Monthly Bonus Content #3—'Through Fog and Smoke...' (Morgan Version) (Patreon)

Wayhaven’s lighthouse stands sentinel at the edge of town. It shines its beam across the midnight depths of the lake before turning its eye on the town with a softer watch. Nothing stirs that night except the usual patrol that also keeps guard over the town.

The lighthouse seems to slow, allowing the team of two more light for a moment to maze their way through the thicket of trees at the edge of town.

“I didn’t think lighthouses turned their light on the actual houses. Don’t they just swing back and forth across the water?” Morgan asks as she walks with agile ease along the shadowed path that rings around Wayhaven proper.

I look at her before returning my focus to the trail, thankful for the lighthouse’s continued gentle light as it reveals a safe route. “They do normally, as far as I know. But this one broke a long time ago, and the people back then apparently liked it because there wasn’t much other illumination for the town, so they left it.”

Morgan glances to the towering building on the far cliff as it sweeps its beam back towards the lake, as though sensing her enquiring glance. “Sounds to me like they just wanted an excuse not to bother fixing it.”

I chuckle and shrug. “That does seem likely.”

-

The lighthouse casts its bright eye once more over the cliffs and lake, no wind or activity stirring the depths.

But even the brightest light can’t always see through the darkest shadows.

Below the cliff edge, deep within the caverns that carve through the rock, echoes a voice. It has a sing-song melody that would normally lift the hearts of those who might hear it…but the words it chants are anything but cheerful.

“Web and string, web and string, time is such a fragile thing. Cut the thread and loop the rope, take away those shreds of hope.”

Over and over the words echo and twist in the air as a hunched, gangly figure weaves his gnarled fingers through the air, pinching and grasping at invisible threads. He yanks on an unseen filament and draws it close, watching it shine with the thinnest iridescent splendor.

A grin spreads across his face. “Make a cut and change the past. Her most treasured memory gone at last.”

His finger slices through the air, and a pulse of energy bursts out from the cavern. It travels beneath the ground, rippling out beneath the grass and mud, searching like a radar for its target.

And finally…it finds it.

-

Morgan and I continue our patrol. It’s as quiet as most nights, which is a relief from all that’s been happening lately. She walks beside me with an easy gait, matching my own steps with precision, not seeming to notice how close she’s gotten to my side. Our arms brush as we go, and I can’t help the intense awareness throughout my body at the simple touch.

I’m about to open my mouth to say something when Morgan gasps for a breath.

“Morgan?” I call as she slumps against a nearby tree and clutches at the crystal hanging at her chest. Smoke sizzles from her tight fist. “What the—”

She hisses in pain with her fingers still clenched with a vice-like grip around her pendant. I can see the red-hot glow of heat from within her palm.

“Let it go!” I yell, but she doesn’t seem to hear me as she grits her teeth, sweat staining her forehead as she almost crumples onto the ground. I lurch forwards, uncurling her solid fingers from around the object until it falls against her chest. It glows with vicious brightness before dying back to its usual clear glimmer.

Morgan slides down to the ground, stretching her legs out, her palm resting in her lap. The scorched imprint of the crystal is scarred into her skin, but the edges are already beginning to stitch and heal back to their original smoothness.

I fall to my knees and stare wide-eyed at her. “What was that?!”

“I…I have no idea.” She blinks at me, narrowing her eyes to take me in. “Who the hell are you?”

“You are joking, right?” But all I get in reply is an angered scowl. “It’s taken me over half a year to get you to even acknowledge me and now you’re joking about even knowing me?” My laughter edges on panic.

She springs onto her feet, pushing away from me with a frown. “Half a year?” She shakes her head, holding her palm to her temples as pain creases her features. “You’re lying. You…are you?”

My throat thickens with fear, and I reach out my hand to rest on her arm. “Morgan. You’re scaring me a little bit….”

Her eyes drop to the touch, where the confusion clouding her gaze suddenly seems to lift. Her shoulders drop back down from around her ears as her breath flows easily once more.

“Sweetheart/Handsome…” My pet name leaves her in a shudder, but I’ve never been more relieved to hear it.

I make to draw my fingers away, but her hand whips out to fall over mine and keep it in place. “Are you all right? What happened?”

“I don’t know.” She shakes her head, pain streaking a cracked line across her features. “But I have a serious headache.”

I hook a brow upwards. “Can vampires get headaches?”

“Apparently I can now,” she growls, squeezing her eyes shut as she fists the fingers of her free hand tightly into her hair.

“We need to get you home.” I step to her side, wrapping an arm around her middle in order to offer whatever support I can as she stumbles along beside me. I can hear her teeth grinding together as we go.

-

Back at the Warehouse. In the Living Room

“You said it came on suddenly?” Nate asks with a tilt of his head as he steps away from examining Morgan, who I barely just managed to get into an armchair before she collapsed. He was careful not to touch her as he looked her over, something she seemed to be appreciative of as the headache continues to drag her whole body down.

I nod. “She just suddenly grasped her crystal and…forgot about me.”

Adam sighs and rubs at the arched bridge of his nose. “Then it’s true.”

“What’s true?” Morgan and I ask in unison.

“There’s a Weaver in town,” Farah announces with an excited gleam before offering a sympathetic frown to Morgan. “But it looks like you’re his target.”

“We knew one of us was the target,” Adam explains. “Do you remember Freej-da?”

Morgan slumps even further forward, rubbing at her face with her hands. “Him again?”

“I’m guessing he’s someone you know?” I ask when this conversation loses its meaning for me.

Morgan reaches out for me, so I shift closer until she can wrap her arm around my hips and rest her head against my waist. She eases out a breath and relaxes further into the position instantly. “He’s a Weaver we stopped from ruining a timeline a few years ago. But I thought he signed an agreement?”

My eyes snap open, and I shake my hands in front of me. “Wait—ruining a timeline? That’s not…actually possible, is it?”

The group eye each other with wary glances, as though unsure if they should actually answer that and destroy what little understanding of this confusing world I have left.

I roll my eyes at their continued silence. “Of course it is.”

“It’s not easy,” Nate adds, shoving his hands into his pockets. “It’s requires such power that even Weavers, who have an affinity with those magics, rarely actually pull off anything major.”

“So what is he trying to do with Morgan?” I ask, not realizing as I let my fingers stroke through her hair and rub soothingly at the back of her neck.

Farah glances between us. “Make her forget about you.”

“Why?”

“Because he was creepily obsessed with this human, but she was already in love with someone else,” Farah begins.

“And he was trying to make them forget each other in the hopes the human would fall for him instead,” Nate continues the story with a disgusted grimace.

I join in with the expression. “Oh, that’s just all kinds of wrong.”

“Which is why we stopped it,” Morgan states, her voice regaining some of its strength.

I look down to her. “Feeling better?”

“Yeah. But I’m seriously pissed off,” she snaps, standing up with a determination flashing like lightning in her stormy eyes. “Nobody messes with my memories.”

“Eh…” Farah lets out with a slow tilt of her head.

Morgan purses her lips. “Not without my say so.”

“The Agency has tracked his magic to the lake, though we can’t pinpoint it further than that without getting close,” Adam explains, leaning against the fireplace mantle and rubbing at his lips. “But we can’t all go because he’s too sensitive to our presence.”

“Then I’ll go,” I offer, stepping forward and feeling Morgan’s arm fall away. Something deep in me longs for her touch the second it’s gone, but I try to ignore the strange sensation. “He won’t be able to sense me or won’t be on the lookout for it, at least.”

Adam frowns and shakes his head. “I don’t like how much we’re growing to rely on you to fight our battles.”

“I have skills and assets you don’t, and you have ones I don’t,” I reply with a shrug. “That’s the point of a balanced team, isn’t it?”

“I’ll be going with them anyway,” Morgan announces, stepping closer once again.

Nate and Adam exchange yet another silent glance.

“All right,” Nate agrees with a nod. “Then you’ll need the cuffs that can block his magic. Get them on him, and you won’t have any more problems.”

I let out a short chuckle. “Oh, so an easy task then.”

“It should be,” Farah adds. “He’s not exactly a fighter and using his magic drains him like you wouldn’t believe.”

My brows rise as I allow a smile. “That’s the best news I’ve heard all day.”

-

At the Caverns beneath the Lighthouse

The tide laps at the pebble-strewn shore, seeming to follow us inside as we make our way into one of the open caves hollowed into the cliff’s front. Water sloshes around our ankles, seaweed making the walk treacherous, but we push onwards.

It doesn’t take long to find the right path as seriously creepy mutterings echo down one of the tunnels. Dribbles of water cascade down the back of my jacket, making me shiver, and the chill dampness continues to invade every sense until they’re dulled with the musty scent of time and disuse.

“There he is,” Morgan whispers, crouching and shuffling closer to my side.

Ahead of us is a small rocky room illuminated in an eerie purple light with flames of orange spewing upwards in the centre. Thick grey smoke curls around the stony roof, probing at the unyielding surface until it finds a small shaft to escape from.

The figure is cloaked and indistinguishable, especially as he has his back to us, arms circling over something and looking very much like a villain out of a children’s storybook. The comparison doesn’t help with calming my nerves.

“Ok, you go—” My plan is halted as Morgan lunges out of the safety of our shadowed tunnel towards the Weaver. I blow out a breath and follow behind.

“You [lots of censored cursing]!”

The Weaver spins at the sound of Morgan’s angered yelling but doesn’t seem as surprised as I’d expected. In fact, he smiles.

“Morgan, get back!” But my warning comes too late as the Weaver snaps out a wiry arm. His fingers curl in the air like a cage around Morgan, who drops to her knees as the crystal burns with glowing fury.

“What once was, now be lost. Take from her the earthly cost.” The man chants out the words which pop and hiss in the air around Morgan.

The deep red material of her t-shirt scorches bright and a hole begins to burn away beneath the pendant.

My breath stops.

“What are you doing?!” I cry, letting the cuffs drop with a dull clank to the ground as I make to rush for Morgan.

The Weaver whips up a hand to halt me. “I wouldn’t dare if I were you.”

I swallow hard and stop. “Why are you doing this?”

“Because she took away the one I love, so it’s only fair I do the same,” he hisses, crooked teeth poking out from yellowed lips. He doesn’t look human, almost more birdlike with wide round eyes and taloned feet.

I scoff. “Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you, but Morgan doesn’t love me.”

He cocks his head and glances back to the vampire writhing a few feet away. “Are you so sure about that? No one clings to memories as desperately as she is unless there’s true feeling behind them.”

My heart both wants to shatter and beat harder at those words. “I… I don’t—”

“You don’t believe me?” He lifts his scrawny shoulders, revealing a matted plume of feathers across his chest beneath his cloak. “I don’t care. What I do care about is making her feel ten times the pain that I do.”

His attention returns to Morgan, flicking his other hand out and seeming to manipulate some kind of invisible web that only he can see. His fingertips slide down threads, plucking at strings with vile intent.

I blink when I realise my gaze has become watery, ignoring the sting of cold dampness against my hot cheeks.

In one sweeping motion, I stoop down and retrieve the cuffs and make a grab at the Weaver.

The cuffs slip around his scaley wrists before he can even process what’s happening. Light shoots out of the cuffs, burning in the air before sinking back down into the metal with a soft glow.

Silence plummets down onto the cavern.

After a few moments, I dare to let out a breath, followed by Morgan’s rasped inhales.

I rush to her, ignoring the slumped Weaver staring wide eyed at his cuffed hands, and drop to Morgan’s side.

“Hey?” I mumble as I reach for her. “Are you all right?”

“That’s the second time you’ve had to ask me that today,” she groans, pushing herself up onto her feet. She only wobbles slightly before regaining her balance.

I smirk at her. “Maybe you’re losing your touch.”

“Or maybe all these assholes could stop coming after us long enough for me to recover,” she suggests with an angered flash of her fangs at the Weaver.

A flicker of a frown catches my brows, but I try to hide it. It’s rare Morgan admits her vulnerabilities—and even less so in front of me—but that was such a casual admission of it.

The Weaver’s words spin webs in my heart, but I try to brush them off and not let them linger.

Love is far from what Morgan feels for me.

…Right?

“I’ll call Unit Bravo and tell them the good news,” I say in order to distract myself.

As I make to move away, Morgan grasps my arm lightly. I turn back, finding her suddenly only an inch from me. Her hand slides up my arm, tracing the curve of my neck before wrapping around the back of it to bring our foreheads together.

She sighs against me, and I shiver beneath the warmth of her breath.

“Don’t ever let me forget you,” she pleads as her eyes fall closed with exhaustion.

My breath hitches. “Isn’t the point of forgetting so you wouldn’t know if you had?”

Her eyes flutter open to find mine with an intensity that shocks my system. “I’d know.”

---

So this wasn't exactly about a time-travelling object, but I had this character from Unit Bravo's past missions, and it seemed too good of an opportunity to bring them back! So it's sort of time related instead :D

Also suuuuppppeeerrrr long, I'm so sorry!...I got seriously carried away with writing the Weaver again, hehe! (I know most people don't mind really long, but I totally understand it's really difficult for those who read on phones to scroll so much! I will definitely contain my imagination for next month's scenarios!)