Chapter Twenty-Five

My arm throbbed, pulsing white hot pain through every nerve ending. The boy shook his head at me, pursing his lips delicately in an expression that managed both pity and spite.

“I'd have thought that by now, you'd know not to cross me,” he breathed. “It seems as if your spirit will be harder to break that your dear sister's was. She was so easy.”

At the mention of Rosemary, wings shuddered through my mind once again, and for a moment, I felt as if I was surveying the scene through another person's eyes; smaller, younger eyes that were even more frightened than I was. The pain in my arm subsided, and as the boy smiled at me, the whimper of fear that escaped my lips was not in my voice. I realized suddenly that this was a memory—a memory that wasn't mine, but that I was reliving with so much clarity that it was as if I had been there there...or as if someone who was there was inside my head.

And with all that had happened to me, that notion was far from surprising.

I came back to the present with a jolt, blinking rain out of my eyes. The lake water was lapping up against my muddy ankles, warning me with every icy slap that its consuming waves were only inches away. The boy was still staring at me, his eyes expectant, so I straightened my shoulders and forced myself to meet his gaze head on.

“You don't scare me,” I said, and the words were both the biggest and best lie I had ever told.

He saw right through it, of course, and laughed. “Yes I do. We all do. Look at you: you're terrified. It's pathetic.”

“It's human,” I countered. “In other words, everything you can never be, no matter how hard you try.”

Anger flashed in his eyes, and I sensed that finally, I had struck a chord. “We're not trying,” he hissed. “The last thing we want to do is be like you.”

I clenched my fists, ignoring the pain in my arm, as if I kept them tight enough I would be able to hold onto the small sliver of confidence that had crept up within me. Before I could grind out another response, however, the boy spoke again, murmuring, “There is far too much talking going on right now. This needs to be finished before you are missed.”

As the boy placed a chilly hand on each of my arms, I couldn't help but worry about just what he meant by “finished.” By the sinister gleam in his eyes as he leaned closer, and the way the surrounding shadows seemed to cluster in, I didn't think that it could be anything good.

“This won't hurt,” lied the cruel boy, his lips curled into a perpetual sneer.

“Yes it will,” I replied. My voice was stronger than it felt. I wondered briefly how, at this moment, seconds from having the very center of my being vacuumed into the soulless pit of a monster, I was finding a sense of tranquility.

It was the calm before the storm.

“Yes,” he agreed, a moment too late. “It will.”

I shuddered as a breaking wind snapped over us, bending the boughs of a low-hanging willow to brush the surface of the lake. As if in response, the water splashed into the air.

“What are you going to do?” I asked softly, staring into the trees.

The boy was silent for a moment. I wasn't looking at him, but my gaze was forced in his direction as he placed two fingers beneath my chin and turned my head with a surprisingly gentle touch. He studied me with his eyes, and thought I couldn't read the look in them, I quickly realized what was about to happen.

“I'm ever so sorry,” he said, not sounding sorry at all, as he leaned forward and pressed his lips to mine.

The cruel boy had kissed me once before; once, as I waded in and out of sleep, when I was still unsure of what was real and what wasn't. This time, every sensation was intensified, and every shred of fear was blown into maximum proportions. His lips, cold to the touch, burned icicles against mine. His fingers, wrapped around my wrists, sent pain shooting up my arms. It quickly became very clear that this was far more than just a simple kiss in the rain.

I felt it inside of me, something that started like the gentle flutter of moth wings and morphed into the slicing blades of a propeller. It turned my blood to ice and then set it on fire; the flames burned behind my eyelids. My eyes were squeezed shut in terror, and any hope of a scream was trapped in my throat. And though I wanted to struggle—though every part of me was demanding that I fight back—the spell of the boy's insistent lips left me rooted to the spot.

Having one's soul forcibly removed from their body feels exactly as it should: as if something is being ripped out of you, being clawed away so savagely that it turns you inside out. The pain was sharp and thrumming, like a heartburn that was everywhere all at once, and it hurt. It really hurt. I felt the tears on my face and the sweat on my brow, and I felt the complete and utter hopelessness of my situation. Because at this point, I thought, there was no chance. I could wish a thousand times over for everything to disappear, and to wake up in my bed in a cold sweat with the realization that everything had just been a bad dream, but it wasn't going to happen. There were no whispered prayers or lucid dreams that could save me.

There was only a spunky psychic with an uncanny amount of resolve.

I had all but forgotten about Laury in the midst of accepting my imminent death, but she clearly had not forgotten me. Even now, I wonder how she did it: how she tore herself away from the shadows and ran, broken body and all, faster than they could catch her. I wonder how she was brave enough to barrel straight into me, screaming, “Don't touch her!” and sending me flying off balance.

But she did it. One moment the boy's lips were crushed against mine, and the next I was being shoved away from him, somehow catching air and lingering there for a split second. The lake was below me, tossing fitfully, and the boy was reaching his slender fingers toward Laury's neck.

I heard a scream as I hit the water, but I'm not sure whether it was hers or mine.

◙════════════◙

Have you ever nearly drowned?

I had once before, at a swimming practice back when I was seven. I dived a little bit too enthusiastically into the deep end, it my head on the bottom of the pool, and forgotten which way was up. I remember my mom telling the coach that the safety standards needed a major boost, and almost made me quit the team. She had already lost one daughter to drowning, I guess—and that was one too many.

That's what I was thinking about as I plunged into the ice cold water: swimming practice all those years ago. Swimming practice, where there were parents and coaches and lifeguards. Not here, in the middle of a freezing lake at midnight with a potentially broken arm. I didn't have time to be confused as to why Laury had shoved me into the lake, or what was going to happen to her now. The most imminent problem was the matter of how I was going to get out.

At first, as I sunk into that murky abyss, I wasn't very afraid. My air supply would last for a minute at least. The water rushed around me, and though it was dark and cold, it blocked out all the sound, cocooning me in a tight, familiar embrace.

But the deeper I got, the more panicked I became. I was starting to feel the strain on my lungs, and as fear set in, I began to kick and flail against gravity's insistent tug. If anything, though, that only made me sink faster. This was a new position for me: as a swimmer, I was used to having complete control over all my limbs, and knowing where I was in the water at all times. I was only one appendage shorter, but now I found myself unable to go anywhere but down.

My air was going fast.

I knew what was going to happen. My lungs were going to scream for air, and choke when they couldn't get any of it. My head would start to throb, and my eyes would drift slowly shut. A burning sensation would arise in my chest and spread through my blood like wildfire. Inch by inch, my body would shut down, my movements becoming heavy and weak. Then my mouth would open in a last attempt to breathe, sending a flow of water into my throat. Eventually, my heart would stop.

But I wasn't there quite yet. And until I got to that last point of complete immobility, I wasn't about to stop fighting.

I was slipping downward, looking up, kicking fiercely and sweeping my one good arm in an attempt to change directions. Something was slowing me down, however, besides the obvious injury, and I realized that it was my fleece pajama pants, billowing out around my legs and filling with water. They had to go. Using my toes and a hell of a lot of willpower, I managed to inch them off my body and send them floating upward: in other words, the very direction I needed to swim. The lack of cover made my bare skin sting with the cold, but I ignored the feeling as I swam as fast as I could after the streak of pink fabric.

My hurt arm was shrieking in pain, but I didn't hesitate to use it as best I could, even if all it could do was flap uselessly at my side. I followed the pants on their diagonal, ascending path until finally, they stopped rising. They'd hit the surface about five meters away, and soon, I would too.

At least, I thought I would. What I had forgotten while swimming for my life was that their were hundreds upon hundreds of monsters waiting along the shore of the lake, wanting to kill me with every fiber of their being. And what I hadn't counted on was the fact that they would follow me down in the form of a thousand shadows collecting on the water's surface.

There had been a sheen of moonlight against the water, but as I watched, every glimpse of light was slowly blotted out by a massive shade. They brought in the night piece by piece, filling in a jigsaw puzzle that left me immersed in darkness. I tread water and watched, breathlessly, as everything disappeared.

Time had lost all meaning by that point, and it didn't matter so much about how long I'd been underwater, but how much longer I'd be able to hold my breath for. I couldn't see, but I got the sense that the shadows were converging—and if that was the case, I would have nowhere to turn. My lungs ached, and I felt my lips strain to open, but I pressed them together and clenched my teeth. If I gave in to that one need, everything would be over.

Cold water stung my eyes as I squinted at the surface, trying to assess the situation in the few milliseconds of air I had left. And as I stared up at the black water and my limbs began to go limp, I decided that I only had one choice: I had to keep going up.

Not allowing myself a chance to hesitate, I gave one final kick that sent me spiraling skyward. I tried to tell myself that this was just another swim meet: I was streaking through the final leg to hit the wall before my opponents. This thought set a familiar seed of determination in my mind, and with all else forgotten except the need to make it to the end, I plunged through the shadows and into the open air. My instincts took over immediately, and I gulped in a heaving breath, tipping my head back against the waves. My eyes darted from left to right, and I quickly realized that there was no sign of the shadows. There was, however, a thick layer of ink spread out over the lake like frigid oil. Still, I knew that my focus had to be on getting to shore. So I paddled my arms and kicked my numb legs, ignoring the water that splashed against my face and the fact that it was very hard to stay afloat.

As it turned out, staying afloat wasn't on my agenda.

I had barely been swimming for a second when a hand seemingly appeared from nowhere, landing on my head and pressing me back beneath the water. I wasn't prepared; I had no time to take a breath before I went down. I struggled, panic racing through my veins, but the arm that held me in place seemed to have infinite strength. At the same time, all those melting shadows crept toward me through the water, surrounding my flailing body and encasing me in a frigid embrace.

Without thinking, I tried to scream; by the time I realized my mistake, it was too late to take it back. Water flowed into my mouth and down my throat, choking me. The darkness melded with my skin and turned my flesh to ice. And in that next moment, that single second before I lost consciousness, I looked up and saw the cruel boy's face, distorted by the water, smiling as he watched me drown.

◙════════════◙

In the darkness, I heard a familiar voice.

It wasn't quite words, though, that traveled into my ears and slipped like molasses into my head. It was more like the idea of them, the faint echo of something spoken and not understood. I wondered briefly, automatically, if I was dead, and if this was the part where I was informed that I was going straight to hell. It was too dark to tell.

But there was that voice again—and now, as my brain cleared, I was almost certain that it was saying my name. Those quiet, whispered breaths were saying Parker, Parker. Parker.

I opened my eyes.

The first thing I noticed was that the ground beneath me was uncomfortably damp; the wetness seeped into my clothes. However, it wasn't raining wherever I was, and that was a slight improvement. And, I realized as I flexed my fingers, my arm was no longer broken.

As my surrounding registered, I noted that I was still at Bear Lake, lying on the shore of clear, calm waters. It was late at night, same as before, and the moon above cast a spotlight on the familiar figure standing over me.

My sister.

“Parker,” she said again, peering at me through hazel eyes.

“Rosemary?” I mumbled groggily, blinking as I slowly sat up. My sister knelt down at my side, the knees of her jeans burrowing into the mud.

She looked much the same as she had in every dream, photograph, and memory I'd ever witnessed: she looked just like me. She was my older sister, preserved forever at age fourteen, and somehow, she was here.

“Hey, sis,” she said, filling the space with a bittersweet smile.

“Hey?” I lifted a muddy hand to rub my temple. “Where am I?”

“Bear Lake.”

“I figured out that much, thanks. But I was just drowning five seconds ago. Where am I?”

Rosemary bit her lip and tapped her palms against her thighs. “You're dreaming,” she admitted. “This is a dream. You're actually floating somewhere in the middle of the lake, and demon boy is probably removing your soul from your body as we speak.”

I raised an eyebrow.

“Sorry,” Rose amended. “That was blunt.”

“No kidding.”

She sighed. “But it doesn't matter anyway, because he's not going to get very far.” She looked over at the lake, her eyes narrowed as if she saw something more than just the silver reflection of the moon.

“I don't—”

“They're not getting away with this, Parker,” Rosemary said, her tone steely as she returned her focus to my face. “Not again. I didn't get to grow up, but you will. I'm not letting Mom lose another daughter to these monsters.”

I stared at my sister in disbelief, leaning forward to study her features. She was serious, without a doubt, but I couldn't help but think that she was also just a little bit out of her mind.

“Rose, are you listening to yourself?” I demanded. “These things, they—they killed you! They're trying to kill me. There's no way that we have any chance against them. Not us.”

“Who, then?” She glared at me. “Who is there to stop them but us? Who else can stop them from killing, once and for all? There's only us, Parker, and I know it's not a lot, but we're all we have.”

I was silent.

She said nothing for a moment, and instead opted for picking at the her bare pinky toe. Finally, she sighed and murmured, “Laury said you were strong.”

“What?” I said.

“She said you were strong—or at least, that your mind is. And that's why they need you; that's why they're afraid of you. And they are, Parker. I hear them all the time. You terrify them. And I think that makes you the only person who can stop them.”

I swallowed hard. We met eyes, sister to sister, and hers were filled with steady determination. I ignored the twisting anxiety in my stomach and tried to channel some of the hardheadedness that I knew we both shared.

“How?”

My sister smiled. “Do you remembered the mirror?” she asked.

“The mirror?”

“Yeah, the one in your dream. Laury made you break a mirror, thinking it was connecting you to them. What she didn't know was that the mirror was actually a gateway for the monsters to come fully into our world. The real connection isn't a real thing, an object; it's just inside your head.”

“So, what then?” I frowned. “I break the connection and I'm free?”

She hesitated; just for a moment, but long enough to make me nervous. “Almost.”

“Almost?”

“It's not—it's not them you have to sever the connection with,” she said. “It's me. I'm the one who's been keeping them alive. My soul has been sustaining them for all these years, and they can't go away until I do.”

“What do you mean 'go away'?”

“I mean I have to disappear. I have to extinguish. It means no more talking to you in your dreams, no more sisterly guidance. It means I go to where I should have gone when I died in the first place.”

There was a cold look in Rosemary's eyes as she gazed into the trees, her mouth falling into a straight, white line. I felt a shiver run down my back as the implications of her words hit me full force.

“No, okay?” I said, slowly understanding. “There has to be some other solution besides extinguishing you.”

“Yeah, well, there's not,” she snapped.

I didn't respond. My head was hurting all of a sudden, and it was from more than just the cold. When I looked at my sister, she seemed real—but she had been dead for years, and this was just what was left of her. A dream. A memory trapped inside my head. I had to let her go.

“That's the only way to stop them?” I asked meekly.

“They're nightmares, Parker,” Rosemary replied, her voice gentle again. “I'm a nightmare. We're in your head. You dream us into reality.”

“But all this time, you've—”

“Only existed because you let us,” she finished. “The monsters came in and planted the seed; you gave them water and sunlight and let the plant grow.”

I swallowed hard, wrapping my arms around myself. “Then how do I stop them—you?”

“The same way you stop any other bad dream.” My sister smirked sadly. “You wake up.”

I blinked at her, not quite sure that I was understanding. “I wake up,” I echoed. “That's it? No dramatic chases or magic spells or epic battles?”

She chuckled. “Don't go thinking it's going to be easy, little sis. They're in your head, right now. They're keeping you locked inside this dream until they're done with you. But you need to do the same thing to them. You're going to have to fight your way out, because once you do, they'll be the ones trapped in here, you'll be alive, and I'll be on my way to...wherever.”

I pursed my lips, playing her words back in my head. “But trapped, you said. That means they're always going to be here, in my head, forever.”

My sister's face sobered as she affirmed, “Yeah. They'll always be there. As long as they can't get into your dreams, they won't come back. But you're going to have to live with them, Parker. They'll be there for the rest of your life.”

I stared at my legs, somehow once again cocooned in dry, pink fleece. “And if I don't do this?”

“You die, and end up trapped in the dreamworld. Like me.”

I looked up, and Rosemary was fixing me with an expression of pleading. I could read it all in her eyes: how she wasn't afraid to disappear, how she thought this could really work—how badly she wanted me to live. This was my sister, my flesh and blood, and if I couldn't trust her at this very moment, I couldn't trust anyone.

“All right,” I said. “Now or never.”

A smile of relief fell onto her lips, and Rose pulled me into a tight hug that felt very real, considering. When she pulled away, her hands slipped to the back of her neck, tugging off something that glinted and shone in the moonlight.

Her mirror necklace.

“Something to remember me by,” she said, clipping it around my neck.

I nodded and touched the cold glass, but said nothing. There was nothing that really needed to be said, not anymore. I took one last look around me, at the calm, quiet lake of my dreams, knowing that when I awoke, it would be to chaos and rain and struggling. And I spared a final glance at my sister, so similar in looks that she could have been my twin. This, I knew, was the last time we would speak. Soon, all I would have left of her would be fading memories in the corner of my mind.

“What do I do?” I asked, forcing myself back to the present, to this dream.

“Lie down and close your eyes,” Rosemary instructed. “You'll start to fall asleep, and when you do...well, you'll know what to do.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course I'm sure, Parker.” She smiled. “You're my sister, after all. It's in your blood.”

I nodded, took a deep breath, and lay back into the mud before I could hesitate. Rosemary grabbed my hand, squeezing it in a tight, comforting grip. I looked up at her for the last time, and slowly, slowly closed my eyes.

“I love you, Parker,” she said, as darkness filled my vision.

My voice was already gone, but I thought the words, and knew she could hear them.

I love you too, sis.

◙════════════◙

I was rushing up through darkness, swimming through an endless vat of ink. My limbs were lost in it, but something was propelling me forward, forward, out of my head. I could feel the shadows grouping around me, touching me with cold tentacles, trying to hold me back. Everything was a blur as I evaded their grasps, speeding away, away, away. It was like the lake all over again; as I swam, I could see the surface coming up fast. Somehow, in all the black nothingness, there was a little sliver of brightness. I drove myself toward that, and finally, when I was close enough, threw myself straight into it.

As I tumbled into the light, I felt my mind reasserting its power over my body. I also felt, though, at the same time, a cord in my head being severed, like an electrical plug ripped from its socket. I screamed at the pain, only to realize that I was, in fact, back in the lake, lost in its murky depths. Water rush into my mouth and down my throat, and I knew I didn't have long. I'd stopped the monsters, but with my head filled with pain and my senses a mess, I had no idea how I would be able to save myself.. Because I was still sinking, sinking, sinking, slipping into the lake bed and back into my unconscious mind.

And then—the air began to shimmer before me. In my dazed state, I couldn't fathom quite what it was. It was a person, surely: a glittery, filmy, person who wasn't quite there. I could have been imagining it, for all I know, and maybe it was because of my inebriated state that when the figure reached out a hand, I took it.

But my eyes were already closing, the water was everywhere, closing in on me, staining my vision black. Maybe this was an angel sent to take me to heaven—or the devil here to drag me down to hell. Maybe I wouldn't survive, but maybe, wherever I went, I'd find my sister.

That is what I hoped as once again, everything went dark.

◙════════════◙

I don't know when they found me, and I don't know where. But I know that at some point, I drifted back to consciousness long enough to hear a familiar voice calling my name.

“Parker! Oh my God, Parker.”

It was Logan. And then there were hands on my arms, on my legs, pulling me out of the lake and into the mud. There were more voices too, in tones I couldn't make out. I thought I heard my mother somewhere in the mix, and maybe Juliette. I felt hands, pumping my stomach and forcing water out of my mouth. And lips, pressed to mine, familiar lips; Logan's lips. But not kissing me: giving me breath.

Then more voices.

It was altogether entirely too much. Nothing had quite registered yet: the fact that I was safe, that the monsters were gone, that Logan was there. That would all come later. At that moment, I was shivering, wearing nothing but a t-shirt and my underwear, and had been completely soaked to the bone. A blanket was draped around my shoulders, and I smelled that familiar scent of toothpaste as Logan pulled me into his arms, rocking me back and forth.

“She's breathing,” I heard him say, his lips against my hair. “Thank God, she's breathing.”

I couldn't respond, of course. I didn't need to. Everything would sort itself out, but I was there and I was alive and even though I wasn't quite sure how, I wasn't about to take it for granted. Taking a small, grateful breath, I pressed my cheek deeper into Logan's sweater—and let myself realize that finally, I didn't have to be afraid to close my eyes.

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Dedicated to the Asian Charlotte aka Spider Pig because I swear I dedicated a chapter to her before but it might have been on her old account and I don't know but I love that whore and she leaves fab comments.

A/N: So there was a lot going on in this chapter wow it just kind of went back and forth and over the rainbow and I hope that wasn't too confusing because I confused myself writing it. Also, after this, there's only one more chapter and the epilogue, and then it's over. Which is kind of weird, considering how long I've been working on this. So yeah, you can look out for that in the next few days. And as always, thank you to my lovely readers, I love you all xoxo