Flight of Life (Essence Series #1) Read online

  Breccan stared at his cousin with a dumbfounded expression. “You’re going to do awesome on your SAT’s.”

  “Calloway is right,” Easton said. “That’s the exact meaning of the words.”

  “Then why didn’t it just say that?” Breccan said.

  Easton shrugged. “It’s more difficult for them to compose their thoughts. Or perhaps we just have a difficult time understanding their concepts.”

  “Even though Calloway explained it, I still don’t understand the meaning. How does it apply to us?”

  “They want us to give up,” Calloway said. “We all have those days or moments when we don’t understand the purpose of our actions,” he said. “Why do we go to school? It’s so we can be educated. Why? This will lead to a prosperous job. Why? So we can support our families. Why? So they can grow and change? Why? So then our children can repeat the cycle? Why? So we can fulfill our purpose. But what was the purpose? Why are we bothering to do that? Sometimes I wonder what the point is—why am I doing this?”

  Breccan nodded. “I suppose.”

  “Wouldn’t it just be easier—better—to understand what the purpose of all of this is? Why do flies continue to exist if they only live for three days? Why does life keep pushing onwards? In the end, does it really matter?” Calloway felt the depression fall on his shoulders when he thought about the words he just said. He felt this way on a daily basis. He was pushing himself to be better by applying for a college admission and getting a job to help his family with their financial expenses, but in the end, did that matter? What does matter?

  “What do the Hara-Kirs gain by forsaking the Life?” Breccan asked. “Why are they intent on destroying this life?”

  “They don’t believe this is the right one,” Easton said. “They believe their life is the true life—the Anti-Life.”

  “And what do they do in this Anti-Life?” Breccan asked.

  “Since I’ve never been there I can’t say,” Easton said. “But I don’t agree with them. I think there is more to this life than we can understand.”

  “Like what?” Calloway asked.

  “Well, there’s the After-Life,” she said. “You can’t venture in the realm of the After-Life if you choose the path of the Anti-Life.”

  “Says who?” Breccan asked.

  “The Hara-Kirs,” she said.

  “So they are banned from heaven?” Calloway asked

  “They choose not to go there, if such a thing exists, unless they’re referring to something else,” she said.

  Calloway rubbed his temple. “If this has been going on since the beginning of time, the universe, and everything else, why is this happening now? Why did I see a Hara-Kir at a public library? If they are confined to the Anti-Life why don’t they stay there?”

  “That’s exactly what the problem is,” she said. “The breach between the worlds is open.”

  “And what does that mean?” Breccan asked.

  “Eternal night.”

  Fight or Flight

  Breccan leaned back in his chair and sighed. “I still don’t understand.”

  “I’m not sure either,” Easton admitted.

  “So you’re wrong?” Breccan said.

  “No,” she snapped. “I just have a knowledge deficit. That doesn’t mean I’m wrong.”

  Calloway knew where this conversation was headed. “Keep reading and we’ll find out.”

  Easton returned her gaze to the book and flipped the page. She stared at the words for a long moment before she looked back at Calloway. “I can’t decipher it,” she said. “I know some of the symbols but not all.”

  “Well, that’s wonderful,” Breccan said sarcastically.

  “I told you this from the beginning—I never said I was fluent. I just need some time to decode it,” she said.

  “Can you make anything out?” Calloway asked.

  Easton sighed and returned her gaze to the page. Breccan sighed loudly, impatient for her to finish, and Easton glared at him before she continued. She finished after a few moments. “It’s difficult to make out, but it seems that the goal of the Hara-Kirs is to end this Life by gathering the essence of innocent souls from this mortal world. When they have enough they will be able to end this Life as well as the Anti-Life, and both worlds will cease to exist altogether.”

  Calloway thought for a moment. “So they want to commit suicide?”

  Easton shrugged. “I guess.”

  “And why do they need essence to achieve this?” Calloway asked. “Do only humans have it?”

  “I don’t know.” She sighed. “But they need to be stopped—for good. Eventually, they will get what they want and send us into oblivion.”

  “And why do the Hara-Kirs want this?” Breccan asked.

  “Apparently, they don’t want to exist anymore,” Calloway said. “Life isn’t worth living—it’s repetitive and meaningless—worthless.” The depression sank into him when he thought about what he just learned; his Life and After-Life could be taken from him. A part of him understood why the Hara-Kir felt that way. Almost every patient in a psychiatric ward wanted the same thing; for it to be over. Even if he didn’t agree, Calloway could understand the need for the cycle to end. It was difficult to find the good things in life worth living for when there was so little to be found. He was teased on a daily basis and felt isolated from the world, like no one cared for him. There were days when he didn’t want to get out of bed or continue living—he admitted it.

  He thought of his father when he looked at the orb and knife sitting on the table. Somehow his father had these gifts but Calloway wasn’t sure why. Did he travel into the Anti-Life and retrieve these them? And if so, why? Calloway assumed his father met his end while he pursued the destruction of the Hara-Kirs. It was the only explanation. He probably retrieved the Kirin Book from the Anti-Life and hid it within the abandoned library where it wouldn’t be found. His father never had an open casket and Calloway never saw his body after he was killed. He was just a boy. The knowledge that his father died trying to save the world invigorated him with strength, replacing his fear, and solidified his choice to continue down this path. His father never commanded him to finish his work but Calloway was choosing to. That’s how he sounded in his letter—he wanted to give his son the option.

  Breccan grabbed the orb from the table and squeezed it in his palm. The light didn’t shine. He continued to play with Calloway’s glowing orb. “How do you know how to read these symbols?” he asked Easton.

  “I learned from my sister,” she replied

  “And how does she know?” Breccan asked. “How do you both know about the Hara-Kirs?”

  “Well, my sister became aware of it when she started taking college courses when she was still in high school. I don’t know much more than that. She warned me about the Hara-Kirs and told me to be careful. She would come home with these books of symbols and I watched her decipher them with a decoder. Eventually, I memorized some of the words.” Easton crossed her arms over her chest and watched Breccan play with the orb. “My sister doesn’t discuss it often, and if I bring up the topic she ignores me.”

  Easton played with her fingernails, which were painted an oily black, and she scraped the paint off the surface. She didn’t have any friends at school, choosing to spend all her time in solitude, and the other students teased her at every opportunity. They labeled her as a Satan worshiper and a gothic, even though she never wore black despite her painted fingernails, and she never challenged the names. She ignored everyone. Calloway suspected that he and Breccan were her only friends, even though they were just using her for her knowledge. Calloway pitied her even more than he did before. He knew exactly how she felt.

  Calloway leaned forward over the table and looked at Easton. “We have to do something,” he said. “The Hara-Kirs need to be stopped.”

  Easton stopped picking at her nails and met his gaze. “We?” she asked incredulously. “How do you propose we do that?”

  He shrugg
ed. “I don’t know,” he said. “But it’s our duty to try—it’s our essence we are talking about.”

  Breccan dropped the orb. “But what can we do?” he asked. “We barely know anything as it is. I don’t think three high school students can make any difference. We’ll just get ourselves killed.”

  Calloway sighed. “We have the Kirin Book and I’m sure it will give us all the information we need—once we decode it—and then we’ll pursue this until we succeed or are killed in the attempt. What kind of people would be if we just left the world to its fate?”

  “We would be smart people,” Breccan replied.

  Easton sighed. “Calloway is right,” she said. “We have to do something. We would be cowards if we did anything else—and I am definitely not a coward.” Calloway sighed, relieved by her commitment to the task. He didn’t want to do this alone—he needed her. “We can gather followers as we move forward—people that we trust—and eventually we’ll have the means to accomplish this.”

  “But what do we do until then?” Calloway asked. “We can’t just wait for help.”

  “Well, we could take down every Hara-Kir we find,” she suggested. “It doesn’t sound like much but at least that’s one Hara-Kir less in the world.”

  “And how do we expect to do that?” Breccan asked. “We don’t know anything about these things and you think we should try to kill one?”

  “We can do it if we combine our efforts,” Calloway said. “It’ll be three against one.”

  “But we still don’t know how to kill it,” Breccan said. “We can’t just experiment until we get it right. By then it will take our essence and be gone.”

  “The Kirin Book will detail their vulnerabilities,” Easton said. “We’ll figure this out.”

  Breccan sighed. “I have a bad a feeling about this.”

  “We’ll be fine,” Calloway said.

  “So are we Hara-Kir hunters now?” Breccan asked incredulously. “We just search the nighttime streets until we find one and kill it?”

  “Of course not,” Calloway said quickly. “But if we come across one we don’t run—we fight. I suspect I’ll have an encounter with one soon.”

  Easton stared at Calloway. “We have to promise each other that we’ll never pursue a Hara-Kir on our own—we have to be together.” She was directing her message to Calloway. He was amused by her intuition. She was right.

  “I promise,” Breccan said quickly. “I’m not stupid.”

  “Calloway,” Easton pressed.

  Calloway sighed. “Okay.”

  “So, how do we attack these things?” Breccan asked. “Are we just punching it?”

  “I think we should pursue it with a knife,” Calloway said. “They are easy to hide in our clothing and are deadly. I suspect a gun wouldn’t work—even if we could get one.”

  “So, we’re really doing this?” Breccan asked.

  Easton nodded. “Yes.”

  Breccan looked at Calloway. “I’m going to be pissed if I die.”

  Calloway smiled. “There are worse things than dying,” he said. “We aren’t just fighting for Life, but the After-Life.”

  “My parents don’t care about that,” Breccan said. “They would be angry if I died.”

  “I know,” Calloway said. “I don’t think they’d be happy if something happened to either of us, but I also think they would be extremely proud.”

  “Or just think we’re stupid.” Breccan laughed.

  “I’m sure they think that already,” Easton jabbed.

  Breccan looked at her and was about to speak when Calloway intervened. “Just five minutes,” he said. “That’s all I’m asking for.” Breccan shut his mouth and turned away. Easton smiled as she watched him back down.

  Easton looked at the book and flipped through the pages, looking for anything that she could decipher on her own. She stopped when she saw a chapter that detailed their attributes and she skimmed through the lines.

  Calloway caught her look. “What is it?” he asked.

  “It says something about their physiology but I can’t decode it properly, and it mentions a stab through the heart and a paragraph about sections,” she said as she shook her head. She squinted her eyes like she couldn’t read the text. “I’m not sure of it, but it sounds like the heart needs to be severed into parts or something.”

  Calloway nodded. “Then the knives will work,” he said. “One of us will stab it through the heart while the other two hold it back—that can be me and Breccan. Easton, you can do the stabbing.”

  She didn’t look up from the book. “It would be my pleasure.”

  The sound of footsteps from above made them all flinch. Easton shoved the book into her backpack just as the basement door opened. Calloway grabbed his orb and knife and placed them back into his pockets as Easton’s sister descended the staircase. She reached the bottom and smiled at them all. She had brown hair that was identical to Easton’s except it was longer and reached past her shoulders. She was also taller than her younger sister and almost reached Calloway’s height. Her persona seemed upbeat and vibrant—exactly the opposite of her younger sister. She was beautiful—attractive. Perhaps it was because she was an older woman, but Calloway and Breccan immediately noticed her charms.

  She stepped toward them and extended her hand to Calloway. “Hello.” She smiled as she shook Calloway’s hand. “I’m Weston—Easton’s sister.”

  “It’s nice to meet you,” he said. “I’m Calloway.”

  She nodded and turned to Breccan, who was staring at her with a dumbfounded expression. Weston took his hand and shook it. “Hi,” she said with a smile.

  Breccan found his bearings. “You’re normal,” he blurted.

  “Thanks for the compliment—I guess,” she said with a laugh.

  Easton glared at Breccan for a moment. “I’m not weird—you’re just insanely boring.”

  Weston ignored them. “So you two are friends with Easton?”

  Breccan said no and Calloway said yes at the same time. Calloway looked at Breccan then back at Weston. “Yes, we’re her friends.”

  Weston nodded. “That’s great,” she said. “Easton doesn’t bring people around very often. I was worried she completely isolated herself.”

  “Shut up,” Easton snapped.

  Weston looked at her sister. “You’re using my house, aren’t you?” she said. “I suggest you be a little nicer to me.”

  Easton sighed but didn’t say anything.

  “So do you go to the university?” Calloway asked.

  “Yes,” Weston said. “This is my first year.”

  “What are you studying?” Calloway asked.

  “History,” she said. “But my concentration is on women’s studies.”

  Calloway and Breccan didn’t know what that meant but they both nodded like they were interested. Calloway leaned forward in his chair. “Do you like the university?”

  “Yes.” She nodded. “It’s so much better than high school—a completely different world.”

  “I hope so.” Calloway sighed. “I couldn’t survive four more years of that.”

  “It gets better.” She smiled. “Don’t worry about it.”

  Calloway doubted she had any problems in high school. It was obvious that she was a popular kid that was asked to prom by ten different guys. She’d never been teased in her life. In fact, she probably did the bullying. Both of the boys doubted she had an experience that was even remotely similar to theirs.

  “Did you go to the same high school as us?” Breccan asked. “I don’t remember you.”

  “No,” she said quickly. “Easton and I went to different schools. We didn’t get along very well when we were growing up so I applied for an inter-district transfer. We started to get along after I moved out—as you can see.”

  Easton stayed in her chair and started to pick her nails, like this conversation was extremely boring to her. She kept her legs crossed under the table and her back was straight against the chair.


  Weston looked at her sister. “So, what are you guys doing?”

  “We were hanging out,” she said.

  “But why in my basement?”

  “We were doing homework—wanted to go somewhere quiet,” Easton answered.

  Weston noticed that the table was empty. There were no books or papers across the surface. It looked like they were doing nothing. “It doesn’t look like you’re studying very hard.”

  “Well, we’re done.”

  Weston nodded but she didn’t look convinced. “You guys are welcome here anytime,” she said. “As long as you don’t make a mess.” She walked to the steps and ascended the stairway into the house.

  “You sister is cool,” Breccan said immediately.

  Easton rolled her eyes. “You think any girl who talks to you is cool.”

  “Well, you’re talking to me and I don’t think you’re cool.”

  Easton ignored his jab. “It’s getting late,” she said. “Should I take you home?”

  Both boys sighed. They knew what was waiting for them at the house. Calloway leaned back in his chair. “I guess.”

  “What’s the problem?” she asked.

  “It’s a long story,” Breccan said. “Basically, Hawk broke our camera in photography class and now we have to replace it because it was checked out to us.”

  “Why would he do that?” Easton asked.

  Breccan looked at Calloway but his cousin avoided his gaze. “Calloway wanted to be a hero and spare Beatrice from Hawk’s harassment. Hawk decided to pick on us instead.”

  “Why did you do that?” she asked Calloway. “Why did you intervene?”

  Calloway felt the anger rise when he relived the moment. “He wouldn’t leave her alone—he wouldn’t stop—and she was practically crying. I couldn’t stand the sight.”

  “Your empathy is going to get you killed, Calloway,” she said.

  “I agree,” Breccan added.

  Easton gave him a surprised look. He had never agreed with her before.

  “I know,” Calloway said. “But I would do it again in a heartbeat.”

  “Why?” Breccan asked incredulously. “Beatrice didn’t even acknowledge you for it. Since you aren’t one of the popular kids she is too embarrassed to even speak to you. Why help someone if they don’t even thank you for it?” Breccan shook his head. “She didn’t deserve your help.”