Mind Games: An Urban Fantasy Novel (The Lillim Callina Chronicles Book 6) (12 page)

“Just ring for me when you’re done,” Walter said to neither of us and both of us. “I’ll come back to escort Miss Callina to her blood draw before we release her back to her father.”

“Very good,” Dr. Emile replied, waving for me to take a seat on the couch.

“Blood draw?” I asked as I sat hesitantly on the edge of the cushion and was immediately enveloped in the crush of its overbearing softness. I tried to struggle against it, but only succeeded in being swallowed whole.

“Yes. We have to take your blood to make sure there are proper medication levels in your blood.” He smiled at me like it was totally reasonable for him to draw my blood and run tests on it when I’d done nothing wrong.

“Why? I thought I was only here for a checkup?” My heart began racing as I said the words. “Am I being checked back in?”

“Of course not, dear,” Dr. Emile said with a chuckle that seemed semi-genuine. “We need to make sure the medication isn’t interacting poorly with your body and causing nasty side effects.” He pulled his feet off the table and leaned toward me, yellow legal pad gripped in one ebony hand. “I’m not really worried about it though. The chances of that are statistically negligible and according to your parents, you haven’t been feeling any side effects.”

“Yeah, because I haven’t been taking your demon pills,” I almost said but totally didn’t because that was a sure fire way to cause trouble for myself.

His dark eyes roamed over me, taking me in as he readied a blue ballpoint pen in his other hand. His eyes left mine before I could respond as he glanced over the pad, presumably reading notes he’d left for himself earlier. What if there was something bad written on there, something that would keep me here, locked away in Mercer & Mercer forever? The thought made a chill run down my spine.

“I’m okay.” I shrugged in a way that hopefully conveyed agreement with his assessment. Besides, it wasn’t like I was about to tell him I still thought this world was totally fake. He was the one person who could rescind my limited freedom with the stroke of a pen. If there was anyone I was going to lie to, it was him. Then again, I wasn’t sure why it mattered. If this all was fake, what did it matter whether or not I lied and kept myself out of Mercer & Mercer?

Because…
said the tiny, fearful voice inside me.
Because this might not be fake.

“That’s good to hear, Miss Callina.” Dr. Emile tapped his pad with the back of his pen. “Your parents told me you got lost and didn’t realize how you got there. Is this true?” He raised one bushy eyebrow at me as though challenging me to disagree.

“Yeah,” I mumbled almost inaudibly. “I was waiting for my mom and got distracted by my thoughts. I must have wandered off without realizing…”

“Is that so?” he asked, staring at me with his hard eyes. “Or is it something else?”

“What else would it be?” I asked as he stood and dropped his pad onto the table. It landed with a loud thwap that made me jump. Writing was scribbled across the page, blotting out nearly the entire sheet, but as I leaned forward to try to glean information from it, I realized I couldn’t read a single word.

“I don’t know. Maybe you were hallucinating again?” he asked and although his words sounded accusing, his tone was gentle, like he was dealing with a skittish fox. “That’s not a bad thing. Sometimes it takes a while for the delusions to completely fade away, or maybe your medication isn’t working anymore. We could try a stronger dose…”

“No,” I shook my head, knowing it wasn’t the medication because I wasn’t taking it. “I’m not hallucinating.”

“Are you sure?” he asked, his dark eyes fixing on me with nearly unnatural force, and I felt myself starting to fall, to slip away down the rabbit hole to a place I’d never return from. “Are you sure?” he repeated, and the words slammed into me. I felt myself sway as he knelt down beside me and placed one hand on top of my own. His touch was like fire, and as I tried to pull my hand away, he gripped my wrist hard and tugged me toward him until we were eye to eye.

“See here’s the thing, Lillim. You are crazy. Crazy to think I can’t read your thoughts.” He smirked, and there was a flash of color in his eyes, reminding me of a comet streaking through the night sky. “You think all your little lies matter, but they don’t. Not even a little. Why, I could snap my fingers and…” He grinned at me and a shudder rippled across my flesh.

“And what?” I asked, not sure how my voice escaped my throat because I was so scared I could barely breathe let alone talk. What the hell was he talking about? Why was he being so weird? Unless… unless this was Jormungand. Maybe he was just screwing with me for kicks? But why would he do that? Hadn’t he won?

“And I could send you into a cell so dark you’ll actually go crazy. I could unleash terrors so bleak and monstrous, you would never be able to climb your way out.” He exhaled a breath that smelled like mildew and copper. “Or you could play nicely in the perfect world I’ve created for you.” He shrugged, and the meaning of the gesture was clear enough to fill my blood with ice. He’d do it in a heartbeat and not care in the slightest.

“Jormungand,” I whispered, and while he didn’t acknowledge the name, his eyes twinkled.

“Do we have an understanding, Lillim?” He released me. “Or do I unleash horrors far beyond the red room?”

I punched him as hard as I could. He must not have expected it because my fist caught him on the underside of the chin. He staggered backward under the force of the blow. The back of his knees hit the table, and he toppled to the ground. I leapt on top of him, driving my knees into his chest as my fists came down smashing his face into a smear on the carpet.

Which was pretty much exactly how the rest of the staff found me. Orderlies swarmed over me, dragging me backward off the doctor. I whirled, and while I couldn’t call on my power, I lashed out with all the rage inside me. My knee connected sharply with one orderly’s crotch. He grunted in pain and fell to the floor, his eyes bugging out of his skull.

The other one raised something, presumably some kind of drug, but I ducked his initial jab. I twisted and lunged at him. We hit the ground with a crash as Dr. Emile got slowly to his feet, staring at me in disbelief through a mask of blood.

“Lillim, what are you doing?” he asked as I ripped the needle from the orderly’s grip and drove it into the man’s thigh and depressed the plunger. His hands slipped off of me as I rose to my feet.

“Escaping, Jormungand!” I snapped, and instead of attacking him, I turned and ran from his office. I wasn’t sure where I was going to go, but I barely made it three steps before the floor beneath my feet opened up and swallowed me completely.

Chapter 15

I barely had time to take a breath in the time it took me to fall through the floor and into some kind of sharp-edged hell. I hit the effervescent emerald rock hard enough to shatter everything inside me. I lay there, trying to remember how to breathe as my eyes adjusted to the low light cast by the green torches blazing from sconces attached to the walls. Shadows leapt and danced all around me as I flopped onto my side and found myself staring at a familiar face.

Zef sat cross legged on the ground next to me, staring at my broken, battered body with his one good eye. His lips quirked into a bemused smile as he reached out with one slender hand and flicked me in the center of the forehead. Everything flashed white for a split second as indescribable agony ripped through my body. Then, before I could draw a second breath through my clenched teeth, it was over, and I felt fine, better than fine actually. If there was a locomotive around, I could totally bench press it.

“How are you?” he asked, leaning toward me so his long white hair fell in front of his face, blocking his eyepatch from view. “I could flick you again if you like.” He readied his hand. “It’s remarkably enjoyable.”

“I’m okay,” I squawked in my best please don’t flick me again voice. “How are you here?”

“The truth?” he asked, spreading his hands wide. “Is that you’re very close to death.”

“I’m close to death?” I asked because that was crazy. I felt fine, more than fine. Give me a tanker truck, and I’d show him just how fine I was. Hell, give me three and I’d juggle.

“Indeed. It’s why I’m able to visit you.” He exhaled loudly, probably wondering if he needed to remind me that he was the Black Prince and by extension, the guardian of the gates of death. If he said I was about to die, he was probably right. That sucked.

“So what’s the plan?” I asked, getting myself into a sitting position which was when I realized the floor was slick and wet. Cold fluid seeped through the seat of my pants, chilling me to the bone and making goosebumps sprout on my flesh. Still, I knew better than to show weakness in front of Zef. I mean, it wasn’t like he’d ever really hurt me. If he wanted to attack me, it wasn’t like I could stop him. It was more that being around him was like being in the same room as a pacing tiger. Let me tell you right now, you do not want to look like prey when confronting a tiger.

“The plan is for you to wait, and when you are done waiting, to strike. You are to do this at exactly the right time and not a moment before.” He smiled at me, baring his perfectly white teeth. “Nor a moment after.”

“Awesome,” I replied. “So I’m dying, and I’m just supposed to wait it out and hope for the best?”

“Precisely,” he said, stroking his chin. “And here, I thought this was going to be difficult.”

“Why am I dying?” I asked, glancing around the cavern. It reminded me of an emerald version of the one beneath his house on the hill. Every surface was hewn from gleaming, jagged gemstones made more ominous by the leaping shadows thrown off by the firelight. Crystalline water flowed from a fountain directly behind the death god. Now that I was paying attention, the sound of spattering water filled my ears as the stalactites above dripped and dropped in an endless cacophony of noise.

“Jormungand is trying to pull too much power through your body.” He shrugged. “It was inevitable, really. He hasn’t learned how to use his hosts properly. It doesn’t help that you keep trying to rebel either. Every time you do, he must expend more power to keep you beneath his thumb.” He waved his hands in front of him. “It’s sort of a cyclical tornado of hopelessness. You fight, he fights, and you both lose. But you lose more because when you die, he’ll find a new body, and you’ll be dead.”

“Of course,” I replied, trying to wrap my brain around what he was saying. Was Zef telling me that every time I fought with the snake god, I was actually killing myself? If that was true, the best thing to do would be to go along with everything so he wouldn’t be forced to put me down. Still, if I couldn’t find a way out, death might become a viable option. There was no way I was going to let him use my body forever, even if it did keep me alive. “Is that why he hasn’t dropped me in a pit of endless torment?”

“Bingo,” Zef said, smiling at me like I was his number one student. Then he reached out and ruffled my hair. It was back to its natural lavender color, and for some reason, that made me extraordinarily happy. Normally, I wasn’t super fond of my lavender hair because it brought me unwanted attention, but ever since I’d become trapped in dream world, well, I had been forced to have normal black hair. It was lame. If I ever got out of this, I was never dyeing my hair to hide who I was again.

“So how will I know when to strike?” I asked, hoping he would just tell me instead of giving me one of his riddles. Admittedly, it was probably asking for too much.

“When the sky turns gray with soot and the earth cracks open and blood spills across the land. In that moment, you must lash out at Jormungand with everything you have. It is the only way.” He smiled.

I sighed and halfway hoped he wasn’t speaking in metaphor because what he was describing sounded like it’d be pretty freaking obvious. “And how do I do that? How do I stop Jormungand? He is everything and everyone.”

“You’ll think of something,” Zef said as he rose to his feet and began walking away. “I’m counting on you, Lillim.”

“Thanks,” I said, but he was gone, and I found myself staring at an ominously red ceiling. I tried to move, but my arms and legs were bound to the bed beside me. That pissed me right off.

“So you’re awake,” Dr. Emile said from beside me. His nose was bandaged and his eyes were ringed with bruises, presumably from my fists.

“Let me guess. I’m back in the red room,” I said with a sigh.

“Indeed, Miss Callina,” Dr. Emile said, approaching me carefully, like he thought I might somehow rip myself free of my bonds and maul him like a momma lion. That was crazy though, how could I tear through straps wider than my wrists with my bare hands? Magic? The thought made me smirk and then grow immediately sad. If only…

“How are things?” I asked as genially as I could. “Good, I hope.”

“Not really,” he said, disappointment filling his voice. “You haven’t been taking your medication.” He tapped a clipboard in his hand. I was presumably it was the results of my lab work.

“Yeah.” I tried to shrug and totally failed. “About that, I’m really more of a Flintstones chewable kind of girl.”

“I don’t think you recognize the gravity of the situation, Miss Callina,” he replied, staring at me with his dark eyes. There was more than a little concern in them. It was enough to make me feel bad for beating him into twain because he was one of Jormungand’s manifestations. “You’re very sick.”

“We both know you’re just going to shoot me full of happy juice and send me on my way,” I said, and as the words left my mouth, he took a step back from me and shook his head.

“I’m not sure that’s wise. You’re clearly a danger to yourself and others.” He sat down in the chair beside my bed. “How can I possibly let you out before we make sure you’re not only back on your medication, but that it’s actually working?”

“Um… because I promise to take my pills?” I asked as sweetly as I could because I didn’t even have an answer for his question. What he said sounded totally reasonable.

“You punched me in the face, beat up some orderlies, and ran away screaming about a snake monster,” he said, shaking his head. “I’m worried you’re getting worse.”