The Deepest Black Read online

  He halts, catching his breath.

  “It's missing a few inches,” he says down to me.

  “That's what she said.” I flash him a winning smile and head back to wrestle around the junk for something to stack on top of the can. I find a folding chair that seems to be stable enough and return to him with it.

  “Are you serious?” He groans as I unfold the chair and stack it on top of the bottom of the can. “Do I at least get a balancing stick?”

  “No, but I can sing circus music, if that helps.” I reach up and pat the seat of the chair. “Allez hop.”

  He manages to get one foot on the rim of the trash can and his other foot on the chair before it occurs to me I'm probably built more suited for this kind of acrobatics. I keep my mouth shut, because I don't envy his position at all. The chair scoots a little, and I put up my arms as if I'm going to be able to do anything if he falls. Which I'm not.

  The chair scoots again, right to the edge. I dart over and grab the legs and push back, stilling it as he settles his other foot onto the seat, then reaches for the pergola. I say a small prayer that no one busts us out here playing Jenga with the junk yard.

  With an oomph, Remy pushes himself up on the beams, then crawls over the edge. I try not to picture them cracking beneath him, superstitiously expecting it to happen now that I've thought it. Luckily, it doesn't, and he manages to inch his way over to the window. He lifts his hand to shield his eyes as he peers inside. A long moment later, he looks over the edge at me and gestures for me to follow him up.

  He's got to be out of his mind. I shake my head vigorously, til my hair is flopping in my face. He squints one eye at me, then turns back to the window to watch.

  To watch what, though? Irritation spreads through me. He didn't think to tell me what is going on beyond the glass pane?

  Stifling a growl, I lunge up onto the rim of the trash can, then teeter my way to the seat of the chair. I open my mouth to speak as I take a careful step forward. The chair collapses underneath me. I yelp as the stack crashes. My back hits the ground, knocking the air from my lungs. I scramble to stand as the door bursts open.

  Fae. Three of them.

  “What are you doing out here?” A female fae with wild curls rushes toward me.

  I roll away from her, stumbling as I stand. My hand goes for the baton before I remember I'm unarmed. She's on me and grabs the back of my hair. Her face is inches from mine.

  “What are you doing prowling around here again, little girl?” Her breath is rancid, and my mind races with the realization that the smell is probably human flesh and that she's seen me here before.

  I try not to glance upward at Remy and give away I'm not alone.

  “Just looking for. . .something to eat,” I stutter, then nearly gag at my choice of words.

  Not like I can tell her I was spying on the fae. Or trying to. Can I pull off the bit of a homeless girl? Probably not. How many options do I have now?

  That would be zero.

  The woman sneers, our noses nearly touching. “There is no food out here—for you.”

  Is she threatening me? Of course she is. I would like to run, but she's pulling my head taut by my hair. I struggle to remain looking anywhere but at Remy.

  Finding my voice, I say, “I'll just get going then, and not—”

  The beams snap. Everyone turns to look at Remy standing outside the window above us. His face is frozen in wide-eyed terror. The woman swivels back around to glare at me, her face already distorting. Her jaw cracks as it lengthens. Her eyes widen apart as the bridge of her nose stretches and protrudes.

  I scream and shove at her. She pulls back her free hand as it twists and mutates into something deadly. I scratch at her face, my skin twitching as I feel her goopy putty-like flesh between my fingers. She roars and gut punches me, letting go of my hair. I fall to my knees, forehead slamming into the ground. Pain circles in my stomach until I dry heave despite the snarling and thudding around me.

  I force myself upright as Remy lands on the ground. He charges my attacker. One of the other fae—a male with crooked, broken teeth—grabs him and swings him into the side of the building.

  I need to get back to the truck. Sage oil will set these asshats right.

  Demon fae woman comes at me again. I bolt past her, toward the back door. If I can disappear into the crowd and make it out the front, I can get the oil. It's a big if though, because that place is crawling with these monsters.

  I slam face first into something hard. I'm on the ground, and my vision goes in and out almost in time with the throbbing in my knees and hips. Someone tripped me.

  That's just low.

  I push myself up. Something catches me in the middle of my back. I'm down again, my ribs burning in a way I never thought possible.

  They're going to take me, and this time, they're going to kill me.

  I shove at the ground, but my body doesn't move. Pain shoots through my elbows, down to my fingers. I collapse in my spot. Clawed fingers dig into my hair, scratching at my scalp. I try to beat at the hold, but do little more than wave my hand around.

  Fiery sparks shoot through my skull as I'm dragged across the rock and into the dirt and dead grass. My hands scrape at the ground, trying to find purchase. All I manage to do is provide enough resistance to make her grip painfully tight. I let go and struggle to breathe through the agony, to find my voice to admit defeat so she'll let go. I'll walk anywhere she wants to take me, but I can't seem to catch enough air to say it.

  Just as I'm about to pass out, she releases my hair. My hunched shoulders drop to the ground. Relief floods my body, everywhere but my head—my scalp feels like a burning bruise. I want to stay where I am, fall asleep and wake up when this is over, but she's pattering around somewhere just out of my sight. With aching arms, I push to a sit and twist to look at her. She swoops in and yanks me up, slamming me back into the rusted car. Metal jabs into my lower back and ass.

  My head spins as I try to make sense of the situation: we're far away from the others, and Remy is still occupied with fending off the other two fae. Maybe just one. I can't really see much around the gruesome face in mine.

  Cool air brushes between my breasts. I look down as her claw continues to pop off buttons of my shirt. My stomach flutters as she reaches the bottom, expecting her to set to work on my pants, but she doesn't. She uses her nasty deformed appendage to push back the jacket and shirt at my shoulders, and her wide, wild eyes settle on my chest.

  Oh, shit. I'm dinner.

  I shove back, hard—harder than I thought I had left in me. She stumbles, her claw catching me in the arm. I hiss in pain, slamming my hand over the wound.

  She turns to look at me. The black wisps behind her gather and twist, forming a framework of wings that flap slowly. Thick drool strings from her jagged teeth. I have no attack, just defense, and that's if I'm lucky.

  She lunges at me. I grab at her gross face with both hands, catching her head. She twists and tries to jerk free. I hold tight, straining to ram her into the car. She flails as I hold on like she's a bucking bull. My elbow slams into the car window. The glass doesn't shatter, but pain sears up my arm. Maybe I can smack her head into the window. Maybe just shove her inside.

  A little brain bulb lights up. I let go with one hand and slam my fist into the window, over and over. Nothing happens. She contours and bends, freeing herself of my hold entirely. As she comes at me, I slam into the glass with both hands. It won't give, not even a tiny crack. My palms are numb, my fingers itching and burning. She raises back her hand, ready to sink it into my chest and pull out my still-beating heart. I go for the car door handle. The first is stuck. I go for the second. She strikes at me. I grab her boney arm-like limb just as the door opens. I twist her arm-thing behind her, and shove with my entire body. She falls into the back seat of the car. I scramble out and slam the door shut.

  No idea what the plan is from here. I press my weight against the door as she screeches and bangs a
round inside. The other side of the car is too crumpled to be a functional exit. My gaze darts through the field, landing on Remy. He's jogging toward me. The other two fae are out cold on the ground. Or dead.

  “Get. . .the. . .oil,” Remy gasps, shooing me away from the car.

  I'm momentarily dumb, then I let him hold my captive fae hostage as I flee through the lot, toward the fence. No way I'm daring to go back inside the bar.

  Up and over the fence, I stumble, then fall. My face hits the asphalt, but I barely feel anything even as I stand up again. I hurry to our vehicle, yank open the door, and fumble with the glove compartment for the oil. The bottle gives me the faintest bit of hope. I return to Remy as quickly as my muscles will hoist me back over the fence. Staggering on my last reserve, I hold the oil out at him.

  He scowls and shakes his hands at me. “Just toss it all over the car, on the ground. She won't be able to get out and no one will be able to help her.”

  I'm not sure I understand the logic behind that, but I'm not eager to get close enough to douse her like normal.

  I nod, my throat swollen and burning, my head throbbing, my limbs weak. But I do as he said, dousing the vehicle and the surrounding ground with the rest of my oil. I don't want to be without it again, but I really don't want her to escape. Judging by how her face is pressed against the window pane as she screams and rages, baring wild teeth, she's going to make it her mission in life to find me, even if my heart is the last one she ever eats.

  As soon as the final drop of oil has been used, Remy grabs the bottom of my jacket and guides me toward the fence. If I had the energy to groan, I would. My body is simultaneously cold from the frigid night air, and hot from aches and pains. The last thing I want to do is hop the fence again, but now is not the time to be whiny. That can happen later. And it will happen later.

  I follow Remy over the barricade and head toward the truck, tossing the empty bottle to the side. It clinks when it hits the asphalt and then rolls into the darkness.

  “So we just leaving her there to die a slow death?” I hurry to catch up with him, despite how even my ankles and fingers hurt. “Not a big fan of the fae...well, ya know. . .but that's sort of brutal. . .”

  He stops at the driver side of our vehicle. “No, we're going to try to get some answers from her.”

  “She doesn't seem to be the talkative sort,” I say, rounding to the opposite side and dropping onto the passenger seat. Remy slides in behind the steering wheel. I wrap my arms across my stomach and shudder. “I'm not sure I want to be around when she gets out of her prison, anyway.”

  “We're going to try to fix her,” Remy says as he starts the ignition.

  I hesitate.

  “Kill her, you mean,” I say, even though we already missed an opportunity to do so.

  “Nope. At least, I hope not.”

  I stare at him, waiting for details, but he doesn't seem interested in providing any. Not even when I raise my eyebrow. Or huff.

  Irritated more at his vagueness than anything else, I grumble, “I'd rather just give her a sage oil bath and watch her turn to dust.”

  Darkness drops over his face in a scowl. “Well, you don't get your way on everything, got it?”

  “Excuse you?” I turn in my seat, bracing my hand against the center console. “I don't know where you get off thinking that I've gotten anything I want. I didn't ask for your freaky people so sneak around my city, all villain-like. I didn't ask for you to join me, either, and I certainly didn't ask to try to have tea with one of those monsters. So maybe you should—”

  “I want to give her the Penumbra elixir,” he says simply, cutting my words with a single swing.

  “Oh.” I shut my mouth.

  Is that all it would take? Just hold them down and inject them with the window cleaner looking stuff, and they go back to being nice?

  I glance at Remy. Well, less mean.

  “It's never been tried, that I know of,” he continues, and the little bit of hope brewing in my chest is washed away in a flood of pessimism.

  I collapse against the seat. “So you don't actually know if it will work or not. That's fantastic.”

  “We have to try,” he says quietly.

  Who knew a guy with a faux hawk would be taking the role of Superman?

  “I don't really want to try, if I'm being honest,” I say, but it comes out a lot softer than I had intended.

  “I know,” he replies.

  He reaches over and squeezes my hand.

  I don't pull away from his warmth, but when he relinquishes, I wrap my arms around my torso and try to shrink away into nothing. The idea that we have to subdue that raving creature long enough to shoot her up with a magical brew gives me goosebumps as it is. The realization that it may not work, and she may get the upper hand in the process, makes my limbs feel heavy and weak.

  But these monsters, these dark fae, aren't going away unless we make them.

  * * *

  I say nothing as Remy drives us outside of town, and I continue to say nothing as he turns us onto a bumpy dirt road. It's not until he pulls to a stop in a field of grass and small brush that I finally speak, though I don't even look at him, my gaze stuck on the wild around us.

  “You keep the elixir here?”

  “Not exactly,” he says, turning off the car and stepping out.

  I take a deep breath in exasperation, filling up with the unexpected scent of green, and then unbuckle and join him in the patch of wild. The only light is mounted on a single pole a few feet away, casting a yellow glaze that fades into the dark. My soles squeak on wet grass and bend twigs as I follow him farther into the property.

  Ahead stands a house with a tall tree growing straight through the top, the roof collapsed on one side. The branches form a canopy over the building, and it's as if the tree is wearing the house as a skirt. To the side stands a greenhouse, the glass grown over with the vines that seem to hold this entire place together. He probably keeps the elixir in there, out of sight. Or perhaps in a basement, locked in a vault.

  He heads around the house, and I scowl trying to make out where he is going. We circumvent the buildings and wind up in the backyard. I halt in my step to scope it out: green spreads in all directions, endlessly, like we aren't smack dab in the middle of the desert. Trees with slender trunks bend toward each other, as if old friends in conversation. The vines continue from the front, wrapping the property together as if it were the ribbon on a package.

  Remy continues into the greenery, lit by an unknown source. As we make our way deeper into the oasis, a dark form appears, resting against one of the trees. It's about seven feet tall, with long angled sides. In the middle of the front is a heavy wooden door.

  We head toward the hut. It is covered in a thin slathering of moss, but it seems fully intact. Remy reaches for the knob and yanks the door open. Inside, the hut is lit by an orange fire burning in a sconce on the far wall.

  He steps over the threshold, and I follow after, waving away the bit of dirt and dust that falls from the ceiling. Under the sconce is another heavy door. Without a word, Remy crosses the small room to the other side. I'm right behind him as he lets us through the exit.

  I take a few steps, then halt. The greenery is gone. I turn back and forth, absorbing my surroundings, uncertain how the world could have turned to black and ash in the few minutes we were inside the hut. What was once distinctly forest and houses looks like it had been hit with a bomb. Rubble, chaos. The sky is variegated grays, though it no longer seems to be night. It's like I'm inside an old black and white clip of the aftermath of war.

  “What...happened?” I turn to Remy, but I look past him, at the continued decimation in every direction. It makes me dizzy.

  “The shadows came, took our people, and then our people took our world.” He follows my gaze. “It's not all gone, but most of it. I'm not sure if it's coming back, either.”

  “What do you mean the shadows came?” I force myself to focus on him, to ac
tually see him, like he's land in the distance keeping me from getting sick at sea.

  He points at the sky. “Blocked out the blue, blocked out the sunset.”

  “It looks like smog.”

  “It's worse. I don't know what it is, but it made. . .them.”

  “The evil fae?” I push, insisting he will say it eventually. He will call them as they are.

  He says nothing, but trudges forward, and it's as if his shoes are suddenly weights and he no longer has the will to walk. Can't really blame him. I don't know exactly how I got here—I suppose the hut was that portal he had mentioned—but I'm not excited to see the rest of this place. When he had said disaster struck while he was away, he hadn't been exaggerating.

  Part of me worries, too, what happens if the shadows reach me in the same way it touched the fae. Will I survive without the elixir? If not, will they give me some, or will they make me suffer as an outsider?

  A few people—fae—peek out from behind broken doors and shattered windows. Just little silhouettes, and then they are gone. Apparitions. There aren't many of them, even though the town seems like it used to house hundreds or more, but each motion makes me jump. My hand goes for where I usually keep my baton, but I'm still unarmed. My second instinct is to sidle up to Remy, but I halt. He's still one of them, and I don't know how he's going to act now that we're back in his own world.

  I could just turn around and go home through the portal, but then I would be right back where I started—literally. Instead, I tense up and follow a few feet behind him.

  As we make our way down the street, our path becomes increasingly full of debris, and we resort to pushing it aside with our hands: collapsed sides of buildings, overturned stands with rotted fruit, and fallen trees. I cough and choke, waving away dust, and reach for another board. It nearly disintegrates in my hands. This whole place feels like it's made of ash, like it will all fall apart with just a touch. It doesn't seem real.