Some Velvet Sin, page 29
Victor’s blood turned to ice water. He grabbed Albie by the front of his shirt. “Who has Cyn?”
“Richard and his friends. They’re waiting at the overlook.”
That was all Victor needed to hear. He made a beeline for his car, flinging himself behind the wheel. Albie jumped in the back, because Scarlet was already sitting in the passenger’s seat, a pretty pout upon her face. Victor turned the key, too focused on getting to Cyn to bother making her get out.
Della was waving her arms, taking small steps in her heels. “Wait, Vic—”
She shouted something after him as he sped out of the lot, her words obscured in the engine’s loud rumble. His own head roared at him on the way out of town; all he could think of was Cyn. If any of them had touched her, they were dead. Dead.
The air was cool tonight. A fierce wind tore past the windshield, whipping wildly between their bodies and making conversation impossible. Scarlet gazed straight ahead, a gleam in her eye and a slight smile upon her lips. In any other circumstances, her odd behavior would’ve left Victor unnerved, like it had many times before. Albie leaned forward between the two of them, not saying a word.
Nobody else was on the road; nobody ever took this road this late at night, unless they were parking. Richard and them had chosen the overlook for its isolation. Anybody there would watch the fight rather than try to stop it.
Several minutes passed before Victor realized what Della had said.
It was Albie. He wanted you to take the blame.
Another minute passed before he understood what she’d meant by that. He’d been too messed up about Cyn to see it before now. Albie might have told him of the rumors, but he was the one who’d spread them in the first place. He was the one who’d knocked Scarlet up, and he’d made it so Victor would take the blame.
So the squares would target Victor instead of Albie. Albie must have told Baz everything, and Baz had confided in Della.
We were going to tell you.
This wasn’t as much of a surprise as it should have been, given Albie’s recent behavior, but it still stung. Albie had been his friend once, a good friend. His betrayal wasn’t something Victor could just let go like it’d never happened. Not when it affected people other than him. He’d have turned around right then and called Albie out on his lies if it wasn’t for the very real possibility that Richard and them did have Cyn. It wasn’t difficult to imagine. If they believed he’d messed with some girl, one of their own, they’d retaliate in the same way. And that wasn’t difficult to imagine either, though Victor forced himself not to.
He wouldn’t let anything happen to her. He promised himself.
He’d nearly reached the overlook when the other car rounded the bend just ahead of them, driving on the inside lane—a yellow Studebaker. Victor had to swerve to avoid it, slamming on the brakes so they wouldn’t fly over the edge of the cliff. Scarlet let out a shriek, her hands flying to either side of her face. Albie muttered a curse from the back seat.
Victor glanced in the rearview mirror, watching the Studebaker execute a turn on a road that was just wide enough to allow it. He saw Richard in the driver’s seat, Jack riding beside him with vicious glee on his face. George rode in the back. No Cyn.
“This what you were hoping for, Albie?” Victor said calmly as the Studebaker revved its engine, headlights glaring in the mirror. He glanced at Scarlet, who quickly lowered her eyes.
“It was all… just a prank,” Albie said weakly. “Because you stole Cynthia from me.”
Victor’s anger was so cold and calm he didn’t even bother to contradict Albie. He steered back into his lane, and the Studebaker shot after him. It gained on him quickly, pulling up alongside him, crowding him against the hills. Victor focused on keeping the Merc steady, ignoring Jack’s jeers as he hung out the window and reached tauntingly for him.
“Where the hell is she?” he shouted to Albie over the wind and engine sounds. They zoomed past the overlook and all the cars still lined up there.
“The graveyard,” Albie shouted back. “But they didn’t touch her. I swear!”
“They just meant to scare her a little, to get back at you,” Scarlet confessed. “They were going to leave her stranded and then come after you. I told him—I told Jack you’d… that you’d hurt me.” She let out a broken sob. “But I do like you, Victor! I really do! What happened with Albie—I didn’t mean—”
“Shut up,” Victor said with quiet ferocity, and Scarlet immediately clamped her lips together. The graveyard wasn’t far now. He needed to see for himself whether Cyn was all right.
Richard’s car inched closer, and Victor heard the scream of metal on metal. The Merc veered toward the hill, tires bouncing off the sloping ground covered in buckwheat. Victor struggled to regain control of the wheel, the car pinging back and forth in the narrow space between the hill and the Studebaker. Scarlet was sobbing, and Victor swore he could almost feel Jack’s hot breath as the square shouted threats from the open window.
“Jack!” Scarlet screeched desperately, but her pleas went unheeded.
“You’re gonna kill us!” Albie accused.
Every time Victor slowed down, Richard slowed too. When he sped up, Richard did the same.
All he had to do was make it to the graveyard. If he had to fight once he got there, so be it.
Albie slapped the seat urgently. “Vic, I’m sorry—”
“Save it.”
Richard fell behind abruptly. Victor glanced in the rearview to see Jack hooting and hollering out the window, having a good time. Richard laid on the horn and jerked the wheel, ramming Victor’s bumper. The Merc slammed jarringly into the hill as Victor lost control of the wheel. Rough scrub scratched the door and dirt rained down on Scarlet’s head.
When Richard did the same move again, the Merc bucked over the uneven ground and then spun wildly in the opposite direction. They spun so fast Victor couldn’t tell which way was up. The scream of rubber on asphalt was endless, the smell of it like hell. He felt weightless. And then he didn’t.
Victor stared at the dark sky. Dust floated in the glare of headlights. He had to get up. He had to get to her. Cynthia. Cyn.
Car doors slammed. People shouted. They argued. Beneath it all, he heard someone sobbing. Yet it all seemed so far away.
“Cynthia,” he choked out, little more than a whisper. A last breath. Someone had to hear him. Someone had to realize that he needed to make sure she was all right. That he had to see her. “Cyn… thia… Cyn…”
Then, suddenly, everything was quiet.
THIRTY-FOUR
Between
When he woke, all he heard was the low rush of the ocean. Stars shimmered overhead, winking like the glass that littered the road around him. The sharp, unpleasant smell of burning rubber lingered in the air’s stillness.
Victor immediately sat up. He saw his car, angled across the road, the front end resting in the wrong lane. Black tire tracks marked a damning trail right toward it. A few shards of glass clung to the frame of the windshield. Gil was going to kill him when he saw that crumpled metal; they’d never get it right again. The headlights still burned a path through the night. All the dust had settled.
The yellow Studebaker was gone. Everyone was gone.
He stood, reflexively brushing off his clothes. He stretched a little. No pain, he thought with some surprise. But he didn’t think about it for long.
She needed him. She was why he’d come.
Just around the last bend, the graveyard waited. It wasn’t far now. Since his car was useless, Victor set off toward it on foot. He walked with purpose, hugging the hill. Occasionally the buckwheat brushed his arms. The wreck faded from his mind as he drew closer to her.
Not far now.
After a few minutes it occurred to him, dimly, that he wasn’t getting anywhere. Somehow, no matter how many steps he took, he never seemed to round that last bend. The smell of burning rubber clung to him, obliterating the clean salt scent of the ocean. He had to keep going.
Not far.
But he was back at the wreck. He didn’t see how that was possible, because he’d been walking away from it. His car was still there. Still ruined. And something else was there, something he hadn’t noticed before. A body. A body on the road, with half the skin scraped from its face and sightless eyes—
Him. It was his body. But wasn’t he in his body? Wasn’t he using it? To walk along the deserted road, to see the night sky, to smell the burning rubber?
It wasn’t far to the graveyard now. He just had to make it around that last bend.
So he walked. The first blush of rose began to lighten the sky, and still he walked, knowing he’d get there eventually. He had to. Even though he was starting to feel like someone had lit his skin on fire, the pain growing worse with each step. Its presence seemed to heighten everything else that lurked inside him: the anger, the hurt, the need, all of it melting together into one unbearable sensation, a turmoil both physical and emotional. His flayed skin was a prison, and the only thing he could do to withstand it was walk.
Again he returned to the site of the wreck, unsure how he’d managed it when he’d intended something else entirely. The car was gone now, and so was the body. Yet he was still here, somehow. Maybe he’d imagined that body. There wasn’t any blood on the road. Only the tire tracks and a few diamond bits of glass remained as evidence of what had happened.
Victor walked. The graveyard wasn’t far now.
Night fell, though he hadn’t been aware of the passing hours. Shadows began to creep along the road after him, a ghoulish entourage. Some part of him wondered if their presence should worry him, but they didn’t bother him, so he paid them no mind. All he cared about was her. Cyn. She’d betrayed him, but it didn’t matter. Now he thought that it had never mattered. He needed to make sure she was safe.
He walked.
He never reached the graveyard.
But it wasn’t far now. Just around that last bend.
“You’ll never make it.”
It seemed a long time since he’d heard someone’s voice, even his own. This one belonged to a woman.
She stood to his left, at the edge of the cliff. Her clothes were all wrong: a tattered evening dress, long black gloves, a scarf wrapped around the lower half of her face. He’d never seen anybody dressed like that, except in pictures and gangster flicks. Ragged-looking feathers stuck out of her sharply bobbed hair.
“Wherever you’re going,” she said, “you’ll never get there.”
“It’s just ahead.” He pointed, like she might not know the way.
Her greenish eyes were sympathetic, and she lowered the little book she’d been holding. “Do you know, or do I have to tell ya?”
“Know what?” Victor snarled.
“You’re dead, kiddo. You died in a car crash.”
A quick flash of that body—his body—made him look away from her. His eyes traveled back the way he’d come, to the site of the wreck that had been cleared away but remained firmly imprinted in his memory. He could still see it. Smell it. The pain of it lived on his skin and in his bones. He’d walked for hours, it seemed—days—but he hadn’t made it very far at all. And, he knew, he never would.
“Yeah,” he said softly, feeling resigned all of a sudden. Weary. “I know.”
“That’s good. But you’re stuck between worlds now, like me and heaps of others.” The woman started toward him slowly, her narrow hips swaying. “It happens. Something’s keeping your spirit here, see. Your energy.”
He looked at her doubtfully. “What?”
“I couldn’t tell you that, could I? But everything’ll be copacetic for you in no time. This place we’re going, it’s called the Between Realm—it’s full of people like you and me. People who got stuck after death. And I can tell, kiddo, everyone will think you’re just the cat’s meow.”
Victor shook his head. “I can’t go. I have to be somewhere.”
She laughed and fell in step beside him as he started up the road yet again. “And where’s that?”
“The graveyard.”
“You meetin’ a dame?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, I hate to be the bearer of more bad news, but whoever was waiting for you ain’t there anymore. Think about it: they’ve already cleared away the wreckage, and that must’ve taken hours. How long do you think a dame’ll wait for her fella to show up when all she’s got is a bunch of bones for company?”
On some level, Victor recognized the logic of her words. He had no clue how much time had passed since the wreck. Cyn wasn’t in the graveyard anymore, if she ever had been in the first place. She hadn’t even known he was coming. She’d done the worst thing she could think of to make sure he’d never speak to her again.
“She wasn’t waiting for me,” he told the woman sharply. All the pain in his body flared, making him wince, then grit his teeth against it in order to remain standing. “But I have to know if she’s all right. I was on my way when—”
When I died.
It had happened. He couldn’t continue to deny it. He couldn’t keep mindlessly walking to the graveyard, when he’d never find Cyn that way.
Stopping in his tracks, he reluctantly shifted his eyes to the woman.
Once she had his attention, she tilted her head. He had the sense she was smiling gently, as if in pity, though he couldn’t quite tell with the scarf covering her mouth. “See those?” she said softly, one slender arm lifting in a broad gesture.
Victor looked, though he knew exactly what she meant. The shadows lurked all around them, wisps of darkness that seemed to watch and wait—for what, he didn’t know. They were slithering, hungry things that had followed him up the road each time he’d walked, aching to get closer. He’d felt them like a cold breath, hovering at his back.
“They were like us, once,” the woman said. “Just people who died and stayed behind. But we call them exiles. They’re the ones who got so mired in their misery, so obsessed with their death, that they just faded from existence. They became these wraiths, and now all they want is for someone else to feel what they felt in those last moments.”
“What’s that got to do with me?” Victor grumbled.
“See, the way the exiles do that is by slowly consuming us. But if you have protection, they can’t touch you.” She tapped a finger on the jeweled band holding the feathers in her hair. Most of the neatly faceted jewels were black, but one was rougher than the rest and glimmered with blue-white luminescence. “It’s a substance found in the Realm,” she told him. “It keeps them away from us. The reason the exiles never touched you wasn’t because you were protected, mind you. It’s because you were so wrapped up in your death you were well on your way to becoming one of them. You were useless to them, in other words.”
He believed her. It wasn’t surprising. Beneath his rage and the pain that tore across his body, he felt the way they looked: dark, insubstantial, and utterly wretched. He’d have let those terrible things draw him into a pit of despair if it wasn’t for the hope he’d see Cyn again. Cyn, who didn’t need him. But she would’ve heard he’d died, and something told him she’d care.
He’d never given up on her, and he wasn’t about to start now.
“I guess I should thank you.” Victor rolled his shoulders and fixed the woman with a cool gaze. “What’s your name, anyway?”
“I’m called Poisonelle. In the Between Realm, you get to choose your own name, if you like. Mine’s a reminder of the past, but it can be like a second chance, ya follow?”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Swell! It doesn’t take long to get there, not long at all.” She held out her hand for him to take. “Just a quick trip across the threshold.”
“I’ve gotta see her first,” Victor said, shoving his hands firmly in the pockets of his jacket. “I can’t go anywhere until I do.”
Poisonelle lowered her hand. “You can’t go anywhere from here, kiddo. If you stay here, where you died, you’re trapped. The Realm is where you belong now. From there, you can cross to wherever your little heart desires.” She paused. “There’s just one catch.”
“And what’s that?”
“The pain,” she said softly. “All that raw skin on you—I can only imagine. It gets worse the longer you stay in the world of the living. But I promise, you can leave the Realm any time. You’ll see your dame again. Can’t guarantee she’ll see you, though.”
That was all right with him—it had to be. There was no other way to explain any of this, and no other option but to listen to Poisonelle. He nodded tersely, and this time he let her take his hand.
They moved between worlds. Victor couldn’t think how else to say it. One second they were on the beach road, and just a couple of steps later they’d entered some kind of forest. A blue-green forest of trees and stone, furred with moss, a place that looked like it’d come from a dream. He gazed around in wonder and bewilderment as they walked along a path of sharp, brittle material.
All the physical pain had fled his body, and he relaxed with the relief of it.
Something was… screaming. He winced as they drew closer to the terrible sound, and his mouth dropped open when he saw it came from an arched gate made up of human skulls. Screaming human skulls. They rattled fiercely, jaws clicking as they screamed.
“What a welcome, huh?” Poisonelle said. “I call them the clackers.”
“What the hell are they?” Victor demanded.
In her jaunty way she explained about the prince and the challenge, and what the prince did to the losers. She told him about the caves, all the hundreds upon thousands of them, where the ghosts or ghouls or whatever they were now made their undead lives.
An impressively tall man with antlers springing from his head appeared from nowhere as they approached the gate. Victor sized him up, preparing for a fight, but all the man did was smile.
“Time for a riddle,” Poisonelle said, sounding chagrined. “He does this to everyone I bring through, don’t you, Starkweather?”
