04 Last

by Lynnie Purcell

  We followed Reaper to the heavy door that led outside. Alex followed behind us. She had her hands jammed in to her heavy winter jacket and she had pulled a toboggan out of her pocket. She looked winter-ready, but I had never seen her look so uncertain. She stared at her feet as she walked, and her sadness for the situation she had created with Reaper was a song between us.

  The icy cold wind of the outside was bitter after the warmth of the inside. Daniel’s electric touch was the only ward against the chill. Jackson was waiting with the others. King and River were next to Preacher, catching up with Preacher. King looked the same – his head was bald, there was tattoo of a king of spades on his neck, and his neon blue eyes cut through the white of the falling snow. River was different from one day to the next – today her hair was a combination of pink, blue, and purple stripes mixed in to her black hair, and she had a new piercing in her eyebrow. King nodded at me when he saw me and glanced at Daniel curiously. The nod told me he had been successful with the task I had sent him on. The glance was because King could feel Daniel’s suspicious stare; it was as obvious as the day. I squeezed Daniel’s hand to get him to stop staring. Spider was hanging on the rails and fighting throwing up. He was eager to get off the ship and get on with whatever adventure we would find.

  Sara was in the middle of the group, her stance calm and patient. She wasn’t wearing her normal, colorful jewelry. She, like the others, was wearing white; winter camouflage. Her smile of greeting, more than the others, was respectful. She knew I was the one to take the whispering voices out of the darkness of the world she traveled from one place and the next. She felt the affect of Nemesis’ departure from the dark prison more than anyone did. For some reason, she respected me for what I had done. Perhaps, I had taken away one of her nightmares…I could understand her relief. A group of five others was preparing to jump to the bank – to keep lookout in Margaret and Preacher’s stead.

  “Just keep the ship moving north,” Reaper told River.

  “I know. You told me,” River said.

  “I’ll call when we’re ready,” he added.

  “You told me that, too. You better leave, before I think you’ve gone mother-hen on me,” River teased.

  Reaper nodded in agreement, a small smile on his face. He trusted River to do what needed to be done; it was time to let her do it. He held out his hand to Sara. Sara took it and waited for the rest of us to do the same. Daniel and I shared a look of readiness, and then we both stretched out our hands.

  We weren’t sure what was waiting for us, but we knew there was no turning back. We were committed to the path ahead. More than just Daniel’s happiness depended on it.

  Lives hung in the balance.

  Chapter 2

  The cave Sara set us down in was not anything special.

  At least, it wasn’t how I had imagined a secret hideout. Water dripped endlessly from somewhere; it was dark and cold. The only source of light was a small halogen lantern set near a wall opposite from me. Next to the light were three chairs. A breeze gusted around the enclosed space, seemingly out of nowhere. It brought it with a foul smell I couldn’t place. To the left, front and back of me were the walls of the cave. To the right was an endless stretch of tunnels that went back out of sight. The tunnels branched off and recessed in to darkness more complete than anything I had ever seen. The tunnels created a feeling of space, despite the low ceiling and thick walls. It was space I was happy to embrace. The walls were just too close. There was nothing separating me from the ceiling caving in and crushing me.

  I focused on the furniture, instead of the feeling of enclosure. I was not a fan of small spaces, not since getting locked in a tomb in one of New Orleans’ oldest cemeteries. It had been the first time I had realized how space could affect a person’s psyche. Goosebumps that had nothing to do with the chilly climate crawled along my back. I wanted out.

  “Cozy,” I said, trying to keep the others from noticing my discomfort.

  “I wanted to bring in a sofa and a couple of chairs, to add feng shui you understand, but ‘cave in the middle of nowhere’ doesn’t have delivery, of all things,” Jackson said.

  “Shame,” I said.

  “Isn’t it?” Jackson asked.

  “This place has more ‘funk’ than ‘shui,’” Alex said, holding her hand to her nose. “What’s that stink?”

  “Oh…I don’t know,” Jackson admitted. “I think something died back in the caves. We haven’t found the source of it yet. We‘ve had other things on our mind.”

  “It’s foul,” Alex said. “How can you stand it? I thought Watchers were supposed to have advanced…everything?”

  Jackson smirked at Alex. “We do have advanced…everything. You stop smelling it after an hour or two.”

  “Awesome,” Alex said with a roll of her eyes.

  “Are you done?” Daniel asked us.

  He was not as interested in furniture or wayward smells in the dark. His eyes were focused on the wall to the left; they were focused in a way I knew was dangerous, not only for himself, but for those who were keeping Han and Beatrice. He was determined and hyper-focused. It was a look I did not test, not without a willingness to be burned by it.

  “Are you?” I asked Jackson.

  “Sure. There’s violence to be had…so, let’s get on with it,” Jackson said eagerly.

  Reaper was also looking at the wall to my left. His silver eyes were impressed with what he saw. He walked over and put a hand against the seemingly firm wall. He didn’t use his gift of turning to smoke, but his hand still went through the rock. The wall didn’t ripple or move with Reaper’s touch. It remained as solid-looking as the others.

  “You haven’t lost your touch, Preach,” Reaper complimented Preacher. “This is amazing work.”

  “Thank you,” Preacher said with a small smile. His orange eyes cut through the dark as he eyed the wall. “Would you like me to keep the illusion up?”

  Reaper nodded. “For now… Can you make sure we’re not seen when we go outside?” Reaper asked. “They might have people watching this area.

  “I’ll do my best,” Preacher said.

  “I can help with that,” Margaret said. “I’ll turn the storm this way.”

  “Good. The more cover the better,” Reaper said.

  “Yeah, speaking of that…Let’s go take a look,” Daniel said.

  He was impatient. He looked ready to storm the building all by himself. I wasn’t the only one who noticed.

  “Are you sure you can stay calm?” Reaper asked. “This is your family we’re talking about after all…I wouldn’t want your emotions to get the better of your judgment…”

  One of Daniel’s eyebrows arched dangerously. It was a look that came with a recommendation: don’t question him. He would do whatever it took – even if that meant waiting – to get them free. His impatience would not get the best of him. I knew that for a fact. Daniel had mastered waiting. He might fidget and get annoyed, but he never acted without forethought.

  Reaper smiled at Daniel, not taking the threat as seriously as others would have, and stepped through the seemingly solid wall. The others followed him. I hesitated. It wasn’t just because I didn’t want to be shown how impossible it would be to rescue Han and Beatrice. The cold, tingling shock of being watched was traveling through my body in a message of awareness.

  The others didn’t seem to notice the feeling – as trained and aware as they were, I knew they would have felt the feeling if it were real. The excitement and fear was obviously getting to me. I was wound up. Still, I couldn’t help but turn and look at the deep recesses of the cave for an answer to the feeling. Even looking straight at the darkness, the feeling didn’t fade.

  “Clare?”

  I turned at the sound of Alex calling my name. The others had already left; Daniel’s impatience had hurried their exit. Her eyes pierced mine through the dimly lit area. Around the question, there was worry. She knew something wasn’t right. She could tell from the ex
pression on my face. I rolled my shoulders and tried to force the feeling from my mind. It was just my nerves. Nerves wouldn’t help what we were trying to do.

  “Yeah?” I asked.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “A feeling,” I said.

  “Uh-oh,” she said.

  “It’s nothing,” I said.

  “When is it ever?” she asked.

  I smiled but ignored the question. I hooked my hand through her arm and pulled her toward the wall. I focused on stepping through the seemingly real wall, so that I wasn’t focused on following through on my first impulse; the impulse that would have me doing something dangerous. Going lone wolf in a dark cave was the last thing we needed in the middle of a rescue mission. I had promised Daniel I wouldn’t do that anymore. I had promised him to think before I acted. Too, I feared the utter the darkness more than I would have admitted to anyone.

  Walking through the wall was no different from walking through an open door. There was no resistance, nothing to impede us from stepping out of the inside of the cave to the outside. The illusion was nothing more than a trick of the eye.

  The outside of the cave was much more dramatic than the inside. Steep mountains, covered in a mantle of snow, reached up around us like a steeple. We were up high – higher than the valley floor – but the mountains still loomed over us. They were never-ending. The mountains had a sense of time, of place. They were majestic…and terrifying. It was obvious they cared little for the humans crawling along its surface. We were nothing more than a blip on its timeline; they would outlast us by generations. It was comforting to know something would, but also strange to feel the sense of time in such a dramatic way. It was as if the mountains were looking down on us and saying, ‘See? Even you won’t last as long as me.’

  Above us and shimmering like a mirage in the desert was a wall of rock; Preacher’s attempt to keep us from prying eyes. The illusion was not very tall – it was a half inch from the top of my head – and it did nothing to stop the falling snow from collecting in our hair and on our faces. The snow had changed. It was no longer lace gently falling to the earth, rather wet stones cast to the ground with a vengeance. It obscured the mountainside, though it did not stop us from seeing down to the valley below. A cold wind chilled me to the bone; any skin I had left exposed to the elements immediately started to hurt. Dark clouds moved over our heads, closing us in even more. It was as claustrophobic as the cave, despite the sense of space. It was Margaret’s doing, though I wished for a warmer attempt to keep us from being seen.

  Daniel and the others were crouched down near a row of heavy rocks along the edge of the mountain. A short trail separated them from the cave. There was even less space separating them from a fall straight down the mountain. Daniel gestured for us to crouch down as soon as I was outside. Alex and I both knelt down and waddled like ducks until we were close to the rocks. There wasn’t a lot of room along the edge of the cliff, but we found a place next to Daniel. His green eyes were busy surveying the valley below. I tried to see what he saw. My eyes strained against the cold and the bitter wind to see so far.

  I saw the tiny specks of people as they roamed the icy landscape. There was nothing to differentiate between one person and the next, no hint of a weakness. At least, not to me. The fortress was easier to see. It was large and as solid as the mountain. There was no escaping it. It was carved out of the rock, like Jackson had said. It was not an elegant carving. Blocky and purposeful, it had been carved with the word, ‘fortress,’ in mind. Towers rose at regular intervals from the blocky structure. Windows were minimal. There were more windows the higher the structure was from the ground, but even those were narrow and looked as if they held some defensive purpose. The rock above the structure had been blown away, so that there wasn’t an easy way to crawl down to the roof. The landscape in front of the fortress was flat and icy – it would be easy to tell if an army, or even a single person, was approaching.

  The others saw more than just artistic choices in design. Their eyes moved across the mountainous landscape. They catalogued defenses, strategies of the enemy and knew the secrets of the place before I could even catalogue the rocky surface of the structure.

  Reaper moved closer to us and got Daniel’s attention with a gesture. He made some hand gestures I didn’t understand then pointed back at the cave. Daniel nodded and touched Jackson on the arm. Jackson didn’t need the touch to know what Reaper had said. He nodded as well.

  Alex and I shared an exasperated look.

  “Ever feel left out?” I asked in a low whisper.

  She rolled her eyes in agreement.

  Jackson tapped me on the shoulder and shook his head, to keep me from saying anything else. He gestured us back in to the cave. I sighed and followed the others. As soon as we were inside again, I was irritable.

  “Why did we all go out there for two seconds?” I asked. “Doesn’t looking at defenses take more time?”

  “That’s as long as it took to see that storming the place is impossible,” Daniel said.

  “I could have told you that when Jackson claimed it was a fortress,” I said.

  “I thought you were supposed to be the optimistic one?” Daniel asked.

  “Why do you need to storm the place, exactly?” Spider asked.

  “To get Han and Beatrice out, of course,” Reaper said.

  Spider shook his head at Reaper’s misunderstanding.

  “That’s not what I meant,” Spider said. “You’re looking at it all wrong. Storming the place is what it’s designed for. They’ve designed it to withstand armies; to withhold a siege. It’s obvious they expected company one day. You said yourself that Marcus is paranoid. But even paranoia can’t account for all the ways in to a building…no place is ever really ‘impenetrable.’”

  “Sneaking in is impossible, too,” Daniel said, his face darkened by the seriousness of his thoughts. “They’ll have sensors and people watching the sensors. We would get caught in a second.”

  Spider laughed. “That’s why I like people as a rule. They underestimate my ability to sneak.”

  “That’s a great reason to like people,” I said dryly.

  “Yup,” Spider agreed.

  “You should listen to the boy,” a new voice added. “No place is without weaknesses.”

  We all spun to face the direction of the voice – it was coming from deeper in the caves. The direction I had sensed eyes on my back. I had my knife out of my boot before I knew what I was facing. The reaction was immediate – I couldn’t have stopped it if I had tried. The others had similar reactions. Reaper had pulled out his gun and had forced Spider behind him before I had my knife half way out. Daniel had pulled out a gun as well – which surprised me. I hadn’t known he was carrying one. He pointed it at the dark, even as his eyes surveyed the space for the enemy we all knew was lurking. Sara had a curved knife as long as my forearm in her hand. I wasn’t sure where she had hidden it, but I wasn’t going to ask – not with the look on her face. Preacher, Jackson and Margaret were the only ones who hadn’t pulled a weapon out. Their bodies were tense, though, as tense as the others.

  “Oh, don’t be ridiculous,” the voice said. “If I had wanted you dead, you’d be dead.”

  It was then I recognized the sultry, accented voice. There was a hint of French in the voice, and it was unmistakably feminine. The playfulness of it didn’t hide the person’s penchant for bringing trouble. It was someone I had definitely never wanted to meet again.

  “You like to use people too much to kill them, Serenity,” I said back, not lowering my knife an inch, despite recognizing the voice. “We both know that.”

  “Hmmm, still charming people with your wit I see,” Serenity said.

  Serenity finally stepped in to the light with her words. She was wearing a snowsuit and a cute, white hat that would have looked ridiculous on me. Her ebony skin was perfect, unblemished, and her golden eyes were pale in the light of the lamp. She didn’t m
ake a sound as she walked, her heavy boots not detracting from her grace at all.

  “Don’t let my charm overwhelm you. I’m really quite annoyed,” I said.

  Daniel stepped in front of me. It was a small step, but enough of one to put his body in front of mine, should there be a fight. He trusted Serenity about as much as I did; only he knew her well enough to know the full extent of her dangerous abilities. His anger radiated between us like a living force. It connected me to the past he shared with her and his defiance of the Watcher Serenity worked for, a powerful seer by the name of Odette.

  “I thought you were going to stay clear of my business,” Daniel said, a threat in his voice.

  Serenity’s golden eyes flashed with irritation. She kept her irritation out of her voice, however. She maintained her silky purr.

  “I don’t remember agreeing to the threat you made. I just listened as you made it, darling,” Serenity said.

  “I thought it was pretty clear that I didn’t want to see you again,” Daniel said. “Not after what you did in New Orleans…”

  “If I remember correctly, I saved your life,” Serenity said.

  “Only after putting it in danger,” Daniel said. “Only after putting Clare’s life in danger, just so you could line up whatever vision your boss had of us.”

  “You’re not seriously blaming me for what happened in New Orleans?” Serenity asked. “I just told you to be down there at a certain time. I am not to blame for what happened after you took my advice. I cannot control everything in the universe.”

  “But you like to try. I know Odette told you what to expect. She sees everything,” Daniel argued.