The Four Horsemen(21)

“The others are there too?”

I nod.

She smiles, “Then the dead have claimed you. You sleep with your sisters, your past lives. The dead who wish to keep your soul for you. Embrace them, do not hate them. Do not hate Lillith. She was lost when she made her mistakes.”

I stand up abruptly, ready to fight with cruel words and savage thoughts.

Instead, I am dropped from the ceiling onto my bed. I jolt upward, coming awake from my dream in a gasp.

Wyatt wraps his thick arms around me again, “It’s okay, Rayne. It’s okay.”

I start to cry again, “Mona!”

He looks sick, “Where is she? She and Constantine never made it out. The nixie only had you. She told me she had a message for you and left you with me.”

I shake my head, “I have to free them. I have to find them. I don’t even know how. I doubt the garden will show itself to me.” I turn to him, “What did the nixie say?”

“That the blood of Lillith will satisfy the devils or draw them.”

I swallow hard, “What does that even mean?”

He shakes his head, “I got something cleaned up while you were gone. Want to go see them?” He gets up and grabs the picture that Willow and Fitz live in.”

I hold his hand and touch the star.

We are there instantly.

Willow smiles at me, her eyes are filled with tears. “Are you okay?”

I shake my head, stumbling towards her, “I left them there. I can’t get them back. Mona doesn’t even know that I left her there. And Constantine cut my love from his heart to free me, so I could kill Lillith. It’s all a mess.”

She shakes her head, kissing my hair, “It’s okay, Nene. Lillith is dead. That’s half the battle. We can get Mona and Constantine back. They’re safe, the fae won’t hurt them. They are nonviolent people.”

I sigh, “I don’t know what to do. The nixie said Lillith’s blood would satisfy the horsemen? How do I end them with her blood?”

She looks at Fitz who smiles, “We don’t know. You have to have Lillith’s blood.”

I scowl, “Why does everyone keep saying that? I didn’t exactly collect a jar of it as she was bleeding out. She died and became feathers, nothing more than feathers.”

Fitz looks shocked, “She became feathers?”

I nod.

“Did you keep any?”

I reach into my pants pocket and pull a handful of feathers. He points at them, “They might work. Did you clean the knife?”

I look at Wyatt. He shakes his hands, “The nixie gave it to me, it was coated in their sea-water slime.”

“That will seal the blood to the blade. The nixie know what they’re doing.”

I look at Willow, “What are they doing?”

She scowls, “Getting vengeance. They have long been the only witches to believe in Lillith. We tried to tell them, they wouldn’t listen to it. Lillith used them to gain access into the garden. She used them as her go-to people. She made them swear to always aid her. They have spent their lives watching over you, protecting you. They would do anything for you.”

Wyatt gives me a look, “We have always documented them as part of the other versions of you.”

Fitz nods, “The witches have never helped you before this though. The nixie have, but none of the others, and they don’t help each other. Not normally. They warred before, the witch wars, and that was it. They all went their separate ways, controlling their separate types of magic.”

I sigh, “None of this is useful.”

Fitz gives me a look, “I’m trying to help you understand hundreds, thousands of years of history.”

I can see the disappointed look in Willow’s eyes. I look down, “I just mean, how do I get the horsemen and how do I kill them? I’m tired, that’s all.”

Wyatt offers me his hand, “Let’s go sleep.”

I scowl, “I can’t sleep until the dead take me, don’t you see? I don’t…just… just—just sleep. I never rest. I need the blood of Lillith? What does that even mean?” I can feel something building inside of me, “I don’t ever get a minute’s fucking peace from this mess! I just want to be done with it all! I want to go to school and become something other than a poor sin eater! But now I can’t. The whole world is gone. It burned up. My college is probably ash. I’m tired of being homeless and owning nothing and having no one! I have no parents and no home, and my mom is a ghost in a goddamned painting and everyone wants to kill me. Do you have any idea the level of stress I am constantly being bombarded with?”

Wyatt gives me a grin. I scowl, “Fuck you, Wyatt.” I press the star, the one that takes me back to Fitz’s painting. I stand in the room, looking at the painting. The rage is still there, making my breaths laborious and my heart pound. I pull my dagger and stab into the painting, dragging the knife down it. A scream rips from my lips as I do it.

I feel my heart again, I have taken away the one way in which I might see them again. I have destroyed it.

Panic sets in, how will Wyatt get out?

“NO!” I grab the destroyed canvas, pulling the jagged edges together. I slap it on the floor, pressing the edges together but they won’t meet again. The canvas is too tight. I hold it with my trembling fingers, pressing the star.

I bend over the edges of the picture, lying on top of it. I don’t even cry, even though I’ve trapped Wyatt in there. He will press the other star and end up in Boston on the side of the road and alone. On the side of the road in a, no doubt, destroyed city. I close my eyes and hold it. If I hold it maybe I can heal it. Maybe he can come back to me.

Michelle comes into the room, looking exhausted, “Hey, you’re back.”

I nod. She looks around, “Where’s Wyatt and Mona and Mr. Sexy pants?”

I sigh, “Shit. Goddamned shit.”

She flops onto the bed, “Don’t panic. Just start at the beginning of shit and go from there.”

I look down, “We went to the garden and there was a man. Mona got stuck staring at him and Constantine a lady. I murdered the lady and then went to my mom. I killed her with the nixie and they brought me here. Then Wyatt got stuck in that painting, and I ripped it so he’s stuck in there, or he might be in Boston.”

Michelle starts to laugh, “Okay, that sounds like a lot of shit. I don’t even know what that means. What’s the guy Mona found like?”

I shake my head blankly, pretty much dead inside or at least lost in the panic attack I’m having silently.

She nudges me. I lift my head, screaming at her, “I DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU ALL WANT FROM ME!”

She slaps me hard, and grabs me, “I’m so sorry, Rayne. That was an accident. I didn’t mean to.”

I burst into tears. “I killed my mom, I didn’t even know her. I don’t think she loved me and I killed her.”

She wraps around me, pulling me into her, “No. Don’t cry. You have Willow.”

I cry harder, “Willow is dead too. Everyone is leaving me.”

“Not me. I’m not leaving you.”

I sniffle, “I don’t know what to do next or where to go. I’m fucking tired.”

She starts to laugh, “I know, babe. I’m tired too.”

I pull her back, “You haven’t done shit!”

She scoffs, “I’ve been reading with Stella every day and every night. I’m beat.”

I laugh, rolling my eyes. “Death by orgasm doesn’t count, ya ho.”

She smiles, “Trust me, that’s not all we do. We mostly research the old Van Helsing books. We got this, Rayne. You tell me what’s next—we got this.”

I wipe my face, “I have to find the horsemen. They will come for Lillith’s blood. I don’t know what that means.”

She looks around the room, “Let’s see if we can’t get Stella and Wyatt’s douche mom to see if they know.”

I hold her to me, “No. I don’t want to tell Stella that Constantine’s gone; she’ll murder me. They’re the last of their family. And Wyatt’s mom is the devil in heels.”

Michelle looks confused. “Well, how should we get the horsemen to come to us?”

I nod to the window, “Go outside.” It’s the instinct I have. If we go outside, maybe they’ll come for us.

She looks hesitant, “Maybe we should get help.”

I shake my head, “Just come with me, please?”

She nods, “Okay.”

We slip to the far side of the castle and leave. The weather is cold and dark.

“Have you noticed how dark it is all the time?”

I shake my head, looking about the vast gardens and grassy landscape.

“This place looks like Jane Austen movies, huh?”

I start ignoring her, looking around.

“What are we looking for?”

I almost shout at her, but I realize she is the last person with me. She is it. My oldest friend is my last friend. I’ve betrayed and abandoned everyone else.

I shake my head, “If I had to guess, I would say they are huge and smelly and undead sort of. I think of them as the ‘Ringwraiths’ from Lord of the Rings.”

She makes a face, “Great. You sure you don’t want to go get Constantine first?”

I sigh, “I want him to come, I just don’t think he will.”