The man behind the counter stammered.
“Let them stay,” a woman said as she descended the stairs. She was bent with the weight of time and her long, silver hair flowed freely.
“My dear Esmeralda, do not worry yourself over this lot,” said Jaqueel.
“I will worry over whomever I see fit,” she responded. “Besides, they’re exactly who I’ve been waiting for. You” -- Esmeralda pointed at Elise -- “come here.”
Elise looked up at Jade. The muscular woman stepped in front of her. “She’s under my protection, old woman.”
“Calm your ass down, shape changer. I’m not going to snatch her away for a stew. I just thought she might like to know what her mother’s been up to since coming to Clarensdell.”
At the mention of her mother, Elise pushed Jade aside. “You know my mom? Is she here? Where is she?” A hope she’d been trying to suppress blossomed into Elise’s chest. She would finally get to see her mom.
“Come up,” said Esmeralda. “They can have the rooms by mine, Jaqueel.”
“But…” Jaqueel stammered.
“The warrior is right. You do owe her. Now pick your jaw up and give them their keys,” Esmeralda turned and headed back up the stairs.
Jaqueel glared at Jade. “My debt to you is paid after this, and you will leave in the morning.” He looked at Chase and Aroon and shook his head. “Is there any way I can convince you to keep those two beasts in the stable? If anyone sees them, they will die of apoplexy.”
“They are not beasts,” said Jade. “They’re our friends and will be staying in our quarters.” She grabbed the two keys hanging from the innkeeper’s hand and waved the group up the stairs.
When they reached the appropriate floor, the old woman was waiting for them in the hallway. Elise walked up to her and once again asked, “Is my mom here?”
A softness crept into the woman’s face. “I’m sorry to say she was with me up until yesterday when she stole my moose and left. I’m assuming they had a good reason for leaving. That old fool hasn’t been away from my side in his past thirty-two years of life. With your help I think we can find where they’re hiding. Now go get yourself cleaned up and get some rest. I’ll tell you what I know in the morning.”
Disappointment flooded Elise. She hadn’t realized how much she missed her mother until that moment. All she wanted was to snuggle in her mom’s arms and have her say everything would be okay. Her chest tightened and tears threatened. She wiped a hand over her eyes and looked at Ashley.
“Come on, kid, let’s do what she says.” Ashley held a hand out to Jade, who dutifully placed a room key in it. The two young girls and their male companions headed to the door on the right. Elise saw Jade stop to talk with the old woman but didn’t stay to listen.
The room was slightly larger than Elise’s room at home. There were two small beds, each with its own side table. Two doors across the room led to a closet and bathroom. A large rug covered the entranceway. It was bright purple with gold filigree. The room was illuminated by two large lanterns glowing a soft, pale yellow, casting elongated shadows on the light wooden walls. Elise walked to the closer of the two beds and collapsed down into it. The pillowlike bed topper enveloped her in a cloud of sheer comfort. She couldn’t remember a time when she had felt anything more pleasurable. She let out a long, contented sigh and said, “Is this heaven?”
Ashley laughed as she sat on the edge of Elise’s bed. She let out a groan as she removed her boots and threw them to the floor. “If it isn’t, it must be the next best thing,” she said, rubbing her left foot with her hands. “I’m going to wash up and see if I can get this thing off my face.”
“Okay,” said Elise, closing her eyes. “Let me know if I can help you.”
Elise dozed as the other girl worked in the bathroom. Just as she was about to be pulled under into true sleep, she heard Ashley say her name. “Yeah?” she responded; her eyes still closed.
“Can you come here for a minute?” Ashley asked through the closed door.
“Yeah, just a second.” Elise opened her eyes and got slowly to her feet, stretching the tension that had formed in her shoulders and back. Chase was curled up on the floor next to her bed. A quiet, rhythmic snoring betrayed his slumber. Aroon sat on the other bed. He had found a comb and was quietly combing out the mats in his silver fur. He gave Elise a toothy grin when he saw her attention on him. Elise smiled back and patted his arm as she limped past him to the bathroom.
She knocked on the door. “Come on in,” said Ashley. Elise walked in and saw Ashley standing in front of a sink. Her small body was wrapped in a towel and her black hair was damp. She hadn’t managed to scrub all the dirt from herself. Streaks of mud rolled down her arms and a small puddle had formed at her feet.
Ashley turned toward Elise. She had a wet washcloth draped over her bad eye. Her clear blue eye focused on the younger girl, and she said, “It’s impossible to get clean in this place. I had to pump the water a thousand times just to get a decent flow. I wonder if there’s a community shower.”
“I hope there’s something,” responded Elise as she walked up to Ashley. “I think I gained ten pounds in dirt. What can I do to help you?”
Ashley pulled the washcloth off her face, revealing the partially removed eyepatch. A wave of nausea flowed hotly through Elise. Remnants of the green and brown eye covering clung to caked-on clumps of yellow goo. The hole where Ashley’s eye had been was a mass of red and black with off-white pustules surrounding the lid. Some of the pustules had burst, dripping their contents down the side of Ashley’s cheek. As Elise came closer, her nostrils were assaulted with the cloying scent of decay. Rot was evident in the other girl’s socket.
“Oh, Ashley,” Elise said in a horrified whisper.
“I can’t… I can’t get it off, Ellie,” whimpered Ashley.
“I think we should get Jade,” said Elise, trying to keep her voice from shaking.
“No,” Ashley said firmly, “I don’t want anything from her. Could you just help me peel it off?”
“Ashley, it looks infected. You need medicine.”
“Just help me, please? I promise I’ll get medicine. I just want it off.” Panic crept into Ashley’s voice. “It hurts too much for me to do it myself. You have to help me.”
Elise was not excited about the prospect of touching the covering, but she wanted to help her friend. “Okay, okay. What do I do?”
“Just dab it with the washcloth and peel slowly,” said Ashley. Elise did as she was bidden. It seemed to take forever to remove each piece. Every time Elise grabbed a portion of the patch it broke off from the rest. Ashley made pained noises whenever a particularly glued on section was pulled off. More than once Elise ruptured one of the pustules sending more hot, putrid liquid down Ashley’s face. It made both of the girls gag.
Finally, after what felt like hours, all evidence of the field patch was eliminated. Elise couldn’t even begin to imagine the pain Ashley was going through. Her socket was red and inflamed. Heat rolled off of it and the smell of the pus had intensified tenfold. “We need to get Jade in here,” said Elise.
Ashley didn’t respond. She just looked at herself in the mirror with her good eye. She was silent for a long moment. “Why didn’t she help me?” Ashley finally asked. “Why did she let this happen? I just…. I don’t understand.”
Elise didn’t know what to say. She walked over to Ashley and rubbed her hand across the other girl’s back silently comforting her. The other girl finally said, “Okay. Let me get dressed and I’ll get Jade. Maybe that old lady can help. Can you hand me the other patch? I don’t feel like walking out into the hall like this.” She waved her hand in front of her face.
Elise grabbed the patch from the nightstand and brought it to Ashley. “I’ll be out in a minute.”
As promised Ashley emerged from the bathroom minutes later wearing a plain brown tunic and tan cotton pants. They had been packed away with the other essentials Jade brought with
her. She grabbed the comb Aroon had been using and quickly removed the tangles from her hair. After braiding it back she said, “All right, I’m ready, kid.”
Elise, who had been sitting on the floor petting Chase with Aroon, stood up and headed for the door. “Aroon, you stay here with Chase. We’ll be back soon.”
“Aaarrr---oooonnnn,” replied Aroon.
The two girls walked into the hallway together. Just as Elise was preparing to knock on Jade’s door, Ashley said, “Elise wait.” Elise felt the pressure of the other girl’s hand on her shoulder. She turned in time to see Ashley raise her staff and bring it down hard onto her head. A faint green glow rolled from the new eyepatch and a wicked smile crossed Ashley’s lips. Then the world was black.
Chapter Seventeen
Henry
The news reports had been flooding the airwaves nonstop since the revelation the police department was covering up a significant theft. Henry had no idea how she’d managed it, but merely a few hours after he’d told Sandra, she had gone on air with an itemized list of everything that had gone missing. Including, but not limited to, twelve kilos of cocaine, ten large marijuana plants, four hundred and fifty thousand dollars of drug money, and assorted guns. The knives were mentioned but clearly not a priority. Word of his wife and daughter were pushed aside for the new controversy. Henry didn’t know how he felt about that. He was tired of hearing his family’s names constantly, but he didn’t want enthusiasm about the search to wane.
He’d been expecting a visit from Detective Stathem. It seemed only natural the man would want words about the shit-storm Henry had caused. Henry sat at home all Monday evening prepared to be led away in handcuffs. He didn’t know what they would charge him with, but he was certain they could find something. The hours built on each other without a word from the police. By the time Tuesday morning crept up he still hadn’t heard anything.
The coffee pot signaled its brewing completion with a quiet buzz. Henry grabbed a cup and filled it with the hot liquid. His mind kept replaying the conversation he’d had with Arthur the previous day. It made his skin crawl thinking of the man. He was clearly in need of psychiatric intervention. Even so, the description of the sorcerer’s power made him anxious. So many unexplainable events had occurred since the disappearance of his family, and even though he rationally knew what he had been told was ridiculous, he couldn’t help his doubts.
Henry sat at the table and turned on the international news, so he wouldn’t have to hear about anything local. He sipped his coffee and waited for a contractor to show up to make a bid on the repairs to the bathroom and family room. He needed to distract himself from the previous day, so he’d called around to different renovation companies until he found someone he thought would be good for the job. Now he just needed to wait to see if the estimate was reasonable. As he was finishing off the last dregs of his coffee a confident knock sounded at the front door.
Henry stood up and let in a man wearing jeans and a t-shirt with his company logo. The man whistled when he saw the damage. “You weren’t kidding when you said there was a flood,” he said.
“No, I have no idea how long the water was running before the police shut it off.”
“I’m going to have to get under the house to look for structural damage. We’re going to have to do things a little differently if something happened to the supports. Any idea if there’s water down there?”
“I honestly didn’t even think to look,” said Henry, mentally calculating the monetary hit this would take.
“I recommend, if you haven’t done it yet, to contact your insurance company. I can submit my estimate to them and hopefully they’ll pay up.”
“I’ll work on that while you take a look.” Henry called the insurance company, and after forty-five minutes, he tentatively worked something out with the bored-sounding customer representative. Another twenty minutes later the contractor let him know he’d looked around and would mail a copy of his estimate to both Henry and the insurance company.
“Before I go,” the man said, “I found this next to the pipes under the house. I’m not sure how it got there. Looks like it’s brand new. Didn’t have a lick of dirt on it.” He held up a knife the size of a switch blade. Its handle was blood-red. The blade had a wicked curve and looked sharp enough to slice through grass without causing it to bend. It had tiny inscriptions all over it in an alphabet Henry was unfamiliar with.
Henry felt like he had been punched in the diaphragm. Although he tried, he couldn’t get air into his lungs. “Hey,” the contractor said, “you okay, buddy? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“Where exactly did you find it?” Henry asked quietly.
“Like I said, by the water supply pipe under the house. Hey, I need to get going. I’ll send you those numbers soon.”
“Okay,” Henry said numbly, taking the knife in his hand. “Thanks.”
He shut the front door behind the man and took the knife over to the table to inspect it more closely. This had to be one of the knives involved in the theft. He could vividly remember the first time he’d seen them laid out in court. They’d radiated menace. The weight of evil was palpable in the knife that sat before him. It felt almost too heavy hold. How had it come to be under his house? The access to the crawlspace was in the back yard and it wasn’t pleasant to get into. Only desperation and determination would have sent him under there.
Another knock at the door grabbed Henry’s attention. He walked over and opened it up to Officer Clemmens. “Good morning, officer,” Henry said nonchalantly. “What can I do for you?”
“Mr. Kowalski, I need you to come down to the station with me,” said Officer Clemmens, his voice purely professional.
“Is it about my girls?” asked Henry.
“No sir, Detective Stathem would like to discuss your briefing with the press yesterday.”
“And why couldn’t Detective Stathem come here himself?” Henry asked. “I would be happy to have a conversation with him in the comfort of my own home.”
“I cannot speak for the detective,” said Officer Clemmens. “I just do as I’m told, and he told me he wants to speak with you down at the station.”
“Am I under arrest?” Henry crossed his arms.
“At this time there have been no charges placed against you. He just wants to have a friendly chat.”
Friendly chat, yeah right, thought Henry. “If I’m not under arrest then I’m going to have to decline the request. If the detective really wants to talk, he knows how to get in contact with me. I’m sorry you had to waste your time, officer.”
“Mr. Kowalski, I think it would be in your best interest to come with me now.” Officer Clemmens took a step into the house. His gaze went past Henry and locked onto something behind him. The officer stiffened and pulled his gun from its holster. “Get on the ground right now!”
Henry complied, lying flat on his stomach. “Hands on your head, Kowalski!” Clemmens shouted.
“What the hell are you doing to my son-in-law?” Lisa Baxter’s voice rose behind officer Clemmens.
“Ma’am, I’m going to need you to step back,” said the officer, his eyes never moving from Henry. “Your son-in-law is in possession of stolen property. Mr. Kowalski, you have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of—" His words were cut short as the near silent whoosh of a stun gun releasing its barbs was emitted. The officer stood rigid for a few moments and then tumbled forward onto Henry.
“Jesus, Lisa!” It was all Henry could say.
“He had the safety off and his finger was on the trigger,” Lisa said with the stun gun still held out in front of her. “You were doing what he said, and he was going to shoot you, Henry.”
Henry pushed himself up and walked over to his mother-in-law. He pulled her inside and dragged the policeman’s body the rest of the way in, so he could shut the door. He checked Clemmens’ pulse, which was beating strongly, and then turned to Lisa. She�
�d wandered over to the table and was inspecting the knife. “Was this what he was talking about?” She held it up gingerly with two fingers.
“Yeah, the knives were among the objects stolen on Friday,” responded Henry, panic filling his chest. “It was a misunderstanding. I would have cleared it up at the station. How are we going to explain this?” He indicated the unconscious man on the floor. “And where the hell did you get a stun gun?”
Lisa didn’t respond. All her attention was on the knife in her hands. “This looks so… familiar.”
“It was one of Arthur’s knives. They were submitted into evidence during the trial. Now focus, Lisa. We need to get our stories straight for when he wakes up.”
Lisa slowly pulled her eyes off the knife with a look of horror on her face, “Henry, move!”
Henry jumped to his left. A breath later a malformed, muscular black paw with three-inch claws came down hard where he’d been standing. Henry turned to face a nightmarish demon. It stood at least a foot taller than him with tatters of Officer Clemmens’ uniform falling from his wide chest and articulated legs. Razor sharp fangs hung over his feline jaw. Short, black fur covered his body with pale yellow tufts extending from the tips of his ears.
His eyes were cloudy but not unseeing. The white, milky orbs locked onto Henry. The demon let out a hellish shriek and lunged for him. Henry jumped to his right, grabbed a potted plant from a side table, and brought it down hard onto the beast’s head. He didn’t have enough time to revel in the shock of the action. The demon shook his head and had Henry pinned to the ground before Henry had a chance to think. He raised his enormous paw. Henry closed his eyes in anticipation of the impact.
“Stop!” Lisa screamed.
“Lisa, no!” Henry yelled back. The beast stopped its attack and looked between the humans, confused.
Lisa ran at the creature with a chef’s knife she must have retrieved from the kitchen. She let out a scream as she impaled his side. The beast turned on her, growling menacingly, and smacked her with the back of its paw. His mother-in-law flew across the room and crashed hard against the opposite wall. Her body fell limply to the ground, leaving a large crack in the drywall above.
A World Divided Page 21
