“The same for all of them?” Phoenix asked, ignoring that last part Guardian had said.
Guardian slanted his head, asking Phoenix for a private word. After a warm rush of air, my eyes found them both across the room. As Guardian spoke in a whisper to Phoenix, every part of Phoenix tensed in what could only be rage.
I felt like I was waiting for the judge to decide my method of execution. I was starting to think that Phoenix was not sending me to death so he could fight a war, but because he thought what he had become was too dark and dangerous for me to become. I couldn’t figure out how that could be any worse than a vengeful spirit.
I started to take a step back, make my escape, but then all at once my lawyer arrived. Skylynn appeared next to them with the drawing she had in hand. I would never be able to repay Skylynn for always being my voice.
Both Guardian and Phoenix seemed shocked, confused, and maybe even angry at what Skylynn was showing them.
Fearing that my lawyer was losing her plea, I began to edge back to the door. One beat later, I was in Phoenix’s arms and had no idea how I’d gotten there. “Going somewhere, Love?” he asked, lacing his fingers through mine.
“I have half a key and a clock to find, and a date with a half-frozen lake.”
The nonchalant way I’d mentioned the impending repeat of my death seemed to anger him.
“Genevieve,” Guardian said gently to me. “Do you happen to remember anything about this house, how it was moved?”
My growing turmoil was this sensation of standing between a past and the present. My life as Indie told me this house was two hundred years old, had always been in this one place. My memories, however, along with my gut feeling, were telling me that that was a lie, that it was built in a different reality. I kept hearing Wilder’s voice in my head, telling me I needed to hold on to the life I had—what was real in that life.
“I was told it was built here two hundred years ago.” I glanced at Phoenix. “I don’t know how or why it is not where you left it.”
Guardian pointed to the points where the trees were on the paper. “Do you remember planting these trees, anything you could have said over these trees?”
My befuddled look told him I didn’t. “Why are you guys bothered by my trees?”
“They are very similar to something that is the center point of the war Phoenix and I are fighting. We just don’t understand why or how…you and this house are here.”
“Twin realities,” I said, crossing my arms, agitated that they were acting as if I were on the edge of sanity. Maybe I was, but I was not an idiot. “The Fall. The star that centers it. One side is dark, the other is light. We are from the light and stuck on the dark side now. I’m not an idiot. I’m not slipping away. More than half of me is here. In fact, more of me is showing up every second. I don’t know what you two have been up to since I last saw you, but it’s clear to me that both of you are more than human at this point. I would love to debate how a home built for a family I never had mimics the universal war we have been at for longer than any of my memories can stretch, but listen to me: Rasure is trying to seize this home, and I will not let her have it. All of you should be backing me up on this point, especially considering that at one time you called it home.”
Guardian raised his brow as a grin spread across his addictive visage. I could see Skylynn grinning out of the corner of my eye.
“I swore to you that I would handle her,” Phoenix said with a sigh.
I was making this hard on him. I knew far more than he thought I did.
“Listen,” I said, looking back at Guardian. “I’m not exactly the normal girl you boys left behind, either. I have odd traits that cause the space around me to freeze when my emotions get off point, and when I touch things I see memories of the past. Sometimes just standing in a room will make memories come to life. To help you understand why those trees are there, I will touch everything but them.” They all seemed to question me at once. “I try not to touch living things. I don’t want to hurt them. I’m sure in one of the libraries I can find the original plans that are said to belong to this house, but I’m not looking for that now. Not until I find what I’m on the hunt for.”
“It’s all right. We’ll figure it out,” Guardian promised. He glanced at Phoenix. “What do you need me to do?”
“You have your own thing.”
“This is in my path,” Guardian stated dominantly.
“How is it in your path—because it’s Skylynn’s fault?” Phoenix snapped.
“It’s in my path because it’s you. Nothing will be undone without you.”
“You’d fare well without me for a while, Mate.”
“You know that is a lie. For the record, I’m not a fan of option one either.” That was the plan where I kill Rasure then move on.
“Why is that?” Phoenix asked.
“You know why.”
“I need it all,” Phoenix said under his breath.
Frustrated, Guardian looked at Skylynn. “You’ve known her for awhile, is she brighter or darker?”
“Getting brighter every second. She’s more real now than ever before.”
“Um, hello,” I said, raising my hand. “Standing right here. Can you drop the third person?”
Guardian bit his lip to try and stop his smile. He knew it was only infuriating Phoenix. He tipped his head toward me. “You...um...you’re angrier. That could be a sign that you are slipping, with or without how aware you are of your past lives.” Guardian tilted his head as he furrowed his brow. “But as far as I can tell, the anger is justifiable.”
“Thanks for the insight, Mate. Don’t you have someone who is waiting on you?” Phoenix asked Guardian with a frustrated snap.
“I do,” Guardian said, letting out a sigh. “I understand if you can’t be there tonight.”
“I’ll be there.”
Guardian locked eyes with me and gave me a subtle smile, then a brisk shot of warm air took him away.
“Need a minute,” Phoenix said to Skylynn. She looked down, then vanished.
Shyly, I looked up at him. “Sounds like you are having a hard time getting votes for your options.”
“I don’t need votes. This is my life.”
“I thought my life was the only one in question?”
Seriousness took over his expression. “Listen…there is a wolf hiding within the sheep.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means you can’t trust anyone.”
“Is this your jealousy surfacing again?”
“This is me trying to protect you,” he said as he reached to trace my jaw with his fingertips. “Genevieve…it terrifies me to think how close you have lived to evil. At this point, living or not, I don’t know that you would be able to tell friend from foe.”
“I think you have forgotten how to trust me.”
“I trust you. I don’t trust this war.”
“I cannot help you debate this war if I do not know every detail. You asked me if I trusted you. I trust the boy I knew so long ago. I have no idea what time and circumstance has done to you, but I know that time has left me bitter, empty, and full of grief. We had to fight apart for this long, what is the difference now? Why can’t you just leave me be?”
I heard his sharp intake of breath and regretted saying those last few words. I said them trying to sound stronger than I was, but clearly he took them as if I saw him as some old fling that had resurfaced in my life.
“If you think I can walk away, act like I didn’t discover that you have been here, blind to me, all this time…then you have no idea how I feel about you—and you have proved me right the one time I wanted you to prove me wrong.”
I couldn’t figure out what he meant by that. I couldn’t figure out how to tell him that the memories of him that were becoming more real by the moment were life to me, an awakening, that unknowingly I’d been waiting for him and that I didn’t want him to leave. That I didn’t regret finding him now because even
if I turned into a dark, vengeful spirit I would have this memory, these emotions, that they would be my anchor to my humanity.
When I didn’t say anything, he looked to his side. “I have to go. Skylynn is going to stay with you. She’ll have to leave for a bit, but it will be after the frozen lake repeat…listen to her. She’ll keep you safe.”
Chapter Eleven
The second he vanished, the room iced over and I felt my heart break in two. Maybe he was wiser than me, knew that the less time we spent around each other, the better. Maybe that’s why he was leaving Skylynn to babysit me—someone he clearly didn’t care for. One thing was for sure: my guys never would have left me like that. I was getting a bitter taste of my own medicine, watching someone walk away right after they basically said that time and reason would not allow us to be together.
I swallowed my pride, clutched the key, and began to make my way to the playroom. Just before I reached the door, Skylynn appeared.
I couldn’t look her in the eye. “Listen, I know you have better things to do than watch over me. Go help them fight or whatever.”
“You’re the only friend I have, the only best friend I’ve ever had in my existence…where else would I need to be?”
“Flattered. I don’t know, with them, I guess. Looks like you guys have your own private club or war to deal with.”
“It’s not private, and you, apparently, are very much a part of it.”
“He doesn’t want me there. He pushed me off on you, someone he clearly disagrees with.”
“Do you want to know what Phoenix’s issue is?”
“Not really. I don’t need any more Karma.”
“He thinks you’re an echo, a shell, that the real you is gone, left the night of your death. The fact that Guardian could not bring you back tells him that he is right, that you are too far gone.”
I still could not get over how much Sebastian and Guardian had changed. I felt the grief I always carried in my soul intensify. I knew that the past that was ricocheting in my mind was gone forevermore. We had all escalated to some odd supernatural level. I was grieving for lost innocence, for a past I could never get back.
Bravely, I locked stares with her. “If that boy needs any more proof that I am me—dead or not—then there is no hope for him, and I don’t have time to deal with it.”
She grinned. “You’re messing with his head. Keep doing that. I know that nothing has changed. You may be a little confused, but you are holding on. As soon as he figures that out, he’ll get past his own dark thoughts.”
“Why does he despise what he is? Why does he not want me to be that?”
“He likes being a phoenix, all too well, and therein lies the problem.”
Those words made my stomach cave in. I guess I was reading him the wrong way.
“He likes it because it’s a perfect place for his dark energy to gain strength. I haven’t figured out why he is holding back yet, but I think he doesn’t want it for you because he thinks it will stifle the light you are, that your light has already dwindled down to nothing.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Opposites attract. Soul mates come from light and dark; he was the dark, you were the light. Now you’re both bordering on the dark side. Basically, in some supernatural way you are very ill.”
“I’m dead,” I said with an odd grin on my face. “Ill? Really?”
“Only the vessel,” she said with a sigh.
“So he thinks because I lived my life in anger and grief that I’m no longer bright or whatever?”
“Somewhat. But I disagree. I think unconsciously you have hidden yourself in this life, that behind that ice wall is the boldest, brightest energy that has ever existed, that no change—whether it be death or into a phoenix—can harness it.”
“I don’t know enough to agree or disagree…he was a stranger to the life I’m clinging to.”
“He was not a stranger. You’ve screamed his name out in your sleep since the day I met you.”
“You watched me sleep?” I asked, mystified, wondering exactly which name I screamed out.
“At times, when you were scared.”
“Good to know,” I murmured.
“I’m really sorry I wasn’t there when you needed me the most. I still don’t understand why I didn’t feel that you were in pain or scared.”
“How would you have felt that anyway?”
“I spelled you to me. I have no idea what blocked me from you that night. The only thing I can think of is that you were not in pain, and you were not scared. You fought hard.”
“Still fighting. I need to figure out this key, clock, Rasure thing.”
She held her hand out, telling me to lead the way. “You can search for anything on these grounds, within the house, but you can’t go out.”
“I went out yesterday.”
“Yeah, and yesterday I didn’t know the house was protected.”
“I’m going to have to go back to that lake. I think the other half of that key is in there. This time, we will all focus on it—know where to look.”
“The second you zap out of here, I’m bringing you right back. Phoenix was not kidding. There is a wolf among you.”
I wasn’t going to argue with her about what I would or would not do. I knew she had something to do with Phoenix and Guardian later, that if I really wanted to, I would go then.
Before I went to the playroom, I wanted to go downstairs, look at that old clock, maybe see if I could find Ben or my other brothers and sisters down there. I needed to know for sure how much time I had left, and I could figure that out by listening to them. I hoped Ben had gotten his way, that a machine was giving my body life right now.
Right as I went to go down the stairs, I felt a bolt of energy stab me. It felt like razor blades were on the inside of my body, turning in place. I screamed in agony just as Skylynn pulled me back.
“What the hell!” I shrieked. As soon as I was away from the stairs, the pain stopped.
Skylynn stepped down one step. Along the creases where the next step began, she picked up a handful of white powder. “Salt.”
“That much salt hurt me?”
“No. It’s lined all the way across. Someone didn’t want you mingling with the others downstairs.”
“Salt? How worried should I be about pepper?” I asked dryly.
“Very funny. Salt and iron keep away. I don’t like the fact that you’re being corralled,” Skylynn said with disgust laced in her tone as she glared down the stairs. She must have decided that staying with me was more important than figuring out why I was being forced to stay up here. The ‘who’ was not a question. It was Rasure, no doubt about it.
“You don’t like the fact that someone else is corralling me?” I said with a snap.
She ignored me, instead scooping up what was on the floor, breaking the line of it, and causing it to vanish into thin air. “Let’s save those floors for later, when the living are sleeping.”
“Give in to Rasure, who obviously put that there? Is that what you mean?” Going down there after my brothers and sisters had left defeated the purpose.
“When someone strikes you, they expect you to strike back. You can’t be predictable right now because she’s counting on that to undermine and ultimately defeat you.”
“Fine. Then I’m going to go and figure out when she moved those clocks. You can’t come. Cadence will know something is off if my imaginary friend comes to life. I want her to pass on.”
“She won’t see me. That is why I’m here instead of Phoenix. I can hide myself. Side effect of having a shadowed soul.”
I could see the pain in her eyes. Any fool could see that she hated how invisible she was to most. If I made it out of the mess I was in, I was going to make it a personal goal to set her free from whatever this was that she was fighting. “I’m sure whatever time and reason your soul needs to come back is close.”
“We’ll see,” she said with a fake smile.
I looked down as I made my way to the playroom on this floor. It was the room that all of my sisters and I would hang out in. It had a massive flat screen TV that took up nearly an entire wall, oversized couches and chairs, tables for us to do our homework, and every gadget or electronic device known to exist. The décor in the room held relics from across time like street signs and old radios. It reminded me of a really trendy restaurant, and that could have been because of the bar stretching the length of the back wall. It never once held alcohol, but it did hold its fair share of ice cream and late night snacks in the refrigerators under it.
I didn’t spend nearly as much time in there as Cadence did. I only really went in when the guys wanted to play video games or I needed the space to lay out my work for school.
When I got there, Cadence had five white boxes beside the bar and was laying out the shots I’d taken—that wasn’t even half of the images I’d captured.
She glanced up at me when I walked in. Even though Skylynn was right next to me, she acted like she didn’t see her, which wasn’t odd. Skylynn had been by me most of my life, but a ghost to the others.
“Where are the rest?” I said, noticing these were from the last six months.
“This is everything you took for your project,” she said, straightening the piles out. Cadence was a bit neurotic about organization, everything having its place.
“I’m not working on my project. I’m trying to take an inventory of the things in the house so I know what’s mine.”
“Indie, do your project. Worry about that when your case is settled. Aggravating Rasure is not going to do anything but give her more leverage over you.”
“That woman has nothing to hold over me, she never has,” I said as I went into the enormous closet that was in the back corner of the room. I found the box from my sixteenth year, the year that the addition was finished. I had the foresight then to photograph this entire manor. I wanted proof if anything was missing after she ‘moved in’ to her own wing.
When I started to lay out the images, I quickly discovered they were the wrong ones. These were from when my family was alive: Christmas, birthdays, every special and ordinary event in our lives.