Chapter 53 #3
That means . . . that means . . .
It crashed over me like a black ocean.
I was a witch.
There it was exposed to the world, the reason why my parents didn’t want me. The dark parts of my soul, the broken pieces, genetic mutations.
I was born broken—worse than that, evil—I’d just killed a man.
My parents knew it. My foster families knew it. Even Tom cheated, he must have sensed it. My subconscious knew it. It sent nightmares as punishment every damn night.
Vampires hate witches. Ethan would kick me out. I’d be alone, again.
I cursed under my breath. My legs wanted to drop out from under me.
I staggered backwards. I stared at the man’s lifeless body.
My head throbbed with such intensity I thought it might pop.
I turned my hands over, staring at the palms as if seeing them for the first time.
I was caught in an uncomprehending daze.
How was it possible that normal looking hands could hold such devastation?
A normal looking person could be so lethal. He was dead. I’d killed him.
Oh God.
The pressure in my head traversed to my whole face, my nose ached and thumped with every beat of my heart. My nose began to bleed. I wiped it with the back of my hand. The room lost its form and rotated. I reached out to empty air, Karson clutched my arm, steadying me.
“Breathe,” he said smoothly, holding me with one arm and running his other over my hair. “Breathe, Amelia.”
He wasn’t acting like he hated me, but he must. I jerked the breaths in through a pinhole, tears rolled down my face.
“You’re alright, everything is alright.”
Everything was far from fucking alright.
I opened my mouth to shout at him or tell him . . . tell him what? That I was sorry for being a witch? For being the thing he despised? Instead only a small pathetic whine came out.
Vampires hate witches.
I tried again, I opened my mouth to speak but wool choked my throat and nothing came out. I swallowed. Blood ran into my mouth. Dizziness held me hostage.
“He’s dead,” I said finally as I let out a shuddering sob. “I killed a man.”
“No,” Karson said, looking uncharacteristically pained. He gripped both arms and swung to face me. “I severed the artery in his neck, he had moments left.”
I couldn’t meet his eyes. I was afraid of what I might see. More tears streamed down my cheeks. I couldn’t stop them.
“Amelia, listen to me. You did not kill him. I did.”
“I threw him,” I breathed. I looked across at his body, pale and still, awash with blood. It coated his neck, his shoulder, his torso, the floor.
Karson’s fingers lifted my chin, forcing me to look at him. No anger, no hate, just an agonizing softness. “Yes, but he was already dead.”
BJ made a muffled sound of annoyance.
BJ! Jesus, BJ.
I forced my legs to move, to hold balance. I went to him, and with trembling fingers, I pulled the gag from his mouth.
“I’m so, so sorry,” I whispered, dropping to my knees.
I sniffed and wiped fruitlessly at my eyes.
He simply stared, wild-eyed and pain-ravaged.
Shock had left him speechless, his bottom lip trembled.
I wanted to hug him, I reached out and held his bound arms, they were damp with sweat and trembling.
“BJ, I’m sorry. Please talk to me, are you okay?” I begged.
He shook his head slowly, like clowns at a show. “I have two knives hanging out of my leg, Amy,” he breathed, and then he laughed, but it was mildly manic. He grimaced.
“I guess that’s a ‘no’ then,” I snorted laughter, and then I cried some more.
I looked at the knives still stuck in his thigh, they had to come out. I didn’t want to do it. In less than a heartbeat Ethan had pulled them free. It was done so fast I don’t think BJ even realized it was happening.
He grunted. Blood seeped out onto his jeans, two pools flooded together to form a large, red stain.
BJ’s eyes darted back and forth between Karson, Ethan, and the dead men. “What the . . . what the . . . what—What the hell are you two?”
“Well, I would say extraordinarily handsome, extremely intelligent, and completely charming, but I’m guessing that’s not the answer you’re looking for?” Ethan tried to make light of it.
BJ’s brow drew into sharp lines. “How did you move so fast?”
Neither man answered. He paused and took a few heaping breaths. “Oh, good God, I’m going to puke. Untie me,” he muttered.
My legs protesting the effort, I stood up and wiped my nose with my sleeve. Ethan undid the ropes which held his legs and then his arms. BJ rubbed his raw wrists, his eyes rolled suspiciously between the two men. Wincing in pain, he stood up. The blood continued to surge.
We needed to get him to hospital and get it stitched.
From behind came the sound of footsteps pounding down the hall. Fists clenched, I spun back. Dahlia stopped in the doorway looking frazzled. Anger burbled inside, if I had the energy I would’ve punched her in the face.
“I’m sorry. I tried to stop them,” she said breathless, and with what looked like a flash of guilt, her eyes fell to BJ’s bloodied leg. “I can help, take your jeans off.” She strode over to him.
He stood up, the injured one perched and shaking, on a toe on the floor. “Geez, Dahlia, there’s a time and place for everything.”
“You wish,” Dahlia said, “take your jeans off before you bleed to death.”
Looking decidedly pale, BJ hobbled backwards and, wincing with pain, he sat back down.
He unbuttoned his jeans, breathing deeply, and jiggled them down to mid-thigh level.
Dahlia grabbed them and pulled them to his ankles.
Blood oozed like a slow running tap from two small, deep cuts.
BJ turned his head away and took a few heaving breaths.
“This is not quite what I had in mind,” BJ muttered, “when I pictured you taking my jeans down, Dahlia.”
Dahlia huffed a laugh. Then she closed her eyes, waved her hand above his leg, and chanted softly, over and over.
“El Morsa Repair’es. El Morsa Repair’es.”
A pale golden glow radiated from her hands and seeped into his leg. The skin pulled in slowly, like a zip pulled back together. The bleeding slowed. The wound had half closed. BJ’s face relaxed, as if his pain was gone. Even with all I knew, it was still perplexing to me.
“How the . . .” I paused, befuddled, “did you . . . how did you just heal that?”
“Enough to stop the bleeding, for a while at least, and remove the pain. It’s one of my gifts,” she declared earnestly. She rose as BJ pulled his jeans back up.
“You knew they were coming.” Karson raised his voice. He hovered threateningly over her. “You should have warned us.”
Dahlia lifted her chin, not a trace of fear in her eyes. “They said they were going to do something, I just didn’t know what. I came as soon as I found out, and I did warn them.” She shot Ethan and I a bitter, accusatory look. “They wouldn’t listen.”
Suddenly I felt faint. The small room reeked of the metallic stench of blood and death, it felt like a tomb. I had to get out. I turned, my legs feeling like I’d gained a hundred pounds, and walked numbly down the hallway. They followed behind.
“Who are they?” I asked Dahlia, blinking into the bright light as I stepped outside. My head pounded like hammers. The BMW was gone.
“They’re part of the same coven I’m in. We come when we are needed to protect the waters. It’s coming, Amy, and you need to be ready. We didn’t have time to wait for you to accept what you are, we need to train you to fight.”
“Well they are fucking fabulous,” I said furious and confused.
“What waters, what’s coming, and why me?
You’re making no sense, Dahlia. None of this is making sense.
” As I ranted, the story of the boy Bob had told me hit my mind.
The waters in the mountains which gave the boy impossible strength. Could it be true?
I turned to Ethan, he had his arm wrapped around BJ’s back, helping him hobble down the lane.
“Is it true—the story. Are there waters that heal in the mountains?”
He looked at me for a long beat. What was it I could see? Guilt? Uncertainty? Definitely something disturbingly grim. “It’s all true.”
“There is someone, or lots of someone’s, about to try and get those waters,” Dahlia said, before Ethan could add more.
I didn’t know what it all meant but the looks on their faces were enough to tell me that someone getting the waters was not a good thing.
“Cole?”
“Maybe, but it’s more than him. A simple mortal couldn’t draw the wolf, there are more, and you can bet they’ll be powerful.”
“Wolf? The wolf that runs with me?”
“That’s how we know it’s you.”
A man laid over a tree trunk his back arched like a skilled ballerina. His eyes frozen.
BJ draw in a sharp breath and jerked his head to Karson. “What are you two? You’re not witches, so what the hell are you?”
“It’s okay BJ, I’ll explain later,” I reassured him. “How did Caron get past you?’”
“I didn’t see them, I smelled blood but I was focused on getting into the room. They must have cloaked themselves.”
Cloaked themselves. I was certain we were in a scene from a fantasy novel. I half expected a movie producer to jump out and yell cut at any moment.
We arrived at the end of the lane. Karson grabbed a box of baby wipes from his car, and handed one to BJ and one to me. BJ lowered himself to the edge of the back seat and with trembling hands began removing the blood.
“We start training tomorrow, Amy” Dahlia said, “and I will tell you what I know.”
I shook my head, wiping the blood from under my nose, exhausted but sufficiently concerned. “No, Dahlia, we should start today.”
She glanced skyward. “It’s going to rain, I have things to do, you’ve had a big day.
Your head must be pounding.” She studied my face.
It was. “When you first use your powers headaches and exhaustion are common until you get used to it. Get some sleep and we’ll start tomorrow morning.
” She turned her attention to BJ. “That’s going to need a few stitches, BJ, sorry, it was deep. I can only heal so much.”
“If you can heal like that, Dahlia, why aren’t you a doctor?” I asked.
“I can’t heal normal people, only those with witch’s blood.”
BJ gaped at her. “I’m not a witch, I don’t have any skills.”
Dahlia raised her eyebrows. “Well you have the blood, BJ. There must be skills in there somewhere.” She looked at Karson. “Make sure he gets stitched up.”
BJ reeled back. “No, it’ll be fine.”
The flesh had parted ways at least an inch deep, blood leaked sluggishly. “It’s not fine. Are you scared of needles?”
“No,” he answered a little too quickly.
“Cry baby,” Dahlia teased.
“I’ll head off now,” Ethan said to Karson.
I felt my stomach drop. “Where are you going?”
“I’ll pop in to see Darcy, then I’m going back to Portland . . . to take care of business.”
Take care of business, was that the code for feeding?
The thought hit harder than I expected. I prided myself on being okay with coping on my own, years in the foster system had taught me to.
But right now, I didn’t want to be alone, I wanted him to stay.
To tell me that it didn’t matter if I was a witch and he a vampire. We would still be friends.
The thought of him leaving was too much to take, not now, not when I needed him. I felt something crack inside.
“It will be okay,” he said, noticing the look on my face. “I will be back in a few days.”
I pulled his arm to a point away from the others, out of earshot; from two of them at least. I leaned to his ear and trying not to sound desperate, I whispered, “Ethan, if you need to feed, you can, on me, if you want?” I justified it in my head; it was no different than donating blood, which I’d done quite a few times before.
He stiffened and took a step back. “No, and don’t you ever offer that to any others, Amy,” he said, suddenly furious. “Do you hear me?”
I blinked. The vehemence of his response was startling. To see him so angry, I didn’t understand why.
“Okay,” I stammered. “I just thought . . . I want to help you.”
He took a deep, ragged breath, and in a flash, he was in my car pulling away, leaving me staring after him, confused.
My eyes locked with Karson’s. His cold look was enough to give my goose bumps, goose bumps.
BJ slid into the car, a little more washed out than normal. We took him to Dr Page and found out he was indeed scared of needles. His eyes had rolled back in his head, he almost fainted. Despite the seriousness of the day, I couldn’t help but laugh.