“Go,” he says to Mathew and me as Gabrielle fights to get away. Monarch picks up a piece of glass as he says, “Go check on your people.”
Mathew hurries across the room, but I don’t dare move as Monarch presses the tip of the glass to Gabrielle’s throat. “You and I have some unfinished business.”
“Monarch, don’t,” I say, feeling something ache deep inside my chest, knowing if he kills him, he might feel the same ache. “It’s not… it’s not worth more blood on your hands.”
Monarch turns around and looks at me, his grey still a bit alarming. “Kayla, go. You’ve done your part, and now I’ll do mine.”
I don’t want to leave and let Monarch do what I think he’s going to do—kill Gabrielle—yet at the same time, I see nothing except evil in Gabrielle’s eyes. So even though it’s agonizing, I turn and walk away, hating myself a little bit.
When I step outside, it’s still dark; however, I can see a speck of sun on the horizon and I swear I can feel it’s warmth. The streets are fairly quiet, the echoes of battle continuing in the distances. The streets are covered with bodies of abominations and people. For the most part, though, the people and Day Takers—what’s left of them—have gotten the streets under control from the beasts.
Near the corner of the building, Nichelle is hugging Mathew, sobbing as torches burn in the street. “You’re okay.” Tears stream down her face as she grips him tightly. I can suddenly understand her emotion more than I’d like to admit.
He holds her firmly in return. “It was all Kayla,” he says. “We owe it all to her, for risking her life to save others.”
I stop when he says it and glance around at the blood painted on the streets. Yes, there’s a cure now, but at what cost? All these deaths… and Aiden’s death… and there’s still so much left to change. How are we even going to get it to spread quickly enough? How are we going to fight to cure the world? Yet, as I glance around again at the streets, hope arises because we survived.
I’m about to take off and see if I can find Sylas when Nichelle rushes over to me and hugs me, tears spilling from her eyes while I have to choke back my own. I wrap one arm around her as she thanks me repeatedly. It doesn’t feel as strange as it used to. When I let her go, she runs back to Mathew and continues to hug him. They seem completely happy and so do I, yet the death that surrounds us also makes me incredibly sad.
“Are you okay?” The voice takes me by surprise and I spin around, almost falling to the ground as my weak human legs try to give up on me.
Sylas catches me in his arms and pulls me against his chest, holding my weight for me. The warmth of his touch overflows me, along with my feelings for him, and what I have to tell him. Tears start to fall from my eyes again, despite how much I attempt to suck them back.
“I’m so sorry,” I say as I circle my arms around him.
“Sorry for what?” he asks, kissing my hair.
“Aiden,” I choke.
He tenses and holds me tighter. I know he won’t cry. Not when he’s still a Day Walker, but deep beneath the surface, he’ll hurt. I hate being the one to tell him the thing that will make him feel that way.
“Kayla… why do you smell different?” he asks, his face nestled against my neck.
“Because I’m human,” I whisper.
He jerks away and looks me in the eyes, searching them, and then his expression falls. I wonder if he hates me. If he’ll leave me here, standing in the streets, alone.
“What happened?" he asks, shocked.
“I took the fading.” I take a deep breath then blow it out and it feels like I’m blowing out freedom. “And now we found a cure.”
Epilogue
It all seems too good to be true, and for the next few days, we’re all stuck in some strange, alternate reality, but for once our hopes are high because we have a future of our own.
The people of the colony spend a lot of time burying their loved ones and cleaning up their city. There were a lot of deaths, including humans and Day Takers. Maci and Greyson managed to make it out okay, along with Mathew and Monarch, who are making plans for the best way to spread the cure without killing off the entire population of the world. They decide the best way is to send the remaining Day Takers out there to inject the vampires with my blood and allow them to spread the cure amongst them. I’m a little wary of his plan since it follows his whole army theory he’s had from the start. Still, it seems like the best plan going up against the vampires and the remaining Highers. Plus, it’s the only plan we have now, however Mathew and Monarch are trying to make the cure airborne.
There’s one more reason why I’m not so keen on the idea of the Day Takers being the ones who have to go. But that’s based on the fact that the person I care for the most is a Day Taker turned Day Walker. One who’s been pretending not to be sad, yet I can see it in his eyes whenever he doesn’t think I’m looking at him, and the fact that he doesn’t seem to want to bury his brother, not wanting to accept yet.
However, on the third day of recovery, Sylas and I decide to have a burial after he finally decides it’s time to move on. Around daybreak, we go up to the top of the highest hill and Sylas digs a large hole. Then we put Aiden’s body into it and bury it with sand. By the time we’re finished, the sunlight is breaking through the sky and, for some reason, it looks brighter.
“Are you ready to go back to the town?” I ask Sylas as he stares out at the land, wisps of his dark hair shadowing his charcoal eyes.
He shakes his head and sits down in the dirt. “Not yet.” He glances up at me then pats the ground beside him. I do what he asks and sit down beside him.
When I get situated, he reaches over and takes my hand. I can immediately sense that something’s wrong, but I’m afraid to ask what because, knowing Sylas, he’ll give me the blunt truth whether I like it or not.
“I’ve been wanting to talk to you about some stuff,” he starts, leaning back on his arms and watching the horizon, watching the sun rise. “You have the cure inside you, and everyone’s talking about spreading it across the world… changing everyone back to being human and how the Day Takers are going to be the main ones to do it.”
“It’s not a bad thing.” I keep my eyes on the approaching sunlight. “Although I wish you weren’t going.”