Heartless (The Heartless Series) (24 page)

Guess I'd be finding out soon.

Hell on Earth.

Except I'll probably be dead.

"You have to die today, Gracen. I'm sorry… It's just the way things have to be. If you do, you can be saved."

I never get a chance to ask Seth what he means by
saved.

"My brother." Hart pushes me to the edge of the rim, but he doesn't let me go. He holds on to my arm, not tight. I'm not even sure he realizes he's still doing it. Truthfully, it is how Sam used to hold onto me when we were standing in line at the movies, at a restaurant, or wherever we happened to be. He always had a hand on me. Always. I never much thought about it at the time. I just assumed it was him holding me, sort of like holding my hand, only not.

Ain't I a lucky duck?

"Is he in there?" I whisper to Hart who has his eyes directly on Seth.

It takes him a second to register that I'm even talking to him. He looks down at me, his brows knotted. "Who?"

"Your brother? Did he fall? Is he down there? In Hell? Is that why you did this? To get to him and get your revenge?" If this was going to be the last few minute of my life, I wanted to at least know all of the puzzle pieces and where they fell into place.

Hart shakes his head. "No, he's not in Hell, though he should be." He focuses back on Seth, and so do I.

Seth sets a book up on a rock that looks strangely like a pulpit. I say a prayer. Why not? If God can't hear a demon praying, if my prayers won't get into Heaven, then what's the difference? But if the angels can hear me… maybe they can get to me. Maybe they can help in some way.

Wow, if I could only speak Latin. They really should teach that in schools. Especially if Hell comes to Earth, I'm sure it will be a handy language to know. He rattles on, and my insides start to shake. If I thought any anxiety I'd ever had before was bad, yeah, this—there are no words for this.

As Seth reads the words, everything in me wants to run. Surely I can outrun them. I'm strong, right? I'm a pure demon—stronger than them. If only I knew how to kick in my freakin' demon mojo! Not that I want demon mojo, but beggars can't be choosers. I don't want to kill my father—
my father.

Hart grips my arm tighter and looks at me again. I don't see the scary dude I'd seen in my dreams. I don't see the guy who has ruined my life. This guy, he looks just as scared as me. Scared about losing me? He can't be. Why would he care in the least about me? I mean nothing to him. A means to an end. And now that he's turned me into a monster, what else is there? What else would he want from me? Why is he looking at me like his favorite pet is dying?

Maybe I am.

And maybe I am.

"I am sorry about this, you know?"

I have to do a double take. "Excuse me?"

Hart seems different. I can hear Seth repeating some words I don't understand, don't want to understand, and I'm praying for the angels to come. So, whatever it is that Hart's sorry about, I'm kinda busy at the moment. Wind picks up inside the cave and tosses my hair around my head. It gets more powerful with each word Seth says.

"I'm sorry… for what I had to do to you to get you here. It wasn't personal."

I'm sure my jaw dropped at Hart's words. "You mean you didn't enjoy torturing me? Eating my innards every night. Pretending to be my aunt… pretending to be my boyfriend…"

He opens his mouth to speak when Seth cuts him off. "Children, you can stop flirting now." We turn to face Seth. The words he'd chanted caused light to shine through the glass. It lights up Seth's face in the cavern, lights it up and forms shadows which, when he smiles, makes him look extremely creepy. More than creepy. Terrifying. "It's time."

My mind races.

Time… It's my time.

My time to die.

My insides feel like they're going to explode. I feel something swelling within me. My heart… my soul… I have no idea. Hart said I didn't have either one. But I know something is in there. Something is pumping to come out. I have no idea what. I don't know how to let it out or how to save myself. I feel helpless, and I hate it.

I've always hated feeling helpless. Feeling like a freak. Feeling like I didn't fit it. I've never liked being an outsider. Now I know why, why I could never have friends. Why I could never have anything like normal people. Because I'm not normal. I'm an abomination. An abomination to God. If I'm something that God hates, there's no way He's going to help me. There's no way he's going to send anybody or anything down here and save me. He might save the world, but he won't save me.

Some things can't be saved.

The feeling that God hates me crushes me. My stomach knots tighter, and I feel like I'm going to throw up. After everything I've learned and heard and whatever about myself, it is finally sinking in. I'm something that is against God.

And I'm going to die.

And there is no way in Hell that I'm going to Heaven.

My legs feel like they're going to give out. I can hardly stand on them. My knees buckle, and Hart has to catch me. He seems surprised at first. "Gracen." His voice shakes. This is getting to him too. I can feel it. It feels like everything inside of me is screaming, exploding, and I can't hold it in.

I can't control it.

A tear slides down my face. When Hart wipes it away, it isn't water. It's blood.

"Fear," Seth says, his hand outstretched like he is welcoming me to come toward him. "Fear is something we can't control. Our greatest weakness. And you…" He walks toward me, and I want to run. With everything I have, I want to run. The only thing keeping me on my feet is Hart holding me up. I have to stop this, but I can't. I can't figure out anyway to stop it. I keep trying to think. It's not working. It's not.

The tears keep flowing.

I smell the iron from the blood as it runs past my nose.

Seth stops and bows down in front of me. "Fear, your fear, is exactly what I need."

He wipes the tears from my cheeks and checks his fingers. "Abomination." He smiles and rubs my blood on the blade of his knife.

His knife. The one that looks a lot like Hart's. Same symbol and everything.

Hart looks at me. I look at Hart. From the corner of my eye, I see Seth examine the knife with my blood on it. I shiver.

It's been a slow build up until now, and I've appreciated it. Truly, I have. Anytime you can prolong your death, the better in my opinion. Except everything suddenly moves so fast it feels like it's slow motion. If that makes any sort of sense.

I hear it before I see anything. It sounds like a flock of birds flying through the cave. Bats, I guess would be a better description. Their wings flapping, hitting the walls. And they are coming fast.

Hart must hear them, too. He grabs my hand and turns toward the cave entrance. I have no idea why he grabs my hand. Probably to keep me from running, but I'm not going anywhere. Where would I go? My insides are going to explode, and I have no idea how to stop it. I have no idea how to use what I am to stop Seth.

Hart squeezes my hand, and we watch the shadows entering the cave. They aren't birds. Not by a long shot.

Angels.

Angels flying toward us.

They are here to save us. To stop Seth. To save the world!

It'll all be okay.

It'll all be over soon.

Seth grabs my other arm and rips me away from Hart. As Hart yells my name, Seth pulls me back against the rocks, throwing me so hard it knocks the wind out of me. With no ceremony, no last words, no parting goodbyes, no last thoughts, he sticks the knife in my chest. Right into my heart.

"Looks like you've had one all along." He smirks as my blood runs over the blade and drips onto the ground. It covers the same symbol that is on the knife. It glows yellow.

Fire burns through my body. Fire that wants desperately to get out. Thoughts and images swim though my head, my life flashing before my eyes. Sunday night popcorn parties with my mom. My aunt taking me on train rides. Sam kissing my lips ever so gently.

The fire inside me starts to fade until I feel nothing.

My world turns black.

Sickly, otherworldly screams are the last things I hear.

I couldn't stop it.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

HART

I
'VE SPENT MY ENTIRE LIFE TRYING
not to feel anything. Anything but anger. Anything but looking at the mission, completing the mission. It started back during the war. Don't feel. Just run. Just survive. Just shoot and pray you don't get shot back. Yeah, I prayed. I prayed a lot. And I believed.

And then my brother shot me.

And all my faith went away.

Until I saw
him.

Seth.

He held my hand. He took me out of my body. And promised me a way I could get back at my brother, get revenge for what he'd done to me. I thought I already had, truth be told. I'd shot the son of a bitch just like he shot me. But then I stood with Seth and I watched. I watched as his soul left his body.

It left his body, and it went to Heaven.

I tried to follow him, but the anger, the pain, the everything kept me pinned down. I felt the earth moving under me, and I knew. Not that it took a genius to figure out, but I knew. I wasn't going with him to the pearly gates. No, my brother, the one who shot me—who killed me—was going to Heaven. And I was going to Hell.

So much for praying.

So much for any of it.

"Don't worry. You'll get your revenge. Whatever you do… if someone offers you a deal, say yes. I'll be waiting for you. I'll be waiting to help you. You keep that fire burning in your belly, Hart Blackwell. Keep your eyes on the prize. Keep them on your brother, and you will be saved," Seth whispered in my ear. He took me to the gates of Hell, he patted me on the shoulder, and he tossed me in.

Eventually, after things even I couldn't imagine, Amelia-- my torturer offered, and I took it. I became a demon. Most demons were human once, after all. As were angels. My brother was—is—an angel, and I've made it my life's work to make him pay. To get my revenge. Seth said we would. He promised.

I heard him coming, my brother and his army of merry angels, coming to save the day. I imagine a Hell gate opening would be a horrible day for them, terrible to have to close. Lots of nasties getting out. Demons getting out, possessing people. The least of my worries. I could care less about the demons. I am one after all.

Still…

I hear my brother coming. It should be the best moment of my afterlife. I've waited over two hundred years for this, for my revenge. To make him pay for everything he ever did to me.

We used to be friends.

We used to be close.

He was my best friend.

He killed me.

I can't let that go.

The fire burns in me, in my soul. Sometimes, I still feel human. Those days with Gracen. Not the nights. Not when she slept. Not when it was my job to torture her in her dreams. Seth the angel's idea, not mine. When we were awake, especially in the early days when we went places together, when we actually went on dates, when she thought I was Sam, I remembered what it was like to be human. I got to feel the humanity I fought so hard to keep.

I didn't hate it. Not at all. My biggest secret: I loved feeling human. I missed being human. I missed not feeling anger all the damn time. And I made myself believe, sometimes, for very short moments, in the length of time it takes to watch a movie or eat a meal at a nice restaurant, that I
was
human. That I was just a man and not a demon, not a monster.

Not what I am.

Those days, those moments, are over now.

I hear my brother coming. I can feel him. I've taken pleasure in taunting him all these years. Too bad he doesn't remember me. Guess things in Heaven forget things in Hell. Too bad.

I held on to my humanity so I'd never forget.

This is it. The big finish. The big crescendo. The big build up is over, and I'm about to throw that angel into Hell—doors open both ways after all—not that I ever told Seth that part of my plan. He was a means to an end, just like I imagine I am to him.

I never intended for the gates to open permanently. I never intended for the girl to die. I used Seth to get here so I could show my brother what Hell was really like.

I should be happy. I should be gearing up and getting ready to pounce on my brother. I should be doing a lot of things.

My eyes won't leave Gracen. She's slumped against the altar, and her head is to the side. Her eyes are open, staring unseeing. There's a hole in her chest where the knife used to be. In her heart…the one I told her she didn't have. The biggest lie of them all. No, she didn't have a normal heart. Inside, it had black spots and things I would never want her to know about. And she did have a soul, no matter what Seth told her, no matter what he believed.

Gracen Sullivan had a soul. She was the sweetest, nicest person I ever met. I believed she actually loved me—loved Sam.

Now she's dead. Her mission has been completed. She had one goal in life, one purpose that was given to her before her birth—at her conception. She was to be the abomination and die opening the gate.

I'd done my job well, so well that she died believing she was worthless. That she didn't matter. That she had a stain on her heart. That nobody liked her.

It was so far from the truth.

I hear Seth yelling at me. I hear the angels coming. They've made it into the same cavern we are in. The Hell gate is glowing. The world is shaking. I can hear the screams. The screams of all the souls and all the demons in Hell rising, ready to get out. Gracen's blood flows against the glass, but for some reason, it isn't shattering.

Something is missing. I missed something.

"Hart!" Seth screams at me. The wind has picked up, and I can barely hear him. Can barely stand. "Come here! I need your help! We have to open the lock!"

I take my eyes off the dead girl and run over to where Seth stands at the altar, above the pit. The glass covering the opening vibrates, looking like it would bust at any minute. It needs something else… it needs…