The Institute called them their Angelic Legion. They expected a few hundred children, gifted with talents beyond nature, properly trained, would be able to turn back the forces of hell when the End Times came. Ky Monroe saw them for what they were years ago–a cult masquerading as something good, something holy, something that would help and not harm. Matthew Thatcher recognized them for what they were, too–a dangerous organization not above murder and violence to achieve their aims, and together with Ky worked tirelessly to make sure the organization died–and when an explosion ripped through the Institute’s main facility in the midwest years ago, Ky dared believe they might have succeeded. But when an old friend reappears with a story to tell, Ky realizes exactly how wrong she’s been–and that time is running out to save the people she loves…
When All’s Said and Done is narrated by Kyle Anne Monroe (alias Kyrie Thatcher), a college student who escaped from the Institute as a teenager. It is the major work planned for the Lost Angels Chronicles, which shares a universe (and many characters) with the UNSETIC Files (and Court of Twelve works like The Man Who Made Monsters, a project I’m working on with L.P. Loudon).
This is another one of those super-long chapters that might be cut into two in edits.
Two
Reece was still up when I got home, curled in the corner of the old blue couch with a book open against her knees. She glanced up at the sound of my entry, tilting her head and glancing at the clock. “Later than usual,” she observed, smothering a yawn.
“Were you waiting up?” I asked her, tossing my keys into the basket on top of the microwave. The evening had grown sticky, humidity promising a late summer storm. From the temperature inside the apartment, she and Marie had closed the windows and turned on the air when the stickiness began to ratchet up, probably a few hours before.
She marked her page and closed her book. “Not really. Just got sucked in, that’s all. Enjoying the last few days I can read and be guilt-free about it.” She grinned at me, but her brow began to furrow the longer she looked at me. “You okay?”
I nodded, starting to put the kettle on for hot water. I needed a mug of something hot, mostly to soothe my nerves and help me calm down enough to sleep. “Yeah, I’m okay.”
“Was it bad?” I’d told her on the phone that Matthew had gotten a call about work. She knew by now what he did, and she’d seen me after I’d helped him through dealing with victims. She didn’t quite know how or why I was so readily able to deal with Matthew—or sometimes the victims themselves—the way I could, but she’d mercifully never asked about it, either. I sometimes thought that was a blessing and a curse all at once.
I took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly, preparing myself to lie to her as I took down a mug from the cupboard. “Kind of,” I said. “Someone who escaped a cult made it to Damon, so he called Matthew. But it wasn’t really that bad. Could’ve been worse.” Could’ve been a lot worse. I finally looked at her. “You want some cocoa or something? I’m putting water on.”
She shook her head a little, still watching me. “You seem like you’re upset about something.”
“I am a little bit.” I never thought that I’d ever see Ridley so…defeated. Broken. Lost. “It’s hard, that’s all. On Matthew and on me.”
“Do you need to talk about it?”
No. Not yet, but maybe soon. I took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly, shaking my head. “No. Thanks, though.”
She nodded. “Okay.” She got up and went to lock the door again as I spooned powdered latte into my mug. She paused for a moment next to me at the counter, brow furrowing. “You sure there’s not more to it than that? You’ve been weird for a couple of days.”
“Have I?” I hadn’t noticed. If I had, I might’ve tried to hide it.
“A little. Distant, distracted. I thought it was maybe you worrying about classes starting up again, but you’re never worried about that. Heck, I realized that when we talked about scheduling in March you were really blasé about this semester. Cakewalk, you said. So I know it’s not that.”
Leave it to Reece to pick up on something like that—and remember what I said six months ago. I exhaled and leaned against the counter, staring sightlessly at the teakettle. “I’ve just had a lot on my mind. Not school stuff.”
“And you’re sure you don’t want to talk?”
I nodded. Not yet, anyway. Not quite yet. “Yeah. Not tonight, at least.”
“You haven’t been having nightmares again, have you?”
I shook my head. I hadn’t had the nightmares in almost two years, but they’d been really bad around the time she and I met and became friends. “No. I haven’t had one in a long time.” My stomach twisted as the teakettle began to whistle. I swung it off the burner and started to fill my cup. Hopefully they’re not going to start up again. Hopefully my imagination isn’t going to run wild, run rampant. I looked at her and forced another smile. “Really, Reece. I’m okay—or I will be. Nothing for you to worry about.” Not yet. Not tonight.
She hesitated before nodding. “Okay.” She was quiet for a moment, then said, “You know, maybe instead of just looking at that old box of cards, you should open it for a change.”
I sucked in a breath, remembering the way my arm tingled earlier when I’d touched the box. I’d shown her the cards once, a long time ago, when she’d seen it sitting on the shelf and asked about it. I hadn’t told her the whole story, just a series of vague half-truths. That someone I loved had given it to me, that I didn’t really know how to read them the right way, and that it was the only piece I had from the person who’d given them to me. It was a keepsake, a memento. “I didn’t know you saw me looking,” I mumbled.
Reece put a hand on my arm, smiling at me gently, her gaze sympathetic and concerned. “It could help, Ky. With whatever’s bothering you.”
I nodded wordlessly. Maybe she was right. Maybe it’ll…maybe it’ll help. Maybe it’ll help me touch him again… The ceramic of the mug was warm against my hand. “Maybe I will.”
She nodded. “Good.” She went and picked up her book and shut off the lights in our living room. “I’m going to go to bed, I think. Marie’s out with Ian. Said she might not come home tonight.”
“Okay. G’night, Reece.”
“Night.” She headed upstairs and left me alone in our kitchen.
I took a slow sip of coffee and glanced toward the window out onto the parking lot in front of the townhouse, toward the lights of the student union beyond it. The campus was still quiet, still a week out from freshman orientation and a week and a half out from the start of classes. Maybe that would be enough time for me to get my head back on straight.
Maybe enough time to find him and make him safe. I exhaled and turned off the kitchen lights, trudging up the stairs to my bedroom. I flipped on the light and sank down on the edge of my bed, staring at nothing for a long moment. I could hear Reece in the bathroom for a few minutes, and then silence. She’d gone to bed, or at the very least flopped into her bunk to read. I took another swallow of coffee and set the cup aside, taking a deep breath and exhaling slowly. My eyes fell on the box. It felt like a long time had passed before I actually picked it up.
My arm tingled all the way up to my elbow as I lifted it, shifting to sit cross-legged on my bed. I settled it in my lap and brushed my fingers across the pentacle carved into the wooden lid, exhaling quietly.
Hadrian. I closed my eyes, resting both hands on the box for a long moment. I took another deep breath and opened the box and my eyes in the same moment. The Knight of Swords stared up at me, face-up on top of the pack. I knew I hadn’t left it like that, the last time I’d opened the box, touched the cards. For a moment, I lost all of my breath as a giant hand wrapped around my heart and squeezed. The Knight of Swords was Hadrian’s card.
I picked it up. Beneath it was the Queen of Swords—my card—also face up. I shivered. After all this time? Are you reaching? Are you…are you trying again? I bit my lip, then picked up the card.
The Devil stared back at me from the top of the deck, mocking me. The Institute. I sucked in a breath and picked up the card with a shaking hand. The green and white Celtic knotwork pattern on the backs of the cards greeted me. Relief flooded me. I was afraid that I’d see more.
I turned the Devil over and laid it back down, followed by the Queen of Swords, but I held the Knight of Swords for a long moment, staring at it and trying to bring to mind the image of Hadrian’s face. It was harder than it should have been, and that brought tears to my eyes. I stared at the card a little longer, then slowly put it back in the box and lowered the lid. I didn’t put it back on the shelf, though. I tucked it into the corner of my bed, near my pillow. That way, it would be near enough to touch without getting out of bed.
I got up, put on my pajamas, and turned out the lights. My coffee sat forgotten on my desk as I curled in bed with my blankets, still trying to hold the wavering image of Hadrian’s face in my mind. I missed him so much, more than I ever admitted, more than I ever let myself feel.
And yet, I was having trouble remembering his face. That upset me more than I wanted to admit.
Closing my eyes, I tried to sleep and hoped the nightmares I expected wouldn’t come. I drifted somewhere between sleeping and waking before I finally dropped off, and dreamed.
I found myself in a familiar garden, a grotto festooned with flowers and trees surrounding a reflecting pool as bottomless as the limitless starry sky it reflected. It was our dream-garden, the place where Hadrian and I had met in dreams, back before, back when I hadn’t dared sneak into his bed back at the Institute, back in those months and years before I failed to rescue him after my own escape. I hadn’t been here in four years, not since then. Not since I thought he’d died because I stopped being able to reach him.
My heart skipped a beat as I saw a thin, frail figure sitting next to the reflecting pool, his back to me. He looked like some kind of shade, dressed in gray, brown hair unruly but limp at the same time. I took a deep breath. Is this real? Or just a fantasy? I slowly walked toward the figure, crouching down to touch his shoulder.
He turned to face me, and I knew it wasn’t a dream.
A nasty, blackening bruise ringed one eye, his face gaunt and narrow, a few freckles standing out starkly against the paleness of his complexion. There was defeat in his eyes at first glance, defeat that melted like ice under the midsummer sun as he stared at me. His chapped lips parted and he sucked in a breath, shock quickly replacing the hopelessness I’d first seen.
“Ky,” he breathed. His shoulder was thin and boney under my hand, and his fingers were frail and reedy as he grasped my arm. “Are you real? Really real? Did I die?”
My heart cracked in half and I sank down onto my knees, shaking my head. “No, Hadrian. No. You’re alive.”
“But you’re dead,” he whispered, fingers tightening painfully. “They all said so.” He sounded confused, terrified.
Oh, Hadrian. I slowly slid my arms around him. He didn’t resist, just sat there, staring almost blankly, as if he was lost. He was so cold, for a moment I wasn’t sure that he was still alive. It was an agonizing few moments before his arms slid around me and he held on tight.
“We’re not dead?”
“No,” I whispered, threading my fingers through his hair. “No, we’re not dead. Whoever told you that lied. I’m so sorry.”
“Ridley and Laren…they said I had to be dreaming. Letting my wishes run away with my heart and mind. That you’d been dead for years, since you tried to escape. They told us…they told us you’d died then. I didn’t believe them.” He shuddered and clung to me. “Until I did. Until I gave…gave up…” He sucked in a breath as if he were a man drowning, struggling for air. “I couldn’t feel you anymore after…so I finally got to thinking that maybe they were right. Maybe I’d just dreamed it all because I missed you so much and needed to be able to focus my hope on something…”
I pulled back and looked at him, at the tears brimming in bloodshot hazel eyes. I took his face gently in my hands and kissed those tears, then held him for a long moment. He shuddered in my arms and pressed his face against my neck. “I’m going to get you out of there,” I whispered. “Somehow. I promise.”
He shook his head a little. “Don’t even know where I am,” he mumbled into my neck.
“We think we do.” I started to stroke his hair again, wincing at how thin and frail he felt. What had they been doing? Had they just never stopped, even though I was gone and they didn’t need the leverage anymore? Or had they found something else to do to him instead?
“We?” He whispered. “Who’s we?”
“Ridley found his way to me and Timothy’s brother.”
Hadrian stiffened. “He gave in to them, Ky. They broke him.”
“I know,” I murmured. “He told me.” He graduated. I knew what it meant when he said that. “There’s some things that don’t go away, though, and one of those things was Ridley’s sense of right and wrong. He got away, and now he’s told me where I can maybe find you.”
“Hurry,” Hadrian murmured. “Please. I…there isn’t much time, Ky.”
My heart seized up again. “What is it?” Tell me you’re not dying. Tell me I haven’t come this close only to lose you again. Please.
He shook his head a little, drawing back and staring at me with haunted eyes. “Something’s going to happen,” he whispered, a glimmer of clairvoyant madness slipping into his gaze, lending an edge to his voice. “I can’t…I can’t quite grasp what, but I know. I can feel it, in the pit of my stomach. Something big, something bad. They’re going to do it and you have to stop it.”
I grasped his arms and squeezed. “We have to stop it.”
Hadrian stared at me for a long moment before leaning forward again, pressing his forehead against my shoulder. It was my turn to cling to him, now, as if he’d slip through my fingers and be gone again if I didn’t hold onto him with all of my strength. He shivered, once, and pressed closer.
“So cold,” he murmured. “So tired.” He swallowed hard. “What if they find you, Ky? What if they find you before you can get to me? What if they’re…what if they’re using our connection right now to find you?”
“They don’t have anyone that could do that, Hadrian,” I murmured. At least they didn’t then. Why should now be any different? I’ve never heard of someone with that kind of gift. He just shivered again, not answering me.
“Don’t tell me where you are,” he murmured. “Don’t tell me what you’re planning—not all of it. I…I don’t know how far I can be trusted these days. I don’t know what I’ll say if I’m delirious. Don’t know what I can keep back from them.” He sucked in a breath. “I’m almost an open book, Ky. If they asked someone loyal to them to read me, they’d know everything.”
“Do you think they would?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he said honestly, arms loosely ringing my waist, now, as if he was too tired to wrap them any higher. “Don’t know if they could tell what’s real from what’s a delusion, either. Don’t know that they care that much anymore. They’ve stopped asking me to tell them what I see. Maybe they already know.” He wet his lips, lifting his face to mine again. “Before tonight…before tonight, I’d started hoping that they’d just end me and let me have peace. I thought that whatever was on the other side had to be better than what I was trying to live through.”
Oh, Hadrian. “And now?”
“I have to hang on,” he said simply. “You say you’re coming for me, and I believe you. You’re the only thing I have left to believe.” He reached up, put his cold palms against my cheeks and cradled my face in his hands, his eyes searching mine for something he’d lost—his hope, I guess. “Tell me this is real, Ky. Just one more time. Tell me it’s real and I’m not imagining this.”
I hugged him close again, drawing him tight against my chest, near enough that he could hear my heartbeat. “This is real,” I murmured to him, resting my chin on his head. “This is real and I’m coming for you, one way or another. I’m going to find you and you’ll be safe and we’ll be together, like we always planned. Like we’re supposed to be.”
He swallowed and nodded. “I believe you,” he whispered. “But please hurry.”
We sat there together, in our dreaming place, for a long time. All I could do was hold him and pray. I prayed that I would find him, and that I wouldn’t be too late. I loved him, after all. I owed it to him—needed to keep my promise. I’d promised I’d come back and get him out of there, a promise I’d made before I ran six years ago, before I escaped.
It was a promise I intended to keep.
♦ ♠ ♦
I woke in the morning to my phone ringing, tears still wet on my face. It was light outside, the sun slowly climbing up into the sky. The ringtone told me it was Matthew and given current circumstances I probably shouldn’t ignore it. I rolled out of bed, grasping for my phone. I eventually found it just before it kicked to voicemail.
“Morning, Matthew,” I grated, then coughed and cleared my throat. “Sorry.”
“You okay?” His voice sounded concerned, even over the phone. “Kicked to voicemail twice before you picked up.”
“I was asleep.” I sat on the floor against my bed, staring at the open blinds. How I’d managed to sleep with that much light flooding into the bedroom, I wasn’t quite sure. “What’s the matter?”
“I just thought it would be better if you were with me when I went to collect your friend and Damon’s cousin today, that’s all. I found a safehouse for them.” Matthew exhaled. “If you don’t want to come, tell me now, because I’m already driving.”
Weariness dragged me down. I took a deep breath. I couldn’t say no, not to this, even if I’d wanted to. “No, I’ll come. When will you be here?”
“Twenty minutes.”
Enough time for a shower. “All right. If I don’t answer the door when you knock, just wait. Might still be in the shower. I’m getting off the phone now.” Maybe the shower would help ease all the tightness in my limbs, the knots in my back.
“All right. See you shortly.”
We both hung up and I headed for the shower, which helped ease some of the tightness, but didn’t erase it completely.
We’re really connected again. The aching wasn’t mine, it was his—it belonged to Hadrian. Whatever had severed our connections four years before wasn’t keeping us apart anymore. In a way, it was a relief, though I feared the moment that I stopped feeling again. I wasn’t sure what that would mean, but given the skeletal, gaunt vision of him, I was afraid it would mean that I’d lost him forever.
I was scrubbing a towel over my short hair when I heard Matthew knocking on the door. I poked my head out of the bathroom to see Reece heading to answer it. I ducked back into the bathroom to drag a brush through my hair. Their voices drifted up to me.
“Hi Matthew. Ky didn’t tell me you were coming over this morning.”
“She didn’t know until half an hour ago,” Matthew admitted, probably as she let him inside.
“What are you two doing today?” Reece sounded confused. I wondered for half a minute what the hell Matthew was wearing. Either he was in a suit or he wasn’t. I wasn’t quite sure which would have confused her more.
I didn’t catch his response as I tossed my brush into a drawer. “Sorry, sorry,” I said as I came down the stairs.
Matthew was dressed in a pair of khakis and a polo shirt, looking more like he was about to go play golf than about to go move two people to a safehouse. Then again, that was probably safer. At least he wasn’t carrying his gun, which I was pretty sure was out in the trunk of his car. It was never that far away. He smiled at me and nodded.
Reece glanced at me and arched a brow. “You guys don’t look like you’re dressed to go to work.”
I shook my head. “Suits are intimidating.” It was the first thing that came to mind, and apparently it made as much sense to her as it did to me.
“I guess so,” she said, looking between us for a moment. “You going to be home for dinner, Ky? I think Ian was going to cook for us.”
I nodded. “Hopefully. I’ll call by four if I’m not, okay?”
“Sure.” She chewed the inside of her lip for a moment, then glanced at Matthew, then back to me. “Ky, can I talk to you for a minute?”
I looked at Matthew. “I’ll be out in a second, Matthew. Just give me a couple.”
He nodded. “I’ll start the car.”
Reece waited until he was out of the house before she took a deep breath and stared at me. “What’s going on, Ky? I’ve seen you go with him on a case once, but never twice on the same case like this.” She touched my arm. “Are you going for him, or are you going for you?”
I took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly. Do I tell her the truth? “He asked me to come,” I said quietly.
“Why?”
I grimaced, crossing my arms, almost hugging myself and looking toward the sliding glass window and the shared commons behind the townhouse—looking anywhere but at her. How much do I say? “Because I know how to help the victim he’s dealing with.”
“How?”
I’d braced for the question, even though I hadn’t quite formulated how I was going to answer her. I took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly. Bite the bullet, Ky. “Because I used to be like him.”
I still couldn’t look at her, couldn’t bring myself to see what her reaction was to that. The strain in her voice, though, that told me all I needed to know. “Ky…what are you talking about? You used to be just like who?”
“The victim,” I said quietly. “The one Matthew’s going to go move to a safehouse.” I swallowed and finally looked at her, seeing the shock etched on her face. It was a big secret, one I’d kept for a long time, even from my closest friends. “You knew that Matthew took me in after my folks died, but you didn’t know that they died a long time before Matthew found me.”
Reece’s jaw worked for a moment before a sound managed to come out. “A cult had you? You never told me.” She wet her lips. “No wonder you have such a problem with religion.”
I couldn’t help myself—I burst out laughing, so hard I sat down on the floor just shy of our stairs. I covered my face with my hands, laughing helplessly until tears came. Reece dropped to her knees next to me, putting a hand on my shoulder.
“Ky?”
“I’m fine,” I gasped between fits of laughter. “You have no idea, Reece. No idea.” Angelic legions. Battles at the end of time, against the demons of hell that will rise. There will be no Rapture, no saving, only the Legions to hide behind. The Legions will save us, which is why they must be taught. Must be trained. Must listen and believe… The old words echoed through my brain and that helped me regain control of myself. Most of us hadn’t believed in their rhetoric. We’d laughed about it in private, mostly so we wouldn’t cry. I could see how someone desperate and broken, though, one of us, could come to believe them. The words were hope, twisted as it was, and made us important, gave us a reason for all of our suffering. Yes. I could see how some of us, some of their purported Angels, could break. The thought sobered me and I took a deep breath, wiping my eyes.
“Sorry,” I said as I finished drying my eyes, suddenly feeling hollow in the wake of my laughter. I shook my head a little. “It’s a long story, Reece, and Matthew’s waiting for me.”
“Let me put my shoes on. I’m coming with.”
I blinked at her. Wait, what? “No, Reece.”
“Why not?” She was already getting her shoes. Something told me I was going to lose against her stubbornness, but I had to try.
“Because this isn’t something you really need to be exposed to.” It was a weak answer and I knew it.
She looked at me squarely, tugging her shoes on and grabbing her satchel. “Maybe not, but it’s something I need to understand. You’re my friend. I don’t know why you’ve kept this a secret for so long, but if you’re not going to tell me why, then I can at least witness why.”
I swallowed bile. “Reece, I didn’t tell you because I didn’t—”
Reece just stared at me and shook her head. “You’re not talking me out of it. You need someone to lean on that’s not Matthew and you know it. Something’s been eating you up almost for as long as I’ve known you. Is that what it is? Whatever you went through?”
After a moment’s hesitation, I sighed. “Part of it.” I grabbed my bag and shook my head. “If you’re going to get involved, will you do something for me?”
She blinked, but nodded. “Depends on what it is, but shoot.”
“Don’t press me. Please? If I tell you I don’t want to talk about it, please believe that there’s a good reason for it.”
A few moments passed before she nodded. “All right. I think I can do that.”
I exhaled the breath I was holding. “Thank you.”
She squeezed my arm. “You’re welcome.” She handed me my keys and stepped out onto our tiny concrete porch. I turned to lock up the house. Her question came quietly. “The box, with the Tarot deck in it. You got that while you were inside, didn’t you?”
I paused in twisting the bolt into place, nodding. “Yeah,” I said softly.
“Is he still out there? Alive, I mean. Somewhere.”
I nodded, squeezing my eyes shut for a moment as I finished locking the house. “I think so,” I lied, not wanting to tell her that I knew. I’d told her enough. I wasn’t ready to tell her that, not yet. Though coming with Matthew and I to move Ridley…well. She’d get an education pretty quickly.
Matthew isn’t going to like this. I shoved my keys into the pocket of my jeans. “All right. Let’s go.”
