Volume 1.18: Fall Into Place

Type: Series

Genre: Urban Fantasy

Rating: M

Characters: April, Andrew, Luca, Willow, Ethan
Word Count: 3540

Glossary: 

Warning: language

And if we can't find where we belong

We'll have to make it on our own

Face all the pain and take it on

Because the only hope for me is you alone

The Only Hope For Me Is You-My Chemical Romance

Al Simhara, Egypt
Present day...

“Stop beating yourself over this. It’s not your fault, Ethan’s a dog and he has to be put down,” Willow raged behind the wheel.

“I was stupid. I shouldn’t have slept with him,” April mumbled weakly. It was nothing she hadn’t said or Willow hadn’t heard before. She was starting to sound like a broken record, but in her mind she thought maybe if she said it loud enough and as many times as possible, it would free her from her shame. But it never did. Instead, the viperous fingers called guilt tightened their grip around her throat, making it hard for her to breathe. She felt sick to her stomach and she waved frantically at Willow to stop the car.

In an instant she was outside, doubled over the side of the road and puking out her empty guts. Willow held her hand through it all, and ran a gentle hand through her hair, making sure the long red strands didn’t get lost in the cloud of sick spewing from her crimson lips.

“Better?” Willow asked when the heaving and retching stopped. April smiled weakly and allowed the Witch to lead her back to the car.

“Here,” Willow handed her bottled water as she shifted the car into gear. April took it. It wasn’t blood. But it would do. It would get rid of the sour taste in her mouth.

They drove in silence for a kilometer or two, neither feeling the need to talk.

April stared outside her window, it was dark but with her brilliant vision she could make out the Great Sphinx in the distance. It was one of the places she wanted to see in Egypt, she’d heard from Willow it housed the Soul-Peace Statue, which diviners believed cured the mummy’s curse. She didn’t have a mummy’s curse, but she could do with a lot of curing for all her other sicknesses.

“What’s it like?” Willow asked out of the blue. April blinked at her question, wondering if she’d missed something.

“To live forever?” Willow cleared up her confusion.

“When you have someone to live forever with, it’s the most amazing feeling in the world. But alone, it gets lonely. Dark. Gloomy. You tend to focus on all your losses and not what you’ve had or could still have.” April replied. “It was great when I had Julian. It’s all I ever wanted. But the last twenty years have been exhausting.”

“I want that with Andrew. Eternity,” Willow bobbed her head up and down a little too quickly, it was almost as if she was at odds with herself, trying to convince herself it’s what she wanted.

“But?” April prodded.

“But nothing,” the Witch sighed, it was a loud whooshing sound, dispelled in staggering breaths.

“Drew will give you anything you ask for. Just make sure it’s what you want and you want it for all the right reasons,” April’s voice was barely above a whisper but she knew her words had found their mark when she saw panic in Willow’s eyes.

“Forever isn’t guaranteed Willow, even for us Vampires. Look at me and Julian. Luca’s parents. Andrew’s parents. I could give you a long list. Sometimes right now is all that matters,” April continued. She knew Andrew wasn’t comfortable with the idea of turning Willow, subconsciously maybe she was trying to change Willow’s mind for him. But a big part of her wanted the Witch to choose immortality freely, not because she was pushed into it by her irrational fears.

Their conversation came to an abrupt halt at the Copper Quarry, their meeting spot. They approached the entrance and were vaguely worried when they didn’t see Razia, Willow’s Special Merchant.

“We are not late, are we?” Willow asked, her gaze shot to her wrist and she slapped her forehead gently with her palm when she realized she wasn’t wearing her wristwatch.

“No. It’s just after 6:45pm. We said 7. She’ll be here,” April assured her. She didn’t wear a wristwatch, but she’d checked the time on the dashboard just before they jumped out of the car.

She played with the ring on her left hand as she watched Willow pace the length of the tomb’s entrance. It was the only piece of jewelry she ever wore.

“That’s a nice ring,” Willow suddenly stopped pacing and stared at the ring on April’s finger.

“Thanks. It was a gift from Julian.”

“How did you meet? With me and Andrew, it’s weird, I was supposed to be his meal, but he got more than he’d bargained for when he bit me and found my bloodstream full of Mystic Dust. Did he ever tell you about that?” Willow laughed as she recalled her first encounter with Andrew.

Without stopping for breath the Witch carried on.

“Anyway, Witches use Mystic Dust for everything, it’s mostly for good magic, but it can have negative effects when ingested by anyone who’s not a Witch or a Warlock. Andrew was sick for days after that. Somehow he tracked me down and he begged me for a cure. I was tempted to let him die, you know, make him suffer because that’s exactly what he’d planned for me. But when I saw the pain in his eyes, and he told me about Melanie and why he couldn’t afford to die I caved. He stayed with me for a week; I hid him in our barn and nursed him back to health. I think my mom knew what I was up to every time I ran to the barn. She never said anything though. She really liked Andrew. I’m sad things soured up between us,” Willow finished off with a small smile, a big fat tear rolled down her cheek and April found herself giving her a hug.

“Yes, Andrew told us once how you met. It’s very romantic,” she smiled when they pulled apart.

“Yeah and so is Andrew,” Willow nodded. “What about you? How did you and Julian meet?”

April’s eyes popped out. She wasn’t comfortable talking about herself. But Willow seemed like a nice girl. She wasn’t prying; she genuinely wanted to know more about her because she really wanted to be her friend. Maybe she could do this friendship thing. Maybe having friends wasn’t so bad.

April took a seat on a large rock on the side of the entrance. Willow clapped her hands excitedly like a little kid getting ready for a bedtime story.

“My parents, Arlene and William, were former house and groundskeepers for the Delacroixs,” April began. “I was born in their home, so I know Luca and Julian all my life. But it wasn’t until I turned twenty that Julian and I became a couple. Ten years later, in 1957, Julian and I were involved in a head on collision.”

Willow breathed in sharply at this, her mouth frozen in a perfect 'oh'

“You almost died?” She asked softly.

“I was driving; Julian came out of the wreck unscathed.” April continued. “The clan said it’s a miracle that I survived long enough for him to turn me. Upon completion of my transformation, Julian gave me this ring as a symbol of his love and his commitment to spend eternity with me. And I let him down. He’ll never forgive me for this. Never!” A single tear fell from her eye.

Before Willow could rush up to her and give her a comforting hug, a tall woman of Arabic descent stepped out of the shadows and approached them. The look on her long thin face was full of suspicion and mistrust. Becky, Willow’s friend, had warned her about the Special Merchant, she could get a little difficult and unwelcoming, especially towards foreigners.

“Who is Willow Hart?” She asked in a thick eastern accent, her almond shaped eyes roamed over April and Willow.

“I am,” Willow raised her hand, like one does in class when responding to the teacher’s roll call. She quickly dropped it to her side and smiled at the merchant.

“Come, follow me,” she beckoned at Willow and turned towards the entrance. She stopped when she saw April trailing behind them.

“Who is she?” She demanded.

“She’s my friend. You can trust her,” Willow told her quickly. Razia shook her head and unlocked the door to the tomb, all the while mumbling something under her breath in her language, but since Willow and April didn’t speak a word of Arabic, her angry mutterings were lost to them.

It was pitch black inside the tomb, both April and Willow felt claustrophobic as soon as the secret door clicked in place.

“It’s so dark,” Willow complained.

“Hush now! Don’t be a baby,” the Special merchant snapped at her as she felt around on the wall for a light switch. A second later, the narrow tomb was bathed in an eerie flame glow coming from the single torch light on the stone walls.

Razia put up her hand, signaling for them to stop where they were. They watched her in fascination as she crouched down to disable a series of floor traps.

“To keep out intruders. 18 000 volts of electricity, you would have been toast; any movement you made would have triggered the traps. Ever smelled burning human flesh?” Razia turned to them with a slightly twisted smile. From the dazed look in her eyes when she mentioned electricity volts, April guessed the merchant had a secret obsession with fire and all things explosives.

“Show me yours and I’ll show you mine,” for the first time since they met her, she gave them a genuine smile and all three ladies burst into laughter at her corny line.

Willow fished out the small pouch Andrew had given her earlier and handed it to the Special Merchant. Razia looked at the ancient coins inside and grunted her approval.

“Your turn,” April demanded.

“Of course,” Razia politely asked them to stay put while she went to the treasure chest in the corner of the room. When she came back she was carrying a small oak case, very much like the one Ethan had, but April and Willow saw hers was unlocked with a large gold antique key.

“It’s all there. Sands of Understanding and Escape Dust. Ten of each like you asked. You can count them if you like,” the Special Merchant cocked her head to the side and April found herself smiling at her accent. It was pretty, and she could see why guys found a woman with an accent such a turn on.

Julian had not been indifferent to accents, and once when they’d role played, he’d found her bad impersonation of a Russian nurse very seductive.

April wiped away the fresh hot tears simmering on her eyelids. Sometimes looking back wasn’t a good thing. It reminded her of how much she’d lost, what she’d been forced to live without. Oh how she missed him!

“-Do you understand?” Razia was saying something and April had missed a large part of it, but she was glad Willow was paying attention.

“Yes, yes, yes.” Willow cried effusively. “I get it. I know what the reagents are used for.”

“Good, and as a token of goodwill, I’m throwing this in free of charge,” Razia gestured at the antique key she’d used to unlock the box. “It’s a Skeleton key. It opens any door. Provided it’s not magically sealed of course!” She cackled at this last bit and April and Willow didn’t laugh, her joke, as innocent as it was, had hit too close to home…

Across the dessert, about five hundred meters from their base camp, Luca and Andrew approached the Tomb of Discovery.

They knew why Ethan had sent them there. The tomb, rigged with all sorts of traps, was their death waiting to happen; Ethan didn’t expect them to make it out of there alive. But with the fate of their clan resting on their shoulders, both men were determined to prove him wrong. The fact that they’d explored the tomb before in its entirety automatically put them at an advantage, Ethan didn’t know this of course.

Inside the entrance room the two men paused to re-familiarize themselves with their surroundings.

The place seemed to have shrunk in size since their last visit about eight months earlier, it looked smaller, the brown walls and floors seemed gloomier too, and just being inside made them feel stifled, like the walls and ceiling were closing in on them.

The second room was much bigger than the one they’d just left. From their previous visits they knew the stacks of barrels lining one end of the room were empty, so they didn’t bother with them, whatever homebrewed beer or oil they’d held had dried out a long time ago.

Two gray chairs, made out of marble, were thrown carelessly in one corner, and another sat near the main door, isolated from the others, very much like them in fact, ostracized by the Youngblood coven and their alliance. Luca got angry again just thinking about Sonja and her coven, but then Cadence’s face flashed ever so briefly in his mind. It was enough to cool off his rage.

Andrew dashed to the treasure chest in the middle of the room, hoping with all his heart it still held the key to their current dilemma, they’d need it to unlock the door directly in front of them.

“Bingo,” he smiled as he retrieved a crescent shaped keystone from the box and threw it at his cousin.

“At least some things never change,” Luca caught it swiftly and inserted it on the gray slab on the wall next to the door. They heard a faint clicking sound when the rune snapped in place. A moment later the chains on the door came undone.

“Let’s do this thing,” Andrew growled as he walked through with Luca following closely.

Luca jumped on the floor switch in front of him. 

He firmly planted both his feet on the footprints embossed on the tile to reveal a narrow staircase leading to the level below them.

They made their way down, conscious not to place their entire weight on the fragile staircase, any sudden movement or pressure would cause the rickety steps to collapse.

They took a quick left which brought them to a smaller door with two creepy looking statues on either side.

This time Andrew did the honors and stepped on the floor switch to unlock the door.

“Great, just great!” Luca growled when they walked into the room and saw the three giant statues.

 This was the part he hated, figuring out which statue was movable and the floor switch it was supposed to be placed on to unlock the bigger door. He was grateful he had Andrew with him; otherwise even with his superhuman strength and speed it would have taken him twice as long to gain access to the hidden room.

“Don’t be a wuss!” Andrew smirked as he proceeded to move one of the statues to the floor switch. The chains on the door broke off when he pushed it in place.

“Who’s the man?” Andrew grinned at him.

“Yeah, yeah, let’s get on with it,” Luca grudgingly clapped him on the back, it was his way of acknowledging that Andrew had an uncanny talent for statues and floor switches.

But their mission wasn’t over yet, the bigger door leading to the final room where they suspected the curator had left Ethan’s documents was still sealed and they couldn’t figure out why until Luca’s gaze fell on the second floor switch and he stepped over it.

The door flew open then and they rushed through.

The relief they felt when Luca opened the treasure chest and found Ethan’s papers, was inexplicable.

“We did it!” Andrew cried in disbelief. Luca ignored him as he  looked through the binder and skimmed through the papers.It was a five hundred page manifesto, detailing a covert take-down of MorcuCorp, the largest biotech company in Egypt.

Luca didn’t understand half the things mentioned in the document, but he knew if Ethan was involved it couldn’t be good. He felt sorry for MorcuCorp; they didn’t know what was coming their way. But then again, they were one of the greediest corporates in the industry, a lot of people had died because of their unsafe, experimental drugs and they’d shown no compassion or remorse to the families of their victims. Maybe they deserved what was coming. Maybe justice would finally be served for those poor families. But right this minute, it wasn’t something Luca wanted to concern himself with. He wanted justice for Julian and Melanie and Warrick. And he was close to getting it, especially now that he had something to hold over Ethan. He guessed they’d be headed home sooner than they’d all anticipated.

Andrew wanted to call Ethan and let him know they’d found his papers, but Luca decided against making contact. He wanted to surprise their nemesis, catch him off guard. If he knew they were coming, he’d have plenty of time to cook up more schemes just to keep them in Egypt for longer.

With Aziz’ help it wasn’t hard to locate Ethan’s hotel; the shop keeper and the curator went back a long way.

It was early dawn when they arrived at the Sands of Time. Andrew compelled the front desk clerk to give them the keycard to Ethan’s room.

They were both relieved to find the suite empty and they wasted no time settling in after they made contact with April and Willow and told them to get ready to ship out of Egypt.

Luca helped himself to Ethan’s assortment of drinks.

While Andrew blew off steam at the foosball table in the corner of the room.

Andrew was having so much fun he asked his cousin to join him.

“Why the hell not?” Luca mused as he remembered the grueling night he’d spent scavenging the tomb, looking for Ethan’s papers.They might as well enjoy themselves whilst they waited for the devil to show up.

To their annoyance though, Ethan only retired to his room six hours later. But the look of pure horror in his eyes when he opened the door and found them waiting, more than made up for their slow night.

“Luca, so we meet again,” Ethan pushed the door with his heel and it clicked in place.

“Indeed,” Luca drawled from his seat.

Andrew was mixing himself another drink at the bar. They both looked very comfortable, so at home.

“We got your papers,” Andrew nodded at the file on the bar.

A small muscle twitched on Ethan’s jawline, anger and disappointment danced in his eyes.

“What? You thought we wouldn’t make it out of the tomb alive?” In a blink of an eye, Luca was at his feet. The sudden movement caught Ethan off guard and he was instantly on attack mode.

“Hand over the papers and we’ll be on our way,” Andrew finished his drink and slammed the glass on the counter.

Wordlessly Ethan walked to the safe hidden in the walk in closet; he punched in a few key to unlock it, seconds later he approached them again.

“Was it worth it?” Luca asked him as he took the papers from him. “Turning those poor innocent kids and using them as pawns in your crusade for revenge? Did that make you happy, watching Emme bleed for her child, watching Sonja mourn Warrick?”

Ethan nodded. His lips slowly spread wide into a twisted smile. “There’s always collateral damage in any war, Luca. I warned you my father’s death will not go unpunished.”

“And unleashing the fledglings on the town was your idea of punishment?” Andrew bellowed from his place at the bar.

“It worked didn’t it? The whole town hates you. The witches locked away your clan. So, yes, it was worth it!” Ethan retorted.

For a long time Luca and Andrew stared at him, both thinking his days were numbered. Now that they were so close to freeing their clan, it was time to think about ridding themselves of Ethan.

They knew all along he was behind the attack on the town. When Luca and Julian avenged their mother’s death and killed Ethan’s father, he’d vowed he’d make them pay. But they’d never imagined he’d do it on such a grand scale.

Luca had wanted to retaliate and finish Ethan off, but April and Andrew had argued he was the least of their worries, the damage was already done and they had to focus all their energy on freeing Julian. Walking away, letting Ethan live, was probably the hardest thing he’d ever done.

Twenty one years later, as he felt Andrew’s hand hold him back, walking away from Ethan was still the hardest thing he’d ever done.

They’d just reached the door when Ethan stopped them. “What’s with the Star?”

Luca gave him a cold smile. “Wouldn’t you love to know?”

With that they let themselves out of the room, both relieved to know Ethan wasn’t on to them. He had no idea why they needed the Star, no idea how far they were in their plan to free the clan. If he did, they doubted he would have handed it over so easily.