Gabriel (24 page)

But right here, it was just me, myself, and I.

I thought about Zherneboh and the fact that he now knew I was alive, but as yet there was no sign of any Pureblood Masters or their Second Generation Vampires. I wondered what was taking them so long. Maybe we were close to water—which helped to prevent rifts opening—but if they believed that I could keep my form in all the dimensions, and therefore destroy Styclar-Plena, or even the third, wouldn't they be doing all they could to find me? And fast?

Maybe I should stop worrying about why they hadn't found me yet and concentrate instead on being ready for them when they did.

To truly be the most powerful being to walk this world, surely I should be physically stronger or be able to do something that, perhaps, they were unable to do? But I wasn't, and I couldn't. Even before Jonah had drunk my blood, I was struggling to summon and control my Angel abilities, and when I used my Vampire abilities they came with a dull ache—in fact, thinking about the tree, they hadn't come at all.

I had to try.

I skimmed the scenery, finding a fence and gate separating some of the land ahead. I closed my eyes and envisioned standing next to it. When I opened my eyes, I was nowhere near the fence. I was elevated. I flapped, unable to travel forward and unable to drop back to the ground. I desperately squeezed my eyelids and tried to imagine weights around my feet; I tried to imagine something—anything—to help me meet the grass. Then I plummeted, falling to the ground too hard, and my ankle caught beneath my leg. I stifled a squeal, plucking my leather boot out from underneath me.

I was in trouble.

From the outside in, I was not the way I should have been. My body was failing me. I knew what I needed, but I also knew what that meant. If I drank blood, I would survive, but the likelihood was that my relationship with Gabriel would not.

Disgruntled, I rose to my feet, deliberately exerting pressure on my ankle. I didn't care if it buckled; I didn't care if it broke clean in half. I was going to stand, and I was going to walk over to the tree in the distance, and I was going to find the strength to uproot it.

Mind over matter.

I lugged myself down the lawn, hell-bent on making it to the willow tree. I walked under its drooping branches and pressed my palms against the worn bark. I wiped the sweat from my brow and squatted at its base, gripping the trunk with my arms.

I counted to three and reached deep within myself, calling upon any strength I possessed to flow through me.

I pulled long and hard. I lost track of for how long and how many tears had streamed down my cheeks while I did, but by the time I wailed in defeat, blood was inking the lines of my palms, trickling down my wrists.

My head spun and I passed out.

At least, I thought I'd passed out.

I was sitting under the tree's spindly branches, staring out between them into the land. There was no color; it was as though the gray clouds had run with the rain and turned the scenery monochromatic.

Except for one thing.

A beautiful blue butterfly danced across my drained vision. It flew past, slowly, and then returned.

Where had it come from?

Was I dreaming?

A sense of panic rose in my chest as I realized if I was, Zherneboh could find my mind. As the fear overcame me, the butterfly responded. With an unnatural speed, it zoomed in front of my nose, twisting and spinning up and down, left and right.

But then it just stopped.

I searched the backdrop, but it was still. I calmed. No smell of burning ash, no harrowing screech. Zherneboh wasn't here.

And then the butterfly came back to life. It hovered above my shoulder, brushing my earlobe.

The clap of the butterfly's wings met me, and then a voice—one that belonged to a young girl. “
El efecto mariposa
,” she whispered.

I struggled to crane my neck to the right, and at the base of the tree beside me sat a fresh-faced child, dressed in a long sapphire-blue dress with a black cardigan covering her arms. I was immediately drawn to her eyes, which were like marbles—opaque glass surrounding hazel star-shaped swirls that gazed up toward the sky, startling me.

I would have thought her imaginary if I hadn't felt the press of her iced skin on mine as she took my hand. “You are the why,” she said. “He is meant to save you. Let him save you, Lailah.”

And then her figure dissolved and the Morpho butterfly returned, taking her place. It ascended into the air, stopping at arm's length from my chin and beating its wings together as though it were waving good-bye.

My eyes illuminated at the sight. The butterfly's iridescent blue wings seemed to absorb and then reflect the light shining from my eyes, until they became so brilliant, and so bright, that they transformed into white flame. Like a piece of paper too close to a bonfire, the black outline of the wings caught fire. The butterfly burned before me, and white-hot embers scattered across my vision.

When I came to, Gabriel was kneeling beside me, cradling me into his chest. As my sight refocused, the first things I saw were his eyes of sapphire gems gleaming back at me.

I recalled how they had reminded me of a Morpho butterfly once before, and how they reminded me still of the same. He had said he would save me—he would always save me—and I thought then that the girl was a sign, reinforcing the things I already knew and was battling to hold on to. Maybe she was my mind's way of telling me that I must continue to fight for Gabriel so that he could continue to fight for me.

I would hold on. I would find a way. I would not give in.

 

TWENTY-ONE

G
ABRIEL ACCEPTED MY EXPLANATION
that I had over-exerted myself while using my abilities. It was the truth; I just failed to mention that they weren't exactly working properly.

I knew I was running out of time; every move I made only caused my body to slowly drain away what little energy I had left. I searched for clues in the strange vision that had crept over me while I was unconscious—seeking out
how
I could let Gabriel save me—but I was coming up short.

I sat on the end of Brooke's bed, having showered long ago, pretending to show an interest in her many outfit combinations while secretly letting my mind wander. Finally, she thrust a pile of clothes into my hands.

“Come on, get dressed,” she said. “The marshmallows won't toast themselves, you know.”

Gabriel was with our new “friends,” and Brooke, who was now wearing the tightest pair of leather pants I had ever seen, and I were to join.

She explained that our garden guests had insisted on hosting a bonfire—an olive branch, extended by Fergal. It was an opportunity for all of us to chat and get to know one another better, although I knew the only beings from this house that any of them really desired to converse with were the Angel and “the girl.” The rest of us, I figured, would likely not stay too long and I was glad. That scratching sensation in my throat had returned with a vengeance, and I had to resist the urge to claw my skin with my unkempt fingernails. It was a strain to find my voice let alone hold up any decent conversation.

“In a minute,” I said. “Bathroom break first.” I barely had the energy to dress myself. I needed time.

My feet might as well have been severed for all the use they were as I tried to make it to my own en suite. I had to concentrate on every wiggle of my toes and every forward motion of my thighs.

Too tired to make it as far as my own bedroom, I fell into the main bathroom just off the landing. My head swam with dizziness. The sink, though only inches from me, blurred into the eggshell white of the wall.

I collapsed onto the ceramic tiles, and as I sat, legs sprawled out, my towel fell below my chest. The scar running across my heart was red and purple. The streak was so prominent—so obvious—against my pale, chalky-white skin.

Every breath hurt.

The thought of Jonah's blood—the memory of me drinking from him once before—branded my vision. I was so engrossed that, for a second, I could taste him. But then I realized I had actually bitten my tongue and my own blood was spreading across my taste buds. It didn't taste bad; it tasted sweet. It tasted good.

Blood pooled in my mouth, and then automatically my fangs cracked, stabbing my tongue a second time.

I swallowed.

My blood was in no way the same as a Vampire's—full of dark matter—but I had been told that blood itself was still a fueling substance and helped to keep a Vampire's form functioning. That didn't, however, apparently stretch to drinking one's own blood. Although for a few minutes I stopped aching inside, all too quickly my chest began to jerk.

I was going to be sick.

I didn't have time to get to the toilet; instead, I reeled around and gripped the edge of the bathtub behind me, violently throwing the blood back up. I tried to keep it down, knowing that it had done something good before my body rejected it.

My efforts were desperate, the sound of heaving impossible to stifle, but I refused to let it all escape.

The creak from the landing told me that someone was approaching.

A knock on the door came three times in quick succession.

“Who is it?” I choked out as I wiped my mouth with the inside of my towel.

The door swung open, and Jonah towered over me.

I grappled for the shower curtain hanging from the rail above the tub, and in one clean movement slid it across, before propping myself up again.

“Why can I smell your blood?” he demanded.

Jonah stooped to my knees. He knocked the hood of his sweatshirt down and scraped his hand through his dark, disheveled hair. His hard, marblelike hazel eyes stripped me bare. “I asked you a question.”

Squeezing his lips together, his look of irritation and discontent filled me with a great sadness. I wished I could unburden myself to his waiting ears, like I would have done once before. But it was a selfish wish; he didn't want that. I had bonded him back to me against his will. I was nothing more to him than a prison sentence, trapping him inside my walls and persecuting him for a crime he was tricked into committing.

The sudden rising of bile, mixed with blood in my throat, overcame all other thoughts. I lurched forward as my belly contracted, but, trapped by Jonah, all I could do was grab his arm. Somehow I managed to choke it all back down.

My towel slipped, and I instinctively grabbed for my chest, covering myself. When I found Jonah's eyes they locked onto mine, as though he were probing for the truth, as though he cared. But then his gaze flitted down to my hands clutching my chest, and he traced the outline of the scar running underneath them, across my heart. Without saying a thing, he cupped his hands over mine, nudging them lower down, only just allowing me to keep my modesty.

He ran his fingertips over the ridge of the scar before pushing down on my white skin as though he were testing to see if it would leave a mark. And though his action was clinical, I couldn't help my insides fluttering at the touch of his skin on mine.

I hadn't realized I was holding my breath until he said softly, “Breathe, Lailah.”

I did as I was told and sucked in a bout of air. As I exhaled, I found myself breaking into a light and dizzy laugh, knowing how ridiculous and how terrible it was that he could literally cause me to stop breathing.

His frosty exterior melted away for a moment, and I thought a smile of his own appeared on his lips in return.

But as my stomach churned, I moved a hand to my belly, pushing away the cotton, and his eyes followed. I thought for a second that perhaps he had seen the smear of my blood inside the towel. I was wrong. His smile faded fast and finally died as he took in the sight of my skin, showing itself between my widespread fingers. I met his stare then, as the marks left by the damage he had inflicted on me revealed themselves in distinct dark lashings against my milky skin.

He sprung off the floor, flicking his hood back up, and his body tensed. Again he asked, “Why can I smell your blood?”

When I didn't reply, he reached forward and, taking my wrist, yanked me off the tiles. He brought me in close, refusing to release me, silently demanding an answer to his question.

I coughed awkwardly, struggling to keep myself covered by my towel, and pulled my hand back to my chest. “I don't know why. Excuse me.” Shutting the door on him as I left, I was relieved that I had managed to escape without having to explain myself.

I was stepping inside Brooke's bedroom when I heard the rings attached to the top of the shower curtain skim backward, followed by Jonah cursing loudly.

Crap.

*   *   *

N
OW COMFORTABLY DRESSED IN
jeans, T-shirt, and a sweater, I joined the others in the kitchen as Gabriel proceeded to advise us on how we were to conduct ourselves with our Irish guests.

Brooke hovered at the back door. “Yeah, yeah, can we go now? They've already got the fire going!”

“Yes, I suppose we should,” Gabriel said. “But remember: No details, no storytelling; just be polite and listen to what they have to say.”

Everyone had freshened up for the occasion, though it was only Brooke, in her skimpy top, who was ignoring the fact that it was bitterly cold outside. Ruadhan was as smartly dressed as ever in a long tweed jacket, trousers, and leather shoes. I appreciated that he appeared older than the rest of us even though he wasn't actually as ancient as Gabriel or me, technically speaking; yet his lines and graying hair caused me to feel safer, in wiser company.

Jonah had left the house—I assumed to feed. I didn't know if he was planning on making an appearance at this little gathering. I hoped he wouldn't. His cruel and cutting words circled in my head.

“After you.” Gabriel held open the doors, ushering Brooke and then Ruadhan through.

He waited for them to leave and then strode over to me in the corner of the kitchen. Taking my hands in his, he kissed my curled fingers and gazed down at me. “Lai, are you sure you're feeling okay? It's just, I know what you said, but you look a little—”