Charmed

The slender, shaking figure sits huddled in a blanket, knees tucked up to his chest, brown hair falling like a curtain into his amber-brown eyes. Eyes that are finally kind of the right color but so what?

Mentally and physically drained from the last 48 hours, I slump against the wall. Aiden, Crystal, and I had managed to subdue the monster invading Kye’s body but at the cost of suppressing all his emotions and memories. And I was the one who did this to him; Crystal and Aiden may have done the spell, but I hung the charm around his neck. He doesn’t even remember his own name and doesn’t seem to think “Kye” is a real word.

“Do you think he’s even aware of anything going on around him?” I wonder aloud.

“Maybe it’s better if he’s not,” Crystal says bluntly and I wince. “Sorry, Rose, but it’s true. Maybe in this state he’s not thinking about the monster or any pain or –”

“He’s not thinking at all!” I snap and see Kye flinch in the corner at my raised voice, and another piece of me withers and dies a little. “Sorry,” I say quietly this time. “This is all just, I don’t even…”

“We understand, Rose,” Aiden puts a hand on my shoulder softly. “Trust me, it’s not any easier on us.”

“We have to get him back.”

“We will –”

“No, I mean, right now,” I stand up in a flurry. “Get that charm off him.”

“Rose,” Crystal gently reaches out to me and I squirm away,

“No, break the spell now.”

“Rose, even if we take the charm off, it still won’t be Kye, you know that. The monster will reawaken. It’s safer for everyone – for Kye – if he stays under the spell. The spell won’t hurt him; the monster will.”

“How can you say that? It’s hurting him right now,” I want to scream but I don’t want to scare off Kye again – Kye: my beloved, fierce, fearless Kye who’ll jump in the path of a demon to protect me and did and that’s how we ended up in this situation. Love isn’t about debts or keeping score but I do owe him.

“Rose,” Aiden grips my arm more firmly to stop me from doing something rash, his tone of voice clear that he’s not messing around. “Rose, stop. He’s disoriented, yes, very out of it, but he is safe. You’ve got to trust that, Rose. You’ve got to trust us.”

I glance at Kye’s shivering, sunken body pressed against the wall with a blanket to his chin, clutching the fabric so tight that his knuckles are blanched. He’s still in the same clothes as he wore down in the basement, dusty and tattered, and the amber necklace glows unnaturally with the enchantment. Safe is the last word that comes to my mind to describe him. But I still nod.

Aiden must have decided I won’t try anything stupid because he releases me slowly. “We need to get him to eat something. He hasn’t had food since the monster took over his body, and that was over two days ago.”

“I’ll bring him a plate,” Crystal says, getting up to go to the kitchen. “Paper.”

“I’ll do it,” I say immediately.

“Rose,” Aiden warns warily again. He doesn’t think I’m strong enough to be around Kye when he’s this way. And he’s probably right but that doesn’t matter, and I shake my head.

“Please, let me. I can still sit by him and talk to him, right?”

“Don’t expect too much out of him though,” Crystal cautions me after a long pause from both of them.

Much? He hasn’t looked up from the same spot on the floor for at least ten minutes.

We’ve tried to give Kye as much privacy as we can without leaving him alone behind a closed door, so I go down to the kitchen with Crystal as Aiden tries to get him to change into clean clothes. We scrap together enough ingredients from the sparsely-packed refrigerator to put together a decent sandwich.

“No mayo,” I stop her. “Kye hates mayo. Maybe the monster or this empty version of him doesn’t, but it’s still Kye’s stomach.”

“Rose, you cannot do this,” she suddenly says softly.

“Do what? Make a sandwich?”

“Blame yourself,” she looks me square in the eyes. “What happened to Kye is not your fault.”

Averting my eyes, I become very preoccupied with layering slices of deli meat onto the bread.

“It’s not, Rose.”

“I didn’t listen when he told me to stay back so he ended up in the monster’s path to defend me, and then I put a necklace on him that stripped him of all identity: which part of that wasn’t my fault?”

“Listen to me,” Crystal shakes me by the shoulders, “you want to blame yourself? Fine. But right now, Aiden and I need your help to get Kye back to the way he was, so really, Kye needs your help. So we need you to pull yourself together and figure this out with us.”

I nod but it doesn’t escape me that she didn’t say this wasn’t my fault.

“What do we do?” I ask instead.

“First, we need to get him eating and sleeping. Same goes for us. Aiden and I will delve into some restoration spells tomorrow; you could help with research.”

Because not only did I get us into this mess, I’m also the only one without magic to actually do anything useful. But if I take the necklace off him, maybe I can get through to him on my own. He’s still in there, he still loves me – he said it in the split-second he broke through the monster’s hold…right before he begged me to put the necklace on him.

“Don’t even think about it,” Crystal says sternly and I glance up surprised to find her watching me. “You have the same look on your face Aiden says I have when I’m about to do something reckless. By the way, Aiden doesn’t have that look because he never does anything reckless. So you need to listen to him because I bet I can guess what you’re thinking of right now, and no, you can’t take the necklace off.” She hands me the sandwich on a paper plate. “Can I trust you upstairs with him alone?”

“Isn’t that something an overprotective dad should say?” I avoid directly answering.

“Yep. Mine definitely said it when he met Aiden. And I’ll repeat the same thing he said then: keep the door open.”

I roll my eyes to hide how much my legs tremble as I rush up the stairs to the room where Kye seems not to have budged an inch, though he does wear a fresh shirt and pajama bottoms. Aiden had been sitting across from him and stands up when I enter.

“Is he-” I don’t even know how to finish that. Okay? Better? So obviously not, and Aiden shakes his head lightly, just touching me briefly on the arm with a knowing look as he steps out of the room, keeping the door ajar.

If I thought I was ready to be alone with Kye, I was so wrong. The last time we were alone his eyes had been red and he’d thrown me against a wall – no, the last time was actually him telling me he loves me and pleading me to put the necklace on him. Either way, all of that is gone, leaving behind an empty shell of the man I love, still tucked into the corner with a blanket in his lap.

Clearing my throat, I approach him cautiously. “Hey, I brought you some food.”

He glances up, those sweet caramel brown eyes slightly off-hue, flat and dull.

I try again, crouching down and putting the plate beside him. “Aren’t you hungry?”

Again, no answer.

Finally, I sigh. “You need to eat, Kye.”

“What’s a kye?” he asks, his voice weak and broken, matching my soul as I try to explain and convince him.

“Your name is Kye.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“Kye,” I say gently, swallowing hard. “Please eat.”

As if on command, he obeys, picking up the sandwich and taking a tentative bite as I take a shallow breath.

“Do you know who I am?”

His eyes roam over me, studying every inch of me that for a moment it seems that he’s really seeing me, gazing at me in a way that under normal circumstances would make my skin sizzle, but my blood runs cold as he eventually says, “No,” and returns blankly to his sandwich.

Reminding myself that I expected this, I try not to take it as a punch to the gut but it hurts as I force a smile. “I’m Rose.” It’s an even worse hit when he blinks without reaction to my name.

Kye devours the sandwich, clearly starved, and wraps the blanket back around himself.

“Are you cold?” I ask, instinctively reaching out to adjust the blanket and he jumps, scuttling against the other wall, away from me. The last sliver of strength I clung to gets shredded apart.

He’s afraid of me.

God, it absolutely rips me apart.

“Kye…Kye, wait, I’m sorry,” I whisper desperately, trying to coax him back. “I’m sorry. Please, come back. It’s okay.”

He loosens his tense grip on the blanket and very slowly inches his way back towards me, light brown eyes a devastating mix of skeptical and naïve.

I force myself to sit still and put on a smile. “I just want to make sure you’re okay. You haven’t eaten or slept in a while, and you’ve been through a lot.”

“Have I? I don’t remember.” He releases the blanket and stares at his hands. Several angry red cuts and scratches mar his tan skin. I wonder what he thinks happened, how he got the injuries – if he’s even thinking at all. I too have a couple bruises from the fight in the basement before I subdued the monster – Kye would never forgive himself if he knew he did that to me, even if it wasn’t really him.

“Maybe that’s a good thing,” I echo Crystal’s earlier words, though they still sound as sour as before.

“You’re hurt too,” he says suddenly, tilting his head and studying the few thin scratches on my arms too, eyes drawn heavily. It’s the most cognizant he’s been, and despite the charm’s dulling effects, I can make out the tempered concern etched in his face, and a glimmer of faith flutters in my stomach. He is in there, even if he can’t get out yet.

But then I reach out towards him and he reels back, scampering back into the corner, and my flicker of faith extinguishes.

“Kye?”

He rests his head on the wall, turned away from me with closed eyes.

“Okay,” I say weakly. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Kye. For all of this.” Taking a grounding breath, I take the win that at least he’s fed, picking up the empty paper plate. “Is there anything I can get you? Anything you want?”

He goes back to staring at that one spot on the floor, and I realize he won’t want anything until I allow him. The weight of that obligation – that unfair, unethical power – hits me hard, making me dizzy with the realization that Kye is so totally and completely helpless in this state. Fury and outrage simmer in my veins as I look at that glowing amber necklace resting against his skin, holding him captive to its muting effects, locking him into himself, and all I want is to break him out of there and back to me. I almost had him. Almost.

I asked Kye what he wants, but he doesn’t even know what he wants, doesn’t know that I can do this for him, that I can fix this. Fix what I broke.

Despite Aiden and Crystal’s orders, that shortest moment when he looked at my scratches – when he nearly saw me – gives me the reckless resolve to do this.

Not foolish enough to try to touch him again, I shift so that I’m in front of him and meet his eyes. I’m definitely taking advantage of his vulnerability under the compulsion spell but I’m doing it for the right reason. “Kye, can you give me your necklace?”

He glances down at the silver chain like a child might look at a cupcake they’re about to share with you, and he undoes the clasp, holding the necklace out to me in offering.

With still breath, I take it, breaking its contact with his skin, and watch his eyes closely. At first, they stay dazed and unclear, and Crystal’s warning of the charm’s effects becoming permanent makes my heart sink. But then he blinks once, twice, and those caramel drops become sharper and more aware – and they stay brown.

Not daring to believe it, I can’t move until his tender gaze shifts to me, and his face both relaxes and pinches with lucidity.

“Rose?”

A short exhale of incredulity rushes over me and then I have my arms wrapped around his neck, kissing him hard.

“Kye. Oh God, Kye,” I run my hands all over him, making sure he’s real and here, and when he rests his head against my shoulder, I truly believe it.

“Rose,” he sighs, arms clinging to me desperately.

The feel of him holding me again is such a blissful relief that I don’t notice his embrace becoming suffocating until he flips me onto my back, pinning me down and hovering over me with –

No.

His eyes are red again.

The monster has woken up.

Kye – the monster in Kye’s body – bares his teeth and snarls, ready to tear into my flesh.

I must have screamed because all of a sudden, Aiden and Crystal storm into the room in a blur. Aiden immediately tackles Kye to the floor, the two males exchanging blows as Crystal hauls me to my feet.

“Don’t hurt him!” I shout as Aiden slams into Kye’s shoulder.

“I’m trying not to!” he grits between his clenched teeth, swiping the discarded necklace off the floor and forcing it around Kye’s neck again, barely avoiding one last uppercut to his jaw before Kye’s body goes slack again.

Staring in horror, I watch a violent shiver run through Kye as he lets out a crippled whimper, the glowing amber charm taking effect again.

Aiden gets to his feet, wiping blood off his split lip, and gently props him back up, waiting for Kye to once again open his brown but broken eyes. Taking in his surroundings, he scrambles back into the corner, burying himself into a blanket with wide, frightened eyes.

My heart officially breaks.

“Why the hell did you do that?” Aiden whirls around to me, furious and frustrated.

“I thought- I just wanted to help him,” I stammer as he swears.

“What did we tell you, Rose? He needs to keep the charm on! The charm keeps him safe! I get that it kills you to see someone you love like that so why can’t you get that it’s the only thing we can do? If there was another way, we would have done it by now!”

“Stop yelling, you’re scaring him,” I hiss at Aiden because anger is the only way I can get through the sorrow and guilt racking me right now. Kye sits in a ball in the corner, head in his knees, hair spilling across his face as he rocks back and forth.

Aiden glances at Kye and swears again, dragging a hand across his face as Crystal shakes her head wordlessly.

“You may have just scarred him indefinitely,” he bites out and my knees go rubbery. “The monster feeds on moments like these, and right now, he’s using Kye’s love for you as a snack. Even if Kye gets out of this, he’s going to remember all this, Rose. When he finally gets the monster out and gets out of this trance, he’s going to remember all this, all he did to you. That sort of guilt will be worse to him than any charm. You may forgive him, but do you think he’ll forgive himself?”

I have a worse feeling that he won’t forgive me, because I sure as hell won’t.