Love Comes In Many Dangerous Forms

I sighed as we pulled over to the side of the road. I hopped out of the carriage, stretching my cramped muscles. The sun was right above us, blazing down on us. But, sadly, I couldn’t feel the heat, only the harsh wind slashing against my exposed skin.

“Where are we?” Shane asked Zach, who was holding the map.

“A half a mile away from the New York,” he answered, rolling his eyes.

“So we’re walking all the way over there?” Colton whined.

I groaned, “Will you stop being a baby?”

“I’d rather take the stupid horse,” he complained.

I glared and punched his arm, “My horse isn’t ‘stupid’,” and Aidan neighed and kicked the back of Colton’s leg, “Good boy, Aidan.”

“What the hell?!” he shouted clutching his arm, “Why do you have to hit so hard?”

“Because then you wouldn’t feel it,” I explained stepping over him and unlatched Aidan from the cart, his large head nudged my side, “You’re hungry aren’t you?” I giggled, retrieving his bag of feed.

“We better set up camp now, before it gets dark. And we’ll be too tired to do it when we get back,” I told them retrieving my tent bag form the top of the carriage.

It took us about thirty minutes to set up camp back up and the boys changed clothes and I hooked Aidan’s sandal and reins on, “Good horse.”

“You’re taking Aidan?” Shane asked, putting his shoes on.

“Yeah, I don’t want anything to happen to him,” I scratched behind his ear, “And no, Colton, I’m not riding him.”

Colton rolled his eyes at me.

“Hold on,” I sighed walking over to my tent and retrieved the gun and its holster. I tied it against my thigh with a ribbon; it was hidden under my skirt, no one would see it.

“Let’s go,” I sighed, leading Aidan cracked asphalt road.

As we got closer, the more destruction I saw. Debris was scattered across the plain – from scrap metal to emptied water bottles – it was all there. On the horizon, I could faintly see the destroyed city. Aidan trotted happily next to me, unaware of the destruction.

I’ve been to New York only a couple of times, looking for Tristan, but I haven’t gone into the heart of the large city, only glimpses. I was actually scared to see what had become of the city. I have seen pictures of the city, when immortals were just in fairytales. It was big, busy, and loud. People would fill the streets, cars would be at a standstill in traffic, and everything was busy, unaware of the immortals planning to take over.

There was a bulky stationary figure on the side of the road. I have never seen anything, at least not in person, only in photos, like it. It was a small abandoned car.

I smiled as we approached the vehicle. I gave the reins to Zach and bolted towards the car.

“What is she doing?” I heard Colton ask, I didn’t bother to answer. I was too excited.

The doors were missing, giving me access inside. The red paint was chipped and there were several dents in it. It was all different to me, “Humans used to drive these all the time.”

“So?” Colton snorted.

“I haven’t seen anything human made, ever, well besides the stuff we’re just bringing back. It’s nice to know what humans made, what they did, where they went,” I breathed, sitting in the driver’s seat.

I loved the feeling of the steering wheel in my hands. I could faintly smell cigarette smoke that was imbedded in the leather seats. The windshield was cracked and the interior was soiled with dirt and garbage. But that was what made it special, its history.

It was almost painful to leave it there, but I had too. I sighed as I exited the small red car, and Zach gave me Aidan’s reins and we started walking again.

“You like that car don’t you?” Shane whispered in my ear.

I nodded smiling, “That was the first car I’ve ever seen. The immortal leaders made a law about mortal made things, since mortals were disgusting and dysfunctional, the thing we created were too.”

“I remember that,” he sighed, “Every family had to have a man recruited into the immortal’s army. They were sent on raids to kill the humans, destroy everything, and bring back the useful humans.”

“You were solider?” I guessed.

“No, but my father was. I was too young,” he corrected, shoving his hands in his pockets.

“Tell me about your dad,” I told him climbing over a fallen tree.

“Well,” he looked a bit nervous, “his name is Athen. Carly and I have his hair and he has brown eyes-,” I cut him off.

“I want to know about his personality, not his looks,” I smiled.

“He… hates humans, every single human alive… he wants to kill them…” he looked nervous.

“That’s not a bad thing, well it is, but he can’t help it. Almost every immortal hates humans besides you guys, Vera, Audrey, your mom, Carly and Jimmy. But there’s nothing I can do about it, I wish I could, but the royals won’t allow me to talk to their people. They want to have their people believe that humans are evil and vile,” I sighed.

“But I’m sure he’ll like you,” he told me, lying.

“I doubt that, but you weren’t too crazy about me in the beginning,” I reminded him, “And now, you’re one of my best friends.”

I wasn’t sure but I thought he said, “That isn’t enough,” but I brushed it off, because the broken city appeared, and it worse than I imagined.

Buildings were destroyed; ivy was creeping inside and out of the cracks and windows. The ground was covered in fallen beams, bricks, rotten wood and just… garbage. The skyscrapers were wrecked; most of them were torn to the ground. It was all… terrible.

I looked somberly around the wasteland that was once one of the biggest cities in the world. I bit my lip in anger – anger towards hatred.

So much hatred caused the fall of my people, caused so much death, so much destruction. All because of one silly, inconvenient emotion… hate.

I sighed; leading Aidan over to the sturdiest building it could find and tied him to one of the beams.

“Let’s start looking,” I sighed entering the building I was closest too, humming the familiar lullaby.

But something stopped me in my tracks, when I saw a small object lying on the ground in front of me. That one simple thing brought back so many memories of my childhood. It was a doll.

But it wasn’t just any doll – that was my doll.

Vera made it for me when I just was a baby. It kept me calm and I had a friend who I could talk to anytime. I would hide her in the old well in the bucket, or in the hole in the ground, in between the castle walls and the old oak tree.

I bent down carefully to retrieve the doll; I could feel all of the guys’ eyes on me. I picked it up gingerly, careful not to damage it even more than it already was. One of her blue button eyes was missing. Her purple dress was torn in places and had holes in the fabric. Her yellow yarn hair was tangled and mated. But her body was completely unharmed, stitched up even.

I was confused, she use to have stuffing spewing out of her felt figure, especially on her neck.

I looked at the stitches closely, knowing Vera didn’t stitch her up.

“Wh-,” Colton started to ask, but Shane shushed him.

I brought the doll to my face, to look at the stitches, and the cotton filling inside. That made me more confused.

There was no white fluffy stuffing in her, the opposite actually. There was black, all black, and… it was moving – swirling around in a mist.

I frowned, picking up a sharp piece of glass absentmindedly. My hand seemed to move without me telling it too, and it brought the glass against the threaded stitches. I sliced each one, more and more the black mist became more restless.

I cut the last stitch on the back of her neck, and her head went limp without the threads supporting it and the mist escaped flowing out relentlessly until my doll was nothing but fabric.

And there stood towering over me was a large frameless shadow.

A demon’s shadow.