Ember
Erik. He’s alive.
“How?” The blood drains from my face. “How is this possible?”
Aiden walks to the bed and studies the man like he’s trying to find evidence to fight Eliza’s claim. He glances at me and barely nods, confirming the unbelievable.
I step backward. “How could you hide this from me? All this time.” A sudden anger grows in me. “He’s been here?”
“Ember, let me explain,” Eliza says with urgency. “Even though Erik survived, he was gravely injured.”
Aiden focuses on Erik’s face with scrutiny. “Why aren’t his abilities working? He shouldn’t look like this if they were, right?”
“They’re working, well, kind of.” Eliza clears her throat, stifling tears. “It’s… it’s been touch and go for a while. Rose thinks he’s gotten through the worst of it, and that’s why I’m okay sharing this with you now.”
An urge to see Erik pulls me forward, but I fight against it, stepping closer to the door. “It wasn’t right of you to hide this.”
Eliza drops her head. Her black hair covers her face like a veil. “I know, but—”
“All the secrets.” A tear sneaks from my eye, and my chest quivers. “All the lies. How could you do this to me?”
“Ember.” Aiden steps toward me. “I completely agree it wasn’t right to hide this but focus on the bigger picture for a moment.” His eyes convey a gentle understanding, a tenderness. “Erik’s alive.”
A strange sensation overcomes me, one full of sadness but also a relief. One of love but also anger. I don’t know what to call what I’m feeling, but Aiden’s words are a fishing hook on my heart, reeling me away from the door. I walk toward the bed like I'm in a trance. My mind screams at me to leave, fearing it’s all a trick—that there’s no way someone I thought I lost is actually right here.
But it is true. Erik is really here.
Tears drip on the black sheet covering Erik. His long face is recognizable, even with half of it missing. White streaks mix with his bluish-black hair, and laugh lines surround his one remaining eye. His wound seems to be healing, exposing mostly muscle and a little bone poking through his jawline and chin, and a dullness in the texture implies it’s trying to grow new skin.
I lay my hand on his shoulder and take a shaky breath. A bag of blood hangs on a steel pole opposite me. A tube from it runs underneath the sheet to Erik’s arm, and another tube coming from his nose connects to a bag full of a creamy substance hanging beside the blood. Numerous machines track his vitals. One continues with a steady beep, indicating his heartbeat. A stainless-steel cart sits against the wall, littered with packaged tubes and needles, empty blood bags, gauze, and bandages.
My eyes become a river of tears. I cover my mouth to muffle my sobs. Though there’s something scary about seeing Erik like this, an immense joy overwhelms me. I’ve never cried such happy tears in my life. Someone I love has been given back to me. After so much loss in my life, I don’t know how to handle this rare gift.
Aiden wraps an arm around my shoulders. “It’s okay, Em. It’s a lot to take in.”
My tears keep falling. I glance at Eliza. “How is this possible?”
She clears her throat and runs her fingers through her hair. “Do you remember when we got separated after the attacks began?”
The memory of that night from months ago flies into my mind. Eliza and I were having dinner downtown at The Garage. One minute, we were laughing and talking over a basket of onion rings, and the next, the building was shaking. Then the screams started. Eliza and I ran outside where a mob of people separated us, and I ran into Johnny soon after. He shoved me inside a flower shop and tried to take my abilities. That’s when Aiden found us and saved me, but that was only the beginning of our problems that night. Jill would soon show up with the other villains, bringing more havoc with them.
“Of course,” I answer Eliza, feeling the memory fade from my eyes. “How could I forget?”
“I heard people shouting that the first attack was a bomb.” Eliza stares into space. “That it took out the transport taking Mad Marie, and only she survived. I knew Erik oversaw the whole operation. I didn’t, couldn’t, believe he was dead, so I left to find him.”
Her words are like a knife in my back. “You… you left me?”
Aiden places his hands on my shoulders. “Let her explain.”
I take a shaky breath, but it does nothing to soothe the painful ache I feel.
Shame and tears shimmer in Eliza’s honey-colored eyes. “I’m so sorry, Ember. I tried to look for you, but after all the people pushed us apart, I didn’t see you anywhere, and I knew if there was any chance Erik did survive, he’d need help sooner than later. With everything happening, there was no way the Guardians would take the time to assist him.” She inhales a shuddering breath. “So I made one of the toughest decisions of my life and left.” A small hint of a smile, though sad, pinches the corner of her lips. “I knew you’d be okay. You’re a strong and capable young woman, and you’ve always been a fighter, and I had to at least try to find Erik. I–I love him.”
Questions fill my brain. “You love him?” I glance at Erik, who looks more cadaver-like than alive. Memories of shared looks between him and Eliza come to mind—ones full of a gentle warmth, a gentle love. “I guess I’m not really surprised.”
Eliza’s smile is timid. “We officially started seeing each other about six months ago, even though we’ve been in love for years…” Her voice trails off. “We were there for each other when everything happened with your parents, but we tried to keep our distance between us. He was busy with his Guardian work anyway, and I with you.” She glances at Erik. “I also knew how you felt about him, and I didn’t want to make your life any more difficult than it already was.”
My shoulders tense even underneath Aiden’s gentle touch. “Were you ever going to tell me?”
“Em, honey…” Aiden leans close to my ear. “Breathe.”
I take a long breath, not wanting my anger to get the best of me.
“I know you’re upset.” Eliza’s eyes are gentle with understanding. “I planned on telling you the day you came home and ran into him leaving here, but things got complicated, since that was the same day he took your mother’s diary.” She narrows her eyes at Erik. “Which he better have a good explanation for. Anyway, I decided I’d tell you at dinner that night, but the attacks happened, and, well… everything has been a blur since then.” Eliza hugs herself and sniffles. “I didn’t know what to do.” A tear rolls down her face, and her lips tremble. “I wanted to be honest with you about everything but also protect you. I wasn’t sure if Erik was going to pull through.” More tears fall. “I didn’t know what was worse: taking a chance you’d have to mourn him again or letting you heal in case everything went wrong. You’ve had so much loss in your life, and if I could spare you some pain, I wanted to.”
I stare at Eliza, and shame oozes over me. All this time, she’s been trying to figure out what’s best for me. Now I’m not even sure if I would’ve wanted to know about Erik sooner. She’s right. If he didn’t make it and I had to go through losing him again… It’s hard to say what that could’ve done to my psyche.
“I’m so sorry, Eliza,” I say on an exhale. “I shouldn’t have gotten so angry with you about all of this.”
Eliza relaxes; her eyes shimmer like the gold stars on her red blouse. “Honey, I understand why you were. No one likes things hidden from them.” Her stare flickers toward Aiden for the briefest moment before resettling on me. “Especially from the ones they love.”
Why did she glance at Aiden like that? I’ve never told her of his ties to my parents. Maybe I should? But now isn’t that time. “How did you find him?” I ask, wanting to get back on the subject.
“Honestly, it was a miracle that I did.” Eliza walks to Erik and caresses his uninjured cheek. “When I made it to the scene, it was horrible. Something straight out of a horror film. There were burning chunks of metal, debris from nearby buildings, and”—Eliza closes her eyes and shivers—“the charred bodies of the guards, and some civilians as well.”
My stomach turns sour, and bile travels up my throat. Aiden swallows hard, like he’s experiencing the same. We both look at Erik like we can’t help but picture the scene.
“I was terrified the whole time that I’d come face to face with my brother,” Eliza continues. “I heard that he was with some other villains close by, but now I know they were all trying to get Mad Marie to safety. They were never going to look back.”
“That makes sense,” Aiden says as he locks eyes with me. “When we encountered Black Mold, he didn’t stick around. He took off with Iron Forge to get Mad Marie safe, and now I understand why.”
“Yeah,” Eliza says. “That’s one thing I can say for my brother… he does love her, even though that love has driven him to do unspeakable things.”
I glance at Eliza, Erik, and Aiden; is there a limit on what I would do for the people I love?
Eliza interrupts my thoughts. “At first, there was no sign of Erik.” She combs her fingers through Erik’s hair. “I overheard on my way there that he had been burned to dust, but I wouldn’t believe it. I used my plasma abilities to search through the debris to find him.” She faces me, and a smile spreads across her face. “And then I saw it.”
Confusion creases my brow. “Saw what?”
Eliza walks around the bed to a small nightstand, slightly hidden by all the medical machines. She retrieves a small book from inside. Her eyes sparkle with excitement. “This.”
“What’s that?” Aiden asks, stepping closer to get a better look.
Eliza’s gaze doesn’t leave mine. “Your mother’s diary.”
My breath escapes. “My mother’s diary?” But if Erik managed to survive, a little book shouldn’t be surprising. “It’s intact?”
Eliza hands it to me.
The leather makes it heavier than I expected, and it feels daunting in my hands.
“Unfortunately, no,” she says disappointedly. “Most of the paper inside was burned. Only a couple pages survived, with drawings of some kind of flower.”
Sadness engulfs my heart. My mother’s thoughts leading up to her murder are lost to me forever. Any speculations she had about Black Mold or Mad Marie will remain a mystery.
Aiden walks to me, staring at the diary. “That’s incredible that you found it.”
“It was,” Eliza says. “I could’ve easily overlooked it, but the color of the leather grabbed my attention.”
Even though it’s a shell of what it once was, the diary is still bound in brilliant red leather. The texture is cracked and grainy, now singed all over. I open it, and dust falls out like pepper, covering my trembling hands. The few pages that survived are blackened around the edges, and I touch them carefully, scared they’ll disintegrate at any second. On one page is a black-and-white drawing of a flower. It reminds me of a hibiscus but with an extra layer of petals. A long pistil with a clump of seeds and ten filaments fan out from the middle. The next page contains a pencil-colored drawing of it surrounded by sand, or maybe some kind of gravel. The petals are amber, fading to a rich brown in the middle, and the pistil and filaments are silver. I carefully turn to the last remaining page to see another depiction of the same flower, but this time, the petals have been separated from the center and drawn in a circle around the pistil. In my mom’s cursive handwriting, “Blooms once a year?” and “Which realm?” is written next to the drawing.
“All these are of the same flower,” Aiden says. “Was this her favorite flower or something?”
“Not that I knew,” I answer honestly. “She wasn’t even into gardening. She only liked cacti because they could survive being around her hot temperature.”
All this time I thought this diary would have answers, but all it’s done is give us more questions.
Aiden clears his throat. “Do you think Erik would’ve read anything before the attacks happened? Since he took the diary earlier that day?”
A new hope swells in me. “He could’ve! That’s a real possibility, isn’t it?”
Eliza nods. “He may have some answers when he wakes.”
“How did this help you find him, though?” I ask, closing the diary, and bring it close to my chest, right over my heart.
“It was next to an alley that was blocked by some debris, and I cleared a path into it.” Eliza rubs her cheek. “I actually got injured by some of the debris trying to move things so quickly, but that’s… that’s how I found him.” She closes her eyes, and her chest trembles. “It was horrible. His arms and legs were completely blown off, and he was burned so badly.”
I gasp, staring at Erik, thankful I didn’t see him in that state.
Aiden glances at me with horror in his blue eyes. “How did he survive that?”
Eliza wipes her eyes. “His abilities saved him by creating new skin around the worst of his wounds so he didn’t bleed out, but that was it. It was like they did the bare minimum to keep him alive.”
“How did you get him out of there without anyone else finding out?” I question.
“I had some help. Even if I could carry Erik using my abilities, that wouldn’t be discrete.” Eliza chortles. “Could you imagine? Walking around with him injured like that in a bright green bubble? There was no way I could have made it a few blocks, let alone a few miles, without someone spotting us. And I didn’t want the villains to find out he was alive. Thankfully, I had your parents’ communication device on me, and I contacted Oscar, a close colleague of his.”
“Oscar?” I ask, not recognizing the name.
“Oscar Lee. His Guardian name is—”
“Bone Piercer!” Aiden says with a smile. “He works closely with Valentino. He and his husband, Shapeshifter, were there for the Defender’s test.”
“That’s right,” I answer, remembering his skull belt buckle with the ruby eyes.
“One and the same,” Eliza confirms. “We talked on a secured channel, and I told him that I found Erik, alive, but he was in bad shape. Within minutes, Oscar was there, and we formulated a plan. He agreed that since Erik was the only one to stop Mad Marie before, he’d be in danger if we took him to the hospital, as would everyone else there. The villains would have tried to take him out again, especially if they got wind of how injured he was.”
“That’s why you brought him here,” I say, everything suddenly making sense.
She nods. “I knew I could hide him here with all of our security.”
Aiden’s brows knit together. “You showed up after Ember got hurt though. How did you get Erik here so fast? This is miles away from downtown.”
“Oscar handled the transport. He concealed Erik, using his bones to form a cocoon on his back, and we parted ways. I couldn’t leave downtown without finding Ember first.”
The thought of manipulating one’s bones to conceal a dying man is unbelievable, let alone running miles that way to get him to safety. The strength and stamina of Guardians are to be admired.
“It’s amazing how you could handle all this,” Aiden says to Eliza with a sense of admiration. “You were so focused on helping Ember after everything happened with Jill.”
“I guess my motherly instincts kicked in.” Eliza makes eye contact with me. “The guilt of leaving caught up with me, especially after finding out everything you went through. When Rose came to check in on you, I got word to her about Erik. I knew she and Oscar would handle things until I could get here. You needed me.”
My throat grows tight with emotion. I behold the medical equipment in Eliza’s room—all the machines, the bed, and the other supplies. The sight of Erik. Alive. All thanks to Eliza and Nurse Pumpa’s efforts. “I still can’t believe you did all of this. And somehow, I never knew.”
“Do you know why his abilities aren’t working properly?” Aiden directs his attention to Eliza. “Is that why you’re keeping him like this?”
Eliza’s shoulders sag, making her look even smaller. “To put it simply, he sustained too much damage. His abilities have been declining for years, mainly after battling Mad Marie. He could still regenerate fine with smaller injuries, but sometimes it could take longer. Once, he lost a few fingers, and it took him a whole day to regrow them, when before it only took seconds. As for why he’s still in the coma…” Eliza’s gaze darkens. “When his body tries to regenerate his limbs, it’s bad. We can’t control the bleeding. It seems to be too much for his abilities, and he’s only regenerating a bit at a time. The muscle and bone will form with no skin or continuation of the blood vessels, so blood runs out all over until the vessels form properly. Rose recommended putting him into a coma, because he was in so much agony, and we had no control over it.”
My eyes widen, scared for what Erik endured and secretly hoping the regeneration process doesn’t happen any time soon. “How often does that happen?”
“There used to be no telling as to when it would occur, but the last couple months it’s been like clockwork—every three days, in the evening. It happened last night, and that’s why Rose was here.”
Aiden squeezes my hand like he needs my strength. His face is extremely pale, with a faint hint of green. “Eliza, I don’t know how you’ve managed to do all this.”
The bags under Eliza’s eyes darken. “It’s been incredibly hard.”
“Is this why you’ve looked the way you have?” Even if I get why Eliza hid all of this from me, a part of me wishes I could’ve been there for her, to help with the load of trying to keep Erik alive. “The stress of all of this?”
“It definitely hasn’t helped, but I’ve also been providing blood for Erik because of all his blood loss.” She glances at the bag full of blood hanging next to the bed. “Even though we’re not the same type, I can be a donor, and I gave more than I should for a bit, but I wanted to ease the burden for Rose. She can get some blood from the hospital, but I didn’t want her to take more than needed.”
The worry that Eliza was terminally ill fades, and relief encompasses me.
Aiden steps closer to the machine keeping track of Erik’s heartbeat. “How much longer will he be kept like this? His vitals seem to be stable.”
“They are, but Rose thinks we should keep him like this until his body finishes regenerating. We’re hoping it’ll only be another couple months.”
“That would probably be best for him,” I add.
Aiden looks over his shoulder at Eliza. “Who else knows about all of this? Other than Nurse Pumpa and Bone Piercer.”
“Oscar felt Mantu and Valentino should also be notified of the situation, since they’re in charge of the league.”
“So, Shapeshifter and The Prism. That’s all, then?” Aiden asks.
Eliza nods. “That’s all.”
Erik’s chest rises with his slow breaths, and the beeping of his steady heartbeat fills the room.
A few tears prick my eyes. “It’s amazing he’s pulled through all of this. It’s absolutely amazing.”
Eliza reaches for my hand, and I give it to her while still clutching my mom’s diary with the other. “It really is, isn’t it? We’ve been given a great gift.”
A dark notion invades my thoughts: is this a gift? Or will someone have to pay for this? I glance at Aiden, still standing near the heart monitor. A lump forms in my throat, remembering his red eyes cutting through the darkness.
But that was just a dream, not a premonition.
I refocus on Eliza. Our gazes meet, reflecting our love for each other, but my mind spins. Between my nightmare last night, and now learning all of this, it’s overwhelming. Some fresh air may do me good. I need a chance to just sit with my thoughts.
I hand my mother’s diary back to Eliza. “Will you keep this safe for me?”
She takes it. “Of course.”
My gaze falls to the floor. “Thank you for telling me about all of this, but I think I need some time to myself.” I spy Aiden from the corner of my eye. “Just a chance to gather my thoughts.”
Aiden nods. “I think that’s understandable.”
Eliza holds my hand with the gentleness of a mother’s love. “Take all the time you need, sweetheart.”