Between the Heaves of Storm

by V. J. Chambers

  Jason was outside of the house, talking to his guards, who were gathered in a clump around the house. As I got closer, I realized he wasn’t really talking. He was screaming at them, demanding to know why they hadn’t stopped Edgar. The guards looked pretty pissed at themselves.

  “It’s not their fault,” Edgar called. “I used magic. I confused them.”

  Jason ignored him. The girls from the A-frame were starting to wander out of the house in their nightgowns, murmuring amongst themselves. One of the concubines came up to me. “What’s going on?” she whispered.

  “Jason’s dad came to visit,” I said. “Apparently, that’s a bad thing.”

  “Jason has a dad?” she said.

  My thoughts exactly.

  “Jason,” Edgar was saying, “whatever my motives might have been when I created you, however misguided I was, you were imbued with power that is ancient and powerful. The Sons didn’t create the notion of the Rising Sun, you know. Independent cultures all over the world did. They all predicted the coming of a powerful person to right the wrongs of the world. You are that man. You always have been. Maybe I did set you on the wrong path. But if I wronged you, please give me the chance to make it right.”

  Jason turned away from the guards to Edgar, still furious. “I don’t want to be the savior of the world, all right? I never asked for that. I just want—” And then he foundered, as if he realized that he had no idea what he wanted.

  Edgar took the opportunity to move closer to Jason. “The world needs you.” He put a hand on Jason’s shoulder.

  Jason shook him off. “I don’t have anything to give.”

  “That’s not true,” said Edgar. “I may have placed you in situations that required you to be violent, but I made sure you had solid values. I made sure you knew it was right to protect the innocent and punish the guilty. And I know that you are a good man.”

  Jason pointed at the row of heads that lined the path to his house. “I don’t care about the innocent,” he said. “I don’t care about anything.”

  “What’s he mean by that?” asked the concubine next to me. She sounded nervous.

  I didn’t know what he meant by anything anymore.

  Edgar seemed to notice the heads for the first time. He walked over to them so that he could inspect them more closely. He looked back at Jason, an expression of horror on his face. “Dear God,” he whispered.

  * * *

  ~kieran~

  Agnes’s head was on a stick in the middle of the river. The water flowing past it was blood red, and it was glutted with flies. Great clouds of them alighted on the river, buzzing a drone that made me feel cold inside. I stared, mesmerized by their iridescent wings and bodies. They were green and shiny against the deep crimson of the flow of the river. There were so many of them. Agnes presided over them like a queen over her subjects. Her eyes were open and flitting back and forth with the movement of the flies. And then she saw me.

  “You aren’t anything more than a little boy,” she gurgled, blood rushing up like a fountain through her lips. “A stupid boy.”

  I cocked my head at her. I didn’t speak.

  “Aren’t you just a stupid boy?” Her voice had taken on a lilting, teasing quality.

  I still didn’t respond.

  “Thinking she loved you,” said the Agnes head. “Thinking she could ever care about something like you. You’re nothing to her. Nothing more than a fly. Just like these.” The Agnes head’s voice dropped to a whisper. “When she told you that she loved you, you know she was always thinking about him, don’t you?”

  She meant Azazel, of course. The woman I loved. The woman I was devoted to. Wasn’t I?

  “You should feel bad, little boy, about wanting the other one.” The Agnes head sneered. “The blonde one. I know what you think about her. What you want to do with her. That one, the blonde one, she’d be grateful. She’d writhe and buck against you and scream out your name, and she’d make you feel like a man.”

  I swallowed, images of Eve without clothing flitting through my head. I bet her skin was soft.

  “But we know the truth, don’t we? You’re not a man. You’re just a stupid little boy, playing around with powers you don’t understand.”

  The flies on the river were buzzing around my head now, but I could still hear the Agnes head’s voice clearly, slicing through the air to my ears.

  The Agnes head laughed suddenly, her laughter echoing through the flies. They vibrated with the force of it. “You think she’d do it only because she’s lonely. Like you. Two lonely children playing at being grownups. Naked games. You think she’s a little girl like you’re a little boy.” The Agnes head grinned. Her teeth were red. “She’s not.”

  I didn’t like this, I realized. I decided to get up.

  “Little boy,” said the Agnes head.

  I stared into her eyes. I couldn’t stop myself.

  “She wants you, all right. She wants to chew you up. She has uses for you. She wants you to be her dying god. And you will die, little boy. Maybe you won’t notice, but once you let her in, little pieces of you will die. One at a time, crumbling into the abyss.”

  I struggled to speak. “Eve is a nice girl,” I managed.

  The Agnes head broke into gales of laughter. The flies twittered with her. The laughter rippled through the river and the sky, thundering through my head. “Imagine thinking you could control it, little boy. Imagine thinking you were bigger than the power. Imagine thinking you still had a say.” She stopped laughing. “No. It’s done now. You can’t get away if you want. You don’t have a say. Now go to her.”

  There was a pause.

  “Do you think you can defy me? I’m inside you, little boy. There’s no escape from this. I’m all around you. The Lovers. The Devil Card. The Hanged Man.” The Agnes head closed her eyes briefly and then opened them again. “World peace. You’re the key. Find her. Go to her. Touch her. Make her squeal. You’re mine.”

  I struggled to my feet, but the air was heavy. It pushed me down.

  “Go to her. Find the blonde one. Take her. Take her or else—”

  The flies were everywhere. They were crawling into my ears. They were clustering on my eyelashes.

  “—Or else, I will take you. Do you see? I will take you. Me and the flies. And I’ll use you to stuff them down the first one’s throat. I’ll take you. Take you. Take you. Take—”

  I sat up in bed. The room was bathed in sunlight, and I was drenched in sweat. Fucking dreams.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  ~joan~

  Edgar gripped his cup of tea with a shaking hand. We were in the kitchen of the A-frame. Lori had been able to track down some tea when Edgar had asked for some. Lori and I sat at the kitchen table. Edgar sat across from us. “It’s worse than I thought,” he said.

  Jason had run off after confronting Edgar. I didn’t know where he’d gone, and I hadn’t followed him. I was feeling more and more confused with every passing minute. One minute it had seemed Jason was trying to solve the problems he’d created. The next he’d seemed to take pleasure in pointing out to Edgar what a nasty person he was. I couldn’t shake the memory of his voice when he’d declared he didn’t care about the innocent. I knew he cared about me, but I wasn’t really sure what kind of caring it was. It seemed like it was maybe nothing more than obsession.

  Edgar was still talking. “I knew things were strange here, but I hadn’t realized he was so far gone.” He gestured to me with his cup of tea. “Why are you still with him? You always struck me as a girl with better sense than that.” He considered ruefully. “But then I guess you were always devoted to him.”

  Lori gave me a look. “What is he talking about? Why do both he and Jason act like they’ve known you for ages?”

  “I have amnesia,” I said. “I don’t remember anything, but apparently, I’m Azazel.”

  Lori was horrified. “The Witch of the OF?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t remember it.”

 
“Amnesia?” said Edgar. “That’s odd. And what’s this OF Witch business?”

  Lori and I filled him as best we could with all we knew about Azazel and the OF. I even told him about what Terry Dawson, the man who’d shot at me, had said about someone named Kieran stealing my powers and the OF trying to kill me because of that. Hopeful, I asked Edgar if he knew who Kieran was. He didn’t.

  The sky was lightening outside, and the sun would be coming up soon. We’d been up all night dealing with this craziness. I felt exhausted, and I could tell Lori did too. I got up to make both of us some tea. Hopefully the caffeine would help. I busied myself boiling water on Lori’s gas stove.

  Lori was completely floored by everything we’d told her. “I can’t believe you’re actually the OF Witch,” she said. “And I can’t believe Jason has a father. What are you doing here, anyway?”

  Edgar sighed. “I’ve been trying to get stateside for quite some time, but I’ve been trapped in England. I don’t suppose either of you have much idea what’s going on in the rest of the world, do you?”

  I set out two mugs for Lori and me and then sat back down at the table. I figured there wasn’t much point watching the pot of water, considering pots never boil when you’re watching them and all. “You know, it is strange, because I never understood why we didn’t get aid from the rest of the world when the solar flare happened. Why didn’t England help America?”

  “I suppose at first it was a communication problem,” said Edgar. “There wasn’t any communication coming out of the east coast for quite some time. By the time anyone on our side of the pond figured out there was a problem, we had Sutherland to contend with.”

  “Right,” said Lori. “That crazy guy who was running the west side of the country last year. He was in contact with Europe?”

  “He was quite a force to be reckoned with,” said Edgar.

  “But,” said Lori, “Jason stopped him last spring. So what’s been stopping you since?”

  “Sometime last spring everything fell apart,” said Edgar. “There was a moment felt around the world, this kind of aching wholeness that filled everyone’s soul for several minutes. And then it cut off.”

  I made a face. “That’s weird. What do you mean?”

  “I felt it,” Edgar said. “I recognized the signature of it immediately. It was the same power that had destroyed the Sons. The combined power of you and Jason.”

  I shook my head. “I wish I could remember what happened. Jason and I must have combined our powers. Maybe we were trying to stop that guy. What did you say his name was? Sutherland?”

  “Perhaps,” said Edgar. “But this was more pointed. The power took control of each and every person on the planet and made them feel elated and peaceful. No one had felt anything like that before. When it stopped, people nearly went crazy trying to find it again. It didn’t take long for them to associate it with Jason. They could feel his pull even in England. Over the next few months, our media was flooded with videos about him, messages from him. Everyone wanted to come here, to Jasontown.”

  “In England?” I said. “But I thought my power blocked Jason’s power. I thought that was why there was this sudden influx of people here. Because my power wasn’t being used anymore.”

  Edgar took a drink of tea. “I can’t be sure, of course, but I think that perhaps your power only worked so close to Jasontown. You were in D.C. You stopped people from getting here. But that didn’t mean people from all over weren’t trying to get here.”

  I shrugged. It was possible, I guess.

  “At any rate,” Edgar continued, “there were mobs trying to get to Jasontown. But there was no way to get here. The OF was adamant about no one from outside of the country getting in. They communicated to our government that they had far too many problems as it was without letting anyone in. The airports were closed. The docks patrolled. America was cut off from the rest of the world, and everyone was going vaguely insane from their desire to be close to Jason. There were riots and mobs. Things were breaking down. So I made it my mission to get here, so that I could help Jason stop the OF’s ridiculous embargo and get everyone together. I assumed that if Jason were in charge, everything would be okay.”

  The water was boiling. I got up and poured it over the tea bags in the mugs I’d set out. Bringing them to the table, I said, “So, you’re here to help Jason destroy the OF, so that he can rule the world?”

  Lori took the mug from me. “That sounds wonderful, Mr. Weem. I can’t think of anything more perfect.”

  Edgar and I both looked at her like she was crazy.

  “I don’t think Jason should rule the world,” I said. “He’s kind of unbalanced.”

  Lori dunked her tea bag in and out of the boiling water. “I admit he’s not perfect. But I believe in what he’s doing. I believe in him.”

  “I do too,” said Edgar. “At least I thought I did. But he’s so angry. I hadn’t expected that. Perhaps I should have. Perhaps I didn’t realize that what I’d put him through had damaged him so deeply.”

  “What did you put him through?” I asked. “Why does he hate you so much?”

  Edgar sighed. He made a tent of his fingers and rested the bridge of his nose against it. “I couldn’t allow Jason to ever feel safe. I couldn’t let him believe that there was anyone to take care of him besides himself. So I wasn’t present in his life when he was growing up. I knew I’d want to help him and save him, and I knew that if I did that, he would only learn to turn to me. So, instead, I kept him on the run. I hired people to shoot at him. I sent him on tactical missions in which his goal was to destroy every threat. I made sure he had the training to kill and to protect himself. I made sure he relied on his wits and his abilities. At the time, I thought it was necessary.” He gestured at me. “I hadn’t counted on you.”

  “Me?”

  “The counter-balance,” he said. “The shadow. The twin. The consort. You completed Jason and perfectly complemented him. But I’d taught him to be alone and not to trust anyone. If I hadn’t done that, maybe things would have worked out differently.”

  I took a sip of my tea. It was hot, but I liked the way it scalded its way into my belly. It felt like fiery energy, waking me up. “Well, he doesn’t trust anyone, even me. He’s kept us all here under mind control. And he won’t let us leave. He says things sometimes about liking to pretend that people actually care about him, but that he realizes that in reality he has to force people to care about him.”

  “I care about Jason!” said Lori. “He doesn’t have to force me.”

  “I know that,” I said. “But he doesn’t.”

  Edgar peered into his tea cup. “This is my fault. I’ve done this. And I don’t know how I’m going to fix it.”

  I bit my lip. “Maybe more tea?”

  Right then there was a banging noise as the front door to the A-frame was thrust open. We all stood up, our chairs scraping against the kitchen floor, and ran out to the living area to see what had happened.

  Garth and Tessa were in the foyer. Garth had Tessa in a headlock. “Take me to see Jason,” he growled.

  * * *

  ~kieran~

  I felt awkward around Eve that morning, and she must have too, because we spent breakfast barely saying anything. There was no sound but the clatter of silverware on plates and Chance yelling, “Duh-duh-duh-duh!” After we ate, I helped with the dishes, but we didn’t do much talking then, either. It was too silent and strained to hang out after eating, so I took Chance for a walk in the neighborhood. We said hi to the other nice Satanists (such a weird concept for me) and watched some wild rabbits hopping around in the yard. I tried to get Chance to say bunny, but with no success. Around that point, Chance started to get cranky, so I took him back to the house and put him down for a nap. I ran into Eve in the hallway afterwards.

  She twisted her fingers together in front of her body and stared at them. “We can’t avoid each other, you know. If what happened last night was weird, we should figur
e out how to get over it.”

  I felt bad about how nervous she seemed. “Come on, Eve. So things got a little out of hand last night. We’re adults. We can handle it.”

  “Exactly,” she said. “No big deal.” She took a deep breath.

  “It’s not like I’m not attracted to you. It’s just that—”

  “You have a girlfriend,” she said. “I get it.” She patted me on the shoulder and pushed past me, heading down the steps to the lower level of the house.

  It wasn’t that simple. Yeah, there was Zaza to think about. I really cared about her. I was devoted to her. I kept telling myself that. And I guessed it was natural to have little tingles for hot blondes when I hadn’t seen Zaza in a long time. But if it was only that, I was sure I could have handled it. I would have been able to explain away what I was feeling for Eve and move forward. The problem was that I felt like my relationship with Zaza had been over for a long time. Maybe since last year in Columbus, in fact, which was funny, because that was when it started. Now that I knew everything that Azazel had ever felt for me, I felt sort of cheated. I wanted a girlfriend who wanted me as much as I wanted her. And knowing how little she wanted me sort of made me want her less. It was confusing. “I might never see her again,” I called after Eve, who was heading down the stairs to the lower level of the house.

  She paused on the steps, one foot lower than the other, and looked back at me. “So, out of sight, out of mind? That’s what you’re saying?”

  I caught up with her on the steps. “No. I’m saying that I’m in kind of a strange situation here. If Zaza were here, and I could give her back her memories, I can guarantee that she and I would be reevaluating a lot of things. But she’s not here. And no one you’ve sent looking for her has been able to find her. So I can’t exactly reevaluate anything with her. You know?”

  Eve started back down the steps. “Not really, Kieran. Are you saying that you want to break up with her, but you can’t? Because forgive me if that sounds like the same kind of line married men use on their mistresses.”

  Was that what I was saying? When she put it like that, it sounded so final. I started down the steps after her. “I’m not trying to feed you lines at all. I’m not that kind of guy.”