The Deception Dance (42 page)

Yeah… From Andras’s
sword, he must have nicked me. But I am too tired to care. When the
crusted blood washes from my hands, eleven faded sharpie-lines
remain. Madeline made sure the blood that stains my hands can’t
wash off that easily.

I drop my arms, close my eyes and
let Dina sponge me clean. She does not touch the cut, though; she
tells me she’s leaving that for the doctors.

When Dina finally lets me escape
the frigid flow, she pats me dry. She dresses me in a light blue
hospital gown, pats dry my bald head and gives me a clean cloth to
press against the cut. I spin in the bathroom and jump back clutching
my chest; the mirror is covered in a giant sheet. Chauncey is here?
How can that be? No, it can’t be... she’s gone, forever.

Dina examines my face then levels
her gaze on me, “Right now, is not the time for mirrors.”

I nod, “I just thought... I
was confused.”

“Oh...” She takes my
shoulders and nods, “Yes, I know what you thought.” She
steers me from the room. “But no, it was me who covered all the
mirrors that girl did not smash.”

Dina doesn’t lead me into
my room; no, she leads me across the hall. Is she trying to torment
me? I don’t want to go in there. I didn’t want to go into
Chauncey’s room when she was alive, I definitely don’t
want to go in there now that’s she’s...she’s gone.
But Dina doesn’t even notice that I’m digging my heels
into the floor, and she keeps pushing.

When Dina succeeds in maneuvering
me into the cream and light wood room, I blink around. It’s not
overflowing with beautiful dresses and shattered mirror shards, no,
it’s a hospital room filled with doctors. Three doctors, to be
exact, all decked out in white scrubs and masks pulled to their
chins. Dina leads me to a bed that has a hundred controls centered in
the room and helps me sit. When she steps back I grab her wrist.

The doctors descend on me,
asking, “What is your weight? Height? How old are you?”

“Have you ever taken
antibiotics?”

“Have you ever experienced
symptoms of depression?”

“Are you allergic to any
medications?”

“One-twenty-five. Five’
eight. Eighteen. No. No...Maybe, I don’t think so.
Dina...stay!”

More questions... More
questions... “I...I don’t know. Dina stay. Please, stay.”

Dina doesn’t resist my grip
or move from my side.

One of the woman doctors pokes me
with a needle. “Count down from one-hundred,” she tells
me in thickly-accented English.

“One hundred,
ninety-nine...” Whoa, what did they give me? “Ninety-eight,
ninety-seven...” I feel like...I feel like that one time.
“Ninety-six, ninety-five...” I feel like that one time,
when Andras saved me. “Ninety-four, ninety three...” No,
that’s wrong: he didn’t save me, he drugged
me...”Ninety-two, ninety-three...”

My eyes close. I swim in my eyes,
float in a stream just beneath my eyelids.

“Ninety...” I giggle.
“Eighty-nine, eighty-eight...” Andras gave me something,
something made me barf, it took the drugs away, it...I chuckle,
“Eighty-two, eighty-one.” It healed me... “Eighty.”
It was, “Magic!” I shout.

I struggle to open my eyes; my
eyelids are portcullises, and they slam shut. “Dina, magic!
Magic, Dina. Stephen needs magic. Call Madeline. Find Madeline, Dina,
she can save Stephen...”

I’m diving, diving down
into blackness. And I’m falling, flailing, diving to my
disastrous end. Chauncey stands, singing in the dark. There’s a
light ahead, no not a light, a fire.

I land in the blazing fire, it’s
burning my hair, my clothes, but not me; I don’t burn. Hell
fire can’t burn me.

Then, I’m crouching on the
small flaming platform on the top of the roof of the desecrated
church in Rome. There are ravens everywhere around me, and they are
bursting into small fires. Behind them, the sun is rising.

“You’ll never be free
of me,” His voice comes from behind me.

I wheel around in the fire, but
it extinguishes.

Andras balances on the roof, he’s
wearing his old body, his bare feet curling around the ridgeline. He
grins down tenderly, his beautiful tan skin wrinkling into smile
lines, his black hair falls carelessly as he’s outlined by the
waxing light. His giant black wings arc out to each of his sides and
point skyward. He leaps down and lands beside me on the platform. His
hands grip my shoulders, and he pulls me to my feet, “I’ll
always come for you.”

I scream, scream into his face,
but he presses his lips on mine and silences me. And, this is the
inferno… he is my inferno… and I see no escape.

Day
Sixty

Opening my eyes is a fight I’m
losing; I open my left eye about thirty seconds before I can manage
with my right. Even when I succeed with both of them they struggle to
close again. The world is a blurry mess, where ever I am is a fuzzy
mix of cream and white, and… so, I know where I am.

My fingers scratch my head; my
scalp has a layer of bristles, like a boy’s unshaved face.
Well, at least my hair is going to grow back ... I wasn’t sure
if it would. The skin beneath the bristle itches, almost painfully.
But I feel no burns, as if the fire consumed my hair, and then just
stopped. I run my fingers down my face, my lips (which should have
burnt off), and then my arms: not a single burn.

My room starts to come into focus
through my blurry eyes... I sit up a little stiffly. I’m alone;
Dina is gone. I manage to swing my legs over the side of the bed. The
same light-blue hospital gown covers me. I feel my neck and find a
ridge of wet stitches. My hand, when I pull it away, comes off
bloody. Are stitches supposed to bleed?

The door opens and Dina walks
through. She doesn’t look at me, she concentrates on a tray,
heavy laden with jars, she’s carrying. She places the tray on
the dresser across the room, grabs a blue bottle, and wheels around.

When she sees me, Dina literally
jumps and clutches her chest. “Oh,” She breathes, “You
scared me, Raven, I thought you were sleeping.” Her
glaringly-red hair is piled on top of her head in a high bun. She
wears a flower printed apron that has a clashing pattern to the
flowers on her dress.

“How long was I asleep?”
I choke out.

“Let me see,” She
sits beside me on the bed. “About three days...”

“Three days!” I reach
my hand up.

“Do not!” Dina yanks
back my hand. “Your cut will not heal. Don’t touch it.
Now, I have a cream for your cut; but, I also have something else for
you...if you want it.” Dina pulls a bottle from the pocket of
her apron, “Stephen gave this to...”

“Stephen. How is he? Did
he...is he...?”

“Stop that smiling; you
might pull on your cut. The stitches keep coming out.” She
presses her hands into my cheeks forcing the corners of my mouth
down, “I did as you said, went to Albert and he found the witch
girl. She barged into Stephen’s operating room and did some
magic; I do not know about these things, but when I saw him he did
not look as if he had even been hurt, though I did not see under his
shirt. It was… He was… Stop that!” She presses
down at the corners of my lips again.

“The witch made you
something too; Stephen gave it to me...”

“He’s here?” I
try to get out of bed but she pushes me back.

“No not now, two days ago
he gave it to me. Sit down.”

I’m already sitting when
she commands me. “Did she heal Nicholas? Is he better?”

“No,” she says,
shaking her head, “Not healed, but alive. He would not drink
her potions and she would not give him any, but he will survive, if
God wills.” Before I can ask, she adds, “And he is also
not here.” She holds out the bottle again, “The witch
made you a potion, too. I waited to give it to you until you woke,
because I did not know if you want...”

“I do,” I insist.
“I’m not afraid of magic.”

She shakes her head at me. “Magic
is something to be afraid of, very, very afraid.” But she hands
me the bottle before she stands. “I would not even offer the
magic, I would...I should have destroyed it; but that cut of yours
will not heal. It is not natural.”

She’s walking out the door
but I stop her by asking, “Did Stephen have a message, or
anything, for me?”

She turns at the open door and
smiles. “Not that I know of, Raven. He did come in your room
for a couple of seconds; but I was not in here.”

He left me a note. He must have.
Why else would he come into my room for only a few seconds?

“Thanks,” I tell Dina
as she closes the door behind her.

The bottle is little, black, and
sealed with a cork. It’s also freezing cold; as if Dina just
took it out of the freezer. This is two I owe Madeline. I’m
surprised she even gave Stephen something for me, I’m pretty
sure she...um, absolutely despises me. I look into my still-marked
hands; she does despise me. I examine the bottle.

She might hate me, but she loves
Stephen, so I doubt she’d give me anything that would seriously
harm me. I uncork the bottle and sniff it. Pine, it smells like pine
trees, and honey. I put the bottle to my lips, squeeze closed my
eyes, and pour the contents in.

The potion is freezing, colder
than ice yet still liquid. It slides all over my mouth as if it has a
life of its own, then plunges down my throat. I feel my tonsils
freeze, my esophagus, my stomach, and all my internal organs crisping
over with ice. I fall back.

I imagine my heart pumping ice
crystals into my blood stream. My skin literally frosts over, from my
scalp to my ears, over my face, down my neck, a thin layer of ice
covers. I am still, immovable. The ice spreads over my chest, under
my hospital gown inching over my ribcage, and filling my navel. Soon
my entire body is covered in frost. And… I’m so
peaceful.

Suddenly, I’m eight years
old and my father has taken my sister and me to the city Lake Tahoe
after winter’s first snow. I lie in a blanket of snow bundled
to my teeth but the wetness still slips between the cracks of my
clothing. I spread my legs and arms out to make a snow angel, when
I’m done I just lie, with white snow wings spreading from my
back. I watch as the snowflakes drift down. And, I am an angel, and
god is sending my skin a thousand cold kisses.

Linnie’s giggling beside
me. I inhale the pine scent of the trees surrounding us. My mouth
tastes like honey and I have a hundred snow kisses on my cheeks.
There’s no Hell here, no demons, no fire, no void, just Heaven
in the snow.

“Thank you, Madeline.”
I whisper, as I open the eyes of my eighteen year old body.

The frost turns into water and
drips off my skin. Linnie’s laughter fades from my ears, and
there’s no more snow falling, no more kisses. I’m staring
up to a beech-wood paneled ceiling, not into Heaven. The bed around
me is soaking wet.

My neck itches; when I scratch it
some thread comes off into my hand.

That’s not good.

I cringe. I need a shower. I
stand and make my way to the bathroom.

The stitches fall off me
one-by-one in the shower. I see them play on the marble floor, until
they worm their way into the drain.

I’m afraid to check, but I
raise my hand to my neck anyway finding smooth, unmarred skin. The
ever present itching on my scalp increases to a painful throb. I grab
at my head, but feel the stubbles grow into bristles under my
fingers. My hair grows in seconds, channeling between my fingers. It
feels soft, downy, like a child’s hair. It thickens, sticking
to my wet shoulders and back.

When I’m dried and wrapped
in a guest house bathrobe, I pull off the sheet that’s still
covering the mirror. The lingering steam automatically comes between
me and my reflection, but after I use a towel to wipe the mirror, I
see myself.

Madeline’s magic refreshed
me, restarted me; I look the same as when I came here. My hair might
be a little longer and healthier, but otherwise, I look the same.
It’s strange to look so unchanged after what I’ve been
through in the last month. The only dramatic difference is that my
hair didn’t grow into a perfect haircut, more a jumbled mess
cascading unevenly down my back. I run my fingers through the back of
my hair.

Good, I’m glad it’s
choppy, it wouldn’t be right if I wasn’t changed by…
well… by the inferno.

Then, with my neck turned, I see
the cut; there are two black marks, like a black kiss, on my neck. He
marked me again. I don’t know if it was intentional or not, but
it is a new mark...just possibly the mark of our new deal. A black
kiss.

Yeah, a kiss of death.
Fitting
.

After I’ve stared so long
at my reflection that I can no longer really make sense of my
reflected features, I return to my room to look for Stephen’s
note.

But there is no note, not on the
dresser or the end table, not behind or underneath them. Nothing new
is in any of my drawers, the closet or on Linnie’s side of the
room. I even push out every piece of furniture, but there is no note,
no letter, nothing.