Fractured (28 page)

All-black eyes stared back at her behind a transparent black veil. An old woman in black that was sitting on top of flesh that resembled a chair. Abyzou didn’t move, but she glared back at Bash, daring her to do something about it. She held a hand that was embedded into the thing on the bed. Lily’s hand. The old woman controlled Lily, who was helpless under her influence. Memories flashed through Bash’s mind of when she was really young—she remembered seeing that same creepy old woman hovering around Lily. She had always watched Bash with those unblinking black eyes. And it scared her then, like it scared her now.

“Do you see two people there?” she whispered to Seth. She was trying to not look too long at the demon, but it was hard. It felt like her soul was being sucked through those depthless eyes. “Do you see Lily and an old woman?”

“N-no, just Lily. I-I think,” Seth stammered. He wasn’t paying too much attention to anything other than Rick. He looked sick that one of his best friends was reduced to this.

“
Bash
.” Lily sounded scared, like her old self, although her voice was overlaid with a strange, ethereal voice that was Abyzou’s influence. “
Bash, what are you doing here
?”

Bash swallowed, avoiding Abyzou’s gaze. She focused on her sister’s face sunken into that mountain of flesh. “I’m here,” she said, hoping her voice sounding stronger than she felt. “I’m here to save you, Lily.”

Abyzou grinned then, and squeezed Lily’s hand. Her sister’s mouth started moving in response. “
You can’t save what’s been doomed since birth.
”

“Bullshit,” Bash said. Tears threatened to fall from her eyes. “You’re not doomed, Lily. I’m here to help you.”

“
You can’t help me
.
I’m where I belong
.”

Bash placed a hand over her heart as she spoke. “In a strange hotel? With a bunch of dead people? Lily, this isn’t where you belong.”

Abyzou’s smile turned smug. “
This is my world,
” Lily answered.
“
Why do you think I brought you here for the vacation? So you could come with
me
into
my
world.
”

The timbers in the hotel creaked again, sounding like that mocking laugh. The hotel was all Abyzou’s creation. It wasn’t that Lily had grown into the hotel and was manipulating it—Abyzou had transported them into some sort of manifestation of her own mind. When Lily had suggested coming to the Grand Trails Lodge, she had unwittingly brought them to a portal to the other world. And when Lily had lost her grip on whatever control she fought back with, she had brought them all into it.

None of them were supposed to be here.

“You belong with people who love you, Lily,” Bash pleaded. “Like Mom and me.”

Abyzou threw her head back and gave a soundless, mocking laugh, while Lily passively opened her mouth and lent her voice to it.

It’s not Lily who’s laughing
, Bash had to remind herself. It was hard to act indifferent to it, to show a brave face when she was threatening to shatter on the inside. She was a few heartbeats away from breaking down.

“
You never loved me, Bash. You always had to be better than me. You always criticized me for how I lived my life. You took my true love from me. You took everything from me
.
I’m here because of you.
”

A sob escaped Bash’s throat.

“Fuck this,” Seth said through gritted teeth. He stepped forward, feeling the need to defend Bash from the demon’s tirade. “Lily—”

Rick reacted then, leaping off the bed onto the floor between Seth and the two women. Like Rodney, he was growling at Seth like a dog. Flakes of dead, charred skin sloughed off him as he moved, and those lidless, bloodshot eyes watched Seth. Seth tried backing up, but Rick was on the prowl.

“
Not another step
,” he growled to Seth.

Seth looked torn between what to do.

Bash took that moment to look at Abyzou directly in the eye. “Abyzou…” she began to plead.

The demon soundlessly snarled, and her hand on Lily’s clenched in response.

That, apparently, was the signal for Rick to pounce. Bash screamed as she watched the monster leap at her fiancé. Rick’s teeth in his lipless mouth caught Seth’s arm in a vicious bite. He ripped into Seth’s arm almost to the bone, and blood and pieces of muscle were flying all over the place. Bash had heard that human bites were sometimes worse than animal bites, but she didn’t know how bad it could be until now. Seth was screaming, an animalistic cry that held all of the pain he was experiencing.

“Lily!” Bash pleaded. “Lily, fight it. If you ever truly loved Seth, you wouldn’t let Rick do this!” Seth screamed again as the sound of blood splattered the floor. “Lily!”

For a split second, Bash saw a tortured expression cross Lily’s face, then it was quenched, by Abyzou, who frowned and squeezed the hand again. Bash glanced behind her. Rick was even more vicious now, trying to snap at Seth’s face. She only had seconds before the monster ripped into her lover.

She’s still in there,
Bash thought, fleeting hope coursing through her veins.
Lily’s still in there.
As long as she was under Abyzou’s influence, she couldn’t help herself. It looked like Abyzou holding her hand was the connection.

Her plan barely solidified, Bash acted. She ran towards the demon, attempting to knock her from Lily’s grasp. She even made it as far as pushing Abyzou, but she went right through her body. Of course the demon wasn’t solid—otherwise other people would have found her a long time ago. She was a spirit, not just merely invisible.

In response, the demon snarled at her, and the next thing Bash knew, she was knocked headfirst into the wall. Pain exploded throughout her entire being as she slid down the wall. Now Bash knew what people meant when they said they saw stars—stars and blackness were dancing across her vision, threatening to engulf her.

Her body was on the verge of passing out, and she thought it likely she had a concussion on top of the blood loss from her arm. She couldn’t pass out. Not when she wasn’t sure if she would wake up or not. Not when they were so close to saving Lily and getting out of here.

She tried to force herself up into a sitting position, but it was hard. She couldn’t quite hold onto any single thought—they always seemed to slip through her fingers just as she was forming them.

She grinned and coughed with a grimace. Blood. She was spitting up blood.

Maybe she was finally dying.

She had one last bargaining chip, one that she didn’t want to play. It looked like options were running slim. “Naomi,” she said. “Remember Naomi? The woman you killed for no reason?”

Bash didn’t get a response, and Abyzou watched her with cold fury.

“She said that you are a jealous demon. That the reason you do what you do is because you’re infertile. You can’t have kids of your own.”

Abyzou’s eyes widened perceptibly. She was on the right track.

“I think that’s why you wanted one of us, wasn’t it?” Bash said, feeling bolder now. “You didn’t want us to be your children. You wouldn’t be so focused on getting her a mate. You wanted to possess one of us so you could bear your own child.”

Abyzou got to her feet, glaring down at her.

Bash swallowed. So she was right. This was where it was going to get hard. Putting on a brave face, she smiled, even though it hurt her physically and emotionally. “You chose the wrong twin.”

Abyzou growled, finally letting go of Lily’s hand. The other girl let out a gasp, her eyes fluttering open in a mask of terror. The bodies of the other people embedded into the walls of flesh moaned. The demon paid no attention—instead, she moved over towards Bash. She raised a hand, and Bash was painfully forced upright by an unseen force. Bash cried out in pain, but the demon flashed in front of her, their noses inches apart.

“Lily is going to have trouble having children,” Bash grimaced. “She already has had trouble. Don’t you think it’s weird that she
hasn’t
gotten pregnant yet?” Abyzou narrowed her eyes, nonplussed. “After all the one night stands? After all the times there was a chance for something to happen? She hasn’t gotten pregnant yet. No matter how badly you want her to.” Bash gritted her teeth. “Because she has endometriosis. Like our mother. I can’t believe you don’t remember the results. Or you’re such an ancient demon, you don’t understand science?”

Lily had been in the hospital for really bad cramps when she was fourteen. What the doctors had initially suspected  to be appendicitis, was actually endometriosis. While she was sedated, the doctor said she’d have trouble having kids, if she was able to at all. Cheryl, who looked terrified and scared—Bash knew why now—had cried so hard. Lily seemed unfazed by the news when she woke up, probably because as a teenager, kids were the last thing on her mind.

Abyzou flicked a glance behind her at the twin on the bed. She clenched her fist and Lily cried out in pain at the punishment. Bash flinched, trying not to think about what was happening to Seth at that moment. She hadn’t heard anything. Was he still alive?

“You can possess me instead,” Bash pleaded. Abyzou whipped her head back to Bash. “You can bear children through me.”

“
How do I know that you’re not barren as well
?” Abyzou asked. This time, she had spoken using her own mouth and expressions.

“Because,” Bash whispered, feeling her heart break at the admission she was about to make.

Seth must have sensed what she was about to say, because he shouted, “No!” The momentary distraction earned him another punch to the face. She willed herself to ignore him, even though it was difficult.

She didn’t know if it was true or anything, but at that moment, she was willing to grasp at anything to get them out of this situation. “Because I am pregnant.”

Abyzou let go of her clenched fist and Lily sobbed for breath, tears falling down her face. The demon’s hand pressed flat against Bash’s belly, her fingers turning into claws around her stomach. A cold sensation spread throughout Bash’s middle and she shivered, trying to stifle her own tears. Abyzou recoiled, anger flashing through her eyes.

“
You speak the truth
,” she said, a hint of wonder in her evil, ghostly voice.

Surprise flashed through Bash’s mind, followed by the realization that she had just doomed herself and her unborn child to a demon. She had been correct all along. She was pregnant. A wave of emotions spilled over her, choking her with the intensity of it. The things she should have said to Seth. The things she should have done differently. She couldn’t change it now.

“You can have me,” Bash answered quickly, before she lost her nerve with the weight of what she was about to do. She felt like she was crushing her soul. “Let Lily and Seth and everyone else go and live their lives.”

The demon scrutinized her, weighing up whether or not she was lying. A low growl issued from her sneer as she looked her up and down. Bash stared forward, trying to keep her mind blank. She didn’t know if Abyzou could read minds, but she didn’t want to think too hard about what she was doing. Because she would lose her nerve.

What other options did she have? It was either give up herself and their unborn child or be stuck in this hellish world alone until she died anyhow. She could at least save the others.

Abyzou appeared to be considering it.

“
You want to trade yourself for all these...unfortunates?
” The demon gestured to her sister and the bodies of the dead. And lastly, she gestured to Seth’s body on the ground. Bash’s cry caught in her throat at the sight of him, and she swallowed it back down. Seth was dead—the Rick-monster moved away from the body, blood dripping from its maw. Seth’s face had been mauled off, and his body lay broken.

Bash was alone here, the last person standing against the evil. That made her decision quite easy.

“Yes,” she whispered hoarsely. “Yes I do. You just...
have
to make sure that no one—none of these people die. Lily is no longer yours. I want everyone safe.”

The old woman smirked at her. “
What makes you think I can do that, child?
” The demon was calling her bluff.

Bash swallowed. “You’re a powerful demon, aren’t you? We’re in your world now, you can do anything. You can make sure that this never happened.”

The old woman narrowed her eyes, watching her like a bird of prey. “
Done.
”

Abyzou snapped her fingers. A fierce wind picked up, whipping Bash’s hair around her head. She gasped at the unexpected pressure change. The hotel groaned like it was being roused from its sleep. The room started shaking, throwing Bash to her knees. The timbers in the place started creaking and snapping. Splinters flew across the room. She screamed and clasped her hands to her ears, but her voice was lost to the wind. The Grand Trails Lodge was imploding on itself.

A hand appeared in her view. She looked up and saw that Abyzou had insistently forced her hand in front of her. Expecting her to grab it, like she had with Lily’s hands. To possess her.