Layla

The box hit the floor.

The men’s voices drifted in and out, bubbling with worry and confusion as the kitten batted at the flimsy brown paper. All I could do was stare, my mouth frozen as I held it up.

When the dim yellow light struck it, a rainbow burst into the air. It didn’t follow the path of the light. Instead, the entire room transformed into pulsing color. The unicorn skin was more beautiful than I had ever imagined.

“He came through,” I said.

“Babe?” Cal scooped a protective hand around my waist and plucked the stone from my fingers. The light died, revealing the same blotchy brown and black surface that’d been visible when I’d opened the box. “It’s a rock.”

“It’s the final ingredient,” I cried in both joy and terror. A week had passed since the witch-hunter-turned-elf had vanished. I’d tried to not dwell on where he’d gone or if I’d ever see him again. None of that mattered now. With this stone, I could cast Valerie’s spell and bring Daniel back to life.

What if I fuck it up?

“What has you in such a state?” Ink asked, oozing into the room. “Calvin, did you place another shackle upon her finger?”

“No.” He groaned, looking at my finger where the amethyst pressed against my pinkie from the ring slipping. Taking my hand in his, he chided Ink. “Why are you an ass all the time?”

Ink shrugged with his usual cheeky grin. “It would be cruel to deny the world this perfection.” He twisted like he was snapping his spine and curled a hand around his butt, then gave it a slap.

“That isn’t what I—”

Cal’s complaint was interrupted by Ink plucking the rock from his fingers. Once again it lit up with the rainbow, but the colors didn’t fill the whole living room. Ink tossed the unicorn skin back and forth from one hand to the other. “So the stain in the rug is to become permanent. Well, fifty or so years permanent.”

Ignoring his dig, I jerked my chin to the stone. “Raul came through.”

Ink tossed the rock up high and ignored it to face me. “Your concern lies in defending the honor of a witch hunter and not crying out to the ghost?”

All my focus was on the falling stone. It looked like a garden rock, but for all I knew, it was as fragile as glass. “Ink…”

I leaped for it when he snatched it out of the air and clenched his fist around the stone. The rainbow vanished. “Interesting.”

“Daniel?” I called before remembering the other ingredients I needed. “Garavel?”

My angel arrived with a bowl in tow. “My lady?” he asked before glancing at Ink and Cal. “Are we to have another orgy?”

Ink snickered, but was cut off by the man of the hour phasing through the air. The August heat chilled to frostiest December. The blue halo around his body was unavoidable now.

“You called?” he asked, his voice echoing not like he was in the living room but in a huge, empty hall. Time was running out.

“We’ve got it,” I said, approaching Daniel. He lifted his chin, his eyes a ghastly pale.

“Got what?”

I reached back for the stone, but Ink dug his claws in, his lip quirked into a near sneer. Smacking my hand into his forearm, I tried again. He sighed like a fainting dowager and finally opened his hands. As I held the unicorn skin, the light show erupted, colors shifting around in a wave. The wandering eyes of the ghost slowed and focused. As he stared, Daniel’s irises darkened to a sharp brown.

“Is that…?”

“We’re bringing you back.” Tears choked me and I held out the stone like it was the world’s biggest diamond. Daniel placed his hands, ethereal and cool, just above mine. Soon they’d be warm and solid. I could touch him. I could touch all of him.

“Because raising the dead has never been an ill omen,” Ink grumped.

“Babe, when are you…? When are we doing this?”

As I stared into the achingly handsome face, at his sculpted lips and chiseled cheekbones, my heart raced. Something that hot, that beautiful, needed to be brought back to this world. “Now.”

* * * *

I dusted off my hands, spreading green chalk across my jeans. Out of habit, I held Valerie’s spell up to Daniel. “How’s it look?”

An answer didn’t come. I turned, expecting him to be behind my shoulder scrutinizing every line. Instead, he lingered by the couch we’d shoved back against the fireplace.

The other guys stood at various points of the drawn ward. Not because they needed to, but because I didn’t know where to send them. Cal held my spell book open for me. He kept trying to take a peek even though the pages were blank to him. None of them knew I’d opened it to a spell that’d protect us from a zombie’s curse. No one but Daniel.

“It’s almost ready,” I said, approaching him. He should have been jumping for joy. For thirty years, he’d been trapped in this unending purgatory. I was about to free him. His head hung to the side and he peered at the circle with wariness.

“Barring the feather of an angel and blood of a demon. Two of the most powerful magics plucked from obscurity put to use to resurrect a single mortal. I can’t decide if the Celestials would find this hilarious or depressing.”

“Ink.” I’d known he’d be a pain, but I hadn’t expected him to start tightening the screws before I even cast the spell.

He met me eye to eye, lips pulled back so his demon fangs were exposed. I braced myself for a derisive snort, but he softened. His teeth flattened and his eyes drooped. With a shiver, he turned away from me to focus on Cal. “Wolf, your posture is atrocious. Shoulders back, arms straight.”

“Daniel?” I eased closer, extending my palm upward. He broke from his crossed stance to caress his hand over mine, only the cold touching me. “What’s the matter? Why aren’t you excited? You’re going to be alive again.”

He closed his eyes. “This spell is half-baked, from a witch who, for no known reason, helped you escape. What is her plan in all of this? Why did she send you this incredibly rare and powerful spell, and how did she possess it in the first place?”

“Is it Valerie’s motives that are bothering you or…?” I gulped hard, my cheeks burning. “Or is it me?”

His eyes opened wide and he jerked back. “Layla, no, it isn’t—”

“I could say the wrong word, the wrong syllable. Get the letters all messed up.”

“Babe, come on,” Cal said. “You’re not gonna do that.”

“I could banish you by mistake. Or destroy the house. I don’t know.”

“With this level of power, you might raze the whole of the neighborhood to ash.”

“For moon’s sake, Ink. Shut it,” Cal fought back. “Layla, you’re not going to destroy my house, or all the other houses or banish Daniel. You know that.”

“The wolf…” Garavel gritted his teeth at that. “Speaks truly. Your magics never waver. Only your faith in yourself does.”

Their opinions, while sweet, didn’t matter. They weren’t the ones whose very existence rested on my fingers. “Daniel?”

“I’m…I’m scared.” Panic choked him. His face flushed. He tried to clench his fingers around mine, but they sailed on through. I braced myself for a trademark cutting incubus remark, but Ink stayed silent. All of them did while Daniel fell apart.

“My faith in you is as strong as ever. I believe you can do it, but at what cost? What if this…if there’s a trick or a trap and you’re hurt? My life’s not worth that.”

“At last, something we agree upon,” Ink said, but his signature smirk was gone. He sounded sincere as hell. The rest of the men nodded solemnly with Daniel.

“You’re wrong. All of you. You’re worth it, Daniel, because…you’d do the same for me.”

He gasped, hunting for the air he didn’t need. “I love you.”

Placing my hand over the golden heart at the top of my chest, I said, “I know, and it’s time to make you whole again. Garavel?”

“Yes?”

“Bring out the feather,” I said.

The angel reached behind his neck where he somehow stored a massive sword. “Ah…” He fished his hand out where the ten-pound kitten had dug her nails into his forearm. What I cared about was the massive feather pinched between the tips of his fingers. He seemed terrified to touch the reminder of his creator who he’d killed to save me.

I lightly brushed my palm over the shaft, so white it nearly blinded me. I didn’t look at the feather but focused on Garavel. At first, he didn’t let go. I traced my hand around the curve of his cheek and held him tight.

“Promise me…” Garavel stuttered. “That it will be for a worthy purpose.”

“Daniel knew something that terrifies Conquest. We’ll find it and stop him.”

“Good.” He opened his fingers and I caught the feather.

“Now the blood. Ink?”

Daniel scoffed. “You gave it to the demon? I thought you said you put it in a safe place.”

Snickering, Ink reached into his pocket and lifted the glass vial to the light. “Clench your sphincter, ghost. There was no safer place to store the destructive power of demonic blood than in the clutches of a creature that cannot use it.”

He held out the vial to me with no fuss, but as I went to take it, he had to say, “I would ask if you think it is worthwhile to expend such power, but when have you ever acted sensibly?”

“I am fucking an incubus,” I said and clenched the distressingly cold vial. Ink smiled and bowed his head. As if he had nothing more to give, he stepped back.

“One feather of an angel, one drop of demon’s blood, one unicorn flesh to unite the two.” Holding the feather out, I was about to tip the vial of blood when my hands began to shake.

I’m gonna drop it. It’ll shatter at my feet and I’ll lose my only chance to hold him.

Warm fingers swept behind mine, steadying them to a surgeon’s level. Cal pressed in tighter behind me to whisper, “You’ve got this,” before kissing me on the nape of my neck.

With his help, a single drop of blood beaded on the lip of the glass and plummeted toward the blinding white feather. The moment the blood hit the downy spines, the feather hardened to a rock, like a feather fossil but heavier than a bowling ball. I struggled to keep it upright, tears rising.

What happened? Was the angel not good enough? Did the feather lose its magic because he’s dead?

The fossil crumbled first to gravel, then sand in my palm. Just as I held my breath, the angel’s feather burst into dust which began floating away.

“Is it supposed to do that?” Cal voiced what I was too terrified to say. We had another feather, but who was to say the same thing wouldn’t happen? “It’s gone.”

The heavy dust faded from the light, the feather taken as quickly as Daniel had been.

“Look again,” Ink instructed. I fought to blink away the tears and stared. The air was no different than before with the house dust dancing in the sunlight. I focused on a single mote twirling like a dirty snowflake. As it spun, worlds appeared. A giant green marble with purple waters cascading off the edge. A black volcano with hissing red veins of lava exploding from its cracks. Skies of orange with blue sunsets. Every possible impossibility formed in a second, then folded into another.

“You’ve reduced the feather and blood to the base ingredients of creation. We are tinkering in the Celestials’ toolbox now. Be wary.”

Ink’s warning was like a fire alarm blaring in my head. If he was worried, shit was about to get real. But I couldn’t stop, not when we were so close. “Now I add the unicorn skin.”

Kissing the rock for good luck, I cupped it in my hands and threw it. Rather than rebounding off the wall and hitting the TV, the stone landed dead center in the middle of the floating bits of creation. It began to rotate as, one by one, every color peeled off. First red, then orange…the room lit up to the solitary hue tearing off the stone. The light grew brighter, burning with every falling shift until purple pierced straight through my brain—and blackness fell.

“Layla?”

“Can anyone get a light?”

“Where are you?”

“Ink? Is that your hand on my—?”

A soundless explosion and light came into being. A single, pinprick-sized ball floated in the middle of the ward, casting both light and heat.

“Did you just make a sun?” Cal asked.

“There is no life without light,” Ink mused, then squeezed my ass.

I fought to tear my eyes away from the source, not just of light and heat but magic. It shivered inside of me the way no other magic had—wild and young. Ink stared at the same micro-sun and rapture dawned on his face.

“Don’t even think about it,” I ordered.

“To sip from the dawn of creation would be a most exquisite meal,” he murmured, his face slack with awe. Then he snickered. “And also my last. Shall we chuck the bones of the dead inside and see what slithers out of the universe’s birth canal?”

I shivered at his metaphor and turned to Daniel. “Are you ready?”

He bowed his head. “Layla, promise me that if…if something goes wrong, if this doesn’t work—”

What? Does he have a backup plan? A way to bring back a ghost that he’s found in one of the books?

Wafting his chilled fingers above my cheek, Daniel stepped closer. He placed his palm over the locket and whispered, “You do not blame yourself.”

“I can’t—”

“Promise. Or this ends here.”

Everyone went silent save the low hum of the universe birthing itself before us. “Daniel, I…” Clenching around the locket through his hand, I gazed into his eyes. “I promise.” I pulled open the golden heart and lifted the single fragment of finger bone.

Facing the storm, I held the piece of the lost. There’s a very good chance this will fail. I won’t just lose the opportunity… I’ll lose him. But if I don’t do anything, I’ll lose him anyway.

“Daniel, I love you,” I cried out. Then I tossed the bone into the primordial fire. Nothing happened. Daniel remained beside me, his cool form competing against the heat of the micro-sun.

Now for the hardest part, reading gibberish and getting it right. Shaking, I unrolled the scrap of paper we’d been working on. Daniel had written it phonetically for me.

Raising my head, I stared at the incoherent mix of vowels and consonants. I took one last look at him and spoke. “Rise.”

A bong echoed through the room and I slapped a hand over my mouth. “I didn’t say that. I said this…whatever this is.”

“You are speaking the language of creation,” Garavel explained. “Nonsense is impossible when sense does not yet exist.”

“From the ashes of Celestials, the fires of their veins, I command you to rise…Daniel Lu. Return from the darkness and enter the light.”

The room exploded, blinding white rays shooting out of the sun. We hit the ground as one, power rampaging above us. Daniel opened his mouth and threw his head back. The light pierced him, burrowing tiny holes in his body that began to chew him apart. He swiveled his head to me, his mouth still strained as if he were screaming.

What did I do?

I reached for him, and he smiled. “Layla,” he whispered just as the light burned him to ash.

Darkness fell.

Scrambling to my feet, I fought to catch fire on my fingers, when Ink grabbed my hand. “That is most unwise right now. You might set the entire planet aflame.” I pulled to get my arm back, needing to find a flashlight and a passage to bring Daniel back.

“Cal? Garavel?”

“I am here, lady witch. A cushion softened my fall.”

“That’d be me.” Cal moaned. Manic shuffling told me the two were trying to get untangled, no doubt uneasy in this pitch darkness. I reached for any of them, knocking my palm into an arm and trailing down to a hand. Garavel’s.

“We have to fix this. Find a way to…”

“Lady witch, look.”

He pointed, though he didn’t have to. A single mote of dust glowed. It appeared five feet in the air, then floated down to the ground. More appeared, each taking the same path, but as they fell, they built outward as if creating something…or someone.

“Is it working?” I cried out.

“Appears to be,” Cal said. In the near darkness, he held up two thumbs for me.

Ink sauntered closer to watch and mused. “A thought occurs to me. Are you certain he shall be returned to you as he had been?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Or will he be revived as a babe, and you shall have to raise your future lover from infancy? How de Sade of you.”

“Ink.” I groaned, not ready to face those fucked-up repercussions.

I didn’t have to wait long to see if Ink was right. The magic picked up speed, forming the outline of a fully grown man. It moved like a 3D printer, laying out a layer before moving higher. I couldn’t see any details, the light blinding them away, but in the shadows I spotted toes and fingers, the crook of an elbow, a person. A man. Daniel.

Holding Garavel’s and Ink’s hands, I watched in near silence. Hours must have passed, but I was terrified to blink. If I looked away, he could vanish. With every layer of light, it grew harder to see. My eyes watered. I couldn’t fight it anymore and closed them tight just as creation vanished.

The darkness receded as the house lights took over. Blinking away my tears, I faced my creation.

My god, he’s beautiful. It hit me that in my months of knowing him, I’d never seen Daniel sleep. I couldn’t. There he was, his arms at the side, his soulful eyes closed, his lips parted—deep in the throes of slumber. So deep it could almost be confused for…for…?

“Is he breathing?”

“I’m not sure. Dan? Hey, Daniel?” Cal shouted.

The hands holding me fell away. I crossed the line of creation without realizing it was there and dove for his still lips. “Daniel?” I cried, my voice beating against the darkness. “Breathe. You have to breathe. Fight. Come back to me. Please.”