“You’re name is Elizabeth.” He swallowed hard, thinking back to everything he knew about her. From what that was; he remembered Rochie telling him, he believed that he killed her during the end times. Rochie wouldn’t have lied about this. He knew his friend well enough for that. He just wouldn’t do such a thing. “But you died. Rochie killed you.”
She laughed again.
The sound of it boomed around the small room.
“He did try to kill me.” She raised her head and then lowered it again. She stared at his face. “I took the wood to the chest, but like my brother, it takes much more than that to rid this world of us.”
He swallowed hard. It took a lot of effort to get it to go down too. When he finished it, his throat hurt some.
“I don’t believe you.” He had no knowledge of any of this. He didn’t remember being there, or watching anyone giving birth, but then another memory popped inside his head. He remembered hearing about Kalima telling him that he and Rochie were there when he was born. He told them this just before they stormed Devish’s castle a few years prior. Kalima told them that they knew who his father was. They were there. He was there. He and Rochie blocked this from their minds to protect him. Again, he shuddered with realizing this.
Elizabeth watched his eyes burn. She saw his forehead realize everything. Seeing it, she laughed again.
He felt like he was going to be sick. He felt like vomiting. Just the feeling was enough for him to know the truth. She wouldn’t have known this. She wouldn’t have known what he told us. It has to be true. It has to be real but how. How did we not see this? How did I miss it?
She saw enough. She stood up fast.
He heard her but was too trapped within his own thoughts to care.
For her, the fun was just beginning. “Now that we understand each other, I can get back to work.” She turned to the door, reached for the handle, but stopped just before opening it. She had more to say, more to gloat over, before she could leave him. She just couldn’t help herself. “We know of the boy and what he can do Kenar. We know where he is and how to get to him.”
He shook his head. “The boy?” He knew of only one that would interest them. “You’re after his son?” His shuddering turned in to an all-out shake. He shivered to his very being.
She loved watching him. She had him right where she always wanted him. She just loved all of this so much.
“Oh yes.”
“Why? What possible reason could you want him?”
She looked at the floor. She looked at the thin old carpet covering it. She looked back up.
“We are going to change the world Kenar. We are going to make it as it should have been.”
He winced. He had to do something. If this woman—this thing—was Kalima’s sister, and he no longer doubted that she was, than she had a part of him inside her too. She would have the good there too. He just had to find it. He had to get it to come out. He had to try.
“Why are you doing this?”
She shrugged softly. She knew he couldn’t see her, so she did so freely.
“I am my father’s child.”
He sat forward to his knees. He sat upright on to them. He had to get her attention.
“That may be true but you are also your mother’s daughter. You are half-human too.”
She bowed her head. “I know.”
He heard something inside her voice and it did give him hope. It sounded like sorrow. It sounded soft.
“Then don’t do this. You can choose a different path.”
She shook her head, and gripped the handle tighter in her hand. “I am doing it for her too.”
He didn’t know what to say to that.
“I am going to wrong everything in this world Kenar. I am going to give it to those who truly deserve it. I am going to set everything right.”
He blinked fast. “What are you planning?” He so wished he had his gifts. He so wanted to know. He couldn’t, so he felt just about as lost as ever.
She sighed. “Only what must happen. The Trinity must come.”
He heard it. H felt saddened, truly disappointed beyond words.
“Now if you would excuse me Kenar, I have a show to put on.” She opened the door. She left the room quickly, and shut it behind her. She was done. She felt spent.
He heard her leave. She did so fast that the brief feeling of knowledge and strength went by without him having the chance to use it. He just couldn’t keep up.
Left alone, he felt more so than ever.
How did this happen? What can I do to stop it? Why did I let it? He truly felt tears swell up in his eyes. He didn’t have any answers for any of this, and that made him cry. He just didn’t know what else he could do. He felt more than just lost he felt true dread. He felt just as helpless. He felt defeated.
He just sat back against the wall and cried. He had nothing left.
40
Jimmy couldn’t wait to see them. It felt like an eternity since he left. After everything he heard about them being attacked by this gathering storm group, he hated himself for it. He should have known better. He was smarter than this. At least he thought he was.
“Don’t worry buddy. They found them and they’re safe.” Brandon tried to reassure him. He could see the pain all over his face. He felt it in him. He heard it from David himself. He told him everything. He told him about Rachel stopping them. He told him about the injury to this boy that was with them. He didn’t leave anything out.
Jimmy knew what he was trying to do, but it didn’t help him at all, with how he felt. He only nodded to him. He would have to see them before he did anything else.
The car pulled up in front of an old looking building by the docks along the Delaware River. Everything around the building looked rundown. It looked like the perfect hideout.
The car then stopped.
Jimmy barely let it, and jumped out of the car just as the breaks were pressed. He didn’t stop there. He ran to the door in front of him, guarded by two large looking men with rifles held out in front of them, and went inside.
He came into a large and carnivorous room.
“Lord Kalima?” David greeted him. He even bowed. He sounded shaky and he was. He had never been this close to him like this before and he didn’t know how to act. He felt like he was meeting a god. He felt completely lost for words.
“Where are they?” Jimmy didn’t care how he felt about him. Rachel and Casey was the only people he cared about the most.
David watched Lord Brandon join them behind him. “They are here.” He held out his right arm towards the back of the room. He awkwardly moved, and led them to a hallway just to their right. He continued down the hallway to the first door on his right, and opened the door.
Jimmy followed him and came to the door. He looked inside.
Rachel was there, sitting on a small wooden chair next to an equally small bed that sat along the wall to the left of the room. Casey sat on the bed. A young girl with blonde hair stood next to them at the head of the bed.
Rachel saw him and stood up.
She rushed him and flew herself into his open arms.
He hugged her tightly. He kissed her forehead. He felt thankful that he could. “I am so sorry that I left you like that.” He held her. He didn’t want to let her go. “I shouldn’t have gone.”
She pulled herself from him, and looked up. Their eyes met. “I know you’re sorry.” She knew him oh so well. “But we’re fine now.” She smiled. “Really.”
He saw it hollow. She looked tired. She looked winded. He expected as much.
He looked to his son. “How are you?” He saw the swollen cheek. He had a bruise that covered his chin up to a spot just beneath his left eye. A small amount of blood covered his upper lip. It looked split. It explained the blood.
Casey shrugged a boyish try. “I’m okay. I’m just a little sore.”
Jimmy released his wife and knelt down in front of his son. “I’m sorry Casey.” He reached
out with his right hand and took him by the chin. He tried to be gentle. He didn’t want to cause him any more pain.
Casey did wince when he did, so his father dropped his hand.
“What are you sorry for?” He sat back some on the bed. His head still felt rather fogged over, and he figured it would feel like this for a while. In fact, he was surprised that he didn’t feel all that bad—all considering.
Jimmy shook his head. “This is all my fault. If I had stayed with you, if I didn’t leave, this wouldn’t have happened.”
Rachel couldn’t agree with that. “It’s not your fault Jimmy. You didn’t know that they were going to come for us.” She believed this completely.
So did Casey as he shook his head.
Jimmy needed to know more. “How did they find you?” He stood up.
Rachel shrugged hard. “I have no idea. They just came. They were humans.”
She turned to the door, saw Brandon and Sharlia standing there, and gave them both a soft and grateful nod of the head.
They both returned it.
Sharlia listened to everything and decided to come into this. “However they found you, it does not matter now. What matters is that you are here with us.”
Jimmy sighed with this. “The only reason I’m here is because of Kenny.” He thought about the message left for him in his apartment, and how he would know what it meant. He thought about the smell that led him to the place in south Seattle. He saw the three people there when they caught him in the room. They were surprised to see me. He saw the woman that was with the man with the blonde hair. He saw her black hair. He saw her pale face. They were afraid of her because she was a Walker. The man knew she was one. He put everything together with what happened to his family. Suddenly, it all made sense. They led me to the warehouse. She led me there to occupy my thoughts. They wanted me to come to find Kenny, because they wanted me out of the way to get to Rachel and Casey. He felt a pit in his stomach. It told him how right he was for thinking all of this. It was all a ruse. It was all about getting to them.
Sharlia nodded.
Rachel hugged herself with both of her arms. “What did you find out about Kenny?” It was time to get to business. She was dying to find out. If he found something, it should help them with all of this. At least she could only hope it would. As for everything that she now knew about her son, she would wait to tell Jimmy that at some other time. This was not it.
Jimmy looked back at Casey. “I think we should let him rest.” He didn’t want to talk about this in front of him, so he quietly pointed this out to all of them. That’s when he truly saw the young girl. With his rush to see his family, he didn’t see her there before, but now, he felt jumbled as to why she was there. It shouldn’t have happened. “What is she doing here?” He recognized her as the one that was with Casey in the diner. Again, why did they bring her with them? It just didn’t make any sense.
Rachel shrugged. “They know about her Jimmy. They tried to use her to get to Casey.”
He bowed his head with this. “What about her family?” He did acknowledge some of her reason, but he had to make sure about the rest of it.
Of course she did. “Her family is not in town. I didn’t have the choice but to bring her with us.” As for the rest of this, the part of her not trusting her, it was not the time to get into that either. She would wait, like she would do with everything else.
He agreed. “Very well then.” He brought his thoughts back to the matter at hand. “We need to compare our notes.” He turned.
Rachel thankfully agreed with him. “He’s right.” She turned with him.
Casey felt bad for his girlfriend, and thankful for his father in understanding all of this. Some of him didn’t want her here, but another part, the greater part of him, did. As for them still wanting to keep him in the dark about what was going on, he didn’t like it at all.
“I’m really fine dad. I want to help.”
He admired his son’s strength, but now wasn’t the time for him to show it. “You need your rest. We’ll tell you everything after you do.”
Casey puffed. “Fine.” He swung his feet around and lied back. He slowly placed his head onto the pillow. Angel helped him.
Jimmy watched her and then nodded to the others.
Both he Rachel stepped out, as Sharlia and Brandon stepped back.
Rachel then closed the door to the room.
Brandon and Sharlia led them out to the greater room.
Jimmy joined Brandon. “Thank you for sending help for them.” He felt more than this. As far as he was concerned about it, he now owed his old friend his very life. He would repay it the next chance he could.
Brandon shrugged awkwardly. “It’s cool.” He looked at Rachel. “From what I heard, they didn’t need their help. Rachel took care of them all by herself.”
Jimmy wouldn’t let it go. “I’m serious Brandon…Thank you.”
He just gave him a boyish grin.
Jimmy took his right shoulder into his hand and squeezed.
Sharlia had so many questions, that she didn’t know where to start so she picked the most obvious one and went with it. “Who is the boy?” She had her own feelings about him, but wanted to hear it straight from Kalima’s mouth.
He knew this. There was no reason to hide it now. He looked at Rachel as she joined him by his side. She gave him an acknowledgeable nod.
“He’s my son. He’s ours.” He wrapped his left arm around her shoulders.
The entire room gasped.
Sasha stood by Brandon. “How is that possible? No Wanderer can have children.” More than just one person had always told her this, so what he just said couldn’t be true. She of course knew about Jimmy, but as for Wanderers and made Walkers, they couldn’t have children. It just didn’t make any sense.
Robert would have agreed, but of course, he knew better. “Apparently not.” He stood by his sister. He watched her closely. He watched her every move. He wanted to rush her and hold her in his arms, but couldn’t. He still thought that she cut him off, and if he were right, he would continue giving her the space.
She turned to him and smiled. She then reached out and wrapped her left arm around his waist. She was more than just happy to see him, she was ecstatic. She loved him so much.
He took it in, and did the same thing to her.
Sharlia already knew. “Why are they after him?” She had to continue with this. All other things, they just didn’t matter.
Jimmy couldn’t answer her. “I wish I knew.” He wouldn’t stop there. “He has no gifts, at least nothing that is showing itself yet.” He watched all of their stares at him, trying to take in everything they were thinking as he said this. He just wasn’t sure himself. “He is completely human—well—except for his rapid aging.”
Rachel nodded with this, but as for his gifts, she did know something about them. She too watched all of their eyes. She saw the looks they gave them, and with seeing them, she knew she couldn’t tell them what she felt she knew. She had to tell Jimmy first. They had to talk about this, because if she was right, and he was somehow blocking her from using her gifts, than they all might be in danger. Jimmy couldn’t change, as far as she knew, so it—he—might affect all of them. She couldn’t take the chance as to how they would react to this. She wouldn’t risk him. She just didn’t care about anything else but him.
Sharlia didn’t believe him. “Sima had gifts Kalima. He must have them too.”
Jimmy shook his head. “He doesn’t. I don’t know why they are after him.” He looked at all of them. It’s time to tell them everything I know. “I think they were using Kenny to get to him—to Casey.”
They all looked confused, so he continued, “They left a message on his refrigerator. It was a message that was left for me. They wanted to get me away from Rachel and Casey. They knew I would go and try to find him.”
“What did the message say?” Sharlia readied herself for anything.
He took a hea
vy breath before he began. “It said that the gathering storm is the master and Sima is the strings.”
The three of his closest friends all bowed their heads at the same time.
It startled him immensely. “What?” It was like they already knew.
Sharlia sighed before she answered him. She didn’t want to tell him what they knew, but knew that she didn’t have the choice. He had the right to know everything.
“We think they are using her remains to make a drug that changes Walkers back to humans. That is how they are killing us. They make us human and kill us as one.”
Jimmy knew of this drug. He used it on himself, and now hearing where it came from, he truly felt ill with it. They used his own daughter to make it. He had it inside him. He had her inside him.
They all watched his face turn pale.
He let go of Rachel and moved out towards the hallway behind them, and stopped. He had to think. He had to push everything he now felt out of him before he could.
Sharlia felt for him, as she always did. “I know that must sicken you Kalima, but it is true.”
He now understood what the message for him meant, but there was more. Why didn’t she tell him this when he saw her at the flames? Why didn’t she tell him the truth? Living within the flames gave her an insight to the future and to the past. She would have known it. She should have told him, but didn’t. It destroyed his very will to think straight.
Sasha felt his pain for hearing all of this, and she, like everyone else, understood it. She always understood him.
“Jimmy?” She moved to him and stood right behind him. “Are you okay?”
He shook from within.
Rachel did too. If what they said about this was real, then what about Casey. Did he have the same power? Did his body have the same thing? She wasn’t sure, but was about one thing. It gave them a reason to hunt him. It chilled her through her very soul.
Robert heard her thoughts—somewhat. He couldn’t place them but as a feeling for her son. He understood this. Sima and he are more alike than she had ever thought before. He now knew how she felt.
Jimmy looked up. “They used her to get to us.” He saw the message again, and suddenly it all made more sense to him. The puzzle of all of this was. “The gathering storm is the master. Sima…the drug…is the strings. We are the puppets.”
The Puppets and the Strings (A Werewolf's Saga Book 7) Page 25
