CHAPTER EIGHTY-ONE
Chaz:
There was a point, at the beginning of all this, when the earth rolled out beneath turquoise skies, when heaven touched our horizon. Some say that back then, the first man and the first woman gave up eternal life, sacrificed it on some unknown altar. Maybe it was so they could stay together. She went alone, along a path of death and enlightenment, deceived perhaps. But then he followed, willingly. To be with her.
In that moment, when I held Angelique in my arms, I understood all of it.
Sometimes love propels you to do something you would never do otherwise. Like stand on the edge of eternity and fight a demon, to free a little girl from a life of hell. Like hold the woman you love and beg God not to take her.
Please not this. Not eternal life alone.
Please dona€?t let me stand with heaven forever at my back, staring into torment.
I dona€?t know how prayer works, dona€?t think any of us will ever really know how spoken words can change the world we live in, how or why God would choose to stop the universe and listen. Like I said, I dona€?t know how it works. I only know it does. I only know that someone stands on the other side of an invisible curtain and nods his head.
I held Angelique in my arms and wept. I knelt beside her and remembered seeing the sky of heaven rip in two because I didna€?t belong there. But I didna€?t belong here either. Already I could feel the earth fading away, as if time no longer mattered; as if I stood still long enough I would see the city crumble to dust around me, I would watch another generation rise up. And they would be just as hungry for immortality as the one before them.
Dona€?t take her, please.
Words tumbled from my lips, tokens of the emotions that raged inside. I found myself saying all the things I wished I had spokena€”before all this happened. But every word hung hollow in the air, seemed to fall flat on the cement and crash against worn tombstones.
She didna€?t move. Didna€?t breathe.
Omega continued to watch over her, a restlessness in his eyes. He howled again and paced around both of us, then finally he lay down beside me, his dark fur pressed against my leg, his head in her lap.
Overhead, the lowering sun sparked through a bank of trees. It dragged a host of shifting shadows through the cemetery. They stood in the empty spaces between the tombs and then lingered there, as if watching me. Tall and slender, the dark wavering shapes always stayed just out of my line of sight, moving whenever I turned my head.
My throat was sore and her body was cold.
I knew that the empire my family built would collapse soon, tumble over like a house of straw. The Number Nines would rule the world for one brief moment and then it would all burst into flame. Soon there would be no need for Babysitters. I would wander through eternity alone, like some sort of unclean spirit, chasing down back alleys in search of Neville. I would catch him eventually. There might even come a point when the two of us would be the only two people left, our journey across a charred landscape forever destined to cross pathsa€”at the intersection of heaven and hell.
My tears continued to fall and I shuddered, pulled Angeliquea€?s body closer.
Throughout it all, the dog stayed at her side, faithful. Perhaps he was unable to understand Death since it had no power over him. A chill wind whisked around us, ruffling the doga€?s fur, whispering Angeliquea€?s hair. And at the same time, the shadows moved nearer, no longer hidinga€”they surrounded me now and the City of the Dead seemed to pulse with a strange, rugged energy, something primitive, almost supernatural. I could feel the presence of that eerie horizon, the border between heaven and hell. Maybe it never left me. Maybe part of me was still there and I had pulled these spectral shadows back with me. I didna€?t know and I didna€?t care.
Light danced across Angeliquea€?s hand, almost made it look like her fingers moved, like some part of her was still alive.
I leaned forward and cradled her face in my hands. Every touch left a stain of her blood behind, a smear on her cheek, fingerprints on her forehead. My hands were red with it now.
I wished I could see the sparkle in her eyes once more.
I pressed my lips to hers, my heart crying.
One kiss. To say good-bye. It was our first kiss, really.
Imagination and hope can be cruel partners. In that moment, they worked together to create a lifetime of what could have been: Angelique and I together, laughing, finding some existence apart from my familya€?s empire. I even thought that I felt warmth, that some part of her responded to my touch and I couldna€?t bear to let her go.
Then the dog howled again, long and plaintive and mournful, the sort of cry that breaks your heart because ita€?s so wild and raw and alone. I wanted to howl along with him, wanted to rip this bad dream apart with claws and fangs. But it was time to let Angelique go. My arms were still wrapped around her and I knew Skellar would be sending a medical team soon. They would be too late, but still, they would take her from me, get her body ready for the grave.
Please dona€?t take her away from me, I begged one last time.
Then the shadows moved even closer until they engulfed both of us, and that was when I realized that they werena€?t made of darkness. They were like holes in the fabric of the universe, each one of them filled with pinpricks of light, each one whispering and calling her name.
Calling Angelique to return.
That was when I felt it, when her chest was pressed against mine. It was so faint, so fragile. Almost like a distant echo, deep inside her.
A heartbeat. But only one.
I pulled away. As I stared at her, the ragged slash across her neck began to disappear, the wound closing. And then a moment later, a pulse centered at the base of her throat. Warmth began to return to her limbs and a pale color returned to her skin. Her cheeks and lips darkened to a soft rose and then, finally, her mouth opened a fraction of an inch and I heard her take a shallow breath.
a€?Angeliquea€”a€? I whispered.
Omega lifted his head, his ears up, his tail wagging.
Another breath. I could tell it was painful, I could almost feel the sharp bite of knives deep inside, I wished I could take away the pain. Then the shadows moved away from us, dissolving in the autumn sun.
In that instant, her eyes fluttered open and she stared into the sky for a moment, as if saying good-bye to something. Then she looked at me and I saw it.
The sparkle in her eyes that said she loved me, that she wanted to be here with me. That maybe immortality wasna€?t such a bad thing after all.
And I knew then that I wouldna€?t have to spend eternity alone.