by Penny Knight
I give my whole existence to serve the cause. I deal with greed and depravity. The ever-suffocating lust for power that turns men and women into worse monsters than the stories of the Hydra and the good old fashioned Cyclops I heard when I was a child.
Living the same cycle of reign and terror with moments of idyllic peace.
And here I am.
I rip the wall length door off the large refrigerator and throw it across the room. I know I have broken a lot of much needed equipment. I will make sure I fund another ten of them.
We found her blood type before I left, and I take three bags, flying at breakneck speeds back to the apartment. Not worried about detection, too fast to be seen.
Broderick is still outside the door.
"They haven't moved her yet," he says.
I give him the blood. "Give it to the nurses to get ready." Walking past him, I take my helmet off. Then open the door.
"Just in time," the doctor says. "She has slipped into a coma, but she's hanging in there."
Elita is limp but peaceful in sleep.
For my sanity, I avert my eyes. The sight burned into my soul. This I'm used to. I have been by her side waiting for her to recover already too many fucking times.
"Where is my son?" I ask the doctor.
The kid is gone.
"Waiting in her room, the incubator has just arrived downstairs and will be set up soon."
This has my attention. "The baby is premature and underdeveloped?"
This is it. The fruits of Gaia, just like the Oracle said. He needs to eat from the tree of life in our realm.
Therefore, I need to take him. For his safety but also so he can survive. The incubator will have to do for now until she wakes.
She has to wake.
"I have the blood."
"Good, now pick her up and let's get her set up for the transfusion." The doctor motions for me to make quick work of it. A nurse walks with me, pushing the machines and helping her to stay with us.
I lay her gently on the bed and cover her with the linen quilt.
I stand against the wall and watch, as the first bag of blood filters through.
Then another.
Still, she does not wake.
Hours pass, and she does not wake. I don't move. Not even to lay eyes on our son again.
We will have our time.
Elita will not have hers. For the oracle's words are as true as the night falls.
They both will die if, upon birth, he is not brought to where the fruits of Gaia herself are rife.
Our realm, where the Immortals are free to be out of the shadows.
The longer I stay, the less chance our son will survive. I know I'm already cutting it close. This is not what I had agreed to.
She will not forgive me this time.
I want to tell her the truth. To wait for her to wake, so she can understand. But after all this, how could she let him go? How could I ask that of her?
She lost a child, and she will have to say goodbye to another.
And live with that.
She can't.
Not the woman that I have come to respect and love. There is only one way she can survive this pain.
She needs hate. She needs to hate me to live with what happened. I will take this decision from her. I will give her the strength she needs to get stronger.
And my penance.
I stand.
She will never be mine again.
I walk to her side and press my lips to hers. There is no need to whisper my sorry, nor my sentiments of love. They are fruitless.
"I will protect him." This I promise her.
With that, I stand and don't look back. Leaving her to wake, alone and childless.
The baby has been placed in her room. Set up with all the equipment to help develop a premature baby.
I stand before the plastic incubator at the future King of the Immortalies.
How lucky he is to have the blood of the woman who birthed him. He will rule with strength and courage.
"Is it time?" Broderick comes to stand by my side.
I swallow the lump that forms. "Keep her safe. But let her live free." I squeeze his shoulder. "What we went over? Make sure it happens, and only if her life is in danger, intervene. Give her, her life back."
The one that I took.
"It won't be long. You can explain when you're back," he reminds me.
"What road back would end with me getting the girl?" I laugh at the irony, I thought finally I had found my peace in this existence of repeated war and loss.
Broderick stays silent.
I lift the lid, and with careful hands lift my boy out. The warmth of his body, that lay comfortable under the warm lights, fades.
I nuzzle him to my chest and make a promise.
"She will live in the stories I will tell you."
I kiss his tiny forehead.
TWO WEEKS LATER
The crisp grass tickles my feet running barefoot across the field. Anna laughing loudly while I fetch the darn frisbee.
My throw turns it, making it just propel back to my face. I duck and barely escape without it making contact.
Apparently, that makes my beautiful girl laugh.
“How did you even get this thing, anyway?” I say, scooping it up.
I jog back to my position to try my throw again.
“Dad gave it to me.” I freeze mid throw.
“Oh.” I know Leo comes to see her. She’s told me before. Sometimes when I close my eyes, wanting to see her again. It’s blocked, and I can’t get through. Those nights, I’m forced to relive my nightmares. I know it’s him here with her.
Most of the time, though, I get to see her.
If I could, I would stay here forever.
I continue with my throw. He will not plague me here. Not when I know I will be awake soon.
This trip has been long.
She almost catches it. Not because she can’t, but because I suck at throwing the frisbee. It’s not like me and Franziska, were out tossing a few around when I was a kid.
I laugh at the thought.
Then the familiar sting of troubles unresolved follow.
I push it away and stay in my heaven. Just a little longer.
Once she picks up the frisbee, she plops herself on the grass. “I’m pooped.”
I chuckle, jogging to lie beside her. Putting my hands behind my head, I look up to the thick white clouds.
“If you are always here, how can you be living back there?” she asks. Her head brings shade from the sun, outlining her silhouette.
A perfect picture. One I’d take if we were in real life with a camera. Keep it forever, beside me.
Anna has answered her own question. How can I live over there? It’s rhetorical, as the answer is obvious.
I can’t.
I wanted nothing more than my normal life back. My weak wants and needs of success and money. What I thought was safe and stable.
I have that now.
Thanks to the bankroll Leo gave me, for services rendered. The money he deposited in my account. Familiar fire burns, anger boils. The white clouds darken and swirl, wanting to dance together.
“Mummy,” I hear her calming voice.
“I like it here.” I smile up at her. She eases the darkness away, something that doesn’t happen when I’m in that world. The tension in the clouds simmer and dance away. Only here can I feel like this. “What? Don’t you want me around?” I tease.
When she giggles, it fills the emptiness. “I do. But you can’t do this forever.”
She’s broached the subject a couple of times now. Every time she says it, I find it hard to understand why not.
Why stay there when the anger and pain is debilitating?
“It isn’t over Mommy.” Those four words have me sitting up, her voice distant, her gaze over the rusting fence. “But you have to be ready for when it comes.” Her sad smile shatters my heart. “You are not ready Mommy.”
> I can’t argue with that. I have barely bathed for the last few weeks, let alone even talk if I didn’t have to.
I am not ready for anything.
“Ready for what?” I say, knowing this is what will make her happy.
She lifts my hand. “For anything.” Her eyes twinkle, “For everything. We have forever here.”
I look around this field of ours and nod. This is ours and it feels like forever.
“But he will need you, too.” My head snaps back to her.
“I’m sure Daddy has enough help, there isn’t anything he would need me for,” I say, and her smile falters. Instant regret slams me. How do I control the anger I feel when the thought of him is in my head?
“Not Daddy.” Her words silence me.
Does she mean?
“Nate might need you, too. Someday.” Nate? She calls him Nate.
“Why do you call him Nate?” My voice is barely audible to even me.
“He likes it.” I blink and the tear rolls down my jaw to my neck.
“You see him?” My son, Nathaniel. I know his name. Broderick had asked me to name him. Right after I was told he was gone.
I said Nathaniel.
For Topher Nathaniel Palmer.
“Yes,” she fiddles with the grass. She’s nervous and uncomfortable, and it’s because she knows I’m in pain. Something a child shouldn’t need to know about their mother.
In the real world or in a dream world.
“I don’t know how to get ready.”
This has her hands off the grass and bouncing in her lap. “I do.”
“Well, let’s hear it then smarty pants.”
She places her hands on my head and I see a clear path of where I am to go. Once again giving me what I need to move forward. This time, answers. And no excruciating pain.
The screeching violin pierces my thumping head. My hand flies to find a pillow to cover my ears, knocking over a small plastic container with my sleeping pills inside.
The lid pops off when it hits the floor and a measly two fall out.
Two, that’s it.
How did I go through so many?
My head pounds in a familiar way. My eyes are heavy and my mouth furry and sticky.
Throwing the covers off, I’m surprised that there isn’t much physical pain left. Well, with the amount of sleep I have been getting, I should be better than new.
Another off keynote pierces my skull.
I vaguely remember talks about Topher learning an instrument while we’re here.
Livvy offered us a place to stay. She has a rental off Great Ocean Road. Cliffside with ocean views. More importantly, not many people.
Topher didn’t even complain. But he did decide to buy a violin and use this time to his so-called advantage. Again. Lucky those little pills send me back to where I feel something. Anything. Anywhere but this pit of darkness.
And this is where it starts. Sitting hunched on the side of the bed. Three seconds into my day. Even then, I know it’s going to be too much.
That’s why I am down to two little pills.
Not today.
This time I lunge forward and stride towards the blinds. With both hands I let the stark sun burst into the room, momentarily blinding me.
The first thing I need is a drink. If I stand in the hot water now, I might faint. The fog in my head needs to be cleared.
I pick up the white robe that lay thrown on the floor and wrap it around me.
As I walk towards the kitchen, the sounds of the violin get louder and louder. And worse and worse. He still definitely needs a lot of practice.
I walk in as he is bowing.
“That was terrible,” Livvy says.
“And loud,” I add.
Both turn and stand abruptly.
“You’re up!” Livvy claps.
“How can I not be with the sound of tortured hyenas screaming in my ears?”
Topher laughs putting down his violin. “Oh, there she is, the bright and bubbly Miss Sunshine everybody.”
Despite the pile up of shit that life has been thrown at me, a smile touches my lips.
He will always be my home, too.
“How are you feeling today?” Livvy hops up on the barstool, resting her chin on her elbows.
“I feel like crap right now.” I reach for the aspirin to help with my headache but decide maybe just do this the old-fashioned way for a while.
I pour another glass of water.
“Do you want me to whip you up a nice brew?”
A magic brew?
“I’ll be ok. Just water for now. And maybe a walk a bit later.” This necklace is still weighing heavy on my chest, I’m not adding more magic inside me I will need to overcome. Which reminds me.
“Where is your computer?” I ask Topher. Surely it wouldn’t be too far away.
He clicks and points behind me. It lies on the kitchen bench, charging. I go straight to it and open the lid, switching the user I log in with.
“Whatcha doing?” Topher shuffles over to me as he peeks over my shoulder. “You have been hibernating like a bear for two weeks now. And suddenly you have an urge to-” Once my browser hits the airline site he stops talking.
I type my destination. Indonesia, Bali.
“Hell yeah, I am in!” he claps. “We need a god damn real holiday.”
He cheers, and he’s right. We do need a holiday and he will have the best one ever. But that’s not why I’m going.
I don’t tell Topher yet. He can have this happiness now. I look over my shoulder at Liv. “You in?” I ask.
She bites her lip. “I have school starting next week.”
I nod in understanding and purchase the two non-return tickets to Indonesia.
Not knowing what is in store for me. Or if I will ever see Nathaniel in my life. There’s only one thing I do know. Anna’s vision she put in my head.
One of me and the person who is going to help me recover. And that happens in Bali.
Nothing will stop me now.
If at any time he needs me, I will be ready. I won’t rely on the help of magic, or the skills of others.
I have a power and will learn how to use it. I won’t let this kill me. I will survive and I will thrive.
The world I wanted back more than anything is lifeless and reeks of death. If that means stepping into unknown dangers again, so be it, it’s not over for me.
This is the beginning of my story.
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UK
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Dedication
Thankyou, Renee and Julie.
Without your support this wouldn’t have been possible
And to my own chosen one,
my daughter.
Published by Knight Falls Media 2021
Copyright © 2020 by Penny Knight
ISBN - 978-0-6450308-0-8 (ebook)
ISBN - 978-0-6450308-1-5 (paperback)
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.
