by Lori Adams
Caleb may have been disavowed, but he could still sense emotions in others. And his eyes widened in recognition. “Uh…come again?”
“I’m getting…I mean I want to get married. I want you to marry me…and my fiancée.”
Caleb blinked like he’d been slapped and then took a step back. “No shit?” He laughed and then took a moment to let it sink in. “So, you’re coming to me because this isn’t on the up and up. Otherwise, you’d go to Dimitri or someone else. Anyone else but me. Am I right?”
Michael nodded.
Caleb shook his head, grinning. “Gotta love free will, man. So what, she’s human then? Am I right?”
“Yes. Technically, she’s a spirit walker now.”
“No shit. So we’re doing a…what was that called?”
“Hieros gamos,” Michael said.
“Right, yeah. A holy marriage. Sure, I’ll do it. Anything for you, man. So when’s the big day?”
“As soon as possible. I can have Sophia here tomorrow. Will that work?”
“Sure. So that’s her name? Sophia?” He nodded and then stopped. “Wait, you’re not talking about Sophia St. James, are you?”
Michael’s jaw went slack. He immediately picked up Caleb’s whirling change in emotions. He was radiating fear. “You know her?”
Caleb raised his hands and backed away. “Ah, hell no, man. Sorry, Michael, but if that’s your chick, I’m out of here. Seriously, man. No way I’m marrying you guys.” He jumped gracefully over the balustrade like a man used to quick exits.
“WAIT!” Michael lunged for him, but Caleb disappeared halfway down.
Chapter 11
You Go, I Go
Yelling voices. Angry shouts. Pounding stone against stone. My head is throbbing in the midst of a brutal nightmare. I toss my face to the side, my eyes flicking erratically beneath my lids. Blurred visions fly past my eyes. My chest is heavy with excitement, with the rush of power. The images come into focus and I find myself standing before a row of scowling faces. Men in black cloaks behind a long stone table. Darkness hovers at my back and from it comes the angry shouts. I am the one they are afraid of. My presence provokes arguments. Chaos.
I feel Dante behind me. He, too, is afraid of me. I turn back and smile with cool confidence. He is shocked. Then he snatches my hand and pulls me from the mob while I laugh hysterically.
I twitch awake and my eyes fly open with sudden awareness. Bolting upright in bed, I pant and look around the room. I am home. Safe in my bed. Sundance has bailed on me and lies against the door. I’ve scared the bark out of him with all my tossing and moaning.
“Holy crap,” I breathe out. I lay a hand over my heart. It’s a freaking jackhammer. This was by far the worst one yet, these visions and nightmares I’ve been having of Ka and Dante in Hell. Unless I’ve missed an episode, I think I’ve witnessed just about everything Ka has seen and done since Dante took her. I can’t make out exact conversations, only the involved emotions interspersed with hazy visuals. So far I feel everything Ka is feeling.
And just like the first time, I feel a shift in my power that makes me tremble. And my nose starts to bleed.
“Damnit.” I wipe it and tip my head back. Carefully sliding from bed, I make my way to the door, bumping into stuff because I’m walking like a zombie and can’t see where I’m going. Sundance barrels out when I open the door. I continue down the hall to the bathroom. It takes about five minutes to stop the bleeding this time. Three minutes longer than the last nightmare. It makes me light-headed and I have to wait a while longer before I can change clothes and head down for breakfast. It affects my appetite, too. I’m hungry like it’s nobody’s business.
“Everything okay?” Dad asks. He’s been studying me from behind his coffee cup. I stop swirling maple syrup over my Cheerios and look at him.
“Oh.” I realize what I’ve been doing and set the syrup down. I have no clue. No excuse. He suggests that it might be a “female thing.” Dad’s roundabout way of asking if I’m suffering from PMS. This strikes me as funny for some reason and I burst out a hard laugh. Just once. It startles both of us. “Sorry,” I mumble, embarrassed. I take my cereal bowl and set it down in the sink. Bracing my hands on the counter, I stare at it and gather my thoughts. This is getting out of control, I think, just as a single drop of blood lands in the milk. I wipe at my nose with a paper towel and tell Dad I’m going to work. I rush out without a coat.
There is only one thing on my mind as I make my way to the Gazette; things are getting worse, not better. I have to find a way to get Ka back here, now. My emotions keep rocketing from one end of the spectrum to the other. The surge of power I felt in my nightmare was exhilarating in a frightening sort of way. When Rama Kuan and I finally had our private chat about things, he warned of the power of my dark opposite. Everyone has a dark opposite, he’d said. The e spermati kakias, the seeds of wickedness, that are intermingled within every spirit. If your elements split evenly when you made Ka, then the power is equally divided. Odds of that happening are one in a billion. Chances are strong that one of you has a driving power that will overtake the other.
Not something that I wanted to hear. I knew my power was strong; everybody said so and I could feel it when I destroyed the soul seekers and reapers. But I have nothing to compare it to. I haven’t seen Ka wield any kind of power. Without the Chelsea Light, she should easily yield to me. But my nightmares are suggesting otherwise. If she has a larger portion of my dark opposite, that freaky spermati kakias crap, then I could be in more trouble than I imagined.
The Gazette is busy when I arrive. Connie Caulfield is paying for a page of advertisement in the Real Estate section. We eye each other with mild curiosity; she’s wondering if I approve of her dating Dad. I’m hoping she won’t feel awkward around me. We’ve always gotten along. In the end, we share polite smiles so I think we’re okay.
Vern Warner is loading his mailbag with supplements and freebies from the Sugar Shack. I snag a handful of edible New Year’s Eve candy poppers when he isn’t looking. I unwrap one without a second thought and toss it into my mouth. It explodes like a Skittles stuffed with a firecracker. Yum. I lick my lips. Miss Minnie frowns at me because I’m being unprofessional.
I don’t know what’s gotten into me, so I go straight to my desk and keep busy on the computer.
A while later, when everyone has gone, I spin Miss Minnie around in her swivel chair because I want her full attention. “Something’s happened.” I charge in without any kind of introduction. I tell her all about Dante and Ka in Hell. About the nightmares and nosebleeds. I’m desperate to get back to normal. I need another spell. I need High Alice.
“Settle down,” Miss Minnie says, because I’ve worked myself into a fit. I’m pacing and cracking my knuckles.
“I can’t get back into La Croix,” I say. “Not without Dante.”
“It wouldn’t matter,” she says. “Alice isn’t in La Croix anymore. After your visit, Baron Semedi and Maman Brigette got antsy about keeping her for themselves.” Miss Minnie becomes agitated at the thought and fiddles with her sleeve. I return to my chair across from her and lean forward, resting my hand on hers. That strange sensation that passed between us the night I learned about High Alice returns, shivering up my arm when I touch her. I lift my hand and look at it. Then at her. She gives me a soft smile and says, “It’s not so uncommon for those in tune with the spirit world to share a feeling of recognition. I call it energy awareness.”
“You have premonitions.” I state this as a fact, remembering what Bailey told me about her.
“It runs in the family. Alice is especially gifted and…” Her voice quivers and she pulls a tissue from her sleeve to wipe her eyes. I reach out again and squeeze her other hand, welcoming the “energy awareness” between us.
“I’m sure she’s fine,” I say, but without any real conviction. This isn’t something I’m familiar with. “Alice said Baron would do anything to protect her. Although, now that I th
ink about it, I’m not exactly sure what she does for him. Do you know?”
She nods with a somber expression. “They discovered her unique gifts. Alice has premonitions regarding humans but also regarding demonic activity. They use her to keep tabs on fellow demons. At least that’s what she told me. Personally, I think it makes her weak. Every time we speak on the phone her voice is thin. She sounded so feeble the last time.”
I sit back and cross my arms, giving this some thought. “Where did they take her?”
Miss Minnie fiddles with her tissue, her thin hands trembling. “I don’t know. She said something about an underground fight circuit. I couldn’t make sense of it. I’ve been meditating on it ever since. Sometimes I see flashes of bodies. Cages. Crowds of people. And I use that term loosely. People. Whatever she’s involved with, it’s not for humans.”
“What about her dad? Sheriff White should have some resources. Ways to track her down.”
If I didn’t know better, I’d say Miss Minnie was blushing. With embarrassment. She’s as bright as a tomato and she rises from the chair to fuss around her desk.
“What is it?” I demand. “He’s not really her dad? Is that it?”
“Oh no. He is definitely her daddy. Remember I said our gifts run in the family? Yes, well, Bruce, who you know as Sheriff White, isn’t really a sheriff.”
I slump back in my chair and flip my hand up. “Go ahead. Tell me what else I’ve believed that wasn’t true.”
So she does. With a straight face, although she’s now on the pink side, she explains that Alice’s dad had been missing for many years. When he finally came back around, he wanted to jump-start their relationship, so he had the brilliant idea of joining the police force. He thought he could protect Alice from any bullies. She’d been harassed terribly all through her formative years because of her gift. As a child, Alice simply could not understand how others didn’t know what was going to happen next. She was called horrible names, even beaten a few times after she’d revealed personal information about a classmate’s parents. Over time, she learned to keep to herself. By the time her dad returned, Alice could take care of herself. Unfortunately, he’d already donned a sheriff’s uniform, minus any training or official certifications. He had no clue that Connecticut didn’t have sheriffs.
“We have marshals,” I say, smiling because I’m no longer a newbie. “Not to mention that he had no reason to pull me over the night I came here, and he shouldn’t have written on the back of a legal ticket, making me work here.”
“He’s not too keen on details,” she confesses. “He got a bit flustered at that car accident your first night in town. One of the local police officers that showed up addressed him as Marshal. So he figured things out from there.”
“So why’d he do it? Why did he arrange for me to work here? Was it because I was supposed to meet you?”
She nods. “I had a vision of your coming. So did Alice. We don’t always know what the visions mean. But we try to stay alert about these things. Guide them along if need be. We had only good feelings about you and…” She trails off with a shrug.
I appreciate her sentiment, but I don’t know how I could emit such good feelings in someone’s premonition if I keep messing things up.
“Did you see the ending?” I ask with a playful tone, but she shakes her head. Hmm. “Okay, so where is Sheriff White now?”
“Bruce has gone off, again. This time looking for Alice. She and the demons move around a lot, so it’s hard to get a read on her.” She sighs with the heaviness of deep frustration. I want to ask in what direction he might be looking, but my second heartbeat pops alive just then. I stand up and look toward the door.
Michael walks in a moment later. He’s wearing a blue ski jacket with white racing stripes down the sleeves. Bits of snow are stuck to his hair and shoulders. He looks like one of those hunky snowboard instructors you see in movies. Except that he has a devastated sort of expression that he can’t hide until it’s too late. Something is wrong.
He pulls himself together and lies with a straight face. “Good morning, ladies.” He doesn’t look at me but at Miss Minnie. She moves to the counter and offers him some hot cider. “No, thanks. Any news?”
“No,” Miss Minnie answers quietly. I wait to be clued in but neither one explains.
“If you don’t mind,” Michael continues without meeting my eyes. “I’d like to speak to Sophia. If she’s not busy?” He finally shifts in my direction but I can’t read his blank expression.
Miss Minnie gives me clearance so I walk out with Michael. Snow is drifting down from a gray sky and we move beneath the awnings. We don’t speak as we stroll. It’s not necessary because Michael Bublé is singing “Let It Snow” through the town speakers, like he doesn’t know that we have been. For weeks. Everything is white on white. The park is crawling with kids in plump winter paraphernalia. They’re dragging around shiny new sleds, loading snowball launchers, or playing human bowling on the courthouse ice rink.
There is a strange sort of tension between us—this dance that Michael and I often move to. Most of the time I worry that he has discovered my latest secret, and he watches me for telltale signs. And then we release the strain like letting go of hands, only to rotate and pick up on another worry as we turn. Today is the dance where I worry about what’s bothering Michael, and he worries about how to tell me.
I stop walking and face him. Michael’s pale blue eyes soften and he gives me a warm smile. What makes him worry can’t compete with his feelings for me. Not for the first time I think, Sometimes our silence is just love not speaking.
“What?” I ask, because he’s looking down at my clothes: jeans, sweatshirt, snow boots.
“Well, I know you don’t react to the elements the same anymore, but you really should keep up appearances, babe. You know? Wear a jacket?” He shows off his ski jacket as an example.
The last thing I can think about is my lack of clothing at the moment. “Is that all? Everything okay with the Halos? You would tell me, wouldn’t you?”
“Everything is fine. In fact, I made my first death kill. Earned a seven-day vacation.”
“Wow. Congratulations. Maybe you could make another one in May. You know, for graduation and stuff.” He laughs as if I’ve said something funny. “Michael, you’re planning to graduate with me, aren’t you?”
“Uh, I think we both have bigger things to deal with than walking across a stage for a piece of paper. Don’t you?”
“Well, yeah, of course, but…I don’t know. It’s kind of a big deal for me. Something I’ve worked really hard for, so…it would be weird not to graduate.”
Michael grins. “One of those important human milestones, huh? Well, we’ll see how it goes.”
“Won’t your family insist? To keep up appearances?”
“No, they won’t. But that reminds me, I’ve moved out of the farmhouse. I live in the barn now.”
This surprises me, so I ask if everything is good with the family. He says yes and then stuffs his hands into his pockets and changes the subject.
“Want coffee?” He nods toward the café. I contemplate things and decide I want answers instead.
“What were you and Miss Minnie talking about? ‘Any news’ about what?”
“Oh, she’s been worried about her great-niece. I offered to look into it but she declined.”
I startle. “You know High Alice?”
Michael frowns. “Of course I know her. She went to school here last year. Do you know her?”
Oh, right. I hadn’t bothered to make the connection before. Of course Michael would know her.
“Yeah, Bailey introduced us.” I hurry on before he asks about the circumstances. “So you know what she is? I mean, what she can do?”
“Sure. Angels can always sense people who are open to the spirit world. I believe most of Miss Minnie’s family has some unique abilities.”
“Does she know about you and your family?”
“No.
She suspected at one time but we compelled her in another direction. She basically believes our family is similar to hers. But she’s a very private lady. She doesn’t talk much about her gifts or her family.”
I nod with agreement and let my eyes wander around the town, sorting everything out. I need to speak to High Alice but have no clue where to find her. I look back at Michael while hatching a plan.
“What?” he asks with obvious suspicion. “You’re up to something. Hatching something. I know that look.”
I fess up…with a slight detour in the direction of a different sort of truth.
I explain that I was just asking Miss Minnie about High Alice, thinking she could help me locate the demon spy in town. And by demon spy I mean a spell to bring Ka back to the surface.
“I’m feeling desperate, Michael. I can’t stomach the idea of a demon inhabiting one of my friends. You understand, right? I mean, they’re your friends, too.”
“Yeah, but Miss Minnie doesn’t know where Alice is.”
“Well, yes and no. She just learned that Alice is traveling with some demons in an underground fight circuit.”
Michael’s face lights up and he starts shaking his head. “No way, babe. I know what she’s talking about and…you’re not going.”
“You know about it? So you can tell me how to find it?” I’m all kinds of excited now. It never occurred to me that Michael would know about an illicit fight club.
“Of course. But—”
“Michael, just listen. If I find it, I’ll find High Alice. I can help free her from the demons that are holding her. Miss Minnie says Alice is getting weak. She needs to get away from them. So, I help Alice escape, and then maybe she can help me find the demon spy.”
“You’ll find it? No way, babe. I don’t want you anywhere near—”
“You’re doing that thing again.”
