04 Last (60 page)

The historian had given up her life for me.

I felt my tears leak over and spill out on to the floor. They were simple tears, salt and water, but they were no less strong with their emotion. The historian was really gone. Everything had changed with my descent in to the city Farrah and the brothers had once called home. My whole world was different.

I stayed in the same spot for a long time, trying to find the strength to move. All I wanted to do was sleep…sleep until I had found my strength again…until the thought of losing the historian, and probably many others from the battle, did not hurt so much.

There were still things to do, however. My task was not as complete as I wanted it to be. The last I had seen of my friends, they had been ambushed by an army of Nightstalkers. I had to know if they were still alive…I had to help them if I could. I could find the strength for that.

I wiped away my tears and focused on what I had to do. I had to go back to the fight. I picked up the necklace I had dropped and wrapped it in my hand. Then, I felt the weak pull of the darkness. With effort, I managed to fall in to the world in-between. As I moved in to the moving darkness, I heard a voice.

I am proud of you….

The voice was full of passion. It was the voice of my father. I felt it was the last time I would ever hear it. My task was done. So was his. Whatever protection he felt I needed before was no longer necessary.

The darkness passed. I fell back out of the place in-between. My landing was not graceful. I hit the sand hard and rolled. I did not get up. The strength to do so had abandoned me.

I could tell where I was despite my prone position. I was on the battlefield. The battle was over. There were no sounds of fighting, just the sound of the injured crying out for the pain to end.

It took me a second to realize a strange truth. There were no Nightstalkers anywhere. There were naked people, who could have been Nightstalkers at one point, but the field was deserted of beasts of any kind. Many of the naked people did not move, but there were plenty who did. Many of the naked Watchers poked and prodded at their skin in a dumbfounded way. Others sat and cried. I saw Anna hugging a large man with dark features; the man she had professed to love was no longer a Nightstalker. At first, no one looked at me twice. Then, I heard a call.

“Clare! It’s Clare! She’s here!”

I looked up and saw Alex, her blonde hair flying out behind her as she ran toward me. When she reached me, she hugged me tight. I couldn’t move my arms to hug her back. My body wouldn’t respond the way I wanted it to.

“Are you okay? What happened?” Alex asked, inspecting me for wounds.

Her hand moved to the scratch on my neck, where red blood had formed around the wound. I could feel that it had not healed the way it was supposed to. The dark magic of the sword had made the wound tougher than most. I would have a scar. It would be a reminder of what I had just gone through. I felt the tears threaten again as I thought about what had happened and the sacrifice the historian had made for my sake.

“We won…” I said.

Alex’s x-ray eyes knew there was more to the story than those two words. The cost of winning had been great. She put a hand of comfort on my cheek and looked up to something beyond my range of sight.

“Daniel is here,” she told me.

I was transferred to Daniel’s arms in one fluid motion. He wrapped his arms around me, and his face swam in to view. His green eyes were worried. He, like Alex, wore clothing that didn’t fit him properly. He was unhurt, though dirty. He was alive. He had won his fight as well.

“Are you okay?” Daniel asked.

“Dandy,” I said in a weak voice. “How are you?”

“Curious,” he admitted.

“About what?”

“What happened, for one,” he said. “And why you’re not moving for another.”

“I’m tired,” I told him. “I’ve had a very busy day.”

“We all have, I think,” Reaper added, stepping in to view.

His armor was covered in blood and dirt, but his silver eyes were very bright. He was still wrapped up in the success of the fight.

“Hey, Reaper,” I said.

“Hey, Clare,” Reaper said. “We were worried about you.”

“You were?” I asked.

“Well, you did take a nosedive out of a tower,” Daniel replied. “Then the sky darkened unlike anything I’ve ever seen…then, there was this light. It was warm and felt like you.”

“Are you the reason all the Nightstalkers are suddenly human again?” Reaper asked.

“Could be,” I said. “How’d it happen?”

“That light…It knocked us all on our asses,” Daniel said. “When we got back up, we were normal again. Everyone was. Then, the light kept moving. It’s probably still moving.”

“Oh,” I said. “Yeah. That was me.”

The others looked at me in shock. I finally found the strength to move. I raised a hand and put it on Daniel’s cheek. He smiled at the touch, his shock disappearing in an instant.

“One day, I’m going to tell you how you helped me down there…but right now, I’m going to sleep,” I said.

“Okay,” Daniel replied. “I’ll be here when you wake up.”

“I know,” I said.

Daniel kissed me lightly, and I felt the pull of sleep drag me down. For the first time since the change, I allowed the sleep to take me. Darkness, warm and complete, filled my senses. It was bliss.

When I woke up, I was in a leafy paradise. The air was warm and wet. We were in the jungle again. Outside, I could hear the sounds of people moving and talking in low voices. I recognized the voices of my family. I recognized other voices – voices of the Saints who had survived the battle. I took a long moment to listen to the sounds of humanity. The weight of the fight with Marcus was still on my chest, but I felt better hearing proof of life. It would take time to fully come to grips with what had happened in that buried city, but I knew I would not have to face it alone.

The second my eyes opened, I felt a hand move to my shoulder. Daniel was in the leaf-made room with me. He was awake and his green eyes were bright with happy energy. He was glad to see me awake.

“I thought you were never going to wake up,” he said.

“How long has it been?” I asked.

“Four days,” he replied.

“Oh,” I said.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“I’m…Ask me tomorrow,” I decided.

“I will,” Daniel replied.

“The historian is dead…” I said.

Daniel’s eyes were sad.

“We thought as much. We couldn’t find her body,” Daniel said after a moment.

“Nemesis took her,” I said.

Daniel was curious at the admission, but he did not press for details. I refocused on him and the fact four days had passed. I knew it couldn’t have been an easy four days.

“Anything interesting happen while I was out?” I asked.

“Not unless you count burning the dead, destroying the tower, hiding the city you fought Marcus in and recovering from our injuries ‘interesting,’” Daniel replied.

“It’s better than the alternative,” I said.

“True,” he said.

“What about the others?” I asked. “How many others did we lose?”

“Not as many as you think,” Daniel replied. “Would you like to see for yourself?”

Daniel knew the others would bring me happiness. I needed proof of life. I nodded, and Daniel’s hand moved to mine. He helped me stand. For the first time, I realized my clothes had been changed. I was wearing jeans and a t-shirt, clothes that were more comfortable than armor. My necklace was back around my neck. It welcomed me back to consciousness with dull warmth. My ring also hummed with electrical warmth. Both had helped me in the dark. Daniel pushed back the vine-made door.

Ellen, Naomi and Sam were sitting directly outside my vine house. Naomi whacked Ellen on the arm when she saw me and pointed. Ellen had been focused on my grandfather’s book. She was lost in the words he had left her. She pulled away from the words the moment she saw me. They both jumped out of their chairs and hugged me at the same time. I wrapped my arms around them and felt the weight of the fight leave me. For the first time in my life, I could be certain that Ellen would never be hunted again. She was free to live her life…finally. She would no longer have to run because of me.

Sam hugged me next. His hug was fierce and genuine. I could tell he realized that Ellen was finally free as well. That fact had not escaped him. He was smart enough to realize the fight went beyond the present.

When Sam let me go, I saw that the platform of my room was surrounded. People were hanging out, waiting for me to wake up. Reaper, Alex, Margaret, Jackson, Han, Beatrice and the rest of Reaper’s generals were sitting in a semi-circle on the floor around Sam, Ellen and Naomi’s chairs. Twitch was on Margaret’s lap reading a book, while Cora and Ethan held hands next to Alex, who was at Sam’s feet. Sprint and Spider sat closest to Ellen.

Anna and a large group of people I didn’t recognize were down below, while other Watchers were in trees, on the stairs, anywhere they could find space. The people I had led in to the tower were closest. Ileana and Mick were directly behind Reaper. Fiona was hanging from vine-made hammock above us. The only person I didn’t see in the mix was Serenity. Her golden eyes were not among the many eye colors of the people staring at me. The stares of the people around me were full of awe and respect. It didn’t unsettle me as much as it would have a week ago.

“Were you all waiting on me to wake up?” I teased them.

“We didn’t want to celebrate until we knew you were safe,” Jackson said.

“So, what you’re saying is that I was keeping you all from a party?” I asked.

“Yeah, I guess I am,” Jackson said.

“Well, let’s party then!” I said.

The others cheered and Spider turned on the radio. Music circled the clearing. People started dancing and talking loudly. The people I was closest to, my friends and family, eyed me with a mixture of awe, relief and happiness. They all had things they wanted to say – they all wanted to understand what had happened. I had a question of my own.

“Eli?” I asked.

Spider sighed. “He’s gone. We had his funeral already…”

“Oh. I’m sorry,” I said.

My eyes moved to Alex. Her eyes were incredibly sad. Reaper refused to look at her. I could tell that little had changed between them with Eli’s death – I felt that more of a distance had formed. They were further apart than before the fight had started. Eli was still a wedge between them, despite his death.

“I guess Eli cared after all,” Spider said in a low voice.

“Of course he did,” I replied. “He was just searching for his own way…he just made the mistake of not including you while he searched.”

There was a pause of silence in which everyone contemplated my words. The silence was broken by a question from Alex. She was the only one brave enough to ask what they were all thinking.

“What happened once you got inside the tower?” she asked. “They said you ran up the stairs and…then we saw you fall. Then, the historian disappeared…”

I took a deep breath then shared my story. They listened quietly over the sounds of music and partying of the others. When I told them about destroying the sword, their mouths dropped open. Sounds of shock filled the clearing. They couldn’t believe I had found the power to destroy it. I couldn’t believe it either. When I told them about the historian and Nemesis, they were sad. Their sadness was my sadness. The historian had given up so much for me. It was a heavier burden than all the lives I had taken in battle.

“All this because Marcus thought you two were destined to rule the world together?” Alex asked when I finished. “That you were reincarnated lovers?”

“Yeah,” I agreed.

“That man should have checked in with reality,” Alex said. “He could have saved us a lot of grief.”

Everyone laughed.

“Well, it’s over now,” Reaper said. “We can finally move on.”

“What happens to the Saints?” I asked. “What do you do now that all the bad guys are gone?”

Reaper shrugged.

“I haven’t thought about it,” Reaper said. “But I think there will always be people out there who need help. The end of the war, and Marcus’ death, changes our world forever, but that doesn’t mean people who would harm others have disappeared entirely. The world moves on…Watchers don’t change that much.”

“So, you stay vigilant?” I asked.

“Well, maybe a little less vigilant,” Reaper said. “I could do with some time to relax. A vacation would be nice. But as long as people need a home, a family, they will find it with Saints.”

“Han and I were discussing this, actually,” Beatrice said. “We have a wonderful opportunity to rebuild our house in King’s Cross, and we thought that perhaps your Saints could use some of our space.”

“There are quite a few of us,” Reaper pointed out. “Many will stay…the Saints is the only family they’ve known.”

“We like big houses,” Beatrice pointed out. “And we love having lots of people around, so long as we have our tower to experiment in. You don’t have to decide now, but I can assure you privacy and all the science you can handle.”