Secret Worlds (408 page)

This time, Tom has to agree to see me. He must know who Dante is, and if he doesn’t, we need to find out.

***

Tom’s house is as faceless as his human life is. I stare at the flaking green front door, memories of Rose flooding back because this is the last place I saw her. Nobody is home or they’re ignoring me, so I sit on the cold stone step and wait.

Fortunately, Tom appears first, the weird skinny guy dressed as if he was twenty years older than he is, nondescript trousers and shirt. At school, I’d have teased the hell out of this guy. Now I have to ask him for help. He pauses on the pavement and eyes me warily. “Alek?”

“Tom. Rose needs your help.”

“I tried to call her loads and she’s not answering. Is she okay?”

“No.”

He doesn’t approach, clutching the handle of his large bag. If I stand, he could get intimidated, so despite my desperate need that has me on the edge of demanding or threatening, I stay where I am.

“Where is she?”

“In danger from some of these people you track.”

“The Dark?” His expression changes to one of interest.

“Worse. Do you have some kind of database with names? I need to find out who somebody is.”

“You won’t hurt me, will you?” he asks.

“What the fuck? If you’re the only person who can help me find Rose, what do you think?”

“Okay.” Tom edges toward me. I move to one side.

As I enter his house, the punch in the guts accompanying thoughts of Rose hits again. We walk into the kitchen. I stare out the window at the spot on the pavement where the man died. The place I last saw her.

“What happened after the party? Did the police come?” I turn back to him.

Tom sets his black messenger bag on the table. “They arrested the guy who did it. There were plenty of witnesses. Our landlord is threatening to evict us, though.” He makes a soft sound in his throat. “Our first ever party.”

I scoff. “You did invite Between, Dark, and Reapers, Tom. Who invited the nurse? I’d like to talk to him about what he saw Finn do.” And kill the Dark bastard.

“Finn or Rose, I suppose? I don’t know him. What did Finn do?”

I bristle, suspicious of Finn again. His reaction to Rose’s disappearance was genuine shock, though. Or is he a good actor because he now refuses to help? I tell Tom the story, about how I saw Rose disappear and of my suspicions. I don’t give him the story about Lizzie and Julian.

The front door opens and Tom goes out to see who arrived. Grace’s voice travels from the lounge and she comes into the room.

“Hey, Alek. Why are you here?”

I edge to the corner of the room, aware I’m drawing some of their energy, and I want to stay and talk. “I have a name and I need to find out who it is.”

“Raven?” asks Grace.

I stare at her. “How do you know about her?”

“I lived with her, didn’t I?”

“What the fuck?”

“We’re paranormal investigators, Alek.” She pauses and fixes me with a disparaging stare. “Not ghostbusters. We don’t waste time trying to find ghosts, our work is a bit more than that.”

“There’s bigger stuff happening,” says Tom. “Otherwise, why would Grace risk living with two demons?”

Shocked silence isn’t a normal response of mine, but it’s all I have.

Tom pulls a couple chocolate bars from his bag and throws one to Grace. I frown. “To counteract what you’re doing to us,” he says, unwrapping the bar.

“I’m not deliberately taking your energy.”

“I know, but you drain a lot more than Rose. You can’t stay here long.”

In a room full of people, I don’t do much harm; in a room with just a couple, it’s tough not to. “Can’t we go somewhere else and talk?”

Grace shakes her head. “We’re not talking about this publicly and we don’t want to be seen with you. The party has put us in the spotlight as it is.” She throws Tom an unimpressed look.

“How was I supposed to know what would happen?” asks Tom.

“You should’ve listened to Zach!” she retorts.

“Look, if I have to leave soon, just tell me what I need to know and quickly,” I say.

“Which is?” asks Grace

“Who’s Dante?” I ask.

Grace’s hands hover where she’s taking her laptop from her rucksack. “Dante? Where did you hear that name?”

“Obviously you know him. How about the doctor at the hospital? Julian Granger?”

Tom pulls out a small, red notepad and I stare as he writes something down. “I put everything in my book, so we don’t lose anything if we get hacked.”

“What if you lose your book?” I ask.

“Exactly what I say,” says Grace. “That’s why I’m part of the twenty-first century.” She flips open the lid on her laptop.

Grace clicks a few keys as Tom leafs through his book. “Dante. Chief demon, a king perhaps.”

“I doubt they have a democracy,” snorts Tom.

“King? So he’s a leader?” I ask.

“Yeah, he’s mentioned in a lot of old texts as a mythical leader. He’s a martyr to the cause of the Dark and a symbol of the power they could regain. The ‘good old Dante days’. “

This is worse than I thought. “Which I presume weren’t good?”

“Awesome, if you’ve a Dark soul. Not so great for the rest of us.”

I bristle but bite my tongue against explaining I’m not Dark because I’m Between. “Where is he?”

“Hell, of course. Or whatever your kind call it.”

What the fuck? They want to send me to Hell? “I’m not their kind,” I growl.

“What’s wrong?” asks Tom sharply. “You’ve gone pale.”

“ I think we might be revisiting ‘the good old Dante days’. The guy at the hospital, the doctor, he’s preparing for him to come back.”

“I knew it!” says Tom triumphantly. “Didn’t I say?” He looks at Grace who stares back at him as if he’s a lunatic.

“Yeah, but you say it like it’s a good thing,” she says.

Tom clears his throat. “That’s not what I meant.”

“What’s he planning to do when he gets back?” Grace asks me.

“I thought you might be able to tell me?”

Tom swears under his breath. “No, what you should be asking Alek is
how
is he getting back?”

That is something they don’t need to know, not until I’ve decided what I’m going to do.

“Thanks for telling me about Dante.” I peel myself from the kitchen bench and head to the door.

“You can’t ask us and then just leave us with half a story!” protests Tom.

“I don’t know the whole story,” I say and lean toward him. “I’m going now before I hurt someone.” Tom takes a step back, and I push my way out of the kitchen. I wouldn’t hurt the guy, but it’s best if his wariness of me borders on fear.

“Will you be able to help Rose?” asks Tom from the kitchen. I pause, hand on the front door handle. “Can you bring her back from wherever they took her?”

“I hope so,” I say quietly, wishing I could say ‘yes’.

ALEK

The next morning, I hang around the house after a night running my choices over and over in my head. Dante’s from Hell and Finn’s an angel, right? I was never religious, but the ideas came from somewhere. Good conquers evil? This means Finn can help? Finn knows what’s happening, he has to.

Rose’s handbag rests on the table by the front door where I placed it after the party. I pull out her phone and search for Finn’s name. Tempted to read through their messages, I stop myself. Rose was scared of him; why would there be anything between them?

The phone rings once before Finn answers. “Rose?”

“Alek.”

Silence.

“I said I couldn’t help,” he says, voice flat.

“Heard of Dante?” I put in before he has a chance to end the call.

“Of course.”

“You don’t sound so worried.”

“If I do what I need, he won’t come back.”

“What’s that?”

“Leave me alone.” He hangs up.

I stare at the phone in disgust. He caused some of this; he doesn’t get to wash his hands of us. I call him back. No answer. On the tenth call, he answers.

“For fuck’s sake, Alek, I don’t want to see or talk to you.”

“Help me to help Rose.”

“No.”

“What? You care about her.”

“Not anymore, she’s lost now.”

“She isn’t! Finn, I’m going to get her.”

“No! If you go to her, you both need to stay there.”

“Why?”

“Because when you get back, I’ll kill you both.”

His words stun. I’ve spent the last few weeks convincing Rose that Finn intends to kill her. Rose’s protest that he’s a good guy almost had me convinced. Was I right all along?

“You wouldn’t kill Rose.”

“I know they’ve asked you to bring Dante over and I can’t let that happen. Do you understand what chaos he’s bringing with him? If you both come back I won’t know who’s carrying him. He won’t hang around your bodies long, so I’ll have to kill you both before he gets a chance to leave.”

He knows. How does he know?

“You wouldn’t kill Rose,” I repeat icily.

“Wouldn’t I? This is over, Alek. Go to her or stay here, but there’s nothing anyone can do.”

“I was right all along about you,” I spit. “You always meant to kill her!”

“Goodbye, Alek. Again. Stop calling me.” He ends the call again.

I retreat to the kitchen, sit at the melamine table with a beer, and remain there longer than it takes to drink. I don’t have a choice; I never had a choice, not since the day I agreed to exchange my soul for my sister to live in peace after her death. My phone rests on the table next to the beer. Six times I pick it up to call Raven, and six times I put it back down.

What’s the point in delaying this?
I call her. “How do I do it?” I ask Raven.

The sound of voices in the background fades as Raven moves somewhere quieter.

“Let a Shade take all your energy,” she replies.

I glance at the stairs, where the room the Shades pass into sits at the top. “That’s all?”

“You need to get into the Void.”

I shudder at the memory. “But I’ll instinctively fight the Shade; I won’t be able to help myself.”

Raven giggles. “Just lie back and think of Rose.”

“This is all a joke to you?” I snarl.

“No, Alek. This is very serious.”

“And how do I get back?”

“Again, the same way as last time.”

Shit.
“That was difficult. What if I can’t manage this time?”

“Dante will take care of that, don’t worry. You’ll be a lot stronger with him as your passenger.”

Rose’s jacket hangs over the chair opposite and I pick it up, as if connecting to her. “And I can go anytime?”

“Whenever you’re ready. Dante’s not going anywhere. But don’t take too long, you don’t want Rose disappearing.”

Scrunching Rose’s jacket in my arms, I take a deep breath, catching the scent of her. “I’m going tonight.”

***

The room darkens as the afternoon ends. I sit with my beer, staring at the row of empties in front of me and remembering Rose’s admonishment about drinking. I reconnect with the feeling of helplessness I had in the early days and understand why Rose has been so scared. Even if I refused to do what Julian asks and instead stay where I am, I wouldn’t escape what they want from me. I made the bargain, so I’d only delay the inevitable. I have no doubt I’ll end up in Hell eventually, once I’m no longer any use. But Rose never made the choice; she doesn’t deserve this.

I walk slowly upstairs toward the door Lizzie once let the Shades through. I never touched the door, unless Lizzie was with me to control them, because I was unsure how strong the Shade who came through would be. I used to marvel at how she could control them with her barrier spell and weaken the strong ones. I suppose I should’ve considered then how strange this was for a human witch.

The room is bare, just a bedroom with a bed and mattress, a lamp table, and curtains, which don’t meet in the middle. The scratched wooden floor and flaking blue paint on the walls show years of use, but not recently - by humans, anyway.

The cold hits as soon as I walk in but nothing is here. Do I wait? The door clicks closed behind and I rest against the hard wood. Within seconds, the room temperature plummets further and my gaze darts from place to place. Where will it come from? Raven used to just bring them through the door.

A figure materialises from the wall, beginning as a shadow, which at first looks like it comes from the setting sun but gradually darkens. Does this Shade know I’m here, or is it going to get a huge shock? Because the energy he or she is about to get from me will see it stuck here for some time.

The Shade solidifies gradually, morphing in and out of view. I focus on who or what, already disappointed at the small size of the Shade. A girl, around my human age, petite with short black hair comes into focus. Once she reaches a solid state, she stumbles backwards and places her hand behind her onto the wall. Her alarmed look turns to one of suspicion as she narrows her eyes at me.

“What the fuck?” she growls.

Not the reaction I expected. Her delicate features are pierced, a metal hoop in her bottom red-painted lip and stud in her nose. She blinks at me through heavy black eye make-up.

“Where the hell am I?”

“You’re back in the world,” I say.

“What world?”

“The world of the living?” I suggest sarcastically.

The girl glances around the room, and then back to me, lips pursed. “Are you high?”

“Not currently, no.”

“Why am I in this room with you? Is this some kind of weird dream?” She touches her face. “Am
I
high?”

Great, why did the Shade have to be one of the clueless ones? “You do know you’re dead, right?”

“Whoa, dude. Okay, let’s talk about this. You don’t need to kill me...” She holds up her hands, palms out. “Just let me leave, okay. You don’t need to keep me here.”

I huff and step away from the door, indicating to the girl she can try. “Sure, go ahead.”

She edges past me and opens the door, and I close my eyes against her inevitable reaction. The girl rushes at the doorway and is slammed backwards onto the floor.

“Why the hell can’t I get out?” She pulls herself up, a rising tone of panic in her voice.

“You’re not strong enough,” I say.