Lightning Forgotten

by Lila Felix

  “None,” Collin answered.

  An unexpected gust of wind blew the tent’s flaps open, and Regina filled the empty space in an instant. She was out of breath with her hands on her knees, trying to steady herself. “I found them. Our team broke apart to search the area because we’d seen some red streaks in the sky. I found them. Both of them. I found the bastard.”

  A smile grew on her face. I wasn’t the only one seeking revenge.

  “Where?” I demanded.

  “Easter Island. There’s a hut there. He keeps going in and out of there, flashing. He must know we are near. I think he’s flashing from there to Scotland. He’s checking out that shadow thing of yours. It worked. I bet he didn’t think we’d be on the other end. I bet he thinks she’s safe.”

  Just as I’d pictured the island in my mind, Omar appeared.

  “It worked, Eidolon. He’s in Scotland. He’s near the shadow. I think I saw him talking to it. Come quickly.”

  A smile tugged at one side of my face. “I don’t need him. I need the woman. I’m going to Easter Island.”

  Regina flashed first. As soon as I’d pinpointed her location, I flashed to her, almost knocking her over.

  “It’s there. The shack. See how he comes and goes? He’s afraid.”

  There was a three to four-minute span between him leaving and coming back. Three minutes was all I had to take his mate like he had taken mine. It was our only chance to get him to stop hurting Colby.

  “Wait, Theo. There’s some kind of protection around the shack. I tried to get near it, but it was like hitting a wall. You can see the sheen of it if you look close enough.”

  I froze in place. How would I get through that? But if he had that power, then I had something in my Eidolon arsenal to combat it. “I can get through it. We just have to time it correctly.”

  She nodded, and we waited for him to flash back. Shadows moved within the tiny house by the light of the moon, so bright without being blocked by buildings.

  Then, like clockwork, he flashed out of there, leaving a wake-like flash around the place.

  I ran to the building and remembered how I’d put my face through the window at my apartment. If there was a time to use that weird gift, now was it. Testing it with my pointer finger, I focused on what was beyond the wake. It worked. I soon stuck my whole hand in. With not much time left, I passed through the barrier and opened the door.

  Pema was crouched just inside, her hands around her stomach.

  “Pema, come with me. Don’t fight this. I don’t want to hurt you.”

  But I’d spoken too soon. In this state, Pema couldn’t have fought off an ant from biting her arm. She was nothing but a skeleton like Colby, but there was a dodgeball-sized swell under her baggy dress. Her hair had grown a little, but there were spots on the top and the middle that were bare.

  He was killing them both.

  “Theo. He’s killing us,” she said and then fainted right into my arms.

  ***

  When I flashed into the tent with Pema, the rest of the people gathered were as confused as I was about how to proceed and what to do with her. On the one hand, she was Sanctum’s mate or breeding buddy. She carried the spawn of one who we would rather not exist at all.

  We certainly didn’t want him creating more little bastards to run around wreaking havoc.

  But on the other hand, and I realized this more and more as I held her pitiful form, was that she was a female Lucent at the core. She was one of our people. The only difference between her and the others was that she had made a really lousy choice.

  We couldn’t just let him kill her.

  “I know,” I said to Collin as he stepped forward to take her from my arms.

  “She is a descendent of the last Eidolon. She will be treated as such, regardless of her—situation.”

  I nodded. “I knew you would, Collin. You are honorable to a fault.”

  He chuckled. “It is not without a second thought of leaving her stranded somewhere to suffer. Believe me. Not that honorable.”

  It was actually the very definition of honorable—wanting to do something wrong but doing the right thing anyway.

  Ari walked with him down the hallway to put Pema in their room for the night, I assumed.

  The thing was—I now had to face my brother alone.

  The damned shadow was just that—a shadow.

  “What in the hell, Theodore?”

  I was off my game—that much was for sure.

  Picturing the shack in my head, I flashed back to check on the imp.

  But she was nowhere to be found.

  “Damn you, Pema! Where did you go?”

  But my lightning protection remained around the cabin. She couldn’t have passed through it. She was too weak.

  There was only one who could’ve broken through it.

  “Theodore. Oh, brother, what have you done?”

  I made him wait two days. The women who were once the Synod kept tabs on him as he paced and threw fits by the shack and in Scotland. Once he knew that what he saw was my shadow and not me, he approached it. Upon my command, it vanished into thin air.

  Pema was awake, but barely. Her breathing was shallow, and I had to make the decision on whether or not to give her nutrients.

  My mind wanted me to treat her like the traitor she was, but the part of me that was Eidolon wouldn’t have a Lucent woman treated that way, even though he’d treated my mate that way.

  I made my rounds, checking in on both of them. Pema hadn’t spoken yet, so when I heard a whisper leave her mouth, I paid attention.

  “What did you say? And choose your words carefully. You are still a traitor in our eyes.” I sounded downright stupid trying to be badass. It never had worked for me.

  “Take this off me. Only you…”

  Her voice ran dry. I had no idea what she was talking about.

  “This,” she croaked out, scratching at her neck. There was a deep red mark around her neck, extending down into the collar of her dress.

  “Collin, come see,” I said, wanting some kind of witness. I was still a gentleman. In spite of who she was, it didn’t change my honor.

  With my finger hooked under her chin, I turned her head right and left, inspecting what looked like burns. The surface of her skin had fresh scratches that were bleeding and scabbed over.

  “What the hell is this?” I asked her.

  “A piece of her—of piece of you.”

  Pressing a finger to the line around her neck, I felt something inside. I traced the protrusion around until, with my throat constricting, I realized what was going on.

  “He buried something in your neck?”

  She nodded but turned to her left, no longer wishing to look at me. She had to be ashamed, and her guilt was almost palpable in the air.

  “Collin, we are going to need Malynn for this one.”

  Collin left the room and I sat back on my heels, not wanting to think about how he did that to her and what she had been promised in return.

  Malynn and Collin came back in a good while later. While she examined Pema, Collin and I went back to visit Colby. A million thoughts skidded through my mind as we walked the short distance.

  Not only had Pema allowed Sanctum to impregnate her, but she also had something similar to Colby. Now, it was killing them both.

  And the bastard had put something under her skin. There was just no telling what he had thought to do, but Malynn, I was sure, would get it out of her fast.

  I squinted, not believing my eyes when I walked into Colby’s room. There wasn’t that much of a marked difference, but there was some—and at that point, progress was progress.

  “Is it wishful thinking or does she look a little less pale today?”

  Collin looked over my shoulder. “You are right. She is a little less pale.”

  Collin walked out of the room while I knelt next to Colby and thanked the Almighty for that small favor. I didn’t know how it happened, but a small repriev
e was all I needed to continue to hope that all of this would work out—that my plan would be fulfilled and she would be okay.

  “Eidolon, I think you need to see this.” Malynn flitted in and out, in a hurry to get back to what she’d found.

  “I’m coming.” I placed a chaste kiss on Colby’s lips and left her again.

  When I got back to Pema’s room, there was a full-on surgical table set up with Pema as the patient, complete with a hospital gown.

  “Where in the hell did you get all of this?” I asked, looking at the equipment while trying not to shake in anger that this stuff was not used on my mate.

  Malynn paled. “I had to, Eidolon. This was surgery, not like Colby. I did flash to a hospital to get the medicines for Colby, but I needed sterile conditions to do what I needed to here.”

  The place smelled like disinfectant and iodine. Bloody tools sat on a metal side table. Pema was out cold with bandages covering her neck.

  “What was it? Was there something in there?”

  “Wait—let me get something to hold it.” She looked at the metal table and covered her mouth while making a gagging sound.

  She came back in with a long metal rod that looked like a fire poker, maneuvering it around before pulling it up to reveal what was buried in the last Eidolon’s ancestor. “I gave her a local anesthetic, but she kind of passed out when she saw the blood. She will heal, but she needs food and water. She’s dehydrated and malnourished. She will always bear the scar of her decisions in more ways than one.”

  “Is it a necklace?”

  Malynn shuddered as she looked at the thing. The chain was heavy and thick, the pendant at the bottom was oval and egg-shaped.

  “I think there’s something inside it, Eidolon. My mind pictured him putting something inside this egg thing when I touched it. But it made me so sick that I threw it down.” Tears came to her eyes, and her hand shook as she continued to hold up the offending piece of jewelry. “He is—he is so completely evil, Theo. I know that Colby had dreams of fixing him—of somehow restoring him to your brother again. She was so worried that you would mourn the loss of your brother even more after all of this was over.” She looked at him with her jaws clenched. “He cannot be saved. He is the root of all evil, and there is no good intention in him. Just the thought of him makes me sour.”

  My eyes went back to the necklace. If there was something inside of it, then we needed to find out what it was.

  “Let me try,” I offered, holding my hand out.

  “Eidolon, you cannot. Your gift—you are too pure—too good to even stand in the same room as whatever conjuring he has placed on this object. Let my father touch it, or Collin, or anyone.”

  I huffed out my rebuttal and ignored her pleading. If I was as pure as she had said, then it shouldn’t affect me.

  “Let me try,” I said, reaching for it. As soon as I touched the cold metal, though it had just come from Pema’s body, a punch of gut-wrenching pain hit my torso, as though it had reached into me and was fisting my heart.

  “Stop, Eidolon, it will kill you. That kind of power is too evil.”

  I heard her, but at the same time, the evil powered me on. I had to get through it in order to stop the curse. “No. I won’t stop until I get to it.”

  I had to close my eyes and concentrate on the task at hand. As I used my fingernails to dig into the carvings on the shell of the egg pendant, I was desperate to find a way in. Never in my life had I experienced a panic attack, but while working to find the opening, my breaths were taken from me and my skin felt like worms were crawling underneath the surface. The pain in my chest radiated down to my stomach and up to my head, pounding like having a chorus of seven migraines at once.

  “There.” I finally found the crease in the pendant and cracked it open. Inside were strings of something, singed and rotten. The smell that came forth from that tiny pendant was more pungent than a thousand sewers doused with sulphur.

  “What is it?” I asked aloud. I turned to her, seeking an answer when I realized we’d been joined by Eliza, Regina, Omar, and Collin. Ari came in just as I spoke.

  “Oh, crap on a cracker, that smells like an alligator curled up, died, and decayed right in the middle of someone’s ass crack.”

  Collin shut his eyes and slammed his lips together before calmly saying, “Ari, I don’t think this is the time for your graphic explanations.”

  She shrugged. “You’re right, I guess. That shit says it all by the smell. And by the way, I’m a graphic kind of girl. Get over it.”

  I held the charred, straw-like contents in my palms and rushed outside before everyone in the tents began throwing up like I wanted to. Pushing back the gagging, I broke through the tent’s entrance. For once, I welcomed the dry, desert air.

  “Let me see what’s in it.” Malynn was crouching next to where I’d collapsed from the relief of not having to be cooped up with that horrid scent.

  “Don’t touch it. It’s killing me to hold it. I don’t want it to hurt you any more than it already has. Just look and cover your mouth and nose.”

  She pulled up the scarf she already wore and covered most of her face. I tried to move the contents around so she could get a good look, but it still resembled nothing that I would expect—more like spider webs in a clump.

  I spat. “Wait… that son of a…”

  Collin was behind me again, looking over at the scene. There was something about his presence; I always knew when he was near. “Eidolon, that is hair. It is a clump of hair.”

  I knew that already, but hearing Collin confirm the fact made me even angrier. I tested the limits of its power by smashing the contents between my palms and rolling it back and forth, trying to separate what seemed like two different textures.

  “There are two clumps of hair, twisted together. Then burned?”

  “No,” Malynn answered. She had gotten one of the blades from Pema’s surgery and was now prodding the hair. “They were put in and then have become burned from the power of the spell or magic that was infused into this object. Wait…” She closed her eyes and crouched into a ball, holding her head in her hands. “It is Rebekkah’s necklace. No, just the pendant. The pendant belongs to the last Prophetess. He stole it from her when he…” She trailed off, not wanting to say that he had stolen the pendant from Rebekkah when he murdered her in cold blood.

  “Whose hair is it and why was it inside her neck?”

  “It doesn’t matter. We need to bind this magic. We have to seal it in something pure.”

  Omar stepped forward, blocking the sun from my eyes. “I have an idea.”

  I sat at the top of the Empire State building, waiting and watching. It was nearly three o’clock in the morning, but New York City thought it was broad daylight, the way they were still in full swing.

  Theodore had stolen her from me—stolen them from me.

  Pema was gone despite my best efforts to save her. I hadn’t realized when I bound the fate of Pema to Colby that carrying my fetus would kill her slowly—and kill Colby in the process.

  I’d only meant to hurt both of them long enough for Theo to relent.

  The real Sanctum, the ruler of all things evil, called to me from the depths of hell. The inside of my temples burned and forced me to recognize his calling. I had free reign on this Earth. Even if he came up here, he couldn’t stop me from running—or flashing as it was.

  Just like the Synod, the devil had no real power. He was bound to Hell, forced to rely on demons and minions like me to do his dirty work.

  All of his power was in the minds of those he carried dominion over.

  And if they would stop giving him power in their minds, he would have none.

  I had felt every tug of skin and bone as someone cut out my connection to Pema. But they could remove it all they wanted to. I was already in Colby’s head, and she was sealed to Pema and my spawn’s lives just like Colby and Theo were bound.

  If my child died, so would Colby.

 
If Pema died, so would Colby.

  I cursed the stars and thought about my options, which were few. The thought of bargaining with Theodore came to mind. I spat onto the patrons below me. If I had my way, those pesky humans wouldn’t even exist. They would all die away, and the Lucents would rule the world.

  Well, most of the Lucents.

  The plans I’d had and the reasoning for my war crumbled beneath my fingers and floated on the air.

  There was nothing left for me to fight for except the unborn child in Pema’s womb. She was probably crying to them and telling them everything that I should’ve never told her in the first place.

  “A little bargaining for the blonde Barbie’s life should do the trick.”

  And with that, I flashed back to Easter Island and awaited the man I hated most in the world—my brother.

  “I am the biggest idiot on the planet—we are the biggest idiots on the planet,” Malynn screamed at the top of her lungs the next night as we gathered silently in the main room. Colby had not progressed since the day I’d found her less pale, and Pema had still not woken from her post-surgery faint.

  Malynn did an ultrasound and found that while the child was still small for the gestational timetable, that it was vital and very much alive.

  “Malynn, you speak out of turn,” Omar fussed at her, but I agreed a little.

  “Fine, I can be punished later. Theodore, when I was braiding Colby’s hair for her visit to the Synod, there was a piece of her hair that was way shorter than the rest.

  “Holy shit.” It all fit together, with that one sentence. “Wait, how in the hell did he get her hair?”

  Everyone slinked away at my question.

  Malynn continued, “So that’s the skin. It wasn’t skin—it was hair. He took some of her hair and somehow bound himself to her. That’s how he controls her body—how he manipulates her mind—all of it. But why in the holy hell would it be in her…” She made a round motion around her neck.

  “If that’s true, then whose hair is the other? It’s too long to be Pema’s.”

  My stomach turned sour. “It’s his. It is Sanctum’s hair mixed with my mate’s.” My words were monotone and unbelievably calm for what I’d just discovered. I didn’t know why I’d expected anything less.