The Ghost and the Darkness Volume 2 (The Fallocaust Series) (59 page)

“Killi?”

Killian’s face scowled. I patted his cheek. “It’s Reaver.”

My heart filled when I saw his eyes widen. He suddenly looked at me and I almost laughed as his face adopted an expression of pure shock.

“Reaver?” he croaked. His voice was so rasped and broken but it sounded like angels to me. “I... I remember you.”

Killian tried to lift up his hands, but before he could I gently took him into my arms. I held him and closed my eyes for a brief moment. I knew that was the only moment I had before I had to deal with the rest of this situation.

Then my hand brushed the back of his head. My brow furrowed as my fingers traced something odd, bumps in his scalp, hot to the touch. I gently tilted his head to the side, and felt the heat of the room and of my body, drain away, leaving in its place frozen liquid.

Killian had red and inflamed staples behind his head, starting from behind his ear and not ending until his other ear.

“I’m okay,” Killian said faintly but his words did nothing to quell the horror washing through me. It brought a tremble to my lips that cared nothing for the emotionless man I once was.

He had operated on Killian.

What had Perish done to him?

PERISH!

I hadn’t even realized I had screamed that until I had jumped to my feet. In an instant the heaviness of my emotions dissipated. All of the agony I felt over what had happened to Killian seemed banished with the sole realization that the scientist had to be near.

He wanted a robot, a slave. He did surgery on Killian to make him love him, or, or something... it was him, it was him. No.

No.

It was Sky.

It was that fucking O.L.S implanted in his brain. Perish would’ve never hurt Killian. It was him.

A dangerous pulse of anger licked my veins and flushed my brain with their violent thoughts.

Stacking savage thought after savage thought on an already taxed mind, I let each transgressive image rush through me, letting it fill me and take me. With the dozens of emotions that had laid claim to my body over the last several hours, this was the one my chimera mind embraced.

In the throes of my own rage, my head snapped towards the sound of crying, but it wasn’t Killian. I narrowed my eyes, briefly confused as to why I was hearing such a sound, before my legs took me to a door embedded in the far wall.

I opened it wide and it held open. I looked inside.

Silas was on the floor holding Perish’s head in his lap. The scientist was dead, and from the looks of it the back of his head had been bashed open.

Strangely the king was rocking back and forth, the same shell-shocked eyes staring forward. He was mumbling to himself; his head also shaking like he was trying to deny what was going on around him.

Silas reached down and petted Perish’s black hair back, before his eyes clenched shut, tears spilling from them.

“No, no,” Silas kept mumbling; his voice a desperate whine. “No, no, not him.”

“Not forever; I can’t handle forever.”

I stared at him, not understanding why he was so upset. I could see Perish’s head had been smashed but that was a plus for everyone but me. Because I wanted to torture this Sky fuck for the rest of our immortal lives.

Immortal lives...

I walked up to Silas and Perish. I kneeled down and picked up Perish’s hand.

It was stiff and cold to the touch; the shock of it made me retract my hand.

My eyes travelled up to Silas. The king, with his eyes red and his mouth trembling, made eye contact with me.

“He’s dead, Reaver. He killed himself.”

I stared back at him, not knowing how to feel about this. I was confused, I was fascinated – and I was drinking in the look of fucking agony on him.

I smirked, and at my smile he dissolved into hysterical tears.

The next thing he did blew my mind, and dismissed all of the logic in the world I had gathered to help explain Silas.

Because, with his face twisted in agony, he put Perish’s head down, crawled over him and put his arms around me. Bewildered and confused, King Silas crawled into my lap and sobbed like a fucking child.

“Hold me, please. Hate me later. Punish me later, just hold me,” Silas cried. His entire body was trembling like he was having a seizure or an anxiety attack. Perplexed, I steadied him enough so he wouldn’t roll off of me and awkwardly let him sob in my shoulder.

“You... you hated him,” I said to him. “You despised Perish.”

I could see his jaw twitching with how hard he was clenching his teeth. He let out a sob and shook his head. “I hated him because every time I looked at him I saw Sky. Every time I heard his lucid voice I heard Sky. Now my last tie to my old life is gone. My Perish is gone.”

I glanced down at Perish’s open skull, my brow furrowing as I realized that there was no brain inside that huge gaping crater. I nodded towards it. “Don’t you have Sky’s O.L.S? Too bad, if you didn’t kill Leo you would have the formula to make another Sky. Serves you right, eh?”

Silas looked down at Perish’s skull and I felt his heartbeat suddenly spike. “His O.L.S? I could... I could... Elish would have the research. He could make me a Sky. I know he could.”

Silas slid off of me and I rose to standing, feeling disgusted even having Silas so close to me.

I brushed it off and turned to walk back towards Killian.

To my complete shock Killian was in the doorway. He was holding something in his hand.

“It’s gone,” I heard Silas say, his voice thin but hoarse. “His O.L.S is gone.”

My eyes found Killian’s; he was staring right at me. Though, unlike when I had first seen him, his eyes were focused. They were fixed on my own, with a sanity in them that I hadn’t even seen when he was at his best.

“His fucking O.L.S is gone!” Silas screamed.

Killian’s eyes flickered down and so did mine. Then his hand drew up and pinched between his fingers was a small plastic device the size of a pebble.

Killian smiled at me.

And I smiled back.

“YOU!” Silas suddenly screamed.

In a flash Silas tried to push me aside but instead of letting him through I grabbed onto him. Using the same move Greyson had mastered while restraining me I wrenched Silas’s hands behind his back and pinned them into my stomach. The king screamed at Killian, thrashing his body and contorting it like a scaver caught in a snare. Hysterically shrieking at Killian when he saw just what my boy was holding.

“Give me Sky! GIVE ME SKY!” Silas was the embodiment of madness, a hysteria that brought a smile to my lips and warmed the dark pits of my heart.

I drank it in, I held it to me, and cherished it as you would a prized possession.

Yes, this was the feeling. This was what I live for; this was what I have bled for, been raped for, and separated from Killian for.

This was the Reaper; this was the Reaper working side by side with his Angel of Death.

“PLEASE!” Silas sobbed. I saw the tears start to drop from his face, his entire body heaving and shaking back and forth. His legs kept weakening; I kept having to thrust his body to keep him standing. I had never tasted such agony and fear on a man, and like the sweetest ambrosia, I savoured every second of it.

Oh, this is certainly heaven in the greywastes. Nothing could compare to this.

Killian took a step closer to him. An eerie, cold smile that had once seemed unsuited for his face, now graced it like a well-fitting glove.

“I’ll leave you alone, just let me have him. Let me clone Sky,” Silas sobbed desperately. “Give him to me. I need him. I need him to help me get well. I’ll be normal if I have him, I know I will. I was before.”

I leaned in and couldn’t help pressing my lips up against his neck.

“Oh,
bona mea,”
I whispered in the most taunting manner I could muster. “I love tasting this agony on you.”

“Killian... Killian!” Silas begged as I continued to kiss him. “Give it to me. I’ll let you live in peace. I will... I’ll...”

Killian slowly shook his head before leaning in further. I tightened my grip on Silas and smiled as my boyfriend brought the O.L.S right up to Silas’s face.

“Look at me,” Killian whispered to him; his voice was sane, his tone level. “Don’t take your eyes off of me.”

Silas whimpered but looked at Killian, slowly shaking his head back and forth.

Killian smiled one last smile, a grin showing a row of white teeth...

Then he popped the O.L.S into his mouth.

Silas shrieked as Killian bit down, the sound of crunching drowned out by the frenzied, desperate screams spilling like a torrent through Silas’s lips. In my own throes of cruel joy I laughed, making him watch as Killian swallowed the O.L.S with a satisfied smirk.

The king thrashed and in his own delirium he seemed to draw out of him an insane strength, with a cry he snapped his arms out of my vice-like grip and threw me against the wall.

But he didn’t attack Killian like I thought he would. Instead he fell to his knees, took in a deep breath and screamed. An torturous scream that brought on its heels a sudden snap of electricity, followed by a low, body shaking vibration.

Oh shit...

I dashed to Killian and grabbed his shoulder. I picked him up, and as Silas’s screams echoed inside of the metal room, I ran down the hallway towards the living room.

I didn’t make it by a long shot.

A wave swept through my body, a weighed pressure that almost knocked me off of my feet. I swore and looked around, temporarily confused by my surroundings and where I could find the exit.

The timer was now ticking down, the sestic radiation quickly gathering around the laboratory, condensing in on itself until the inevitable explosion of white fire.

“Go back down the hall, go right,” Killian suddenly said, his voice full of haste. “The door, there’s a metal door... there’s shelter... right, right, left, right. Hurry!”

I turned and ran; my teeth grinding as Silas’s hysteria-filled screams scraped against my brain like sandpaper. I raced down the hall, the boy in my arms, and to the door on the right side of the hallway.

Killian opened it and I kicked it the rest of the way with my foot. I took one step through it before I saw the light again, followed by a roar.

Then darkness, burning darkness.

I woke up in a painful daze, flames all around me. I saw the ghostly outline of my burnt hand, several fingers roasted to charcoal, one of them even holding a flame.

I was being dragged.

My eyes squinted; I opened them wider and shifted around. Then a hand on my forehead and his sweet sweet voice.

He was dragging me to safety. I was the immortal one, not him.

I stumbled as I tried to get up; I looked around as confusion temporarily reigned in my mind. Everything was on fire, it was so bright... so... brilliant...

I turned and looked at Killian.

“Killian!” I cried. All my confusion snapped out of me when I saw that his left arm was blackened. His forearm’s skin was split in half by the pressure of his cooked flesh, and his side was devoured by a black char that leaked blood and white fluid.

“NO!” I put my hand to my face and shook my head. His eyes were glassy, his good arm still grabbing my collar, desperately trying to pull me from the flames. He was saving me before he died.

He was going to die, he was going to die. “Killian? Oh no... no, no...”

“Reaver... I’m okay,” Killian panted, but a moment later he stumbled backwards, his back hitting the brick. We were in a sewer, some sort of cistern. “Reaver... Reaver we need to get to... right, right, left...” Killian coughed. I realized smoke was pouring in from behind us.

“Killi...” I moaned. I walked towards him, my hands trembling and my heart dissolving to nothing. “Killi... I’m sorry.”

He steadied himself and tried to take a step forward but stumbled again. I managed to catch him and picked him up.

Killian coughed from the smoke and looked at me with his eyes glazed and his face hot and flushed. “Reaver... right, right, left, right. Please, Reaver... you need to... to take me there.”

All I could do was stare at him in horror, my mind numb, refusing to process what I was seeing.

I was seeing him die.

“Killi...” My voice came out a raspy, broken cry. I felt my eyes start to sting as I looked down at him. He looked so weak... he looked so...

Killian’s face tightened and he glanced down at his charred arm. I looked down too, my body seemingly frozen in time.

Then a loud crack sounding from the top of the stairs. Temporarily snapped out of my shock I looked behind me and saw the white flames shooting out of the doorway. The opal inferno burning the railing and making the metal a dusty white from the intense heat.

I needed to get him out of here... I... I needed to get him some place cold.

I needed water... something... something to cool down his body. I could save him, there was still hope. I could escape and find Silas and go with him to Skyfall. They had technology there for burns, didn’t they?