“So you were trying to prove a point?”
He nods. There is no shame or regret on his face and for a moment I wonder if maybe he is some kind of sadist.
“That I need you? Is that it? Look, not even two days ago, my life was normal. And now the damn apocalypse has arrived and vampires and witches are trying to take over the world, and I’m some kind of fairy, excuse me, fae and you’re a half-angel, half-vampire and let’s not forget about the zombies, Infected, whatever the hell they are.” I scratch my brow. “So, yeah, I need you. But, I don’t need you to come in my house with me. Can you respect that, please?”
His gaze is on the sky as if he’s searching for a sign on what to do next.
I get that he doesn’t want me to go in alone because I’m special and have a skill which can help save the world. Just thinking about it, gives me the creeps. I’ve never been special. I was a fat, freckled-face kid who tried to dye her curly cherry-red hair black when I was twelve because I was sick of being called a troll doll.
He sighs. “If you’re not back in three minutes, I’m coming in whether you want me to or not.”
I shrug. “Deal.”
He’s at the bottom of the steps, arms crossed, legs slightly apart, overlooking the yard as if he’s a Secret Service agent protecting the President.
Once inside my house, I dart to my bedroom.
Standing at the door’s threshold, I survey the room. Nothing looks out of place. It’s exactly as I left it, a basket filled with dirty clothes in one corner, my checkered covers hanging over the edge of the bed, and my books neatly stacked on my bedside table.
I get down on my knees on the hardwood floor next to the side of the bed. I crawl under the bed, dragging myself with my elbows, thankful I was smart enough not to purchase a low bed. Even so, the crawl space is tight and I’ll need to hurry because not only am I afraid of heights, I’m also claustrophobic.
When I was five, an older kid, maybe he was ten or eleven, I can’t remember exactly, locked me in a classroom closet during recess after I had gone back inside to get my coat. No one noticed I was gone. I was in that closet in the dark for forty-five minutes screaming my little head off and pounding on the door.
I suck my lip and use my fingernails to dislodge a loose floor board. I reach inside the space below where the board was and draw out a black leather journal. I blow off the layer of dust, put the board back in its place and drag myself out.
Taking in a deep breath, I shake off the layer of dust my clothes collected. Then, I charge into the hall. I pass the bathroom door and consider stopping for a much-needed bathroom break. I’m sure three minutes haven’t passed. I’ve got plenty of time to relieve my exploding bladder.
After I’m done, I wash my hands, splash water on my face, brush my teeth and apply a coat of deodorant. I’m tempted to say screw it and just get in the shower, but then I’d tick off Daniel and end up encouraging his already possessive attitude.
Vampires are often portrayed as jealous and controlling in books in movies, and so far, Daniel is doing a good job of keeping up that stereotype. I would have thought his angel side would have mellowed him out. But then, he is a descendant of fallen angels. I can’t be too hard on the guy though, he has saved my life, twice.
Still, he better tone down the overprotective, sadistic personality, I don’t care how sexy he is. And he is damn sexy, that’s for sure.
Settle down there, hot stuff, and stay focused on your mission.
Tying my thick locks with a ponytail holder, I step out into the hall. I feel better now that I’ve cleaned myself up a little and also retrieved my journal. I feel downright ready to kick some apocalypse butt.
The feeling doesn’t last…someone grabs my hair and yanks me back. I elbow whoever it is in the gut. He belts out a cry and lets me go.
I turn ready to boot him in the crotch.
“Jonathan, what the hell are you doing?”
My ex-boyfriend eyes the journal in my hand. His clothes are torn, his hair is disheveled and there are bruises on his face. “I came for that.”
I hide the journal behind my back. “What are you talking about?”
He puts his hands on my shoulders. “You know what I’m talking about.”
Jonathan is not right. Maybe he’s infected. Or just traumatized. I examine his eyes. They are still brown, not a hint of red in them. That leaves traumatized. It’s the only explanation. How does he know about my journal?
I brush his hands off me. “You’re scaring the crap out of me.”
“He’s a traitor. He’s working for the New Order.”
Daniel is standing at my side.
“Is this your new boyfriend? I’m kind of jealous. He’s taller than me and those eyes...I always knew you liked blue eyes, Selena.”
“Did someone hurt you? Who is making you do this?” I ask Jonathan.
We need to go now,” Daniel says.
“Give me the journal and I’ll go.”
“Why do you want it?”
“Seriously, Selena? Stop pretending.” He places his palm on his mouth. “Oh, I see. Your boyfriend doesn’t know, does he?” He glares at Daniel. “She hasn’t told you about her little book of magic and technology?”
“Shut up, Jonathan.”
“There’s no reason to be rude. I’m not going to hurt you. I was sent for the journal and once I have it, I’ll be on my way,” he extends his hand out to me, “so, please hand it over.”
I smack his hand. “You’re insane. Did they infect you?”
He laughs. “Infect me? Oh, you think I’m becoming a zombie.” He growls. “I’m teasing. I’m not infected. The New Order promised me a powerful position if I helped them.”
“And what is that?” Daniel asks.
“I’ll be a lord, reigning over a town where every person will need to do as I say.”
I laugh at the stupidity of what he has just uttered. “This isn’t eighteenth century England. What the hell is the matter with you? They may not have infected you but they definitely drugged you. You’re delusional.”
Jonathan scratches his head and stomps the floor. “They spared my life!”
“You betrayed your own for nothing,” Daniels says. “Once you give them what they want, they will kill you, but not before you suffer. First, the vampires will drain you, leaving you barely alive. Then the witches will cast a spell on you that will make you think you’re being eaten alive by whatever creatures they decide, insects, lions, crows, bears…it doesn’t really matter. You will wish you were dead but they won’t stop there. They will torture you until you take your last breath and then they will tear you limb from limb and feed your remains to their wolves.”
Jonathan shrugs like a child who’s been punished but doesn’t care and has every intention of continuing his bad behavior. “You’re lying.”
I’m not giving up on Jonathan. He was in the city when Hell came out of the ground and like a pissed off vengeful demon brought down its wrath on all of humanity. As atrocious as my ordeal has been, I’m sure it doesn’t compare to what Jonathan has had to not only endure but also witness.
The New Order fed on his fear and survival instinct. I can forgive him for betraying me and agreeing to bring them my journal.
What I can’t forgive is his newfound greed for power over the innocent. But then, maybe I’m being naïve. Maybe I never really knew Jonathan. A superficial layer always blocked Jonathan and me from connecting on that special level where people expose their secrets and darkest thoughts, as well as their dreams and hopes. Sure, we laughed a bit, got along for the most part, watched movies, went out to dinner, had crazy roll-on-the-floor-like-animals kind of sex, and even held hands and cuddled. But what we never did was trust each other with our true thoughts, feelings and wishes.
We risked nothing and because of that we strayed. And now he has betrayed me.
Jonathan can come back from this, though. He can go with me and Daniel to the place where other hybrids l
ike me are. “Come with us.”
“He’s not a hybrid,” Daniel says.
“I don’t care. We can’t leave him.”
Jonathan glares at me. “I never loved you. And I don’t think you loved me, either.”
His words hurt me but this is not the time to acknowledge them. “Come with us.”
“It’s not permitted,” Daniel says.
“Give me the journal,” Jonathan says.
“You’ll need to take it from me.”
“I don’t want to hurt you. Hurting you was not part of the deal I made.”
“You’ve already hurt me.”
His eyes are tearing up and I wonder if he’s crying because he’s ashamed of what he’s doing or if he’s crying because he knows he’s going to die a wicked man.
“I didn’t have a choice. You weren’t there. You didn’t see what was happening. I was at a club when we were viciously attacked.” His tears make their way down to his cheeks. “Vampires tore out people’s hearts and ate them! I wet myself, that’s how scared I was.”
I touch his face and look into his eyes hoping to make a connection. “It’s okay. It’s going to be okay.”
His lips are quivering. “I ran…I didn’t help anyone. I pushed people out of my way so I could save myself. There’s no redemption for that, Selena. I was stained before the New Order came to me. Two of them found me hiding in a bathroom stall. I thought I was going to die. I deserved to die. They beat me but they didn’t kill me. I was spared because of you. They wanted your journal and they thought I might know where you kept it hidden.” He turns his back on me. “I knew about your journal. I knew where you kept it. I saw you one night when you thought I was still in the shower.”
Jonathan never liked being out of the city. He hated staying at the cottage and only stayed there a few times. It was during one of those rare stays when he must have seen me.
I want to curse at my carelessness and stupidity.
Daniel firmly grasps my arm. “We need to go right now! Witches are here.”
“Jonathan, come on!”
“Good boy. You did what you were supposed to do. You found the journal and Selena. Bonus points for you. Too bad you won’t live to enjoy any of what was promised to you.”
In front of us is a slim and tall, beautiful woman with pale skin and golden wavy hair that comes down to her hips. She’s not a haggard, wrinkled, hunched-over witch with thinning long hair and long crooked bruised nails. She isn’t at all like the witches in old fairy tales.
This witch is more like a fairy godmother, like Glinda from The Wizard of Oz, endearing and soft-spoken. Except that unlike a fairy godmother she’s not here to sprinkle glittery pixie dust on us.
She’s here to kill us. And she brought friends with her.
Two more witches who look exactly like her are now with us crowding my narrow hallway.
I seem to escape one deadly scenario only to keep finding myself in another. I have been close to falling into Death’s arms more than a few times since the end of the world arrived.
“There isn’t enough room for all of us here. Maybe we should step outside and talk. I’m sure we can figure this all out.” I hope my unexpected light comment helps diffuse the tense atmosphere. Something tells me it won’t.
One of the witches runs a red fingernail along Daniel’s shoulder and chest as if she’s trying to seduce him. “You didn’t tell your little half-human hybrid how much we witches despise humans? We hate them so much we want to wipe them off the earth. Vampires want to keep some so they can enslave them and feed from them and torture them. Not us. We seek their extinction.”
I maneuver myself between her and Daniel. “Why do you hate us?”
“Sweet special little hybrid. I actually only hate half of you. Your repulsive human half,” she bobbles her head slightly, “not that I’m a fan of the fae, but they were more tolerable than humans and they didn’t betray us. We only helped kill them because they sided with humans. They were always so loyal to humans, helping them build things that humans would never have been able to build. Ah, stupid humans. Nothing to show behind their big egos. If it wasn’t for the fae, humans would still be living in caves biting their toes and picking their noses.”
“You still haven’t answered my question. Why do you hate us?”
She hisses and snarls like one of the Infected. “You bore me.” She tries to shove me but I hold my place.
“How’s this going to go? Are you going to try and kill us? Cause if you are, get on with it.”
Oddly, I’m not scared of these wretched witches. Their arrogance and invasion has fueled me, making me more confident. Daniel standing next to me helps, too.
The witch exhales a vigorous laugh as if she was an audience member and I was a stand-up comedian who just nailed the punch line. “Of course we’re not going to kill you!”
I take hold of Jonathan’s sleeve and drag him forward. “In that case, we’re leaving.”
The witches step aside and let us pass.
“When we’re outside we’re taking flight,” Daniel whispers in my ear.
I know I should turn around and make sure the trio isn’t going to ambush us from behind, but my instinct tells me to keep walking and get out as quickly as we can. I’m not sure what we’re going to do about Jonathan. Daniel won’t agree to take him with us and even if he did, I doubt he can transport us both. Jonathan is a burly man.
Behind us, the witches are laughing so eagerly they sound like a pack of hyenas that just came upon a carcass in the savannah after days of not eating and can’t believe their luck. Their laughter makes my skin slither.
We make it out and I sigh, thankful we’re one step closer to fleeing what could have been a fight ending in death for one or more of us.
My gratitude doesn’t last. Jonathan starts choking, his face turning blue; his hands on his throat, he drops on the deck and squirms violently. Foam begins to skid out of the corners of his mouth and then I notice his eyes. They are turning red.
The bitches infected him.
Daniel lifts me into his arms. “There’s nothing we can do for him.”
I sway my legs and smack Daniel in the chest like a little girl throwing a tantrum. “We can’t leave him!”
“He’s infected.”
“I don’t care.”
“Did you forget how he betrayed you?”
“He didn’t have a choice.”
“Everyone always has a choice.”
What Jonathan did was wrong but it breaks me to see him die in this cruel way. I need to accept that this is the new reality in which I’m living and that I’m going to witness more brutality than I already have. But it’s not fair that he should die like this. It’s not fair that he will now roam aimlessly, mouth agape, seeking humans on which to feed.
I search my strength and will. I will not let him suffer anymore.
“Please put me down. I need to end his misery.”
“The witches will come after us if we don’t leave now. I made a deal with them. His life for yours.”
My mind is on what I need to do. Whatever Daniel did will have to wait.
He relents and sets me down.
I approach Jonathan. His body is convulsing, veins mark his face, and his eyes are swelling.
“I’m sorry,” I say to him, but I know he can no longer hear me. He’s one of the Infected now and in a minute he will raise himself and have no memory of me or who he was. He will see me as food and he won’t waste a second trying to devour me.
I push my hand forward, commanding it to release a lightning bolt. If I have to stand here and let the witches kill me, so be it. I will not walk away. If I’m truly a fae then let the power of my ancestors show itself.
I call on you now! Curse you, Fae! Curse you if you don’t help me. I’m desperate.
I bite my lip, keeping my back straight and head held high and then I thrust my hand again. This time a ball of light emerges from my palm and drives violentl
y into Jonathan’s chest. The force of the explosion knocks me several feet backwards, and I land hard on my shoulder blades on the other side of the porch.
Winded, I stagger to my feet. I did it. It actually worked. Daniel embraces me and keeps me from falling.
“Are you okay?”
“I don’t know.”
I massage my palm. I don’t feel any pain but there is a round bruise in the center. It resembles a mark, specifically like something you might find in a Wiccan book, not that I have a clue about what’s in such books. I’ve seen enough movies to have an idea.
I look at Jonathan. I gasp and hold my stomach to keep from hurling. I can’t believe what I’m seeing. It’s a horror scene.
There is nothing left of him. He’s nothing more than a charred skeleton, bearing no resemblance to a human. The smell of burnt flesh makes it difficult for me to breath. I cough and gag.
Daniel gently sweeps me up. “Don’t look.” He shields my eyes with his hands and ascends into the clear sky.
I sink my face in his chest. He was telling me truth. I’m still not sure I believe everything he told me but I have to accept that I am more than human. I have known for a long time that there was something about me that was unusual and not in the nerdy tech girl kind of a way, more like I might be an alien kind of way. I’m glad I’m a fae and not an alien. Aliens are always probing people. I’d rather not be a part of that.
We climb higher and I remember what Daniel said about making a pact with the witches. He didn’t even try to fight them. He did nothing. I saw him easily rip the head off an Infected one but he simply stood there and did nothing when the witches came. He intentionally refrained.
“You could have killed those witches.
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Because I couldn’t risk one of them hurting you before I could kill them all.”
“When did you make a pact with them?”
“Soon after they arrived.”
“How?” Daniel and the witches hardly said a word to each other.
“Witches and hybrids can read each other’s minds.”
Chapter Five
Legends of the Damned: A Collection of Edgy Urban Fantasy and Paranormal Romance Novels Page 250