Hidden (Book 1)

HIDDEN

Megg
Jensen

For Luke, sorry I
accidentally smacked you in the face with my braid. It certainly inspired quite
a story!

Cover
art by Michael Gauss

http://gaussianeffect.blogspot.com/

Cover
design by Steven Novak Illustration

http://www.novakillustration.com

Copyright
© 2013 by 80 Pages,
Inc

Published
by 80 Pages,
Inc

This
book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either
products of the author’s imagination or used factitiously. Any resemblance to
actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or
transmitted in any form by or any means, electronic or mechanical, without
permission in writing from the author or publisher.

1
^st
Edition: December 2013

This
ebook
is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This
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purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Sophia woke to the sharp piercing cry of an
infant. She pulled the rough blanket over her ears, hiding from the noise. Its
screams cut through the otherwise silent air.

“Is
someone going to take care of that baby?” Sophia asked from under the covers.
She peeked out. Her parents weren’t in their bed. It didn’t even look like it
had been slept in.

Sophia
inched the covers down and sat up. “Momma?” She hadn’t used that word since she
was a little girl. At thirteen, she was nearly a grownup. The only answer came
from the crying baby.

She
tossed off her covers, slipped into her shoes, and laid a housecoat over her
shoulders. She pulled the door open, stepping out into the damp morning chill.
A heavy cloud of fog hung in the air, thinner in spots than others, but Sophia
couldn’t see to the edge of the village to her left. She hadn’t ever seen a fog
that dense.

The people
of Hutton’s Bridge were strangely quiet. By this time of morning, adults were
always up and about their jobs. Some preparing for a long day of blacksmithing
or hawking their wares to the travellers who came from far and wide to buy
their honey. Hutton’s Bridge had the reputation for the sweetest honey, and it
was rumored their honey had healed many an affliction. Even the royal family in
The Sands claimed it saved the king during a particularly bad bout of stomach
distress.

Yet
this morning, no one was about. Sophia’s slow gait picked up. Something prodded
inside, whispering that none of this was right. She pinched her arm, to
reassure herself she wasn’t trapped within a dream.

The
crying grew louder. It had to be the Connell baby, born just a month ago. Her
mother was always so attentive, but today it seemed all of the adults were busy
with something else. Maybe they were in the meeting hall?

Sophia
knocked on the door to the Connell cottage, sure now that the crying definitely
was their baby girl,
Kimma
. The door swung open
silently and Sophia crept into the dark cottage. She glanced to the bed the
Connells shared, but just like her cottage, the sheets were unwrinkled. Not
slept in.

The
baby squirmed in its blanket; the swaddling had come loose. Sophia hurried over
to the infant, lying on the floor. Who left their babies on the floor? Her
hands cupped under the baby’s armpits, the tips of her fingertips holding the
bobbling head steady.

“
Shh
,” she cooed in
Kimma’s
tiny
ear. “It’s okay.” Sophia rocked back and forth on her heels, hoping to calm the
baby and herself. With each passing moment, fear and panic rose inside her like
bile after eating a bad mushroom.

Sophia
crept out of the cottage, holding
Kimma
tightly to her
chest. “Where is everyone?”

Kimma
cooed in response, her
crying over now that she was being held.

Slowly,
doors to cottages opened all down the street.
A head here, a
pair of eyes there.
Small hands grasping the wooden
frames.
Tiny
slippered
feet
shuffling out of doorways.

Not
one adult in sight.

Another
door opened wide. Sophia smiled in spite of the situation. It was
Tomas,
the boy she’d recently developed a crush on. “Where
are your parents?” he asked Sophia pointedly.

“I
don’t know. I heard
Kimma
crying and went to find
her. Her parents aren’t here either. It looks like none of the beds have been
slept in.” She stroked
Kimma’s
little tuft of black
hair.

“It’s
the same in my cottage. Where are they?” Tomas turned around, yelling over his
shoulder, “Michael, Scott, come out here and run through the village. See if
you can figure out where they are.” He turned back to Sophia. “Take
Kimma
back to your cottage and wait, just in case there’s
something sinister going on here. I don’t want you getting hurt.”

Sophia
nodded, fear streaking through her blood like ice on a cold winter’s night. She
tried not to bounce too
much,
she’d heard a baby could
die if shaken too hard, as she ran back to her cottage. Closing the door behind
her, she finally took a deep breath.

“It’s
going to be okay,” she said to
Kimma
, even though she
knew she was really talking to herself.

Sophia
waited.

Outside
her cottage, children cried, calling for their mothers.
Some
begging for their fathers.
Their calls went unanswered.

Finally
a knock came on her door. “Sophia?”

“Come
in, Tomas.”

The
door swung open and closed behind him just as fast. His chest rose and fell,
his breathing erratic.

“What
is it? Did you find them?”

Tomas
shook his head.

It was
then she noticed what was in his trembling hands. Flesh. Blood.

A
hand.

She
held the baby tighter and backed away from Tomas. “What is that?”

“Joseph’s
hand. He ran into the fog and a moment later, this flew back through.” Tears
streamed down Tomas’ cheeks, over his blubbering lips, and onto his nightshirt.

Sophia
had never seen him cry. He had always been the bravest boy she knew.

“And
the adults?” she asked.

He shook his head.
“They’re all gone. We’re alone.”

Death lurked in the air that afternoon. Tressa
sat by Granna’s bedside, clasping hands with the woman who, at ninety-three,
had outlived her entire generation.

“You
are leaving tomorrow, yes?” Granna’s liver-spotted hands shook. The rough-hewn
walls seemed to close in. Tressa knew Granna didn’t have much time left. She
wanted to squeeze out every moment she could with her. Nineteen years wasn’t
enough time.

The
smell of tonic and medicine hung in the dark room. When the curtains were
drawn, Granna’s eyes watered. Adam, the village healer, said sunlight would
help Granna recover, but Tressa knew the truth. Granna would leave her
soon,
leave the village, taking the only first-hand
knowledge of the outside world with her. It was a place no one in Hutton’s
Bridge had seen since Granna was just a child, not since the impenetrable fog
had descended at the borders of their village. They weren’t even sure anymore
if it was real or part of Granna’s imagination.

“Yes,
Granna. You chose me, remember?” Tressa stroked Granna’s hair with her free
hand. The silver strands were still long, and luxurious like a newly spun piece
of cloth. “Me, Geoff, and Connor.”

Granna
nodded. “Yes, yes, I remember now.” A gasp preceded each breath, struggling
against the inevitable finality of life. “I am the only one you will leave
behind. It is easier that way.”

Tressa’s
eyes dropped to the floor strewn with straw, the hem of her long,
cotton
dress sweeping it every time she moved. After three
years of coupling, she had not one baby to show for it. Not even a failed
pregnancy. Tressa had felt the cold whiff of death breathing down her neck
every time she didn’t conceive, knowing she was likely to be chosen over any
woman who had children.

“Tressa,
it is your destiny to leave the village.”

She
held back a sigh. Granna was about to die. Why would she want her only great
grandchild, the only family she had left, to follow her in death? No one who
ever entered the fog returned to the village. It was as much of a death
sentence as Granna’s failing health.

Tressa’s
palms began sweating. A tremble skipped up her arms to her chest where her
heart pounded out an irregular, nervous beat.

Granna
took another deep breath. Without looking at Tressa, she said, “The fog. You must
leave.”

Tressa
managed to force out a small laugh. Granna’s grave expression didn’t fool.
“Granna, don’t you want me to live a long life, like you have?”

Granna
shook her head. “Beyond the fog there is a life for you. I have seen it.”

No one
had the gift of sight in her village. Granna claimed once there was magic
before the fog descended. It was one element of her stories that made the
outside world seem so desirable. Tressa would give anything for a magical
potion to save her great grandmother. Instead, they could only rely on Adam’s
knowledge of healing.

“But I
was supposed to live to watch you leave. I saw it. I believed it would happen.”
She took another breath, shallower this time. “I don’t know if I can hold on
until tomorrow.” Granna’s eyes flashed with anger. She held out one frail hand.
An owl flew through the window, landing on Granna’s fingers.

“That’s
my
Nerak
.”

The
little owl hooted in response.

“You
take care of Tressa,
Nerak
. Help her to see the
truth.”

The
owl’s head bobbed
,
then it flew out the window and sat
in the tree. The fog’s undulating fingers caressed the owl’s ruffled wings.
Granna’s cottage stood on the town’s border, next to the curtain of fog.

Granna
always said the downy owl had magic. Tressa had never seen it do anything different
from the other trained birds in the village. Tressa leaned down, kissing Granna
on the forehead. Granna was cold, too cold. Her skin paled into a gray pallor.
Her blue eyes lost focus, gazing somewhere over Tressa’s shoulder.

“I
love you, Granna,” Tressa said.

“I
love you too, my sweet Tressa.” Her voice rattled. Granna’s eyelids fluttered,
then closed with
a finality
only accompanied by death.
One last breath expelled.

Tressa
laid Granna’s hand on her stomach. Taking a step back, she ventured one last glance
at the woman who had loved her every moment of her life. Tressa’s mother died
in childbirth and her father had left through the fog. Like all of the others,
three a year for the last sixty-seven years, none of them returned. Two hundred
and one souls lost to the unforgiving fog, looking for a way out of the misty
prison that had held Hutton’s Bridge for eighty years.

Tressa was next.