Autumn Storm (12 page)

She said nothing, silently disagreeing. He
had the arrogance of a guy who only dated blond models. It seemed
at odds with his kindness towards her.

“Okay, I have to tell you this,” he said,
grinning. “When we’re touching, I can sometimes see what you’re
thinking.”

“Are you serious?”

“Yeah. It’s an awesome skill when you’re …
ah” he fumbled “with someone. I’ll just leave it at that.”

Her face grew redder at the image in her
thoughts. She tugged her hand away from him, not wanting him to
see. The awkward silence lasted until they entered the main house.
Beck paused in the living area.

Jenna waved from her spot on the couch with
Adam and a few others. Autumn returned the gesture.

“I’m going to rest,” she told Beck.

“I’ll be around,” he replied. His eyes went
to the stairs, and he rubbed the back of his head. “You … um, don’t
take this the wrong way, but you want an escort? For the stairs.
Not your room … just the stairs.”

Autumn shook her head, amused. “I’ll be
okay.”

He gave a salute and walked into the living
room, nudging Biji over on the couch so he could sit. Autumn smiled
at the small girl’s objection. Unconcerned, Beck squeezed between
her and the arm of the couch.

With a deep breath, Autumn tackled the
stairs. Beck’s magick wore off too fast, and she was in pain
halfway up the stairs. She forced herself not to pause, afraid of
showing anyone else how weak she was. When she reached the top of
the stairwell, she steadied herself against the wall in the shadows
of the hallway before proceeding to her room.

She was relieved to see Dawn and her
entourage had left. Autumn closed the door behind her and sat on
her bed. Removing the brace, she stared at her leg.

Sometimes, when she was alone, she felt
anger at the part of her that was so weak. The visible scars, the
immobility. Why did this happen? What had she ever done to deserve
pain for the rest of her life? Wasn’t taking her family from her
when she was four enough?

Frustrated and fatigued, Autumn propped up
her leg on a pillow and lay back in bed. It’d take awhile for the
swelling to pass. She normally read a book. Today, she felt too
tired and closed her eyes to nap.

Come with me.

The whisper pierced her sleep. Her eyes
opened, and she blinked, surprised to find it dark in her room. She
didn’t mean to sleep the rest of the day. She’d hoped to take a nap
then venture outside to recover her iPad in the hope it survived
the snow.

Autumn sat up. The swelling in her leg was
gone. The room was chilly, and a glance out the window showed it
still snowed. Dawn was sleeping deeply, and the time on her alarm
clock read a few minutes past midnight.

Standing, Autumn waited for her body to
balance then crossed to the bathroom. She refused to turn on the
light, telling herself it was because she didn’t want to wake Dawn.
In truth, seeing the dark-haired girl in the middle of the night
scared her too much to fall back asleep.

When she returned to the bed, she caught a
glimpse of movement from the Square. Autumn pushed aside the sheer
curtain to gaze into the quiet gathering place, lit by a single
light on the back of the main house.

She gasped. Standing below her window,
gazing up, was the dark-haired girl from the mirror. Her body was
ethereal and surrounded by black fog, her pale face the only real
part of her with form.

Autumn closed her eyes and willed the girl
away, terrified that the hallucination had moved from her mirror to
the real world.

Come with me.

She knew before opening her eyes that the
apparition wasn’t leaving without her. Autumn looked. The girl
remained.

Shakily, Autumn pulled on jeans, boots and
two sweaters. She grabbed her cane and checked out the window
again. The girl waited for her. Telling herself the hallucination
would disappear by the time she reached the Square, Autumn took her
time with the stairs and retreated out the back door.

The snow was three feet deep and the air
cold. The night was silent, aside from the murmurs of air and earth
magick. She stopped as she stepped onto the back porch, unwilling
to venture into the deep snow. Air magick filled her uninvited, and
she shivered. She didn’t fight it, instead comforted by the
element. It mixed with her magick, and both moved in and out of her
as she breathed.

Autumn looked around for the dark-haired
girl. Her gaze found the apparition at the other end of the Square,
past the dorms by the edge of the road. Invisible hands pushed the
snow out of her way to clear a path leading straight to
her,
the ghost.

Autumn gripped the handle of her cane more
tightly. She’d hoped the answers she sought showed up in a document
on her iPad, not in the form of a ghost on a snowy night.

Heart pounding hard, she walked onto the
path. The air pushed the snow back over the path behind her, as if
forbidding her from backing out. Autumn kept her eyes forward.

The dark-haired girl waited. Her features
grew more real as Autumn approached while the fog moving and
shifting around her obscured her body. The ghost was gorgeous, with
large, dark eyes, fine features and a clear complexion as pale as
the moon. Autumn had avoided studying the image in the mirror, but
she saw how pretty the girl was as she neared.

When Autumn was a few feet away, the girl
turned and fled towards the forest. Air cleared a path behind her
for Autumn to follow. Uneasily, she realized there were no
footprints. The apparition wasn’t a part of this world, and the air
magick was determined that Autumn follow her.

The girl stopped at the edge of the forest,
beside the memorial plaque on the forbidden trail.

Autumn’s gaze moved from her to the deer
path. The trees lining it were weighed down on one side by heavy
snow and untouched by winter on the other, causing them to lean
away from the path.

As before, when Autumn neared, the girl spun
and ran down the path. Autumn swallowed hard as she stepped onto
the trail. She reminded herself nothing bad happened earlier in the
day, when she’d ventured this way. She’d wondered why the path was
off limits at all.

The girl paused at the clearing until Autumn
approached. Autumn stopped to take a deep breath. Her leg was
starting to ache. She hadn’t thought about putting on her brace
before leaving her room. She stopped to stretch, eyes on her guide
running across the field.

More fog drew her attention as she set foot
into the clearing. She paused, puzzling over the strange display.
There were patches of white and black fog in the field, moving with
more discipline than smoke. They hovered around a large, flat stone
in the middle of the field before two of them – one black and one
white - raced away towards the canyon. Almost like … people? She
squinted, trying to see more. The clouds seemed to reset suddenly,
with all of them returning to the stone in the center. As she
watched, they milled once more, before the two broke away and fled
once more.

They disappeared into the forest, only for
the routine to start anew. She sensed they were acting out some
bizarre scene. It was like the corridor; unfamiliar and scary. Was
this a memory of the air magick, projected into the field? Like the
earth showed her?

The dark-haired ghost reached the other side
of the snowy clearing. Autumn trailed again, watching as the girl’s
form disappeared into the forest.

This time, the ghost didn’t wait for her at
the edge of the trail where the forest fell away and the cliff
overlooking Miner’s Drop. As Autumn watched, the ghost approached
the edge of the canyon. She stood still for a long moment.

Fear rose fast and cold within Autumn. She
quickened her pace, uncertain why the idea of a hallucination –
probably brought on by her pain meds – jumping off a cliff affected
her at all.

Don’t.
She willed the girl.
Just
wait!

If the ghost heard, she gave no indication.
Autumn limped free of the path into the snow. Black fog swirled
around the ghost. She was gazing down into the canyon. Autumn drew
abreast of her, taking in the pale face once more. There was sorrow
in the girl’s dark eyes, and Autumn followed her gaze. For a long
moment, she couldn’t breathe.

On the snow-covered slope far below, the
girl lay unmoving. Her body was bent at angles that told Autumn she
didn’t survive the fall. Blood pooled around her, glimmering
red-black amid the black shadows milling around her form. Both were
a stark contrast to the snow.

A tremor of distress went through Autumn.
She glanced at the girl beside her. The apparition was gone. She
was alone on top of the cliff. Her body shook from something she
couldn’t identify. Emotion? Memory? Whatever it was, it was buried.
The scene before her meant something to the part of her she
couldn’t access. It made her breathing harsh and uneven.

As she watched, the body in the canyon faded
and dissipated like smoke. No sign of what happened remained.

But Autumn knew. She understood why the path
to Miner’s Drop was off limits. The dark-haired ghost haunting her
had showed her. She fought the darkness of her memories, struggling
to recall why the ghost had chosen to follow her from the hospital
to bring her here, tonight, and remind her what happened.

Her head began to pound. The harder she
fought the blocked part of her mind, the sharper the pain grew,
until she was dizzy. She needed to know, but fighting her mind was
a losing battle resulting in a migraine.

She just couldn’t remember.

“You keep following me.”

Decker’s voice made her jump. Autumn winced
and touched her temple. She drew a few deep breaths before turning
to face him. He stood a few feet away, gaze on the sky. She focused
on him, frowning. His words were slightly slurred and his eyes
unfocused. The allure she’d barely escaped by day was intensified
by night. Shadows didn’t just trace his movement, they swirled at
his feet and wrapped him in a cloak.

“I don’t mean to,” she replied.

Her voice drew his attention. His gaze
remained glazed. She wasn’t certain if she was relieved he couldn’t
focus his intensity on her or scared he’d be like the college boys
that pushed her around.

“Are you okay?” she ventured.

“Fine.” He glanced down at himself, as if to
double check.

Autumn’s gaze swept over him, settling at
the small pool of blood beside him. She looked harder for some sign
of an injury. His hands and clothing were wet with blood.

“It’s not mine,” Decker said, aware of her
gaze.

“Whose is it?” she whispered.

“The bus comes Thursdays. You just got
here?”

She nodded uncertainly.

“Amber showed you the Light orientation.” He
snorted. “You have no clue about the other side of the story.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’ll give you the quick version. There’s
Light, and there’s Dark. Beck is Light. I’m Dark. His job is to
protect those in the Light, and mine is to enforce the laws of
both.” He lifted his hands. “This is how I do it.”

A chill went through her. She’d thought him
dangerous, but this was entirely different than what she
expected.

“You … you kill people?” she managed.

“Witchlings that go Dark. Only those who
warrant it. Sometimes those who probably don’t.” He shrugged. “I
don’t believe in second chances.”

Drugged and unguarded, Decker’s human side
was exposed. Horrified by his words, she nonetheless sensed there
was a pain as deep hers lurking beneath the shadows. She hated the
idea of someone else suffering as she did, even him.

“I do,” she said, uncertain what else to
say. “I had one. Maybe you will, too.”

“What?” His gaze sharpened.

“Nothing, I just …”

For once, she prayed Beck stumbled upon her
again. Decker was staring at her hard, the shadows around him
stilling in what she took to be warning, like a hunter about to
pounce. The whisper of air magick grew fearful, alarming Autumn.
What kind of magick did an element fear?

“There are no second chances.” His tone was
hard, his voice inhuman. “Remember that, if you choose to go
Dark.”

The shadows around him began to shift again.
Autumn swallowed hard. If she could run, she would. Instead, she
was trapped here with the panther, hoping it didn’t attack her.

“I…I meant to thank you for what you did at
the football game,” she said, trying to ease the tension between
them.

“No worries.”

She wanted to laugh and scream at the
response, unable to feel as calm as he did after just hearing him
admit he ran around killing people. Her mind was numb, and her body
wouldn’t stop trembling. This time, it wasn’t air magick or the
weather that made her shake.