The confession leaves my body shaking slightly, and through my tears, I no longer see my friends but the image of me draining my friend at my feet.
“I didn’t even ask Lisa where she buried her afterward. I just let her take her away like my dirty little secret,” I choke out. “I didn’t look up her family or anything. I acted like she never existed.”
I peer up and find Chester and Levi staring at Rez inquisitively.
“Wh—”
“She didn’t die,” Rez whispers before turning to me, squeezing my arm painfully. “She didn’t die, Zeke,” she repeats. My heart shudders as her words finally register.
“What? No, that’s impossible.” I shake my head, but Rez turns away from me and motions for Levi to come over.
“Levi, can you help?” she asks excitedly. Turning to look at me again, “Zeke, I know it’s painful, but I need you to trust me here, okay?”
I’m motionless as I grasp her words. My emotions are still running rampant through me, but here she is asking me to trust her? Hell, I can’t even trust myself…but maybe that’s the point. When have my friends and family let me down, especially maliciously? Not trusting my words, I nod my consent and she gives me a small smile.
“Okay. Listen. I know this is going to suck, but Zeke, since this is your trial, I’m guessing you can control this damn thing. So, can you bring us to the point where Lisa comes in and takes your friend?”
Anguish. That’s the only thing that can describe what I’m feeling as Rez stares at me with her gray, pleading eyes. She wants me to go back to that moment?
“Trust me,” she tells me, and Levi reaches out and grabs my shoulder. Instantly, my nerves settle as I take a slow and steady breath before picturing Lisa and Trin.
“Look,” Rez calls out, narrowing her eyes and pointing. “You might have to stand behind me, but you can see through Lisa’s smoke.”
We shuffle behind Rez, and just as she said, the smoke separates for us to see Lisa pull Trin’s face against hers. Lisa’s eyes glow a deep purple along Trin’s porcelain skin. It’s different from her normally bright red eye, but I can easily see that Trin’s eyes are open and focused on my Shadow Horse.
“What the hell?” I exclaim. “It has to be a trick.”
“No, listen,” Chester quiets us. “I know you can hear it if you focus, Zeke. It’s faint, but it’s her heartbeat.”
I focus in, absently slowing down the scene, and the slow rhythmic thudding of Trin’s heart cripples me to my knees. So many questions surface as to what happened then. Why didn’t I see her again? Did she die after this? Have I really been holding this against me for all this time?
“I don’t understand,” I manage to get out.
“Can you rewind this? I might be able to shed some light,” Levi answers, and I give him a questioning stare. Sighing, he continues. “I’ve never mentioned it before, but your Shadow Horse, Lisa? I know there’s not much on her in the literature Ryker and I have read, but I can feel the power that radiates off of her. It wouldn’t surprise me if she’s doing something to her while her eyes are glowing that shade. Aren’t they normally red? I can cast a simple revealing spell that might give us answers.”
His explanation is enough for me as I lick my lips in worry, but I nod in understanding. I haven’t told anyone about the journal that talks about Lisa, but now isn’t the time. It’s still safely tucked away in a spelled case in my closet back home. I take us to the point Levi wants and watch as he weaves his spell. Lisa’s black cloak of shadows disappears and is replaced by white and gray sparkles. A discombobulated voice spills outin choppy tones, weaving some of the spell in a language I don’t know.
“I know this spell,” Levi says regrettably. “Lisa is erasing her memories.”
It takes me a moment to understand what the implications are, but once I do, I cry for a different reason.
Lisa, my friend. My protector. My Shadow Horse. She was protecting me, once again, by wiping my friend’s memory of me. She was giving her sweet memories and promising to wipe her family’s memory of me and their time in Nova.
The grayed specter was right. Can I survive knowing I made someone up and move their entire life because of me, or will I succumb to despair?
CHAPTER 29
Level Five- The Black Monster
Moni
“Where are we?” Lynx questions as we make our way through the woods without my sweet nectar of life, coffee.Oh, that will make this all better.I reach for my S.I.N. box only to find I can’t get into it. No! Now this is truly my version of hell. Holding back the burning tears threatening to escape, I shrug in answer to Lynx’s question. I look around, trying to get my bearings, but I’m as lost as he is.
“I don’t know. Knox?” I turn to glance at the big shifter. “Do you have a clue?” I ask, slightly pulling on my tail. It’s my first time without my Chestnut, and I’m on edge. I’m not even sure how we got separated when that ghosty lady showed up, but I can’t help but wonder if he’s okay, who’s with him, and if he’s getting along with everyone. I’m missing him like crazy. Even though I have two shifters with me, I need my own...maybe even as much as I need my coffee.
“By the smell of it, we’re close to water, at least,” he observes. We break through the tree line and out into a section that lookslike old campgrounds, but a shrill voice calls out before I can react.
“There you are, Monikaloy. I see you tried to run off again. Good thing those barriers are up,” a camp counselor wearing an ugly tan outfit says, glaring at me.
