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𝐅𝐈𝐕𝐄 : 𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐊𝐄𝐃 𝐂𝐑𝐈𝐌𝐄𝐒

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The world was a cold gray and I was more than blessed to see it.

There was a small pounding behind my eyes but other than that, I was fine. There was no bullet in me or Amy, just frozen bliss.

"Move the bullet," a voice whispered from behind me and I couldn't tell if it was either a man or woman speaking.

I spun around, facing the freezer and seeing no sign of a spirit. My breath hitched in my throat, was it her? Could it finally be her?

"The bullet," the voice whispered again and I spun again in my little circle. I jolted back, knocking into the freezer behind me as I stared eye to eye with the frozen bullet. I moved my hand, gently touching it and finding that it moved out of the way for me.

"This is some Quicksilver bullshit," I muttered, grinning. Before I could thank whoever had given me this tip the gray was gone and the bullet shot past me and into the freezer, shredding metal.

Tobias looked at me, hands shaking as his face contorted into a rage. "Witch."

Amy let out a bellowing laugh as Aiden held the gun up again and I went forward with a jab, forcing him to retreat. I grinned at the gleam in his eyes, the fear that exuded from him as he backed away at the sight of my blade. I wished my gray would return, to freeze him long enough for me to send one last strike but I knew whatever had visited me wasn't here for a long time, it  wasn't here to play games.

Only to teach.

"Amy, get to the stairs," I barked over my shoulder. We needed to get away from him, to put as much distance between us and the gun.

Amy, however, did not go to the stairs. She appeared at my side, kicking out a leg and knocking the gun away before he could pull the trigger again. She launched herself at Tobias, clinging to his body as she pulled and bit and struck, sending the man into a fit of angry seething as he tried to rip her from him.

"Blaire, you go to the stairs!" Amy howled with a laugh before stabbing with her kitchen knife, the blade slamming into the muscles of his shoulder with a sickening thud. She pulled the knife free and his black blood dripped off the tip and it was hard to believe that it came from him, the tar. It looked like it belonged to something else entirely. "Blaire!" Amy's voice rocketed through my brain and I stumbled away from the pair still wrestling. "Go! Now!"

I nodded, turning on my heel and making a beeline to the stairs. I took them two at a time, pulling myself up with the railing. I barreled through the entrance and down the hall, knocking into the wall as I shot out. I stumbled across the carpet before reaching the back door and tearing through it with my shoulder.

The warm air encased me instantly. It was sickly humid, thick. This wasn't right, none of this felt right.

I heard the faint sound of gunshots from inside the church and that got my feet moving again. I had to be careful, in case whoever Tobias was here with was still around. I reached the front of the building and slowed when I saw a man climbing the stairs, pulling out a pair of keys from his pocket.

Victor Macabre looked different in the dark. Menacing.

He met my eyes and froze as my running slowed. I narrowed my eyes, opening my mouth but two more gunshots rang out and I stumbled, hands up over my head as if my arms could protect me.

Macabre backed away from the door, his eyes wide with fear and I took that as him not knowing the church was currently being occupied by a gun wielding lunatic. It told me, with great certainty, that he wasn't the one who accompanied Tobias here in the first place.

"Blaire-" Macabre started, already jogging down the stairs as I reached the sidewalk.

I held up my hands, making sure he could see the blade I held tightly and he stopped. He held his own hands up, showing me there was nothing to fear and I relaxed only slightly. My eyes darted back and forth from him and to the back door, waiting for Amy to come out so we could get the hell out of here.

"Tobias is inside," I heaved in between gulping breaths. "He's got a gun-"

"He doesn't work for us anymore," Macabre said, his dark eyes watching me intently. "He defected, just like the others."

"Who else?" I snapped. "Who else is coming after me, huh?!" He opened his mouth to speak but I shook my head, shaking as I yelled, "I know what you are, I know what all of you are-" I kept shaking my head, eyes flicking back to that back door. "-and I know what you've done. I won't stand here and let your group of assholes come after me, I-I refuse!"

"Dear, I'm sorry but-"

Keep stalling, I told myself before stammering out, "You can't fool me, you can't fool anyone with-with your fake priest bullshit! You tell me who else is still in this-this game and-and-"

"And you'll what?" the priest smiled. "You'll kill me, too?"

"Yes!" I shouted, feeling a surge of anger course through me, clenching down on my lungs and heart. "Are all of you really that stupid?!" None of them believe me, they're not scared like they should be. They killed my family, my parents, my friends, Pandora...they killed Pandora and they don't even care, they don't think I'll avenge her.

"Archer has no control over the ones who've left us," Macabre murmured, changing the subject as he looked back at the church doors when we heard something fall, the sound echoing inside. "Tobias has a different agenda, away from our own."

"And your agenda, then? What are you planning?"

"It's been the same, as always," he said with a sleazy grin. "Stop you. Kill you."

"Then I'll be forced to do what I did to your missing coworkers," I snarled as I finally saw movement breach the back door, the door rustling.

"So, you really did kill them?" Macabre asked and I could see the astonishment gleam in his blackened eyes. "How?"

"The same way I'll kill you and your boss," I laughed as the back door flung open and Amy went falling down the stairs. She pushed herself up from the ground and through the darkness, I could see her hair was a mess and she had a busted lip as she took off for me down the sidewalk, throwing her hands in the air to get me moving. "Sorry, I can't stay to chat!" I cackled as I took off running as Amy finally neared me. "Expect to see me real soon, Victor!"

We made a mad dash down the street before disappearing near the stores and getting into my car with excellent speed. We sped off with the same ferocity. Gripping the steering wheel, I snapped over to Amy, "What the hell happened when I left?"

"Aiden Tobias is an asshole, plain and simple," she grumbled back. "Got me good across the arm and leg, but I'll be fine."

"Did he say anything to you?" I asked as I slowed to turn down my street.

"Besides how he wants to gut both of us?" she asked with a laugh. She shook her head, picking at the dried black blood underneath her fingernails. "He didn't say much after that, but he did seem to think you knew where John was."

"Me?" I gasped, brows pulling together with irritation.

She nodded. "Thinks you were helping him, that you...woke him."

"Woke him?" I echoed, pulling into my driveway and turning the car off. I sat back against my seat, hands in my lap.

"He also mentioned that you need to be killed before any of this gets out of hand, before--and I'm not even kidding you when he said this--before the dark lord rises to his full power."

A smile spread out across my lips, turning to look at her. She gave me the same confused smile, shrugging. "No, he didn't-"

"He did! Swear!"

"The dark lord..." I laughed, shaking my head. "I know he obviously means the devil but the whole theatrics of it is kind of absurd."

"He thinks that you summoned him or are going to-"

"Why would I want to do that?"

She shrugged again. "Beats me."

I grabbed my bag and scowled as I got out of the car, the two of us walking to my front door as I murmured a sudden strange thought, "Amy, if you're working for John, why don't you know where he is?" I opened the door and I walked inside, pausing when I turned around to see her still standing there, head looking down. "Um, Amy?"

She looked up, shaking her head and plastering a big smile across her face. I ignored how that startled me as she said, "You never asked, silly."

"Well, I'm asking now."

She sighed, finally stepping inside and past me towards the kitchen. "I don't know where he is, okay? He sent me a message saying to come here and that's it."

"What'd the message say?"

She opened the fridge, bending down to peer inside. "Just the basics, that I needed to help you and blah, blah, blah. Is this pizza still any good?" She pulled out a pizza box and I nodded, following her with my eyes as she added, "He left a voicemail, so I really don't know where he is, Blaire, I'm sorry." She pulled out a slice and took a huge bite. "Can I ask you something, though?"

I nodded, feeling an increasing sense of dread wash over me as I watched her.

"Did you love him?"

"Who?"

"Ace."

My brows furrowed. Love?

"Did you?"

"I didn't have time to think about love, to think about him like that--" I rushed out, shaking my head. "Sure, it would've been fun to maybe, I don't know, kiss him, but I didn't think of him like that--"

"Why?"

My mouth fell open and brows knitted together even tighter. "Why so curious about my love life all of a sudden?"

"Demons, we gossip, we hear rumors."

I wanted to get out of this kitchen, to go to my room and lock the door. "Rumors?"

She nodded, mouth full of her cold pizza. "Demons talk, Blaire."

"What are you trying to imply?" I asked, my scowl threatening to return.

"We wonder why Archer Crow has such a deep fascination with you," she purred, wiping her mouth with a jerk of her thumb. "Surely you must wonder why he begged you to leave that barn alone that night."

"How-"

"Demons talk, Blaire, come on, catch up."

I thought I had been alone that night, with Pandora. Perhaps, somewhere out in the corn field or even lurking in the corners and shadows of the barn, someone had watched me. Someone had snuck through and watched me find my best friend's body. Mutilated like cattle. "What are you trying to imply?" I asked again, at a loss for new words.

"Why would he want to protect you after killing her? And why would Tobias think you're so connected to John? None of it is making any sense to me," she said with a shrug, as if what she was trying to accuse me of was not a big deal.

But wasn't it? Wasn't it horrible, rude, and ugly to associate me with Crow? With the man who ended my best friend's life as easily as he did my fathers? My mothers?

I gritted my teeth, reminding myself that the man I had somehow adored over the phone was nothing more than a monster. He needed to be a monster, the thing I feared the most, the one I hated so dearly. I wouldn't allow him to be anything else but the face of evil.

"Like I get it, you know," Amy continued on, taking another slice before pushing the box towards me. "You're powerful and everyone wants what's in your veins, I get that. But the way John dotes after you and how Crow just, ugh, like we get it. You're hot, you're powerful, but without that knife? Without your sight? What do you have that they want so badly?"

I pressed my lips together, looking down and away from her. She was right, without my powers and without Spiorad, I was nothing but a normal high schooler. I wouldn't be this important without my assets. I would be nothing.

I craved that nothingness. To be useless. Common. Normal.

To have a normal life, to have both of my parents, to have my friends still here. To have everyone alive, I wouldn't be alone anymore.

"Goodnight, Amy," I said under my breath, leaving her in the kitchen and feeling her eyes follow me as I walked up the stairs.

I got to my room and instantly shut and locked the door, I didn't need her creeping around up here while I slept. I needed to be at peace, to no longer have the unceasing stress pressing in my skull and chest.

I turned my shower on and stripped my clothes off, admiring myself for a moment in the mirror. I was glad I hadn't received any new bruises or cuts but in a strange sense, I wish I had. It made me feel like I had just gotten back from a battle, from waging war. That I was a knight or a soldier or even just the messenger of god, fighting and screaming and raging on. The markings were my purpose, the wounds were my promise.

I stepped back from my counter and to the shower. The water rained down on me and I ignored the sting, the dangerously cold chill. The cold water brought me back, it woke me from deep into my soul. The cold water made me feel like I could breathe again.

The cold water felt less and less like the cold hands of death that it once was.

It made me whole again.

~

I left Amy alone at the house the next day.

I had school, which was still bizarre to me. I was out here, running around at night with knives and demons and ghosts, and then I had to turn around and go to school like I hadn't been acting like a wild animal hours before.

I had missed my fair share of days at Wooden High, but in my defense, my best friend had just been murdered and my other friend was missing. So, technically, it wasn't my fault. I'd come and go but I hadn't gone for a full week in a while. I needed to focus, I only had a few more months of senior year and then I would be off into the world.

Or, I'd be off to the grave. It was still hard to tell at this point.

I made my way to my first period with no troubles and before I knew it, the day was in full swing and I had biology. Since my lab partner had vanished along with our star quarterback, both Blondie and I were at a loss for partners.

Mr. Parker decided to put us together for the remainder of the year since our classmates had, quite literally, vanished. We combined our projects the first few days and then she didn't show up to class and then I didn't show up, and it was just a guessing game whether or not either of us would be in class.

It seemed like it was our lucky day because sitting in her usual spot by the window was Blondie. She was resting her chin in her hand and was staring blankly out into the courtyard, like she did most days. Since the death of her own best friend Gretchen Cork, she'd pushed back from the popular scene.

I wondered what we would've been like together if we had been best friends and I had taken her offer to sit with them during lunch on my first day. If I hadn't gone to Pandora's table, if I had welcomed John's advances, would I even be who I was today if I had? Would Pandora and Ace and John and even my mother still be here?

"You look like shit," Blondie muttered as I sat down.

I rolled my eyes. "As if you look any better."

She gave me a sneer before looking back to the window. She'd grown quieter since Gretchen's death, since being there to witness it, the same as me. She would only hang around Luke Baxter, the lovable best friend of John who I adoringly gave the nickname Winker to since he had winked at me on my first day and I hadn't had a clue who he was. The nicknames for them stuck like glue from then on.

Blondie had attended Pandora's funeral. I had seen her enter with Winker close by her side and they sat closer to the front. We hadn't had a chance to speak but when everyone was finding their seats, she had brushed past me and ran her hand against my back as if to say I'm here, you're not alone.

The bell rang and class began in its silent studies.

I took a quick glance at Blondie, noticing the dark circles under her eyes but there was a pink hue to her cheeks. She was exhausted but still had put an effort into her makeup, her clothes, and even her hair that was pulled back into a high ponytail that trailed down past the nape of her neck and to the middle of her back.

I noticed on the desk one of her notebooks for class, it's pages filled with her messy scrawl. Countless lines dedicated to our project, showing me how much she'd worked on it when not in class. When I had just thought she was skipping, like me, to be alone. To have quiet. To forget. But she was working harder than I ever had in this class to begin with.

I took the time to actually work in class, not wanting to be slacking off. I finished my work in no time and when the bell rang, I felt refreshed. It felt good to have done something productive that wasn't centered around ghouls and dead things.

Even though those dead things called out to me, beckoning me closer and closer until their little rotting hands took mine and dragged me under.

"Hey, Blaire, wait," Blondie said as I stood from my seat, books already in my hands as I prepared to leave. She stood, digging around in her backpack before handing me a little slip of paper with a shrug. "I'm having a party this Friday, come if you want."

I took the paper and unfolded it, revealing her address.

"It's not a big deal if you don't show," she said, crossing her arms. "But it'll be fun, a whole grade type of thing."

I nodded, fumbling with my smile as I said, "Yeah, no, that'd be fun."

"So, I'll see you there?"

I nodded again. "Definitely."

She smiled, genuinely. She slung her bag over her shoulder and walked with me towards the door where Winker was leaning against the frame, waiting for her. "Listen, if you want to black out and forget everything with me, you can spend the night. I know a few other people might too, so it won't be, like, awkward-"

I laughed, feeling the rise of something good in my chest. Something hopeful. "Remind me on Friday and I'll run by the liquor store."

"Bet!" she grinned, bounding off with more pep in her step than I've seen the past month.

I watched her take Winker's hand, swinging their hands between them as they walked off. I wouldn't have pegged them as being a couple if Ace hadn't told me about them at the party. My cheeks flushed at the memory of us in the bathroom, how he had helped me stand.

I believe, if our circumstances had been different, we might've been together. I didn't want to feed Amy's ideas of me having any type of feeling for Ace besides camaraderie, but I knew there was some truth to her words. If I had been a normal high schooler, if I had been a normal teenager, a normal girl, Ace and I would've fallen in love.

Maybe.

But there was no point in fantasizing about what could have or should have been when I was stuck in the winding loop of caution, deception, and cruelty.

My mind drifted to Crow as I walked towards my locker. The same goes for Crow, if he was different, if he wasn't exactly who he was, would I have subjected myself to fall? To collapse? To crumble at his feet? To allow him to take me, raw and filthy and whole?

Monsters had two faces, and I couldn't allow myself to be fooled by the one I liked more. I wouldn't stoop as low as him, to crawl on all fours for some raunchy midnight dream.

The bell rang and I took a deep breath, filling my lungs until I felt them swell and strain before letting go. I nodded to myself, reassuringly. I just had to get through this week and then I could finally be a teenager. I could get drunk, smoke, dance, and laugh with the girl who was more similar to me than I had once liked to admit.

Same trauma. Same losses.

I smiled as I walked to my next class, welcoming the new friendship I hoped I was getting. We needed each other, we needed someone who would listen. Someone who wouldn't be afraid to talk back, to argue, to show them what's best.

Things would be okay again.

At least, I was optimistic it could be.

The day ended smoothly with a nice bundle of homework I needed to do tucked away inside my backpack. The journey back to my house was equally as smooth and nice, which left me with the nagging suspicion that something was going to go wrong.

Potentially not at this very moment, but soon.

I was relieved to walk into my house to find Amy eating a bowl of cereal at the kitchen counter with her big curly hair pulled into a topknot. She greeted me with a wave, not looking up from the newspaper she spread out in front of her.

"Come check this out," she said as she shoveled a spoonful of Cheerios in her mouth.

I walked over, peering over her shoulder as she pointed to the main headline. Deaths of Two High Schoolers Linked To Two Missing Teens? I pulled the paper from her, skimming the article and picking up the most important details, including the one about how the police are refusing to elaborate on the cases. Detectives refuse to answer questions about the cases that happened weeks apart. The heinous crimes don't seem to be stopping. Locals believe it could be the work of a serial.

"The whole thing is a mess," Amy said, swallowing another mouth full. Her spoon clanked against the bowl as she traced the edges, milk dripping. "If the police don't cooperate soon, the press is likely to notice."

"The police department has been corrupted for god knows how long," I murmured. "They're bound to notice by now."

Amy took the paper from my hands and pointed to a line and laughed, "They think Wooden is a hot zone for crimes, the deaths and the supposed 'kidnappings' are all linked to the high school."

"Of course they're going to blame the school," I sighed, snatching the cereal box from the counter. "They have to point the finger somewhere."

"It even brings up the murders from the seventies and eighties," Amy pointed again and I took a look, hastily reading.

Could the famous occult killings from the '70s and '80s be another link to the recent crimes? Some locals such as Miriam Castor, owner of Ingredients & Inquiries, have spoken out about some of the recent allegations. "We'd be fools not to think the cases are related," she said. "We'd be even bigger fools if we didn't think these cases didn't have anything to do with what happened here back in the seventies."

"Like, isn't Miriam Caster that crazy lady who sued the town way back when?" Amy asked me, scowling at the paper.

I nodded, thinking back to when she finally got her settlement of around a hundred thousand dollars in the wrongful death claim case for her children. "Yeah, her kids died from...I think lead poisoning? It happened way before I was born but I remember watching some old news story with my parents about it. Said the town's water supply was bad, even though it was only her kids who died."

"This town is full of weirdos," Amy murmured, tipping her bowl back to down the milk in two large gulps. She pushed back her seat, licking her lips as she stood. "Listen, I'm going to be late coming in tonight, going to go snoop around some of Tobias's hold hangouts."

My ears perked at this and I stopped walking towards the stairs, turning. "I should go with you-"

She shook her head. "No offense but you kinda stand out, so it'd be better if I just went alone."

I felt my cheeks flush and I laughed, looking away. She had a good point. "Where does he like to go?" I asked, referring to the places she'd probably be breaking and entering into.

"Some bar in Bellenau and then a small office building near Charlon."

I recognized the name of that little town, Charlon. It was way past Bellenau and if you just kept going down the highway, you'd end up there. I'd only been once or twice as a kid and remembered it being extremely plain. It wasn't a place where most people tended to visit, it was a business town if anything. There were rows and towers of buildings made up of random office spaces, beige feeling cafés, office supply stores, and the occasional Wendys or McDonalds that gave off the eerie feeling of being lost or disorganized when entered. It was founded after Pierre Charlon, an old french writer who lived and died in that boring little town.

"So," Amy said, drawing out the word in a low voice. "You stay here and get your homework done and be a cute little student, okay?"

I rolled my eyes, opening the cereal box as I headed up the stairs, saying over my shoulder, "Yeah, yeah, have fun!"

I was tempted to follow her, to see what she was really up to. After her accusations the other night, I had a feeling she wasn't telling me the whole truth. When the night came in and the sky began to blacken, I watched her from my room, the door parted only slightly enough for me to see through and down into the kitchen.

She gathered a few snacks and stuffed them in a bag I didn't even know she had. I wondered what else she was hiding in there, zipped closed, her own personal map of secrets. She stalked across the room and headed for the front door and she paused, only for a split second, with her hand on the knob before turning it and leaving.

I left my room completely, scampering down the steps to peer out after her through the window but she was already gone.

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kinda just a filled chapter lol, next one will b fun tho i swear

a lot of action/plot is going to happen in the next chap which ill post next monday or maybe sooner, idk yet but keep an eye out for it!!!!!!

pls pls comment/vote, i would love to hear your opinions on whats happened so far

xx day