The Risen (Book 1): Dawning

by Marie F. Crow

  Lawless will not be coming back to me. So much time I wasted while she waited. She waited for this night like a bride planning her wedding. Each detail was undertaken with great care. Every moment planned for her perfect night. She and I are wed now with his loss. She will walk with me until the end of my days. Until death do us part. Amen.

  CHAPTER 50

  I dream of them that night. Lawless, with his effortless laugh, chases Lilly and Conroy around a park on a summer day. The sky above us is a crystal blue with the whitest clouds I have ever seen. A soft, warm breeze caresses my face, chasing away the many tears I have cried. The birds sing their songs of happiness, filling the air with their joy. I watch them play a game of tag that only they understand, in the midst of so many other children surrounding them. Ashley swings beside me, floating higher and higher as her legs pump and her body sways with the swing. She smiles down at me at the crest of the swing’s path, and while I watch her descend, everything changes.

  The soft white clouds roll together forming a grey mass above me. The breeze turns cold with the lack of the summer sun to warm it. I search for them, and by their laughter, I find them, still enjoying their game. They run among the many children who turn to stare at them as they go by with faces void of any childhood emotion. A face that is so contrasting with the scene that Lawless provides chasing Lilly and Conroy around them.

  I stand, confused by the silence that children mold into with their passing. I look to Ashley who is still swinging, still smiling down at me, to gather any sense of what is happening. The rhythmic creaking sound of the metal hinges of the swing adds to the unease of the situation.

  The colors are fading to shades of greys and contouring blacks. I call to Lawless, trying to get him to see what I am seeing. He waves to me, and Lilly copies it, before tagging him and running away to be chased by him and Conroy. They both wear their coordinating blue pajamas, hers with the dancing bears and his with the cowboys on horses. The soft blue is the only color left around us and it separates them that much more from the watching statues around them.

  The children stand in waves, synchronized with the creaking of Ashley’s swing. Each moan from the metal bringing more of them to their feet, and still Lawless does not take notice of it. The children watch the game, silently, with hungry, jealous eyes that stalk every movement of their prey.

  I scream for Lawless, but no sound comes from me. My feet are rooted to the ground, and no matter how hard I pull, or how loud I try to scream, I am stuck motionless and mute. The only sound is the creaking of the swing behind me, and the laughter ahead of me. I am unable to stop what is about to happen, as Margaret now comes to stand beside me.

  The small children have become walking nightmares. Their once pretty and delicate clothing is now many stains of bright reds among the muted shades around them. Soft baby faces melt into grimaces of unnatural rage, exposing dark mouths no longer lined with the pinks of gums and the whites of teeth, but dripping black crimsons of unspeakable sins. With the style of a barbaric Ring Around The Rosie, they encircle Lawless and the two still laughing with their game.

  They are frozen around them, snarling and waiting as I attempt to scream. My throat burns with the force of it, but still no sound comes forth from my desperation. I buckle from the strain of it, pleading for them to hear me, but they do not. The ring of children turn to me, smiling with their motives, and my body shakes with the horror as their eyes glaze from their once bright colors to dull interpretations.

  All at once, they launch at their victims, pulling them down and shredding into them among screams that fill the air. Tiny hands pull chunks of flesh, sending it into the air with their destruction. They coat themselves in the murders, and all there is to see is red. So much red.

  I become weightless with their death, swaying with each breath I take. I feel Margaret’s hand grab mine, tugging on me for my attention. Disbelievingly, I look to the red-haired girl beside me with her white ribbon-tied pigtails. She is smiling at me in her blue dress with its white flowers and denim jacket.

  “We appear dead, but we aren’t. We never really died, until you.” Margaret’s voice is as sweet as the Serpent’s was to Eve, and her words are just as damning.

  “…but we are. We are dead, and it is also because of you.” Ashley is still swinging behind me, and her words rain down on me like acid. The metal screeching of the hinges does not cover the wet sounds of the murders taking place.

  I can’t look away from the little girl who’s hand I am holding. She begins to hum a song. A song of pastel hallways, and beady black eyes, as she swings our hands, still clutched together.

  “… and everywhere that Helena goes, her lambs are sure to die.”

  “Helena. Helena. Breathe. Breathe for me.” I can hear Rhett’s voice. It pulls me from this nightmare with the rough shaking of my body. “Helena!”

  My lungs burn when my eyes open to see him above me. They force air into them, expanding the pain to cover my whole body as they expand. I cry out with the many images of my dream still so vivid to me, and Rhett cradles me in his arms.

  He melts his body to mine, encompassing me in his strength and scent. He holds me, and we both cry together, hidden in this dark room with our shared sorrows over what we have lost. I cry with it until my body grows weak, lulling me back to sleep, even as I try to fight against it.

  Rhett pulls me tighter into him, wrapping his arms firmer around me with his desire to protect me. “I’ll be right here. Right here.” He whispers to me. His voice is thick with his grief and suffering, and it pulls me deeper into mine.

  “Sleep Sweetheart. Sleep, and escape.” He rocks me gently in his arms, and I feel myself slipping under again.

  I want to tell him he is wrong. I cannot escape from what I have done. I want to beg him to keep me awake so I do not have to see them again. But I don’t, and the park looms before me again with its blue skies and the emerald green grass.

  CHAPTER 51

  “She screamed for him most of the night. The rest, she just screamed. Every time I got her calmed down, she would just start back up again.”

  Rhett’s voice eases me into the dawn. I know by the muffled tone, he is outside my room and attempting to whisper to someone who waits with him. He has been with me all night. His presence was curled around me when the demons came to play, and they played their dark games well. The scene might have changed but it was always the same. Lawless and my Angels stolen, massacred by child-like demons, in front of me while I was unable to stop it. Their bodies were torn and mutilated with their anger. Sometimes Ashley would be an added sin, or an added sinner, as she and Margaret stood there damning me for my past.

  I feel no more rested from my night’s sleep than a marathon runner feels after a race. My body aches with it, unable to move from the tight ball I have become. I want to stay here forever, unwilling to face the first day without Lawless.

  For brief moments, I am convinced I can smell him on the cot we shared. Small pockets of his scent will wrap around me so quickly, and fade just as rapidly, leaving me feeling betrayed with their departure. A shirt of his still lies on the floor where he left it. It is a coiled snake with its dark hissing of what I have lost. What I had only hours ago, and what I took for granted. I told him I never thought of him because I thought he would always be here. He would always be with me. I was wrong, and now all I can do is think of him.

  Rhett has come to kneel in front of me, blocking the view of the snake and its hissing. I am aware of him, but I do not see him. I feel his touch gently pushing my hair from my face, but it does not move me. I am finally drowning from this new world, and I hope my last breath is soon.

  “You need to eat.” His voice is whisper-soft with his concern. Even as I hear him, he does not reach me. He sighs, sliding down to the cold tiled floor to sit with his back to me. We both stare at the crumpled discarded cotton on the floor, afraid of it with the memories it holds.

  “He was a good kid. Real good.
A little cocky with that ego of his when it came to the girls, but a good kid. How the girls loved his attention. That smirk of his could drop panties for miles.” Rhett chuckles with his memories.

  “Not just white cotton either, he had g-strings to silk. Until he met you. One look and done. You put up a good fight. Had him chasing his own tail like a whipped puppy. That boy would go out with us, brawl all night or whatever we had to do, then return to the bar to stare all moon-eyed at you. Funniest shit I have ever seen.”

  “Why are you telling me this?” My voice is harsh and gravel filled, interrupting his memory lane.

  “One of us needs to talk.” He shrugs as if it is nothing more than a discussion over what to have for breakfast, not the burial of my soul.

  “I don’t want to talk.” I stare at the grey shirt, and I can see him in it.

  “Then you will listen.” I wonder if Rhett is seeing him, too.

  “I don’t want to listen.” He wore it just two days ago. I am the one that took it off him.

  “I knew he was going to do it. I saw it on his face. The way he handed his bag to Marxx, I knew. It’s my job to keep him safe. It was supposed to be me. To stand by him, you know, when it gets real. That is my job.”

  I do not want to listen, but Rhett ignores my request. I do not want the details. I have seen him die plenty in my dreams from last night to fill me with enough wet, red details but I listen. He kept watch over me, now I keep watch for him.

  “The little punk knew I wouldn’t let him go. He clocked me right in the face. Sent me down just that fraction of a time to distract them all. Then just like what J.D. said, he ran out there. Just ran right the fuck out there. Never looked back.”

  Rhett holds his head between his bent knees as the memories take him. He is shielding his eyes as if he can hide from what he is seeing. I know he can’t. You cannot hide from your own demons. They are yours, and you own them as much as they own you.

  “They were on him so quickly. Soon as he ran out, they ran after him. Hell followed him. Hell followed him all the way down. There was nothing I could do. I promise you, there was nothing we could have done.”

  I have no words of comfort to give him. I am selfish in my own mourning, and I do not have the energy to carry another. I hold my words behind my locked jaw, gifting him with only my silence.

  “I’ll sit here as long as you need. I won’t let anyone near you until you are ready. As long as it takes, Helena.” He tells me this as another man told me something so similar only days ago.

  “Why?” At the sound of my voice, he twists to see me.

  “Why what?” His voice is soft with concern again as he stares at me. I must be having a very bad hair day.

  “Why are you doing this? Before all this, you never said a word to me. I was taught to steer clear of you, for my own good. Guilt that bad?” I did not mean for the words to come out this rough, but they have. He flinches from their implications, and for a second, I feel my own guilt, before the cold numbing wave washes over me again.

  “Part of it.” He returns to staring at the wall ahead of us. “When you first came to us, you were what, 15-16? Just a kid. Kids don’t last long in our world. Shit, grown adults don’t always last long in our world. We aren’t about people pleasing. You come in. You earn your spot, and you keep earning it. It doesn’t ever stop. It breaks people down. J.D. breaks people down.”

  He smirks his twisted smile of enjoyment.

  “The things we do. Tears some of them right up. Only a real few really make it inside. Where it counts. Where the trust is earned.”

  He stalls with a chuckle before continuing.

  “Like Law. You wouldn’t believe the bets that boy had against him. We put him through so much just to watch and laugh at him. He did it all though. Not saying he didn’t bitch about it, but he did it. No matter what you needed. No matter how mad he was with someone. If he was needed, he did it.”

  Rhett sighs, rubbing his face with his hands. I guess I am not the only one that memories haunt now.

  “Now seven years later, here we are. Still here. Still together. Still fighting. Fighting things a little differently than I thought we would ever be, but, still fighting. I’ve watched you grow up. Maybe your life should have been more proms and parties than bar fights and stitches, but you stuck with it. You’ve earned your spot Helena, and you keep earning it.”

  “You’re a pretty girl. Smart. Stubborn. A little too stubborn. Before all this, with their social norms on age, would I have enjoyed our games?”

  He pauses, letting the question float between us while he debates it.

  “Yeah, probably.” He shrugs, unashamed in his lack of care for society.

  “It’s all changed now. Who knows what the rules are. If there are even rules. I sit here not out of guilt, but because I care. Plus, you have this soft little moan in your sleep that does it for me.” I can hear the smile on his face without him having to look at me.

  “Perv.” I nudge him with my knee, and even as I try to fight the smile, I lose.

  “Takes one to know one, Sweetheart.” He does turn to me now wearing the smile that lures so many women to their doom. “You ready to go down and get some food?”

  “No.” I tell him, feeling myself caving again as my smile fades.

  “…..but you’re going to anyway.” His smile has left us now, too. He understands me well.

  “…..but I’m going to anyway.” A little too well.

  CHAPTER 52

  A walk to the gallows would have been easier than to the cafeteria. Eerily with the sad faces around me, it feels the same. Rhett parts the crowd that has grown the way well-wishers do at the most inappropriate times. Marxx walks behind me, keeping them from overtaking me, with their sad eyes and the need to touch me giving me false comfort as they gain their own. It is hard for them to think of someone they saw as being so formidable lost to us. It brings their own fears of their fates too close to their surface. If one of us can fall, then what chances do they have?

  Every step we take holds a visual ghost for me. The phantoms are the strongest in the suffocating stairwell where so many moments were shared. Fate is strangling me with dawn upon us. The sun reaches every once dark corner, forbidding me to hide from her.

  “Just keep one foot in front of the other.” Marxx encourages me, as the distance grows between Rhett and me with each failing step of mine.

  “I can’t breathe.” Marxx wraps his arms around me, helping me to sit upon hearing my words.

  He holds my back against his chest, rocking me with his body. “Yes, you can.”

  I shake my head as panic sets in with the sensation. Rhett catches my head in his hands, steadying it so I am forced to look at him. “You can do this. Just look at me. Breathe with me.”

  Together, he and I, focus upon filling our lungs and nothing else, with patterned inhales and exhales. Slowly the pain subsides as the panic leaves me. My numbness penetrates the space it once filled, and I feel weaker with its cold blanket around me.

  “That one wasn’t so bad.” Marxx helps me stand when my sagging body disobeys me.

  “That one?” I feel as if I am walking on quicksand. Each step could be my last should it suck me below forever.

  “You’ll have more. Each time a little less till there are no more.” Marxx’ hands rest on my waist and guide me down the stairs.

  I want to ask him what it is he is talking about, but with the numbness chilling me, I lack the energy to care. Besides, every time I ask a question the answers get worse. Perhaps I should save some answers for later, before I am so far into them, that I have none to spare. When the noise from the cafeteria hits me, I have a lot less than just answers. I have lost all my bravery to continue.

  At what point is it okay for me to go running off screaming, regretting my decision to do this? The answer? Five minutes. Now, six minutes passed, I am fully regretting not running off screaming back up the stairs. I have a good idea of what I would scream, too
.

  Breakfast is painfully silent as we all feel his loss. There are muffled condolences as people go by. Each time I begin to breathe normally, someone leans in to remind me of what I cannot forget. It is a vicious cycle of my endless regrets, brought on by those that only mean well with their soft touches and silent nods. That is normally how bad things happen. People always mean well.

  “We should hold a funeral.” Aimes is making her idea of art again on her plate. I have no clue as to what it may have started out. I have no clue what it is ending up as either.

  With no one agreeing with her, she pouts harder, taking her emotions out on the artwork.

  “We should do something. It’s Larance.” She whispers his name like a Catholic at Mass, holding it sacred upon her lips.

  “We will.” Of course, the Preacher’s son would volunteer, as the rest of the men sit stone-faced and sour with their grief.

  “Tonight. Around the fire. He would like that.” Aimes’ masterpiece of oatmeal, and something thicker, is clumping from her abuse.

  “He’s dead. He don’t care what we do now. He’s gone.” J.D.’s anger is startling among such levels of silence. I almost welcome his rage. It feels more real than the sad faces and long stares of the sheep.

  “It’s not for him. It’s for us.” Chapel attempts to calm the beast beside him. It only propels J.D.’s rage deeper.

  “You want to do something. You want to ease that suffering of yours? You want to paint it all pretty, the facts of what happened to him? Then get off your padded ass and get to killing them things instead of holding up here like cowards. He died a man. The rest of us, we just gonna die. There is your pretty little fact.” J.D.’s voice carries through the cafeteria with the depths of his anger.

  The families closest to us huddle their children to them with protective arms. Some begin to whisper as the fears they have been thinking all day long are now in vocal form floating around them. Soon, the room becomes alive with the whispered hissing of fear and the many different reactions it causes.