Inescapable (Eternelles: The Beginning, Book 1) (8 page)

What had she ever done to deserve this? To live for nearly three millennia and be reduced to an insult board for a bratty adult who still behaved like a spoilt teen?

“She does have a point,” Craig interjected through her litany of self-pity.

“Shut up.”

“Yes, ma’am.” He snorted, but mercifully did as she asked.

“You know, there is one thing that keeps nagging at me above all others,” she said after some moments of silence. “One thing I just can’t get out of my mind, and it’s terrifying me.”

“What is that?”

Her query about the mysterious Desmond Roxburgh may have to be postponed until further notice. More pressing matters abounded.

She turned and locked gazes with Craig. “The soul stealer drank Susan’s blood to get stronger. But we never asked ourselves, why would he also need to take the sample away with him?”

After pulling on a skull cap and the gloves she’d left in a basket by the pantry door, Sera zipped up her burgundy leather biker jacket and stuffed her hands into her pockets as she rushed through the back gate of the garden like a sprite gasping for freedom. Along the way, she welcomed the nippy outside air like she’d welcomed a reprieve from the oppression inside, even though it felt chillier than usual at this time of year. The worked-up steam of anger shrank to a slow simmer, and then gave way to pure adrenaline as she picked up pace.

So her mother had gone and cancelled all her classes this week. The gall of her. As if the students could do without their lessons in Ancient World Languages and History, right? Still, that was for the better, because she couldn’t deal with company right now. Not that she’d ever let Adri know that. Oh, the shame. She couldn’t place herself as the adult among a swarm of energetic teens brimming with life. The very thing she loved about her job, she couldn’t handle at all today.

             
Her brown leather Converse sneakers flew over the rough stairs hewn into the hill that led down to her cottage by the pool. Dewy green overgrowth carpeted the stone wall on her right, as well as part of the ground, while a miniature sculpture of one of the turrets of their castle, complete with riding knight and a princess leaning out from a top balcony in the tower, rose to her left. Grass also grew in abundance through the stonework of the whimsical piece, giving the immediate area an otherworldly, fairytale appearance.

             
God, how she loved this place! If she ever left Shadow Bridge, she’d miss it like no other, except the cottage itself.

Her mother had let the unruliness of Nature thrive in this part of the gardens that stretched beyond the formal terraces, mazes, and floral plantings that would rival the landscaping in the royal
palace of Versailles. Perhaps she’d done so to humor Sera’s artistic side, knowing her taste for order and elegance would not normally stretch to encompass this bit of wilderness. Although, she’d once admitted, she rather liked how it had turned out as it reminded her of other treasured places she’d enjoyed in times long past.

The cottage was a good walk from the main home that looked more like a medieval stronghold than a house, but to Sera, it was totally worth the fifteen minute hike—eight minutes, if you walked fast. A sturdy wood structure built from red bricks, a slate roof, and fitted with floor to ceiling windows to bring in light, she’d decorated it to her own taste and sense of comfort—not for show. Her sanctuary was anything but a tidy museum piece, and she liked it that way.

She made it in seven minutes, passing by the solar-covered rectangular pool and Jacuzzi, and unlocking the walnut door in the blink of an eye. Rushing in on a sigh, she’d barely taken off her gloves before something bolted behind her and pushed her to the overstuffed couch upholstered in a lively bohemian design. A warm, wet nose burrowed in her hair and a rough tongue licked her lobe.

“Will!” she cried, digging her fingers in the softest fur and feeling the overworking muscles beneath. “Will, stop it! Where did you…come from? How’d old… Jim…treat you? I hope he didn’t give you too much pie. …Will!” she said breathlessly.

The German Shepherd—named in honor of her lost love—sat on his hind legs and regarded her with adoring eyes and a dangling tongue. The excitement of seeing his mistress had him panting and whining and tapping his tail and front legs on the Persian carpet, utterly beside himself.

Dear, dear creature, my Will. You’ve come a long way since the time I plucked you from a kill shelter.

“My best friend,” she cooed, rubbing below his ears and ruffling the fur at his neck. “Always happy to see me. Missed you too, buddy.”

He placed a paw in her hand.

“We have to go check out that sick pigeon later. Jim said she should be ready for release in a few days. She’ll be happy to join her friends. And I hope you haven’t been chasing Tilly too much? Poor rabbit never gets a moment’s rest when you’re around. Alright then, let’s get to work.”

Will gave a loud woof that sounded suspiciously like an ‘Okay!’ Laughing, she gave him one last snuggle and pushed him gently back, patting his head.

She stood and assessed the space. The entire cottage consisted mainly of one big cozy room bursting with exotic decorative touches, and a full modern bathroom and stocked kitchenette at the back—all the creature comforts she needed. A wide, comfortable chaise at counter-corner with the couch sometimes doubled as a bed—or even the couch itself did—on days when she worked at her painting from sun up to sun down, and was too knackered to take the trek back to the house.

She had a feeling this would be one of those days, because she had no desire to go back up there any time soon. Not after what had happened—security be damned. She couldn’t be more secure than she was at her very own digs in
Shadow Bridge, anyway, could she? The place where the portal was guarded twenty-four-seven, and life proceeded as normal.

This place was
hers
and she was safe here.
Glass surrounded her, bringing the outdoors in, and to one side, a dim, secluded alcove, separated from the main room by a wood bead curtain—much like the veil in Shadow Bridge between the mortal and supernatural worlds—housed dozens of finished paintings carefully stacked against the wall. And waiting to be exposed to the world, her mother would say.

Her painting was her best kept secret for now. Well, not a secret, but a succession of private moments she wasn’t yet ready to share with a lot of people. An easel sat prepped up in the center of the room with a blank canvas on it, ready for her brush.

She switched on the central heating and discarded her jacket. Walking to the upright easel, she opened the handy storage drawer beneath the canvas. A palette lay there, begging for another round of color on its weathered, stained surface. Lately, she’d suffered a breakdown in patience and taken to pastels or acrylics. True, master artists always used oils, their skill unfolding with layer upon layer of paint, but she was going through a phase when she needed to see immediate results. Using a retardant to prevent the acrylic from drying too quickly, she could finish a painting in hours or at least, in a few days—not months, as use of oils would require.

She liked working at that speed; a beginning and an end at her fingertips. From sunrise until sunset.

She flipped open her acrylic storage case laid conveniently atop a folding table by the easel, and squeezed out the basics from their oversized plastic bottles—blue on one side, red and yellow on the other, white in the middle, a hint of black on top. Warm and cold, like the seasons. She placed two small cupfuls of water on the side extension. Will took his usual spot under the easel frame, totally relaxed, head on paws.

Taking a deep breath, she opened up her mind and let intuition loose like a hungry dog at a meat factory, mixing up colors in a blur of movement where there was no room for thought or logic. Finally, her hands stilled and she frowned down at the palette.

Her sight unfocused for a moment then restored itself. Reds. At least a dozen shades of red on the darker side of the spectrum, sickly earth tones, a hint of greyish white. And one she used sparingly—black. The non-color would always appear in her miscellany in feathery or hefty doses, but she never started with it. This palette brought a veil of shadow into the room. Dark, soulless, cruel. A smattering of dull blues gathered to one side. A suggestion of Naples yellow. No greens, open blues, purples, orange, and bouncing, distinct colors that she often favored in her surrealist style creations.

They did say surrealism consisted of mostly mystery, and the colors before her were certainly that. The canvas would give her the answer.

The freedom she normally enjoyed while here, being the artist and forgetting all else, suddenly twisted into a sharp ache in her gut. Flashes of the attack in the hotel room sprang in front of her like stills on a tiny projector screen blocking her view of the real world.

She looked down. The palette shook in her hand, as did the other hand that held the brush poised over it.

A power larger than her took over her mind and shifted her creative energy to another realm, forcing the real, flesh and blood Sera to watch like a dumb spectator.

This had happened in recent years—these visions—but only a couple of times, and only before she got ready to paint. In both other instances, the messages were pure, happy, leaving her with a light heart and unforgettable moments.

Once had been ten years prior, predicting that Kyle and Petula Sager, the Fae-Witch couple who’d endured endless protests from family members and even the Shadow Bridge authorities at their inter-species romance, would marry. The second time had been a month before Faith Geeley, one of the part-time waitresses at
The Stirring Pot
, had become pregnant with triplets—and Sera had already seen it happen.

She’d never told anyone about these hints of Second Sight, choosing to unveil her paintings only after the news were confirmed, for all intents looking like she’d painted the happiness after getting official confirmation of it. Just as well, because if everyone knew... If her mother came to know...

The very first time it ever occurred, though, was the time she’d seen William, her beloved, sink to the darkest ocean depths, swallowed by the unforgiving Atlantic.   A vision too ruthless to bear repeating, and in fact it hadn’t.

This
now, however, didn’t feel good.

This
felt like a slow drawing and quartering.

The brush pressed into the palette, as if someone was guiding her hand, and indeed, her choice or intuition seemed to sit on the sidelines as she drew out her vision. She soon realized—it was either let go, or resist and feel the pain a hundredfold as it sliced through her poised muscles.

The canvas a blob in her mind’s eye, she gave in to the whirlwind that raged inside her, for if she didn’t, she feared that torture would win and crush her.

Time, action, sensations, thoughts—all whisked about in a separate dimension of sorts, splashing themselves like flying cake mix in a faulty food processor, away from her physical body. Who was she? The sum of all parts that now went in all directions, or a puppet on a string led by an invisible master?

Blood, blood red everywhere. Fire. Terrified screams. Black is the night. Death everywhere. Murder….

A distant groan.

Then the world spun on its axis and she floated back, flailing, screaming….

Nagging whines sounded at her ear and a panicked voice tore through the cloying haze.

“Sera! Sera,
mon trésor
, wake up. Please, dear gods above, wake up!”

Slowly, the veil got thinner and thinner until it cleared, revealing her mother’s beautiful, tear-streaked face. Her mother, who was on her knees by her side.

“How—what are you…doing here, Mom?” she asked in a raspy voice that sounded as though she’d just awoken from a long, deep sleep. She licked her lips, bringing some moisture back to them.

“You okay, darling?”

She nodded, needing to hear an explanation.

Her mother took a deep breath. “After our argument, I figured you’d be here. I heard Will barking and whining and found you on the floor. Sera, what on earth happened?”

“I—I had a vision. But not a good one, Mom. More like the one I had after William…after William…” And she broke down in desperate tears.

“Visions?” The one word rang with incredulity.

Oh no, she’d let the cat out of the bag. A whimper escaped her, and that’s when Adri gathered her in her arms, shifted her onto her lap, and rocked her like a babe.

“Shhh,
mon petit coeur, tout ira bien
. Everything will be fine. Shhh….”

The soft rocking, the endearments called out in lilting French—they all broke the little composure she still struggled to cling to. Sera stopped fighting.

“It was horrible! Please don’t leave me,” she begged. She was nothing but a lost child calling for Mama—a wandering soul seeking purchase.

“Come now, I’ll stay with you as long as you like.”

You know I’ll never leave you,
Adri could have said, and at that moment, Sera couldn’t ask for more.

“Cry. Let the tears flow.
Je suis là, mon amour.
”

She gave it all she had, cried like she never had, not even when William died, not even when Rafe turned her world upside down.

She hung on for dear life, inhaling her mother’s flowery perfume as though it were a balm to her soul. That waking dream had been too horrific for words, even though she couldn’t understand it. The images, crude and bloody, would scar a sensitive soul for life. How would she get them out of her head?

Luckily, her second sight came with a self-cleaning mechanism. After she’d seen William as a corpse in her visions, the experience hadn’t transferred to sleepless nights and horrible nightmares. It had simply dissipated within her, like the fleeting shivers and goose bumps on a cool morning before the first cup of coffee kicked in, and the warmth of a wool sweater seeped through layers of skin.

The incident with Rafe and now this—
Second Sight.
What the hell?