Immortal Souls (The Immortal Souls: Magic & Chaos)

Book 2 - Chapter 7

Jade jumped, knocking several things off Sam's bookshelves, as she heard a loud bang from downstairs. She sped down the staircase from the attic, through the hallway and jumped down the first few steps onto the landing. Jamie was standing at the end of the staircase; the door behind him was ajar after he had apparently kicked it open. Sam was in his arms, her body was limp and her arms dangled lifelessly at her sides as he carried her inside.

Jade took a step towards Jamie, who was now walking up the stairs. "Is she alive?"

"Can you get her door?" Jamie asked without answering Jade. She ran ahead of him and opened the door to Sam's bedroom. Jamie followed close behind her; she pulled back the duvet so he could lie her on the bed. He spent a few seconds carefully fixing her head on the pillow and brushing her hair over her shoulder.

"Is she alive?" Jade repeated.

Jamie hesitated before answering. He stared at Sam, looking a bit weirded-out. "Yes . . . " He let the sentence trail off and opened his mouth as if he wanted to say something else but didn't have the words. He sighed and looked at Jade. "She's not right," he said, obviously settling on the simplest form of the words he had wanted to say.

Jade looked at him, eyebrow raised, then back towards Sam. Her skin was a little pale and she was covered in blood, her legs and feet were caked in dirt and her hair was tangled, but other than that she seemed to look like a normal Sam.

"How exactly is she not right?" Jade asked. She walked over to the corner of the room where there was a chair with a pile of clothes on it. She pulled the chair away from the wall, tipping it forward to get all of the clothes off it, and dragged it to the end of Sam's bed. She sat down, crossing her arms and legs.

Jamie sat on the end of the bed and watched his knees, seeming like he was concentrating really hard on what he was trying to say. "It's difficult to explain," he said with another glance towards Sam.

"Okay . . . " Jade thought for a moment. "Well, start from the start."

Jamie chewed his lip and looked at Jade, the expression on his face making him look like there was something he really wanted—yet didn't want—to say.

"Look, you woke me up in the middle of the night and asked me for my help, so if you know something I don't care how bad it is, you tell me right now. 'Cause I can't do anything to help if I don't know everything that's going on here."

There was no reply from Jamie. Instead he just turned his head and looked towards Sam. Jade followed his line of sight. That was the first time she really noticed it.

When they had come into the room Jamie had been very careful to keep Sam's neck covered. Jade stood and marched around the bed, past Jamie who was now staring at her, his eyes wide with alarm. Yet he did nothing to stop her as she moved Sam's hair away from her neck to reveal two tears in her flesh, about the right size apart to be bite marks.

A cold fury flowed through Jade as her head snapped up to glare at Jamie, who was looking at her, his expression a mix of shame, guilt and confusion. "I swear I don't remember what happened," he said, his voice barely a whisper.

Jade let Sam's hair fall back into place, she sat back in her chair and squeezed her eyes shut tightly. It was way too early to be awake. "Tell. Me. Everything," Jade commanded. Jamie sighed. "Now!"

"I came over to see Sam earlier," he said hesitantly, "just before sunset. She looked like she was half dead. There were two men in uniforms and they had a wooden chest. They gave it to Sam and told her it was Danny's. They said he was dead and they had to bring it to her. After Sam got them to go, she came inside, I carried the chest. She said it wasn't Danny's and that we had to get rid of it, 'cause who knows what could be inside it. So she stayed inside and I buried it out in the back garden under the flowerbed. Then I heard a noise coming from the front and I went to see what it was. There was nothing there and then . . . "

Jade waited for a moment for Jamie to continue, which he didn't. "And then?"

He let a shaky breath. "Then I was kneeling by the front door and Sam was—she was lying on the floor. And I tried to shake her but she wouldn't wake up, and—I . . . " Jamie looked like he was close to tears and Jade felt a pang of sorrow for him. "I could taste her blood," he said reluctantly, whispering it like he was hoping no one would hear, "and I knew that she was dead."

"That doesn't make sense," Jade stated. Jamie looked at her in confusion.

He shook his head. "I wouldn't hurt her on purpose, but I know it was me."

Jade sighed. "No, you missed out a part." He tilted his head sideways, squinting his eyes in thought. "The part where you actually attacked her."

Jamie looked down at his lap, where he was clenching and unclenching his hands. "That's because I don't remember it."

"Okay, tell me more about before."

"Before what?"

"You said you heard a noise. You went outside and then what?"

"Thennothing," Jamie said. "There was nothing there, just an empty street filledwith streetlamps and shadows. And then . . . I don't know. Idon't remember seeing anything else, or hearing anythingelse . . . I don't even remember going inside." Jamie looked atJade with fear in his eyes. "I don't remember what happened."