Chapter Ten
All is dark.
And then, POW! Smelling salts.
I gasp and jerk upright. My heart thrums like hummingbird wings.
There’s our girl!
“Are you all right?” Pax says, holding the vial of salts away from me. I blink, a lot. Tears stream down my face from the stench. Embarrassment burns my cheeks.
Pax leans over me and swipes a tear off my jawline with his thumb, so gently I almost think I’m imagining it. He’s blurry through my stinging eyes, but concern wrinkles his forehead. The ice that hardens my core thaws slightly. No, I think, and I lean away.
Nirav hunches nearby, his small face tight with worry.
There, on the edge of my vision, is the man in the wide-brimmed hat, along with his two partners.
He has stepped away, but he’s here, he’s here.
He is surrounded by flames and thick, black smoke.
He twiddles his too-long, clawlike fingers, beckoning me to his side, and I feel like I’m burning, choking, blistering.
Heat waves blur my vision, dry my voice to a thin whisper.
And then, the horrible, awful sensation of falling.
A total and complete loss of control. Plummeting toward earth.
I snap out of it with a start.
Do you understand, Stella?
Do you see your eternity if you choose murder?
We do not need you to avenge our deaths with another death. An eye for an eye leaves everyone blind.
That last voice was not Daisy, and I suspect it wasn’t Pax’s young sister, either.
But it was a coworker of theirs. One hundred forty-five others died alongside my sister, after all.
Did Daisy know her? Did they share a laugh and a cigarette on their breaks?
Did they drink stale coffee together? The falling, the flames, the smoke—is it the work of the Dark Legion, or are the factory workers showing me their horrific deaths? Deaths they wish upon no one.
I manage to push myself up on one elbow. “Our revenge…,” I eke out. “I won’t kill. I won’t…”
Murder.
You can’t even say the word, lass. It’s not for you.
And it’s not for us, either. We will not help you destroy your soul.
Pax looks pained, as if I am taking away a lifeline he just found. He’s bloodthirsty.
“The best revenge isn’t death,” I say, trying to walk back Pax’s wrath. My voice has fingernails, clawing its way up my throat. “The best revenge is pain. Long, excruciating pain. Lots of anguish over a long amount of time, not a flash of agony that results in a merciful death.”
As I say this, I have the sensation of wave after wave of seawater crashing over me. I see myself: sputtering and choking on the salty sea, arms flailing, legs burning with strain, but I do not drown.
Stop it, I command Spirit, and the sensation fades.
“I know about evil,” I say. I point in the direction where the man in the wide-brimmed hat hovered, but he is no longer there. Nirav shrinks away from the corner. He may not see, but he knows.
“I won’t be a trapped soul,” I tell Pax.
My voice grows stronger as I move away from the idea of murder.
My skin cools, and I feel merely feverish now.
“I won’t get snared in the in-between. There are so many souls imprisoned there, some light, some dark.
I am all too familiar with their plight.
And I don’t want that for either of you. ”
Pax ponders this. His jaw unclenches slightly.
He offers me his hand, and I hesitate. But when I place my palm against his, my skin against his skin, I hear it: snick!
We are drawn together by destiny. He audibly gasps and looks at my hand in his, then blinks at me, as if he’s awakening from a deep sleep.
He assists me off the floor and places me in an overstuffed tufted silk chair.
He kneels at my knee, looking me in the eyes, deeply. Those silver-green eyes of his are like tide pools, teeming with life and excitement, bristly things, things on the move. Mysterious things. Endangered things. Dangerous things.
I won’t, my eyes plead to his.
The crinkles on his forehead smooth, his shoulders lower. The relief I feel is immense.
“Okay,” he says, those eyes of his never leaving mine. “Okay. We won’t do… that.”
“Do you promise?” More promises between us. More hinting at a future where we are in each other’s lives to uphold those promises.
“Yes. I promise.” He stands abruptly. His hair is still wet from where I woke him just… minutes?… ago.
“But I will destroy him,” Pax says, pacing again. He says this without anger. Without malice. Without emotion of any kind. My skin now chills.
His desire for this is obvious. I can only hope his desire to keep promises is stronger.
“Revenge takes a lot of forms.” Pax picks up the painting again. “I will find a way to destroy him. I want him to feel the pain of one hundred forty-six burning souls. And I want you to help me, Stella.”
I wait.
Silence.
Silence here speaks volumes. Spirit never shuts up. But at this moment, no one chimes in to stop me. I replay Pax’s statements and realize there were no questions asked; this plan of Pax’s was stated with certainty.
Silence is complicity, is it not?
(A question.)
Nirav crosses the room, takes my hand.
“I can do that,” I say. “I can help you destroy him.”
And I will. And I’ll protect my soul in the process. I can do both.
This is my fate, is it not? These strangers whose lives are so quickly becoming intertwined with mine, like the Daisy and the Rose on my placard.
Revenge appears to be my destiny.