Mortal Danger

FOR EVERY ACTION, THERE IS A PUNCH IN THE FACE

The Halloween bash got wild pretty fast. Nobody seemed impressed by my mad scientist gear, but plenty of guys tried to hook up with Davina. She blew them off to stick with me, which I appreciated since I didn’t really know anyone else. By ten, people were hammered, taking off their clothes, making out with questionable partners and barfing in the bushes, usually not all at the same time. Awkward was my middle name as I skulked around the fringes; I had rarely felt more out of place.

I’d thought she was kidding, but a mob in monster masks poured out of the house at eleven. Drunk girls screamed and ran, turning the backyard into pure chaos. Between the shouting and music, I couldn’t think. Davina was dancing on the patio, so I waved to her and gestured that I was going to the bathroom, but from what I’d seen, it was worse indoors. Every available surface was covered in people grinding. Given the other costumes, I could live without seeing more side boob tonight.

Should’ve gone out with Kian.

The thought didn’t cheer me up as I rounded the corner of the house, looking for half an hour of solitude before I dragged Davina out front to wait for her mom. I found a gazebo nestled at the back of the property, where it was dark and quiet. The monsters playing tag on the lawn hadn’t discovered it yet. With a sigh, I sat down on a padded chair before I realized I wasn’t alone.

“Not enjoying the festivities?” From the smell, Cameron had been drinking long before his guests arrived.

“It’s not really my thing.”

“Mine either. Not anymore.” With the careful movements of the totally shitfaced, he set his plastic cup on the floor. “Want to go for a walk?”

With you? Hardly trembled on the tip of my tongue, but his face was so ravaged, I couldn’t kick him when he was already on the ground. “You obviously want to be alone, so let me find somewhere else to hide.”

But he wasn’t listening to me. “I don’t understand how everything went to shit so fast. Last year I had everything. Last year—”

“You hurt me because you could.”

He recoiled like I had punched him in the face. Part of me considered it; no matter how much I wanted to move on, I couldn’t forgive him. Cameron stumbled to his feet, and I jumped up, putting some distance between us. On seeing my reaction, he stopped short, his hands up in some clumsy gesture I couldn’t interpret. Out here, the shadows were too deep for me to read his face.

“Edie—”

When the howl rang out, at first I thought it was more special effects for the party, but Cam looked blank, and two red eyes opened in the darkness behind him. I raised a shaking hand to warn him, and he stumbled. A growl rumbled from the shadows.

“Wild dog?”

“I don’t know,” I whispered.

“If you run, I’ll distract it.” He turned slowly.

“That’s a terrible plan. You can’t even walk straight.”

But it happened too fast for me to make it more than two steps. Smoke dogs swirled around Cam’s ankles, real and not-real, hounds born of night with fangs like obsidian and eyes likes windows into hell. With each snap of their teeth, he faded a little more, not blood but shadow, until he was only an outline with a hand thrown out toward me.

“I’m sorry,” the wind whispered. And then it fell silent, too.

A single black dog stepped out of the smoke; this one had full shape and definition, probably gained from the life it stole from Cameron. It studied me with ember eyes, sniffed once, and then trotted away. Teeth chattering, I ran forward, patting the chair where Cam had been sitting, the floor where he’d set his drink, but … he was just … gone. My teeth chattered as I whirled and fled, back toward shrieking monsters and giggling girls.

What the hell just happened? Who can I tell? There was no body, no blood. Halfway there, I had to sit down with my head between my knees. That was where Davina found me, half an hour later. Probably thinking I was drunk, she hauled me to my feet, but when she didn’t smell booze, she tapped my forehead.

“You high?”

“No. I’m freaking out.”

“I can see that. Let’s get you home, little hermit crab.”

Maybe I should’ve corrected her and explained that it wasn’t the party that turned me into a trembling puddle of goo, but I couldn’t find the words. So I sat in the back of her mom’s car and shook, right up until they dropped me off. My thoughts ran in an endless, panicked, disjointed loop. Cameron is gone. Cameron is never coming back. And I was the only one who could give his parents peace of mind, but they wouldn’t believe me.

I saw it, and I wouldn’t either.

I mumbled my way through the parental inquiry, but my dad seemed reassured that I was sober and still wearing a bow tie. Hat tip for his savvy, it was hard to imagine hooking up without taking it off. Five minutes later, I escaped to my room while this fact battered against my brain: You had just thought that you couldn’t forgive him … when the hellhounds appeared. You’re doing this. Somehow.

Because I didn’t know what else to do, I typed “hellhound” and then “black dog” into the search bar; it told me a bunch of legends and lore, including the fact that these dogs were nearly always a portent of death. Since it killed Cameron, that seemed logical. But I never heard any of that before just now, so why would my angry thoughts summon them? Pacing, I raked my hands through my hair. Now that’s the real mad scientist do.

I need to do something. This can’t continue.

Briefly, I considered the solution I’d chosen before, but I couldn’t even complete the thought. I want to live. Maybe it’s wrong, but I just can’t. Not now. A true heroine wouldn’t hesitate to give her life for someone else, but I wasn’t painted with that stripe. Just as I’d come to that place out of weakness, now that my life was good, I couldn’t throw it away, even to save people.

My knees gave out after a while, and I huddled in front of my bed. Around one, I came up with the half-baked idea of going to see Kian since he was only a few blocks away, but reason poked me. Not only would that be stupid and dangerous, I could tell him what happened without leaving the apartment.

So I got my phone and typed, You there?

Yep. How was the party?

Can you come over? By the time I locked the door, he was in my room.

“That’s handy.” Odd. My voice didn’t sound shaky at all.

“You don’t ask me over for ninja visits unless something’s wrong.” He replaced the distance with concern. Five seconds later, I was in his arms. While I recounted Cameron’s last moments, he stroked my back. I finished by asking, “What did I see? Is he dead?”

He hesitated. “I’ve never witnessed anything like that. But if the dogs took him, I suspect the answer is yes.”

“What am I supposed to do with that?” I demanded. “What about his parents?”

“I have no idea. I wish I did.”

A whimper escaped me. “It’s … I think I’m doing this.” Before he could interrupt with hollow reassurances, I repeated what I had been thinking the instant before. Cameron disappeared—how I couldn’t forgive him. Then it was like my dark reflections translated to instant judgment. “Now tell me that’s a coincidence.”

“It seems unlikely.”

“I can’t deal,” I whispered. “I’m so scared right now.”

Kian murmured something into my hair and tugged me toward the bed. I knew better than to imagine he’d picked this as the perfect time to make his move, so I followed, and he cuddled me against his chest. No telling how long it would take for the party to wind down and for anyone to realize Cameron had vanished. But unlike Russ, there was no body for anyone to find.

If anyone looks.

“I’d do anything to get you out of all this,” he said softly.

“That’s what I’m afraid of.” I was just upset enough to tackle the way he had been acting. Again. “What’re you hiding from me?”

“How long have you known?” At least he didn’t try to deny it.

I thought back. “Since just after we went to your new place.”

“I need to give back that trophy for best actor.” He attempted a smile, but too much pain dragged down the corners of his mouth, resulting in more of a grimace.

“Please don’t do anything stupid.”

“Good advice, if it wasn’t already too late.”

“Kian, tell me.”

“I made a deal for your protection,” he blurted.

A spate of words I didn’t even realize I knew—in all-new combinations—tumbled out. “With who?”

“He’s not in the game, but he has leverage. He’s not interested in competing with other immortals. His interests are more … varied.” That wasn’t an answer, and he knew it.

Maybe who wasn’t the right question. “Exactly what did you use for collateral?”

In the old stories, humans made all kinds of dire bargains with elder beings. Swaps included the soul, a first-born child, all the love in your heart, or a particular memory. The taut silence ended when I smacked him. Inexplicably, he smiled.

“It’s not a big deal, Edie. I was already serving a life sentence. So it doesn’t matter.”

“It does to me.” I fixed him with a look that promised I wouldn’t budge until he confessed, but Kian shook his head.

“Knowing certain things would make your life worse. This is one of them.”

“Before, you said ‘I want you to have a life.’ And you looked so sad. Is it because you signed away what little freedom you had left? For me?”

“Stop talking,” he said firmly.

I wasn’t in the mood, at first, when he started kissing me, but Kian’s mouth changed that. Even though his physical closeness felt good, it didn’t change my sadness. When Kian left an hour later, my sorrow still went bone deep, because our kisses tasted of loss and endings. The Pandora’s box in my head exploded, peppering me with emotional shrapnel: Brittany, Russ, now Cameron. The guilt spread through my system like a poison, and I couldn’t even rely on Kian to be straight with me. Our relationship could survive all kinds of stress, but not his silence or his secrets, and I didn’t want to watch us die like I had Cameron. That night, I cried until my head ached.

Things didn’t look better in the morning, possibly because my eyes were almost swollen shut. An hour of cold compresses reduced the damage enough for me to leave my room. Sunday my parents slept in; I couldn’t talk to them and a day in isolation wouldn’t help, so I shoved some things in a backpack and headed out. One of my favorite places in the city was the Victory Garden on Boylston. During the day, it was a great place to walk when you had nowhere else to be and, more important, it was free. During the worst time of my life, I’d spent hours hiding there and pretending I had a social life. Today, the character of each plot didn’t charm or relax me. I wandered aimlessly, shoulders bowed beneath the awareness that Cameron was gone, and it was my fault.

I wish I knew what I accomplish that’s so important. The immortals were batshit crazy if they thought I could see things like this and then stay on course toward a shining future. Of course, maybe that’s the point. You don’t know who killed Cam. If Dwyer is watching you, he might’ve decided that guilt would drive you nuts. If that was true, maybe I didn’t manifest the death dog after all. It wouldn’t save Cameron, but then I wouldn’t have to live with knowing I was a heinous person. But I’d ping-ponged over who to blame before.

Despite the brisk breeze and the sunlight, I spun in place, suddenly wary. The people wandering the garden this late in the year were mostly old. A few gardeners had planted pumpkins and had Halloween displays not yet taken down. Bales of hay and gourds, mostly, though there were ghosts made of white sheets and fat-bellied witches from plastic trash bags. I didn’t see anyone rang my alarm bells.

Until something rasped, “Hello, pretty-girl skin.”

The thin man had spoken to me once before and I would never forget that sound, or the waft of the grave that poured from his mouth. I whirled, making sure he was out of reach. Kian said not to let him touch you. But he wasn’t close enough. Yet. People passed all around us, probably guessing I was admiring the autumnal colors in the chrysanthemums before me.

“What do you want?” I growled the words, low, hoping nobody would notice the crazy girl talking to the flowers.

“I bring a message from my master.”

“And who’s that?”

“The Lightbringer, of course.”

A scared click of my brain, and I suspected he meant Dwyer, who Kian had guessed must’ve been known as the sun god. “Make it fast.”

Pure bravado, because what would I do if he attacked? Before, when I tried to escape, he appeared in front of me in the blink of an eye. My heart pounded out a terrified rhythm. If I can’t run, maybe I can fight. Too bad I had no idea how.

“He is waiting. Waiting for you to breathe your last,” he rasped. “Your death is already written. But you cheated, pretty-girl skin. Now you’re a hole in the world, and you let other people fall in your stead. How long before you become one of us?”

With awful, empty eyes, he reached for me. This time, I understood the futility of running, so I did the only thing I could. I touched him first.

Madness. He doesn’t take your life. He steals your mind instead.

My brain spilled over with cascading flashes of pain and violence, red splatter, black dog, crawling maggots, a bird eating a fish head. The images twisted and bled, burrowed deep until I couldn’t think, and still it wasn’t finished. Despair, decay, dread poured into me, endless rivers of poison, until my vision grayed, replaced by shadows, echoes of footsteps running away, away. I tried to call out, but a bony fist about my throat choked my voice.

For a few seconds, I saw how this ended—me gibbering in a padded room while nurses shot me full of tranquilizers, and then I glimpsed the other end of the tunnel, where this vacant thing hunched, avid for my pain. Channeling everything toward me left a vacuum on the other side. Simple physics. Trembling, I fought the only way I could—with my own dreams and memories, hopes and longings. I shoved back hard, until slivers of me plinked into the empty well. Spelling bee, DNA model, trip to the Grand Canyon, first kiss, A+ in calculus—I swam against the toxic stream, carrying my life, my identity with me.

You didn’t touch me, I told him silently. I touched you. That makes you mine.

When I couldn’t bear more without screaming myself hoarse, the thin man vanished. My eyes snapped open; I was on the ground, surrounded by worried onlookers. A middle-aged woman I had noticed tending a garden nearby crouched beside me.

“Are you diabetic? Epileptic? Do you have medicine?” She spoke slowly, like I might not be able to understand her.

I shook my head, coming up onto my knees. “I’m all right, right and tight.”

Dizzy, I scrambled to my feet and rushed away, staggering with each step. I heard an older man say, “Probably a tweaker. Cops don’t patrol this place like they should. You know I’ve found needles down by the water?”

Sadly, being mistaken for a junkie was better than them thinking I was nuts. Near the exit, my legs went watery, I grabbed on to the fence and forced myself to stay awake through sheer force of will. With agonizing languor, the tendrils receded; my brain felt as if it had pinpricks all over it. But it was mine, wholly mine, and if I’d had the strength, I would’ve shouted in triumph.

Like a drunkard, I stumbled home, and it took me the better part of an hour, though I wasn’t far in terms of physical distance, but I kept having to rest before my legs gave out: curbs, benches, other people’s front steps. I didn’t realize I was sitting near Kian’s building until he strode down the street toward me. Rarely did I get the chance to observe him when he didn’t know I was looking; in this unguarded moment, his mouth was compressed into a grim, pale line, and his green eyes held the weight of a promise he refused to share. Women checked him out as he went by, but he never turned. Not once.

In fact, not expecting me, he hurried past and then whipped around, like he might’ve imagined me. I managed a weak smile. “Hey, way.”

“Are you waiting for me?” he asked, butterfly-tentative.

“Nope.”

“Then what are you doing?”

“Sitting.” I sounded giddy, goofy, even, I couldn’t stop giggling. “Hitting.”

“Edie?” He crossed to me in a few steps, leaned in with a look of dismay gradually dawning. “Jesus Christ. I smell him on you.”

“True blue. I’ve been dancing with the devil in the pale moonlight, didn’t go down without a fight.”

His voice trembled. “Did it touch you?”

“Don’t fear the worst, I got him first. I can’t fight monsters with guns or knives, but it seems I can with my mind.” With trembling hands, I made dual finger-guns and fired. “I fought the law and I won. See, this is my wheelhouse, son.”

Why the hell am I rhyming all the things? That’s probably not a good sign.

“You can’t survive touching the thin man.” Kian seemed frozen with horror. “At least, not with your mind intact.”

I smiled up at him, though my face felt stiff and strange. After a few seconds, I shook off the Cockney rhyming daze, keeping my reply simple as weary pride bloomed.

“But I did.”