Клаудия Грэй - Afterlife

Of course Lucas dreamed about her, too. She’d killed him. But how many monsters would I have to banish from Lucas’s dreams just to win a few hours for us?

“Lucas!” I shouted. I threw myself toward the fray, sliding bet\veen Lucas and Erich. “Look at me!”

“Bianca?” Lucas looked horrified. “What are you doing here?”

Erich’s hands seized me from behind, strong as steel. “Hey, Lucas — want to watch your girlfriend suffer?”

“No!” Lucas grabbed me, pulling me back. The struggle felt totally real.

“Lucas, he can’t kill me,” I said as I tried to twist out of Erich’s grip. His fingers felt like claws digging into my flesh; it was difficult to remind myself that this wasn’t real. “He can’t hurt you either. It’s a dream. Don’t you remember?”

He couldn’t hear me. Panic had gripped him — his fear for my life far greater than it had ever been for his. “Bianca, hang on!”

Lucas kept trying to swing at Erich with his stake, but Erich dragged me that way and this, using my body to block them. “You’re going to be the one to kill her, hunter,” Erich sneered. “You’ll cremate her to stop the pain. You know those old stories they told you in Black Cross? About the worst torture you can work on a vampire? Soak the stake in holy water, stab them deep so the holy water sinks into their blood — and then they’re paralyzed forever. Can’t wake up, can’t move. They just lie there feeling like they’re burning alive for all eternity.”

“I never did that,” Lucas panted. “Not even to scum like you. You, I’m just gonna kill.”

“I’m going to try it.” Erich spoke into the side of my face; I could feel his cool undead breath against my neck. “I’m going to do it to Bianca. She’ll be like Sleeping Beauty, but you’ll know she’s not sleeping. You’ll know she’s burning forever. Nobody else will be able to hear her screaming, but I bet you will.”

“You won’t get the chance,” Lucas swore, but I could see his fear mounting. When he risked his own life, he could stay calm; when it came to me, he lost it.

Finally I lunged forward, pulling myself free of Erich’s grasp. Sharp lines of pain lashed my shoulder — Erich’s fingernails, I thought — but I didn’t care as I fell to the floor. Lucas flung himself at Erich, sending them both toppling down. The battle was furious now, blood from open cuts spattering onto the stone wall.

My silver, shining blood oozed between my fingertips. It glistened on the floor, mingling with Lucas’s red blood in a way that seemed beautiful, almost mesmerizing.

Snap out of it! I told myself. I was in shock.

“Oh, this is fun,” Charity laughed from her place atop the boxes. She clapped her hands like a little girl who’s just seen her birthday cake. “Save her, Lucas! Save her while you still can! Or.. maybe you can ‘ t?”

Lucas’s face took on an expression I recognized, though I’d only seern it once before. I could never have forgotten it — the look of pure torment he’d worn at my bedside the night I died.

At that moment I realized that I couldn’t break him out of this memory. I couldn’t do anything in this dream except make it more frightening for Lucas. That meant I had to leave.

I closed myself away from sight. Away from him. When I could see again, I stood in his dark dorm room, at the foot of his bed. Lucas twisted beneath his sheets, then slumped, drifting from the nightmare to deeper, dreamless sleep.

At least it’s over, I told myself. Yet even in my ethereal form, I could feel physical pain; that had never happened before. Confused, I glanced at my burning, aching shoulder.

The lines of Erich’s scratches still showed upon my skin, and each one glimmered with droplets of silver blood.

I LEFT THE DORM ROOM, GOING THROUGH THE door and down the hallway as though I were mortal. More time must have passed than I’d realized, because nearly everyone was quiet, asleep or at least settled in for the night. Although I badly wanted to revisit Vic and Ranulf, in the feeble hope that they could cheer me up, I Wouldn’t wake them for my own selfish reasons.

Without them, I realized, there was literally nobody else in the world I could talk to, or even watch, without it causing pain.

How did we screw up so badly? I thought as I descended the long, winding stone stairs. Around me I could hear the crackling of ice. I was leaving evidence, but at this point I didn’t much care. The only thing we ever wanted was to be together, and to live honestly without all the lies. How did so many people get hurt?

For the first time, I realized how easy it would be to follow Maxie’s advice and let go of the mortal world completely. Effortless, mindless drifting within blue mist seemed really good to me right now. It would have been a relief to be free from sorrow and guilt, from responsibility for the people I’d left behind.

Was that true for the ghosts trapped at Evernight Academy now? Maybe trapped wasn’t the right word. This could be a sanctuary for them, too — a place where they didn’t have to remain in their old haunts and habitations, taunted by the lives they’d lost.

But Mrs. Bethany had attacked Maxie once, and was no friend to the wraiths. There was no way she’d built this place as a refuge for them. Tentatively, I stretched my consciousness, seeking the other wraiths who lived here. Can you hear me?

No response — but I could sense a shift in the air, like knowing that someone was watching. Then the visions began to flood my mind.

They were like vivid daydreams, almost hallucinations, except that I knew they didn’t come from within my own mind. The wraiths were forcing me to see them: Vampires, each of them at their most monstrous, as though students went around Evemight unwashed, bloody, and fanged. They were attacking human students in the hallways, in the classrooms. one brutal assault after another.

“None of that is real,” I said, hoping they could hear. “They mostly leave the human students alone, and when somebody screws up, Mrs.

Bethany’s all over them. The humans you followed here — they’re safe.”

The wraiths must not have believed me. Every image intensified, coming closer, and now they had sound (screaming) and smell (blood). Disgusted, I tried to turn away, but how can you turn away from something in your own head?

One of the vampires in the visions suddenly went blue and turned into ice. I watched, fascinated and horrified, as deep cracks appeared in his hardening flesh, fragmenting his cheeks, his lips, his whole head. He fell, a crash of bloody slush, and I knew that was what the wraiths hoped to do to the vampires.

What they wanted me to help them do. “I’m not helping you attack anyone!”

And like that, I was alone. Nothing vanished or went away, but I simply knew that I Wasn’t being paid attention to any longer.

What were the ghosts going to do? If I’d been terrified of them before, it was so much worse now. I’d learned some new powers, but nothing that could defend me or my loved ones against an attack like that. Could the wraiths hurt Lucas? Balthazar? My parents? If they tried anything, would I be able to help?

No, I thought, depression sinking deeper into me. There’s nothing I can do for any ofthem. I’m useless.

I’m dead.

I drifted through the great hall on the ground floor, which looked larger when it was empty of students. Although it was always a majestic space, it became more beautiful and austere when it stretched out vast and silent. The moonlight streamed through the many stained — glass windows, which stretched from floor to ceiling, but it was brightest through the one window of plain glass. The original stained glass had been destroyed by a member of Black Cross — Lucas’s long — ago predecessor here — making hiis escape. Lucas had damaged it himself once, maybe living up to the family tradition. I’d always wondered why Mrs. Bethany didn’t have it repaired so that it would look like the others.