The 13th: Destiny Awaits (22 page)

“What were you thinking?”

“I just wanted my mum back.” And she still did. But it was too late for that, the hints of pink aura reminding her of that every time it entered her line of vision. Her mother was dead, gone, but still... Kate wasn't ready to let her go.

“Oh, Kate.” Ethan fell to his knees before her and pulled her against his warmth, while his hand brushed down her black hair and murmured soft words of consolation.

They stayed like that until the numbness creeping into Kate's legs forced her to shift. She leaned back against the wall and rubbed her eyes. “She's gone now.”

“Not yet. You are still holding onto her, preventing her from leaving.”

“But I can't...”

“I know.” Ethan's hand hooked around her neck and he pressed their foreheads together. “I know. But you have opportunity to say goodbye to her. Most people don’t have that and you should use it. You should get rid of the pendant and talk with your mother.”

“I can't. I'm not ready yet.”

He tilted his head as if listening and then said, “She says that she understands and that she will wait.”

“Do
you
understand? About Nan?” Her fingers found a loose thread at the collar of her thin green shirt and she started to twirl it.

“I think I do, sort of. You love your mother and you did what you thought was best for her, even though it was wrong. What do you think he wants with Nanael?”

“I... I don't know. To feed on her like he fed on my mother. That's how he avoids the pain of remorse -- or something like that.” Was Ethan aware of the Eaters' hell? “But she wouldn't go missing if it was just that.”

“That Eater used you like it was using your mother. It had been there since you were little. Did you know that?”

“No. Did Mother tell you?”

“Yes, just now. Could it be that it was always after the Keeper?”

That would explain Nan's reluctance to contact her face to face as a Keeper, but it would also mean that she was always under the Eater's influence. “But it doesn't make sense. Why would he go through so much trouble? Weren't there other ways to find the Keeper? Couldn't he feel the Keeper's spiritual energy?”

“Apparently not.” Ethan rose up, took hold of her hands and tugged her up, then used the edge of his blue cotton sleeve to dab her cheeks.

“What are we going to do?” Was there any help to be had? The one person who might have been able to offer them advice was the one person they couldn’t find.

“First I'm going to make lunch, and then later, we have to go through the handbook to see if there is a way we can contact the 13th and ask for their help.”

“I could just wash it. It shouldn't take long.” Kate stood beside Mandy as the blonde browsed through the sweaters folded on the closet shelf looking for one to replace Kate's blue one stained with juice. She and Tyler were going to spend a weekend over at Mandy and Ethan's place since her father was absent again and the parents didn't trust them enough to leave them unsupervised overnight.

“We can't have you walk around in your bra until it dries. What would Mandy's parents say?” said Tyler, who lay on the bed set at the west wall, left of the window. He was leafing through some teenage magazine he had found on Mandy's desk.

“I would have dried it with a hair drier.” Kate crossed her arms, irritated with herself that she had forgotten to bring a change of clothes, but glad that she had on a black bra that made her feel as if she was wearing a bathing suit. Not that she had too much of a problem parading around in front of Tyler in her underwear, not when they had bathed naked in the backyard together when they were little.

Ethan peeked into the room. “Hey, I need to talk with -- Oh.” He opened the door wider and stepped inside, his eyes on Kate and his mouth stretched in a smile.

Kate's arms shot up to cover her chest. “What are you doing? Get out.”

“But... What about him?” Ethan pointed at Tyler.

“Here.” Mandy offered a white shirt to Kate.

Kate almost tore it from Mandy's hand and pulled it over her head. “That's different.”

“He's a guy, too.”

“He’s Tyler.”

“And how is that different?”

“You two stop fighting.” Mandy stepped in front of Kate, frowning at her brother.

“They’re not fighting. That's just the way they communicate.” Tyler rolled on his side and propped his head on his hand. “Shouldn't you be used to it by now?”

“Is there something you wanted?” Kate went around Mandy and sat on the edge of the bed, her fingers tugging the collar of the shirt away from her neck.

“The logo should be in front. You put it on backwards.” Ethan walked to the desk at the left of the bed, sat in the swivel chair and spun it around until he faced the bed. “I think I found something.”

“You did?” Kate pulled her arms out of the sleeves, turned the shirt around and put her arms back in. They-- well, actually Ethan more than her -- had been poring over the handbook for the past two days, but until now the handbook hadn’t shown them anything helpful. “Great, then I will be able to finish that project that I need for... erm... school.”

“They know.” Ethan put the handbook on the desk.

“What?”

“We know,” Tyler repeated Ethan's words and sat up.

“Know what?” Kate's gaze darted among the three of them.

“That you two can see ghosts and that Nan has something to do with it.” Mandy joined Tyler on the bed.

“And that this is the reason she's missing,” Tyler added.

“We don't know if that's true,” Kate said before she cast a dark gaze in Ethan's direction. “You told them. How could you?”

“Oh, come on.” Tyler stood up and crossed his arms. “Like we weren't aware that something was going on.”

“Yeah,” Mandy said. “We were just waiting for you two to tell us what.”

“And he had to show me, otherwise there was no way I was going to let him stay alone with you when you so obviously disliked his company,” Tyler pulled Mandy into a half embrace.

Always a good friend. Warmth spread over Kate and she felt the urge to jump over to Tyler and hug him, instead she cleared her throat. “And you believed it? Just like that?”

“It wasn't just like that,” Tyler said. “He showed us your mother.”

Kate's gaze found Ethan. “You showed her? How? Does Tyler have latent powers?” And she had never known.

“Of course not,” Ethan said. “I only held their hands while materializing the gloves. The Stones of Awakening allow people in contact with them to see the spiritual world.”

“Oh.”

“She's very nice, your mother,” Mandy crawled closer to Kate and put her hand on Kate's shoulder. “And beautiful.”

“Yes, she was.” Kate felt wetness in the corners of her eyes and she willed it away. For a moment here, in the absence of the pink blur, she had forgotten about her mother's death. She was glad when Ethan told her that the Ritual of Warding prevented her mother from following them to Mandy and Ethan's house. The only reason why she could penetrate the wards around Kate's house was because she had been a member of the household. To get rid of her completely, Kate would have to perform a Ritual of Exorcism before the Warding. But Kate didn't want to get rid of her mother's ghost; if she did, she would have reaped it.

Somebody's hand shook her and as she looked up at the body towering over her, her eyes meet with icy blue ones that gazed down on her with worry.

“I'm fine.”

“Are you? Sometimes I wonder.”

“You said you found something.”

“Not the way to contact the 13th, I'm afraid. Just a way to get in.”

She would have asked him what help was that to them, when a twinkle in his eyes told her. “You want us to go there?”

He nodded, opened the handbook and gave it to her. “Read it.”

It took her a few minutes to go through the chapter that told her the process of opening a portal into the 13th. She closed the handbook and gave it back to Ethan. She as a Reaper had an easy access to the 13th, while he could only enter it with her help. She didn’t want to go, not alone. “When do you want me to leave?”

“You mean when do we leave?” Ethan said.

She would prefer company, but... “No.”

“I can’t leave without you and I’m not leaving you on your own.”

It was dangerous, since they not only had to leave their bodies, but also merge their spirits. They had already combined their powers, but could they merge? And what did that really mean? And what were the consequences?

“How else are we going to get their help?” Ethan asked, as if he knew that she would hate it to go on her own.

Ethan had already tried with butterflies, sending them out while either thinking of Nan or of the 13th, but as soon as they materialized they dove back into his flesh. Kate turned to Tyler. “No news?”

“No.” Tyler shook his head.

“Has anybody gone through her things?” Kate asked.

“Yes, we did,” said Ethan. “There was nothing there -- well, nothing out of the ordinary. I found a book similar to the 13th handbook, written in Latin. It's weird actually, it’s so similar, but everything is written out. We used a translator for the text, some of the titles are the same as in our handbook, but the text doesn't make sense. It's like it's coded.”

“And you haven't told me about this, why?” Kate rose up.

“It's not important since it doesn't help us, does it?” Ethan said.

“Are you two going to include us in this or do we have to pretend we are deaf?” Tyler crossed his arms while Mandy nodded.

If they intended to cross over, Kate and Ethan would need their help since they couldn't leave their bodies unsupervised, especially not with adults around. But was this really a good idea?

“But you are included, you are,” Ethan reassured them before his blue eyes were back on Kate. “So, Kate, what do you say? Are you up for a bit of sightseeing?”

Kate surveyed first Ethan's face then Tyler's. They looked so serious. Nan meant a lot to both of them, to her, too. It was her fault that Nan was missing. And, according to the book, Ethan couldn't cross by himself. She would do what Ethan wanted. “Fine, let's try it. It's not like we have a lot to lose, just our souls.”

“Don't be so dramatic.” A smile stretched Ethan's mouth as he patted her back.

#

Kate was supposed to be napping in Mandy's room, feigning sickness, but when she heard Tyler going up to Ethan's room, she couldn't help but jump up and rush to catch him before he went back downstairs to the living room.

The way he and Mandy had accepted the ghost thing was too easy, too smooth. Didn't he find the whole thing strange? She asked him that.

“Of course I do.” Tyler leaned on the door of Ethan's room and shook his head at her, amusement playing in his brown eyes and on his lips. “It's not every day that you hear that your best friend is the Soul Reaper.”

“The Reaper? I thought Ethan only told you about the ghosts.”

“Yes, he did, but I overheard the two of you. You are so funny.” Tyler mussed her hair. “Keeping this kind of thing from me.” The smile vanished from his face. “It made me mad. We have known each other for so long, and you never trusted me enough to tell me.”

He didn't look angry, though, maybe only mildly irritated. “I was afraid you would think I was crazy if I told you. That you would start to look at me like the rest of them do.”

“Kate, I have been tolerating all those pentagrams you carved everywhere and salt and your hiding in the closet without any complaints or questions.”

“You did ask me about the ones on the bamboo in the garden.”

He ignored her. “Don't you think if these antics haven't made me treat you differently, nothing ever will?”

“Would you have believed me?”

He frowned. “I don't know. I might not have, but I wouldn't have thought you were crazy. Well, I might have thought you were being a little silly.” He smiled.

Kate giggled despite herself. He really was a good friend, always there for her, and she had never appreciated him as she should have. “You are like a knight in shining armour, aren't you?”

“Flattery won't get you anywhere; this knight already has his princess.”

“The nicest, cutest and tallest girl in the school.”

“Yeah,” The curve of Tyler's mouth grew. “And don't forget the strongest. Just the other day we bumped into Ervin -- you remember him, the bulky guy who follows Sandra like a puppy. He threatened me and was about to start a fight -- you know how I can't fight or I'll be thrown off the team -- and Mandy twisted his arm and got him on his knees. I extracted a promise from him not to try it again or the whole school would learn how a girl kicked his butt. You should have seen it, it was so awesome.” His eyes had lit up while he spoke and a light flush covered his cheeks. “She's awesome. That guy even cried a little.”

The nice I-can't-hurt-a-fly girl had the big bully crying. Kate wished she had been there. “You are so head over heels, aren't you?”

“Well, she's so awesome.”

“Yes, she is.” Kate chuckled. “And you’re awesome too, that's why you two fit so well together.”

“What's so funny?” Ethan appeared at the top of the stairs, his brows knitted together.

“The awesomeness,” Tyler said.

“Shouldn't you be napping?” Ethan crossed her arms, glowering at Kate.

“You’re up, too.”

“I don't need as much sleep as you do.”

“Yes, master.”

Ethan's scowl deepened, he grabbed her arm and guided her past Tyler into Mandy's room. “This is serious.”

She knew that, but somehow she felt lighter, as if Tyler and Mandy knowing about their ability lessened the heavy burden she had carried on her shoulders for so long. They knew now and they liked her just the same.

Tyler followed them. “Oi, you are hurting her.”

“No, I'm not.” Ethan pushed Kate into the room.

“He's such a bully,” Kate loudly whispered to Tyler over her shoulder, grinning.

Ethan shut the door, his eyes dark as they landed on Kate. “Stop flirting with him. He already has a girlfriend.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Don't play stupid with me.” A blond strand fell over Ethan's brow as he towered over Kate, his blue eyes clouded.

“What's wrong with you?” Kate poked him in his chest, feeling slightly intimidated, not by him, but by her heart starting to march in her chest so loudly she was afraid he was able to hear it.

“You’re what’s wrong with me.” He leaned over her, and before she could ask what he was doing, his mouth landed on hers, so soft, so pliant. His hands cupped her neck and waist and as he drew her closer, the touch of his mouth became more demanding. His tongue slid against hers, enticing her, luring her into a dance of rapturous joy.

Electric shivers zigzagged under skin, taking her breath away and making her knees weak. Her arms wrapped around his shoulders, and she held onto him tightly while the world around her and the worries that troubled her vanished in a hot delight that squeezed her chest in happiness so intense that it hurt. The love that had seemed so unimportant just a few days ago burst up and crashed over her like a tsunami, shattering any coherent thought she had. She wished for the kiss to never end.

In the next moment, he shoved her away, cursing, leaving her bewildered and shaky.

She had to rest against the wall behind her while she pressed her hands over the rampant beat of her heart, feeling warmth under her skin. She must have been blushing like crazy, like him.

“I'm sorry, I shouldn't have done that.” He lowered his head, and before Kate could ask him why he was apologizing, he was out of the room, the door slamming behind him.