Burning in a Memory (36 page)

             
“Well, if I have another member in the coven, I’d like it to be someone beautiful.”

             
“Ew,” she let slip. There was no doubt in her mind that Zachary had saved her partially because of her looks. She’d never pictured shades as remotely sexual creatures, but now she found new meaning to his actions. Thinking about it threatened to make her sick.

             
“Don’t be too flattered though. Margo partially picked you because you are weak and will be easily controlled. We can’t have shades with the strength of Leon Colton running around at once.”

             
“I’m not,” she huffed. She considered fighting again but she wasn’t sure how. Her strength was tapped and her magic was nearly useless. But then she needed to see Adam.

             
“Take me back to my cell,” she demanded.

             
Zachary didn’t budge at first. Just when she thought he wouldn’t give in to her demand, he finally made a small gesture with his hands. Zachary never held nor dragged her, he allowed her to trail behind him, which she did reluctantly. Instead of fighting though, she took the time to look for the exits, the doors, and the windows. She listened for sounds of the others but heard nothing when she reached the basement. Zachary opened the lid on the pit for her but refused to allow her a better way down.

Adelaide jumped before she was pushed. She braced for impact but never hit the ground
—arms caught her during her fall. Surprise made her struggle and she broke free from the hold. The subsequent landing though was hardly painful in comparison.

She recognized Adam
while the light streamed into the pit, but she didn’t expect what happened next. Adam came at her and pulled her forward. She squeaked when she hit his chest and was encompassed in his crushing hold. His chest muscles flexed against her cheek.

             
“Are you all right? Are you all right? I heard you screaming. I thought they were killing you!”

             
Adelaide swallowed the lump in her throat. If she’d managed to forget Mistel’s brutal fate, she remembered it now. Adam kept rambling.

             
“You’re okay? You’re okay!”

             
He trembled but the shaking calmed within a minute. His grip loosened on her, as if he suddenly thought better of it, but he never let her go. Adelaide used her elbows to wrench herself free and laid her eyes on his face. She saw nothing but a raw expression and a cold fear. She remembered how to speak.

             
“Leon’s up there. He’s alive and they haven’t turned him yet.”

             
Adam’s face lit up.

             
“Thank heaven,” he gasped as if he abruptly remembered the outside world.

Up top, Zachary replaced the lid on the pit and
left them in darkness. Because she couldn’t see him, Adelaide touched his arm.

             
“They are going to wait to turn him until he is weaker. It’s likely they’re going to come get me first, and when I’m out of the pit I’ll start the biggest fight I can. I suspect the others have come on a rescue mission for you and, with my distraction, it’ll give them a better chance to get you out,” she said.

             
He faltered under her touch.

             
“What?”

             
“The shades heard something around the manor. It’s got to be the others coming for you. So really, now is the time to reconsider your stupid suicide mission and be with your family.”

             
He closed the distance between them abruptly and took her by the shoulders. He leaned forward and their foreheads touched.

             
“What did they say, Adelaide?”

             
“They heard something in the woods…”

             
“What did they say about you, Adelaide?” he interrupted her, directing her.

             
She stole a gulp of air but had trouble saying what was next.

             
“They’re going to turn me into a shade. I’m afraid it won’t be long now until they do.”

Thirty-
one

Adam sat next to her in the small confines of their prison but Adelaide had never felt f
arther removed from him in that moment. Her world felt numb and she felt alone in her painful thoughts. She rested her chin on her knees and kept her eyes closed.

             
Their spell earlier had been broken for some time and they did not touch. Adelaide wasn’t sure how much time had passed since they’d been in the dark pit, but her body told her it’d been too long. Her stomach had long since begged for food and her muscles ached from the cramped space and hard floor. When Adam finally spoke, she was surprised.

             
“Were you close to your cousin?” he asked. His voice sounded genuine so she didn’t let his question go unanswered.

             
“Not really. I think we might have been but she was a teenager when she was turned. I was only four or five. I never got to know her outside of what you saw up there, but she did save me when I was kid. For that, I feel bad,” she said. Letting out a breath, she felt an unfamiliar emotion surge through her. The words actually felt liberating, even if Adam wasn’t the best audience to hear them.

             
“Well, I’m sorry. One way or another, it’s hard to lose family,” he said.

             
The emotion of liberation faded quickly. Her mind returned to what she’d nearly done to Leon and it left her with a sinking feeling in her stomach.

             
“I’m sorry,” Adam added. “I might have judged you harshly on the front. If I was alone as a mage, I don’t know what I’d do.”

             
She resisted the urge to scoff. If he were alone, he’d run into a shade’s lair on a suicide mission to save his family. Fast-forward to them sitting in a dank dungeon, starving and delirious from dehydration before they were taken to the chopping block. The shades hadn’t mentioned Adam’s fate, but she knew it was only one of two things. The guilt grew worse. She struggled to answer him coherently.

             
“Don’t worry about it. It’s my fault on that front, too. I was taken in by a human family and had no aura. I could have lived an awesome life, but I let curiosity get in my way. I kept hunting for clues until I ran into the Hawthorns. I caused every bad thing that’s happened to me.” Mistel had told her that weeks ago but now it seemed bitterly true. Adelaide struggled to shake the mental image of her dead cousin.

             
“It doesn’t sound like you just stumbled upon some books and thought it was cool. You wanted to know what happened to your real family—your coven, I mean,” he pointed out.

             
She nodded slowly, though he couldn’t see her.

             
“I did want to know what happened to them. I wanted to find people who could do the things I could do. Growing up with humans didn’t mean I could avoid coming into my powers. ”

             
She suddenly flexed her fingertips. With a gentle pull on her exhausted aura, a flicker of fire lit above her palm. The pit lit up in the dim red hue until she let it go out. The light actually burned her eyes. She curled her fingers back into her chest. 

             
“How did you first figure out you have powers? Did you light something on fire?” Adam asked.

             
She laughed weakly.

             
“No, but I figured out how to make my glass shatter. It sounds strange but I thought, at first, I was some telepath from the X-men.”

             
She’d broken her mirror with magic by accident once. Then she tried it out on her window. Her mother kicked down the door, wielding a broom like a weapon and screaming. That mental image finally made Adelaide smile, as the conversation turned to something besides their looming fate.

             
“I couldn’t imagine what that made being a teenager like,” he quipped.             

             
“I still am a teenager,” she pointed out.

             
“You’re still a teenager…” Adam repeated quietly.

             
She hurried before their conversation took on a dark tone again.

             
“My mother was a smart woman, but she didn’t know much about magic. She just helped me hide it. She was always afraid something would happen to me like it happened to my coven. Of course when she told me that, I couldn’t let my curiosity go. After I left for college, it became easier to look. I dropped out and did it full time. I guess I didn’t see my destiny involving student debt and paper degrees.”

             
Adelaide paused. She hadn’t considered it before, but now she realized that her family would never know what happened to her down here. They would never know why she wasn’t coming home. The thought was crippling. Desperate to stop the sullen thoughts from overtaking her, she engaged Adam.

             
“Did you ever go to college?” she asked.

             
Adam took awhile to answer. 

             
“I did. I have a bachelor’s in microbiology, but with the family issues, I never got to use it.”

             
“Oh, kind and smart,” she said without thinking. Adam shifted from his spot on the wall. She noticed he now sat another inch away from her. She clung to the free flowing conversation.             

             
“Adam, can I ask you something kind of weird?”

             
“What?” he cued, sounding uncertain.

             
“I mean, I know some things about shades but maybe there’s something that I don’t know. You say that most shades kill automatically, that they give no mercy. If that’s true, I feel like being near Mistel was more than dumb luck sometimes. Even statistically speaking, I couldn’t be that lucky,” she explained.

             
“What are you thinking?” he asked.

             
“Mistel had ample opportunity to hurt me and never did. Upstairs, I was almost certain she was trying to help me, in her own twisted way. I wonder now if there’s anything left of the person when the shade takes their body. I wonder if part of Mistel was still in there, resisting because she knew me.”

             
Adam stayed silent for a long time. When he answered, he answered quietly.

             
“Even if I thought it was possible, do you really want to think that’s what happens to them?”

             
His question abruptly made her whimper.

             
“Yea, you’re right. They’re going to turn me into a shade. I always thought it’d be like automatically dying. What do you think it’s like to die?”

             
Adam abruptly cursed. His loud shout of words filled the tiny pit and returned to them in echoes. She jumped from surprise.

             
“I just heard you screaming up there and was convinced they were torturing you!” he said then. “I have never panicked that much in my life and now you’re asking me what its like to die?”

             
She recoiled a bit and nudged the last subject.             

             
“Adam, you brought me here knowing that was a damn good chance. Hell, it was your plan! Why are you freaking out about it now?” she asked.

             
She never intended to hit a sore spot, but she clearly did.

             
“I wanted so much to hate you. I didn’t even know exactly what you did but I knew it was bad. I knew it involved my brother and it made me angry. I wanted to hate you and I would have been okay with you dying.”

             
It was her turn to collect herself before talking.

             
“Well, it did involve your brother. You probably should hate me, Adam,” she whispered. He interrupted her before she could say more.

             
“For the first time ever, I think I see the real Adelaide, and I don’t like how much I like her. Don’t you understand? Stop talking. Stop making yourself seem like a real person.”

             
She scoffed, but he cut her off again. His hand reached out this time, and before she could shift to avoid the contact, he had her by the wrist. At the hot touch, the remainder of her self control barreled down with it. When he pulled, she gave.  His arms swept around her in a tighter, closer embrace. It felt bizarre but she didn’t fight.

             
“Adelaide, I’ve been struggling with you forever. I don’t know if I can fight it anymore. And I don’t know if I can listen to you die,” he said and his voice broke on the last few words.