Free Intangible by J. Meyers Page B

gesturing around. “This is my home. I take care of my own.”
    “I don’t want your care.”
    Jonas took a step toward her, and she immediately stepped back.
    “Meghan.”
    “Jonas,” she said. “Go away.”
    He threw his hands into the air, and fought the urge to grab her and snap something. But, he reminded himself, that was neither necessary nor productive. Calm. Try to be calm. He inhaled deep through his nose.
    And froze.
    “No,” he said, and then sniffed again.
    “It’s not—”
    “Are you human ?”
    “Jonas—”
    “You’re human ?” he said. “You reek of human stench. What did she do to you?”
    “Nothing I didn’t want her to.” Meghan lifted her chin.
    Without saying a word, he turned back toward downtown. He’d find that healer. And she would pay for what she’d done. Perhaps Lilith needed a new plaything to torture.
    “No!” Meghan sprinted around him, grabbed his arm.
    He wrenched away, but still she stood in his path. They glared at each other for a long moment.
    “Get out of my way.”
    “I did this, Jonas,” she said. “ I did it. I chose it.”
    “Get out of my way.” Each word threatened. “I could break you.”
    “I know. But you won’t.”
    “Won’t I?” He smiled without warmth, leaned in close to her face. “What makes you so sure?”
    “Because I know you.”
    “Not well enough.”
    She stood her ground. “Better than you think,” she said. “You won’t harm an innocent.”
    “You’re hardly an innocent, Meghan.”
    “I am now,” she said.
    Jonas stepped back, and looked away. She was right. After sixty-three years she knew him and knew he wouldn’t hurt her. Of all people.
    “Why?” he said. “Why would you do this?”
    Meghan just looked at him. “What would you give?” she asked. “What would you give to be human again?”
    “Nothing.”
    “What if you could breathe, eat, live again? Wouldn’t you take that chance if you could? Have a real family? Have children? Have a future?”
    “You want the pain and suffering of a human life?” he said. “Again? Wasn’t it bad enough the first time around?”
    “I didn’t want to be a monster anymore.”
    “Humans can be monsters, too.”
    “I want a future,” she said. “You have no future. It’s just the same decade after decade, century after century. You don’t get to grow old and die like a normal person. You’re just waiting for someone to kill you.” She paused, looked up at him. “I don’t want to live like that anymore, Jonas.”
    “I have all of eternity as a future. You have sixty or seventy years, if you’re lucky.”
    “I’m tired of fighting to stay alive-but-dead. I’m tired of watching from the outside as people live . I want a life, Jonas. She gave me a life.”
    “No wonder Feyth was there.”
    “I don’t think she even realized what she did,” Meghan said.
    “I’ll kill her after I kill the healer.”
    “She doesn’t know, Jonas. She’s an innocent.”
    “She can’t do this.” He paused then, her words sinking in, and looked at her. “But you knew.”
    “I guessed.”
    “You knew,” he said. “Don’t lie to me, Meghan. You knew. I saw the trail of blood you left. The trail that started around a corner and led straight to her. You knew. ”
    Meghan pressed her lips together hard, glared at him.
    “I knew that if anyone had that power it would be that girl,” she finally said.
    “How?”
    “I’ve been following her for months, watching her heal humans. And then there’s her brother. It all added up.”
    “To what?”
    “The Prophecy.”
    And suddenly he knew. He could feel the knowledge burst upon him all at once.
    “The Children of the Prophecy,” Meghan said when Jonas didn’t respond. “I came across it in the records a few months ago. I’d already seen her heal and I figured if it was really true—if it was really them—then she’d be able to change me.” She held her hands out at her sides and looked down at her body. When