Children of the Silent Season (Heartbeat of the World Book 1)
Page 23
“Mmm, I suppose.” His weight shifted on the bed, and he prowled towards her, the floor cricking gently under his padded feet. “I can taste the change on your breath—not simple fear, but curiosity.”
She turned her gaze to see him slouched sitting on her left. “This information is, of course, pricier. It comes dangerously close to the burning heat of a broken oath.”
"And, that would be?" Amelie asked, unsure she wanted to know.
“The price of breaking your blissfulness regarding your pursuers, to know the shape of the shapeless. Just a few scant drops of blood.” He finished, his voice ending in a hiss. She could have sworn she saw a forked tongue dart out of his mouth in flourish as he spoke the words, though the wind of his breath gave no indication of this anomaly.
"It's going to heal, right?" She asked. "Not a deep cut or anything?"
"Not deep at all, and of course you will heal. It is once again merely a sign of your dedication." He purred. “Simply one that offers proof of a deeper dedication.”
"Okay." She decided. "Is this the left arm again, in the same way as before?"
"Present your arm yes, but I shall do the favor of extracting the blood myself."
Amelie raised her arm, holding it at the angle approximately the same as the first time, in the darkness.
"Now repeat after me: "Asay nitukoosinin, Nikeentohta—" The echoing of his voice suddenly died down, and he leapt back. Lilim had entered the room, unnoticed by either of them.
Amelie gasped, throwing her arm back in shock. She had been too focused on that strangeness in him, too filled with anticipation of further answers. She hadn’t felt the woman’s approach against the air.
"Were...you talking to someone?" Lilim asked, looking around the room furtively.
"Yes, I was just..." Amelie thought quickly. "Just talking to my cat." She gave a stupid grin at the woman. "You know...gets lonely and confused sometimes, gotta give him a little pep talk." Kokopelli gave a derisive snort.
"And...what were you talking about?" Lilim's words were extremely cautious. She slowly added; "Does he talk back?"
"Oh yes, he was just telling me how happy he was to meet Elizabeth yesterday, and he'd very much like to visit with her again." She said, seeing a slight knowing smile from Kokopelli. Apparently he enjoyed the play. "I was just showing him my arm...see?" Amelie displayed her arm out at the same angle, but pointed as if giving the offering to Lilim instead of the cat creature.
"My Gott." Lilim came to her, examining the arm. She then hurriedly examined the other arm, and declared: "I suppose, the bruises were not bad at all. They looked of concern last night, but now there is no mark on you!" Lilim examined Amelie's legs. "Here too, it must have been a trick of the light. I am glad to have been wrong." The woman gave a dumbfounded, but honest smile at Amelie, which she returned.
"Funny how things can look worse than they are." Amelie grinned.
“Indeed. Let’s feed you, then. I cannot imagine you are not starving.” Lilim motioned out the door, “Your feast awaits.”
Lilim had lead her into the dining room. It was a smallish square space sandwiched between the living room and the kitchen, with a slightly oversized wooden table filling out the middle. Chairs stuffed between the table and walls left little space for movement even before they were filled.
Tim’s seat spilled halfway through the kitchen door, and M’grevor sat haphazardly behind him, having to lean at a painful angle to keep a presence among them. The boy had a fat ringed notebook open in front of him, spinning a pen gently on its surface.
Another wood-bandaged hole lit the room, but it was much wider than the others, the boards placed in a vertical picket fence formation. The crossing of the light from this, the kitchen window, and even some hazy glow from the living room beyond, gave a respectively cheerier atmosphere even with the crowding.
She sunk into the seat, and to her frustration the table mocked her with its height, forcing her arms at an odd angle to reach the surface. The living room peered at her through a double wide portal, a cluttered mess of piled things. Great stacks of wood, vaguely rectangular and long, lay in piles along the walls and bracing the back of the couch. Piles of glinting metallic objects of various finely machined detail lay all across the end table and spilled onto the floor. The kitchen mirrored the clutter, only stacks of vegetables and tins replaced wood and metal.
A bowl slid in front of Amelie finally, filled with some cold stew of some kind. A few crackers made its company.
“Water’s here.” Tim gestured at a jug in the centre of the table. “Everyone else has eaten. You should eat even if you don’t feel it,” he said, still looking down at his spinning pen.
An awkward silence hung over the room as she ate her stew. No one was looking at her. All gazes seemed evasive, all breath seemed restrained, the heartbeats nervous.
"Hello, my name is Amelie Beren," she broke the silence, hoping perhaps it was her fault. "I've heard Tim and Nich's story, and some of Elizabeth's I suppose. I know M'grevor's, and Louren's, because I was there with them when things happened. I don’t know how much they told you, but I don’t want to keep anything from you.”
“Amelie, there’s no need, it’s not you,” the man grumbled, leaning into the doorway.
“Well, did you tell them what having me here means?” Her voice lowered, and she poured some murky water into a cup. It was gritty but as clean tasting as one could wish for.
She forced her eyes around the room, probing the faces for familiar expressions. Louren and M’grevor she needn’t worry about, though Louren’s perceptions of the event might have been confused. Elizabeth was more interested in searching the room, unengaged with what she was saying. Charles met her with a pair of weary but intelligent eyes.
“I don’t know the reason, but there is a group of crows following me. I set them off somehow the first day, they found me at the Woolley’s house, and it’s possible they’ll find me here too.”
She glanced around again, to Nicholas, to Lilim. None at the table showed any increase in fear or anger, but the tension lingered on.
“They won’t attack you unless you hit them, so if you just ignore them, it should be okay.”
“It’s not you, Amelie. Finish your stew,” M’grevor grumbled.
“If you want me to leave, if it’s too much of a burden, I’ll leave. I’ll go, somehow.”
An annoyed grunt stopped her. “Timothy, this is your house. What do you say?”
The boy looked up finally from his paper, and seemed to suddenly see her. “If you actually care…”
“Yes, we do.” A low frustrated growl. The others at the table shifted nervously.
"She can stay, far as I'm concerned. Come what may, I won’t have her out.”
"Is there anyone who feels otherwise?" The large man looked around the room. There was no outward protest.
“I’m sorry, but, maybe we could ask Macca. Maybe they would take her in.” Louren cut in with a trembling tinge. “Not only because you don’t know what the things were like Tim, but because it’s just much nicer there. They have hot food, and power, and there’s even things to be done indoors. It’s safe there, a fortress.”
“Were I years younger, I would gladly take their shelter,” Lilim cut in. Her breath seemed more collected than the others.
"Thank you for your honestly." M'grevor smiled, and nodded.
“Okay, here’s what we can do.” He took a great breath and his arm intruded into the room, pointing at Lilim.
“You’ve made your point, we’ve heard it. Louren, I would like you to speak to James today, take Charles and Elizabeth with you. Hopefully he can help with what they need.”
“Wait, I found that device,” Lilim cut in with a fury.
“It’s over budget.” Tim stared down at the book.
“Don’t start this again. We didn’t know what they w—”
“Enough. He’s made his case, and the rules weren’t ever vague. We’re overdrawn o
n…”
“C-6 plot 8.” Tim read from the ledger.
“But you’re right, Lilim. It’s valuable if it has something they need. So I’d like Louren to take it with her when she goes, and I would like you to speak to Lyssa about a ‘transfer’ of whatever credits they have to Lilim. Once that’s been resolved, you are to return the player to where we found it. Is that acceptable to you both?”
“I guess so,” Timothy muttered.
“Fine.” Lilim bit, and slid a thumb sized device over to Louren.
"Tim, Nich, I'd like you to go with Lilim today, head southwest towards the coast. If you somehow hit the coast then try to head north along it, Donna really wants to find a city. She gave me some notes on making salt. Otherwise do as you would in the groups of two: scavenge anything that looks worthwhile. If you meet people give them the information we have. I expect you back by dark, unless you find shelter by then." He nodded.
Lilim’s eyes had locked on Amelie since she had conceded the device. "You know, I wasn’t sure, but with the light on your face…” The room grew silent. Again, eyes turned to her. "You're that flying girl."
A declaration that fell on Amelie’s shoulders like a faint leaf, and shuffled off as easily. There wasn’t any trace of Meldice’s delight in the tone, but neither any sort of fear or awe.
“I confess I found the bundle with your dress underneath the bed. So odd, but even under the stains it was so familiar. ‘Amelie Beren.’ I couldn’t quite place it, but yes, I recall.”
"I haven't flown recently." Amelie grumbled at the woman, touching the hair tie quickly. "Last time I did, was the day I was with M'grevor and Louren."
"You saw her, flying?" Lilim looked at the man and woman with a piqued interest.
"Well, yes, kind of." M'grevor shrugged. "It's hard to say what we did or didn't see then, I wasn't paying full attention to her, but yes she seemed to 'fly' in some respect." He was waffling in his own knowledge, splitting his gaze furtively to Amelie to probe her reaction. She wanted to assure him it was fine, that he shouldn't hide anything he knew, but wasn't able to express it wordlessly.
"I saw the news, read the journals." Lilim talked faster, her accent becoming thicker. "There was so much attention spent on her, but then they all gave up trying to understand. It was so much hope, so much excitement, I was sad when they surrendered to the mystery."
"Was a lot of attention, lot of people asking things I couldn't tell them, you know." She muttered with the tiniest twinge of guilt seeing the woman's excitement. They’d all been like that at first, the doctors and scientists, excited and optimistic that they had the groundbreaking questions to elicit the perfect answer.
"Oh, I know. I think I remember an article, near the end, where they said it was like trying to explain colour to a blind person, trying to communicate sound to the deaf. I would have loved to know your story after that, but everyone seemed to have forgotten you, so I could not follow." Lilim lamented.
"They never forgot." Amelie corrected. "We still had visits from time to time. Usually from someone who had a new theory, or hoping to make a name for themselves. Forgotten nationally, not locally."
"I am...I was...a paramedic in the days before." Lilim started, her voice sounding morose. "I saw much suffering, much death. Many of my colleagues become macabre, twisted. I always thought of the deeper side, looking to the meaning of these things, looking for some sign of a merciful universe. I found little, very little, and then I found you." The woman gazed longingly at Amelie. "You were one of the first true, real, things. No ambiguity, there was no question of what you could do. All were so excited, they thought you were something new, something fantastic. But they couldn't crack your knowledge, your hidden sense, and they dismissed you. They were wrong, though. Even without showing it in numbers, without tapping into it as power, you are indeed something new, something fantastic." The woman beamed.
"That’s not the end of it though.” Amelie recalled, remembering the television people who had come in waves when it had been discovered she would be attending school. “They wanted to do a show, they wanted to document everything after that." Amelie sighed, looking down at her plate, now empty. "I didn't care, really. It was my parents, they said that people were putting too much emphasis on me, and would sanctify me, think I was something more than I am. I don't have more answers than you do, Lilim. I just know, and sense, what I know, and embrace it for something unique, something to be cherished, but not hidden."
"I was on call, that day." Lilim spoke, allowing the girl the peaceful end. "Dying woman in her mottled old house. We tried to help her, but we couldn't. I kept going at it, I couldn’t stop. My partner, he went outside to leave me alone, we aren't supposed to keep trying like that, not like that." Her voice trailed off.
"That's when, it happened. The house began to crumble around me, shaking like an earthquake. Then it was all dirt, just the dirt. I couldn't even save her body, she was buried in the ruin of her house, and the world was destroyed, ruined. I wandered, I thought surely this was hell, surely this place was the twisted spirit given form. I wandered, and I collapsed there, in the dirt."
Lilim's voice grew darker. "I spent a night out there, under the empty sky. The moon was so dull, so dead. The world itself had been drained of any joy, of any meaning. You would think that would crush my spirit, make me give up, but I decided there, under that empty sky, that I would go on. I wandered another entire day, then at the night, I found more ruins, still nothing but ruins." Her voice was distant, like a ghost. "Then, in that time where I had given up, my thirst nearing to overcome me, I met M'grevor. I took him for a phantom, for my mind leaving me. I went with him just glad for some company, weather from my own madness and desperation or not. He brought me back to this place, and have been with him since then."
The room was quiet. Elizabeth stroked the catlike creature hidden below the table in silent contemplation.
"Let's get moving then." M'grevor finally barked through the silence. "You all know what you are doing, so get on it."
The table emptied with a military precision, even Elizabeth falling into the rhythm of the group, displacing Kokopelli onto the floor. They left, leaving Amelie and M'grevor alone in the house.
Amelie sat in the kitchen, bored with the dullness of the passing day. M'grevor had instructed her to stay indoors and then driven by ancient hoarding instinct had headed back out to collect more wood.
"So...offering of blood then?" She asked, finding Kokopelli curled up on the couch in the living room. She had needed to probe the winds to find him tucked between piles of engine parts and other miscellaneous metal artifacts.
He opened a single eye, it glowed there, regarding her. He was stubbornly silent.
"I suppose we could go upstairs." She offered, clumsily navigating the junk maze of the living room. She escaped from the clutches of the metal into the hallway, ushering impatiently for the lazily moping creature to follow her.
A door to her right following under the path of the stairway caught her curiosity as she waited for the pointedly slothful little beast. She opened it, and peered down into the darkness below. The wind lurked in the depths, chilled and broodingly still. The smell of cool earthy must rose from the cellar, its darkness was too foreboding for her eyes to bear for long. Amelie shivered, not from the cold, but from the unknown black depths below.
Gathering her wits again, she shut the door quietly, as if to avoid waking some sleeping fiend in its dank pit below. She proceeded up the hallway, and towards the creaking stairway. Kokopelli followed beside her, snapping into step.
The house was a foreboding and gloomy place, even in the daylight. The light pierced the makeshift shutters, but served only to make a starker contrast with the lack of light beyond their reaches.
"I'm not sure, not sure I want to be up here with nobody around." Amelie said, looking down at the shape of her small guardian. The light played off of him, making him look like a strange shagged zebra of sorts.
On the second floor all three of the doors were open, and it was somewhat less gloomy for the additional light. The shadows pooled in the stairwells, dark creatures avoiding the narrowed knives of the sun.
Amelie stole a fleeting look into Timothy's room. It was not chaotic, nor was it neat. It held the trappings, the declarations of independent thought, and the silly desires common to a young man his age. Though it was much less grandiose than Meldice's room had been, much smaller as well, the two could have been interchangeable assuming a few elements were substituted for one another. He didn’t have the patchwork mosaic of magazine clippings on his wall, yet the feeling was still there, somehow intangibly so.
Two cots lay on the floor. Amelie wondered if Timothy slept on the floor of his own room.
She continued down the hallway, the centre room looked no more interesting than it did the day before. It did seem much lonelier without its residents, the entire floor quiet and empty.
She arrived at the third door in the hallway. The room, though much pinker, was not very different in the light of the day now. Sitting down on the bed, cross legged, Amelie wondered to herself: How does Tim feel about us using his sister's bed, if he won't even sleep in his? She would have to ask him, for his honest answer when they met later in the day. She wouldn't want to cause him grief, even if he could hide it perfectly.
Kokopelli sat there, hunched over in front of her, as before. She didn't even wait for him to command her, she could remember the words now as if they were her own.
Holding out her arm, stiff and hooked at an angle perpendicular to her heart, she spoke: "Asay nitukoosinin, Nikeentohtawawak okimawak kamamawahpichik unteh Kokopelli Nahemtumwak."