The Shattered Genesis (Eternity) (47 page)

             
Several of the men in our camp grabbed hold of him. I watched in slight amusement as ten of them hauled him off. It took ten fully grown men to subdue one. It was as a small smile pulled at my lips that I noti
ced the remaining spectators spectating me. Some looked downright horrified by my very existence. Others were bemused. Others were expressionless though their screaming minds betrayed their fear and curiosity.

             
My father was the only one whose mind shouted
the livid thoughts of a confused and betrayed man. He felt that I had lied to him, though why he expected honesty after so many years of hatred between us, I was not sure. He felt that I had kept a dangerous secret from him, though he could not determine
the exact nature of what it was I had been hiding. I was one of them, he believed. I had always been one of them. But no, he had seen my birth. He knew that I was human.

             
The last word through his mind was one even he tried to push away:

             
Infected
.

             
The
alarm I felt at hearing that word spoken, even in his thoughts, was so sudden that it stole my breath away. I was not afraid of how he would handle my “infection”, though I should have been. I was more worried about being thought of as dangerously ill in t
he first place.

             
Elijah stood up, grasped my hand, and pulled me away from the gawking, silent crowd. The rain had ceased suddenly, so my brother, sisters and I walked to the edge of the campsite that had been abandoned in the fight.

             
“Penny, did you see a
nything?” I asked her softly. They were odd words to speak after such a brutal occurrence but truly, Penny emerging without any scars, physical or emotional, was my chief
concern.

             
Penny shook her head and reached her arms out to me. I felt that she was tr
embling with cold and potent fear. I knew that I could remedy both. I stood up with her as she clung to me with every last bit of her young strength. I reached into a tent and pulled out a blanket; I would repay the owner with my own later. After prying Pe
nny from me in order to wrap her up, I swaddled her like a baby, even going so far as to tuck her arms inside the confines of the blanket. Then, I cradled her close to my chest, feeling my eyes dissolve back into their normal blue as they met her wide, fea
rful eyes.

             
Her fear was not of me, God bless her. Her fear was of what had just happened. Her fear was of the natives.

             
I shushed her when she started to cry softly. I rested my cheek against her forehead and rocked her back and forth, back and forth. My
only thought was to warm and calm her. Though my muscles were beginning to ache and an angry cut on my forehead was dripping blood into my left eye, I thought of nothing but my sweet little sister.

             
It was strange, how I could switch from feeling nothing b
ut a need to kill a living creature to a need to comfort one I held so very dear to me.

             
I was thinking only of tranquility as I held her, believing wholeheartedly that I could soothe her not just with my words and my arms around her but also with calming
thoughts. I was so lost in them that I was beginning to believe that such peace was actually possible. Even after I lulled her to sleep, I stayed drunk on that fabled serenity. I did not reemerge from its depths until I felt a hand on my shoulder.

             
I opene
d my eyes.

             
Penny was still nestled against my chest, fast asleep. I turned to look, expecting to see Elijah or Violet standing there. Instead, I saw my father standing with his burly minions behind him. Instead, I saw the butt of a shotgun being pulled ba
ck.

             
The last thing I heard was Penny screaming.

XXX

             
The highlights of the previous day played on in my mind like a grimly educational slide-show in a class on the meaning of things. I saw James's handsome face. I felt that striking warmth that absorbed
me every time he kissed me. As a quick, crippling terror exploded inside of me at the sight of the earth burning, I clung to that warmth in order to be comforted. Then, the warmth fell to a frigidity that was my need to feel nothing when it came to James.
He had lied to me. He had walked away. He was gone forever. Violet's secret was that James had left the campsite. Despite knowing most things, I could not see his path clearly. I could see him scarcely at all. But I did not want to see him. I wanted no par
ts of James Maxwell.

             
James Maxwell. James Maxwell.

             
His voice saying his name when he introduced himself to me deepened whatever spell I had fallen under.

             
I was repeating his first name as I emerged from its depths.

             
“I must be just as stupid as you
think I am. I thought that you had let him go. I thought you had been able to reason away whatever ridiculous, immature feelings you had for him.”

             
It was my father talking. I opened my eyes to find that I was in a room lit only by one dim bulb hanging nex
t to the iron door. He was sitting in front of me, tapping my pack of cigarettes on the table. Actually, it was not the pack that I had left in my tent. The one in his hands was unopened.

             
“Yeah.” He replied as he held the pack up for me to see. “We knew p
eople would have a fit if they had to quit smoking, so we brought a few hundred packs. Though, when we run out, you'll have no choice but to quit. I brought these specifically for you, Brynna. I know they're your brand. I thought it was the least I could d
o.”
             
“The least you could have done was not hit me in the face, actually.” I replied after lifting my
head delicately. “But you have already done that three times since we got here. Just like old times, is it not?”

             
He chuckled softly and slid the pack tow
ards me. When in doubt, smoke a cigarette. That had always been my mantra. But when I reached for the pack on the table, I found that my hands were cuffed tightly behind the chair I was sitting in. A jolt of panic went through me that I prayed had not flas
hed through my eyes. The only way to trump him was the show no weakness.

             
“It appeared as though you hadn't realized that you were handcuffed and I just wanted to make sure you were aware. That's only responsible.”

             
“Are you going to kill me, Dad?”

             
There
was not even a slight tremor to my voice. I was not afraid of him. I did not call him “Dad” to soften him into sympathizing with me. I used the term in sarcasm and disdain to the shock of no one, including him.

             
“I don't know, Brynna. I talked with several
people. You never would have been able to do that. Most of them are just so stupid.” He stood up and started to pace around the room. “They're afraid of you. They don't want you in the camp anymore. After seeing what they saw you do, they think you're one
of them. One of the natives, I mean. You'll probably be surprised by this, but I did try to reason with all of them. I tried to tell them that you are my daughter and I know that you're not one of them. I don't know what's come over you but I know you're
not a native.”
             
“This conversation is fascinating. Really, it is. But let me stop you right there. If they don't want me in the camp, then I'll pack my things and leave. I am not afraid of the natives. I can live in the woods.”
             
“That was originally going
to be my first course of action. Banishment, exile, whatever you want to call it.” He told me after sitting back down again.

             
“Quarantine.” I added breezily in a play on his earlier theory regarding infection that I had so rudely heard while invading his m
ind. He ignored me.

             
“But then, I realized that I could use you. Did you notice how...” He looked up, searching for the right word. I read into his mind to root out what exactly it was he was trying to say. I wanted the little powwow to be over as soon as
possible. The sooner I was able to start my attempt at surviving independently, the better. I wanted to know immediately how apt I was to make my own way.

             
“Did I notice how
entranced
the man was with me?”

             
“Well, did you?”

             
“I would not call it entrancement. I would not call it anything because it did not exist. You are wrong.”

             
I knew that he was right.

             
“I'm not, though. We talked to the man that you attacked. He says that you're ch
anging over. He says it's happening to a lot of us. Not all, just
some
.
Special
, is what he called you.
Freaks,
is what I call you.”

             
“You would.” I nodded and smiled in quiet triumph. He was afraid of me, of us, whoever or whatever we were.

             
“Now, the rea
son why I bring up the man from the first night is because he's their leader. There are so many of them, Brynna. There are too many. They'll overpower us. Do you remember what I said that day behind the ship? About trading you?”

             
“Sure do.”

             
My heart was b
eginning to hammer roughly against its cage of bone. He could hear it. He could feel my tension rising. I would not show it outwardly to him. I would never allow him to see such weakness when I knew of the sadistic delight it would bring him.

             
“Well, I mus
t have had a freakish moment of my own because I predicted that would be what he wanted. He wants you.”

             
I panicked internally. I had felt hunted before. I had felt preyed upon in my youth, though
certainly not by my father. His best friend, my godfather..
. He had been so very bad. He was Maura's husband, too, I remembered... She had covered her ears when he dragged me downstairs...

             
Now I was going to face the same awful horror. I was going to be the prey again, this time to a man whose origin I did not ev
en know.

             
My father saw the fear in my eyes. I did not look at him but his thoughts betrayed an equal mix of satisfaction, justification and surprisingly, regret. The three contrasts rolled together in a fight to the death. Regret won, a victory that stunn
ed me into silence and enraptured attention.

             
“Brynna, I should have been able to love you.” He said as he stared intently at me. “We both should have. But after what happened, after what it did to you...” He trailed off and looked away. “It turned you int
o such an awful person. At first, we both felt sorry for you. How could we not? Then your brother...”

             
“I know that you hate me for what happened to Lucien.” I told him dryly. My eyes might have shown the sudden grip of sadness that had taken me but my voi
ce certainly would not.

             
I did know that they all hated me for that. But I hated myself for it, too. I allowed their loathing to contaminate me, though a small, sensible part of my inner self understood that my little brother's death had not been my fault.

             
I cannot speak about these things easily. I can barely put them into words. Still today, I feel great pain over them, despite living for years under the assumption that I could no longer feel or show strong emotional strife internally or externally, resp
ectively.

             
“Your mother... She was broken after that. And I didn't care about what had happened to you anymore. I'll admit that to you. Neither did she. You were supposed to be watching him. I don't care what happened. You were old enough to know that you
had to pay close attention to him or else an accident could happen. Your mother, Maura and I explained that to you time and time again. I don't care how traumatized you were. You shouldn't have looked away.”

             
I was not going to make excuses. I was not goin
g to pass the blame.

             
To this day, I still do not know how long he floated face-down in the water before I came out of my stupor.