"I wanted to show you the books. We haven't had time with all the craziness, and that's not disappearing soon, but I think it's important."
"Is this the one with the picture you mentioned? I've been wondering what's so hilarious about that."
I chew on my lip. "It was funny at the time."
As I run a finger along the shelved books to locate the right one, Vee approaches from behind and wraps her arms round my waist. She places her head on my back.
"Are you okay now, Joss?" she says. "You haven't spoken about things fully. You still don't feel right to me."
I loosen her arms and turn, encompassing Vee in mine and pulling her close. She smells good, vanilla-flavoured Vee with her soothing presence. She asked me in the past why I always wanted to hold her when we slept together and always kept amazing self-control. Yeah, that was bloody hard, but I worried if I scared her away, I wouldn't be able hold her and absorb the comfort she gives that bolsters me when things are tough.
Heath complains how he hates his role as Death; Ewan sometimes barely disguises his stress about the role. Xander? I don't know; his mood swings probably keep him focused in an unfocused way. Me? I crave the closeness, the touch, and the natural comfort from being with somebody who brings out the human Joss and lets me forget the Horseman side.
For me, this is Vee.
"I had a weird vision." I don't mean to say anything; the words spills out.
"When? Just now?"
"No." I sit on the nearby chair, and Vee perches on my lap, arms wound around my neck. Her easy intimacy draws me closer to her and allows me to admit what I haven't to anybody.
I tell her the story of what I saw the first time and the second. I choke back the words several times, and she grips me tighter smoothing my hair.
I finish, emotionally and physically drained, more than any time I've fought demons—because this time I'm fighting mine. Vee voices what I didn't want her to.
"I know you believe in the Biblical, Joss. Do you think you were in Hell?" Her words are hesitant, spoken into my hair. and I hold her harder.
I swallow. "Yes."
"And do you think the man you saw—"
"Was me?" I interrupt. "Yes."
Vee pulls away and holds my face in both hands. "No. He couldn't be. Joss, you're a good person. You care. You're intuitive. The day I arrived in your lives, you helped me. You never showed a single sign of malice."
I pull her hand from my cheek, and every question that's come to me when I've lain in the dark spills out. “But what if the person I saw in the two visions is another me, and I was in Hell because of the things I did to people? What if this is my second chance, and if I fuck up, I’m dragged back to Hell? I'm worried that's what happened to the Horsemen who came before us.""
My anxiety rises as concern flickers across Vee's face. My words sound too convincing.
"But we can't be sure Hell exists, Joss."
I gesture at the books. "Something does. Maybe under a different name, not labelled by a religion. I've said this before. I call him Lucifer for want of a better name."
"Call who, Joss?"
"Whoever rules the realm beyond the portal the Order want to breech. The one who plans to send through his demon race to conquer the human world. What if all this shit happening is to prevent us paying attention to the portals? We're distracted."
Vee chews her lip. “How do you know if the portals are under threat from those on the other side?”
"We sense it."
"And do you now?"
"No."
“Then don't worry. Focus on what's happening."
We fall into silence, and I fight the quickened breathing that betrays my fear. I need to know more.
“I thought you were quiet because you were recovering from the attack. I didn't know this was happening."
"I can't stop thinking about it, Vee. I doubt myself. I'm terrified I'm going to lapse back into whoever he was."
"He wasn't you, Joss. This is who you are. The man who loves and cares for us all. The guy who succeeded in resisting my request to lose part of who I am because of that love and loyalty."
I look into Vee's eyes, seeking a true answer to my next question, even though I know she can't lie. "Do you still want that, Vee? Do you still want to lose your human side?"
She looks away, stroking my cheek with her thumb lost in thought. "Sometimes." She looks back. "I fight it. Ewan made me realise what would happen if I do. I want to love you all, and be loved by you all. I want the closeness we have as five, and all that's happening is I'm pushing you away."
I catch a hint of something else. "But?"
"But there's something here." Vee places a fist on her chest. "Something gnawing I can't explain, and I'm scared it will devour me."
We share a look, an understanding. Do we all have the same thing eating at us? I rub her legs. "Let me show you the book. Maybe that will explain something—to both of us."
The blue leather-bound book smells of the past, the pages musty to join the peculiar smell the combined ageing books give the room. Every book was in this room when we arrived, as if left there for research. I found this one a few months later; it took me a while to work through them. Many confused me with their rows and rows of scrawled text in an unfamiliar language. This one included images, and I was drawn to the contents as I began to recognise and decipher things.
I open at the beginning, a blank page of thick paper.
"This starts with Biblical stories, a history lesson, I guess." I flick past pages crammed with neatly printed text. "These are Biblical verses about us."
Vee scratches her head. "About the Biblical Horsemen."
I nod. "You should read this, if you don't know our namesakes' full story. Even these days, humans predict the seven seals will open into an apocalypse. We only know of six portals, so maybe one has already. But we're supposed to walk through and devastate the world, so this obviously isn't accurate as we didn’t."
"Okay. So what else?"
I flick through pages until I find illustrations. "These show where the portals are located. There's one on each continent."
"Wow. What if they were all attacked at once? There're four of you and you're in one place."
"Yeah, we asked ourselves that question." I point at the page, showing lines running between the portal symbols. "I think they're linked, as if they need to be opened in a specific order."
"And have any been breached while you've been in the world?"
"No. We've visited them to inspect what they are, but that's it. Our main concern is keeping what's already here under control to stop any attack on them from this side."
"And you think that's what's happening now?"
"I don't know. I suspect there’s a more coordinated plot that involves taking us out first."
I continue turning the pages, and Vee leans over as the Horsemen’s names appear on separate pages, with visual representations of our powers. She laughs. "Was this a training guide?"
I give a wry smile. "If it is, we didn't find the book until after our powers triggered."
"I bet that was a shock!"