Shadow Demons (15 page)

We were outside. I had no idea how we’d gotten here. Everything was a blur of black smoke and twisting and turning. My head was spinning. Jackson led me a spot in the back yard where we would be completely hidden from anyone entering or leaving the Ashworth house.

“Sit down,” he said. He spread his black jacket across the grass and held my hand as I collapsed.

“What the hell just happened?” My voice sounded screechy and full of panic. I lifted my knees and held them close to my chest. I didn’t feel like myself. Some dark energy was swirling around in my head, and I couldn’t get it to stop. I held my hands out. Some of the black oily residue of Mrs. Ashworth’s spell was still stuck to my palms. I rubbed them against the grass with a violent need.

Jackson sat down and took my hands in his. “It’s going to be okay,” he said. “I couldn’t take us far, but we should be safe here for a few minutes.”

“What was that?” I asked. “The memory? Was it real?”

My voice deteriorated into tears.

“Shhh,” he said, running his hand down the length of one of my blonde curls.

“Did you see it too?” I asked, clawing at the shackle still hooked to my wrist. “We were in some kind of old abandoned house. There were leaves on the floor in the house and it was dark. Did I imagine it?”

“I was there, too,” he said. “Harper, I remember everything now. Your mother, she came to me when she was pregnant with you. She needed help, just like you said. A truth potion.”

I laid my head forward against my knees, trying to catch my breath. “Mrs. Ashworth - Lydia - that was her best friend,” I said. “But she was trying to kill her wasn’t she?”

“That was the truth your mother found out,” he said. He kept looking around to make sure no one was coming for us. “That’s why she sent you away. To keep you safe.”

“How come you didn’t tell me all this before?”

“Harper, I didn’t remember this until just now,” he said. “That language you spoke just before the vision started? That was my language. Shadow demon language. It’s a spell that blocks certain memories. I taught your mother that spell, Harper, so she could wipe our memories of you after she gave birth. She did it to protect you.”

“I don’t understand,” I said. “Why would she wipe your memories too?”

“Because once you were safe, she needed to make it so that no one remembered you ever existed. Not me. And definitely not Lydia Ashworth. As long as no one knew you were alive, they couldn’t hurt you. But she never planned for it to be permanent. Once she was sure the threat was gone, she was going to come for you.”

The pieces of the truth all started to come together in my mind. She’d been murdered by the crows before she ever had the chance to come for me.

“I had no idea I’d ever really even talked to your mother,” he said. “That’s why when you asked me about the potion earlier, I didn’t remember giving it to her. Not until you unlocked the memory.”

“Harper?” Someone near the tent called my name.

My body tensed and my eyes grew wide. I looked to Jackson and he lifted a finger to his lips. I held my breath and listened.

“Harper, are you out here?”

I recognized the voice. It was Zara.

I started to stand up. The High Council needed to know what Mrs. Ashworth had done to my mother. But Jackson put a hand on my shoulder. I drew my eyebrows together, questioning. He just shook his head.

We waited together as Zara continued to call for me. Eventually, she disappeared back into the Ashworth’s house.

“We can’t trust anyone,” Jackson whispered. “Not even people you thought were your friends.”

“We’re in a lot of trouble aren’t we?” I asked.

“They know about my powers now,” he said. “And they know you don’t have any intention of becoming their Prima. Plus, they all saw you attack Mrs. Ashworth. I’d say we’re in some serious shit right now. She’s going to tell them whatever she has to in order to make you look bad. We’ve got to get away from this town for a little while.”

“How long is a little while?” I asked. How many times had I dreamed of running away with him? Somehow, now that the time had come, it didn’t seem so romantic. We weren’t leaving because we chose to run away together. We were leaving because we had no choice if we both wanted to stay alive.

“As long as we need to until we figure some of this out,” he said. His features darkened. “Harper, remember that night you came to my room and I wouldn’t show you what I’d been drawing?”

My stomach twisted. I nodded.

“One of the pictures was of you in that dress,” he said. “But when I was drawing it, I kept seeing your mother’s face. I didn’t understand it until now. That was the dress she was wearing the night she blocked all our memories that you existed.”

I turned away and stared into the darkness of the woods behind the house. How had everything gotten so complicated? I felt so messed up inside.

“Where will we go?” I asked.

“I know a place,” he said. “You’ll be safe there.”

“Okay,” I said, too drained to argue.

“Harper…” Jackson placed his hand on my face.

“Yes,” I said, my breath catching in my throat.

“I know this isn’t the right time, but I saw that shackle hit your wrist and for a split second, I was so scared I was going to lose you,” he said. “I don’t want another minute to go by without telling you how I feel.”

His eyes met mine.

“Harper, I love you.”

My pulse raced as Jackson leaned closer to me, his lips so soft and warm against mine. I lost myself in his kiss. The rest of the world faded to nothingness. I put my arms around his neck and melted into him.

I never wanted this moment to end. My body felt electric, alive. I pulled away, breathless.

I rested my forehead against his. “I love yo-“

Jackson put his hand over my mouth, his body rigid. I listened, my heartbeat pounding in my ears.

“I know you’re out here,” Brooke said. She was close. Maybe fifteen feet away, near the house. “You’ll save us all a lot of trouble if you just come out and face this. You can’t ignore what just happened in there. Jackson has a lot to answer to, and so do you.”

I swallowed and leaned against Jackson’s chest.

“We have to get out of here,” he whispered.

I nodded. “Okay,” I said.

Jackson pulled me close, his arms tight around my body. “Close your eyes,” he said.

I pressed my face against his shirt and suddenly, we were falling. Flying. Twisting. I clung tight to him. My body was light and floating. Air rushed through my hair and my stomach felt weak, like we were in free-fall.

When the world finally settled and my feet touched solid ground, I opened my eyes. We were in a dark alley. A street lamp flickered, casting uneven light on the area around us. Motorcycles roared in the nearby street. Jackson took my hand as the group of riders stopped just at the entrance to the alley.

“So maybe you do need me after all.” The girl in leather smiled, her eyes locked on Jackson’s face. She had an English accent.

I squeezed his hand tighter. “What is she doing here?” I asked, my voice cracking.

“Harper, this is Lea,” he said. He swept his hand from her to me. “Lea, Harper.”

The girl narrowed her eyes into angry slits. “We’ll have time for introductions later,” she said. “But seeing how you’ve got the whole bloody Order after you at this point, I think you better come with us. Cristo, grab the girl. Jackson, you’re with me.”

“No, Harper stays with me,” Jackson said, placing an arm in front of me as a guy near the back got off his bike and came toward me.

I gasped and took a step back. I recognized the guy they called Cristo instantly. It was the same guy who had been watching me from the window of the pizza parlor a couple weeks ago. His beaded braids clacked together when he walked.

“Don’t be difficult,” Lea said. “If you want my help, you play by my rules.”

Jackson’s chest rose and fell. He looked from Cristo to me, then back again, his arm still raised in defense. “You have to promise me you’ll be very careful,” he said. “And we all stick together.”

Lea’s jaw grew rigid and her lips thinned into a tight line.

“Come on, mate,” Cristo said. “If we don’t move, we’ll all be in trouble here in a minute. I’ll take good care of her.”

My eyes widened as Jackson slowly lowered his arm. “Where are they taking us?” I asked. “And who are these people?”

“People?” Lea raised one eyebrow in a high arch and laughed. “You’ve got a lot to learn, little girl.”

I shivered. The hatred in her voice terrified me. I wasn’t sure what I’d done to make her hate me so much, but disdain dripped from her words like poison.

“I promise I’ll explain everything once we get there,” Jackson said. “You’ll be safe, I promise. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

I threw my arms around his neck. “I just want you to know that I love you,too,” I whispered in his ear, then kissed his neck. My declaration had been interrupted earlier, and I wanted to make sure he knew exactly how I felt about him.

Jackson leaned down and swept me up into a kiss. Lea cleared her throat.

“I’ll be right there with you the whole time,” he said. “Everything is going to be okay.”

I nodded and reluctantly walked away from him. Cristo motioned toward his idling motorcycle. It was much bigger than Jackson’s, its engine so loud I could barely hear my own voice.

“Got an extra helmet?” I shouted.

Cristo’s eyebrows pinched together and he turned his head, questioning.

“Helmet,” I said, pointing to my head. “You know, so I don’t fall on the pavement and crack my skull open?”

Cristo smiled, his whole face lighting up with laughter. His teeth were bright white and perfectly straight. “You’re funny, mate” he said, then climbed onto the bike.

I sighed. Awesome. I crawled on behind him and tentatively put my arms around his waist.

In front of us, Jackson got on Lea’s bike. I couldn’t hear them, but they were arguing with each other about something. The sight of him with his arms around her waist made me want to scream.

There was definitely something between them. When he’d said he knew a place we could go, I never dreamed he meant we’d be running away with some hot chick and her gang of thugs. I tried to ignore my jealousy. I wasn’t exactly in my right mind.

He’d said they were old friends. Nothing more.

Lea and Jackson sped off and the rest of the gang followed. Cristo and I rode in the middle of the pack. We were going so fast, I had no choice but to hold on tight, pressing my body close to this stranger.

We rode through the deserted streets of Peachville, over the bridge that led out of town, and then on past the county line. Everything we passed was a blur. We had to be going over a hundred miles an hour. Around a tight turn, the motorcycle leaned so close to the pavement, I could swear my hair glided across the asphalt.

I held tighter to Cristo’s waist.

“Whatever you do, mate, don’t let go,” Cristo yelled over his shoulder.

I peered around him to see if we were about to go around another corner or up a hill, but the road was a straight shot into the darkness. Still, I clung to him, my heart racing.

“Here we go,” he said.

I closed my eyes, my body tense. The motorcycle seemed to jump into the air, then I felt my body twist and turn. It felt the same as when Jackson had shifted into his shadow form. Suddenly, I understood why these people were his old friends.

They were shadow demons.

We were shifting into shadows, becoming a part of the air around us. I didn’t dare open my eyes. I knew the ground wouldn’t be underneath us anymore.

We flew through the air, dark shadows against a dark sky. My stomach flipped and lurched as we dipped and turned and changed directions so fast, I couldn’t tell which way was up anymore. I screamed into the back of Cristo’s jacket, unable to contain my fear.

Then, suddenly, I was solid again. I lunged forward as the motorcycle landed back on the ground.

I needed a minute to let my head stop spinning. I clutched the fabric of Cristo’s jacket tight in my fists, my face still buried in his back.

“You okay back there?”

I shook my head back and forth. I wasn’t sure what I was. Glad to be in solid form. Scared out of my mind. Confused. Anything but okay.

Cristo peeled my hands open. “You can let go now, sweetheart. We’re safe here,” he said. When I didn’t move, he said, “Jack, you want to come get your girlfriend? I think she’s freaking out or something, man.”

“She’s not his girlfriend,” Lea said. “She’s a human.”

A warm hand on my back. Jackson’s voice in my ear. “It’s okay Harper, I’m here,” he said. “Come sit down by the fire and warm up a bit.”

I hadn’t realized my body was shaking so much. When I opened my eyes, I realized we were very far away from Peachville. The moonlight illuminated the rocky cliffs. I could hear waves crashing against the shore below. There weren’t any rocky shores in Georgia. Heck, I wasn’t even sure there were cliffs like this on the East Coast until you got pretty far north. Where the hell had they taken me? And how did we get here so fast?

Jackson took my hand and helped me off the bike. He led me toward the edge of the cliff.

“There’s no fire,” I said.

A black guy with long, thick dreadlocks walked up beside us. Without a word, he thrust his palm upward, creating a large flame that seemed to consume his entire hand. He looked around, located a few pieces of dead wood, then brought them all to us with nothing but a flick of his wrist. The logs stacked up on the ground in front of us. He took the fire in his hand and threw it down toward the pile.

The logs caught fire instantly.

I stepped back, the heat shocking against my cold skin.

“Here,” Jackson said, pulling up a large piece of driftwood. “Sit down in front of the fire. Shifting like that can be really disorienting for a human. And it gets really cold the higher up you go in the atmosphere.”

“How high were we flying?” I asked.

Jackson and the black guy exchanged looks. “Higher than an airplane,” Jackson said. “Let’s just leave it at that.”

I sat down, my jaw trembling from cold.

The black guy sat next to me, criss-cross on the dirt. I stared at him and he nodded up at me.

“I’m Harper,” I said.

“Mordecai,” he said. “Nice to meet you.”

I smiled. At least this guy seemed normal. For a shadow demon.

I held my hands out toward the fire to warm them. They were numb from cold. My heart slowed down to a normal beat, and the events of the night started to sink in. I attacked Mrs. Ashworth. The Order was coming for me and Jackson now. We were fugitives.

What were they going to do to us once they did find us?

I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.

And how did we end up on the run with a gang of shadow demons? I hadn’t even known there were others like Jackson here in our world. Demons who weren’t bound to witches. I had a million questions I needed to ask him.

When I turned to find him, though, he was by that girl again. Lea. I studied her in the firelight. She was undeniably beautiful. She was young like me, but I had a feeling she was also old like Jackson.

I watched them argue. She placed a hand on his arm in a move that had such tenderness and affection, it seemed out of character. I expected Jackson to pull away, but he didn’t. He just stared at her. I swallowed hard.

They obviously shared a past. And after tonight, I was sure that any hope I had of a future with him was slipping through my fingers like sand.

Or shadow.