Chapter 5
After a school day that had dragged at a pace so slow it had bordered on cruel, Arianna had spent the remainder of the afternoon in Luke’s garage. She’d watched admiringly as he’d labored and toiled with parts she couldn’t name, parts that belonged to her motorcycle, all the while, his hands had worked expertly, skillfully. He was undoubtedly talented at repairing anything with a motor. She’d been impressed with his level of expertise. Moreover, the confidence with which he’d moved had struck her. Until that point, she had only seen him as the person he was with her, and with his friends. He had been relaxed and funny, and quick to flash his warm smile. In his work space, however, he had been intense, focused. Neither his lips nor his eyes had smiled. He had hovered over her bike, his mouth pressed to a hard line, his brow furrowed, and had worked passionately while she’d sat and listened to music. Of course he had stopped occasionally, and had allowed the Luke she knew to return long enough for a kiss. But for the most part, he had concentrated on her bike.
She hadn’t been annoyed by his concentration on her bike rather than her. In fact, she had been thankful for his distraction. She had enjoyed watching him work inasmuch as she could, enjoyed the way the ropey muscles in his arms flexed and bulged, but did not feel like her normal self. She supposed she would never feel like her normal self ever again. Not with the changes that had occurred, and continued to occur. And certainly not now that she knew what she was. She was the Sola, whatever the hell that meant exactly. Her new title seemed to mean she’d be acquiring new powers at warp speed. The most recent had been her heightened hearing. She wondered what would come next. The ability to hear the slightest of sounds had made for an equally draining and revealing day. Mr. Davis and Mr. Smith’s conversation had been the tip of the iceberg. She had been involuntarily privy to enough gossip, information and meanness to last her a lifetime. The only power she could have imagined being more stressful and consuming would have been mindreading. And she prayed that would not come next.
Interspersed between the nasty and conspiring whisperings she’d been able to hear, the fragments of lectures she had been able to actually pay attention to and the general freaking out she had been doing about the chaotic condition of her life, she’d thought about Lily and Desmond. She’d thought about them in the quiet of Luke’s garage and thought about them still.
Home and alone in her cramped room, Arianna dug out her cellphone from her bag and decided to try Lily’s number again. She punched in the ten digits and waited. When she was met with the same set of nearly a half-dozen rings followed by a voicemail recording, she hung up, not bothering to leave yet another message. Frustrated, confused and exhausted, she sat on her lumpy bed that did not smell as bad as it had when she’d first sat on it, and allowed herself to fall back. She stared up at the yellowed water stains on the ceiling still clutching her phone. Her muscles yearned for rest, for revitalization. But questions swarmed in her mind and prevented her from relaxing long enough to drift off to sleep. The question of Lily’s whereabouts was chief among them. Ordinary people did not simply stop answering the phone call of friends; they did not disappear as Lily apparently had. Arianna and Lily had been close when she had lived in Rockdale. She had been drawn to the pale, fair-haired girl two years her junior, had felt protective of her even, though she, herself, had been the new girl. In the months after their initial meeting, she had become close to Lily. Lily had been the closet a person had ever been to holding the title of best friend in Arianna’s recent past. They had spent almost every day together, had confided in one another, and had gained each other’s trust. Now, Lily was gone. No fight or falling out had occurred and no indication of their friendship ending when Arianna had moved had been suggested. Arianna could not think of a logical reason why Lily would suddenly sever all contact with her; unless something else had happened, something far more nefarious. The fine hairs on the back of her neck rose at once as awareness slithered up the length of her spine with serpentine deliberateness. She became convinced that something had happened to Lily. She could feel it shiver through her. And with that shiver came panic.
A sense of dread forced her to her feet. Another matter pressed her, made the notion of sleep impossible. She wondered whether she was responsible in some way for Lily’s disappearance. The question burned inside her, seared her to her core. She needed answers. She needed to find out what was happening with Lily. She needed Desmond.
Unable to be still a second longer, Arianna grabbed her coat from her closet and slipped into her boots.
“I’m going out,” she called to her mother to be sure Cathy Rose was not the last to know about it.
Her mother did not reply and she assumed the woman was either too drunk to answer or did not care. Either way, she was not waiting around to find out. She dashed down the hallway and out the front door.
Outside, the temperature had fallen considerably. She pulled her coat closed and wrapped her arms around her waist. She looked left then right, undecided about where she should go exactly. She just knew she needed to move, to be away from her trailer. She wasn’t sure where she was going, but needed to find Desmond. If he had been with her for her entire life, he would not be hard to find. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath of the crisp night air. As she exhaled, she decided she would walk for a mile or so to an open field she’d passed on her way to school, before her motorcycle had been totaled, and summon him. She wasn’t sure how to do it, if there was some special witch way of doing it, but was confident she would figure it out. She had to figure it out. Lily’s life could depend on it.
With a plan in place, Arianna began moving. She walked out of the trailer development and on to the main road. Her feet crunched rhythmically on the gravelly shoulder of the street, the faint whoosh of the occasional passing car, a soothing sound. Dried leaves rustled and stirred and a faint but chill breeze blew. Overhead, the stars, abundant and gleaming against the blackened night sky, looked as though they quivered rather than remain fixed, shuddering with the same nervous energy Arianna possessed. She would get answers, answers she might not be ready to hear, but answers, nonetheless. She picked up her pace and walked more quickly, determined to get to the clearing as quickly as possible. Beyond the clearing was a wooded area. No houses skirted the clearing or the woods. As far as she knew, it existed as undeveloped land. She pictured it in her mind, willing her legs to move faster. She would go to the woods and call for Desmond.
After nearly twenty minutes of walking, Arianna’s lungs burned. Despite the burn, however, she wanted a cigarette. But she would not smoke before calling to Desmond. She crossed the clearing and stepped into the woods. Around her, barren trees reached skyward with skeletal branches, piercing the navy heavens with their blackened limbs. The crunch of fallen leaves gave her pause. She quickly scanned her surroundings, checking to see if anyone lingered near. She stilled herself and listened, every muscle frozen, for the sound of movement, human movement. When none was perceived and she was confident she was alone, she spoke Desmond’s name aloud.
“Desmond!” she called and felt foolish for a fleeting moment.
A section of the air before her became visible, quivering and shimmering like heat radiating off pavement on a sweltering summer day. She instinctively stepped back, away from it, and waited. She knew she should have been afraid, that anyone else would have been afraid, but felt fearless, her need for answers superseding any fear. Light burst briefly from the shimmering air, creating a phenomenon similar to a camera flash. The flare had been unexpected, her eyes hadn’t been prepared for it, and she was blinded briefly. But when the dark shapes subsided from her field of vision, Desmond stood before her.
“Hello, Arianna,” he said in his soothing voice.
The sight of him stole her breath. She’d forgotten how tall and broad-shouldered he was, how strong he looked. How beautiful he was. His fair skin
, golden hair and brilliant blue eyes shined against the moonless night and Arianna had to remind herself to breathe.
“Hello, Desmond,” she replied and her reason for calling to him came rushing back with her breath.
“Is everything okay?” he asked.
“No. Nothing is okay. Everything has changed,” she said honestly.
Rationally, she knew her changes had not been his fault, that whatever defective DNA she possessed, or birthright she was heir to, was responsible for it all, yet could not halt the accusatory tone in her voice.
“How can I help?” he said, unbothered by her harshness.
“Well, you could start by answering one of the, I don’t know, thousands of questions I have for you,” she huffed.
“Okay, shoot,” he replied.
“When you told me that the Carl thing was a catalyst to get me and my mom out of Rockdale because someone was getting close, who did you mean? Who was following me?”
“Howard Kane. Howard Kane was, and is, following you.”
“Who is Howard Kane? I’ve never heard that name in my life. Why would he be following me?”
“Because he wants you dead,” Desmond stated as matter-of-factly as he would have said it was nighttime.
“What? Why?” Arianna spluttered. “Why would he want me dead?”
“He knows the Sola is near, is drawn to her, to you, though he does not know your name or what you look like, and he will not stop until he finds you. He is the leader of an organization, a church filled with followers who hunt people like us.”
“Hunt people like us,” Arianna echoed his haunting words. “Like what, like we’re game or something?”
“Yes, just like big game. Only unlike Bengal tigers or a pride of African lions, we have supernatural powers.”
“With our powers, how does he manage to kill anyone?”
“He is a very skilled hunter. He and the hundreds of supporters he has get us by targeting the ones whose powers are not yet fully developed, or by surprising us.”
Us, she thought. Desmond used the word so casually to refer to her and the witches of the world, so nonchalantly. She still struggled with the fact that she was part of a supernatural order of beings. Not just one among them, she was their paranormal prophet, designated to unite them in their fight to exist.
“I don’t understand, how does he find us in the first place?”
“I don’t know how he is able to find us, but he does. He’s been waiting for your arrival. He’s been following you for months now.”
“So he was in Rockdale, this Howard Kane,” Arianna thought out loud. “And right behind me, on my trail. Lily was left behind.” Emotion collected in her throat and constricted it. She tried to swallow against it, to speak, but her words came out in a hoarse whisper, “Was Lily one of us? Did this Howard Kane, did he kill Lily?” she asked, afraid to hear Desmond’s answer.
Desmond was quiet, pensive, his face unreadable.
“Did something happen to Lily?” she screamed, her voice suddenly strong.
“I don’t know,” Desmond replied. “I left with you, remember. My mission is to protect you.”
“So you let something happen to her,” she accused more than questioned. “You let them hurt my friend!” She lunged at him and pounded her fists against his hard chest. He did not flinch, just stood stoically, unmoving.
“How can you just stand there? Don’t you care that a sixteen year-old girl could be hurt, or dead?”
“Of course, I do. But my goal is to,” he began, but she cut him off.
“I know! Because your goal is to protect me; I get it! But she’s innocent! She’s never hurt anyone,” Arianna said as tears welled then spilled down her cheeks.
“I’m so sorry, Arianna, for all of this,” Desmond tried to comfort her.
“Good for you! Good for you that you’re sorry! ‘Cause I didn’t ask for any of this! I didn’t ask to be the Sola or whatever the hell you say I am. Life was hard enough before. Now I’m some fucking freak that’s supposed to save others like me when I can’t even save the only true friend I ever had!”
“Arianna,” Desmond attempted.
“No! Lily’s probably dead because of me! Just for knowing me!” she cried and took several steps backward, the need for distance between her and Desmond overwhelming.
“You don’t know that anything has happened to your friend, Arianna,” he tried to assure her.
“And neither do you,” she accused. “I thought you were some all-knowing warlock, but you can’t even tell me if one girl is okay!”
“First of all, I am not an all-knowing warlock,” he said shedding his calm tone of voice for a more commanding one. “I have powers that are limited and will someday pale in comparison to the ones you will possess when the transformation is complete. And second of all, I needed to get you out of that town before Howard discovered that you’re the Sola. I didn’t have time to check in on your friend, who, by the way, may very well be a witch herself given that you felt drawn to her and protective of her. Had you ever felt that way, an inexplicable pull toward another?” he asked.
She wanted to answer him, tell him that she felt a kinship with Lily unlike any she’d ever felt, that she felt like an older sister to Lily, but her mouth went dry, the lump in her throat burning, and all she could think to do was run, run as fast and far away as her legs would take her. And she did.
She turned from Desmond faster than she’d ever imagined she could possibly move and began to run. With her head down, she watched her feet take turns hitting the grass then the pavement. She knew she should have felt her shoes slapping against the ground, knew that her body should have labored at the exertion, but felt as though she were weightless, as though she were flying. In her mind, she swore she heard Desmond’s pleas for her to stay, heard them whisper through her as though they were her own thoughts but spoken in his voice. She tuned them out more readily than her own thoughts, though, and concentrated on the beat of her heart, felt its energy swell and flare through her veins. But she did not feel peace in the lulling rhythm her heart produced. Instead, every possible worst-case scenario began to play out in her mind’s eye. The phantom Howard Kane, his sick followers, all of them, faceless forms in her imagination, faceless, maleficent forms. They swirled and eddied about like spectral predators prowling for and preying on the naïve, on the innocent.
Anger surged inside her, propelled her forward, faster. Tears streamed from her eyes and blew back, dampening the sides of her hair. She balled her fists tightly as she pumped her arms in sync with her legs. So tight was her grip that her fingernails bit into the tender skin of her palms. But she did not care. Physical pain had become irrelevant. She knew what she had to do. For the first time in her life, she felt a sense of purpose. She would go back to Rockdale and she would look for Lily. If Lily were a witch, as Desmond had speculated, than she would have someone to entrust with her deepest, darkest secret, instead of a guardian hell-bent on shielding her at the expense of those she loved. Lily would have someone to unburden her secret with, too. And if she happened upon Howard Kane, she would deal with him, just as she’d dealt with the men in the alleyway behind the nightclub.
Dark Reality 7-Book Boxed Set Page 34
