Children of the Silent Season (Heartbeat of the World Book 1)

by T. Wyse

  "I'm...I don't think they're dead, the people I mean." Amelie offered. Her desire to comfort the woman overcoming Kokopelli's warning. "We don't know what's happened."

  "That's true, Elizabeth, we don't know." M'grevor's voice was soft, he touched the woman gently. "We're all looking still, we won't know what we'll find, could be anything." He offered softly.

  "No...no they're dead. Everything's gone, and I'm alone. What am I going to do?" She begged helplessly.

  It was then, that Kokopelli poked his head past the door, and looked in briefly. She hadn’t noticed his presence until now, perhaps he had been scouting the house without her.

  "You have a cat!" The woman's voice trembled with a silly glee. She snagged the little creature before he entirely knew what was going on. He betrayed a surprised grunt as she stole him into the corner.

  "Oh I had a cat, what was her name, we loved her so much, but we took her for granted. I took her for granted, and now she's gone too." She cried, tears falling upon matted white fur. Amelie met Kokopelli's eyes, trying to indicate not to struggle, or fight his way out of the embrace. The little creature gave a sigh, indicating a resigned understanding.

  "Now, 'Liz, I don't think he likes that." M'grevor approached the woman, who was cuddling the small creature, hunched in the corner.

  "I think it’s okay." Amelie tried to leave the door frame she was leaning on, but wobbled back onto it to keep herself from falling. "He's a pretty tough little critter." She chuckled, frustrated by her own fragility.

  "Elizabeth, promise me, that you'll be gentle, okay? Don't hold him if he wants to go, alright?" M'grevor said soothingly, touching the hunched and suddenly silent woman in the corner. She mumbled something Amelie took to be confirmation, and M'grevor headed back to the door.

  He motioned with his head that they were to continue. He held her wavering hand again, and they proceeded down the hallway, even more slowly than before.

  "Truth be told, that's the happiest, and quietest I've seen her." The man gave a glance back at the door. "She promised she'd be gentle, and I tend to believe her."

  "That man, is he sick?" She asked, remembering the form lying on the ground asleep.

  "Oh he's fine, he just doesn't have much energy." He concluded dismissively. "I'm sure he'll say hello tomorrow." He smiled at her.

  They arrived at the third room. The darkness was inky in this part of the hallway, barren of a window to light it. The stairway continued up into a thicker and more foreboding blackness above.

  “Bathroom here, locked.” He gave a gentle rap on the door facing the stairs. “We have a latrine out back, but most are on the road during the day. At night nobody wants to go outside, so we have…buckets, for that. I’m afraid that’s the best we can do for now. The less thought or spoken of it the better.”

  “Right now Lilim and Louren are sleeping in here.” He waved to the final bedroom door. “You might recall Louren, at least a little, since she was with us at the start. Room’s got a nice bed and enough space for you all, seems like a good fit.” He opened it without a knock and a pale rose hue cut the darkness in half.

  The room itself caused Amelie’s eyes to burn. The brightness came not from the windows, which were both quite tightly boarded up, but from the glaring decoration about the room. The bed, the rug, every bit of furniture within glowed with a prideful pink, slashed here and there with an equally happy yellow trim. The bed bore a likeness to a flattened pig, so plush and wonderfully soft looking even against the dark.

  “This was, is, Tim’s sister’s room,” the man declared, his voice distant, his breath withdrawn. “As he said: you’re welcome to sleep here, or we can figure out something on your own, but only the attic and the couch downstairs are left, really. Meldice said you preferred to sleep alone.”

  “No, this is fine.” Amelie leaned back to steal a glance at the stairwell again. She and the dark were hardly adversaries, but something about it felt off. Perhaps the clicking creaking from above, perhaps the way the wind became a blur the moment the stairs finished their rise.

  "They've been doing shifts on the bed, but I'm sure neither of them will grudge you using it tonight. They’re both too tall for it anyways." He smiled. She slumped down onto the back of the flattened pig-bed, and a great heaving sigh of air yielded around her shape.

  "Bring up memories?" he asked, looking down at her, his face obscured.

  “Oh, no.” She chuckled. “Not even close, but it’s safe.”

  “No bright pink decoration for you then?”

  She peeled the splintered woolen socks off and let them fall onto the floor, slipping under the covers. “No, my friends always said nothing in my house is what they expect, and every time they visit they see something new, something weirder. Amanda’s little sister has a room like this.” She faded, feeling the air of the ceiling slowly move around the light above, hanging from a useless electrical noose.

  "Lil and Louren will be back before dark, should be soon really." There was a note of worry in his voice, some uncertainty. "In any case, we can keep the formal introductions until tomorrow." He said with a concluding tone. “You must be hungry, or need to go—“

  “No. Thank you.” She muttered sleepily. In truth her stomach clenched, a lingering watery nausea still swimming within. Be it from bruising or worry or fear, she wanted only to rest.

  “If you change your mind and it’s a big deal, you know where I am. Lil and Louren will be tired, but they’ll forgive you if it’s necessary. We’ll be up with the sun regardless.” His breath stopped a moment, and he raised his hand as if to stroke her hair, but pulled it back.

  “The, uh, bucket is over there.” He motioned to one of the corners, and with that final clinical detail the door clacked shut behind him.

  Amelie lay there like a squashed starfish, simply unable to move. Everything ached, everything stung, and even the emptiness of the room couldn’t fight that feeling. The air swung the light in an invisible pendulum, and in the darkness Amelie waited, wondering about Kokopelli’s fate in the rambling woman’s hands.

  There were no dreams as she slept, it was a simplistic and soothing blackness. No tarry shapes brushed against her, nor did she visit the pen or carve upon its walls. Amelie’s mind was lost in the infinite ocean of healing unconsciousness, wiping away the pain and fear of the recent past.

  The door opened with enough care that she didn’t hear it, but the air of the room flashed into a temporary burst of life that roused her. Nothing would move, not even her eyelids would shift. It was a shape of a small adult at least, surely meaning no harm.

  A crisp set of footsteps approached her, and the form stopped with intent at the edge of the bed. The woman cleared her throat, then rising to a falsified burst of gentle coughs before resorting to a direct touch. "Amelie, Amelie wake up." The voice prompted.

  She rolled over, and forced herself to sit, though the cramping pain in her stomach protested heavily. Letting a few heartbeats go by, her head still turned to the woman, she forced her eyes open and looked to the visitor.

  The pale blue of dusk set gentle cuts across the garish room, giving only the vaguest sense of the woman’s face.

  "Hello child, my name is Lilim Fulke." The woman spoke with a softened eastern European accent that Amelie couldn't trace, perhaps German or Russian in origin, she couldn't tell for sure.

  “Hello.” Amelie smiled dreamily, swaying from the warmth-muted ache in her limbs.

  Kokopelli leapt out of the darkness, and took his position on the foot of the bed. Lilim flinched at the sight, but recovered without stumble.

  "Oh, that's just my cat." Amelie grinned. "I guess he got away from Elizabeth finally." She motioned him closer and gave him a gentle pat on the head.

  A second woman came through the door, stepping softly. "Oh she's awake." The voice said bluntly. "Here's the light you asked for, 'Grev says don't use it longer than you have to, just check for anything really pressing." The woman's hand contacted with
Lilim's, passing a cylinder between them.

  "I don't see why we can't just take her outside." Lilim protested.

  "Oh, that's not an option, trust me there." The woman, Louren she assumed, stepped back into the frame of the door, then stopped. "Good to see you up and about again, kid." She stated with a biting bluntness before disappearing through the door again.

  "Funny little cat," Lilim spared a glance at Kokopelli. "M'grevor mentioned him, said Lizabeth found sleep today thanks to him." She smiled with an off-centre grin, revealing a full half of her front teeth, yet her breath was sincere, and Amelie couldn’t help but return the smile.

  Amelie pet the little creature with a slightly more appreciative fondness for his affection.

  "Since we don't have the light of day to work with, and taking you outside is no option. I have been given this light to look you over, to make sure you will be well through the night. Please present your legs and arms for me, and I will look you over with the light as quickly as I can." Through her accented speech Amelie sensed the warm, yet firm, demeanor that she had come to associate with nurses and such practitioners.

  She grudgingly moved away from the covers, presenting her legs, and rolling her sleeves up to expose her arms for inspection.

  The woman passed over her arms with dedicated and practiced speed, pausing a few times on each arm, to examine the bruises there. The woman emitted words in another language with the unmistakable intones of a curse. "So little light to work with, eckh." She grunted in frustration.

  The woman looked quickly at Amelie’s legs, pausing at a few spots.

  "Three big ones on your arms, six on your legs." Lilim concluded, turning off the light finally. She pressed on Amelie's arms three places in turn. With each press the woman asked if they hurt.

  "A little I guess. I ache all over."

  She repeated the procedure for her legs, the result was the same. The bruises hurt, but the pain wasn't worse than the ache itself she felt in most of her body.

  Lilim's motions stopped finally. "You can get back into bed now." She offered.

  "It's okay then?" Amelie asked, glad to cover herself back under the luxurious covers.

  "There is some bruising, but it is to be expected. You are lucky you got through the trip with so little, in fact. I think M'grevor is simply over concerned, but that is his way." Lilim offered an assuring smile that shone through the haze.

  "Oh, whose supposed to sleep in the bed tonight?" Amelie asked, reluctantly facing the prospect that she might lose the soft warmth in the face of fairness.

  "It is mine. You are welcome to it though." Lilim answered. "Both of us are too big to sleep in it really, my feet dangle over the edge, Louren's less so. We've agreed you can have it as long as you like." She smiled warmly down at Amelie.

  "Oh I couldn't take it entirely." She stated. The bed was awfully comfortable though.

  "I absolutely insist." The woman nodded. "Louren, too, I am sure will agree."

  "Wellllll....if you insist!" Amelie exclaimed with softly muted glee.

  Amelie returned to sleep, only interrupted briefly by Louren returning to the room, and the sound of ruffled cloth rummaging over the floor. After that a quiet silence filled the room, as the night came fully. She slept even more soundly than before, her little guardian having returned to her, and with the knowledge that two others shared the room.

  She felt safe; safe and warm.

  8

  Timothy’s House

  She again returned to the dreaming pen, but only became aware of it as the flurried hands had finished their shaping memorial to its passage. There were three shapes remaining frozen in some state, and she could recognize them as Victoria and Amanda, both hovering slightly above and to each side of a figure she could only assume was her. None of them bore any overt markings and each could easily be mistaken for some angelic porcelain doll, but even as the air closed around them, baking them in like a kiln, she could sense it.

  The pen waited in a hushed stillness that remained even as her hands pulled away from the canvas. Yet this time there was no slapping against her aura, no whispering in her ear.

  Still unwilling to turn around, she allowed her senses to shift outwards. The roots of ink still choked the grass, but today they were still. Gathering some bravery, she turned and focused in whole, only to see that watery thing far away on the other side of the pen, looking like some twisted fish half submerged into the ground. It swayed slowly, the head still bobbing and turning out of sync with the pendulous motion, but this time its focus wasn’t on her.

  The creature was staring up, beyond the etched wall, and into the forest beyond. She leaned in, focus empowering her sight, and she could almost make out something in the forest there, something curious, something dark. Neither the interior creature nor the far anomaly moved, entranced in one another’s company.

  She awoke embraced by the soft warmth, and an alien feeling hummed in her down to her toes. She was rejuvenated, awake, and hadn’t woke with some intruding and jarring start. She sat without effort or wobble or even the slightest sign of ache, and yawned in the tired but cool morning air.

  The biggest thing wasn’t the bed, or being able to sleep in beyond the trickling of sunlight, no. She sucked down again, letting her lungs glow beyond capacity, burning with joy at the fresh air mixing into the room. Even the slight trace of the basement stench simply served a more complex bouquet to her starved palette.

  Letting her hair free, she slipped out of the warmth and knelt before the window. The puny razors of wind tickled her hair, but ultimately struggled to straighten it out into the waving wire.

  Still inside the breath, she inspected her arms in the slits of light. They were both clean of any purple or even reddened marks. Her legs were clear as she could see, and certainly the ache was gone. The itching slowly tickled as her skin awoke, but the air was too sweet to be bothered by that.

  "I suppose this might need some explaining." Amelie sighed, looking down at the half asleep guardian. He gave no reply.

  She glanced around the room, confirming that it was empty, then leaned in low furtively. "I think we're alright for a bit." She whispered to him.

  "Oh? I suppose so." He replied, letting out a long yawn. He stretched then rose to a hunched sitting position on the bed. "I believe they're downstairs for the time being, could come up at any moment though." He warned.

  “I’ll be able to see them coming.” Amelie’s mind followed the stagnant air as far as she could reach. Her perceptions became a useless fog shortly after the lower landing, but it would be enough to see any figures threatening to intrude.

  “I wanted to ask. The two stories, well no, all of the stories. Since you know all this, why did Meldice’s house have windows, but this one doesn’t? Why was the wave so random in what it took?”

  “Though it appears random perhaps, it is not, though the rules are fickle and unpredictable. I did tell you that, did I not?”

  “You did, but this doesn’t seem to make sense.” She shrugged, tying her hair back up, satisfied that the breeze had done all it could.

  “I have seen different things preserved against the wave’s culling. Age is something often respected, perhaps materials at times. I have heard of odder things as well, born of taboos and sacredness.”

  “But if it’s age like you say, why are only the windows gone? The house certainly seems old, and for that matter, why wouldn’t it take the things inside?”

  “Not taken because they were sheltered.” He gave a bony shuffling shrug. “The house is old yes, and perhaps the houses nearby were just as old. Were they old enough to have memory? Memory beyond their residents? Have they seen a century, perhaps more? What would your criteria for respect be?” He stretched and trotted over to the window. “It is not impossible that the windows were ‘renovated,’ as you would say.”

  “But glass is just sand, right?”

  “Ah, but again, what was the age that they were perceived?”

/>   “For that matter: the overpass. Are you telling me that the one chunk of it was older than the rest?”

  She watched as he returned to the bed, and resumed his sitting position at her feet. "The Silent Season is unpredictable, and fickle, it's best not to linger on the finer details too much." He mumbled. “Else you will spend all your time contemplating unreasonable truths.”

  "So the tree that Nicholas was under it was over two hundred years old. The ones in the yard of Meldice's house were too?" She asked. "But why would it take the leaves then, and not the tree?"

  “Perhaps the leaves were content with their existence, yet the tree itself is not?” He gave a gentle chuckle.

  "Same as the windows, perhaps. Same as the people not firmly sheltered under something." Kokopelli retorted. "Really, lingering on this is useless to your current situation. The Season has its own logic, its own judgment. You might well ask the dirt around us these questions as it will be as forthcoming.”

  Amelie gazed at the window once again. She really hadn't seen much of the world outside since the Season had begun. There were the monuments below her when she had flown, the skeletal trees, the shacks that Meldice had been loath to even look at. She craved the sky's view now more than ever, to try to catalogue what had been spared and what had not.

  “I saw it again, in that dream, in the forest,” she began, her finger crossing the hair tie again for courage, for clarity. “It was there again, but it was different.”

  “How?”

  “Before it was…well, not angry, but it was …striking out? I can’t really describe it, but today it felt different. It wasn’t striking out today. It wasn’t interested in me at all.”

  “Oh? What was it looking at?” His tail paused, the glowing embers squinted.

  “I don’t know.” She shook her head. “Something outside.”

  “Outside is good, and to be expected I suppose.” He purred.

  “I want to hear it, about the crows, now.” She met the burning eyes. “People see them differently, they bleed metal, and they want me. Let’s hear it.”