Forty-Eight ◑ The Portal

The lake was deeper than what Lucille had anticipated. She was submerged all the way, to the point where there was nothing but the bed of stones, the weeds floating around, and the dark mass of murky water.

She expected her heart to stop now, her vision to go entirely black. But instead, her pulse raced, even as the water entered her system. Her surroundings seemed to get brighter, lighter, as though the entire lake was moving away from her.

New colors and shapes rose out of the brightness, solidifying into another vision.

Only this time, it wasn’t a flashback.

Lucille found herself standing in the middle of a wide, rectangular room with brick walls, a polished, wooden floor, and a high ceiling with murals of angels. Even though the velvet curtains of the arched windows were drawn back, the room was still dark.

It was daytime outside too. The sky was the color of powder blue, settling over the snow-capped mountains. The pine trees that dotted the landscape were speckled with white, yet it felt like a night setting.

And the weirdest thing was, she felt like she was really here, like this wasn’t a vision but an actual travel.

Lucille could swear her feet were touching the ground. Her skin was prickling with the cold air. The place was reminiscent of the Arkham Manor, except that this seemed devoid of life. Just an old, huge house at what looked like an English countryside. Everything else was unfamiliar.

What she recognized, however, was the woman sitting by the largest window sitting by the largest window with her back turned. Short black hair, a petite frame under a thick wool coat. . . .

Agnes.

And Agnes wasn’t alone.

“Why are you not resting?” came Cade’s baritone from somewhere behind Lucille.

Lucille couldn’t turn around to see him. She didn’t want to. The irrational fear of being found was preventing her from moving. With this fear was the colossal spike of guilt that made her body clench.

“I told you to rest,” he said. “Stop looking out the window.”

“I’m sorry,” Agnes said without turning around. Her words came out with an odd lisp, like half of her mouth was frozen. “But really, it’s okay.”

“No, it’s not,” he objected. “If I see Thanatos again, I swear I will kill him.”

“He doesn’t go by Thanatos anymore. He goes by Dimitri.” Her voice cracked. “Besides, Cade, you know you shouldn’t be here.”

With that, she shifted on her seat and faced Cade.

Lucille gasped. Agnes . . . well, she didn’t look like herself. Half of her face was deformed. The entire left region had blackened and withered skin that seemed too transparent, too rough to be considered human. Her skull was protruding underneath it, creating drastic dips and planes that were emphasized by the slanted light coming from the window.

Her lips were shriveled and cracked. Her entire left eye was pure white, bulging out of the socket.  A good portion of her neck and left arm bore the same black marks, splattered on her like paint.

Looking at it made Lucille’s stomach roll.

Had Dimitri done this? Had this been what he’d meant when he’d said that Agnes wasn’t alright after the fight?

Lucille stepped aside, averting her gaze from Agnes and ending up seeing Cade instead. The first thing that she noticed was his hair, which had grown about two inches longer since she’d last seen him. The second and main thing that kept her attention was his pained expression. Helpless. Desperate. It was as though he was turning as gray as his clothes before her eyes. He stepped closer to Agnes, but he froze when she suddenly doubled over.

A yelp escaped her lips as she clutched her chest, like Cade’s step forward was a direct stab. The blackened areas of her skin throbbed and spread just a bit more.

“I’m sorry,” Cade said in horror. “I just . . . I hate not being able to touch you without hurting you. It’s all his fault—”

“It’s not,” Agnes interrupted. Despite the clear pain in her eyes, she remained calm. “You’ve never been able to touch me since I started to remember my past. Our past. It just got worse when Dimitri accidentally hit me.”

“The Mark of Death,” he murmured. “He gave you the Mark of Death and it wasn’t an accident. I will kill him for this—”

“He’s a god.” Her mood shifted from serene to defensive, almost impatient, as though they’d had this conversation many times before. “This is the price we have to pay for us. This is the price we have to pay for love. You told me so.”

Silence stretched between them, taut and thick. Agnes glanced through the window and drew the curtains closed, bathing the room with another layer of darkness. Now she was standing before him. Too far to touch, close enough to be seen in her entirety.

“Does it bother you?” she asked. “That I look like this now?”

“Not at all.” His eyes shone with emotion. “You’ll always be beautiful.”

This made Agnes smile. The gesture seemed eerie, dark. Lucille didn’t know whether it was because of the marks on her face or the hint of uncertainty in her good eye, but she could say for sure that that smile was off.

Still, Lucille didn’t move when Agnes asked, “So what are you still frowning about?”

“It’s. . . .” Cade trailed off, trying for a smile but failing to do so. “I sense something strange, like a presence. Like we’re not alone.”

Lucille’s heart stopped. Cade turned around and looked directly at her.

He began to walk towards her. She stepped back, but as she did so, the scene shifted. He was still in front of her, advancing slowly and menacingly, but they were surrounded by a forest.

The same forest, she realized. The forest at the seaside of Crete. The royal palace was visible, and so was the stream.

“You ruined my life,” he said, “And now I will ruin you.”

This was a flashback now, and she was stuck. He was holding a knife while she stood unarmed and cornered. There was a fiery, insane look in his eyes. She was alone. He knew it. No one would see her again, hear her, and he would get away—

The jolt of alarm that invaded Lucille’s heart was so strong that she immediately pulled herself out of the scene.

She gasped, her eyes snapping open. She was no longer submerged under the murky depths of the lake. Or at least, her upper body wasn’t.

It took her a while to gather her wits. Her teeth were chattering, her diaphragm moving in waves. Slippery stones were digging into her palms, her backside. She blinked repeatedly, her vision slowly adjusting to the dark.

And the first thing she saw was Keiran, sopping wet from head to toe.

His arms were wound around her middle, and he was hauling the rest of her out of the water. Dimitri was at the shore, his worried expression visible even in the dark. He was clutching the golden box to his bandaged torso, watching Keiran helplessly. His eyes widened the moment he saw her moving her head around to look.

“Lucille!” He rushed towards her and helped Keiran, wincing but too relieved to care.

She struggled to stay on her feet, stepping on the stones to ease her weight off them. “Why are you guys here?”

Keiran flinched at the sound of her voice, but he guided her to the shore anyways. He opened his mouth to say something, but closed it immediately. Both of them regarded her with wary, concerned faces.

“I just went for a swim,” she lied.

Dimitri and Keiran exchanged knowing glances. Then, they both pulled her into a tight hug.

Lucille’s body stiffened as the brothers held her close, their heads on both of her shoulders. With her eyes flooding with tears, she hugged them back just as tightly.

They knew she hadn’t told them the truth. Her lie had been unnecessary, but she didn’t want to tell them the reason why she’d plunged into the lake in the first place. It was too personal, too dark, to be shared even to the ones she considered her family.

Well, right now, as she kissed both of them on the forehead, she couldn’t even remember why she’d wanted to leave them.

They were all she had. And although they had each other, it was clear that they counted on her too.

“I really am okay,” she assured them as they broke away. “You don’t need to. . . .”

Lucille trailed off at their horrified expressions. They were looking at the lake.

Or something in the lake.

She whipped around, her heart pounding. The calm stretch of the lake was now disturbed, its once smooth surface now filled with ripples originating from the center. It was as though something big was about to burst out.

The three of them stepped back, but they didn’t make it far. The water seemed to have a gravitational pull of its own, tugging at them and forcing them to stay as close possible to the water.

The rippling turned into bubbling, the sound piercing the quiet night. Soon enough, the bubbling became splashing, the splashing into glowing. The lake was now a pool of liquefied orange light, bathing the trees in a warm glow.

For some reason, the sight of the glowing pool tugged a thread of familiarity in Lucille’s head. She could swear she’d seen this before—

“A portal,” Keiran spluttered. “Who made—?”

The rest of his words were drowned when the water rose alarmingly fast and high, sucking them into its gravity and taking them into the unknown.