Mengliad (The Mengliad Series Book 1)

by Jana Janeway

  His entire demeanor changed with those three words. Before, he had seemed somewhat inconvenienced, like whatever was being said to him was mildly annoying. Now, he seemed shocked and flustered.

  Jessica wanted to ask him what was wrong, but before she could, he was speaking again.

  “Yeah, I’ll tell her. What about Shea and Stacy?”

  Her blood instantly ran cold, a horrified expression following, but that just prompted Craddock to shake his head at her, gently, indicating she shouldn’t panic.

  “Yeah, I understand. Where do we go from here?—‘Kay.—Yeah, we’ll call you when we get situated.—Thanks.—Yeah, bye.”

  Clicking off the phone, he called out towards the front, “Joe, take the next junction. They want us to get off this road, find a motel, and wait for further instructions.”

  Nodding, Josiah shifted in his seat, straightening his posture. “What’s going on?”

  “They were able to set up a meeting, to try and negotiate, but they’re not holding out much hope that it will go in our favor.”

  “Shea and Stacy?” Jessica asked, worry furrowing her brow. Her breath was shaky and fast as she awaited his answer.

  “They’re fine,” he assured her. “They were just moved to a different safe house, to err on the side of caution. Shea is definitely converting, but Stacy isn’t.”

  Unsure of how to broach the next piece of news, Craddock hesitated, holding Jessica tighter to him as he stared over at Bibi. By the way she was eyeing him, he knew she could sense his inner struggle.

  “What?” was all she asked.

  He cleared his throat, stalling as he struggled to find the right words. When the right ones remained elusive, he settled for the first ones he could think of. “Lilith. . . isn’t dead.”

  It was like a gun had just gone off in the car, everyone startling and reacting in their own way.

  Josiah swerved out of his lane as his attention darted to Craddock, then to Bibi, before returning to the road and regaining control. Bibi gasped, her eyes growing wide, her mouth dropping open to ask a hundred questions her voice refused to form. Jessica bolted upright out of Craddock’s embrace, staring back at him with a look of utter shock on her face, begging for an explanation with her expression alone.

  “When they caught her passing the information along to the Registry,” he told them, “they assigned a man to kill her. He happened to be an infiltrator. They faked her death.” A slight smile appeared. “She’s going to be calling you, as soon as she is able to.”

  “Thank God,” Jessica breathed, reaching out to place her hand on Bibi’s arm, which was resting on the headrest for support as she was turned sideways in her seat. “She’s alive, Bibi,” she clarified, when Bibi still seemed confused.

  “Then why did that Carter guy say she took a long time to die?”

  “To rattle you,” Craddock answered.

  “‘Cause he is a sadistic fuck!” Josiah added.

  “What if Marcy is just saying that?” she asked with a sort of bewildered sense of panic. “To make everything that’s to come easier?”

  “I know Marcy pretty well,” Jessica said, “and I don’t think she’d lie about something like that.”

  “You and Marcy were close?” Bibi’s confusion and paranoia turned into surprise. “I thought you said you didn’t know her all that well.”

  “Well, yeah, for what you were looking for when you asked me that question, I didn’t. I don’t know anything about her Mengliad life, because she never told me she was Mengliad. But, emotionally speaking, I know her pretty well. Like, I know she always gives the homeless guy who sleeps in the alley behind Judy’s all the spare change she has in her pockets each night. I know she’s rescued two dogs and a cat from the pound, before they were put to sleep. I know she loves her boyfriend, and that she wants to be a nurse ‘cause she wants to help sick kids. . .”

  She trailed off, concluding with, “I know her well enough to know, she wouldn’t lie to you about something like that.”

  “Do you think she knows you as well?” Craddock asked cautiously, not wanting to give away where his thoughts were.

  “Yeah, probably.” She arched an eyebrow. “Why?”

  He shrugged, feigning indifference. “She said something before, about her knowing you pretty well, is all.”

  There was something he wasn’t telling her, she was able to determine that much, but before she could question him further, Josiah spoke up, changing the subject.

  “Is anyone else hungry? Maybe we should stop and eat first, before we try to find a motel?”

  “Stop and eat? Like, at a restaurant?” Jessica asked, adding with the same confused inflection, “How do you suppose we do that?”

  “There are Mengliad friendly restaurants all over the place, Jessica,” Craddock explained. “You just have to know what to look for.”

  “Mengliad friendly restaurants will usually sneak some form of the word entomophagy into their advertising and menus.” Bibi’s mood was considerably lighter than it had been just minutes before. “Some will even have a separate dining area, so that you don’t have to take your meal to go.”

  “With her Enyoh as strong as it is,” Josiah said as he scanned the horizon for roadside signs, “we should probably take it to go anyway.”

  “Yeah,” Craddock agreed. With the mundaneness of the conversation, he felt himself relax for the first time in well over an hour. Casually, or so he was hoping it would seem, he nuzzled into Jessica’s hair. “The sun should be up soon.”

  Nodding, Jessica asked nervously, in a whisper so that only he could hear, “We’re going to talk about what you said back at the rock quarry, right?”

  Adrenalin shot through him like a fast acting poison, and he closed his eyes tightly in an attempt to stave off the effects of it as he nodded against her. In a whisper that was bordering on pained, he asked of her, “When we don’t have an audience?”

  She nodded again, in agreement. “They don’t approve, do they?”

  “It’s not as simple as that,” he was still whispering, “and it’s not you they have the problem with.”

  “Seems like it is.” She scoffed quietly, jumping in his arms when Josiah announced excitedly, “There! That sign! Dudley’s Diner!”

  “Home of the Mop Hag burger.” Bibi laughed as she read the sign. “That’s one I haven’t seen before.”

  “And that means they’re Mengliad friendly?” Jessica asked, a slight smile curling her lips.

  “Yep!” Bibi turned in her seat. “Entomophagy. . . take off the ‘ento’, drop the ‘y’, add a space between the ‘p’ and ‘h’, and you have—”

  “Mop hag,” Jessica cut in, laughing. “They must get asked every day of the week, by Humans, what in the hell does that mean?”

  “No doubt,” Craddock agreed before suggesting to Bibi, “Why don’t you guys go in and order, and I’ll wait in the car with Jessica.”

  ****

  After Bibi and Josiah left the car, it took several moments for Craddock to gather enough courage to start off the conversation. He knew he would have to word things carefully, since her conversion was still too new for her to feel what he was.

  “I know it seems like this is about you,” he finally began, “but really, it’s not. It involves you, but their problems have to do with me. My actions.”

  “Your actions being?” She pitched the question just so, making it clear that she was looking for him to elaborate.

  He took in a steadying breath. “Me being affectionate. With you.”

  “Why should they care, if they don’t disapprove of me?”

  “A lot of it has to do with what I’m willing to give up. . . for you,” he answered reluctantly. “Which they don’t think I would be doing, if it wasn’t for—”

  When he stopped abruptly, she encouraged him to continue. “If it wasn’t for...?”

  “You know.” He planted a soft kiss in her hair, as a way of answering without having to say the words
.

  “I do,” she admitted, “but I want to hear you say it.”

  “I did say it,” he countered weakly, his heart racing wildly. Damn Chimie, he thought to himself, closing his eyes in the futile attempt to calm it.

  “Outside the stress of our deaths being imminent.” She held her breath, waiting for what he would say next. To see if he would admit it or dodge it.

  Resigned to the fact that he would have to put his very soul on the line, he steeled himself against the fear of rejection. “I’m in love with you.”

  She nodded, quietly pondering for just a few seconds. “Not that I’m trying to tell you how you feel, but how can you be? You barely know me.”

  Her whispered words and almost monotone inflection gave away nothing in regard to how she felt about him, and he sighed as he berated himself, in his mind only, for opening his big mouth back at the rock quarry, and seconds ago. “It’s. . . complicated,” he finally answered, scowling when she laughed in response.

  “Mysterious to the last, aren’t you?” she teased him, pulling back to initiate eye contact. Gaining seriousness, she asked, “This is one of those explain it to me later deals, isn’t it?”

  He smiled uneasily. “If that’s okay?”

  “What if I were to say that it’s not okay?” she asked him cautiously. “If I asked you to, would you just. . . tell me now?”

  “I wouldn’t know where to begin.” He broke eye contact and looked away, but reinitiated it when she touched his face gently.

  “Can you just. . . try?” she asked.

  Several moments passed where all they did was stare at each other, before he finally whispered, “Let me just see something.”

  Raking his fingers into her hair, he pulled her towards him, his lips brushing hers tentatively.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  To say she was shocked would have been putting it mildly, but it wasn’t an unpleasant surprise by any means. His lips were soft, his kiss hesitant, and for a moment, she actually wondered if he was planning to advance at all beyond the slight contact. Then, like a jolt of understanding, she realized. . . he was waiting for her to move forward.

  As soon as he initiated it, he knew he needed to hold back, to allow her to decide where to take it. To see if she felt anything for him, Chimie or not. It was rapidly becoming impossible not to get carried away, though, and he fought with his heart, and against the Chimie raging in him, to keep his desires under control. To let her lead.

  Seconds ticked on like minutes, but with her only passively accepting his slight affection, he was quickly gaining the opinion that he was alone in his feelings. Until something happened that both surprised and thrilled him, and changed everything between them.

  Wrapping her arms around his neck, she pulled him closer, intensifying the kiss, her tongue seeking his. But a mere few seconds later, as it started to heat up, she pulled away abruptly. Startled, she stared back at him with a confused expression on her face.

  “What’s happening?” she asked, expecting by his smile that he knew very well what the answer was.

  “Describe it.” His smirk remained, causing her to scowl back at him.

  “I don’t know how.” She sounded lost, her eyes fixed on his, as if trying to decipher something within them.

  “Try.” Attempting to encourage her, he took one of her hands in both of his, nodding barely, just once, for emphasis.

  Sighing, she gathered her thoughts first. “It’s like an adrenalin rush, in a way, only it’s not at all scary. I feel drunk, but insanely sober, all at the same time. Like I’m hyper aware of myself, and you, but in a strangely comforting way.” She stared back at him just so, as if requesting his feedback.

  “Wow,” he breathed, his smile growing, “that was an excellent description! We should write that down!”

  Her scowl turned into a joking half-glare. “I don’t have pen and paper on me.” Gaining seriousness again, she asked, “What is it?”

  “We call it Chimie, but what it is, is hard to explain. Some don’t even believe it’s real. They believe it’s just a fanciful tale. Some claim to have felt it but haven’t. Some believe so strongly in it, they refuse to settle till they find it.

  “There’s no one exact scientific explanation for it,” he continued, “but, it’s like. . . chemistry. Electricity. Like, how some people say we release pheromones, which cause us to become attracted to one another. It’s kinda like that, in a way. But, basically. . .” he hesitated, becoming nervous, “Mengliads believe, to feel Chimie with someone, or towards someone, means you’ve found your soulmate.”

  Her scowl returned. “And I’m assuming, you’ve been feeling this. . . Chimie, for all this time.”

  “Almost,” he admitted. “Since I held you to console you, back at your apartment, the day after you started to convert.”

  “But, if we’re destined to be together,” she asked, not so much skeptically as curiously, “then why am I just now feeling it? Why not before, like you were?”

  “There are a few rules of thought on that. Some say you can only feel Chimie after you kiss the person. Something to do with the swapping of spit.” He shrugged, smiling uneasily as he offered an apology for the term he’d used. “Kinda crude way to phrase it. Sorry.” When she nodded in acceptance, he continued. “It’s also possible that the reason you haven’t felt it before now, is because you’re new.”

  Several long seconds passed, and after they did, Jessica’s gaze finally left his to shift about the car, and to their surroundings outside. “Josiah said something to Bibi about that, when they both thought I was asleep. Bibi told him that you thought you were in love, and Josiah asked, based on what? He hasn’t even kissed her yet.”

  “Is that why you ran? ‘Cause they said I was in love with you?” Worry tinged his tone, considering that she might have fled because the notion was so unappealing to her.

  “No.” Her answer was immediate. “I left because I didn’t want you, or them, to sacrifice your lives for me. I just figured that was why you were prepared to sacrifice your life.”

  Relieved, he let out a long breath. “Is that when you knew? You said, back at the rock quarry, that you knew.”

  “That’s when it first clicked, but I had my suspicions before that.”

  “What gave me away?” he asked, a slight nervous smile appearing when she shot him an amused look.

  “It was either that, or you’re just an incredibly affectionate individual.”

  He laughed at her lighthearted response, but he was quick to lose his mirth, back to being serious again. “You didn’t mind?”

  “No,” she looked away from him, “I didn’t mind.”

  Taking a chance based on her answer, he leaned in, brushing the back of his fingers across her cheek to gain her attention before slowly meeting her lips with his. It was instantly electrifying, and when she eagerly reciprocated, his heart soared, the Chimie he was feeling before growing in intensity, creating an almost frantic need to be as close to her as possible.

  Gathering her into his arms, he pulled her to him, sweeping the hair off the back of her neck to nuzzle against it, his lips melding to the soft, tight skin at the nape.

  “My God,” she breathed, “this is insane! Does it ever go away?”

  “Not completely, but, supposedly, it does ease a little. . . in time.”

  The way he caressed her with the tip of his tongue caused her to sigh, and murmur his name. Lost to the sensations he was creating, in awe of them, her body and soul screamed out for him, demanding more of what he was offering.

  “Craddock. . .” She repeated his name, pulling away just enough to stare back at him, her eyes requesting what she couldn’t seem to verbalize.

  He could read her easily in that moment, connected to her in a way that made doing so simplistically complex and frighteningly thrilling, all at once. The way her lips twitched in anticipation as he leaned in to kiss her made him smirk unknowingly.

  The kiss was gentle and
tender, and far too brief.

  “Craddock!”

  Like a guilty teenager who had just been caught making out with his girlfriend on the family’s living room sofa, Craddock pushed away from Jessica. He only glanced at Bibi through the open door before dropping his eyes to stare at nothing in front of him.

  When he offered no form of explanation or apology, Bibi added, just as angrily as when she had barked his name, “Do you have any idea how inappropriate this is? Do you have any idea how irresponsible—?”

  “It wasn’t like I was forcing her!” Craddock interrupted, snapping at her in his defense. Breathing deeply, he forced himself to calm down, hoping to reason with her. “You don’t understand. Chimie—”

  “I do understand! And I don’t care if you think you’re experiencing Chimie or not!”

  “Think?” He scoffed. “I know very well what I’m feeling, Bibi! And I’m not the only one feeling it!”

  “She’s confused!” Bibi argued. “And you kissing her will only add to that!”

  “How? How is that adding to any sort of supposed confusion? I can’t force her to feel what I’m feeling! I can’t make her feel Chimie!”

  “This is uncharted territory! You gave her your blood, Craddock! You might be feeling Chimie, but it’s possible, that your blood in her is reacting to you!”

  “Fake Chimie?” he questioned her skeptically. “I’ve never heard of any such thing!”

  “Yeah, well, like I said, this is uncharted territory! No donor has ever hit on the recipient!”

  “How would you know?” He glared at her for a moment before adding, “And I haven’t been hitting on her!”

  “Oh, please!” she scorned him. “You’ve been drooling over her since day one!”

  “And haven’t I been a perfect gentleman in spite of that?”

  “Until just now!” Everything about her words, tone, and expression screamed disapproval. “You shouldn’t have kissed her!”

  Before Craddock could retort, Jessica cried out, startling both him and Bibi, and even Josiah, who had been standing aside, shifting nervously. “Stop it! Just stop it! It’s okay that he kissed me!”