Page 42

The air ‌was stagnant around the fools.

A ring of fallen evergreens danced with the signs of an impending storm, their leaves shuddering, unwilling victims to what they were to witness. Thunder rolled above the ridge.

Darkness encroached around the five figures in the clearing, dresses and suits snapping in the wind. Gone was the daylight, replaced by lantern light. The flames within trembled whenever the breeze clawed too hard. The lonely ring of protection—a dwindling circle of salt—once a clean, thick boundary, was slowly being bled away by the storm.

Kieran Lazarus stood at the edge of the circle, shoulders squared against the backdrop of shuddering trees. His breath came in thin exhales. His hand rested on a heavy talisman draped in iron chains. “Are we ready? Do we have Christian arriving soon?” His jaw hardened as he scanned the group. They were always too afraid, he thought.

If anyone had to be afraid, it was the Demon of Devil’s Bay, a very superfluous man in my opinion.

Cassandra answered first. Her eyes flicked toward the bowls of shimmering liquid at their feet. “Do we have enough serum from the lab?” Her voice was sharp enough to cut through the whistling wind.

From the shadows, Irene elegantly shrugged as she struggled to maintain the flame of her cigarette. “We’ve been greedy,” she said. Irene believed that greed was an art. Avarice ‌was not a goal of their group—it was about alchemy, the allure of bathing yourself in deviance that humankind would frown upon. It was about collecting things that no one else could get their hands on. As always, her tone suggested her usual dismissal of consequences.

Killian Bishop hovered close to the salt’s fractured edge, the storm lifting strands of his hair across his face, always etched with hunger he could never control. Killian was isolated in his secret. Immorcantem alone would not curb his sickness. He knew what they all wanted was dangerous, these many people shoving themselves into places they didn’t belong. “They will come for us, for anything that we love. Should we even consider another cycle? Christian’s morgue has enough bodies to cultivate serums for us each.” His words slipped out faster than he meant to. Anything to keep the possibility of a cure within reach without upsetting the Limina.

Too late, I was already watching.

The forest grew darker. The storm’s pressure stifled the air, dense with warning. What they were treading on had only been done by one person, not multiple. Beyond the line of salt, the woods spoke in hushed tones.

Kieran exhaled slowly, then lifted the talisman, feeling its gravitational pull, the power of the gate forming. For him it was a delicious feeling holding his young life’s work. Enough with the secrets, he thought to himself. If they were a group, drawn together by the dark things they’d done, they would survive this.

It was getting dramatic and I couldn’t help but lean closer.

“He should be the one who does it,” Cassandra suggested, wiggling her fingers. “Make it spicy.”

“I think you need to remember how we’ve arrived here Cassandra. Without my tenacity and bravery. None of this would happen. I have been shouldering the town when they ask questions, the bodies—if only they knew this is what happened with lost people. The ones who come here and think that Devil’s Bay is idyllic and wonderful. It is not,” Kieran lambasted. He then turned his gaze on the tree line where my favorite pawn was meant to emerge minutes ago.

Kieran’s tired tirade had been heard before. What kept them together all these years was their fervent need for more. More knowledge. More youth. More money. More infamy. And recently, the possibility of immortality.

“There’s more down there that you haven’t told us about. If Immorcantem is among the best of substances that place has to offer us. I would like to find out.” Killian dragged a hand down his face. Immorcantem was already proven to not work on dying bodies, which is why they were there in the first place. Thoughts bounced around Killian’s mind: would Kieran be able to retrieve Daisy’s soul to stitch back into her body? Could he be implicated in a murder case? What would happen to Marisa?

The wind rose sharply, a crescendo in an already loud atmosphere, swirling the last grains of salt into a stream of cold air. Kieran had already decided what would happen tonight; the others would follow, knowing they had their shares of desires. They would open the gate and Kieran would cross first. And this time, Christian would have no choice but to follow him.

And so I watched and waited for this to unfold.

TWENTY

Evening

September 24, 2010

“Even silence can rot.”

— DR. ARIK MARLOWE

The silence of this place might just be the thing that drives me to the edge. Dim lighting cascades around the dining room. Behind me a roaring fire crackles, sending embers flying near my cold feet every so often. The cavernous space smells of fresh herbs and roasted meat.

I need to ingest something before the visuals of the entire day flood my mind but nausea roils through my body. I feel a trembling, bones grinding against one another. I scoot out of my chair and crouch before the fire. Soot puffs up at my dress. Dirt had managed to seep its way into every fiber over the course of the day.

I peer over my shoulder toward the threshold between the dining room and the main hallway. Kieran is busying himself with locking the doors, windows and every crawl space from here to the shore. I politely declined the offer he’d extended to join him, because for one, my mind was failing to wrap itself around that thing in the East Wing. Two, I would have to explain my unwarranted snooping from earlier in the day. And three, I needed to come up with a plan to get back to the lake tomorrow.

He returns a few moments later. The fire seems to react to his entrance and the darkness of the hallway parts around him. He raises his hand showing me a bottle of wine.

“Is this your way of making me forget you live in a hell house?” I quirk my brow at him, earning a flash of sharp teeth. His eccentrically kind demeanor has returned and I’m grateful for it. I rise from the fire, walk back to my seat and pull it closer to the table. He uncorks the bottle with ease. Wine sloshes as he leans over me to fill my glass. It’s then I notice the hollowness of his cheeks and the darkness of his eyes weren’t a fabrication of the lighting, but rather a tiredness that seems to have dug its talons into his body.

“You look like you need a vitamin.” I comment, which earns me a deep chuckle.

He plops himself into a chair near me and exhales loudly.