Copula Chronicles: The Complete Collection: Origin, Descend, Ascend, Legacy

by Venessa Kimball

  I hear a soft voice whisper on the breeze that emerges from the trail, “Jesca.”

  It sounds like my mother. “Anna?”

  Maybe she is trying to reach me to tell me something. What if something happened to Nate or Ezra? What if she has found Xander and Sebastian too? What if I’m the one that is lost? “Anna?”

  I’m inching closer to the trailhead, when I feel a sensation I haven’t felt in weeks coming at me from behind: the vibration, the hum, the warning of something dangerous. Lightning getting ready to strike. Without thinking, I run into the woods on the trail. My body feels like it has a mind of its own as it soars with every stride, dodging the over-grown brush from left to right. The humming vibration is still coming strong. I turn my head to see if anything is following, but there is nothing there. My next step lands me in water; the depth trips me up, and I fall to my knees. I stay there for a moment, get my bearings and listen; the humming vibration is gone. I wait and listen, it may come back. A glow catches my eye in the water, a reflection. I look to my right, following the reflection and the flow of the water. Crap, I am kneeling on all fours in the middle of a stream, but not just any stream. The very stream I dreamt about before traversing.

  I stand up slowly and walk to the water’s edge. In my dream, I drudged through the stream. Without considering the consequences, I follow my instinct and walk along the bank downstream. I look ahead at the enigmatic amber glow piercing through the tangled tree branches interweaving above the stream.

  I move quicker, determined to see if the end of this stream bears the same resemblance as my dream: the lake, the river, the mounds in the distance. It takes me no time at all to get to the opening of the overgrown tree branches and where the stream empties into a river. I try to get my bearings. I am not on the ridge that overlooks the lake like I was in my dream. In my dream, I was looking at the river from the overlook by the lake.

  I hear Anna’s voice again over the sound of the river, “Jesca, don’t.”

  Don’t what? I look across the river and fix my eyes on a vast ridge housing the distinct silhouette of three mounds. In the quickly dimming sky, above the highest of the mounds rests three bright stars; a constellation.

  I hear a rustling in the woods behind me and it is coming fast. I turn and get my footing, ready to fight to protect myself. Anna breaks through the tree line, stumbles toward me, eyes looking frantic. She grabs hold of my arms and talks quickly, “I tried to get to you before you could show him.”

  What was she saying?

  “Show who?”

  Anna tries to catch her breath as she says, “Michael.”

  I look behind her searching for Nate and Ezra. They should be with her. “Why aren’t Ezra and Nate with you?”

  She looks at me strangely. “With me? I haven’t found them. I have tried to make contact with them, but I couldn’t connect. Michael knows I am here.”

  I start talking frantically. “Nate said that you were with them! You were taking them home! To my home in Marietta!”

  She realizes what has happened the moment I do. Anna shakes her head quickly. “He is pretending to be me.”

  I break her hold on me, put my hands to my head, and start to pace along the riverbank. “I have to try and reach Nate and Ezra.”

  I close my eyes and try to focus on Nate first, but my mind feels like it has a million thoughts running through it all at once. “Damn it, I can’t think straight!”

  Anna walks over to me, her voice clipped and stern. “The same thing happened to me. It’s this place. It is trying to consume us.”

  I turn to look at her. “Wait, how were you able to reach me?”

  Anna says, “Because you are unconscious.”

  What is she saying? “No I’m not! I’m standing here, drudging through this creek in THIS Marietta looking for Xander and Sebastian!”

  Anna shakes her head and grabs my shoulders firmly again. “No, Jesca. That is exactly what Michael wanted you to think. He wanted into your subconscious. He wanted to see the premonition and where it will lead you! I couldn’t get to you fast enough to stop you from showing him where your legacy is taking you. What it is leading you to.”

  That bastard! He got into my head! If he got into mine, then I’m sure he is attacking Sebastian and Xander’s.

  Anna continues, “Now that he knows what you know—”

  “Crap! He has Nate and Ezra. He hasn’t killed them because he is using them as a trap for me.”

  Anna replied, “Yes, and he has separated you from Xander and Sebastian, who are still unconscious.” She starts to walk away from me and I catch her arm in my grip. “Wait, where are you going?”

  Anna wiggles her arm out of my grip. “I’m going to find Ezra and Nate!”

  She runs from the riverbank and into the woods and I chase after her. I catch up and grab hold of her arm again. “Anna, I’m coming with you!”

  She turns on me and pushes me up against a nearby tree trunk. “No! Wake up, Jes!”

  Her eyes burn with fire and sadness as she looks at me, pinned against this tree. What is she doing? Her breathing changes, panting and crying all in one, as she pounds me against the tree again, and again. “I’m sorry, Jesca, but you need to get to Xander and Sebastian and find us! Wake up!”

  I grip her arms harder now. I can’t let her go alone. “No, I need to help you!” I hear a loud crack as the back of my head makes contact with the tree once more. Then, a shooting pain runs from my skull to the bottom of my spine. Shards of light flash before my eyes and the hands that held me to the tree disappear and I fall to the ground hard. I try to call out to her, but it comes out as a croaking whisper as I fade. “Anna.”

  The rise and fall of my head on something solid is what brings me to. Am I really waking up this time or am I still unconscious? I lift my head and immediately feel the familiar sharp pain from my earlier dream and I worry that Anna’s manhandling might not have done the trick.

  I look down at what my head was resting on. In the paling sunlight falling below the earth, I see an abdomen, chest, broad shoulders; Xander unconscious beneath me. Okay, this is good sign that I am awake. I try to sit up to look for Sebastian, but Xander’s arms are locked around me keeping me from moving too much. Just then, I remember the tight hold he had on me when we traversed. Sebastian had a tight hold on Xander so he shouldn’t be too far either. I’m able to look around Xander’s body among the dried leaves, but I still don’t see him. I needed to get up.

  I wiggle my body in Xander’s arms either to loosen his hold or wake him up, whichever comes first. He doesn’t wake, but I am able to loosen his hold enough to move closer to his face. I put my hand on his shoulder and I’m about to whisper to him to wake up when I notice tears running down along his temples and his inhale and exhale speed like he is running. I grip his shoulder and call to him, “Xander, wake up.”

  He doesn’t respond. I’m about to shake him a little harder when I hear a rustling in the leaves behind me. I look back, not knowing what to expect, and see Sebastian leaning his shoulder against a nearby tree trunk; he looks tired, drained.

  “You okay?”

  He wiped his dampened eyes with the sleeve of his shirt and just shakes his head as he comes to kneel beside me. He starts to pull Xander’s hands from around me. “Your voice woke me.”

  I sit up on my knees next to Sebastian, hover over Xander and shake the hell out of him. “Wake up!”

  Xander groans, still not opening his eyes.

  I grip his face between my hands. “Xander, open your eyes!”

  When those bright, green-blue eyes flutter open and meet mine, they double in size. He takes hold of my arms and rises up to sit. “Oh my God, Jes, I thought you had died.”

  I search his frantic eyes, wondering what illusion plagued him, tested his resolve and made him think I was dead. Xander’s arms encircle me,
pulling me flush against his chest. His entire body trembles as I wrap my arms around his neck and hold him.

  “They are just illusions, Xander. I’m here.”

  Xander loosens his hold on me, cups my face in his palms and urgently feathers slow, tender kisses on my lips. Those kisses—I can’t deny that my desire for them takes over. I surrender and let my mouth glide against his feverishly.

  The sound of Sebastian clearing his throat reminds me that we are not alone and I feel heat rising on my face as I slowly pull back from Xander. He brushes his thumb against my cheek, his eyes studying me less frantically now. I pinch my eyes closed, trying to calm my racing heart and breath before speaking. “He used the illusions to pull us away from Nate and Ezra.”

  I look at Sebastian. “He is using Transfiguration to appear as Anna and he is leading them to my house.”

  Sebastian pushes off the tree trunk and moves toward us. “Your old house?”

  I rise slowly to keep the dulling headache from spiking again. “I know it sounds crazy, but this place—it is an exact replica of Marietta, Georgia. These beings have used our thoughts, our memories to create a false reality.”

  Xander tries to get his footing to stand. “How is that possible?”

  He stops abruptly, grabbing his head. “Ahh! That hurts, that hurts!”

  Sebastian and I reach toward Xander and take hold of him for support. Sebastian looks around us suspiciously. “It’s like they have constructed an alternate Marietta in their world based off of yours, Ezra’s and Michael’s recollection.”

  “Michael’s recollection? When was Michael in Georgia?”

  Sebastian stands stunned before us as the question lingers in the air. The type of customary silence that comes when someone is withholding information. My stare must stir the need for words. Sebastian starts, “While I was out, Michael got into my head. The illusion—”

  Sebastian’s voice begins to shake with emotion and he shakes his head to try to rid the feelings flooding him. “He grew up in Georgia.”

  Sebastian turns away from Xander and me, giving us the hint that he has nothing more to say. The rest of the illusion must have been unspeakably upsetting based on his reaction.

  I shake my head, resentful that he had direct influence on their illusions as well as mine “Michael knows about my premonitions, my dreams.”

  Sebastian hastily grips my shoulder, shocking me at his urgent reaction. “What?”

  I watch Sebastian’s reaction intently as I speak. “When I was unconscious, I had a premonition about the Etowah Mounds in Georgia. Anna, the real Anna, tried to stop me from following through with the illusion, to keep it from Michael, but she was too late. He saw what I saw. He is going to try and stop us from getting to those mounds.”

  I pull away from Sebastian’s grip. “Back in Kyoto at the facility, you dodged Xander’s questions about why you chose the Etowah Mounds site. What is its significance?”

  Sebastian runs his hand over his mouth and taps his finger on his lips as he thinks. “What did you see?”

  “A creek, the outlet above a lake, in the distance I see the mounds. I follow the creek down to where it joins a rushing river.”

  I close my eyes to conjure the image in my head as I speak. “The ridge is high above the river. It’s dusk, but the profile of the three mounds is vivid. There are stars, three of them above the largest of the three visible mounds.”

  I open my eyes slowly. “That is what I saw before Anna came to me. The stars, it looked like Orion’s Belt.”

  Sebastian stops tapping his finger on his lips. “I have had premonitions of the mounds, but you have seen something that I have not.”

  “All I saw were the mounds and three stars. It isn’t that big of a deal.”

  It really wasn’t. It was just a constellation in the night sky.

  Sebastian continues, “In all of my visions of the mounds over my lifetime, I have never seen Orion’s Belt above them. You have seen it above those mounds for a reason.”

  “What the hell does a bunch of stars have to do with saving our world?”

  Saving my father and Nate, ending Michael, getting all of us the hell out of here, sealing the veil, and saving our world. My chest constricts from the pressure of knowing that the events of my purpose are upon me and closing in fast. I turn away from both Sebastian and Xander to try to calm down.

  I feel Xander’s hand rest on my shoulder. “Hey, you are not going at this alone, remember.”

  I nod, acknowledging his support, while I bite my lip to hold my opposing words for what I know he would be willing to do to protect me. What both he and Nate would be willing to do: anything.

  I look up to hold the tears in my eyes for as long as possible. I can’t let Xander and Nate risk themselves for me; another item to add to my growing checklist of things to do.

  Sebastian’s somber voice interrupts my internal rant, “I thought it would be me. The one to have the visions that you have. I sought the uncharted territory in the first place. I challenged the boundaries of our world, our universe. I wanted to find what was beyond us, what created us, originated, possibly what had occupied our world at one time before us. We can’t be the only ones that have been here. This should be my burden, not yours.”

  Sebastian covers his mouth with praying hands and closes his eyes. He breathes in deeply then moves his hands away to speak. “I have burdened my wife, my sons, my niece, my grandson, you, all of you. Dobria, she would still be here if I were home when they came for me. They murdered her because of me.”

  “She was murdered?”

  Sebastian nods. “Because of what I had discovered about our family, our ancestral legacy in Georgia, we are not just guardians. That is only the destiny of our origin because of who we are, our abilities, and what we can do. Yes, parts of our abilities are because of the Copula. But much of it is inherently because of our lineage.”

  Our lineage?

  Sebastian continues, “The men in suits came for our family. Michael’s father—” Sebastian shakes his head, like he is trying to shake off a bad dream, bad illusion.

  Not able to read him and wanting to break the anguish on his face even for a moment, I whisper, “It was only an illusion, Sebastian.”

  He turns away from us. “Truths lie within the illusions, Jesca. Sometimes we try hard to bury those illusions, but they plague our reality and will always resurface. Our legacy could only be buried for so long. I exposed it, dug too deep, to the root of our legacy and it has transformed everything around us. I should be the one to seal the veil and save our race, not you.”

  Crestfallen, Sebastian turns his gaze to the ground. “I was not chosen to see what you have seen. Know what you have learned. The calamity of our family’s legacy has fallen on you, Jesca.”

  I turn away from both of them now, swallowing the golf-ball-sized lump of trepidation in my throat. When I speak, I expect my voice to be strong, but it sounds so—so weak. “What am I supposed to do? I don’t know how to save us.”

  I look up at the sky and hope Michael can hear me and realize that it is a lost cause to try to kill us. “I don’t know how to seal the freaking veil! I don’t know how to save our world!”

  I feel Xander’s body move closer behind me, his chest barely touching my back.

  Sebastian explains, “The premonitions, they will guide your path.”

  I snicker, “My path. That phrase keeps coming back to bite me in the ass, doesn’t it?”

  I hear a familiar voice in my head and it makes me smile like only he can. “You are thinking too hard. Keep it simple, love.”

  Ezra.

  Hearing those words in my head give me the renewed spirit I need. I turn around to face both Xander and Sebastian. “Right now, getting Ezra and Nate from Michael is my path. After that, well, I will just have to figure it out as I go. I need to
keep it simple. Anna has gone after Ezra and Nate, but she won’t stand a chance against Michael, Sam, and the beings wanting to keep us here.”

  Xander interrupts, tensely, “Jesca, Ezra and Nate are bait to draw us in! You are doing what Michael wants you to do!”

  I look from Xander to Sebastian. “Balthazar says sometimes to catch you have to be caught. This is one of those times.”

  Sebastian nods. He can’t argue his son’s wise words. It is not a confident and optimistic nod by any means, but I will take what I can get. I look back at Xander. The condescending look in his eyes fuel the fight building quickly within me. “What? It is what it is, Xander! There is no other option!” Xander shakes his head and works his jaw back and forth. I start to move around him.

  He steps in front of me, blocking me from passing. “I can’t let you do this, Jesca!”

  “Then don’t!”

  In that moment, I turn and run like hell. The only way to get Sebastian and Xander to follow through with my bright idea is to force it upon them.

  CHAPTER 20: DISGUISE

  Ezra

  Anna walks ahead of Nate and me, leading us out of the thinning wood. I watch Anna’s movement; the way her body shifts, it’s different. Maybe it has been so long that I have forgotten the way she moves. I have Nate walking beside me. I didn’t like the way his body reacted to Jesca making contact. It made him vulnerable.

  It’s nearly dusk and my eye is caught by the light beyond the brush ahead. Without warning, I see a small figure pass in front of the light from one side of the opening to the other. I react quickly, put my arm out and grab hold of Nate’s shirt, bringing him to a halt. His eyes dart from me back to the opening. I hear his thoughts as he contemplates what he could have seen just now. Anna is still walking. I call to her in my mind, “Anna,” but it has no effect on her as she keeps drudging on. I whisper, “Anna.”

  She stops, crouches and turns to face me. “What?”