Chapter Thirty-One
“SOOOO...” FRANK CLICKED HIS PEN BEFORE tapping it against his clipboard. “I have good news and bad news.”
The video of what happened when Rook and I kissed and fell into the dreamscape played for the fourth time. Turned out, they hadn’t cut the feed and...I was glad.
I’d been curious about what happened and now, I knew.
“What’s the good news?” Dillon slouched against the wall with Whisper sprawled by his feet. It seemed Whisper had officially accepted the damn man into our little pack, and I didn’t know how I felt about that.
Most of me was jealous. But...the other less selfish part was grateful.
I didn’t want Whisper to be lonely. And the reality was, my cat would soon be very lonely if we couldn’t figure out how to stop dying.
Stop it. Rook’s voice blared into my head. If you keep thinking about Whisper being left behind, I’m going to burst into tears and freak everyone out.
A tragic smile twitched my lips as I reached for her hand where she sat beside me on the black leather couch in Frank’s office.
We’d only woken an hour or so ago, and according to Frank, who sat on the edge of a matching black chair—jiggling his leg and pressing rewind on the remote like it was hiding secrets he desperately needed to know—we’d been unable to be roused for over thirty-seven hours.
The moment we’d returned from the dreamscape, he’d dragged us to his personal office where he’d ordered us to have a shower, change into a spare set of clothes, and had presented trays and trays of food—trying to find something to entice us—only for it to make us retch.
It was official.
The thought of putting anything in my mouth that wasn’t Rook made my stomach twist violently with disgust.
“The good news is...” Frank sniffed and stopped jiggling his leg. “The good news is there is clear evidence that whatever you’re doing in the dream world is affecting you in the real world. See?” He pressed play, watching as I dragged Rook to the bed, cupped her cheek and kissed her.
The second our lips connected, we collapsed into two unmovable corpses.
For a couple of minutes, nothing happened. We just looked dead. But then...frost slowly glimmered over Rook and fire smoked over me. Our skin began to glow from within, icy blue and cherry red, making the room brighter and brighter.
The entire space was engulfed in light as silver and gold erupted from our hearts, wrapping around each other like vines. The vines continued to weave around us until it trapped us in a chrysalis, pulsing with energy and light.
The camera feed hissed with static.
It continued recording, but...we only grew lighter and brighter. The camera broke with a loud pop. The screen went black.
Frank paused the recording yet again and leaned back in the chair. “If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn’t have believed it.”
Dillon cleared his throat. “So...you just slept for almost two full days? You didn’t actually do anything?”
Rook’s cheeks went pink as a highlight reel unspooled in my head, remembering how many times I’d fucked her. Missionary and doggy-style, cowgirl and sixty-nine. We’d stopped counting at eight...
Her eyes met mine, heated with that delicious silver ring.
If you keep looking at me like that, Rook, I’ll have you back on your knees again.
She shifted on the couch.
Whisper went to her, no doubt smelling her arousal just like I could.
Yet another ‘gift’ from my rapidly changing body. Her scent had always been strong to me, but now...now I could smell the fluctuations of her mood and heart just as easily as I felt her.
“You’re doing it again,” Dillon muttered. “Stop talking like that. It’s rude.”
Rook laughed quietly. “You were the one who asked a stupid question. We can tell you exactly what we got up to if you want.”
“God, spare me.” Heading to the desk in the corner, he flung himself onto the computer chair. “I’ll just pretend you had a good long nap.”
“You’re right.” I smirked. “It was a great nap.”
Dillon gave me the finger and Whisper chuffed as if fully enjoying himself.
Frank frowned, studying Rook as if his eyes had become microscopes.
Shuffling higher in his chair, he slipped into the interrogation I’d known was coming.
“So two days you’ve been here but not really here...
if you know what I mean. Two days where your bodies didn’t break.
Two days where you stabilised each other.
The fact that you haven’t died yet is incredible but...
you’re actually looking marginally better. Tell me. How are you both feeling?”
I answered for both of us. “The constant pain has faded and we’re no longer utterly exhausted but...” I flashed Rook a look, unsure if she wanted me to share or not.
She just nodded.
I continued, “That was the fourth time we’ve fallen into the dreamscape and each time its healing capabilities are less.”
“Less how?” Frank demanded.
Rook took over. “To give you context, when we first triggered the ascension, our powers were unbearably strong. We had no idea how to wield them, and it was actually Dil who taught me that they were probably emotionally based.”
“You’re welcome.” Dillon smirked as Whisper prowled around the room, sniffing stuff.
“Up until the night in the mountains, that power felt...friendly. It answered us, even if we didn’t fully understand how to call it. It gave us what we wanted and felt happy to do it, but now...” She sighed, struggling to put it into words.
“Now it feels like our enemy,” I said. “It completely abandoned us after the mountain almost as if we’d proven ourselves unworthy.
We couldn’t access it at all—and believe me, we tried.
It only returned when we tripped into the dreamscape...
almost as if we’d tapped into the very place where it originated.
It allowed us to use it again but at a much greater cost.”
“What cost?” Frank asked warily.
“Pain? Decay? Death?” I shrugged. “Take your pick. Each time we wake with power, it obeys us for a little while before recoiling with agonising backlash.”
I shivered as I sank into the furnace where the flames existed.
Utterly empty one second, it surged with red hot fury the next. It put me on constant edge because I couldn’t predict if the fire was trying to keep me alive or kill me.
“Same for me,” Rook said. “The ice feels like it’s waiting for something. It’s angry and impatient and refuses to answer any of my requests...almost as if I don’t matter anymore.”
Frank rubbed a hand over his exhausted face. “That’s a lot of information and I guess...I guess it makes sense.”
“What makes sense?” Rook asked, leaning forward in interest.
“Well...the Requiem gene was never about granting magical powers but about creating something better than human. I suppose whatever evolution is happening inside you has decided it can do better.”
“Do better?” I growled.
“But what about what you told me?” Dillon cut in, planting his boots on the ground and clasping his hands between his spread legs.
“You said the reason a particular frequency can override the Requiem change is because everything vibrates, right? That’s how the collars and Rook’s necklace worked.
So...wouldn’t it make sense to keep trying to find the frequency that fixes them? ”
Frank nodded slowly. “You’re right that frequency is the language of reality.
At the quantum level, nothing is truly solid.
Everything—atoms, cells, thoughts, even souls—are just energy vibrating at different rates.
That’s why we thought we’d cracked immortality because the Requiem gene isn’t supposed to just rewrite DNA but to change it to a frequency where death can’t affect it. ”
“And once again, this is well over my pay grade,” Dillon muttered.
“However...” Frank continued. “If the powers are becoming sentient and no longer just existing on a frequency plane, then...it’s resenting the symbiotic relationship with you.” His voice trailed off, worry pinching his eyes. “After all, the butterfly doesn’t care if the caterpillar has to die.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Dillon grouched. “I swear talking to you makes my head hurt.”
Frank rubbed his temples, looking ten years older than before.
“Think of your powers like parasites. They’ve lived inside you ever since you were born—feeding off you, growing stronger right alongside you.
For a long time, they’ve had a good deal.
They had a healthy, young host they could use.
But now...that power knows you’re dying. ”
He looked between us, eyes heavy with guilt.
“Parasites will feed until there is nothing left. It might be keeping you alive by allowing you to slip into the source, but ultimately, it’s breaking you down and trying to wring out every last drop of energy before your body fails completely. Which is actually...positive news.”
“Positive?” Rook blinked. “How the hell is that positive?”
“Because parasites can be killed.” Frank shot to his feet, eyes sharpening with hope.
“Worms, mites, tapeworms, malaria—we’ve eradicated countless parasitic infections throughout history.
We have treatments designed specifically to target and destroy them without necessarily destroying the host. If your powers have truly become parasitic, then we finally have a clear target. Something concrete we can fight.”
He gestured between us, warming to his idea.
“Once we kill it, hopefully the remainder of the Requiem gene will go dormant. Or better yet, it could cease to exist completely. None of the other test subjects lasted long enough to see a separation of person and power. It might be doing you a favour by turning on you because if we can isolate it and figure out a way to remove it...you could return to just being human.”
Fire detonated out of my hands with pure, primal fury.
“Shit.” Balling my fists, I wedged them into my armpits, trying to prevent the roaring inferno from incinerating the entire room. Flames just poured out of my arms instead.
“Get down!” I yelled as a crash of fire swallowed the TV, melting it into a puddle of glass and metal. The fire crawled along the walls, licking up the curtains and filling the room with smoke.
Whisper snarled as Rook shot to my side. “Lucien!”
Her wonderfully icy hands landed on my burning arm.
I tried to yank the power back, but it wouldn’t listen.
It raged hotter, angrier, as if it had heard every word and decided it would rather burn everyone to ash than let anyone try to kill it. My ribs cracked as the fire clawed its way out of me, refusing to be contained. I dropped to one knee, coughing up a thick mouthful of black blood.
“Lucien!” Draping herself over my back, a blast of ice cracked through me. For a second, it helped. The fire stuttered. The carnage stopped, but then...
Her power turned on her too.
Rook gasped as a blizzard detonated. The temperature plummeted. Frost smothered my smoke and every piece of furniture froze solid.
I grabbed her as we both collapsed. I curled around her as another rib snapped with a sickening crunch. Rook cried out, convulsing as more ice soared like glittering daggers.
Capturing her jaw, I crushed my mouth to hers in a fierce, messy kiss. The second our lips met, the world fractured.
We slipped, tumbling into the dreamscape—that misty, shimmery meadow—and the fire and ice instantly ceased.
I got it now.
What Frank said about this place being the source of our power made sense.
In this space, the powers stopped fighting us because for now...they were us.
Rook writhed beneath me as I kissed her deeper. She answered with equal hunger, her frost wrapping around my flames in a perfect, harmonious dance.
Everything went calm—the circuit completed, creating an undying ouroboros where there was no beginning or end, no life or death, just peace.
Pulling back, I caught her eyes—
We snapped back to reality with a violent jolt.
Cold water hammered us from the ceiling. The sprinkler system drenched the ruined room, thawing out the frozen furniture and dripping off the smoking curtains.
Staggering to my feet, I helped Rook up.
Frank and Dillon stood drenched by the destroyed TV and Whisper—
I choked on a laugh. “Whoops.”
Whisper bared his fangs.
Rook giggled beside me. “Oh no, we’re so sorry, kitty cat. We didn’t mean to...”
The once sleek and majestic panther looked like a drowned, miserable kitten. His fur stuck up in wet tufts, droplets flying as he shook himself with an indignant growl.
“Well.” Frank cleared his throat. “I’m guessing you didn’t mean to do that.”
“Nope.” Rook shuddered as I wrapped my arm around her and tugged her close.
“I suggest you watch what you say from now on.” I narrowed my eyes pointedly. “It seems as if the ‘parasite’ is listening.”
“Ah.” Frank nodded and tapped his nose with understanding. “Noted.” Marching to the door, he ripped off his sodden lab coat. “Let’s go. I’ve had enough of talking.”
“Go where?” I asked, guiding Rook toward the door.
“To test every inch of both of you.” Frank raked his hands through his grey, wet hair. “Somewhere inside you is a way to keep you alive, and I won’t fucking stop until I find it.”