by Lucy Auburn
He doesn't react to this news, which is irritating, to say the least. "I didn't lie, technically. Just left out the truth."
"Same thing."
"I suppose it depends on your point of view." Tilting his head, he adds, "More than three hundred years have passed since Lainey was my living, breathing daughter. Whatever it is she's become since then, after dozens of cheated deaths and immeasurable murders to keep her life going, is far from the daughter I knew. I'm your father, Dani—not hers."
I don't even know what to say to that. "She also said our family is cursed."
Meyer just stares at me. "I thought you didn't consider me family."
"I don't. So I guess I won't worry about it." Rubbing my arms, I add, "It would've been nice to have all the information about Lainey upfront. I didn't like being surprised. But keeping things from me is your whole deal, so... I guess I'll repay the favor by doing the opposite and telling you that I'm leaving town for the summer."
"Oh?"
"Yeah." I glance over my shoulder, towards the people waiting for me in the hallway outside his cell, people who care about me, tell me the truth, and do their best to keep me safe. "I'm going on vacation. You're not welcome. By the time I come back, this place will have been repaired, and I'll be a sophomore here. But as for you, well... I guess I'll be seeing you the next time I have questions that need answers. Or a homicidal maniac shows up who may or may not be related to you. Whichever comes first."
Meyer observes me for a moment, head tilted to the side. "Have a good summer, Dani. Don't forget: you're still young. This is going to be remembered as the best time of your life."
"Yeah, yeah."
I'm about to leave when he adds, "Happy birthday."
There's nothing I can say to that. So I turn away, walk out, and don't look back.
I've got far more to look forward to than to look backwards at, after all.
"We should probably talk about what happened." As I head towards the Great House, walking through milling throngs of the students left here over the break, I feel eyes on me. I'm the center of attention—again. "You know, how I... what I did. To you."
"Order us to obey your will, you mean." Ezra's voice is pitched low; his eyes dart to the students too, and I wonder if he's wishing things could go back to the way they were before, when no one even knew I had four demons bonded to me. How long ago that seems now. "I understand why you did it, Dani, but I can't say that it thrills me. We should be beyond those sort of tactics."
"We should also be beyond you guys overruling my wishes and tying me up," I snap, voice rising—which gets us even more attention. "Turnabout is fair play."
Sebastian says, "All is fair in love and war. Since we're speaking in cliches now."
I glare at him—then at Lynx, who has the misfortune of standing closest to him. The book-loving demon looks away, sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck.
"I didn't like doing it," he says quietly. "Tying you up wouldn't have been my first choice. But seeing you die definitely wasn't up there on the list either. For a moment there... Dani, you seemed like you were really dead."
We get to the front steps of the Great House, and I pause to frown in his direction. "What do you mean? I was only out for a moment or two."
"Not the last time." Ezra's voice is sorrowful. "You went limp in my arms. You had no heartbeat, you weren't breathing. And then I felt you just... go."
Mateo says, "I wasn't there, so I didn't see. But I felt something. Through the soul bond, I guess. It was like getting kicked in the nuts."
"You would know what that's like," Lynx quips, "seeing as how half the woman you've met in your time on Earth pulled that move on you."
"Yeah, well, you never pulled any moves off, you nerd—"
"Hush," I tell them both, focusing back on Ezra and the whole nearly dying thing. "That last death did feel different for me. It was like there was this other place that I went to. But I didn't know you felt it."
"Other place?" Lynx asks.
Scowling, Sebastian says, "The afterlife. You tried to go to the great beyond without us."
"The afterlife." Licking my lips, I shake my head. "It can't be. I mean, my mom was there, sure, but she didn't talk or seem like herself. And nothing really happened. It felt like I was in between places, not... in Heaven or something." Another thought occurs to me, and I reluctantly add, "Or Hell. Not that I know what that's like."
"Neither do we." Ezra takes the steps up to the front doors, and I follow, torn between getting some sleep and snagging whatever food they might have managed to prepare in the dining hall, between the invasion and the explosion. "We were created in Purgatory, between one place and another, where souls go to pay for their sins and the hope for redemption. Hell is a place for the truly, irredeemably evil, creatures and beasts unfathomably foul."
"'Bad shit' is what he means." Mateo rolls his eyes. "You don't have to talk like we're in some old stuffy book written by a British dude. 'Unfathomably foul' my ass. You can fathom 'em when you see them—like those voltari things from earlier, and that thing Lainey nearly got to come up from the Earth. Real B grade horror movie shit. Some of the things they supposedly have down there—"
"Lainey said that it's where we're gonna go when we die." I can't listen to him describe Hell any more. "Something about a family curse. Meyer didn't exactly contradict it when I asked him about the whole thing, so. I guess that explains their obsession with not dying."
I walk into the Great House, stomach rumbling, and veer towards the dining hall. The demons follow me silently, clearly thinking about what I've just told them.
"Guess I'll have to ration my next seven lives. How long can a phoenix live if they're not constantly getting stabbed to death by Grims? A hundred-and-twenty years, right? Maybe if I make it past a century I'll welcome the thought of burning in Hell."
"It doesn't have to be true." Lynx puts a hand on my shoulder, turning me around to face them, his voice soft and quiet. "Just because it's true for them doesn't mean it's true for you."
"Have you managed to translate that journal any better?"
"Only a little," he admits. "A good half of it is in some kind of code. But maybe over the summer, once there aren't any classes or training sessions, there will be more time."
"Look for words like curse. Or Hell." Jokingly, I add, "Then again, maybe I'm cursed to be eternally hungry and incredibly hot."
"We'll figure it out, Dani," Ezra reassures me. "We always do."
"Together," I tell them, and they echo the word in unison.
"Together."
Until the end—whether it comes before I make it to graduation, or sometime about eighty years from now, when I'm old and wrinkled.
As I grab my bowls of cereal, I tally up the things I have to do: check in on the shifters and other students, find out from Petra where this beach house is and when we're going, pack all my things—including enough books to keep Lynx happy—and maybe cajole her into taking me into town to buy a swimsuit, and figure out what elective I should take next year, now that I'll get one of those.
I'm halfway through filling up the bowls when I hear my name, softly said. And I stare over at Sebastian, who's frowning at me.
"You should probably wash your hands," he says, his blue eyes a shock of sympathy. "They're not in the best condition."
I glance down at my hands, and nearly laugh when I see that I've gotten dried blood on the cereal bowls. "Right." Grabbing my tray, I rush it over to the dish washing window and push everything through, heart hammering. "I forgot to wash the blood off my hands."
Thankfully the dining hall is still empty, since all the students who were locked in here during the fight are out figuring out what happened and catching up on the latest gossip. Now I know why they were staring at me—I must look awful.
"Hey." Sebastian puts a hand on my shoulder, and I look at his arm to avoid look up into any of their faces, because I don't want to see pity or worry there. "It's not an eas
y thing to deal with, death."
"But I'll get used to it."
His fingers tighten briefly. "No, I don't think you will." Shocked, I jerk my eyes up to meet his. "It won't get easy, and you won't get used to it. Which is for the best. This is the part that makes you human."
"You guys seemed to deal with it pretty easily," I observed. "That night on the cliffs especially."
"We're demons," Sebastian reminds me.
Mateo adds, "Also, those people deserved it."
"Lainey deserved it." Flexing my fingers, I rub my hands together, feeling bits of blood roll up and flake off. "She was the worst of the worst."
"Killing even the evilest of people isn't easy," Lynx chimes in, "when you share a connection. What makes killing easy for us isn't the fact that we have supernatural powers or even see souls."
"What is it, then? What makes it easy?"
"We don't know who we are." His voice is tinged with a distant sort of sadness. "We don't have familial connections or values rooting us to the past. Everything we do is easy to leave behind us because we live in the present—or we did, until you. I think you make us a little more human."
"Nah." Mateo snorts disdainfully. "Humans are terrible shots."
Lynx rolls his eyes. "But regardless. The things that make you feel sorrow, regret, fear, failure—they're your memories, your foundation. So you shouldn't make yourself stop feeling them. Even when it's hard."
"Also," Ezra adds, "you did just die four times."
"Yeah." I'm thankful for their guidance, even when it's a bit funny at the edges—they are demons, after all. "I wonder what I'll do with my next seven lives."
We talk about it as I head to the restroom and wash my hands, bantering back and forth about the uses for a few extra phoenix lives: a parachute-free dive out of an airplane, exploring Chernobyl, crashing a Ferrari off the side of a cliff, and dozens of things involving explosives, courtesy of Mateo's strange mind.
By the time I've got the blood out from under my fingernails my skin is raw and pink, and I'm glad for one thing: the fact that Mateo blew up the watchtower. Now I'll never have to go back, collect her body, and decide what to do with it.
But maybe I'll make a headstone for her and put it near the spot where she died.
She was my fucked-up sister, after all.
Chapter 40
Two Weeks Later
There's nothing quite like the sight of wolves running through sand, waves lapping at their paws, as the sun sets and the moon peeks through the clouds. Petra is racing her nephew and little brother, tongue lolling out of the side of her mouth, long legs easily lapping them–though more than once I think she's slowed down to give them a chance to catch up.
As I watch, she whips around, rears back, and pounces on them both. Little yips of delight and play growls fill the air, then all at once they shift back to their human forms and dive into the dark waves, thoroughly sandy from head to foot.
I still can't quite believe that all of us are alive, happy, and whole. I also can't believe that I reached into my own half-sister's chest and pulled her heart out.
Ever since I did it, something feels... different. But moments like these—moments where I get to see Petra be happy with her family—it feels worth it. I didn't do it because I wanted to; I did it to protect the people I care about.
I wish it could have been some other way.
But I've always known that for me, words like "family" weren't going to have a traditional meaning.
Turning away from the scene of sibling shifter frolicking, I spot a distant private spot on the beach, near the pier, and head in that direction. I've done my best not to show it to Petra, but as much as I like being here, getting to enjoy the beach and be off campus for the first time in months, I'm looking forward to returning to school for summer training. There's something about seeing her with her family, all of them happy even when they're bickering or getting on each other's nerves, that has started to grate on me.
I know it isn't fair. They've all welcomed me with open arms. But it doesn't feel the same as having family for myself. Even when I've played tag with her little brothers or showed her sister how to best pick a tourist's pocket—something I got quite the mouthful from Petra for doing—I know I'm not really one of them. I can feel it in the way they look at the demons the few times I've summoned them when we're together, and in how people glance from each of their blond heads to my dark hair and pale skin when we go shopping together. This is just a borrowed family; the real version, for me at least, is totally fucked-up.
I still wonder if it was my mother who I saw when I died.
And I can't help wondering if I'll see her again the next time I lose one of my lives.
Not enough to make me want to waste a life. Just enough to make me wish I'd stuck around a little longer to try to get her to talk. Knowing my luck, though, she'd wind up being just as fucked in the head as Meyer and Lainey. You'd have to be, to have a kid with a guy like him.
I remember very little about her, except that she used to talk about my dad like he was the best thing in the world until the day he split. I always thought she was talking about the guy whose name she put on the birth certificate. He was a shithead, but I'd take him over Meyer any day.
Reaching the underside of the pier, I stand in the darkness and stare out at the black distant foam of the tide going out to sea. And I consider the fact that I have another family.
One that's fucked-up in its own way.
If I've learned anything, though, it's that fucked-up can be its own special kind of fun. My fucked-up demons don't expect me to change for them, to stop cursing or get good grades, to show up to class on time or be perfect. They like killing lesser demons when we go on dates; sometimes we blow shit up together and shoot things with guns.
I don't even need to close my eyes or do any of Yohan's meditation techniques in order to summon them now. All it takes is thinking of them and tugging on the four bright points of our bond to bring them to me, underneath the shadowed darkness of the pier, nothing but a hint of distant stars to light the dusky horizon.
"Whoa." Mateo looks out towards the ocean, blinking. "Shit, it looks nice at night. Dani, why don't humans come to the beach when it's all dark and epic like this?"
"The tide washes out, the water is cold, you can't see anything, and the waves are too strong." I laugh at the maniacal expression on his face. "Also, there are little sharks out there this time of night that will bite your toes off, but I'm sure you'd just shoot them with your gun."
"Cool."
He's staring at the water, but Lynx is staring at me, a puzzled frown on his brows. "Everything okay?"
"I'm not in danger."
Ezra says, "You know that you don't have to be in danger to summon us." Reaching out, he cups my cheek, his palms calloused in the places where he holds a sword. "But you look sad. It doesn't suit you."
Sebastian, blue eyes sharp, is studying me. "There's pain on your face. The kind I can't take away."
Taking a deep breath, I let it out slowly. And nod, pushing down on the urge to cry, to scream, to throw a tantrum about the unfairness of it all, like a rich girl mad she got a Bentley instead of a BMW.
"I guess what I'm feeling is grief. Not for the family I had, but the family I'll never have. What a fucking joke." Looking at Sebastian, I tell him, "There are other ways to take away pain."
They take me in their arms, hold me, touch me. We share kisses, both the gentle kind and the hungry, devouring kind. The sun sets; stars come out in the night sky. Between them, they have enough jackets—leather and otherwise—to lay down on the sand and make something like a bed, along with my dry beach towel and a picnic blanket Mateo filches from the pier.
Ezra takes me in his arms first, strong and confident. He trails kisses down the side of my neck to the hollow dip in my clavicle. Clever fingers strip my bikini off piece by piece. Closing my eyes, I stretch my neck out as his mouth travels to the center of my rib cage
, over to the delicate skin of my breast.
I can hear the quick beating of my heart.
And louder, distant, the crashing of the waves on the shore, relentless in the darkness of the early night.
Ezra's hungry mouth closes on my nipple, draws it between his lips and onto the tip of his tongue. He coaxes pleasure out of me until I'm gasping, pressing forward against him, fingers gripping his short dark hair and tugging.
New fingers trail down the back of my neck. My pleasure increases twofold, threefold. A low, dark voice, like black coffee, murmurs in my ear: Sebastian. "More pleasure, my darling. Just for you."
I swallow as Sebastian pushes forward against me until I can feel his hardened length against my ass cheeks. Ezra kneels in front of me, mouth reaching my belly button. I glance down to meet the sliver of his green eyes staring up to meet my gaze as his sword-calloused hands find my hips and stroke my skin.
His warm mouth draws closer, nearer, to the apex between my thighs. I lick my lips; my nerves tingle as Sebastian's fingers press down on my skin, as his mouth presses against me as well, on the side of my neck. As Ezra's tongue descends to the hot, desirous warmth between my thighs, Sebastian's lips suck on the side of my jaw.
I shiver all over from the pleasure of it.
Ezra's mouth presses further; he spreads my thighs apart with his fingers and tongues my lower lips. Gasping, I shudder all over, weight falling forward towards him. A low, dark chuckle emerges from his throat, and he grabs my hips to prop me up.
Pulling back, Ezra looks at me with those green eyes, which reflect the moonlight. I can feel Mateo and Lynx watching us, waiting, their coordination secret but somehow agreed upon in advance. And behind me, Sebastian, stirring my pleasure up and down with the touch of his skin on mine, bringing me to the edge and back again.
"Maybe you should lay down," Ezra says, licking his lips; I find myself licking mine in mirror to him. "I wouldn't want you to collapse on the sand from overwhelming orgasmic activity."