by Casey Wyatt
“No. You’ve been out for two days,” my lover said, his face dark with concern. “Please, Cherry.”
Agony flooded my mind. Ian’s fear for my safety beat against me like a heart.
“Fight this. Release your mind,” Ian pleaded.
Sensation returned to my hands first. The clench of his fingers, knuckles pressed into mine. I latched onto the feeling. Anchored it to me as the tendril of the story reached out – we’re not done yet.
“Yes, we are,” I said out loud. “I don’t want to hear anymore right now. If you want to be heard, go into the laptop.”
Laptop? The voice puzzled, then read my mind, grasping my intention.
As you wish. A blue wisp snaked out of my mouth. With blurring speed the entity was gone.
Outside, Jay yelped, “What the fuck?” Footsteps padded into the bedroom. “Some freaky blue cloud jumped into my computer.”
“Go with it, Jay,” I said, flopping onto my side. The blankets were tangled around my legs. Big mistake. The room dipped and bobbed like a cork on the ocean.
“Hey, you’re finally awake,” Jay smiled.
“Yup.” I yawned and stretched slowly. “So what happened to me?”
Jay and Ian took turns filling me in. After I commanded the bracelet to read the text, I turned into Chatty Cathy, speaking non-stop for almost twenty-four hours. Once my body collapsed from exhaustion, I went into a deep sleep, muttering and thrashing for another two days. Every attempt to revive me, except the one I recalled involving the juice, had failed.
“I was afraid, you’d never snap out of it,” Ian leaned over, smoothing my hair away from my face. “Jesus. I’ve never been so scared in my life.”
“I’ll second that,” Jay added.
“The whole time, I could feel another presence in your mind.” Ian tapped his forehead. “The emotions, the patterns were not yours.”
“The blue cloud must be a sentient being. Or a memory program.” Jay stroked the closed laptop. His fingers danced as if unsure if he should risk opening the machine.
“I don’t think it meant to harm me.” I eased onto my elbows. The room no longer spun like a roulette wheel. “It was trying to tell me a story. Their story.” I gestured to the computer. “I hope your machine can handle the information.” Anything I had learned was already fading. Like wisps of smoke, I couldn’t retain the images. “I hope you thought to record my chatter, because I can’t recall it now.”
Damn. Three days flat on my back and nothing to show for it. The least the ancient life form could do was let me remember the encounter.
“Don’t worry, I captured it. You talked non-stop,” Jay patted the computer. “I need to check on my programs.”
Ian joined me on the pallet and curled around my body like spoon. When he finally spoke, I had to lean into him to hear.
“The whole time that thing was in you, my bracelet . . . it wept for her.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“We’re not alone, Cherry,” Ian said, the barest hint of quaver in his voice. “I can feel him in my head. Ever since the cuff attached to me.”
I closed my eyes and sensed. In the theater of my mind, she waited behind the constructed red curtain separating my psyche from the family bond. I pushed the barrier aside and strode onto center stage. She sat in a balcony, high above the audience. A lone entity with a box to herself.
The woman was clothed in pale yellow. Her raven black hair was pulled off her face. She stared down at my family below with a curious expression of wonder. Elfin in appearance, she had high cheekbones, thin arched eyebrows and fine boned jaw. If sadness were cloth, she wore a fine cloak, trimmed with melancholy and regret.
When I tried to reach toward her, she abruptly stood and exited the box.
“Damn. She left,” I said. “Who are they?” Stupid question, since I’d already guessed at the answer.
Ian gave me a quizzical look. “Ghosts from the past. This place’s memories.”
My brain couldn’t handle those memories. Not all in one sitting.
“He loved her. With his whole soul.” Ian said, voice trailing away. The same gloominess projected off of him.
“Hey!” I twisted around and captured his gaze. “Don’t let his depression suck you in.” When he glanced away, I gave him a firm shake. “Look at me.”
He stared at my mouth. Words slowly formed on his lips. “I like it when you jostle me around.” A wicked smile brightened his features.
“Ah, there you are. The Ian I know and love.”
He stilled. “Do you really love me, Charity Belmont?”
“I do.”
“Good. Because you’re mine.” With blurring speed his mouth was on me in a deep kiss.
I broke away long enough to growl back “mine,” before he captured my lips with grinding force. The dark memories of the lost king and queen were overridden by our passion. And I enjoyed the hell out of every moment of it.
~ * * * ~
“I suppose we have to get back to the real world.” Ian tugged my tangled hair.
I groaned. Every muscle in my body buzzed from pleasant overuse. “If we must.”
Ian clucked at me, “You know we have—”
Loud bangs rattled the front door. “Cherry! Get out here. You have to see this.”
“Is Jay always so enthusiastic about his work?” Ian rolled off the pallet, stood up and stretched. I enjoyed every ripple and curve of his sculpted body. Too quickly, the red jumpsuit covered it up.
“Why do we have to wear these dumb outfits?” I groused, yanking up the zipper with an angry pull.
“You’re the boss. Change the rules.”
“I like the way you think.” I tiptoed up and kissed his nose. “I’ll plant the bug in a member of the Morale Committee. They’ll think it was their idea.”
“Clever girl.” Ian’s admiration touched me.
Jay burst into the bedroom. With a quick glance up and down, he said, “Good thing you’re dressed. There’s a lady standing on the shore who wants to speak with you.”
“Yeah, we’ve met her before,” I said.
Ian and I left the cottage, with Jay stammering behind us, “Thanks for the warning. She nearly gave me a heart attack.”
“You need a heartbeat to have one of those, buddy,” I teased. The woman, unchanged since last time, watched us approach.
“The moment of truth is upon you,” she said to us. “King Enkile and Queen Azarel have chosen you to renew the Eliade.”
“Wait. Before you go further, who or what is the Eliade?” I’m rude. What can I say?
“You are descendants of the Eliade. The peoples of this planet,” she said, her tone conveying, how dumb are you? “Queen Azaral, she told you the tale, did she not?”
“She did,” I grumbled. “And she nearly put me in a coma.”
“Because of the human in you.” The lady walked across the shore, leaving faint footprints behind, proving she had substance.
“I don’t understand. What are we supposed to do here?” I curled my fists into balls, tired of the riddles. I wanted her to spell it out for me. Ian placed his arm around my shoulder – waves of calmness floated into my mind.
“Be who you were meant to be.”
Great, more nonsensical answers. “You mean dead? Like this planet?”
The lady paused, considering my statement. “The planet can have new life and so can you.”
“I kind of liked my old, undead life,” I muttered.
“Our kind was never meant to be in a state of suspended animation.” She waved Jay over. “This one, he is newly brought over, yes?”
Jay nodded, “I am.”
“Yet for over a hundred years, you prolonged your youth and your life drinking this female’s blood.”
“True.” Jay stared openly at the lady. He reached out and touched her shoulder. “What are you?”
“I am a living memory.” The corners of her mouth turned down.
“Enough of this!” My
temper spun out of control, despite Ian’s quiet efforts to relax me. “Again, I’ll ask. What is the point of us being here?”
“You’re our biological legacy. In order to save our race, we experimented with alchemy and science. We invented a new genetic strain to sustain us on your planet. When we arrived on Earth, there were unintended side effects. Instead of life, we became undead.”
“Sweet Jesus,” Ian said. “You experimented on yourselves.”
“Yes. To save the race.”
“From what?” Jay asked.
“Extinction. The planet could no longer sustain us. The climate changed. The water dried up, the vegetation died and the atmosphere faded. We had advanced technology,” she waved her arm out to the caves, “yet no way of saving the world. So we escaped. Three groups. One to Earth, one to the stars and another through a rip in the fabric of reality.”
“The Veil?” My skin crawled at the memory.
“Not the one you traveled through. Another.”
Nice. There were more of them. “What happened to the other two groups?” I asked.
“We never heard from them again.” The lady turned to face the water. I could see the lake through her body. As each moment passed, she became more transparent. “I need to replenish. Learn the story. Don’t let us die.” She slipped into the water with barely a ripple.
“Wow. She’s a freak show.” Jay rubbed his palms together. “Guess I’d better get back to the murals.”
“Wait,” Ian called out. “Did you learn anything from Cherry’s ramblings?”
I shot Ian a cold stare. Ramblings. Like I had any control over myself at the time.
Jay rubbed the back of his neck, gaze to the ground. “Not really. When I went to replay the files, all I could hear was gibberish.”
Fiddlesticks.
The bracelet pulsed against my wrist. “Shut it.” Looked like I’d have to learn to speak Ancient Eliade. Without my head exploding.
~ * * * ~
We left Jay and his team behind in the caves. I’d have to learn to speak Eliade some other way. The men-folk decided it was too risky for me to try translating again. No argument from me.
Many unanswered questions tantalized me. I peppered Ian with them on the way back to the colony, until he asked me to stop.
“We can’t solve them everything right now, luv,” he said with far more patience than I deserved. If it had been me, I would have applied duct tape to my mouth. Liberal amounts.
“Okay,” I relented. “Let’s make Prior and Harmony share the fun.”
Upon our return, I called an emergency meeting and recounted the events in the cave. Harmony silently absorbed the information with very few questions. She left the meeting to go reflect upon an answer. Waiting for divine enlightenment from the Gods. How useful.
Prior, on the other hand, was giddy with anticipation. “I must assist young Jay. I have some ancient texts Queen Victoria left me.”
My hand itched to smack him upside the head. “At some point, did you plan on sharing the information with us?”
“Well, I didn’t think it was relevant at the time,” he sniffed.
Prior had me there. If he had brought me the information, I would have asked him what it had to do with settling the colony. And he knew it too, the little toad.
Ian shuffled the papers in front of him, suppressing a smile. Despite my order to lay off the reports, Prior continually found ways to generate documents. He claimed the pile awaiting me in my office was information necessary to run the colony.
After the meeting adjourned, I subjected myself to an odious sonic shower. Louis intercepted me as I returned to my room clad in a bath towel.
“Good. You’re back. I need your approval on a number of items.” Louis had to jog beside me as I power-walked back to my quarters.
“Fill me in right now.”
He laid out a long list. The most pressing in my mind—the greenhouse’s progress and if there had been any additional biological reactions. Louis continued talking. I opened the door to my room.
I dropped the towel and Louis went quiet. Annoyed by his modesty, I snapped, “I know I’m not the first naked female you’ve ever seen.”
No answer.
“Come on, I’m not hideous.”
Louis stood immobile, gaze fixed over my head.
Before I could chastise him further, his arm pointed behind me. As I turned to look, he tackled me onto the bed, covering me with his body.
“God damn it!” I shoved him back. His grip, firm yet gentle, held me immobile. “You’re not my type.” Besides Ian would rip his fool head off if he walked in.
Louis howled in pain. Okay. I hadn’t hit him hard enough to break anything.
“My back!” he grunted, flaying at something behind him.
A spider robot was embedded in his skin. Its mechanical legs stabbed Louis’ back repeatedly. I had no idea if silver poisoned zombies.
“Shit. Louis, let me go.” I wiggled my left arm out from under his chest.
“No,” he groaned. “Stay quiet.” He barked out in pain again.
This death-bot didn’t seem too bright – it hadn’t discovered it was attacking the wrong person. It continued to attack Louis, pointy tipped feet burrowing and injecting deep into his skin. Hydraulic clicks and hisses sounded off with each movement.
I breathed out. Not because I needed to, but on reflex. Louis’ weight increased. He could no longer hold himself up. In a moment he’d be an undead boulder trapping me.
The noise stopped. I stilled. Whirring gyros moved up Louis’ back.
Eight tiny robotic eyes peered over Louis’ shoulder. Last time I hadn’t gotten such an up close and personal look. Whoever designed the artificial thing, made it as realistic as possible. Except I was pretty sure there were no real spiders as large as a Chihuahua. Red beams shot out of the eyes, tiny lasers scanning my image. I needed to move—
It jumped.
I blocked it with my left arm. The spider’s legs struck the cuff with a metallic bang. It skittered, clinging to the cuff’s edges. The little injectors shot poison onto the gold surface. The spider shifted, probing for skin.
“Do something!” I shouted to bracelet. Arcs of blue energy erupted, frying the spider’s circuits. The robot jerked and twisted. Spasms shook the legs and they unlatched from the cuff. The spider ejected onto the floor with a clatter. Acrid smoke billowed into the room as it burned.
“What in the bloody hell?” A wave of pissed off flooded my brain. Louis’s limp form was torn off my body. Ian slung him onto the floor. “There had better be a good reason he’s on top of you.” Ian sniffed the air.
I weakly pointed to the burning wreck next to my cot. “Big bug.” I gave him the thirty second version.
Ian sat me up, checking me for punctures. He tapped my cuff, “Glad to see this can do more than act like a GPS or brain scrambler.”
“Will Louis be okay?” My assistant hadn’t moved yet. He’d saved me from true death.
“Not sure.” Ian poked his head out my door and flagged down a passing revenant. “Go find Prior. Tell him to come here right now. And then fetch Phillip.”
“Clothes.” I was naked. And despite my bravado earlier, I didn’t want to be in my birthday suit in front Prior. For some reason, he reminded me too much of Morton Vandemere III.
Ian handed me a jumpsuit.
“I can’t believe I got jumped again,” I said, zipping up my suit.
“What?” Ian’s cold voice was like a face slap. “When did this happen?”
“The day you sent for me in the cave. I was in the greenhouse and one of those creepy crawly spiders attacked me.”
“Hell, woman. You could have mentioned it sooner,” Ian huffed.
“I’m sorry,” I touched his hand. “So much has happened in the last few days.”
His face softened. “Sorry. If I recall, we had other concerns.” He leaned down and kissed me, stirring heat in all the right places.
&nbs
p; There was a polite knock on the door.
Ian stepped back and promised, “Soon, naughty minx. You can properly apologize for withholding information.” A seductive smile told me how much I would enjoy my “punishment.”
“Come on in,” I called, regretfully.
~ * * * ~
“Louis will be fine,” Harmony informed me. She intercepted me on the way to my office. “We’ve taken him to the temple for healing. Lucky for us, silver doesn’t kill zombies.”
Man, I owed him one. Big time. “Thank you for caring for him.” I opened my office door, stepping aside to let Harmony in first. Stacks of papers littered my desk. I swear I’d light a bonfire outside of Prior’s door, if he didn’t stop sending me reports.
“It is my pleasure to assist.”
“Great. Can you spare someone to go to the caves?” After I explained the situation, Harmony agreed to send as many priests and priestesses as necessary.
“This is what we are meant for. To interpret the will of the Gods.”
I wondered how Harmony and Lake Lady would get along. They’d probably speak in verse together. Then again, Harmony would probably understand better than I could. And she had way more patience.
“I will take my leave to make arrangements.” Harmony stood up to leave.
“One more thing,” I faltered. Religious fervor of any kind had left a bad taste in my mouth, but I needed to find a way to translate the story. Part instinct and part suspicion drove me to believe understanding the story was important.
“Go ahead, my child,” Harmony smiled placidly, waiting as if she had infinite time.
“I had an encounter . . . with an ancient memory. She tried to show me the past. I couldn’t handle it.” Nerves fluttered my stomach remembering how I had felt after. “Is there a way I can prepare . . . for next time?”
Harmony nodded her head with understanding. “The mind must be made ready to accept the wisdom of the Gods. We can assist when you are ready.” Before leaving, she laid her palm on my abdomen, “Blessed be.”
My brows furrowed. A warm tingling spread throughout my lower body and womb.
