The Better Part of Darkness

“That’s enough!” the chief commanded.

My arms shook, too weak to support my weight. I fell back to the bed. Trying to think clearly amid the heavy clouds in my mind was like trying to run up a cliff backward. “Will,” I forced out, “they took her from Will. Killed him. Go to his apartment. You’ll see.” The chief glanced over his shoulder and nodded to an officer standing guard. “A Revenant took over his body. The others. Bryn, Hank … Are they alive?”

“Charlie,” the chief asked more gently than before. “What are you talking about?” I could tell by the softening of his hard expression that the more I tried to explain the more ridiculous it all sounded.

“Didn’t you find them? In the spa. All of them, drugged.”

“We didn’t find anyone except for the victims.”

I frowned. No, that didn’t make sense. They were there. I’d seen them. If only my head would clear! Sluggish, I shook my head and swallowed. “No … Where are they?”

“It may be the pain meds talking,” Doctor Berk said, coming to stand at the foot of the bed.

“It’s not the fucking meds!” Bright rainbow stars of pain flashed behind my eyelids. I jerked against the restraints, grabbing at the chief’s wrist. My vision swam so badly, his features blended to a lump of flesh. “Please help me. I’m not lying.” The chief was like a father to me. And he’d betrayed me. He’d allowed me to be Titus Mott’s lab rat. “How could you, how could you agree to do that to me? You and Titus …”

He gave me a gentle pat on my hand and a reassuring squeeze. “We’ll talk about that later, Charlie. You need to rest now.”

“She will stand trial as soon as we can set a date,” Otorius said tightly.

“The only place she’s going is to the hospital as soon as I can arrange it. You never should have brought her here like some criminal.”

“She is a criminal!”

“And I say she’s not. Not until my investigation is complete.” The chief stepped toward the Abaddon representative, standing toe-to-toe with him. “Let me get one thing straight, this is my detective and my precinct. I don’t take orders from you. We do this by the book. You get me?”

“If we did this by the book, she would have been brought in days ago, before more of my countrymen died, and I lost my hand!”

The chief’s voice was low and deadly. “And I didn’t have a warrant a few days ago.”

The room grew silent, and I imagined the chief was using his infamous stare down. I smiled slightly as I heard a low curse and the door open. “You have no idea who or what you’re dealing with,” Otorius said in a serious, even tone. “There’s more than one monster in this city.” The door closed.

“I need a moment alone,” the chief said tiredly, his steps growing louder as he approached the bed. A chair scraped across the floor as two sets of footsteps, Doc Berk’s and the nurse’s, faded away behind the click of the door.

My heavy eyelids opened again as he sat down and regarded me with a mixture of annoyance and caring. He shook his head. “You’ve got this entire department into one hell of a mess.” I opened my mouth, but he cut me off. “I know, I know. It wasn’t you, right? Doesn’t matter, Charlie. We’re under a microscope right now.” He sat back, letting out a huge sigh. “Did you have to go and massacre eight Charbydons and an Elysian mage?” He rubbed his face. “This isn’t like you.”

“He was a black mage,” I mumbled and then took a deep breath. “Go to Mynogan’s bath house, and you’ll see. It’s grown there. Then it goes to the Lion’s Den. Tennin, he has a bunch of it. You’ll see. You’ll find the ash. We need those flowers for an antidote or all of them … they won’t wake up.”

He pinched the bridge of his nose. “Mynogan is running for city council, Charlie. And Grigori Tennin …”

“Is a murderer and a drug dealer,” I slurred, growing tired. I closed my eyes. “You scared of him?”

“Hell, no, I ain’t scared of him. Goddammit,” he sighed. “Look, I’ll check into it. And if Hank and the others have gone off the radar like you say … well, the fuck if I know, but we’ll figure something out.”

“Just get me out of here, Chief.”

He eyed me for a hard second. “Can’t do that. You don’t think I’m under the gun? I’m already up shit’s creek for pulling strings at Deer Isle because of your asinine bargain with Tennin. If you go free now, it’ll be the end of my career, and I sure as shit won’t be able to help you then.”

“I don’t care about your damn job right now,” I spat.

The chief walked to the door and stopped. “You’re the biggest piece of trouble I’ve ever known, Madigan.”

“Yeah, I know,” I whispered on a faint breath.

When he was gone, I relaxed back into the thin mattress, body limp and out of breath. I needed to heal, but my wounds were much worse this time around, and all I wanted was to slip back into unconsciousness. My body and mind begged me to. Maybe just a little nap.

No!

God, no. I couldn’t. There wasn’t time.

I let my eyelids close and remembered my conversation with Aaron. Be calm. Both Charbydons and Elysians had the power to heal. It was inside of me somewhere. The dark power and the light. I realized at that moment, I’d relied mostly on the dark, had used every ounce in me. But the Elysian power, I’d barely tapped. And I knew just how to do it.

Emma.

All I had to do was imagine her in my mind and she was there. Drawing on our bond, I freed my emotions, all the warmth and love. Her smile lit the darkest part of my soul. The sound of her laughter filled me with joy and peace. And her love for me was absolute, and so damn humbling. I’d sacrifice the world and more for her.

And she was my pathway to the light.

Only the good, I commanded as thoughts of her kidnapping came into my mind. My Emma. Strong-willed, passionate, kind. Pride swelled my chest, mingling with all the wonderful emotions she brought out in me.

The goodness unlocked something and behind my closed lids a light grew, and the Elysian power released, flooding into my own light and the light that my child created inside of me. I realized then, as my fingers and toes tingled and my body hummed, that the darkness had nearly overtaken me. I had relied upon it so much in my anger and desperation that it had grown and adapted to me while this power had not been given much of a chance.

Well, now it had. And I held on to it, letting it course through my veins, every sinew and muscle, every cell and bone, welcoming it and fusing it with my human side and the dark side.

It was like a giant helping of morphine. For a moment everything—my side, the bruises, cuts, and stiff muscles—became pain free, but it didn’t last long. Once it ebbed, I was left with some serious aches and pains, but not enough to keep me from getting my ass out of there and finding Emma.

“Will you help me sit up?” I asked the nurse sitting by the bed reading a novel. From her tired look, I wondered how long I’d been healing myself. It hadn’t seemed that long.

“Sure.” She set the book down and raised the bed.

Relieved, I scanned the room, noting the two doors, one to a small bathroom and the other—my path to freedom. As she fluffed the pillow for me, I pulled on the restraints around my wrists. “Is there anything you can do about these?”

She gave me a sad look. “Sorry.”

“What if I have to use the bathroom?”

“One of the guards will come in and stand outside the bathroom door while you go.”

“Fine by me. I have to go.”

“Let me check your side first,” she said, coming around the bed to inspect the bandage around my torso. “No bleeding. How do you feel?”

“Trust me, good enough to go to the bathroom.”

After patting me on the leg, she went to the door to tell the officer that I had to pee. Way to put it bluntly.

Trying to formulate a plan in that short amount of time was impossible. But one, I did have to pee, and two, I desperately wanted out of those restraints. And three, if I was able to stand on my own two feet, then I knew I could make it out of there somehow.