Eternal

by B C Morgan

  I looked down at her with a sense of pity settling in the pit of my stomach, I had no idea what the hell I was supposed to do now when I noticed something leaking from her ear.

  “Err Kat, please tell me that what I am seeing right now, is nothing to be concerned about?” I asked indicating at the leakage with my pointer finger.

  She stepped closer to get a better look and the colour drained from her face, leaving her looking completely ashen.

  “Marcus, this is not a good sign, she is definitely exhibiting signs of a fractured skull.”

  I asked what that meant, but Kat just shook her head. She said she had no idea what this could mean for someone like Unya, who for all intents and purposes was in fact human.

  “So, what, she’s going die?” I asked, feeling stricken to my core, but ensuring that my appearance remained aloof.

  “Just another name on your list hey Lawson, you’ve racked up quite the body count,” Stated Marcus, who continued to stoke the fire that was threatening to burn its way out of me.

  I raced over to him and hurled his body into the wall, lifting his body off of the floor, with nothing but the one hand that I secured around his throat.

  “For the last time, I did not do this too her. If you want to blame someone, then point the finger at the actual culprit.” I said this with an ice -cold tone that even I did not recognise.

  I could hear Kat screaming at me to let him go, but it sounded as though she was miles away instead of standing right next to me. I was so consumed by the fury inside me that I didn’t even feel when the sword pierced my back, it followed through until it was slicing through my abdomen and painting my once white top, red. My grasp on Marcus loosened as the sword was pulled free from my body and I slumped down onto my knees, my eyes connected with Kat’s. I was shocked to see the sword in her hand, but the worst part was the fact that the entirety of her eyes had turned a blood red and red veins were creeping across her face.

  “Do not even contemplate touching him again or I swear to god, I will end you.” Her tone was deep and cut through me more than the sword initially had.

  Marcus gripped hold of her shoulders and turned her into him, making sure that her eyes made contact with his, as he placed his finger under her chin and tilted her head up. I watched as the veins began to slowly fade from sight, alongside the red that had dominated her eyes, until the whites had returned and her eyes where once again a warm chocolate brown.

  She shrugged Marcus’s hold off of her, not allowing him to say the words they both needed to hear. She turned back to me with remorseful eyes, but I knew that she would never apologise.

  “I don’t believe that you did do this to her Lawson, but you are barely hanging on by a thread, eventually you are going to step off of that precipice and fall straight into the waiting arms of the darkness that keeps beckoning to you. Please don’t insult my intelligence by trying to deny it, I know where you are standing because I am right there with you, the only difference is, I don’t think I can continue to fight my fate any longer. I am going to lose my humanity and I will be just like all the other Erinyes that reside down there, but you have a choice.”

  Her speech ironically left me speechless and I did not have a clue what I should say in response, not that she gave me the chance as she walked out of the room slamming her door closed on the way.

  “She has been fighting tooth and nail to hold onto what and who she used to be, why would she suddenly give in?” I asked, not expecting Marcus to grace me with any kind of answer.

  “I wish I knew, she barely speaks to me now, all she has told me is that she no longer has a reason to hold onto that side of herself anymore.”

  I swallowed deeply, as I realised that Marcus had been more than just a fleeting fancy, he had become her salvation and I had helped her on destroying that.

  I shook myself free from my reverie and was surprised to realise that they had left me alone with Unya, I perched myself down on the edge of the bed and wallowed in my own misery.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Unya

  I walked into the house that was shrouded in shadows, there wasn’t an ounce of light but I could walk around this place with my eyes closed and the darkness had always seemed more of a friend to me, instead of something to be feared. As long as there was darkness, there would be places for me to hide. Whenever my mum would wander down the hallway and found herself entering my room, I would hide under the covers and pretend that I was asleep.

  I couldn’t recall the exact moment when my love for her had changed to fear, I knew that it must have been after the third of fourth lash with the belt but that had also been the time that a seed of defiance had begun to take root inside of me. I had grown used to the slaps and punches and even the occasional pinch when she felt like spicing things up a bit, but the belt had been the undoing of me.

  I started to become numb to the pain, I mean sure I may have only been thirteen but I had grown used to it and if I didn’t show that it hurt me, she would soon lose interest. Instead she would send me to my room without food unless of course I had an event coming up.

  I had been in a recital the day before and she had been sitting there in the front row, her eyes burning holes into the fabric of my very being. I had sung a hauntingly chilling song that had bought a tear to many eyes, but my finger had slipped when I was playing the violin and a hideous screech was released. I saw her grimace and wondered what punishment would fall on me this evening. Something snapped right there and then and the fear that had been festering gave way to unbridled anger as I smashed the instrument down into the floor, striking it repeatedly until it was nothing but splinted wood and snapped string.

  My mum had sent me to my room and drowned her sorrows until she reached the bottom of the third bottle of wine.

  I heard her steps as she clambered up the stairs, I knew that I was going to be in for it this time, after my little performance on stage, but I was done cowering in fear. I stood in the corner behind my door covered by the shadows, as the smell of permeated alcohol assailed my senses. I saw her enter my room and reach out for my bed, I made sure that I didn’t move a muscle as her face twisted in rage as she discovered that I wasn’t where she had expected me to be.

  She spun around as her eyes searched the room and suddenly latched onto me, but I would not cower, she came at me and I raised my fist and connected it with her face, the moment she closed the distance between us.

  She recoiled away from me, as she looked at me in horror, she retreated from my room as she kept muttering to herself, saying the same thing over and over again. All she was saying was “I failed.”

  It was because of that, that I was able to find comfort in the darkness and welcome its caress like it was nothing more than an old friend. I scanned the living room but could tell that it was empty and with the kitchen light off I knew that she would not be in there either, “Happy fourteenth birthday” I said to myself. It could have been possible that she had gone out, but I knew that wasn’t the case, as the front door had been unlocked and her car was still sitting in the drive way. I didn’t really want to see her anyway, but I was curious as to why she never collected me from school that day, why would she suddenly release the shackles that she had placed on me.

  I climbed the stairs until I reached the landing and noticed that water was seeping out of the bathroom, it was the only room I could see light pouring out from. It was coming from the crack at the bottom of the door.

  I felt a shiver run down my spine as a sense of trepidation filled me, I edged closer to the door and slowly pushed down on the handle and opened it.

  I saw my mum laying in the bath, with the taps running and the bathwater dyed crimson with her blood. Her wrists were pointed up to the ceiling with deep gashes running up towards her elbows and her eyes were nothing more than vacant orbs.

  I slid down onto the toilet seat and felt my anger ebb away, I waited to feel something at the sight lying before me, but nothing happened.
My emotions remaining dormant, I decided that I should probably call for an ambulance when her head turned towards me with her mouth opened wide. Dark tendrils began to seep out of her as they coiled their way towards me, I tried to get away from them, but the door slammed shut as they continued to coil around my still frame and slithered inside my eyes, ears and mouth until I was nothing but darkness itself.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Lawson

  I was still in the same position, and I wondered if she would ever wake up or if my demise had been set in stone, with the inevitable death that would befall her soon.

  “I know this is selfish, but I need you to fight Unya. I have no idea what power lies within you, but I know that you possess a fierce strength and I need you to call on that now. I need you to be stubborn and to want to live, if you let go now, then I have failed in what I was sent here to do, and I will surely die. There was a time, not so long ago that I would have welcomed that fate because I knew that deep down, I deserved it. I deserved to die an excruciating death, but there’s something inside me that wants to survive, I guess it’s nothing more than human nature. I keep trying to extinguish that side of me but it’s a lot harder said than done. There’s a darkness that has been festering within me for a long time and it’s grown its roots and it now has a vice like hold on me. Sometimes I think I should just let go and let it take me over completely until I think of my dear father, Lilianna and Katherine. They all had their own battles to bare and not one of them ever gave in, but it now seems as though Kat is going too and I can’t leave her alone right now. I need to help her to find a reason to keep on fighting and as long as she does, I will too.”

  I had said all of this, knowing or maybe more accurately hoping that Unya wouldn’t actually be able to hear me. I just needed to get it off of my chest and it seemed like the most opportune time to do just that. Part of me wanted to finally unload about Lilianna but just mentioning her name had made my throat want to constrict and my heart want to beat right out of my chest, as the darkness snaked through me, trying to condemn me further.

  Z

  Another two days passed before Unya’s face began to heal, I hadn’t even noticed the transformation until I heard the sound of bones crunching and looked up to see her nose was once again, whole. There was absolutely no sign of there ever being a break and the bruises where quickly fading as well. I let go off the sigh that I had no recollection of holding and realised that maybe she had more of Zeus’s blood in her, than any of us had realised.

  I found myself wondering about her boyfriend, and whether or not he had taken a running jump off of some cliff but shook the thought away. Just because she was able to heal the extensive damage that she had, did not mean that she would be powerful enough to control a mind so fully as to make them not even able to break through when their life was on the line. Maybe her powers weren’t even born from Zeus and were in fact an extension of the gifts that the sorceress had possessed and she only had the healing from the ruler himself.

  But of course, this was all speculation and I really had no idea as to why she seemed as though she could actually be more powerful than myself when I was a full demigod and not just some descendant with a watered -down blood line.

  I removed myself from the bedside vigil that I had erected and fell down onto the sofa. I had worn myself out with my constant observation of Unya, but now that she appeared to be healing, I decided to grab a little shut eye.

  I awoke about an hour later, feeling worse than I had before I closed my eyes. I knew it was my own fault, seeing as that was all the sleep I had allowed myself to have in the last forty eight hours. Nevertheless all I did was wipe the sleep from my eyes and stretched my tightened muscles.

  I thought I heard a murmur but shook it off as wishful thinking until I actually heard my name, whispered from a dry and croaking mouth.

  I flew to my feet and quickly got to her bedside as my eyes connected with the luminous green of her own. I realised that once she remembered what I had done to the guy who had been strangling her, she may fear me so I made sure that I wasn’t within her personal space.

  “Water please,” She croaked, and I quickly saw to her request and waited patiently for her to freak out.

  “I thought maybe I dreamed you coming to my rescue, but I guess not.”

  I almost laughed out loud at that, until it dawned on me that she did remember what had happened, and yet she wasn’t reacting the way I thought she should be. I knew she didn’t react when it first happened but she had been so battered, I thought she was just to shattered too be able too. But that did not explain how she could be so aloof about it now.

  “No, it definitely happened, I thought that you would be cowering away from me to be honest with you,” I stated, and I noticed that her eyes opened a little wider at my statement.

  “He was trying to kill me, why would I care that you slit his throat?”

  “Because I murdered a man before your very eyes, because his blood flowed across your face and because no one would ever be as relaxed about that sort of situation as you are being, it does not make any sense.”

  I could tell that she was weighing up her next response, when Kat bounded over to her, not even taking a second to acknowledge my presence.

  “You have no idea how relieved I feel that you have awoken, I was so worried about you girlie.”

  Unya smiled at her, but I noticed that no warmth reached her eyes, the smile looked so genuine, but I knew that there was no genuine emotion behind it. That fact seemed to elude Kat though, as she gave Unya a mega-watt smile in return.

  “How long have I been asleep?”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Unya

  Three days, that was what Kat had replied to me, but it didn’t make any sense. Surely my ankle still should have been in pain as well as every other part of myself that had sustained an injury from their onslaught.

  “So, I wasn’t as injured as I thought then,” I said out loud and saw the look that passed between Lawson and Kat after I had said that.

  Kat proceeded to pull her phone from her pocket and began to show me picture after picture of my injuries, she explained the injuries that the pictures didn’t show and after, while I just laid there completely dumb struck.

  There was no way in hell that I should have healed from all of that in only three days, and then recalled what Mihaela had said. Don’t get me wrong it’s not as though I believed what she said about being related to a Greek god, but with the accelerated healing I found myself wondering if I should give her another chance to explain.

  “Why hasn’t any of this surprised you?” I asked as I realised that they didn’t seem perplexed in the least by my miraculous recovery.

  “We all have our secrets to bare, but trust me when I say this Unya, I have witnessed and even lived through a lot weirder stuff than what has happened to you,” stated Kat as her smile faltered slightly.

  “So, have you seen that side of Lawson too then?”

  She did look perplexed this time, so I decided to elaborate.

  “The side of Lawson where he slits a man’s throat without a second thought, with a smile spread across his mouth and enjoyment clear in his eyes.”

  Kat looked genuinely surprised by my revelation, where she tore her gaze from mine and connected with Lawson’s sheepish look.

  “Lawson, are you kidding me, I know amongst all your protests you had claimed to save her life, but to take a life right in front of her. Have you lost your ever-loving mind?” She enquired.

  “I think the death was the least of her worries, I would have been more concerned by the blood that she was washed in if I had been in her shoes,” he replied meeting her gaze head on.

  Kat grabbed him by the cuff of his top and proceeded to drag him from the room, the door slamming closed behind them in an act of finality.

  I had no idea what was going on between them, but it was clear to see that a wedge had been driven deeply between them and their f
riendship had not come out unscathed. I was lost in my reverie when the door was gently pushed open and an unknown guy entered looking quite uncomfortably towards me.

  “Can I help you?” I asked, wondering if he had expected to find Kat but had unfortunately found myself instead.

  “I just wanted to see how you were feeling, you were in such a bad way when you arrived and a few accusations may have been hurtled towards Lawson in your honour,” he replied rather glumly and I found myself wondering if he wanted Lawson to be solely responsible for what had been bestowed upon me.

  “I’m sorry to dampen your hopes, but Lawson didn’t cause any of that to happen, in fact he wasn’t even there when it began,” I stated it with such conviction so that he would have no reason to doubt what I had said.

  “Please allow me to introduce myself, I am Marcus and I guess you could say that I am a friend of Kat’s.”

  “Do you honestly believe that you can just call yourself her friend, I may not know you but I have heard of you and that girl is certainly crazy about you.”

  He looked slightly taken back by my words until he visibly shook them off.

  “Marcus, why would you have suspected that Lawson would have done that to me? And while we’re having this little Q and A, how the hell did he even find me up there?” I stared straight at him, practically daring him with my eyes to try and lie to me or avoid the questions all together.

  “Lawson is floating in his own little world of anger and darkness; he has done a lot worse than what had unfortunately befallen you. I guess I was also angry at him for dragging me and Kat into his problems and it wouldn’t have been out of character for him to bring someone to death’s door. As for how he found you, that question should probably be answered at some other time.”