The Guardian (Callista Ryan Series) (43 page)

             
“Maybe,” he whispered in agreement.

             
She glanced at him again, but before she had time to consider the sad look on his face, they were already out the door, and flying towards Shay’s house. The way he held her while he carried her, a little too close, a little too firm….It was like he was keeping her near him with some sort of desperation.

             
When he placed her on Shay’s doorstep, he didn’t step inside. She turned to face him, and saw him holding himself up on outstretched wings. He wore the same assessing, devious expression he’d had back at his house. The usual shallow guard in his grey eyes, not allowing one entry past the walls with which he surrounded himself, was absent. As Callie watched him, she saw that there was some ancient loneliness just beyond the surface, in the place which he let no one see. She wondered when was the last time he’d admitted caring for someone.

             
Before she could guess what he was doing, he had reached out, and tugged forward a strand of her hair. He let the threads slip smoothly through his thumb and first finger, watching the inches slide forth and fall over her shoulder once he had reached their end. She held her breath, unsure of how to react to this unusual gesture of tenderness.

             
Meeting her eyes once again, Emeric seemed to rebuild his walls right in front of her. The moment when his guard had been lowered, for whatever reason, had passed. “Have a safe journey,” he said curtly. And with that, he turned, and disappeared behind a sea of feathers into the darkness.

             
That night, as Callie slept on the couch which Shay had cleared for her by stacking the instruments in piles all around it, she kept hoping that Alex would come to visit her. All the while, she was hoping that he wouldn’t. She didn’t know what she could say to him now, even if she had the chance. A part of her was still angry with him, still reeling with perceived rejection. But another part of her was still so madly in love with him, so willing to forgive him. She didn’t know how she would face him. She just knew that she needed to.

             
The sun rose before long, before Callie could claim a wink of sleep. And then, to Callie’s amazement and horror, as the pink rays filtered through the trees, the leaves began to shake in indication of someone’s arrival. She sat up, expecting to see Alex break through the branches in a moment. Her stomach churned at the prospect, her heart sped.

             
But then Zeke emerged from the leafy canopy, and flew into Shay’s door. Callie felt her shoulders sink when she saw his open face, but that only lasted a moment before the reason that he was there occurred to her, and then she felt the remnants of last night’s panic begin to surge once more.

             
“It’s too soon,” she said, knowing that they had to leave anyways. Some mixture of the worst kinds of terror and heartbreak took root in her blood. Would she ever see this place, these people, again?

             
“I know, kid,” Zeke said, sinking into the couch next to her. He sighed with compassion, but shook his head. “It’s not so bad.”

             
Callie didn’t respond. They both knew it wasn’t true.

             
“Look, I’ve been away for much longer than this’ll be. I’ve been away two hundred years before coming back to this place,” Zeke offered.

             
“Yeah. But you always
came back
,” Callie said miserably.

             
Zeke nudged her shoulder with his own. “Who says you won’t?”

             
“Alex will never allow me back here until the battle is over,” Callie said. “And by then, who knows? I could be ninety and drooling, with osteoporosis, unable to live in this place.”

             
Zeke paused, and then burst out laughing. “
That’s
what you’re worried about?” he asked. “Trust me, Cal, a little bone wear and tear is better than the alternative. If you stayed here, you’d be a goner. And then you’d be unable to live
any
place. Besides, this battle will be quick. It’s the reorganization that’ll take the longest. If I were you, I’d be worried about the restructuring aspect taking centuries, and Alex not wanting you back until things were stable, by which time you’d be six feet under.”

             
“Wow, thanks,” Callie said.

             
“Sorry,” he replied. With a big breath and a shrug of his shoulders, Zeke stood and hauled Callie up by the shoulders. “Well, it’s about that time.”

             
Callie felt tears brimming, but nodded silently. “Can I say goodbye to Shay?” Callie asked.

             
“Shay’s out, kid. She left a little while ago. Clients, and all,” Zeke said.

             
“Oh,” Callie said. Her heart had only ever ached so badly once in her life, and she had never thought she’d feel that way again. Zeke lifted her into his arms, and Callie watched, depressed, as the forest faded away behind them.

As she and Zeke flew out over the
ocean, she couldn’t keep herself from turning to look at him. Some sort of self-preservation was kicking in now that such unbearable sadness had taken root, making her feel furious rather than heartbroken, and she needed to take it out on someone.

             
“Why did you let them do it?” she asked. “Why go along with it? You were the one who told me to stick around. You were the one who said that it would break his heart if I left. And yet here I am, leaving, and at your and his orders, no less. All that stuff about my mattering so much—did you make it all up, just for kicks?”

             
The words spilled angrily and harshly from her mouth, and she knew that most of them weren’t fair. But she felt more lonely now, as they flew over the glistening sea, than she’d felt since arriving in the forest. She felt utterly rejected, and completely useless.

             
He gazed down at her in patient understanding, letting the anger drain slowly from her eyes, before he answered.

             
“Cal, you’re a smart girl,” he said. “Crunch the numbers. Do you really think he’d be breaking his own heart right now if you mattered any less?”

             
She shook her head, not in answer, but in refusal to acknowledge his answer. She turned away from him, folding her arms across her chest. He might have said more, but she didn’t want to hear it. After a few miles, she pretended to be asleep.

             
Against her eyelids, she could see nothing but the picture of Alex’s face before he left last night. The image of him, guilt-stricken and apologetic, should have satisfied her more. But it didn’t. It just made her want to turn around and hold him, comfort him, even though he’d been the source of his own pain.

             
Somewhere along the way, eased by the smooth glide of Zeke’s flight and the gentle rolling noises of the ocean, Callie must have really fallen asleep.

             
Because when she woke up the next morning, back in her childhood bed, surrounded once more by her own bedroom, Zeke was gone. The window was open, and a gentle breeze drifted in. It was the only sign that anyone had been there at all.

             
And for a moment, forcefully shutting her eyes against the light—willing herself to forget their faces, their words, his scent—it was as though it had all been a dream.

Chapter Twenty Three

Bleak House

             
Callie stepped ou
t
of her bed. Her limbs felt heavy, her head pounded with the sting of yesterday’s tears. She was dehydrated and dizzy and nauseous, and, worst of all, she was hopeless. She didn’t want to be here; she didn’t want to be anywhere, really. Because the world was no good to her without him, and he didn’t want her in the forest.

             
She staggered into her bathroom and looked at her reflection. The patches of skin around her eyes were swollen and pink; the second Maggie saw her, she’d know Callie had been crying. She decided to forego the shower. Just the sight of the bright labels and cheap plastic bottles of her shampoo and conditioner made her ache for the canopy, for its simplicity and authenticity. Besides, she knew that she needed to go downstairs eventually. There was no telling the kind of damage Maggie could have brought upon the house when she was unwatched.

             
Callie walked down the stairs, the familiar motion feeling strange. It was impossible to believe that there were people right outside these walls, walking around in suits and ties, creating trivial havoc over things like restaurants and family portraits. The wingless world seemed so petty now. Having lived amidst the grand scheme of history, the present seemed small in comparison.

             
“Mags, you home?” Callie asked, stepping into the kitchen. She gasped. She had been picturing piles of dishes strewn across the counters, heaps of laundry blooming from the corners. There should have been empty bottles, week-old take-out trays, errant Kleenex boxes and trash bags. She had been bracing herself for days’ worth of clean up.

             
But instead, what she found was order. The laundry was folded neatly into a laundry basket that was waiting at the foot of the stairs. The recycling bin was empty of anything save a few papers, not even boasting a single wine bottle. Two large black trash bags sat outside the kitchen door, where the garbage truck would pick them up on Friday.

             
For a moment, Callie couldn’t grasp the scene before her. This couldn’t be the home of an abandoned alcoholic. There was a vase of daisies on the windowsill, for Christ’s sake. Callie turned on her heel and walked into the living room, only to find that this, too, was spotless. No beer cans or dirty towels or wrappers; just furniture organized exactly as it had been when Callie had left, and a few dollars in a trinket dish on the table by the door in case of food delivery.

             
Had Maggie even been home in the past few weeks? She must have, Callie realized, because the place looked even better than when she had left. But the fact that things were so well maintained made little sense to Callie, and as she looked around, she became even more confused.

             
“Maggie?” she called again, beginning to doubt she was in the right house.

             
“Callie?”

             
Callie walked into the kitchen and froze. Maggie sat at the table, hunched over with a mug of coffee in her hands, reading the paper. She didn’t look normal exactly… Her skin was still ashen and worn, and her eyes still had bags underneath them. Her brown curls were still a mess, piled into a high bun on top of her head. Overall, she looked about the same as when Callie had left her.

             
But this was the first time in years that Callie could walk within five feet of her and not be overwhelmed by the smell of body odor and booze. And to make matters weirder, Jacob was sitting next to Maggie.

             
For her part, Maggie looked just as shocked as Callie felt.

             
“What’s going on—“ Callie started.

             
“Where the hell have you been?” Maggie cried, jumping up from the table, lucid and furious. “Do you have any idea what I’ve been going through trying to find you?”

             
“Maggie,” Callie said, stunned. “You’re…sober.”

             
“And you’re a bitch, you know that? I wake up one morning and you’re not around, and then I find
this
,” Maggie shouted, pausing only to retrieve a note that was taped onto the refrigerator and shove it in Callie’s face.

             
Callie skimmed the lines quickly. The handwriting was identical to her own. It said exactly what Emeric told her it would. Tears welled in her eyes again when she thought about that morning, how they’d all been strangers to each other. All she had wanted back then was to be exactly where she was now. The irony was painful.

             
“I’m sorry,” Callie whispered, looking down so Maggie couldn’t see the heartache on her face.

             
“Sorry? Callie, you could have died out there on your own, you know that? You have no idea how to live by yourself, let alone without any money or friends. For the better part of a month, all I could do was picture you face down in the ocean!”

             
Maggie’s green eyes were on fire, as she stood there waiting for an explanation. But as Callie looked at her sister, the way her hands rested indignantly on her hips, the way she was fully present, both physically and mentally…it was as though she was looking at the old Maggie again. And then there was a new pain that Callie felt. She realized just how much she’d missed her sister over the past four years.