“I am not surprised.”
“They are not my parents? Real y?” As if convinced by his words, I al owed my eyes to wel up with very real tears. Tears I’d been holding back from Michael’s betrayal.
“Real y, dear.”
“So I can’t trust what they’ve told me about myself?”
“No, El speth. I am sorry to tel you that you cannot trust the representations of Hananel and Daniel.”
“But you wil become a parent to us? Michael and I wil not be alone? You wil show us the way?”
He smiled; this was the reaction he sought. “I wil indeed, El speth.”
I smiled back at him and drew even closer to his blond hair and blue eyes and his unusual, incense-like scent. “I’m so pleased,” I whispered.
“As am I, my dear,” he whispered back. Then I touched him.
Chapter Thirty-two
The hatred I witnessed in the hearts and minds of my classmates after the Facebook incident was kindergarten stuff in comparison to the darkness of Ezekiel’s spirit. Even the malice I’d seen in Missy could not compare. Through his eyes, I watched scene after scene of dominance and degradation, where he’d concocted ingenious and sickening ways to ensnare the attention—and then the souls—of mankind. He was relentless in reaching his nefarious tentacles into human beings’ lives—births, marriages, il nesses, deaths, educations, businesses, governments, technology, warfare, money, you name it. Ezekiel would not rest until mankind’s thoughts and desires were his own.
He delighted at each conquest, no matter how smal or large. For each victory turned another soul away from any hint of goodness. Ezekiel was a fal en angel, and if you bought into the biblical tale, he was punishing God for casting him out. And he would never, ever stop.
His was the darkness that had crept into my soul and mind after the Fal Dance. I wondered if it had crept in through my tasting of Missy’s blood.
Had she sampled Ezekiel’s, and did she carry his blood in her veins?
I did not think I could tolerate the malevolence of Ezekiel’s thoughts or, worse, his deeds anymore. He’d performed and arranged countless acts of betrayal, deception, seduction, even murder—some with his own hands, some using the hands of others. I couldn’t survive the onslaught a second longer. Then suddenly it stopped. Ezekiel realized what I was doing and shut down his mind.
I opened my eyes and looked directly into his. In that moment, he understood that I saw him—as no one had every truly seen him before. Why couldn’t Michael see Ezekiel’s evil? Had Ezekiel corrupted him before he had a chance? If Ezekiel had frightened me before, he now terrified me.
But the flash had given me a moment of clarity and freedom, and I flew.
I had never flown as fast or as high. Propel ing upward, I sped past the boulders that comprised the sheltering cove, the sharp rock face into which the path was cut, and spiky precipice that made up the cliff top. I desperately needed to make it to the level rock overlooking Ransom Beach before Ezekiel or Michael. Otherwise, the vantage point of the Ransom Beach cliff top would provide them with the precise direction of my route.
Once I figured it out.
I touched down on the top of the cliff. For a moment, I saw nothing but gray skies and grayer rocks and the black asphalt of the highway. No silvery-white of Michael’s or Ezekiel’s hair. I exhaled in relief.
Too soon. I felt the earth shudder beneath my feet, and suddenly Ezekiel was there.
“El speth,” he said with his awful smile; it was like seeing the skeleton under his skin. “Where do you think you are going, dear?”
When Ezekiel walked toward me, I realized that he wasn’t alone. Michael stood to his right.
They were converging on me. Slowly but deliberately. As I backed away, I realized just how much they looked alike. It clouded my thinking for a minute, but then I refocused. My choices were limited: move backward to the cliff edge from which I’d just alighted, or head out onto the deserted highway. I opted for the road and the slim chance that a car would appear. Not that a vehicle and driver could stop this duo.
“El speth, there’s nowhere else to go. Nowhere else wil you be understood and appreciated for who you are,” Ezekiel said.
“We are your true family,” Michael echoed Ezekiel. What was happening to him?
“You belong with us, El speth. You were born to rule, with Michael and me at your side.” Ezekiel kept using that lul ing tone, despite my read of him. I bet it lured a lot of people to him, but just now it wasn’t working. Not that I’d point that out. I’d hate to see what tactic he’d try instead.
“Please, El ie. You know that you and I were meant to be together,” Michael piped in. How could he have joined up with this monster? Did he not see what I saw?
I kept retreating as they continued their slow advance toward me. I didn’t know how to fend them off or where to go. Unfortunately, comforting thoughts of home kept penetrating my consciousness before I could lock them out. I longed to be with my parents, and Ezekiel must have read the yearning on my face.
“Do you think of returning to Hananel and Daniel, El speth? They can no longer protect you. And your presence wil only bring them harm.”
“What do you mean?” I stopped.
“Didn’t they tel you their little secret while they were divulging yours?”
I shook my head, sick at the thought of what he was about to say.
“No? Hananel and Daniel surrendered their immortality when they agreed to raise you as their child.”
Chapter Thirty-three
“Ruth, you said I could cal if I needed you. I real y, real y need you.”
To her credit, Ruth didn’t ask what happened or why I needed help. She just asked where I was, and said she’d pick me up in twenty minutes.
Twenty minutes? Twenty minutes sounded like an eternity when I knew how fast Ezekiel and Michael could travel if they wanted. I prayed that Ezekiel meant what he said just before I took off: “Let her go, Michael. She wil return to us when she is ready.”
Rainwater pooled at my feet as I slid my cel back into my bag. I wiped off my face and hair as best I could with a dry T-shirt from my bag, and looked around the kitschy general store, The Maine Event. In summertime, when the tourists flocked to the beaches and even the locals became regulars at the seaside hangouts, this place swarmed with visitors. Now, manned by a single attendant, it didn’t exactly have the comfort of crowds.
But I didn’t spot a lot of other options as I skirted this isolated stretch of highway, especial y once it started to storm.
Trying to look occupied, I strol ed around the store. I spun carousels of postcards and examined shelves with seashel s and local preserves. The attendant gave me a curious once-over, so I hoped that I looked more appropriate—and interested—than I felt. My mind whirred with the horrors I’d seen through Ezekiel’s eyes and the narrowness of my escape.
After exactly twenty minutes, I heard the bel over the front door ring. My stomach lurched. I wasn’t sure whether it was my savior Ruth or my persecutors.
Thank God it was Ruth.
She raced over. “Are you okay? You look terrible.”
“I’m fine. Real y I am.”
“Did Michael do something to you?”
I knew that would be her presumption; after al , she’d looked reluctant to drop me off with Michael at Ransom Beach less than two hours ago. In formulating my reason for the emergency pickup, I had decided to play on that assumption. “We just had a fight. And I didn’t trust him to bring me home straightaway.”
“I understand.” She gave me a hug and pul ed me toward the door. “Come on, I’l take you home.”
Home. I wished I could go home, but I couldn’t. I would have to enlist Ruth’s unwitting aid once more—to protect myself and my parents. And her, for that matter.
We drove in silence until I asked her about Jamie. Her face lit up as she described how smart he was and how helpful with her homework. I kept her talking until we neared the Til inghast town green. When we pul ed alongside the whitewashed town church, I asked her to stop the car for a minute.