Descendant - Archaic #3 (Sample of Published Book)

Chapter 4 - Part 2

"All that matters is she's okay," I replied as my eyes went back to her still form. Tyler stood by her and Danny was still on his knees on the other side of her.

"Take her into the spare room," Jared instructed Danny as he tried to stand up. I stepped forward to help him when he struggled to stand but his mom beat me to it and she put his arms around her neck to hold him up.

Danny lifted Emma effortlessly and carried her upstairs. She still looked so pale.

"You're going to bed, to rest," his mom insisted as she tried to steer him toward the stairs, but he resisted.

"No, I can't, I need to stay with Ava," he insisted as he tried to stand on his own again but his legs buckled. Nathaniel caught him this time and held him up. His body couldn't do what his mind wanted to. Why was it so difficult for him to let go and let someone else watch over me, even if it was just for one night?

"You're in no state to protect anyone," Nathaniel reinforced. "Someone else can watch her tonight."

I couldn't believe we'd been fighting about the same thing just a couple of hours before. Now he had no choice but to assign someone else to watch over me.

"You'll never forgive yourself if something happens tonight and you're not strong enough to fight them off," Nathaniel appealed to Jared. "For some reason altering Emma took a lot more of your energy than Ava's did and you know even with healing you still need rest for your body to recover."

I watched the battle in his eyes. He didn't want to delegate my protection to anyone else but he knew what Nathaniel had said was the truth. He didn't look happy but he didn't have a choice. I saw the reluctance in his face and then he looked to Tyler and said, "You'll watch her tonight."

Tyler nodded his head. Their eyes remained on each other for a few extra seconds. A message passed between the two without any words being spoken. Jared pulled his gaze from Tyler and looked at me, keeping his features free of any emotion so it was hard to figure out what he was thinking.

"I'll pick you up tomorrow morning," he told me before Nathaniel steered him to the stairs.

"He'll be okay. He just needs some rest and he'll be fine in the morning," Catherine assured me. She wrapped her arm around me and gave me a quick squeeze before she followed Nathaniel and Jared up the stairs.

"What's up with Jared?" Andrew whispered to me. It didn't take much to see there was an issue between him and Tyler. You could cut the tension between the two of them with a knife.

"I don't know." I shrugged. I was still tired. Everyone was okay, Jared and Emma just needed to rest and they would be fine. I turned to Tyler as he came to stand on the other side of me.

"Can we go now?" I asked him as I rubbed my eyes. The reason for the meeting was now lying safely altered upstairs in the guest bedroom.

"Yeah, sure," he said.

"See you tomorrow at school," I said to Andrew.

"See you tomorrow," he said as he remained behind with the rest of the Archaics.

I left with Tyler. We fell into a comfortable silence as he walked me back to my house in the dark.

"I'll see you in a few minutes," he said before I opened my front door and entered my house. He would have to go through my bedroom window like Jared did every night.

"Hi, sweetheart, did you have fun?" my grandmother asked as she appeared in the hallway. She was dressed in her pajamas and slippers.

"Yeah."

"Good. Well, I'm off to bed so I'll see you in the morning," she said as she gave me a quick peck on the cheek and walked upstairs.

I poured myself a glass of water and went up to my room. Light flooded into the room as I flicked my light switch. The room was empty. I got my pajamas and went into the bathroom. After a quick shower and brushing my teeth, I reentered my room.

Tyler was sitting on my bed when I entered my bedroom. He'd changed into more casual clothes. He stood up.

"Hey," I said in greeting. It felt a bit weird to have someone other than Jared in my bedroom.

"Hi," he said back. "I take it this is my bed." He pointed to the folded bedding still on my desk. I nodded my head.

"I'm sorry. It isn't going to be very comfortable," I said.

He smiled, and said, "It'll be fine."

I climbed into my bed as he began to make his bed on my floor. Once he was finished, he lay on his back with both of his hands tucked behind his head as he stared up the ceiling of my bedroom. I switched off my bedroom light.

"Good night," I said.

"Night."

I tried to close my eyes and not think of what had happened that night but thoughts of Emma and the altering kept coming up. It still didn't make any sense. Why would someone do that to Emma? It was probably the Hue. But was it the same man that was after me? And if it was, what did he hope to accomplish by altering Emma?

I tossed and turned for a while until eventually, unable to fall asleep, I sat up.

"Can't sleep?" I heard Tyler ask. He was also still awake. I wasn't the only one being kept awake by the events of the evening.

"Yes. I can't stop thinking about what happened tonight," I revealed. "I can't understand why they, whoever is behind this, would do that to Emma."

"It doesn't make a lot of sense," he agreed. "It wasn't an accident, everything that has happened to Emma. There is a reason, so we just need to figure out what it is."

She was a synthetic Hue and now that she'd been altered she would become a true Descendant like me. I wasn't alone anymore; there was another one like me. I actually felt sorry for Emma because I knew how painful it had been. Despite my dislike for her, I couldn't help but sympathize with her.

Hopefully we'd get the information we wanted when she woke up. She would be able to tell us who did this to her and then we would find out why all these things had been done to her.

The one part I wasn't looking forward to was her symptoms. The chances were good she would experience the same side effects I had after I'd been altered, which meant she would need to touch Jared regularly to ease the link. I didn't like that thought one bit.

It was going to be a tough couple of weeks, at least until she completed the transition. Then another thought struck me: What if something developed between Jared and Emma? It wouldn't just be for a couple of weeks. I'd have to get used to seeing him with someone else.

"So what's going on between you and Jared?" I asked the question that had been bugging me. It was clear from their interaction tonight there was definitely something going on between the two of them. Jared had been acting strangely with me too. I didn't see the big deal in getting someone else to protect me. Not only would it make it easier for me, surely it would be better for him as well.

Who wanted to be responsible for their ex-girlfriend? I'm sure once a guy dumped a girl he would make sure not to see her that much, but our situation was different. We were continually thrust into each other's lives so it was going to take a lot more to move on, at least for me. Maybe it wasn't as hard for Jared to move on.

"Don't worry about it, it'll sort itself out," he answered cryptically. I heard him move in his bed and with that the conversation ended.

I lay back down in my bed and closed my eyes. I wondered if I was going to dream about Jared again. If I couldn't have him in reality then at least I could hold on to him in my dreams. With that last thought I drifted into a peaceful sleep.