Chapter 27
He was crouched down in the abandoned shop, wedged between two narrow bookcases. The sunlight streaming through the slatted windows was dissecting the floor, casting prison bar shadows. He lifted his arm up slowly and extended it, letting his hand fall into a shaft of light. He drew it back quickly, as if he’d been burnt and rested his head back against the wall, shutting his eyes – and seeing her, as always.
Why was he still here? It didn’t make sense. Why couldn’t he fade back? As a child he’d been knocked unconscious and found himself in the Shadowlands for the longest minute of his life before he’d returned to the human realm. Why couldn’t he do that now? Maybe he’d been unconscious too long. Or maybe as a kid he’d only dreamt it. Or maybe this was all a dream. He didn’t know. He couldn’t fathom it.
The door, boarded over and pushed just to, was kicked ajar from the outside. His eyes flew open and he faded back into the gap between the bookcases, his hand reaching silently for his blade, which lay on the floor by his feet.
But it was only Issa. She ducked inside and quickly closed the door behind her, then stood letting her eyes adjust to the gloom. She stepped forward into a ribbon of light and pulled back her hood, sending the dust motes into a blizzard-like fury around her.
‘Lucas?’ she whispered, her eyes on the bookcases and their piles of forgotten, mould-coated books.
He rose from his silent crouch and stood, then stepped gingerly forward into the light. She smiled as soon as she saw him, the relief palpable on her face.
‘What did you find?’ Lucas asked.
‘I brought some food.’
‘But did you find anything – anyone? Are there any Shifters left?’ he asked, unable to keep the edge out of his voice.
Issa studied him, her disc-like eyes seeming to illuminate the whole room. ‘No,’ she answered finally.
Lucas drew in a breath, pressing back against the bookshelf. They were in the Shifter realm but so far they’d not seen a single Shifter. Only Mixen, Thirsters and Scorpio. And he’d felt a few Shadow Warriors, though not seen them. The realms had all, with the exception of the Sybll realm and the Shadowlands, been overrun. The Elders were no longer in control. The Originals had risen up, and with their army of Mixen and Scorpio had decided to take things into their own hands, starting with controlling the gateways between realms.
‘Were there many out there?’ Lucas asked.
‘Enough to make it difficult to avoid them.’ Issa said, dropping to her knees and opening her bag. She took out some supplies – food that she’d managed to pilfer from somewhere.
‘What are they still doing here?’ Lucas asked. There was no more food source, for the Thirsters at least. That’s why most were heading through to the human realm.
‘Moving in?’ Issa shrugged. ‘Looting – partying by the sounds of it.’
Lucas exhaled loudly, running a hand through his hair. He began pacing. ‘I can’t keep hiding in here like a fugitive. I need to get back.’ The frustration was killing him. ‘We need to find a way through, Issa.’
‘You are a fugitive, Lucas, or had you forgotten?’ Issa asked, standing and thrusting something towards him. It was a hunk of bread. It felt like a lump of volcanic rock in his hand. He was tempted to lob it at the wall.
‘You managed to make it through,’ he grunted.
Issa glared at him. ‘That was before they knew the gateway had opened up again, before they started guarding it. Now there’s no way back. We’re stuck here.’
Lucas grimaced, gesturing at the damp and dusty bookstore. ‘We can’t stay here, Issa, living like rats in the wreckage, waiting for a group of Thirsters to slip through your visions and finish us off.’
‘I’ve already told you,’ Issa answered, her head down, still rummaging through her bag. ‘We should head to the Sybll lands. They’re the only safe place to be right now.’
Lucas took a deep breath in, trying to stay calm. They’d already argued over Issa’s inexact visions. She claimed she couldn’t see all that was going to happen, but she had also been adamant about one thing – that the human realm was done for and that pretty soon it was going to be a desolate wasteland much like the Shifter realm, with a rampant Thirster population running wild.
Lucas twisted away, angry and frustrated. He bent to pick up his bag.
‘Ow!’ he sucked air in sharply and winced, his hand flying to his wounded side, pressing against the bandage that covered his stab wound.
‘Careful.’ Issa was right there, in front of him, her hair falling in front of her face like a shield, her hands moving straight to his side, lifting his shirt.
‘I’m OK. I’m OK,’ Lucas said, backing away from her, holding his hand to the light to see if there was any blood on the palm.
‘If it tears open again,’ Issa said, flicking her hair out of her face, ‘I’m not sure I can fix it.’ She didn’t mention the obvious, that the Thirsters out there would smell it and come running. ‘You need to rest, give it time to heal,’ she said.
Lucas sighed. The stitches had torn twice already, both times when he’d tried to wield a sword before Issa had claimed he was ready to even get back on his feet. But he was back on his feet now, the stitches seemed to be holding, and he’d finally fought off the infection. He couldn’t wait any longer. ‘I need to get back.’
Issa stared at him defiantly. ‘You’re not going to be able to fight all of them, Lucas. There are too many, even for you.’
Lucas tried to stand straight, to ignore the flames shooting through his abdomen. ‘Issa, don’t start this again. I’m always being told what I can and can’t do by Sybll and you’ve been wrong on every count. I’m still alive. Evie’s still alive.’
At the mention of Evie’s name Issa’s mouth puckered tightly. ‘I didn't come back to find you, to save you, just to watch you throw your life away again, Lucas,’ Issa snapped.
They stared at each other, her expression fierce and uncompromising, his own guilt ridden. What could he say? She had found him. In the midst of the Shadowlands. Which, given the vague nature of her visions, was something of a miracle. And she had saved him. The truth was, he wouldn’t have lasted even one more night, maybe not even another hour, if Issa hadn’t found him when she had.
He was rotten meat, his wound festering, infected, thick with pus, the skin around it puckered and shiny, when Issa had reached him. His brow was so hot to the touch she’d whipped her hand away as if he was a Mixen. He was long past sweating at that stage, past shivering too. He had been a corpse, hanging by the slenderest thread, half-flesh, half-ghost, waxing and waning.
For what felt like weeks, but Issa had told him had only been days, he’d lain, feverish, curled in a makeshift shelter of rocks, where he’d managed to drag himself. He had thought he was going to die out there in the wastelands. No water. No food. No way back. Fever-spiked dreams the only thing keeping him tethered to any realm – dreams of Evie, dreams where he could touch her and taste her, where his naked body wasn’t lying against rocks, coated in dirt and sweat but was lying against her warm, soft skin, melting into her.
He still had those dreams, but now they were stolen moments where he shut his eyes and tried to picture her. Occasionally they came at night – she would be there, flesh and blood, as real as his own hand in front of his face. And he would be reaching out to her, trying to make her understand that he was still alive, that he was coming back to her. Though her eyes – those dark ocean eyes – were always blank with sadness. She thought he was dead. And he couldn’t make her see otherwise.
Thousands of times a day, with every single breath he took, he tried to imagine where she was. What she was doing. Praying like hell that she was in Riverview and that she was safe. Praying even harder that she hadn’t got it into her head to hunt down Victor and kill him. Whatever Evie might think, whatever dark place she was in right now, he knew she would never be what he was – a cold-blooded killer.
He pressed a fist against the shuttered window and peered through a small gap. Outside it was early evening. The time when they started to come – those that hadn’t crossed through yet into the human realm. At night they scavenged in this realm, looking for fresh meat, though the last of the Shifters had long ago been killed or had crossed through the gateway seeking safety in the human realm.
‘How long will it take them, do you think’ he asked Issa quietly, ‘to overrun the human realm, just as they’ve done with this place? A week? A month? A year?’ He turned away from the window. Issa was glaring at him. ‘I’m not going to sit here or in the Sybll lands, and let it happen. That’s my sister on the other side, and Evie. That’s my family we’re talking about. I won’t just give up on them. I’m going back tonight. The way through is open. We don’t know why. But I do know that my life is on the other side.’
‘We do know why the way through is open,’ Issa said softly, holding his gaze. ‘It’s open because the White Light didn’t shut it. Cyrus did.’
Lucas turned his back on Issa so that she wouldn’t see the stricken look on his face. What she’d said had struck a note of fear in him. It was the real reason he was pushing so hard for them to make it through the gateway. Soon enough the Originals would figure out that Evie hadn’t died – that the White Light was still alive and the prophecy wasn’t fulfilled, and they would try to find her.
The only thing that frightened him more was that Evie would discover that the way through was open as well, and that she would try once again to close it.