Death, and the Girl He Loves

He looked down at the girl, at me, and I saw things I didn’t see back then. His claws were razor sharp and as long as my legs. He perched one under my chin and lifted my face to his. I didn’t remember that. I never remembered that one act of … humanity?

But all the feelings I remembered, the fear, the adrenaline coursing through my veins, were there. I could feel them all over again. Just like I felt what others felt when I had visions, I felt my own emotions rise up and choke me. I was both feeling them anew and reliving what had already happened, what was branded into my mind like an insignia. So the emotions that coursed through me now were twofold.

I stood with my fists at the ready, my face puckered in a combination of fear, anger, and determination. Malak-Tuke slid another of his claws along my cheek and over my jawline. Then, just like I did remember, he dematerialized. He became smoke and mist and entered my mouth, burrowed into my lungs, curled around my spine.

I both remembered and felt anew the acidic texture of him as I breathed him in. His essence scorched my throat and seized my lungs until I stopped fighting for air and accepted him.

And we became one.

“No!”

We turned and watched as a man ran toward us. Dyson. I didn’t know it at the time, but this was Dyson.

“No!” he yelled. “I summoned you, not her!”

He fell to his knees in front of us. Grabbed my shoulders. Shook me. His impudence would not go unpunished. He was screaming in our face and we didn’t like it.

He was screaming in our face.

I moved closer to the scene, watched like a voyeur as the man who opened the gates of hell shook me. That was so wrong. I was only six.

I suddenly realized I was outside myself again, looking on. I moved even closer, knelt down beside myself to get a better look at the man as the little-girl me scanned the ground around her and I remembered, we’d picked up a stick and stabbed him. It was his own fault. He was screaming in our face.

She spotted a stick, the stick I remembered picking up, the same crooked piece of wood, the same jagged edges, only she stopped. And looked at me.

This didn’t happen before. I never stopped and looked at anything. I picked up that stick—we picked up that stick—and stabbed him without regard for anything other than convincing him to go away. But she stopped and I peered into my own gray eyes. Red curls hung over them, partly obscuring her vision, but she stared into my eyes with a knowing far beyond her six years.

She raised a hand to my cheek, and a darkness drifted out of her. Malak-Tuke’s essence wafted around her like a dark fog. I could see it, something I’d never seen before. It was both fascinating and horrific. But I could also see what I assumed was her aura. My aura. And it was just like Jared had described. Fire licked over my skin and danced around me, bathed me in a soft glow.

I wondered if this was what fascinated Malak-Tuke. The fire that had been passed down from Arabeth, through generations of prophetic women. It was the fire Arabeth had been burned in. She used it, absorbed it, transformed it into a positive thing before she died. And she sent it to her three daughters, one of whom was my direct ancestor.

The little-girl me raised a hand to my cheek. “You can do this,” she said.

“What?” The man beside us was still screaming. Still shaking us.

Then his face morphed from anger into shock. He looked down at the stick protruding from his abdomen, and recognition shot through me. I knew him.

“You can do this, Lorelei!”

I swallowed huge gulps of air as I was catapulted once again out of the picture and back to reality.

“You can do this.”

It was my grandmother’s voice. She was frightened, her voice quivering as she kept hold of my forearm.

Then I realized other hands were on me as well. I was being held down by several people. Jared was holding my head. Cameron my feet. And Mac and Granddad were draped across my body. At that moment I realized I was thrashing about. Catching only brief glimpses of those around me. Brooklyn’s hands were over her mouth, her eyes wide with horror.

Wonderful. What’d I do now?

Grandma was helping Granddad. Or trying to.

“What?” I asked, only it came out more like a gurgle. That was embarrassing.

My muscles strained against my skin as though trying to break free of it. They ached instantly, and I tried to force myself to relax.

“She’s coming out of it.”

I’m already out of it. I’ve been out of it. But my body wouldn’t obey. It wanted to thrash about a little more for good measure.

I tried again to make myself relax, to slow my racing heart. Then I remembered what I had to tell them and my heart sped up again.

“I know him!” I said, and it kind of sounded right.

“Lorelei,” Grandma said. “We called an ambulance.”

A what? “No, I’m okay, I saw him. I recognized him.”

“Don’t try to talk, baby,” Mac said at my side. “The ambulance will be here soon.”

I took Jared’s hand in mine. “I’m okay. I don’t need an ambulance. I have to tell you what I saw.”

“Can you drink?” Grandma asked. She held out a cup of water from the dispenser.

Jared helped me into a sitting position, but I collapsed back against him. He sat on the cot and braced me against his chest, holding my head in his strong hands.

“I saw him,” I said again.

Grandma held the cup to my mouth. Why were they not listening to me?

“I saw the man. I saw Dyson.” With those words, I realized I was slurring a bit. I tried again to force myself back, taking a sip of water as the world tipped a little to the left. “I’m okay,” I said, my breaths ragged. “I feel like I just ran a marathon, though.”