Redlisted

REDLISTED
Book
One: Mnemosyne's Head
Sara Beaman

Text copyright and
cover design © 2012 Sara K Beaman
Cover photographs ©
2012 Melissa Richard
Model: Caroline Witherspoon
All Rights
Reserved

This book is
dedicated to Keith, Christie-Sue, Blakely, my family, all of my beta
readers, and most of all Daniel Ingraham, who helped me form my
scattered thoughts into a system of magic and a universe.

{Anonymous}

I wake up to a
bang as the electronic lock on the door releases.

I roll out of bed,
walk across the cold linoleum and splash some water on my face at the
little sink. I pull on the outfit they’ve provided for tonight:
a silk blouse, royal purple, under a gray wool pantsuit. It’s
fussy and the pants are too tight. I wish they’d let us wear
skirts now and then.

I sit down in
front of the vanity mirror and take a look at her face. My new face.
I guess it’s not really new anymore—the scars are
gone—but it’s still fresh enough to be jarring. The skin
around my eyes is still tender; it hurts when I put on my eyeliner.
I’d skip it but I don’t have the option. Mirabel wears
her eyeliner thick and black.

I pull my auburn
hair back into the requisite ponytail tied tight at the nape of my
neck. I sling the purse over my shoulder, take the smartphone out of
its charger and check tonight’s schedule. Aside from breakfast,
I’ve only got one Program appointment tonight: voice training.
Five hours of it. Once I’m done with that I’ll come back
here and sleep. I slip on the pair of black leather slingbacks by the
door and step out into the windowless hallway.

Breakfast is only
two levels down from here. I could take the stairs, but a vague
memory of losing my balance in the stairwell scratches at the back of
my mind. I can’t remember what happened, nor how. I guess I
haven’t gotten used to walking in heels this high quite yet;
it’d be easy to slip and fall.

I decide to take
the elevator instead. I press the down button and wait with folded
hands. A chime sounds; the doors slide open. I step inside and press
the B3 button. The doors close.

I glance upwards
at the mirrored ceiling as I descend, up into Mirabel’s cruel
hazel gaze. I want to look away, but I don’t dare. Her eyes
hold me hostage. The real Mirabel might be out of the country, yet
here she is even still, looming over me, mocking me, making me feel
scared and small.

The chime sounds
again; the doors slide open. I break away from the reflection and
step out into the fluorescent glare of the third sub-basement
corridor. I turn right, towards the commissary for the girls in the
Program.

My heels click
against the concrete, resonating through the long hallway in a
purposeful series, metered like the tick of a clock. I check my
watch, bite into the chapped skin on my lower lip, think about going
home and sleeping.

A door slams shut
somewhere ahead of me. Muffled snippets of conversation echo from not
far down a side corridor, somewhere near the stairwell. It sounds
like an argument. One of the voices is low and male. That’s not
right. The only people allowed down here at this time of night are
the other girls. But they’re drawing closer, whoever they are.

Panic sets in,
then the urge to flee. I turn back towards the elevator and try to
sneak away, but every footstep is like a hit on a snare drum,
amplified by the bare walls and floor.

“Mirabel?”
a man calls behind me.

I stop and turn
back to face him.

Before I can
glimpse his face, he fires. The bullet hits me hard in the sternum,
sends me reeling backwards. An instant later, I’m staring at
the ceiling, watching the fluorescent lights fade into darkness.

Moments before I
black out, I hear a woman’s voice:

“That’s
not her.”

///

I awaken
bleary-eyed to pain and the smell of blood. I’m in a dimly-lit
room, lying in bed under sheets that smell like mothballs. A chair
creaks, scrapes against the floor. I look over, blinking, rubbing at
my eyes.

Slowly a
stranger’s face materializes from the fog, angular and pale. He
has close-cropped hair the color of black coffee; his eyes are the
color of a winter sky. He wears wire-rimmed glasses.

“You’re
awake,” he says. “Thank God.”

I groan.

He picks up a
glass full of dark liquid from the bedside table. “You need to
drink this. It’ll help with the pain.”

I try to sit up,
but the pain restrains me. I wince.

He slides a hand
underneath the thin pillow, lifts my head slowly and places the glass
against my lips. Inside is blood. I can tell without looking, just
from the smell of it. I open my mouth, he tips the glass, and it
flows down the back of my throat.

My eyes snap open.
Wait. How does he know I need it? Who is he?

He pulls the glass
away and places my head back down on the bed. “My name is Adam.
I’m a relative of Mirabel’s.”

What does he mean
by that?

“You were
working for her, weren’t you? Down in her main office in
Atlanta?

I stare up at the
bare wooden planks of the ceiling, taking shallow, shuddering
breaths. Where am I? What happened to me?

“Things will
come back to you,” he says.

I try to sit up
again, sending a white-hot throb of pain through my entire body.

“Lie still,”
Adam says. “Try to relax.”

I got shot. I
don’t remember anything aside from that. I look down at my
chest, at the open entry wound. Jesus Christ! I could have died!
Shouldn’t I be in a hospital?

“You’re
going to be fine.”

Have I been
kidnapped?

“You should
get some more rest.”

I ball my hands
into fists, grip the sheets and prepare for my next attempt to stand.
I need to get up, to get out of here.

Adam places his
hand, cold and dry, against my forehead. “It’s for your
own good.”

Suddenly my eyes
feel unbearably heavy. My vision blurs.

///

I wake up without
remembering being asleep.

I’m in the
little bedroom, alone. A thin ray of light slices through the room
from the skinny space between the drapes. My skin prickles where the
light crosses my arms.

The pain isn’t
gone, not entirely, but when I look down at my ribcage, I see that
the site of the wound has closed up. A scar remains in its place, a
web of white lines embossed on the space between my collarbones. In
the center lies a perfect circle of raw pink flesh barely covered by
skin.

I’m
starving.

I sit up without
too much trouble. I turn on the bedside table, then place my bare
feet one at a time onto the cold wooden floor. I catch my own
reflection in a mirror on a dresser across the room. My hair is
tangled, my eyeliner smudged. The outfit is ruined; my blouse is
caked with dried blood and my jacket is missing.

I have to find
something to eat. Maybe Adam can help. He said he was working with
Mirabel. And he helped me before, I guess, although maybe he
kidnapped me? But he has blood, and I need blood.

“Adam?”
I try to call out, but the word won’t come—just a weak,
breathy wheeze. I try again—“Adam?”

Nothing comes. I
can imagine the sound with perfect clarity, but my mouth can’t
form the syllables. My tongue feels swollen. The back of my throat
prickles. I need water. Or blood. I need something.

Help
,
I imagine saying as my voice fails a third time.

I stumble out into
the hallway. Past the deserted living room is a kitchen, through an
archway to my right. Food. Yes.

I throw the
refrigerator door open only to find it empty. One by one, I throw
open all the cabinets. Nothing in any of them, not until the last
cabinet, where I find a few cans of soup. I rifle through the drawers
in search of a can opener; finding one, I crank open a can of tomato
soup and drink it cold, spilling some onto my chin.

It’s not
enough.

I crank open a
second can, chicken and wild rice, and drink the broth, scooping the
chunks into my mouth with my fingers.

Not enough. Not
right.

I grab a carving
knife from the drawer and open the door leading to the yard.

It’s cold
outside, with a chill breeze cutting through the air, and it’s
dismally sunny. My ears ring and my blood pulses against my scalp. As
I step out into the full sun, the horizon shifts, begins to spin. I
fall to my knees, retching. My skin burns.

It takes me a few
minutes to stand up again. I still feel dizzy and sick, but it
doesn’t matter. I need to find blood. That fact is
non-negotiable. Inescapable. A reflex within me spells it out in no
uncertain terms. I know it as deeply as I know my need for oxygen. I
need to find blood or I’m going to die.

There’s a
car in the gravel driveway, a sedan. An umbrella rests on the floor
behind the driver’s seat. I try the door—it opens, thank
God—and I grab the umbrella, opening it and hiding in its
shade. The ringing in my ears stops and the pulsing in my head slowly
begins to subside.

Beyond the gravel
driveway is a dirt road. Surrounding the house in all directions are
a limitless number of trees, leaves the color of fire. I walk down
the driveway, sharp rocks poking at my bare feet.

Where am I going?
How am I going to find blood? I’m not a killer or a hunter. I
can’t exactly remember, but from the way I’m dressed and
from what Adam said, I’m apparently some desk worker from
Atlanta. And here I am, out in these nameless woods, carrying an
umbrella and wielding a kitchen utensil.

I take a deep
breath, choking down my doubt. It’d be best to look for a small
animal to kill, if only because I doubt I could summon the strength
to overpower a human. Just the idea of it makes me want to vomit
again. But what other choice do I have?

I cross the dirt
road, head into the woods, and start hiking upward. The incline gets
steeper as I press on; the tree cover thickens. The sunlight
eventually dims enough, filtered through the canopy, that I no longer
need the umbrella. I pull it shut. The noise sends a squirrel running
for cover. Oh God—I’m an idiot. I must be driving away
all the wildlife with all the noise I’m making.