Crywolf - Ghosts

I sat on the edge of my cot, wishing the vision I had just had was just that, a vision, not a call, not a request. Nothing frustrated me more than the fact that my mind seemed to be so easily encroached upon. I wasn't supposed to be like this, I had practiced for years to close my mind off from others, to make this kind of warfare ineffective against me. I suppose I couldn't fault myself for my father's ability to infiltrate my dreams. I had never really expected to be able to keep him out, not completely at least. Especially when my defenses were at their weakest as I slept. Especially now, when my mind was the weakest it had been in years, but now this? Now him?

I knew logically I shouldn't blame myself for his ability either. He had been the one to begin my training, the one who had first given me the tools to keep others out. But I still hated that I couldn't get a single damned afternoon of sleep without someone prancing through my mind like it was their own personal garden. I was sure he was lying, or maybe I just wanted him to be lying. It seemed doubtful though, I remembered all the lectures he had given me on the merits of honesty when I was a child. Maybe if I had listened to him I wouldn't be in the predicament I was currently in, maybe I would still have my family.

I ran my fingers through my hair as I tried to remember the details of his message, which were already fraying at the edges as my mind tried to destroy the memory someone else had placed. I threw my head back in frustration as I realized I wouldn't be able to remember it all. My defenses hadn't been enough to keep the message out, but they were pulling it apart too quickly for me to replay in full. I pulled a notebook from my bag and began writing all that I could remember, getting more annoyed with each detail that disappeared like shadows in growing candlelight.

Master Darke, please do not disregard this...

...I believe, due to recent unfortunate events, that Jordan will be joining us shortly for her protection and of her own free will. He will not be able to get to her where we'll keep her. She will be safe with me, I promise you that much...You need not worry for her...

...I strongly advise that you join her, join us. You need protection just as much as she, perhaps even more...Put your past where it belongs and make the right decision, for both your sakes...I will not let him have her and I will do everything in my power to protect you as well...Do not do anything rash...Everything in due time...

...You know where to find me, and if you do not, I'm sure you'll figure it out shortly...I must apologize for my ambiguity, I need to take precautionary measures in case he is monitoring you...

...Please excuse my intrusion. You've been extremely difficult to physically locate, to which I must congratulate you. I do hope to see you soon.

I knew there was so much more, the 'vision' had taken close to two minutes, but the more I tried to remember, the more my mind shredded any evidence of the invasion. I remembered how proud I had been when my mental blocks became automatic, when I no longer needed to call upon my energy and focus to be protected. Now I cursed the fact that I didn't consciously control them. It didn't help that almost every time I tried to concentrate, almost every time I closed my eyes, I saw hers staring back at me. Either peeking over the edge of a bar's snowy rooftop, or wide with terror in a city alley as she stared at what she thought was a monster coming for her soul.

I wished I felt better about the message, I wished I trusted him, but he was from a time in my life I would never see the good in, never be able to trust, even in the thinnest most fragile form of the word. I couldn't decide why I hated the idea of her there so much, why it left my stomach in knots. If she wanted to be there, then that was where she should be, simple as that. Maybe I hated it because every memory of Abraham I had involved my father, because I couldn't separate the two, because in some small sense I would always think he was working with him, for him. But I knew that wasn't true.

Put your past where it belongs.

Maybe I hated it because he was the one protecting her, doing what I couldn't. What good is power if you cannot protect the ones you love?

Make the right decision, for both your sakes.

Maybe I just hated that he was becoming a part of this, a part of something that should only be my burden.

Do not do anything rash.

At the very least I knew she'd be safe, safer, with Abraham than with Chi. She was safe with Chi because of how they blended in, how they went unnoticed in the city, but she would be safe with Abraham for a very different set of reasons; power, strength, and numbers in addition to stealth. I couldn't ignore the logic. She would be safe with him. But I wouldn't run there, I wouldn't retreat like that. I couldn't. This wasn't Jordan's fight, she should never have been a part of it. She should be with him, with Abraham, somewhere safe, but I couldn't do that. I had one purpose, only one purpose, and I needed to finish it before I could be at peace, before I could give myself the ultimate peace.

I laughed to myself as I thought of the irony, that I thought of my death as peace, of Hell as peaceful, but at this point, it probably would seem be, at least I wouldn't have to try so hard anymore. The worst fate I could think of was having to live forever. I remember I used to scoff at the idea of peace, scorned the thought of every day being the same, unchangingly safe, benign. Now, I understood. It wasn't about monotony, it wasn't even about constant safety, it was about being able to rest when you needed it. Being able to put your work away at the end of the day. Being able to come home to a safe place with people you trusted, people you loved who loved you.

I now understood why people wanted peace, but I also knew I would never have it, not in the way I wished. The only peace I could achieve was in death, and that was enough for me. That was what I wanted, but not until I fulfilled my purpose. Not until my father was dead.

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I felt like I wasn't even alive, again. How many times could one person die? How many times could someone have their heart broken, their life torn apart before they gave in to the promise of peace that death held? I had considered that far too many times to count in the last few hours. It was like every time I managed to find some twinkling of happiness, no matter how dim, the world found a way to snuff it out and have me spiraling out into the darkness again. The worst part was that I couldn't see where I kept going wrong. Why I kept wreaking havoc and destruction everywhere I went. It was like a curse, like I was the curse.

I tried not to hurt Chi or her family, to keep them safe for what they had done for me. I tried to keep myself distanced from Syn, from everyone, but it didn't matter, death still found them through me. My first Clan hadn't been my fault, not truly, not solely, but this had been. I knew it deep down. I'd led them to their ruin, all the while thinking my presence wouldn't hurt them, couldn't hurt them. All the while thinking I was just a person, that I couldn't possibly harm someone just by being near. But I was a poison, slowly slipping into those around me, weakening them, calling to the darkness, calling it to those I had prepared for it. I felt like the lowest of creatures, one who hurt those it tried to protect, those it tried to care for, to care about. What good is power if you can't protect the ones you love?

I had tried to find my place in this world over and over. I opened myself to the Clan and was shattered, I let Chi and her family in and met the same fate. It didn't matter if I was connected to someone as closely as I had been to my Pair, or as loosely as I had been to Syn, everywhere I went, ruin followed, death followed. Every tie I made to someone, no matter how slight, ended in pain and death and sorrow.

I hated myself as much now as ever, the feelings I had worked so hard to stifle recovered overnight, their claws raking me with new guilt and loathing and shame. My first Clan hadn't been my fault. I had no choice, no control over what I was, and though Chi's Clan wasn't my own, not really, they had been something similar in a small way. They hadn't been my second Clan, but they would be my last, I promised myself that.

Everything I touched came into ruin, everyone. Maybe that was my nature. Maybe it wasn't that I couldn't try to be good, maybe it was that I simply couldn't be. That even the good things I did would end disastrously. Maybe it wasn't that I was evil, but that evil followed me like a shadow, something inescapable and forever attached to me. Its slim fingers grasping onto something in me I couldn't discard, digging itself into my soul, tainting everything I did, everything I touched, everyone I cared about. A disease, a poison, a curse. Maybe the only way out was death. Maybe that was how to protect those around me.

I was miles away before I stopped running, collapsing against a fence, snow drifting up all around me. I hated the cold, but it seemed fitting. I shouldn't be comfortable, I should be freezing in the early dawn, so cold I was almost delusional, shivering so hard I couldn't even stay still enough to rest my aching muscles. I should be miserable, I deserved to be. I had killed someone, someone who shouldn't be dead. I hadn't held the knife to his throat, but I had killed him just the same as my targets, just the same as all the evil I had hunted. I made Syn die. I was the reason he was gone. It was my fault and that broke something in me.

I had never felt that before, guilt too deep to wade through. I had felt guilt for my nature, as soon as I discovered what I was, but I could always tell myself that that wasn't my choice, that I couldn't change my blood, my parents. But now, looking at my time with Chi and her Clan, I couldn't believe how blind I had been. I had things after me that were more powerful than even I knew, and yet I had ignored that, ignored my past because it was too painful and my weakness had gotten someone killed, someone innocent, someone who deserved to live a long life. And the Clan wouldn't even have a body to bury.

I had stuck my head in the sand, pretended I wasn't who I was because I didn't want to be...and I had gotten my friend killed because of it, because I was too stubborn to admit what I was and act accordingly. I had stayed with people that were weak, and then was surprised when they couldn't defend themselves. I had been carefully avoiding the realization that my Pair's father was a Fallen, a powerful one, who wanted me and his son back. Juda had made that clear. We were prizes for him, tools, our power was the thing of legends and he wanted it under his control. All this time I thought I was hiding, but he knew where I was and sent one of his followers to leave me a message, that he was watching, that he knew, that he was just biding his time.

He had broken up the Clan, weakening us all, separating us so he could get at the ones he wanted. How had I been so stupid? Did I really think he would just forget about me? That he would let me live out my life in the city, killing those I found fit, and let the power his son and I had slip away from him? No, he was hunting us, just like I hunted, except he was more patient, he was willing to wait, to make me think I was safe, hidden from him, and then he would strike again, shattering me each and every time. Maybe he already had his son, maybe that was why he was coming for me now, the missing piece to his prized puzzle.

I hated myself more than I ever had as I leaned against the chain links of the fence, listening to them groan against the snow's weight and rattle with each new burst of wind. I wondered for the first time since my dream where Kael was. I just wanted to see someone I knew, someone I wouldn't be able to hurt, someone strong and prepared who could pretend I wasn't a monster, maybe even believe it. I leaned my head back and willed the heat to leave my body, to let me freeze there, but that was cowardice, and I couldn't die like that, I wouldn't let all I had gone through end in a snow pile on the side of an abandoned old road. Even if I was a monster, I was worth more than the slush I sat in.

I got up and walked, but instead of following the road, I veered off into the woods, listening to the bare branches scrape one another and the snow swirl around me. The wind seemed to scream at times, though at others it simply whispered. Each noise resounded in me, regardless of its strength. It either screamed like my anger, or whispered my guilt, but both found a home in me as I walked through the trees. I tried not to, but my mind kept circling back to my run in the woods, so similar to the scene around me, that had brought me to the Clan, to the life I had always wanted. I wasn't so sure now. Syn would still be alive if I had simply lived a life like everyone else, if I had been satisfied with being human, if I hadn't sought out such an awful existence. Even if I had hated my life, at least it never hurt anyone, not really, not like now.

I felt my eyes burning and I let the tears come. The last time I cried like this, so honestly, I had thought our leader was dead, I had mourned him, for a man I thought I loved but now hated. This time felt different, it didn't pull at my heart with pain or loss, but rather my tears came from my mind, from my guilt, from knowing what I had done. I didn't care for Syn like I had for any of my own Clan, but I had still cared, I tried not to, but I did. I knew he didn't deserve the fate he had met, and I cried for that too. That I had killed someone who shouldn't have died, that I hurt the people who had helped me. That a Darkling was in Hell who didn't deserve to be regardless of his kind, his lineage. I was alone in the woods, no one could see me, so I cried openly as I walked, having no reason to hide it, no one to hide it from. Having no one.

For the second time I was lost, purposeless. I didn't know what to do and my previous plan seemed useless. I couldn't save the city, I couldn't even save those who had opened their home to me, those who had trusted me against their better judgment. I couldn't even save one man, one kind, fearless man who showed me his past, his pain, why he was who he was, how he was.

My Pair's father wouldn't let me slink along in the city, doing what I pleased, killing who I wanted, I knew that much. My previous plan would never have worked. But even now, even knowing I was lost, the only thing I truly feared was him. I didn't want to be his pawn, to be molded into a weapon for him. It had taken my Pair years to undo what his father had tried to turn him into, what if I wasn't so strong? What if I became a monster? What if I let him turn me into a monster? The fear I had for the Fallen in the city was nothing compared to the fear I had for the Collector. He was something else entirely in my mind, a demon in its truest form, evil and power in their truest forms. Life didn't seem worth the fear.

I had been torn from two separate families because of what I was. I'd tried so hard in both of them, one to fit in, to be a real part of something, and one to just slide along at the edges, never getting too close, too deep. But neither had worked, and now I didn't want to try for anything anymore. All I wanted was to lie down in the snow, stare up at the multicolored sky as it changed to a pale dawn and let the softly falling snow bury me. I wanted to close my eyes in my freezing coffin and never open them again. I wanted peace, something I had never thought sounded like much of a goal suddenly seemed like my only need, my only desire.

That was when my mind tickled with something, like a shiver in my memory, like I should know what to do, like I did know what to do deep down. I knew where to find peace, the only time I had felt it in months was staring me in the face. The memory quivered one last time and then it was there, a new plan, a better one, a peaceful one, or at least one that wouldn't hurt so much, wouldn't hurt so many. It wouldn't drag people into danger they weren't prepared for, it wouldn't leave those around me an easy target. My plan had two parts, and the second was contingent upon the first. I hoped I could still find it. I needed it. Unfortunately, it would bring me back to the last place I ever wanted to see again.

It loomed up ahead of me just like it always had, looking just like it always had, except now it was empty. Empty and dead and ugly. Its bulk just looked cold now. It was probably the only abandoned building I couldn't see any beauty in. I dropped my eyes to the shin-high snow instead of looking at the manor any longer. I swung to the side without looking up, knowing exactly where the garden would be, and trudged toward the gate, glaring at the bright white ground the whole way.

It looked different in the snow, no longer having the greens of forest life to break up the ground between the white stones. The small pond was frozen over, the snow hiding where it should have been, an unnecessary reminder of the bitter temperatures and that I hadn't felt any kind of warmth in hours. All the while walking, ever walking, getting closer to where I knew the Clan's house would be, boarded up and vacant. It had taken me hours, first to figure out my location, then to start in the direction of the mansion, and now the cold seemed a part of me as I slowly walked between the stones, hating how familiar the grounds were, hating the memories this place called to mind.

The last time I had been here I saw him, or at least I thought I had, but it was just a trick, an illusion by a man I still didn't fully trust. But he had made me feel some small measure of peace, just from his presence, just from his eyes. I wanted to feel that again, so desperately that I was willing to take my chances with him, with whoever the 'we' he had spoken of was. I needed to learn what I was up against and he seemed to know me, me and my Pair, and his father. Maybe he would know the prophecy Syn had mentioned. Whatever information he could give me, whatever peace he could make me feel, was worth the risk of not truly knowing him. At least he was prepared, strong, at least he knew the danger he was taking on by housing me, who was after me.

I leaned against one of the rocks, closing my eyes and trying to feel my fingers as I remembered the old man, Abraham, as vividly as if he stood before me. He had said he knew my Pair, knew him when he was a child, knew his father, the man who I was now sure was hunting me. Anything I could learn would help, anything Abraham knew was better than the close to nothing I did. And at least I wouldn't be pulling someone into my battle who had nothing to do with it. I would never make that mistake again.