6. Sebastian

6

SEBASTIAN

Sebastian got out of bed eventually. He showered and dressed, then decided to get out of the duplex.

Sometime while he'd been unconscious, a bunch of mail had arrived for him. He now had his debit card, a nice set of over-ear headphones, and a laptop. He synced the headphones to his cell phone and selected some music.

Sebastian went to the General Store to try out his debit card. He kept the headphones on and felt more relaxed, knowing no one would try to talk to him when he clearly couldn't hear them.

He took a muffin to the register and slipped the headphones around his neck when Carla looked up at him.

"Hi, Sebastian." She smiled brightly.

"Hey." He pulled out his card.

"Got your money, I see." She chuckled and scanned the muffin. "Glad things are back to normal. Wasn't sure if that darkness had scared you off."

"No, I really am a local."

"Must be." She handed him the muffin. "In that case, you probably know there's a trivia night at the diner every other Monday. And in case you're looking for a team, my boyfriend and I need all the help we can get. My sister joins us, but she always steers us wrong. If you want to come along, let me know." Carla looked at him expectantly.

The invitation took Sebastian by surprise, making his stomach churn. Back in college, he wouldn't have hesitated to say he was game, but socializing had become nerve-wracking. "Maybe. I don't really like busy events."

Carla nodded. "Fair enough. I'm sure I'll see you around here, anyway."

"Probably." He shrugged. "Have a good day."

At least Carla hadn't seemed annoyed by his response. She was very friendly and Sebastian did want his own friends outside James's group. Maybe they could do something else together other than trivia.

Sebastian took his muffin to the park. Maybe he should have been wary of the place after the bear incident, but he didn't think it any more likely a possessed animal would show up just because one had yesterday. He wasn't going to hide inside twenty-four-seven.

It felt good to get out and wander for no reason. He was still adjusting to everything not being trapped at Storm House entailed, and most of it was good. He appreciated sitting among the fall leaves, listening to music, and eating a sweet blueberry muffin more than he would have otherwise.

A man walking through town gave him a funny look before entering the diner. It gave Sebastian a flash of insecurity. Did he look weird or something?

He didn't have long to worry about it. James showed up a minute later. He'd dropped Eli at home and filled Sebastian in on their trip to his cursed property.

"Sounds like things are getting sucked into the gateway." Sebastian agreed with James's conjecture. "It must be connected to whatever I did to the veins, banishing the darkness. "

James tensed next to him, saying quietly, "It feels like we have less and less time to figure this out."

"Yeah, everything's crumbling and getting less manageable by the day." Sebastian rubbed James's shoulders, ignoring the sinking feeling settling over him. "I think I should call my mom."

"What?" James's eyes widened in alarm.

"She might know more about how the imbalance started. Her dad was alive at the beginning of all this. Yeah, he was a little kid, but he had to have known something happened or had his own suspicions and insights about what his parents and grandmother were doing over the years. I have no idea how much he passed on to my mom and Uncle Stephen before he died. I'm not going to assume Stephen told me everything he knew."

James's frown cut deep lines around his mouth. "Do you think your mom will tell you if she knows anything?"

A surge of anger coursed through Sebastian. His mom had refused to help him before, in even the smallest ways. "I don't know. I can't make her talk, but I'm not above manipulating her if I have to. She'll be worried about Kira when she hears I've escaped. Maybe I can use that."

A muscle in James's jaw ticked. "Whatever you need to do, I'll support you."

Sebastian squeezed James's knee. His support meant everything. Sebastian pulled out his phone. He had his mom's number memorized unless she'd changed it in the last six years. Before he could think too hard about what talking to her would be like, he dialed and listened to it ring. The voicemail picked up, and he heard Samantha Storm's voice for the first time in years.

"Hi, it's Sebastian. Call me." He left his number and hung up.

Sebastian figured giving almost no information would be the best way to try and get his mom to respond. A nasty part of him wished he could see her face when she got that message. She'd be shocked at the very least, maybe even scared not knowing how Sebastian had contacted her .

James took Sebastian's hand. They sat for a few moments in silence before he said, "Eli wants to read over anything you have about the veins and any letters or notes you have from Selma, Sullivan, or Nelson."

Sebastian gripped the silent phone. "That's a good idea. Eli might catch something I missed. Hell, I might even read everything over again too. We've got nowhere else to look for answers."

"Eli and Parker are going out there again later this afternoon. If you have the letters and journals somewhere easy to find, they can grab them. Or I can go out and search."

"They're in a box in the library. I gathered up everything I could find and dumped it all together."

James unlocked his phone and began texting. "Great. I wasn't looking forward to searching for more papers, if I'm honest."

Sebastian snorted. "No, me either."

James tucked his phone away after he was done relaying everything to Eli.

"Have you heard anything from Eleanor and Hazel?" Sebastian asked.

James nodded. "They checked whether Eleanor was trapped yesterday. She's stuck behind the barrier with us. Hazel checked too, for good measure, and she's still trapped."

"I know it's what we expected, but dammit." Sebastian rubbed his temple as a twinge of pain started behind his eyes.

"Yeah," James agreed with a tired sigh. He stood from the bench and stretched. "What are you up to for the rest of the day?"

Sebastian got up. "I might go back to bed."

James put his hands on Sebastian's shoulders and looked him over. "Are you feeling okay?"

"My head aches a bit, and I'm tired." Walking one whole block to the park had worn him out. Sebastian needed to be careful with himself since he didn't know what the veins' power had done to him. If his body wanted sleep, he would listen and hope to have more energy when he woke again.

"You should eat something too." James took his hand and began walking back toward the duplex. "I'll bring some of the food Parker left at my place over to yours."

"Thanks, James." A breeze swept fallen leaves across the sidewalk that crunched under Sebastian's feet. "What're you going to do with the rest of your day?"

"I should probably go to work." James threw a sideways look at him and smiled.

Sebastian grinned back. "Yeah, you should. You've been lazy."

James shook his head, squeezing Sebastian's hand.

As they passed the bar on the corner of the town center, William came out of the post office across the street. He glared at them, making a sneering, degusted face before turning toward town hall.

"I really don't like that guy." Sebastian stared after him. "What was that look about?"

"I don't know. I've never liked him either."

Sebastian pushed William from his mind, trying not to let the strange look trigger his insecurity. He didn't need to dwell on the opinions of random people in town. He had bigger problems to deal with.

Sebastian woke from his nap late that afternoon to a box of familiar papers in his living room. He heated up some of the lasagna James had brought over and emptied the box's contents on the table.

He started with Selma's journal and paid close attention to anything to do with her sons, but as he remembered, she hadn't recorded anything about the veins of power on their property .

She mentioned Nelson leaving and detailed her personal feelings on the abandonment but never touched on the root of her anger toward her son. He'd ruined so much , taken something from them he could never replace, and broken their family . But that was as close as Selma got to discussing the disaster with the veins.

Selma seemed more upset with Nelson than Sullivan. Perhaps she respected Sullivan for dealing with his mistake instead of running. Nelson was apparently greedy and overly ambitious. Though, years later, Selma wasn't complaining about that ambition when she demanded shares in Nelson Power. She felt he owed her, Sullivan, and the rest of the Storms, apparently.

None of it felt helpful.

The letters from Nelson to Selma and Sullivan were even worse. They were terse and as brief as possible. One just said: No, it's not possible . That was all. Sebastian suspected the letters to Nelson held more information, but he didn't have those. They'd probably been thrown out decades ago by whoever dealt with Nelson's estate after he passed away, if Nelson had even saved them.

Sebastian read and ate, moving on to pumpkin soup for his second course until he'd gotten through all the papers. He texted Eli to let him know he was done with them.

Just as Eli texted back to say he'd come pick the box up, there was a knock on Sebastian's door. He went to answer it and found James on his doorstep.

"How was your nap?" James kissed him on the cheek as he entered.

"Good. My head hasn't hurt since."

James nodded in approval. He picked up Selma's journal. "Find anything—" His question was cut off by the ringing of Sebastian's phone.

He grabbed it off the table. "It's my mom."

James was at his side in an instant. "I'm right here."

Sebastian wanted to say it was fine, but his stomach roiled. He gripped James's hand and accepted the call, switching it to speaker so James could listen in.

"Sebastian?" his mom asked when he didn't say anything, her voice hesitant like she didn't believe he was there.

He cleared his throat. "It's been a while."

There was a long silence. "How did you get a phone to work at the house?"

Not: how are you or are you okay? She went straight for the curse, wondering how Sebastian was getting around it.

Sebastian ground his teeth. "I'm not at the house."

The silence was even longer this time. "How?" The word came though full of fear. "Don't lie to me. Is this even really you calling? How would I know?"

"It's not like you'd recognize your son's voice or anything." Sebastian closed his eyes. It wouldn't pay to antagonize her too much, but he couldn't control himself. "In case you still aren't sure, it's me, the one you cursed to save your daughter. The one you left to get imprisoned after Stephen died. The one?—"

"All right," she snapped. "Point made, Sebastian. Is this why you called? To shame your evil mother?"

"I need to know everything your dad told you about the curse and the veins."

"Why?" She waited for an answer, but Sebastian didn't give one. "How did you get away from the house without the area exploding? Something like that would have been in the news. You can't have escaped if there was no explosion."

"If you want to know how I got out, tell me about the curse and the veins."

"You haven't called your sister, have you?"

The words hit Sebastian like ice. "Why don't you ask her?" Sebastian was overwhelmed with bitterness. His sister had never asked for their mother's favor or been aware of what Sebastian had saved her from, but part of him hated her for being given all the affection he'd craved .

He hated his mom even more fiercely, in a way he thought he'd moved past years ago. Apparently not.

"Don't you dare try to tell Kira about any of this. She won't come visit you. You won't be able to trap her."

It hurt that his mother thought he'd do that, but it wasn't in his interest to correct her. She needed to feel threatened, or she'd never help. "If you want to guarantee that won't happen, talk to me."

"I don't know anything, Sebastian," she snapped.

"That's not what Stephen said. You knew about all of this." Sebastian took a breath, trying to calm down. "I think your dad knew what Sullivan and Nelson did. All I'm asking is that you tell me, and then you'll never hear from me again."

"Why does it matter? If you're free, why do you care?"

"Being free hasn't fixed anything. The curse is still here. It's just changing."

His mom sucked in a breath. "I have to go." She hung up.

Sebastian set the phone on the table with a shaking hand, and James pulled him into a tight embrace. "That won't be the end of it," he said into James's hair. "She's afraid of the curse. Once she checks on Kira, I'll hear from her again."

"Do you still think she knows something?"

Sebastian pulled back. "I have no idea, but she's the only one who would possibly have information. I have to rule it out and ensure she isn't hiding anything." He hated that figuring this out might all come down to his mother. She was the one who forced the curse on him, and it was hard to believe she'd help now, no matter how he tried to convince her. But he had to try.