Angel continued to drag me along for awhile. As we strode along, I listened to the sound of our boots slapping the rock under our feet and the steady drip of water echoing through the cavern. We soon turned a corner and found ourselves in a smaller, adjoining room.
Rocky shelves cut into the walls lined the perimeter of the room. Each shelf was stocked with towels, handmade soap lumps, and square woven baskets to hold clothes while somebody bathes.
Angel pushed me toward one of the bins and helped me to remove my leather weapon harness and short, gothic trench coat.
"I still have no idea why you insist on wearing this thing," she muttered, just loud enough for me to hear.
"Provides protection," I answered. "And you guys told me it was a gift, but wouldn't say who from."
"Seems like it would lower your speed more than anything." She scowls. "And I was against giving it to you."
I followed Angel across the smooth stone floor after placing my coat in a bin and leaning the weapon harness against the wall. She picked up a first aid kit off one of the shelves and continued to the wall opposite the entryway. She lifted the curtain bolted into the wall to reveal another archway leading into a cavernous room.
In the center of the room, stretching for nearly half a football field, is a crystalline pool. Small bubbles surface in various spots throughout the pool. The openings that cause those bubbles serve as a sort of natural filtration system to keep the water fresh. Light steam floats across the surface of the water, and through the mist I can just make out the silhouettes of some people sitting on the edges of the pool a little ways ahead of us.
Angel turned and proceeded to walk around the side of the pool, being careful to remain silent so the people taking their baths wouldn't know we were there. She led us to the furthest corner and gestured for me to sit.
I gingerly untied the laces of my combat boots with my fingers and carefully place them behind me before sitting on the edge of the pool and placing my bare feet in the warm water. The heat was luxurious and the pain in my feet slowly numbed.
I waited while Angel removed her own boots and sat next to me with the first aid kit before I spoke, remembering to keep my voice low to prevent it from carrying across the cavern to the bathers.
"I'm sorry," I murmured, focusing my eyes on the veins of crystal in the rock ceiling several meters over our heads.
"It's fine," she replied, taking my hand and looking over the cuts. "Just need to learn to keep that anger in check."
"I'm trying," I sighed.
"I know."
I glanced around the large room and reached up to my hairline. I pulled back and felt the wig slide from my head, freeing my real hair to spill down my back. Angel spared only a small glance at it before she focused back on the task of cleaning my injuries.
"Better?" she asked.
"Much." I tossed the wig to lay on top of my boots and shook my waist-length hair out behind me. "Tell me again why I have to pretend to be a boy."
She pursed her lips as she dabbed at the cuts in my palm with a wet wash cloth. "We've been over this."
"Tell me." I watched my reflection ripple in the water, straining to look for scarlet red.
She sighed, exasperated. "I'm not sure myself. I was against it as well, but Liam and the seventh master would not budge."
This was a new bit of information. "The seventh master? Hasn't he been missing for 16 years?"
"We were still in contact with him, up until around 6 years ago," Angel responded. "Then he just stopped contacting us."
She then proceeded to call him a bunch of names not to be repeated in polite company.
"Could he have been taken or killed after the Nightwalkers took over?" I wondered.
"Nah," she admitted, pulling gauze and bandage wraps from the first aid kit. "He's too stubborn and flamboyant to let that happen. Not that he was ever in any danger to begin with, the jerk." The last part was mumbled quietly as she pressed a pad of gauze to the now dry cuts and began wrapping my palm with a bandage.
I remained quiet for a moment before speaking. “Richard hates that I have to do this. He told me, ‘Don’t forget about the girl you killed.’”
“Insensitive little snot,” Angel growled. “Acting like it’s your fault. The least he could do is support his little sister.”
I lowered my gaze back to my reflection in the water as Angel moved to patch up my other hand. I strained my eyes to see the scarlet pigment in my hair again, but even after going cross-eyed, my hair, as well as everything else in the world, remains a dull palette of black, gray, and white to my eyes.
I uncrossed my eyes and stared at my reflection. I watched as it rippled and transformed and I felt a familiar pull. I let myself be dragged into the vision.
* * * * *
I found myself floating in a pure white fog. I twisted my body to see all around me, but found nothing but the fog in all directions.
I was weightless, like I was in space with no gravity. I leaned back to slowly recline into a horizontal position in the air, as if I were floating on water.
"What is this place?" I wondered aloud.
"You ask that every time you come here," an amused voice responded.
I tilted my head back slightly and opened my eyes to meet those of a boy looking only a couple years older than me.
“And every time you give me a vague answer,” I said.
“How about...the line between dreams and reality?” He gave me a half smile as his body floated backward. I pulled myself into a sitting position to look at him.
His black and white hair resembled that of a J-rocker. The spikes flipped out slightly at the ends and bobbed as he floated through the fog around me. The full length of his hair actually fell past his hips, wound in a cluster of small braids that started from the base of his neck. His body and head were donned in a stylish rendition of jester’s clothes mixed with steampunk.
“I’m pretty sure I didn’t fall asleep,” I smiled back at him. “So this can’t be a dream.”
He tilted his head to the side and the bells hanging from his hat twinkled lightly.
“You don’t have to be asleep to dream.” His eyes sparkled.
“You are so cheesy,” I snickered.
“I prefer romantic,” he said, matter-of-factly.
“Whatever you say, lover boy.”
This back and forth banter is how we’d interacted for the past seven years. Soon after the Nightwalker takeover, when the masters, Richard, and I had arrived in Carlsbad alongside many other human refugees, I had taken on a fever. I was so sick that when I wasn’t sleeping or retching into a bucket, I was in a delirious state of mind where I had no idea what was going on around me. It was in that delirious state that I first met Senri.
He looked exactly as he did now and every other time he came after, from the J-rocker hair to his strange clothes.
“Hello, little one,” he’d said. “Not feeling well?”
I’d shaken my head.
“Well that isn’t very fun, is it?”
Another head shake.
“Shall we get you fixed up, then?”
A nod.
He’d smiled warmly and gently placed his lips on my forehead, and as he did, I’d felt a pleasant warmth spread through my body as my eyes fluttered shut. In the next moment, I’d woken to the relieved and crying faces of Richard and Angel. It was then that I learned how close I’d been to passing the boundary between life and death.
Back in the present, I crossed my legs and placed my hands on my shins. “So? What did you call me here for, Senri?”
“I see things have been getting exciting on your end.”
“I suppose you could say that,” I said. “We never get strangers in the caverns.”
“Mhm…” He studied me with a soft smile. “I sense things will get even more interesting soon. I hope you’re prepared.”
“What’s going to happen?”
“Who can say?” He shrugged his shoulders and shook his head. “All I know is that things are truly starting now.”
“What sort of things?” I asked, feeling uneasy, the first time this had ever happened in this in-between space.
Suddenly, he was standing right in front of me and tilting my chin up so that we were looking directly into each other’s eyes.
“How hard are you willing to fight to win back a world you no longer know?”
* * * * *
“Luna!” Angel’s hissed whisper brought me back to the edge of the pool.
“Huh?” I asked stupidly.
“Honestly,” she said, shaking her head in disbelief. “You really need to stop zoning out. I asked you what that was about.” She gestured down.
I lowered my gaze to where she was looking and realized she meant the white bandages that were wrapped around my wrists. The ones that had been hidden beneath the long sleeves of my t-shirt. I looked up and met Angel’s dark eyes.
“They reopened.” I said simply.
Her lips thinned to an almost imperceptible line as she pushed my sleeve up to my elbow. Carefully, she unwound the bandages around one wrist. As she unwrapped the last layer, the coppery tang of blood drifted to my nose once more.
She silently tossed the bloody bandage to the side as she dabbed at the mark on my wrist with a wet washcloth: an ugly, dark ‘X,’ burned and sliced into my wrist. Identical to the one on my opposite wrist.
No one knew where they’d come from. I’d had them for 15 years. Neither Richard nor I could remember how I’d obtained them.
Angel stared at the marks sadly as she cleaned up the blood, and I could see her eyes were shiny with tears she was trying so hard to hide.
“It’s been so long since you came to us with these,” she whispered, voice cracking. She looked up at me. “When did they start bleeding again?”
“New Years,” I said quietly. “Seven years ago. Not constantly, but every once in awhile they start up again.”
Angel was silent as she reached into the first aid kit for fresh bandages and gauze.
I cast my eyes out over the steamy water again, wishing to avoid the topic.
She must have received my silent plea because she didn’t bring it up again as she bandaged up my wrist, followed up quickly by the other one. I pulled my feet from the pool and dried them with one of the towels we’d brought, before tugging my heavy combat boots back on and lacing them up. I scraped my waist-length hair back into a ponytail and slid on the wig cap.
“Hey.”
I glanced up at Angel’s voice as I picked up the short, black wig. Her lips curved in a pained smile.
“You know you can trust me, right? Please don’t shut me out.”
I paused and knelt down to wrap my arms around her.
“I know,” I said. “You’re like an older sister to me and I trust you, possibly even more than I trust Richard.”
I smiled at her before standing up and walking back along the edge of the pool. I quickly pulled the black wig back over my head and slipped out through the blanket-covered archway into the changing cove.
As I finished adjusting my weapons harness over my gothic trench coat again, Mal entered from the passageway.
“Yo,” I called.
He turned toward me. “So this is where Angel dragged you off to.” He smirked. “What did you do this time?”
I shrugged. “I threatened Yumar and broke a table.”
His deep laughter echoed off the rock around us. “Kickass. You actually broke a table?”
I nodded sheepishly and looked away embarrassed. “I didn’t mean to,” I muttered. He laughed even louder. I pointed my thumb back towards the pool cavern’s entrance.
“She may need you in there.”
He smirked appreciatively at the bandages wrapped around my palms, but his eyes soon spotted the tell-tale wraps around my wrist, peeking just out of my coat’s sleeve. His eyes darkened and he nodded silently to me.
I walked across the room, preparing to head out into the passageway past Mal, but his arm shot out, stopping me in my tracks.
“She cares about you a lot, you know,” his voice was quiet, cutting through me like a knife. “Like you’re her little sister. If you’re not gonna tell the rest of us about what’s going on--” His eyes flicked down to my now covered wrist. “--the least you could’ve done was tell her.”
“I think of her as a sister, too,” I said, staring at my combat boots. “I just didn’t want to worry any of you.”
His large hand clamped down, hard, on my shoulder.
“Let us help you,” he growled. “Stop trying to take on everything by yourself.”
“It’s my problem to deal with.” My voice was barely more than a whisper. “I don’t want to involve anybody else.”
I suddenly found the world was speeding past me and I could feel hard rock pressed against my back. I sunk to the ground, out of breath after having been shoved into the wall by Mal. When I finally looked up, I saw him towering over me with white hot fury blazing in his eyes.
“Don’t try to feed me that crap,” he yelled, the sound ricocheting off the stone around us. “Stop acting like a spoiled brat! The world doesn’t revolve around you, y’know!”
“You think I don’t realize that?” I screamed back.
“You don’t! If you did, you wouldn’t be trying to push us away!”
“You don’t understand what I’m going through,” I growl, staring at him in defiance. “You don’t know what it’s like to have to go around day after day pretending to be someone you’re not! You don’t know what it feels like to not know where you came from or how you wound up with injuries that could’ve killed you as a toddler or to wonder why your parents no longer wanted you!”
“Then help us to understand!” He exhaled loudly, his voice falling back to normal volume.
“Listen,” he sighed, crouching so that he was eye-level with me and balancing on his toes. “I’m sorry for losing my temper, but this has to be said. You’ve changed. Ever since you became Lyon. You’ve become cold and closed off. Don’t shut us out. Let us help you.”
Instead of answering, I stared at my hands. Mal sighed again.
“Lyon is just a mask, kid, remember that,” he said softly. “Don’t let him take you over. Remember who you are, Luna.”
I remained still for a moment longer before nodding meekly. He grunted and straightened back up to his full height of 6’4”.
“I’ll talk to Angel and try to make her understand,” he reassured me, scratching the back of his head. “In the meantime, you think about what you feel we should know and when to tell us. Alright?”
I tilted my head to look up at him. His hand was held out in front of him, waiting for me to clasp his wrist. I curled my fingers around his well-muscled forearm and he flashed me a grin. I smiled back as he took ahold of my own and hauled me to my feet.
“T-Thanks, Mal,” I mumbled. “I needed that.”
“The stern talking to or the crap beaten out of you?”
“Both.”
He chuckled and slapped me on the back, pushing me toward the passageway. I looked back at him, a silent question in my eyes.
He replied, “Your brother and Shin are looking for you. They’re with your friend and his sister. They left the newbies with Sam and a few other guys to look after them. There’s someone else you need to meet.”
“Who?”
He gave a mocking grimace. “You’ll see.”
“What about you?” I asked.
He grinned again. “I have to check on Angel, remember?”
“Oh, right,” I joke. “Don’t make out too long, ‘kay, tough guy?”
“Alright, you little shit,” Mal chuckled, his cheeks flashing a light pink. “Go before I throw you in the pool.”
“How rude,” I exclaimed, pretending to take offense. I walked through the archway into the tunnel, but turn back to look at him. “Actually take as long as you need with her. I won’t tell.”
I ducked behind the archway and ran off, laughing maniacally as I hear one of the woven bins smash into the rock wall where I’d been standing.
As I left, Senri’s question echoed through my mind once more.
“How hard are you willing to fight to win back a world you no longer know?”
* * * * *
Mal shook his head as Lyon’s laughter faded away down the passageway.
“That psycho,” he exhaled. “She really has a death wish. Ah, hell. At least she’s laughing again.”
He smiled to himself and walked through the archway cut into the opposite wall. He placed one hand on the rocky frame while the other held the blanket out of the way as he scanned the pool cave.
All across the bottom of the pool, the rock glowed in bright, phosphorescent colors of sea foam green, aquamarine, cerulean, even turquoise. The colors reflected off the glowing crystals growing from the ceiling and rocky walls. Similar gems were set into the floor, but they were smoothed down so their tops were level with the floor.
As he struggled to see through the steam, a group of women wrapped in nothing but towels walked past him to leave the pool. They started giggling and staring at him as they paraded past, but when he paid them no attention, they quickly lost interest and left in a huff.
“Hopefully they didn’t hear us yelling at each other,” he muttered to himself, continuing to scan the mist.
He finally spotted her in the furthest corner, the crystal lights catching and magnifying the scarlet of her corset. She sat by the edge of the pool, her knees pulled tightly to her chest, maroon and lavender tail skirts lying on either side of her. Her thigh high boots lay abandoned in a heap behind her. Her eyes were red from crying and Mal could still see tear stains trailing down her cheeks.
She looked like a lost child: confused, upset, and vulnerable.
The sight looked all wrong to Mal. Angel shouldn’t look so broken; she should look strong and confident. He took mental note of this and vowed to beat Luna to a pulp later.
He took a step into the room and continued around the edge of the pool until he was standing right next to her.
“Ange.”
“Mmm.” She didn’t look up when he said her name and continued to stare at the vibrant colors under the water’s surface.
He sat down next to her. They stayed that way in silence for several minutes more.
Finally, Angel spoke. “Mally?” Her voice was hoarse, as if she’d been screaming.
“Hmm?”
She paused before asking, “Why doesn’t she trust us?”
He didn’t have to ask who she was referring to.
“Just give her some time. Having to pretend to be a boy all the time is stressful,” Mal responded quietly. “Not to mention, we haven’t exactly been truthful with her, either. We just have to have faith in her decisions.”
“You make us sound like her parents,” Angel mumbled into her puffy sleeves.
“Ha,” he chuckled. “I do, don’t I?”
“I guess that’s kind of what we are, though,” she huffed, her voice taking on a steely edge. “Especially after he dropped her and Richard off on us.”
Mal leaned back on his hands and watched her from the corner of his eye. “I suppose you’re referring to their father.” She nodded. “I’m sure he had his reasons. He even said it was for the better good of the children that they were raised by the six of us.”
“But what kind of parent would willingly give up their child to near strangers, even if those strangers were friends of his brother?” Angel’s voice shook. “And when the two-year-old daughter is bleeding from her wrists…!” Fresh tears sprang to her eyes.
Mal could feel an invisible rope pulling him to her, and the next thing he knew, he had his arms wrapped tightly around her trembling form. Angel always cried for the sake of others, but never for her own and it drove him nuts.
Her shoulders stiffened, but the trembling doesn’t stop.
“Mally?” she breathed. “What’re you--?”
“Please,” he murmured, his voice muffled in her hair. “Just let me hold you this once and listen to what I have to say.”
She sat silently in his embrace and gave a small nod to let him know she was listening.
Mal sighed. “You are smart, courageous, and strong. More often than not, I’ve been beaten by you in our many duels. But with that strength comes vulnerability. For all the attitude you coat on, you carry twice as much emotional instability. You are kind, imaginative, and most of all--” he leaned back and gazed directly into her amethyst eyes, “--you are beautiful. More beautiful than anything.”
Angel’s eyes widened with shock as he gently brushed her tears away with his finger.
“So please,” Mal continued. “No more crying. No man is worthy of seeing a woman’s tears, your tears, least of all me. Just give Luna a little more time. She’ll tell us when she’s ready.”
Angel clutched the back of his shirt in her clenched fists as she nodded, her eyes never leaving his.
“Besides,” Mal said, his tone less serious. “You won’t have time to cry from here on.”
“What do you mean?” she asked, her gaze questioning.
“Thierry is back.”
“What.”
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