Soul of Darkness (26 page)

Sounds coming from the living room drifted toward me, and I could hear my dad’s comments while he watched one of his favorite TV shows.

Everything seemed normal. Vaguely I remembered having felt distressed about something before…but there really was no need…everything was fine.

It was all fine…

Directly following this thought, my mother suddenly shouted something in my direction. As I was startled by the abrupt change in the peaceful atmosphere, my hands shook and the pie-plate slipped from my fingers. As it loudly shattered on the floor, bits of ceramic and crust were flung in every direction.

Not having a clue what was going on, I quickly turned toward my mother, whose exact words I hadn't been able to make out.

When my eyes finally found her, I saw her holding a sheet of baking parchment that seemed to have caught fire. I shouted at her to throw it in the sink before she could get burned, but though my whole body shook with the violence and force of my scream, no sound came out of my mouth.

I watchedin silenc
e―
stuck to the spot by the weight of my shoc
k―
as my mother’s clothing started to catch fire. The soothing aromas of spices and pumpkin were replaced by a smell so terribly devastating that I failed to find a name for it.

As my eyes filled with tears and the house filled with smoke, making it impossible for me to see clearly, blurred silhouettes of spreading flames danced before my vision. They seemed to be heading for the living room…and my dad.

I opened my mouth to warn him…but, once again, no sound escaped my trembling lips. Instead, screams that were not my own pierced my ears and my heart…and echoed inside my head even as I escaped my nightmare, my eyes flying open before the bright orange flames had entirely faded from my mind’s eye.

Noooo!
I shouted inside so loudly that I thought my head might burst. But the sound that came out of my mouth, instead, lacked the strength to convey what I felt inside, escaping as a fragile, dying, and pitiful thing.

Fully awake and unable to fall asleep again any time soon, I slowly pulled myself into a sitting position and leaned my back against the headboard.

Tears leaked from my eyes, and my body shook violently in the aftermath of the cold sweat and the pain I’d experienced…and from the fear that the dream I’d had could actually have been a true account of how my parents had died.

Abruptly, a strong arm encircled my shoulders as Aidan, who seemed to have been resting on the bed beside me, pulled me into his arms and placed my head against his chest, lending me his strength and warmth. His hand gently stroked my hair, comforting me as I wept, while my salty tears stained his shirt beneath my cheek.

“Shhh,” Aidan whispered, trying to soothe me.

But I wasn’t ready to be soothed…wouldn’t let myself be soothed. Right then, what I needed was the truth, not comforting words.

“Aidan,” I said, struggling out of his arms so that I could sit up and look him in the eye, “how did my parents die?”

I no longer needed to ask if they were really gone. I’d already felt the truth behind Malcolm’s words. After what seemed like forever, Aidan’s lips finally started to form words.

“Persephone, I…I’m not sure I’m the one to tell you. Why don’t we jus
t―
”

“Please,” I interrupted him, foiling his plan to avoid giving me an answer so that he wouldn’t need to be the one to relay the heartbreaking news. Perhaps he thought I might end up hating the messenger.

“Whatever your answer is,” I pleaded with him, “I will be grateful to you for telling me the truth. Even if it’s unbearable, I would rather hear it…from you…than anyone else.”

He hesitated for another moment.

“I fear you’ve already ‘heard’ it from me,” Aidan whispered softly, sounding regretful.

“What do you mean?” I asked, mystified by his cryptic answer.

“The nightmare you just had,” Aidan answered, his voice slightly cracking, “I’ve been sitting next to you on the bed thinking about your parents…and I think you just might have…subconsciously…tuned in to my thoughts about the…fire…that killed them. I happened to catch a few of your thoughts while you were dreaming…and it seemed you envisioned flames.”

Upon hearing his words, my throat abruptly went completely dry. Desperately trying to speak past the lump in my throat, I swallowed several times before I managed to find my voice again.

“So, they…they really…burned?” I finally croaked, my throat constricting and tears once again springing to my eyes, momentarily robbing me of the ability to see or speak.

All I could do was sob uncontrollably while Aidan pulled me back against his chest and held me until I was too exhausted to do anything but fall back to sleep.

Thankfully, the nightmare didn’t return. Though I felt myself drifting back to that horrible scene once or twice, the dreaded nightmare was instantly swept away, leaving me afloat in a mindless, peaceful nothingness.

Perhaps,
I thought vaguely between consciousness and sleep,
a higher power of some kind is watching over me as I sleep, keeping the bad dreams at bay. Or perhaps it’s Aidan, soothing my soul as much as he’s soothing my body.

Body and soul…why did he have such a hold on me? My awareness always seemed to drift toward him, no matter my state of consciousness.

When I awoke hours later, the sky beyond the windows was already tinted dark grey. The day had come and gone, and I’d slept through most of it.

Aidan’s body was still cradling mine, his head resting against my own. He seemed to have fallen asleep while holding me, and I felt reluctant to move and wake him. Unfortunately, nature called, leaving me little choice but to move.

A regretful moan escaped his lips when I pulled out of his arms. Mumbling something I couldn’t quite make out, he turned onto his side and drifted back to sleep.

Watching him like this, I was helpless against the grin spreading across my face and the warmth spreading throughout my heart.

Intent on not waking him again, I quietly slipped into the bathroom. After washing my hands, I took a tentative look at myself in the mirror and splashed some icy cold water in my face, hoping to relieve my sore and puffy eyes. I’d wept so hard that my eyelids looked as though they’d been stung by bees.

After having brushed my teeth and washed my face, I felt a bit refreshed and headed back to the bedroom. I was just about to walk past Aidan and go downstairs when his voice drifted toward me through the semidarkness.

“Are you alright?” Aidan asked tentatively.

I didn’t know how to answer him.

Was I alright?

Not at all.

Would I ever be?

I wasn’t so sure.

And would it help me at all to be honest and tell him how I really felt? Or would I merely distress him even more while he was trying so hard to help me?

Finally, I decided it didn’t really matter what I said. Without needing to hear me say it, he probably already knew exactly how I felt. Yet, hoping the words I spoke now would turn out to be true one day, I said, “I’m alright,” and listened to the obvious lie as it echoed around the room.

“Thank you for being here and…for…holding me,” I spoke softly into the shadowy room, hoping I was loud enough for him to hear me.

I didn’t feel like repeating myself and had purposefully told him in the cover of shadows. For, in light of everything that had happened between us lately, I couldn’t help but feel very awkward around him.

“You’re welcome,” he whispered back.

Leaving the room and Aidan behind, I went downstairs to find Malcolm seated at the kitchen table. Leaning over a steaming cup of tea, he was obviously deeply lost in contemplation.

Though I normally wouldn’t have wanted to disturb hi
m―
having seen the expression on his fac
e―
I felt I had no choice. I needed answers…even if the truth turned out to hurt me even more.

“May I?” I asked, hesitantly wrapping my fingers around the back of the chair standing opposite him, waiting for his reply before pulling it out.

“Of course, my dear,” Malcolm answered, a sad smile appearing on his face, as though he knew exactly why I was there and that
―
no matter wha
t―
I wouldn’t stop seeking him out until he told me everything he knew.

“If truth be told,” Malcolm said, “I have been waiting for you for quite a while. For, I knew you would come.”

“Then you know what I must ask,” I replied softly.

“You want to know what happened…how they died…even if it will give you no comfort but only pain.”

“Yes,” I said, swallowing hard, “because that’s what I owe them. The only thing I’ll ever be able to do for them anymore is try to understand their last moments…and share their pain.”

We sat at the table for a long time while Malcolm told me what he knew. Between visions of dancing flames, I pictured my family as it had been…pictured the house I had grown up in…remembered vividly the last time I’d gazed at my bedroo
m―
the heart of my little univers
e―
before I’d turned my back on it and left.

Now, I would never see it again.

I would never see
them
  again.

Everything I’d had was gone…all that remained were my memorie
s―
which would gradually fade over time, degrade day by day, until I no longer recalled the details.

After Malcolm and I finished our talk and I wiped away my tears, the four of us quietly ate dinner. Despite the fact that Aaron repeatedly glanced in my direction as though perhaps wishing to convey his sympathies for my loss, he said nothing.

After dinner, I volunteered to do the dishes. Even though Adam’s kitchen was equipped with a dishwasher, I felt like taking care of the dishes myself. Rather than minding the work, I welcomed it as a means of distraction.

While Malcolm and Aidan had already cleared out of the kitchen, Aaron had stayed behind. I could hear him rummaging around in a cabinet behind my back, obviously playing for tim
e
―
perhaps the time he needed to finally say what had been on his mind since we’d sat down for dinner.

When the rummaging noises finally ceased and I heard hesitant footsteps approaching me, I stopped what I was doing and listened for the sound of his voice.

“I…,” he cleared his throat before continuing, “I wanted to say that I’m…so sorry…about your parents…Persephone.”

Before I could get past the agony of hearing my parents mentioned and find my voice, Aaron had already left.

“Thank you,” I whispered into the now empty space behind me, though I knew he couldn’t hear it.

But if he knew me at all, he would already realize that I was grateful for his words and his sympathy.

And I believed he knew me well enough.

That night, my sleep was restless. I kept rolling from one side of the bed to the other for a long time before I managed to fall asleep…and continued doing so even after I finally drifted off. Hovering between sleep and awareness, I could feel my body continuously moving around as I dreamt.

When I once again found myself in my family’s kitchen, facing my mother and the undeniable truth of what I was about to witness, I tossed my body around so violently in my desperation to get away from this horrible scene that I suddenly felt myself falling straight off the edge of the bed, my eyes popping open just as I landed right on top of Aidan’s outstretched body.

“Argh,” Aidan huffed as the air was pressed out of his lungs through the weight of my body crashing on top of his. Before I could get hurt by rolling off and hitting the hard floor, he managed to hold onto me, his arms wrapping tightly around my waist.

Thus, I suddenly found myself lying on top of him, feeling the warm skin of his bare, powerfully built chest pressing against my naked arms as they rested against his upper body.

His face directly beneath mine, he looked up at me with unfathomable eyes, the little moonlight streaming in through the window reflecting in their depths.

After a long, breathless moment in which we gazed at one another, he suddenly seemed to have come to his senses, threw me off, and started to stomp from the room without even a single word.

Desperate to know what he was thinking, I reached out with my mind and focused hard.

Stay away from me…I can’t trust you,
  I was able to make out before he slammed a wall in front of his mind and the bedroom door in my face.

Since I didn’t hear any footsteps going down the stairs, I assumed he’d be making himself comfortable right outside the door. Malcolm must have admonished him not to stray too far from my side.

After all, I was still to be watched very closely. Even though I hadn’t felt Darkness’s presence since that day at the beach, I could understand their need to be as careful as possible around me.

Darkness wasn’t a foe to be underestimated.

Neither was Evil.