Dead Lost (Kiera Hudson Series Two (Book 8)) (14 page)

“Gone?” Potter asked, now staring at me through the darkness.

“Vanished,” I said. “Without saying anything, Sam’s mum took my hand in hers and led me toward the spot between the trees where Sam had disappeared. Then, all of a sudden, I was no longer standing in the snow in the middle of the woods.”

“Where were you?” Potter said.

“I was walking hand in hand out of a tunnel and up onto an underground platform,” I said. “Sam was standing there waiting for us.”

“Was there anyone else?” he asked, still keeping his voice low.

“No, just the three of us,” I said. “No sooner had we left the tunnel, then a tube train came racing out of it. The train stopped in the station. The doors opened, but each carriage was eerily empty. There was no one waiting to get on or off. The doors slid shut again, and the tube train left the station. The platform looked like any other Tube Station you might see in London. The walls were curved and tiled. There were posters on the walls advertising upcoming books and movies. There was a wooden bench set against the wall, and Sam’s mother guided us toward it. I went to sit down, but there was a newspaper. The headline read:
Catastrophic Thunderstorms To Hit Ungland. 
I folded the newspaper in half, tucking it beneath the bench so I could sit down. It was here that Sam’s mum explained how she wanted us to go back through the cracks and stir things up a little with Kiera and her Dead Angels.”

“But why you and Sam?”
Potter asked me.

“Sam asked his mother the same question,” I explained. “His mother told us that they needed a wolf to see the cracks, and he was the only wolf they could trust.”

“I told you they were using the kid,” Potter cut in.

Ignoring him, I continued. “And they needed me, because I could get close to you all. They could trust me not to give away their plan to the wolves. Why would I want to betray my friends?”

“Mr. and Mrs. Teen Wolf sure had it all figured out,” Potter said.

“Sam’s last name is Brooke,” I told him, but he already knew that, Potter was just being an arsehole again. “Sam was to go and take a picture of you in that barn before you got the kicking from those Skin-walkers and then he was to go and take that picture of Isidor and Melody Rose together. He was then to go through another crack and leave the picture for Isidor to find in that grate. I was unhappy about this, as I knew what my brother’s fate was to be. But Sam’s mother told me that however hard it was to understand, Isidor had to go and find Melody Rose again. He had to get her to remember him. If Isidor and Melody weren’t
pushed
back together, then the world would stay as it was where the wolves ruled and treated humans as slaves. Sam looked at me as if seeking my approval to go and photograph Isidor and Melody. I reluctantly agreed. It was then I was instructed to go and take the photograph of Kiera and her father and leave it at her flat to find, and then deliver your old love letters to Sophie.”

“I would love to know where they got those fucking letters,” Potter cut in.

“Sam’s mum wanted Sophie to remember you, just like she wanted Melody Rose to remember Isidor, and for Kiera to remember the deep love for her father and go seek him out,” I said.

“Just so more of these cracks would appear,” Potter said thoughtfully.

“It’s what your friend Lilly and Noah asked you to do, isn’t it?” I said.

“I guess,” he replied
, but I couldn’t help but feel he wasn’t so sure.

“What I don’t get
is, that picture Sam took of me…” Potter started.

“Shhh!”
I cut in, snapping my head to the right. “I can hear Sophie locking up. She’s leaving.”

Potter sprang from the slab, the long white sheet flowing out behind him looking like some kinda ghost. He followed me to the door, I leant against it
. I could hear Sophie locking up on the other side of the wall, the sound of her footfalls walking away. 

“She’s gone,” I said, looking at Potter, my eyes wide.

He slowly eased open the door and peered into the gap. Potter glanced left then right. Seeing that Sophie truly had left, he snuck through the gap in the door and I followed. There was another slab in the middle of the room, but this was unoccupied. The room smelt of bleach. The walls were covered with pristine white tiles. The floor sparkled where it looked as if it had recently been mopped. On the other side of the room, there was an office. Potter crossed the room and went inside.

“Hey, Kayla,” he said.

I joined him inside. He was holding up a see-through plastic bag and I could see his clothes folded up inside. Potter was grinning from ear to ear. He began to unwind the sheet wrapped about his waist.

“Don’t look,” he scowled.

“As if,” I tutted, turning away.

Sophie’s desk was cluttered with beige coloured files and medical records of the dead lying in the room next door. There were ‘in’ and ‘out’ trays. Both were made of bright red plastic.

“Hurry up,” I said.

I smelt cigarette smoke and glanced over my shoulder. Potter now had his trousers and boots on, and a cigarette jutted from between his lips.

“I don’t think you should be smoking in here, do you?” I said. “It is part of a hospital, after all.”

“Well, it’s not as if the smoke is going to kill any of the fuckers in here,” he said, pulling on his coat. “They’re already dead, you included.”

Knowing there was little point in arguing with him, I headed for the door.

“Hang on,” Potter called after me.

“What for?” I said, turning to look at him. “We haven’t come back here to hang out in some morgue, we’ve got some mail to deliver, remember?”

“That’s what I’m thinking about,” Potter said thoughtfully.

“What?” I asked him.

“Give the letters to me,” he said, holding out his hand.

I pulled them from my pocket and handed them to him.

Potter looked down at the letters, then back at me. “Sophie told me that these letters were posted to her over a series of weeks and months,” he said.

“So?”

“We’ll I ain’t planning on staying in this
where
and
when
for the next few months so I can play at being Postman-freaking-Pat,” he said.

“Well at least let’s deliver them to her house,” I said, “That’s where I was told to take them.”

“What’s the point?” Potter groaned. “We can leave the letters here for Sophie to find.”

“Where?”

“Here,” Potter said, dropping the wad of letters into Sophie’s ‘in’ tray.

“But that’s not how she originally got the letters,” I reminded him.

“What difference can it make?” Potter said. “She’s still going to get the letters again, isn’t she?”

“I guess…” I started.

“It’s not like we’re really changing anything,” Potter said. “And besides, like I’ve already said, I’ve had enough of this bullshit. I’ve done more than I bargained for on this errand than I originally agreed to. I just want to get back to my own
where
and
when
and see Kiera. As far as she’s still concerned, I’m dead.”

I got the feeling that Potter was afraid to go anywhere near Sophie again. “You’re scared, aren’t you?”

“Sorry?” he said, glancing at me.

“You’re scared that if you see Sophie again, it might bring back some of those feelings. You would remember her as much as she is going to start remembering you,” I said. “Part of you still has feelings for her.”

Coming and standing right in front of me, Potter looked into my eyes and said, “There is only one person I’m in love with, and that person is Kiera Hudson.”

“Are you sure?” I asked, matching his stare.

“Why the fuck do you think I’m even here, Kayla?” he whispered with a shake of his head. “I’m doing all of this for Kiera. I let Sophie die so Kiera can live.”

Without saying anything else, Potter left the office and the love letters waiting for Sophie to find in her tray. I went back into the sterile-looking room to find Potter forcing the door open with his claws. He stepped out into the awaiting darkness and I followed. The sound of the door slamming shut behind us was drowned out by a sudden boom of thunder overhead. It was so loud that the ground seemed to shake
beneath our feet. I looked up at the night sky as another explosion of thunder rumbled overhead.

“What are they?” I gasped.

“What are what?” Potter said.

“Those,” I said, pointing up at the night sky.

“They look like cracks,” he said over another menacing roar of thunder.

“Why are there cracks in the sky?” I breathed. “What caused them?”

“I think we did,” Potter said, his wings springing from his back. He closed one hand over mine. Together, we shot up into the sky and went in search of the nearest railway station.  

Chapter Twenty-Two

Isidor

“We’re all dead,” I told Melody.
“Me and my friends – all of us.”

“How?” she asked.

Rolling onto my back, but keeping my arms and wings about Melody, I looked up at the ceiling. Just like the sky outside, the ancient beams above my head were covered in cracks. The song
Heroes
continued to play on the radio, like it was stuck on some kinda loop. The wind howled outside and blasted snow against the bedroom window.

“We were betrayed by a friend,” I told her. “He was a Vampyrus, just like me and the others. But just like the wolves here, our friend wanted the Vampyrus to rule the Earth. His lust for power was so great, that he murdered each of us in turn.”

“What was his name?” Melody asked.

“He had many, but we knew him to be called Luke Bishop,” I said.

Hearing his name, Melody slipped free of my arms and tightened the sheet draped about her shoulders to keep warm. “I’ve heard that name before,” she said.

“Where?”
I asked, sitting up.

“He is better known in this world as the Wolf Man,” she said, staring at me, eyes bright. “He’s a wolf.”

“Bishop is no wolf,” I breathed. “He is a Vampyrus, just like me and my friends.”

“But he leads the wolves,” Melody said.

“Have you ever seen him?” I asked, struggling to believe what she had told me.

“No,” Melody said, shaking her head of pink hair. “He is very much like you and the other Dead Angels.”

“How come?” I asked.

“He is something of a myth – like some kinda legend,” she explained. “He makes very few public appearances. He lets others do his dirty work.”

“Sounds like Bishop,” I said.

“But why would he be masquerading as a wolf if he’s really a Vampyrus?” she asked.

“Because he wants power, and the wolves have it in this world,” I said, trying to figure it out for myself. I wished Kiera was here because she would have it figured out in no time at all. She could
see
stuff more clearly than I ever could.

“But why doesn’t he just forge an alliance with the Vampyrus in this world and rule the wolves?” Melody seemed to be struggling to figure out Luke’s motives as much as I was.

“The only Vampyruses in this world are Luke Bishop, me, and my friends, and we would all rather die than form an alliance with him. He knows that, and that’s why he killed us all before,” I said.

“You told me once that your race came from below ground,” she said. “Why doesn’t he just go back below ground and…
”

“He can’t,” I cut in. “The Elders sealed all the entrances to The Hollows. They don’t exist anymore. As far as the Vampyrus know, there is no world other than The Hollows. They have forgotten about the world above their heads and us.”

“I must tell the wolves that this Wolf Man is an imposter, that he really is a Vampyrus,” Melody said.

“Bishop is too smart for that,” I said. “He’ll snuff you out like a light as soon as you utter so much as the first word. No, I must go back and find my friends. I must tell Kiera what I know.”

I pulled the sheet back and stood up.

“I want to come with you,” Melody said, climbing from the bed.

“I wasn’t planning on going without you,” I said, pulling on my jeans that Melody had earlier pulled from me and thrown to the floor. I watched her put on some clean warm clothes. When she was dressed, she looked across the room at me. She looked kind of haunted.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, going to her.

“I was just thinking,” she said, taking my hands in hers.

“About what?”
I asked, gently squeezing her fingers with mine.

“So what happens if we find your friends, tell them about Bishop, and they somehow defeat him – put the world right again,” she said. “There won’t be a happily ever after for us. We will die, just like before.”

“We won’t die, Melody. We’ll get
pushed
,” I said. “But this time, we’ll get
pushed
together.”