The Dead and the Dark(85)

Beyond the window, he couldn’t see the water. He couldn’t see the trees. He couldn’t see the glowing campfires on the other shore. He could only see the dark.

“I can’t take this,” he whispered into the empty room. “I can’t take this anymore.”

I know, the Dark breathed between the floorboards. It kills you.

Brandon’s breath was a ragged gasp. He’d spoken his grief into the night for months, but it had never spoken back. The cabin was colder than the night outside and darker than black. He wondered if Alejo could hear him talking. He wondered if Alejo was here at all. Brandon felt as though he’d slipped away, suspended between one life and another; between what was and what could be.

Things were supposed to be different, the Dark moaned.

Something opened like a pit in Brandon’s stomach. “I wanted a family. I wanted to be happy.”

What would make you happy?

“My daughter,” Brandon croaked. “My daughter is gone.”

The wooden walls groaned in the wind. The floor beneath Brandon’s feet shifted. Something inside him shifted, too, and he thought he might be sick. The unknowable thing slithered through him, coiling in his stomach, wrapping around his heart like an oily noose. He hadn’t thought to be afraid, but now the fear and the ache were all he had.

Your daughter is buried in my arms, the Dark whispered. Would you like her back?

Brandon sucked in a quivering breath. For the first time since he’d lost her, hot tears stung at his eyes. He knew it was wrong—it couldn’t be that simple—but just the thought was enough. “How?”

I can bring her back to you, just as she was, the Dark offered. For a simple favor, your world could be right again.

“What kind of favor?”

Carry me with you, the Dark whispered, hushed like a breeze. I have lived under this town for years. I want to see the light of day. I want to roam. Give a little of yourself to me—let me come up for air—and I can bring your daughter back.

Brandon wiped at the tears that rolled down his cheeks. It wasn’t true, or it was too good to be true, but he didn’t care. He didn’t know what the Dark was, but he would let it consume him until there was nothing left if it meant she was alive. Brandon felt her little hand wrapped around his finger like a phantom limb.

“What are you?” Brandon asked.

I am the dark created from everything. I am the memories of this place come to life—anger, grief, hate. You know these feelings well. You have felt me here your whole life. In a sense, I am Snakebite. When the Dark stopped speaking, the world was quiet. But I want to be more than a shadow. I want to help you. Will you let me?

Before he could answer, the Dark crept into Brandon’s lungs and ran in his blood. Its tendrils spread into his skull like ivy. The Dark wasn’t Snakebite, anymore; it was him. Its thoughts, its movements were his. It shifted in him, quiet and black as the night, and he shuddered.

“Yes,” he said. He closed his eyes. “Please bring her back.”

And then the world exploded.

The blast was enough to shatter the lakefront window. The cabin’s roof and walls split, banging against each other in the impact. The ceiling lights flickered on, then collapsed from their bolts and crashed to the floor. The world was a spiraling storm around Brandon, but he was the eye. The calm. The trees shook and the lake rippled out for miles. The shadows around him were thick with magic, suspending splinters of wood and dirt in the air.

The door to the next room crashed open before collapsing from its hinges. Alejo stood in the dark, half dressed, eyes wide with terror. He surveyed the room as though he thought he might be dreaming.

“Brandon?” he asked.

Brandon turned slowly to face him. Draped across his arms, hidden from the debris, a girl with dark hair and unusually dark eyes blinked awake. She looked into her father’s face—into Brandon’s face—and smiled. And though he was full of darkness, Brandon smiled too. He’d done it. Nothing else mattered.

He was the Dark, and he was whole again.

Alejo looked at Logan and his eyes welled with tears. His expression was recognition and fear and love all at once. Slowly, cautiously, he stepped into the room and reached for Logan. She reached back and wrapped her arms around his neck. Alejo’s laugh was sharp with a sob. He shook his head.

His dark eyes met Brandon’s.

“Brandon…” he breathed. “What did you do?”





36


A Goodbye Of The Forever Kind


“Wait,” Ashley said. “So … you’re the Dark?”

Brandon rubbed the back of his neck. “Until a few months ago, yeah. Kind of. I was more like a host for it. I carried it around for years, but I never killed anyone. That’s new.”

“Then how is it killing people now?” Ashley asked.

“Not sure.”

“How are you not sure?”

Alejo scoffed. “I think Logan’s rubbing off on her.”

Ashley flushed.

Brandon took off his glasses and cleaned them with the hem of his shirt. “I don’t know as much about it as you’d think. It doesn’t really talk about itself. After Logan … after the incident, we packed up and left. There’d be too many questions about the cabin if we stayed. People would ask how she was back. We couldn’t explain any of it, and we knew no one here would take our word for it.”