Arise (23 page)

“So they offered you your freedom,” I asked softly, “in exchange for … me?”

“Not exactly,” the pirate said. “An intermediary has agreed to negotiate on our behalf, as long as she—”

“Silence!” The gray-haired woman cut him off with another hiss. She held him in her cold stare as she addressed the rest of their companions. “We’re done explaining things to her. Let’s get on with it.”

Upon hearing her command, they each nodded. Then they began to take slow, stalking steps toward me. Almost in unison, they extended their hands like claws, reaching for me.

They looked like predators. Dead, crazy predators.

Panic and terror boiled inside me, along with that damned, searing heat. But I still clenched my fists and let loose a feral snarl.

“I won’t go without a fight,” I growled.

Still moving in, the soldier chuckled darkly. “Good.”

Once again, something about him reminded me of Eli—of his cruelty and sadism; his pleasure in my pain.

And just like that, I was infuriated beyond rational thought. Suddenly, mindlessly, I began to stalk forward, too. Ready to meet them headlong.

But just as abruptly, they scrambled away from me, skittering back across the uneven surface of Bourbon Street like leaves. Only two ghosts remained close enough so that I could still see their eyes, which shined with fear.

When I peered closely, I realized they shined with the reflection of something else, too …

Something almost neon, and blue.

I didn’t even have time to register what I’d seen in their eyes before the burning inside me doubled. So much so that I felt like my brain had finally dropped that lit match into the kerosene.

The blaze was so hot, so blistering that I arched my back and then hunched forward, flailing in some subconscious effort to put out the fire. A particularly strong wave forced my head downward so that I faced my hands. When I saw them—still clenched in defense—a soft shriek escaped my lips.

My protective glow was back.

Sort of.

Instead of fire, traces of blue light raced each other up and down my hands, my wrists, my arms. I
glowed
again.

But not with the ghostly flame I knew. That flame had never harmed me. This glow
hurt
. Wherever the light moved it seared, leaving lines of pain in its wake. Roasting me from the inside out.

After a few seconds of mindlessly staring at my hands, I realized that the light followed the tracks of my veins. In fact, it looked as though the veins themselves were shining through my skin. Like blistering hot, illuminated pathways that followed the course of my dead circulatory system. Blue lights, crisscrossing the places where my blood once flowed.

This isn’t possible
, I thought.
It can’t be
.

Then it struck me:
this
is what I’d been feeling since Joshua and I left the cemetery. This is what had been boiling inside me. The slow, hot buildup of an internal lightning storm.

What did Gabrielle
do
to me?

With my mouth hanging open, I raised my head and faced the other ghosts.

None of them had vanished yet. They still hovered cautiously, at least a few feet away. But although the ghosts still watched me, none of them actually looked me in the eye. Instead, they seemed hypnotized—entranced by the light that snaked its way across my skin.

Slowly, one by one, they stirred. While I still writhed in pain, they leaned in to get a better view of my light show. And as they did so, their frightened expressions began to disappear.

They started to
smile
.

“Now this,” the pirate hissed, “is interesting.”

“What do you think?” the aristocrat whispered. “That she’ll be worth more to them like this?”

The soldier moved one scuffed boot closer to me. “What do you say, troops? Should we find out?”

The other ghosts nodded again and took slow, careful steps toward me.

Obviously, my light had only provided a momentary distraction. In a few more seconds, the ghosts would completely regain their confidence. Once that happened, they wouldn’t hesitate to capture me and serve me up to the darkness like a meal.

I had to get away from the ghosts; I knew I had to. But I just hurt so badly. I tried to move forward so that I could run, but the pain intensified. Instinctively, I curled into a ball and crossed my burning, glowing arms against my chest.

That move, however, was a mistake.

It was as if my arms had marked an X. All at once the fire contracted, rushed through my limbs and veins toward one target.

My heart.

The fire blossomed in my chest, unfurling petal after petal of pain. I thought my heart might explode, ending my existence right there on the grimiest street in New Orleans. But it kept scorching me—so fiercely, I actually screamed aloud.

Thank God I didn’t scream too loudly to hear someone calling out to me, shrill and urgent.

“Amelia! Holy hell, Amelia, get out of there!”

I didn’t recognize the voice, and I had the fleeting impression that I’d simply imagined it. But while I sucked in rapid, shallow breaths, I heard it again.

“Amelia!
Run!
”

And suddenly, I did just that.

Despite the incapacitating pain in my chest, despite the bloodlust shining in the Quarter ghosts’ eyes, despite my suspicion about who had shouted that last-minute warning—I ran.

I broke through the ghosts’ ranks easily, shoving in between the aristocrat and the gray-haired woman. As I passed, I felt their hands clawing at my dress, but I shrugged them off without a backward glance.

Free of the ghosts, I ran fast and hard down Bourbon Street. Sidestepping underage girls and bleary-eyed boys, dodging late-night hot dog vendors and people peddling booze in grenade-shaped cups. I flew past them all, pushing my legs to their limit until, finally, I couldn’t take another step.

I shouldn’t have felt the acidic burn of adrenaline in my legs. Nonetheless, it flooded my muscles with crippling force. I had just made it to the relative safety of a side alley when my thighs gave out and my legs buckled beneath me. There in the darkness I collapsed in a heap on the dirty ground.

All my energy spent, I gasped desperately for air and pressed my hands to my chest, where my heart still punished me with fire. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, couldn’t feel anything but scorching.

I couldn’t even open my eyes when a familiar voice spoke from somewhere above me.

“It worked,” a girl whispered. “Holy hell, it worked.”

“Jesus,” a male voice hissed. “What have you done?”

“What she asked me to do,” the girl snapped.

“She didn’t ask for this. Just look at her chest; look at her heart. Don’t you remember how that felt?”

“Yes,” the girl answered, surly. But her voice softened as she went on. “She can touch the living, Felix.”

“She can
what
?” he gasped.

“I know, I know. Try to touch her.”

The voices fell silent for a moment and then the boy whispered, “I can’t.”

The girl swore and then said, “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Well, can’t we just figure it out later?”

“Fine.” She sighed. “If you stand watch while I grab her—”

The boy cut her off. “Don’t I always help you clean up your messes?”

She made a petulant sound. “Don’t think you can lecture me just because you’re alive and I’m—”

“Gaby,” he warned, “now is not the time for that discussion.”

The voices once again fell into a tense silence. Then, so softly I knew I must have dreamed it, a set of arms slipped under mine. As someone lifted my body, I felt an impossible heaviness settle in my chest; and I wondered, deliriously, how anyone had the strength to carry such a weight.

“It’s happening,” the girl breathed. “Look.”

At that point I finally managed to flutter my eyelids open. In the few seconds I stayed conscious, I saw a pair of astonished, radiant blue eyes staring back into mine.

“Joshua,” I whispered. “I need to go back....”

I trailed off when my vision doubled. At least, that’s what I think it did; that was the only explanation for why I suddenly saw two indistinguishable pairs of blue eyes studying me.

I blinked, trying to clear my vision, but the moment I closed my eyelids, unconsciousness slipped over me.

Chapter

TWENTY

T
he world had gone dark again, like it had in my dreams. All around me, everything was still and quiet, except for the hushed lapping of water.

This time, however, I didn’t panic. I felt peaceful. At rest. And I had no idea why.

I kept my eyes shut, breathing shallowly for who knows how long. When I sensed daylight breaking, I opened my eyes and watched as a uniform layer of dark clouds became visible high above me. A weak sunrise began to filter through them, and I realized that I was somewhere outside, lying on my back and facing the sky.

But instead of leaping up and trying to figure out where I was, I shut my eyes again and did an unrushed self-appraisal. After what had just happened to me, I had the feeling I wouldn’t get another quiet moment to assess the damage I’d suffered; I had to take advantage now.

To my surprise, I found … nothing. Absolute nothing.

My thighs didn’t sting with adrenaline anymore, nor were my lungs straining from the effort of my run. Best of all, the fire in my chest was gone. My heart felt free, unburdened—as if the flame had never burned there.

Because I was suddenly free of pain, I assumed that
all
my physical sensations had disappeared. With my eyes still closed, I wriggled my fingers, expecting the numbness of death. When they touched something grainy and wet, I pulled them back into my palms.

For some strange reason, the sensation didn’t scare me. I opened my eyes, splayed my hands against the wet earth, and pressed myself up into a seated position.

First, I checked my body, now free of the blue-glowing veins. Evidently, they’d gone the way of the burning in my chest.

Next, I took in the wide expanse of slate-colored beach stretching out in front me. I sat in its sand, bare feet pressed to the ground, staring into what looked like an endless black sea. Only, I couldn’t really tell where the water stopped and the clouds began.

I felt everything now: the cold, gritty sand between my toes; the spray of mist off the water; the brisk chill of the wind.

Again, none of it scared me. If anything, it made me more peaceful than ever. Perhaps that mood allowed a memory to seep into my mind instead of flash suddenly as it usually did.

In the memory, I was a child, so young that the image seemed faded and patchy like an old photograph. I wore a bathing suit dotted with small, blue daisies—my favorite suit, I remembered. But I shivered, too, as I played doggedly on the muddy beach. Every few seconds I would toss a petulant glare back at my parents, who waited impatiently in the car. Seeing the image now, I didn’t blame them—it was an unseasonably cold day, and I was the only member of the family who hadn’t given up on our day trip to the lake.

The memory faded, until I was once again watching black waves lap at the beach of an unfamiliar sea. I had the sudden urge to touch the mud one more time. To mold it into something important. Something memorable.

Still feeling inexplicably calm, I squished my fingers into the silt. Before I could raise my hand, though, a hushed voice spoke next to me.

“I know what you’re thinking,” she said softly. “That this is an ocean. But it’s definitely not.”

I turned toward the voice, strangely unsurprised to see the pretty redhead from my prairie dream. She sat cross-legged next to me, arms propped behind her so that the sleeves of her green tunic skimmed the sand.

Looking at her, my brain did a few automatic leaps: if this girl—an obvious figment of my imagination—sat here, then that meant “here” was just another dream space. Which meant this place wasn’t real.

This also meant that my pain might not actually be gone.