Huh? Demetrius? Keepers? From what Alex had told me, these two were like complete enemies with one another. Demetrius was the one who wanted me dead, and the one who controlled the Death Walkers. So why was someone who was a Keeper talking to him?

“Yes, the Keeper’s,” The first man, who I now knew had to be Demetrius, replied. “So what is it you’ve done to make them suspicious of you, my good friend?”

“Well, it seems that the girl’s mother has disappeared,” the other man, which I assumed was a Keeper, said. “And there’s been some speculation that I might have had something to do with her disappearance.”

“Has there,” Demetrius replied thoughtfully. “Well, isn’t that interesting.”

“Very,” the Keeper replied with laughter in his voice.

Something dawned on me, and every part of my body tightened. Could they…Could they be talking about my mother and me?

No. There was no way. Was there?

If they were talking about her, I had to know. I had to know what this Keeper looked like.

In all the other vision-like things I’d been sucked into, no one had been able to see me. I was hoping it was the same here.

Very carefully, I peeked around the side of the chair.

Standing in front of a fireplace were two men. One significantly taller than the other one, with dark hair that brushed his shoulder tops. He had on a long, black cloak that looked a lot like the ones the Death Walkers wore.  The other man—the shorter one—was dressed head to toe in black, and his black hair was slicked backed. The fire casted an orange glow on to their faces, which, of course, were blurred over by a sheet of haze.

I should have known.

“I need you to be patient, Demetrius,” said the shorter man—the Keeper whose name I didn’t know. “I’ll make sure the girl stay’s safe until the time is right.”

“You better.” The man wearing the cloak—Demetrius—warned. “Otherwise you’re out.”

“Watch who you’re threatening.” Mr. No Name Keeper replied, pointing his finger sharply at Demetrius. “You’re walking a very thin line right now.”

A sudden snap of light blazed across the Keeper man’s face. The haze covering his face momentarily flickered away before returning to a blur again. But the flicker lasted just long enough for me to see a faint white scar scuffing his cheek. I gasped. It was the man from my nightmares. The one who always stepped out of the shadows of the forest right after the Death Walker captured me.

“Did you hear that?” The man with the scar asked.

Demetrius shook his head. “Hear what?”

Scar man held up his hand, and his head turned in my direction

I threw my trembling hand over my mouth and sank back behind the chair. This wasn’t supposed to happen. He wasn’t supposed to be able to see me.

Heavy footsteps treaded toward where I hid. My body shook with fear. If he caught me, I knew he’d kill me, just like he did in my nightmares.

“I could have sworn…” his voice drifted over the back of the chair.

I shut my eyes. Please wake up. Please wake up. Please….

“Gemma, wake up.”

Electricity sparkled across my skin, which meant…I cracked open my eyes. I was back at Laylen’s, and yes, Alex was there, standing over me, looking utterly terrified. But why? Why was he looking at me like that?

”What the heck happened?” His voice cracked.

I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing came out but a wheeze. What was wrong with me? Was my voice broken? Then it all came rushing back to me. The Death Walker. It’s breath hitting me in the chest. Being paralyzed.

Panicking, I tried to will my cold limbs to move.

They didn’t.

“Stay still,” Alex told me and turned to…Aislin—I hadn’t even notice she was there until now. “Go see if you can find Laylen.”

Her bright green eyes were wide. “What are you going to do?”

“I’m not sure,” Alex said, glancing down at me. “Her skin’s already gone blue.”

Blue! I struggled to lift my hand up so I could check out the damage, but then remembered I couldn’t move.

Aislin had a purple duffel bag draped over her shoulder, and she let it fall to the floor. “Alex, are you going to be able to stop it from…because you know if you can’t then—”

“Just go!” he yelled.

She flinched, spun around, and dashed out the door.

Alex immediately went into Save Gemma Mode. He slipped off his jacket and knelt down on the floor beside me. “Okay,” he mumbled to himself as he assessed me over. He wrapped his arms around me and helped me sit up, every bone in my body feeling as though it was going to snap like a twig. Then he leaned me into him.

Right away, the electricity started working its magic, thawing my frozen body and lifting the cold away. I could breathe again and even wiggle my fingertips a little.

“It’s going to be okay,” he whispered.

Well, this was a nice change. Put me on the verge of dying and he was all for being nice to me. And as strange as it was, I actually felt content. All of my problems, big or small, seemed irrelevant at the moment.

Moments later, my breathing had returned to normal. And I was shivering, which was a good sign because that meant I was no longer paralyzed.

He rubbed his hand up and down my back. “Well, at least you’re moving again.”

“Yeah, at least there’s that.”  I croaked.

He laughed, his breath ticking at my neck.

I was starting to feel better now, but I made no effort to try and move away from him. I sat there and let him rub my back and whisper that it was all going to be okay because…Well, because it felt nice. And no, I hadn’t forgotten about all the lies and unsolved mysteries that seemed to center around Alex. It was just that his arms being around me felt so comforting, and hey, I was only human…or at least partly human...I think.

“Gemma.” Alex murmured.

“What.” My voice sounded strangely euphoric.

“Did you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Stab that thing.”

I raised my head away from his shoulder and followed his gaze to the Death Walker sprawled on the floor, a knife sticking out of its chest. “Yeah, I did. Laylen told me if I ran into one of them to stab it in the chest and run. But it breathed this cloud thingy on me, and I couldn’t move my body anymore.”

“That cloud thingy is called the Chill of Death,” he said then muttered, “I can’t believe you actually stabbed one of them.”

Chill of Death. Well, that sounded lovely. “I think I took it off-guard or something.”

“Still, it’s not—”

Aislin walked into the room. When she caught sight of us, she hit a dead halt and pressed her hand over her heart. “Oh my gosh. I’m so glad you’re alright. I thought—”

“Aislin,” Alex warned.

I knew what he was trying to do. He was trying to stop her from breaking the bad news to me that I’d almost died. But I’d figured that out the moment the Chill of Death had hit me.

“Where’s Laylen.” Alex let go of me and rose to his feet.

I tried not to act too disappointed about him letting me go as I struggled to get to my feet. My legs wobbled and the room spun and I almost fell right back down. Fortunately, I was getting really good with being dizzy and worked my way through the spinning without falling on my butt.

“He was just behind me,” Aislin said at the very same moment Laylen ran into the room.

He slammed the door behind him, the icicles on the ceiling rattling in protest. He went to lock the door, but the Death Walker—the one I’d stabbed—had broken the lock when it had come crashing into the room. “Son of a—” He smashed his fist against the door. “We need to get out of here! Now!” He hastily shoved one of the bookshelves against the door. May I add here, that it was a very heavy bookshelf, at which he was able to pick up very easily. So he was strong.

“There’s more of them!” Alex cried, and I suddenly was aware that he had the Sword of Immortality gripped in his hand.