by Scott Tracey
I knew as well as anyone that Lucien was biding his time, waiting for the opportune moment to strike. But he couldn’t read my future, and it kept him off his game. I just needed him to stay off it a little while longer. Luckily for me, he’d needed another demonstration of what I was willing to do.
Since she’d been the one keeping lookout, Jade had missed what had gone down between us, but Trey had been here the whole time. I’d forgotten. His expression was dark, his arms crossed in front of him. Concern rolled off of him in waves, but I pushed him to the side of my awareness, and took a seat at the end of Riley’s bed. She still slept, but it was only a matter of time now.
Jade and Trey crossed the room as well, setting up next to the blacked-out windows. About as far from Catherine and the demon as they could get. And even putting Riley’s bed between us. He starts to fear you, came a whistle in my mind. Yessss.
Of course Catherine’s ego preceded her into the room. “Have you really forgotten how this arrangement works, Fallon? You come when I call, not the other—” she stopped abruptly once she realized she wasn’t alone with Lucien the way she thought. “What are they doing here?”
I offered her a grin and an enthusiastic wave, but I kept my mouth closed. This would be good enough without my two cents.
If looks were weapons, Lucien’s glance towards me would have been a poison dart. He cleared his throat, trying and failing to summon up his immaculate aplomb. “What do you want, Catherine?”
She should have noticed that something was wrong with him, but Catherine was always too self-involved to notice the things around her. “I’ve been trying to reach you all day. Where the hell have you been?”
And for a moment, Lucien forgot the situation he was in. I could see the irritation sweeping through his body, stiffening his spine and lacing his words with acerbic bite. “I am not your pet, to come when you call me because a manicure ran long. I have my own concerns. My own interests.”
“Like forcing my son to sign a contract with you?” She didn’t even give him a chance to reply. Her arm darted out and slapped him across the face. Then she hauled back and did it a second time.
Lucien wasn’t human, and I’d seen him go through enough to say with certainty that he was a durable sonofabitch, but his head snapped back just like any man’s would after the second strike.
But it wasn’t the change in Lucien that surprised me. It was Catherine, specifically, the tears in her eyes. She stood there, hand pressed over mouth, as tears spilled down over her face. She was shaking, I realized, though she tried to press her hands close to her body to hide it.
“What were the terms?”
Lucien rubbed at his jaw, eyes narrowed down to little slits as he turned back to her. His entire posture shifted. A broken demon and a prisoner in this world, but he still wore the shape of a man and still had height, weight, and strength on her.
“Forget that,” Catherine continued, still not realizing the danger that she was in. “I’ll do it. I’ll take his place. You can negate our deal, or add the terms onto the one I’ve already signed, or whatever.”
“Mom, no,” Trey protested. Before he could say anything else, I placed a wall between us, as easily as breathing. It was as cold as winter silence, bitter to the touch, a construct of demonic ice. Trey continued to shout, but no one could hear him.
Lucien’s rage vanished in a moment, replaced by a smile full of contempt. “Do you even know what you’re offering up? You haven’t even seen the terms.”
“I can guess.” Catherine’s bitterness had consumed her. There was a nasty look directed my way before she continued. “You’ll take my future, leaving me an empty shell destined for nothing but mediocrity. Maybe even kill me. I don’t care.” When she looked up at him again, her eyes blazed with her conviction. “But you won’t take my son. I don’t care what the cost is. I’ll pay.” She took a shuddering breath, and even I knew it cost her plenty already to add the broken “please” after it.
Lucien looked to me, waiting for my reaction.
“Nah,” I said, loudly for Catherine’s benefit. “I don’t think so.”
Lucien turned back to her, spreading his arms as if to ask: Well, what do you expect me to do? He was enjoying this little show, even though he wasn’t the one pulling the strings. Of course he did. Demons loved causing trouble.
“Stay out of this,” Catherine snarled.
“Do you really think you get a free pass, Catherine? Are you really that naive?”
She lunged for me, face contorted with rage until she resembled the monster she really was. Catherine did ugly about as well as Catherine did anything: full tilt and holding nothing back. Her rage was a contorted creature. Lucien grabbed her by the arm and held her back from making a dangerous mistake.
“He’s my son! You won’t take this away from me. This is my right!”
“No, not quite. This is your punishment.”
I closed my eyes, feeling the darkness welling up within me. Yes, the voices hissed, take this away from her. Break her so exquisitely that she will never be repaired. When I opened them again, the world spiraled into shades of violet, symbols in patterns made by claws fluttered through the air, remnants of broken worlds that had been cobbled together to form this one. Catherine’s heart, beating a rhythm and pumping incendiary fear coursing through her bloodstream.
She yanked herself out of Lucien’s grip and stumbled back towards the door.
I turned to Lucien. My equal. My enemy. My eyes raged violet, and I could hear the Riders calling to me, cajoling from across the voids. Our eyes met, and voiceless conversations that were made up of sun flares and tsunamis passed between us before I finally bobbed my head once, sharply. “Do it.”
“Lucien, you can’t possibly—you told me you needed him!” She still thought Trey was in danger. It was laughable.
The demon still didn’t understand. When I said “now” I meant now. My fury became an inferno in an instant, and I reacted. I lunged outside of time as the world fell to freezing around me. The others were trapped statues as I rushed forward, barely feeling my feet touch the ground. Even Lucien was caught up in the wake of time, his eyes stuck on the place where I had been, a cruel smirk forming.
I grabbed his arm, dragged him towards Catherine. I pressed his palm flat against her forehead, held it there, and stepped back through the bars of time’s cage, and roared, “DO IT!” My rage would brook no argument. There would be no cease-fire here.
I don’t know how it looked, if I was just a blur of speed or if I’d simply disappeared and reappeared standing between the two of them. I didn’t care. She would pay. She would pay forever if I had my way.
A demon lives to destroy, and in a way, this moment would destroy Catherine Lansing forever. “You are marked as fortune’s favored daughter,” the demon whispered. Black fire swirled around his skin, seeped into the follicles of her hair and the beads of sweat on her skin. “You will not die young, a victim of accident or chance. Wherever you will go, good fortune will keep you on your way. Your life will be spared for all of your days. Your mind will be as sharp as it ever was, your memory as clear as glass.”
In my haste to see it done, the wall trapping Trey had slipped and shattered. He grabbed me now, fingers digging into my skin. “What are you doing?” he demanded, shaking me.
“She doesn’t get mercy. She doesn’t get to forget and become something less.” I looked away from him, to where black fire was still being swallowed up by her skin. “She killed my uncle. And probably a lot more, too. I don’t want her to ever forget.”
“Why?” he whispered.
“Because I want her to remember. I was her destruction, but I was also her savior. Someone would have toppled her eventually; she’s made enough enemies. Now they won’t. Now she’ll live.”
Catherine looked up at me, and the horror I wanted to see in her eyes was truly there, leaking out the sides. So fragile, I thought, looking down at her like a pet. I could shear you
r soul from your body and scatter it across all the stars in the devil’s sky.
“You wanted a weapon, Catherine,” I said, crouching down in front of her, cupping my hand under her chin and pulling her back to her feet. “Wish granted.”
“One more thing, Catherine,” Lucien said, coming to my side. In this moment, we were almost partners, with an impeccable sense of timing. “Braden and I came to an agreement last night. Your son’s contract was already voided.”
“What?” Catherine’s head whipped around as she looked at each of us in turn. Too much had happened, her mind had gone through so many different scenarios, but this was clearly not one of them. “Then why … ”
I looked up at Lucien and nodded. “Show her the rest.”
And so Lucien gave her a glimpse of the power he possessed, filled her mind with visions of Belle Dam’s former fate. All the lives that Catherine had affected, or altered, or ended. He put faces to names, reminded her of sins long since past. Things even she’d forgotten. Even the ramifications—things she’d done that wouldn’t play out for another generation or two. A tangible glossary of her wasted, pathetic life.
Her punishment was knowledge. Walking the streets of Belle Dam and every time she saw a familiar face, she would be reminded of the crimes she’d committed against them.
“Jade, get her out of here,” Trey commanded. Jade did as she was told, first helping Catherine to her feet and then leading her out of the room. Trey stood above me as Lucien backed away. His disapproval hung like a chalk cloud in the air, infecting my skin with it.
“What are you doing?” he asked softly.
Who did he think he was, to question me? Did he not see me just bend the Rider to my will, force him to act as my puppet? And who was he? A boy stupid with the gold in his veins, who could not even comprehend the majesty of what was happening now.
“Remember who you are,” the boy bleated. It was hard to remember why I should care. Why his voice affected my body. “This is the demon talking. Not you. You have to fight it.”
“I am fighting,” I said quietly. “And I’ve only just begun.”
“No,” he said, and he risked death by laying his hands upon me. Curiously, I did not strike him down, though the desire was there. “This isn’t you. You’re not the boy with the violet eyes. Your eyes are blue, or green, but never this. Come on, you can remember. For me.”
But it wasn’t Trey who broke through to me. It was Riley.
“Braden?” she whispered.
Human instinct won out over demon influence. Somewhere inside of me a flame went out, and when I spun around, I was myself again, my thoughts as clear as they’d ever been before.
It was getting worse. Whatever was happening to me, this degradation, it wasn’t going to get any easier to control. The longer I was out here, the more likely I would do something I would regret. If any part of me remained human long enough to regret it.
Riley’s eyes were open, focused and sharp and a far cry from the girl who’d been lost.
“He came after me,” she said simply, eyes staring at Lucien though they didn’t have any fear, “and then I don’t remember anything.” Her smile was slow in coming, but when it formed it was just like the memory of her in my head. A knot in my chest unraveled, and if I accomplished nothing else, at least I’d made good on my promise. I’d found a way to bring Riley back.
“Did you save me?” she asked.
I trembled, and Trey’s hands slid over my shoulders, squeezed me and pulled me tight against him. “He did.”
“Go away,” I commanded Lucien, my voice little more than a rasp. He dipped his head, the curl of his lip the only hint of disdain he allowed to surface. He was well into the hallway before I quietly added, “Don’t go far. You have one more appointment tonight.”
I’d bargained for three days, but I was barely going to make it through one. Grace had made a very bad deal. She thought she’d won a victory, when she bargained my three days down to three midnights, returning me only hours before the first. She thought there wouldn’t be enough time for me to go off the rails. Now I knew it was too much.
Trey started to explain to Riley what she’d missed, but it didn’t prove necessary. Despite having spent every day since her attack in a psychotic state, Riley had an easy grasp of what had gone down in her absence. “And now Braden swallowed up one of the wellsprings so that he could go toe to toe with Lucien and not get bitch-slapped again,” she concluded.
Neither Trey nor I knew what to say. I rubbed my hands on the bottom of my jacket again and again, the feel of something slick on my skin that I couldn’t get off.
“Get out,” Riley said finally, and my attention snapped back to her.
“What?”
She looked at me like I’d ridden in on the short bus, then gestured down at her outfit. “If I’m going with you, I can’t exactly go in a hospital gown and my robe, now can I?”
“You’re not going with us,” I said, almost in stereo with Trey’s protest. But Riley didn’t want to hear it. And since allowances had already been made for Jade, because I honestly couldn’t tell her no after what I’d done to Drew, the same went for Riley, too.
She stopped me before I reached the door. “I remember what you’re going to do,” she whispered, lowering her voice so it was just the two of us. “It won’t work.”
“No, it will. You’ve said it yourself all along.” The jacket wasn’t cutting it so I tried wiping my hands down on the bed sheets. Riley wouldn’t need them anymore. “Take in the wellspring, become that thing, and I could beat them.”
“Beat them, maybe, but you’re not just trying to beat them, Braden.” She rested her palm against my cheek, and I flinched at her touch. It wasn’t that long ago that she’d hijacked my brain with a little skin-to-skin contact. But nothing happened this time, the demonic power inside me still dormant. “It doesn’t balance. There’s two of them, and only one of you.”
In all things, balance. It had been beaten into my head often enough. My heart thudded and then rolled to a stop in my chest. It wasn’t going to be enough.
I wasn’t going to be enough.
thirty-five
The last time I’d been in a cemetery, I’d been fighting for my life. Well, actually, the last few times I’d been in a cemetery. The night air was a cool breeze off the bay, salty and fresh. There’d been a morbid tint to my thoughts ever since I’d left Riley’s hospital room. I knew this was where it had to end. It was poetic.
This was where it had really started, where Lucien had set me onto the path for Grace, and I’d become so enmeshed in Belle Dam’s secrets that I jumped through every hoop I could find.
The cloud cover opened, and a sea of stars wished us on our way. Anticipation whispered through the trees like it was Christmas Eve, though that was days past. Belle Dam was hushed, sleeping lightly, ready to wake up in the morning at the moment that everything was different.
Because after tonight, it would be.
Lucien had vanished into the shadows, likely more comfortable traveling on his own than with a bunch of teenagers. Jade and Riley were insistent about coming along, and neither one would hear a word of argument. But since the real showdown was happening in the lighthouse, and not the cemetery, I didn’t lobby very hard against their going with us. Trey shot me a disapproving look, but a few minutes more with my friends was a small price to pay.
Trey drove, but when I tried to take the passenger’s seat up front to ride next to him, I’d been pushed into the back with Riley on one side and Jade on the other. This new, restored Riley was a quiet creature, prone to long silences and eyes that held too much knowledge. It was hard to say how much she remembered after what had happened to her, Riley deflected questions with the ease of someone who had been asking them for half her life.
Jade, however, was not prone to any such silences. “I get that you’re pitting the two of them against each other,” she said, repeating my own words back about what I expected to
happen tonight, “but what’s the outcome? Do you really think that they’ll take each other out?”
“Of course,” I lied. I liked my version of the story better than the reality. My friends didn’t need to know what Riley had confided in me, or my own fears. As far as they needed to be concerned, everything was going to happen just the way it was supposed to. Until it didn’t. “They’re evenly matched. Or at least, they will be. Then all we have to do is wait them out. They’ll destroy each other before breakfast. No doubt.”
“And you’re not worried she’s going to turn on you? She’s already done it once before,” Trey said from the driver’s seat, and the lack of approval in his words halted the conversation for a minute.
“He’s lying.” There was no emotion to Riley’s voice, and it sounded so strange and flat that I thought for a minute that Lucien had fooled us all, and Riley wasn’t fixed after all.
“It’s a good pl—” I started, but Jade pushed me back, showing a physical strength that I wouldn’t have expected out of her. She leaned in front of me, staring over at Riley.
“What do you mean? What’s he lying about?”
Riley’s auburn hair was limp and pulled back, and the clothes she wore hung off of her like she was hardly bigger than a hanger. She’d lost a lot of weight in the hospital, and probably still needed to be there for a while. Another reason why jailbreaking her hadn’t been a good idea.
“They can’t kill each other,” she said softly, playing with the fringe on the edges of her sleeve. “He knows that. Everything’s too bound up into everything else. He’s playing at something else.”
I gritted my teeth and tried not to let it show too much on my face. I was lying, and Riley was exactly right about everything, but why the hell was she telling Jade? Why was she trying to ruin everything? I had one chance, maybe, and the last thing I needed was Riley trying to sabotage me from the sidelines. Especially since she knew more than she was saying. Why blow the whistle on me if she wasn’t going to reveal everything she knew?