Authors: V J Chambers
Trembling (21 page)
"Who could be dead through a kiss like that?" said Jason. He pulled
me close and kissed me again. My heart stopped in my chest.
Hallam scrambled to his feet. "Isis and Osiris," he muttered.
"You
are
the
Rising Sun. Your consort breathed life into you. It's one of the signs."
Jason stood up too and helped me to my feet. He shrugged at me, taking my hand.
"Well," he said, "gotta say it's good to be a dying god. But I
really think this bullet didn't do much damage. It doesn't even hurt."
"You were dead!" Hallam said. "You didn't have a pulse!"
Jason laughed. "Right, Hallam. It's a miracle." He grinned at me.
"Of course, I guess we did drive a bunch of men mad a few months ago.
Maybe we really are, like, magic or something." He laughed again.
"Come on, Azazel, we've got to get out of here."
"You can't leave," said Hallam.
"Got to," said Jason. "Don't you know that I must be about
screwing up my father's business?" He took his phone out of his pocket and
hit a few numbers. Holding it to his ear, he said, "I've got her. Meet me
out front. When can you get here? . . . Good." Jason hung up his phone. He
turned to Hallam. "You double-crossed me. You've been in touch with Weem
all this time."
"Did you overhear while you were . . . dead?" Hallam said.
"No," said Jason. "No, I've got a source. Listen, Hallam, you
and I have a history. Just let me and Azazel walk out of here, okay? I'm
willing to just let you go. You were my friend."
Hallam looked confused. "Where are you going?"
"I never want to see you again," said Jason. "If I do, I'll have
to kill you."
Jason took my hand and led me through the house. When the Sons saw us, they
dropped their guns. They fell to their knees. They whispered amongst themselves
things like, "He's alive" and "He
is
the one." On the front porch, two
of the Sons were wrestling with Jude. When Jude saw us, he went nuts.
He yelled after us, "This isn't over, Jason! You killed Mother! I won't
ever forget that, and I'll make sure you don't either!"
But in the tired darkness of the wee hours of the morning, with the moon
sagging in the sky above us, a car pulled up in front of Michaela Weem's house.
Jason led me towards it.
"Jason," I said, "who . . .?"
"You'll see," he said, opening the door for me.
We slid into the back seat together, and Jason slid his arm around me, holding
me tight against him. It felt so good to be close to him.
The driver in the car turned around. "Where to, kids?" he said.
I looked at Jason in alarm.
The driver was Sutherland.
Epilogue
Twenty hours later, Jason and I were standing at the
Trevi Fountain in
eternal city. Bright sunlight filtered through the ancient buildings and a
crowd of tourist had already gathered around the fountain. The water cascaded
over the statues, which were so life-like, I thought the stone horses were
going to leap out at us over the frothy water and gallop across the square. Of
course, that might have been just because I was ridiculously sleep deprived.
I hadn't slept
—
really slept
anyway
—
since the night that
I huddled with Lilith in the abandoned house. Instead, Sutherland had taken
both Jason and I to the airport, where we'd caught a flight to
confused. I tried to ask Jason questions as we waited for the plane, but it
wasn't until we boarded and got settled that we really got to talk.
During the long flight to
Jason had explained as best as he could what had happened. "First of
all," he said. "I owe you an apology. I kept saying you were
paranoid, and that there wasn't any danger, and you were right all along."
"No," I said. "I thought it was the Sons. I was wrong. And I was
totally clueless about Jude. I should have listened to you."
"I should have listened to
you
," Jason said. "I can't
keep running away from this stuff. It follows me everywhere. It's part of who I
am. I won't forget that again. Okay?"
I kissed him. "I'm just glad you're alive."
He grinned. "Well, so am I."
Jason began to explain. After beating Sutherland to an inch of his life, Sutherland
had begged Jason to let him live, promising to tell Jason information that he
knew about the Satanists and Jude. Disgusted, Jason had left him, coming back
to me that night, dazed from his violence. After I'd disappeared, Jason
remembered what I'd said to him about the Satanists. He'd hunted Sutherland
down and beaten the information out of him.
"Sutherland and I made a deal," Jason said. "In return for his
cooperation and any information he knew about me or you, I told him who my
father was."
Sutherland, in return, had told him that Michaela Weem had engineered the
capturing of me. He'd been doing Michaela a favor by watching me. That was why
he'd been in
Sutherland also told Jason that Jude was actually Michaela's son. Further, he
told Jason that Hallam was in contact with Edgar Weem.
Armed with this knowledge, Jason had gone to Michaela's house, tied her up, and
left the note for Jude to find. Sutherland had used his knowledge to contact
the biggest enemy of the Sons that existed
—
the
Catholic Church.
I was surprised. Jason said that he was too. Since Jason knew that Hallam was
working for Weem, he got Sutherland to work a deal with the Church. In exchange
for sheltering us, we'd help them fight against the Sons. That was why we were
in
to stay with people who wouldn't let us have sex.
Because of Sutherland's actions, big changes were going down in the Sons. Weem
had purportedly stepped down and had been succeeded by Ian Hoyt, my great
uncle, who I'd never heard of. There were things I didn't understand about the
connection between the Hoyts and the Sons. Was Grandma Hoyt working with the
Sons? Was she working with the Satanists? Now that we were in
fully intended to visit my younger brother Chance at his boarding school. I
thought it was strange that my grandmother had sent him away right before
everything had gone down with Gordon and Noah. I didn't know what was going on
with my grandmother.
Then I'd spent some time catching Jason up on everything that had happened to
me. I was breezing past some of the things at first, like how Noah and Gordon
had showed me hours of videotape and documents proving that Jason was actually
a cold-blooded killer. Jason stopped me and asked me about it though.
"They showed you what?" he asked.
I explained again, but slower. He wanted to know about the video of the girl
from the sorority house. He made me explain it in excruciating detail. I felt
embarrassed, frightened that Jason would think that just because I was telling
him the story, I also believed it. I didn't. But I was confused. I wasn't sure
what to think.
"She said I was smiling?" Jason repeated.
I toyed with the tray table
—
the
remains of the snack that the flight attendant had yet to collect from us.
"A lot of people said that about you. That you were smiling."
"Really?" said Jason. He looked disturbed. He settled back into his
chair and looked into the aisle of the plane.
"And Hallam said it too. He said that he saw you kill Anton on a video
tape and that you were smiling when you did it."
"Really," Jason repeated, still not looking at me.
"I don't believe it," I said. "Or . . . even if it is true, it
doesn't matter."
He turned to me then. "You mean that?" he said.
"Of course I mean it," I said.
"No matter what I've done."
"No matter what you've done, I'll always love you," I said. "I
overheard you saying something like that about me to Lilith."
He nodded. "I did. It's true."
"Did you . . . did you kill people before you met me?"
Jason stared down at his fingers. He shook his head. "No," he said.
"No, of course not."
I nodded. Of course, he hadn't. How could I have believed . . .? I hadn't,
though. I hadn't believed. We were quiet for a little bit, then Jason prompted
me to go on.
I finished explaining what had happened to me, everything, including shooting
Noah and Gordon and killing Lilith. Jason squeezed my hand tight when I thought
I might cry. And I didn't.
"It's good that we're talking about all of this," Jason said. "I
don't think we've been communicating enough lately. We've been avoiding things
that are true. We never talked about what happened in
About the Sons going nuts."
I was glad he said that. I'd been thinking about that too. In the house with
Noah and Gordon. "I know," I said. "We've been running from who
we are. From what we are."
"We tell each other everything from now on," he said.
"Yes," I said. "And it doesn't matter what it is. Because I
trust you, and I want to know you. And I want to know everything you've ever
felt or done been."
"Then we tell each other everything."
"Everything."
* * *
Once in
our wounds bandaged, we'd gone sight-seeing. The monks of the order assured us
that the Sons wouldn't bother us in
The entire city was a sanctuary of sorts, considering its history and ties to
the Church. We wandered freely through the streets, feeling a kind of liberty
we hadn't felt in months.
Next to us, a tour guide was telling her tour that throwing one coin over your
shoulder into the fountain would ensure you returned to
love, and three would mean your current lover would break up with you. Jason
and I didn't have any coins, so we didn't throw any.
But it wouldn't have mattered anyway. We were going to be in
issue. As for love, we had exactly what we wanted.
True love. Honest
love. Forever.
* * *
Later, as twilight was falling on
hand in hand. We paused and sat down on the Spanish steps. I lay my head on
Jason's shoulder. And he took my hand. Then he whispered in my ear, "I
lied to you."
I started, moving to look at him.
"One thing," he said. "And I guess I've been lying to myself
about it for a long time too, because I didn't want to face it. But when I'm
with you, I don't feel like I'm who I used to be. And when I'm with you, I feel
like . . ."
"You can tell me anything, Jason. You know that."
"He called me an abomination," said Jason. "The same words
Michaela Weem used. When she said them, I thought of it. That night, he came to
me, and he said that I was a thing of great evil. He was all I ever had. And he
wanted me dead."
I took Jason's hands in mine. "You killed Anton, didn’t you?"
He
nodded.
