Chapter 47
47
Sonny
A va and Beatrix made me feel even worse about going into the woods when we got back to campus. They tried every tactic they could think of to change my mind—from bears and ghosts to freezing to expulsion from the school—but something about this feels too significant to give up that easily.
The tree line is directly behind Devlin, which makes it easier to sneak in without being caught by another student, yet more probable that I could be seen by a faculty member. I came up with a plan to go early in the morning, before the sun fully rises and most are still asleep. From there, the only direction Matilda offered was to head East until I found the first stop.
Whatever that means.
Tall trees with wide trunks greet me as I approach, their sparse autumn canopies still managing to stubbornly block the sunlight. As soon as I step into the tree line, it’s like everything goes silent. Any noise from the campus or the city beyond dissipates at once, and I can’t even hear so much as a bird singing or a squirrel scattering around. The floor is a dangerous mess of vines, dead leaves, and fallen logs.
As far as I can tell from the undisturbed foliage, no one has been out here in a while.
I’m not sure what was in the tonic she gave me that has my stomach turning and sweat dripping down my temples.
“Take this and go into the woods,” is all she said for the third time before we left her shop. But nothing has happened in the twenty minutes since I guzzled the tart drink down and tucked the vial into my pocket.
What kind of guidance is that? I need more clear instructions than?—
I stop in my tracks as something flickers in the sides of my vision.
Fuck . I’m going to pass out.
Stumbling over the mess of rocks and twigs covering the forest floor, I stretch my arm out to lean against the nearest tree. The instant my skin comes in contact with its rough bark, a vision plays in my mind for the first time since I’ve stepped foot in Nocturne Valley.
It starts off blurry, as they always do, but quickly clears up to reveal two boys dressed in black trousers and cream, round collared shirts sitting across from one another on two fallen logs. One boy has sandy locks that hang past his eyes and appears to be on the cusp of puberty with sparse facial hair growing in patches. The other keeps his near-black hair shaved close to his head with a short beard wrapping around his pouty lips.
They’re talking animatedly, but I can’t hear their words until the vision is crystal clear.
“—then you should consider heading west,” the older boy suggests with a serious expression. He’s got a stronger version of the accent I heard in Nocturne Valley, with words crisp and rounded.
The younger one shakes his head, and I can tell from being inside his head for so long that this one is Finley just from the stubborn way he speaks. “Absolutely not.”
“Finn,” the older one, who I assume is Lewis, draws out the name in irritation, confirming that my assumption was right. “You’ve got to get someplace safe before snow falls.”
They look so much younger than I imagined when I was reading the journals.
Too young to go through what they did.
“There’s nowhere for me to go out west,” Finley spits.
“I’ll go with you. We’ll get you settled in Infinity Heights. My mum knows a woman who takes in lost kids. We’ll find some work for you to earn your keep.”
Finley scowls at that. “I’ve already earned my keep here, Lewis.” He points in my direction, and I jump at the possibility that they can see me. But he continues talking, proudly straightening his shoulders as he says, “My father built this town with his own two hands, and they betrayed him. They need to pay for that.”
I take a tentative step toward them, not entirely convinced that they can’t see me. When neither reacts to the leaves crunching beneath my feet, I move closer and examine both of their features.
Small freckles splatter across Lewis’s nose, giving him a boyish charm.
And Finley . . . I’m shocked to find his eyes are the same brilliant violet color as mine. My mother always said it was a rare gene. One that was passed through our generations.
Could this be evidence that she was somehow related to Finley Landry?
That I’m related to the Landrys?
If so, that would make this whole thing entirely more complicated.
Lewis drops his head, clearly exasperated. “You keep going on about it, but we can’t do anything about what has been done in the past. We need to get you somewhere safe before the same fate befalls you.”
Finley narrows his eyes. “Why have you taken such an interest in what I do, anyway?”
“I told you, I cared for your sister.” Lewis’s back straightens, his shoulders tense as he grabs up a fallen twig and mindlessly pokes at a pile of leaves.
“Please,” Finley scoffs, his nose scrunching in irritation. “A little schoolboy crush isn’t worth risking the wrath of the Syndicate.”
Shrugging, Lewis keeps his gaze fixed on the ground. “Sure, it is.”
Finley considers him for a moment, his eyes bouncing around his friend’s features. After a few beats of silence, he crosses his arms and kicks his feet out before him. “Tell me the truth, Lewis, or I’ll stay in Nocturne Valley until they drag me out in a casket.”
Lewis lifts his gaze and blinks at him for a moment, probably realizing that the young boy is stubborn enough to do it, too. When enough time has passed that I’m sure he’ll refuse to elaborate, he blows out an irritated puff of air.
“She was carrying my child,” he admits in a low, sad voice, as if he can hardly believe it himself.
Finley’s eyes go wide and my vision blurs again, yanking me out of the memory.
I never see his reaction.
Blinking rapidly, the empty woods come back into view and I’m alone again. I try to take a step forward, but the tonic has my legs feeling unsteady, so I reach out for the next tree for support.
Three more trees aid me in my hike before my vision blurs again and another memory floods into my mind.
Lewis and Finley are fighting.
No, they’re sparring.
The fogginess clears to reveal the boys in leather jackets with fur hats on their heads. Each breath they take comes out in a plume of white, indicating that the temperature has dropped. I can’t feel the cold, though. My limbs are already numb.
Finley has grown an inch or two taller, leaving him with the typical long, spindly limbs you see in pubescent boys. His face has hollowed out from an obvious lack of nutrition, given what I know from his journals. Clearly, he won the argument about leaving, but it has cost him.
Lewis looks stronger and more handsome. On the tail end of the transition from young boy to a man, his arms have filled out and his jawline appears more squared. I feel so sad for him, now that I know all that he’s lost.
His grief had to have been unimaginable.
“You need to tighten up your left side, or your opponent will recognize the weakness immediately and exploit it,” Lewis lectures.
Finley rolls his eyes, as if he’s sick of hearing it, but squares off his stance and nods for Lewis to come at him again. This time, he blocks a blow to his left side, smiling when Lewis praises him.
It’s such a simple, boyish thing that they’re doing, but I know what it’s for. To fight off the Syndicate when they inevitable send their muscle against him.
Near the end of the final journal, Finley spoke about them closing in on him. They had already begun renovations for the school—although Ravenshurst will have you believe they waited two years to start those—and he was going in each day to destroy their work. The mayor was pissed. Lewis overheard him planning to put a team together to hunt him once and for all. The only thing stopping him was the fact that most people had no idea Finley was still alive, so finding a group of people he could trust was proving to be challenging.
I still remember the maniacal way he scribbled his thoughts in one of them, and the sinking feeling I got when I saw his words splattered across the page. It read:
There
will
be
a
reckoning.
Whether it is my soul who delivers the punishment, or some future legacy. I will ensure that my family is aware of the betrayal that was cast against their blood.
Nocturne Valley will pay the price of their sins. They should prepare for the worst.
I’m thrown out of the memory and back into the present, where I’ve fallen onto the forest floor on my hands and knees. My stomach lurches, but nothing comes out. The sun has set further, causing the trees to cast shadows over the forest floor. I have no idea how long I’ve been out here, stumbling around with no sense of direction. I’m definitely not anywhere near the entrance of the woods. There’s a creek a few feet away from me, and my mouth goes dry at the sight of it.
Climbing to my feet is impossible. Even with the help of the trees, my legs are too fatigued to make it more than a few steps, my abs sore from dry heaving. Instead, I crawl my way there, ignoring the rocks and sticks as they bite into my knees and palm. Stray, sweat-soaked hair falls in my eyes, blocking my vision. I don’t have the energy to move it.
I need water. I need sustenance. I need something in my stomach besides that wretched tonic Matilda gave me.
I’m going to kick the old woman’s ass next time I see her.
Finally, after what seems like ages, I reach the edge of a small river. Rocks dig into my knees when I carefully lean forward to cup my hands against the current of the flowing water. I hiss at the freezing temperature, eyes widening at the blood that swirls in the water from my ripped up palms.
I’m too thirsty to clean them off.
Carefully dragging my hands toward my face, I take a gulp of the cold, metallic water and my eyes roll back as another memory invades my mind.
This one appears clear as day.
Two different boys are running toward me with fear written across their immature features. They can’t be older than ten, though the basic jeans and T-shirts they’re wearing are more modern than what Finley and Lewis had on.
The forest is showing me someone else.
Squinting my eyes, I try to focus on their round faces. They stop just beside me on the river’s edge, sawing out breaths as they repeatedly look back in the direction they came from with widened, terrified eyes.
“We can go through,” the older one suggests.
“The current is too strong right now,” the younger boy says, shaking his head. “We’ll lose our footing. We have to keep moving through the woods. They’re coming up on us quickly.”
Looking down, I see that the calm, shallow water I had just drank from is now twice the width and at least six feet deep with rushing, angry current.
A blood-curling, feminine screech echoes off the trees before two women break through the thick brush.
I recognize them immediately from family photos I’ve seen decorating the walls of Aunt Divina and Uncle Graysen’s home.
It’s my mother and Divina. They can’t be much older than me.
They stop a few feet away from the boys, cornering them against the dangerous creek.
“You shouldn’t be out here,” Divina warns, taking slow steps toward them.
“We were on our way home,” the young one explains in a shaky voice. He holds a ready stance, prepared to take off at a second’s notice.
I recognize those round, unyielding eyes from somewhere, but I can’t place them.
Divina scrunches her nose in that signature scowl I’ve come to know so well. It’s so surreal, seeing this younger version of her. Poppy resembles her more than I’m sure she’d like to admit.
“Is that why you were on the ground, listening to us?”
“Dee, leave it. They’re just little boys,” my mother’s voice lulls from a few steps away. My head snaps in her direction, heart dropping into the pit of my stomach.
It’s exactly as I remember it. Soft and soothing—calming, even with the panic laced through it. I’ve missed her so much. No matter how much time passes, the agony from losing her is ever present. It’s been lying dormant for years, fooling me into thinking it may have faded or disappeared with each passing day that separates us. But one word from her mouth had it all rushing back, my chest swelling with that familiar ache that pummeled me the moment I heard what happened in that dark middle school hallway.
I needed her. For so long, I needed her and she wasn’t there.
“They heard us. They could run and tell someone and we’ll both be thoroughly fucked,” Divina snaps.
The young boy gulps. My heart breaks at the terror in his face as he holds his hands up in innocence. Whatever transpired before this, I doubt these boys pose any real threat to my mom and Divina. They look like they’re about to piss their pants.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about. W-we just want to go home,” he stutters, taking a tentative step backward.
My mom speaks directly to Divina, ignoring the boy like she doesn’t want to spook him any more than they already have. Her lack of attention seems to comfort him. “What’s your plan? We can’t hold them hostage. I don’t care if they say anything.”
Divina responds by rushing toward the boys. She moves so quickly. One minute, she’s standing before me, and the next, she’s only a few feet away from the boys, her angry eyes glaring into their uncomfortable faces. With the creek directly behind them, they’ve got nowhere else to go.
“We have no idea what you’re talking about,” the young one says, and as I walk around his front to get a better look at him, I realize where I recognize him from.
The older boy finally speaks to them. “Just let us go,” he bravely bites out, eyes darting all around. “W-we don’t want anything to do with you.”
“I find that hard to believe when you were just spying on us a few minutes ago like two little pervs,” Divina spits.
“Dee, drop it. Seriously.” My mom slowly moves toward Divina and grabs her shoulder, but she fights against and races toward the boys—and me—again with a wild look in her eyes.
“Fine, you can go. If you can swim,” she bites out, her expression a picture of pure evil.
It happens so fast. Divina shoves against the older boy’s shoulders, catapulting his small frame into the rushing waters. My mom and Divina share a few hostile words while the younger boy screams so loud, birds abandon their places on the branches above us. My ears begin to ring as he breaks into a sprint and follows the other boy’s lifeless body down the stream.
My mom curses, mumbling something about the boy not being able to swim, then takes off after them.
The vision ends before I have a chance to see if they got to him. To know if he survived.
But with the knowledge I have, my guess is that he didn’t. And I think, for the first time in my life, I finally understand what happened to my mother to make her the way she was.
She experienced the raw, devastating effects of that boy’s death. All thanks to Divina and her psychotic control issues. What were they talking about that they didn’t want the boys to hear? God, I wish I knew.
But Divina . . . she’s pure evil.
When I come to, I’ve got tears streaming down my face. Tears of sorrow, for those young boys and the trauma they experienced at my family’s hand. Tears of grief, for those extra few moments I got to hear my mother’s voice again. And tears of relief, because I can rest assured that the demons who haunted my mom were far bigger than me.
They began with Divina.
All of it started with Divina.
Lifting my gaze, I realize I’ve somehow climbed back to my feet and hiked downstream. Five feet away from me sits the edge of the forest that breaks out onto a beach with smooth, sandy shores and deep blue ocean water beyond it. The waves beckon me closer—hypnotizing me. Using every tree on my way for stabilization, I stumble forward until there’s nothing but open air.
Then, my knees buckle again. This time, in soft and cool sand that seems to neutralize the fire coursing through my veins.
How long is this going to last? Will I be stuck out here, stranded on this beach, until my body sobers up? I have no idea how many more visions I can handle.
Will anyone bother to look for me?
Laying back, I stare up at the sky and wait. Huge, fluffy clouds pass by overhead and before I know it, I’m falling into another vision, my mind shifting back in time.
“I can’t believe we’ve only got one year left,” Aunt Divina’s young voice muses from somewhere to my right.
Turning my head, I find the younger versions of her and my mom sitting beside one another on a blanket. They’re each looking out at the water with their arms wrapped around their legs and calm smiles on their faces.
“One year, and then the rest of our lives,” Mom replies, closing her eyes.
“We’ll graduate with honors. Get kick-ass jobs and start our careers,” Divina muses, staring off somewhere ahead with a peaceful expression. It’s got to be the happiest I’ve seen her.
“Piss our parents off and marry the Ellery twins,” my mom adds with a smitten smirk.
Divina rolls her eyes, knocking her shoulder into my mom’s. “Of course. Carter and Graysen aren’t going anywhere. My dad will surely have a heart attack when he hears the news.”
Mom laughs, and my chest tightens at the musical sound. It’s breathy and loose and just like I remember. “Graysen is too terrified of him to not ask permission.”
Divina nods. “True. Dad will probably offer him a job. Your dad would rather put Carter in the ground than let his precious jewel marry a boy from the other side of the railroad tracks.”
Mom’s top lip juts out in that stubborn way it always did when she and dad would argue.
It’s so odd how I remember the smallest details. Things that seemed menial back then, but hold so much meaning now. “He’ll just have to deal with it.”
“Absolutely.”
This version of Aunt Divina feels like some sort of doppelg?nger to the one we have now. She’s almost . . . likable. How could she have changed so much since then? And watching them together like this, with such a deep love for one another, feels like I’ve stepped into an alternate reality. They’re like me and Poppy. It’s hard to compare this to the version of their relationship that I grew up with.
“Then, we’ll have a whole horde of kids and raise them together on one big property. They’ll grow up as best friends and continue the tradition,” Mom goes on.
Divina nods her agreement, though her smile falters the tiniest bit. It doesn’t look like Mom notices. She holds her hand up with her pinky sticking out. “It’s you and me, forever.”
Mom mirrors the motion with her hand, wrapping her pinky around Divina’s before they each lean forward and kiss their fists, solidifying the promise.
It’s the same thing me and Poppy did when we were younger, but I swear I’ve never seen them do it before.
I’m once again pulled out of the memory, so exhausted that I can hardly open my eyes anymore. The sun is nothing more than a sliver behind the dense foliage of the forest and mountains beyond it, offering little to no light. I have the fleeting thought that I’ll be stuck trying to navigate my way through the dark, or be stranded here for the night. Though, at this rate, I have no idea when I’ll be well enough to stand on my own two legs.
For now, I’ll rest.