“Typical,” Weldon mutters as he rolls his eyes.
A flicker of anger seeps past Mack’s controlled gaze. “You can begin the interrogation,” he says to the four Elites awaiting orders. “Please excuse us.” He holds his hand out, indicating he wants us to step outside the room.
“This ought to be fun,” Weldon says with a snort.
Once the door is shut, Mack moves in on Weldon like a lion in the brush. “Tell me, brother, is it normal for a demon such as yourself to go through enough blood bags to feed this entire ward?” The smile that follows his words shakes me hard.
I look to Weldon as the world tilts off its axis. He blanches. Freezes up, every muscle in his body rigid as a swarm of emotions passes over his face.
“No? Didn’t think so,” Mack continues, advancing on him. “And what about your late-night disappearances? I don’t recall stalking innocents to be a healthy habit for someone who is in control of their demonic side.”
“I haven’t hurt anyone,” Weldon says through his teeth, his hands shaking at his side.
“Weldon?” I ask, pushing against the wall he’s put up between us. I use my power to knock it over, stumbling back when I find nothing but darkness in his mind. This can’t be happening. Blood floods his mind. Fire. Chaos. Pain. It knocks me back like a hard gust of wind. Constricts around my lungs, stealing my breath. “Weldon, what’s happening?” I ask, fear coiling around my throat.
This is what Mack was waiting for. His smile reaches me, and I see Clara flash in his eyes. “Haven’t you figured it out yet, Faye? The anger. The absence. He’s been paying visits to Charlie in hopes to help him find his humanity. Only, I think Weldon is the one coming away changed. And not for the better.”
Gavin bows up. I almost forgot he was still here. But his anger is like a weight pressing down on all of us. It’s thick like tar and heading straight for Weldon. “I told you to stay away from my father,” he says.
Weldon keeps his eyes to the ground as he says, “Someone has to help him, Gavin. Who better than someone who knows what it feels like to come away from the Underground?”
“It isn’t your place!” Gavin shouts, his chest heaving up and down.
I don’t know what to do. Who to console.
I think Gavin’s waiting for Weldon to say something to remedy the situation… but words can’t fix the pain Gavin’s feeling. When Weldon doesn’t say a word, Gavin storms across the hall to where Charlie stands with a pleased smile, watching all this unfold. “What the hell is wrong with you?” he yells at his dad, fists banging against the glass.
Charlie takes a cool, measured step forward and smiles. “Hello, son.”
“I’m not your son,” Gavin spits out. “I’m not anything to you.”
Charlie appears in front of the glass in a blink, eyes murderous and dark. “That’s right. You’re not, because no son of mine would be a coward like you. No son of mine would let their woman die and not do everything they could to bring her back.”
Gavin falters back, reaching for something that isn’t there. “I… I did everything I could.”
“Weldon,” I say sharply, yanking on his arm. “Do something. Help Gavin!”
But Weldon doesn’t look at me. There’s a possessed look in his eyes, a darkness I’ve never seen before.
Charlie’s eyes tilt to the side. “Did you?”
It’s like his words are an ax taken to a tree. Gavin snaps in half, and then disappears out of the ward.
“How dare you!” I shout as I storm up to the glass.
Charlie’s smile is gleaming now. His gaze is unreadable, shielded by shadows, making it hard to gauge just who he is. “Ahh. You must be the Everlasting. I see my boy has good taste.”
“How could you treat him like that? You say you’re ashamed of him for Cassie’s death, but look at you! You should be more ashamed of yourself for giving into the darkness so easily.”
“Should I?” Charlie poses. “I guess the same could be said about that partner of yours. You know, that head of his is a sad place to reside in.”
Ice trickles through my veins, freezing up my ability to think. “What did you do to him?”
“Nothing he wasn’t on the cusp of doing to himself.”
One statement slams into me like a derailed train. I look over my shoulder at the warped look in Weldon’s eyes. “Weldon?”
Mack clamps a hand on Weldon’s shoulder and shakes him one good time. “Time to snap out of it, brother.” He presses a button on the wall. Not even a second later, volation fills Charlie’s cell from top to bottom. I look away when Charlie drops to his knees, twisting in on himself at angles that shouldn’t be possible, trying to fight the pain.
Weldon shakes his head as if coming out of a fog and looks to me, pain bleeding from his eyes. There’s a quake tremoring in my bones. A crack in the earth threatening to pull me in, back into its darkness.
“Jaxen will be waiting for you, won’t he?” Mack asks, his words layered with hidden meanings. “As for you,” he adds, looking to Weldon, “that plan of yours better be worth our time. I went out on a limb by agreeing to give you full access to this ward. Do not make me regret it.”
Weldon looks like a wounded animal. I want to rescue him from his pain. Pull him into my arms and shield him from his brother’s glare, but what I want and what I have control over are two things that never seem to align. After Mack disappears into the interrogation room, I try to open up to Weldon, but he’s built his wall so high that climbing it seems nearly impossible.
“Whatever you’re going to say, save it,” he says, the curtains drawing in his gaze. “I’m fine. Everything is under control.”
“Is it?” I ask, my heart beating hard against my chest.
“Stay out of this, Faye.”
I don’t like the way my name sounds on Weldon’s lips. The harsh shape it takes as it extinguishes the nickname he always uses for me.
I open my mouth to protest, but the words dissolve under the hateful glare pulsing from his eyes. “If you know what’s good for you, you will listen this time. You can’t fix everything. How about you focus on yourself and what you’re supposed to be doing, rather than sticking your nose in everyone else’s business?”
He doesn’t give me a chance to respond. A shadow swallows him whole, leaving me standing there in the middle of the hallway with a broken heart at my feet.
“You might not want me to be there, but I won’t give up on you,” I vow.
DAYS MOVE PAST US LIKE the leaves descending from the trees as fall nears its end.
When I’m not hunting with Gavin, I’m with Alesteria in Mourdyn’s room hovered over his diary as his words fill the air around us. We breathe his thoughts out loud, little by little, so often and so much that sometimes I feel as if he’s there with us. As if I’ve known him my whole life.
He writes about his curiosities. He writes about his childhood. He writes of blood, horror, and pain. I can’t help but connect this to what I saw in Weldon’s mind. The loneliness and confusion Mourdyn felt that was left to rot. I won’t let that happen to Weldon. Mourdyn couldn’t be saved, because no one truly tried to let him in. He didn’t reach out, and because of this, no one was there to catch him when he fell.
But Weldon is my very best friend, and I refuse to let the same happen to him.
After he doesn’t show up to our meetings with Alesteria for the second week in a row, I decide to look for him. I’ve kept my distance like he asked me to, but just because he wants me to stay out of whatever he is up to doesn’t mean I have to.
I just need to keep him from detecting me.
After Jaxen falls asleep, I ease out of bed, reaching for my coat. I know I should probably tell him. I would wish for him to do so if the roles were reversed, but he’s already running himself into the ground by pushing his team to do all they can to help eliminate the creeping numbers of paranormals. I don’t want to dump more on his plate, especially when the subject is already sensitive.
br />
Soundlessly, I slip into the hallway and head for the front door, thankful my eyes are already adjusted to the lack of light. At the end of the hallway, I pause, peering around the corner to the couch where Gavin sleeps. He barely ever sleeps, and the last thing I want is for him to question where I’m heading and wake Jaxen because of it.
But when I find an empty couch, sheets rustled, my stomach bottoms out. He’s gone. I don’t know why, but it feels like there’s someone standing over me. A realization I’ve yet to put together just waiting for the right moment to tap me on the shoulder and shake me to the very core with its truth.
The Seven stand outside the apartment, all coming to attention the moment they see me. They’re like hawks—always sharp and extremely alert.
“Stay here,” I say to One, keeping my tone flat and even, and my body rigid and hard.
When I turn, he grabs my arm. I open my mouth to tell him to let go, but the look in his eyes wards me off.
“We will not stay if you are going,” he says, voice cold and unmoving. “We protect you.”
I squint my eyes at him, snatching my arm from his grip. “I am not made of glass. Do you understand? If I wanted to, I could have you all on your knees with or without your permission. I will be leaving now, and you will be staying. That is an order.”
I don’t wait to argue with him. I head for the stairs, taking them two at a time. It takes me no time to make it to the correctional facility where I know Weldon must be. The streets are silent, empty at the hour, the moon lighting a path heading toward the building.
I peek through the window to make sure the lobby is empty. I waited until I knew the receptionist would be off-duty so I wouldn’t have to answer any questions.
Lies still aren’t my forte.
After pressing my thumb against the keypad, I head in the direction Mack took us before with Brian, careful not to make a sound. I don’t want him to know I’m coming. I can’t help him when he shuts me out. When he lies to me. I need to see the truth for myself. Need to be there if he slips up.
When I reach Ward Six, I pause outside the double doors as my heart pounds in my throat. What if I can’t handle what I find on the other side? What if Weldon really is lost to me? I shove away the doubts, crushing them with my will to protect my friend, and then perform a cloaking spell that not even he could detect. A spell I found in one of Mourdyn’s Grimoires.
I hear a female voice before I make it around the next corner where I sense Weldon’s presence. “Weldon,” she says. “Please. This isn’t you!”
I hear Weldon snicker. “And you have a right to say who I am? In case you need a reminder, we aren’t partners anymore, Claire. You left me for that Darkyn bitch.”
“Don’t talk about her that way!” Claire says.
“Oh. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend your precious lover.”
There’s silence as my mind races to put all the pieces together. Claire and Meredith… is that what’s pushing Weldon over the edge?
“Weldon, I… I can’t help who I love. I didn’t mean—”
“Is that why you followed me here? Why you’ve been following me for days? To apologize? Well, you can save it. I don’t need to hear it. I don’t give a flying fuck about who you love, okay? We were done long before. Now, if you could please get out of my way.”
“I won’t let you go through with this,” Claire says, the desperation in her tone making the hair on my neck rise. “I know you. You think you’re doing the right thing, but you’re not. You could hurt him, Weldon, or worse… he could be killed.”
My heart pushes painfully against my chest. What is Weldon going to do?
There’s shuffling, as if they’re struggling to get around each other. My pulse thunders as I move around the corner. Weldon has Claire backed against the wall, hands pinned by her sides.
“This is your last chance. Leave,” he says, his voice sounding unlike his own. With a heated glare, he presses a button to Charlie’s cell, opening the door and letting him out.
I can’t hear past my own heat pounding as Charlie stalks out of his cell, stretching his arms above his head. Can’t feel anything past the numbness pulling at my legs, sinking me lower into an inky, cold darkness. “It’s about time. I thought maybe you got a case of cold feet,” he says to Weldon, who still has Claire pinned against the wall. “Need me to take care of her?”
I don’t like how he says it. His words paint death on the walls.
“No. I’ll do it myself,” Weldon says. He disappears with her within a shadow, and then reappears a second later. “By the time she finds her way out of where I left her, we’ll be long gone.”
I take a step toward him, ready to stop him from whatever he’s about to do, but Charlie’s words stop me dead in my tracks.
“Is Gavin ready to make the deal with Bael?”
I swear the earth shatters around me. That truth that has been stalking me has finally made its appearance. Everything I thought I knew crashes at my feet like shards of glass.
“He is,” Weldon says. “It didn’t take much. I think his visit with you yesterday finally pushed him over the edge.”
Charlie’s smile spreads across his face like a snake slithering from a hole. “Good. Then let’s head to Whiskey Hallow, shall we?”
A second later, they’re gone.
Panic stabs me in the stomach as I scramble to figure out what to do. I flip off my emotions. There’s no time for a breakdown. Only a solution. I can’t get there in time by driving. I need a demon, but my option of shadow walking just disappeared.
Unless…
Brian’s head hangs when I open his cell. His skin is sallow and blood leaks from his ears and eyes. I grab a bucket of holy water from the corner and dump it on him.
“Wake up!” I shout.
His head flings back as pained cries rip through the air. I don’t wait for him to register what’s happening. I’m not sure if what I’m about to do is even going to work, but I have to try.
The lights flicker in and out as I pull on the energy in the room. In the past, when I’ve drained a demon, I’ve felt their power inside me. Felt it overtaking my senses, making me one of them.
Maybe if I took his power, I could use it to shadow walk.
It doesn’t take but a couple minutes until there’s nothing left of Brian and my veins are pulsing with power I’ve yet to taste. I don’t stop to question myself. I know what I’m doing is heartless. I know when I turn my emotions back on, I’m going to regret walking down this path, but I must.
It’s what Weldon would do for me.
One of the lightbulbs above me shatters, leaving the room covered with shadows. The darkness inside me tastes sweet on my lips as I recall everything Weldon’s ever told me about shadow walking. All I need to do is see the other side—the dimension others can’t see.
I close my eyes and let the darkness inside me spread until my veins are so full they feel like they’ll implode. When I open my eyes, there’s spherical vibrations all around me, in every shadow. They pulse with an energy I’ve never felt before.
You just pick your path, and then walk it, I hear him say as I focus on the closest sphere. So many things could go wrong. I could get lost. Stuck in the Underground where Bael would surely find me. I could also find myself floating in an eternal abyss I may not have enough power left to get out of. But I must try. I must save Gavin and Weldon.
Desperation has replaced fear.
I imagine Whiskey Hallow and reach out for the other side of the sphere. Then, with a deep breath, I step in, praying I come out on the right side.
I’M SPIT OUT FROM THE other side of the shadow into the snow.
My whole body feels like it’s been dropped into a frozen lake. I pick my head up, eyes desperately scanning for any sign of Weldon and Gavin, and find three outlined forms in the small clearing near the cave Gavin had recently visited. The forest lassos around the clearing, dark leaves knitted so closely together it almost b
lurs out the sparkling sky overhead.
Stumbling to my feet, I brush away the chill and plow through the snow in their direction. Every step I take is like walking through tar as my heart does jumping jacks in my chest. I need to stop them. Must protect Gavin. I reach out to Weldon, hoping to get to him before he does something he’ll regret forever, but there’s an ocean between us I can’t swim through.
As I near them, I make out Gavin’s hunched form standing in front of his dad. A knife coated in pain stabs at my heart. Weldon stands off to the side, watching as Charlie hovers over Gavin like a monster trying to sink his fangs in.
“Don’t be weak, boy!” Charlie shouts through the wind cutting through the trees.
“Gavin, you have to summon him. Think of Cassie. She would want you to do this,” Weldon adds as he moves in beside Gavin.
No. No. No. My pulse pounds in my ears as I shout, “Gavin, don’t do it!”
All three heads whip around in my direction.
“Weldon,” Charlie says, the warning in his voice like a blade pressed against my throat.
“Damn it, mouse!” Weldon says before disappearing and reappearing in front of me. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
I shove him with a blast of magic hard enough to throw him back a few feet. “Me? What are you doing, Weldon? Pushing Gavin to make a deal we both know he shouldn’t be making,” I state as I stalk toward him, volation searing down my arms. “Is this why you were pissed that he wanted to kill himself? Because you needed him to do this first?” I hover over him, glaring. “Who are you?”
Weldon is back on his feet, eyes as black and empty as Charlie’s. “You don’t know what you’re doing, mouse. I told you to stay out of it. You’re going to ruin everything,” he hisses.
“Do it!” Charlie shouts at Gavin, shoving him back. “Summon him. Do it now, boy!”
“No!” I scream.
I run, trying to get to Gavin, but Weldon has other ideas. He grabs me and pulls me into a shadow, moving me from spot to spot around the forest as I struggle against him. I pull on his energy, draining him a little, trying to break the connection.