“We should let bygones be bygones.”

  Makenna swallowed harshly.

  “I suppose you´re right. It probably would be easier.”

  He didn´t answer and as they kept walking Makenna noticed that they were close to her home. She could even see her cottage, but the facade wasn´t made out of reddish wood anymore. Instead it was black and it seemed to have black paint dripping from the roof and it covered the windows. A black tentacle or being or whatever it was swirled in and out of the chimney.

  “What is going on over there?” Makenna almost shrieked. “What is that thing doing?”

  “It´s like that everywhere,” Daniel said. “Don´t worry about it. Your parents are safe.”

  “My mom will be so upset when she finds me in that coma.”

  “Don´t think about that,” Daniel said. “I should have told you before but the first rule in the dark place is to not think about bad things.”

  “I don´t believe you. You probably made up that rule just now.”

  Daniel looked at her condescendingly and then said.

  “There´s a practical reason for that rule.”

  “What reason?”

  “Look over there,” Daniel said and pointed at a tree trunk. It looked like all the rest but at the bottom of it, something was forming. At first it was small, like a black ball of yarn but then it grew bigger and bigger until it looked like one of the other tentacles. Makenna stared at it and she could feel it staring back at her, maybe even giving her a grateful, sinister smile.

  “Did I do that?” she rasped and Daniel nodded. “How?”

  “You´re anchored to this place and now you can create too.”

  She remembered when Daniel had told her that she would be able to create in the dark place as well, an attempt from his side to make it sound more appealing.

  “Am I sleepwalker?” Makenna asked baffled but Daniel shook his head.

  “Not really. But you have the creating abilities now.” He raises his eyebrows. “See, there are some benefits to this after all.”

  “Oh yes, lucky me,” Makenna said sarcastically but an idea had popped into her head, a dangerous, reckless idea that might work. Makenna bit her lip and could almost feel it bleeding. She couldn´t stay here, she wouldn´t last a day let alone years.

  They continued through the woods and Daniel frequently glanced at her both possessively and warily as if she was a ticking bomb. Even though it was he who had all the control, she had the feeling that she had some control too. There had to be a way out, just like Flora had said. She was going to find it and she was going to escape and she already had a clue of what it could be. If she did it and failed, she didn´t know what Daniel would do but she could imagine that he would be furious. It was risky but maybe it was her only chance.

  Makenna observed Daniel´s back and the way he seemed to be listening to her steps as if he needed to be sure that she was walking behind him. But not once did he turn around to see if she did.

  “I can feel you staring at me,” Daniel murmured. “What is it?”

  He didn´t turn around but when Makenna walked up to him, he pulled her closer, roughly and almost crushed her to his side, reminding her that he was both bigger and stronger. But it was also he who was the sleepwalker, and not she.

  “If…if, I ever left you,” she said with her face in his throat. “You would manage, right?” He didn´t even smell the same in the dark place and she moved away from Daniel, to his dismay.

  “Stop being so desperate to leave,” Daniel snarled. “You´re just torturing yourself if you keep toying with that thought.”

  “Then must we stay here, this close to my house? I can´t be this near to it.”

  “I understand,” Daniel nodded. “We could go wherever you´d like. It will be like before, like in the dream world. Or close anyway.”

  “Can I do it?” Makenna asked. “Can I create where to go, like I created that dark thing?”

  Daniel laughed and it sounded strange in the dark place. Like laughter didn´t belong here.

  “It´s a little too early to let you do that, I think. We should wait some time, just until you familiarize yourself with all of this.

  “Please,” Makenna said and stroked his arm. “I really want to try it.” He looked at her hand and his eyes grew hooded. A smile crossed his face and then it was gone.

  “All right,” he said slowly. “I suppose there´s no harm in that.”

  “How is it done?” Makenna asked, trying to hide how incredibly nervous she was. It was now that she needed to focus because if she failed…

  “It´s easy. You just close your eyes and think of where you want to go, try to remember the details as much as possible.” Daniel smiled crookedly. “I can´t wait to see what you choose. We could go to the ship wreck or to Venice or to some place completely new.”

  “New?” Makenna asked and Daniel looked questioning.

  “Actually that might be too experimental, maybe the ship wreck will be the easiest, so think of the pattern in the roof and…”

  Makenna closed her eyes, his voice trailed off in the expectation but then the grip he had around her arms hardened.

  “You were right,” she said when she opened her eyes again. “It was easy.”

  Daniel looked like he wanted to slaughter everything around them. Even the dark beings seemed to fear him now. A new moon shone on the sky but it was a weak, milky light and the black pine trees stood gravely still, as if they were waiting for something.

  “Route 11,” Daniel said and his voice was cold as ice and his nails dug into her skin. “Why choose this highway out of all places?” It was as if he for the first time understood that when she´d said she wasn´t going to give up either, she had meant it.

  “I think you know why.” Makenna took a step back and his hands fell to his side.

  “I trusted you.”

  “I trusted you,” she hit back. “And then I ended up here.”

  “Careful,” Daniel warned. “You don´t know what you´re playing with.”

  “Maybe, but it´s worth a try,” she said and Daniel closed his eyes for just a fraction of a second. He was shaking with anger and stopped trying to prevent the darkness from coming closer. Instead he seemed to be encouraging it.

  “This isn´t what you want to do, you even told your friends that you chose me.”

  “I lied,” Makenna said, ignoring the pained look on his face. “The same way you´ve lied to me the whole time. I was just pretending in front of them.”

  “Why? Why would you pretend like that?” Daniel snarled and Makenna shrugged.

  “I don´t know. Maybe because I wanted to hurt you, the same way you´ve hurt me.”

  “But I don´t want to hurt you.” He took a step closer and she backed away. “I never meant to hurt you. I cherish you more than anything.”

  “You have a strange way of showing it,” Makenna said and rage surged in his eyes and she backed away from the sheer menace that was rolling off of him.

  “All right, fine,” he said furiously. “If you´re so eager to pick a fight then go ahead, but you should know that I always win.”

  Makenna bit the inside of her cheek and braced herself for whatever was to come. Stay strong, stay strong, she repeated to herself.

  Daniel closed his eyes and Makenna felt trembles up her legs, her palms tingled and the highway started spinning around them. She could barely distinguish Daniel or the highway or anything else. It made her so sick she almost collapsed and it was like she was captured in a hellish carousel. Her eyes tried to forcefully close on their own and Makenna glimpses of the ship wreck flashed before her eyes. He was trying to move them to another place, get them away from the highway but if he did then everything would be over. Makenna mustered as much willpower as she could and fought against the pressure in her head and the way that her eyes were closing.

  “Stop it,” she shouted at the top of her lungs and with a final last rumble the highway suddenly stopped spinning and she almost stumbled to the ground.

  Daniel still had his eyes closed and when he opened them there was peacefulness to them. It could have fooled Makenna but then the peacefulness disappeared and his eyes turned fully black again. And all the dark beings seemed to be relishing.

  “Are you trying to trick me?” he said in a low, dangerous voice. “Why didn´t you just tell me you wanted to come here?”

  “As if you would have agreed to it. I´m not as stupid as you think.”

  “I never thought that of you,” he said harshly.

  “No? Well, you were arrogant enough to tell me things like, it was game over from the beginning or that you always win.”

  “This is my world,” Daniel said and she nodded.

  “I know. That´s why I don´t belong here.”

  “What are you doing?” he asked when she started to walk backwards and he menacingly followed her as the black beings crawled around him as if waiting on an order to attack.

  “This is where we met, remember?” Makenna said. “That first time. You told me this is where you entered my dream but at that time I hadn´t given you my permission.”

  “So?” Daniel asked and grabbed her by the waist but she slithered through.

  “Route 11 is some kind of opening or a portal isn´t it? That´s why you didn´t need my permission.”

  “That´s not why,” Daniel said and tried to grab her again but she jumped out of his way. She could tell when he was lying now.

  “I know I´m right,” Makenna said and he clenched his jaw. “That´s why you had that seizure and why you disappeared on me in that way. I just want you to tell me that I´m right.”

  His eyes that remained black were hard to read and she was scared of looking at them too long.

  “You don´t know how difficult it was for me to do that.”

  “I can only imagine but it´s all over now.” Makenna was shaking on the inside with worry about whether this would work or not, but she couldn´t let him know.

  “It´s not over,” he said. “And even if this was a portal you wouldn´t know how to get out.”

  “Because you´ve been keeping it a secret, haven´t you?” she asked and he didn´t answer. “But you don´t have to tell me. I already know.”

  “How?” he said mockingly. “How could you possibly know?”

  He stared at her as she quickly jogged away from him to put some distance between them.

  “I know because this isn´t my world. It´s yours. And I´ve noticed that I can do some things that you can´t, some things that you never do.”

  His eyes narrowed and within a second he was right in front of her, as if he had transported within thin air.

  “Yeah, what´s that?” Daniel´s face was just a couple of inches away from hers and his eyes flickered from black to green and back to black.

  “You can´t turn around.”

  Daniel blinked.

  “What?”

  “In your world, you´re unable to turn around and see what´s behind you.”

  “That´s not true,” Daniel snarled. “I can do whatever I want.”

  “You can go form one place to another, but I´ve never seen you turn around. That´s why you didn´t turn around when I asked you to look at the statues at the ship wreck. Or when that Venetian creature was coming towards us.”

  “Now you´re just grasping for straws,” Daniel said but he sounded tense.

  “Prove it then.”

  “I´m not turning around and you´re being embarrassing.”

  “What happens if you turn around?” Makenna asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “Something must happen, since you´re the one who´s holding your worlds together and not me.”

  “This is our world.” He said it in such a way as if he was desperately trying to convince himself.

  “No it isn´t,” Makenna said and steadied herself. “I never wanted it. I only wanted my own.”

  The dark being flew across Daniel´s head and moved towards her and she started to run. This would be difficult and she knew it. She managed to get away from Daniel but the beings still followed her, they were breathing down her neck, a hot breath that felt like coal and she increased in speed. The plan was to get to the edge of the highway and throw herself off the cliffs…. Makenna screamed when she slammed into Daniel.

  “Don´t do this,” he said pleadingly, holding her so hard it hurt. His eyes had turned black again but they were wet with…tears?

  Shakily she pushed him away with as much force as she could. The edge wasn´t far away now and she let out a yelp when Daniel once again stood in her way.

  He was transporting himself and she tried closing her eyes, thinking that maybe she could do the same because it would go faster that way, but when she tried she only saw flickers of the ship wreck again and her eyes burst open. It was too dangerous to do that and she continued running and her heart was beating so quickly she was surprised it was still in her chest.

  Focus she thought, focus on the creation of the highway. Makenna could see the edge and the black ocean that lied beneath and she took a run for it, only to be caught by Daniel again. He tried to push her away from the edge. She grabbed on to his shirt and they almost fell to the ground, when she suddenly turned around and Daniel did the same.

  She was hanging over the edge and Daniel was screaming in pain and his agony felt like knives all over her body. There was some kind of rift in the air around him, looking like the air was made out of paper that was now being cut. Panicky she let go of his shirt, only to have him grab her wrist instead and her knees scraped against the cliff. The dark beings were standing on the edge, as if on guard and what looked like black oil started sipping from them but it couldn´t reach her.

  “Let me go,” she screamed as the air around Daniel was breaking, separating into pieces and behind her there was a light.

  “Don´t leave. Stay with me,” Daniel said between broken lips. “Don´t leave me alone.”

  He had a horrible expression on his face, a mixture of desperation, regret, greed and there was such black sorrow in his eyes. They were bottomless with a scorching love that promised to consume her and she thought she would drown in them. If she did she would never get to the surface again. He was almost clawing at her, grabbing on to as much of her as he could and a sense of overwhelming doom came over Makenna.

  She was never getting out of here.

  “Please let go,” Makenna cried and tears streamed down her cheeks. And he gave her a look that would haunt her forever, pressed his cold, unforgiving lips against her forehead and his grip suddenly loosened, dropping her into the black, gaping ocean.

  Makenna gasped from the shock.

  He let her go.

  She was lying on her bedroom floor, feeling the soft rug on her elbow and she could see that her favorite scarf which she´d thought she lost was stuck between the wall and the bed. It was so normal and it felt so good to see the real world. It felt so good to be free. She touched her scruffy bed and desk and the walls and she almost started weeping at the sight of the view outside the window. Snow was melting off the trees and a fragile but caring sun was shining in the distance.

  “Mom,” Makenna screamed and ran down to the kitchen where Mrs. Lestrange was burning the toast. “Mom, I´m so happy to see you,” She sniveled and threw her arms around her mother.

  “Honey, what is it?” Mrs. Lestrange said in surprise and stroked her daughter’s hair. “Did you have a nightmare?”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Sometimes it did feel as if everything had just been a dream or perhaps a nightmare was the more suitable word. But both Makenna and her friends knew that everything that had happened when Daniel Barlow came to Gravesend was real. They barely talked about it. Maybe they were afraid that uttering his name would be like uttering a curse.

  And as time passed Daniel began to turn into a forgotten, tragic history that was best left alone. Life continued but Makenna couldn´t fully commit. The things that she had experienced with Daniel had been beyond what was normal and those things lingered like old ghosts in her head.

  She did whatever she could to keep them away, including getting closer to Parker even though it wasn´t a fair thing to do. And whenever Parker asked her what she was thinking about, she would always give him a lying answer. The truth was that she would be thinking about him.

  She found herself often walking by the harbor or just sitting in class, looking out the window and her thoughts would always find their way back to Daniel.

  She would remember the look he´d had on his face, his fear, his pleading and what had looked like love, but maybe it hadn´t been. Maybe his love had been distorted and twisted just like the dark place.

  Makenna couldn´t help but wonder what he was doing, was he wandering around, was he creating, were the dark beings suffocating him, was he praying to see the light? And would he actually ever see the light again or would he be damned to the dark forever? She hoped for the former, because despite what he had done to her she wanted him to be safe.

  After she had returned from the dark place, she feared that she would see his face right before she fell asleep. And she waited, terrified that he would be there with his beautiful eyes and his cruel mouth and she thought that his hands would reach out for her, grab her and try to bring her back to him.

  But he wasn´t there.

  Her room would bathe in silence and she would listen to the swirling forest sounds and feel..., she didn´t quite know what she felt. Whenever Makenna passed his house, a shiver would crawl up her spine because he was still there. To someone who didn´t know, Daniel would only look like he was sleeping but she knew that he was sleepwalking in the dark place and that it would take years for him to come back again, if he ever did at all.

  She knew that she could walk in, go into that room and see him, maybe touch his hand, talk to him and believe that he could hear her from where he was.

  But she never did.

  Instead she did her best to stay occupied and distracted during the day because her nights were consumed by Daniel. Whenever she fell asleep she would be back in the dark place. Only that this time it felt like a dream. There were no dark beings, it didn´t feel dangerous and she knew it wasn´t real but only to her. To him it was real and wherever she walked, he followed.

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22