a/n: You'll see what I mean in this chapter about Flagg being a combo of Alexander Skarsgard and Jamey Sheridan: Kai sees him one way, and Nick sees him the other. Hence the disparity in their physical descriptions.
I'm changing my posting days to Monday and Tuesday, so here we are! Bonus chapters this week. ;) Keep up the comments, y'all. I love them!
temporary is my time
ain't nothin on this world that's mine
except the will i've found to carry on
The Avett Brothers, "Ill With Want"
June 29
Three days later and she was beginning to despair. His fever raged no matter how much Tylenol she gave him. He was dehydrated, unable to eat and barely able to drink. His eye was healing well, but his leg was still red and inflamed. She kept cleaning it with saline, but it didn't seem to be helping.
Yesterday morning she'd nearly wept when, on a rare break, she'd wandered out into the overgrown yard and almost tripped over a patch of yarrow flowers. A quick (very quick) trip into town during daylight hours and she found calendula at the garden center of a home improvement store. It wasn't the right time of year for goldenrod, and besides that she was allergic to it, so these would have to do.
Back at the cabin she'd combined the plants with honey to make a paste and carefully spread it on a bandage, like butter on toast. She hummed as she did it, an old healing song she remembered from her Grandmère. It wasn't that she believed in witchcraft or spells, but she did believe in her grandmother's results. And a healing song couldn't hurt.
She applied the poultice around midday. His good eye opened as she worked, but she couldn't tell if he saw her or not. Or if he did, whether he recognized her. She smiled and brushed his hair back from his forehead. Still burning. She'd sponge him down later, as they'd both done so often for Jane Baker in her last hours.
Except, of course, these were not Nick's last hours. She'd promised him he wouldn't die, and she never broke her promises. "You're going to be fine," she signed.
"Feel like shit," he signed back, weakly.
"I know. Do you think you can drink something?"
The words seemed to take a long time to penetrate the fog around his brain, but at last he gave a slow nod. She finished with the bandage and hurried back to the kitchen to warm some broth and grab a Pedialyte from the fridge.
He was asleep when she got back, so she set the mug and the bottle on the nightstand and crawled into bed next to him. She'd been sleeping in here because she didn't want to leave him alone. Sleeping was a relative term, because his restlessness kept her up. Mostly she read and wished she'd asked Sarah more questions about medicine.
When he stirred again a few hours later she was ready. She got some more fever medicine down his throat, plus almost half a mug of chicken broth.
"Can't," he signed. "No more."
"Are you sure?"
He nodded and pushed the mug away. She sighed and put it back on the bedside table. Then, just like that, he was gone again. Passed out, fever spiking, mouth open in a silent cry of agony.
She bathed him in cool water and hummed her Grandmère's song. Propped him in the chair while she changed the sweat-soaked sheets, then wrestled him back into bed. Helped him to the bathroom and held his hair while he wretched up the feeble bit of broth.
The sun went down and the room filled with shadows. She passed through the cabin to make sure the doors and windows were locked (something she did every night now, since the coyotes on the road) and switched on a few lamps as she went by.
Somehow she remembered to eat, a peanut butter sandwich with the last of her bread and a can of vegetable soup. A weird combo, but none of it tasted like anything anyway. She just needed the calories to keep going.
She had no tears. Not anymore. They were useless, a waste of time and energy. She replaced his bandage with a fresh one, and it seemed maybe, maybe the wound looked a little less red. Calmer. She added her honey poultice to the new bandage and murmured the song. He didn't wake this time. She pressed the cloth to his forehead and closed her eyes. Her chin fell to her chest and she trembled.
"You're not going to die," she signed. "I'm not going to let you."
Outside she heard the call of an owl amidst the cry of summertime insects. "Please," she said, "God or whoever might be listening, help me. I made a promise. Please."
Feeling almost feverish herself with pure exhaustion, she rounded the bed and collapsed next to him. Suddenly, like sinking into water, she fell into a deep, restless sleep.
She dreamt again, as always, of the cornfield. Searching for Nick. Always fucking searching. This time his voice was faint and weak; the crows' raucous cries were far louder. She tried to see over the corn, but of course it was too tall.
The sky above rumbled its ominous warning and she felt like sobbing with frustration.
A crow flew overhead. She followed its path with her eyes, even jumped to see above the corn, and in the near distance she saw an entire murder of them circling something, like vultures. Another leap and another glimpse: now and then one would separate from the group and dive.
"Fuck," she breathed. "Oh fuck!" She shoved her way through the corn now, heedless of the leaves' razor-sharp edges. She felt their sting, but it seemed far away, and even the warm trickles of blood that started down her arms and legs were as nothing to her.
Finally she burst through the last row between herself and whatever held the crows so fascinated. It was, as she'd feared, Nick: his long, lean form sprawled on the ground, sick and feverish. Crows swooped and dove; a few of them landed on him; and rats inched in ever closer from the corn.
"Go!" she cried, rushing toward him. "Get! He's not dead! Fuck off!" She waved her arms at the birds and kicked her feet at the rats. "You can't have him! You can't!"
Once they were finally gone—the rats sullenly, like stubborn old men—she dropped down beside Nick and patted across his chest. Wiped the blood from rats' nasty teeth and crows' vicious beaks off his arms and face. He was breathing, and his skin was so hot she was surprised the corn he was lying on didn't start popping.
She tugged his upper half into her lap, cradling his head in her arms and stroking his face. "You're not going to die," she said, low and fierce. "Do you understand me?! I told you that when you were awake, but your eyes weren't open. But I know you can hear me here, and you are not going to die! I always keep my promises, Nick. Always."
His good eyelid fluttered, but otherwise he didn't move. She let out a soul-deep groan of fury and glared up at the sky. The sun was there, big and bright and merciless, even as clouds crept closer.
"You chose him!" she screamed at it. "Didn't you!? Isn't that what Mother Abagail meant?! You chose us both! What's this survival of the fittest bullshit?! You fucking chose him and you're not going to let him die now!"
Silence, and the distant call of birds, was her only answer. Her chin dropped to her chest and she didn't bother to wipe away the tears that ran down her cheeks and dripped onto his forehead.
"Please," she whispered. "Please, don't let him die. He's the good one here. He's the one who deserves it. Not me. Not me."
The day around her darkened, the temperature noticeably chilled, and in her arms Nick shivered. She held him tighter and ignored the rippling sound of someone or something approaching through the corn. Darkness and fear and the force of her fury somehow made flesh.
"Well!" a voice said. He chuckled. "Look what we have here. A real-life Pietà. How sweet."
She squeezed her eyes shut. "Go away," she said. "We don't need you here."
"Don't you?" he said, voice filled with pity that stung like thorns.
She watched dusty, worn down cowboy boots approach before they stopped and the speaker knelt beside them. Reluctantly, like her neck was on rusted hinges, she raised her head to look at him. Then blinked.
He looked—normal. Blond, blue-eyed, hair a little too long and beard a little too scruffy, but otherwise…like just some guy. Some random guy who'd make a pass at you in a bar or who would come into the restaurant for supper and bitch about the French menu.
"What?" he said. "You were expecting the boogie man?" He gave an easy shrug full of lazy bonhomie. "I'm just a guy, Eden. Or—you go by Edie, right?" He tilted his head back and forth as though thinking it over. "Maybe I'll stick with Eden. Brings back some fond memories." He winked at her and pushed himself upright.
"Anyway, from where I'm standing, you really could use somebody's help." He raised his arms and turned in a slow circle. "Hello!?" he called. "Anyone out there? Hey! Dying man here! Hellooo!"
His face scrunched in sympathy and he knelt again. "Nothin', kiddo. Deafening silence." Another brief shrug. "That's just how He operates. Not like me. I'm a man of the people. Really like to get down among the hoi polloi. That's the—"
"I know what the hoi polloi are," she said through gritted teeth. "I'm not interested in your sales pitch, either."
"Come on, you haven't even heard it yet! It's a good one, Edie. One of my best, and it's a limited-time offer."
She glared at him, but his grin only widened.
"You gotta ditch the dummy, kid," he said. "He's not long for this world and you've got miles to go before you sleep."
"Do not call him that!" she snarled.
"Okay, okay." He lifted his hands in a placating gesture. "Insensitive of me, I apologize. Edie, listen." He lowered his hand and when his fingers spread there was a black stone cradled in his palm. Somewhere in its depths a red spark glistened, like a winking eye. Somehow the fire trapped inside it just made the whole thing seem colder and more awful, and she looked away.
"I don't make offers like this to just anyone, Edie," he said. His voice turned low, intimate, like a croon. She shut her eyes and rested her cheek on Nick's burning forehead. "Ditch your friend here and come with me. I'll make you a queen over a new Eden, a true Eden. You'll be free. Isn't that what you've always wanted?"
"A queen," she said, without opening her eyes or lifting her head. "Whose queen? Yours?"
He made a low, regretful noise. "Alas, no. I already have my queen. You're…ah…not suitable for that position. Not quite Liz the First if you get my drift."
Now she did look at him, an incredulous glare. "You mean because I'm not a virgin?!"
"I'm old-fashioned that way," he said.
She rolled her eyes. "Just fuck off, whoever the fuck you are. I'm not letting Nick die, no matter what you're offering."
He sighed and stood again. "I've been rude, Edie, and you're right to call me on it. I never actually introduced myself."
"Let me guess," she said, sweetly. "You're a man of wealth and taste."
He threw back his head and laughed long and loud. She shuddered at the sound. "I do like you, kiddo! Taste, yes; wealth, nah. Man of the people, remember?"
He knelt again, and he was beginning to remind her of a jack-in-the-box. "Name's Flagg. Randall Flagg. That's two L's and two G's, and a whole lotta soul."
"Do you find that this schtick usually works on people?"
"What can I say? I like the soft sell. Look, in that spirit, I'm prepared to negotiate. You're attached to this kid; I get it. We all get attached sometimes. Take me, for example. People keep telling me you're one of hers, but I say no, no. Not my Eden." He leaned in closer; lowered his voice to a whisper. "Not you, Edie. You're mine. And you know exactly why."
He sat back. "Not just you, though! Trashcan Man. Too unstable. Just kill him and get it over with." He waved a dismissive hand. "But I hate waste, don't you? So few humans left on this planet, it seems a shame to burn the ones who could be loyal and devoted and useful."
"I literally have no idea what you're talking about."
"Of course you do, my dear. At least the part about you. But we'll play the innocent game if you want. Now, as for my offer: the kid here doesn't die. Doesn't even lose his eye. Not only that! I'll give him what he never had: ears to hear and a voice to speak. All you have to do is walk away." He held out the stone again. "Come with me, be a queen over a new world, and forget the old woman. Forget the deaf-mute. He won't even be a deaf-mute anymore! He won't need you, and neither will she.
"It doesn't have to be this way, Edie," he said, soft and coaxing. "It doesn't have to be such a struggle. You don't have to be afraid anymore, or worried. Just say yes, worship me, and rule."
Nick stirred in her arms and made a quiet sound of distress. His face was scrunched with effort, and as she watched, his good eye opened to pin her with a long, steady glare. It still burned fever-bright, but she knew what she saw there, and it gave her the strength she needed to do what she did next.
She raised her head to meet Flagg's vivid blue eyes. "I don't want any deals," she said. "Nick doesn't want any deals. We don't want you."
"It's not about him, Edie. He's just baggage."
"Fuck off!" she screamed directly into his face. "Go away! Take your crows and your idiotic thunder and your fucking rats and fuck the fuck off! Oh, and enough with the goddamn coyotes. Your point has been made!"
He gave a sorrowful shake of his head and rose to his feet on a long, long sigh. She swallowed back her fear and let her eyes move up, up, up to his face towering high above her. The sky was nearly black, but a single beam of sunlight cracked the cloud cover and fell across her face like a warm caress.
"So it's a no, then?" he said.
"Go away! No to your deal, no to any deal, no to every fucking deal!"
He grinned, more a leer, and his teeth flashed blinding white. His eyes seemed to glow red like the spark at the heart of that stone he offered her, but she didn't look away. "Call me when you change your mind," he said. "When they see through you. When they find out what you did. I'll be here, Edie. I'll always be here for you."
She snarled like a wild animal and suddenly he was gone. The air lightened and the dust settled and liquid sunlight poured in golden and soft to replace it. She trembled all over and when she looked down at Nick he'd passed out again. But he seemed calmer somehow. Easier. The groove between his brows wasn't as deep, and she ran her thumb over it to soothe it further. Down the long, straight line of his nose and across the healing cut on his cheek.
"Wake up, Nicky," she said. "Please, wake up."
Nick had no idea how long he'd been fighting the infection, or how many times he slipped into unconsciousness to find himself in that same Nebraska cornfield. It seemed like weeks of running, always running, trying to stay ahead of the darkness that chased him. He called out for Kai, but her voice was so faint and far away he thought he'd never find her.
He was so tired that the word had lost all meaning. He just wanted to rest. To sit down and let the darkness come, because at this point what was the worst it could do? He'd already lost an eye, and his leg burned like it was stuffed with hot coals. A one-legged, one-eyed deaf mute. It was like something out of a Dickens story.
And so he stopped. He stopped searching for Kai and he stopped trying to outrun the hollow sound of worn-down boot heels. He turned toward the thunder and he dropped to the ground. Pulled his knees up and let his hands dangle between them. He waited.
It didn't take long.
The corn parted and a man strolled into the clearing. That's all he was: a man. He wore dusty jeans and worn cowboy boots and a jean jacket with buttons on it. One was a big yellow smiley face. Nick blinked. He hadn't expected the Dark Man to have a mullet.
"Well there ya are!" he said with a wide, wide grin. He sat down across from Nick and crossed his legs. "Nick Andros. We meet at last. How the hell are ya, buddy?"
Nick lifted a brow and said nothing.
"Silent type, huh? I get it. Pretty sure you can talk here, though." He paused. His blue eyes twinkled with mirth. "Maybe you just don't feel like it. I heard you've been under the weather lately. Not the flu, what a break! But bad enough. Bad enough to do the trick."
His mouth moved in a slow, sardonic smile. "She made me a promise," he said.
"That's true. But women, right? Can you really trust them to keep their promises? They're so…flighty."
Casual misogyny. How gauche. Nick fought the urge to yawn.
"No, no"—he lifted his hands as though conceding a point—"she's different. You're right. Look like the innocent flower, but be the serpent under it."
Nick snorted. "She's hardly Lady MacBeth, and I'm pretty sure she wouldn't like to hear how she's not like other girls." His eyes narrowed. "What do they call you, anyway? I don't mean all the stupid nicknames. I mean for real."
He grinned again. "Oh, well, that's easy! Name's Randall Flagg, two L's and two G's. I'd offer to shake your hand, but I have a feeling you'd say no. Then I'd get offended, and you'd be upset when I burned your eyes from your sockets. A whole big thing we can just avoid, don't you think?"
"Sounds like a plan." He let his knees fall so that he mirrored Flagg's posture. "Can you hurt me here?"
"Eh." He wagged his hand in a maybe gesture. "Not directly. But I can do things that would make you want to hurt yourself."
Nick made a low, thoughtful noise. "Is that why you're here?"
"No!" He looked wounded. "Gosh, Nick, no! I'm here because I'd like us to be friends. Good friends. The type of friends who share things." His lips curved in another of those too-wide grins. "Women, maybe."
He blinked. "I'm sorry?"
Flagg let out a brief, impatient sigh. "I'm talking about Edie, of course. You could have her. No questions asked, no tedious courtship rituals. Just her, all yours."
"I thought you said you wanted to share."
"Ahh, well, that's negotiable. I'm not so much interested in having her in my bed as just having her. And you, of course."
He leaned closer. Around them the air chilled, and the day darkened. Nick pretended not to notice and didn't take his eyes from Flagg's face. "She is a stubborn woman, Nick. I know the type. You have to listen to them, all the time, to even have a chance of getting into their panties. It's exhausting. I'm offering you a shortcut. Everything you want, without all the work."
Nick frowned. Shifted on the hard ground and took a moment to enjoy the sound of the wind in the stalks. Finally he lifted his hands in a shrug. "Nah," he said.
Flagg sat back, stung. "Nah? That's what you have to say to me?! Just nah?!"
He scrubbed a hand back through his hair and huffed out a laugh. "You really think I want her like that? Some kind of weird-ass slave? All meek and cowed and quiet?" He shook his head in amused disbelief. "She's named after the fucking ocean, and you're offering me a goddamn puddle. So, yeah. Nah."
Flagg stared at him, and for a moment his eyes flared red and his entire face seemed to contort and change into something horrific, so terrible that Nick's mind blanked, but then his expression stilled and he burst out laughing. "Oh, Nick!" He wagged his finger at him like he would at a naughty child. "You're right! What was I thinking? What's the point of wasting all that money on the pure bred filly if you just break her spirit?!"
Nick wrinkled his nose in distaste. "Not exactly what I meant, but sure."
"Okay, all right, let's get down to brass tacks, you and me." Flagg pushed to his feet and glared down at Nick from what seemed like much too far away. "I want to place you high in my council, Nicholas. I want your voice to be my voice. All those people, the ones like Ray Booth and Billy Warner, will cower at the sound of it. They will beg you for mercy and you will decide if they are worthy of it. If you want her at your side you can have her, on whatever terms you want. You can have your voice, your ears, and both your eyes. The power, the woman, and everything you've ever wanted."
Nick craned his head back to see Flagg's face. His eyes burned and crows circled and cawed overhead. The sky was nearly pitch black. "What do I have to do?" he said. "Sign on the dotted line?"
"Don't be silly. I'm a laid-back kinda demigod. Your word is good enough for me. Your word that you'll put no one else before me. That you'll fall to your knees and worship me. That you'll devote yourself to me and me alone. Such a tiny request for so much in return."
Nick swallowed hard. The ground shook beneath him and he nearly toppled when he tried to stand. Mother Abagail would want him to say no. Kai would say no, laugh and throw his offer back in his face like so much bullshit.
"She's not who you think she is!" Flagg said. He had to shout to be heard over the sudden howl of the wind.
"I know who she is," he said with a scowl.
"Do you?" He smirked and spread his hands like a magician revealing his trick. "So she's told you, then? Her big, bad secret?"
Nick clenched his hands so hard his nails bit into his palms. The pain grounded him. He shoved his hair back where the wind whipped it into his eyes and shook his head. "My answer is no. I don't want power, I don't want her—not the way you're offering her—and I have my voice. Rudy Sparkman gave it to me, and it would take someone a whole lot bigger and badder than you to take it away."
He turned and pushed his way into the corn despite the tremors and the gale and the lightning that threatened to split the sky in two. He was done here. He had to find Kai, and he had to wake the fuck up, because she had a promise to keep.
"Nick!" Flagg cried from behind him. "I'll be here when you change your mind. Ask her! Ask her what she did!"
Nick didn't turn. He reached back, lifted his middle finger, and held it steady until he was swallowed by the corn.
i want to be very clear that Nick has no desire to be anything other than who he is. Flagg is making an offer he THINKS Nick will accept, that he THINKS Kai will accept on Nick's behalf, but he doesn't understand that not everyone's desires are as base as his, or that not everyone is unhappy with who they are. evil assumes that everyone shares its same petty smallness, and part of resisting it is proving that you're bigger than it is—something that all of Mother Abagail's people are able to do when tempted, but Flagg's ppl aren't. i say this bc i don't want y'all to think i'm playing to the "all disabled ppl secretly wish they were abled" trope, bc i'm not.