Christine
The birds dropped me onto a cold floor. It was darker than it had been the entire night. I felt dead birds around me, and I heard someone moving in the darkness. They were wheezing like they were hurt. Elena Devore.
Voices echoed around me. The loudest was my mother’s.
“Christine! Christine!” She sounded both painfully close and painfully far away. “I need lights! Now!”
Someone obeyed her command, and the overhead lights burst on.
“Chris!” Nate yelled.
“In here!” I tried. My voice didn’t sound loud enough. I ignored the pain in my body and brought myself to my feet. As soon as I got there, Elena flailed her arms in my direction and whispered something just loud enough for me to hear but too softly to be understood.
Something invisible crashed into me, and she laughed. I collapsed, and my head slammed into the marble floor. The fast and potent blow reminded me that I wasn’t the strongest thing in the room. It also reminded me of why I’d come to fear dark and ancient forces.
For a peaceful moment, I watched the sparkling chandelier dance and sway over my head as the glass trembled from the same force that had taken me down. It sounded like thousands of tiny bells, tolling for me.
I heard my mother singing me to sleep. I heard my father belting out a love song in a club. I heard Nate’s soft voice telling me he loved me for the first time.
I love you more. I have loved you for days. I will love you forever.
That was my life, the wonderful parts, flashing before my eyes.
I coughed up blood. It flowed onto the marble floor, and the lights from the trembling chandelier made it glisten like something magical was inside of it.
Cold hands clutched my throat and pulled me to my feet.
“Be quick,” a voice said. “You’ll have to kill her twice.” It took me a moment to place the voice.
Remi.
“My dear,” Elena said, still trying to catch her breath. “Would you like to do the honors?”
“With pleasure,” Remi said.
“Hold her,” Elena said. “Let me get the camera ready.”
Remi was strong enough to hold me up by the neck with one hand. With her other, she swiped her finger through the blood running out of my mouth. “Hi there,” she said. “Do you know how many people saw this moment happen? This moment right here with you and me?”
Elena told her to wait for the camera, but Remi ignored her.
“And why do you think that is?” I said, as she strangled me.
“I don’t really care. I’m just glad that it’s finally here. You know … I wouldn’t hate you so much if you weren’t so greedy. You had friends and Nathan and a family, and you still had to take–”
She paused, clearly still in pain over Kamon’s death.
“You don’t know me, Remi,” I said.
“I know enough!”
“You know what he told you, and you know what you’ve made yourself believe. And you know, as well as I know, that you just need someone to blame for your pain. Just like you blamed your mother and your blood for turning you into a panther. But that was your fault, and it’s your fault that you’re here today, and I accept that there is nothing that I can do about that.”
She laughed and clutched my throat tighter. “Is this when you beg for your life?” she said.
“No. It’s when I take yours.” Staring into her icy eyes, I said, “Let go of my neck.” Her face said that she would never do that, but her easily controlled brain didn’t get the message.
Her fingers loosened to her dismay.
Instead of thinking about who Remi was and about all the things she would never get to be if I killed her, I thought about my mother—who wasn’t screaming my name anymore and could’ve been dead from whatever Elena had done to me. Then I thought of Nate, how he looked when he laughed, when he was truly happy and not weighed down by his past. Then I thought of Sophia and how I’d probably lost her and how much I would regret her losing her life for nothing.
I wouldn’t let her die for nothing.
I had to kill Remi.
But as I moved the knife in Remi’s hand to mine, Elena grabbed me again, chanting wicked spells that made me want to vomit. I pressed my bracelet into her cheek and the rings into her forehead. Her skin began to fry, and I thrust the knife into her heart, right where she’d stabbed Sophia.
Remi seized her chance to jump on me again, but I brought all three of us down to the ground. I held Elena with my hands and Remi with my thoughts, until Elena’s tortured screams suddenly ceased.
“Wait!” Remi screamed, because she knew she was next. “You’re not a killer. I know you’re not. I …”
I didn’t want to hear the rest of what she had to say, because I was still me and I would’ve fallen for a false plea for her life. I was raised to be kind, and I was never going to grow out of that. But I was not raised to be stupid or weak, so I slit Remi’s throat with her own knife.
As I watched her gasp for air, I felt both of their spirits pulling away from their bodies. Elena’s reached towards the few birds she had left. I jumped on her again and pressed my bracelet into her cheek, and while the last of her old, foul spirit died, I incinerated her birds. All parts of her were burning alive.
When she stopped wailing, for good this time, silence rushed into the room. There was no screaming, no chirping, and I was the only one left standing. Because I was still me, I apologized to the dead birds. They’d done nothing wrong. I just couldn’t let Elena use them to escape.
****
Remi
It didn’t hurt. I’d expected it to hurt, but I felt very numb, and I was getting colder by the second. I’d lost to Christine, and since I couldn’t feel my body anymore, I assumed I wouldn’t be getting a rematch.
Ever.
And that hurt.
“Don’t let it,” a voice said. I knew I was dying for sure when I heard my love’s voice.
I watched the chandelier over my head. It blurred as my body grew colder, and then his face came into focus. Kamon smiled. “You lost.”
“And you’re disappointed,” I said.
“Not really. Come on … get up. You look ridiculous down there.” He helped me up, and I touched my throat. The wound had healed, and the ballroom had faded away. Kamon and I were walking in white, open space, holding hands.
“I missed you,” I said.
“Of course you did. Who wouldn’t miss me?” I bumped his hip, and he laughed. “I miss you, too, Remi.” He kissed the back of my hand. “And the boys miss you, too. Okay, I’m lying. Only Carter does.”
“You’ve seen them?” He nodded. “So there’s life after death.”
“Any life you can dream of, my love.”
“I dream of a life with you.” He surprised me by becoming the silly version of himself. The Kamon that he only let himself be after a few glasses of wine. He picked me up and spun me around. Then he lowered me down to his lips slowly and gave me a sweet peck.
“Then a life with me you shall have.”
He put me down and we started walking again. I looked behind us, then ahead. There was nothing but white space. Never ending space.
“Is this real?” I asked.
He chuckled and managed to sound both sweet and sinister like only he could. “Does it matter if it’s real or not?”
“No,” I told him.
He clutched my hand, and together we walked towards a blinding light.