Awaken (22 page)

I opened my eyes.

The ambulance was still. Broken glass tinkled
down from the front window behind me, and a hissing noise came from
the engine. In a jumble on the floor near my legs, Baylie stirred
groggily, her brow furrowing as she struggled to wake.

I leaned away from the wall and then froze,
pain lancing through me as all my muscles protested in chorus. As
if to compensate, tingles of electricity surged across my body,
setting off the burn of transformation all over again. I choked as
air clogged my lungs like soup – thick and impossible to breathe –
and my fingers dug into the floor, fighting the change.

“You…”

I flinched and looked to the front.

Marty lay in the driver’s seat, the tatters
of an airbag in front of him and a splintered branch from the tree
rammed through his chest.

Nausea raced up my throat at the sight.

Slowly, his head turned to the side and his
eyes pinned me. “We…” he whispered. “We’re everywhere. You’ll
never… escape us all.”

His lips curled into a smile, and then a
breath left him.

He went still.

I stared. Trembling shook me and I gasped,
trying to breathe around the impossibly dense air.

“Chloe?” Baylie murmured, her eyes squeezed
shut against the light. “What…”

I looked down at her. My skin was burning and
everything hurt. Pressed against the floor, my hands trembled while
my legs shimmered iridescently.

“Chloe! Baylie!”

My head snapped up at the sound of Noah’s
voice. The back door tore open, nearly leaving its hinges, and
light flooded the inside of the ambulance.

“Holy…” he started. “Maddox, get in
here!”

Noah clambered up the step and hurried toward
us as Maddox rounded the corner of the ambulance.

“Here,” Noah said, shoving Colin’s body
toward him.

Maddox grabbed the man’s legs and yanked him
backwards. With a disgusted look to the body as it tumbled to the
ground, he climbed in after his brother.

“Can you get her out?” Noah asked him,
nodding to Baylie.

Without a word, Maddox scooped her up and
then turned in the tight confines to carry Baylie toward the
door.

I shuddered, the air growing thicker. I dug
my fingers into the icy metal as black spots swam across my
sight.

Noah crouched in front of me. “Chloe? What
happened? What’d they do to you?”

“In… injected… something. Can’t…”

He caught me as I slumped to the side.
Muscling me back upright, he pressed his hands to my face. “Focus,
Chloe. Come on. Fight it.”

I closed my eyes, struggling to do as he
said. To breathe. To fight. To stay human.

And not die.

“Baylie’s waking up,” Maddox called from
beyond the door.

“They’ve done something to Chloe,” Noah
shouted back. “Injected her with something.”

I heard Maddox swear.

“Come on…” Noah urged me.

I choked and then gasped as the air thinned.
The burning faded from my skin again, though quivers still shook
me.

“That’s right,” he said, relief clear in his
voice. “Breathe.”

I opened my eyes. His gaze met mine.

He smiled. “Hey.”

“Hey,” I whispered.

“Can you move?”

I winced, pushing away from the wall with
muscles that felt like they’d give out at any moment.

“What’d they give you?” he asked.

“I don’t… Just keeps trying to make me–”

I gripped his arm as shivers ran through
me.

“We need to get you to the water,” Noah
said.

I shook my head hard. “No, no I–”

“Chloe, we have to.”

I looked over at him, and I could see the
worry in his eyes. My legs quivered, threatening to collapse on me
again.

Swallowing hard, I nodded.

With his arm supporting me, Noah helped me
toward the ambulance door.

“Maddox,” Noah called as we reached the step.
“We need to get her out of here.”

By the vehicle’s side, Maddox looked up.
Baylie sat on the ground next to him, blinking blearily with a hand
to her head. “Take the car. Dad’s on his way and I’ve called Diane.
She’s coming to get us.”

Noah nodded and then turned, holding me as I
climbed down. The ground swayed as I reached it, and my grip on his
arm tightened.

Step by wobbly step, we made it across the
country road to the car.

Shifting around, he lowered me into the seat
and then shut the door and ran for the driver’s side. My head
leaned over, resting on the window as I focused on keeping myself
breathing.

The door slammed. The engine started. In a
cloud of dust, Noah sent the car roaring away from the
ambulance.

“Just hang in there,” he urged. “Just hang
on.”

Shivering, I looked over at him. His hands
clutched the wheel and beyond the windows, the trees swept past at
high speed.

“Mom and Dad,” I whispered. “The other
ambulance. Were they…”

“They’re fine. The other EMTs were as
confused as us when those bastards took off.”

I let out a breath in relief.

“And then you…” I pressed a shaking hand to
my leg as it tried to change again. “You both came after us.”

He glanced to me. “Yeah.”

I paused. “What are you?”

He hesitated, returning his gaze to the road.
“Save your energy, Chloe.”

“Noah…”

He didn’t answer.

“Please.”

He grimaced. “Greliaran.”

My brow furrowed.

“It’s from some dead language,” he continued
reluctantly. “Means guardian or protector or something. We’re kind
of like you: we look human but aren’t. Not quite, anyway. And we… I
mean, we just…”

“Stop bullets,” I said hoarsely as he trailed
off.

He glanced to me again. “Yeah. Sort of.” He
paused. “I guess that’s a plus.”

His hands adjusted on the wheel. “I only
found out I was like this a few months ago. Dad, Maddox, they
started showing signs of it when they were both really young. But
I… I just didn’t. I thought maybe I hadn’t inherited it. That maybe
I could just be human like our mom and not have to deal with the
stuff they did. Hide things the way they did. But then, all of a
sudden one day, there it all was. And I would have told you, but…we
can’t. Dad drilled that into us since we were kids. It’s all
secret, you see. It has to be, if we don’t want to end up in a lab
or something. Not even Baylie knows.”

“But Diane…” I managed.

He sighed. “When Maddox was thirteen, he was
hurt in a hit-and-run. Diane and Dad were around the back of the
house; they heard it happen. They came running, found Maddox, and
when his skin changed like ours does and he started healing up in
front of her… Dad sort of had to explain.” Noah gave a half-hearted
chuckle. “She didn’t really freak. Not too much, anyway. She was
just pissed he hadn’t shared it with her sooner. But then, Diane’s
awesome. He probably should have.”

I watched him steer the car around another
curve. The mountains were falling behind us and I could feel our
proximity to the coast like a feather running over my skin, sending
shivers through me.

“You don’t have to be near the water,
though,” I whispered.

“It feels better,” he admitted. “But it’s not
like it is for you.”

I swallowed, leaning my head on the window
again. The sense of the ocean nearby was getting worse. Making it
harder to fight.

“Hang on,” he urged. “We’re almost
there.”

“Where are we going?”

“Home. Our stretch of beach is about as
secluded as anything gets in town, so that’s probably the safest
place for you to…”

My eyes closed. I didn’t want to think about
it.

“You won’t die, Chloe.”

I looked over at him.

“You’ve made it this far,” he insisted. “You
won’t.”

I shivered. Up ahead, the outskirts of Santa
Lucina came into view.

“And then what happens?” I whispered.

His brow furrowed.

“I-I change like they do. Then what?”

“You’re better. Whatever they gave you gets
out of your system, you change back, and you’re fine.”

I glanced to him. He didn’t meet my eyes as
he kept driving.

Biting my lip, I turned back to the window.
The seat fabric hurt, and I shifted around on it, trying to make
the burning stop. Filaments formed on my skin, tying my legs
together and then snapping into smoke as I pulled them apart.

The car flew by fences and houses, rushing
into town. Slowing to as far above the speed limit as he dared,
Noah wove the sedan through the streets, cursing under his breath
every time a stoplight appeared.

And finally, his house came into sight.

Pulling up fast in the driveway, he left the
engine running and threw his door open the moment he could slam the
gearshift into park.

I leaned my head back, fighting to keep the
air from thickening.

The door flew open and his arms wrapped
around me, lifting me up from the seat.

“I can walk,” I protested hoarsely.

He ignored me. Shifting me around in his
arms, he took off running.

Wind whistled in my ears as Noah circled the
garage and raced through the backyard. His footsteps thudded on the
wooden steps and then went silent when he reached the sand.

I could feel the saltwater in the air and I
pressed my forehead to his shoulder, struggling desperately to keep
my body from changing at the sensation.

He skidded to a stop with a curse.

I turned my head, following his gaze.

Dehaians were walking from the water. Scales
melted from their legs as they moved, becoming swim trunks that
shimmered faintly in the sunlight.

Noah’s grip on me tightened.

“Chloe?” Zeke called, pushing past one of the
men and running toward us through the waves.

“Who the hell?” Noah growled.

“He’s not one of them,” I whispered.

The words didn’t make Noah relax.

Jogging onto the beach, Zeke started toward
us and then slowed, his gaze going from Noah to me and back.

“We’re here to help,” he said cautiously. “We
just need to get her in the water first.”

Noah didn’t move. “You all get the hell away
from here, then. I’m not leaving her vulnerable with any of you
around.”

Zeke stared at him. “
Vulnerable
? Do
you even know what she…” He grimaced. “Look, whoever you are, we
don’t have time for this. Did the Sylphaen dose her?”

“Leave.”

“Dammit, did they dose her or is she just
reacting to being out of the water this long?”

Noah paused. I swallowed in the thickening
air, trying to force the words out.

He beat me to it. “They did.”

Zeke muttered something in a language I’d
never heard. “Get her in the water. Carefully, though. With what
they gave her, too fast could be… bad.”

Noah hesitated. A shudder rippled through me
as my legs tried to change again.

Growling a curse, Noah headed into the
water.

Saltwater spray hit me as the waves tumbled
in around us, and I gasped, my body spasming in his arms. He
clutched me tighter as tingles crawled over my skin and a cry
escaped me at the feeling. My skin was changing. My hands flailed
out, clutching at nothing, and I couldn’t breathe in the stupid,
dense, useless air.

“Easy,” Noah urged, his voice tense.

He lowered me down.

I shrieked as the waves swept around me, over
me, through me, tearing me apart. The water scorched my skin like
acid and I thrashed in Noah’s arms, trying to escape the pain while
the ocean flooded down my throat, drowning me.

Noah clutched me tighter, holding me to his
chest as my tears mingled with the saltwater.

And slowly, the world stopped hurting.

I gasped, my vision clearing. A sensation
like a million tiny fingers caressing my skin ran over me, soothing
the pain away. Blinking hard, I looked down at my body, afraid of
what I would find.

My clothes were crumbling, as though a fire
was burning them to dust despite the waves. Filaments of light
shone through the vanishing fabric, twisting across my legs and
chasing down toward my ankles and up across my chest, becoming
iridescent, cream-toned scales as they passed. When the light
reached my feet, it spread, transforming my flesh into a broad,
translucent fin and bringing with it a feeling like unbearable
pressure finally being released.

A breath escaped me. Lifting a hand, I
watched the sunlight play across my shimmering skin. Nothing seemed
as strange as I’d believed it would be.

Everything just felt right.

Noah shifted his grip slightly. I looked
up.

From just above the rolling waves, he watched
me.

I tensed, uncertain what he’d think now.

He seemed to feel my fear, and carefully, his
arms adjusted around me. He pulled me back up through the water,
his mouth curving into a smile.

My head broke the surface.

The air was too thick. It burned.

I gasped and jerked away. His hold broke and
I fell into the water.

Horror swept over me. Fighting to stay
balanced against the current, I turned, looking back up at him.

His expression mirrored my own.

Frantic, my gaze darted around. Above the
surface, I could hear Noah yelling at the dehaians standing near
the shore.

Zeke dove through the waves, shifting form in
a heartbeat and pulling up beside me.

“Why–” I started. I blinked at the sound of
my own voice, as clear beneath the water as in the open air. “Why
can’t I breathe up there?”

A wince twisted his face. “It’s not
permanent. But the Sylphaen–”

“The who?”

“Those guys who injected that stuff into you.
They gave you some messed-up form of neiphiandine. It’s a medicine,
normally. It forces a full transformation and keeps you like that
for a while.”

At my expression, he grimaced. “I told you,
it’s not permanent. But it means you can’t go back above the water
right now.”