Beautiful Monster 2 (23 page)

“I’ll see you tomorrow night, Liam,” Thomas said, his voice oddly quiet and yet echoing through the theater.

“Call time is 6
pm,” I answered, and Thomas nodded, and then they were gone.

“Alright, everyone, that’s a wrap!” I called to the rest of the cast, who giggled a bit at my film terminology.

Amy stood up on her tiptoes to kiss me and I gave in gratefully, placing my hands on her shoulders.

“See, I told you every
thing would work out,” she said quietly.

I smiled.
“Sure, except I’m standing here singing a part I’ve rehearsed maybe once in my life, and if Charlie isn’t better tomorrow, I’m going to kill him myself.”

“But you and I, together on stage again,” she said, squeezing my hand.

A thought crossed my mind and I winced. “This means I might have to kiss Sarah. Dear God, someone find Connor and explain to him about a stage kiss before my life is in danger too.”

Amy let out a soft giggle and reached up to kiss me again, gazing into my eyes. In that moment, I felt like we were the only two people in the world.

“What if I just swept you up right now and ran away?” I whispered in her ear, and I felt her shiver in anticipation of my touch.

“Then we’d have a lot of angry actors,” she finally said, her breath hot on my ear and her lips brushing against
my neck.

I was more tempted by
that thought than ever before. “Didn’t I teach them that the show must go on, no matter what?”

She wrapped her arms around me, squeezing tight as
the chaos continued around me. “Soon, Liam. One day.”

“One day,” I whispered back, a promise to myself and to her.

The theater began to clear out soon, cast and crew glad to be released.

“Don’t party too hard!” I called after a group of seniors, who laughed and waved as they left.

I had told Connor to let the vampires back into the guest accommodations, and to rejoin us at dusk in the field behind the school, where I had the witch meeting us.

Arianna was a friend of Porsche’s, a rebel, like her, who chose her own path in life. In her 30s, with a small child at home, Arianna sold her powers to support herself and her child. She didn’t differentiate between
vampires, werewolves, Shields or ghosts, all creatures paid the same price for the spells they needed. Mostly, it was love potions or voodoo dolls, but sometimes, she was called upon to do real magic, like I was asking her to do. I supposed it was one way to show equality. The only doubt I had in my mind was whether it would be enough.

“If it doesn’t work,” Amy said
, as we walked down the hall to get some lunch, “then I don’t know what will. This is everything we’ve got.”

“Is there any way your mother can help?” I asked, playing with our fingers
, intertwining.

Amy looked up at me.
“I mean, she’ll be there. I don’t know how she can help, aside from watching over us. She can’t really exist outside the theater, even with thirty Shields in there. She seems to be able to get places quickly though. She was following me around the wings, pretending to be my costume mistress.” Amy smiled, a smile that was halfway between sad and happy.

I supposed that would be exactly how I would feel if my ghost mother could rejoin me.

“Perhaps we can ask her if she’s willing to help us communicate? Do you think she’ll agree to that?”

“Sure
.” Amy nodded. “She said she’d help us anyway she could.”

“Right
.” I squeezed her hand. “Then there’s nothing left to do. Let’s bind Sarah and then… it’ll be curtain time in less than a day.”

“Even with you as the Phantom?” she teased me.

“The show must go on, Amy. Even if the lead is reading from a script,” I replied. “Come on. Let’s talk about something other than the show. Or vampires. Or anything other than you and me.”

She smiled, following me into the office, lunch quickly forgotten.

I pulled on a coat, preparing for the night cold. Liam had warned me that the binding spell could take a while, and the last thing I wanted to be was the weak human, freezing cold outside. In order for the spell to work, and Liam to take Sarah’s protection without being affected by her powers, he needed to be in his supernatural form.

I shut my door and met Sarah in the hallway.

“That’s new,” I said, commenting on a black lace coat that dropped to the floor.

She shuddered.
“Connor got it for me. And after being in that frilly dress, I needed some Goth time.”

I laughed, taking her arm as we made our way through the back of the school and out to the field. There was a fire burning, which I hoped no one would notice. It was a bit suspicious to have a blazing orange fire surrounded by
a few people in the back of the school, where we did outdoor theater.

Standing by it
and warming her hands, was a tall woman, dressed nonchalantly, save for a huge pentagram pendant around her neck.

“Are you Arianna?” I asked
.

S
he looked up. “Amy,” she said, reaching for my hand. She was in her mid-thirties, with a bit of extra weight around her middle, and chipped nail polish on her chewed fingernails. I didn’t know what I was expecting, I had never met a witch before. But now I realized how easy it must have been to pass them on the street, to never be aware of this whole world that I was now deep inside. “It’s so nice to meet you. And you must be Sarah, oh my.” She pulled her hand back from Sarah’s handshake, smiling. “Definitely a Shield.”

“Yep,” Sarah replied, looking about. “The boys are coming.”

I looked up, seeing their two figures approach in the darkness, and took a step back.

I had see
n Liam before in his vampire form, but never Connor. With their fangs coming over their lips, and their eyes dark as coal against their pale faces, it was a bit frightening. I noticed they kept their distance from us as well, keeping to the other side of the fire.

“Are we ready?” Liam addressed Arianna, and his voice seemed growly, deeper than it normally was.

Arianna nodded. “Whenever you are. I need you here, and you here, and Connor, is it? You need to be the anchor between them, here.”

“I’ll just…
be here.” I took a step away from the triangle she had made.

Liam glanced up at me.
“You don’t have to be here, Amy.”

“It’s ok. I want to be. It’ll be ok
.” I rubbed my arms for warmth and then stepped back, as Arianna took her place over the fire.

I could feel the magic in the air as soon as she started chanting. Everything felt alive, stronger, and louder. I fe
lt like I could see colors that I couldn’t before, like the world was a different place, with a whole new power I could never feel. The trees seemed to be talking to the grass, and the wind communicating with the sky.

I turned to Connor, who was standing on my left and saw him wincing as his fangs receded straight away. I could almost see Sarah glowing, as if her power was manifesting off her and washing over Liam.

Arianna’s eyes had gone completely black, and I wasn’t sure if she could see or hear any of us as she chanted words in a rhythm that I didn’t understand, probably pulling out spells from thousands of years ago.

Liam grunted and doubled over, and I
moved towards him. Connor’s hand came out, pulling me back.

“No, you must let the magic happen.”

This time, Liam full-out groaned, and I felt my heart wrench as I saw his hands tremble.

“But he’s getting hurt!” I cried, turning to Arianna. “Stop, something’s going wrong!”

She didn’t even acknowledge that she heard me, chanting over the flames that rose so high I thought they would engulf her. Liam bellowed in pain and I struggled against Connor as I saw blood trickle down his face.

“Liam!”
But I was no use against a vampire, even one who was being kept half human.

Suddenly, there was a giant flash of l
ight and what I felt like was a sonic boom. The force of it threw both Connor and me to the ground.

My head connected with the hard dirt and I saw stars in front of my eyes.

I took a deep breath, gritting my teeth and willing myself to gain control.

After a moment, the pain subsided and I was able to push myself up on shaky hands. It took another moment
before my vision cleared.

Liam was lying, sprawled on the ground, a few feet from me. Immediately, I pulled myself towards him, reaching to grab his shoulder and roll him over.

“Liam,” I said, and then gasped, moving backwards with haste. I hadn’t expected him to still be in vampire form, and it startled me. Normally, I was a few feet away during his transformation.

His eyes met mine, disorientated, and then he snarled at me.

I leapt back with a little screech and felt Arianna’s arms around me.

“It’s ok, Amy. It just means the spell worked. Liam is no longer bound by the laws of Shields. Bound to Sarah, he is protected from them.”

Sarah was sitting up half a meter away, rolling her neck from side to side. Her brand new coat was dirty, spotted with mud, and she looked paler than normal, but otherwise, happy. She wore a wide grin on her face as her head swiveled from Liam to Connor.

“Are you still human?” she asked.

“Indeed, and it’s a bit unnerving,” Connor replied. “You can’t turn it off?”

“This is permanent, right?” Liam spoke at last, standing up. He seemed taller than he normally did, and no longer in pain. “As long as Sarah’s close, I’m forever immune to anything?”

“Anything supernatural,” Arianna said, looking at her watch like she was ending a casual coffee date. “I really should go.”

“Thank you
.” Liam nodded to her, looking down at his hands, and then up at the stars, as if taking the world in for the first time. “The money will be in your bank account within twenty four hours.”

“Good. Nice to meet you all,” Arianna said
, and then headed off towards the school parking lot.

I guess
for her, this was an everyday occurrence, changing people into toads and re-arranging the laws of nature. I knew that the binding spell was forbidden by witches who worked in a coven, but it was clear from her attitude that Arianna worked alone.

I looked to Liam, who was rooted to the spot.

He gave me a slight smile. “It’s ok, Amy. Your blood is just as tempting as ever.”

“Gee thanks,” I managed, but still didn’t move any closer.

This wasn’t the Liam I knew, full of compassion and kindness. This Liam was someone else, even if the one I knew was trapped inside.

But then he cocked his head in that familiar way that I found adorable, and gave me a wider grin, winking at me, and I found the man I had
fallen in love with again.

I moved forward into his arms, feeling his body as a vampire for the first time. He felt more solid, built and I could feel the power in his muscles. He wrapped his arms around me and I knew that
it was the safest place in the world to be: that nothing at all could harm me.

“So, we’ll see you tomorrow night, then,” Sarah said, also safe inside Connor’s arms. They were giving each other a look that told me they had other plans for the evening.

“Yes,” Liam replied, and I smiled, breathing in his familiar scent. Everything would be alright, I knew it.

Once the other two left, Liam reached down to take my hand.

“Do you want to take a walk?” he asked.

I looked up, surprised.
“Is that… ok? Are you going to be ok?”

“As long as we stay around here and don’t head to the cent
er of a crowded town.” He smirked. “Unless you want that kind of fun.”

“No thank you,” I replied, gulping slowly. There were still parts of this, even after a
year, that frightened me.

“That’s ok, I’m not really hungry
.” He gave me a devilish smile and we began to stroll toward the gardens at the very back of the school property.

I had never really spent much time there, preferring indoors and climate
-controlled theaters. It was cold, and I couldn’t feel my fingertips, but I didn’t want my time with Liam to end. More than ever, I wanted to understand what was going on when he was like this; how he felt and what he thought.

“How’s Ranger going?” he asked, approaching a delicate subject matter.

I hadn’t yet retracted my plan to pull out of school after the show was over, and to be honest, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do.

I loved Ranger, and I loved performing every single day, a different script within the same character. I knew Cassandra Winters almost better than I knew myself by now. If they told me to improv all the scenes from here on out, I was pretty sure I could.

But at the same time, I felt frustrated with the set. I hated the long breaks we took, sitting around waiting for the lighting to be moved or the director to argue with the writers. I hated being in character with a strong emotional backing and then having to be told to go back and do it again, or wait an hour for lunch to be over so we could film it from a different angle. As I expressed these thoughts to Liam, a wide grin stretched over his face.

“It’s like we’re the same person,” he said, stopping to pick up a flower and hand it to me.

“What do you mean?”

“Every time I was on a film set, I felt like bashing my head against a wall. You don’t know how many times I wanted to scream at them to just get going.”

“But you spent most of your career in film,” I protested.

He laughed.
“You don’t have to tell me twice, I know. Every day I was itching to get back to the stage.”

“So what you’re saying is even full
-time actors have it hard?”

“Oh yeah,
limos and parties are terrible,” he snorted.

I giggled.
“Did you talk to Charlie by any chance?”

“Hard to talk to someone who has no voice,” he replied
.

I looked up in horror.
“Does that mean you’re playing the Phantom?”

“At least for opening night. I feel a terrible sense of
déjà vu.” He swung my arm a bit, making me laugh. “You and I, together on stage again. It’ll be a show that the media will never forget.”

“At least you’ll be wearing a mask,” I realized. “So you can transform away and no one will know. What do you think Selene is planning?”