was in the past, and I tried to push it as far back into the recesses of my mind as I could.
I threw myself into my work at the Lodge, because it was all I had left. The voice in my head came not long after that, as a way of keeping me company, the voice of reason to every impulsive urge I had.
I kept lists, because when you have something planned out for you, you have to keep to it. Because when you couldn’t see beyond your pain, you could always go down to the next number and find some purpose. Even if it was just cleaning out the outhouse.
I rub at the spot on my neck where I nearly hanged myself. “I almost succeeded at it. At killing myself,” I clarify, realizing that I had just spent a few minutes reflecting on my past. I wet my lips. “And I didn’t die. For some reason, I didn’t die. And I felt dead inside until I saw you.”
She still doesn’t stir, and I close my eyes. “When you left—when we were kids—I thought that was the worst thing to ever happen to me. You were here, and suddenly you weren’t. I didn’t know what had happened to you, and neither did Maysa. And I think that was when we moved from being friends to something more.”
I pause, chewing on the inside of my cheek. “Your absence brought us together, Jennet. And right now, your absence is tearing the Halos apart. We need you.” I squeeze her hand again. “I need you.”
Nothing from her. I remember in old novels and movies that this is the part where the protagonist is supposed to wake up. And Jennet is still unconscious.
“Rahym?”
I look up to see Nakir standing over me, ill at ease. He seems like he doesn’t want to disturb us, yet at the same time, he looks like there’s something he wants to get off his chest.
“Yes?” I ask.
“Can we talk?”
I look down at Jennet and steel myself before finally nodding. “Of course.”
Why not? It’ll just take you away from her.
Nakir leads me outside of the Door Stop into the bright noon sun. I squint my eyes, looking around for any sign of dust trails of demonlings or more firestorms tearing through the desert. So far so good.
If there is any silver lining to be found in the wildfires, it’s that the storm had killed off demonlings for miles around us.
I blink at the Watchtower, still in the distance yet seeming like we’ve inched ever so closer to the structure. We’re the closest anyone has ever been to the tower. We’re the closest ever to succeeding. And Abaddon’s tower may as well be on a different planet.
“I wanted to say sorry,” Nakir says by way of introduction.
“Sorry? For what?”
“For…” The angel gestures helplessly toward the tower, the dark obsidian structure obviously weighing on his mind. “Everything,” he finally says.
I sigh, feeling the pull at my chest. “It’s all right.”
“No, it’s not all right,” Nakir says. “You have every right to be mad at me, to hate me. Especially after everything that’s happened. If you had been there for Maysa and Beste. If I had just hacked my way through.” He clears his throat and gives me a hard look. “You have every right to kill me right now.”
You have every right to make your own decisions.
I smirk, and Nakir gives me an incredulous look. Obviously, I just had part of this conversation in my head, so I wave off Nakir’s comments. “I’ve been thinking about that,” I say softly.
Nakir hesitates. “Yeah?”
“I was angry the other day,” I reason, and he visibly pales. “You seem to be this all-powerful being with no scruples. You’re stronger than any man, more magical than any witch, just a hell of a lot of more. And when I saw you do the impossible and kill that horde of demonlings, I thought you could do anything. Anything, and yet you didn’t save Maysa or Beste.”
“I couldn’t—”
I hold up a hand to shush him. “I know that now. Believe it. You wouldn’t have let Sena die if you were all-powerful. And you would have stopped Abaddon a long time ago. I get that, too. It’s just…I know you’re not human. Now I know what else you aren’t.”
Nakir lets my words sink in, and he gives a self-deprecating chuckle. “Yes,” he whispers. “I used to think I was superior to you humans. Back with the first Halos, I thought that with an angel on your side, anything was possible. And that arrogance…ended us.”
“You have another shot,” I tell him. “Use it wisely.”
He scoffs slightly, shaking his head. “When I get to Abaddon…”
“When we,” I point out. “Because you apparently need some witches and humans to help you out. You know, because you aren’t perfect.”
The corner of his mouth pulls up as he watches me. “You really are something, aren’t you?”
I shrug. “Don’t look much into it.”
“Rahym!”
We both twist our heads to see Fatma standing at the entrance to the Door Stop. An exuberant smile plays across her face as she looks at me.
“It’s Jennet.” Despite her smile, icy fear clenches my gut at what that could mean. “She’s awake.”
/> Chapter 23
Jennet can’t seem to keep her fingers still as she takes in the news. They keep tapping against each other or threading together or splaying apart or cracking the individual knuckles. She looks pale and weak as she sits up on her pallet. Her eyes are unfocused as she stares into the fire.
“Sena is…dead?” she whispers.
When I first came in from my conversation with Nakir, I thought she might have lost her mind, too, because she’s been so silent. So to hear her speak, even with the bad news, makes that tight muscle deep inside my chest loosen. Just a tiny bit.
Fatma can’t seem to stop looking at Jennet, like she’s some sort of specter from beyond the grave. And, really, she truly is. There’s something about her that seems to be transparent, like she’s so fragile, she can just be shattered easily.
Kerem stays at Jennet’s side, a shadow to her light.
Jennet is the one who keeps the witches grounded. She’s the one that makes them more whole.
Nakir nods solemnly in answer to her question, and her hands cover her mouth, trembling against her skin. Tears fall down her cheeks in rivulets, and she’s not really seeing anyone but her own pain.
“Oh my god,” Jennet whispers, her voice shaky, breathless. “I—I was the one who—”
“It’s not your fault,” Fatma says, reaching out across the space between them. Jennet’s eyes flick to the younger witch, horror in her gaze.
Then her face crumples, and she leans forward on herself. “If only I could have been a little stronger!” she cries, rocking herself. “If only…”
If only, if only, if only…
Our lives in the shadow of the curse are filled with “if onlys.” When you only have so much energy, you start to question everything you do with that energy. If you had done enough. Jennet doesn’t think she did enough.
And it breaks my heart to see that look on her face.
“I should have known that I could have transferred energy,” Jennet sobs. “I should have—”
“You didn’t know,” Fatma says gently. “You are the only witch to possess power like yours. You couldn’t have known.”