Winter's Fury - Volume Two of The Saga of the Twelves

by Richard M. Heredia

  “Sleep,” it said. Its’ voice was so low, it resonated somewhere deep in the middle of her chest.

  Unbidden, Juanita fell backward onto her elbows, unable to control her motor movement. She blinked in rapid succession, trying to clear her vision to no avail. Her eyes filled with tears. She gulped at the air, but for some reason her lungs were no longer working. She could see the blackness now, coming at her from all sides. She fought it like mad, but still, it came.

  “You belong to the Seeker now,” was the last thing she heard.

  Please, don’t touch me! was the last thing she thought before she spun into a darkened hole with no bottom.

  *****

  Nine-year-old Miller Stanley was trying his darnedest to find something useful to do. He needed something to keep him occupied, to keep the thoughts at bay. Something! Anything! But, nothing was working.

  First, he had tried the obvious and played his favorite video game. It had become available on Xbox One a while ago, but he had been able to download only a few days prior. He had only just earned enough money from his allowance and odds-and-end jobs around the house to do so. He had played it for five hours straight on Thanksgiving and an hour longer the following day. But now, the idea of walking around a giant landscape, mining for minerals, hunting for food and building shelters did not appeal to him. It was frustrating. Minecraft was the perfect game to lose one’s self. What was wrong with him? He should be blissful. His immersion in that virtual world of animated skeletons and zombies, should have left him without a care. He should have been an empty vessel of pure imagination. But, for some reason, he had grown bored.

  After that he tried reading on his Kindle Fire, but found he could not focus on a single word. So, he tossed it aside without bookmarking his page, his irritation rising.

  Next, he pulled out his Legos. He thought if building in cyberspace bored him, then maybe doing it for real would be enough to keep him distracted. Even that had not worked.

  I’m totally losing it, he admonished himself. What sort of kid loses interest while playing with Legos? He must be a total basket-case.

  Crap! So now what do I do? He peered about, seeing a deck of playing cards his parents had brought him back from Las Vegas the last time they had gone. They were authentic, having seen use on the floor of the MGM Grand at one point or another. His mother had taught him how to play Solitaire with them. Maybe now he could find some degree of peace by playing a few hands of that time-wasting game.

  Couldn’t hurt, right?

  He grabbed the deck and began shuffling atop his twin bed. It was set against the wall opposite his desk where his Dell XPS sat, complete with its’ 22-inch HD monitor.

  Miller was Caucasian. He was a little tall for his age at four-foot-ten with rail-straight, chestnut-colored hair. He wore it to his shoulders. It was a Sixties sort of style, though he had no clue. He was far too young to know that at one time famous individuals wore their hair in almost the same manner as he. The Beatles, the Monkeys, even some of the Beach Boys had worn their hair over the ear. Of course, many other less well-known folks had worn it as well, but Miller would not know this. To him, he liked the way it framed his hazel eyes and pronounced facial features. This was because, even for one as young as he, Miller had a hard look about him. His chiseled cheekbones and a man-like looking cleft in his chin amplified that aspect. They made him appear older.

  He finished shuffling the deck for the third time and began laying out the cards in the appropriate manner. Halfway through the routine, the thoughts he had been trying so ardently to banish returned. Almost at once, his hands stopped moving.

  Can it be true? he thought. Can all three of them be gone? They had been his best friends after all. Though most boys his age would have balked at having friends that were girls, Miller was not of the same mind. He liked girls. He had for as long as he could remember. He liked to make them laugh. He liked to see them smile at him. It made him feel warm inside, and that was a good thing.

  But now, three of his closest female friends were victims of a kidnapping, stolen from their families. Where taken? Only God knew now.

  He stared at his hands, willing them to move, but they did not. They remained suspended above the playing cards and the bedspread. They shook from the conflict raging inside him.

  Gone. Can it be true?

  Marissa.

  Mikalah.

  Elena!

  Is this happening? Please make it change. Not you, Elena. Please, not you!

  The cards dropped between in fingers. The tears began to flow, the heaving sobs he had been trying to suppress all day overwhelmed him in seconds. He let himself fall forward onto the neat rows, feeling some of the cards stick to his face when he turned to the side so he could breathe. Why did this have to happen? Why did it have to happen to three of the nicest, sweetest girls he knew? And why Elena? She was the one girl he’d had been mooning over since first grade, but hadn’t the courage to tell her. Why was she gone too? Why? Why did it have to be so? Why?

  He struck the bed, making the cards bounce, angry at himself for not having the guts to tell her how he felt. He should have done so months ago when he first realized he cared for her in more than friendly fashion. He should have written something, a note or put a few phrases in a card. He should have been brave enough! She was a nice girl. She would not have made him feel stupid or insecure, even if she did not feel the same way he did. She would have been easy on him. She was too nice to act otherwise. He knew this for truth as he lay there, mad over his cowardice. Why hadn’t he seen this before? Why did he wait? Why hadn’t he done something?

  She’s gone now…

  He rolled over, gazing up at the ceiling, his vision blurred by tears, his face bunched with the pain he felt in his heart. True, he was only nine years old. True, he did not know what love was or what it was all about in its' realest form. Yes, he was inexperienced, yet to witness much about the world around him. All that was correct, an accurate assessment, unfailing to be exact. But, in Miler’s eyes, there was only one thing that mattered to him – he cared for her. Maybe it was puppy-love. Maybe it was immature, lacking in depth and meaning. Maybe. He felt it all the same, and that is what was real. The anguish in his chest, the burning, in what he deemed could only be his soul, was real. It was something no one older than him could take or deny to him. It was his. What he felt for Elena was his.

  Gone…

  He wiped at his eyes with undo haste, already sick of crying. He hated it. The stuffiness, the headache, the mucus – it was all so freakin’ gross.

  “Come on, Miller. Get a grip,” he mumbled to himself, coming up to rest on an elbow, running the sleeve of his t-shirt along his tear-soaked visage.

  “Yes, you should pull yourself together, young man,” said a voice at the foot of his bed.

  It was a deep, penetrating tone that made the boy’s head snap toward it. Through the moisture distorting his sight, Miller saw a giant shadowy figure he had not known was there. In his room no less!

  “What do you want?” he asked, unable to think of anything else to say.

  The figure rumbled with laughter. “Why, I want you.”

  “What -?” he began to ask. But he stopped instead. Something popped just above his forehead, something that smelled like fresh dog crap and made him choke. He coughed when he tried to breathe. “Who a-a-are y-y-you?” he managed, half-strangled.

  As if spoken through the side of its’ mouth, “That’s not important. Sleep.”

  Miller had more questions, a hundred more things to ask, but would never be able to ask them. In the end, he did what he was told – he slept.

  *****

  Sixteen-year-old Chamondalar Demondrad finally got the wherewithal to tap the green, phone-shaped icon on his cell. He initiated the call he had been agonizing over the entire day. It had only taken five unsuccessful tries

  He was, in fact, a rarity in Los Angeles, something of an exotic. He was Malagasy. He hailed from a small su
burb outside of Antananarivo, called Mandrosoa, in central Madagascar. True to his heritage, he was small in stature with ropey muscles and a dark complexion. He had delicate features for a teenage boy, but that too was much in the norm from where he was born. He had coarse, black hair, combed back over his head, revealing dark eyes, a narrow nose and pointed cheekbones. His face was devoid of facial hair and tapered to a point, giving him a severe sort of cast, but it fit the look of him.

  Though he spoke English as if he had learned it in Great Britain, he had lived in Los Angeles for over five years. He had immigrated along with his family to the United States when he was eleven. One would think his accent would have altered being around so many Angelinos for such an extended period of time, but it had not. But that’s how things were with Chamondalar (who preferred Chum-lee, because of the many syllables in his name). Once something took hold, it stayed that way – forever.

  Despite having the unusual talent of not perspiring in the warmest weather of southern California, a thin sheen of sweat emerged upon his brow. The connection in his ear went through and the line on the other end began to ring.

  For the past three months, he had sat opposite her in his second period Modern Art class. For nearly as long, they had stared at one another across the flat desks separating them. These were not the typical, single-seat sort of desks that wrapped about one’s body from left to middle. No, these were table-like, made for working on large projects as they were wont to do when drawing or painting. Their arrangement was back-to-back. They formed a myriad of squares about the classroom with four students sitting on the outer edges, facing each other in pairs.

  Monique Ceballos was a petite half-Mexican, half-Caucasian girl of similar age. She had been “paired” with him since the first day of school. She was small – only five-foot-one – but had an athletic body with all the accompanying bulges and lumps that Chum-lee liked.

  He often gazed upon when she was not looking in his direction, for long periods of time.

  She had straight, dark-brown hair. She combed it over to the left, creating a half-bang or cascade of hair hiding that side of her forehead. Her eyes matched her hair, speckled with a much lighter hue. They reminded Chum-lee of maple sugar. It was a captivating feature he often fell victim, lost within for minutes at a time. Her lips were thin, pale-pink, surrounded by skin suited to those of her genes that were non-ethnic.

  He had liked her from the outset. He liked her straight-forward attitude and her tendency to look on the better side of things, no matter how difficult the situation. He often found spare moments at the rinsing sink to talk to her. He tried his best to not come across as too aggressive, but was walking a fine line. He still wanted to let her know, in a casual sort of manner, his interested in her was beyond mere friendship.

  She was a classic Heavy Metal throwback. This included the bandanas, the steel-studded jewelry and the leather. Her clothes were almost always torn, in a strategic sort of way, showing much of her body underneath. He liked that more than anything - the fact that she was comfortable in her own skin. This was something alien to the females of his family.

  One day, after they had completed making bowls of clay, at the very same sink, Monique had said Chum-lee had nice eyes. Her frank words had sent shockwaves of tingling sensations up and down his spine. Thrilled over his dream coming true, he knew these were the first inklings she liked him back. It had been a slow process between them after that. This was due to their wide range of differences and origins. But, as the months rolled by, as fall edged ever-closer toward winter, their interactions became more flirtatious. They were more intimate, spoke in hushed tones or by way of notes. These they scooted across their desks when their teacher turned the other way.

  By the end of October, they were spending Nutrition and Lunch together. They would talk and laugh over at the south side of the Quad where trees and a multitude of walkways made for a more private setting. They had spent the last month getting to know each other, content to leave their interaction at school until four days ago. Monique had said in no uncertain terms that she liked him more than a friend and wanted give him her cell phone number.

  Without delay, he had inputted it into his phone. He even went so far to suggest they exchange their social media information as well.

  She was winking at him when the bell had rung, saying if he called her they would do so.

  That had been on Wednesday. Four days ago. And like all nervous young men on the verge of having his first girlfriend, Chum-lee had done what any of them would have. He had procrastinated until he was near insane with dread.

  “Chum-lee! You finally grew a pair and decided to call me after all.”

  All thought banished in a second and the young man from Madagascar found himself at a complete loss for words.

  An uneasy silence ensued.

  “Chum-lee, you better not freeze up on me, not after I’ve waited four damn days to hear from you.” Then, with much more vehemence, “You better not hang up!”

  Chamondalar cleared his throat. “Ah, hello.”

  “Hi, yourself.”

  His eyes shifted back and forth, darting about his room. He was uncertain of what to say as if he had just met Monique and had not spent the last few months talking with her, walking around campus.

  Another awkward pause.

  “What’s wrong?” asked the Metal-Head girl.

  Maybe the truth will work, he though a split second before he replied. “I’m nervous.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know…,” he swallowed. “I guess because this feels so much more formal than anything we’ve ever done together. I don’t know.”

  She giggled, but soft-like, not wanting to make him feel bad. “Talking on the phone is formal?”

  He thought for a moment. “Sounds ridiculous, huh?” He chortled, breathing through his mouth.

  “A little.”

  “No, it sounds like I’ve knocked my head against something.”

  She quieted. “You sound fine to me.”

  “You are just being the nice girl your parents raised you to be,” he countered, disbelieving.

  She guffawed. “Me? ‘Raised’ to be nice? You do see how I dress, right? You do know the kind of music I like, right?” She clicked the roof of her mouth. “I’m not a ‘nice’ girl, Chamondalar.”

  He felt the thrill of electrical current rush through him. He loved it when Monique spoke his full name. The way she rolled her tongue over the “r” at the end was scintillating.

  “You seem nice to me.” He spoke it like a matter of fact, a thing above question. In his mind, it was a sound evaluation.

  “I do?” She was being coy.

  He took the bait. “Yes, and I would like to get to know more about the ‘nice’ girl on the other end of this cellular phone.”

  “You would?”

  “Of course.”

  “And what would you like to know?”

  The innuendo was so palatable Chum-lee almost blurted precisely what he wanted to know about her. Instead, he caught himself before he ruined everything. He cleared his throat a second time. “I would like to take you on a date.”

  Her breath caught in her throat. “A date?” She sounded as panicky as he had at the beginning of the conversation.

  “Yes.” It was a dramatic pause. “Would you like to go on a date with me?”

  “Will I have to wear a dress?” she asked before she could stop herself. The idea of wearing anything girlie was mortifying.

  He laughed, bemused at how fast they had exchanged emotions. “Not where I would like to take you. No, Jeans and a T-shirt, and comfortable shoes will suffice.”

  She perked up. “Oh?”

  “Ever been to the Huntington Library?”

  On the other end of the phone, her face screwed up. “Why would you want to take me to a library? We can’t even talk…”

  His laughter was heartfelt, genuine. How could she not know about the Huntington Library? “It�
�s more of a botanical garden than anything else and there’s a museum there as well.”

  “A garden? Like with carrots and corn, and shit?”

  He sniggered into a fist. “It’s nothing like that at all. It is a place where they grow rare plants from all over the world.” He could tell he was not making much headway. “You’ll have to see it for yourself to understand. While we’re walking around, I can explain everything about it to you. What do you say? Would you like to go with me, on a date, to the Huntington Library?

  “I promise, it will be unlike anything you’ve ever experienced before.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yes. You will be amazed.”

  She twittered in her throat. “Well, if it’s anything like you say, then I can’t wait. When are we going?”

  “I was thinking next Saturday, if that works with you.”

  He could almost see her smiling through the smartphone. “Ok. Yeah, that works. Cool! Going on a date with you, who would’ve ever thought…”

  “I sure wouldn't have, my dear.”

  “Oh, so now I’m ‘your dear.’”

  “But of course.”

  They talked for just under an hour. The topic of conversation changing for one thing to another as rapid as they could manage and not get confused. The entire time, in the back of his mind, Chamondalar knew his final decision. With each word he uttered, his confidence grew. He knew he would find some time, while they were at the Huntington. Maybe in the rose garden or near the beautiful Chinese bridge, he would ask her out. It was time for the next step. They had waited long enough.

  By the time they said their good-byes, he had already figured out how he would word it. It would be magnificent. It would be perfect. After all, what girl would not want her future boyfriend to ask her out in one of the most picturesque places in southern California?

  “You’re a genius,” he said aloud to himself.

  “Unfortunately, you talk too much, even for a human.”