Wren recognized she was still
in shock over
the events of the morning. She hadn’t thought to call the police to report the
damage. Ethan and Caleb had done so after she’d pushed them out the door of her
store. What they’d found checking the stairs had prompted the call. The two had
sat on the bench outside in front of the display windows. They’d made it clear
they weren’t going to leave anytime soon.
She’d called around trying to find someone who could fix the
stairs today for a reasonable amount. The two concepts seemed mutually
exclusive to the three handymen recommended by the hardware store.
Wren contemplated her ability to rent a saw and fix the damn
steps herself when the police cruiser pulled in one of the parallel parking places
right in front of her shop. Not hard to tell where he was going. Caleb and
Ethan had joined her when the officer arrived. Their presence did seem to
steady her nerves. The officer looked around the shop with a smile.
“Ethan?”
She put her
hand on his arm. “What really happened to my stairs?”
“Several of the treads were unbolted and removed.”
Caleb nodded his verification of what Ethan said.
“Removed?” Wren gasped. That led to the most grueling,
frustrating hour talking to the detective about the ‘vandalism’ to her stairs
and the unlikely idea that someone might want to harm her or one of her
neighbors.
The officer smiled. “In all likelihood it’s a simple case of
prank vandalism. Your stair treads are probably being repurposed into a DYI
book shelf over at the college dorm by now. Well now Ms. Aldridge, if you think
of anything else,
call
this number.”
She walked him to the door. The officer handed his card to
her with a printed phone number for the station and a penciled in case number
and started toward his car. “Good thing you at least reported the incident. I
don’t expect you’ll have any more trouble. Call the station and we’ll send
someone out if there are any more problems.” The officer left, getting into the
car and with a wave, pulled away from the curb.
“Vandalism” Ethan scoffed. His hostile energy had slowed to a
simmer.
She wanted to believe it was all a horrible misunderstanding,
that the officer was right, simple mischief. Ethan’s words somehow made the
events of the morning too sinister. It also occurred to her how quickly she’d
come to trust the two.
“Like I told the officer, I don’t know anyone who would want
to hurt me.” She was already stiffening up from the bangs and bruises of the
fall.
She had a good relationship with the other business owners in
town. They’d all respected her Grandmother who owned the shop. She didn’t have
much conflict in her life.
Oh, last night the break up with Ron Packard, the man she’d
recently dated, had embarrassed her more than anything. He wasn’t even a blip
on the radar. Before that she’d teetered on the verge of becoming involved with
Kiernan Walker. She’d thought at the time, dating him, they might have had
something special, but he’d dropped her about six months ago without a backward
glance. His rejection still stung. But, no he wouldn’t want to hurt her.
A tidal wave of emotions tumbled through her mind, robbing
her of breath. These men interested her beyond reason. Admittedly she was
attracted to the rugged bad boy vibe they exuded on overdrive. Part of her knew
they were way out of her league.
The other part of her wanted to be the double stuffing
between these two demi-god cookies. Nothing good could come of it. The whole
thing smacked of inviting a wrecking ball into her well-ordered life. “I don’t
seem to be able to get rid of you two today. I’ve got to get my store opened
and find someone that will fix those stairs.”
“You will open the store soon enough.” Caleb’s words soothed
her. “Ethan will go buy the boards to repair the stairs.” Ethan gripped Caleb’s
arm and pulled. They crashed together like two boulders in what passed for a
man hug. “I won’t be long. You know what to do.”
Caleb released his brother with a look Wren didn’t grasp and
continued his conversation with her. “We have them blocked off to prevent
anyone else falling. I will stay inside, for now, to keep you safe.”
Outrage surfaced, Wren didn’t need anyone to keep her safe. A
chill rippled down her neck. Well, maybe it was okay to let them think she
needed a body guard, for now. “Don’t you two have a job to go to or something?”
Caleb gave her a patient look that communicated more than
words she wasn’t going to shake them that easy. “We work for a special unit of
forestry fire fighters. We’re on call a lot.” Caleb turned the welcome sign to
open, behaving like an experienced shopkeeper.
Her mortification kicked into overdrive. She dropped her head
in her hands. Her skin burned for their touch. Oh My God. What had happened to
turn her life inside out?
“Wren, are you alright?”
Caleb paused in the midst of exploring the shop.
What the hell had she gotten into? Instead of a,
thank you very much for saving my life catch
ya later
, she had turned her problems over to two virtual strangers.
Strangers she was panting to get to know more intimately.
“No, I’m not alright. I fell through my stairs this morning
into wonderland. I allowed two strangers to--to take over my life and…and…. I
have crazy thoughts in my head I don’t understand. No, I’m not alright. I feel
like Alice on crack.
She stood on wobbly legs teetering through the office
doorway. She leaned on the frame gathering strength. “Yet, you look like a
Greek god puttering around my shop, behaving like the green grocer. I didn’t
give Ethan money for the wood to fix my stairs. As if he
should
be fixing my stairs. And all I can think about is how to get
you both to. . .”
Her tirade abruptly
ran out of steam. “I need coffee. I haven’t had coffee.”
Perhaps all this would make sense with the
help of a strong fix of caffeine.
“Tea is better for you.”
He moved into her break room office and set up her drip-through coffee
maker to heat a cup of water. “You have an herbal blend for sale that will
help, try it.”
His voice held a
humorous, indulgent tone.
She turned to lean back against the doorway. “Another thing,
you know your way around my shop like you’ve worked here. Of course, you blew
it on the java thing…thinking I would drink Tea uck!”
She was in overload and still didn’t have
any answers. Caleb returned with a steaming mug grinning at her. Did the man
have the gall to try to look shy?
“Arrghh.”
She slid down the wall to
sit.
Caleb leaned over and held his finger to her lips. “Trust
yourself.” He wrapped her fingers around the cup. “Now drink your tea.”
She stared at him. He had the uncanny ability to make this
freaked out mess seem normal.
She pushed off the floor and stood. First a walk through her
store, normalcy of routine should be enough to jerk her back from the urge to
attend the Mad Hatter’s tea party.
“I can do something to help you this morning.”
Caleb followed her on her trek through the
shop.
“I might as well show you how to run the register on the off
chance someone actually comes by to purchase something. The cops being here
might draw the gossips hoping to get juicy news to spread. I’m not up to facing
them.”
She showed him the mechanics of making a sale. “Everything is
marked with a price. There’s fifty dollars in the register, for change. I cash it
out at the end of the day. If you make a mistake it comes out of your pocket.
I’m going to work on the books and try to figure out how to pay for the repairs
to the stairs.”
She stared at him trying to figure out what was missing from
the picture. Oh, hell. She’d turned his shirt into a rag. She nodded at his
shirtless state. “Pick a t-shirt off the rack here. Yours is trash after I bled
all over it.”
Noticing her own blood-splattered tank top, she grabbed the
first small green t-shirt off a hanger. The trade logo, Just do it, seemed like
cosmic advice for the decisions assailing her.
“You would clothe me.”
Caleb’s voice nearly purred with satisfaction.
She didn’t quite understand the look on his face. “Well, the
least I can do is
give
you a new shirt. There should
be something here that would do. Why, would that offend you?”
She pointed toward the different extra-large
t-shirts sporting popular logos and trade-marks.
“No, you honor me.”
He
smiled this time and paused as if considering something important. “Would you
clothe Ethan as well?”
Obviously something more crucial was going on than simply
giving away a t-shirt.
“Of course, I mean, he probably doesn’t need one, but he can
have it… if he wants … I mean, yes, of course, give him a shirt also as my
thank you.” She trailed off, feeling foolish.
Caleb nodded, his smile stamped with boyish enthusiasm.
“Good.”
Sparks lit the golden highlights
in his eyes.
“Now, short of bringing in a bus load of customers, I’m not
sure what you can do, dust, sweep, read a book? I will be in the office, holler
if you have a problem.”
She paused by
the array of thematic t-shirts. They were one thing that consistently sold.
He cocked his head as if considering many divergent
possibilities. “I’ll do as you suggested and be ready for customers.”
Wren returned to her office feeling something monumental was
happening around her without understanding her place in the events. She sipped
at her tea while she tried to concentrate on the financial mess before her. Her
eyes kept drifting to the couch. She remained distracted by memories of the
delicious feelings the two men had given her.
The front door chime rang. She almost got up before she
remembered Caleb was handling customers. Amazing how much she already relied on
the two, she couldn’t shake the feeling of connectedness, like she’d known them
so much longer than just the chaotic morning.
She deleted twenty-five emails from Ron without opening them.
Jeash, the guy never gave up. She went over her sales inventory. Renee’s chain
mail bracelets sold well, along with Georgia’s lemon grass eucalyptus goat’s
milk soap.
If she could only predict what items would be hot and stock
them. Looking at the expenses versus the income revealed the sad truth. If she
didn’t get a handle on things soon and build a steady customer base, she
wouldn’t have to worry about it much longer. She would be out of business.
The tinkling bell attached to the front door rang again. Damn
bell. Either Caleb was going in and out of the door a lot or the gossip mongers
had descended.
She peaked out to
see him talking with two women she didn’t recognize. He seemed able to handle
himself. She leaned back in her chair, determined to think of how she could
save her dream business. Instead of focusing on the need for more fairy
necklaces in stock, she lost herself in fantasies of Ethan and Caleb. Fixing
the mess her life had jettisoned into would take a lot more than fairy dust.
Ethan held up the hex head
bolt from Wren’s
stairs for Old Man Monroe to scrutinize. He was as much a fixture at the
hardware store as the baskets of bolts, nuts and screws. Ethan had never heard
anyone use the man’s first name. He’d already been home to gather tools he
needed for the construction project. He couldn’t find a socket that would fit
the odd shaped bolt.
“Maybe I’ll have to get a different size but this is the
original bolt that matches the others on the stairs. I need to find a socket
that will fit.”
Old Man Monroe ran his hand through his wiry whiskers
sticking out from his face much like a
hedgehogs
bristly coat.
“Jeb.”
He called to the other veteran in
hardware residence. “You
ever seen
one o’ these. None
of the standard sizes seem to fit.”
Jeb shuffled his way over, the hard soles of his steel toed
boots making a gritty scoff against the concrete floor. He took the bolt from
Old Man Monroe to examine. The round thick lenses of his glasses made his eyes
magnify to owlish orbs as he squinted and turned the bolt looking at the head.
“Forty-five millimeter McMaster Penta-bolt” he pronounced.
“--Made in Italy--Takes a special socket.
There was a metal
stair way kit you could buy that had everything in it for assembly, boards were
even cut to size for the treads. They also make a size for manhole covers.
Several of the buildings around here have them as a replacement when the
original wooden stair risers rotted.”
The man’s recollection was amazing. Something niggled at the
edge of Ethan’s psi-awareness; Jeb’s recollection was a little too phenomenal.
Old Man Monroe dug through the collection of sockets looking
for the right one. “I thought we’ve had one here then.”
“We did have. Don’t now.” The grizzled Jeb said
matter-of-factly.
“Why’d we get rid of it?”
“Didn’t get rid of it.”
“Then why isn’t it here.”
“Sold it.”
“Sold it?”
“Sold it.
That’s how I recognized
the bolt. Fella had a picture and exact measurements of one just a few days ago
and needed a socket for remodeling to some stairs on one of the buildings down
town.”
Ethan steadied himself placing a hand on the shelving as a
vision descended. “I don’t suppose you know this guy’s name.” Flashes of the
scene blew through his consciousness revealing the description of the man in
question. He’d recognize him if he came across him.
“Naw, he paid cash. Nerdy character, he didn’t look the handy
sort to me. But what do I know. He bought the socket. It musta worked he hasn’t
been back.”
≽
∞
≼
Kiernan steeled
himself
against the onslaught today’s torture would bring. Bits of his
dragon body,
Phaux
, carved away on a sea of pain. The
mad scientist hummed while he worked. He was at his worst when he hummed. The
heat in the slaughter house wrung a new level of sour from the cretin’s body
odor.
Kiernan doubted he’d stop even when the
Phaux
was nothing but a husked carcass of bone. He’d probably whittle into his bones
and fester in his organs like a maggot. Yes, maggot suited him better than
weasel, stinking little maggot of pain boring under his skin.
The iron bound him in dragon form. He’d struggled to shift to
human to slip the wretched collar and escape. Then when the maggot concocted
another bizarre experiment he’d turn up the booming base beat pulsing from the
stereo speakers. The throbbing base caused the massive dragon into a physical
paralysis Kiernan was unable to break. That he was reduced to a hulking slab of
meat by sound waves defeated him. His mind screamed against the violation. I’m
a man, I’m a MAN, not an animal; I’m not an animal; not an animal. Yet the
beast remained a helpless prisoner to the insanity of the maggot.
He listened to the worm rant about Wren and rejoiced that
she’d managed to escape harm. If he understood his captor’s occasional
outbursts, Wren was in the company of shifters or watchers. If he could reach
her with his thoughts, she might be able to send help. They’d dated for a few
weeks before Kiernan had been captured. He’d considered deepening their
relationship. She was a breath of fresh air from all the pressure he was under
from his home dimension and from his mission of infiltrating the Knights of
Druiere’.
In moments he considered turning his back on the whole mess
and finding escape with Wren. He’d not tried to contact her with his mental
energy before, not knowing what she might do to free him. But if she were in
contact with Watchers now there might be hope. They’d established enough
rapport in their time together that she might hear his thoughts and get him
help.
He closed his eyes and grasped the illusive threads of memory
of the woman-- everything about her whispered peace to him. He thought on
memories of her shining redness of her hair, burning flames wreathing the glow
of her happiness, a radiant smile, sparkling green eyes. Wren, Wren, hear me, I
need your help.
He’d been drawn to her even if he’d not been pointed in her
direction by his masters. She held some fascinating power he’d not been able to
decipher the origin. Even in his madness the maggot had been drawn to her as
well, a dangerous attraction. Another cut in his hide drew a scream
unconsciously from him. Get help, Wren. Can you hear me?
Nothing.
He must go deeper into the darkness to find escape. Despair settled on him,
blanketing any hope of Wren hearing or answering him. At what point would there
be no return from the darkness?
Kiernan’s mind wandered back to the single act that had been
the root decision that led to this personal hell. What had begun as a search
for meaning behind a
rumor.
The decision that had
played him into the power of the spider queen who’d delivered him into the
hands of another. Dirk Hamilton, the rogue who’d infiltrated the Knights of
Druiere’, in order to become the driving force of their destruction.
Instead he’d turned that power into his own Earthside
kingdom. Perhaps he too was an agent of the Queen. The power of a name trusted
to the wrong person brought his ultimate downfall. Dirk had first summoned him
with the sacred name words entrusted to the queen verifying that link in the
insidious chain.
He’d awoken with Dirks hands clasping his skull, eyes boring
into his having finished planting a mind control so deep and so powerful it
bound him surely as this iron did. Kiernan had become a pawn in a magnificent
game of chess all in search of a prophesied deliverer that never arrived.
One betrayal leading to another and another until at last he
arrived here as worm food for the maggot, delivered into the hands of madness.
The hopelessness of despair set the stage for the kill. Knowledge that there
was no hope eroded his tenuous hold on sanity.
A presence soothed across his despair. That small fae woman
hadn’t left, he bellowed for her to go away, save herself. No, wait she’d
escaped. Was it only days ago or maybe longer? His time sense was scrambled. A
faint gleam suffused the corners of his vision. This couldn’t be
,
his eyes were closed. Perhaps a vision then, maybe death
had come at long last. The pain reduced him to babbling whimpers begging for
the final darkness.
“Hush now, I have purpose for you. Your suffering is not
unheard or in vain.”
Her raven darkness held its own glow and encompassed him
around like pale light. Death has come for
me,
deliver
the mercy blow of ConAnasia to end my suffering.
“No my warrior.
I am not your death.
I am life.” She placed her hands about his huge draconic head, spreading a balm
of soothing from her fingertips
.“
A curse remains deep
in your soul. You must fight it. When the time is right you will have the power
you need. For now you must survive.”
There is no survival of this hell. There is only death. The
destroyer will take you as well if you don’t go now, escape, save yourself.
“Fear not dear one, only you can see and hear me.”
You are the Goddess and I am not worthy of the paradise of
Gla’hera then. I am already dead left to suffer in the wards of hell.
“Kiernan, listen to me. You draw breath and you continue to
live. I need you alive. I bring you a message of Lumatia Sacrismo. You are
destined to serve my appointed daughter as the Tao'Taran.”
A Revelation of the Goddess, who am I to receive such
enlightenment, I’m nothing. This can’t be. I’m a pawn of evil, broken and near
death. Now you tell me I am to be the sword arm of the warrior Queen. Our
people have waited so long for a deliverer who never came.
“You will not die. Everything will work together for your
good and the glory of the Goddess. My chosen elect.”
Chosen? The mad maggot that carved on his flesh called
himself “The Chosen”. He screamed as pain penetrated his fading body as clearly
as a blade stabbed into his flesh. My destruction engineered for your glory. I
have arrived at another level of hell, my own madness.
“Ah dear Kiernan.
You may think
you’ve descended deeper into hell before your mission is accomplished. Remember
my
words,
you are the Tao’Taran of the Queen to be.
She comes soon. You will join with her mates the Man’Tung who now enforce the
veil between worlds as they journey toward ascension with her to rule our
people. She will become Queen and Guardian of the race. While you are
predestined to this path you must claim it as surely as she claims you.”
He knew he’d fallen into hallucinations from the pain of torture.
How long had he lasted, six months, more? How much longer could this go on, his
body failing and his mind
broken?
Dirks voice chuckled
in his mind. Why as long as I say it shall, my dear boy and you will submit
because it is my will.
He’d always submit to the demand of the evilness that
controlled him. He had no choice-- no choice. Pain became a sharp focal point
that made his existence continue moment by moment. Pain took him away and pain
always brought him back.
“Take courage and claim your destiny. It is for you to
choose, save her, save our people or become the ultimate betrayer.”