A wild idea flies through my brain.
“You know, Chloe, during the faction war it was me who Demetri was helping, not you.”
A fire brews in her eyes. Her entire person illuminates with rage in only the way that Chloe Bishop can.
“Why don’t I ask him for you?” I taunt. “I bet he’d pop that haunted DVD in right this second if I asked real nice. I bet we’d witness every single one of your Gage-free days, right down to your final hours when you call his name, and he refuses to answer.”
A sting ignites across my cheek as she releases an open-palmed slap, but I revel in it. I revel in the fact Chloe is eating a shit burger right now and having one hell of a time trying to digest it.
“I’ll tell you your life story in a single breath,” I volunteer, still nursing the side of my face. “You continue to make my life miserable until I find a way to hack through that chain you’ve welded on your neck. I’ve already put great thought into how I’m going to kill you the second time around. I’m going to crumble up a thousand pictures of Gage and me, happy in every single one, and I’m going to shove them so far down your throat you’ll choke to death. That’s right. You think you can hurt people in order to force them to love you, but the truth is nobody can stand you because we all see you for what you are. You’re a monster, Chloe. You suffer the worst disfigurement known to man. You have no heart.”
The room warbles, it shifts and moves in silver waves, fluid as mercury with the implications just as lethal.
Chloe latches onto me, pushing her fingers into my flesh so deep she’s become a part of me, and we fall through the inter-dimensional trapdoor, with fire and brimstone rising all around us.
I’m headed straight for hell, and I’m taking Chloe Bishop with me.
Chloe and I sail downward through a funnel of fire, the walls ablaze with a heat so searing I can feel the burn on my face, my bare arms sting as we enter into a never ending free fall. Chloe pulls me in and locks her arms and legs around me. I know what she’s doing—getting ready to use me as a cushion to break her fall.
We grunt and kick, fighting like hell with neither of us willing to let go of the other. It’s a wrestling match that spans dimension, time continuums,
gravity
.
A navy film of darkness expands at our feet as we continue to plummet like stones. Branches blink in and out of focus, gnarled and twisted, charred from the sheer horror of what they’re forced to witness. With a crash, our bodies land in a thicket of trees. Dead evergreens with pallid tendrils break our fall as Chloe and I slice down the sides of the pines until I grab onto one and jump the rest of the length to the ground, soft as a whisper.
“Shit,” she grunts, landing flat on her face. Honest to God, I half expect her nose to be molded to the side of her face from the sheer heft of her fall.
“That looked nasty,” I say, dusting my bottom off for no good reason. “I bet Demetri himself increased the velocity a little just to watch you slam to the ground like that. You know you’re bad when the one creature that has to stay on your side doesn’t want to help you.”
“Skyla,” Logan hums from behind and I spin, taking a breath at what I see. Logan’s skin gives the slightest hint of an illuminated glow. His eyes shine like molten gold. Logan is a sight to behold. I could easily spend the rest of my life suspended in this moment just trying to wrap my head around his beauty.
“You didn’t fall with me.” I hop on the balls of my feet and peck a kiss on his lips.
“You brought a guest.” He looks over my shoulder, disapproving.
“Not really, she hopped along for the ride—kind of like a parasite.”
Ingram appears, the troll who thinks he rules the underworld of the Celestra tunnels. He glows a sickly yellow, nothing at all like the pale blue splendor that Logan emits. Logan does have some Count blood, and he did pledge over, maybe that’s why he’s blue. Nevertheless, he’s too damn hot for words.
“Move it,” Ingram yips. “Junior Council has places to go this evening.” He takes a step and stops abruptly after spotting Chloe. I bet he’s never seen anything so wicked, so vile, so inexplicably evil in all his dungeon-master days.
“Ms. Bishop.” He gives a slight bow. “You’ve been taken?”
“Heavens no.” Chloe averts her gaze as if this were impossible. “I’m here of my own volition. I thought I’d accompany my friend. Lend her moral support in her time of need.”
“Why don’t you lend me about eight pints of blood?” I quip. And what’s with Chloe and the Titan of the Tunnels making small talk? And why the hell doesn’t it surprise me that the Tenebrous Woods are her old stomping grounds?
“You and Chloe are friends?” Logan wraps his arm around me tight as we follow Ingram down the winding path. “When did this happen?”
“It happened
never
. She’s just trying to meet her quota of lies for the day. I’m her most prolific subject if you haven’t noticed.”
We walk a short distance, past hollowed out shells of trees, tall and silent evergreens that hold their arms toward heaven as if they were begging God for mercy.
The slight stench of something burning tickles my nostrils, and I’m scared to death we might accidentally stumble upon a Celestra on a spit.
“Here.” Ingram points to an enormous oak tree so thick and wide, it can double as a hotel.
A deep blue mist seeps around us and out of the oily haze emerges Wesley, the boy who resembles Gage closer than a mirror reflection, except for the eyes. Wesley’s eyes are the color of ocean fungus, and Gage mimics a clear L.A. sky.
Chloe staggers forward in full stalker mode. “Who in the hell is
this
?”
“Wesley Paxton.” Ingram is quick to fill her in on the details.
“What’s the matter, Chloe?” I sneer. “A carbon copy of the boy you love just step out of a demon-inspired night?” I love teasing Chloe with yet another boy she can’t have. “Too bad he’ll reject you just like Gage. He’s got his heart wrapped around a girl back home. She’s beautiful, and sweet, basically everything you’re not.” I pump a quick smile before Ingram shoots me a wild look.
“Elysian,” he says it bored, “do present the offering to the Junior Council. We all have better places to be.”
“Damn straight,” I whisper.
“What’s that?” Ingram barks. The last time I pissed him off he instructed Wesley to drain me.
“I said, please Master, take me quickly.” I give a sarcastic curtsy into Logan. It was made clear in the beginning that I’m to ixnay the use of proper monikers and address Logan as “Master” each and every time.
“Better.” Ingram motions me toward Wes, and I head over willingly.
“Hi,” he says it quiet, with a touch of shyness. His lids are hooded, and for a fleeting moment I really do believe it’s Gage.
“Why do you do this?” I don’t hesitate getting into the ready position. “I mean, you don’t really strike me as the pure evil type.”
Wes pumps a dry laugh, but his dimples don’t quite pronounce themselves as they would on Gage. Wes and Gage are polar opposites. Gage would never steal the lifeblood from someone who was held prisoner. Hell, he won’t take it from me half the time I offer when he really, really needs it.
“Who’s this?” He whispers as Chloe walks mechanically forward, her hair wild and disheveled from the fall, her hands held out as if she needed to touch him even at a distance.
I roll my eyes at the sight. “Would you cut the bride of Frankenstein routine?” I snipe at Chloe. “Like I said, Wes isn’t interested. Get it through your fractured skull, he’s devoted to someone who’s
not
Chloe Bishop. Kind of funny, isn’t it? It looks like Gage will reject you in all his incarnations.”
“This isn’t Gage,” her voice quivers. Her fingers tremble as she taps alongside his face. “He can never be Gage.”
“Ms. Bishop, is there a problem?” Ingram asks as though he’s genuinely concerned. He seems to like her well enough. Maybe
he
can have her? Now there’s a match made in hell if I’ve ever seen one, and I mean that in a good way.
“No.” She backs away like escaping from a gunman. “No problem, please continue with the show. I’m dying to watch from a spectator’s point of view.”
A spectator’s point of view? As if she ever played the part of victim. I wonder when her ugly mug haunted these woods last?
Wes presses out an apologetic smile before pulling me in by the waist like I were his girlfriend. He smooths his lips over my neck prepping me for the puncture. His hot tongue runs a heated line over a small area, and a perverted part of me pretends he’s Gage—that it’s simply Gage loving me and not some strange boy from a place I’ve never heard of.
Wes bites down and draws the first hard pull of blood. A surge of adrenaline courses through my veins, and my eyes spring open surprised at the fresh bite of pain.
Laken filters through Wesley’s mind. Her long, golden hair swings from side to side as she runs into the arms of another boy. I recognize him from the war. Cooper Flanders.
I hope Cooper gets the girl
, I say as Wes continues to maul my neckline.
I bet Cooper wouldn’t hesitate to save her from a monster like you. In fact, I bet he’s planning on doing just that.
Wes pulls back and examines me, rife with anger. A seam of sanguine liquid lines his lips, and my stomach turns at the sight.
“Don’t you ever have anything nice to say?” He wipes his mouth with the back of his sleeve.
Chloe whoops out a laugh.
“Sounds as if you know Skyla pretty well,” she quips.
I pump a depleted smile at him. “I do have nice things to say, Wes, just not to people like you. Not when you’re hell bent on hurting me, on hurting others.” I shake my head. “Listen, if you really want to get the girl, stop acting like you’re untouchable. Everyone pays for their sins eventually. Laken will know all about this one day, and she won’t be pleased.”
For a second I’m hopeful that I’ve made Wes sick from the sight of me, which was my wicked plan. I’m in no position to be taken and drained when the only person I can depend on to rescue me is Chloe.
I reach forward and take up his hand.
Look, I didn’t mean to piss you off,
I say.
I’m just trying to get home tonight in one piece. I can’t afford to wake up alone and dying in the arms of my enemy. Honestly, I don’t think there’s a worse way to go.
“How about watching someone else steal your girlfriend?” Wes is good and pissed. I’ve bruised his ego, and he’s got a look in his eye that says I’ll have to pay. “That’s a pretty crappy way to go, Skyla.” He sighs and glances over his shoulder at Chloe. “She won’t let you die. I can see it in her eyes.”
“Her eyes lie.”
Wesley gently pulls me in by the face like he’s about to land a tender kiss over my lips. “I’m sorry, Skyla.” Wes plunges over my neck with a rabid aggression. He sucks the life giving plasma out of me, urgent and greedy.
I need my fuel, and you’re the best. I’m planning on bringing Laken down here soon. She’ll prove you wrong, Skyla. She wants to be a Count. She openly begs for more. Cooper may get the girl, but it won’t be mine.
My lids flutter open. The Tenebrous Woods blink back with surprise as if Wesley’s actions appalled these sooted-trees the most.
Wes evaporates in a cloud just the way he came, and I drop to my knees, too weak to support my own body weight.
“Skyla!” Logan kneels beside me and draws me onto his lap. “Where were you on Paragon? Where did they take you from?”
“Demetri’s,” I whisper. “Just me and Chloe.” I shake my head at the hopelessness of it all as the world begins to warble and shift.
Logan spikes to his feet and rattles Chloe by the sweater. “Help her, dammit!” He roars like a lion, and I buck at the impressive sound of his voice, as deep and wide as a mountain. “You fucking
owe
me!”
And the world goes dark.
It’s a strange feeling knowing you’re locked in a dream, that your lids struggle to open but can’t.
I can feel my body moving through time and space, my head bobbing up and down.
“Skyla!” My mother’s voice echoes my name. It sounds as though I’m buried in deep waters, the vibrations from her demanding tone move from above in waves. “Demetri, do something! Damn it all to hell, I will never speak to you again if you don’t fix this right this minute.”
A sharp sting ignites just beneath my thigh. My lids quiver, and I see Marshall’s precious face, interchangeably with my mother’s. I’ve become an infant all over again, and they’re admiring me in tandem.
Death played fast and loose with the rules, killing and resurrecting me by the power of my own Celestra blood. It was a gift and a curse all rolled into one.
I give a few hard blinks and wake to my mother holding me in my bed, back at our own house, far from Demetri’s, far from Marshall’s. Here I was within the familiar walls of my bedroom, perched on this demonic rock called Paragon.
“Skyla.” Her tear-stained face dissolves in a heartbreaking smile.
“Mommy,” I whisper, falling asleep again, safe in her arms.
A new day dawns over the Landon house. I peer out the window at the mango-colored sky as morning cries out like a newborn.
Nev swoops down in all his ebony caped glory, and I roll open the window to let him inside.
Snowball lets out a series of high-pitched gurgles and bats her wings in a panic.
“Don’t worry cutie-pie,” I purr. “It’s not like Nev, here, is going to eat you.”
Nevermore lands on my shoulder with a hard thump and stares intently into the cage.
Why in heavens are you allowing this ornery fowl to disgrace your bedroom?
“Nev! Go easy on her would you? She’s totally precious. I accidently killed her years ago, and Marshall was kind enough to resurrect her for me.”
Nev lets out a squawk, loud as a fire alarm, right in my ear.
“Ouch.” I buck him off. “And would you keep it down? I’m pretty sure Tad would be up for an early morning hunting session in my bedroom. Now that we’re broke, nothing is off the menu so long as it’s f-r-e-e.”