Immortal Consequences(5)
“Ah.” August leaned against the doorframe. “There’s that familiar look of disdain. Did I hit a nerve?”
“You wish.”
She knew she was only satisfying his perverse desire to drive her absolutely crazy, but she couldn’t find the restraint inside herself not to indulge in her anger. If anything, she was currently trying to decide between charging toward him and wringing his neck or using the pointed edge of her concealed dagger to jab his eye out. Neither of which was a sensible option, seeing that no matter how hard she tried, Augustine Hughes could not be killed.
“Come on, now,” August teased. “There’s no need to get violent. We’re beyond all those silly games, aren’t we?”
“Dunno. Maybe we should test it out.”
“You could stab me,” August commented with an impartial shrug. “That always puts you in a better mood.”
“Though tormenting you does bring me great joy, you don’t need to worry. I’m not risking my nomination just so I can snap your neck or push you off a building again.” Wren smirked and crossed her arms. “Publicly, at least. I might consider privately maiming you every once in a while. You know, just to keep our spirits up.”
“How generous of you,” August chuckled.
Wren stepped forward in an attempt to walk past him, but he jerked his arm out, obstructing her path.
She sighed. “Do you mind?”
“You forgot to put shoes on. Wouldn’t want you getting hurt.”
They smiled in unison at the thought.
Pain.
Wren never thought she’d miss it. The sharp prick of a paper cut. The stabbing pressure of menstrual cramps. The throbbing, dull ache of a migraine. She craved it. They both did. It was why they tormented each other mercilessly, desperate to find ways to somehow, despite everything, still feel alive.
But much to their collective disappointment, they were unsuccessful every time.
Wren placed her hand against August’s arm. Her fingertips grazed his skin, and he tensed under her touch. That she knew he could still feel. That rush of…something. Of being too close to one another. Of crossing a boundary that shouldn’t be crossed, let alone acknowledged.
“I think I’ll manage,” she said with a wry smile, and he dropped his arm, motioning her forward with an indolent wave of his hand. “But, as always, thank you for your concern, August.”
2
Emilio
Emilio Córdova pressed the burning tip of the wax candle against his forearm and frowned. He could smell his flesh burning. He could see his brown skin melting into a sunken welt, blistering and wrinkled. He could even feel a gentle nudge, a gossamer pressure, like the delicate brushing of a feather.
With a sigh, he lifted the candle and watched the wound heal almost instantly.
Another pointless attempt to feel human, once again thwarted by the unchangeable fact that Emilio was not alive. He had to keep reminding himself of that. He even wrote it down on scraps of paper and taped them to his bedroom wall.
You are not alive.
It was all about acceptance. That was what they told him, anyway. But how could Emilio accept the fact that he had accidentally died at the ripe age of seventeen? He could still remember the party. The strobe lights, multicolored and flashing against the perimeter of the room. The bass pounding in his chest. The bitter taste of the pills on his tongue and the sweet release that came after.
But the sweet release had been too sweet.
And there he was.
Dead.
The worst part was he had no idea why he hadn’t crossed over to the Other Side. Sure, he had his flaws, but was that really enough of a reason to subject him to eternal unrest? He didn’t think so. But he supposed his circumstances weren’t all terrible.
He’d always wished for magic to be real.
“You have to stop doing that to yourself,” said a familiar voice from above, in a thick French accent that rang in the air with a melodic swing. Emilio glanced up at the balcony wrapped around the second floor of the Library and spotted Olivier sitting with his long legs dangling from the railings. “It’s never going to change. You’ll always heal.”
Emilio hadn’t expected to bump into anybody else tonight. It was past curfew on the night before the Decennial opening ceremony, which meant most students wouldn’t risk getting caught. Emilio, however, knew better than to delude himself into thinking he stood a chance at the nomination. Either way, he had formed a bit of a habit of sneaking into the Library after hours, drowning in ancient scrolls and towering stacks of textbooks. It was his guilty pleasure. His favorite high. The intoxication of knowledge. Despite having only been at Blackwood for a year, he often felt like he knew the academy better than most, memorizing every fact he could get his hands on. Like how Blackwood’s central location in purgatory made it a nexus of magic. And how the Ether—purgatory’s liminal passageway for lost souls—existed in a plane beyond their comprehension, accessed solely through the portal tucked within the Opal Chamber. How the academy held the delicate balance of the afterlife precariously within its brick buildings and vast halls.
There were, however, blank spots. Certain topics that seemed rather hazy, with no concrete information accessible to students. Emilio had always been curious to learn more about the origins of Blackwood—how the academy came to be. But there was nothing, really. Other than a basic explanation that it simply was always there, hovering in the heart of purgatory, a vital thread in the complex web that made up the afterlife.