Amelia Atwater-Rhodes - Token of Darkness

“Margaret’s back is broken,” Ryan answered. “The doctors have told me that it’s a low break, so it doesn’t affect any major systems, but the paralysis of her legs is probably total.”

Cooper returned, and reported, “Samantha isn’t there, and Delilah is still unconscious. They’ve got her on some kind of breathing thing. So, who is this?”

Before Ryan could answer, Brent returned with the nurse, who had a slightly dazed look in her eyes. Ryan or Brent or both of them had probably done a number on her mind, convincing her to let them all in here outside visiting hours.

The nurse checked Delilah’s … no, Margaret’s vitals. Delilah refused to think of this body as herself. She was borrowing it for a little while. That was all.

“When can you get me out of here?” she asked Ryan. “And back in my own body?”

Ryan nodded, though slowly. “Cooper should be able to knock you out of this body. I can keep the shadows at bay so you are not damaged without your flesh. With your own power to guide you, you should be able to reinhabit your own body without trouble now that it is no longer drowning.”

Cooper seemed less calm. “Wait, I can what? Who says I can do this intentionally?”

“You were going to come back to study with me, weren’t you?” Ryan asked. “Consider this your first lesson.”

“I’m not entirely comfortable with having my ‘first lesson’ involve another person,” Cooper said.

Delilah found herself smiling, impressed to see Cooper, who she had always thought of as something of a teddy bear, standing up to Ryan. He did so in his own mellow way, but it was still more than she had ever seen Brent do.

At that moment, for example, Brent was leaning against the far wall with his eyes closed. She could recognize the tension between his brows as a sign of one of his ever-present headaches.

“It’s all right, Cooper,” she assured him. “Sometimes you have to risk a little to learn a little.”

Cooper looked like he was going to continue to argue, but before he could, a flicker of shadow caused them all to turn toward the other side of the room. Samantha’s colorful form looked like crystal as the afternoon sun streamed through it. There were tears on her face.

“I didn’t mean it!” she cried. “I didn’t know what was going on. I got scared! I just—I mean, I—” She broke off as she noticed the figure on the hospital bed, and her face took on an expression of cold horror.

“Samantha. Nice of you to join us,” Ryan said. He looked wary, but to his credit, he stepped between the elemental and the three humans without hesitating. “I gather you have benefited from Delilah’s experiments, since the four of us can all see you clearly now. Delilah didn’t fare quite so well, but she’ll be fine in a few minutes. Cooper, is that the face she has always had to you?”

Cooper nodded, and pushed past Ryan, heedless of any danger the elemental might represent. “Samantha, are you …” She lifted a hand as if to grasp his, but her hand passed through his. They both frowned. “I believe you that it wasn’t your fault.”

“Then you’re the only one in this room who does,” Ryan muttered under his breath.

“What happened to the person who was in this body?” Cooper asked, looking at Delilah.

Ryan swallowed tightly, and for a brief moment, Delilah thought he might actually display a hint of emotion. His words, however, were blunt. “She’s gone. Once Delilah’s essence is returned to its rightful place, this body will once again be inert. Margaret has no blood relations left, so her guardianship has fallen to my family, since we were her mentors. I have been pursuing the process of having her body taken off life support.”

“There’s no possibility of her recovering, even with your magic?” Cooper asked.

Ryan shook his head, though he was looking at Samantha, who had crept toward the bed. Having her so near made Delilah nervous. She might have looked like a pretty teenage girl, but the expression in her eyes as she stared at Delilah was very far away, and not entirely human.

“Then …” Cooper drew a deep breath. “Is there … I mean, this sounds horrible to even ask, but if she’s really gone and there’s nothing else …” He trailed off, and looked to Ryan and Brent for help, but neither offered it. Cooper managed at last to put the words together. “You thought Samantha might have been in Delilah’s body, right? That means you think she could do something like that. What about this body? Once Delilah is back in her own, could this one maybe make it possible for Samantha to be alive?” He winced. “I know this girl was a friend of yours or something, but—”

“Samantha’s an elemental,” Delilah said. “She doesn’t need to use another body to have form. She should be able to create one, once she is bound to a mortal being.”

“She obviously isn’t powerful enough to maintain that kind of connection, or she would have done it already,” Ryan said. “Using another’s form is probably the only option she has, and it is not acceptable. Delilah, if you knew Margaret, you would realize—”

“Stop talking like I’m not here!” Samantha’s shriek made the panes of the windows rattle. “I don’t want that … that thing!” She reached forward, and Delilah tensed for a blow, but she could not have expected the sensations that followed.

Samantha didn’t hit Margaret’s body; she actually hit Delilah. Delilah felt herself shoved outward and upward. Disoriented, and fighting to regain some kind of control, she saw chaos break out. Samantha hit Ryan before he had any chance to defend himself, and as he crumpled, Samantha turned to the body on the hospital bed. Cooper, Brent, and Samantha were all shouting, the words overlapping each other but sounding muffled. All Delilah could tell was that Samantha had gone mad and was determined to kill the figure on the bed.

“You don’t have to!” Cooper shouted. “If you don’t want to—”

“She shouldn’t be here!” Samantha wailed. “She should be dead. She shouldn’t have lived!”

To Delilah’s surprise, Brent stepped forward, taking charge of the situation. He gripped Cooper’s bare arm with one hand, and then reached toward Samantha’s form with his other hand.

The shock waves that followed sent Delilah tumbling backward into darkness … and then again into memories of fire. Tears snapped and sizzled as they fell into the flames. What had she done? “Tell me where you are!” she shouted. She could hear the screaming, but she couldn’t find the source. “Please!” The fire was starting to get too hot, and the power she had summoned was starting to fade in the face of her despair .

Delilah woke with a gasp, her body spasming as her lungs struggled to eject phantom water and smoke. Her lungs; her body. She was still in the hospital, but she was in her own skin. Now, what about everyone else?

Cooper woke on a hospital bed, with his mother sitting pale-faced beside him. “How long have I been out?” he asked.

“Only a few hours, and you’ve just been sleeping naturally for most of it. Long enough for them to check your wallet and call me. Thank God the hospital had the sense to tell me you were all right before they told me you fainted,” his mother said, gripping his hand tightly enough that he winced. “They ran some drug tests, but those came back clean, of course. They’ve scheduled you for a CAT scan and an MRI to make sure nothing’s wrong. Your father wanted to be here, but the doctors said he needs to be on antibiotics for twenty-four hours before he’s out and about.”

Cooper nodded, the small movement causing his head to spin as he tried to piece together his jumbled memories of what had happened. Samantha had gone berserk. Cooper’s idiotic suggestion had sent her into a frenzy far beyond anything he could have predicted. Then Brent … well, he wasn’t sure what Brent had done.