Chapter 24
Chapter
Twenty-Four
Sitting back on a cot, already filled with emotion, I pulled the journal from the bag, my hands quaking. After Hanna and Caden, I had to retreat to a quiet room by myself. I hoped someday they would see and understand. But what if they didn’t? What would happen to them?
I couldn’t think of that possibility. One thing at a time.
Leaning against the wall, I pulled my legs up, placing the book on my thighs.
Nerves attacked my lungs as I slowly opened it, something slipping out and landing on my stomach.
The picture I saw in the book, the one of my mom pregnant with me.
A sob hitched my throat, my hand covering my mouth, tears pushing through and spilling over.
Until this moment, I had never really seen a close up shot of my mother.
In my actual hands. She was laughing, her hand rubbing her belly.
So happy, beautiful and young. In my head, she was always my mother, forgetting she was not much older than I was now.
She was a three-dimensional person with hopes and dreams, opinions and beliefs.
I traced over her face, taking in every detail I could. She had long, dark hair and pale skin like mine, but she was much softer and sweeter looking, with bright green eyes, round cheeks, and a heart-shaped face. I took more after my father’s Russian heritage.
My finger trailed down to her stomach. I was in there, and with me, her life would end.
Why did I have to come that night? If she weren’t giving birth to me, would she have lived?
Tears burned my eyes. I placed the image to the side, no longer able to look at her.
So much was there, so much grief and guilt.
Peeling open the first page, my heart thumped again at seeing my father’s familiar handwriting. The first dozen pages were nothing but simple updates about me or his job.
Brexley took her first step today. I wish Eabha was here to see how smart and strong she is.
Istvan has us building up our troops. Tensions are rising; another war is brewing with the fae.
About a third of the way in, things started to shift, and he was no longer using my name.
Something odd happened today. Age 4.
She fell over two stories onto a marble floor . . . very lucky. She should be dead. Age 5.
I’m noticing more and more as she grows. A sick feeling in my gut. Age 5 ⒈／⒉.
Fear. I feel it more each day. To even utter the word, even think what I am thinking, would be blasphemy. Age 6.
We are leaving today for the East. I can no longer ignore my gut. Andris agrees with me after what we’ve seen. How can this be possible? I must find out why. I tried to find Eabha’s family—it has only led to dead ends. Age 8
I knew very little about my mother’s side. Other than they were refugees from Ireland, her family coming over here when the old Seelie Queen Aneira was still in power.
It was also understood Mom was human . . .
But what if she wasn’t?
Istvan is sending us east again in search of a substance, a nectar. Following the ideals of a quack scientist, it is said this substance gives humans fae qualities. Strength, infinite life. His need for power has become a sickness, eating away the man I used to know.
I feel dread today as I leave her again.
I fear he will discover her. I fear he senses something.
I’m afraid when he does realize, he will take her from me or kill her if I don’t follow exactly what he wants.
I have no choice. She is my soul. My world.
We must be careful, spies are everywhere, but I use these trips to find more about her.
So far, her abilities connect with nothing human or fae. Age 10
My mouth pinched together. Neither human nor fae. Not fitting anywhere.
Gray.
I have found leads. But eyes are watching me. Always watching.
I flipped to the next page.
I understand now . . .
After that, every post became more paranoid, speaking in strange riddles. Then about a month before his death, he started writing in secret code.
All encrypted. The final page, dated the day he died, was filled with nonsense words and strings of letters, but a single row toward the end was different from all the rest. They looked like a dove, rose, forget-me-nots, violets, and a boat.
“Fuck!” I slammed the book closed, rolling off the bed, tucking the picture of my mom in my back pocket. “Dammit, Dad! What do you mean you understand now?”
I only knew of one person who knew my father’s mind, one who could possibly understand his puzzle. My feet ran down the hall, bursting into my uncle’s office, his head snapping up the moment I entered.
“Brex?”
“Can you read this?” I slapped down the book in front of him to one of the encrypted pages.
Andris put on his glasses, moving the journal closer to him, his brows scrunching while he scanned the page.
“It’s not any of the ones we used to communicate with each other.” His finger skimmed over the symbols, flipping through more pages.
Disappointment stampeded on my lungs, deflating them.
“Really? Nothing in there? Even the bottom there? Why is it different?” I motioned to the page again, desperation etching my voice. He was the one I thought would know. “Do you know what he meant?”
“No, I don’t.” Andris’s expression flattened, appearing as deflated as me. “I told you he got extremely paranoid by the end. Stopped talking to me, afraid if I knew too much, it would be dangerous.”
A strangled cry rolled around in my throat, my hand hitting the desk. It was always a step forward and a dozen back.
He held up his finger, grabbing his walkie-talkie off his belt. “Ling, can you come to my office?” He spoke into it, then glanced at me. “She does more magic hacking, but she still is well versed in breaking codes. She’s our best bet to possibly breaking his cipher.”
A pump of hope went back into my lungs. Ling—Ling-ks. A Kitsune fox, she had the magical power to deceive and trick magic spells that she used to hack computers and systems.
Barely thirty seconds later, Ling was next to me, making me jump at her sudden appearance.
“Can you look at this?” Andris turned the book to her. She stepped up to the desk, her dark eyes skimming over the pages. “I know it’s not your forte, but I’m hoping you could try to decipher it.”
Her body was still, only her eyes moving over the page, as if her brain was computing each letter and symbol, running through a database in her mind. The room was silent for a few moments before she spoke.
“No.” She stood.
“What?” I rushed to the desk, shoving the journal back toward her. “Look again, there has to be a way. You can hack the most magical spells in the world.” My voice rose, anxiety nipping at my nerves.
“Exactly,” she responded, unemotional. “Magic spells and computer encryptions. This,” she pointed at the book, “is none of those.”
“Ling . . .” Andris went up on his feet. “Please, this is very important.”
“I will need more time with it and put it into the database.”
“Yes.” I nodded. “Do it.”
“Do what you can, my love.” Andris picked up the journal, handing it to her.
She grabbed it with a nod, slipping out of the room as quiet and fast as she arrived.
Biting my lip, I fought the urge to run after her and tail her every move as if she had the most precious item in the world. To me, she did. I still hadn’t had time to really pore over his words and thoughts, skipping to the end to see if he had any answers.
“She will do everything she can, Brex.” My uncle’s voice drew me back to him. “We will figure it out. No matter how long it takes. Okay?”
I nodded. The sensation that time was running out pumped panic into me. I had no idea why I felt the clock ticking, but it was like a bomb in my gut.
He peered down at his watch. “It’s late; you should get some rest.” He scoured his head, sitting back down in his chair, eyes bloodshot.
“What about you?”
“I will when our enemy is defeated.”
“Do we even know who that is anymore?”
His mouth pursed, a huff coming from his nose.
“It’s getting harder to tell every day.”
I banged back into the vacant room with the single cot, my brain whirling with the strange symbols and phrases.
If the man who was like a brother to my father, who knew how he thought better than anyone, couldn’t even figure it out, how would I or anyone else? My dad could use any cipher in the world. Something he made up and was so obscure only he would ever know.
Though something tugged at my gut as if my father were reaching through the pages, circling my mind with every possible idea.
My legs and brain wouldn’t stop moving, anxious while time ticked into the first hours of October 31—Halloween to the western world, who dressed up and spent the day in fun celebration.
To HDF, it was the exact opposite. We barricaded the windows and added more guards to the gates, preparing for the moment Halloween night and Samhain convened.
The fae took over the city, howling through the streets like wild animals, taking the “tricks” part of the night to an extreme level.
Pulling out the picture of my mother, I stared at her joyous face.
I wanted to jump into the photo, drink up every moment.
Hear the sound of her voice, feel her touch, see her eyes really look at me.
Smile. I knew nothing about her, but I felt this connection to her in my gut, something more profound than this physical life.
Pacing the room, restless and tense, I couldn’t lose my foreboding feeling about the coming night. A heaviness I couldn’t shake.
Prickles danced down my vertebrae, slinking through my skin, brushing at a deep intimacy, notifying me of his arrival.
I twisted to the door. Warwick leaned against the doorjamb, watching me.
He had the deadly talent of slipping up on someone silently and undetected.
But not me. Our connection was too intense, the link throbbing like a violin string plucked between us.