“Why do I have to be quiet?” I hiss, standing up straight and stepping toward him. “What’s going on?”
He glances nervously around the room again and then locks the door. “So what do you think about what Alex told you?” He rests back against the door, his gaze flickering to the top of the shirt that I’m pretty much bulging out of.
“I’m not sure.” I fold my arms over my chest self-consciously. “Some of it seems plausible, but it seems like he’s still keeping a lot from me. Like the fact that his father just disappeared along with the Death Walkers and just left us all behind.”
He rakes his fingers through his hair, leaving his hand on the back of his neck, his elbow bent upward. “I’m unsure about that part, too… I’m hesitant about a lot of things.”
I sink down on the foot of the bed. “When you guys came back from Nevada, how did everything seem? Was it only Alex and me inside that mess of a cabin?”
He takes a seat beside me, sitting near enough that our legs press together. I can’t help thinking about how he can manipulate emotions and, for a second, I contemplate telling him to give me a moment of solace, anything to make the pain go away.
“Pretty much,” he says. “Alex was just sitting there, holding you. He looked like he was freaking out, but then when he saw us, he went completely calm.”
It’s so confusing, a tangled mess of wires that need to be unwound. I ask him a few more questions about what Alex has told him so we can compare stories. For the most part, everything adds up, nearly matching. Maybe a little too much, as if Alex’s story was rehearsed. I think about all the times he lied to me; how he pretended he didn’t know me when he did, how he knew my memories had been erased, yet only divulged the information when I asked him. He’s extremely good at keeping secrets, what's not to say he doesn’t have more locked away inside him?
“So do you believe him?” I ask. “When he says he has no clue where the Death Walkers and Stephan went or why they ran off?”
He stretches out his legs in front of him and crosses them at the ankles. “I have no idea what the hell to believe.” He leans in, his shoulder brushing against mine as he lowers his voice. “What I do know is that there’s a slim to none chance that the Death Walkers are just going to leave when they know you have the star’s energy in you. Plus, if Stephan’s in on it with Demetrius and the Death Walkers, which I’m sure he is, then he’s the kind of person that’ll do anything to get what he wants. So walking away from you is pretty much impossible if what he wants is the star.”
“From what I saw that’s what he wants,” I tell him. “I mean, he showed up with a herd of Death Walkers.”
“I wonder why, though. I wonder if it’s for the same reason as Demetrius… if he wants to open the portal… or he has other plans for you and the star.”
“Laylen did you… do you know that Stephan is Immortal?”
With a clenched jaw, Laylen nods. “Not until yesterday, though… when we got you here. Alex explained some things that apparently he’s been keeping from everyone—even Aislin. Like the fact that his a**hole of a father pretty much can’t be killed.”
“How is that possible, though?” I eye over the black ink tattooing his skin, the Mark of Immortality. “I mean, I know you are because you’re a Vampire, but what does that make Stephan?”
Laylen scratches at the Greek-like marks on his arm. “He could be a lot of things. There are a lot of different breeds that get the mark… Alex says he doesn’t know why his father has it, though. Only that Stephan told him once that he couldn’t be killed by anything.” Laylen rolls his eyes as I cringe. “Alex didn’t even question him, and I’m not surprised. He always did what his father said… until in the cabin… supposedly.” He pauses. “But still, wouldn’t it seem normal to be suspicious? Especially when he told Alex that he can’t even be killed with the Sword of Immortality, which is supposed to be able to kill all Immortals.”
“I’m not sure if Alex fully understands the word suspicious,” I point out. “He doesn’t even understand why I’m suspicious over everything he does… but how can I not be after everything that’s happened?” I pause, taking an unsteady breath. “I’m not sure who I can trust.”
Laylen offers me a sympathetic look and then places a hand on my leg. His touch causes a very mystifying feeling inside me that coils all the way up to my thighs. “You can trust me.”
“I know that.” I actually mean it, too. Something about Laylen makes him seem like a very trustworthy person, which is what I need at the moment. “What else did Alex tell you?”
Amusement develops on his face. “He told me that you guys took a little trip to the City of Crystal where you discovered that you’re a Foreseer.”
I rub my hand tensely on the mark on the back of my neck—the inky black circle wrapping the ‘S’—the one that brands me a Foreseer. “Did he tell you about the vision I went into while I was down there?”
“He did,” Laylen hesitantly answers. “Do you want to talk about it? I know it has to be hard for you to deal with, seeing that happen to your mother.”
Images stab at my mind like shards of glass; Stephan forcing my mom to go into the lake, the entrance to The Underworld where she’s been tortured by Faeries. “Do you think there’s any way she can still be alive? My mom, I mean… while I was blacked out I had a dream or something and I saw her… she was begging me to help her.”
“Really?” he asks and I nod. He stares at me contemplatively. Part of me grows eager, the stupid side probably, thinking he might say yes, there is a possibility that my mother, who I haven’t seen since I was four years-old, and can barely remember—thanks to the detachment of my soul from my emotions and the erasing of my memories—might still be alive.
“I don’t know, Gemma,” he utters quietly, giving my knee a squeeze. “She’s been down there for a really long time…. But maybe. I mean, there’s been some people that I’ve heard of who’ve survived the Water Faerie’s torture for a really long time without going too insane… God, there’s even been a few people who’ve escaped.”
“Are you being serious?” I ask. “Alex made it sound like there wasn’t a way to escape.”
“Don’t get mad at him for that.” Laylen slips his arm around my back and draws me closer to him. He puts his lips right beside my ear and whispers in a deep voice, “He doesn’t hang out with the same crowd as I do, does he?”
I turn my head to the side and our lips nearly touch. “And what kind of crowd is that? A Vampire crowd? Witch crowd? Black Angel crowd? There are so many crowds in this crazy ass world I’ve been thrown into.”
He grins mischievously. “The everything kind of crowd.”
We’re so close that I can’t help thinking about how amazing it’d feel if he just took me over, owned my emotions; got my thoughts of dying, the end of the world and, ultimately, Alex out of my head for a while. “Is there any way we can find out if she’s still alive and where she is?"
“It depends on how brave you are,” he says with a wink.
I force a small smile, but thoughts of my mom drowning in a lake of Fey haunt my mind. If she’s alive, I need to save her, like she asked me to in the dream, if that’s what it was. “Are you trying to get me all riled up for some reason?”
He shakes his head and a grin slips through. “I’m just trying to tell you the truth, so you know what you’re walking into.”
“I’m not scared,” I assure him, which doesn’t seem like a lie. “I want answers—real answers—and I’ll do whatever I have to in order to get them.”
He mulls over what I said, nibbling on his bottom lip, making sucking noises as he draws the lip ring in between his teeth. “Then I say we do it.”
“Do what exactly?” I’m practically bouncing with excitement. “I need to know what I’m getting into.”
He inclines back a little and his gaze fleetingly glides to the bed. It scares me for some reason, the idea that he might be thinking something that requires me being on the bed. Again I try to sift through my emotions to figure out how I feel about him, but I can’t quite understand it and the prickle seems to be stuck in the REM cycle.
“You remember that club we got the Sword of Immortality from?” he checks.
I nod. “Yeah, and I really remember how the bartender spiked my drink with a rufi.”
“Well, where we’re going is similar, but worse.” Worry laces his tone.
I consider what he said, recollecting the Black Dungeon and how I pretty much attacked Alex after drinking that drink. Alex was there to help me, but he won’t be this time. I’m not sure I want him to be, either. “You think it’s worth it to go check it out? That there might be answers there?”
He nods with confidence. “I think your mom may know more about what’s going on than anyone does. I think that might be why Stephan sent her there. That and to keep her away from you.”
“I think so, too,” I agree. “In the vision I saw—the one where Stephan forced her into the lake—she said she knew things about Stephan that eventually everyone else would figure out.”
Plus, I really just want to see my mom. I miss her, even though I really don’t know her, and the idea of seeing her again is enough to make me risk anything. The only family I ever had was Marco and Sophia, my supposed grandparents and two of the most cold-hearted people I know.
“Laylen, what happened to Marco and Sophia?” I ask.
Laylen shrugs. “I’m not sure, but I feel like we need to find out. They were part of removing your soul and they might know something as well… but no one can seem to find them at the moment.”