Midheaven (Ascendant Trilogy Book 2)

by Rebecca Taylor

  But I wasn’t that woman. Those weren’t things I wanted. Not yet anyway. Right now I was little more than a girl who hardly knew anything about her own life, never mind the mysteries of the world.

  I heard the door slide open behind me. Sophie, groggy eyed and blinking, pushed her head out the door. “Whatcha doing out here?” she whispered. A red crease from her pillow case ran from her forehead, across her eye and down her cheek, evidence that she had been exhausted and hardly moved throughout the night.

  I reached for her hand and pulled her outside with me, “Just thinking. Admiring the view,” I nodded to Mount Emei in the distance. “Imagining getting to the top of that.”

  “Ugh,” she sighed. With her arms crossed, she pushed close to my side and leaned her head on my shoulder. “Is there some sort of trolley…maybe a tram?” she asked hopefully.

  “Maybe,” I smiled. “But I doubt it.”

  Inside, I heard the pulsing ring of Aaron’s cell phone. Sophie and I exchanged a look, then turned to head back inside. On the other side of the curtain, Aaron was fumbling to pull himself from the depths of a dead sleep. I could see the confused expression on his face as his mind tried to figure out what exactly that noise was.

  “Here double oh seven,” I said reaching for his phone on the high dresser. “Let me help you.” I held the phone out for him.

  Behind me, Sophie didn’t even bother to cover her burst of laughter. Aaron gave me a crusty look and snatched the phone from my hand.

  “What’s up,” Caleb asked. Propped on his elbow, he ran a hand through his disheveled hair.

  “Our secret service man is taking a call,” Sophie laughed.

  I smiled, but when I turned back to pay attention to Aaron’s conversation, all the humor drained from my body. Aaron listened to the person on the other end and I watched the shock move across his features until his face had gone white. His eyes looked up and locked onto mine, “I understand,” he said and hung up the phone.

  “What’s happened?” I asked.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  China

  Aaron sat on the bed in his wrinkled T-shirt, the phone lying dead in his hands—not answering my question. I stood, waiting for his response, watching for some clue that would tell me who said what to him and why he wasn’t telling me.

  Moments crawled by until I couldn’t take it any more. “Aaron, what is it? Tell me what is wrong.”

  “They don’t want me to tell you.”

  “Who? Tell me what?” What the hell had happened? “I don’t care what anyone told you…tell me right—”

  “Franzen,” Aaron’s voice rose over mine. “It’s Franzen. He’s dead. Franzen died yesterday morning.”

  I sat down on the bed behind me. It wasn’t possible. Franzen couldn’t be dead. “My mother,” I whispered. “She’ll be devastated…and Grace,” I suddenly thought.

  Aaron closed his eyes. There was more, more he wasn’t telling me. “What? What else?”

  “Your mother’s been taken. When the news spread that Franzen had died, the people hiding her panicked and blew their cover. Your mother was abducted, in broad daylight, right off a street in Venice. Your uncle is certain Emerick is behind it.”

  “Where is she?”

  “He doesn’t know. He’s waiting to see what Emerick wants, but he’s pretty sure he already knows.”

  “Me,” I breathed. “He wants me and the puzzle and all the keys we have so far.”

  “That’s why he didn’t want me to tell you. He thinks you’ll want to stop getting the keys and rush back to England.”

  “Of course I do. Of course we have to go back. The authorities, has anyone reported him to the police, the FBI? You can’t just steal a person off the street.”

  “Charlotte, you forget that, as far as the world is concerned, your mother is dead.”

  I thought of the grave marker in the Spencer family cemetery. My uncle’s attempts to have the world and Emerick Wriothesley believe that my mother was dead, to protect her. That is until my snooping and prying had helped Emerick find the truth—my mother was very much alive and well, living with her lover and their youngest daughter in Germany. Now that Franzen was dead, Emerick would continue to use my mother, only now he would use her to get to me.

  “And besides,” Aaron continued. “Emerick Wriothesley can absolutely have a person abducted because there is no way it would ever look like it was him. It’s just another woman stolen by another man to do with what he will. It happens every day Charlotte.”

  The truth of his words made me angry. They made my own vulnerability so plain before my eyes. The inherent weakness of every girl and woman. In the end, all the brains and words in the world were no match against brute, physical force. For some reason, I thought of Hayden. “It doesn’t happen every day to me! To someone I love!” What would Emerick have done with my mother? Would he keep her safe and unharmed until I gave him what he wanted? I hauled my bag from the floor and snatched my phone and brush from the nightstand. The sooner we got home and I gave Emerick the box, the sooner I would be able to get my mother back.

  It was Sophie who dared to speak up, “What are you doing Charlotte?”

  “I’m packing Sophie, what does it look like I’m doing.”

  “Charlotte,” her voice was quiet, trying to calm. “He’s not going to take the puzzle unsolved, not without the keys.”

  Her words were like a slap. My hands fell into my bag, useless, my shoulders slumped as the tears built pressure inside my head. “What am I going to do?”

  Caleb came to my side and turned me towards him. I allowed myself to rest against his chest.

  “You’re going to have to keep going. We are.”

  “What if he is hurting her? What if she isn’t okay? It could take weeks to get the rest of the keys.”

  Caleb didn’t have a good answer, “We’re just going to have to hope.”

  Still against his chest, I reached up and wiped a stream of wet from my cheek. Hope was not enough—and I could do better than that.

  We weren’t meeting the keeper of the Buddhist key until tomorrow afternoon. When Aaron, Sophie, and Caleb decided to go into the town to find some breakfast, I asked them to bring me something back, “I just want to lie down for a while.”

  “I’ll stay with you,” Caleb said.

  “No,” I said quickly. I wouldn’t be able to do what I needed to with him in the room. “You go eat, I’ll be fine.”

  Aaron watched me with suspicious eyes for a moment, “We’ll just get something in the restaurant downstairs.” He locked the sliding glass door and pulled the curtains closed. “Don’t answer the door for anyone.”

  “I won’t.”

  “Half an hour,” he warned, and I wondered if he knew what I was going to try and do while they were gone.

  Once they were out the door with promises to bring me back whatever looked the most like western food, I shoved the coffee table from the middle of the sitting area and sat down on the bare space of floor. With my legs crossed, I sat up tall, stretching the crown of my head towards the ceiling like Mohan had shown me. Last time, Mohan had pulled me into the astral plane, I didn’t know if I would be able to return all on my own. What if I couldn’t get myself back to that strange place?

  What if I did?

  The thought of going alone made me nervous.

  The thought that I might be able to help my mother, who could be hurting at the hands of her captors, pushed away all my fears about what might be waiting for me on the other side.

  I sat there for what felt like forever, the pressure of the limited time remaining until Aaron, Sophie, and Caleb returned kept my body from relaxing. Worrying about if I could even do this, and the fact that time was running out—trying to quiet my thoughts with my mind was like trying to still the ocean with a spoon.

  Your breath, concentrate only on the breath. Mohan’s words returned to me. I closed my eyes and inhaled deep through my nose until my chest expanded in
a tight ache, then let the air rush up and out through my mouth. In and out, again and again. Concentrating only on the sound of the rush through my body, the feel of lightness that came from releasing thoughts of anything else. Every worry washed out on the current of my breath.

  Time stopped, there was only my rhythm, rising and falling, rinsing and cleansing.

  An electric feeling started at the base of my spine and slowly ran up each of my vertebrae, my neck, out the crown of my head. A slight buzzing in my ears and my body felt as if it were vibrating—with energy.

  With intention, lift yourself. I imagined my energy rising up out of my body, passing past my skin.

  Like coming against a wall, my body resisted, pressed and contained. The soul does not like to leave the body, Mohan had explained. In my mind, my skin became watery. Not a solid that must be overcome, but a liquid that I could easily slip through.

  Separating, rising, losing control of that physical shell, a rush of panic rose and I could feel a pull returning me to my body, returning to the control. I thought of Mohan’s words, Lie back, like in a warm pool, allow yourself to float on your breath.

  I listened only to my breathing, and when my soul separated from my body, instead of clenching back in fear, I let it flow until my whole being was thick with vibration.

  I opened my eyes and saw myself sitting quietly and alone, crossed legged in the middle of the floor. I had done it, I was in the astral plane. Myself sat, chest expanding and contracting with each gentle breath. Was it wrong to leave my body here? Would it be vulnerable?

  I sighed and looked away, “You don’t exactly have a choice Charlotte,” I said to myself. There wasn’t time to worry about the implications of my body sitting here unguarded. Walking past myself, I moved through the glass doors and across the balcony until I was staring at the roof tops below us. I knew, because I was not bound by traditional physics, that I could just move over to them. Traverse the twenty foot gap between where I stood and the closest roof top. But because I had never done it, I had the same fears my body would have—that I would fall and plummet to my death, or at the very least, break twenty bones.

  “Your bones are sitting safely inside the building,” I reminded myself. “When you step off this balcony, you will simply float over to that rooftop.”

  After a deep breath to steady my nerves, I took a step right through the railing. With my foot aiming for the open space, I closed my eyes and trusted that all was fine, I could now walk on air. My weight shifted into the step—and kept going. The moment, that transition into the fall, the realization that I was wrong, the sickening plunge and then the rush of air over my diving body. The uncontrolled turn, head first, I could see the sidewalk rushing up crush my body. Reflexively, my arms rose to shield my face—I was going to die.

  My body hit the concrete.

  The hard surface felt rough and grainy beneath my palms, I didn’t dare move but I opened my eyes. The impact hurt, but it hurt like walking into a wall, not breaking every bone in my body. Shock, I was in shock. Likely I had a traumatic brain injury—how could I not? Maybe I was actually dead but didn’t know it yet.

  “You’re not dead,” he said.

  His voice, so clear, so here.

  “You should stand up, you look ridiculous lying there.” His footsteps approached, the soles of his leather shoes echoing between the alley’s tight walls. His feet were in front of my eyes and then his legs crouched down before me. “Honestly Charlotte,” his hand touched my head and sent a shiver through my body. “It only felt like it hurt because you think it should hurt to fall off a five story balcony.”

  I twisted my head and looked into his eyes. “What are you doing here?” I asked.

  He raised his eyebrows and grinned, “What are you?”

  I tested my arms, moving them slightly, before placing them beneath my shoulders and putting weight on them. It didn’t hurt, not really, not like it should. And the more I thought about how it didn’t really hurt, the less I thought it even kind of did.

  Apparently, Hayden was right.

  When I finally pushed myself up and got my legs beneath me, I dusted the dirt and gravel off the front of me and my hands. I tried to not look at him. I inspected my legs, elbows, palms, pushed my hair from my face. He stood and stared. Brazen as always.

  Not really knowing what else to do, afraid of what could happen if I stayed, I tried to just walk away.

  Hayden grabbed my arm and pulled me back, pulled me into him.

  His touch felt like fire and my breath caught in my chest. Facing him, Hayden pressed my body into his. I closed my eyes, kept my head down, and tried to keep my focus. I was here for a reason. But my body hummed next to his. The vibration between us was so intense, so perfect, so complete. Without thinking, I pressed myself closer into him.

  Hayden’s mouth lowered to my ear. “I want you Charlotte. I need you. Now. Do you understand me? I can’t wait any longer.” His hand grabbed my chin, gently, insistently, he tilted my face towards his and lowered his lips onto mine.

  Hungry, greedy for him, for this, I kissed him back. I opened my mouth to him and felt his tongue inside my mouth. Hayden groaned and my insides melted. My hands moved to his head, pressing it between my palms, wishing I could devour him, my fingers moved through his thick black hair and grabbed fistfuls so hard Hayden let a small cry of pain before lifting me off the ground and wrapping my legs around his waist. With two steps, he had my back against the building’s brick wall.

  No, I thought, but a sigh escaped my lips and my head fell back, exposing my neck to his mouth. I had to stop this, remember why I was here, but my body felt limp in his arms.

  I needed to find my mother.

  My head cleared a little. I was here for a reason and that reason was to try and find out where my mother was, if she was okay. Focus Charlotte, think of her, she needs you right now.

  “Hayden,” I said and kissed his lips. “Hayden, I have to stop.”

  He shook his head, “I won’t ever stop,” his mouth ran over my cheek, his teeth pulled softly on my ear. “Never again Charlotte. I will never again stop. I can never be apart from you again.”

  “Hayden,” I held his head in my hands. “I need to find my mother.”

  Insane with lust, his hands moved all over my body. He wasn’t listening.

  “Hayden, please listen to me. I have to find her, I have to know if she is okay.”

  Suddenly, without warning, he stopped. He let me go, and an exhausted sob escaped him. His shoulders slumped and he covered his face with his hands. “I can’t think,” he said. “I can’t think,” his voice was louder, more forceful. He turned away from me and grabbed his hair, his voice echoed out all around us, “I CAN’T THINK!”

  Frightened by both his intensity and the sudden change of it, I pressed my back to the brick and watched as he strode away from me, stopped, then stomped back. Tears streamed from his bloodshot eyes. A wild desperation contorted his beautiful face. “I can’t think anymore Charlotte,” he cried. “All there is, is you. Nothing else. I can’t even remember what there used to be. It’s like nothing ever existed except you and I’m never right without you. Without you, there is only this…this darkness.” He looked around us, as if examining our surroundings for the first time, like he was expecting something, or someone. His gazed stopped on something to my right, “I see you!” he yelled.

  I turned to look, and almost screamed. Twenty feet away, at the edge of the building, black fingers clutched the corner next to a pair of black bulging eyes. The creature was small, but terrifying in his grotesque form. He reminded me of a nightmare.

  “Get out of here,” Hayden yelled at the small goblin.

  It lifted his head further around the corner and for one horrifying moment I thought it was going to come closer. It bared its black, needle like teeth and hissed at us before scurrying away down the alley. I watched it move, slinking, fast as lightening, until it squeezed its body through a slim crack betwee
n another building and the sidewalk.

  “What,” I breathed. “What was that?”

  “The darkness,” Hayden whispered. He closed his eyes. “Come to me,” he said. “Not here. In the real world.” He opened his eyes and stared me down with them.

  “Where’s my mother?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “But you’re working for your father.”

  “So that he would help lead me to you. I don’t care about anything else.”

  “What else? What does he want?”

  “Whatever it is you have with you. Something that fat sweating pig you’re traveling with carried out of the burning hotel. He knows it must be important and that it has something to do with why you’re traveling.”

  He didn’t know. Emerick didn’t know about the puzzle box—yet. Hayden was concentrating hard on me, he narrowed his eyes.

  “It’s some sort of…game? A box,” he said.

  I sucked my breath and shook my head. Was he reading my mind? I forced myself to think of something else, gray fog, a snowy day.

  Hayden’s expression relaxed, like he was giving up on a game of twenty questions. “Fine, I don’t care anyway.”

  “You’re reading my mind.”

  “Our mind,” he said with so much assurance, I knew he didn’t doubt the truth of the statement. “And not perfectly. But I do see things. When we were both in California, I began learning how to get closer to you. When I was here, in this place, I could see not your exact thoughts, but images. I could sense what you were thinking. It helped…I felt warmer when I did it. Like it held back the dark.”

  “My dreams,” I said.

  Hayden nodded. “I came to you as much as I could at night. It was easiest when you were asleep. You would see me back.”

  I stared at him, not sure what to think, afraid to think anything clearly in case he might see that too. But an uneasy dread settled in my stomach, a quiet violation of my individualism. Suddenly, I was highly aware of the irrevocable bind between us and felt confused by wanting to both rip myself from it and throw myself into the depths of it.