Echoes in Eternity (The Pella Series Book 1) (13 page)

“X2s?” I ask surprised. “That’s for speed. It can fly at more than 300 mph. It’s a remarkable machine but...” I contemplate. “There are too many red flags for this all to be for a tourism company. It is possible that they might take extreme sports lovers for a fast ride, but I want you to dig deeper. I smell the Godfather behind the Olive Oil Company. I want to be satisfied with... ” I say but I don’t get a chance to finish my sentence. I feel the creeping visions. Fuck! Air hisses through my teeth. Elissa is in trouble. I try to push the visions away, but to no avail.

“Alexander!” Henry shouts.

“Get to Elissa! She’s in trouble!”

“But you...”

“If she’s dreaming while driving, she’ll get killed! She doesn’t know how to control her memories!” I pronounce as my head is pounding and my visions are trickling their way in. I try to push the flood gates closed. I close my eyes and try to focus; it takes immense control, but I have learned to shut them out. This time however, I want to know what she’s dreaming about. What is she learning about our past?

“Go Henry!” I growl through gritted teeth.

Without a word, Henry runs out of the office. Unlike Elissa, I can remain in the here and now if the memories flood through me. I relax, and let them take over my mind.

“Fire at the
 
Four Winds
!” yells young Jesse Caswell running. My heart lurches and then falls into the abyss with an excruciating distress. Elissa and the twins are at home, at the 
Four Winds
! Everyone rushes to their feet out of the 
Casa
, and nobody has to tell me that this is no ordinary fire: the twin seals on my wrists start burning reminding me of the approaching doom already. As fast as my feet could carry me outside of the 
Casa
 housing the ranch hands, I whistle for Bucephalus who comes on a fast trot towards me. He understands the urgency in my voice. I jump on my horse with a horrible tug at my heart, and vaguely realize that everyone is running to their horses to reach the
Four Winds
. But all is in vain. The only one who isn't hurrying is the old Indian Nieto, but I could care less about that right now. He is crouching on the ground as if listening to the winds, his bottomless eyes closed.

I crack the whip, and dig my spurs on my horse’s flesh, and order with determination.

“Run like the wind 
B
!”

The darkness of the night gives nothing away, hides everything like the secrets of Hades, oddly nothing stirs or can be heard except the harsh breathing of Bucephalus as if his lungs are ready to burst through his nostrils and my whip that rushes him into his deadly run. I feel Elissa’s soul shredding scream rather than hearing it, and that’s worse because it makes me feel helpless, useless, and ready to fight to the eternal death just to save her. I push my horse beyond his limits to get to her! The two miles ride stretches as if it’s two hundred miles! I
 couldn't even dare to breathe when my soul is ripping apart inside. I am willing to negotiate with the devil himself just to save her. Surrender my soul to be shredded by the hell hounds just so she would live, and not be put through the torture she would be in the hands of the 
Fallen Angels
.

“Alexander! Get the girls!” I finally hear her voice, begging, and if
I could fly, I would grow wings and get there right then.

“
Run faster!
” I roar and crack the whip upon my horse’s rump once more. My eyes are fixed at the consuming ball of fire surrounding our great house, the 
Four Winds
. I hear distant gallops, and my name and hers shouted behind, but I pay no attention to anyone else. Their efforts will be fruitless; I know that. It is only me, and one other who could make a difference.

“We’re coming Mr. Pella!” someone yells in the distance.

“Miss Ellie!!” I hear one of the ranch hands scream from behind. No one answers. Visions stir before my eyes, and a deep, familiar pain searing my soul is pulling me apart, reminding me of my duty, and the impending sacrificial death...of the only woman I ever loved. Tears burn the back of my throat like the branding iron, but I refuse to shed them, holding onto my horse’s reins hard, my spurs digging into its flesh willing him to fly, and yet, the 
Four Winds
 feels so fucking far away!

“
Faster! Run faster!
” I order my horse with agony in my voice, my eyes fixed ahead on the enveloping rings of fire over the 
Four Winds
. The end must be getting closer, because the visions start stirring before my eyes of the first time she was made known to me, clouding reality. This isn’t a first, but this time I refuse the visions; I am losing her, not knowing when I would see her again, if ever; I just want to die with her if she is to die this time. I want the ominous distance closed between us. I just want her in my arms where I feel she is safe.

“Sir! Mr. Pella!”
 a distant sound calls my name. Yet, it’s close by, close to my senses. Strong arms grip me; arms I cannot see.

“Mr. Pella! Please! We need you! Ellie needs you!”

I force myself out of the flood of memories but they come in an unstoppable rush. Jumbled, confusing me.

“Sit him down!”
 I hear an order. Henry. 
“Let him ride it through!”

“But, Doc! Miss Ellie!”
 Ellie? Elissa? I can’t get my head out of the fog, unable to swim out of the flood of rushing visions before my eyes.

“Doc?”
 Anthony’s voice asks packing all his concern and worry into that single word.

“I’ll examine Elissa...”
 I strain myself to hear him, but then memories clog my hearing to the here and now.

“Nooo!”
 I force myself to utter.

“Doc!”

“Let him be, Anthony! He needs to break out of it on his own. Because they’re experiencing the visions together, it has to be their own mind breaking it! I’m checking El...”
 and the voices drown under the strain of my visions again.

The acrid smoke is choking me as if someone stuffed two
 hell-hounds into my nostrils. I have to get the girls out of here. Elissa’s leaving me! Leaving us! Agony grips me, suffocating my soul; bleeding me slowly by a thousand superficial knife wounds, slicing me, torturing me painfully and pushing me back into the bottomless abyss where there is no light, no life and no existence. I call unto Zephyr vaguely remembering Bucephalus getting stonewalled and stuck outside of the house, my gaze fixed on my wife for the last time, branding her image into my memory. I have no time to think, I only have time to act. If it’s only Zephyr that can enter into this inferno, I’ll take him to save my family! When the horse whinnies and pushes my shoulder, I make the herculean effort to break my gaze away from my wife, and see her tormented look, and our indelible love reflected in her swollen, red rimmed eyes. I put the girls on Zephyr and holding onto his mane, I lift my leg up, and hit him with my spurs. He jumps through the imploding fire, through every barrier on his way as I lean over my daughters’ bodies instinctively protecting them. Fresh air hits my face momentarily as Zephyr speeds through the darkness, and he bucks me off his back soon after we are out of the confines of the inferno disappearing into the mist with my children on his back!

“No! No!
 
No!
 Zephyr!” I scream until my voice no longer comes out, my throat is burning as I run faster than I ever did in all my existence, chasing the horse named after the 
Western Wind
 until the haze disappears, sucking everything in, including my heart, my wits, and mind; then there’s nothing. “I want my wife! I want my children!” I cry out falling into a heap on the ground, all my faculties lost, my reasons for living departed. I am shaking and limp at the same time. Not one of my loved ones comes back. My will to live drains out of me completely.

“Mr. Pella, sir! We can’t put the fire out! We can’t even get into
the
Four Winds
! Is your family still inside, sir?” asks a familiar voice. I manage to turn my head towards the sound, and my eyes are locked with the foreman, Buck Whitman.

“What?” I ask dazed, my eyes swollen red.

“Are Miss Ellie and the girls still inside, sir?” Buck asks grief lacing his voice, not wanting to hear the obvious. I look ahead, uncomprehending. Buck Whitman shakes my shoulders forcefully.

“Mr. Pella? Is your family dead?” he asks slapping me on the face. I shove the hand that holds my shoulders and stand up abruptly holding my head between my hands rocking back and forth.

“Mr. Pella, are they dead?” another voice asks, seeking a horrendous confirmation.

“Shut up! Shut up! Shut the fuck up!!!” I scream, and my hands let go of my head, my eyes looking bewildered like a mad man, and I look around the faces standing here, watching me helpless, pitiful. I want no pity. I want to die! I want
to punish! I want to burn the whole world down to extinguish my searing pain! I don’t want to exist anymore. My hands find the mesquite tree nearby, and I fist my broken knuckles again painfully, and punch the rough ridges of the tree trunk over and over and over again until the cowhands wrestle me down to the ground.

“Let go of me! I want to die, too!” I scream in a hoarse, burning voice, the effort is agonizing, and I want to feel nothing; I kick my way out of their grasp, and...Though they are my kind, Nephilim, I am far stronger than they are. They try to restrain me to prevent me
from harming myself any further, but I struggle against them... and struggle, and struggle... and I hit the floor. Pain sears my head. My hands shaking, automatically reaching for my head, then my eyes crack open. I’m looking at the legs of my ultra-modern desk and Anthony’s proffered hand. I feel dazed, horrified, and the afternoon lights are seeping through my floor to ceiling windows.

“Welcome back Alexander! Don’t think I’m rushing you or anything, but I need you right away! Elissa was nearly hit by one of our security details in the parking garage.” Doc’s voice talking about Elissa shakes me into awareness of
the here and now. While I try to protect her from what's outside, someone from my own security detail nearly killed her? Furious, doesn't even begin to cover what I feel. I stand up immediately ignoring Anthony’s extended hand. Elissa is lying on the sofa, unconscious. I find myself immediately rushing to her side, and lifting her into my arms. I examine her body for any injuries, and seeing none, I crush her to my chest, inhaling her scent deeply.

"
Was she hit by a vehicle? Is she okay, Henry?" I ask Doc. He’s the only one who can heal her from anything which makes him extremely valuable to me.

“No, she’s not Alexander, but she’s experiencing her exit memories, as you had.
” I look at her worriedly. This is dangerous, but I’m yet to understand why this is happening to her in daylight hours. Is it her close proximity to Nephilim from her past, or is it something else? Or is someone sinister close to finding her? I have to find out.

 
“Henry! Why are her memories flooding in daylight hours?” I ask, knowing it has never happened this way before.

“Alexander, you forget how admirably regnant you can be over people and how you enthrall the female gender, least of all Elissa,” he responds. Surely, it
 couldn't be just me.

“But she doesn’t recognize me as Alexander... as her...” lover, husband, and protector; one who fathered her children. I swallow, unable to bring the end of the sentence, but Henry knows. He looks at me as he’s still checking Elissa’s vitals with his stethoscope, a task hardened by my embrace of her body tightly wrapped in my arms, and he diverts his attention from his task for a brief minute to look at me and shakes his head with exasperation.

“For a first generation topflight Nephilim, a man whose skills are so legendary in such a way that the sentiments afflict those who have heard the mention of such endowments in a single individual with avarice which you are keenly aware of and you have the capability to descry those individuals from continents away; yet, you are sometimes quite inept in recognizing the feelings of the one who has always been the closest to you,” he says in his Southern gentleman tone.

“How so?” I ask curiously, perhaps seeking to reaffirm Elissa’s feeling
s for me. He sighs.

“In short, Alexander, her soul recognizes yours. Her body is drawn to you like she would never be drawn to anyone else.
 
Amor sempiternus, Alexandros! Numquam periit amor... Etiam in morte, superset amor,
” he explains in one of the languages of my initial existence; invoking my perpetual, ever growing, boundless love for Elissa.

I swallow, and look down longingly at the woman who is infinitely attracted to me but doesn’t recognize who I am, or what she means to me. “Eternal love, you say. I know that love never dies... I know that in death love survives... But the agony, the fear of losing her again is making me a lunatic.”

“That’s the spirit! 
Omnes amantes sunt amentes! Amare et sapere vix deo conceditur,
” he says, grinning at me.

“You say that ‘all lovers are lunatics! And, even a god finds it hard to love and be wise at the same time.’ Surely, keeping all your mental faculties about wasn’t why you
 didn't open the doors of your steel heart to someone worthy,” I speculate to draw a reaction from him. It works. Even after being around someone over two hundred years, you manage to learn something new.