Falter (42 page)

The fleeting moments drove me closer to a cliff’s edge. I felt it coming closer, gaining speed. A dark nothing that would smother my light. An impending doom that would finally break me. Anticipation of the drop cut through the dreadful emotions racing in me. Archard’s body grew rigid with mine, maybe to brace us against the fall—or perhaps to let me go one last time.
 

A rising humidity made the room almost unbearably hot. Bitter sweat dripped from our pores. The glowing halos flickered and shook, allowing black to fracture the light. Thick steam funneled around our bodies, searing my lungs as I struggled to control my erratic breathing. A hot gust of wind rushed through the room, thrashing our bodies back and forth.
 

Archard battled to keep his cocoon around me, squeezing me tighter, but his hands were slipping. His tormented yell deafened my ears, frightening me even more. I wiggled around to see anything other than flickering shadows writhing across the floorboards, but his grip was too tight. His massive wings sheltered me from the mayhem beyond.
 

“Archard! What’s happening?” I screamed through gritted teeth.
 

The burden of his emotions drilled into my heart even deeper. Only guttural groans sounded from his heavenly mouth. Then my skin began to scorch. Fiery heat blistered my toes, climbing up my legs. I realized Archard was attempting to shield me from the igniting flames. He felt the burn long before I did, but continued to hold me.
 

The throbbing blaze took over. I begged for an ending, for the pain to vanish, for
his
pain to be relieved.
 

Just as I gave up, the candles blew out. Complete darkness prevailed. I gasped as my legs stretched out from under me, no longer supported by a floor, and the sensation of falling tickled my stomach. We were plunging into an eerily calm nothingness. The room had disappeared as if the whole world was swept away by a tornado.
 

I allowed my arms to relax and sail on the current of wind whizzing around us. I reveled in the cool breeze now blasting upwards against my charred skin, dulling the throbbing pain as we plummeted down.

“Archard?”
 

He didn’t answer. His arms loosened from around me, and he drifted away. I panicked, swiping at the empty air, trying to find his unconscious body in the dark, but I only knocked him farther out of reach. The weight of his limp wings grazed my back, then he was gone.

 
“Archard! Wake up,” I screamed.

The soundless repose of descent turned into a terrifying plunge into something unknown. The more I reached for Archard, the faster I fell.
 

Then, it came.
 

The severance.

 
It ripped through me, effortlessly, like a knife through butter. Quick but not painless. This pain was different from the aching loss of George. It was different from the heartbreaking sting of, once again, losing my angel. Even what I’d experienced minutes before, in the room, was too physical in comparison. This cut to an entirely new level. It snatched the life force from my body and left only a hollow shell.
 

Until this moment, I never realized the love that surrounded me. All the times I felt alone were nothing compared to the complete isolation I was experiencing now. I understood now that every kind act on earth was a sign of His love. The true love that I had forgotten and abandoned along the way.
 

The misery of this emptiness was debilitating. I couldn’t force myself to move, to breathe, or even want to anymore. My very being was pointless now. My vacant soul
was
the nothingness that I’d felt rising to meet me at the cliff’s edge. I had nothing left to reach for; not a single thing to latch onto in the silent darkness of my own personal hell. The light that I never knew was there snuffed out in a mere microsecond.
 

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Depths Of My Soul

I lay in the shadows of my emptiness, raw and alone, wondering if this would be how I spent my eternity. Futureless, without the hope of meeting George or my mother in a peaceful afterlife.

I had finally realized that the love of God was there the whole time. Traces of it wound into my everyday life; George’s protective ways, Gavyn’s comforting touch, and the friendly smiles of countless people around me.
 

I should’ve recognized those things as a blessing long ago. Instead, I was too stubborn to see it. Now I was on my own, static in this void.
 

Guilt of the life I led weighed upon me. My heart throbbed as much as my burnt flesh. I attempted to gather myself and search for Archard, but I couldn’t force even a finger to flinch. It was as if the strings of Heaven, which kept me afloat through life, were snipped by a giant pair of scissors, leaving me as nothing more than a soulless rag doll. I didn’t want to stay in this place. I didn’t want to waste away as an empty, lonely husk.

There was too much silence. I couldn’t even hear the incessant beating of my heart or my lungs deflating against labored breaths. I waited for Archard to call for me but knew if he did, I wouldn’t be able to hear him either.
 

I sank into the desolate dark, pondering over the many gruesome ways that the demons would tortured George’s soul, tearing his essence to shreds.

I failed him.

Lord, I know I haven’t done anything that deserves your attention, but please save him somehow. He doesn’t deserve that kind of punishment
, I prayed.
 

No one answered, but in the quiet oblivion, I noticed a white glow approaching from the distance. My heart sped up.

“Archard.” His name rushed across my dry lips.

The glowing orb jetted away. “No. Wait. Please come back,” I begged.

I grunted, pressing my palms to the surface beneath me, and raised up. My arms gave out. My face hit the ground. I took a deep breath and pushed up again. This time I was able to stand; walking was another matter. It felt like I was dragging a car behind me, but I trudged along, chasing the only thing visible in this place, ignoring the sense of impending doom that was tying knots in my stomach. I had to find a way out. I had to find Archard.

As I advanced, nearly catching up with the orb, the muscles in my back stretched and stiffened, making it harder to move in fluid motions. My joints grinded. I was convinced my bones might give out, or even push through my skin, at any moment. I contemplated stopping, but what if Archard is alone too, waiting on me to find him? My eyes focused on the gliding sphere of light, and I forced myself to move forward. It found me for a reason. I needed to know what that reason was. I grunted and huffed, lurching myself down the unending path behind the glowing ball.
 

After miles and miles of following it through the endless dark, I slowed, panting and ready to quit. My feet stumbled, and I drifted to the side, gasping in shock when my hand slapped against a wall with sharp ridges roughening its surface. I looked up to see the orb’s glow illuminating a doorway a few paces ahead. The light disappeared through the door, bathing me in pitch black once again.
 

My nerves tingled, warning me against following. I glanced over my shoulder into the black nothingness behind me and considered turning back. It was hard to ignore the caution signs screaming at me, but I refocused my attention in the direction of the doorway. I took a heavy step forward, then another.
 

As I crossed the threshold, the dim glow became visible again. The sudden sensation of cold metal chilled my hand. It took a moment for my vision to adjust before I saw the shiny, silver blade tucked comfortably within my grasp. I brushed away the intriguing question of how the blade mysteriously made its way into my hand and searched for the light.
 

I squinted my eyes and inspected the room I’d entered. It wasn’t long before I realized where the floating orb led me. I cringed, wrapping my arms around my anxious midsection, and glanced back at the door—the large, iron slab—behind me, contemplating the urge to run.

My gaze wandered to the chair sitting in the center of the floor—a high-backed Victorian with paisley cushions. It was empty though. Memories of the pretty woman that occupied it before flashed through my mind. Air rushed in and out of my heaving chest. I closed my eyes and covered them with my empty hand, pressing my fingertips against my eyelids until the images left.

I spun in a circle, scanning the shadowy perimeter for signs of the demon that tortured the lady. No disturbing forms lurked in the corners, no shrill screams reverberated against the walls, and there was no woman waiting for her slashing. But still, the ominous feeling of evil hung grimly in the room.

The bubble of light began to glide in a slow circle around the edge of the room, drawing my attention to a large, silvery mirror on the wall to my right. As I lifted and lowered one unsteady foot and then the other, the pain in my weakening joints threatened to let me fall. I reached out for the wall, using it to support my body as I inched closer to the reflective surface with stiff, jerky movements.
 

I maneuvered myself in front of the glassy rectangle and pressed my hands on either side to keep myself upright. Puffs of labored breaths fogged up the area of mirror in front of my face. The orb drifted into the reflection, stilling just behind my right shoulder, distracting me from the tiny smudges of moisture that vanished and reappeared under my slowing breaths. I lifted my head and gaped at the reflection illuminated before me.
 

I jerked away in terror, choking on a gasp. The monster that haunted my memories of this prison from Hell stared back at me from the mirror. I wanted to run but could barely take one step.

I swallowed my fear and steadied myself, hoping it was only an illusion. We faced each other at close range, our gazes sliding over the other’s image, memorizing every detail. Blood stained bones poked through wrinkled, charred skin. Dead eyes mindlessly bored into mine.
 

I’d expected the monster to jump through the mirror, but we stood there for the longest time, and it made no attempt to attack. I peered into its charcoal eyes, hoping to detect some hint of remorse or goodness, but I quickly became aware that there was no understanding this thing. The demon was now a vile product of the life it led before. How much evil must a person commit to turn into such a creature?

I raised a hand to touch the mirror, freezing in place when the demon did the same.
 

Is it playing games with me?
 

My curiosity got the upper hand. I had to know if the surface was solid. Would it keep the monster trapped behind the reflection, or was it another portal that would give way when the monster was ready to come after me? Even as horror lumped in my throat, I leaned toward the reflection and lightly traced a fingertip across it.

The real terror hit me like a brick wall. Every move I made, the demon mimicked perfectly; every stroke, every pause. My heart sank.
 

The stammered movements, the stiff, heavy limbs—I was morphing into this thing all along.
 

Bile worked its way up from my sour stomach. I hunched over and puked uncontrollably from my rotted mouth. The sound of my voice was harsh and screechy as I groaned against the urge to continue vomiting.

How did this happen?
 

I rubbed my eyes, attempting to scrub the image from my memory. I couldn’t be the horrid thing in the mirror.
 

This had to be a dream
.
 

I lowered my hands, holding them out in front of me. They were nearly black and charred to the bone with jagged, onyx-colored nails protruding from my fingers. My knobby knees collapsed to the floor. I peered over at the evolving form in the mirror as it lowered to the same position and continued its last transitions.
 

A blood-curdling scream erupted from my mouth as decrepit vertebrae sliced through the thin layer of flesh on my back. Strangely, the scream dwindled half-way through, and became a raspy moan. I was enjoying the delicious burning pain that ignited from the bones piercing my leathery skin. That frightened me more than anything. With my soul vacant, a yearning to succumb to this new evil form took flight like a phoenix.

Stunned from what was happening inside me, I didn’t hear my name being called for some time. My demented gaze jumped from the reflection of myself to a figure behind me. It wriggled in the chair, violently pulling against restraints of some sort, yelling at me breathlessly.
 

I suddenly remembered the blade in my hand again. The cold metal bit into my broken, blistered flesh, begging me to drench it in blood. I glanced back at the glossy surface. The monster in the mirror’s mouth curled into a disturbingly wicked smile.
 

The pleasure of the darkness rolled through my veins, filling me with renewed strength. Though my movements were still jerky and painful, I didn’t hesitate to rise and stretch my much larger frame. The unnatural grinding and snapping of my new body yielded tears of anguish and freedom simultaneously.

I still couldn’t understand how agony could bring so much pleasure. Really, I didn’t care. I just knew I liked it, and I wanted more.