Six (19 page)

As we climb the fence wrapped in old, black vines, I feel excitement at the idea of freedom. Joy rises at the prospect of never having to endure Liam’s affections, never having to look out my treacherous window into emptiness again.

Lana and I perch on the top of the thick fence, our backs to the palace. What we glimpse in front of us has frozen us to this spot.

“What the fuck is that?” Lana whispers.

It is the abandoned city. Black smoke still rises from the cracked streets. Tall buildings with their tops demolished litter the deconstructed skyline. Up close it looks more tormented than from the balcony at the palace. Creatures that are indistinguishable control the gray atmosphere in every direction I look. Their scaly wings cut through the air as easily as a knife through skin. Small fires rage throughout as far as the eye can see. Life has forsaken this city long ago. My life has been split into two categories at this moment. Before and after.

I force my gaze back to the palace and squint my eyes through the smoke and magical mist. I hone in on Liam’s window. He is standing there, his hands pressed against the pane, frozen. Very slowly, a smile creeps to his lips. Then, it transforms into a laugh I imagine I can hear from miles away. It holds malice and disdain. Liam knows what I am seeing and he thinks I will turn back to the comfort of his false world. A shiver runs down my spine.

It comes easily this time, throttling my body. I let out a shriek and it encompasses me with ease. I feel fear. Again. It is not because of what lies before me. It stems from what is behind me. Horror and dread edge their way into my body. Without a second glance behind us, I grab Lana’s hand and jump down from the twelve-foot wall to land in the abandoned city. Immediately, a thick cloud of heat envelops us. It forces labored breathing. The impact of the fall pales in comparison to the smoke. There is so much of it that it dampens my senses.

Lana groans beside me. “Way to give me warning, you bitch. Why are you breathing like that?” she asks while waving her hand in front of her face in a futile attempt to get rid of the smoke. At her question I realize I am gasping, panting. My eyes are glowing white.

“I…I…I am scared,” I say out loud. The smoke around us lights from the glow emanating from my face. I cover my eyes with my hands.

Lana grabs my hand and raises in into the air. “Folks, we have a winner!” she says in a masculine, booming tone. Lana releases me and smacks me on the bottom.

“Let’s hope Finn is up to the challenge. Only two more emotions to go,” Lana quips. I think surprise and love will be impossible to feel in only a week’s time.

I tilt my chin up to scrutinize the tall buildings surrounding us. Windows are broken, and the heat and smoke cause them to shatter further, triggering glass shards to rain from above us. I shield my face with a hand as I try to find something–anything–that has a redeeming quality. A city such as this seems an impossible place to feel anything except death. A shiver rips up my spine.

“I see why this shithole is abandoned. Magic probably can’t even help this place,” Lana says. She brings her hood up to protect her head and begins trudging through the streets, scoffing loudly as she goes.

I precariously leap from one side of a road to the other. It splits directly down the middle in a jagged zigzag pattern, as if something streaked along it underground causing the surface to splinter. I hear the palace alarms. They ring out so loudly that I am sure all the other palaces hear them as well. Sucking in a deep breath, I will myself to feel bravery. Being frightened is a choice and I know fear will only hinder me.

Lana, sensing my unease, glances my way. “The redcoats are coming, the redcoats are coming!” Lana screams into the abysmal city sky. Her laughter is foreign as it echoes, complementing the glass that smashes on the ground. I force a grin to my face, but tremble as the alarms sound once more. This time the alarm follows a horrible, haunting wailing.

I start running haphazardly. It is a panicked run. A desperate run. “Where are we supposed to go?” I ask, willing my voice to carry over to Lana. I look left and right, but not up. I hear the soft waft of wings.

The noise alone disconcerts me and when more wails tear through the sky, I pair the wailing with the winged creatures. A small sob passes through my lips. Lana runs on the other side of the crack. I look over to her and catch glimpses of her through the smoke and fire that occasionally rise up from the ground below. When her silver gaze meets mine she smiles.

“You are insane, Lana,” I yell as loudly as I can to drown out the noises. The hissing of the steaming, angry crack between us, crackles as if it may explode.

Lana turns back to running forward and pumps her arms quicker as she picks up her pace. “We all go a little mad sometimes. It’s how you feel alive, Emma.”

She is right. With my four emotions blasting through me, I do feel alive. The heat pricks my face and the smoke burns my lungs, but I feel limitless. The next clearing without smoke and fire, I hop over a zag in the road and fall in step with Lana’s pace. Her excitement is contagious. Luckily, it forces fear into the background.

She kicks a large piece of broken road. “It’s not about where you end up…it’s about the ride, it’s about how you get there. That’s what life is,” Lana says, her speech labored. “We all end up at the same place, whether you are a human, darkling or a witch. What are you going to do before that? How will you make your go round worth it?”

Darklings and witches are immortal and live forever unless a hapless accident cleaves their head off. Humans die. My mother died. I know what I want to do with my life. I want to
know
I am alive. In this abandoned city with uncertainty looming over my head like death I feel alive.

“I just want this.” I open my arms up and slow my pace until I come to a stop. I turn in a circle and shut my eyes.
Joy. Sadness. Anger. Fear.
Soot and glass rain down and I smell the rubber from the soles of my boots melting on the fiery ground. Lana puts her hands on my shoulders. I open my eyes.

“I was hoping you’d want a little more than this.” Lana scrunches her forehead and looks up at the sky sideways. My laughter sounds maniacal. “Oh, and P.S. your boots are burning,” Lana whisper-shouts.

She grabs my hand and we enter a building. The glass door that once resided there is no more. My boots stick to the slick, cooler floor. Now that fear has returned I worry for Finn.

It consumes me.

Chapter Twenty-Four

July 26th, Late, late night

“How long has Finn been here?” I ask, unable to conceal my nervousness.

She merely shrugs her shoulders, signaling she does not care or does not know. She pulls open a large, heavy door. I cover my ears as it lurches and creaks. A steep stairwell resides behind it. She nods her head and I start going upstairs. I notice she takes great care to pull the door shut behind us.

Hesitantly, I hop up a few steps. “Where are we going?” I ask.

Lana breezes past me, taking steps two at a time. “Just go up as quickly as you can, Emma. I don’t want you to piss your pants or anything, but the guard is the least of our worries while we’re here. If anything, the savages and winged fuckers will take care of them for us,” she states matter-of-factly.

I stumble on a stair.

“This building looked most central from the palace wall. He said he’d be in the center…” Lana trails off as she starts taking the stairs three at a time. My legs are tired—they feel heavy and my energy is waning quickly. The walls in this stairwell are white painted brick, but unlike the enchanted palace they are stagnant white, they are real. I let my fingers graze the cool stones as I hop up as quickly as my thighs let me.

My stomach twists. “Finn is here?” I ask, mortified. I will have to confront him without gathering my wits first. I have not planned what I want to say. I am unprepared, but it feels like lightening blazes through my veins.

“If I’m lucky, he’s here,” she says. Lana is distracted as she spouts off numbers in no apparent order. I think her insane—alive, beautiful, but completely insane. Crazy as she may be, I trust her with my life and with finding Finn.

She busts through one of the doors at the top of a stairwell. A large red sign that says
Exit
rests above the door frame. I find it odd we are going into a door that says Exit. Suddenly, my pack weighs heavy on my back, so I swing it to my other shoulder to relieve some of the pressure as we stalk through a dauntingly long hallway. The gray haze that permeates the broken glass windows is the only light. The eerie smoke wisps in, but it is quiet on this higher level, away from the sizzling, popping ground. Carpet with wild swirling patterns lines a plain hallway with many doors.

“What is this place?” I ask while switching my backpack to the other shoulder, barely stifling a groan.

“It’s called a ho-tel.” Lana enunciates the word oddly, the way the humans from the old world would have spoken it. “We learned that humans stayed in places like this when they traveled the old world.” My mother never mentioned anything about hotels when she told me stories. Lana peeks her head in one room then looks back at me with a wrinkled nose. “They look more like torture chambers now.”

I notice a bed when she peeks in another room and I sway on my feet, exhausted and frustrated with my weakness. “Is it safe to sleep here? I am so tired,” I breathe out.

“You’re tired? You’re tired? First I had to turn into you, then I had to pleasure your darkly douchey husband prince while making wicked deals, and then I had to make a mad dash to this glass encased building that I am sure will blow to smithereens any moment. I want to sleep too, but we have to find Finn first. If he even made it to this twisted fuck of a place.” I shudder. Lana laughs. “Just joking. We do have to find Finn first, though.” She turns and starts checking rooms again. “He’d be pretty pissed if we fell asleep while he was off battling nasty savages by himself.”

We enter a room and find supplies littering the ground.

Lana whoops.
“Bingo!”
she shouts. The room is empty but for Finn’s things. My face falls and my stomach sinks with disappointment. “He’ll be back, don’t worry,” Lana says. She unzips her jacket and shakes a large amount of ash from it.

I settle down on the floor amidst Finn’s things. I pick up a canteen and imagine his lips wrapping around the spout. My core clenches. I let myself think of his lips for the first time in a long time. I remember my earlier question. “Lana?” My tone pitches higher than normal. I bite down on my tongue, already embarrassed.

“Yeah, freakling?” She is in a joking mood, happy we found Finn’s things and impressed with her job well done. I am impressed with her, too. But curiosity wins out and I decide to forge on.

“What
exactly
did you do with your tongue?”

Lana laughs so loudly that I wince. She shakes her head, her black hair bouncing around her cheeks. Her silver eyes light in amusement and her slim lips expose a humongous smile. I take a deep breath and wait for it, because I know it is coming.

She clears her throat. “Don’t ask questions you don’t want to hear the answers to.” I cross my arms over my chest, angry she treats me so childish. At my expression, new fits of laughter ring through our room.

I leave Lana laughing and enter a bathing chamber. I slam the door, but still hear her. The water no longer works, but there is a large mirror. I wipe away the black ashy substance that matts my face and comb my fingers through my hair. Satisfaction courses through me at the realization that Liam’s princess is nowhere to be found. My blue eyes stand out against my pale, un-painted face and my lips are bare of glosses. Relief floods me as my agitation with Lana wanes.

I am readying myself to ask her once again when I hear the front door creak open. The rumblings of a very male voice enter my awareness. Heat prickles my neck and my heart thunders in my chest. I throw open the door and the scene before me starts in slow motion—like a dream.

My brain finally catching up to my heart, I stop breathing. “Finn,” I say, my entire body flaming alive. He stares at me, his full lips parted in pure perfection. Neither of us move a muscle—we just study each other. My gaze trails over his body and back up to his face. The ash smudges that mar his cheeks only add to his appeal. His gaze sweeps left and right, and up and down as if taking inventory of every inch of my body. Lana crosses between us and the momentary spell is broken. I blink my eyes to clear my head and take in a breath. A tiny part of me never thought I would see Finn in front of me like this. It is obvious he feels the same way.

Lana punches him in the shoulder. “Finn, glad to see you’re alive. I’ll be in the next room over while you two get reacquainted with each other, or stare at each other, or whatever it is that you do. Weirdos.” Lana opens the door to leave.

I feel panicked at her leaving me alone with him. It is all I have dreamed about and my largest fear rolled into one. I am damaged.

Lana winks at me. She faces Finn. “Emma was just inquiring about using her tongue properly. Maybe you could give her a play-by-play tutorial? It may help with the two emotions…who knows?” she says. With a sinister cackle she leaves the room. I feel my cheeks heat. Finn does not look at me, his gaze trained high above my head. I see his face redden slightly and mentally commend Lana. She has embarrassed us both.