Hold the Light (38 page)

I hobbled close to them, but stopped dead in my tracks. The gift begged me to halt. It cried to avoid the two damned lovers at all costs. I stood motionless and watched intently. I could feel her radiance warm my face from my considerable distance.

"Wake up," she whispered, softer than the glow she emanated.

The convict's eyes fluttered and strained to adjust, perking up to her presence. He slowly rose with his back to the tree, chipping off bark, until he stood: a seedy, dark, and broken man across from a flowing, bright, and elegant woman. He stood out before her as if he was her shadow.

"Hunh?" the convict snorted.

"I am here," she sighed, "you can rest."

"I am not done. I need to get Veronica back."

"Mural, I am Veronica."

The convict's face crunched together and anger ran over his face like a smoky veil.

"If you dare tell that lie again," he barked. "I will rip your tongue out."

Her light flickered in shock and sunk some. She said, "How can you not recognize me?"

"Because I have found her already," he looked over to his right and glared at me accusingly.

"The man with my gift shelters her."

I wasn't sure if the woman before the convict was Veronica or a sick joke from the demon. She sure looked like the woman I saw from the convict's memory, but my trust wasn't going to be placed with anyone other than Betsy.

"I am Veronica. You are just confused," she pleaded. "My heart still beats for you. We have waited so long. You have found that little piece of you that has been missing. We can be whole again."

"Your lies grow tiresome. Look at your hair, your face, you are older than Veronica."

He could only see his wife, in his mind, the way she had looked when he lost her; he couldn't fathom her any other way. Her hair was hoary in the light, aged by centuries of weariness, but she appeared no older than what I saw of her in my memory. But the centuries had eroded her face and showed all the change in the world to the convict.

"Did you think I wouldn't age? Look at you. Do you think you look the same?" she said. "You look worse than ever."

The convict's face was barely human, crushed into an obscenely disfigured block of flesh and bone. She brought her serene palm to what was left of his cheek. I was waiting for him to shy away, but she was utterly captivating. She must be able to see and love what he had been centuries ago. Her light brightened and I could see his old face illuminate with a trick of her light. The supple brilliance from her palm gently caressed his cheek and he was under her spell. Mural's face appeared over the convict's for only a split second, but in that brief time, all his love flared within his eyes. It shone with a brightness that matched the sun. Blinding flares arched about and danced between them. They were linked and drew closer.

But then doubt flickered. It created a vacuum that collapsed their bond and greedily devoured their light until the darkness snatched him back. His ardor for the hunt consumed him.

"No," he said, pushed her hand away and reached down. He bent down and clutched my father's sword. He hobbled towards her with vengeance.

"Yet another obstacle I have to weather. Step aside. I hear whispers from you..."

"It is me, I swear!" Veronica pleaded with open arms as the glow surrounding her hands began to dim and sink further.

"Test me, if you dare," he brought the sword to her neck. With a piercing gaze of rage, the blades edge nipped into her neck. "I know she is out there, I have seen her. She has slipped away too enough. If you delay me from her with another one of your deceptive words, I will continue cutting."

Her lips trembled and she began to cry. The sword's tip slid limply away from her neck and clanked against the pavement as he used it for support.

Broken and rotting, determined to find his way, the convict turned from the glowing light of his beloved wife, and into the darkness of the woods.

She dropped her face into her cupped hands and wept, her shoulders heaved with each laborious tear. The bleak clouds of rage obscured her glow and she fell to the road. Sprawled across the pavement, she wailed for absolution and wept herself into nothingness.

I shook my head and turned back to my travels. Shivers permeated me and I grew weaker. My pants and shirt still felt soaked and my old stab wound ached. Exasperated, I moved on, trying to place the mystery of Amber and Veronica's real identities, but gave in to fatigue.

God, I was so tired.

Chapter 73

My shaded walk was consumed by memories. I was relentlessly assaulted by different moments from my life. I never realized how much I hated my past and how good it felt to want to change. Even my time with Jessica was hampered by the confines of my fears, but I would remedy that once and for all.

The crumbling asphalt road receded into gravel as I came upon the cemetery. The trees rustled their branches in the half-light as I crunched along. The plot of land before me was copious and I imagined that wasn't anywhere near the actual size of the cemetery. Dark sad trees lined the property, serried together as a living wall, and wept their leaves down onto my head. I strolled up to a lone light, hanging from the arched gates ahead, as it flickered on as the sun slowly descended.

I tried to peep between the dying branches and into the cemetery. The trees were staunch in their defense and I couldn't see much beyond a few nearby tombstones in the misty grass. From the entryway several dirt roads weaved around the headstones, scampering off in several directions beyond the horizon. I stood below the old sentinel lamp fixture as it gazed down on me disapprovingly. A supple wind moaned by and gave me a push under the entryway and into the cemetery. I paused half way through the entrance, half trying to recall and catalog detail, half wary of something happening as I entered, but all I was offered was a feeling off deja vu.

The slowly dying light hindered my sight and I realized I had little time until nightfall. I stepped past the threshold and cringed in anticipation of the worst.

I've walked down this path before. Even with the instructions, I never knew it was here. The coincidence of it all. I wondered if I had done this all without my wits about me, completely oblivious to my actions.

And I had.

Chapter 74

The night crept close and it became hard to read Randy's note. I tripped on the road and my hat sailed away, rolling like a coin down the path. I looked up from the dirt and watched it bounce off a grave in the distance. Dusting myself off, I felt in my pocket for my yellow piece of paper. Sighing in relief, I stood and retrieved my hat.

Gazing at the inscription on the grave, I fixed on the words that spoke to me, that told me why I was there; the reason this place looked familiar. I couldn't place it before. I wasn't paying attention the first time. I was lost in the pain of her funeral.

While reading the gravestone of my wife, I felt stupid that I never was able to connect that Jessica and Randy were both buried in this cemetery.

I bent over and read the description on her grave. My fingers caressed the engraving that spelled her name. Tears threatened to spill from my eyes but I wiped them away before they did so. This was redemption, not despondency. I smiled at her and glanced at the directions in my hand. I had to get going before the light left completely. Thankfully, leaving her then was easier than when she left me.

Knees cracking as I stood, nausea encircled my stomach and head, forcing me to brace on her gravestone. I shook it off and grabbed my lantern, but before leaving, I placed a kiss on my hand and pressed my palm atop her stone, hoping she felt it.

My stomach erupted with more pain. I brushed that aside and shuffled off towards a sagging oak tree perched on a hill that overlooked a distant harbor. Once under the branches, I sat before Randy's gravestone and felt relief for the first time in what felt like ages.

The sun was in its final retreat, taking all the lingering light from the graveyard, and yanking it over the horizon in a swift pull, stealing all the security I had left. I have been waiting for this moment for quite some time, whether I knew it or not. The thought weakened me. My vision blurred as my mind wouldn't stop wandering. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath as the most exact touch of deja vu hit me.

I had to calm myself because this was the hard part. Hard because I wasn't sure what was going to happen but no longer frightening was the unknown. On top of the hill, overlooking a dark and shadowy graveyard with the languid city lights in the distance, I placed the lantern down and thought back on my life. The details eluded me but from somewhere in the forgotten depths of what I hoped was
my
youth, a surprise phrase surged to my lips so hard that I blurted it out.

"I am the lantern and you are the light."

The blues and blacks of the night were banished and I sat patiently waiting for the light.

Basking in the new light of that desolate night, I found I was not young again, and not back in college, but I did find the lantern had lit somehow.

Chapter 75

The wind picked up and dried my eyes. I blinked and my lids were intolerably heavy. The lantern lit a small radius, a strangely blue radius instead of yellow like it should, reminding all too much of the light inside me. The light I no longer held. The inscriptions on the surrounding gravestones stood out as if they were being shouted out in an eerie sapphire shade.

I reached out for the words on Randy's grave and saw my trembling hand was stained a dark maroon. I looked at my hand curiously, wondering what was on it, when my fingers connected with a wall of cold. A shiver weaved down my spine and limbs. My outstretched fingers halted and the chill encompassed me before I had even touched the gravestone.

I was rendered immobile as an internal patch of ice proliferated over every inch of me. I felt thwarted. Stopped so close. No, I wouldn't be stopped.

The only part of me that was thawed was my eyes and they darted about, surveying the area for threats. I was defenseless and obvious, marked by the only light around.

A scratching sensation filled my eyes and a bulging pressure mounted behind them. Tears waited to flow, but froze on my lashes. My heart beat heavily and tears fell. I watched them plummet into the emptiness of an ominous before me. I blinked furiously to clear my eyes.

"Why? How?"

My brain ferried wasted words to my tongue. I gazed up into the night sky, no longer able to bear the bane of the familiar silhouette that crouched before me. My chaotic mind struggled to grasp reality and I instinctively yearned to flee. The impulses shot instructions to my feet to run, but they were firm and stubborn. I was trapped. My fear ran rampant but I slowly managed to subdue it, knowing my struggles were futile. I had to remain lucid to discover a way out of this rout.

I watched the fastidious stars in the navy sky stretch backwards in tenuous bright streaks. Serenity took me. My body wouldn't run away so my mind did instead; it barreled right into unconsciousness.

Chapter 76

I awoke to almost familiar sensation of nausea. Freezing and so tired, I craved to sleep away suffering. My joints and sockets strained as I slowly stirred. I raised my head. The light from my lantern flickered on the gravestone and illuminated the outline of a hand holding on to mine. My heart skipped a beat and my mind froze in panic. My jaw swung back and forth, as I was blessed with more movement, while I wasted that gift with incoherent babbles, managing only one real word.

"Amber?"

Her hand clasped mine so tightly that I thought she was the marble tombstone. I whimpered under the force and gazed up at her. Her black hair disappeared into the drapery of night and all I could see was her bright face. Her eyes were sunken dark pools and her features almost glowed in the lamplight.

Nothing felt right; my heart sank deep in my ribcage the more I saw her smile at me. Those lips spoke without uttering a word. She helped me up by the hand. As I slowly rose, shedding the immobility of fear had held me, I heard scraping sounds of metal on stone. Shivers shot down my spine as Amber slid our father's sword along the tombstone. It was a hideous sound. I squinted to look at her; the lantern was barely lighting her face. It shone past her, ignoring her like it was ashamed to go near.

"Yup, I'm here" she answered. "You don't look so hot."

She let go my hand and I crashed backwards onto the grass and tumbled away with the momentum. I rolled down the wet hill, watching the sky appear and disappear, as I somersaulted until my head slammed hard against the ground. I slumped against the bottom of the hill.

Shrill and intense pain pulsed in my waist. I hadn't the energy to ignore the pain so I finally decided to inspect the wound I had been ignoring since the car crash. I gently brushed my hand along my shirt and pulled back a thick viscous liquid that seeped between my fingers. Confused, I raised my hand to my face and saw blood.

More blood than I had ever seen.

I looked down and gawked surprise. My shirt and pants were completely saturated. I tried to stand but must have misplaced the energy and instead resigned to kneel.

My consciousness flowed out with my blood. I watched the maroon droplets play out an almost comedic repetition that would have been funny if it wasn't my blood. They repeatedly, like diligent little morons, rose from my clothes to scurry back to the wound, eager to reenter, to only be slapped away, repelled from the overpowering outward flow of their siblings.

I sent my finger back to the wound to investigate further, eager to stop this futile battle and felt a sharp prick. I lifted my shirt and saw a gleaming, almost smiling metal shard peeking out from deep within. I probed my fingers deeper into my flesh, cringing as I felt my innards, but I couldn't judge the size of the shrapnel or grab it. My efforts opened the gash further as I tried to find a small grip on the piece. My fingers slid across the blood-soaked metal thwarting every attempt. I couldn't remove it.

My head swirled and my energy drained further. I found a grave nearby to focus on and crawled towards it. As I inched along on all fours, I watched my blood fall in a thin yet steady stream down to the dark cool grass and cheered on the smaller, though stout stream of returning blood running against gravity and back to me. But I couldn't watch long. Didn't want to, my eyes were so heavy. With each movement, with each breath, I longed to stop and sleep.