Arc 2

by RoAnna Sylver

  “Honestly?” she shifted her shoulders in an experimental way, wincing a bit. “Probably not. I’m sure it’ll all hit me right when I’m trying to go to sleep. But right now—I’m better than okay. For a couple different reasons.” Eva actually smiled, looking exhausted but genuinely happy. Maybe it was just the lingering adrenaline from almost dying, but Jude suspected something else.

  “I thought you and Letizia looked… close,” Jude said, offering Eva his arm as they started slowly down the path toward smooth pavement. She leaned on him for a few steps, then sighed and bent down, slipping her shoe-shaped torture devices off. He could see her entertain the thought of hurling them into the underbrush, then think better of it. Same old Eva.

  “I think we are,” she said thoughtfully, still with that funny, slightly giddy smile. She moved more easily with her feet freed of their torture devices, but she didn’t let go of his arm. “I really think we might have a good thing going. We’ll still have to figure everything out, of course.”

  Jude thought of Pixie, and Jasper and Felix, wherever they were. Hopefully safe. If they weren’t safe, he’d have a lot more of this strange night left ahead of him. “I know the feeling. I’ve got so much rattling around in my brain I don’t know where to begin.”

  “Hey, at least you don’t have to go in to work tomorrow,” Eva said, voice taking on a little teasing tone. “So that’s one less thing to worry about.”

  “You know, you could always take a day off,” he said.

  “I might have to,” she said with a bone-weary sigh. “Or maybe a week.”

  “Why stop there? You could quit.”

  “Do you have the real Jude tied up in a basement somewhere?” Eva peered at him sideways.

  “I’ve recently gotten into the habit of quitting jobs I hate,” he said with dignity. “And I strongly recommend it.”

  “Mmmm—no, unlike you, I don’t actually hate my job. Besides, someone has to make sure the mall doesn’t explode.”

  “Do they? It’s such an eyesore.”

  “You really are the absolute worst security guard ever.”

  Jude grinned. “Good thing I’m not one anymore. Now I can focus on what’s really important.”

  “Start by carrying me home,” Eva grumbled, leaning on him again as they walked away from the circle and back toward their lives. “When we get there, I’m burning these shoes. There’s a ritual sacrifice for you.”

  “You know it’s not a full moon anymore.”

  “Burning. These. Shoes.”

  With every second that passed, Felix got more and more worried. It had been hours since he’d last seen Jasper and even longer since he’d felt he had a good grasp on the situation, or any situation at all. Jasper had simply said he was going out to meet Jude for the evening but not elaborated, seeming perfectly calm and cheerful—unless you were his fiancé, in which case, he couldn’t have been more obviously anxious and stressed if he’d had a neon sign.

  Felix hadn’t asked any questions. He rarely did. Jasper’s business was his own, and the outside world was a strange place Felix didn’t quite feel he belonged in anymore. The threshold to normalcy was one he just couldn’t cross, even when invited.

  But that had, indeed, been hours ago.

  Before he’d felt a surge in his blood, a wave of stinging energy that swept over him like a gust of burning air. It was a strangely familiar feeling, as if it was years ago in his old fire-fighting life, and he’d opened the door on a burning building and taken the brunt of the backdraft.

  And familiar in a different way as well.

  “Wicked Gold…” he murmured to himself, daring to draw the blackout curtains away from the window. “What are you doing?”

  And where was Jasper? Where were Jude and Eva, on this night that screamed, sang to Felix’s blood that magic was vital and alive and striking like a lightning bolt? But this was not a healthy magic. The charge in the air was not wholesome, and every bit of him knew, the way he knew his sire’s name, that something wicked this way was very much to come.

  Felix only hesitated for a moment before sliding the window open and easing his way outside, huge wings tightly folded across his back. Then he spread them, and leaped into the air.

  He soared over the city lights, high up enough to be nothing more than a nearly-invisible black spot against a clouded, starless sky. Felix liked feeling invisible. Unseen was safe; hidden was unbothered, unexposed. But even this wasn’t enough to reassure him, and anxiety stung through him, even more urgent and alarming than any unsavory magic. Frantically, he searched the ground for any sign of his chosen family. Though he saw nothing, the strange magic that pounded like warm blood through his undead veins intensified as he turned toward a dark spot on the ground, a thickly wooded park with a faint orange glow in the center.

  The air was tinged with the scent of wood smoke, and Felix was just about to head directly toward the source, when he saw them. A figure on the ground that caught his attention as if they were lit up by a spotlight.

  Someone stood alone in a gap in the trees, a small parking area at the head of a trail, one streetlight, no cars or people. At the sight, Felix felt a spark of recognition, one that made him bank toward the ground, and fall. Felix landed surprisingly lightly on his taloned feet, folding his wings. But although his descent had been almost silent, the figure still started and turned to face him.

  Sanguine wavered on his feet, pale and obviously terrified—and moving unsteadily, in a way that suggested something very wrong. Anyone seeing Sanguine now would simply assume he was drunk or high, since the reality was so far removed from anybody’s point of reference it would never enter their minds. Most abuse was, even of the non-supernatural variety.

  He froze at the sight of the dark figure, but didn’t run.

  Then Felix moved enough for the light from a nearby streetlamp to hit his face and instead of screaming, as any rational human would have done, this one broke into a wide, relieved smile.

  “Hey, buddy.”

  “Hello, Sanguine,” Felix said, his own cheeks aching; he realized he was smiling as well. His face was still nowhere near used to that. It was a strange expression for his permanently half-transformed face, but not a frightening one, once you recognized what it meant.

  “Oh man, I can’t believe you’re here! I thought I’d never see you again!” Sanguine cried. With his face lit up in excitement and joy, the obviously unwell young man looked much younger. Alive, instead of someone living a numb half-life in the hands of a monster. But it didn’t last for long. Sanguine had barely had time to smile back before his tired face sobered again, and Felix could see tension overtake him once more. “Honestly, I kinda hoped I wouldn’t. You shouldn’t be here.”

  “I’m sorry,” Felix said, heart sinking despite its stillness. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

  “Are you kidding?” Sanguine said with a raspy, cough-like noise Felix recognized as a laugh. “This is so much better than any other way my night could be going right now.”

  It had to be an understatement, Felix thought, quick medic’s eyes flicking over his friend’s visible injuries. But he didn’t need to see the blood on Sanguine’s face and in his hair. He could smell it from here. He’d been hurt like this for some time from the smell of him, and lost quite a lot of blood. Likely concussed. That might explain his unsteadiness, the glassiness in his eyes, his blanched face and dark circles.

  “Are you all right?” Felix asked anxiously, foolishly; of course he wasn’t. He hadn’t been for a long time. Felix knew that much, and nearly firsthand.

  “I’m…” Sanguine’s mouth twisted and Felix could tell he was about to retort something sardonic, but then the expression dropped off his face, leaving only exhaustion behind. “I could be worse. Not much worse, but… considering everything else that happened tonight…”

  Felix stood up a bit on his clawed toes to sniff at the air and feel for any lingering magical charge, but the electricity-like feeling was
fading. The storm was moving on. “What did happen? Was anyone else there? I can’t find anyone. That isn’t good.”

  “Yeah, I’ve seen your friends.” Sanguine looked again like he wanted to smile, or do something besides struggle to exist, but just didn’t have the energy. “Wicked Gold tried a big ritual thing at the stones in the park. I dunno what for, but he had Eva—wait!”

  Felix froze mid-leap; at the sound of his friend’s name he’d immediately made to shoot off into the air again, but he stopped, lowering his spread wings at the pleading look on Sanguine’s face.

  “She’s okay! The Witch came and got her, they’re fine!” Sanguine babbled. “They fucked up his spell, and then he noped on out of there, but they’re okay, and if Jude and them weren’t at the circle then they’ve gotta be fine too, just—just don’t go yet, okay?”

  “I’m glad to hear that,” Felix said in a vast understatement of his own. At least now he could check their homes and actually expect to find someone. Jasper may be home by the time he got there, even. Hope bloomed in his chest instead of fear, and now he was able to turn more of his attention to the filthy, ragged young man before him.

  Someone had hurt Sanguine, and Felix had a very good idea who. Many times. Not just tonight. Felix knew the look of new injuries and old scars, and this boy had too many of both. His clothes were hardly more than torn rags by this point, except for the T-shirt he wore over the rest, its clean fabric and colorful design stark and almost wrong-looking on the rest of him.

  Guilt sunk its claws into Felix again, and he folded his wings into a cloak that did nothing to block out its chill. “Why are you happy to see me? I left you with that monster. I should have come back for you. I wanted to come back for you! I’m so sorry, I haven’t—”

  “No!” Sanguine cut in, raising his hands. “No, no you definitely should not have. You got away, you’re gone and need to stay gone, at least until Mr. Gold fucks off to Europe again or whatever. And I told you, stop apologizing—or at least, not to me,” Sanguine said, eyes dropping to the ground. “I’m not the one who needs to hear it the most. You did better than I ever expected. You…got the three of them out. The two girls, and…” he paused, licking his chapped lips and swallowing, blinking hard. “Is he okay?”

  “He’s doing fine,” Felix said gently.

  “I miss him.”

  “I know,” Felix said again, just as softly. His voice was rougher than it had been, distorted by his half-transformed vocal cords. Sometimes he didn’t even recognize it himself, but it was the one he had now, and in this moment he meant every word. “He’s fine. As much as he can be, under the circumstances. But he’s safe. I’ll make sure he stays that way.”

  “Good,” Sanguine said, thin shoulders dropping as he sighed. “And remember, don’t say anything about—”

  “I know,” Felix said, watching as Sanguine wrapped his arms around his thin torso. It was a cold night, but he got the feeling that wasn’t the source of the human’s shivers. “That’s for you to say, when you see him again.”

  “Sure. Right.” Sanguine’s voice was deadpan, completely flat and devoid of hope.

  “Come with me,” Felix rumbled, unable to hear that despairing voice, see those living-but-dead eyes anymore, not without at least trying to help once more. “I have friends. I’m not alone anymore. We’ll keep you safe.”

  Sanguine hesitated, mouth hanging open. A silence stretched between the two of them, unbroken by the sounds of cars or people. The light from the bonfire was gone, the hum of the stones undetectable. Even the woods seemed to hold still, as if holding their breath so as not to interrupt this strange, desperate meeting and inevitable parting.

  “No, I can’t,” Sanguine said then, quickly, mouth twisting into a bitter grimace, and took a step backwards.

  “Please. You’re hurt and it’s cold. You shouldn’t be out here alone. Or at all.”

  “He’d know. He always knows somehow,” Sanguine’s voice rose a bit as a note of panic crept in. “It’s like he’s got some kind of tracker bug on me, probably a spell, or some other vampire thing, but he almost always knows where I am, except for a few places—like that freaking circle. I’d lead him right to you. And I’m not going to do that, not ever!”

  Felix couldn’t argue. He knew his friend was right; he’d known it before he’d even offered, but he’d had to. He could see the clean tear streaks down Sanguine’s blood-and-grime coated face now, the sharpness of his collarbones and wrists.

  “There has to be something I can do.”

  “I told you, just keep taking care of yourself, and him.”

  “For you. There has to be something I can—”

  “There really isn’t. Not if you don’t want Wicked Fucking Gold to be onto you in a second—and if you really want to make me happy, you’ll avoid that at all costs. Fuck, I have to get out of here,” Sanguine said, panic ringing in his voice like a metallic clang, stumbling backwards so fast he almost tripped. “I shouldn’t have asked you to stay, he’ll know I was out. He’ll know I saw you—he’ll smell you on me! Obviously! Fuck!”

  Felix pulled back too, horrified at the idea that he might have brought down another barrage of punishment onto Sanguine’s head.

  “Wait,” Felix tried, though even as he spoke he felt the brief connection slipping through his fingers, if he’d ever had a hold on it at all. “It doesn’t have to end like this!”

  “Not for you it doesn’t,” Sanguine said, carefully shaking his bruised and bloodied head, and taking a few steps backwards, half-stumbling. “You got away, man. You made it, so run with it, don’t you fucking dare throw away that chance just because you’re sad I didn’t make it too. It took us too long for you to waste it now, so just go. Tell yourself it’s for me if that makes it easier, just disappear. While you still can. You could never get me out alive anyway.”

  “Wait!” Felix cried again with a pang of desperation, as he saw the distance between them grow, Sanguine’s walls coming up, hard and cold and defensive against further disappointment. “I’m still going to help you. There must be a way! I will come back for you. I will get you out of there.”

  “Nice of you to say that,” Sanguine said, voice flat and entirely devoid of hope, plainly refusing to rise to the bait, and the hooked barb that surely waited along with it to pull him down again. “And I hope you’re having a great life in the real world. Really.”

  “I—I still hope—”

  Sanguine cough-laughed again. “Hope’s a kinda dangerous thing, isn’t it? No. You stay right there, and don’t you dare follow me. I need to get as far away from you as I can, because fuck if you’re getting caught again because of me. Nobody’s getting hurt because of me anymore. Not ever. I’ll make sure of that.”

  “Sanguine? What does that mean?” Felix asked, feeling a chill despite the fact that cold hadn’t bothered him for just over five years. It never would again, but that didn’t keep steely fear from gripping his heart.

  “Like I said… I was never getting out of this alive.”

  “No,” Felix said. Suddenly he felt as if he were airborne again, a mile up, looking down at the tiny figure on the ground, unable to reach or help or hope for an ending without tragedy. “There’s another way out of this, there has to be. What are you going to do?”

  “Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answer to, my dude,” Sanguine said with a mirthless twist of his mouth. “And don’t make promises you can’t keep. I better not see you around. Now go find your friends. They need you more than I do.”

  Felix felt paralyzed as Sanguine stepped away, out of the light. He was right here, slipping away before Felix could save him or even reach him. Felix was failing, again, for what felt like the thousandth time, and now he was falling like a stone, wings or no wings.

  “Wait! Sanguine!” Felix cried, desperation nearly making it break. But Sanguine didn’t turn or stop, and Felix made one last, wild try. “Jeff!”

  Now he stopped. The young m
an stood frozen for a moment, then turned, taking a step back toward Felix, just enough to cast light on his face and red hair.

  For the first time, Felix noticed the design on his white T-shirt: a stylized sun, with the block-letter words Endless Summer.

  Something about it, about seeing the sun at night, about seeing such an optimistic thing on the chest of someone with every reason to hope for nothing the rest of his life—and the spots of blood, when Sanguine had obviously tried to keep it clean—made Felix’s heart ache.

  “Haven’t heard that name in a while,” his friend said, a tired, bitter smirk on his face, the kind of thing that tried to be casual and ironic, but just came out looking exhausted and sad.

  The ache in Felix’s heart became a stab. He longed to rush forward and pull the ragged young man into his arms, wrap him in a protective cocoon of wings, and fly him far beyond his cruel master’s reach. But shame rooted him to the sidewalk, and he could feel the precious chance of rescue passing him by, leaving him empty.

  “This isn’t goodbye,” Felix said quietly. “I will find you again. My friends and I will keep you safe. This isn’t the end, this isn’t forever—you have not been abandoned. Remember that.”

  The slow, full, real smile the young man gave him was the most bittersweet thing he’d ever seen. The joy and despair at odds and at one within it would stay with him forever, Felix knew, even as his friend stepped back again, out of the light for good. Then he took another step away. Then, as if taking the plunge before he could change his mind, he broke into a run down the dark path through the woods, and disappeared.

  Felix didn’t pursue him, even if his heightened senses easily picked up the receding footfalls. Instead, he stood there alone until even he couldn’t hear the human anymore. Then, shaking his head, he took a few running steps in the opposite direction and launched himself back up into the cool night air.