“I don’t know, but it doesn’t feel right,” I replied, getting up. The taste of coffee was suddenly too bitter. Something was going on, and until we figured out what it was, I could no longer enjoy the perks of being alive. I tried my best to explain every sensation I’d been dealing with since we’d arrived. To my relief, Tristan understood.
He took my hands in his, squeezing firmly. It helped ease some of the shivers. Even the birds had stopped singing, I realized. It was as if nature itself understood something I clearly didn’t. “You may have noticed something I wouldn’t have because I’m desensitized,” he said. “Maybe you’re more receptive to everything around you because you’re still adjusting to your body. It could very well save both our asses in the end.”
“But what are we dealing with? Why are they acting so strangely?” I replied. “If the people are all accounted for…”
“We‘ll look into it.” He stood, looking worriedly around. “For the time being, I think we should go downstairs and stock up on a few things from the safe.”
“You mean weapons?”
He nodded. “Might as well be on the safe side.”
“You think there are still clones here?”
“I won’t exclude the possibility, which means the two of us are in serious danger. But I don’t want you to make a radical decision until we confirm,” he said. I knew what that meant. He wished for me to hold on to my body for as long as possible.
We rushed downstairs, and Tristan punched the secret code into the safe’s number pad. I heard the click of the lock opening, followed by the shuffling of metallic objects and glass. We each had a backpack to fill with a variety of portable weapons—throwing stars, smoke bombs, and short-radius grenades. I fitted a pair of long knives in holsters across my back, leaving my scythe visibly hung from my belt. Tristan had been kind enough to procure me a couple of nicely fitted GASP uniforms to wear. I wasn’t a Reaper anymore, technically speaking, but I was still an ally.
“It could all just be in my mind,” I said, while Tristan loaded his bag with pulverizer pellets and double-checked a pulverizer weapon before handing it over to me. I’d already slipped about fifty reload units into my backpack. That meant a hundred shots. It was all very unusual for me since I’d always had my scythe and death magic to rely on, but I had seen Tristan and the other Shadians use their weapons so many times. I already knew what every item from my husband’s safe did. “Maybe I’m overstimulated and overreacting, I don’t know.”
“Or you’re on to something. Like I said, I didn’t like the behavior of some of the people we saw this morning either.”
My husband was everything to me, and I was the one who was truly able to protect him—or, I had been, until I’d been given this body. The tables had turned, and Tristan took it upon himself to keep me safe. He wanted me to hold on to this life, to make the most of it and not throw it away for anything. But if push came to shove, we’d both agreed I’d immediately jump out and sacrifice my flesh to be Unending again. If push comes to shove. You’re not there yet.
“How do we go about this?” I asked. My husband knew The Shade best. If anyone could sneak around unnoticed, it was him. “How do we figure out what’s wrong here without setting off any potential alarms?”
I thought about last night’s dinner. For a moment, I imagined that Esme and Tristan’s parents had been clones all along. Kalon, too. Derek and Sofia. What if we’d walked into some kind of hell and didn’t even know it? The mere thought horrified me. Yes, it was too soon to jump to that conclusion. Further study was desperately needed because I couldn’t cope with the dread of having fallen into such a heinous trap. I needed to know one way or the other.
“We should get out of anyone’s sight, first,” Tristan suggested. “South, deeper into the redwoods.” He showed me a pair of hi-tech binoculars. “I borrowed these from Phoenix’s prototype locker back at the base. These babies will allow me a longer range of vision, since we don’t have a sentry friend we can rely on right now.”
“Assuming they’re all clones, you mean,” I murmured, once again horrified by the prospect.
“It’s going to be okay,” Tristan said, smiling. “We’ll figure this out.”
A knock on the door startled us both. My husband looked at me first, then calmly proceeded to close the safe and put his backpack on. He kept the pulverizer weapon in one hand, locked and loaded, as he walked over to the door and opened it.
Esme beamed at us both. “Hey, lovebirds! Good morning!”
“Morning, sis,” Tristan replied with a broad smile, while I measured his sister from head to toe. She frowned at his weapon.
“What are you doing with that?” she asked.
“Just cleaning it,” Tristan replied. I could only imagine what was going through his mind at this point. If this were his sister, I imagined he’d be relieved but deeply embarrassed that he’d basically overreacted by whipping out the big guns. If this wasn’t Esme, however… it meant she had been taken. Or worse.
“Cool. So, I was thinking. Since, you know, you and your gorgeous wife are already getting suspicious,” Esme said, her matter-of-fact tone a disturbing contrast to her words, “that we might as well get it all out in the open now. It’s the polite thing to do.”
My blood ran cold.
In an instant, Tristan roared and brought his pulverizer weapon up. Esme giggled as he fired two shots. Nothing happened. Each time, we only heard the clicks. “We disabled every pulverizer weapon on this island,” she said. I grabbed my scythe and tried to slash her, but she bent backward out of the way, then kicked me in the stomach. I ended up on the floor, pain searing through my torso from her blow.
I didn’t even see how Tristan was subdued, but when I looked up, Esme’s clone was on him, his hands bound behind his back. “I’d have given it a few more days,” she said. “But I should have known from the looks you were giving us last night that you were on to something. Consider me impressed, since no one else has figured it out.”
“You’re not going to get away with this,” I hissed and scrambled back up. I’d lost my scythe, but I still had two long knives I could work with. As soon as I unsheathed them, Kalon’s laughter boomed throughout the entire treehouse. He came down the stairs, while I tried to figure out how he’d gotten in—maybe we’d left a window open or something. I hadn’t heard any glass breaking.
“But we already have,” Kalon’s double said. “Come at us with whatever weapons you’d like. You’re mortal, Unending. You’re weaker than Tristan now, and… well, look at him.”
I did. My husband was furious, a vein throbbing angrily down his temple, but he was helpless. Esme’s clone had done a fine job of immobilizing him quickly. That must’ve been the reason for her ridiculously blunt approach. She’d gone for the shock factor, and it had worked.
“Taeral, can you hear me?” I called out through the comms piece. If the whole island was infested with clones, I couldn’t reach any of them. But I could still get to Taeral and anyone else outside The Shade. I wondered where my siblings really were. The clones had copied everyone living, but they had yet to produce doppelgangers of Reapers. It worried me deeply.
Nothing came through the comms system, though.
“You know we would never have allowed you to communicate with the outside world,” Esme’s clone muttered, shaking her head in dismay as if I’d disappointed her somehow. “Thought you’d be smarter than this.”
“Wait, Esme and Kalon were on Visio when this whole clone debacle started,” I said, my mind working incredibly fast. “How are you here? How were you made?”
“All that was needed was a bit of hair left behind,” Esme’s copy replied dryly. “Our originals left plenty of their DNA behind in their redwood cabin. You really aren’t as bright as we’ve been led to believe…” She sounded disappointed.
“Now, now, darling. Be nice. Unending has been through enough,” a familiar voice oozed into the living room. I found myself transfixed, utterly
paralyzed at the sight of Anunit walking into our treehouse. Only, she looked different. Slightly but fundamentally different, which was an odd observation, but it was the only one that made sense.
“Anunit,” I managed, feeling my eyes widen at the sight of her. “I don’t understand…”
“That’s because you haven’t been paying attention,” Anunit replied dryly. My hands trembled, making it harder for me to hold on to the long knives. Our pulverizer weapons had been tampered with. Somehow, the clones had hijacked the safe. Tristan’s was on the floor. Mine had been left by the safe. Both seemed to laugh in my face. I had been a fool. I wasn’t sure I could even perform any death magic that might protect me and my husband. I’d lost my scythe.
“Your eyes,” I said, trying to understand why they weren’t holding galaxies anymore but wild and peculiar blue fires. I was a complete stranger to this picture, and no one was kind enough to explain things to me. “Your eyes are—”
“Back to normal, thank the stars,” Anunit replied, almost laughing. “You have no idea how difficult it is to conceal one’s true nature, especially for creatures of Purgatory.”
It hit me then, where I’d seen the blue flames before. The golden hair. The slightly shimmering skin I’d initially assumed to be a marker of whatever species Anunit had belonged to prior to dying.
“What’s going on?” Tristan grunted, struggling with his restraints. It made Kalon’s clone smirk, and I would’ve liked nothing more than to cut off the bastard’s head.
“She’s a Valkyrie,” I murmured, trying to wrap my head around the monumental deceit into which my husband and I had been pulled from the very beginning. Death didn’t know. She couldn’t have known. She would’ve told us. No, Anunit had played us remarkably well. The implications that followed caused heat to burst in my throat, dread clutching my heart painfully—she’d come across as a Reaper to the point where we’d been able to track her as one. The magic and effort required to pull something like that off was unbelievable. “A being of Purgatory.”
Anunit grinned broadly. “And Unending gets the prize, it seems.”
“She’s not a Reaper,” Tristan joined my conclusion.
“I never was,” Anunit shot back, visibly pleased with herself. “But I made you all believe I was. Death included. It took considerable effort and combined spells, but hey, I pulled it off!” Her good humor didn’t mask the horrific situation we found ourselves in. This had been her plan since day one. The quests. The living body. The revelations. It had all been a part of her agenda. Tristan and I had been the marks, and I knew… I knew my body served as a trap.
It broke my heart to finally understand every decision that had brought us here. We couldn’t have known. Anunit had played this entire sequence, and our complicated relationship, the strife with Death… Damn, she’d gotten the best of us.
“And for the record, my name’s not Anunit. It’s Hrista,” she said. “The real Anunit is no longer available, I’m afraid. Hasn’t been for a very long time. Locked away for the sake of this whole project. The details are pretty boring. And you two are right where you need to be, so I hope you aren’t in a rush to go anywhere.”
It wasn’t a real hope expressed, nor an invitation. It was a statement. A Valkyrie had fooled us, and we were now her prisoners. I had no idea how this would end. I only knew the body I loved and had worked so hard for had suddenly become my prison.
Unending
Tristan and I were taken to a cell somewhere deep in the redwood forest. Ironically enough, it was just where he’d suggested earlier as a good hiding place. A structure had been erected here, made entirely of steel and concrete. There were bars on the windows, but I could at least feel the breeze on my face.
“You should make yourselves at home,” Hrista said, nodding at the double bed against one wall. There were twin nightstands, a table and two chairs present, along with a trunk of clothes. We also had access to a small bathroom, and I’d already spotted the fruit and blood vial basket she’d left for us on the table. The bitch was thoroughly prepared. “You’ll be here a while.”
“What’s the point of all this?” Tristan asked. “It’s obvious you’re behind the clone invasion, but how’d you pull this off? Where are the others?” His rage simmered beneath the surface. I couldn’t blame him. We were in a truly awful predicament, and I had no idea how to get us out of it. There was so much we still didn’t know. “My sister, my parents, what did you do with them?”
“Oh, they’re somewhere safe,” Hrista replied. “Locked away forever. I needed the whole island, and they never would’ve gone quietly. I’m not one to support unnecessary bloodshed, however, so here we are.” The hypocrisy did not go unnoticed, at least from where I stood, but there was so much she had yet to tell us. I couldn’t risk her shutting down, not while I still had a chance to probe for more information.
“But why? What is this all about?” I asked, gripping the steel bars that kept us imprisoned. The walls were covered in death magic runes and other foreign symbols. Naturally, Hrista would’ve taken many kinds of precautions to keep us submissive while in captivity. “I don’t understand why you had to drag me into whatever this is.”
Hrista sighed, giving me a look of genuine contempt. I was meant to feel stupid and inadequate, yet I couldn’t be bothered. I could only stare at her in disbelief, trying to remember every interaction we’d had, wondering if there had been any signs of such colossal deceit. Something both Tristan and I might have missed. But there was nothing. She’d played us impeccably well. “I needed you off the gameboard, honey. Isn’t that obvious? You’re Death’s first… well, second. You’re powerful and capable. I cannot risk you stomping all over my plan. Not after I’ve worked so hard to turn it into a reality.”
Esme and Kalon’s clones had retired a couple of steps back, but I could still see their expressions. They seemed in love with one another, and that was pretty much the only genuine aspect about them. They were copies. Frauds. Exquisitely crafted, just like Taeral and Eira had said, but frauds. Tristan had bought their lie from beginning to end, and it was a miracle I’d even noticed the minor discrepancies and fleeting looks. But even after I’d spotted the differences, I hadn’t interpreted the details properly. The longer I dwelled on it, the more foolish I felt. This wasn’t how it would end. I wouldn’t let it.
“Who are you, exactly, and why did you do this to me?” I asked, pointing at my body.
Hrista inched closer, but I saw no hate in her eyes. Just pity. It angered me more than anything else. “I’m the one who’s going to tear it all down and prove that the forces of the universe are inadequate and incapable of fueling it any further. The Word. Death. Order. They’re terrible. One by one, I will help them prove it.”
“You’re a foot soldier, just like the rest of us,” I replied. “And you’re not the first nor the last to think you can do better than them.”
“Right. You know one such enterprising soul, don’t you? The Spirit Bender?”
Chills ran down my spine. “How did you know about him? How did you know about any of this? Beings of Purgatory aren’t supposed to leave that realm.”
“Oh, damn…” Tristan muttered, suddenly realizing something. “Remember… remember on Visio, before he was defeated—Spirit said something about a “her,” someone he’d spoken to from beyond the curtain!”
Hrista chuckled. “You’re a smart cookie. I like you, Tristan. Even though you betrayed me by trying to capture me after I gave your wife that gorgeous body. Normally, I would’ve killed you without batting an eye, because I don’t generally forgive betrayal. But I need you and Unending alive. I need you both to understand that the entities we worship, they’re nobodies. They’re frauds with way too much power, and they do not deserve leadership over this world and its dimensions!”
“So, this is just you being pissed off about Spirit, isn’t it?” I cut her off, crossing my arms. I couldn’t hide my contempt, not when her broken heart was insultingly obv
ious, now that I’d made all the right connections. “Your lover is gone, and now you’re trying to upend the world and the natural order of things? You don’t belong here, Hrista. You never will. Give up now and go back to Purgatory. This will end badly for you either way, but the longer you stay in this realm, the worse your demise will be.”
“You sound awfully serious, considering you’re nothing but a meatsuit now,” she retorted, leaning forward. “Let me tell you something, Unending. It takes a certain skill and dedication to pull off what I’ve accomplished. One by one, the leaders will fall. Death. The Word. Order. Each of them will be revealed as the weaklings that they truly are. We’re the gods, Unending. We’re the ones with the power, the real power! Think about it! You can make people immortal! One of your brothers can manipulate the flow of time! There are witches in these realms that can build new worlds from scratch! But we’re all slaves to the entities that supposedly rule us. How pathetic is that?”
I shook my head, stealing a brief glance at Tristan. “We need law, and we need order. You’re too deranged to serve as any form of authority, Hrista.”
“And you’re never going to leave that body unless you wish to move on into the afterlife,” Hrista hissed. I must have struck a nerve, because she’d just revealed a disturbing detail of my condition. I was still shaking, but by gripping the steel bars I’d managed to gradually reduce the tremors. Tristan paced the cell behind me, the balls of his heels thudding gently against the stone floor. He was trying to think of a way out of this mess, though I wasn’t sure how that would work. Hrista had played us superbly into this corner.
“This was a trap from the moment you saw me, wasn’t it?” I asked, though I already knew the answer. It made her smile.
“I deliberately made myself known to Death. I knew she’d send you after me. You are her strongest, the one they know little about out there. It made sense,” Hrista said. “Playing Anunit was easy, if I’m honest. Keeping a straight face while you walked right into it was the only real challenge. This body is your temple. You’re sealed in there. You cannot simply renounce it.”
A Shade of Vampire 91: A Gate of Light Page 12