Beautiful Darkness - Chapter 36

Flesh and Blood
Macon!”
It was all I could do not to fling my arms around him. He, on the other hand, looked at me calmly, brushing off some of the burnt grit from his
dinner jacket. His eyes were unsettling. I was used to the glassy black eyes of Macon Ravenwood the Incubus, the eyes that regarded you with
nothing but your own reflection. Now he was standing in front of me, as green-eyed as any Light Caster. Ridley stared, but didn't utter a sound. It
wasn't often you saw Ridley speechless.
“Much obliged, Mr. Wate. Much obliged.” Macon rolled his neck back and forth, uncoiling his arms, as if he was waking up from a long nap.
I bent down and picked up the Arclight, lying in the sandy dirt. “I was right. You were in the Arclight all along.” I thought about how many times
I'd held it in my hand and relied on it to guide me. How familiar the warmth of the stone had felt.
Link was having trouble coming to grips with the idea that Macon was alive, too. Without thinking, he reached out to touch him. Macon's
hand flew up and grabbed Link's arm. Link flinched. “So sorry, Mr. Lincoln. I'm afraid my reflexes are a bit — reflexive. I haven't gotten out much
lately.”
Link rubbed his arm. “You didn't have to do that, Mr. Ravenwood. I just wanted, you know, I thought you were —”
“What? A Sheer? A Vex, perhaps?”
Link shivered. “You tell me, sir.”
Macon extended his arm. “Go ahead, then. Be my guest.”
Link stuck out his hand tentatively, as if he was about to hold it over a candle on a birthday dare. His finger came within a millimeter of
Macon's ragged jacket and stopped.
Macon sighed, rolling his eyes, and tapped Link's hand against his chest. “See? Flesh and blood. Something we have in common now, Mr.
Lincoln.”
“Uncle Macon?” Ridley crept up to him, finally ready to face him. “Is it really you?”
He looked deep into her blue eyes. “You've lost your powers.”
She nodded, her eyes brimming with tears. “So have you.”
“Some of them, yes, but I suspect I've gained others.” He reached for her hand, but she pulled away. “It's impossible to tell. I'm still in the
midst of it.” He smiled. “Sort of like being a teenager. Twice.”
“But your eyes are green.”
Macon shook his head, flexing his hands. “True. My life as an Incubus is over, but the Transition is not complete. Although my eyes are
those of a Light Caster, I can still feel Darkness within me. It has not been fully exorcised, yet.”
“I'm not Transitioning. I'm nothing, a Mortal.” She said the word like it was a curse, and the sadness in her voice was real. “I don't have a
place in the Order of Things anymore.”
“You're alive.”
“I don't feel like myself. I'm powerless.”
Macon weighed this in his mind, as if he was trying to determine her present state as much as she was. “You may be in the midst of a
Transition of your own, unless this is one of my sister's more impressive tricks.”
Ridley's eyes lit up. “Does that mean my powers might come back?”
Macon studied her blue eyes. “I think Sarafine is too cruel for that. I only meant that you might not be fully Mortal yet. Darkness does not
leave us as easily as we would hope.” Macon pulled her awkwardly to his chest, and she buried her face in his jacket, like a twelve-year-old. “It's
not easy to be Light when you've been Dark. It's almost too much to ask of anyone.”
I tried to quiet the torrent of questions racing through my mind, and settled for the first. “How?”
Macon turned from Ridley, his green eyes burning into me with their newfound light. “Could you be more specific, Mr. Wate? How am I not
resting in twenty-seven thousand distinct fragments of ash in an urn within the Ravenwood family vault? How am I not rotting under a lemon tree
in the sodden prestige of His Garden of Perpetual Peace? How did I come to find myself imprisoned in a small crystalline ball in your grimy
pocket?”
“Two,” I said without thinking.
“I beg your pardon?”
“There are two lemon trees over your grave.”
“How very generous. One would have sufficed.” Macon smiled tiredly, which was pretty remarkable, considering he'd spent four months in a
supernatural prison the size of an egg. “Or are you perhaps wondering how is it that I died and you lived? Because I have to tell you, as far as
hows go, that's a story your neighbors on Cotton Bend would be talking about for a lifetime.”
“Except you didn't, sir. Die, I mean.”
“You are correct, Mr. Wate. I am, and have always been, very much alive. In a manner of speaking.”
Liv stepped forward tentatively. Even though she would probably never become a Keeper now, there was still a Keeper inside her seeking
answers. “Mr. Ravenwood, may I ask you a question, sir?”
Macon tilted his head slightly. “Who might you be, dear? I imagine it was your voice I heard calling me from the Arclight.”
Liv blushed. “It was, sir. My name is Olivia Durand, and I was training with Professor Ashcroft. Before …” Her voice dwindled.
“Before you Cast the Ob Lucem Libertas?”
Liv nodded, ashamed. Macon looked pained, then smiled at her. “Then you gave up a great deal to save me, Miss Olivia Durand. I am in
your debt, and, as I always repay my debts, I would be honored to answer a question. At the very least.” Even after being trapped all those
months, Macon was still a gentleman.
“Obviously, I know how you got out of the Arclight, but how did you get in? It's impossible for an Incubus to imprison himself, especially
when, by all accounts, you were dead.” Liv was right. He couldn't have done it alone. Someone had to have helped him, and the minute the ball
released him, I knew who it was.
It was the one person we both loved as much as Lena, even in death.
My mother — who had loved books and old things, nonconformity and history and complexity. Who had loved Macon so much she walked
away when he asked her to, even though she couldn't bear to leave him. Even though a part of her never had.
“It was her, wasn't it?”
Macon nodded. “Your mother was the only one who knew about the Arclight. I gave it to her. Any Incubus would have killed her to destroy it.
It was our secret, one of our last.”
“Did you see her?” I looked out at the sea, blinking hard.
Macon's expression changed. I could see the pain in his face. “Yes.”
“Did she seem …” What? Happy? Dead? Herself?
“Beautiful as ever, your mother. Beautiful as the day she left us.”
“I saw her, too.” I thought about Bonaventure Cemetery and felt the familiar knot in my throat.
“But how is that possible?” Liv wasn't trying to challenge him, but she didn't understand. None of us did.
Macon's face was full of grief. It wasn't any easier for him to talk about my mom than it was for me. “I think you'll find the impossible is
possible more often than we think, particularly in the Caster world. But if you would care to take one last trip with me, I can show you.” He opened
his hand to me, offering Liv the other. Ridley stepped forward and closed her hand around mine, and hesitantly Link limped over, completing
the circle.
Macon looked over at me, and before I could read his expression, the air was filled with smoke —
Macon tried to hold on, but he was blacking out. He could see the ebony sky above him, streaked with orange flames. He couldn't see
Hunting as he fed, but he could feel his brother's teeth in his shoulder. When Hunting had his fill, he let Macon's body drop to the ground.
When Macon opened his eyes again, Lena's grandmother, Emmaline, was kneeling over him. He could feel the heat of her healing
power as it coursed through his body. Ethan was there, too. Macon tried to speak, but he didn't know if they could hear him. Find Lena,
that's what he wanted to say. Ethan must have heard him, because he took off into the smoke and fire.
The boy was so much like Amarie, so stubborn and fearless. He was so much like his mother, loyal and honest, and bound for the
heartbreak that came from loving a Caster. Macon was still thinking about Jane when his mind faded.
When Macon opened his eyes again, the fire was gone. The smoke, the roaring of flames and ammunition — it was all gone. He felt
himself drifting in the darkness. It wasn't like Traveling. This void had weight. It was pulling him through. Yet when he reached out, he could
see that his hand was hazy, only partially materialized.
He was dead.
Lena must have made the Choice. She had chosen to go Light. Even in the darkness, knowing the fate of an Incubus in the Otherworld,
a sense of calm washed over him. It was finished.
“Not yet. Not for you.”
Macon turned, recognizing her voice immediately. Lila Jane. She was luminous in the abyss, shimmering and beautiful. “Janie. There's
so much I have to tell you.”
Jane shook her head, her brown hair falling over her shoulder. “There's no time.”
“There's nothing but time.”
Jane stretched out her hand, her fingers glimmering. “Take my hand.”
As soon as Macon touched her, the darkness began to bleed into colors and light. He could see images, familiar shapes and forms
swimming around him, but he couldn't anchor them. Then he realized where they were. The archive, Jane's special place.
“Jane, what's happening?” He saw her reach out, but everything was blurry and unclear. Then he heard the words, the words he had
taught her.
“In these walls with no time or space, I Bind your body and from this Earth erase.”
There was something in her hand. The Arclight. “Jane, don't do it! I want to be here with you.”
She was floating before him, already beginning to fade. “I promised if the time came, I would use it. I'm keeping my promise. You can't
die. They need you.” She was gone now, a voice, nothing else. “My son needs you.”
Macon tried to tell her everything he had failed to say in life, but it was too late. He could feel the pull of the Arclight already, impossible
to break. As he spun into the abyss, he heard her seal his fate.
“Comprehende, Liga, Cruci Fige.
Capture, Cage, and Crucify.”
Macon dropped my hand, and the vision released us. I held it in my mind, unable to let her go. My mom had saved him, using the weapon
Macon had given her to use against him. She had given up the chance for them to finally be together, because of me. Had she known he was
our only chance?
When I opened my eyes, Liv was crying, and Ridley was trying to pretend she wasn't. “Oh, please. Enough with the drama.” A tear leaked
onto her cheek.
Liv wiped her eyes, sniffling. “I had no idea a Sheer was capable of anything like that.”
“You would be surprised what we are capable of when the situation warrants it.” Macon clapped his hand on my shoulder. “Isn't that right, Mr.
Wate?”
I knew he was trying to thank me. But as I looked around our broken circle, I didn't feel like I deserved thanks. Ridley had lost her powers,
Link was wincing in pain, and Liv had destroyed her future. “I didn't do anything.”
Macon's hand tightened on my shoulder, forcing me to face him. “You made yourself see what most would have overlooked. You brought
me here; you brought me back. You accepted your fate as a Wayward and found the way here. None of that could have been easy.” He looked
around the cave at Ridley, Link, and Liv. His eyes lingered a moment on Liv, and then his eyes locked on mine. “For anyone.”
Including Lena.
I almost couldn't stand to tell him, but I wasn't sure if he knew. “Lena thinks she killed you.”
Macon didn't speak for a second, but when he did, his voice was even and controlled. “Why would she think that?”
“Sarafine stabbed me that night, but you died. Amma told me. But Lena can't forgive herself, and it's … changed her.” I wasn't making
sense, but there was so much Macon needed to know. “I think she may have made a choice in her heart without realizing it.”
“She didn't.” Macon dismissed me.
“It was The Book of Moons, Mr. Ravenwood.” Liv couldn't help herself. “Lena was desperate to save Ethan, and she used the Book. It made
a trade, your life for his. Lena had no way of knowing what would happen. The Book can't be properly controlled, which is why it's not meant to be
kept in Caster hands.” Liv sounded even more like a Caster librarian than usual.
Macon tilted his head slightly. “I see. Olivia?”
“Yes, sir?”
“With all due respect, we've no time for a Keeper. This day will require certain actions best left unkept. At the very least, untold. Do you
understand?”
Liv nodded. Her expression said she understood more than he knew.
“She's not a Keeper, not anymore.” Liv had saved his life and destroyed her own in the process. She deserved Macon's respect, at the very
least.
“Not likely, after this,” she sighed.
I listened to the waves crashing, wishing they could carry my thoughts out to sea with them. “Everything's changed.”
Macon's eyes flickered again to Liv, then returned to me. “Nothing's changed. Nothing important. It could, but it hasn't yet.”
Link cleared his throat. “But what can we do? I mean, look at us.” Link paused. “They've got a whole army a Incubuses and who knows what
else down there.”
Macon took stock of us. “What do we have? A powerless Siren, a renegade Keeper, a lost Wayward, and … you, Mr. Lincoln. A motley but
resourceful crew, indeed.” Lucille meowed. “And yes, you, Ms. Ball.”
I realized what a train wreck we were, hammered, dirty, and exhausted.
“Yet, somehow you made it this far. And you released me from the Arclight, which was no small feat.”
“Are you sayin’ you think we can take them?” Link had the same look on his face as the one he had when Earl Petty started a fight with the
whole Summerville High football team.
“I'm saying we don't have time to stand here and chat, as much as I enjoy your fine company. I have more than a few things to take care of,
my niece being first and foremost.” Macon turned to me. “Wayward, show us the way.”
Macon took a step toward the mouth of the cave, and his legs collapsed under him. A cloud of dust rose where he fell. I looked at him, sitting
in the dirt in his charred dinner jacket. He hadn't recovered from whatever happened in the Arclight. I hadn't exactly called in the Marines. We
needed a plan B.

Categories: Beautiful Darkness

Beautiful Darkness - Chapter 34

Sea Change
It felt like we had been walking forever, as if the bridge in front of us only got longer the closer we got. The farther we went, the less we saw. The
air became brighter and heavier and wetter, until suddenly my feet came to the edge of the weathered planks — and what appeared to be an
impenetrable wall of fog.
“Is this the Great Barrier?” I squatted down, touching the place where the wood ended. My hand felt nothing. No invisible Caster stairwell.
Nothing.
“Wait, what if this is like a dangerous force field or some kind of poisonous smoke?” Link pulled out his shears and gently pushed them into
the mist, then yanked them back, perfectly intact. “Or maybe not. Still, pretty creepy. How do we know if we go through that we're going to be able
to come back?” As usual, Link was only saying what the rest of us were thinking.
I stood at the end of the bridge, facing the nothingness. “I'm going through.”
Liv looked insulted. “You can barely walk. Why you?”
Because this whole thing is my fault. Because Lena was my girlfriend. Because I might be a Wayward, whatever that is.
I looked away and found myself looking at Lucille, her claws digging into Ridley's shirt. Lucille Ball was no fan of the water. “Ouch!” Ridley
put her down. “Stupid cat.”
Lucille took a few deliberate steps across the wood, turning to look at me. She cocked her head.
With a flick of her tail, she took off and was gone.
“Because.” Turns out, I couldn't explain. Liv shook her head, and without waiting for anyone else, I followed Lucille into the clouds.
I was in the Great Barrier, between universes, and for one second I didn't feel like a Caster or a Mortal. All I felt was magic.
I could feel it and hear it and smell it, the air thick with sound and salt and water. The shore at the end of the bridge was pulling at me, and I
was overwhelmed with an unbearable sense of longing. I wanted to be there with Lena. More than that, I just wanted to be there. I didn't seem to
have a reason or logic for it, apart from the intensity of the longing itself.
I wanted to be there more than anything else.
I didn't want to choose one world. I wanted to be part of both. I didn't want to see only one side of the sky. I wanted to see it all.
I hesitated. Then I took a single step and walked out of the fog and into the unknown.

Categories: Beautiful Darkness

Beautiful Darkness - Chapter 35

Out of the Light
Cold air hit me, sending goose bumps up my arms.
By the time I opened my eyes, the brightness and the fog had disappeared. All I could see was a blur of moonlight pouring into a hole in the
jagged cave in the distance. The full moon was clear and luminous.
I wondered if I was looking at the Seventeenth Moon.
I closed my eyes and tried to experience the intense rush I'd felt the moment before, when I was between worlds.
It was there, behind everything else. The feeling. The electricity of the air, as if this side of the world was full of life I couldn't see but could
sense all around me.
“Come on.” Ridley was behind me, pulling Link, whose eyes were squeezed shut. Ridley let go of his hand. “You can open your eyes now,
Super Stud.”
Liv appeared after them, breathless. “That was brilliant.” She came up beside me, barely a golden hair loose from her braids. She watched
the waves crash against the rocks in front of us, her eyes sparkling. “Do you think we're —”
I answered before she had a chance to finish. “We've crossed into the Great Barrier.”
Which meant Lena was here somewhere, and so was Sarafine.
And who knows what else.
Lucille was sitting on a rock, casually licking her paw. I saw something next to her, snagged between two rocks.
It was Lena's necklace.
“She's here.” I bent down to pick it up, my hand shaking uncontrollably. I had never seen her without it, not once. The silver button was
shining through the sand, the wire star caught in the loop where she had wrapped the red string. These weren't just her memories. They were our
memories, everything we had shared since we met. The evidence of every happy moment she'd ever experienced in her life. Tossed aside like
all the other lost bits of broken shells and tangled seaweed that washed up on the beach.
If it was some kind of sign, it wasn't good.
“Did you find something, Short Straw?”
Reluctantly, I opened my hand and held it out for them to see. Ridley gasped. Liv didn't recognize the necklace. “What is it?”
Link looked at the ground. “It's Lena's necklace.”
“Maybe she lost it,” Liv said innocently.
“No!” Ridley's voice was rising. “Lena never took it off. Not once in her whole life. She couldn't have lost it. She would've noticed the second
it slipped off.”
Liv shrugged. “Maybe she noticed. Maybe she didn't care.”
Ridley lunged at Liv, Link holding her back by her waist. “Don't say that! You don't know anything! Tell her, Short Straw.”
But even I didn't know anymore.
As we picked our way along the shore, we approached a rocky line of uneven coastal caves. Tidewater pooled in their sandy floors, and jagged
rock walls kept everything in shadow. The pathway between the rocks seemed to be leading us toward a particular cave. The ocean crashed
around us, and I felt like it could wash us away in a second.
There was real power here. The rock was humming under my feet, and even the light of the moon seemed alive with it.
I jumped from one rock to the next until I was high enough to see past the rocky outcroppings of the coastal caves. The others climbed after
me, trying to keep up.
“There.” I pointed at a large cavern, just beyond the caves surrounding us. The moon was shining directly above it, illuminating an
enormous jagged crack in the ceiling.
And something else.
In the moonlight, I could barely make out figures moving in the shadows. Hunting's Blood pack. There was no mistaking them.
No one said anything. This wasn't a mystery to solve anymore. It was quickly becoming reality. It was a cave most likely filled with Dark
Casters, Blood Incubuses, and a Cataclyst.
All we had was each other and the Arclight.
The realization hit Link hard. “Face it. The four of us are dead.” He looked down at Lucille, who was licking her paws. “With one dead cat.”
He had a point. From what we could see, there was only one way in or out. The entrance to the cave was heavily guarded, and what waited
inside was likely to be an even more formidable threat.
“He's right, Ethan. My uncle's probably in there with his boys. Without my powers, we're not going to survive the Blood pack again. We're
useless Mortals. All we had going for us was that stupid shiny stone.” Ridley kicked at the wet sand, as hopeless as ever.
“Not useless, Rid.” Link sighed. “Just Mortals. You'll get used to it.”
“Shoot me if I do.”
Liv stared out at the sea. “Maybe this is as far as we can go. Even if we could get past the Blood pack, to take on Sarafine would be …” Liv
didn't finish, but we all knew what she was thinking.
A death wish. Insanity. Suicide.
I looked out into the wind, the darkness, and the night.
Where are you, L?
I could see the moonlight pouring into the cave. Lena was out there somewhere waiting for me. She didn't answer, but that didn't stop me
from reaching for her.
I'm coming.
“Maybe Liv's right, and we should think about goin’ back. Gettin’ some help.” I noticed Link's breathing was labored. He had been trying to
hide it, but he was still in pain.
I had to own up to what I was doing to my friends, the people who cared about me. “We can't go back. I mean, I can't.”
The Seventeenth Moon wasn't going to wait, and Lena was running out of time. The Arclight brought me here for a reason. I thought about
what Marian said at my mother's grave when she gave it to me.
In Light there is Dark, and in Dark there is Light.
It was something my mom used to say. I pulled the Arclight out of my pocket. It was turning a brilliant green, incredibly bright. Something
was happening. As I turned it over and over in my hands, I remembered everything. It was all there, looking back at me from the surface of the
stone.
Sketches of Ravenwood and Macon's family tree, spread across my mother's table in the archive.
I stared at the Arclight, seeing things for the first time. As I did, images rose to the surface of my mind, and the stone.
Marian handing me my mother's most treasured possession, standing between the graves of two people who finally found a way to be
together.
Maybe Ridley was right. All we had going for us was this stupid shiny stone.
Then a ring, twisting on a finger.
Mortals alone were no match for Dark power.
A picture of my mother, in the shadows.
Could the answer have been in my pocket all along?
And a pair of black eyes that reflected back my own.
We weren't alone. We never were. The visions had laid it all out for me from the beginning. The images vanished as suddenly as they had
appeared, replaced by words, the second I thought them.
In the Arc there is power, and in the power there is Night.
“The Arclight — it's not what we thought.” My voice echoed off the rock walls surrounding us.
Liv was surprised. “What are you talking about?”
“It's not a compass. It never was.”
I held it up so they could all see. As we watched, the Arclight shone, brighter and brighter, until it was eclipsed in a perfect circle of light. Like
a tiny star. I could no longer see the stone within the light.
“What is it doing?” Liv breathed.
The Arclight, which I took so innocently from Marian at my mother's grave, wasn't an object of power, not for me.
It was for Macon.
I held the Arclight up higher. In the iridescent moonlight of the shallow tidal cave, the dark water around my feet glittered. Even the tiniest
flecks of quartz studded in the rock walls caught the light. In the darkness, the sphere seemed to ignite. I could see the glow of the round,
pearlized surface revealing the swirling colors of a hidden interior. Violet churned into somber greens, then burst into vibrant yellows, which
deepened into oranges and reds. In that second, I understood.
I wasn't a Keeper, or a Caster, or a Seer.
I wasn't like Marian or my mother. It wasn't for me to keep the lore and the history or protect the books and the secrets that made up so much
of the Caster world. I wasn't like Liv, charting the uncharted, measuring the immeasurable. I wasn't Amma. It wasn't for me to see what no one
else could or to communicate with the Greats. More than anything, I was nothing like Lena. I couldn't eclipse the moon, bring down the skies, or
kick up the earth. I could never convince anyone to jump off a bridge, like Ridley could. And I was nothing like Macon.
In the back of my mind, I had been searching for how I fit into the story, my story with Lena. Hoping I could fit into it at all.
But my story had found its way to me through all of them. Now, at the end of what seemed like a lifetime in the darkness and confusion of the
Tunnels, I knew what to do. I knew my part.
Marian was right. I was the Wayward. It was my job to find what was lost.
Who was lost.
I rolled the Arclight to my fingertips and released it. The stone hung in the air.
“What the —” Link staggered closer.
I pulled the folded yellowed page out of my back pocket. The one I had ripped from my mother's journal and carried all this way, without a
reason. Or so I thought.
The Arclight cast a silver light around the cave as it hovered. I stepped closer to it and held up the paper so I could speak the Cast from the
page of my mother's journal, even though it was in Latin. I pronounced the words carefully.
“In Luce Caecae Caligines sunt,
Et in Caliginibus, Lux.
In Arcu imperium est,
Et in imperio, Nox.”
“Of course,” Liv whispered, moving closer to the light. “The Cast. Ob Lucem Libertas. Freedom in Light.” Liv looked at me. “Finish it.”
I turned the paper over. There was nothing on the other side.
“That's all there is.”
Liv's eyes widened. “You can't leave it undone. It's incredibly dangerous. The power of an Arclight, let alone a Ravenwood Arclight, it could
kill us. It could kill …”
“You have to do it.”
“I can't, Ethan. You know I can't.”
“Liv. Lena's going to die — you, me, Link, Ridley — we all are. We've come as far as Mortals can go. We can't do the rest alone.” I put my
hand on her shoulder.
“Ethan.” She whispered my name, just my name, but I heard the words she couldn't say almost as clearly as I heard Lena's voice when we
Kelted. Liv and I had a connection all our own. It wasn't magic. It was something very human, and very real. Liv might not like what had unfolded
between us, but she understood it. She understood me, and a part of me believed she always would. I wished things could have been different,
that Liv could have everything she wanted at the end of all this. The things that had nothing to do with lost stars and Caster skies. But Liv wasn't
where my road was taking me. She was part of the path itself.
She looked past me to the Arclight, still glowing in front of us. Her silhouette was framed in light so bright it looked like she was standing in
front of the sun. She reached for the Arclight, and I remembered my dream, the dream of Lena reaching out to me from the darkness.
Two girls who were as different as the sun and the moon. Without one, I could never have found my way back to the other.
In Light there is Dark, and in Dark there is Light.
Liv touched the Arclight with a single finger and began to speak.
“In Illo qui Vinctus est,
Libertas Patefacietur.
Spirate denuo, Caligines.
E Luce exi.”
She was crying, watching the ball of light as tears streaked down the sides of her face. She forced out every word, as if they were being
etched into her, but she didn't stop.
“In the One who is Bound
Freedom will be Found.
Live again, Darkness,
Come out of the Light.”
Liv's voice faltered. She closed her eyes and spoke the final words slowly into the night between us.
“Come out. Come —”
The words broke off. She held her hand out to me, and I took it. Link limped over to us, and Ridley clutched his arm on the other side. Liv's
entire body was shaking. With every word, she was falling farther from her sacred duty and her dream. She had taken a side. She had Cast
herself into the story that was only hers to Keep. When this was over, if we survived, Liv would no longer be a Keeper-in-Training. Her sacrifice
was her gift, the one thing that gave her life meaning.
I couldn't imagine how that would feel.
We became four voices. There was no turning back.
“E Luce exi! Come out of the Light!”
The blast was so cataclysmic, the rock beneath my feet shot into the wall behind me. All four of us were thrown to the ground. I could taste the
wet sand and the saltwater in my mouth, but I knew. My mom had tried to tell me, but I hadn't been able to hear.
In the cave, framed by rock and moss and sea and sand, was a being made of nothing more than a mist of shadow and light. At first, I could
see the rocks behind it, as if it was an apparition. The water washed through it, and it didn't touch the ground.
Then the light stretched into a shape, the shape into a form, the form into a man. His hands became hands, his body became a body, and
his face, a face.
Macon's face.
I heard my mother's words. He's with you now.
Macon opened his eyes and looked at me. Only you can redeem him.
He was dressed in the burnt clothes from the night he died. Only something was different.
His eyes were green.
Caster green.
“It's good to see you, Mr. Wate.”

Categories: Beautiful Darkness

Beautiful Darkness - Chapter 32

Common Thread
I had barely slept. Link's arm was swollen and purple. None of us were in any shape to trek through the muddy forest, but we didn't have a
choice.
“You guys okay? We should go.”
Link touched his arm and winced. “I've felt better. Like, I don't know, every other day a my life.”
The gash on Liv's face was already beginning to scab over. “I've felt worse, but that's a long story, which involves Wembley Stadium, a bad
trip on the tube, and far too many döner kebabs.”
I picked up my backpack, caked with mud. “Where's Lucille?”
Link looked around. “Who knows? That cat's always disappearin’. Now I know why your aunts kept her on a leash.”
I whistled into the trees, but there was no sign of her. “Lucille! She was here when we got up.”
“Don't worry, man. She'll find us. Cats have that sixth sense, you know?”
“She was probably tired of following us around, since we never get anywhere,” Ridley said. “That cat's a whole lot smarter than we are.”
I lost track of their conversation after that. I was too busy listening to the one in my head. I couldn't stop thinking about Lena and what she'd
done for me. Why had it taken me so long to see what was right in front of me?
I knew Lena had been punishing herself all this time. The self-imposed isolation, the morbid pictures of headstones taped to her walls, the
Dark symbols in her notebook and all over her body, wearing her dead uncle's clothes, even hanging out with Ridley and John — it was never
about me. It was about Macon.
But I never realized I was an accomplice. Lena had a constant reminder of the crime she was trying herself for, over and over again. A
constant reminder of what she lost.
Me.
She had to look at me every day and hold my hand and kiss me. No wonder she was so hot and cold, kissing me one minute and running
away from me the next. I thought about the song lyrics, written over and over again on her walls.
Running to stand still.
She couldn't get away, and I wouldn't let her. In my last dream, I told her I knew about the trade. I wondered if she had the dream, too — if she
knew I shared her secret burden. That she didn't have to carry it alone anymore.
I'm so sorry, L.
I listened for her voice in the corners of my mind, the faintest possibility she was listening. I didn't hear a sound, but I saw something, fleeting
images in my peripheral vision. Snapshots rushing past me like cars in the fast lane on the interstate …
I was running, jumping, moving so fast I couldn't focus. Not until my vision adjusted as it had twice before, and I could make out the shapes
of trees, leaves, and branches rushing by. At first, all I could hear were the leaves crunching beneath me, the sound of the air as I moved
through it. Then I heard voices.
“We have to go back.” It was Lena. I followed the sound into the trees.
“We can't. You know that.”
Sunlight broke easily through the leaves. All I could see were boots — Lena's thrashed ones and John's heavy black ones. They were
standing a few feet away.
Then I saw their faces. Lena's expression was stubborn. I knew that look. “Sarafine found them. They could be dead!”
John walked closer and winced, the same way he had when I saw them in the bedroom. It was an involuntary reflex, a reaction to some kind
of pain. He looked down into her golden eyes. “Don't you mean Ethan?”
She avoided his gaze. “I mean all of them. Aren't you at least a little worried about Ridley? She disappeared. You don't think those two
things could be connected?”
“What two things?”
Lena's shoulders tensed. “My cousin disappearing and Sarafine showing up out of nowhere?”
He reached out and took her hand, lacing his fingers between hers the way I used to. “She's always been somewhere, Lena. Your mother is
probably the most powerful Dark Caster in the world. Why would she want to hurt Ridley, one of her own?”
“I don't know.” Lena was shaking her head, her resolve weakening. “It's just …”
“What?”
“Even though we're not together, I don't want to see him get hurt. He tried to protect me.”
“From what?”
From myself.
I heard the words, even though she didn't speak them. “From a lot of things. It was different then.”
“You were pretending to be someone you weren't, trying to make everyone happy. Did you ever think he wasn't protecting you but holding
you back?” I could feel my heart beating faster, my muscles tensing.
I was holding him back.
“You know, I had a Mortal girlfriend once.”
Lena looked shocked. “You did?”
John nodded. “Yeah. She was sweet, and I loved her.”
“What happened?” Lena was hanging on every word.
“It was too hard. She didn't understand what my life was like. That I don't always get to do whatever I want …” He sounded like he was telling
the truth.
“Why couldn't you do what you wanted?”
“My childhood was what you would call strict. Straitjacket strict. Even the rules had rules.”
Lena looked confused. “You mean about dating Mortals?”
John winced again, cringing this time. “No, it wasn't like that. The way I was raised was because I was different. The man who raised me was
the only father I've ever known, and he didn't want me to hurt anyone.”
“I don't want to hurt anyone either.”
“You're different. I mean, we are.”
John grabbed Lena's hand and pulled her next to him. “Don't worry. We'll find your cousin. She probably ran off with that drummer from
Suffer.” He was right about the drummer, just not the one he was betting on. Suffer? Lena was hanging out with John's kind, in places called
Exile and Suffer. She thought that's what she deserved.
Lena didn't say anything else, but she didn't let go of his hand. I tried to force myself to follow them, but I couldn't. I didn't have control. That
much was obvious from this bizarre vantage point, so close to the ground. I was always looking up at them. It didn't make any sense. But it didn't
matter, because now I was running again, through a dark tunnel. Or was it a cave? I could smell the sea as the black walls streaked by.
I rubbed my eyes, surprised to be walking behind Liv instead of lying on the ground. It was crazy to think I could be watching Lena in one place
and following Liv through the Tunnels at the same time. How was it possible?
The strange visions, with the off-kilter perspective and the flashing images — what was happening? Why was I able to see Lena and John? I
had to figure it out.
I looked down at my hands. I wasn't holding anything except the Arclight. I tried to think back to the first time I saw Lena this way. It was in my
bathroom, and I didn't have the Arclight then. The only thing I'd been touching was the sink. There had to be a common thread, but I couldn't
see it.
Ahead, the tunnel opened up into a stone hall, where the entrances to four tunnels converged.
Link sighed. “Which way?”
I didn't answer. Because when I looked down at the Arclight, I saw something else just beyond it.
Lucille.
Sitting in the mouth of the tunnel opposite us, expectantly. I reached into my back pocket and pulled out the silver tag Aunt Prue had given
me, with Lucille's name engraved on it. I could still hear Aunt Prue's voice.
See you still got that cat. I was just waitin’ for the right time ta let her offa that clothesline. She knows a trick or two. You'll see.
In a split second, everything fell into place and I knew.
It was Lucille.
The images speeding past me every time I found my way to Lena and John. The ground so close, closer than it could ever be if I was
standing. The strange vantage point, as if I was lying on my stomach looking up at them. It all made sense. The way Lucille kept disappearing
and reappearing randomly. Only it wasn't random.
I tried to remember the times Lucille had vanished, ticking them off in my head one by one. The first time I saw Lena with John and Ridley, I
was staring into my bathroom mirror. I didn't remember Lucille disappearing, but I remembered she was sitting on the front porch the next
morning. Which didn't make any sense, because we never left her outside at night.
The second time, Lucille had bolted in Forsyth Park when we got to Savannah, and she didn't show up until after we left Bonaventure — after
I had seen Lena and John when I was at Aunt Caroline's. And this time, Link noticed Lucille was gone when we came back down into the
Tunnels, but now here she was, sitting in front of us, right after I had just seen Lena.
I wasn't the one seeing Lena.
Lucille was. She was tracking Lena, the same way we were following the maps or the lights or the pull of the moon. I was watching Lena
through the cat's eyes, maybe the same way Macon had watched the world through Boo's. How was it possible? Lucille wasn't a Caster cat any
more than I was a Caster.
Was she?
“What are you, Lucille?”
The cat looked me in the eye and cocked her head to the side.
“Ethan?” Liv was watching me. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah.” I shot Lucille a meaningful look. She ignored me, sniffing the tip of her tail gracefully.
“You realize she's a cat.” Liv was still staring at me curiously.
“I know.”
“Just checking.”
Great. Not only was I talking to a cat, but now I was talking about talking to a cat. “We should get going.”
Liv took a deep breath. “Yes, about that. I'm afraid we can't.”
“Why not?”
Liv motioned me over to where all of Aunt Prue's maps were laid out on the smooth dirt. “You see this mark here? That's the nearest
Doorwell. It took me a while, but I've figured out loads of things about this map. Your aunt wasn't kidding. She must have spent years marking it
up.”
“The Doorwells are marked?”
“Looks that way on the map. See these red D's, with the little circles around them?” They were everywhere. “And these thin red lines? I
believe they're closer to the surface. There's a pattern. It seems the darker the color gets, the deeper underground.”
I pointed to a grid of black lines. “You're saying these would be the deepest.”
Liv nodded. “Possibly also the Darkest. The concept of Dark and Light territories within the Underground — it's groundbreaking, really.
Certainly not widely known.”
“So what's the problem?”
“This.” She pointed to two words scribbled across the southernmost edge of the largest page. L O C A S I L E N T I A.
I remembered the second word. It sounded like the one Lena said when she laid the Cast to keep me from telling her family she was leaving
Gatlin. “You're saying the map is too quiet?”
Liv shook her head. “This is where the map falls silent, I'm afraid. Because we're at the end. We've reached the southern shore, which
means we're off the map. Terra incognita.” She shrugged. “You know what they say. Hic dracones sunt.”
“Yeah, I hear that one a lot.” I had no idea what she was talking about.
“‘Here be dragons.’ It's what sailors used to write on maps five hundred years ago, when the map ended but the ocean didn't.”
“I'd rather face dragons than Sarafine.” I looked at the place where Liv was tapping her finger. The web of Tunnels we had come from was as
complex as any highway system. “So what now?”
“I'm out of ideas. I've done nothing but stare at this map since your aunt gave it to us, and I still don't know how to get to the Great Barrier.
And I don't even know if I believe it's a real place.” We stared at the map together. “I'm sorry. I know I've let you down — everyone, really.”
I traced the outline of the coast with my finger until I came to Savannah, where the Arclight had stopped working. The red mark for the
Savannah Doorwell lay just beneath the first L in L O C A S I L E N T I A . As I stared at the letters and the red marks around them, the missing
pattern slowly surfaced. It reminded me of the Bermuda Triangle, some kind of void where everything magically disappeared. “Loca silentia
doesn't mean ‘where the map falls silent.’ ”
“It doesn't?”
“I think it means something more like radio silence, for a Caster anyway. Think about it. When did the Arclight stop working the first time?”
Liv thought back. “Savannah. Right after we” — she looked at me, blushing — “found everything in the attic.”
“Exactly. Once we entered the territory marked Loca silentia, the Arclight stopped guiding us. I think we've been in a sort of supernatural nofly
zone, like the Bermuda Triangle, since we moved south of there.”
Liv looked slowly from the map to me, working it out in her mind. When she finally spoke, she couldn't keep the excitement out of her voice.
“The seam. We're at the seam. That's what the Great Barrier is.”
“The seam of what?”
“The place where two universes meet.” Liv looked at the dial on her wrist. “The Arclight could've been on some kind of magical overload this
whole time.”
I thought about Aunt Prue showing up when she did — and where she did. “I bet Aunt Prue knew we needed the maps. We had just entered
the Loca silentia when she gave them to us.”
“But the map stops, and the Great Barrier isn't on it. So how is anyone supposed to find it?” Liv sighed.
“My mom could. She knew how to find it without the star.” I wished she were here right now, even a ghostly vision of her made from smoke
and graveyard dirt and chicken bones.
“Did you read that in her papers?”
“No. It was something John said to Lena.” I didn't want to think about it, even if the information was useful. “Where are we again, according to
the map?”
She pointed. “Right there.” We had reached the long curving line that followed the inlets of the southern shore. Caster connections wove
their way together and apart until they met at the edge of the water like nerve endings.
“What are these little shapes? Islands?” Liv chewed on the end of her pen.
“Those are the Sea Islands.”
Liv leaned over me. “Why do they look so familiar?”
“I've been wondering that, too. I thought it was from staring at the map for so long.”
It was true. I knew those shapes, curving in and out like a group of lopsided clouds. Where had I seen them before?
I pulled a handful of papers — my mother's papers — out of my back pocket. There it was, tucked between pages. The sheet of vellum
covered with a strange Caster design that looked like weird clouds.
She knew how to find it, without the star.
“Hold on —” I slid the vellum on top of the map. It was like tracing paper, thin as an onion skin on Amma's cutting board.
“I wonder …” I slipped the translucent sheet into place over the map, the outlines of each shape on the vellum lining up perfectly with the
shape on the chart beneath it. Except for one, which materialized in a sort of ghostly silhouette, only appearing when the partial outline of the
map grid met the partial outline of the vellum. Without both the vellum and the map, the lines looked like meaningless scribbles.
But when you held them just right, it all came together, and you could see the island.
Like two halves of a Caster key, or two universes stitched together for one common purpose.
The Great Barrier was hidden in the middle of a Mortal coastal chain. Of course it was.
I stared at the ink on the page, and beneath it.
There it was. The most powerful place in the Caster world, appearing through pen and paper as if by magic.
Hidden in plain sight.

Categories: Beautiful Darkness

Beautiful Darkness - Chapter 33

No One's Son
The door itself wasn't that unusual.
Neither was the Doorwell leading up to it, or the curving passage we had followed to find our way here. Twist after turn through corridors built
from crumbling rocks and dirt and splintering wood. This is what tunnels were supposed to feel like — damp and dark and tight. It was almost
like the day Link and I followed a stray dog into one of the runoff tunnels in Summerville.
I guess the strangest thing was how ordinary everything seemed, now that we had figured out the secret to the map. Following it was the easy
part.
Until now.
“That's it. It has to be.” Liv looked up from the map. I stared past her to where a wooden staircase led up to streaks of light, forming the
outline of a door in the darkness.
“You sure?”
She nodded and slid the map into her pocket.
“Then let's see what's out there.” I climbed the steps to the door.
“Not so fast, Short Straw. What do you think is on the other side of that door?” Ridley was stalling. She looked as nervous as I felt.
Liv studied the door. “According to the legends, old magic, neither Light or Dark.”
Ridley shook her head. “You have no idea what you're talking about, Keeper. Old magic is wild. It's infinite. Chaos in its purest form. Not
exactly the combination for a happy ending to your little quest.”
I moved closer to the door. Liv and Link were right behind me. “Come on, Rid. You want to help Lena or not?” Link's voice echoed off the
walls.
“I was just saying …” I could hear the fear in Ridley's voice. I tried not to think about the last time she sounded this scared, when she faced
Sarafine in the woods.
I pushed the door and it creaked, the worn wood bending and straining. Another try and it would open. We would be there, wherever there
was. The Great Barrier.
I wasn't scared. I don't know why. But I wasn't thinking about entering a magical universe when I forced the door open. I was thinking about
home. The wooden panel wasn't all that different from the Outer Door we found at the fairgrounds, under the Tunnel of Love. Maybe it was a sign
— something from the beginning reappearing at the end. I wondered if it was a good omen or a bad one.
It didn't matter what was on the other side of the door. Lena was waiting. She needed me, whether she knew it or not.
There was no turning back.
I leaned against the panel, and it swung open. The crack of light opened into a blinding field of white.
I stepped into the harsh light, the darkness behind me now. I could barely see the steps below me. I breathed in the air, heavy with salt and sour
with brine.
Loca silentia. Now I understood. The moment we emerged from the darkness of the Tunnels into the broad, flat reflection of the water, there
was only light and silence.
Slowly, my eyes began to adjust. We were on what looked like a rocky Lowcountry beach, covered in a spread of gray and white oyster
shells, framed by an uneven row of palmettos. A splintered wooden walkway stretched along the perimeter of the shoreline facing the islands.
We stood there now, the four of us, listening to what should have been the waves or the wind or even a gull in the sky. But the silence was so
thick, it stopped us in our tracks.
The scene was perfectly ordinary and incredibly surreal, as vivid as any dream. The colors were too bright, the light too light. And in the far
shadows beyond the shore, the dark was too dark. But everything was somehow beautiful here. Even the darkness. It was how the moment felt
that silenced us. Magic was unfolding between us, encircling us like a rope, tying us to one another.
As I started toward the walkway, the rounded shores of the Sea Islands emerged in the distance. Beyond that was only dense, flat fog. Tufts
of swamp grass rose from the water to form long, shallow banks rising in and out of the coastal mud. Along the beach, weathered wooden docks
stretched out into the unbroken blue water until they disappeared into the black deep. The docks faded down the coast like weathered wooden
fingers. Bridges to nowhere.
I looked up at the sky. Not a star in sight. Liv looked down at the selenometer whirring on her wrist, and tapped it. “None of these numbers
mean anything anymore. We're on our own now.” She unfastened her watch and slid it into her pocket.
“Guess so.”
“What now?” Link bent to pick up a shell with his good arm and chucked it into the distance. The water swallowed it without a sound. Ridley
stood next to him, streaks of pink hair whipping in the wind. On the far edge of the dock in front of us, the flag of South Carolina — with the
silhouette of a palmetto and a crescent moon on a field of midnight blue — looked like a Caster flag as it fluttered from a spindly flagpole.
When I looked at the flag more closely, I realized it had changed. This one had a seven-pointed star in the sky, next to the familiar crescent
moon and palmetto silhouette. The Southern Star, right there on the flag, as if it had fallen out of the sky.
If this really was the seam where the Mortal and the magical touched, there was no sign of it here. I don't know what I was hoping for. All I had
now were one too many stars on the state flag and a feeling of magic as thick as the salt in the air.
I joined the others at the far edge of the walkway. The wind had picked up, and the flag was whipping around the pole. It didn't make a sound.
Liv consulted the folded map. “If we're in the right place, it has to be between that island, beyond the buoy, and where we're standing.”
“I think we're in the right place.” I was sure of it.
“How do you know?”
“Remember that Southern Star you were telling me about?” I pointed to the flag. “Think about it. If you followed the star the whole way here,
the star on the flag is exactly what you would be looking for. Some kind of sign you're at the right spot.”
“Of course. The seven-pointed star.” She examined the flag, touching the fabric as if she was allowing herself to believe it for the very first
time. There wasn't time for that. I knew we had to keep moving. “So what are we even looking for? Land? Or something man-made?”
“You mean this isn't it?” Link looked disappointed and shoved his garden shears back into his belt.
“I think we still have to cross over the water. It makes sense, really. Like crossing the river Styx to get to Hades.” Liv flattened the map
against her palm. “According to the map, we're looking for some kind of connector that will take us across the water to the Great Barrier itself.
Like a sandbar or a bridge.” She held the vellum over the map, and we all looked.
Link took them out of her hands. “Yeah, I see it. Kinda cool.” He flipped the vellum up and down across the map. “Now you see it, now you
don't.” He dropped the map, and it fluttered into a mess of pages on the sand.
Liv bent to pick it up. “Careful with that! Are you completely mental?”
“You mean, like a genius?” Sometimes there was no point in Link and Liv talking at all. Liv pocketed Aunt Prue's map, and we started
walking again.
Ridley picked up Lucille Ball. She hadn't said much since we left the Tunnels. Maybe now that she had been declawed, she preferred
Lucille's company. Or maybe she was scared. She probably knew better than the rest of us the dangers that lay ahead.
I could feel the Arclight burning in my pocket. My heart began to pound, and my head began to spin.
What was it doing to me? Since we crossed over into the no man's land the map called Loca silentia, the light had stopped illuminating our
path and started illuminating the past. Macon's past. It had become a conduit for the visions, a direct line I couldn't control. The visions were
coming intermittently, interrupting the present with fragmented bits and pieces of Macon's past.
An old palmetto frond snapped loudly under one of Ridley's shoes. Then something else, and I felt myself slipping away —
Macon could feel it immediately when his shoulder snapped — the intense pain of his bones cracking. His skin tightened, as if it could no
longer hold whatever was lurking inside him. The breath was sucked from his lungs, like he was being crushed. His vision began to blur,
and he had the sensation he was falling, even though he could feel the rocks tearing at his flesh as his body seized on the ground.
The Transformation.
From this moment forth, he would not be able to walk among Mortals in the daylight. The sun would singe the flesh from his body. He
wouldn't be able to ignore the urge to feed on the blood of Mortals. He was one of them now — another Blood Incubus in the long line of
killers on the Ravenwood Family Tree. A predator walking among his prey, waiting to feed.
I was back again, as suddenly as I had gone.
I stumbled toward Liv, my head reeling. “We've got to get going. Things are getting out of control.”
“What things?”
“The Arclight — the things in my head,” I said, unable to explain it any better than that.
She nodded. “I thought it might get bad for you. I wasn't sure if a Wayward would react more strongly to an intensely powerful place, being as
sensitive to the pull of certain Casters as you are. I mean, if you really are …” If I really was a Wayward. She didn't have to say it.
“So you're saying you finally believe the Great Barrier is real?”
“No. Unless …” She pointed out past the farthest dock on the horizon, where the skinniest, most splintered dock extended past the others,
so far that we couldn't see where it ended, except that it disappeared into fog. “That could be the bridge we're looking for.”
“Not much of a bridge.” Link looked skeptical.
“Only one way to find out.” I walked ahead of them.
As we picked our way across rotting boards and oyster shells, I found myself slipping over and over. I was there, and I wasn't. In and out. One
minute, I could hear Ridley's and Link's voices echoing as they bickered. The next, the fog blurred around the edges, and I was pulled back into
visions of Macon's past. I knew there was something I was supposed to gain from the visions, but they were coming so quickly now it was
impossible to figure out.
I thought about Amma. She would have said, “Everythin’ means somethin’.” I tried to imagine what she would have said next.
P. O. R. T. E. N. D. Seven down. As in, you be sure to pay attention to the what now, Ethan Wate, because that's gonna point the way to the
what's next.
She was right, as usual — everything did mean something, didn't it? All the changes in Lena would have added up to the truth, if I had been
able to see it. Even now, I tried to piece together my glimpses of the visions, to find the story they were trying to tell.
I didn't have time, though, because as we reached the bridge, I felt another surge, the walkway started to sway, and Ridley's and Link's
voices faded —
The room was dark, but Macon didn't need light to see. The shelves were lined with books, as he had imagined they would be. Volumes on
every aspect of American history, particularly the wars that had shaped this country — the Revolutionary War and the Civil War. Macon ran
his fingers over the leather spines. These books were of no use to him now.
This was a different kind of war. A war among the Casters, waged within his own family.
He could hear footsteps above, the sound of the crescent key fitting into the lock. The door creaked, a slice of light escaping as the
hatch in the ceiling opened. He wanted to reach out, offer his hand to help her down, but he didn't dare.
It had been years since he had seen or touched her.
They had only met in letters and between the covers of the books she left for him in the Tunnels. But he hadn't seen her or heard her
voice in all that time. Marian had made sure of that. She stepped through the door cut into the ceiling, the light spilling into the room.
Macon's breath caught in his throat. She was even more beautiful than he remembered. Her shiny brown hair was held away from her face
by a pair of red reading glasses. She smiled.
“Jane.” He hadn't said her name aloud in such a long time. It was like a song.
“No one's called me that since …” She looked down. “I use Lila now.”
“Of course, I knew that.”
Lila was visibly nervous, her voice shaky. “I'm sorry I had to come, but this was the only way.” She avoided his eyes. It was too painful to
look at him. “What I have to tell you — it's not something I could leave for you in the study, and I couldn't risk sending a message through
the Tunnels.”
Macon had a small study in the Tunnels, a reprieve from the self-induced exile of his solitary life in Gatlin. Sometimes Lila pressed
messages between the pages of the books she left for him. The messages were never personal. They always related to her research in the
Lunae Libri — possible answers to the questions they were both asking.
“It's good to see you.” Macon took a step forward, and Lila stiffened. He looked hurt. “It's safe. I can control the urges now.”
“It's not that. I — I shouldn't be here. I told Mitchell I was working late in the archive. I don't like to lie to him.” Of course. She felt guilty.
She was still as honest as Macon remembered.
“We are in an archive.”
“Semantics, Macon.”
Macon drew a heavy breath at the sound of his name from her lips. “What is so important that you would risk coming to me, Lila?”
“I've found something your father kept from you.”
Macon's black eyes darkened at the mention of his father. “I haven't seen my father in years. Not since —” He didn't want to say what he
was thinking. He hadn't seen his father since Silas had manipulated Macon into letting Lila go. Silas and his twisted views, his bigotry
against Mortals and Casters alike. But Macon didn't mention any of that. He didn't want to make it harder for her. “The Transformation.”
“There is something you need to know.” Lila dropped her voice, as if what she was about to say could only be spoken in whispers.
“Abraham is alive.”
Macon and Lila didn't have time to react. There was a whirring sound, and a figure materialized in the darkness.
“Bravo. She really is much smarter than I had anticipated. Lila, is it?” Abraham was clapping loudly. “A tactical error on my part, but one
your sister can correct easily enough. Wouldn't you agree, Macon?”
Macon's eyes narrowed. “Sarafine is not my sister.”
Abraham adjusted his string tie. With his white beard and Sunday suit, he looked more like Colonel Sanders than what he was — a
killer.
“There's no need to be nasty. Sarafine is your father's daughter, after all. It's a shame you two can't get along.” Abraham walked casually
toward Macon. “You know, I always hoped we would have a chance to meet. I'm sure once we talk, you'll understand your place in the Order
of Things.”
“I know my place. I made my choice and Bound myself to the Light long ago.”
Abraham laughed loudly. “As if such a thing were even possible. You're a Dark creature by nature, an Incubus. This ridiculous alliance
with the Light Casters, defending Mortals — it's inane. You belong with us, with your family.” Abraham looked at Lila. “And for what? A
Mortal woman you can never be with? One who is married to another man?”
Lila knew it wasn't true. Macon hadn't made his choice solely because of her, but she knew she was part of the reason. She faced
Abraham, mustering all the courage she possessed. “We're going to find a way to end all that. Casters and Mortals should be able to do
more than just coexist.”
Abraham's expression changed. His face darkened, and he no longer looked like an aging Southern gentleman. He looked sinister and
evil as he smiled at Macon. “Your father and Hunting — we hoped you would join us. I warned Hunting that brothers are often a
disappointment. As are sons.”
Macon turned his head sharply, his face changing to mirror Abraham's. “I am no one's son.”
“At any rate, I can't have you or this woman interfering with our plans. It's unfortunate, really. You turned your back on your family
because you loved this filthy Mortal, and yet she will die because you dragged her into this.” Abraham vanished, materializing in front of
Lila. “Oh, well.” He opened his mouth, baring his gleaming canines.
Lila covered her head with her arms and screamed, waiting for the bite that never came. Macon materialized between them. Lila felt the
weight of his body as it slammed into hers, throwing her backward. “Lila, run!”
For a second she was paralyzed, as the two of them thrashed at each other. The sound was violent, as if the earth was tearing itself apart.
Lila watched as Macon threw Abraham to the ground, his guttural cries ripping through the air. Then she ran.
The sky swirled around me slowly, like someone hit REWIND. Liv must have been talking to me, because I could see her mouth forming words,
but I couldn't make them out. I closed my eyes again.
Abraham had killed my mother. She may have died by Sarafine's hand, but it was Abraham who ordered it. I was sure of it.
“Ethan? Can you hear me?” Liv's voice was frantic.
“I'm okay.” I pushed myself up slowly. All three of them were staring down at me, and Lucille was sitting on my chest.
I was sprawled out on the rotting walkway. “Give it to me.” Liv was trying to pry the Arclight out of my hands. “It's acting as some kind of
metaphysical channel. You can't control it.”
I didn't let go. It was a channel I couldn't afford to close.
“At least tell me what happened. Who was it now? Abraham or Sarafine?” Liv put her hand on my shoulder to steady me.
“It's fine. I don't want to talk about it.”
Link stared down at me. “You okay, man?”
I blinked a few times. It was as if I was underwater, watching them through ripples. “I'm fine.”
Ridley stood up a few feet away, wiping her hands on her skirt. “Famous last words.”
Liv picked up her backpack and stood staring at the end of the almost endless dock. I pulled myself up next to her.
“This is it.” I looked at Liv. “I can feel it.”
I shivered. That's when I noticed she was shaking, too.

Categories: Beautiful Darkness

Beautiful Darkness - Chapter 31

No One Special
That night, we slept in the forest between the roots of an enormous tree, the biggest I'd ever seen. Link's knee was bandaged in my spare Tshirt,
and his arm was in a sling made from part of my Jackson sweatshirt. Ridley lay on the opposite side of the tree with her eyes wide open,
staring up at the sky. I wondered if she was staring at the Mortal sky now. She looked exhausted, but I didn't think she was going to get any
sleep.
I wondered what she was thinking, if she regretted helping us. Had Ridley really lost her powers?
How would it feel to be Mortal when you had always been something else, something more? When you had never felt the “powerlessness of
human existence,” as Mrs. English had said in class last year. She had been talking about H. G. Wells’ The Invisible Man, but right now Ridley
seemed just as invisible.
Could you be happy if you woke up and suddenly you were no one special?
Could Lena? Is that what life with me would feel like? Hadn't Lena suffered enough for me already?
Like Ridley, I couldn't fall asleep, but I didn't want to stare at the sky. I wanted to see what was in Lena's notebook. A part of me knew it was
an invasion of her privacy, but I also knew there might be something in those crumpled pages that could help us. After about an hour, I
convinced myself reading her notebook was for the greater good, and I opened it.
At first it was hard to read, since my cell phone was my only light source. After my eyes adjusted, Lena's handwriting stared back at me from
between the blue lines. I had seen the familiar print often enough in the months since her birthday, but I didn't think I would ever get used to it. It
was such a sharp contrast to the girly script she wrote in before that night. It surprised me even more to see actual writing, after so many months
of headstone photographs and black designs. Dark Caster designs, like the ones on her hands, were scribbled in the margins. But the first few
entries were dated only days after Macon's death, when she was still writing.
emptycrowded daynights / all the same (more or less) fear (less and more) afraid / waiting for truth to strangle me in my sleep / if i ever slept
Fear (less and more) afraid. I understood the words, because that's how she had acted. Fearless and more afraid. Like she had nothing to
lose but was afraid to lose it.
I flipped ahead and stopped when a date caught my eye. June 12th. The last day of school.
darkness hides and i think i can hold her / smother her in the palm of my hand / but when i look my hands are empty / quiet as her fingers fold
around me
I read it over and over. She was describing the day at the lake, the day she had taken things too far. The day she could have killed me. Who
was the “her”? Sarafine?
How long had she been fighting it? When did it start? The night Macon died? When she started wearing his clothes?
I knew I should close the notebook, but I couldn't. Reading her words was almost like hearing her thoughts again. I hadn't known them in
such a long time, and I wanted to so badly. I turned each page, looking for the days that haunted me.
Like the day of the fair —
mortal hearts and mortal fears / something they can share i untie him like a sparrow
Freedom — that's what sparrows meant to a Caster.
All along I thought she was trying to be free from me, but really she was trying to set me free. As if loving her was a cage I couldn't escape.
I closed the notebook. It hurt too much to read it, especially when Lena was so far away, in all the ways that mattered.
A few feet away, Ridley was still staring blankly into the Mortal stars. For the first time, we saw the same sky.
Liv was wedged between two roots, with me on one side and Link on the other. After I found out the truth about what happened on Lena's
birthday, I guess I expected my feelings for Liv to disappear. But even now I found myself wondering. If things were different, if I had never met
Lena, if I had never met Liv …
I spent the next few hours watching Liv. When she slept, she looked peaceful, beautiful. Not Lena's kind of beautiful, something different.
She looked content — like a sunny day, a cold glass of milk, an unopened book before you cracked the binding. There was nothing tortured
about her. She looked the way I wanted to feel.
Mortal. Hopeful. Alive.
When I finally drifted off, I felt that way, just for a minute….
Lena was shaking me. “Wake up, Sleepyhead. We have to talk.” I smiled and pulled her into my arms. I tried to kiss her, but she laughed and
ducked away. “This isn't that kind of a dream.”
I sat up and looked around. We were in Macon's bed in the Tunnels. “All my dreams are that kind of dream, L. I'm almost seventeen.”
“This is my dream, not yours. And I've only been sixteen for four months.”
“Won't Macon be mad if we're here?”
“Macon's dead, don't you remember? You must really be asleep.” She was right. I had forgotten everything, and now it all came crashing
back. Macon was gone. The trade.
And Lena had left me, only she hadn't. She was here.
“So this is a dream?” I was trying to keep my stomach from twisting with loss, the guilt of everything I'd done, everything I owed her.
Lena nodded.
“Am I dreaming you, or are you dreaming me?”
“Does it ever make a difference, when it comes to us?” She was avoiding the question.
I tried again. “When I wake up, will you be gone?”
“Yes. But I had to see you. This was the only way for us to really talk.” She was wearing a white T-shirt, one of my oldest, softest ones. She
looked tousled and beautiful, in the way I loved best, when she thought she looked the worst.
I put my hands around her waist and pulled her close. “L, I saw my mom. She told me about Macon. I think she loved him.”
“They loved each other. I've seen the visions, too.” So our connection was still there. I felt a wave of relief.
“They were like us, Lena.”
“And they couldn't be together. Like us.”
It was a dream, I was sure of it. Because we could speak these terrible truths with a strange remove, as if they were happening to other
people. She rested her head on my chest, picking mud off my shirt with her fingers. How had my shirt gotten so muddy? I tried to remember but
couldn't.
“What are we going to do, L?”
“I don't know, Ethan. I'm scared.”
“What do you want?”
“You,” she whispered.
“So why is it so hard?”
“We're all wrong. Everything's all wrong when I'm with you.”
“Does this feel wrong?” I held her tighter.
“No. But how I feel doesn't matter anymore.” I felt her sigh against my chest.
“Who told you that?”
“No one had to tell me.” I stared into her eyes. They were still gold.
“You can't go to the Great Barrier. You have to come back.”
“I can't stop now. I have to see how it ends.”
I played with a strand of her curling black hair. “Why didn't you have to see how it ended with us?”
She smiled and touched my face. “Because now I know how it ends with you.”
“How does it end?”
“Like this.” She bent over and kissed me, and her hair fell around my face like rain. I pulled up the covers, and she climbed beneath them,
folding into my arms. As we kissed, I felt the heat of her touch. We tumbled in the bed. I was on top of her, then she was on top of me. The heat
intensified to the point where I couldn't breathe. I thought my skin was on fire, and when I broke away from her kiss, it was.
We were both on fire, surrounded by flames that rose higher than we could see, and the bed wasn't a bed at all but a stone slab. It was
burning all around us, the yellow flames of Sarafine's fire.
Lena screamed and clung to me. I looked down from where we were, on top of the massive pyramid of splintered trees. There was a strange
circle chiseled into the stone we were lying on, some kind of Dark Caster symbol.
“Lena, wake up! This isn't you. You didn't kill Macon. You're not going Dark. It was the Book. Amma told me everything.”
The pyre had been for us, not Sarafine. I could hear her laughing — or was it Lena? I couldn't tell the difference anymore. “L, listen to me!
You don't have to do this —”
Lena was screaming. She couldn't stop screaming.
By the time I woke up, the flames had consumed us both.
“Ethan? Wake up. We have to get going.”
I sat up, breathing hard and dripping with sweat. I held out my hands. Nothing. Not a burn, not so much as a scratch. It was a nightmare. I
looked around. Liv and Link were already up. I rubbed my face with my hands. My heart was still pounding, as if the dream was real and I had
almost died. I wondered again if it was my dream or Lena's. I wondered if that was really how it ended for us. Fire and death, just as Sarafine
would want it.
Ridley was sitting on a rock, sucking on a lollipop, which was sort of pathetic. During the night, she seemed to have moved from a state of
shock to one of denial. She was acting as if nothing happened. No one really knew what to say. She was like one of those war vets suffering from
post-traumatic stress disorder, who come home and think they're still on the battlefield.
She was staring at Link, tossing her hair and looking at him expectantly. “Why don't you come on over here, Hot Rod?”
Link limped over to my backpack and pulled out a bottle of water. “I'll pass.”
Ridley pushed her shades on top of her head and stared at him even more intently, which made it clear her powers were gone. In the light of
day, Ridley's eyes were as blue as Liv's.
“I said come over here.” Ridley inched her short skirt farther up her bruised thigh. I felt sorry for her. She wasn't a Siren anymore, just a girl
who looked like one.
“Why?” Link wasn't catching on.
Ridley's tongue was bright red as she gave her lollipop one last lick. “Don't you want to kiss me?” For a second, I thought Link might play
along, but that would only delay the inevitable.
“No, thanks.” He turned away, and it was obvious he felt guilty.
Ridley's lip quivered. “Maybe it's temporary, and my powers will come back.” She was trying to convince herself more than anyone.
Someone had to tell her. The sooner she faced reality, the sooner she would be able to move on. If she could. “I think they're really gone,
Ridley.”
She whipped around to face me, her voice shaky. “You don't know that. Just because you went out with a Caster doesn't mean you know
anything.”
“I know Dark Casters have yellow eyes.”
I heard the breath catch in her throat. She grabbed the bottom of her filthy tank top and yanked it up. Her skin was still smooth and golden,
but the tattoo that had encircled her navel was gone. She ran her hands across her stomach, and then crumbled.
“It's true. She really took my powers.” Ridley opened her fingers, letting the lollipop fall into the dirt. She didn't make a sound, but the tears
ran down her face in two silver lines.
Link walked over and held out his hand to pull her up. “That's not true. You're still pretty bad. I mean, hot. For a Mortal.”
Ridley jumped to her feet, hysterical. “You think this is funny? That losing my powers is like losing one of your stupid basketball games?
They're who I am, you idiot! Without them I'm nothing.” Black streaks ran down her cheeks. She was shaking.
Link picked up her lollipop out of the dirt. He opened the water bottle and doused it. “Give it some time, Rid. You'll develop charms all your
own. You'll see.” He handed it back to her. Ridley stared back at him blankly.
Without looking away, she hurled the lollipop as far as she could.

Categories: Beautiful Darkness

Beautiful Darkness - Chapter 30

Consequences
We tried to keep up with Ridley, who was weaving in and out of the trees. Liv was behind her, consulting the map or her selenometer
constantly. She didn't trust Ridley any more than the rest of us did.
There was something bothering me. A part of me believed her. Maybe she really cared about Lena. It was unlikely, but if there was a chance
Ridley was telling the truth, I had to follow her. I owed Lena a debt I could never repay.
I didn't know if there was a future for us. If Lena would ever again be the girl I fell in love with. But it didn't matter.
The Arclight was heating up inside my pocket. I pulled it out, expecting to see a pool of iridescent color, but the surface was black. Now all I
could see was my reflection. The Arclight seemed more than broken. It had become completely random.
Ridley's eyes widened when she saw it, and she stopped walking for the first time in a long while. “Where'd you get that, Short Straw?”
“Marian gave it to me.” I didn't want Ridley to know it had been my mother's, or who had given it to her.
“Well, that might even the odds a little. I don't think you can get my Uncle Hunting in there, but maybe one of the members of his pack.”
“I'm not exactly sure how to use it.” I almost didn't tell her, but it was true.
Ridley lifted an eyebrow. “Little Miss Know-It-All couldn't tell you?” Liv's cheeks flushed. Ridley took her time unwrapping a stick of pink gum
and folded it into her mouth. “You have to touch him with it.” She stepped closer to me. “Which means you have to get close.”
“Whatever.” Link pushed past her. “There are two of us. We can swing it.”
Liv tucked her pencil behind her ear. She had been taking notes. “Link might be right. I wouldn't want to get near any of them. But if we had
no choice, it would be worth a try.”
“Then you have to lay the Cast. You know, speak the incantation and all.” Ridley was leaning against a tree, smirking. She knew we didn't
know the Cast. Lucille was sitting at Ridley's feet, studying her.
“I'm guessing you aren't going to tell us what it is.”
“How should I know? It's not like there are a lot of those things around.”
Liv spread the map out in her lap, carefully smoothing it. “We're going the right way. If we keep going east, this path should eventually lead
to the shore.” She pointed to a dense cluster of trees.
“Where? That forest?” Link looked dubious.
“Don't be scared, Hot Rod. I'll take Hansel, you take Gretel.” Ridley winked at Link, like she still had power over him. Which she did, but it
had nothing to do with her gifts as a Siren.
“I'll be all right on my own. Why don't you have another piece a gum?” Link pushed past her.
Maybe Ridley was like chicken pox; you could only catch it once.
“How long can it take to pee?” Ridley threw a rock in the direction of a clump of bushes, anxious to get going again.
“I can hear you.” Link's voice came from the bushes.
“Good to know at least some of your bodily functions are working.”
Liv looked at me and rolled her eyes. The longer we walked, the more Link and Ridley went at it.
“You're not makin’ it any easier.”
“You need me to come back there and help you?”
“You're all talk, Rid,” Link called from behind the bushes. She started to get up, and Liv looked shocked. Ridley smiled and sat down again,
satisfied.
I studied the sphere in my hands as the color changed from black to an iridescent green. Nothing useful, just colors that seemed on
perpetual overload. Maybe Link was right. Maybe I had broken it.
Ridley looked confused, or interested. It was hard to tell. “What's with the light?”
“It's like a compass. It lights up if we're going the right way.” At least, it used to.
“Hmm. I didn't know they did that.” She was bored again.
“I'm sure there are a lot of things you don't know.” Liv smiled innocently.
“Careful, or I might convince you to take a swim in the river.”
I watched the Arclight. There was something different about it. The light began to pulse with a brightness and speed I hadn't seen since we
left Bonaventure Cemetery. I turned to show Liv. “L, look at this.”
Ridley's head whipped toward me, and I froze.
I had called Liv “L.”
There was only one L in my life. Even though Liv didn't notice, Ridley did. Her eyes were wild as she sucked on her lollipop. She was staring
right at me, and I could feel my will slipping away. I dropped the Arclight, and it rolled across the mossy forest floor.
Liv crouched over the Arclight, sitting on her heels. “That's strange. Why do you suppose it's flashing green again? Another visit from
Amma, Arelia, and Twyla?”
“It's probably a bomb.” I heard Link's voice, but I couldn't say a word. I dropped to the ground at Ridley's feet. It had been a while since she
had flexed her Siren powers on me. I had a fleeting thought before my face hit the mud. Either Link was right, and he was immune to her now, or
she was really holding back. If that was true, it was something new for her.
“If you hurt my cousin … if you so much as think about hurting my cousin, you'll spend the rest of your miserable life as my slave.
Understand, Short Straw?”
My head lifted involuntarily and twisted, which made my neck feel like it was about to snap. My eyes forced themselves open, and I was
staring into Ridley's glowing yellow eyes. They were burning so bright, I was getting dizzy.
“Stop that.” I heard Liv's voice and felt the weight of my body slam against the ground before I regained control of it. “For goodness sake,
Ridley, don't be stupid.”
Liv and Ridley were standing face to face. Liv's arms were folded across her chest. Ridley held the lollipop between the two of them. “Settle
down, Poppins. Short Straw and I are friends.”
“It doesn't look that way to me.” Liv's voice was rising. “Don't forget, we're the ones risking our lives to save Lena.” Their faces were lit with
flashes of colored light. The Arclight was going wild, pulsing color through the trees.
“Don't get your knickers in a twist, Mate.” Ridley's eyes were steely.
Liv's were dark. “Don't be a bloody fool. If Ethan doesn't care about Lena, then what are we doing in the middle of these godforsaken
woods?”
“Good question, Keeper. I know what I'm doing here. But if you don't care about Boyfriend, what's your excuse?” Ridley was standing inches
from Liv, but Liv didn't back down.
“What am I doing here? The Southern Star has vanished, a Cataclyst is calling a moon out of time at the mythical Great Barrier, and you're
asking what I'm doing here? Are you serious?”
“So this has nothing to do with Boyfriend?”
“Ethan, who is, in fact, no one's boyfriend, doesn't know anything about the Caster world.” Liv wasn't rattled. “He's in over his head. He needs
a Keeper.”
“Actually, you're a Keeper-in-Training. Asking you for help is like asking a nurse to perform open-heart surgery. And according to your job
description, you're not supposed to get involved. So the way I see it, you aren't a very good Keeper.” Ridley was right. There were rules, and Liv
was breaking them.
“That may be true, but I am an excellent astronomer. And without my readings, we wouldn't be able to use this map at all, or find the Great
Barrier, or Lena.”
The Arclight went cold in my hand. It was completely black again.
“Did I miss somethin’?” Link stepped out of the bushes, zipping his fly. The girls stared at him as I pulled myself up out of the mud. “Sweet
tea in the toilet. I always miss the good stuff.”
“What —” Liv tapped on her selenometer. “Something's wrong. The dials are going crazy.”
Beyond the trees, a crashing noise echoed through the forest. Hunting must have caught up with us. Then I had another thought, fleeting,
but it didn't make me feel any less guilty.
Maybe it was someone else, someone who didn't like us following her. Someone who could control things in the natural world.
“Go!”
The crashing grew louder. Without warning, the trees on either side collapsed in front of me. I backed away. The last time trees had fallen in
front of me, it hadn't been an accident.
Lena! Is that you?
A few feet around us, great moss-covered oaks and white pines ripped up out of the mud, roots and all, crashing back to the ground.
Lena, don't!
Link stumbled toward Ridley. “Unwrap a sucker, Babe.”
“I told you not to call me Babe.”
For the first time in hours, I could see the sky. Only now it was dark. The black clouds of Caster magic had rolled in over us. Then I felt
something, from far away.
More like, I heard something.
Lena.
Ethan, run!
It was her voice, the voice that had been silent for so long. But if Lena was telling me to run, who was tearing the trees out of the ground?
L, what's happening?
I couldn't hear her answer. There was only darkness, those Caster clouds rushing at us like they were chasing us. Until I saw the clouds for
what they were.
“Look out!” I pulled Liv backward and pushed Link toward Ridley just in time. We fell into the brush as a shower of broken pines came falling
from the sky like rain. The branches flattened into a great pile exactly where we had been standing. Dust stung my eyes, and I couldn't see
anything. The dirt caught in my throat as I coughed.
Lena's voice was gone, but I heard something else. A humming sound, as if we'd stumbled across the hive of a thousand bees, all looking
to kill for their queen.
The dust was so thick, I could barely make out the shapes around me. Liv was lying next to me, bleeding above one eye. Ridley was
whimpering, huddled around Link, who was pinned by a massive tree branch. “Wake up, Shrinky Dink. Wake up.”
As I crawled toward them, Ridley shrank back. The look on her face was pure terror. Only she wasn't looking at me. She was looking at
something behind me.
The humming sound grew louder. I felt the burning cold of Caster darkness on the back of my neck. When I turned around, the massive pile
of pine needles that had almost buried us had formed some kind of bonfire. The pyramid of needles created a pyre, a giant burning platform
pointing up into the black clouds. But the flames weren't red, and they didn't produce heat. They were as yellow as Ridley's eyes, and they
emitted only cold, sorrow, and fear.
Ridley's whimpering grew louder. “She's here.”
I looked up as a stone slab emerged from the hissing yellow flames of the pyre. A woman lay on top of the rock. She looked almost
peaceful, like a dead saint about to be carried through the streets. But she was no saint.
Sarafine.
Her eyes jerked open, and her lips curved into a cold smile. She stretched, like a cat waking from a nap, then rose to stand on the stone.
From down below where we stood, she might as well have been fifty feet tall.
“Were you expecting someone else, Ethan? I can understand the confusion. You know what they say. Like mother, like daughter. In this
case, more and more every day now.”
My heart was pounding. I could see Sarafine's red lips, her long black hair. I turned away. I didn't want to see her face, the face that looked
so much like Lena's. “Get away from me, witch.”
Ridley was still crying, huddled next to Link, rocking back and forth like a madwoman.
Lena? Can you hear me?
Sarafine's haunting voice rose over the flames, and she was there again, standing at the top of the fire. “I'm not here for you, Ethan. I'll leave
you for my darling daughter. She's grown up so much this year, hasn't she? There's nothing like watching your child reach her full potential.
Really makes a mother proud.”
I watched the flames crawl up her legs. “You're wrong. Lena's not like you.”
“I think I've heard that somewhere before — on Lena's birthday, perhaps. Except then you believed it, and now you're lying. You know you've
lost her. She can't change what was meant to be.”
The flames were at her waist. She had the perfect features of the Duchannes women, but they seemed disfigured on Sarafine. “Maybe Lena
can't change it, but I can. I'll do whatever I have to do to protect her.”
Sarafine smiled, and I cringed. Her smile was so much like Lena's, or how Lena's smile seemed lately. As the flames moved up her chest,
she disappeared.
“So strong and so much like your mother. Her last words were something like that. Or were they?” I heard a whisper in my ear. “You see, I've
forgotten, because it didn't matter.”
I froze. Sarafine was standing right next to me now, still wreathed in flames. I knew it wasn't an earthly fire, though, because the closer she
came, the colder I felt.
“Your mother didn't matter. Her death was neither noble nor important. It was simply something I felt like doing at the time. It meant nothing.”
The flames rose to her neck and leaped up, consuming her body. “Just like you.”
I reached for her throat. I wanted to tear it out. But my hand slipped through her, into the air. There was nothing there. She was an apparition.
I wanted to kill her and I couldn't even touch her.
Sarafine laughed. “You think I would waste my time coming here in the flesh, Mortal?” She turned to Ridley, who was still rocking, with her
hands clamped over her mouth. “Amusing, don't you think, Ridley?” Sarafine raised her hand and flung open her fingers.
Ridley rose to her feet, her hands clinging to her own throat. I watched as the spikes of Ridley's sandals rose, hovering above the ground as
her face turned purple and she choked herself. Her blond hair hung down from her body, like a lifeless doll.
Sarafine's ghostly form dissolved into Ridley's body. Ridley glowed with yellow light — her skin, her hair, her eyes. The light was so bright,
she had no pupils at all. Even in the darkness of the forest, I had to shield my face. Ridley's head jerked up, like a marionette's, and she started
to speak.
“My power is growing, and soon the Seventeenth Moon will be upon us, called out of time, as only a mother can. I decide when the sun sets.
I have moved stars for my child, and she will Claim herself and join me. Only my daughter could block out the Sixteenth Moon, and only I can
raise the Seventeenth. There are no others like us, not in either of our worlds. We are the beginning and the end.” Ridley's body collapsed back
onto the ground, like an empty sack.
The Arclight was burning in my pocket. I hoped Sarafine couldn't sense it. I remembered the flashing — the Arclight tried to warn me. I
should have paid attention.
“You betrayed us, Ridley. You're a traitor. The Father is not as forgiving as I am.” The Father. Sarafine could only be talking about one
person — the father of the Ravenwood line of Blood Incubuses, the father who started it all. Abraham.
Sarafine's voice echoed over the sound of the flames. “You will be judged, but I will not deny him the pleasure. You were my responsibility,
and now you're my shame. I think it's only fitting that I leave you with a parting gift.” She raised her arms high above her head. “Since you are so
intent on helping these Mortals, from this moment forward you will live as a Mortal and die as one. Your powers have been returned to the Dark
Fire from which they were born.”
Ridley bolted upright and screamed, her pain echoing through the forest. Then it was gone — the fallen trees, the fire, Sarafine —
everything. The forest was just as it had been a few minutes before. Green and dark, full of pines and oaks and black mud. Every tree, every
branch, was back in place, as if nothing had happened.
Liv was pouring water from a plastic bottle into Ridley's mouth. Liv's face was still muddy and bleeding, but she seemed okay. Ridley, on the
other hand, was as white as a ghost.
“That was incredibly powerful magic. An apparition able to possess a Dark Caster.” Liv shook her head. I touched the blood above her eye,
and she winced. “And Cast at the same time, if what she said about Ridley's powers is true.” I looked at Ridley doubtfully. It was hard to imagine
Ridley without her Power of Persuasion. “In any event, Ridley won't be quite right, not for some time.” Liv doused part of her sweatshirt with water
and wiped Ridley's face. “I didn't realize the chance she was taking by coming here. She must really care about all of you.”
“Not all of us,” I said, trying to help Liv prop Ridley up. Ridley coughed out the water and pulled her hand across her mouth, smearing her
pink lipstick. She looked like a cheerleader who had been dunked at the school fair one too many times. She tried to speak. “Link. Is he …?”
I was kneeling next to him. The tree limb that had fallen on him had disappeared, but Link was still moaning in pain. It seemed impossible
that he was hurt, that any of us were, since there was no sign of what had happened here — no fallen trees, not a twig out of place. But Link's arm
was purple and about twice its normal size, and his pants were ripped.
“Ridley?” Link opened his eyes.
“She's fine. We're all fine.” I ripped open his pant leg even more. His knee was bleeding.
Link tried to laugh. “What're you lookin’ at?”
“Your ugly face.” I leaned over him, watching to see if his eyes could focus. He was going to be okay.
“You're not gonna kiss me, are you?”
Right then, I was so relieved I almost could have.
“Pucker up.”

Categories: Beautiful Darkness