Cali felt sick. She didn’t want to hear this.
“Look — ”
Collette cut her off. “But even after everything I tried to do for him, you know what ended up happening? I wasn’t good enough for him either. Not only did he take away my dreams, he took away my Mirror Mate.”
Cali’s stomach dropped.
Collette smiled as if she knew the path Cali’s thoughts were taking. “They didn’t tell you what he did to him, did they? He’s not as innocent as you paint him to be. He took my soul mate away from me.”
“So this is a revenge gig?” She straightened her spine, hoping Collette couldn’t detect the fear squirming within her.
Collette’s grin grew. “I wish it were that simple, but I came here to find out why you’re so special to everyone.” She drew closer and Cali instinctively took a step back. “Why are you good enough, but I’m not? They all want you, and it makes no sense to me. Why you? What makes you so different?”
That crazed glint was back in her eye. Her arm shot out. Cali hissed as pain sliced across her cheek followed by the hot flow of blood.
Collette watched the blood drip down her face, detached, curious. It freaked Cali the fuck out. “I wonder if what they’re after is inside you? If I cut you up into little pieces, take away your beauty, would they still want you?”
Terror threatened to take control of Cali’s whole body. The curious way Collette spoke shook her down to her very bones. Yet at the same time, Collette asked the very same question that had plagued her since she was attacked. Why her? And still she only had part of the answer. Apparently she was important to someone. Important how? Was there some kind of strange prophecy she was supposed to help come to pass? Were her powers stronger than others’ and she just didn’t know it?
With a sickening sensation she wondered if Felix had lied to her. Did he play up the whole Mirror Mate bit so they could keep her for themselves? Did they want whatever it was Collette’s employer wanted?
She remembered Felix telling her Niella had Dreamed about her. Had she seen something more, something she hadn’t told Cali?
If she got out of this, she vowed to get her answers. She was sick of being in the dark, especially if she was the only one.
She’d been foolish to start relying on the others. Foolish to let them in when they could have been holding back from her and laughing behind her back about it.
That familiar sting of betrayal settled in her chest. She pushed it aside as best she could. She had a mental Illusionist to deal with. The only good news was that Collette seemed to be under orders not to kill her. Though maiming still seemed to be on the menu.
Way to find that silver lining, Cali.
The only way out of this was if she used her powers. She’d been practicing with Felix, honing her skill to try to use it as an offensive weapon. She’d been able to move a pepper shaker by gathering her power and launching a concentrated sonic wave. She’d have to go from moving something four inches tall to moving an entire person.
Fuck it, she thought, she could do this. It was do or die.
If she knocked Collette off her feet, she could make a break for the door. Or she could risk going deeper into her apartment to grab a more substantial weapon to try and knock Collette out. With all the rage boiling under the surface, Cali really wanted to go with the second option.
The skin on the back of her neck started to tingle. She gathered all her energy, focusing it all into one ball of unheard sound.
Pain slid along her arms.
“What the hell are you doing?”
Cali didn’t answer. She ignored the blood dripping from the fresh wounds on her arms and face.
“Are you going to attack me?” Collette sounded delighted. “Please, show me this power that has made you coveted by all.”
The cut on her face stung as sweat slid into the open wound. With no warning, she threw her arms out. A deep whomp echoed in the room like a subwoofer set on high.
Collette staggered back.
Cali dove for her easel. The long wooden legs would make a perfect bat.
Collette laughed, the grin on her face stretching the white skin over her skull. She slowly got to her feet. “Was that it?”
Cali held her collapsed easel in front of her like an elongated sword. “Get the fuck out of my apartment.”
Collette rubbed her chest where she’d been hit. “Make me, sound manipulator. Show me why you’re so important. How are you better than me?”
Though she hated to admit it, she should have gone with her first option and made a run for it when she’d had the chance. Now Collette stood between her and the door. Cali had let her anger cloud her judgment.
In the blink of an eye, shards of glass came hurling at her. She used the easel as a shield, but the sides of her arms and her legs were left exposed. Glass bit into her skin again and again. She bit her lip as pain flared, white-hot. Strong arms grasped her from behind. One of Collette’s freakish, faceless mannequins stood behind her, a knife raised in one of its hands.
“Mar her face,” ordered Collette.
Adrenaline scorched Cali’s veins. She jerked from the grip and swung her easel for all she was worth. The thick wooden legs knocked the Illusion back into the barstools by her kitchen. The faceless man blinked out of existence right as something wrapped tightly around her ankles.
Her feet were pulled from behind. Tears sprang to her eyes as she landed heavily on her knees.
That strange white cloth Collette was so fond of was wound tight around her ankles and part of her leg. She couldn’t move, but that didn’t stop Cali from swinging the easel and missing Collette by a few feet. The attack was enough to startle her, and she stepped back. The Illusion at her feet flickered. The fabric loosened and Cali ripped it away from her. It dissolved in her hand.
Collette was breathing heavily, and the fact she wasn’t holding her Illusions for prolonged periods of time meant she was exhausted. Cali scented the weakness like a threatened predator. For the first time, Cali felt she could win this. She needed more of an advantage.
Come on. Think. You control sound. How can you use that?
She scanned her apartment and spotted the lone light fixture above her head. She hadn’t bothered to open the drapes, which meant if she took out the light they’d be in near darkness. For Collette to harm her she needed to be able to tell where she was. Right?
It was worth a shot. She concentrated her power and flung out another sound wave. Black danced at the edges of her vision, but it was worth it when the bulb shattered. Her apartment fell into darkness. She had to move fast.
The back of her neck felt like ice but she kept going, sucking the sound from the apartment, throwing false noise away from where she stood to redirect Collette’s attention. She heard something break to her right.
“Stop hiding in the dark, Cali,” said Collette.
It gave away her position and Cali crept up behind her. When she was relatively sure she was within range she swung her easel. Collette never heard it coming. There wasn’t even a sound of impact. The only indicator Cali had hit her mark was the vibration traveling up her arms.
Collette screamed.
Cali lithely stepped away, feeling invigorated.
The sensation didn’t last. Something in the center of her apartment flickered. It looked like the tiniest of candle flames.
Was Collette so exhausted she couldn’t even create light?
No. It appeared again, this time flickering faster, and each time it flickered it grew in size. It started the size of a golf ball, growing in diameter until it was larger than her fist. The brilliant orange and yellow coloring was blinding in the semi-darkness. Cali held her hand up against the light as it started to pulse as if alive.
Her stomach sank as it pulsed faster and faster.
The floor beneath her feet vibrated as Collette ran toward the door. Cali tried to follow but it was too late.
The ball erupted like a mini explosion. W
hite light blinded her. Her feet left the ground. Her easel was ripped from her grasp as heat enveloped her.
Pain spiked through her back, and belatedly she knew it was because she had slammed into the wall. Again. Cali had no idea how long she sat there slumped against it, her chin on her chest, her whole body stinging. Hours? Days?
One of the drapes had been pulled back. The bright afternoon sun hurt her eyes. Footsteps came closer, and Collette appeared in her spotted vision.
She leaned over Cali. “There’s nothing special about you. You can’t even best me. You never will. Felix will have his fun and then he’ll leave you. Just like he left me.” A baton shimmered into existence in her outstretched hand, like the kind cops wore on their belts. Cali braced for the pain as Collette swung.
Blackness engulfed her.
Chapter 14
“Cali? Cali!”
Sensation slowly started coming back to her. Her body felt as if she’d been hit by a semi truck and then boiled in acid. Her apartment smelled of sulfur, and underneath she could just catch the scent of baked goods. She knew it was Felix even before she smelled him. Her body just seemed to know when he was near. That coiling tension she felt in her chest whenever she was apart from him was gone. She felt safe. Calm.
Felix continued to call her name, interchanged with some cursing.
She cracked open an eye and shut it instantly as the sunlight blinded her.
Felix caught the movement. “Cali?”
“I’m alive,” she muttered. “Wish I wasn’t, but I am. Son of a bitch.” If this is what it felt like to be struck by a bomb, she never wanted to experience it again. She was disoriented, achy, and when she moved in certain ways pain flared like a motherfucker.
“What happened?” He helped ease her up, and she hissed when one of his hands touched a piece of sensitive skin on her shoulder. “Shit, I’m sorry. Let me get something to bandage you up, okay? Don’t move.”
That wasn’t going to be a hard order to follow.
As Felix got a bucket full of cool water, ointment, and bandages, Cali surveyed her surroundings. She was in her room on her bed. A chair was pulled up next to it. When he returned, Felix started to gently wipe her face clean. When he reached the cut on her cheek, she jerked away.
His jaw bulged and he strangled the rag in his hand. “Collette did this, didn’t she?”
She didn’t feel like talking about Collette quite yet. “What are you doing here?”
How had he known she needed him?
He carefully applied ointment to the side of her face. “You didn’t call. I waited forty minutes after you left before I raced over here.” He cursed under his breath. “I knew something like this was going to happen. I should have left sooner. I fucking knew it. Was it Collette?”
She couldn’t avoid the question a second time without looking guilty. “Yes.”
He continued to clean and bandage the small burns along her arms. His face hardened every time he came across one of her cuts. “How were you able to get away from her this time? Are you keeping a Taser on your person at all times now?”
“I didn’t get away from her. She left me.” Collette had beaten the shit out of her and that defeat burned worse than any of her wounds. She had been useless against her.
Felix’s hands stilled against her forearm. His hands were so warm. “She left you?”
“Like so much garbage,” she said bitterly.
His fingers grasped her chin, careful to avoid her burns. “You’re not garbage,” he growled fiercely.
His blue-green eyes glittered with protectiveness and, if she admitted it to herself, a little bit of fear.
He was worried about you.
Her heart flipped.
She pulled her face from his grip. “Doesn’t matter. She came to try and understand why her employer wanted me so badly. After she wiped the floor with me, I don’t think she found her answer.”
A low growl sounded from Felix’s throat. “I’ll fucking kill her.”
The deadly intent in his face gave her pause. He’s not as innocent as you paint him to be. Collette’s words echoed. She didn’t want to believe them but she couldn’t help herself. Could Felix really be capable of killing someone?
She inhaled deeply. “Did you kill Collette’s Mirror Mate?”
He didn’t flinch from her question. Didn’t even bat an eye. He leveled a steady stare at her that she had trouble holding.
Oh, my God, he really killed him.
She didn’t know how she felt about that. She should be terrified, but she wasn’t. She knew from experience that there was more to a story than what someone else said. Was she really going to label Felix like others had labeled her?
Fuck, no.
“D-did he deserve it?” she asked. Did that excuse murder? In Cali’s mind … yes. She didn’t care how that made her look. That was what she believed. Some fuckers deserved to be put down.
Felix put down the rag he’d used to clean her wounds and pulled off his black tee. All that bronze muscle rippled as he moved to bare his left shoulder to her.
She was momentarily stunned by Felix’s near nakedness until she caught sight of the scar. It stood out like a rotting corpse in a field of dandelions. The puckered, twisted tissue made her cringe. She traced the wound with her finger. It was a little wider than her thumb and at least six inches long.
Rage burned within her. “He shot you?”
His expression was grim. “For Collette, he tried to kill me. His name was Kevin Bauer. He adored her, worshipped her like the girls here do the sun.”
“But she never loved him.”
Her comment caught him off guard. “She told you that?”
She shrugged, glad the movement didn’t cause her any pain. “She told me Mirror Mates didn’t have to love one another.” She avoided his eyes and studied a point beyond his shoulder.
“She lied.”
Her gaze shot back to his.
“I don’t think Collette even knew what the meaning of love was. I think she was too busy wanting me that she didn’t open herself up to Kevin. She didn’t know what she had until it was taken from her.”
“If she was so head over heels for you, why’d she want you dead?”
His smile was bittersweet. “You know that mentality that if you can’t have something, then no one can? Yeah, I think that’s Collette’s life motto. I befriended her back in college. I wasn’t looking for a girlfriend. My powers were still too new. Either way, Collette sort of attached herself to me. She turned more hostile as time progressed. She was also a very jealous person. Our friendship started to crumble when we found out about each other’s powers. You’d think it would have brought us closer together, but all it did was make Collette believe that she was entitled to use them. She tried to break up one of my relationships back in the day by sending an Illusion of myself to my girlfriend’s dorm. I stupidly forgave her for that, but she crossed the line when she disclosed my powers without my permission. I stopped talking to her for a long time after that, until I got a call from her explaining she’d found something amazing. She invited me over for dinner, told me to bring my girlfriend.” Grief lined his eyes. “Her name was Jasmine. Collette decided to make an example out of her. She wanted to show me how finding her soul mate had increased her powers. Collette was a theater major. She always had a taste for the dramatic. She materialized a dagger at the dinner table and threw it right into Jasmine’s chest.”
He stopped for a few seconds as if to gather his thoughts. Cali didn’t dare speak. “She was dying right next to me, and all Collette did was invite me to be back at her side. Right there in front of Kevin. I freaked out. My powers went haywire. I screamed at her, told her she was a murderous bitch that needed to be locked away. She didn’t like that at all. Next thing I know, Kevin is leveling a gun at my chest for breaking Collette’s heart. Kevin was a full-forced Dreamer, so naturally I thought I was fucked, but he still had to close his eyes and drift to see the futur
e. He did it to try to find where I’d hide for cover so he could shoot me before I got there. I didn’t bother hiding. I knew I was going to die so I picked up the chair I’d been in and swung as hard as I could at his head. I didn’t kill him.” He stared deep into her eyes as if to convey the truthfulness behind his words. “He was knocked out, unconscious. Still is. He’s on life support last I checked.”
Cali reached for his shoulder again. “And the scar?”
“He managed to pull off a couple of shots. I was lucky this one didn’t take me in the heart like it was supposed to.”
“How’d you escape Collette?”
He ran a hand through his hair. “When I knocked Kevin out, it did something to her. I think I somehow damaged the bond that forms between two Mirror Mates. I remember hearing her scream as if she’d been the one I’d hit. I was too busy running for my life to see what had happened to her, but after seeing her last week … ”
He let the sentence fall away. He didn’t need to continue. The madness was there for all to see when they looked into Collette’s gaze. She was constantly missing her other half. That kind of wound didn’t heal — it simply played on the mind, twisting it. Festering.
Guild of Truth 01 - Silent as the Grave Page 12