Sacrifice
Page 72

But this text wasn’t from Hannah. It was from a new unknown number.
Did you honestly think I was working alone?
Michael didn’t hesitate. He typed back.
I’m going to find you and kill you.
The response appeared almost immediately.
Go ahead and try. Save me some time.
Michael started to reply, but another message appeared below that one.
I already took care of your brothers.
Michael stared at that sentence until it burned itself into his eyeballs.
I already took care of your brothers.
The letters blazed and blurred until he couldn’t make sense of them anymore. To think, earlier he’d thought he’d lost everything.
He hadn’t felt this kind of despair since his parents had been trapped in that fire.
“I need to get out of the truck,” he said. His voice was a wisp of what it had been.
Tyler hit the button to unlock the doors. The air was cold and still when Michael stepped out of the vehicle. He stood and inhaled, realizing that he was waiting for . . . something. A blast of wind, either too cold or too warm for the weather. Some sign of Nick’s presence or power.
Nothing.
It had been raining before, but the clouds had dissipated overhead, revealing a heavy white moon staring down at him.
Had the earlier rain been a sign of Chris trying to draw power? Or just nature playing out? Michael wished he’d checked a forecast. He had no idea.
But there was no rain now.
And the fire continued to blaze from the home. Gabriel would have tried to stifle it, to contain it somehow and help with the rescue efforts.
He kept seeing them in that hospital room, remembering how they hadn’t wanted to be taken away—but they’d gone. For him, because he’d asked. They’d gone with the social worker, and willingly, too.
Hunter stood beside him, immobile. Michael couldn’t look at him. If he looked at Hunter, all he’d see was the brothers he’d lost.
His phone chimed, and Michael almost chucked it at the ground. But he had to look. Just in case.
Just in case what? Just in case your brothers aren’t in pieces and they magically found a cell phone?
It was Hannah.
Where are you?
He didn’t answer.
“Kill the lights on the truck,” he said to Tyler. “I want to walk the property line.”
They all walked, clinging to the shadowed darkness beneath trees and along the fence line. Tyler might have been cautious, looking for hazards, but Michael paid no attention. He simply walked, and they followed. If the Guide confronted him, Michael was ready to fight.
If the Guide simply shot him . . . well, right now that might be okay too.
Another chime from his phone. Hannah again.
My dad wants to talk to you.
He didn’t respond. After a moment, she texted again.
Please, Michael. Tell me where you are. Please call me.
He kept walking. Tyler and Hunter were silent behind him. Michael found that if he kept putting one foot in front of the other, feeling the power of his element, he could go on living.
If he stopped, he worried that he’d fall down and let the earth swallow him up.
When they reached the edge of the property, he could see rescue workers swarming around the house. The heat from the fire warmed his cheeks, even from here. He finally turned to look at Hunter and Tyler. “Do you feel anything? Any power at all?”
“No,” said Tyler.
Hunter’s face was white in the moonlight, leaving his eyes hopeless and desperate. He looked at the house and then back at Michael. And then away. His voice was a cracked whisper. “Nothing.” He had to wet his lips. “I thought we’d find them. I thought maybe they’d be hiding, and they’d sense us walking. I tried to use power, to see—to see if—”
And then his voice broke and he was crying.
Michael grabbed him. Held him. He didn’t cry. Every motion still felt like someone else doing it.
“I shouldn’t have come here.” Hunter pulled away and swiped his eyes on his jacket. “I shouldn’t have started this—”
“You didn’t start this,” Michael said. He couldn’t take his eyes off the burning home. He kept seeking information from the ground, but he felt nothing. “You’re a kid, Hunter. Your dad and your uncle started this. Or maybe Calla and her followers did, when they started that rockslide. Or maybe my parents did, by forming the deal.”
“None of them started this,” said Tyler. “This is the way it’s always been.”
Michael looked at him. “It shouldn’t be this way.”
“No,” said Tyler. “It shouldn’t.”
But it was. And Michael couldn’t fix it. He felt like he’d been fighting forever.
And now he’d failed. The past five years seemed so pointless. Just borrowed time.
“Someone is coming this way,” said Tyler.
Michael straightened, suddenly alert, ready to fight. He was surprised to find himself eager for it, to have a target for all this rage. For the first time, he didn’t care about setting an example for someone else. He didn’t care about what his father would have expected him to do.
If the Guide showed his face, Michael was going to find a way to kill him.
The man who walked through the haze and smoke with a flashlight wasn’t the Guide, though. It was Hannah’s father, the fire marshal.
Jack flicked the flashlight over each of their faces. Michael couldn’t see his face clearly, but his voice was tired. “Hannah told me you were here. Come sit in the car. I don’t have any information yet, but—”