Misery (2 page)

Well, she did get most of this done. She fixed a light supper. She cleaned up the fruit and put most of it away. She ended up with an apple to munch on as she watched reruns of
House
. Her mind was not on the program as she thought back to the large unsmiling man. She felt sure she had seen him before, but the longer she searched her memory, she just couldn’t put a time or place. Maybe it was just a glimpse in some store or walking through a mall.

Her mind went to the guard. What a mess just over her name. She shuddered to think what he would have said if she still used her full first name, Misery. No one could tell why she had that name. It had been on a card, pinned to the blue dress she was told she wore when she was dropped off at an orphanage. There was no trace of parents or relations. The name was put on her birth certificate with a guess as to what they chose to call her birth date.

Being alone had made her form an independence that she didn’t necessarily want. But when you were an orphan you learned to not get close, because you weren’t going to be with anyone for very long. Her blue dress was taken away, the card was misplaced, then she was moved. But the name followed her.

The first person to remark about the name in a disgusted manner that registered in her memory was the head of an orphanage that housed children of all age. The children were sent to local schools. Children her age were kept on the grounds and dressed in hand-me-downs that didn’t fit. They were gathered in a large room for most of the day. They were taken outside during rain, snow, or sunshine for half an hour each day except Sunday.

As the Head Mistress read the folder, the woman kept her standing in confusion, holding a paper sack that held the items that had been given to her from the first place she had stayed. A frown began to form on the woman’s face.

“They made a mistake on the spelling of this young one’s name.”

She picked up the phone and dialed. Mis moved from one foot to another. “Don’t fidget, child.”

This sharp rebuke came from the woman as she held the phone to her ear. Finally someone must have come on the other end of the line. The conversation was short. When she hung up she was still frowning. Mis came to find out, after months of staying at this location, that the frown was a permanent fixture.

She also learned that her name made the frown deeper. She never could figure out why the Head Mistress disliked her so much, but it was a fact that she accepted. She was always on the details to scrub the bathrooms or to clean the garbage pails. Each time the sharp voice that could be heard down the hallways, called out her full name. “Misery, new work detail. Misery, you didn’t earn a recess today, go to the kitchen. Misery, do this, Misery, do that, Misery, Misery, Misery.”

Each time the voice rang her name out in the dark stained hallways, she heard the snickers from the other children. Those who were bullies had a whole new child to take their frustrations out on. Those who were timid were thankful that someone else was being picked on, so they just either joined in or watched.

The teasing she took, the blows she rained out and the ones she received as she went from orphanage to home to school, made her tough. Fortunately the next home had a kinder person in charge. When he read her name he looked at her.

“A sad name for such a beautiful child. What do you prefer to be called?”

She looked up at him in surprise and whispered, “Mis.”

“Fine, that is what I will enter in the school records. We can’t change what they put on your birth record, but I think we can help what is put on the records here.”

She learned to hide the pain from the teasing. But she learned to control the anger, to harness it, to find how to fight back when needed. She also learned to shorten her name whenever possible to Mis. She even got it on her Driver’s License. She also came to hate the parents that not only deserted her, but left her with such a detested name.

Now it had been a long time since anyone had called her the contemptuous name. There was still a misunderstanding about Mis. She probably should have just gone to one of those small town courts and had it legally changed. But like most people, she had no idea how you went about getting your name legally amended to something else. Look at the actors on
House
—
Omar Epps, why had he not changed his name? You know to something like maybe John Monroe? Well, it took an effort and rejection of your past. She had no past, except for what had been written on that card. She wasn’t willing to totally erase it from her life.

The next morning she went to work, taking the bus. She and Tony finished the job at the big office. Her routine continued for the next couple of weeks. Weekends were stay at home, do the laundry, run the sweeper, try a new shampoo on her white blond hair, try a little make up on her pale face. Of course there were the reruns of
House.

The only interruption to her daily routines was that she had to turn around on a regular basis. She had that strange feeling that someone was watching her. She saw lots of people looking, but not watching. There were guys who smiled, guys who leered, women who smiled, women who sneered. There were some men who quickly turned away, probably married and hoping not to be caught staring at a strange woman.

Finally, one morning when she and Tony had stopped at a Starbucks, she caught a sight of him again. She had paid for her drink. She took the cup and turned around to move past Tony. She saw him leaning against a car, looking through the shop window at her. The hair on the back of her neck under her long ponytail stood up as she froze. There was no doubt in her mind that he was looking at her.

Tony bumped into her so, she stepped sideways. She looked at Tony and back out the window. In that fraction of a moment he was gone. How could anyone move that fast? Did she doubt her own eyes? No. She knew he had been there, she knew he had been looking at her.

“Hey, sleepy head, you going to move, or do I have to carry you and my coffee?” Tony gave her a nudge. She went out the door. Actually, she went in a hurry, stepping out so that she could look both ways to see if she could spot the tall dark head over any of the parked cars. Nothing.

The rest of the day she was distracted. Tony had to ask her a couple of times if she was okay. Finally, when she didn’t answer a request from Tony, he actually tapped her arm.

“Okay, let’s call it a day. You can tell me what’s wrong.”

They gathered up everything, went to the van and did their usual change of clothes. Tony waited until they were in the van headed back to her area before he looked at her to speak.

“Your head hasn’t been on the job. Want to share what might be the problem?”

She refused to look at Tony, but she did owe him an explanation. “I have had the strangest feeling for weeks that someone has been watching me. Recently, I have caught the same man. Only he isn’t the type you would want watching you. Big dude, I mean really big. Needs to duck to enter a room. If he ever smiled, it was when he was on his mother’s knee. Probably hired by the President, not to protect him, but to wipe out the head of another country. You know, a really scary guy.”

Tony slowed down but just kept driving, keeping his eyes on the road. “Is this something from your past, Mis?”

She looked over at him and shook her head. “I can’t imagine anything an orphan might have done to interest anyone. High school at a small town, a lucky scholarship that got me into collage. My computer skills got me the rest of the way. I have never been a hacker and I don’t play computer games. I enjoy building more than playing. It must be a case of mistaken identity.”

“Well, I can do some tracing when I get home.” Tony turned the wheel, stopping in front of her apartment building. “Unlike you, I do a lot of hacking and snooping. In the meantime, keep your doors locked.”

It was nice that Tony believed her. He didn’t think she was just a hysterical woman. So she did just that, double checked the locks, looked through the blinds, and was relieved when she didn’t see any lurking shadows below.

Chapter Two

Italy in the 1700’s was a violent country. There were still divisions and serfdoms and even though the Catholic Church ruled, the country was rife with lawlessness that helped keep the people poor and the helpless used and mistreated.

In the mountains, the nightwalkers found a refuge, but it was hard to survive. There were only meager takings. There was someone who came and took the youngest and strongest males of the nightwalkers. At first it seemed to the families that their sons were getting the chance to improve. The sons smiled, promising to send back messages and funds. But these young strong men were never heard from again.

Instead, they disappeared into a military compound run with a cruelty that only the strongest survived. Those who survived moved on to serve the Lord who owned them. He commissioned the force he was building. He was building his own army of nightwalkers who would obey without hesitation, who would kill on command without hesitation, no matter the age or sex or mortal or nightwalker. He wanted living combat automatons.

They were trained by older, mentally stronger nightwalkers. They were beaten into submission. They were placed in matches against each other. The loser was killed in front of them. They were punished for showing any type of emotion. If they smiled, if they laughed, if they cried, there were terrible punishments. Silver was strapped to them, inserted in them. If two of them became friends they were forced into a match that provided only one winner and one of them died. Only one out of ten survived.

He had survived.

So he served the Lord, aware that time went by, but he did not count the time, he counted the kills. He began to realize he might be different than his brothers. Sometimes he killed less. If there were three to kill, he only killed two. For days he would lay awake. He would consider the one he did not kill, finding a strange satisfaction. It was against his training.

He had no concept of actual time, but he thought it might be centuries. But finally he heard the unbelievable
—
he heard that his Lord had been killed in this modern world. His training had been continual, so he knew all the weapons of this century. He still preferred his knives, like any nightwalker, but he could use and take apart any gun, any bomb.

His brothers didn’t know what to do. There was talk of revenge for the old Lord. Most feeling had been trained out of him, but still he felt some deep tingle of relief. Maybe he would not have to kill any innocents. According to the old law, all possessions of the old Lord belonged to the new Lord, if the kill was a noble one. So they waited in the compound for the new Master. But some of the brothers plotted.

There were whispers that the new Lord was claiming the property. It was said that he was indeed a very high Lord who had taken up temporary residency in the citadel attached to the compound. Deck sat on his heels, just as he’d been trained. He didn’t move, but he listened and watched.

Two of the brothers had weapons, guns. One of the weapons had silver. He sat, not moving, barely breathing, and listened.

Finally the Lord, with a group of followers including females, came into the compound. There were still young males in cages. There were still traces of dust in the fighting ring.

He sat on his heels, watching.

The Lord walked forward, raising his hand to signal his followers to stop. He watched this Lord and he had to close his eyes for a second. The Lord was beautiful. He had seen this Lord before, but it was from his childhood
—
something that was supposed to have been erased along with his emotions. In the home, that memory was supposed to have been wiped away.

Now it seemed as if a curtain had been torn away. He saw that home, he saw a female warm and touching. He saw soft light that exposed the paintings on the walls. She talked to him in a voice like music. She told him about the paintings. The Lord in front of him was so beautiful
—
he was part of the paintings. He felt his chest tighten in emotions that he didn’t have any longer. Emotions that had been beaten out of him, daily. Emotions put inside a locked vault in his mind, but the beautiful Lord had the key.

He saw the weapon raised, hidden by the brothers. There was no chance to get to it. There was no way to warn the beautiful Lord. There was only one option. He did not hesitate. As the silver bullets began to rain out, he threw himself forward, in front of the beautiful Lord, letting death come to him instead.

The next thing he knew, he was looking up into faces of two men who were causing him a great deal of pain. He had known he wouldn’t go to heaven
—
he had killed too many
—
but he was surprised at the pain. He couldn’t move. He saw the beautiful face of his Lord.

“Easy, big man, they are taking out the last of the silver. I am Alexander Bider and you saved me. What is your name?”

He looked at the sea blue eyes, wanting to only continue to stare there. But he became aware that he needed to answer his Lord.

“They called me Tenth.”

He saw the Lord frown. He didn’t ever want to make this Lord frown. He tried to remember and he saw the warm rooms of his childhood. How could he? Wait, he remembered.

“My family called me Decimus.”

“Good, we will call you Deck. Now you need to relax, to let the medic finish. I need to tell you a couple of things. First, I am a Council Lord so I have a great deal of authority. That means you saved the life of a very important person. Next, in order to save you, we gave you blood from a very unusual female that is going to give you some surprises. It is important as you discover your new powers that you must keep them secret. You will find you have some extra talents, talents you wouldn’t get until you had lived for a very long time.”