It was an empty shell those ancient people discovered; my soul had already moved on. That would explain why the friar’s body was found as well. That form had outlived its usefulness and the Mercenary abandoned it to find another.
But why were the two of us found together in the church? Did he carry my body there after we parted ways on the hill? After I stumbled into the countryside; walking day and night for weeks; struggling to escape my inescapable prison; to die, though I was already dead; to exhaust myself into sleep, though I had begun to realize sleep would also be denied me …
“It doesn’t matter.” I shove the chair with more force than necessary. “It doesn’t change anything.”
But it does.
The story of Romeo and Juliet is gone, and this one-line mention in a travel brochure is all that remains of me. The Mercenary I was would never have allowed such a thing. If Shakespeare wasn’t interested, I would have found another bard to immortalize my tragedy. I needed my fame, took perverse pleasure in generations of young people being forced to study me in school. Knowing every soul in the Western world knew my tale—or a version of it, anyway—was my only comfort. It gave me a connection that didn’t require touch or taste or smell. It kept a spark of sanity alive in my diseased mind.
I would not have allowed this to happen. I wouldn’t have let my short human life fade away.
As I gather the towels and blanket and slip out the back door, I can’t stop thinking about the fire in the church, about what it would feel like to burn to death. I can almost smell the smoke, feel the heat on my skin as I hurry back to the car. I’m so distracted that I don’t see the truck in the driveway, or realize who’s come to greet me, until Dylan’s father steps into my path.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” The flat of his hand hits my sternum, shoving me back, making me cough as I pull in my next breath.
“Going to a friend’s house,” I say. “Sleepover.” I try to walk around him—figuring the less said, the better—but he stops me with another shove. This one is hard enough to make me stumble. The towels and blankets fall to the ground as my arms swing out to regain my balance. Before I find my feet, he’s slamming me against the garage door.
“I know you took my money, you little shit. I want it back. All of it.” His face is red, his eyes glittering and bloodshot. Even if I still lacked a sense of smell, I’d know he’s been drinking. With a working nose, the whiskey on his breath is enough to make my gut pitch.
Or maybe my gut is simply anticipating the discomfort that meaty hand will inflict when it slams into my middle.
Dylan’s father “vented his spleen” on me once during my first visit, but at the time I hadn’t been able to feel a thing. His punches only made me laugh like that mad creature I was. Now both my body and spirit would rather avoid a scuffle. Ariel is in the car. I don’t want her to see this.
“I didn’t take your money,” I lie in my most soothing voice.
“Bullshit.” His open palm curls into a fist.
“But if you need some cash, I’ve got some in my backpack,” I rush on. “I can go get it and be back in a minute.”
“I don’t want ‘some cash.’ ” His sneer is meant to be mocking, but his slurred s ruins the effect. He’s a joke, and if Ariel weren’t a few yards away, I’d tell him so and make a run for it. Dylan’s usual safe places will be off-limits now that I’ve alienated his friends, but—
You can come to my house. Anytime. No matter what.
Ariel’s words on the beach. She said them before she knew I wasn’t Dylan, before she knew I wasn’t the person who’d turned her heart into a joke. And still she offered sanctuary, compassion. Most of the time, she’s a good person. Truly good, in a way most people aren’t.
But some of the time …
I catch sight of her over Dylan’s father’s shoulder. She’s standing at the end of the drive with the lug wrench from Dylan’s trunk in her hand and a dangerous expression on her face. Her blue eyes burn with cold fire. I’ve seen that look only once before, in the moments before she dove for the wheel of Dylan’s car and tried to pull us both to our deaths.
If I don’t defuse this situation, Ariel’s going to show Dylan’s father her bad side, maybe even her murderous side. Not that he doesn’t deserve it, but it’s my job to turn her toward the better part of her nature, and the last thing I want is to see her this angry. If I’m right, and the screaming things she hears are lost souls, it’s best not to attract their attention. I don’t think the lost souls report back to the Mercenaries—they’ve been cast out, punished, hence the lost before the soul—but there’s no reason to take stupid chances.
“Okay. I’ll get the money.” I lift my hands in surrender, looking him straight in the eye, hoping he won’t turn around. I don’t know what he’ll do if he sees Ariel. My gut says Mr. Stroud wouldn’t touch another person’s child—especially a girl—and that his fists and frustration are reserved for his own offspring, but I’m not ready to put my gut to the test. Just the thought of Ariel bloody and bruised makes me want to leap at this man and rip his nose off with my teeth. “Let me get my backpack. It’s in the house.”
“Not the house, my house,” he shouts while Ariel creeps closer, and I shake my head as subtly as I can, willing her to go back to the car. Instead, she tightens her grip on her weapon.
“I pay for everything, while you sit on your skinny ass.”
“I get paid for my gigs with the band,” I say, hoping to calm him down. “I can pay you back in a few—”
“I don’t want to get paid back. I want you to get off your ass and get a real job,” he bellows, face flushing redder with every word. “By the time I was your age, I was supporting my parents!” Redder, redder, and the fist at his side begins to shake. “But I let you stay here for free. And how do you thank me for it? You steal from me!”
Everything happens at once. He winds up for the hit, my arms move to block the blow, and the wrench falls from Ariel’s hand with a piercing clatter. Mr. Stroud spins, staggering around in time to see Ariel’s eyes roll back and her knees buckle.
“What the hell?” he shouts.
I shove him aside and run, reaching Ariel seconds before her head hits the pavement. I pull her shoulders into my lap, planning to scoop her into my arms and escape to the car, but then I feel it. The cold.
Under her skin, a cold that seeps into my bones and freezes so hard I think I might shatter. It’s the cold of the ice at the poles, blue and ancient with pieces of mammoth hair stuck in the cracks, the cold of things that have been frozen so long they can’t remember being fluid. So cold it burns, scalding away love and hope and happiness in a creeping ice floe of terrible.
Dimly I hear Dylan’s father asking “Is she okay?” and cursing as Ariel begins to shake and twitch, but I can’t respond.
I’m no longer in Dylan’s body. I’m lost in the cold, so shocked by the misery seething inside Ariel that all I can do is stare into Mr. Stroud’s frightened face as he kneels beside me and shoves a stick from the yard into my limp hand. “If she keeps shaking, shove this between her teeth. I’m going to call nine-one-one.”
He turns and stumbles toward the front door. I want to tell him to stop, that an ambulance won’t help her, but when I open my mouth, all that comes out is a scream. A long, lonely scream, like the ones wailing inside her. The lost souls are screaming, and I must scream with them, because I am their brother. My borrowed magic and living body don’t matter. Down at the core, where the real Romeo is curled up in the corner, I am still a creature of darkness. And I will never escape. This is the way I will end, as one of the screaming things, lost and alone except for these brief moments when I can rush inside someone like Ariel and—for a few precious minutes—have my misery be heard.
SEVENTEEN
Ariel
No. No. No! Get out!
My eyes squeeze closed and my body thrashes as I fight the monsters shredding my insides with their jagged teeth. There??
?s no doubt about it now. The things screaming their banshee shrieks in my mind aren’t coming from me. I know I saw them this time, ripples in the air with gnarled fingers that reached for me seconds before the cold hit, as fierce and frightening as ever.
More frightening.
Romeo is out there. In trouble. I tried to force the anger down and hold it tight, but when Dylan’s father lifted his fist, I lost it. In that moment, he was every bully who’d ever pushed someone around, and I wanted to punish him. I imagined the crunch his bones would make when I brought the wrench down on his head. I thought about the way the blood would gush out to coat the driveway, and something inside me screamed with satisfaction, a scream so familiar I knew it was only a matter of time.
And now pain rules my body and the screaming things howl in my brain. It’s misery, torture … but not unbearable. For the first time I hold on, clinging to consciousness after I would usually tumble into the dark. There’s something different. A sound. Not one of the screaming things, but not—
I’m here. Here. Here.
The chanting is soft, but once I hear it, it’s impossible to ignore. I focus on the truth in the voice that repeats the word over and over again, like a mantra holding the world together. It’s Romeo. He’s here with me, and he really does care. As much as I care for him. Maybe more. Because he knows what it’s like to be so lost that he’s certain he’ll never be found.
But he’s wrong. I will find him. I will—
Forgive. I forgive you.
I don’t know why those are the words he needs to hear, but they are. I feel it. And I know the moment he hears me. His soul shudders and then he’s gone, taking the screaming things with him. It’s like a wind that sweeps through my being, carrying the cold away.
My eyes open to a dim blue sky with the hint of night creeping in at the edges. Romeo holds me in his lap with his head bowed. “You can’t forgive me.”
“You heard …” I lick my lips. “You heard me?”
He nods but doesn’t lift his eyes. “But you can’t.”
I brush the hair from his forehead with trembling fingers. “I do.” My voice is rough, but I can talk and move, and for once I’ve made it through an episode without losing control. It’s because of him. Somehow, he held the things back. If I needed more proof that he has magic inside of him, this is it.
“No. You don’t know everything,” he whispers. “If you did, you never could forgive me.” His shoulders bow a little deeper, and I’m suddenly struck by how much he reminds me of the boy in my painting.
The boy I painted years before I met Romeo. The boy in my dreams, whose portrait I’ve been working on when I should be sleeping. But I’m afraid to sleep. Sometimes I dream of the boy, but more often I dream of the man in the brown robe. He says he’ll forgive me and grant me peace. He’s terrifying, but in the dreams, I need his forgiveness. I’ve done something so horrible that I don’t think anyone will ever forgive me, and I know I’ll never forgive myself. It’s only a dream, but I understand what it feels like to believe you’re beyond redemption.
I wrap my arms around Romeo and pull myself up, until I can whisper into the crook of his neck. “Whatever you did, you can’t change it. All you can do is be better, and I believe you are. I forgive you.”
He doesn’t say a word, only kisses my shoulder before easing me from his lap and rising unsteadily to his feet. “I need to stop Dylan’s father from calling the paramedics.” He clears his throat, runs a shaking hand through his hair. “No need to waste time in a hospital when there’s nothing they can do.”
“No,” I say, coming to my knees. “He’s dangerous. I—”
“I’ll be fine. Stay put.” He strides across the brown grass, up onto the porch, and through the open front door. I stand, determined to follow and make sure he’s safe, but before I make it to the steps, he’s back.
He stops in the doorway, surveying me with a raised brow. “That doesn’t look like staying put.”
“I’m not leaving you alone with him.”
“My hero.” He closes the door and shuffles down the steps with the ghost of his usual wicked grin. “He’s passed out. Doesn’t look like he made it to the phone. We’re fine to go.” He grabs the towels and blankets from the driveway and starts back to the car.
I snatch the tire iron and follow, holding the question rising inside of me, until Romeo has pulled away from the curb. “You felt them, didn’t you? The things I hear.”
“I felt them. I should. I come from the same source.”
“What?” I ask, sure I must have heard him wrong.
“If I fail to accomplish my mission, I might be one of them someday,” he says, the certainty in his words making my stomach lurch. “They’re lost souls. They were cursed to roam the human world until their bodies turned to dust, and now they’re trapped forever in the earthly plane with no way to express their misery. Humans can’t see or hear them.”
I twist the bottom of my shirt until the fabric scratches my skin. “I hear them.” I can’t think about the first part. Romeo becoming one of the things that haunt me is too horrible to imagine. “Why? Why me?”
“I don’t know.” His lips twitch. “Maybe you’re just lucky.”
“Right.” I let out a breath that holds an impossible hint of laughter. I can still laugh. Minutes after an episode, and I can laugh. For me, that’s good enough reason not to give up. “Screw luck. We’ll make our own luck.”
“How will we do that?”
“Let’s go back to my house. I want to show you something. I think it might be important. My mom should have left for work by now, so we won’t have to worry about her eavesdropping.”
“What is it?”
“It’s better if I show you.”
He readjusts his grip on the wheel. “Okay.”
“It is okay.” I put a hand on his leg as he turns back toward my house. “We’ll make it okay.”
He sighs, but the silence that follows is comfortable. I find myself enjoying the drive through town as night falls and the antique streetlamps flare to life. Even the silhouette of the Castle Playground, black against the dusky sky, doesn’t make me upset. I smile, and turn to find Romeo watching me with a soft look on his face. “You amaze me,” he says.
My cheeks heat. “There’s nothing amazing about me.”
“I beg to differ.”
“You don’t have to beg.” I lean in and press a kiss to the place where his heartbeat pulses at his temple. “And you don’t have to go home. Just park a few blocks from the house. My mom won’t be back until late. She won’t notice your car, and we’ll be sure to lock the door to my room.”
His eyebrows lift. “Are you asking me to sleep over?”
I shrug, suddenly nervous. “That’s what you told your dad you were doing, right?”
He turns onto El Camino, his expression darkening as he parks in front of the house with the ceramic cows in the window. “I didn’t like seeing a weapon in your hand.”
“I wasn’t going to let him hurt you.” I slam the door behind me, taking the hand he offers before starting down the street. “Even if it had been the old Dylan about to get his face smashed, I couldn’t have just sat there and watched it happen.”
“You could have called for help.”
“I’ve called for help before. No one can help me. It’s time to help myself.” I don’t realize how much I mean the words until they’re out. It is time to help myself. And Romeo. I won’t stand by and be weak or afraid anymore.
“Then help yourself.” He stops before we reach the empty carport. “Don’t worry about me. Or Dylan.”
“I’m not going to worry,” I say, urging him toward the house. “I’m going to win.”
Romeo
I follow her inside. I know that there’s nothing she can show me that will change my fate or give us the storybook ending my fairy-tale-loving girl is after, but still … something’s changing inside me.
Something she said … about he
lping herself …
The answer is there somewhere. Hidden in a few simple words and stubborn determination. I can’t help myself, but maybe … if I’m willing to do whatever it takes … if I love her …
God. Do I love her? Do I? Maybe …
“It’s in here.” She stops at the door to her bedroom, hand hovering over the knob. “It’s not finished yet—it’s barely even started—but I want you to see it.”
“All right.” Even knowing that this thing she wants to show me can’t change our fates, I’m intrigued. She intrigues me. I want to learn everything about her. I want all her secrets; I want to banish her shame; I want to let her banish mine. I know it’s hopeless. But still …
As she opens the door and flicks on the light, illuminating her private gallery, I’m struck again by how much I wish I had more time. I want to see what she’ll paint next month, next year. I want time to prove I can make her happy for longer than a few days, to prove to myself that I remember how to do this.
Or that I’ve finally learned how to do it. For the first time.
I loved Juliet, but I wasn’t good to her. Even before I betrayed her. But I have been good to Ariel, for Ariel. And it no longer feels like something I’m doing to save my own skin. It feels like something I do because I have no other choice. I pulled her into my arms and held her close while the lost souls raged, because I couldn’t imagine leaving her. Because I …
I …
“I …”
“What?” Ariel glances over her shoulder, one eyebrow raised. I stop in the door, stunned that her face has become so beautifully familiar, the face of someone I—
I open my mouth, close it, but before I can speak, Ariel motions me over.