04 Last (48 page)

The sword pierced his heart.

The sound of the ‘crunch,’ as it slid through Daniel’s ribs and in to his heart was earth shattering. Before the man in the cloak could begin to gloat about his victory, I returned with violence of my own. I threw my knife direct at the man’s face. It was a good throw, and the man fell to the ground. He did not get back up. He was dead. The feeling of heaviness stopped as the man fell.

Daniel’s knees buckled, and he fell to the ground. His fall was quick and without grace. The expression of shock dominated his features. The sword was still lodged in his chest. I moved to him, ignoring the chaos of the fight around me.

My hands moved to the large sword sticking out of his chest. I wasn’t sure if it was the right thing to do, but I couldn’t leave it there. It was too difficult to look at. I pulled it out of his chest and put my hands over the gaping wound. Silver blood rushed over my hands, drenching them in seconds. I was useless to stop the blood. I did not have Eli’s talent. I did not feel the pull of healing. I was too worked up to figure out if I had learned that ability as well. But Eli could save him. He could help Daniel heal before the blood loss was too much.

“I’m going to get Eli,” I said.

Blood was on Daniel’s lips. He could not reply. His mouth moved but words escaped him. He was mute in his pain. His eyes were lost in fear. His hand moved to touch my face. It never connected. His hand fell, and his eyes closed. His body went limp. The strong sound of his slow heartbeat stopped.

I looked up from him, feeling shocked. The room was in chaos. It mirrored my thoughts. Everything felt slowed down. The seconds were torture. I could not keep out the visuals however. They pressed in on my senses – my brain was unable to shut down around the fear and pain.

The historian had found another dagger. She was wielding both daggers in different directions as she fought the dragon-girl and the others. She moved and danced in time to the rhythm of the fight. Her skill was unmatched. She was outnumbered, however. I couldn’t leave her to the fight. I couldn’t let her die…

Feeling detached, I raised my hand. The earth started to shake even as fire came from the palm of my hand. Those closest to me felt the wrath of the fire. Those farther away from me felt the wrath of the earth. The cave floor split open and the others, except for the historian and the dragon-girl, fell. When they were gone, the floor knitted back together, sealing them to their fate. They would not survive.

The historian took advantage of the moment and moved close to the woman. With a swift motion, the historian stabbed the dragon-girl in the throat and the heart at the same time. The woman let out a screech full of agony then fell to the ground. She was dead before she hit the floor. The historian turned to me. Her eyes had turned sad.

“I’m taking him to Eli,” I said before she could speak.

“He is gone, Clare,” the historian said.

“No!” My voice was sharp, full of purpose.

I focused on the dark in preparation to take Daniel to the camp. Eli would fix him. He had brought me back from the brink of death after I had been shot. He could do it with Daniel. Daniel was stronger – a fighter. He would never just leave me. Daniel always found his way back to me.

“Clare…let him rest.”

The historian put her hand on my shoulder. Her touch was compassionate, warm and surprisingly feminine. It was the touch of sorrow. I felt the tears form in my eyes.

“No…” I said more softly.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

My hands were still holding the wound in Daniel’s chest. They kept the blood at bay, but I could feel the truth of her words. His heart had stopped beating. He was gone. The cold emotion of loss was finding its way through my heart. Daniel had left me. My whole world had ended. I felt tears form and then start to drop on to Daniel’s body. They started out as regular tears, salty and fresh, but they changed as they fell down my face. The moisture turned warm and bright. The tears turned in to red diamonds before landing on Daniel’s chest.

My weeping was uncontrollable. The diamonds piled high.

Daniel was gone.

My life would never be the same.

I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think.

I wept and wept.

He couldn’t be gone. Daniel, my best friend, the only person who really ever understood me…he couldn’t just leave…he wouldn’t.

The pressure in my chest was too much. I was going to explode from the build-up of emotion.

The red of my tears filled the wound in his chest. For the first time since he had changed, Daniel bled red. The light of the diamonds filled my eyes with its sparkle. Looking at it, an idea formed. I had brought Anna back with nothing more than a cut and forgiveness. Could I bring Daniel back as well? I had to try.

Without thinking about it, I picked up the sword that had so recently been in Daniel’s chest and moved my hand across its sharp surface. A large gash appeared along the length of my hand. I moved my hand to the wound on Daniel’s chest and let the blood drip down on top of the diamonds, on top of the wound. The sound of my red blood dripping was incredibly loud to my alert ears. Every drop was a drop of hope. I willed the blood to bring him back to me. I willed Daniel to come back.

The historian was not as hopeful.

“Clare, your gift for changing people only works if they have not been taken…”

“No one understands my gift,” I said harshly. “Not even you.”

She sighed but didn’t say anything in response. She allowed me my moment of hope. I waited and I waited. Nothing happened. He remained motionless on the floor; his eyes stared at the ceiling, the light gone from his face. With each passing second, my hope dwindled. The historian was right. He was not coming back. I felt a new wave of grief take over. It was grief without hope, without emotion. It was deadening. There was nothing left of me but my body. My mind had left with Daniel. I was empty.

I took Daniel’s hand in mine being careful to not look at the ring he had given me; it was just a reminder of a broken promise. I sat without moving, a statue of pain and suffering. Finally, the historian spoke again. I wasn’t sure if five minutes had passed or four thousand. I didn’t really care.

“Your friends are here,” she said, her voice coming to me from what felt like a very long distance.

I didn’t move. The fact that I still had friends was meaningless. I wanted Daniel back. I wanted my best friend.

I felt it when Alex walked in to the room, however. She was the first inside the cave. She was quickly followed by Reaper, Margaret, Jackson, Spider, Eli and Serenity. Alex’s shock linked the space between us. It was overwhelmingly complete; it reaffirmed the pain in my chest. It sent ripples of awareness though my body. The pain of losing Daniel went beyond me. Alex set her shock and pain aside and moved to comfort me. She knelt down and put her arms around my shoulders. She wept, as she did her best to comfort me. Her tears released me. More tears fell at her touch – human tears. They slid down my face and made the world smell of salty despair.

“I want him back,” I whispered to her. “I would do anything to bring him back.”

My necklace burned with the words. My ring remained icy cold. There was no one to bind me to any longer. The ring had died with Daniel. I hated the warmth of the necklace. It was just proof of what I had lost.

“I know,” Alex replied, holding me tighter.

I felt the grief of the others surround me. I heard Reaper step away from the group and move back outside. His gait was unsteady as he walked – he was bowed down by the weight of his grief. His oldest friend was gone. Margaret and Jackson were in shock. They had never thought Daniel would be taken.

How would I tell Han and Beatrice? How to let them know I had failed to protect their son… I was supposed to be the most powerful Watcher in the world– if the prophecy Odette had seen was correct – and I had failed to protect him. I was not so powerful after all. At least I had killed Daniel’s killer. I could take them that, however fleeting the satisfaction of that truth.

I put my hand to the burning necklace as I thought of the weight of the truth on my shoulders. Its strange pulse sent shockwaves of energy through my body. For some reason, I felt as if it was trying to get my attention. The moment I put my hand on it, I heard a vaguely familiar voice. It was a choral voice, mixed in with a more masculine voice. The masculine voice was a voice from my dreams. It was a voice of comfort.

Get ready.

The voice left certainty in my stomach. Something was about to happen.

I turned back to the others. They had gathered around Daniel. Spider was weeping openly. He held on to Daniel’s left hand, his eyes shining with his tears. His mind was struggling to keep up his mental shield. His emotions made focusing difficult. Words of guilt penetrated my mind – he felt guilty about Daniel’s death. The others were in various states of grief. Margaret and Jackson held each other as they looked at Daniel. Serenity’s golden eyes were full of shock – she had finally found a situation where she couldn’t hide her emotions. I realized, as I looked in to her eyes, that a part of her had always loved Daniel, more than she had let on. In that moment, I trusted her more than I had ever trusted her before. She had never wanted to see Daniel hurt; her love for him was stronger than her feelings of duty. There was also guilt. She felt she could have prevented the death. Eli was the only one who held reserved sadness. It was sadness for a death, but not sadness for the death of a friend. He had never known Daniel, beyond what I had told him. Reaper was still outside. He was dealing with his grief in private. I didn’t know where the historian had gone. She was nowhere to be seen.

For the first time, I realized we were next to Farrah’s rose. The case had been shattered and the rose petals were scattered around Daniel’s unmoving body. The white and the red created a strange shroud around Daniel. I ignored the destruction and focused on the truth I felt in my gut.

“Step back,” I told my friends.

They looked at me in shock. They could not understand why I would force them away from Daniel. They wanted a moment to say ‘goodbye.’ They wanted a moment to come to terms with their grief.

“Step back!” I said more urgently.

They moved back. It was not just my warning that made them finally listen. Daniel’s body had started to convulse. He shook against the floor, causing cracks in the stone. The movement was similar to a person being electrocuted. It was violent and uncontrollable. His eyes closed with the movement; his face contorted with the pain.

After a moment of shaking, he stopped moving again. His body was silent for a brief moment then he jumped up, as if forces beyond his control urged him to move to his feet. His eyes finally opened. They were green and perfect, just the way I remembered them. He looked confused, though. He was unsteady, without focus. The confusion and the green of his eyes did not last long. In the next instant, the green turned to white, and his whole body started to shake in a much different way.

Bone-crunching sounds filled the air. His face moved and distorted. The bones rearranged themselves under his skin. Pop! Pop! Pop! Bones realigned themselves to a more canine frame. His soft skin turned scaly and black. The scales were razor sharp. His clothes ripped to pieces as his arms and legs grew beyond the limitations of the soft fabrics. He grew larger with the change. The sound of bones crunching continued to fill the space. Finally, everything went quiet. The whole change took thirty seconds.

He was a Nightstalker.

He stood at least nine-feet tall. His eyes shone with the milky white color and drool dripped from his mouth on to the stone, causing acid burns to form. A deep growl sounded from his throat. It was guttural – it was angry.

His eyes focused on me.

I actually took a step back out of fear. There was just so much hate there, so much unchained emotion. His muscles shifted and, in a flash, he jumped toward me. He tackled me, his claws digging in to my skin. I kicked him off me on instinct. He hit the ground behind me with a roll. More stone cracked with his fall. Instead of turning to finish the fight, he ran out of the hole the Seekers had blasted in the wall. His focus was only forward. His sharp nails carried him out of sight quicker than I thought possible.

I moved to the door, to follow his course, and saw that Reaper was on the ground. He looked shocked but unharmed. He had moved out of Daniel’s way in time to prevent a fight. He looked at me for an explanation. I could not give him one. I was too focused on the feeling of Daniel. He was running toward the north – he was getting further away as I watched. I could not let him go. I started to move toward the stairs, prepared to run for as long as necessary, but Alex had reached me. She put a hand on my arm to stop me.

“Let me do it,” she said.

I looked at her with ‘no’ written across my face.

“I can catch him faster than you can,” she added. “Trust me?”

Her words were logical. She was uniquely able to catch him – her ability to change made it possible. And I did trust her.

I nodded, and her blue eyes turned steely. She stepped out of the cave and on to the ledge that separated her from the stairs. Reaper looked between us with dawning awareness of the situation. Our actions were giving him an explanation. He knew the Nightstalker was Daniel. Alex rolled her shoulders once and took a deep breath. Then, without warning, her whole body expanded and shifted. Her change was much quicker than Daniel’s change had been – it only took her two seconds to switch from girl to beast. It was obvious she had been practicing without my knowledge; she had worked hard to learn control. It was what she had been doing while I had been training with the historian.