A Healer's War

Chapter 49 - Sight Unseen

Chapter 49: Sight Unseen

Twenty-eighth of April. X643 AA.

Rory Nash's apartment

"I believe Jane found your hair, love," Caroline said, peering through the corner of the slats to where Jane and Rory now spoke. "That was an excellent idea."

Outside, against the gray of her vision, Caroline watched a yellow cloud of confidence swirl inside of Jane's short silhouette. Rory, too, appeared confident, but black stripes of fear cut through him now as Jane rushed towards him with spots of curious blue bubbling within her.

"About damn time," Jacklyn said from the couch, where Sneaks had curled on her lap. She smiled and stroked the cat, summoning a steady purr from the orange tabby. "What about the other guy with Jane? Is he Star?"

"I am uncertain," Caroline tilted her head to the side, considering the bright star at the center of the mysterious young man's chest. "His Stain is bright and strong but swollen with nerves. And remorse." She watched the man's silhouette steam green against the dark background of her sight. "Genuine remorse is hard to manufacture, so that makes him either honest or extremely skilled. I know not which."

Jacklyn looked up. "Is he Merged?"

Caroline studied the man but saw none of the bright monochrome colors carried by a mythstone. "No, his Stain is intact." She turned from the window as she flexed her stiff fingers inside the Kiss's gauntlet. The weapon's long, icy blades tapped against her calf. Rory might have averted another disaster, a needed reprieve, but deep down. She knew it was only a matter of time before they confronted the Merged hunting them.

Caroline faced the black void of Jacklyn.

"This is too risky, my love. Jane could be compromised. Your letter-."

"Jane hates the Director as much as I do," Jacklyn said, not inviting a response.

"That's not enough. Hate is a poor bond."

"It'll work," Jacklyn said.

"How?" Caroline crossed over to the couch. "Rory is..." she trailed off, lost in thought. "He can't see straight. Most people crave power, but he rejected his out of shame. Now, he is actively trying to pass it off to others."

"He wouldn't be the first Host to do that."

"He isn't ready to speak with Jane; his Stain is still in control - he believes its stories. Forcing this now could lead to a crash, and he takes everyone with him."

"Plenty of Hosts have done that, too."

"Jacklyn," Caroline said sternly.

Jacklyn sighed from the void, and Sneak's steady purr filled the quiet. "You're nervous. I understand that. I am too, but the last step in converting is always the hardest, the most painful. If he isn't cooperating, then we need to do something more drastic. A crash can be a good thing sometimes. It finally gets us to stop. Maybe it's time we let the hero run into his wall. Get the crash over with so he can rebuild."

"That could break him."

"It could," Jacklyn said, "Or it could work. We have to trust he can handle it."

"I'm less confident than before," Caroline said.

"That's the nerves talking," Jacklyn said. "This is what faith is all about, Care. So, whatever half-baked idea Rory brings back, whatever scheme he has hatched for whomever he picked, we agree to it. We have to help him through his last wall." She paused, and a twist of dread coiled in Caroline's gut. "I see it in him now. He's in almost as bad of shape as me. He can't go back to how it was. Neither of us can. On some level, we both understand that will kill us. Which makes him desperate - you can see it in his face. The Seed is his hope now. It's all he thinks about. It's all I ever thought about. You see his emotions. Tell me I'm wrong."

Caroline considered, letting her memories come in a wave. She'd seen Rory's emotional hue tinted with red recently. There was an anger there, a resistance. It was never a good sign when emotions calcified around a Stain. "I've seen it." She sat slowly beside Jacklyn. "The Seed means everything to him now."

"Ya," Jacklyn said, taking her hand. "So, if his hope is threatened, taken away, if I'm in trouble, maybe that's the catalyst he needs to finally become the person we all need him to be."

"

"A crash."

"Yup."

"I was hoping to avoid this."

"Me too." Jacklyn inhaled but didn't speak straight away. She did that when he was being careful with her words. Caroline braced for bad news.

"We need to talk about what happens if I'm captured again."

"I won't allow it."

"Care-."

"No." Caroline pulled her hand away and crossed her arms.

"It's not my first choice, either. Ideally, Rory and I find a place to hide for the night and you meet back up in the morning, but the trap we designed for ourselves is closing, and we don't know when it will snap shut. I need you to perform the Assay of Cully and make the final preparations."

Final preparations. The words made Caroline sick.

"This is what I need, Care. We give Rory his chance. Whatever happens, he'll need you to help him finish the Assays. All of them. That means you can't be with me in case I get captured."

Caroline saw Jacklyn's point, but she didn't want to say so. She wanted her to be wrong.

"If I am captured, you're certain you can track me?"

Caroline sighed, hating the corner she'd found herself in. Deny Jacklyn her last wish or plunge ahead into a future not even her eyes could see? There was no choice, only a selection of sorrows. That raw fear of the unknown, the expanse ahead, seized Caroline's heart. Tears welled around her stone eyes and soaked into her blindfold. She finally nodded. "Always. No matter the distance, you are my beautiful black star on the horizon."

"Good, because I want to be rescued. I want to make that very clear. Don't leave me with them because one way or another, I'm passing the Seed soon, and it better be to Rory."

Caroline sniffed, tracing Jacklyn's knuckles with her lithe fingers. "How, with death so near, can you be so brave?"

Jacklyn grunted once from the void, then leaned her weight onto Caroline and buried her face into her shoulder. Even through the leather jacket, Caroline could feel the bone pressed through the skin. She'd lost too much weight.

"I'm afraid to die," Jacklyn said finally. The words cut into Caroline. "I don't want our story to end." The words hung in the apartment.

"Time and chance..." Caroline whispered. She curled into Jacklyn and kissed her on the head and cheek.

The Wyth swiped her thumb over the tears. Jacklyn sniffed and turned away, but Caroline held her face close to hers. "No, we will not hide from tears. We will inflict them on our enemy." A fire lit in Caroline's chest and quickly spread up and down her limbs, emboldening her. "I am with you, always."

Jacklyn pulled Caroline in with a fierce kiss, and as the lightning storm raged in her mind, Caroline lost herself in the embrace as everything else fell away.

Caroline wrapped herself around her best friend, trying to use her body to shield her from the world. "Oh, my love. I am here," she said as Jacklyn sobbed in her arms. Their foreheads met. "I will perform the Assay of Cully. I will use everything in my power to see Rory succeed. Then, if needed, I will find you, and we will watch the sunset together."

Jacklyn shuddered as she drew in a ragged breath. "Promise?"

Caroline lifted Jacklyn's face and kissed her repeatedly, pecking her cheeks, nose, and chin with her lips. Jacklyn squirmed beneath the barrage, and Caroline was relieved to hear a soft laugh emerge from the void.

"We started this together, didn't we?" Caroline said. "We will end it together, too."