Lucille
Chapter
Forty-Six
“Busy?” she asked.
What a pitiful word to describe not only the last day, but my entire state of mind. Had it really only been one day?
“Did you get the answer to my question as I’d asked?” Her lips curled beneath the shadow of her hood. Something about it made me suspicious.
“Why do I get a feeling you already know that answer?”
She shrugged. “You’re smarter than you look, I suppose.”
I pressed my tongue to the roof of my mouth, wondering how I could reveal who she was. “I don’t trust you.”
“Clearly. And I wish I could give you time to mourn and process everything that’s happened,” she stated, sounding unsympathetic and impatient. “But we’re almost out.”
A derisive laugh shot from my mouth. “How would you know anything that’s happened?”
She sighed; it carried that same bone-weary exhaustion from my dream-walk. “I know Ronen finally told you the truth. You’ve lost another… parent. Is that what we’re calling him?” Her mouth tightened. “And you want to save Hell and your mom by asking me how to use Praetervado.”
I froze. To know all that, she’d have to be some kind of seer. She had hinted at the term before.
“Who are you? Melanie?”
“No.” She raised her hands to her hood, slowly pulling it down.
I stumbled back, nearly falling on my ass.
“I’m you.”
She had my face. My eyes. Her hair was braided back the same way we did before training. It was like staring into a mirror—except scars peppered her cheek and another slashed along her neck.
“I’m not a powerful seer,” she said. “I’m future you.”
Holy Heavenly Shit.
She scrubbed a hand down her face. “You saw me in that dream-walk to Miriam. She used our blood to create the guardian bond. I pushed you to her because you needed to see all of that. And I needed to know if I could finally tell you the truth without fucking up the future.”
Thrones could dream-walk to the past, so why couldn’t they dream-walk to themselves?
I remembered asking Cato what type of angel had the power to rip me from a dream-walk and speak in my head. He responded with: the type that could destroy a kingdom. He had used words from the creed. Words that only applied to another dream-walker, and according to him, we were the last two alive.
“Cato knew.”
“Cato knows a lot, as you’ve come to realize. Not that he’d ever admit to it. He’s stringent on anything that could affect time.”
Cato, Ronen, my father, mother, Miriam, myself from the damned future parading around like a know-it-all villain—they all kept secrets from me. Secrets that involved me.
How did I end up in this twisted game? Why was I the fucking puppet attached to their strings, moving in ways they wanted and I never agreed to? What was the point of all this pain and suffering?
The questions acted like a gaseous poison, fumigating my system. And the expectation and cunning knowledge sitting in the tilt of her neck and twitch of her brows sparked a match. Anger surged. I lunged, tackling her to the ground.
I slammed my fist into her face. “You could’ve prevented all this! Put me on a different path! Saved her!”
She bridged, captured my arm and leg, then flipped me over. Blood spat from her mouth, hitting the ground beside my head.
“Oh?” she snarled. “Done blaming Ronen? Back to blaming ourselves?”
I tried the same maneuver, but she didn’t budge. I heaved upward, arching toward her face with bared teeth. “No. He killed her as much as we did.”
Her hand drove into my cheek, whipping my head sideways with a brutal sting. She leaned close, hot breath against my ear. “His safety was at stake,” she hissed.
“He could’ve found another way. She didn’t have to die. Why are you defending him?” I snapped.
She planted her palms on either side of my head.
“Because we’ve lost everything! Everything!” Spit flew from the vehemence behind her voice, her expression raw—shattered.
It stopped me cold.
“What do you mean?”
“What do I mean?” She shoved off me and stood. “I mean, I made all your mistakes and paid the consequences. I’ve spent hundreds of years trying to understand how time works. Killing myself trying to fix everything.”
I sat up. “So we never save her?”
Future Lucy laughed, sounding exhausted. “Heavenly Hell, you don’t listen. Did you not hear a word Cato told you?”
“Did you?” I countered. “You’re here when you shouldn’t be.”
“I’m here because of you!” she bellowed, getting in my face.
“You do try to save her and all of Hell with Praetrevado, and guess what, Lucy? Death takes his retribution.” The last sentence drained all the energy from her.
“Retribution how?”
Her gaze glazed over as she traced the scar on her neck. She dropped her hand, inhaled, and met my eyes.
“In a few days, they’ll come. You need to get everyone in the right headspace, including Ronen.”
“I—”
“Lucille.” Her voice cracked like a whip. “If you want someone to blame, then blame Lucifer.” She stepped closer. “But if you blame Lucifer, then you’d have to blame us—for forcing him to do it.”
“What?”
“I told you. I’ve been fixing your mistakes. Lucifer and I made a runed deal. He didn’t know who I was—but I promised he’d be with his cordistella again if he met my demands.” Her eyes hardened. “One of them was threatening Ronen into silence. It was the only way.”
I looked at the turning, twisting flames of our power. The only light in whatever this was… a dream-walk? Maybe. My head hurt too much to care with all the twists and turns in my life.
We threatened Ronen’s safety. I did.
But couldn’t he have said something? Done something…
He did, I realized. Or tried to. He had banned me from using my powers with Alexei. And I’d used them anyway.
Future Lucy shook her head, sadness glossing her eyes. “You keep blaming everyone except the one person who’s responsible. She made her choice. And because of it, you’re losing precious time with someone who’d remake the world for you.”
I dropped my head, a lump tightening my throat.
“You have most of the pieces to beat Melanie,” she continued. “You just need to put them together. And on the night of the battle—if everything works the way I’ve been planning—you’ll come to me for the final pieces.”
Once she blipped out of my head, I opened my eyes. Oliver pressed against my side, snoring softly with his mouth wide open and hot morning breath drifting into my nose.
I thought about waking him, then remembered Anya’s words about Melanie’s power and closed my eyes again just to be safe.
What’s Oliver dreaming about?
Somnivado took me to… my bed?
I was expecting something more extravagant or wild—not Oliver dreaming about himself sleeping.
“He’s going to love this.”
Sam walked through the bedroom door wearing an apron that matched the red-and-black floral wallpaper—and only an apron—carrying a plate of lemon bars and a steaming cup of coffee.
That made more sense.
Before dream-Sam decided to remove that apron and join us in bed, I jammed my finger, ever so nicely, into Oliver’s side. His snores cut off, and he jerked awake. Thankfully, Sam blipped out of existence.
“That was highly uncalled for,” Oliver grumbled, resettling into the red and black throw pillows.
“I’ll do it again if you don’t wake up,” I warned. Or… at least wake up in this dream.
“I am awake,” he mumbled, snuggling deeper.
I flipped onto my side, facing him, thinking about everything. “Oli…”
“What?” he groaned.
“Open your eyes.”
He sighed and cracked one.
It’d do.
“Why is it easier to blame ourselves or the people around us than the person who actually deserves it?”
He opened the other, and a familiar sadness shone in the green depths.
“Maybe because it gives us a sense of control—something to hold onto—instead of feeling the helplessness of knowing there’s nothing we can do to change the past.”
My lip wobbled. “But what if I can?”
He frowned, and I filled him in on everything I’d learned.
Oliver’s expression bounced between astonishment, concern, hope, and looking one breath away from a joke before he finally pulled me into his arms.
“The world sure does love to toy with us. What did we ever do to it?” Oliver teased.
“Be born.” I snorted. “I’m sure I unbalanced the celestial world somehow. Now it’s mad and taking revenge.”
Oliver wrinkled his nose. “Then what did I ever do to it?”
“Become my best friend.”
He thought about it, nodded, then sat up. “Right, well, I best be breaking up with you then.”
I jammed my finger into his side again. He yelped.
“Oh, this means war.” He snagged two throw pillows and battered me with them until I smiled, then imagined them away.
His mouth dropped open as he stared at his empty hands.
I laughed.
“Am I in a dream-walk?”
I nodded. “You can imagine anything here.”
At that, Sam blipped back into existence with his plate of lemon bars, though this time fully clothed.
“Not now, Oli.” I grabbed his hand and pulled him back beside me, getting rid of Sam.
“Time for more serious talk?” Oliver moaned.
I shrugged, entirely pleased with my compartmentalization skills. “We could just live in here forever. Let everyone else fend for themselves.”
He considered it. “What about Sam? The real one. Can you mind-hive him in?”
“You expect me to share a bed with you two?”
He smiled sheepishly. “And the couch when we get a little rowdy.”
I hummed and hawed, then agreed. “Only if Ronen gets to join.”
Oliver’s eyebrows flew toward his hairline. “Does that mean you forgive him?”
I sighed, dropping from the cloud of our fantasy back into our gruesome reality. “There’s nothing to forgive him for. Only my mom. And myself.”
“Very mature of you,” he said, impressed.
“Figured if we’re all going to die in a few days, I might as well speed up the reflection process.”
“Valid. Seeing as I know we’re going to kick ass and take names, I’m not going to take the higher road and instead continue blaming both myself and my sister for her turning into an evil bitch. Or witch. If we want to be accurate.”
“I’m not sure what the correct response is to that. Should I cry with you or laugh?”
He shrugged. “Both are acceptable. Sam hugged me.”
So I hugged him. Long and hard.
We didn’t laugh. We didn’t cry. We sat on my bed in his dream, sharing our misery beneath the too-cheery morning light and taking what the brutal world handed us on its fuck-you platter.