A Little Rhine Must Fall (25 page)

My eyes narrowed. “How hard for you.”

:How did it go?:
she asked nonchalantly.

I made a wry face. “We’re at war with the aliens, I’m no longer a member of the USB, and it’s okay to let humans know about magic and okay to kill them.”

:That good, huh?

I sank down on a kitchen chair only to jump up as I felt glue seeping through the seat of my pants. Igh. “I’m not sure how it could have gone worse.”

Bastet jumped down off the counter and paced out of the room.
:Always darkest before the dawn and all that sort of thing. Don’t worry. The Oracle said you would save the day. She just didn’t say
when
that day would be:

“Nice!” I called after her. “Glad to see
someone
is being optimistic!”

I spent the rest of naptime cleaning up the kitchen and trying not to feel exhausted and depressed. The girls woke up early, demanding snacks and juice and cheerfully telling me how wonderful Granny was to buy them whatever they wanted. My smile would not have fooled an adult, but it was convincing enough for a four-year-old.

The afternoon dragged on. My life seemed to be all heart-stopping thrills or complete boredom with nothing in-between. Aliens were attacking, the world was ending, and it still felt like a normal day with fighting toddlers, house-cleaning, and trying to decide what to cook for dinner.

I really wasn’t in the mood to cook so I popped in a frozen pizza and quickly threw the remaining dirty dishes in the dishwasher. I was drying my hands when Mark burst in the front door.

“Have you seen the news?” he called, rushing into the kitchen.

I hung the dishtowel back on the oven and shook my head. “What news?”

“There’s a group of crazy people who’ve just come out, claiming to have been attacked by vampires!” he chuckled.

The room swirled around me for a moment. “Really?” I said calmly.

“Yeah! Can you believe it? It’s a huge number of people, from all over the world. They all tell the same story about being bitten by super strong humans with pointy teeth. There’s no way that’s real! It’s just weird that so many people would come up with the same story at the same time. It’s got to be a colossal hoax. “

He gave me a quick hug and kiss. I felt detached from my body. I knew this was coming, but I still wasn’t ready for it.

Mark started flipping through the mail. “What next?” he said. “Werewolves? Dragons?”

“Yeah,” I said weakly.

He looked up. “Are you okay? Are you feeling all right?”

I leaned against the counter. “Umm,” I didn’t know what to say.

He came over and placed a warm hand over my belly. “How’s the little guy doing?”

“He’s good,” I said. “Uh, Mark, I—”

The girls came running into the room. “Daddy! Daddy! Look! Look!” They each had their doll. “Look what Granny got us! Aren’t they bootiful?”

Dolls have always creeped me out. I think it’s their eyes. Open, blank and staring. Like dead people. I’ve never liked dolls, even when I was a kid I preferred stuffed animals to dolls. I tried to remind myself that I was in a rotten mood, hormonal, and feeling very macabre and to not rain on my girls’ parade.

“Mom was over again today?” Mark asked puzzled. I hadn’t told him anything about going to Thailand. For obvious reasons.

“She gave us dolls!” Megan said adoringly. “And dresses, and furniture, and toys, and, and, and,
lots
of stuff!”

Mark examined her doll. “I thought we were going get her one for her birthday,” he said softly in an aside to me.

I sighed. “We didn’t tell Granny.”

“Come see our room,” Megan begged. “It’s
full
of new toys!”

I had to laugh at that. People always say that you can’t buy love, but toddlers might be the exception.

Mark was dragged off to view their bounty and I finally remembered the pizza I’d put in the oven and pulled it out before it was completely burnt. We got through dinner, baths, and bedtime without any further mention of the supernatural world and I was working up the nerve to discuss vampires again when the phone rang.

It was Cecily. “Turn on the TV,” she said.

“We don’t get TV,” I reminded her. “We only do Netflix.”

She made an exasperated sound. “Then turn on your laptop and check the news.”

“Why?” I asked, cradling the phone with my shoulder and firing up my laptop.

“It’s begun.”

“What’s begun?”

“Just look,” she said.

I clicked on Google News and read aloud the latest headlines. “
300 Killed at Pro-Vampire Rally. Hospital Claims “Fairy” Stole Babies
,” and the last headline, “
Zombies Attack the White House.
” I clicked on that one. “Zombies? Really?” I asked, somewhat in shock.

“What do you think the ‘N’ in WAND stands for?” Cecily asked.

“Ummm,” I tried to recall while scanning the news article. “Necromancers?”

“Yes.”

“But I thought it was just …” I trailed off.

“What’s going on?” Mark asked. He started to read over my shoulder. “Is this for real?” He sounded a little frightened.

A new article popped up.
President Enacts Martial Law.

“I can’t believe this!” Mark exclaimed. “If it was April I’d think this was a joke. But …” he reached over my shoulder and clicked to a different news site. The same stories, different headlines. America was coming face to face with the USB and the results were not looking pretty.

“Let me call you later,” I told Cecily and hung up.

“This is insane!” Mark said, still scanning the news. “How can any of this be real?”

I closed my eyes and made a decision. Like Deerhurst had said, the time for hiding was over.

“Mark?”

“Yeah?” he was zoned into the computer.

“There’s something I need to tell you.”

Mark heard the tension in my voice and turned away from the computer. “Hey, honey,” he swept me into a hug. “It’s going to be okay. I know this stuff looks really scary, but there’s got to be an explanation for it all.”

“Yes,” I agreed. “There is an explanation. That’s what I’m trying to tell you.”

“What do you mean?”

I sighed. This was way harder than it should be. I didn’t want to just blurt out the news that his wife had been lying and sneaking around on him. I needed a way to
ease
into it. “Let’s sit down,” I said and drew him after me to the couch.

“What’s going on, Piper?” he asked seriously.

“All that stuff,” I pointed back at the computer, “it’s all real.”

“What do you mean?” he said again.

“Vampires, werewolves, even zombies,” I choked a little on that last word, “They’re all real.” Zombie stories had always scared me. I read
World War Z
once and it gave me nightmares for months. Now that I knew they existed I wasn’t sure I’d ever sleep again.

Mark looked skeptical. “How do you know?”

Here it came. “I’m … I’m not … normal.”

He tried to smile like I was telling a joke, but his eyes were worried.

“Look,” I blurted out, “I’ve got this thing. An
ability
if you will. It’s … it’s a power of command. If I use the ‘Voice,’” I put the word in finger quotes, “people have to obey what I say.”

“Really.” Mark’s face was unreadable.

“Yes. Really. I’ve never used it on you,” No, that was a lie. No more lying. “Well, I’ve only used it on you once or twice, but …” no, there wasn’t a really good reason why I’d used it on him. “I’m sorry,” I finished lamely.

“You’re trying to tell me that you have a superpower?” he asked incredulously. “You have the power of coercing people to do things against their will?”

“Umm, kind of.”

Mark laughed, he wasn’t really buying it. “That’s kind of a silly ability, don’t you think? What, were they all out of telekinesis, or telepathy, or heck, any other tele-something?”

“Mark,” I used the Voice, “go get a pen off the counter and write on your hand.” I commanded him what to write and then waited while he did it. “Keep writing it, over and over again, on your arm,” I commanded.

I checked the time on the mantel clock and sat back to wait for the next ten minutes. Eleven minutes and thirty-eight seconds later the command wore off.

“What?” Mark was staring, jaw open, at his arm. He dropped the pen in shock. He had written, all over his arm, “I should believe my wife. She is telling me the truth.”

He looked at me, a glimmer of fear in his eyes. Now I knew how Cecily had felt. Awful. It’s no fun seeing that the ones you love are afraid of you.

I pulled my knees up to my chest and hugged them. “That’s not the worst part,” I said, half hiding my face.

“Tell me,” Mark croaked.

“The vampires, werewolves, etcetera, are real too. They have an organization, called the USB, United Supernatural Beings, and they all work to stay hidden from humans.”

“Attacking the White House doesn’t sound very hidden,” he commented.

“Well, they
used
to stay hidden. I was a member.”

“You were a member,” he repeated.

“Yeah. Sarah is, I mean
was,
too.”

“Sarah? Your sister, Sarah?”

“She can erase people’s memories.”

He put his hand to his head, “Has she … ?”

I was completely and totally ashamed. “Yes,” I whispered.

His mouth closed in a grim line. I decided to hurry on and finish.

“We just got kicked out. While we were members, humans were protected from being hunted by supernatural beings. But, here’s the crazy part, aliens are coming, in fact, one’s already here, and they want to enslave our world. The USB has decided to fight and they’re allowing all their member groups to ‘feed’ off of humans, so they can be strong enough to resist an attacking alien force.”

Mark jumped off the couch, “Piper,” he pleaded, “Do you have any idea how
insane
you sound? How can you possibly expect me to believe all this!”

“Mark, I know this sounds crazy!
I
thought it was crazy too when Cecily told me!”

“Cecily?” he turned on me. “She’s in on this too?”

Cecily! I’d totally forgotten that she could help prove that I was telling the truth. I leapt off the couch to grab the phone. Bastet was sitting on the counter; she’d been listening to the whole conversation.

:This is not going well for you, is it?:
she said smugly.

“I’m going to call Cecily to come over here and prove that this is for real,” I told her. “But, you could help out right now.”

“Who are you talking to, Piper?” Mark asked.

“Her,” I pointed at the cat. “Bastet, I’ve let you stay here. Help me out now.”

:Why should we?:

“Because,” I growled, “If you
don’t
, I’m kicking you out of this house for good! Oracle or no Oracle, you’re gone,” I tried to think of a worse threat, “and you’ll never see Otis again!”

Mark was edging slowly away from me. “Piper?” he questioned. In a few more minutes he would be calling for the men in white coats to take me away to a nice padded cell.

“
Please
!” I begged her.

She licked a paw and ran it over her whiskers.
:If we talk, we can stay?:

“Yes,” I agreed.

“Piper?” Mark asked again, eyes wide.

Bastet turned her head towards him and opened her mouth, showing a pink tongue and sharp white teeth. “She’s telling the truth, Mark,” she said aloud.

Chapter Twenty-Five:

Revelations

As reactions go, Mark’s was a doozy. If things weren’t so serious, I would have really enjoyed an hour or two of belly-laughing at his expense. Since things were indeed serious, I had to settle for five minutes or so.

Bastet arranged herself on the counter, paws tucked up under her chest, and waited us out. When Mark stopped opening and closing his mouth like a goldfish, and I righted the barstool and chair that he had knocked over in his shock, she spoke again.

“Your wife, Piper, is very special, Mark.”

He looked at me, then back at her, then at me again. “It
talks
,” he whispered.

I started giggling again. It was just such a relief to see someone, besides myself, being taken aback by all this magic stuff. Sometimes I worried that I was becoming too immersed in this world and that it was starting to be “normal.”

“Mark, Bastet. Bastet, Mark,” I introduced them between giggles.

“It is very nice to meet you, Mark,” said Bastet politely, “Although we feel that we have already been introduced.”

“It’s
talking,
” Mark said again to no one in particular.

“
It
is a
she
,” Bastet huffed, “And, while it might have been rude of us to live here under false pretenses, we hardly think your response is appropriate!”

“Give it a rest,” I told her. “Mark, she talks. She’s not really a cat.” I looked at her thoughtfully, “At least, I don’t think she is. Bastet?”

“Close enough for government work,” she purred.

“She’s really an Egyptian goddess,” I told Mark and managed to keep a straight face. “Hence the ‘royal we.’” Maybe if I acted like this was all believable, Mark would have an easier time understanding it.

“Egyptian goddess,” he repeated.

There was a tap on the sliding glass door. Cecily was standing on the porch looking worried.

I looked down at the phone in my hand. I hadn’t called her yet, had I? I was pretty sure that the talking cat bit had happened before I could call for vampire backup.

I slid open the door and invited her in.

“I heard screaming!” she said, quickly scanning the room. “Is everything all right?”

Mark pointed at Bastet. “She talks.”

“Bravo!” Bastet said sarcastically, “You got our gender correct.”

Cecily obviously deflated. “Oh.” She sighed. “I thought it was something serious.”

“She
talks
,” Mark said again, like she hadn’t heard him the first time. “English.”

“We could speak Arabic if that would make this easier for you. Would you prefer the Modern Standard, or Classical form?” Bastet was clearly annoyed.