Chapter Forty-Four I will deny thee nothing
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
I will deny thee nothing
THE AIR WAS THIN HERE, like even nature was holding its breath.
Pain cut through my body, making me numb and faint.
When I opened my eyes, it was to the inside of a small shack.
One of the veiled members of Theta was tied up next to me, while Kasem was bound on my other side.
I tried to reach for him and suddenly, pain tore through my wrists.
I’d been bound too. Someone had secured my hands behind my back, roping them together, and tied my ankles to keep me from running. The silver rope cut into my skin, and when I fought it, friction flamed against my flesh, cutting, painful.
“Kasem,” I whispered. “Open your eyes. Please.”
But he didn’t move, didn’t seem to breathe. His body was deathly still, like a corpse. A cool light emanated from him, tendrils of gold and silver shimmering around his form like an icy flame. Like fractals of light. All around us, the flutter of moths silenced my beating heart.
I drew toward him. I couldn’t use my hands, so I nuzzled his neck, brushed my cheeks against his, let the warmth of my touch find him. His lashes, long as they were, brushed my lips, and when our noses touched, slowly his eyes opened.
My spirit, however broken it had been moments before, was soldering itself together. My heart ached for this man before me, beat along with the shallow rhythm of his breath as if without him, my own would falter.
Just a little longer, I told myself. If we could survive this, I would stay with him until Westfield and he were free from the curse, and my powers became mine again.
“We need to get out of here,” I said.
“I know,” he whispered. He nodded toward the ropes tying our hands and our feet. “Do you have anything that can help us out of this?”
On the other side of me, the veiled Theta shifted in her sleep. But she hadn’t been unconscious at all.
She had a knife between her hands, and she’d been slowly working her way through the rope.
This was our way out. This was our chance.
She stopped abruptly when the door to the shack burst open. The figure in the vulture mask emerged again. He tore the mask away, revealing his face.
The buzz cut, the seething brown eyes.
Pete. The first of Kasem’s two attempted murderers.
“I don’t want to kill you, Kasem. You know that,” Pete said. “It’s just the curse. He beckons me with it.”
Kasem leaned forward, shielding me from Pete.
“Pretend you’re unconscious,” he whispered, his lips brushing my ear.
I pressed my eyes shut and Kasem shifted away from me, his voice booming in the shed.
“I never asked any of you to save me in the woodshop.”
“Tell that to Nathan,” Pete said. “He died first. You know I saw his ghost in the basement of the university? He’s lurking there now.
Trapped on this campus. Just like everyone else who’s died at Westfield.
Yet you get to live as if others haven’t died because of you, as if we haven’t given our lives in place of the death the curse always meant to be yours. ”
When he spoke, his voice wasn’t just his own, but another’s joined in a choir of Pete’s rage.
“That’s the only thing you’re meant to inherit, Kasem.
The curse. Not Westfield. Your blood isn’t worthy of the estate.
He saw to that. To every death of your lineage.
And even if there’s collateral damage with the accidents on campus, with people like Danny, he doesn’t care.
He’s evil. Pure evil, Kasem. And he will never die. ”
“Who is ‘he’?” Kasem said, glaring at Pete.
Pete laughed. “You’ve met him already. You all have. He is in control, and he will have the Westfield estate.”
He grabbed Kasem, forcing him to stand, despite the rope tying Kasem’s feet, before maneuvering him toward the door of the shed.
“He says if I don’t do what he demands, his curse will consume me and trap me here with him,” Pete said. “It’s your fault I was marked. And if I’m not the one to kill you, Jay’s here too. He’ll finish the job. We have to. Or he’ll kill us both.”
There it was again, the person Pete wouldn’t name. If I could just get close to him, I could channel my powers and see what ominous force we were facing.
“You don’t have to kill me to survive this,” Kasem said. “Sianna survived the death the curse ordained for her. If you outlive it, then you’ll be free without giving into its demand.”
“She’s protected by the ?nhye. I’m not. No one can save me.”
“I’ll save you,” Kasem said. “This curse is because of my family. If I can find its origins and stop anyone else from suffering, then you can have your life back. Pete, you were expelled from Westfield. Disappeared. Just to hide and become a murderer. Is that what you want? Do you want it to corrupt you more than it has?”
Pete was silent for a moment. “That’s why we’re here. A drowning doesn’t have to be murder. It can be an accident.”
My heart hammered in my ears. He was going to kill Kasem. He was going to drown him and make it look like a hazing accident.
“Pete,” Kasem pleaded. But Pete was stone, and Kasem’s words couldn’t move him.
“The engine’s ready,” Pete said finally. “Let’s go for a boat ride.”
I could barely see from behind my lashes as I pretended to be unconscious, but faintly, I watched as their figures retreated outside.
Kasem looked back at me, regret filling his gaze, and something else that I couldn’t read.
And then they were gone, like two specters in the night. Gone, like smoke.
“Are you going to just lie there or are you going to help me?” the veiled Theta snapped once Kasem’s and Pete’s figures had retreated.
I recognized Honey’s voice instantly. And sure enough, when I turned to face her, her green eyes bore back at mine through the lace veil.
“How did you end up here?” I asked. “Aren’t Theta and Sigma working together?”
“We’re supposed to be,” Honey said. “But it’s like what happened at Theta House. Something or someone has interfered. Rush has never been like this. It’s like our members were being controlled, like they were puppets without their own will.”
“Do you think it’s a wraith?” I said, remembering what Angelica had told me.
“But so many of them?” Honey shook her head.
“There would need to be dozens of wraiths, each deciding to work together and possess our members to cause such chaos. Wraiths aren’t like that.
They’re single-minded, monstrous. Isolated.
We’ve kept campus protected, even when some of the ghosts turn.
The ?nhye, Sigma, and Theta wouldn’t allow the number of wraiths at Westfield to grow so much, to spiral. ”
“So it’s something else? Someone living?”
Honey shook her head. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “Our societies will have to convene and find an answer. But right now, we need to get out of here.”
She gestured to the door.
“We’re not far from campus,” Honey said. “The groundskeeper has an ATV behind the shed. We can get help.”
But that might be too late. If Pete was planning on drowning Kasem, we didn’t have long until the fan boat started. And soon they would be too far into the swampy waters for us to reach them.
Honey finished cutting through her bonds before turning her attention to me. When she was done, I wrung my wrist, the flesh raw and reddening.
“We won’t be able to help him,” Honey said.
“You go find help,” I said. “Hurry. I’m going to stay and see what I can do.”
She seemed reluctant at first, but then she nodded. We exited the shed and a few feet away at the dock, the roar of an engine sounded. Pete was starting the fan boat.
“Take this,” Honey said. She handed me the switchblade she’d used to free us from our binds.
It had a wooden handle and an archaic mechanism for unfolding, like someone had tried to create a prototype of a switchblade before they became pocket-size.
When I took it, the prolonged touch of my skin through the lace sparked a flash of a vision in my mind: a dark alleyway, a body hunched behind a dumpster.
I gasped, nearly dropping the switchblade but clutching on to it before I did.
“Where did you get this?” I whispered.
Honey looked confused.
“It’s Alaster’s,” she explained. “I stole it off him a while back. It’s one of their family heirlooms.”
On the base of the blade was an engraving, not so different from the one on Kasem’s family ring: JTW.
The engine roared again. I slipped the blade into the pocket of my ruined skirt. I’d have to deal with this revelation later. Right now, Kasem needed me.
“Vivian,” I screamed. “Vivian, we need your help.”
At the mention of her name, Vivian appeared out of thin air. Honey jumped back, startled for a moment at Vivian’s sudden appearance.
“Greetings to the ?nhye from Theta,” Honey said.
“Go get help,” I repeated. “Hurry.”
Honey nodded and sprinted off, making her way to a parked ATV near the shed.
Vivian and I ran in the opposite direction, toward the dock.
“Can you slow them down?” I asked.
Vivian nodded. “I’ll try.”
She disappeared and, in the distance, she reemerged at the foot of the engine as the fan boat took off. At her touch, the motor seemed to disintegrate. The engine groaned, spluttered, and waned.
They were just at the edge of the dock. I ran, faster than I ever had before, faster than my lungs could handle. Pete’s scream of anger was terrifying. Yet I raced onward.
I was nearly there, just at the edge of the dock, ready to jump onto the fan boat.
But before I could reach them, Pete descended on Kasem, kicking Kasem to his knees.
And then, after ensuring that Kasem’s wrists and his feet were bound, Pete threw Kasem into the swampy waters of the Westfield estate.