Para did not hear any of it. She just concentrated on taking deep breaths to calm her anger and wayward emotions. She sunk deeply into gratitude for the fact that she could fully expand her lungs again, being freed from the confines of the force field. Breathing in and out slowly and deliberately, she hugged her knees even tighter.
“Medea?” Thornton asked kindly, approaching her. “I’m really sorry that we all attacked you earlier. I’m really sorry that I attacked you. I was just so shocked to see that you were concealing so much strength. I’d like to have a word with you in private if you don’t mind.”
Para did not move or respond to any of the questions.
“I’m really curious about what the future is like!” Asher added in a cheerful tone. “What’s wrong? Are you mad at us? Look, I know I overreacted about the pickles. I’m really sorry too.”
Their voices washed over her like warm, soothing breezes. Female voices mixed in as well—mothers and grandmothers and things like that, and even curious little girls. Para dug her forehead into her knees, feeling bone against bone. Her kneecaps dug into her eyebrows, providing what would have felt like a rather nice massage if the lower part of her face had not been fractured.
“Medea, dear? We need to know why you came back from the future,” Rose said. “Also, why did you lie to us?”
“It is time to talk about things,” Gordin demanded.
“Stop it, all of you!” Amelia yelled suddenly. “Can’t you see that she's trembling? Back off. Let the poor girl have some space!” Everyone did as Amelia had commanded in her piercing but effective shout. Only Layla, after turning to her husband and handing him their baby, ventured forward, disturbed by the fact that Para was indeed shaking.
“Sweetie,” she spoke in a soft voice. “I brought those shoes you asked for.”
When there was no response, Layla fished into the purse on her shoulder and pulled out the shoes. She carefully laid them down on the stairs close to Para’s bare feet. She stood above her friend, looking down on her in concern. Para was completely unresponsive. Glancing back at the other devas, Layla fought between the need to comfort her friend and the need to maintain appearances of innocence. Screw it, she thought, something is really wrong here and it’s no time for games. Layla carefully sat down beside Para on the stairs, and gently touched one of her arms—the sinews were strained and taut with how tightly they hugged her knees. Long indigo hair fell forward around the deva woman’s bowed head, creating a protective curtain around her huddled form. Layla tenderly reached out to comb back the curtain, trying to remove the barrier between herself and her friend. She brushed the hair over Para’s shoulders.
What she saw immediately made Layla gasp and bring her hands to her face. “Oh, god! Oh my god!” Layla moaned. After the initial shock of seeing the bluish bruises in the shapes of giant handprints on her friend’s shoulders, Layla felt tears gather in her eyes, and her own hands begin to quiver. She shook her head in disbelief. She didn’t think she had ever seen such a bruise on tough deva skin. She instinctively knew that no one in the room was the cause of those bruises
“Sakra, Para—uh, Para-medic! She needs a paramedic!” Layla fumbled, clumsily covering up her slip, and running her unsteady hands over the fused girl’s shoulder to inspect her bruises. “These are definitely broken bones.”
“Are you okay, Layla?” Gordin asked in concern and confusion at his wife’s strange behavior. “We have an infirmary right here if she needs it.”
Layla swallowed. “Of course. How silly of me. I’m just freaking out. She looks pretty beat up.”
Para however, had lifted her head a few inches off her knees. Hearing her true name spoken and feeling a tender caress had startled her out of her meditative state. She lifted her eyes to look to the person who had spoken her name. Layla? Para asked telepathically, trying to sit up. She would have spoken, but her throat felt too sore.
Layla gasped again, putting a hand on her chest. “Sakra!” She reached out and pulled Para into an embrace. The bruises on her friend’s jaw and neck were even more horrible than the ones on her shoulders. Layla knew that Para could hardly feel her hug, and that it would not cause her any additional pain. The mother of three and former detective had a keen instinct which filled her mind with all the gaps in the story. It could only be left to imagine who could harm Para like this. She didn’t think her husband was strong enough to hurt Para like this. She didn’t think Gordin was strong enough to hurt the person who had hurt Para like this. This was bad.
Para gratefully accepted her friend’s embrace. Layla was stroking her hair, and she drew strength from this small show of compassion. Para took a few more deep trembling breaths, before pulling away and giving Layla a reassuring smile. She looked into Layla’s innocent, hazel-green eyes, and her heart broke at the thought of losing her along with everyone else. I will never let Zvarin harm a hair on your head, Lay. Your hair is way too pretty. Zvarin has pretty hair too, of course, but I think I would sell my soul for the opportunity to rip it all directly out of his revolting head.
“Talk to me,” Layla said softly. “Unless—I saw your neck. Are you unable to speak?”
Para swallowed, and was suddenly aware of the painfulness of swallowing. There was definitely some damage in her larynx. “I can speak. It’s good to see you,” she said, hoarsely. She could hear and feel the difference in her voice, but she just ignored it and hugged Layla harder. “Thank Sakra you’re here.”
Layla and Para did not know that the affectionate display was causing confusion in everyone around them. They knew that one of Layla’s daughters had already traveled back from the future, but Para’s skin was too fair to resemble Nyssa or Olive. Everyone was eyeing the little girls suspiciously, and comparing their appearances to Para. There might be a chance that she was one of Layla’s grandchildren. Adult Nyssa had admitted that she had a relationship with Pax’s future son.
“Sweetie, what happened to you?” Layla asked softly, giving her a knowing, understanding look. The detective woman was the only one who knew Para’s true identity. This was somehow exactly what Para needed at the moment. She glanced around at all of the people who did not know who she was, and decided to try to play it off as nothing for now. She did not want to cause a scene or get anyone worried. She just wanted to get to bed. She wanted to sleep. She wanted to forget.
“My teleportation sucks,” she croaked. She gave a small, self-deprecating smile. “That’s all.”
“What happened here?” Layla asked, reaching out and touching Para’s jaw gingerly. “As far as I heard, everyone in this room had a go at you and no one left a scratch.”
Para nodded, again trying to force a smile. “Yeah. The strongest man in the universe just wiped the floor with me.”
“What?” Thornton asked in concern, moving forward. “What happened?”
“Just a bit of a squabble with this guy,” Para said, hating the sound of her cracking voice. She waved her hand in dismissal. “He kind of—uh, crushed my shoulders, and strangled me a tiny bit. Just a tiny bit. Nothing too serious, I’m perfectly fine. These things happen.”
Layla studied her friend’s face carefully. She frowned, reading behind the lines to know that there was more Para was hiding. She had never seen Para lie or conceal information, but she knew Pax and Amara well enough to figure Para out easily. She studied the bruises a bit more, and swallowed. She could see from the imprint on Para’s neck that her adversary had only used one hand to strangle her. She noticed Para was rubbing her bruised right hand with her left.
“And your hand?” she asked.
Para grimaced, looking down shamefully. “I broke it on his face.”
“You fought with him?” Asher asked, with worry in his voice. “Did he attack you?”
She winced at the memories. She answered in a grating voice. “No. Not really. These bruises are just from him grabbing me. I don’t think he actually even meant to hurt me. It was… an accident.”
“O
h, sweetie. Your lips are bleeding, too.”
Para moved her hand up to touch her lips. She withdrew her fingers and saw a single drop of blood. She stared at it. She closed her eyes, trying to forget. She just wanted to go to bed and curl up under the blankets for days and days. She needed to just sleep and forget about Zvarin.
“What did he say to you?” Layla asked, as quietly as possible. She yearned to carry on a private conversation with Para, but she knew that deva ears would hear every word. It was pointless. “Can you tell us what he wants?”
That’s when Para broke. She looked around the room at her friends and family and saw their concerned, confused, and puzzled looks. But mostly she saw the faces of those she loved more than anything. More than life itself. She looked up at Thorn’s concerned face, and her insides just shattered.
Then I could murder them right before your eyes, one by one, starting with that little pretty boyfriend of yours, and you wouldn’t even care because you wouldn’t remember who he was! Then I would finish with those fathers of yours which are supposedly so strong, but we’ll see about that, won’t we?
She began to tremble again, and she felt wetness on her cheeks as tears slid from her eyes. Her breathing became shallow. Daddy. Thorn. Para found herself wishing she could go to them, and hug them tightly until she felt strong again. But they did not even know her.
Raymond was puzzled by the large, watering sapphire eyes which stared at him heartbrokenly. He glanced at Amelia who shared a look of confusion with him before he looked back at the distraught young girl on the stairs. “Is there something I can do to help?” Raymond asked, gently.
Para shook her head before lowering it, and wrapping her arms around herself tightly. She felt tears trickle into her lips, and they brought with them the taste of salt and Zvarin. The metallic alien taste which had lingered on her lips invaded her mouth again, catching a ride with her tears, and the revulsion caused her body to be wracked with a sob. Her shoulders moved jerkily with the sob, and she could hear and feel the crushed bones in them actually cracking. The devas in the room could also hear the noises her bones made and they glanced at each other, grimacing. She moved both of her hands across her chest to grasp her shoulders as if it would somehow ease the pains or help to keep them together.
Although her body was a mess of pains, nothing bothered her more than the fresh taste of Zvarin on her lips and tongue. He did not taste like a human or deva man. His taste was unique and memorable. It was not a bad taste, but because it was his, it was nauseating to her. It tastes a bit coppery. A bit sour and bitter, like tomatoes. The feeling of his lips and body pressed against hers came rushing back. Para suddenly turned away from Layla and placed a hand on the stairs to brace herself as she felt bile rise in her throat. She felt her body heave with nausea and she placed a hand over her mouth.
“Oh my goodness,” said Amelia softly, raising a hand to her cheek and looking on with sympathy.
Para’s crushed shoulders shook with a combination of retching and sobbing, but she managed to just barely control her stomach enough so that she did not actually vomit. The hand that had covered her mouth wiped cold sweat off her forehead before moving to clutch her turbulent, mutinous stomach.
Layla’s blood ran cold. She shuddered, watching Para combat her nausea. As far as she knew, fear of an enemy, even the most dreadful fear of the vilest enemy, did not normally result in the urge to vomit. She shut her eyes tightly as her woman’s intuition told her what type of encounter Para had just teleported in from. She was beginning to form a picture of their new enemy in her mind, and she did not like what she saw.
“Shhh,” Layla said, rubbing Para's back. “It’s going to be okay, sweetie. You’re safe now.”
“None of us are safe!” Para whispered, her voice coming out in an ugly rasp. She turned to look at her friend in the eyes, her pained, deep blue irises meeting Layla’s clear hazel ones.
“Can you tell me what he said to you?” Layla asked softly.
Para shook her head violently, and she placed her hands over her ears as though she could still hear Zvarin’s speaking. “No. No.”
Layla sighed, and reached out to hug her friend again. Para buried her face into Layla’s shoulder and sobbed against her. “Sweetie,” Layla said, rubbing Para’s bruised shoulder. She was careful not to use her real name again although she wanted to in order to properly console her. In truth, Layla was terrified to see her friend—her two powerful friends—crying like this. She could feel the hopelessness that Para felt. This wasn’t petty—this wasn’t about Thornton or Asher. The girls didn’t cry over the boys, they got even.
This was about war. This was about the enemy that Gordin had been worrying about so much that he had been unable to sleep. This was Asura business. Layla’s daughters, Nyssa and Olive, moved closer curiously, watching their mother hold this strange woman they had never seen before.
“How bad is it?” Layla asked softly. She knew everyone could hear her. It was impossible, trying to have a private conversation like this—every word would have to have a double meaning.
“It’s horrible. It’s so horrible, Lay. I can’t defeat him. No one can.”
“Defeat who? What do you know? How strong is he?” Gordin asked aggressively. “Who is—”
Layla held up a finger and shot a firm look at her husband, silencing him. She returned the hand to its previous occupation of soothing Para, and asserted, “There’s always a way. We’ll get through this. We always have. Gordin’s been training—”
“It won’t be enough. Nothing will be enough,” Para pulled away from her friend and smashed her fist into the staircase, feeling it crumble beneath her hand. “I’m useless! I trained so hard and I couldn’t even move. He has this—this mind technique. It puts a force field around me. How can I fight if I can’t even move?”
“Mommy?” Nyssa asked, sucking on her thumb. “Why is the Cinderella princess crying?”
Layla and Para looked at Nyssa in surprise. Para looked down at her ruined ball-gown and thought about how ridiculous she looked. And I nearly vomited in my Cinderella dress. Real classy!
“I read them that story last night,” Layla explained with a small smile.
“And she still didn’t try on the glass slippers,” Olive pointed out.
Para noticed the silver shoes beside her feet for the first time. It felt so preposterous now, to care about footwear. She forced herself to smile at Nyssa and Olive, and obediently slipped her feet into the silver shoes that Layla had brought for her.
“See, girls? They’re a perfect fit!”
“Yaaaay!” shouted Nyssa cheerfully. “That means you get to marry the prince!”
Para’s smile disappeared. She shivered. She slowly looked around the room, making eye contact with everyone. Her face became deathly serious.
“So why were you crying, Cinderelly?” Nyssa asked again.
“There’s a really big monster out there, Nyssa.”
“Is he very strong?”
“Very.”
“Can my daddy beat him?”
Para looked up at Gordin, who was nervously holding Oren and watching her. She didn’t have the heart to tell Nyssa that her father wouldn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell. Para swallowed, and restraining herself from being overpowered by another onslaught of agony, she simply nodded. “Sure. If your daddy trains a lot, he should be able to beat him.”
“I’ll train too,” Nyssa said enthusiastically. “I’ll practice magick with my sister and we’ll be ready to fight the monster too!”
Para glanced at Olive. The slightly older girl wore a grave expression on her face. It snapped Para back to full awareness of the situation. This was a war council, and she was the only one with information. And she was crying and whimpering like a little girl, probably not because Zvarin was impossibly powerful and intended to kill everyone she loved, but because her pride had been damaged from being almost-raped. Get it together, Para. Get it together. She realized t
hat it had almost been lucky that she had accidentally teleported to Zvora. Now she did have information she could tell the devas, and she could pretend that it came from knowledge of the future.
“Okay. I’m going to be the first to state the obvious,” Thornton said, a little bit angrily. “Layla, you know who she is?”
Layla shrugged. “Yeah. Of course I do. If you want to know the truth, your mother hired me to investigate Medea when you began dating her.”
“She did wha—” Thornton began to speak, but he just shook his head and decided to keep quiet.
“I found a few things that didn’t add up—for example, Medea had no past at all up until a few weeks ago. I confronted her personally, and she came clean with me.”
Layla sent Para a private look that said “I’ve got your back!” before turning to the others and continuing. “She told me she was from the future, and that she was here to monitor a potential threat to Earth. She said she didn’t want to alarm anyone before it was absolutely necessary. I helped her to fake a current driver’s license that gave her a more reasonable birth date, and helped her to get a place to stay. She’s one of us, and she’s here to help us.”
Everyone around seemed to be processing this information. Everyone seemed to be accepting and believing it for the first time. Para looked at her friend appreciatively for corroborating the absurd story and conspiring with her as always. The lies seemed so small and foolish now that there was real danger at hand, but she could not exactly back out of them.
Meanwhile, Layla gazed at the ballroom clock, a little bit confused about how long was left in Para’s merger and how much time had passed. She did not understand why her friend did not seem to be worried about separating.
“Let me get this straight,” Vincent spoke, very carefully and angrily as he glared at Para. He held out an accusing finger, pointing at Layla. “You went to her? You needed to confide in someone about this omnipotent threat to the planet, and you went to this weakling human? What can she do? What does she know about fighting? You’re supposed to go to the leader of the devas! Someone with power, seniority, and authority! If you have information on the Asura, you take it up with the king of gods.”
Thirty Minutes to Heartbreak Box Set (Books 1-3) Page 94
