Darkness Brutal (The Dark Cycle Book 1)

by Rachel A. Marks

  My stomach rises again. “That thing just showed up after a spell?” That means it’s magic, and for some reason it affects me. Could my own mark be from a spell, too? In Ava’s dream, Mom said I should touch the violets and lilies to find my hidden blood. And the violets and lilies are there on Kara because of magic.

  “It was faded at first,” she says, interrupting the questions rolling around in my head, “but with each session Sid did to bind the curse, it got brighter and brighter. He said it was some sort of lock to keep the curse held down but also to harness my own energy and turn the curse power on its head. So I’d never be used by any man ever again. I use them instead.”

  “This is dangerous stuff, Kara,” I say.

  “I know. I feel it. But it’s worth it. I’m free.”

  I release a long breath. “I assume after the tattoo appeared your ability to feel things got stronger, too.”

  “Not really stronger but clearer. More focused.”

  “Oh,” I say, wondering what to think. “Can I see it again?”

  Nervous vibrations muffle the air between us. “What? The tattoo?”

  I nod.

  After a second she turns her back to me and pulls up her shirt.

  I follow the green vine and flower pattern down to her waist, where it disappears into her pants. I focus my energy, trying to really see what the tattoo is, not just what it looks like, trying to get a vision of it on her soul.

  A pattern emerges, faint but there, in the curls of the vines, in the shape of the flowers coming together.

  Three circular symbols.

  The first I know means Intimacy. Or Knowing. Below it, the symbol for Power is overlaid with the symbol for Awaken.

  Awaken the Power.

  The third symbol dips past her pants.

  I swallow. “Can I see all of it?”

  She gives me a pained look, like she’s almost embarrassed. I clarify by saying, “I see something, but I need to see all of it to be sure.”

  She bites the corner of her lip and unbuttons her jeans, pulling them down past her hip.

  The third symbol is one I’ve seen before, but I’m not sure where. It’s a double circle, overlapping. Inside one circle it says Demon, and inside the other it says Seer, and where they intersect the space is filled with the marks for the three types of death—Mind, Body, Spirit.

  Demon. Seer. Complete Death.

  And I suddenly realize where I’ve seen it.

  I lift my marked hand and look at Kara’s mark. Then I look at mine. A section of my own mark rises from the rest, almost as if it’s calling out to me. Or showing itself for the very first time . . .

  Demon. Seer. Complete Death.

  It’s exactly the same.

  TWENTY

  Ava’s downstairs at the kitchen table. She’s eating Froot Loops and laughing at something Lester is saying. Jax sits beside Lester and flicks rainbow-colored Os into the sink one at a time. Holly’s frying eggs on the stove top and talking a mile a minute even though no one’s listening. There’s no sign of Connor.

  I watch from the stairs, trying to gather my thoughts. I left Kara in her room. She said she needed to take a shower, get dressed, that we’d talk later. But I think she just wanted to be alone. After she zipped her pants back up she practically shoved me out the bedroom door.

  I thought things were awkward before last night.

  She didn’t ask why I was comparing our marks, so I didn’t mention that something hidden on her tattoo matched mine. Things are weird enough between us as it is, and she probably only sees flowers when she looks at hers.

  Until I know what it means, I don’t want to let my imagination run rampant.

  As I walk into the kitchen, everyone goes silent.

  Jax grins wide. “How was she? Does she bite?”

  My vision narrows. “Wipe that smirk off your face before I cut it off for you.”

  “Ohhh . . . tough guy,” Lester says in a singsong voice.

  “Calm down, man,” Jax says, holding up his hands. “Just admiring your work with getting the ungettable. That girl’s as frigid as Antarctica.”

  “And there’s been others standing in the NTL, naked-time line, for years,” Holly pipes in, not turning around, still frying her eggs. “You show up and poof!” Her spatula waves in the air, sending a bit of egg flying. “It’s suddenly Kara-Aidan Fest 2015. Or Kaidan Fest, if you will.”

  Ava’s watching the whole thing, her gaze moving from person to person, a look of open curiosity on her face.

  Jax flicks another Froot Loop toward the sink. It bounces off the counter, joining a rainbow pile on the floor. “Connor looked like he was gonna cut you to ribbons. Is there about to be a little WWF shit?”

  “Nothing happened, so he can calm down,” I say. “You all can.”

  Ava frowns. “Did you have sex with Kara?” She doesn’t look mad, not exactly. Maybe irritated. “What about Rebecca?”

  Lester grins. “Ooh . . . who’s Rebecca?”

  Ava knows about Rebecca? Great.

  “The boy’s a slut,” Holly says with a giggle. “Want some eggs, lover boyo?” She holds out a pan of overcooked yellow mush.

  I can’t help scrunching up my nose. At both her words and offer.

  Finger comes in, stealthy enough that I didn’t feel him behind me. He holds out a plate, and Holly fills it with eggs. Then he slips away again, heading into a doorway under the staircase.

  “There’s bagels, too.” Holly says, pointing to the top of the fridge. “You must be hungry after a night in the bouncy house with our resident emo chick—”

  I stop listening and say to Ava, “Can I talk to you?” I motion to the entryway, and she gets up and follows me out of the kitchen as Holly continues entertaining herself with the soap opera in her head.

  Ava stops at the base of the stairs and turns to me. “This is about Kara.” She frowns again, obviously not a fan.

  “That dream you told me about the other day, the one where Mom talked to you about me. What was it she said again about violets and lilies?” I fold my arms across my chest, feeling jittery just talking about it.

  Ava steps back. “No way.”

  “What did she say, Ava?”

  “It’s not right. Something isn’t right.” I give her a look, and she continues with a sigh. “Fine. What she said was: He doesn’t know which way to walk along the line. The Light he found will lead him. Its wings sit beneath the heart. But he must touch the violets and lilies to find surrender, to find his hidden blood.” She watches me absorb the words for a second and then adds, “Now tell me what happened.”

  I shake my head, not keen on talking to my little sister about my love life. But her words—my mom’s words—mean something. Kara has a tattoo with the same flowers in the dream, and for some reason it affects me. Could she be the “Light” who’ll lead me? Sid did call the kids in this house lights and beacons. Maybe that’s what it means.

  But where does Rebecca fit—if she even fits at all?

  “How did you know about Rebecca? I never mentioned her.” I’m used to Ava knowing things out of the blue. But there’s usually a reason.

  She blinks at me and then walks past, heading up the stairs.

  “Ava . . .” I turn and follow her.

  “You’ll get angry,” she says as she slips into our room, trying to shut the door in my face.

  I push into the room, shutting the door behind me. “Tell me. Now.”

  “I’ll say if you tell me what happened with Kara. It’s only fair.”

  “Seriously?” As much as she seems to have an ancient soul, in reality she’s just an eleven-year-old little girl. And by little I mean annoying. I breathe through my nose. “I promise not to get mad.”

  If she thinks I won’t like it, then I know what this is about: she must�
�ve used her powers.

  She squints at me, trying to see if I’m lying.

  I raise my hands. “Swear.”

  She chews on her lip for a few seconds, and then she says, “I may have done one of . . . of Mom’s spells.”

  My jaw goes tight.

  “I told you,” she says in a tiny voice. “You’re mad now.”

  I try to reason past the red blocking my vision. “A spell.” I can’t even express how terrifying and inevitable this all feels. “From her grimoire. Why in the hell would you do that?”

  “I wanted to see if I could.”

  “Of course you can!” I wave my arms, exasperated. “You know what kind of shit you can do!”

  Her chin goes up in defiance. “You swore you wouldn’t get mad.”

  I cover my face with my hands and try to calm down. Getting pissed isn’t going to help. The shit’s already hitting the fan. No stopping it now. And Ava doesn’t remember the darkness Mom brought into our world with her casting. She doesn’t remember that horror.

  Maybe it’s time to tell her what I know. I just have to say it: Your mother’s spells cursed you and got her killed. Easy.

  But the words won’t emerge. Instead I say, “I’m sorry.” My head aches from it all. It feels like I’ll never stop any of it. “You can tell me. What spell, Ava?”

  She digs into the back of the closet, pulling out her bag and the grimoire.

  I step back as she opens it and points to a drawing of swirls.

  No, not a drawing, it’s a series of words written in a swirl shape.

  “I wanted to do a small one, just see what it felt like,” she says, “to see if I could do it. So I did a protective-link spell.” She glances up from the page. “On you.”

  I’m fairly sure my eyes are about to pop out of my head and roll across the floor. “Me? You did a spell on me?”

  She shakes her head violently. “No, no! I did a spell about you. It’s different. It’s a looking spell, a spell that unveils hidden things. I just wanted to see a little of your future, that’s all.”

  “Damn it, Ava. You shouldn’t have done that.”

  “I know.”

  “How did you do it, anyway? Don’t you need innocent blood and something from the subject for a spell like that?” I remember far too much of Mom’s casting habits.

  She pulls a puff of fuzz from the folds of the grimoire and holds it out as an offering. It’s splotched with something brown and crusty. “I cut some of the fur stuff from inside your hoodie and used bird blood for the conduit.”

  I take the blood-caked fuzz from her and sit on the bed. The weight on my shoulders just gained about a hundred pounds. “When was this?”

  My little sister did one of my mom’s spells.

  My little sister killed a bird.

  “I did it after you left me the other day, in the orange trees,” she says. “I felt something was different when you showed up. You were distracted, and there was this thing in your eyes.”

  “What thing?”

  “A connection thing. Like you were suddenly worried, but not about me. I wanted to know who it was.”

  “So you did something horrible that’ll only make me worry more?”

  She fidgets with the edge of the grimoire, looking urgent. “Aidan, when I did the spell, I saw her. Rebecca. She was really strong in the object I was using. I saw her really clear.”

  “That’s ’cause it was her brother’s hoodie you stole that fuzz from. And she loved her brother, but he drowned.”

  Her eyes grow like something’s suddenly coming clear. “So she loved the boy who wore that hoodie?”

  I nod.

  “But now she loves you.”

  “She doesn’t even know me, Ava. She can’t love me.”

  “But what I saw was very real. And there was a bond between you guys. It totally felt like love.”

  My ears perk up at that. And even though I shouldn’t be pushing, even though my curiosity will only encourage her, I ask anyway. “You saw both our futures? And we were together?”

  “She wanted to stay by your side. No matter what. It was like she was somehow linked to you in a spirit way.”

  “But there’s no way that can happen,” I say, more to myself than to Ava.

  “Why?”

  “It just can’t. I won’t be seeing her again. It’s not safe. For you or the others.”

  “But you have to!” she whines, sounding as if her favorite TV couple just broke up. “You can’t let that Kara girl get in your head!”

  “Kara is not in my head.”

  She gives me a disbelieving look. “You kissed her, didn’t you?”

  Twice. “It was just a moment. We were both tired.” And somehow fell into each other’s arms? I sound like an idiot.

  She rolls her eyes. “Whatever you do, just be careful. I don’t like her.”

  “Why do you keep saying that? There must be a reason. Did you see a bad thing in a vision about her or something? An image of darkness maybe?” I really would like to know this. I have complicated feelings about Kara myself, but mostly that’s because she seems so unhinged. So unpredictable. All I see with my own sight is wounds. Loads and loads of wounds.

  “She’s broken.”

  “So am I, Ava.”

  She shakes her head. “No. She’s nothing like you, Aidan. Nothing.” She hugs the grimoire tighter.

  I wish she would tell me what’s going on. I wish she hadn’t done that spell. And it’s probably not the first time she’s done one from that grimoire by the sound of it.

  I shiver, thinking about it all, seeing the look on her face, the frantic widening of her eyes, like she’s reliving Mom’s descent . . . If this gets much worse, there’s no doubt in my mind that it’s going to kill her. I have to find a way to change the outcome—to find out if I even can change it. Maybe if I knew more about my own abilities . . .

  But my abilities will lead to my dad. They’ll lead to the part of me I’ve been trying my whole life to bury. Maybe it’s time now to start facing it, though, to start seeing how far it goes. And if it does bring me to my dad, then I’ll face that too, when the time comes. But I have to use everything in me to save Ava. Even if it means confronting what I’m always running from.

  TWENTY-ONE

  After a while, I wander downstairs and sit on the couch next to Finger. His thumbs are flying on the controller as he attempts to kill a dragon with a sword. It looks like some kind of medieval game.

  “What’s the score?” I ask.

  He shrugs. He smells like Funyuns.

  “Looks exciting,” I say, even though I don’t really give a crap.

  He shrugs again.

  “Man, life sucks.”

  Finger snorts.

  We sit there in silence for a while as he kills the dragon and then a horde of trolls. After an hour or so I begin to feel like I can breathe again.

  As if he felt me relaxing, Connor comes into the archway. “Garage, now. Sid wants you on a job.”

  I stand to follow him, but before I leave the room, I turn and say to Finger, “Thanks for the chat, man. It really helped.” And strangely enough, it did.

  Finger smiles, but he doesn’t look away from the TV.

  On my way to the garage, I work up my nerve to ask Sid for help. I’m not sure what to say to him or how, but I need more information than what I’ve got. I need a clearer understanding of my abilities and how they link to my mom. I need more of the story of how she started down her dark path.

  Whatever I request from Sid, though, needs to be simple and not point back to Ava. I’m not ready to trust him with her yet—or anyone, for that matter.

  In the garage, Sid is sitting in the passenger seat of a Jeep, walking stick in hand. He’s always holding that thing, and he doesn’t even have a limp.
He frowns at me as I open the door to get in the backseat. “You look horrid, son.”

  Gee, I wonder why.

  “Connor mentioned there was an altercation,” he adds, nodding to Connor, who’s entering the garage behind me.

  “Just a misunderstanding,” I say, watching Connor as he gets into the driver’s seat. “Nothing major.”

  Connor doesn’t say anything; he just starts the engine and backs out of the garage. Sid makes a sound of agreement, and I wonder if he actually believes me or if he’s just going along with it to keep the peace.

  As we drive down Hollywood Boulevard, heading for the freeway, my pulse races. I can’t shake my nervousness about asking for Sid’s help. But I need to do it as soon as possible. I need to do it now.

  “So how are you and your sister settling in?” Sid asks, looking over his shoulder at me.

  “Fine,” I say. “Thanks.”

  “Your sister is very talented,” he adds. “Hearing her music fill the house is lovely.”

  “Yeah, she’s been playing one instrument or another since she was five.” The music helps her channel her abilities better, she says. It definitely feels otherworldly when she plays.

  “Does musical talent run in the family?” he asks.

  “Um, no. I can’t tell one note from another to save my life.”

  Sid laughs. Connor hasn’t reacted to our exchange at all. He just focuses on the road ahead. There’s a slight tinge of purple on the side of his jaw where I hit him. I’m thinking he won’t be laughing at anything I say for a while.

  I decide to take the segue. “Speaking of family, I’m wondering if you could help me with something.”

  Sid turns a little in his seat to face me. “I’ll help with whatever you need.” No red spark lights his eye. He’s being truthful. Whatever I need.

  “I want to try and find some of my mom’s family. Her mother or her grandparents maybe.”

  He nods slow, considering.

  “I’m not sure I want to talk to them,” I add, “or let them know Ava and I are around. I just have a lot of questions.”