Haunted Devotion

26.

Waking up in Nolan's arms in the home he had below instead of above, I couldn't feel any cold even though the place looked like a big coffin with only cemented looking walls but still elegant all at the same time.

On the far end there was a piano with a patterned rectangle seat and withered piano sheets with music notes inked onto them.

Of course there was a bookshelf in the other corner with hundreds of vintage books he had when living above.

Trying to get used to my new surroundings, I feel Nolan's hand wrap around my waist more just wanting to feel me next to him.

"Is this really where we're going to stay for eternity?" I asked turning to face him as he's waking up more touching my face.

Nodding sleepily he kisses my cheek then gets up opening the black curtains covering the window that was there.

"I can alter it more if you feel uncomfortable."

Sitting up I stretched then shook my head while looking at the back of him.

"I have no appetite, is that normal?"

Walking over to me he bends down kissing my palm then reaches up moving a strand of my midnight hair behind my ear, "Yes, but we can eat if we wanted to. Want me to make us something?" Waiting for my response I shook my head again while reaching to touch his face, wondering how I could make such a choice.

Before I could touch him I stopped and stood up looking out the window seeing rotting spirits go on about their day like we were still in the land of the living.

"What is there to do here other than roam around and do spirit things?"

I asked leaning on the windowsill watching more as everything was completely morbid and dark, never allowing any ounce of light through.

"I'll show you," Nolan reached his hand out to me to grab so I did and he held onto my waist as everything around us morphed into an open field of flowers with actual sunlight beaming down.

A breeze passed through the both of us as we held onto each other.

"This is going to get harder on you now being with me," Nolan says, caressing my arm.

My eyes find his, "What do you mean?"

Before he could explain, a more dangerous breeze bursts through to show Rowen walking towards us in the field we were standing in the middle of.

"How did she find us?" I say trying to stop my hair from whipping my face from the wind swirling it back and forth.

Nolan grabs onto me tightly, "Run. I'll find you."

Shoving me through an invisible hole only we could see, I fell backwards like Alice did in the rabbit hole and ended up in front of Gerald.

"Devlin?" He surprisingly says while cooking in normal clothing and not the formal clothes he wore as he took care of me.

I stand with my knees wobbling from the sudden change of pace of how fast everything happened.

"Nolan and Rowen—-"

Gerald takes a look at me and my ghostly face, lacking the warmth it once had.

"Repeat of history...it always turns out this way."

Holding my head, I get a painful feeling then another in my chest.

"What's—" A sharp whistle fills my ears and my head feels like it's about to burst.

Gerald tries to help me but doesn't know what to do.

"Devlin—" Trying to grab hold of me, his hand goes through and I vanish just as fast as I arrived.

****

Rowen grabs Nolan by the neck showing how grotesque her features have gotten from not absorbing Deviln's life source.

"You sneaky bastard. You think you'll be together this time? You think I'll even let you be happy after you tricked me like this?"

Squeezing his neck more, having no emotions expressed, Rowen glares into his eyes.

"You will bring her back or will make you feel hell every day of your eternal life!"

Nolan muffled a laughter making Rowen's eyes bulge with fury.

"You think I'm going to let you go?"

Ready to take his life source instead, Nolan says one last thing, having him vanish with no trace; he was even there in Rowen's hands.

Nolan falls right in front of a bar hanging on to what energy he had and when he saw the person he casted himself to, he jumped in their body now having full control over them and being hidden well enough that not even Rowen could find him.

Shaking his head trying to get the hang of the possession, he hears the person's voice cursing him out for even possessing him in the first place.

"Look, I don't like it either but I need to find her before she does and you're my vehicle until I find another way for all of this, so stop calling me a bitch."

Walking and finding what they drive, Nolan hops on now searching for Devlin.

****

Wish I could say this was all a bad trip on acid  but sadly it wasn't and I was now in a fogged forest with nothing but wails of unknown voices that sounded like effects in a scary movie.

Dirt stained my knees as I got up from the forest floor hearing a voice tsk their tongue.

"I told you this wasn't going to go well," The unknown voice says.

"What the hell is this? A twisted Alice and Wonderland? Making you the cat with that damn grinning smile?"

The unknown voice now chuckles, "And they say imagination is dead."

Now picking up the speed in my walk, I try to search for a face, a person, anything to get the hell out of this twisted nightmare.

"There's no use in finding an exit. You're in death limbo my dear."

Stopping, my non-beating heart rattles with fear of the words the unknown voice just casually whispered out.

"No...no how is that possible if I did what the relic said...what Nolan said."

The unknown voice tsk their tongue again, "You tried to outsmart the natural cycle of life...of fate. Now you have to pay or try redeeming your pure innocent soul."

Crows sound in every tree that's there with a light blue streak of thunder dancing in the pitch black sky with no living thing to accompany it.