When Silver Moons Rise (Lost Immortals Saga #2) (5 page)

“Absolutely not,” Father barks, his strong voice startling all of us.

“I’m not an invalid or a baby, Father,” Micah says, his chest heaving. The pity he gets from people makes him angry. It ticks me off a bit too. The doctors said he should recover the use of his legs within a few weeks. It has been almost three months, and he still hasn’t regained his ability to walk.

Nina gives my brother one of her rare smiles. I can tell she likes him much better than she does me. “No worries, James. I think it’s best the children know what’s going on.” And on that note, she offers my brother a sympathetic look just before she stands and takes the reader over to him. Micah rolls his chair toward my seat and stops beside me.

My heart thuds, and I feel like someone attached weights to my shoes. I inhale deeply. Micah places a hand on my arm, bracing for what we’re about to see. I stare into my brother’s green eyes that are so unlike my hazel-brown ones. He has deep red hair that shines so much brighter than my coppery strands mixed inside a dark, wavy mop of mess. I won’t even mention the two silver strands that frame either side of my forehead. No set of twins could ever look so different. Our souls are one and the same though.

In the images on the screen, Mrs. Needlemeyer’s corpse lays in a contorted position. Her body almost looks like she fell and somehow twisted the top part of it around backward. Her lifeless gray skin reminds me of the way Muriel looked after Seth finished sucking the life out of her.

Choking on sobs, I stand and open my mouth to scream. Silence. Desperately needing to be out of Nina’s presence, I head toward the stairway.

“Leaving so soon, Chela?” Nina’s chilly voice causes me to turn around. “Don’t you even want to know how this happened?”

Thunder booms set my heart aflutter even more, and a gust of wind rushes around the outside of our house. The lights blink on and off. I know what’s happening. The things going on around us at the moment are my doing, the first bit of power I’ve created in months. Slowly, I turn around. “Her eyes. They’re—they’re gone.”

“Be calm, CC. Hold it inside.” Father walks over to where I’m standing and places his arms across my shoulders.

“You wanted to see. Now you know,” Nina gives me an accusing look. Okay, so yeah, I already know some of this is my fault. She doesn’t have to make me feel like complete crap.

“I didn’t think it would be something like this.” My voice breaks. Micah sits silently in his chair, his head lowered. He’s crushed by what we’ve seen.

My brother always considered our nanny who was also our home school teacher the closest thing to a mother we’ve ever had. Like me, he never bonded with Bess, Father’s new wife, and her bratty daughter, Audrina. A selfish part of me is glad they’re not around to share in this private moment.

“Our people are getting butchered, Chela. They’re being drained of their blood. Things like this are what happens when you play games. A good example of that is when you pretend you can’t read the words inside of important scrolls. Do you understand the extent of this situation now?” Nina bites out at me.

Boy do I ever understand.

You’ve screwed up again, Prizeon.

Nina is talking about the scroll Leezra Konkrin gave the king of Bardonia, Zanas Indrail, just before she came to our world and lost her memory. Only Leezra’s ancestors, the descendants of the seraphim—people like me—can read the scroll. A few months ago, she asked me to read it. I didn’t trust Nina enough to tell her what was in the letter. I guess I probably should have told her. Now, I regret my actions.

“We’ll have to find another gate keeper now that Sarah’s out,” Nina says in a calm voice that doesn’t crack a bit. We’ve destroyed the computers she monitored for us and disposed of the body.”

I’m stunned by what I’m hearing. I pull away from Father. “What are you saying? You’re just going to toss her body without a burial? A priest? Nothing?”

“Procedures,” Nina says blandly. “Angel-bloods can’t very well drop our dead off at the morgue.”

“But—but she needs a funeral. She had friends. She’s in Bess’s home restoration group. They’ll ask questions,” I say in a voice that squeaks through my gasping breaths.

“They’ll find a replacement for her,” Nina says in a bland voice.

“You’re a bitch,” I blurt before I can stop myself. The room falls deathly silent except for the wind’s howls.

“I don’t mind being labeled as the realist in all of this. Somebody has to be that person. We don’t need others using Sarah’s house as a gateway,” she says to Father. He’s so composed. But then, as a government employee, he has learned to conform, to be calm when given this type of news.

Faris could wind up being the next victim of these crazy new gangs. Before I either throw up or pass out, I turn around and walk in a daze up to my room. My spirit grieves for my teacher, and my heart aches for the boy who left me so many months ago.

My overworked mind threatens me with a blackout. I don’t care. For the first time ever, I actually want to get knocked out so I can forget about everything I just heard and saw. Each day, I walk around in a state of nothing. Mrs. Needlemeyer is dead. And it’s my fault like so many other things that have happened over these past few months—or maybe this whole lifetime.

Chapter Six

Memory Lane (Faris)

Thinking of my family has kept me company over the past few months while I’ve been held inside my dark cell. Olivia can treat me like an animal, sell my blood, and let me starve; but she’ll never take away the love I have for my people and Chela.

In the memory I’m thinking about right now, I’m a young boy again. My sister, Asa, runs in front of me, her black hair flowing behind her. We play hide and seek with several kids who live near us. Some of them are royalty, others come from the servants’ quarters. To Asa, we’re all the same.

Father won’t think so, though. He’ll make the servant kids go home. Sometimes they get punished just for associating with us. But my dear old dad isn’t the average Father. He’s King Zanas Indrail, the last of the royal-blooded descendants of the Archangel Gabriel. That makes me his son, the Prince who let his people down when he gave in to the thing living inside him.

“Faris, over here! We can hide in the trees,” Asa suggests. She grabs my hand and pulls me deeper into the woods. We both realize our parents will strip our hides for leaving the safety of the palace; but we don’t care. Laughing and running as fast as we can, the two of us head deeper into the woods until we both realize we’ve gone too far to logically remember the way back to the palace.

“Where are we?” I ask, chill seeping into my body. I’m scrawny for a boy of thirteen. No meat on my bones is the way Asa chooses to describe me. “How do we get back home?”

“Shush,” Asa orders as she listens carefully. The woods around us have gone completely silent, no animal sounds anywhere. Each tensed up muscle in my body tells me we shouldn’t have come out so far. “We should go this way.”

“You don’t know if that’s the right path,” I say. “What if we end up at the mean lady’s house?”

“Hush your face. Now, stop being a baby and follow me,” Asa orders. She’s only two years older than me, and I don’t like her ordering me around. I cross my arms and pout.

“We don’t have time for this,” she says.

“I’m going back that way,” I say.

The bushes shuffle. Both our bodies tense up as we glance toward the noise. A boy emerges from the trees. He doesn’t look to be much more than a year or so older than Asa. But he’s skinny and his clothes seem to hang on his wiry frame. His wild, dark hair and the way he stands make him seem familiar to me.

“Hi. We won’t hurt you,” Asa says to him. His gaze darts back and forth between my sister and me. “We’re trying to find our way back to the main path. Can you help us?”

“Asa, no,” I warn and tug at her shirt, trying to pull her in the opposite direction. The boy glances at me. His eyes are dark and strange. His gaze pierces through me. I don’t like these woods or this boy.

“Seth!” a woman’s voice calls from in the distance. “Seth! Where are you, boy? Get back to this house.”

The boy named Seth lurches forward. I shove my fists up in the air and prepare to defend my sister. Yeah, he’s skinny and all, but he’s taller than both of us. Instead of messing with me, though, he runs and grabs Asa’s hand, pulling her in the opposite direction from the woman’s voice.

Shock pins my feet to the ground at first. The eerily silent woods close in around me as I stand there watching my sister running off beside the boy with the strange dark blue eyes. 

“Faris, come on!” Asa yells. Her voice startles me and my feet move into action. I take off running through the woods. I catch glimpses of my sister and the boy zipping between the trees. She’s running and laughing at the same time. For Asa, this is a game. Anything rebellious or dangerous excites my sister. What could be more risky than interacting with the vagabonds who live in the woods?

Father warned us to stay away from them. Going against his wishes has gotten men hanged and flogged in the past. Sure, we’re his children, but he doesn’t tolerate defiance of any kind from anyone. We arrive at a river. Seth pulls Asa across a shabby wooden bridge. I’m struggling to keep up because they had an unfair head start.

“Asa, wait up!” I call out. My sister is too busy being caught up in her forbidden fun. I run as fast as I can. Still, I wind up losing sight of Seth and Asa. I come to a clearing, stop, double over, and wait for my heaving breaths to ease up.

“Asa!” I call out again to a silent forest. I run my fingers through my hair and curse myself for forgetting to bring my sword. It’ll be night soon. I definitely don’t want to get caught by the Tainteds who scout the woods at night. Soldiers bring stories of my people disappearing back to Father all the time.

I find my way back on to the right path by using the markers Asa made out of fabric tied to certain branches along the way to help guide me. Eventually, I make it back to the castle. A fuming Father meets me at the doorway. To make matters even worse, Mother stands beside him. He takes one step down and glares at me.

“Where have you been? Your mother has been worried into a frenzy.” He’s a bigger, wider, and ten times more intimidating version of me. My heart thuds so hard and fast, I’m sure he can hear it. I open my mouth and then lower my head. I can’t lie. But the truth is bound to have me assigned to cleaning out the stables for weeks.

The door creaks open and Asa steps from inside. “Oh, there you are, Faris. Did you bring back that squirrel food I asked you to find?” My fear turns to anger and then to relief. Asa has a horde of rare white squirrels that she claims can understand her words.

“I did,” I say too enthusiastically. “But I—lost it on the way home. I was trying to hurry and get back before dark.”

“See, Father, Faris was only doing as I asked,” Asa says and gives him the most charming look I’ve ever seen on her face. She knows exactly how to work her magic. Me, well, I could use a few lessons, I guess.

Mother smiles and says, “Come along, children and husband of mine. Time for dinner.”  She’s specifically looking at Father who looks as though he doesn’t believe me. Another short moment passes before he decides to turn and go back inside. Asa heads into the house behind him, giving me a wide-eyed look on the way in. I want to ask what happened to Seth. I’m still upset about getting left behind. I can’t help but to feel like the boy did it on purpose. But Asa saved me…again.

This is the way things are between my sister and me—wherever one ventures to then the other one follows. When something threatens her, then I’m right there to take care of it.

* * *

The shackles tighten around my wrists and ankles, digging deep into my flesh. A burn eases into my skin. I take a deep breath and wait for the fiery feeling to pass. Curse it. I can hardly move, let alone think.

Chela, I’m coming for you.

If you can hear me, know that I can survive this.

I’ll do it for you…for us.

A small band of light shines through the windows above me, The beam gives the metal chamber a touch of softness as a single ray of light shining on my face.

“I ask you again, Faris Toulan. Is this girl worth your life? Your immortality? Or what’s left of it anyway,” Olivia hisses into my ear, a sneer on her face. I stay silent, refusing to give in. She grasps my chin and forces me to look at her face. In exchange for Olivia keeping quiet about Chela’s true identity, I’ve agreed to remain as her prisoner.

I glance deep in her empty eyes, and say: “Yes. Chela is everything to me. She’s all that you will never be. Your tricks can’t remove what I feel for her.”

Icy eyes glare at me. Her harsh laughter rips through my soul. The kindness she showed me earlier disappears at once. I don’t care. All I hope for, all I ache for is a chance to see Chela again. I promised to return as the Protector she needed me to be. I refuse to go back as the thing she is cursed to destroy.  That will only hurt her more than I’ve already done. I intend to keep my word.

“I do hope you understand what you’ve agreed to do,” Olivia says in a low, but deadly voice, her breath on my ear, her cold fingers stroking my face.  “By the time I’m done with you, there won’t be any other name you’ll call except mine. That’s how long you’ll beg for mercy.”

She moves closer to my face and kisses my lips. I want to gag. Inside, I’m already screaming. But her torture, or whatever her plans are for me are nothing compared to facing a life without Chela. By thinking of our love, her laugh, even the way she sometimes annoys me, I can handle anything Olivia does.

Hell most definitely exists. I’m fairly certain I’m about to experience it in full force.

And then, I hear Chela call my name.

Chapter Seven (Chela)

Requiem to a Dream

In my dream, I feel his suffering as though it’s my own. Every burn, each tingle, and the agonizing way he screams from inside that awful dark chamber. Lying in my bed, I think of the kiss we shared the last time I saw him, the day he told me that his spirit would always be with me. I only have to turn around and he’ll be right there.