Page 44 of Before We Burn

I part my lips to speak, but nothing comes out until my third try. “I don’t want you to see that type of horror, either.” My voice sounds distant, like I shouted the words from a hundred feet away.

Marz gives me a soft smile, but it slowly disappears. Suddenly her hand is off mine and the scene is changing. Benny is now staring at me, Constantine kneeling on a seat in front of me while Bunny sits behind me, humming.

I look at Marz who is staring off into the distance. I try to take her hand again, but she quickly pulls away and stands. She holds her head on both sides, lost in the thoughts consuming her until she stops.

She slowly turns to me, her eyes vacant, and says, “It was him. He was there with—” She paces back and forth.

“What? Who?” I ask, frustrated with the lack of information.

She turns to me and yells, “The Premier Leader! He was the one who killed them. Not Alexander, though he was there.”

Everyone has gone silent except for Bunny. She claps enthusiastically as she bounces in her seat, a manic giggle escaping her. “Pop! Goes the weasel.”

There’s something about that song. Something that feels off.

18

IF YOU KNOW, YOU KNOW

MARZANA

Men.

They’re a poison to this world—a poison to everything they touch.

Everett’s memories are filled with horrors; he had been around the cause of his pain for longer than he knew. Who’s to say he hasn’t held on to some of the Premier leaders’ attributes? Who’s to say he won’t turn his back on me when I need him the most? Chances are hard to give when you’ve been conditioned to rely on no one besides yourself.

But his nightmare sits with me. I wanted to stop it—it was hard to sit through—but I couldn’t. There’s a piece to the puzzle that we are missing. We just didn’t know it was locked away in Everett's memories.

The Premier Leader's face is always hidden when he addresses The Collective. He says he does it for protection—so the witches and vampires can’t track him—but I always saw through that. I knew there was another reason. I figured it was because we interact with him everyday, because a man as cruel as he is would like to see his handy work. There was a point in time when the execution of witches was broadcasted for the public—a source of enjoyment for the new world order to look forward to. I knew he was there, somewhere, but I could never prove it. The only group of people he would address without his mask was the special military sector Benny and Everett were a part of.

I don’t know how seeing him didn’t unlock these memories, but it was apparent someone had been tampering with them before I got into Everett's thoughts.

I sat quietly by myself for the rest of the train ride, trying to figure out the whys and the hows to everything. I got nowhere with it. There are no clear answers, no clear reason for Everett's thoughts to be tampered with.

Once the train stops, we all get off and stand in the middle of a landing dock. We follow the strip to a building with small vendors selling newspapers and small trinkets, some even selling fresh pretzels. It’s a drastic difference from the poverty-lined train station where we started.

I look at Constantine who raises a brow and sighs. “Boston is one of the few places left that still fights for a fair living wage and safety for its members. Poverty levels aren’t as high, life expectancy is longer, and there is a smaller military presence here. The council has protected this place for reasons none of us understand.” She playfully pushes me, noticing how uninterested I seem.

“Hey, I know you haven’t been here in a while. It's okay. Things are just different now. Nothing would be how you remember it. You’ve been at Bloodlust for what, thirty years now? Even if the world was like it was before, it would still be different.”

She was right, but it didn’t hurt any less. The last time I was in Boston, I was running away from an unsanctioned kill. But I didn’t care; the bastard deserved it. I watched him all night as he harassed women, men—anyone who would come near him. I knew he was a military official, and I couldn’t care less. I killed him and ran to Boston, the one place I knew I could start a bar fight and everyone would join in. It made for the perfect get away.

Boston has a reputation of going against the grain. The history is lost now, but most vampires remember. I look at Benny who is looking around with wonder. It’s probably something he has never seen before. Their raids would have been solely in the red zones—territories in the far north in the region that used to be Canada. Travel to anywhere else was prohibited unless it was under direct orders.

Bunny appears from thin air as she usually does, a smile on her face with her big round eyes flitting between each of us. She suddenly turns, and with a skip, she starts moving down the long decorated corridors.

We exit the building onto a street made of old broken bricks, lined with buildings so tall we can’t see the sun. I smile at the memories I had here. Vampires roam Boston as often as the sun allows, and though it isn’t constantly cloudy here, there is a decent amount of shade created by the buildings. Luckily we arrived in the middle of Boston’s fall season, the trees boasting leaves of different shades of reds, oranges, and yellows, while people wear long coats and hats to shield themselves from the abusive winds spearing between the buildings.

It feels like a different place. Like there isn’t a war raging on the outskirts—like people aren’t dying at rapid rates because the government is trying to create their perfect world order. It really feels like the people here don’t care where we are from or how we got here—we’re just another group of people hoping to get by and make something of ourselves.

My shoulder bumps into someone, and I turn to apologize, but the man shouts, “Watch where you’re fuckin’ goin’ asshole! You don’t own the sidewalk!” I can’t help the shock on my face as he stands there, ready for my rebuttal.

Bunny appears next to me, a smile still on her face as she chimes out, “I’m sorry! We’re just a bit lost. Do you think you can direct us to the brownstones near Arlington Street?”

The man’s face shifts, his once-angry and confrontational demeanor gone. He relaxes and smiles before responding, “Oh, yeah.” He switches the leather briefcase to his other hand and points down an alleyway. “This is a short cut, and it’ll spit you out ‘bout two blocks from all the brownstones. Just make sure you take a right when you come out. You’ll see ‘em from there.”

I laugh at the accent as Bunny says her thanks. I’m surprised at how quickly he went from ready to cut my head off to willingly giving us directions, but Bunny just looks at me and winks before turning to walk down the alley.