“I did you a favor,” Hecate said. “You should be dead. Your soul should be gone. If it wasn’t for the magic I gave you and the spell that I cast on your cell you would be nothing but dust, your soul would have left, and turned into a lowly demon.”
Kimber gave no reaction. In fact, her skin was beginning to crack. Thin, black cracks that started at the tips of her lifeless fingers and began working their way up her wrists and arms. I watched in horror, my own body shaking, as I wondered if her skin would begin to flake off her body until she was nothing but a pile of bones.
“Stop!” Cole screamed, standing below Kimber, his arms raised as if he would pluck her from the air.
Whatever spell that was keeping Kimber semi-alive within her cell was clearly not working now that she was outside its confines.
I looked around for something I could use as a weapon, something to stop Hecate from whatever she was doing.
But it didn’t matter.
Hecate flung her fingers toward Kimber, who was tossed back into the dark cell, the door slamming with finality behind her. I couldn’t see her anymore, but I heard a smack against the granite walls and a whimpering of pain. I took that as a positive sign that she wasn’t dead. I was getting really tired of Hecate flicking her fingers and flinging people around.
Cole didn’t waste any time and threw the Marble against the floor. It shattered and a swirling portal burst open.
“Let’s go!” he yelled.
With a loud cry Sam charged the iron bars that confined him and sent them snapping outward as he broke free.
Hecate screamed in outrage at his strength. I took advantage of her distraction and ripped the scroll from her hands. She reacted quickly, jerking backward, and the fine paper of the Map ripped, leaving her holding the bottom section of the scroll. I threw what part I had to Cole and he tossed it through the portal and held out his hand for me to join him.
Sam charged the witch, slamming into her, and the torn piece of the Map fell from her hand. I grabbed it and looked down, not trying to read it, but feeling my mind click into place, retaining everything that on the page. Thank goodness for my new “ability” because a strong gust of wind pulled it right from my hands and into the burning flames.
“If I can’t have it, no one will!”
The Map no longer mattered as Sam and I ran for the portal. We were mere inches from jumping to safety when I heard him yell. I turned, but he was no longer behind me. He was back in the cell that he had just broken out of.
I looked at Cole and the safety of the portal. I felt my soul literally ripping from my body. Safety called to me.
I turned my back.
“Sam!” I ran toward him, but when I reached the cell door, my body hit something and bounced off some kind of invisible shield.
Hecate laughed. “You can’t get in and he can’t get out. He’s a prisoner now.”
“I won’t leave him!” I screamed, my voice coming out far weaker than I thought possible.
“Then, in seconds, your body will be ripped free of its soul and you will become a demon!”
You have to go, Heven.
Even through my blurry vision, I could make out every single beautiful line of Sam’s face. His sun-kissed hair was sticking up and gray from soot. He was still the most gorgeous thing I’d ever seen and he was still everything to me.
I won’t leave you here.
You don’t have a choice.
“Heven!” Cole said, grabbing my shoulder. “The portal is closing.”
“No!” I screamed and flung myself at the invisible wall that separated me from my beloved.
Please go. I can’t lose you,
he begged and flattened his palm against the wall.
Yet if I left, wouldn’t we lose each other?
Tears rained down my cheeks and blurred what was left of my vision.
I’ll get out of here, Heven. I’ll come home to you.
I pressed my shapeless hand up against his. We couldn’t touch, but I swear I felt his warmth through the barrier. A sob ripped from my throat.
Sam nodded, but he wasn’t looking at me anymore. He was looking at Cole. Suddenly, I was being lifted off my feet and carried away from everything that mattered.
Please forgive me,
Sam said.
“No!” I screamed. “No!” I hit Cole. I scratched and kicked, but nothing I did would make him let go of me. Through my screams Hecate’s laughter echoed around us.
I
hated
her.
I’ve never seen anyone look so miserable as he stood there and watched Cole tow me away. I hated myself in that moment for not being strong enough to get away.
“Sam,” I sobbed my voice hoarse.
I watched as the full lips that kissed me so many times formed the precious words,
I love you, Heven.
I heard them as a whispered rasp through my mind.
And then Cole stepped through the portal.
Today, Hell was denied the souls it had been trying to claim, but in the end, it stole something much more valuable, something I wasn’t sure I could exist without. My heart.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Heven
I wiped the tears from my face and blinked against the harsh light, realizing that it wasn’t quite light outside yet, but it was still far brighter than where we came from. I didn’t have the strength to pull away from Cole, but I didn’t really want to. I wasn’t mad at him for towing me away like that. He was only doing what he thought best. I glanced down at my hand and noted that the edges of my body were no longer blurred. My skin was pulled taut across flesh and bone and my soul was safely contained within my body. Sam traded his safety for mine.
I ducked my head into Cole’s shoulder and tried to stop my insides from trembling, but it was no use. While my soul and body may have recovered from the horrible events that just occurred, my brain was still trying to catch up.
“Heven, look at me,” Cole demanded, his voice sounding like he hadn’t spoken in weeks. It made me wonder how long we were down in the pits of Hell.
Cole grabbed me by the shoulders and forced me away from his body, holding me out so he could study me. “How badly are you hurt?” he whispered.
Tears filled my eyes. Did he really even have to ask? We left Sam in Hell. The place that is most famously known for destroying a person’s soul and turning them into evil zombies. While I knew that as a hellhound his soul would stay within his body, I was still beyond grief. The boy I loved most in this world was torn from me and I don’t know when and if I would see him again.
“I’ll get you to the hospital,” Cole said, standing up and taking me with him. He swayed a little on his feet and I knew that he was trying to hold it together for me.
“I don’t need to go to the hospital.”
He looked at me strangely before slowly asking me if my face hurt.
I shook my head. The only thing that hurt was my chest, where my heart used to reside.
“Heven, focus,” Cole said firmly and planted me on my feet. He kept his hands clasped around my biceps as if he thought I might crumble to the ground if he released me. “Your face.”
I made a frustrated sound. What about my face? I flung my hands up and pressed them to my cheeks and stopped, my eyes flashing up to Cole’s. Slowly, I lowered my hands noting that one set of fingers came away bloody. Visions of a swinging chain burst behind my eyes. Sam’s anger and cry of protest rang through my ears and I remembered.
Beelzebub tried to lash Sam with a chain.
I got in the way.
“Doesn’t it hurt?” Cole asked apprehensively.
“No.”
The look on his face told me that he didn’t believe me.
I tentatively touched the gash once more. “It doesn’t,” I whispered. The pain of leaving Sam in that horrible place was far worse than any physical pain could ever be.
“You must be in shock. I think you need stitches…”
He was waiting for me to freak out, to scream and melt down. I wasn’t going to.
I didn’t have time for that.
I had to be strong; I was Sam’s only shot at getting out.
Sam. Sam, are you okay?
Please God, let me still be able to reach him through our Mindbond. If we didn’t have that I was sure I would crumble.
Heven! Did you make it out? Where are you?
I literally sagged with relief, swallowed past the lump in my throat and swiped at my tears with the back of my hand. I could still talk to him. We still had our link.
Yes, I’m fine. Cole and Logan are fine too.
(At least I prayed Logan was okay.)
His rush of gratitude and relief strengthened the tether I had on sanity and made me all the more determined to get him out.
Thank God.
What about you? Did Beelzebub come back yet?
I’m fine. He isn’t here.
That was something at least. Still, how long until he came back, madder than ever? We had to work fast to get Sam out of there.
“Where are we?” I asked Cole looking around, trying to get a handle on my surroundings.
“The fountain,” he said patiently, pointing a short distance away at the fountain that we had entered what seemed an eternity ago.
The Treasure Map was lying next to the fountain. Well, what was left of it. I retrieved it on wobbly legs. I didn’t want the stupid thing. It had caused more pain and heartache than anything. I was beginning to wonder if any of it had been worth it.
Of course it had.
I scolded myself as I tucked the scroll beneath my arm.
It brought you Sam.
“I need to go check on Logan.” I didn’t know what kind of shape Logan was in, but I knew that I would do whatever it took to keep him alive. When Sam came home—and he
would
come home—his brother would be healthy and whole.
Just then a blur darted out from between a few parked cars and came at us. I braced myself, but the figure stopped just shy of barreling me over. “What took so long?” she demanded.
My muscles couldn’t relax even though this person was not a threat. “Gemma, Sam is trapped in Hell. We were forced to leave him there. We have to go back and get him. We need a plan.”
“What happened to you?” Her eyes widened as she came closer to stare at my face.
“It’s nothing.” I waved it away. “Can you help me get Sam back?”
“Of course I will help. But now isn’t the time. You’re injured.”
I gritted my teeth. Didn’t she see the urgency of the situation? I looked at Cole for some back up. He looked beaten up and exhausted. I sighed. “Could you check out Cole? He took a few hard hits down there.”
Just like that she was gone and instantly at Cole’s side. I turned to watch the pair together.
“Cole?” Gemma asked, her voice lowering in volume. “Let me see.”
“I’m fine,” he insisted, but didn’t turn away from Gemma’s seeking hands. She grasped his head lightly and pulled him closer to examine his injuries. She made a small noise in her throat as she studied the swollen, blackened eye.
“You’ll live,” Gemma declared. Her fingertips splayed lightly over his wounds, moving in an intimate caress. I wanted to look away. It was painful to see the connection between them and know I abandoned the one with whom I shared that kind of connection with.
But I couldn’t look away. I couldn’t tear my eyes from them. I felt a lump form in my throat and the threat of tears behind my eyes.
Just as I was about to lose all control, Gemma lowered her hand and stepped back. Cole’s face was completely healed.
“The back of his head has a gash in it,” I told her, so she would heal that too.
Cole glared at me for admitting to yet another injury and ruining his ‘tough’ guy image, but I didn’t care. Sam was already in enough danger. I wanted my brother safe.
Gemma slid her hands through Cole’s thick, dark hair and brought them together at the back of his head. When she pulled away, her fingers were red. She frowned at the smears on her fingers.
“Hey,” Cole murmured, grabbing her elbow and breaking the spell his blood seemed to have over her. She looked up and blinked at him. “It’s really not that bad.”
Gemma nodded and threaded her fingers back into his hair, Cole’s eyes fluttering closed. The next thing I knew, Gemma had released him and was coming toward me.
I backed up as far as I could go, but the fountain was at my back. “I don’t want to be healed,” I told her.
Gemma stopped and stared at me. “No?”
“No.” Why should I be healed and pain free when Sam was down in Hell suffering? Panic welled up inside me. I couldn’t leave him there. I couldn’t.
“Heven, that’s crazy,” Cole said, striding forward. He stopped at Gemma’s side. “She isn’t thinking clearly. She…”
“Why don’t any of you seem to get it?!” I yelled. “Sam is trapped in Hell! We have to go back, now!”
“And we will get him back, Hev,” Cole said, using that patient voice again. I hated the way he talked to me like I was going bonkers. I turned my back on him.
“Please,” I said desperately to Gemma. “I need you to do something for me,”
She nodded. “Anything.”
“Take care of Logan. Keep him safe till I get back.”
She didn’t understand. “Get back?”
I nodded and began walking away from the fountain, then stopped and turned back, ready to launch myself at it the way Sam had.
“I’m going back to Hell to get Sam.”
I started to run.
Gemma caught me around the waist before I could jump at the fountain and tackled me to the ground.
“Let me go!” I screamed, trying to shove her off. “I’m going!”
Gemma pinned me to the ground and I made a sound in frustration. I was done with being weak. If she wouldn’t train me, I would find someone who would. “The portal will not open for you. It will only open for Sam.”
I stopped struggling against her and a sob caught in my throat. I hadn’t thought about that.
Her voice gentled when she said, “Even if you could, it’s too soon. You’re soul is still vulnerable and needs some time to root more firmly back in your body.”
“My soul is fine,” I growled.
“You will be of no help to Sam right now. You’re injured, exhausted and your soul…”