Chapter Twenty-Four The Eclipse
Chapter Twenty-Four
The Eclipse
The warm energy quickly stalled as I entered the next room.
It was colder, hostile.
Other shadows were lurking, but they wouldn’t dare approach.
This was not only due to my presence but the telltale ring of a cipher nearby.
They all had a different tune, annoyingly only heard by those from my world.
I supposed we were extra sensitive to a multitude of things: energy, colors, language, and other enigmas.
The man was weary and gray. Too young for his mind to flay the way it had, but old enough to have aged since I’d last seen him.
I could only hope her father had been conservative in his journaling. What would happen, would happen. He couldn’t stop it, as much as he’d tried.
He slouched in the chair, facing inwardly to the parlor. Staring blankly at the empty coffee table. The room was stale; not even the dust moved about in the air.
“Dorian,” Salvatore muttered, his voice scratched and aged, “no sugar.”
I couldn’t help a chuckle that tickled the back of my throat. I approached his side, then set down the tray and poured the coffee anyway.
“Biscotto,” he added.
I tucked the treat beside the cup on the saucer, delivering it to the rickety hands.
He sniffled, clearing his throat before he took a steady sip. Salvatore’s eyes closed, his face easing as he tasted that little piece of home.
Nostalgia was one of the best tasting, my favorite flavor.
It was like a hidden note, a richer savor to any feeding.
With my hand placed on his shoulder, the feeling was strong enough to pierce my core.
It was like watching a flower bloom rapidly, a colorful and fragrant display, even overwhelming to most.
His homesickness didn’t even allow me any room to crave the sweets.
I removed my hand as I sat across from him.
He was a lucky one, all thanks to our bargain.
Not many who had suffered like him had the luxury of aging, of fading away peacefully.
Because that was what was happening. He was fading in and out of this current world involuntarily, spending half his time in between, eventually to pass fully over to the Otherside, as his daughter had so fondly named it.
He was a fool for thinking he could meddle with the other world and still keep his sanity.
His eyes were tired, wrinkled from strain and a lifetime of expression. Of joy, of pain, of all human ranges. His eyes were clouded in color, which made a haze much like the one over the river on early mornings.
Then, they landed on me.
Immediately, they hardened.
“You,” he said, his voice grave.
“Hello, old friend.” I smiled at him. “How long has it been?”
His muscles tightened, wound taut enough to straighten his posture. The lines in his face became vivid, settling into the stress that tainted the meat, strained the heart, spoiled the brain.
I leaned against the back of the sofa, breathing deep when the scent of trepidation teased my nose.
“Are you here to collect?” The weary man’s voice nearly broke at the weight of the words.
“Not yet.” I felt the pull from where he sat. The trapping sigil carved in the bottom of the seat from when he’d last tried to summon me sang like a kettle in my ear. The people called it tinnitus.
It was a truly creative idea, if I were dim enough to fall for such a rudimentary attempt.
“You’re creative, I won’t downplay your ingenuity. I suppose that’s where she gets it from.” I pointed to him. “But just because the human body is mostly water, doesn’t mean your skin will hold me in if I fall for that cheap trick.”
“Don’t hurt her”—the words of a defeated man—“please.”
“The thing about you people is, you think moving from one world to the next is a bad thing,” I scoffed. “Change isn’t bad, nor is it difficult. It will all be painless.”
The man’s lip trembled, his shaky hands barely able to set the cup down in front of him.
I glanced back toward the kitchen; the Iris had yet to make an appearance.
When my eyes returned to Salvatore, he looked like he was bracing himself, his wits held together by silk threads.
“She turned out beautifully,” I told him. “Do you like my contribution? It looks rather nice,” I said, signing a cross over my chest.
His face grew red, sweat beading at his temples. He was sweltering as hot as the flash of anger that lit his blood afire.
“Leave!” he shouted with full lungs. “Go!” He tossed the cup at me, the shatter disturbing the stillness of the room.
“What’s going on?”
His wife turned the corner. As she came to his side, I looked back.
Lucia stood in the doorway. She studied the scene, her brows creasing in concern. Her face was so expressive, even when quiet. The muscle in her jaw twitched, her chest rapidly drew and released shallow breaths, rising and falling in rhythm.
Her eyes turned my way, and her pupils constricted at the sight of me.
What vile honesty. She didn’t even have to say a word. But the message was potent.
“I have to talk to Lucia!” he cried. “Where is she?”
She didn’t move. As still as an idol, solid and immovable, as hard as her facade.
He looked directly at his daughter with glassy, forgetful eyes. “Where is she?” he asked, his voice strained, then he looked around him. “My journal, my journal!”
When I moved, he locked eyes on me again, this time in a panicked sort of fog. “Dorian, you have to give it to her. Please, my good man, promise me you will.”
Calling me by his name made even my own human muscles clench, sensing the eyes on me. As if by guilt, I looked at Lucia.
Unlike her father, instead of cursing me, screaming to the stars, letting her rage out like an arrow to hit me straight in the chest . . .
She left.
The only noises from her were the retreating footsteps that disappeared up the stairs.
Salvatore wailed behind me; he was inconsolable and incoherent. I believed he’d worked himself into forgetting what he’d been upset about in the first place.
His wife, Nina, looked at me, her stare much like her daughter’s—direct, concise. She brushed her fingers through his hair, tucking his head close to her shoulder. Her eyes pointed to the top of the stairs before returning to me: a command, not a question.
Her message was clear: Handle it.
I squinted at her.
Then she threw a stare that could have cut the pavement.
I retreated from the room immediately, not risking any more silent communication with the iron-willed woman.
The disruptive eruption from the floor below dissipated as I ventured up the gloomy staircase. The only light came from a door left ajar on the second floor.
My steps creaked and whined the entire path up the stairs. Lingering outside the room allowed me to see into a time capsule, a delicate image. The energy was much stronger than her father’s nostalgia before.
Though now, despite being a guest, I felt like an intruder.
The room was yellow, crisp wallpaper dotted in small white flowers providing the most jovial of colors.
The furniture was dark wood, the bookshelves covered with small books for small people, whittled toys, and homemade animals made from industrial produce bags.
Pushing the door open farther revealed Lucia in the small bed, her knees tucked to her chest and her skirts slipping over the side.
She wasn’t sleeping; she knew I was there.
My presence only agitated her more, based on the sickening feeling that emanated from her.
The light scattered as the tree leaves waved by her window, a calming hush that filled the stale air. By her head was a child’s blanket, her face buried in it. It was tattered and old, the embroidery the only thing keeping its shape. Even in the suffocating position, her shoulders rose and fell.
The moment my foot passed the threshold, the intrusion weighed on me.
This scene was so unfamiliar, yet the weight of its story pressed down, a crushing memory.
Children felt things so deeply, so thoroughly, that the things touched by their memories were more precious than a diamond pressed by the implosion of a star.
I picked up one of the picture frames, a boy and a girl, one marked by stars, the other a spitting image of my chosen skin. Except in doing so, a horse toppled over on the shelf.
Before I could turn, Lucia had already snatched it from my hand.
“Don’t.” Her word had a bite to it, faltering almost. “Don’t touch things you shouldn’t.”
“Why?”
“Because they do not belong to you.”
“I thought you would say because they’re important or delicate,” I answered. Then, I went for something bold, unprecedented.
I reached for her hand, my fingers brushing against hers, but I didn’t grab it.
Her eyes fluttered to mine, but she held her ground.
She was so unwilling to be moved, physically or emotionally.
It was like her walls were made of lead.
Was teasing her a good idea? Absolutely not.
But there was something that made me want to know it all.
To see every emotion, to figure out what made her tick and snap.
It was like opening a clock to observe the gears ticking.
To open a body and inspect the organs pumping.
Even fully knowing I was hanging over her, close enough to feel her breath, to see her chest moving with each inhale, I started to ease into this outsider’s skin.
She expected me to know a lot of things, things that were so painfully unimportant to the vastness of reality—yet I found myself caring, learning, and eager.
It was a change that I didn’t like in myself, but perhaps I was inspiring a change in her that she also despised.
Her lips trembled, the two-toned bronze clashing with the pink of the markings. Her eyes held longing but also distaste for the thing in front of her. Her entire being was conflict, friction coarse enough to start a flame.
But she wanted it.
She wanted to use me for selfish ambitions.
She wanted me. I knew it, but could she admit it?
I leaned close, watching even the slightest of movements, waiting for her to break down.
Kiss me.
A sharp sting against the side of my face and a sound like the crack of a whip. Only to be followed by heavy shoes and her disappearance from my view.
I touched the tender skin. The numbness didn’t even so much as tickle.
And I was left alone with the rest of the things she’d abandoned.