Total pages in book: 111
Estimated words: 106107 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 531(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 354(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106107 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 531(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 354(@300wpm)
Panic begins to claw through me.
This can’t be happening again.
“I’m fine,” I manage to say, though the words are a whisper.
Abe! I yell in my head. The beast is talking!
I’ll be right there, he says, and he races over to my side in seconds flat.
“What is happening?” Larimar asks, looking between the both of us, her voice rising.
Abe glances at her. “Nothing, dear. Just a bit of doctor-patient confidentiality. Would you mind giving us a moment? You understand.”
I nod at her to go on, and she does, reluctantly walking along the deck toward the helm while she keeps throwing concerned glances at me over her shoulder.
What happened? Abe asks, putting his hand on my shoulder. Look at me. What happened?
I meet his eyes. I heard the voice. Of it.
What did it say?
It said yes.
To what?
I was thinking about how grateful I was to listen to Larimar. Now that she’s immortal, I don’t have to worry so much about her getting hurt or killed during a battle.
A good point, he says with a nod. And it said yes to that?
I nod.
Nothing else?
No.
He frowns, the cogs behind his eyes turning. Can you talk to it? Ask it something.
What?
Make a bargain with it. Choose something that would benefit you. Find out how you can be the one in control. This might be your shot, Aragon.
What if by talking to it, I’m only inviting it in?
Then invite it in. This is what we have been talking about. This is the controlled environment.
Shouldn’t I be in chains first?
Don’t you think that would start things on the wrong foot, going on the defensive like that?
I frown at him. Are you on the monster’s side or mine?
He gives me a small, knowing smile. I knew the monster before I knew you. You are one and the same. The fact that it said yes, agreeing with you when you said that it was good that Larimar is immortal now, means that it wants to be on your side. It knows it can’t really harm her now.
That’s not exactly true. The beast could bite off her head or tear out her heart. But I don’t even want to think about it, lest I give it any ideas.
Talk to it, Abe coaxes.
I look around. Everyone is paying attention to the sea as the Nightwind sails on in hot pursuit of the Dutch ship. The only one looking at us is Larimar.
Alright, I say and close my eyes. Abe keeps his hand on my shoulder to steady me, and while I’m grateful for it, I also feel quite silly, standing here in the middle of the ship like this while everyone else is running around.
Are you listening? I ask the beast, searching for the dark spaces deep inside, the places I’ve been too afraid to go, where I know my demons live.
No answer.
And then a faint reply, so faint I barely hear it.
I am always listening.
I try to gather my courage. What do you want from me?
It wasn’t the question I wanted to ask. I wasn’t even supposed to ask a question; I was supposed to tell it the terms of our bargain.
I want you to make peace with your dark side, the beast says. I want you to make peace with me.
You are my dark side?
Armand Cruz, he says, my old name making me shiver. I am you.
But you came when Kaleid…you came from Kaleid, when he killed me, turned me. He gave you to me.
He did not. I came to your rescue. You would have died had I not appeared. Your dark side kept you alive. I kept you alive.
He turned me into an immortal.
But that’s not how immortals are made. Had I not stepped in and made you go to the dark place, you would have never survived in the world.
You made me kill my family! I yell inside my head, fists clenching at my sides. Abe’s grip on my shoulder grows strong.
We all do things we do not mean, it eventually says. But sometimes we do things we do, things we could never entertain, that we would never admit to ourselves.
I never wanted to kill my family. I seethe.
Never? Oh, there were times you thought about it. When the kids were loud and your wife showed no interest in you. When you resented having to work all day, every day except the Lord’s day.
You are wrong.
I am right because I am you. Within each human is a great capacity for evil. There is a shadow that forms within us since birth. You—we—were well versed in these shadows. We used them in our witchcraft. You called into the darkness so often, Armand, is it any wonder that it called back? They called you Armand the dark, do you remember? Do you remember all the magic and the spells you did that brought harm to others?