The Shamrock Killer

Chapter Sixteen: And Then There Were None

I started breathing again a few minutes later and this was when I became conscious of my soul, still slightly humming on the string of life. I wasn't dead, not in the slightest, but I was angry. I credit that anger with keeping me alive for the rest of the night.

I felt a hot breath wash over my face and my eyes snapped open to see Declan finish tying the last knot on my bound ankles. I studied his calm face furiously, desperate for a clearer answer. This wasn't like my cousin to just flip out and start murdering people. 

"Declan," I whispered lowly, waiting for his reaction. "Declan, tell me what's really going on. Cut the BS about the Patron stuff." Besides the anger, panic was slowly raising an alarm in my brain and my muscles were starting to freeze up. I continuously worked my bound hands behind my back in an effort to loosen them and the rough twine scratched deeply into my wrists. I felt tiny beads of blood billow up and fall on my hands. 

"Well, I guess I owe that to you," Declan replied nonchalantly as he picked up a lighter from his bag and start toying with it. Toying with me.

He glanced over to Oisin, and my eye's followed his line of sight to see that Oisin was unconscious now, a huge red bruise blooming on his temple evidence of foul play. But I saw his chest rise up and down, a slight swell of a wave, and I thanked God he wasn't dead. 

"We are cousins, after all." I took in Declan's smirking face and wished this was a nightmare. But my bleeding hands begged otherwise. The trickle of blood on the cracked yellow linoleum matched the frantic pounding of my heart in my chest. 

"You remember dad, right? Or your Uncle Stephen?" I was taken off-guard by the question, but Declan's grey eyes bored into my soul waiting for my answer.

"Yes, he only disappeared a few years ago. But he's probably dead, Declan." I said the words slowly and carefully, void of emotion.  

Declan let out a maniacal laugh as he settled in front of me, still casually playing with the lighter. The moment of silence gave me the opportunity to study his haggard face, long unkempt hair, and dirty fingernails. Why hadn't I noticed this before? I was a bad friend, and a worse cousin. 

Declan had grown quiet, somber even. "Before he died, he left me a key to a vault at the bank. Mom misplaced the key, and I only found it a month ago. Guess what I found?"

He looked at me then, lead eyes serving hatred beneath the fringes of his red hair. "Money?" I ventured a guess but had a feeling it was much worse.

"No." Declan put the lighter down and looked serious for the first time that night. In his eyes, I saw a haunted man look back at me. 

Declan scowled and scratched at his arm. I watched in alarm as flakes of dry skin wafted off. "There were some old family papers, ancient even. Ones that Grandpa had hidden but Dad had found. The reason Dad left was because they got in a fight about what to do with them." 

I frowned, trying to remember what happened that night. I could still vaguely remember the shouting and Uncle Stephen storming out, and then, wait, now I remembered he did have something with him, a bundle of sorts-

"So you do remember." Declan must have found the glimmering recognition as he searched my face for pity, only to find none.

"I don't know what was in them," emphasizing the I part. I still didn't know what part I played in this. 

My eye twitched and I felt the need to blink. The cold was freezing my lashes together and making it hard to see. There was a reason I rarely came into this room.

"Long story short," Declan cracked his knuckles and they echoed ominously in the cavern of silence, "There's a curse in our family." I blinked. I wanted to say, are you serious? WTF? But I didn't think that was a good idea at the moment.

"The curse only manifests itself every three generations. So, Grandpa's Uncle Liam was the last one who had it." The name didn't ring a bell to me. "Basically, whose ever so lucky as to be born with this particular destiny must be killed before their 18th birthday or else everyone else dies." Declan glanced at me quickly, eyes sparking in the dim light, before shifting his gaze away. 

I sat there, in the corner of the musty room, unused for weeks at this point, bruised and broken. Stunned. Three generations meant one of us had it. Declan's family, or my family. Declan was eighteen already so that ruled him out and I was a few weeks away from my eighteenth birthday. 

"Who is it?" I didn't recognize the cracking voice that spoke.  

"You." The word dropped like a gong and bounced around in my head. I was the cursed one? Well, that confirmed one thing, Declan was after me in the end. Only my death would stop this needless barrage of killing. 

"So your solution is killing people? Patrick, Grandpa, even Rory? So you could what, get to me?"  I had never seen Declan's master plan coming to fruition. 

"Bingo! Everything I did, everyone that had to die, was for me to be able to kill you." Declan's smile widened and now I was really, really scared. 

"So that I could be the savior. She promised me that she would make me a god." Declan's eyes lit up and I could see all his teeth at this point. He must be talking about his Patron, I mused, who I still hadn't figured out who it was. 

"Declan, why would you do that? I'm your cousin! I can just leave if you want me gone! You don't have to kill me!" I shouted the accusations in Declan's face.  Hysteria was crawling up my throat and manifesting itself in my face. My eyes were saucers of fear in my face and my hands itched to get to Declan before he got to me, but I resisted. 

"Nope, you have to die." Declan whistled the words cheerily and I was out. I felt the bird of hope sing its last tune and wither away in my soul. My mind was a blank slate. 

There was only one thing left that I could think of to ask.

"Who is she?" Also, Oisin. I had forgotten about him for a second. My bad. Well, there was nothing to be done about that now. He was still sleeping peacefully in Slumberland. 

"You wouldn't know." Declan dismissed the thought with a wave of his hand, not even giving me the courtesy of knowing before my, probably horrific, death. "But all I have to do is kill you, and everyone else is left alone." He said the words with horrific finality, and I knew if it was up to him, I would never seen anyone again. Mum. Dad. The triplets. 

"The Curse," I spit the words out, hoping that I could distract him long enough to gather my thoughts. 

"What happens if I don't die? And I live?" I had to see if there was another way out. My life depended upon it.

"Then she steals your soul and you become her personal minion or whatever, I don't remember the specifics," Declan looked annoyed at this point, "There was something about becoming a, now what was it, auger of death? Yeah, something about that. But that's not the point. She doesn't want you anymore. She wants me."  Declan turned back to his duffel bag, and I knew that was the end of the conversation.

She wants me. She wants me. She wants me. 

I was puzzled beyond belief. But sitting here, bound and tied in this room, with Declan going to kill me, anything seemed possible at the moment. 

I almost laughed when I tried to think of who she could be. Honestly, the harbinger of death crap sounded a bit like Morrigan's style, but she had helped me so she wouldn't turn around and kill me. I think.

Or would she?

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Two more chapters!!!!!!!!!!!