The Warrior

  “What does it mean?” I ask Oswald.

  He shrugs. “Could be anything, but it’s a starting place.”

  I check out the list he shoved into my hand. “We’re missing a lot of words. What if we’re wasting time doing this?” Even as I ask this, I remember what Aspen said in my dream last night, about learning the words. This has to be the key.

  “I don’t think we are,” Charlie whispers.

  I run a hand through my hair. “No, I guess I don’t, either.”

  “It’ll go faster with two of us working,” Charlie says.

  Oswald flips on a lamp, as if there isn’t enough light from the forty currently lit. “When you two are searching, look for words that are italicized or in a heavier handwriting. Essentially, a word that’s offset from the rest of the text. Once you find a book that has one, dig deeper. Many of the books won’t have any at all.” He raises a finger and smiles. “But where you find one, you’ll find more.”

  “Why don’t more people know about this dead language?” I ask.

  He waves the statement away. “They do. They just don’t know what it can do. That is something only I know. A lifetime of work.”

  “Except for the person whispering the vultrips open,” Charlie adds.

  He pulls at the collar of his robe, and I notice something I didn’t before. There’s a silver necklace around his neck that’s mostly tucked into his robe, but not quite enough.

  “Oswald. That’s Annabelle’s necklace, isn’t it?”

  He looks everywhere but at me. I’ll give him this, at least he doesn’t start turning in circles.

  I shake my head, but I can’t help the laughter that builds in my throat. It dies when I remember there’s one more thing I wanted to ask Oswald. “Hey, Hef?”

  “What’s that, son?” he says, covering the necklace with his palm.

  The word son strikes through me. I miss my dad. I killed my dad. Killed him driving a car on our way to get brownies. Maybe this is why I can’t envision Aspen being dead. I can’t be the person who kills another innocent person. It would destroy me.

  I bite my lip and hesitate. Then, because I can no longer keep it to myself, I say, “I’m seeing Aspen in my dreams.”

  Charlie glances up at me, surprised I told him.

  The old man’s eyes widen. “What happens in them? Do you speak? Are they clear dreams?”

  My breath quickens at Oswald’s reaction. “We’re in a dark place. Not hell, but somewhere else. Purgatory, maybe? If that exists. And yeah, we speak. The dreams are clear. I remember every detail when I wake up. It’s like she’s really there with me.”

  Oswald comes close. Too close. Way too close. “Dude.”

  “I’ve heard of things like this,” he drawls.

  I step back. “Care to elaborate?”

  “It’s called soul touching,” he says. “It can happen when two souls experience something extraordinary under duress.”

  Charlie doesn’t sound exactly thrilled at the term.

  “Not to poke holes in this soul touching theory,” I say. “But I’ve been through a lot of extraordinary stuff with people lately. And there’s certainly lots of duress going around. Why would what Aspen and I went through be any different?”

  “You went to hell together, right?” His eyes urge me to understand. “You experience trials like that with others every day?”

  No. Even when I fought off Rector that night in the woods to save Charlie…no.

  Oswald fingers the tie around his robe. It makes me nervous. I don’t want any slippage happening. “After you’d slid your own soul back into your body, did the two of you embrace?”

  “How did you know I have my soul? Jaysus, Kraven told you everything, didn’t he?”

  Oswald waits while I answer the question.

  Did Aspen and I embrace?

  I think back.

  And I remember.

  “I understand now that we must all make sacrifices,” I whisper to her. “But I will be back for you, Aspen. I will return, and I will blow this entire place apart with the strength of God himself to save you.”

  Aspen collapses against me.

  I hold her as she cries.

  “We hugged,” I whisper, my stomach rolling.

  Charlie takes my hand, and Oswald pulls in a long breath. “It could be her you’re seeing,” he says. “Soul touching is largely unexplored.”

  I stare down at my feet, avoiding his gaze. “Thanks, Oswald. We’ll help you find the words you’re missing.”

  I spin around and stride toward the door with Charlie by my side, wanting to leave this conversation behind. But before I can go, Oswald says, “Dante, I don’t want to mislead you. The Aspen you’re seeing, it may not be her. I’ve heard of soul touching, but that doesn’t mean I believe in it.”

  I bite down and grip Charlie’s palm tighter.

  Charlie is real.

  I can touch her, and she’s here, and she’s real.

  That I know.

  12

  What She Said

  As soon as we exit the basement, I tell Charlie what happened in the training room. Her face tells me she’s every bit as confused as I am.

  “You think it’s because you have your soul?”

  It’s the same thing I thought, but I tell her I’m not sure. “That’s cool that you guys uncovered another part of the scroll.”

  She does a little jump, and color rises on her neck. “It was so awesome. It just appeared out of thin air.”

  “To bad we don’t know what it means.”

  Charlie is about to respond when I see a dude stumbling around. My heart high-vaults into my throat. My body swallows Charlie as it would oxygen at the bottom of the sea. There’s a kind of desperation about protecting her. Not saying this reaction is healthy, but there it is.

  “Dante, calm down.” Charlie edges away, and I recognize that it’s Blue who’s staggering toward us. Instinctually, Charlie steps between me and him. When I see the red in his eyes, I realize what’s happening.

  Blue is wasted.

  “Hey there, Vodka,” I say.

  A growl rips from Blue’s throat, and he lunges past Charlie to take me down. Color me surprised when the stumbling, slurring, red-eyed liberator is successful. My back hits the hardwood floor, and I gasp as the air leaves my lungs. I’m already sore from today’s training, and this is the last thing I need before tomorrow’s session.

  Charlie tries to pull Blue back, but he’s all over me, throwing punches into my side and kneeing me anywhere he can. I grab hold of his shoulders and roll him onto his back. His head slams into the wood, and for a moment, he seems dazed. Then he yells something incoherent and half-slap, half-punches my left cheekbone.

  Even though I know Blue doesn’t really want to hurt me, blood pounds behind my temples and adrenaline sharpens my senses. He’s drunk and heartbroken and desperate, and that makes him dangerous. Not because his aim is true, but because he’s feeling no pain and isn’t likely to stop until I’m unconscious.

  I hook him into a headlock and try to calm him down, but he’s like a crocodile, spinning in an effort to drown and rip me to pieces at once. He mumbles something and throws his fist into my stomach. I double over and groan. Charlie lays her palms on our twisting torsos, and I ask her to please stop trying to do the Blue Hand Thingy on us.

  Blue slams his heel down on my boot. I pick up my foot and dance on the other. “Damn it, Blue, stop.” I shove him away and prepare for him to charge me again. He doesn’t.

  Instead, he does something worse.

  “You said today that Neco’s words were poison,” Blue slurs. “But you know what, Dante? You’re poison.”

  “Blue,” Charlie pleads.

  Blue narrows one eye at me and points a sharp finger like he’s piercing my heart. “You may wear a liberator cuff, but you’re still worthless.” He’s drunk, but each word he spews is a round, solid marble. “You’re the reason Charlie’s soul is gone. You’re the reason As
pen is in hell. Everything you touch turns to crap. There is one savior and one soldier. And you’ve screwed them both.”

  He opens both his arms and stumbles. “Congratulations.”

  Guilt courses through my veins. My throat tightens, and my vision blurs. I don’t think I can stand. I can’t possibly carry what I’m feeling inside. Because what he said are the same things I’ve told myself. But to hear him voice those same thoughts, to know everyone blames me… It’s too much. And why shouldn’t they blame me? What he says is true. It’s my fault. I’m selfish. I’m a coward. If I could, I’d put my ankle to the guillotine and let Blue swing the axe, let him sever my dargon. At least then the pain would stop. At least then I could stop hurting people.

  Blue sighs like some of the fight has left him. He shakes his head and says, “You know He doesn’t want you, right? He just needed a strong, mindless body to fight. After this war is over, He’ll retrieve his dargon and let you rot.” Blue turns his head, but I hear him clearly. “He should have let you die.”

  Charlie shoves Blue and screams for him to take it back.

  But he’s not going to.

  He shouldn’t.

  I don’t know what to do, except this… There’s something I’ve hidden from Blue. Something I knew would hurt him even worse and destroy any chance of me and him being friends. But I owe him this. Aspen told me not to tell him, but I have to. He deserves to know.

  I keep my eyes on the floor when I speak, my voice shaking ever so slightly. “There was this room in hell, this place where the ceiling comes down on you. It’s an illusion. But if you allow yourself to imagine it’s happening, that this wall is really descending, then the pain and torment become real.”

  Blue doesn’t respond, but I can tell he’s listening.

  “I’d been through this room before, so I knew how to handle it. But Aspen was having trouble. She couldn’t get outside of her head no matter what I said.” I swallow and take a deep breath. “The only thing that got her through was you.”

  His eyes snap to me, and I can feel them burning my flesh.

  “When she started panicking, she said that she didn’t want to die without…without kissing you. Thinking about you, Blue, it’s the only thing that got her through. When I was leaving hell, she was about to ask me to tell you something. But then she took it back. In the end, she didn’t want you to know that she’d started to care. I don’t think she wanted you to suffer thinking about her.”

  Blue’s chest rises and falls quickly. “Is that it?”

  I say it is.

  He hits me. It’s the kind of clean blow that says there won’t be any more to follow. The pain is so overwhelming that it numbs the entirety of my face. I don’t even realize I’m on the ground until I see Charlie kneeling beside me.

  Blue weaves his fingers together and places them atop his curly hair. He groans like a wounded animal and stares up at the ceiling. Then he turns and strides away, stumbling down the dark hall in search of his bed.

  Charlie helps me up and asks a dozen questions about how I’m feeling. I hardly hear her. All I’m thinking about is how I’d feel better if Blue had hit me a hundred more times the way he had at the end. The one time doesn’t feel like enough. I was the guy who guided Aspen down into hell. It was up to me to bring her out again. And I didn’t. People can rationalize the situation all they want, but in the end, I left her.

  Charlie and I linger in hopes that Blue is asleep by the time we get to our rooms. When we finally arrive, Max is in the lounge area outside our bedrooms. He has his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands.

  My girl doesn’t ask if I need time alone with him or what she can do, she just reacts. She moves toward him without a word and places a hand on his neck. “All this will be over soon. And you’ll be with Valery again.”

  Max looks up. His face is red, and tears swim in his eyes. He’s not crying, but he’s damn close. “I can’t do it much longer. She won’t even let me touch her. She says she loves me, but she won’t go against Big Guy and—”

  He breaks off and pinches the bridge of his nose to stop the flow of emotion.

  “Charlie’s right.” I sit down beside him. “This thing is going to come to a head. The sirens are growing in numbers, a collector broke in, and we’re training. Shit’s about to get real. And when it’s over, we’ll be able to focus on the people who matter.”

  Max shakes his head. “Every day, I wake up thinking about that scroll. About Aspen and Charlie.”

  A ball of ice forms between my shoulder blades.

  “But at night, it’s hard not to miss her,” he says. “It’s hard to see her during training and only exchange a smile.”

  “Max—” I begin.

  “It’s fine.” His mouth pulls into an unconvincing smile. “I get like this sometimes, that’s all. I’ll be cool in the morning.” Max bolts up and heads toward the door. I try to stop him from leaving, but he only says, “I’m just so angry with Him.”

  Max leaves at the same time as Annabelle steps out of her room. “Oh, good,” she says to me. “You can show me those moves now.”

  I start to go after Max, but Charlie grabs my arm. “Give him some time to be alone right now. But tomorrow, let’s make a point of talking to Kraven. Maybe he can change something for the two of them.”

  I nod, because she’s right, and also because my body feels broken in ten different ways, and I’m fairly sure Blue broke my nose. The Quiet Ones come in bearing beef and shallot stew, and after I eat, they immediately go to work healing my wounds with their pastes and creamy concoctions in blue glass jars. Annabelle gives me approximately seventeen minutes to rest and gorge myself before she pulls me up and begins acting out karate moves and asking me to come at her and see what happens.

  As I train her, my mind trails back to my conversation with Max. Something he said at the end unnerves me. It was the thing about Max being angry with Big Guy. That little confession burrows, but every time I start to dwell on it, Annabelle demands my attention. Soon, I forget all about it, and focus on Annabelle.

  For every move she masters, she asks Charlie her thoughts about Kraven.

  And Paine.

  It feels like old times, like maybe we just got done playing basketball and now there’s pizza to be had. Grams is sleeping upstairs in Charlie’s house, and Annabelle is busting out black and white movies and asking which we’d like to watch.

  As we laugh and work late into the night, it’s hard not to imagine that Max will be just fine.

  13

  Stone Angel

  After Annabelle is asleep, and I’m stationed outside her door, I hear a soft rap.

  My heart leaps with hope.

  Charlie steps through the bathroom door that connects our rooms and finds me sitting on the tile. She squats down and takes my face into her hands. Then she stands and draws me silently along with her. I follow the lead of her body like a horse steered to water. Her hand slides into mine, and she guides me into my bedroom. Our bedroom.

  There’s a low light burning in the lounge area outside our room. It stretches beneath my door and casts shadows over Charlie’s face. Her lips are full and parted. Her breasts are pressed against me, demanding a fierce reaction in my body. I take her in my arms as if on impulse and decide that this time, I won’t let her go. I’ll shatter her reservations and ask her to realize that us being together, regardless of the situation, is always right.

  I open my mouth to say something, but Charlie lays her fingers to my lips. She breaks away from me so easily that I nearly gasp. Charlie moves toward the bed. Her body slides backward on it, and she opens her arms.

  It’s an invitation.

  Blood pounds through my veins, wakes me up, makes every last nerve in my body electric. I reach the edge of the bed, and now I’m crawling, moving over her body like a blanket. I lower my pelvis, and her legs ease open. She’s wearing a long T-shirt, but not much else. When my hips meet hers, I groan. My body throbs. The desire I fe
el for Charlie is a living, breathing thing, thrashing its anxious head.

  I’m holding myself up with my arms, and Charlie is beneath me, her blue eyes wide open with life and lust and love. I want to swallow them so I can see what she sees. Her hands move up my back, tracing the hard muscles there. Then she grips the arch of my neck. I greet her skin willingly, my lips trailing warm kisses up her throat. I kiss her chin, the small, fleshy part directly beneath her lower lip.

  And then my mouth touches hers.

  My tongue slides into her mouth and greets the tip of hers. I growl like a monster and kiss her deeper. Something wild claps through me, a lust so bottomless it scares me. I want to make love to her, to touch her as gently as a falling leaf. But I also want to ravage her, to drive and dominate and howl like a dog. I want all of her and so much more. We’ve been together before, completely, but I need to feel that perfect closeness to her again, now.

  Charlie widens herself to me, and her lips move to my ear. Her breath is warm, and her teeth push me over the edge as she nibbles and bites. We haven’t spoken a word, and there’s this sort of quiet intimacy about that. I lose myself in her, forget where I am and what I am.

  It’s so quiet. So quiet until she whispers, sweet as warm sand, “I want you, Dante.”

  My head drops, because it’s all I’ve wanted to hear the last few days. Late at night, Charlie has denied me time and again. And even though she had her reasons—it’s unfair to celebrate each other when Aspen was gone—I secretly wondered if there was more to it than that. If maybe she didn’t resent me for leaving Aspen in hell.

  But now. Now she wants me, which means even if she was upset, she forgives me. I dip my head and kiss her, the heat in my body pulsing. I reach down and inch her shirt up until it’s bunched around her hips. When my hands crawl back down, feeling her, she exhales.

  Charlie wants me.

  She loves me.

  But if all that is true, then why is this uneasiness spreading through me like arsenic? I try to ignore it, to push it away. But it stays all the same. I bite the inside of my lip and turn my head in the direction of the pain. I want to shake these doubts loose, this thought that something is off. I only want to be with Charlie right now and damn anything else.