The Blood In the Beginning

by Kim Falconer

  ‘Impossible,’ he whispered.

  I don’t think I’d ever heard a more alluring voice than Rossi’s. Too bad it wasn’t saying something more supportive while I spilled my guts. ‘Not impossible at all. She moved fast, for her weight. Bit chubby though. I don’t think we share the same metabolism, or fitness goals.’

  ‘That was not your mother, Ava! She has to be a foster mother. No other explanation.’

  And, back to crazy town, though it would be a relief in a way, if Adel Fletcher was an early, but awful, foster carer. Maybe she adopted me, and then had second thoughts. Before going insane and trying to drown me. I mean, what a crap reunion to have with the actual birth mother. But no, I’d been inside her head, seen what she’d seen. I faced him square on. ‘She recognised me. Said I looked just like him. It wasn’t an act.’ I pushed limp hair out of my face with my free hand. ‘I saw it all, in my head.’ Admitting it aloud made my eyes well, something I did not want to do in front of this man. Mar. Whatever.

  Rossi didn’t move. ‘She said you resembled whom?’ he whispered.

  ‘Do I have to repeat it?’ My voice dropped into a growl. ‘The man who raped my mother, nine months before I was born. He looked like me; I look like him.’ Then she called me her demon spawn. ‘You should have been there. It was quite the mother-daughter catch up.’

  Rossi went slack.

  I seriously thought he might faint. ‘You alright? You’re not looking so good.’ His reaction wasn’t doing anything for my confidence.

  He ran his hands through his hair.

  ‘I don’t know what’s tripped you out. This makes more sense than your “other species” theory, and I don’t care how off the charts my blood is. With my luck, I inherited the dodgy gene from Dad, someone I’ll probably never find.’

  ‘Ava!’ Pretty sure he wasn’t listening to my babble. ‘If you haven’t had human blood since the transfusion, how do you explain this?’ He moved so I could check the slide.

  ‘I really wish you would stop saying human like it didn’t include me.’ I gazed down the scope, the halogen light shrinking my pupils. The sample teemed with live blood cells rushing off to nowhere under the glass. ‘How do I explain it? Easy. Red cells, reticulocytes, neutrophils, platelets.’ I moved the stage a fraction. ‘Lymphocytes.’

  ‘What are they doing?’

  I found a spot that was thick with cells. It was a mini-battleground. I sat up straighter. ‘Yeah. Seen this before. It’s my fatal flaw — red blood cells sucking the daylights out of each other.’

  ‘No …’

  I glanced up at him. ‘Um, yeah. My reticulocytes are attracting oxygen, drawing it in from the hemoglobin-rich erythrocytes.’ I frowned. ‘It’s not unlike your dead blood mixed with human blood.’ That would need some research.

  ‘No,’ he whispered this time.

  Was he impaired? ‘Yes. This is oxygen exchange from the lungs, and a bad case of auto-immune disease. Kinda nixes the “I’m Mar” theory, doesn’t it? Since I have functional lungs?’ I scanned a bit more. ‘Don’t need “human” blood to survive, unless the flaw kicks in too heavy. Then a transfusion stabilises it.’ I sighed. It was only a temporary fix. ‘Proves my point though, wouldn’t you say?’

  I lifted my head from the scope.

  ‘Rossi?’

  I caught the door click shut. ‘Hey! I was having a conversation here.’ I looked down the scope again. Some red cells were fat and healthy, others were dying, shrinking like dried-up husks. Neutrophils were coming in to clean them up. A normal day in the life of Sykes and her weird blood disorder. As I studied the slide, the boat began to vibrate. I felt it from the floor, up the stool and to the bench top. ‘Rossi?’ My head snapped up. The gentle lapping against the hull shifted into a forward driving momentum.

  The stool fell over as I leapt off my perch and ran to the door. It was locked. I pounded the seamless carbon steel. ‘Let me out, you lunatic.’

  ‘In a moment.’ His voice came from above. ‘We have to tell Teern.’

  ‘So open the door and we’ll call him.’ I pulled my phone from my back pocket, pointing it in a few different directions, ready to ring Rourke. Hell, I’d reach out to Flanagan if I had to. No reception.

  ‘We have to meet Teern in deep water.’

  ‘Hell no!’

  ‘It won’t take long.’

  Boy, was he not listening. ‘I don’t sail on the water!’

  ‘Ava, what are you worried about? It’s the sea. What could be more safe.’

  I thought of the oceanic hallucinations I’d experienced, and the attempted swimming lessons that had given me nightmares throughout my childhood, not to mention my own mother’s infanticide visions. ‘We have different ideas of safety.’

  They weren’t hallucinations, Ava. That was my life story, from human to Mar. I realise now it must have been very confusing for you. I am sorry.

  He sounded sincere, but, no. ‘No! And stay out of my head.’

  ‘You need to meet Teern. He needs to know you exist.’ Rossi’s voice was on the other side of the door. ‘You can’t tell me you’re afraid of the water. I refuse to believe it.’

  This man had no freaking clue.

  ‘Ava, if you open your mind to Teern, an hour from now all your questions will be answered. And mine too. You’ll know your origins, your people. You can’t say no to that.’ His footsteps retreated.

  ‘Rossi! I’ll charge you with kidnapping. It’s a felony. Your career is over.’ My pounding fists punctuated every word. ‘Let me out.’

  Within minutes, the engine cut out, pulleys squeaked and the speed picked up. I guessed we were under sail. I searched for a weapon and found a butcher’s knife in the kitchen. Gripping it in one hand, I returned to the door. Silent as a cat, I waited.

  * * *

  Ava, put the knife down.

  He has x-ray vision?

  The door opened and Rossi stepped back. I raised the knife and charged. He grabbed both my wrists, faster than possible. I leaned back to headbutt him, managing only to slam his chest. Tall guy.

  ‘Ava, calm down.’

  ‘Let me go.’

  He did, and I bolted out to the deck …

  I don’t know where I expected to be, but finding myself under all that sail, surrounded by dark-blue water, stopped me dead. I turned toward shore. Two figures stood on the breakwater. I couldn’t make them out from this distance, but I bet they were my tails, Mark and Samuel. The sun rode west, lowering toward the horizon, late afternoon. The sky was still a smoggy brown, but where a bit of light cut through the clouds, it was amazing. I enjoyed it for all of two seconds, then the fear rolled back in. I planted myself on a bench seat and kept a tight grip on the edge. Rossi came and sat opposite. ‘Can I have the knife before someone gets hurt?’

  It was my turn to fix him in a blazing stare. ‘Is this how you operate? You make a choice without my consent?’

  ‘I apologise.’

  ‘Not forgiven!’

  His mouth turned down. ‘Teern has to know of you.’

  ‘Yeah, you said that.’ I thought about the images I’d seen, of Rossi growing up in a long ago Roman Empire. ‘You understand about human rights, don’t you? It’s against the law to steal people?’

  ‘I’m not stealing you.’

  ‘It’s called kidnapping.’ He seemed to need the reminder. ‘I did not agree to go out to sea.’ We hit a small wave and I white-knuckled the rail. ‘Where’s Teern?’ I lifted my chin toward the open expanse. There were plenty of boats in the distance. None headed our way.

  ‘He’s coming.’

  ‘And what is this big revelation, exactly? The must-know insight we couldn’t send in an email?’

  ‘What I saw on the slide. Your own blood feeding off itself.’

  ‘That’s right.’ I said it slowly. ‘Exactly what happens in auto-immune diseases.’ Had he lost his marbles?

  ‘It’s what would happen if your Mar blood fed off your human half.’
/>   ‘What half?’

  ‘If your mother is human and you have functional lungs, like her, oxygenating part of your blood, and your father is Mar, giving you Mar blood, which requires seawater, or human blood to survive on land, you are a completely self sustaining Mar, land or sea. Though …’ He pinched the bridge of his nose like these thoughts were hurting his head. ‘How you function in the sea remains to be seen. We have to tell Teern.’

  All I could do was shake my head.

  ‘Ava, if it’s true, it means you’re a first.’

  ‘First what?’ I snapped at him.

  ‘The first Mar-human ever born.’

  ‘As opposed to hatched?’

  He narrowed his eyes at me. ‘Did you learn nothing from the memories I shared?’

  ‘Those coral-encrusted tombs?’

  ‘Ma’atta.’ His voice became reverent. ‘We rise from the Ma’atta. Oldest living thing on earth, said to have come from ancient falling stars. Ma’atta literally means, “the beginning of all life”. Encased in it, our DNA mutates and, when ready, if the turn is true, we rise from our tombs, Mar.’

  I licked my lips. There just wasn’t anything to say to that.

  Finally, Rossi broke the silence. ‘Who else knows?’

  ‘About my mother?’

  He nodded.

  ‘Rourke hunted her down for me. I told Cate, of course.’ My mind wandered to her for a moment. ‘I haven’t had a chance to tell Tom.’

  ‘What about Bane?’

  ‘I told him about my meeting, yeah.’ His warm comforting arms and that sweet honey kiss came flooding into my mind.

  ‘We should have done more tests from the start. You’re at great risk.’

  ‘From Bane?’

  ‘Him, or any Shen.’

  ‘How can I tell who’s Mar? You all look like humans to me.’ I had to laugh. I mean, could I even take this seriously?

  ‘For one, if you listen, you can hear Mar thoughts.’

  There was that. ‘Can I read human minds too?’

  ‘Unfortunately, no.’

  But I knew I’d heard Zoe’s thoughts, and Tom’s and I’d caught Rourke’s too recently. They sure as hell weren’t Mar, Shen or otherwise. Interesting. I decided to keep that little nugget to myself for now.

  ‘The shades are also a tip-off.’

  ‘What’s with that?’

  ‘The glare. Our blood vessels can’t be exposed to sunlight.’

  ‘Alright.’ I relaxed my grip on the weapon. There was a hell of a lot of messed up shit going on in my life right now, but for all the crazy behaviour Rossi was exhibiting, his theories at least attempted to explain it. I couldn’t work myself up to feeling overly scared of him. Angry, yes, but frightened? I guess Rourke’s background check helped ease my mind. I handed over the knife. It wasn’t like I was going to carve him up anyway. And how would I get back to shore if I did? ‘I’ll consent. Take me to Teern, but let’s make it quick. I want to be home before dark.’ And I’ll never let myself be alone with you again! I didn’t like the idea of a shipboard rendezvous, but I wasn’t so scared I would miss an opportunity to unveil my past now that I was out here. Maybe Teern was ex-CHI Tech, like Rossi, and this was the only ‘safe’ way to meet. ‘Rossi, just so you know, if you ever lock me in a room again, I will break your legs. That’s a promise.’

  He met my eyes. ‘Fair enough, but if you really are from a human-Mar coupling, you’ll forgive me, I promise.’

  Don’t hold your breath.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  ‘You can let go of the railing, Ava. It’s smooth as glass out here.’

  I glanced at my grip. ‘Shut up.’

  He sighed, his expression nudging over to pity. ‘It shouldn’t be like this.’

  No shit. We should be on land, where people belong.

  I still can’t believe you think you’re a Lander.

  I still can’t believe you’re mentally ill.

  He tried to convince me of his theories, again. I ignored the absurdities. They were too uncomfortable to dwell on, so I focussed on the place we would be returning to, hopefully soon, once I’d met Teern: the harbour, and jagged coastline was distant, but clear. In the city, I rarely had the chance to test my long-distance vision. With contacts in, it was darn good. Nice skyline.

  ‘You have to admit, it’s beautiful out here.’ Rossi was gazing in the other direction, out to sea, his hands shading his eyes, even with his sunglasses on.

  ‘Says you.’ I sounded puerile, but his calm state, and trust in the boat, gradually wore away at me. I found a natural rhythm to the rise and fall of the prow and loosened the death grip a further notch. The spray misted salt crystals over my face. I licked my lips. I always liked a briny taste. It couldn’t be fresher than this. Hopefully, low on radiation and heavy metals.

  ‘We’re crossing the Riviera. Lean over. Take a peek.’

  ‘I’m good.’ Part of me wanted to see the new sunken-treasure dive spot of the century, the aquatic wonder that was once the famous Riviera Country Club; another part of me would only look at the middle of the boat.

  Rossi jumped up to bring in the sail. He was as agile as a cat. Easy to watch. ‘This’ll do.’

  ‘For what?’ I spoke a little louder than I needed to. Nerves. There were a few boats further north and south of us, at varying distances from shore, but I didn’t see any on an intercept course. Actually, they looked like toys on the horizon. ‘Where’s Teern?’

  ‘I’m going to call him now.’ I heard the anchor rope running out of the hull. The current was strong, but we were holding position.

  I let go of the railing with one hand and pushed hair out of my face. It blew straight back into my eyes. What a day to forgo the French braid. The churning motion of the boat was less than pleasant. I knew motion sickness was caused by a disturbance in the vestibular system’s sense of movement. Judging by how ‘disturbed’ I was feeling, my sense of balance was way out of whack as well. ‘Call him how?’ I expected him to pull out his phone. ‘Is there reception?’

  Rossi took his shirt off instead and my thoughts vanished clean out of my head.

  Whoa. That’s unexpected.

  He gave me a playful smile, as if for a moment, we really were on a date, or at least, two friends sailing in the bay. But he went serious again, and undid his pants.

  What the …?

  He laughed aloud. Get used to it. Mar aren’t exactly modest.

  Damn. I needed to avert my eyes. Like hell I would do that. ‘Are you seriously going to swim?’ The sun was still behind the clouds, the wind cool. Everything took on a green-gold hue, to me, and I watched, thinking he’d put on his board shorts, or wetsuit or whatever, but no. The man was stark freaking naked. Holy hallelujah.

  ‘I won’t be long.’

  ‘What?’ I tore my eyes off his body, which was lining up to dive over the edge, and found his face. ‘No no no! Wait. You can’t leave me alone.’

  Stay on board, his thoughts swirled into my head.

  Dive. Swoosh. Gone.

  ‘What the hell, Rossi. No way!’

  I didn’t see any scuba gear, not even fins and mask. No snorkel. No rebreather. For the second time in a matter of days, I wanted to burst into tears. ‘You bastard.’ I spat the words out. How could he leave me here? What if he didn’t come back? I was working myself straight into the swirling vortex of panicsville. The sky was closing in; the sea would swallow me up. Tunnel vision made my eyes slam shut. Not good not good.

  Stop. A quieter part of my mind spoke. Find your centre. My voice echoed the tone and demand of Rourke, coaching me before a competition. Breathe.

  I obeyed my higher guide, who clearly had more grace than me at the moment. After a few conscious breaths, the walls retreated, a little.

  Big picture, Sykes, I told myself. No one’s beating you with a pipe. You aren’t being chained to an altar and your heart cut out, or being buried alive.

  All true things.

  Just chi
ll out. Relax. He’ll be back. How far could he go, anyway? I kept up the commentary until my heartbeat slowed to something below a grand mal seizure rate. Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.

  Oh, hell. I sucked in large gulps. After a few moments, I started to realise Rossi hadn’t surfaced, that I could tell, and I really was alone on the sea, which triggered the fear-abandonment-panic cycle again. Too bad I wasn’t hooked up to an ECG. This would make great research for my internship next year. I was lost in those thoughts when a wave hit the deck, drenching me. The sea had been smooth as glass. Hardly a ripple. What was that? When I opened my eyes, sputtering, the answer was in front of me. I screamed like a college chick in a horror film, because suddenly I wasn’t alone any more. A naked woman, tall and gorgeous, stood on the rail.

  I slammed back into the seat, my eyes glued to her. There was only one thought in my head. She’s. Not. Human. Her height, her stance, the way she balanced on that narrow rail and jumped to the deck, her walk. Hell, the way she’d sprung out of the sea. Gravity didn’t appear to be much of an issue for her. Her arms were long, her expression sensual and curious. I’d call her stunningly attractive, if you didn’t count the pointy eye teeth. Definitely not human when she showed that off.

  And you think you are, sweetcakes? She shot the words into my head like they were turbocharged. My neck snapped back with the force of it. Let’s have a little look-see, shall we? Her hands came up to her flawless face, pushing the lengths of long wet hair back. No mean feat as it fell down her creamy skin and over naked hips to the backs of her knees. It was honey-blonde, at least in the late afternoon light. She had to be over six foot tall, an Amazon, with eyes so dark, they looked like black holes. She wasn’t shy, either, given her lack of clothing, and obvious lack of weapons.

  Except for those teeth. Instinctively, I jumped to my feet. Something about her cocky smile screamed ‘run.’ But on this tiny cork floating around on the sea, where to?

  She laughed, and put her hands on her hips. You’re Rossi’s Ava Sykes?

  My knees tried to absorb the rise and fall of the boat to lessen the head spins. ‘That’s me, but I’m not his anything.’ Especially after this string of events. ‘You?’