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  “Maybe we should have gone to the doctor after you fainted yesterday. I’m worried you might have a concussion.”

  “Really, Mom, I’m okay.”

  I said it with more feeling this time, hoping she would be satisfied, but she didn’t take the bait, not that I truly expected her to. My mother is a notorious worrywart. Actually, the more I thought about it, I saw the possibilities that this could work to my advantage.

  “You know, Mom, I am feeling tired. I think I’ll go on up to bed.”

  “Sure, sweetie.”

  Bull’s-eye. She shot another look of concern in my direction. Her maternal instincts would go into overdrive soon. Thankfully, I was genuinely tired, so her checking on me once or twice during the night most likely wouldn’t bother me.

  She went back to paying close attention to the television, watching the news and shaking her head. “It’s sad, Teagan. Everywhere you look there’s destruction and misery. It’s so scary to think our number could be up at any given moment.”

  I thought of Claire and how destruction and misery had hit so close to home, and then I swallowed the lump that had formed in my throat. Who had any idea Claire’s number would be up when she and I joked about Madame Woo, or when I let her finish my bag of chips? Unexpected or not, she certainly didn’t deserve to have her sweet young life taken by a malicious dark beast with huge wings and an emblem carved into his hand.

  My poor mother. It was her job to protect me from the world. She had no clue as to what was about to transpire over the next day or two. If she only knew what was lying hidden beneath my bed…

  I stared at the television. Floods, fires, murder, hatred...the list went on and on. Lucifer’s Hell. As I climbed the steps to my room, I was eager to say good-bye to this day. I was exhausted but wasn’t sure if I could sleep, knowing a sharp weapon had been stowed under my bed, and even more frightening, what I was going to do with that weapon. But, as my head hit the pillow, I fell asleep almost instantly...dreaming of the funeral I would not be going to in the morning.

  I opened my eyes to darkness, lying still and staring at my ceiling. A faint rustling sound had woken me, I was sure of it. My mind drifted, going back to the funeral in my dream, and I saw myself standing above an open grave. I was the only one left in the cemetery, all the others had gone. I was left alone to think of the gloomy hole Claire would soon be lowered into after I left. I regretted not following her into the rave. I missed her terribly.

  A rippling noise filled the air and I felt the hair on my neck rise in a split second of white-hot fear.

  Hadrian. It was as if even my bones screamed his name.

  Behind me, a crow balanced on a branch, keeping a close watch on me. I reached into my pocket, letting my fingers clutch the coolness of the stones and wire. The rosary that had hung in Garreth’s car was now at the bottom of my coat pocket. It was my rosary and my last gift to my friend, an everlasting symbol that she would always be in my prayers. I turned around to drop the chain onto the casket but was nearly knocked over by the force of a startled scream lodged in my throat.

  “I knew you would come.” Claire smiled at me.

  Her breath smelled rank, of old decaying wood. I hastily grasped for composure. It was difficult to keep from screaming into the gray-blue face of my friend, a face that was just inches from my own.

  She hovered there, an eerie specter guarding her own grave. I looked down into the pit before me, which appeared endless and much, much deeper than the required six feet needed for a proper burial. My feet inched back from the edge ever so slightly as I blinked back hot tears. This wasn’t the way I wanted to remember her.

  Her voice changed suddenly. “Why, Teagan? Why did you leave me with him?” She hissed at me from her moldy mouth.

  I could only stare and wonder why she looked so decomposed so quickly after her death. In reality, she wasn’t even buried yet.

  “You walked off with Ryan and Brynn and the others.” I tried to explain, but I knew who she meant.

  A stench rose up from the hole, bringing with it a blast of icy air. The Claire floating before me writhed with agony, resembling a hideous combination of Brynn and all of the other breathless faces I had seen. His victims. His army.

  “Claire! Please!” I sobbed but it was too late.

  I lost my balance and went tumbling into the musty darkness. As I fell, a familiar hand reached out to me, the hand of my father from the picture on my dresser, trying to pull me up from the empty grave. As he reached for me, I saw a scar on the inside of his right palm, a swirly little scar that would have otherwise been unnoticed since it blended with the natural lines of his palm. Barely visible in the photo, it wasn’t significant enough for me to ever question...before now.

  I bolted up and knew. My memory flickered back to my computer, to the strange octagram. Still rattled by the disturbing dream, I tiptoed quietly out of my bedroom, down the hallway to the linen closet at the opposite end. The thought of Claire like that...but no, it wasn’t Claire, not the Claire I knew. It was only a dream. She was changed, just like me. I realized that I was no longer the quiet, mousy girl I used to be; that over the course of a few days I had been dramatically transformed. I stepped inside closing myself in as I had done as a child, and pulled the small, thin chain dangling above my head.

  I remembered hiding in here but I couldn’t remember why. Hiding from someone, something. I remembered the dreams from my childhood, the ones that caused my mother to come into my room to help me back to sleep, and now I clearly remembered Garreth, my angel, guarding me even then when my mother had long since left to go back to her own room. He was the one who stayed the entire night with me, protecting me from my dreams, keeping me safe from the monsters in the corners of my room.

  It had been Hadrian watching all along, sending me running to the closet to hide.

  I reached up and took down the dusty cardboard box of family photos and pulled the chain. Darkness hushed in around me. I opened the door, padding softly back to my room where I set the box on my bed and opened it. I rummaged carefully to the bottom where my fingers found the envelopes containing my long-forgotten baby pictures.

  There were only two pictures in existence of me with the man my mother told me was my father. One was safely framed in silver on my dresser. The other I looked upon now with new eyes, scouring each and every square inch of the faded picture that had been folded in half, as if saved long ago from being ripped in two. It was of the two of us, our poses nearly identical to the one I had framed, only this particular shot was different. He was different.

  It looked like him. He had the same handsome features, the same build, but his eyes reflected back strangely. I turned it at various angles but I was positive the color of his eyes appeared changed, they were darker...black...and there, one of his hands half hidden by my tiny knee. The angle of the camera had caught part of his open hand facing just the right way; a strange tattoo made up of intersecting lines that could easily be mistaken for the crease where the picture had been folded. This wasn’t the mark from the dream. It was hard to tell but I was pretty sure I could make it out. Points. Like half of a square.

  His mark.

  Hadrian.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  I sat back on my heels, cradling the photo in my hands. How could my father have the same mark as Hadrian? I brought the picture closer. My father’s hand looked red and a little swollen. I wasn’t sure, but if I stared long and hard enough I thought I could make out the scrolling detail just beneath the edges of the fresher line. Did he do that to himself? Did he carve an exact replica of Hadrian’s mark into his own hand? Was it to pay homage to his Guardian, or perhaps Hadrian did it—some sort of torture.

  Somewhere along the way, they both must have realized that I would someday learn what this was all about, even if it would be a very long time before I was capable of understanding it. And, although today brought me closer to the truth, it was still far away from making any sense.

&n
bsp; I quickly laid the pictures in the box and stashed them under my bed before climbing under the covers. I knew I had to get some sleep if I was to face tomorrow but I couldn’t stop my mind from racing. Then fear seized me like an icy hand. A sensation of heaviness pulled me down at my knees while my upper body went strangely limp. I willed my eyelids to close, to somehow protect me from what I would see in the shadows, but they wouldn’t obey me.

  The rustling sound had returned. It began in the corner, growing louder, as if a large bird had taken flight; but, this was too large, too loud; it brought with it the hideous dream of Claire and that awful glaring crow. My body wanted to scream, but a strangled squeak was all I could deliver. I desperately fished around for Garreth’s words about strength and purpose but, sadly, this was what I had been reduced to. Then it happened. It rose from the shadows like a cobra, the wings outstretched, the deep ashen veil cutting the dim of my room…

  “I’m awake, I’m awake, I’m awake,” I whispered to myself in the dark. I had become so used to the dreams that I was in shock that this was finally real.

  “Garreth,” I willed my thoughts to him, “please hear me.”

  The form first loomed and positioned itself above me, then shifted into shape as my room became hushed in a cold, ethereal silence.

  He was remarkable.

  I could be honest with myself. Garreth was still my most perfect dream in human form but, as Hadrian stepped out from the shadows, as if taking his place center stage, my inability to tear my eyes away from him hit me like a ton of bricks.

  Dressed in dark clothing that accentuated every line of his perfect form, he stood inhumanly still as his black eyes pierced their way into mine; eyes so dark that even from a distance I could tell the pupil and iris blended into one insanely dark orb. But they were deep and cold, and although I shivered under his determined stare, I couldn’t look away. The magnetic pull I felt toward his enigmatic darkness couldn’t be described with words, and I was so taken by him that I would have done anything he asked, had he spoken, but he only stared at me.

  He moved with a gentle fluidity that resembled music come to life. But I knew better. His dark strength was well hidden behind his austere and graceful facade. I had no doubt that he could snap me in two with one swift motion. To my surprise, I realized I had been holding my breath. As I sucked a large gulp of air into my lungs, I felt warmth wash through me, faint, as if a cloud had passed between me and the dark angel before me.

  “Leave her alone,” Garreth warned.

  I clung to his back as though it was shield the second he materialized in front of me. The thunderous noise that billowed out from Hadrian scared me until I recognized it as mocking laughter.

  “Ah, Garreth, the white knight come to save his love. All of heaven has its eyes on you, I’m sure. You are, after all, the one who’s risked everything for the human girl he loves. How touching.”

  The symbol in my hand stung with warning, and a surge of intense heat came over me as I realized Garreth was giving me more of his light. I felt Garreth’s spine tense and the dark beauty I had been enamored with just moments ago melted away to reveal the grotesque truth. With one sweep of his arm Hadrian struck Garreth, sending him hurtling across my room and into the wall.

  “No!” I screamed.

  I didn’t care if my mom came running in, wide-eyed and scared. I wanted her to! How could I have ever thought I could handle this on my own? Was I insane?

  Garreth staggered to his feet. I swallowed the bitter taste of bile rising into my mouth as I saw dark red appear at his hairline and trickle in a steady stream down the side of his pale face. Even weakened, he tried to make his way over to me. Strangely, I knew I was witnessing the remarkable; Garreth still shielding me, still protecting me under these horrible circumstances. He was a fascinating mixture of teenage boy and ancient Guardian, fighting to the end for what he was sworn to protect. But his strength was gone. He had given the last of it to me.

  An ebony shadow positioned itself above me, spreading its dark fingerlike wings across my ceiling and down the walls on either side of me.

  “It’s a trick…” I told myself.

  Surely, Hadrian was using the shadows to make himself look larger to scare me out of my wits. I thought I had outsmarted him until his cunning face was a breath away from my own. His lips curled back bitterly, and duress blasted through to my bones. I would have sworn I was staring into the face of darkness itself, into the indescribable grin of his twin, Lucifer.

  Hadrian’s wings flung back as if he was defiantly stowing them away. But, instead of following through, they rushed forward in one violent motion that sent a shock wave rolling across my room toward Garreth, sending my bed somersaulting into the air and splintering my bookcases. I turned to scream for Garreth but was too stunned and stood frozen.

  In the wake of it all, Garreth looked at me, his blue eyes calm and gentle, and in an instant the chaos around us paused, melting into the night. With his eyes, he spoke to me without words. I heard him clearly in my head and I learned what I had meant to him all these years, all these incarnations. It would have been indescribable with words.

  Although I watched, I still couldn’t believe what I was seeing: Garreth, so poised, so incredibly still, while all around us our world, or at least my tiny room within the world, came crashing down. And then, as if someone pressed a button, the whirlwind started up again. The part of my room where Garreth stood suddenly became dark. I could only watch as Hadrian’s wrath blasted full force into Garreth and a large chunk of my soul was ripped to shreds.

  I dropped to my knees, sweating and trembling. The emptiness inside me was excruciating. It was amazing how much of Garreth had been a part of me, so much I had taken for granted. Thinking it was how I felt. What I believed.

  My room looked like a war zone and I stared silently at Hadrian, who was suddenly beautiful again. I looked at him, seeking an answer, hoping it would somehow become visible to me, hidden within his jet eyes, his pale skin, but I couldn’t remember how to speak.

  As if surmising my sudden handicap, he turned his attention to me, and for the first time Hadrian addressed me. “He belongs to me now.”

  “Belongs?” I was suddenly filled with rage. The heat in my hand burned intensely, sending a throbbing fire up my arm and into my chest.

  Ignoring me, he turned to leave but I refused to let him. I found the strength to rise to my feet and lunge for his legs.

  “What happened to my father? Tell me!” Choking on my words, I was desperately trying not to lose it. I still had a job ahead of me. A seemingly impossible job.

  He glared down at me, offering nothing. I thought the glimmer that shot across his face like a meteor was one of intense compassion but he regained his composure quickly.

  “I wonder, are you predictable like the others?”

  “What do you mean ‘others’?”

  “Let me ask you, Teagan. What do you choose? I can offer you what your father failed to take. I can give you power.”

  He stepped a bit closer to me, hesitantly reaching his hand out to me. I felt so weak. He was so fascinating, so powerful... I knew taking his hand would be wrong, yet something in his eyes pulled at me.

  “I know you better than you know yourself, Teagan. I’ve known you your whole life, your entire existence. You have so much potential. Heaven would be nothing more than a dream compared to world you and I could create.”

  Hadrian’s cold hand brushed my cheek, triggering a memory deep within me. I had felt another hand on that cheek but it seemed like so long ago.

  “I can help you, you know.”

  “Help...me?”

  “You don’t know all that you possess?” He took my hand and opened my palm, seductively tracing his finger along the scrolling I had been trying to hide. “Together we can unharness a power beyond description. You should consider yourself exceptional.”

  I was beginning to feel sick to my stomach, but Hadrian continued, pleased wi
th my reaction.

  “I have been ready for a new challenge. I’ve grown so tired of your kind, so selfish and demanding. It’s beyond me why Guardians have so much compassion for such a disgusting race.” His voice was saturated with a nauseating hunger and he tapped a heavy boot against Garreth’s thigh. “But I have to admit, you’ve pleased me. I never expected to witness a human transform during an existing life-phase.”

  I looked at the amount of blood pooling around Garreth’s limp body on my floor. It was too much blood.

  “There can be others, you know. With your power you can have your pick, although you may just find me to your liking.” He caressed my flushed cheek with his cold fingers. Then he turned his back to me.

  “You’re no angel, you’re a monster!”

  He spun back around to face me, a look of reproach on his face, as if he was actually considering what I said to be true.

  “I think of myself as an angel of mercy. After all, aren’t humans always searching for meaning to their meager little lives? Wouldn’t you agree that I’m giving them a purpose? Placing them on a new path?”

  The playful tone in his voice was gone. It was clear to me he was no longer willing to nicely talk me into assisting him in his plan of havoc. Instead, he would put me there by force if he had to. As he stretched his blackened wings, I fell to my knees, waiting to take my place where I really belonged, by Garreth’s side.

  The memory of Hadrian’s fury slamming Garreth against the far wall of my bedroom was all I could see as I slumped to the floor. It played over and over again, vivid and hovering inside my brain like a serpent striking over and over. I pressed my palms against my temples but the pressure of my sweaty hands couldn’t stop the pain. It had been so hard to stop looking at Garreth; but, more so, it was almost impossible not to look into the eyes of the one responsible. I was so blinded by the force of Hadrian’s eloquence that it briefly shadowed the black heart he hid so well.

  Hadrian crouched down in front of me. “You find me intriguing, don’t you?”