Better Off Dead: The Lily Harper Series, Book 1

by H. P. Mallory

  Bill nodded and was politely silent for a few seconds. “You know you can’t contact her, right? That sort of thing is strictly prohibited … it only leads to problems.”

  “Yes, I know,” I answered in a hushed tone, wiping my eyes again. “That’s what Jason told me.” I exhaled. “I was hoping you could put in a good word to her angel, just let her know that my mom needs extra help right now.”

  “Sure, I’ll do that as soon as we get back,” Bill said with a comforting smile.

  “You mean if we get back?”

  “We’ll get back, don’t you worry none,” he said with enthusiasm. “An’ when we do, I’ll be sure to talk to your mom’s angel.”

  “Thanks, Bill.”

  “Keep in mind, that part of our work as angels isn’t just protecting you guys but it’s also about helping you through shit times like this, so your mom’s angel prolly is already helpin’ her through it.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked hopefully.

  “Think back to when you were going through a tough time in your life. Did you ever feel like someone was there with you to help you through it?” I nodded. “Yep, that’s us,” he finished and then paused for a second. “Your mom’s angel is right there with her, baby doll. Don’t you worry.”

  “Do you think my mom knows that?”

  Bill shrugged. “It’s hard to say.” Then he grew quietly pensive. “You remember that time when you were maybe ten or so, and your mom took you to the pet store in town?” I gave him a puzzled look, wondering where this story was going, to which he just nodded and continued. “I know you’re gonna say your mom took you to the pet store lotsa times, but this time was different. You were looking at the rabbits and she went ta pick out some dog food, and while you were oohing and aahing over the bunnies, a strange man walked up and stood next to you. He was maybe thirty-five. You remember?”

  I looked at Bill, and my mouth dropped open as I recalled everything he’d just said as though it were only yesterday. “He asked me what I liked to do in my free time, and I told him I liked going to the movies.”

  Bill nodded. “And then he asked you who you go to the movies with, and you said your mom.”

  “Yep, and he said he’d like to take me to the movies sometime,” I finished for him. “He asked me to meet him in the pet store the following Saturday so he could take me to the movies.” I never had forgotten the incident, and looking back on it now, as an adult, I realized the man’s motives for what they truly were.

  Bill nodded, his face hard and angry. “You remember hearing a voice inside your head that told you to get away from him and go find your mom?”

  I nodded just as something dawned on me. “That was you?”

  He smiled widely. “That was me.” We just stared at one another as the weight of his words sunk in. When he spoke again, his voice was softer. “Whenever you find yourself in a bad situation, or feel overcome with grief, we can and do reach out, but we do it in ways that aren’t obvious. We have to be subtle.”

  “Is that why your voice in my head sounded like my own?”

  Bill just nodded and we were both silent for another few seconds. Then he added, “Your mom is gonna be fine eventually, baby doll. It will take a while because the pain is so fresh and new, but she’ll get through it. I promise you.”

  Looking down at my feet, I wiped a few more tears from my eyes, but I could honestly say that his words did make me feel better.

  ***

  “We will stoop haur fur th’ nicht,” Tallis announced, dropping his shield and backpack beside the charred trunk of a tree. We’d arrived at a clearing of sorts, maybe a ten-by-twelve-foot open space in the skeleton-tree forest.

  “Don’t you mean we’ll stop here for the day?” I corrected him. Since we’d just spent many hours walking through the forest, daytime had to be arriving soon.

  “Nae,” he said as he studied me pointedly. “Thaur is nae daytime here. Oonly dark. An’ ye moost accoostem yerself tae th’ neverendin’ darkness ur ye wilnae ken when tae sleep an’ when tae wake.”

  I swallowed hard, looking up at the black sky and realizing that was all we would see for who knew how long? Bill dropped down onto the dirt beside me, resting his back against a tree, as he stretched his short legs out in front of him. Then he crossed his ankles, wrapped his arms around himself and closed his eyes. “I’ll be takin’ a snooze if anyone needs me.”

  “Each oone ah us will tyke turns keepin’ watch while th’ oothers sleep,” Tallis started.

  “Good, I’ll volunteer to sleep first,” Bill interrupted without bothering to open his eyes.

  Tallis frowned at me, but neither of us said anything. Instead, he removed my sword from the scabbard around his shoulder and handed it to me. “Keep thess cloose tae ye at aw times.”

  Standing up, he opened the backpack and pulled out what looked like an ancient relic. It was a bow with three even more primeval arrows. After retying the backpack, he slung it behind the closest tree.

  “Where are you going?” I asked, afraid to be left alone.

  “We hae tae eat,” he answered simply. Before I could argue, he stomped off, disappearing into the line of burnt trees.

  My stomach flopped at the thought of being basically alone. I could already hear the sonorous hums of Bill snoring and had to shake my head at the fact that he was comfortable enough in this … place, that he could fall asleep so easily. But then I remembered he was an angel and couldn’t be harmed. Such was most definitely not the case for me. I sat down against the tree where Tallis left his things and pulled my knees up to my chest, fingering the blade of my sword, which lay on the ground beside me.

  All I could think about was the deathly stillness of the woods. Aside from Bill’s rhythmic snoring, there wasn’t another sound. The uncanny quiet started to undo my nerves. Was everything dead here? If so, what did Tallis plan to hunt? ’Course, Tallis knew these woods since he’d traversed them many times on his way to the Underground City, so I imagined something managed to survive in them. And it was that something that was starting to give me heart palpitations.

  I had no idea how long I sat there, frozen. My own fear crippled me and even though I could feel pins and needles starting up my legs, I couldn’t move. Hearing the sounds of footfalls on the dead tree branches covering the forest floor, I grasped my sword and hopped onto my feet. In response, the stinging pins and needles ran all the way up to my knees but I ignored the pain. Instead, I planted my feet shoulder-width apart and held the blade in striking position, ready for whatever was out there to make its presence known.

  “At ease, Lass,” Tallis’s rich baritone interrupted the thudding of my heart. I couldn’t help the inordinate sense of release that washed over me.

  I didn’t say anything but leaned my sword against the base of the tree and watched him fling something bloody and heavy beside it. I couldn’t see all of it, but what I did see looked decapitated. Tallis kneeled down and started rummaging through his backpack. I took a few steps closer to him without knowing what I was doing. It was just as if my body knew Tallis meant safety as much as my mind did, and consequently, it wanted to be close to him. With a raised brow expression, Tallis let me know he didn’t like me hovering over him.

  “Um, what can I do to help?” I asked quickly, trying to cover for basically crowding his personal space.

  “Can ye build ah fire?”

  I nodded emphatically, pleased there was something I could do to help. Acting the role of a peasant in “Middle Ages,” my medieval reenactment group, I’d managed to learn how to make a fire using nothing but wood and my bare hands.

  “Ye can build ah fire?” Tallis asked again, disbelief in his tone.

  “Yep, I can,” I answered with steely resolve, already having decided that the hand drill would be my best bet. Determined to prove myself, I searched the nearby surroundings for small sticks and something to use as tinder. The sticks were easy to find, the tinder not quite as easy. After gathering an
armful of branches and twigs for kindling, I dropped them into a pile at the base of the large opening Tallis designated as our camp. Then I started scouting the area for something flammable—something very dry that would ignite quickly and start my fire.

  “At the base ah the trees ye will fin’ deid lichen,” Tallis offered.

  “Thanks,” I muttered, irritated that he felt the need to advise me when I intended to prove myself useful in at least something. The base of the closest tree had no dead lichen or moss, so I moved to the tree where Bill lay snoring away. There was a mass of brown and fibrous-looking stuff that I assumed was the lichen. After scraping off a few handfuls of the stuff, I added it to my twigs and branches. Placing my tinder to the side, I separated my kindling from the rest of the branches and piled it into a pyramid shape. I reached for half of the dried moss, which I placed inside the kindling at various spots.

  Then came the task of finding a suitable fireboard. I scouted through the branches I’d assembled, trying to find something for my board and spindle. For the fireboard, I needed wood that was relatively soft. In “Middle Ages,” I’d passed the fire-starting test by using a juniper fireboard. With no idea what sort of trees were in this forest, I could only hope some were soft wood. I found a branch that had a relatively flat surface, then realized I needed Tallis’s help.

  “You didn’t happen to bring an axe by any chance, did you?” I asked hopefully.

  “Aye,” he answered from where he was leaning against a tree, watching me.

  “Great! Could you cleave this in half so I can use it as my fireboard?”

  “Wif pleasure, lass,” he answered. He took the branch from me before rummaging through his backpack until he found his axe.

  Using a nearby stump, he placed the broad branch down and cleaved it in half. Then he knocked off the rough side of one half, creating a nice looking plank. He handed it to me as I thanked him with a smile, and prayed the wood was soft. Pushing my fingernail into the board, I watched my nail indent it, which was exactly what I was hoping for. I glanced up at Tallis again. “Could you cut a V-shaped notch into it, please?”

  He simply nodded and did as I asked, handing it back to me with the glimmer of amusement in his eyes. I noticed he also put a small depression on the edge of the notch for my spindle. Concerning which, I still needed to find one.

  I searched through the kindling I’d collected and spotted a thin stick that was maybe two feet long. The top of it was a bit gnarled, but I could use the bottom half. My tinder close by, I pinched off a bit of it and dropped it in the groove Tallis carved for me. Placing my spindle on top of the tinder, I started spinning the stick rapidly between my palms.

  Making fire from cold sticks would be no easy feat. In “Middle Ages,” it had taken me the better part of two days and countless blisters before I even got the knack of it. And during my fire-making test, it had taken me twenty minutes before I saw the telltale wisps of smoke.

  My hands were getting raw and were beyond tired, but I continued rolling the stick between my palms. My new body included hands that were a callous-free study of beautiful skin. Well, that beautiful skin was about to get a crude lesson in survival.

  After ten or fifteen minutes, I felt like my arms were about to detach from my shoulders, they were so tired. And my palms were a lost cause. But I didn’t stop; I didn’t even pause. I just kept the momentum up, thinking about what a fire might mean for my safety. It would, undoubtedly, ward away whatever creatures lurked in this horrible place. At least, I hoped it would.

  At last, the welcome beginnings of an orangey-red glow and white smoke began to spiral up from my spindle. I knew better than to stop rolling the spindle, though, and continued until there was an actual spark, which ignited the tinder at the base of my spindle. Once that happened, I grabbed the fistful of moss I’d put to the side and added that to the flames. Gently blowing on them, I urged them to consume the lichen. The flames inhaled the tinder greedily, and pretty soon, I had a fairly large blaze going. Lightly blowing on the flames, I couldn’t stifle my elation as the tinder caught fire and the kindling began to crackle. Reaching for some smaller branches, I loaded them on top of the fire and watched in silent anticipation as the flames grew larger.

  Turning to face Tallis with a broad grin on my face, I asked, “How d’you like them apples?” I slapped my hands against my thighs victoriously before wincing at the pain.

  Tallis chuckled and moved away from the tree, approaching me. “Ah moost confess, Ah am impressed,” he answered with a hearty laugh. When he reached for my hands, I felt my heart climb up into my throat as soon as he touched me. I didn’t know what it was about him but my body definitely seemed to answer to his. ’Course, maybe that was just because he was a handsome man and I had little to no experience with handsome men or men at all, really.

  Tallis rolled my hands so my palms faced him and studied them for a moment or two. I couldn’t help looking at his forearms and noticed the gashes were completely healed. I didn’t say anything though. I knew better. Instead, I stared at my sore palms. “It’s just a few blisters. They’ll be fine in a couple of days.”

  Tallis shook his head. “Ye willnae be able tae hauld yer sword.” Taking a deep breath and releasing one of my hands, he reached into his sporran, and retrieved a blade. Thinking he meant to use it on me, I started to pull my hands away, but he held me steady. “Doonae be afraid. Ah willnae hurt ye,” he said softly, as I realized this was probably the third time he’d repeated the same words to me.

  “Then what …?” I started, but lost my voice when he sliced the blade across his palm. Blood gushed from the cut immediately. He clamped his palm down on mine, smearing his blood over my blisters. He did the same to my other hand and then closed his eyes as he muttered something in Gaelic. When he reopened them, he didn’t say anything but reached for his backpack. He pulled out a steel canister of what I assumed was water. Unscrewing the cap, he poured the water across my palms, washing away his blood along with my blisters. “They’re … they’re gone!” I exclaimed in astonishment.

  “Aye,” he answered casually.

  “Your blood … can heal?”

  He simply nodded as I reached for his hand, knowing full well that he wouldn’t like me touching him. In general, he seemed okay with contact as long as he was the initiator. I had a feeling he was a control freak and couldn’t tolerate that control being shaken. Gripping his wrist, I turned his hand around so his palm was facing me. The gash was healed. I shook my head in amazement as I dropped his hand. “What are you?” I asked in awe.

  “As ah tauld ye, Ah am ah Druid.”

  “All cowardice must needs be here extinct.”

  — Dante’s Inferno

  ELEVEN

  “Hoo did ye ken hoo tae make ah fire?” Tallis asked quickly, apparently wanting to change the course of our previous conversation, when I’d asked him what, exactly, he was. Yes, yes, yes, he’d insisted more than once that he was simply a Celtic Druid, but I wasn’t convinced. ’Course, for all I knew, maybe the Celtic Druids possessed incredible powers and he wasn’t covering up the truth … but maybe he was.

  I shrugged as my thoughts drifted back to his question about how I learned to make fire by rubbing two sticks together. “I was part of a medieval reenactment group, and in order to be accepted into the peasant league, I had to learn how to make fire.”

  Tallis studied me for a moment or two, his bushy eyebrows centered in the middle of his forehead as he frowned, obviously not comprehending me. Then he stood up and reached for the carcass he’d dumped beside the blackened stump of a tree and brought it closer. He sat down, leaning against the tree, and retrieved a blade from his sporran, wasting no time removing the dark, blood-soaked pelt of whatever was unfortunate enough to cross his path. Whatever “it” was, appeared to be the size of a basset hound, now looking like a fleshy, bloody mess.

  “Ah whoot?” he asked, eyeing me with interest, his hands covered in blood.

 
; “A medieval reenactment group. We called ourselves ‘Middle Ages.’” I directed my attention first on my fingernails, then on the sleeping Bill, and finally, the charred woods. Anything to avoid watching Tallis skin the animal. After feeling famished a half an hour ago, my hunger had long since tucked its tail between its legs and hit the road.

  Tallis cleared his throat and I brought my attention back to his face as he studied me pointedly. In his expression, I could see he still didn’t get my gist and worse, seemed to suspect I was trying to pull his leg. “Ah doona oonderstand,” he admitted finally.

  I sighed. I wasn’t really in the mood to talk about my time in Middle Ages, especially since I was practically living the real thing now. “There were a group of us, maybe sixty or so, and we acted out periods of history.”

  His frown deepened. “Ye pit oan ah play, ye mean?”

  I shook my head. “No. We actually pretended like we were living history.” Before he could interrupt me with another confused expression, I continued. “All of our costumes were hand-stitched and created from fabrics that would only have been available during the high middle ages. And each costume was tailored to whatever class we happened to be members of. Since I played the part of a merchant’s wife, I wore fabrics of higher quality wools and linens. When I played the role of a peasant, I only wore the cheapest wool available, which was scratchy, hard to clean, and usually the color of mud.”

  “Why elect tae enter th’ class ah th’ peasants oar th’ merchants?” he asked with knitted brows. “Why nae th’ kings?”

  “Well, obviously everyone wanted to enter the class of the royalty, but it wasn’t that simple. You had to work your way up, and everyone started as a lowly peasant. Then, as you mastered each rank, you would eventually enter the class of kings and queens. However, that took quite a while, as I’m sure you can imagine.”

  “Ah oonderstand,” he nodded, briefly glancing at the bloody thing in his hands before offering me his full attention again. “Prithee, coontinue.”