Destine (The Watcher's Trilogy) (31 page)

I stepped back up to the chair and without hesitati
on I leaned all the way forward
and pressed the cross to the area of bare skin exposed by Cami’s v-neck shirt
.
The skin hissed and smoked, and Cami let out a glass-shattering scream
.
She tried to wriggle and m
ove, but it was as if the cross
had her somehow pinned beneath its weight
.
I felt the cross sinking into her skin as if it was hot metal being pushed into
ice cream
.
I silently hoped that it wouldn’t leave a life-long scar, but somehow letting Cami remain in the grips of the Anti-Christ just because I didn’t want to give her a scar didn’t seem like having my priorities straight
.
As the
cross
hissed
and burned its way into my
friends
chest I began to pray
.
I had never been one for prayer before all this began to occur, but I remembered
that
with
Scarlett
praying had
summoned Michael
.

I
didn’t recite any formal
prayer,
instead the pray
er was more of me begging for help. “Please God, please
…
I just want to save her
.
Please give me back my best friend
.
Please give me back the girl
who has made me laugh and smile
since the first day I met her in kindergarten.
”
I began to cry as I prayed, but these weren’t tears for me
.
These weren’t tears of despair and defeat; these were tears for Cami, tears of anger
.
The warm salty tears ran down my face like liquid hate, hate for what Cami had become,
hate
for the situation we now found ourselves in, and hate for Alex Chase
.
Cami deserved more than this, she deserved
to live a happy normal teenage
existence
and go away to college and have all her dreams
come true
.
I had always been the one without the plans, without the dreams, just blindly following life w
h
ere ever it took me
.

As I cried the tears be
g
an to drip from my chin onto Cami’s face and chest
.
Gabriel step
ped
up behind me and la
id
his hands on my shoulders
.
I quickly shook him off.
I had come this far and I wasn’t stopping now
.
Cami continued to hiss and fight, but all her struggle seemed to be restrained by the power of the cross
.
I uttered one more pathetic, desperate, “Please
…
” and the room exploded with blinding light
.
It was the same light I had experienced on the football field
.
I
t
was so bright I stumbled backwards, ripping my cross o
ff
Cami
as I shielded my eyes
.
It could have been my imagination, but I thought I actually felt
it rip from her skin.

The light was so i
ntense I wasn’t sure if it was just light or
if t
here was ac
tually heat to go along with it
.
The blazing glow left me
completely blinded, immobile, and
defenseless
on the floor
.
As my brain began to work again,
I
started
to slide along the floor hoping to find my way to the
doorway
.
I had to escape this blinding light before I went mad
.
I hadn’t remembered it lasting this long last time
.

I reached my arms out, feeling for the wall, the door, anything to help me find my way away from this light
.
As I grasped blindly out in front of me, my hand landed on something
.
I felt
cool fingers wrap around mine, and just before I let out a terrified scream I
realized
it was Gabriel. He also
had been struck
defenseless
by the light
.
He pulled on my hand and grasped at my arm until I started to scoot across the very rough wood floor
.
I would have preferred to crawl to him, but we both seemed confused and disoriented
.
The moment I was in reach of him, he pulled me to his side and threw his arms over my face and shielded my body with his
.
I was about to protest when he rather aggressively shoved my face to
the floor
.
I lay like that for what I’m sure was only seconds, but felt like hours, with my face pressed against the old musty floor breathing my own hot breath back into my face, and then suddenly I heard a loud thump and the room went dark
.

It was as if I had been staring into the sun and I was now in a dimly lit room
.
I blinked hard, but all I could see was the dance of dark sp
l
otches
across
my vision
.
Gabriel roll
ed
to the side, freeing me from
underneath him
.
He made no attempt to move either, and so I assumed that he was as blind as I was
.
Suddenly my mind cleared and I remember the thump I had heard from the other side of the room
.
I launched myself to my feet, and stumbled in the direction I had heard the thump
.
I was still rather blind as my poor pupils attempted to adjust to the change in light, so when I tripped over the limp mass of my best friend I didn’t entirely know what it was
.
But as I hit the ground and braced myself with my palms, it didn’t take long to realize what I had tripped over
.
The lifeless body of my best friend lay in my path
.
My eyes had finally adjusted enough for me to see her blond
e
curls tossed across her face and her very still, very motionless body where it had collapsed to the floor
.
Her arms were still bo
und and her feet w
ere s
till tied to the chair;
she lay on her side
,
still attached to the chair, eyes closed
.
I crawled over to her and began untying her feet
.
The way her limbs flopped as I moved her set off alarm bells in the back of my mind
.
Surely she was just
unconscious
, but as I moved her the
panicked
feeling began to rise in the back of my throat and my eyes began to burn with unshed tears
.
I felt the hysteria bearing
down on me and the panic
was
about to eclipse any rational thoughts I still had, but then Gabriel was at my side lifting Cami off the floor
.
He looked at her as she hung limply in his arms
, and all I could do was stare at him from my position on the floor. It seemed neither of us knew what to do next
.

Then
I heard
the most
glorious sound ever;
Cami took a deep, shuddering breath
.
She gasped as if she hadn’t been breathing, like she was drowning and just now breached the surface of the water
.
The tears t
hat had been pooling in my eyes
spil
led over and rushed down my chee
ks crashing on my chest and hands
.
I saw Gabriel jolt with surprise at the sound and then smile
.
He knelt down and gingerly laid Cami across my lap
.
She continued to breath
e
, taking long deep breaths, but the relief was short lived
.
Abruptly her eyes shot open, and instead of the deep ocean blue eyes I was use
d to seeing o
n Cami’s face, cloudy almost
opaque eyes stared back at me. A
nd then she began to scream
.

The scream cut through the silence that had followed the light like
a sharp piece of glass into
flesh
.
I cringed but I never moved her head from where I had it cradled in my lap
.
She screamed and screamed, loud incoherent shri
ek
s
.
I began to rock her in my lap, back and forth, holding her upper body in my arms and squeez
ing her reassuringly, softly shush
ing her like a m
other attempting to qui
et
a newborn baby. Unfortunately Cami was no new
born and her screams weren’t screams of hunger or tiredness these were screams of pure terror
.

Gradually she began to qui
et
down
.
I don’t know if it was out of fear, exhaustion, or if I was actually quieting her, but she eventually stopped screaming and just laid in my lap and cried
.
She cried for a long time, a time so long that her tears actually dried up before she stopped sobbing
.
Gabriel had abandoned his post at the far wall and had sat down next to me while I held Cami.

Finally, after
what felt like hours Cami spoke.
“
I can’t see,” she whimpered
.

“I know, I know, it
’s
going to be okay,” I soothed
.
“Maybe
it’s
not permanent.
”

“I’m being punished,” she whispered
.
“This is what I deserve, this is what happens.
”

“No, no, n
o,” I shook my head refusing to believe such a thing
.
“You didn’t know Cami, you didn’t know what Alex was, you just had a crush that’s all, and you got sucked in.
”

“You didn’t get sucked in,” she stated in a voice that was hoarse from screaming
.
“You saw him for what he was from the very beginning.
”
She shifted in my lap. “You’re a good friend
,
Chell
, I didn’t deserve to be saved
.
I got so caught up in my own vanity and desire for popularity I just fell right into his trap.” She turned on her side and coughed
.
I knew her throat was raw, but I had nothing to offer her to drink
.

“Cami, I tried to save you because of the person I know you are
.
I know
whom
you are deep down. G
ive yourself some credit
, y
ou are a good person, you’re the person who has been there for me th
r
ough everything.
”

I heard her take a deep breath
,
but before she could sigh the breath caught in her raw throat and she coughed
.
“I wish I was strong like you, but I’m not
.
I’m not a fighter.
”

“Come on, Cami
,
let
’s get you to the car.
” I motioned to
Gabriel
for help
.

He reached out a
nd laid his hand on my shoulder.
“Can I talk to you, over there?” he asked pointing to the other side of the room
.

I moved Cami out of my la
p and leaned her against the wall;
she looked so t
ir
ed and helpless, her cloudy eyes staring off
at nothing
.
“I’ll be right back Cami, I have to talk to Gabriel for a minute.
”
A whimper escaped her lips, but she nodded lik
e she understood
.
I can’t say I
blame her, I was scared to death and I hadn’t lost my sight
.
I stood and followed Gabriel to the other side of the room
.

“We can’t take her anywhere, Michelle
.
Think about it, where would we go?
”
he asked.

“Look at her, what else are we going to do with her?” I asked
.