Bleeding Misery (Threatening Souls Book 2)

by N. M. Lambert

  Nor would anyone.

  “We have to go,” said a female voice next to her, and Rebekah recognized that voice as being Holly’s cousin’s. Someone who she also knew didn’t have a reason to wake her up, or at least none that she knew of.

  “What time is it?” questioned Rebekah groggily.

  “Eleven-thirty,” replied Andre as she left Rebekah’s side, “which is why we have to hurry.”

  Rebekah was confused, realizing she had been asleep way longer than a few minutes. “Why?”

  “I’d rather not explain any more until we make it out of the facility,” Andre said. “Follow me.”

  This confused Rebekah even more because she knew she was not allowed to leave the facility without some special reason. It was rather late at night, when all the people in the facility were supposed to be asleep, so she knew escaping wouldn’t be a problem. But the entirety of the situation felt strange to her. She didn’t understand why she was being taken out so late.

  “Wait, what about the Bewitched?” Rebekah questioned, remembering suddenly those that were cursed and were probably wandering around the ICW hallways in that moment.

  “I didn’t see any near us,” Andre said. “I think we’re fine.”

  So, Rebekah followed Andre quietly out of the room and down the hallway. Even though this situation felt bizarre to her, she knew the importance of keeping quiet, for it was crucial they make little noise. They didn’t want to wake up anyone or alert the Bewitched to their presence.

  In a few minutes, they had reached the entrance of the ICW facility. Surprisingly, Rebekah hadn’t heard the Bewitched at all while they were making their way outside. Not that she would know what they sounded like, but she still took note of the silence.

  When they emerged into the parking lot, Andre led Rebekah to the same vehicle they had used when going to stay at that one hotel for the night. With a single nod towards the vehicle, Andre told Rebekah to enter the car—and Rebekah obeyed.

  Then, she slid into the driver’s seat, slamming the door behind her. “Let’s just hope the sound of the engine doesn’t wake anyone up.”

  She jammed the keys into the ignition, and Rebekah heard the engine roar to life. Without giving further warning, Andre quickly backed out of the parking spot and turned right onto the semi-busy road.

  “Do you seriously have to drive through the parking lot that fast?” Rebekah questioned, feeling a little uneasy.

  Rebekah was sure she saw Andre smile amusingly out of the corner of her eye, but Andre said nothing.

  “Why did we need to leave, anyway?” Rebekah tried again to get some answers.

  “Ava wants to know how you’re doing,” came Andre’s response, and the smile had vanished.

  “That’s it?” Rebekah demanded. “Does she even have anything new for us?”

  Andre didn’t respond.

  “Andre!” Rebekah cried out in frustration. “Does she have anything new for us?!”

  “I…don’t know,” Andre finally said. “She just mentioned wanting to check up on you.”

  Rebekah leaned back in her seat and stared out the window. They hadn’t even been driving that long, and she already noticed how there were fewer buildings than before. “Are we not going to the same hotel as before?”

  “No.” Andre sighed. “It’s safer that way.”

  Rebekah wanted to argue how none of this was actually safe, but she refrained. “Then…where are you taking me?”

  “Somewhere far enough from the city where no one will be around to hear us talking to someone they cannot see.”

  Pretty soon, they exited the downtown area of Munich and started driving on a road surrounded by trees on either side. Andre slowed the car down before pulling off the road.

  Rebekah remembered the last time they were forced to swerve off the road. That was when Dimitri had appeared in front of them, and their car was totaled after it had smashed into a tree deep in the forest. Thinking about such things brought bad memories to Rebekah’s mind, the first time she had ever seen Andre’s violent side.

  Once the view of the car was obscured by trees, Andre cut the engine. “We’re going to walk the rest of the way.”

  “How deep into the forest are we going to go?”

  “Just enough so anyone who passes by here won’t be able to hear or see anything.”

  For a few minutes, they trudged deeper into the forest before stopping suddenly. Rebekah pulled the thin jacket around her tighter as the frigid air enveloped her.

  “How will Ava be able to find us?” she wondered.

  “She’ll find a way,” Andre said. “She always does.”

  Eventually, Ava did find her way to them, appearing before them in the rotating white smoke that Rebekah was too familiar with. When the smoke dissipated, Ava didn’t say anything at first. But after a while, a smile broke out across her lips, and she spoke.

  “It’s been a year since I first made myself visible to you, when I told you what you are. It only seemed right that I see you again tonight.”

  Rebekah didn’t say anything at first. That was also when Ava had given her the task to find and destroy Roseway’s fuel source—a task that had taken ten months to semi-complete.

  “How are you?” asked Ava.

  “I’m…fine,” Rebekah finally said, glancing at Andre. “Is that why you’re here? To check up on me?”

  “That’s part of it,” Ava said before directing her next comment towards Andre. “I found the Greenwich castle. That’s what I had been focusing on since our last encounter a little over two weeks ago. Finding it was no easy task.”

  “I didn’t think it would be,” Andre said. “Obviously, Henri had to create it so the human residents of Greenwich wouldn’t be able to find it easily.”

  “I found it just in time too,” Ava explained. “Recently, Henri had a meeting with the Dark Rulers and the Dark Guard, which I observed from a safe-enough location so no one would be able to see me.”

  “Did he, now?”

  Ava nodded, her eyes landing on Rebekah. “My sister was there. I didn’t get to see the whole thing, though. Only the ending.”

  “Did he reveal what he was planning?” Andre questioned.

  “As a matter of fact, he did,” said Ava. “He called it the Massacre.”

  “The Massacre?” questioned Rebekah.

  Ava nodded slowly. “On January twenty-fifth, he’s planning on gathering an army of immortal magic users and storming the ICW facility, killing everyone inside.”

  “We can’t let that happen, can we?” Rebekah questioned, glancing at Andre, as panic began to consume her. “Can we?”

  Andre ignored Rebekah, her attention still focused on Ava. “Did he say how many he was going to recruit?”

  “Probably enough to outnumber you,” Ava said.

  “We need to let Jason know about this,” Rebekah protested.

  “No! Not yet,” Andre bellowed. “Not until we have more information.”

  “But—”

  “Rebekah, Jason doesn’t exactly know I took you out tonight. If he found out, I’d be in huge trouble!”

  “You didn’t let him know? Why? What if something were to happen to us?”

  “Jason wouldn’t have let me take you out,” Andre replied. “He’s been cracking down on security ever since Henri had sent Holly the package that contained the corpses of her parents.”

  “Did it ever occur to him there’s still danger on the inside?” Once again, Rebekah found herself thinking back to the Bewitched.

  “The Bewitched haven’t made an attack in a little over two weeks,” Andre noted. “People haven’t been leaving their rooms at night recently. If they continue to do so, I don’t see how the Bewitched will be much of a threat.”

  “I saw what they could do, though,” Rebekah mumbled to herself, remembering her dream in Roseway.

  Andre pursed her lips as the extent of what Rebekah said sunk in. “Have you been out at night without my knowledge?”r />
  Rebekah stared at Andre, aghast. “What? No!”

  “Then, how did you see what they could do?” Andre demanded.

  Rebekah paled. “I…I’ve seen their corpses, the damage…” Her voice fell flat, and she could tell Andre didn’t believe her.

  “We’ll talk later,” Andre said with so much finality, Rebekah couldn’t help but shiver.

  Rebekah rammed her fingers through her hair in panic. “How are we going to prevent the Massacre?”

  Ava shrugged. “I wish I could provide you with more information, but I can’t. I wish I could give you a direction to go much like I did in Roseway, but this is something that is beyond my knowledge.” Then to Andre, she said, “I am planning on visiting you at the ICW one last time before the day of the Massacre. Until then, I’ll see if I can gather any more information.”

  “Do you think that’s a good idea?” Andre questioned. “Visiting us at the actual facility?”

  “No,” Ava admitted, “but if Jason has been cracking down on security, I don’t have much of a choice, do I? I mean, obviously, he’s not allowing anyone to leave. You had to sneak out.”

  Andre nodded in agreement. “Do you have any idea when that might be?”

  Ava shook her head. “Sometime in January. I don’t know the exact date, but I will see you again.” Then, she vanished.

  Rebekah didn’t know what to feel at that moment. She knew the ICW was supposed to run until the end of January and that the twenty-eighth was when everyone was permitted to leave the ICW facility and return to their home countries. She also knew the awards ceremony was supposed to be held on Wednesday, the twenty-sixth—which meant the Massacre was going to take place the day before. After glancing at Andre, she knew Andre knew about this as well and was just as confused.

  “Come on, let’s head back,” Andre declared as they began to make their way back to the vehicle. “Before someone realizes we’re missing.”

  ~~~

  The moment Rebekah slid into the passenger’s seat of the car, she could sense something was amiss. Andre was tensely silent as she peeled off down the road back towards the facility, and Rebekah suspected it had nothing to do with Henri and the Massacre.

  “What are you thinking?” Rebekah prodded in a desperate attempt to break the suffocating silence.

  Andre bit her lip but said nothing at first. After a few more moments of tense silence, she said, “Don’t lie to me, Rebekah. Were you at one point out past curfew?”

  “No!” Rebekah adamantly said, which was the truth. She wouldn’t dream of it, not with the Bewitched knocking on everyone’s doorstep.

  Andre sighed. “The comment you made concerns me.”

  “Well, don’t be concerned,” Rebekah snapped. “It was nothing.” Just a stupid dream.

  And then, Andre went eerily quiet again, and a brief look of horror flashed across her face. “Did you at one point dream about them?”

  Rebekah felt like she had been slapped, and she hated how perceptive Andre was in that moment. “How do you know?”

  Andre ignored her question. “When?”

  “It was in Roseway,” Rebekah said. “I…I think I saw the transformation of the Bewitched and then watched as they slaughtered someone.”

  “Do you remember what the Bewitched in your dream looked like?”

  “I—” Rebekah began but then stopped as she tried to recall the dream. Yet to her surprise, she couldn’t remember any of the crucial details, such as the features the Bewitched wore. “No. I…I don’t remember.”

  Andre swore as she swerved off the road and violently slammed on the breaks. Immediately, Rebekah searched the area for a threat, but she saw nothing, and then, she looked into Andre’s eyes—and it was like nothing she’s ever seen before.

  “Andre, what’s wrong?” Rebekah demanded.

  “You’re a diluted Foreseer, Rebekah!” Andre practically bellowed. “Shit!”

  Rebekah’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion. “Mandy’s the Foreseer. I’m just an—”

  “I sensed Paige’s aura in the candle shop, and so did Reilly. That’s why we decided to let her retain her memories of what happened,” Andre explained. “Paige is a carrier of the Foreseer gene, Rebekah!”

  Rebekah shook her head. “That doesn’t mean I’m one!”

  “I sensed the auras of your family when I dropped you off,” Andre admitted. “Both your mother and aunt are carriers. Your uncle had no trace of the gene, but your father…”

  Rebekah didn’t need Andre to finish the sentence to know how it ended. “No,” she said. “You’re lying.”

  Andre shut her eyes in frustration. “Why would I lie about this?”

  “How is this even possible?”

  “I don’t know! This hasn’t exactly happened before!”

  Rebekah now felt herself growing frustrated. “If what you say is true, then how come I’m diluted?”

  “Because you’re an Innocent, Rebekah. That part of you must be stronger.”

  Rebekah let out a huge breath. “Does Henri know?”

  Much to Rebekah’s relief, Andre shook her head. “I don’t think so.” But then, she continued, which paled Rebekah even more. “Because if he did, he wouldn’t be trying to kill you. He’d torture and enslave you.”

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Rebekah: Munich, Germany

  T

  omorrow marked the sixth portion of the ICW and the first portion of the new year. During that day, Rebekah knew Jamie was using her time to mentally prepare herself for that competition, since she would be participating in it tomorrow.

  What Rebekah didn’t expect to happen was Jamie ushering everyone out of the Eternal Division assigned room so she could spend the day in silence and mental preparation. Rebekah didn’t understand that, since the previous Eternal Division participants did no such thing, but she didn’t argue with Jamie. Instead, she went to visit Mandy on that day in order to tell her what Ava had revealed last night.

  “It’s called the Massacre, and Henri is pretty much staging it with the intention of killing everyone who is currently in this facility,” Rebekah explained once she had casually brought up the topic.

  “The Massacre?” Mandy reiterated. “I mean, I understand why he would want to kill certain people, but why me? He didn’t seem like he wanted to kill me when he decided to reach out to me. Even Jason said that wasn’t his intention.”

  “Perhaps he changed his mind,” Rebekah said. “Perhaps he only wanted to keep you alive when he thought you could serve as some use to him. Now that you are of no use to him, he probably won’t hesitate to kill you.”

  If such a thing was even possible, Rebekah watched as Mandy paled even more.

  “What are we going to do?”

  Rebekah shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  It wasn’t long before the door to the infirmary opened. Standing in the doorway was Holly, and Rebekah suspected she was here to visit Mandy too. Yet, Holly’s facial expression told Rebekah otherwise.

  “Jason wants to meet with us,” she said. “All of us.”

  “Why?” Rebekah questioned.

  “Andre told me about you two sneaking out in order to see Ava and that she informed you about the Massacre,” Holly said. “Despite her fear that she would get in trouble for taking you out, I coaxed her into telling Jason. At first, he was furious that she would disobey him like that, but after a while, that anger diminished.”

  “So, he wants to talk to the three of us…about the Massacre?” questioned Rebekah.

  “Not just the three of us,” Holly explained. “The chaperones as well. And he also wanted me to grab Tatiana.”

  “Tatiana?” Mandy questioned. “Why?”

  “Because she’s still an Innocent,” explained Holly. “Jason did say, Mandy, that you are in good condition to walk, so you could leave the infirmary, if you wanted to.”

  Rebekah watched as Mandy leapt off her bed on wobbly limbs. After being bedridden for d
ays, it was a miracle Mandy didn’t outright collapse, but when she finally steadied herself, she flashed Rebekah a smile.

  It was not lost on Rebekah that Mandy didn’t do the same to Holly. The witch, however, ignored it.

  “Come with me to get Tatiana, and then, we’re going to the courtyard.”

  Rebekah and Mandy followed Holly to the room of the Russian clique, which was surprisingly close to the infirmary.

  Holly knocked on the door once, and Tatiana was the one to answer it.

  “Holly,” she said, startled. “And…I can see you brought friends. Did you give any more thought to—”

  “Jason asked me to fetch you,” said Holly.

  “Why?”

  “Because of what you are, and he’s going to announce something to us.”

  Tatiana took a step outside the room. “I’m assuming this has to do with the Bewitched or the immortal magic users or something.”

  Holly nodded.

  “That will actually give me time to tell him something as well,” Tatiana said.

  “What’s that?”

  As the four of them began to head towards the courtyard, Tatiana replied with: “Kat left again. She’s been gone since yesterday, and something tells me she’s not going to return.”

  Even though she already knew that Kat was an immortal magic user, this news still shocked Rebekah.

  “Why?” Holly questioned.

  Tatiana shrugged. “Ever since she became one of my clique’s chaperones, I noticed something strange about her. I’ve pretty much figured out on my own that she’s immortal, and when I overheard her talking on the phone to someone named Melissa about Henri Anderson and something called the Massacre, that proved my suspicions.”

  “Well, you’re right. She is immortal, but she was able to trick Jason into thinking that she wasn’t because she’s good at illusion magic,” Holly said. “Also, the Massacre is what Jason wants to talk to us about.”

  “Did she mention she was planning on leaving at all?” Rebekah wondered.