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Every part of Rachel feels like jelly by the time she exits the corridor. Her pulse races ferociously. A trickle of sweat runs down her neck, soaking her collar.
The adrenaline injection is exactly what she needed, though.
She passes the cafeteria, finds no trace of Golvath or his influenced cronies who’re looking for her. She navigates her way through the debris, heading back to the old school building.
Stop. Wait. Listen.
Nothing.
When she comes up to the T-junction and finds it similarly empty, her synapses fire warnings.
Too easy, she thinks. She turns full circle, searching for anything out of the ordinary, and purses her lips. No way is it this easy.
Rachel stares into the dimly lit hallway, which ends at the bell tower, and recalls all the slasher films she’s watched. This is usually the part in the movie where the final girl gets lulled into a false sense of security, a time when stupid, preventable mistakes are often made. But what other choice does she have?
I might as well get it over with while I still have some fight left in me.
Gripping the shiv tighter, she musters all of her courage, and walks into the shadows with purpose. She could have tried skulking around in the half-light, should have probably been less conspicuous, but then she would be wasting precious energy. No. All of that would have been futile, anyway.
She squares her shoulders and holds her head up high as the gloom intensifies, fearless of the Fae lurking about.
“I know you’re here, Golvath,” Rachel says. “I can feel you watching me.”
“Funny.” Golvath’s voice turns her blood to ice as he wraps his arms around her, pinning her biceps against her sides. “I’ve been watching you for months and you never noticed before,” he whispers triumphantly in her ear, his hot coffee breath blowing against her neck and cheek.
Rachel strains forward before jerking backward as hard as she can. Her skull collides with his forehead harder than she expects, and white hot pain shoots directly into her brain. A starburst of light enters her vision, pinpricking her line of sight. Still, the blow is enough for Golvath to loosen his grip. While he moans, Rachel sprints out of his hold, down the ever-darkening hallway. She ignores the migraine blooming behind her right eye, disregards the possibility of having a concussion, and pays little attention to Golvath’s howl of frustration.
Focusing on her strides, she pushes herself into full speed, desperate to get as much space between herself and her murderous stalker as possible. Rachel darts through the darkness, forcing her legs to work harder, move faster.
“You’ll pay for that,” Golvath shouts somewhere behind her. He stalks forward.
She slows to an easier speed as a trickle of light brightens the stone archway, and makes the sharp turn into the bell tower without coming to a complete stop. Navigating the treacherous spiral stairs is, however, not as simple. Each step creaks when she places her weight on it, some even buckle. Now and then, there’s a precarious crack underfoot, driving her forward or making her freeze.
The spiral structure trembles and questionable handrail shakes as Golvath bounds up the staircase. Each step he takes reverberates up her legs and spine. Rachel doesn’t look back, can’t stop. She propels herself forward, no longer worrying about falling through an iffy, rotten step. There’s no time to worry.
A black tendril caresses the back of her mind, whispering sweet nothings as it searches for a way through the mental wall. Whenever that darkness senses a weakening in her defenses, it probes deeper or strikes unexpectedly. The mental attacks leave behind something akin to a thick, sticky, poisonous residue.
—and kill you—
Golvath’s—thankfully distorted—thought pops into her head.
Rachel falters and grabs onto the tilting handrail to steady herself. She chances a look behind her, only to see the Fae charging up. With every huff, his nostrils flare.
“You should think about getting a gym membership!”
The red-faced Fae releases a scream of fury through his labored breaths, before he starts taking two steps at a time to catch up to her.
“Oh, crap.”
Rachel stops taunting and runs up the remainder of the stairs, hoping Mercia, Orion, and Dougal have some type of plan to get her safely down from the bell tower before Golvath can sink his claws into her.
Rickety wood gives way to stone as she runs onto the narrow walkway that surrounds the suspended rusting bell in the center. She leans over the side, searching for a familiar face on the ground.
“You think you’re so smart, but you’ve literally trapped yourself for me,” Golvath says.
Rachel pivots, still holding onto the stone sidewall, and circles the bell. There are only so many places she can go from here.
“Oh, have you run out of witticisms now?” He calmly walks around the walkway, his gaze never wavering from hers. Golvath licks his lips, grins. “I’m going to take my sweet time with you, Rachel Cleary.”
He darts forward, outstretched arms and long fingers grabbing at her. His one hand becomes entangled in her hair, the other takes hold of her shirt. She screams as he jerks her back to him, ripping strands of hair from her skull.
Rachel twists around, brings her elbow up, and hits him square in the face. At the same time, she lifts her leg with as much force as she can muster and knees him right in the groin.
Golvath howls. He releases her a second time, then drops onto his knees. Rachel rushes out of his grasp, backing away as he falls forward and rolls onto his side, writhing in pain.
“You bitch,” he bites out.
A few seconds, a minute at most, is all the time she’s bought herself. Rachel shifts the shiv, preparing to use it, as she turns around and searches the ground again. Mercia stands there, a speck on the pavement below, staring back at her. She screams something up at Rachel, something indecipherable through the magic surrounding the school.
“What?”
Mercia’s silent scream is accompanied by hand gestures.
Rachel shakes her head. “I can’t hear you.”
“Stupid mistake.” Golvath’s breath hits her face.
Rachel spins around, thinking she still has a few seconds to get out of his reach, but he’s right behind her. So close. Too close.
She gasps just as he wraps his hands around her neck.
Golvath leans closer, until there’s no space between their bodies and they’re both half-lying over the sidewall. His fingers press against her windpipe, blocking off her air. Spite fills his blue eyes; a vindictive smile mars his otherwise handsome face.
Rachel reaches with her free hand and rakes her nails down his cheek.
His skin breaks in places, angry red welts appear almost immediately. He hisses, but doesn’t relent, only squeezes her neck harder, pushes her back with more force.
Her lungs are on fire. She gapes like a fish as she searches for oxygen, just a single breath, but nothing passes through.
“I’m going to watch the life leave you.”
With no other card to play, she shifts the shiv forward and pulls her arm back as far as she can. The world seems to slow down as she uses all of her remaining might to thrust the sharp, metal tip toward Golvath’s jugular vein. Rachel watches the shiv move closer, closer, closer, and then stop a hairsbreadth from reaching her intended target.
Golvath’s smile broadens as she struggles against the invisible hand keeping her arm in midair.
“Did you think you could keep me out forever?” His voice rings through her mind, the dark tendril breaking down the mental wall, brick by brick. “Drop it.”
Her hand opens at his order, fingers splay, and her arm relaxes. The shiv drops, rolls, and probably disappears down the bell tower. Her only weapon, only hope of survival, falls out of her reach.
Golvath looks past her and shouts, “You’re not strong enough to break through my spells, Prince. The best you can do is to watch her die.”
Rachel’s eyes roll back as she attempts to catch a glimpse of Orion.
Using what little strength remains, she forces her hands up to her neck, scratching and gouging and pulling at his fingers.
Air. Need air.
Golvath laughs at her futile attempts.
The edges of Rachel’s blurry vision darken.
Suddenly she’s in a meadow, the moonlight shining down on a girl in a white nightdress with her golden hair gently blowing in a soft breeze. Tears streak her face as she picks up a red and yellow can by her feet.
“Please don’t do this.” Her voice quivers almost as much as her hands tremble. “Please.” She lifts the can over her head and tilts it until clear liquid runs out of the spout. The girl cries louder as she douses herself. Her golden hair goes limp, nightdress sticks to her body. The sharp, distinct smell of gasoline fills the night sky as the breeze changes course.
Rachel realizes this must be Mary Wentworth, the girl who set herself on fire in the 1950s.
“I don’t want to die.” She throws the can aside and falls to her knees, shivering and crying and begging.
Golvath’s voice enters the memory. “Then you should have loved me.”
He looks down at his hands as he strikes a match. The phosphorous tip sizzles to life, the orange flame growing stronger.
The abject horror Rachel feels at having to watch this scene play out is nothing compared to this girl’s suffering.
Without another word, Golvath tosses the match toward the helpless girl, setting her ablaze.
Unable to look away, powerless to help, the most Rachel can do is mentally scream while flames lick at the girl’s body. The smell of rotten eggs, sulfur, wafts through the sky as her golden locks burn away, replaced by the pronounced, sickening sweet stench of cooking fat.
The scene changes abruptly as another memory takes shape.
This time the girl is facing away, as if she’s staring at the beautiful horizon beyond. Her long, raven-colored hair cascades down her shoulders like a silky curtain. She glances back, her dark eyes red and bronze skin blotchy. There’s something exotic about her, something that’s not entirely human shines through.
The breathtakingly beautiful girl walks forward, pleading without words for some type of release from the spell she’s under.
“Fly away little bird,” Golvath says, unable to keep the amusement from his tone.
He watches as she swan-dives off an unrecognizable cliff, so graceful, so elegant.
A telling thump rings across the plains, the sound reverberating in Rachel’s heart until she shatters.
Golvath peers over the edge at the girl’s broken body where she lies cradled in a cluster of sharp rocks. Blood already pools around her, staining the boulders.
Gone. Just like that.
The memories flit through her mind of all the girls he’s loved and the various ways he essentially murdered them. He stabbed one girl to death—over and over until his muscles ached from exertion. The act was done with such brutality that even Golvath had been disgusted with the end result.
“Too messy,” Golvath says into her mind. “I won’t do that again.”
Another girl walked into the ocean on his command and never resurfaced after a wave went over her head. Then there was the girl who ran out in front of a horse-drawn carriage, a death by trampling.
The most horrifying of all his kills, however, was when he’d forced a girl to starve herself to death. He’d enjoyed seeing her wither away, enjoyed her suffering as she tried explaining that yes, she wanted to eat, but she literally couldn’t swallow a morsel without his say-so. They’d thought her mad and sent her off to—what Rachel believes may have been—a convent, while Golvath had continued tormenting her with food for almost a year.
Dozens of teenage girls of all races, from completely different worlds, had died because of his infatuation and cruelty.
“You’ll be my first strangulation.” There’s smugness in his almost-victorious thought.
Her limbs go numb. Parts of her brain shut down, due to the lack of oxygen. The sensation of needles and pins pricking her fingers and toes comes next. Her lips tingle, her tongue feels swollen. Is her heart slowing? She can’t tell.
Ziggy flits into her line of sight, hovering for a few crucial seconds behind Golvath’s head before torpedoing straight for the unsuspecting Fae. The golden sphere smashes into the side of his face, throwing him off-kilter. Flesh burns under Ziggy’s touch, bubbles and sears to the bone.
Golvath stumbles to the side. It’s enough for him to loosen his hands from around her neck.
Rachel sucks precious oxygen into her lungs, inhaling and exhaling rapidly, replenishing what Golvath denied her. She twists to take some pressure off her back, dizzy from the rush of blood to her brain. Rachel hangs onto the sidewall, mostly to keep herself on her feet.
She looks back.
Golvath is uselessly swatting at Ziggy as he hurls crass insults at the Fae light. More importantly, she notices the disfigured, gray-toned face on the other side of the bell tower. Tufts of oily hair are plastered against its skull, his nose is missing, and one ear hangs on by a piece of skin. One half-decomposed hand presses onto the sidewall, finger bones on display wherever the skin has withered away.
The Sluagh’s milky eyes survey the situation on the bell tower, then turns his full attention on Golvath.
He throws his leg over the sidewall, torn pants flapping in the wind, entire patches of skin missing from his limb. The second hand appears, holding a rusty broadsword. The Sluagh flops over the sidewall, onto the walkway, and slowly gets back to his feet.
Rachel looks around until she finds Orion hovering in the sky near her. His large flaming wings drip molten lava, supernova eyes gazes back at her. Although his mouth is moving, his voice is lost through the spell.
An unholy cry fills the air. Rachel shoots her attention to Golvath, who’s finally noticed the approaching Sluagh. The sword rises above the Fae’s head. Ziggy flies off then, just in time to avoid the blade slicing down into Golvath’s shoulder, past his collarbone, and stops somewhere near the top of his ribcage. Blood spurts across the bell tower, staining the stone and covering the rusty bell.
“Jump,” Mercia’s scream suddenly finds its way to Rachel, the spell broken with Golvath’s far too quick death.
The Sluagh uses an inhuman amount of strength to lift Golvath’s limp corpse off the floor. He shakes the body like a rag doll, struggling to release his blade. Golvath’s corpse strikes the bell—a deafening clangor rolls through the town. Rachel’s molars vibrate from the knell and her skull pounds. The Sluagh tries to loosen his broadsword by tugging at his weapon. He lifts Golvath into the air again.
Shake, shake, shake. Dong!
Rachel throws her leg over the sidewall, gritting her teeth as she battles her own body, the exhaustion and pain almost unbearable at this point. She takes one last big breath before rolling off the edge.
As she plummets back to earth this time, she isn’t looking at the ground. Her eyes are fixed on the diorama heavens, where fluffy white clouds float in an almost three dimensional formation. The sun shines brightly, warming her face, while a cool breeze gently flows through the town. For Shadow Grove, especially in autumn, the day is lovely—perfect to spend outside before the big chill hits.
Her hair whips and her shirt billows around her body. After almost being strangled to death, screaming is out of the question.
Before she can even come to grips with the fact that she’s willingly fallen off a five-story tower, Orion swoops in to save her. Her breath hitches as he catches her in his arms, carrying her like a bride. Orion gradually descends back to the ground.
“This is becoming a habit,” he says, a ghost of a smile in the corner of his mouth.
Her throat is raw, the bruises around her neck are tender, and she’s simply too tired to respond. So, Rachel does the only thing she still has energy for: she closes her eyes and drifts away.
