Dae
The walls pressed in on me, squeezing the air from my lungs. Alice stood rigid as a stone, her arms hanging limp at her sides, her face gone completely white as she stared at me with unseeing eyes.
I watched as she thought back over the last few weeks, saw the realization dawn in her expression as she came to the same conclusion I had.
That Marcus had been inside her all along.
"He watched us," Alice whispered. Her voice thin and raw. "When I... when we..." Her hands flew to her mouth. "Oh gods. Last night. He was—" One hand went to her stomach. "I think I'm going to be sick."
"Alice—"
"He felt everything." The words came faster now, higher. "When you touched me. When you drank from me. When I..." Her hands fell away and her eyes flew to mine, and they were wide with panic. "Was that him? Or was that me? When I…When I…"
She couldn't say the words—couldn't voice the question of whether her own desire had belonged to her at all—but I knew what she was asking. "Don't. Don't do that, yeobo," I said quietly, my voice rough. "That was you. That was us."
I reached for her, but she jerked away before I could touch her, and her rejection sent my emotions reeling. I understood why she'd pulled back. She thought Marcus was watching through her eyes, feeling through her skin. She thought she was sparing me from his violation by denying me her touch.
But understanding didn't dull the edge of her rejection. Didn't stop the sharp twist of hurt that stabbed beneath my ribs into the softest parts of me.
Judy stood frozen near the door, her usual composure shattered, one hand pressed to her sternum. She stared at her niece with terrified blue eyes. "How didn't I know? How did I miss this?"
Alice's shoulders shook. "I thought he was gone!" She turned back to face me, and tears streamed down her cheeks. "Oh, gods. I let him in. I invited him in—"
I started to reach for her again before remembering. "You didn't know."
"But how could I not know?" Her voice cracked as she stared at me, her expression beseeching. "Maybe you're wrong. I mean, I don't feel any different than I always have. Wouldn't I feel different?"
She stared at me, her head tilting to the side, silently begging me to tell her she was right, and I was wrong.
But I couldn't lie to her.
"No," she whispered, shaking her head. "No, Dae. No…"
She looked down at herself, holding her arms out like she could see the djinn crawling beneath her skin.
"He's been with me this entire time. He's heard everything.
Seen everything. Every conversation. Every thought about you.
Everything." Her hands curled into claws.
"Get him out. Get him out!" She repeated it over and over as she started clawing at her arms, her neck, anywhere she could reach.
"Alice!"
"Yeobo, stop!"
Judy and I rushed her at the same time. I got there first and wrapped my arms around her, trapping her arms at her sides as she screamed into my chest and begged me to help her.
Her anguish ripped through me like it was my own, dragging through my chest like broken glass, but there was nothing I could do.
"Shhh, yeobo. Shhhh…" I didn't tell her it would be okay as my wild eyes met her aunt's over her head. I just held her, one hand stroking her hair as she screamed and railed in my arms.
Eventually, she wore herself out, the tension draining from her muscles. Her fingers twisted in my shirt as she laid her face against my chest, her ear over my heart.
"You shouldn't touch me right now," she said, but there was no fire behind her words. "I can't—" Her breath hitched as she inhaled deep. "He's watching us. Right now. He can feel you trying to comfort me and it probably—" She made a sound between a sob and a laugh. "Gods. He probably enjoys it."
Judy finally found her voice. "We'll fix this. There are ways to—"
"To what?" Alice's head snapped toward her aunt as she pulled away from me.
I let her go, but stayed close. "Exorcise him?
Cast him out? Didn't you hear what Dae-Jung said?
He's not a passenger anymore, Aunt Judy.
He's..." She looked down at her hands and her voice was full of disgust as she continued.
"He's part of me now. Woven into whatever I am. "
The truth sat like lead in my stomach. "Then we'll un-weavе him," I said quietly. "Whatever it takes."
Alice lifted her gaze to mine. The tears were still there, but something else moved behind her eyes now underneath the grief and shame and panic…
It was fury.
It rose fast, transforming her expression in seconds, her emotions jumping around faster than a vampire's. Her spine straightened. Her jaw set. The trembling in her hands stilled.
"No," she said. The word came out flat and cold. "I'm going to do it myself."
Judy's eyebrows rose. "Alice—"
"I'm done." Alice's voice didn't rise, but the intensity behind those two words made both Judy and me take a step back.
"Done being used. Done being a vessel for some ancient djinn's obsession.
Done being afraid of what I might be or what might happen.
" She clenched her fists at her sides as her eyes shot back and forth between the two of us.
"He wants me? Fine. But he doesn't get to watch me cry anymore.
He doesn't get to feel me break. And he doesn't get to take anything else from me. "
The change in her was absolute. This wasn't the uncertain young woman who never spoke up in meetings. This wasn't the ethereal witch who'd trembled in my arms when Marcus first spoke through her.
This was someone fierce. Someone who'd been buried under fear and doubt and everyone else's expectations.
This was the witch I'd always known in my heart she could be.
Pride filled my heart until there was no more room in my chest. Pride. And worry. "You're not alone in this, yeobo. I'm a part of this, too. Whatever you need from me, I'm here."
Alice opened her mouth, probably to argue with me, but Judy's cell phone rang on the kitchen table where she'd left it.
She walked over to the table, glancing at the screen, then at us, before answering. "Yes?"
I heard Killian's Irish accent on the other end.
"Jesse Moss just arrived at my door with his sister Ryan and seven other vampires," he told her without preamble.
"They're alive?" Judy asked in disbelief.
"Yes. He says Marcus…interrupted their flight, holding them in the plane while he caused his chaos here."
"How did they get out?" she asked.
"He believes Marcus released them because something—or someone—else is holding his full attention and this allowed his hold on the plane to loosen." A pause. "Specifically, with your niece, Alice."
Judy's face went pale. Her eyes cut to Alice, then to me.
Alice stepped in front of me, drawing my attention. My eyes roved over her sweet face, then dropped down to her bare toes and back, unable to help myself. "What is he saying?" she asked.
I started to quietly repeat Killian's side of the conversation for her as he and Judy talked.
"Jesse thinks it's possible that Marcus believes Alice is the reincarnation of one of her ancestors," Killian continued.
"Another woman named Alice Moss who lived generations ago.
But this woman fell in love with his brother, and he ultimately killed them both.
Jesse believes that's why Marcus chose your Alice.
He's been hunting for her through the bloodline. "
"Reincarnation isn't possible," Judy whispered.
"Perhaps it is, and perhaps it isn't," Killian's voice gentled slightly. "But whether it is or not doesn't really matter."
After a pause, she asked him, "Does he know how to stop him?"
"He's asking about a spell book. His mother told him about it. Alice's ancestor used a spell listed inside of it to banish Marcus eighty years ago." Another pause. "Do you have it?"
"No. No. We know of no such book…" Judy's gaze locked on Alice. The question hung in the air between them.
Alice lifted her chin. "Yes, we do. I have it."
Judy stared at her hard. "I take that back," Judy said into the phone, her eyes never leaving her niece. "We do have the book."
"Then bring it tomorrow night and meet us at St. Louis Cemetery.
" He paused, then, "It just seems fitting that we kill this thing in a place where he's caused so much misery.
The dead can be our witnesses." Killian paused again, and I heard another male voice in the background.
"The warlock says not to let Alice open the book again before then.
And don't let her perform any magic. She's going to need all her power tomorrow. "
"Understood." Judy's voice came out thin. "We'll see you there."
She ended the call and lowered the phone slowly back to the table, staring at it like it might bite her.
"That's why he called me 'his Alice' in my head," Alice said softly. "Not because I'm me. Because he thinks I'm her."
A thought suddenly hit me, and I slapped my palm to my forehead. "This is what he meant…"
"What he meant," Judy repeated. "What who meant?"
"That night when Alice came to me at the club," I told her.
"When she collapsed. It told me they'd been waiting for me for fifty years.
I didn't know who 'they' were at the time, but now I know.
He was talking about himself and Alice. Only in his head, he thinks you," I ran my fingertips down Alice's soft cheek, "are Alice.
Your ancestor. He must've known this was going to happen between us somehow, and he was waiting for me so he could worm his way into the bond.
Maybe he thinks he'll never lose her that way, if that makes sense.
" I felt like I wasn't making any sense.
Still in somewhat of a daze, Judy raised her eyes to her niece. Her voice rose a little higher and a little louder with every word. "You have a spell book that belongs to a djinn?"
With one last look at me, Alice turned to her aunt, my hypothesis forgotten. "I do," she told her in a small voice.