“She’s dead,” he muttered, stricken. “But…”
Kates had been silent the entire time. She gasped now, “It’s not her. She’s not the Immortal, but—”
I could still hear from Shelly’s body, but I couldn’t see anything anymore. I didn’t want to stay inside of her and then I heard Kates again. “Lucan, what do we do?” Panic trembled just on the tip of her tongue, but I wondered where that had come from. Kates never panicked. I left Shelly and found Kates easily.
‘It can’t be, but I wonder… it can’t be,’ Kates thought. I caught an image of myself and knew my nolstage was connecting dots faster than I was comfortable with.
‘You can’t, there’s no way. You never could before…’
Kates knew I’d been on the roof with Talia. She’d known that Talia was the Immortal.
‘She’s the empath that was cozying up with the Hunter.’
Kates had been surprised when I’d shown up at the Shoilster with Roane… now it was starting to make sense.
‘She’s the Immortal.’ Kates cursed to herself.
I slipped out of Kates before I felt whatever she was feeling now. I shouldn’t have. I should’ve stayed inside of her because I knew my nolstage had power over Lucan—therefore over my livelihood, but I was a coward. I drew in another shuddering breath as I opened my own eyes and stared at the same door. I lifted a hand and tentatively touched the wood with my palm. It was so sturdy, but just on the other side… everything was barely hanging in the balance.
‘Your lover died.’
I pressed a knuckled fist against my mouth. Talia and Roane had been lovers. He had loved her. I remembered the stricken expression in Roane’s eyes as Lucan had said those words. It had been pure love, the kind that was meant for the rest of a lifetime. He had loved someone else like that… and me… I realized that there had been nothing between us.
My stomach turned over suddenly. I could’ve thrown up in that moment. I glanced downwards, distantly, as I looked at my stomach. Roane was drawn to the Immortal inside of me. A part of Talia was inside of me. He was drawn to her. He needed her—not me. I was just the body.
‘Davy,’ Roane called to me with his thoughts.
I jerked my head to the side. I didn’t want to talk to him, not at that moment, but it was irrational. I didn’t want to deal with what was really happening on the other side of that door. He had no obligation to me. We’d only… we’d only been together one time.
Just once.
That was it. Right? There had been no words of affection, no… no nothing. He had loved her. How was I supposed to compete with that? I couldn’t. The answer was so bleak to me, but still….
‘Davy!’ Roane was more urgent this time. ‘Davy, you need to get out of here. There’s a hallway that goes down. Follow it, keep going. You’ll pass the fountain below us. Keep going. You need to get out of here, away from Lucan. He knows it’s not Shelly. It’s only a matter of time before he figures it out. He’s already looking at the door. You have to hurry.’
It hurt to even hear his voice. ‘Kates knows. She figured it out.’
There was a pause. ‘Yeah. I can see that. You have to hurry, Davy. The tunnel will go all the way to the mansion. It should be safe by the time you get there. Find Gregory.’
I was supposed to run. My childhood best friend, my vampire—I didn’t know what to call Roane—and so many others were in the room behind me. Shelly was dead. I knew I wouldn’t die. I was the Immortal and I had a strong feeling the thread wasn’t going to jump to anyone else—if it did then I was dead anyway.
I was stuck.
Run, not run, hide, not hide. What could I do? I knew what I wanted to do. I always ran. I pressed sweating palms to my pants and tried to wipe them off. I turned, faltering, and stared at where Roane urged me to go. The tunnel was dark, but it didn’t seem ominous. The room behind me was too ominous, but the sound of the water calmed me slightly. It ran through the wall beside my ear. Before I knew what I was doing, my foot had stretched outwards and I found myself slowly passing through the darkness.
I kept going and the water grew louder.
The tunnel dipped forward. I felt gravity on my body and knew I was heading downwards.
I took a harsh breath and clasped my eyes tightly together. I needed to be honest with myself. I was escaping. It wasn’t because Roane told me to go. He loved someone else, someone that was inside of me now. That hurt—it seared deep down, almost too far for my empathic abilities to comprehend. Well, that’s not true. I could comprehend it, I just didn’t want to. I wanted to run from it. He was behind me. Kates was in that room. She had the knowledge to change my life forever. She knew I was the Immortal. I could be hunted if Lucan found out who I was.
I stopped in the tunnel and drew in a ragged breath.
I could go back, but to what? Why? Lucan wanted my powers. He couldn’t have them. I knew that no matter the odds, Roane would best his brother. What was I afraid of? I could run… there was no danger.
But… I remembered the voice inside of Blue’s head. Roane and I could not be separated.
“Are we on a pity party? Is this what the staggering amount of suffering and affliction is about?” The Immortal chose to announce its presence.
I sighed in contempt. “Now is not the time. Why can I hear you like you’re here?”
“I’m the Immortal. Have you forgotten our first trip around the merry go round? You’re the pail. What do you carry? Who are Jack and Jill? You should know this by now!”
“Stop it—”
“—THINK!” The Immortal screamed. “Who’s Jack and Jill? You are the Immortal! You think I was the one pulling all those strings back there where you catapulted yourself out of that car and right to your sidekick? I didn’t do that, Davy. I wasn’t the one in the drivers’ seat. That was all you. I was riding shotgun. You were the Immortal. You, not me, not this voice you keep hearing. It was all you.”
My throat went dry at those words. The thread was inside of me. The thread jumped from person to person, body to body. I wasn’t—there was no way, but everyone had been shocked by the speed my body had acclimated to the Immortal thread. Gregory said some took years to do what I’d done in two days, but none of it made sense. What did it mean that I had done what I had? If it hadn’t been the Immortal… it was me? Who was I?
“Cut out the Buddha bull. You can ponder the eternal question of your identity later. You’ve got to stop moaning in your own piss and get back to that room.”
“Are you my conscious? Are you the good angel now?”
“That’s the issue, honey bunny. I’m neither. I’m the in between. I’m the go between. I’m the reason that your devil is on the left and your angel is on the right. That’s me—that’s you, so you better start deciphering it!”
The Immortal was pissing me off. “Get out of me!”
She chuckled. “Are you angry? You’re more than clueless. You’re choosing your ignorance. You can’t walk away when you know you’re needed in that other room.”
“Shut up! I don’t care. I’m doing what Roane wants.”
The Immortal laughed. “You’re doing what you want. You’re running away because you got your feelings hurt. You’re being a sissy. The boy likes someone that’s not you. Boo freaking hoo. Wake up! You’re more than that and all that romance crap is nothing compared to what’s going to happen if you don’t get your butt back there. Stop feeling with your emotions and think with your head.”
I was empathic. Feelings were my thing.
“Well, they aren’t anymore,” the Immortal snapped. “You want to know a little about yourself? A long, long time ago a visionary realized what vampires could do. He saw how dangerous they could be so he went and created a ‘prophecy’ that said one day, a person who was interwoven with the essence of life would take their life from them. You’re feared by vampires, but also desired. Some think you were created as an ultimate weapon against them, but then rumors started going around that they could drink from you. If they drank your blood, they could get your powers. That’s the prophecy, Davy. The prophecy was created and the Immortal thread came to be. You’ve got the essence of life flowing through every particle of your body. All the other girls, yes—even Talia—they weren’t the Immortal. They were just the carriers for the thread. One would come and become the Immortal. That’s you—not them. And if you want to sit and mope that Roane loves Talia, someone who was less than you, you disgust me.”
As shocking revelations came… this one was big.
It continued, “Every vampire out there thinks they can drink from you and they’ll have your powers. That’s what they’ve been taught. You’re the toad to their Cinderella. They’re wrong. If they’d bitten any other carrier then they would’ve gotten the powers. The thread would’ve jumped to them, given them a flare of power, but immediately attached itself to the first human they would’ve touched. No vampire can handle the essence of life inside of them. It goes against their grain as a vampire. They thrive on pain. They thrive on suffering, on darkness, on death. We are light. We are life. You are life, Davy, and you’re the prophecy.”
All this now… how could this help now?
“It’ll help because you know something they don’t. The prophecy states that when the Immortal becomes one, instead of giving them powers, you will give them life. You’ll strip them of their immortality, Davy.”
“They’ll be human?”