***
I awaken peacefully, opening my eyes as if I’ve woken up from a serene nights rest. But seconds later, the pain rises in my body and I let out a moan as I take in where I am. In an unfamiliar bed, covered with a blanket and the room is crammed with plants. They are everywhere. On the shelves, the dresser and leafy vines dangle from the ceiling.
I slowly sit up, hunching over as my stomach burns in protest. I lift the bottom of my t-shirt and see a very large section of my stomach is bandaged up. I sift through my memories, trying to recollect how I got here, hurt, but I’m drawing a blank.
“We got in a car accident,” Alex says and I turn my head toward the doorway. He’s standing there with his arms crossed, bags under his eyes and his hair sticking up, shirt and jeans torn and stained with blood.
“You look tired,” I say. “Are you okay?”
“Am I okay? Gemma, you should only be worried about if you’re okay right now.”
“Where are we?” I ask, pulling the bottom of my shirt back over my stomach as I gaze around at all the plants.
He sits down on the foot of the bed, leaving some distance between us. “At Stasha’s. The plants are healthy for her gift.”
Pieces of what happened are starting to come back to me, but I don’t think in order because they make no sense. “We were in a car accident… I can barely remember leaving the house.”
His gaze flicks to my head, like he’s checking for injuries he might have missed. “A Death Walker ran out into the road,” he explains. “We hit it and ended up crashing the car.”
“What about the Death Walker?” I ask. “Did it die?”
He gives me a look. “It can’t die, only from the Sword of Immortality.”
“So it’s still alive?” I ask anxiously.
He reluctantly nods. “Thankfully, though, it was just one… and it ran off after we hit it… although I’m not sure what it was doing there in the first place and alone.”
“Do you think it caused the accident on purpose? That maybe your dad sent it?”
“I’m not sure why he’d just send one.” He leans back against the footboard with a quizzical look on his face. “And what I really don’t get is why he’s not coming here himself to get us.”
Something clicks, another lost memory of an erased time. “While I was in the Wastelands, Stephan said something about when you reflected the memoria extracto or whatever the memory erasing rock was called, that it did something and he had to keep his distance for a while.”
This makes Alex even more lost. “Why, though?”
“Maybe because of the sacrificium protegat.” I say it robotically, not even sure what the words mean.
“Where did you learn about that?” Alex asks curiously.
“I have no idea…” A voice whispers to me inside my head, one I’ve heard before but can’t place from where. Not because I’ve forgotten, but there seems to be some sort of wall blocking me from putting it together. “It just popped into my head.”
He ponders this, looking concerned. “Just a second.” Without explaining, he wanders out of the room, leaving the door open behind him. Voices drift from somewhere and after a bit, I get to my feet to go see what’s going on. But I stop as I remember who Stasha is and what she can do. It’s not that I’m afraid of her, well maybe just a little, but I’m also sort of intimidated by her. Sure, I have Alex but that could only be because of the star. I’m not sure I’ll ever be certain whether either of our feelings our genuine until the star is gone.
I end up staying on the bed until Alex returns. He doesn’t look as lost as he did when he walked out. “The sacrifice that I made when we were at the cabin,” he sits down on the bed beside me, this time forgetting to leave space between us and our knees touch, “The one with the memoria extracto, created a seal in your blood, which prevents Stephan from getting close to you for a certain amount of time, because he was the cause behind the sacrifice.”
“Where did you learn that from?”
“Aislin. I guess it’s basic magic 101.”
“And she never bothered to say anything.”
“It’s Aislin,” he says with a shrug. “She probably didn’t even think about it until I brought it up. Although she insists she had an entire conversation with us where she explained it to us.”
“That’s strange… although, now that you mention it, I can kind of remember it happening.” Aislin, Alex, and I in the living room as she’s telling us about it; I can picture it pretty clearly, yet it doesn’t feel like it really happened. “I think something strange is going on.”
“Something strange is always going on.” Alex places a hand on my knee, the corners of his lips quirking.
“That’s not what I meant.” I pause. “It just seems like even though I erased all these events, some of it I can still remember even though technically it never happened.”
“I wonder if something happened when you erased time.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised, since everyone always said simply reading a vision wrong could mess everything up. Plus Nicholas talked about that whole butterfly effect.”
He winces at something I said, but quickly composes himself and scoots closer. “How’s your stomach feeling?” He reaches for my shirt and without waiting for permission, lifts the hem up to inspect my wound.
“What exactly happened to me?” I ask as he carefully peels back a corner or the bandage.
He releases an unsteady breath. “A piece of glass cut you.” He puts the bandage back in place, lowers my shirt, and then brushes his finger across my hairline. “It cut you here, too, but it wasn’t too bad. No stitches or anything.” There’s a trace of a smile and I bet he’s thinking about the last time he put stitches on me, which seems like such a long time ago.
“It felt like I was dying.” I lightly touch my head.
Fear flashes in his eyes. “You were… did.”
“I died?”
He nods. “But I brought you back.”
“H-how?” I’m so shocked I can hardly speak. Dead. I was dead and now I’m not.
“I have no idea, but we need to be more careful.” He reaches out to touch me again, but then pulls back. “We can’t let anything happen to you.”
I want to ask him why, because of the star or because of me, but either answer would be painful. “Is everyone else okay?” I ask. He doesn’t answer, gazing off over my shoulder. “Alex, what happened? Just tell me. Whatever it is I can handle it.”