by R H Frye
Chapter 13
Sarah was a bundle of nerves as she sped towards Asheville. She had to keep reminding herself to slow down since a ticket would cost her more time in the long run than a little speed in the meantime. She could hardly believe how her life had changed in a matter of days. Only a few days before, she could never have imagined speeding towards a hospital with murder on her mind. She knew that what she was planning to do was right, but the rapid change in her thinking was a little shocking, nonetheless.
Her thoughts turned to the pistol on the seat beside her. The bulky weapon was another reason to watch her speed. She knew she would have trouble explaining it to any policeman if she was pulled over. And if she was completely honest with herself, she had her doubts about whether she could actually use it when the time came. It was one thing to talk of murdering another human being in the heat of her desire to help her man. It was quite another thing to have an hour or two to think about actually pulling the trigger and watching a bullet plow its way through a person.
All Sarah knew was that John was too important to her to let him die. And it had looked like he was in serious danger of dying when she left Adam’s store in Cherokee. He was completely unresponsive, and trying to touch his mind only caused her thoughts to touch briefly the thoughts of the monster that was somehow holding John captive. Those thoughts were a whirling black cesspool of violence and anger, and she knew in her heart that killing such a monster would be a service to humanity. God alone knew what such a man would do if he were allowed to rampage unchecked through a society that had forgotten that such men even existed.
Sarah tried to clear her mind of doubts and steel herself for what she had to do. She would kill Maraydel to save John. Her man needed her help, and she was determined not to let him down.
“Damn it! Danny, pull over.”
The words penetrated the fog that had slowly settled over Danny’s mind. He shook his head to clear it and quickly realized why Carol had spoken. The early afternoon sun should have been shining in his face as he traveled west towards US74 before turning south for Cherokee. Instead, the light of the summer afternoon was glinting from the driver’s side mirror to stab into his eyes. He was driving east again.
With a frustrated sigh he pulled the car over into the breakdown lane. He knew that every time they stopped, they increased their chances of attracting law enforcement officials that would have uncomfortable questions about the stolen car they were still driving.
But what could they do? Every time they started to drive away from Asheville, as soon as their attention wandered even slightly, they would find themselves driving back towards the hospital and the monstrous man that it harbored. Danny rubbed a trembling hand against eyes that were dry from strain and too much driving in too short a time. This was the beginning of their third lap around Asheville, and their chances of escaping and finding help appeared to be dwindling away rapidly as the malevolent force in their minds continued to grow stronger at an alarming rate.
Danny looked over at Carol and the look on her face told him all he needed to know. They were beaten. The exhaustion that he was beginning to feel was evident in her face. She had leaned her head back against the headrest, and tears had begun to leak slowly from her eyes to make slow trails down her cheeks. They had put up a good fight, but the will to fight was rapidly being replaced by hopelessness.
“What do you want to do?” Danny asked the question, but he knew there was really only one answer. Since they clearly could not get away, they were faced with the horrible fact that they would have to return to Maraydel’s side and serve him as they had been bonded to do by the power that the magus wielded.
Carol sighed deeply before drawing a slow, sad breath to answer. “You know what we have to do. I hoped we could get away or at least find help, but it looks like God doesn’t have the time or the desire to help us. So, fuck it. Let’s go to the hospital. And I guess I can look forward to being a sex toy to that thing again.” What little composure she had maintained in her exhaustion broke and she began to sob wearily.
“Maybe we can kill ourselves. I know I’d rather be dead than see him do that to you again.”
“You know as well as I do that he won’t let us do that. If we try, he’ll only find some way to stop us, and the more we resist the more we’ll suffer for it later. What did we ever do to deserve this? Can you tell me that?” Her tear-reddened eyes snapped open to look angrily upwards. “Huh? I’ve gone to church my whole life. Maybe I didn’t go every time the doors opened, but I went, and I worshipped you and you let this happen to us. What kind of God are you anyway?”
Danny could only sit in mute silence. He had no answers for her. He had the same questions burning in his mind, and they were making him furious. How could a kind and generous God allow something like this to happen to people like them? They had never hurt anyone. They were good to their friends and to each other. What had they done to deserve this? He prayed silently for answers, but the answers did not appear. After long moments spent in despair, Danny gave a long sigh of his own and prepared to merge into traffic. After waiting for a Dodge Ram to pass, he pulled smoothly into traffic and continued onwards towards the destination that neither of the unhappy couple wanted to reach.
Sarah watched the Dodge Shadow in the breakdown lane carefully. It always paid to be careful when you were driving. It seemed like people drove more idiotically with every passing year, and she could not afford to have an accident if the car in the emergency lane suddenly decided that it needed to go regardless of whether she was there or not. She had a brief moment of tension when she saw the car begin to accelerate down the side of the road, but she rapidly passed the moving vehicle and saw it move into the lane behind her after she passed. Okay, so that driver at least was no idiot. She put any thoughts of the car from her mind and concentrated on finding the exit for the hospital.
Spotting the green information sign for the hospital ahead, Sarah turned on her signal and merged easily onto the exit ramp. She gave her attention to following the signs and never noticed the Dodge Shadow that was following her every turn.
“Well I guess that truck is going to the hospital too.” Danny was making small talk to try to take his mind off their destination.
Carol opened her eyes and glanced at the truck briefly before closing them again and returning her head to the headrest. “Yeah, it looks that way.”
Maraydel stirred in his bed. The motion brought more pain to his tortured body, but the pain was much less than it had been only hours before. Besides, there were more important things to consider. For the time being, the shaman was still managing to stay hidden from him, but that battle was taking up little of his concentration. The slaves were now his main concern. The bonds that he had placed on them had done their work, and the two traitorous teens were on their way to him. They were very close, and he was glad. Soon he would be strong enough to rouse from his healing trance, and it would be time to deal with the two that had left him for dead. Of course, they would not be killed. They still had their uses after all. But they would definitely receive another harsh lesson in what it meant to cross him.
The magus considered the fresh tortures that he would heap on Carol and Danny for only a moment. In his distraction, his link to the shaman was threatening to disappear, and if that happened, the source of the energy that he was using to fuel his healing would also disappear. He returned his attention to the shaman and trusted his power to bring the slaves to him.
John was still sliding silently and swiftly through the depths of the lake where he was hiding.
He was gliding through the water near the surface when he noticed a lull in the storm that was still shaking the world outside the lake. He stopped swimming for a moment when he realized that he felt something familiar…and wonderful. He could feel the link to his body again. The connection was tenuous, and he was afraid that he could lose it at any moment, but for now it was there.
He began to swim for the poi
nt on the shore where he had entered the lake. The lull in the storm seemed to be over and lightning began to lash downward at irregular intervals all across the lake. John knew without knowing how he knew that the storm was the presence of Maraydel. Something had distracted the magus for a moment and the link to his body had reappeared while the evil presence was distracted, but the storm’s renewed vigor signaled all too clearly that Maraydel’s attention was once more focused on finding John. The return of the wizard’s attention was unwelcome and horrible, but there was one important difference.
The link to his body was still there, and John struggled to maintain the connection as he swam furiously towards the shore.
Chapter 14
Sarah slammed the door of John’s truck and hurried towards the front door of the hospital. As she walked, her hand stole into the large purse that was hanging at her side and caressed the grip of John’s Desert Eagle .45. She was worried for John and more than a little scared at the thought of what she was planning to do. In all of her life, she had never considered that she may one day have to kill someone, but it certainly looked like she was going to have to try.
As she approached the door to the hospital, she pushed her worries to the back of her mind. Sarah knew that dwelling on what she had to do would only slow her down when she got to the intensive care unit. She also needed to spend at least a little time trying to come up with a plan to get out of the hospital without being held for murder. She loved John dearly and she would do what she needed to do, but she hoped to find a way to help him that did not involve spending the rest of her life in a cage.
Sarah barely slowed her slide enough to allow the automatic doors to slide open before she could bump into them. She brushed past an elderly gentleman in the foyer and had to slow her stride again to allow the second set of doors to slide open in front of her. Floral scents mixed with the smells of disinfectant assaulted her nostrils as she strode through the lobby and paused for a moment to consult the posted information signs. She scanned through the list of destinations quickly until she located the ICU. She noted the floor that was indicated and turned to follow the signs that were pointing to the elevators.
As Sarah turned to move down the hallway, she glimpsed a young couple approaching the information board she had just finished reading. Something about the two seemed familiar, but at the same time she knew she had never seen them before. What could it be?
Sarah paused for a moment in indecision. She felt a sudden compulsion to stop and talk to the two young people, and such an urge seemed ridiculous considering the purpose that had brought her to this hospital. She studied the pair briefly and noticed that both seemed worried, and the girl had obviously been crying. They were both wearing blue jeans that could use a good washing, and she could see scrapes and scratches on the young man’s forearms and hands.
Sarah shook her head and started up the hallway towards the elevators while dismissing the young couple from her mind. They were probably just there to see some relative on a deathbed. Besides, she had more important matters to attend to than stopping to talk to a bedraggled pair of teenagers.
Maraydel’s was growing frustrated in his search for the shaman. How could the man continue to hide? He was obviously new to the abilities he possessed, and should have been no match for the magus, so how was it that the irritating novice continued to elude him? He knew that the shaman’s spirit was still locked into his vision, but the storm that he was using to hold the man’s spirit had been unable to find him. Now where could you hide from the rain in the middle of a forest that had no man-made shelter?
An answer to that question was struggling to form in Maraydel’s mind, but the constant aggravation from the pain of his rapidly healing injuries made it difficult to focus. The magical potion that was flowing into his arm from a tube served to blunt the worst of the pain and was in fact the only thing that had allowed him to focus long enough to trap the shaman, but the potion had a price. While the potion dulled the pain, it also caused his mind to try to wander. Only the discipline he had learned to control the powers that he wielded had allowed him to counter the ill effects of the stuff that flowed through the tube, but the effort was draining, and it distracted him from his search.
With a fresh surge of irritation, Maraydel realized that his mind was wandering again. He pulled his attention back to the search for the shaman and felt the idea move a little closer to the surface of his mind. What was it? Was it something about the lake? He was about to pursue the idea further, but another distraction presented itself at just that moment.
The slaves were close! So, his spell had finally done its work. He knew that the magic he wielded would eventually bring them back to him. Only his nearly fatal burns had allowed them to draw so far away from him, and as his body healed, he knew that the bonds of magic that he had placed around them would draw them back to him. And now, finally, they were close.
Maraydel was so delighted with the prospect of regaining his servants that his attention wandered away from the search for the shaman…and this time he failed to notice.
As John neared the shore, he noticed the skies overhead were beginning to calm. The rain had slowed to a lazy drizzle, and the clouds overhead had gone from a roiling black to a slate gray in color. He had already figured out that the storm was responsible for his entrapment in his vision, and he knew from his intuition that as the storm waned, his chances of escaping grew. He paused before surfacing just long enough to picture himself in his proper form and pour energy into that form. As he broke the surface of the water, his reformed feet touched the muddy bottom of the lake, and he splashed quickly towards the shore. He could still feel his connection to his body, and he was eager to be out of the dream he had created.
As the rain slowed to a mist and the clouds continued to grow brighter overhead, John stepped from the lake into the stream he had followed to find the larger body of water. With a couple of steps, the water had sloughed away from his clothes and he broke into a run back towards the clearing at the top of the small hill.
Sarah had to continually remind herself to keep her hand out of her purse. She thought there was a good chance that the police had left someone to guard the evil man’s room, and she knew that she would look suspicious if she neared the room with her hand stuffed in her purse. Instead, she had adjusted the pistol so that its grip was barely concealed inside the opened top of her bag. She gripped the strap of her pocketbook with her nervous hand as a bell chimed and the door of the elevator sighed open.
Stepping quickly out of the elevator, Sarah looked around for the nearest nurse’s station. She knew that there was normally a nurse’s station near the elevators so visitors could stop and ask for directions. Her eyes moved to the signs on the wall at the nearest intersection of the hallway, and she moved to follow the arrows that were pointing to the nurse’s station.
As she rounded the corner, Sarah hesitated. A policeman was sitting in a rigid plastic chair outside a doorway just down the hall. He was chatting with an attractive nurse where she worked at the nurse’s station directly across from where the officer sat. The nurse wore the slightly aggrieved look of someone that was trying to be polite, but she was clearly not interested in the conversation. She glanced up as Sarah rounded the corner, and she seized the opportunity to interrupt the policeman’s inane chatter. “Hi there,” she said brightly. “Can I help you with something?”
Sarah was still a bit distracted by the unwanted presence of the policeman, but she managed to say, “Um, is this pediatrics?”
The nurse looked slightly disappointed as she said, “No ma’am. I’m sorry. This is the intensive care unit. Pediatrics is two floors down from here.” The nurse’s eyes brightened with a cheerful idea. “I can show you the way if you like. I need to run some charts down there anyway.”
“Oh, I don’t want to be any trouble.” Sarah really only wanted the opportunity to slip around the corner and think, but the nurse’s presence would obviously lead to so
me questions that were difficult to answer.
“It’s no trouble, really. Like I said, I need to run these down there anyway.” She seized a couple of clipboards from the desk and hurried to take Sarah’s arm. “Just follow me.”
The policeman was left sitting in the hallway with an annoyed look in his eyes as the ladies hurried around the corner towards the elevators.
Sarah started to protest as they approached the elevators, but the nurse leaned close to her and said, “God, I’m so glad you showed up. That cop won’t leave me alone. I know he thinks he’s going to get my number or something, but he’s nuts. On the other hand, if I’m rude to him, it’ll piss off my boss. So, thanks for letting me show you the way. I’m Amy, by the way.” The nurse’s words had tumbled out in a whispered, breathless rush, and she stuck out her hand to shake as she ended the sentence with her introduction.
Sarah found the whole situation to be nerve-wracking, but she had been raised as a polite young woman, so she shook the offered hand and said, “Sarah. Good to meet you.”
“Good to meet you, too. So, who are you here to see?”
Sarah hesitated briefly before answering. While she hesitated, the elevator doors slid open in front of her and she stepped back to make way for the young couple from the lobby. She was surprised to see them and started to speak, but she missed the opportunity as Amy hurried her into the elevator and pressed the button for the floor that held pediatrics. The doors slid shut and the elevator began to move. Sarah sighed, closed her eyes, and leaned against the back wall of the elevator.
