The Water Queens (Keeper of the Water) (17 page)

The woman pushes Cristiano aside and enters the room. She’s dressed from head to toe in black, a pair of sheaths attached to her belt. She still wears her hair up but it doesn’t look as wild as it did when she lived in the jungle. Catherine the Great strolls over to Cassie, completely ignoring the count. I expect Cassie to feel better seeing her most trusted ally but I sense even more anger.

“We need to speak in private,” Cassie says. She turns to her husband. “Please leave us.”

“Unbelievable,” the count says, shaking his head. “I told you I don’t like these women coming and going as they please.”

“They’re my personal bodyguards, you’ve known from the moment we met that they would be with me,” Cassie says. “Especially once my lineage was revealed to the world.”

“Ah, yes, your
lineage
,” Count Cristiano says. “But as I know you’ve seen, the palace has plenty of its own guards, ones actually
here
all the time to protect you.”

“My security is always with me at the most important times. And their job isn’t merely to follow me around and
wait
for someone to attack,” Cassie says. “I make sure they’re allowed the freedom to leave my side to root out potential threats to me
and
you. Considering the rogue assassins killing your family, I figured you’d appreciate my guards’ efforts to keep us safer.”

The count glares at Catherine, who remains stone-faced as she stares back at him.

“Whatever she has to say in front of you, she should be able to say in front of me,” Cristiano finally says.

“I do not work for you so I do not speak to you,” Catherine says.

The count begins to turn red again but Cassie takes him by the hand and leads him toward the door. He clearly disgusts her but she keeps her composure to defuse the situation.

“If my guards have something important to tell me, should we really waste time squabbling?” Cassie asks.

“I am
not
happy about this,” Cristiano says.

“Duly noted,” Cassie says.

“And we
will
discuss starting a family later,” the count demands.

“Of course, my love,” she says sweetly.

Count Cristiano no sooner walks out when Cassie slams the door shut; I’m surprised she stayed calm so long around him. Now that she’s alone with Catherine, I expect her to be in a much better mood.

“I pity you for having to be married to him, for having wifely duties to fulfill with that… man,” Catherine says.

“We all have roles to play if we’re to attain ultimate power with the water,” Cassie says as she approaches her friend. “And it’s vital that we complete those roles as planned.”

Without warning, Cassie slaps Catherine across the face, hard. Catherine leaps back and takes out her twin swords, holding them at the ready. The side of her face has quickly turned red but she gives no indication of pain. Catherine’s body shivers and she immediately drops the swords.

“Forgive me, My Keeper,” she says, picking up the swords to re-sheath them. “That was only instinct; I would
never
hurt you.”

“And yet you
would
anger me, you
would
risk everything I’ve been working toward for the last six years – everything I’ve been working toward for the last five-
hundred
years,” Cassie snaps. “How could you allow the king’s brother to survive? Don’t you want me to rule the world one day?”

Catherine the Great raises an eyebrow. “Don’t you mean
us
? You said we would all rule together, nothing about us merely becoming your band of merry assassins.”

Cassie sighs. “Of course those are the
long
-term plans. But we must take control of
one
country first, gain legitimate power before we can go after more of the world. To do that we must gain a strong enough following from the masses before taking the next step; only
then
will it be feasible to start dividing power among us, to put you back in charge of Russia. But that can’t happen with the king’s brother still alive.”

“Tell me where he’s hiding,” Catherine says. “I will go there myself and kill him by night fall.”

“I don’t
know
where he’s being kept,” Cassie snaps, her anger growing. “Do you know how suspicious it would look if a countess demanded to know such information? The king’s brother is now a national hero for being the only royal to survive; the public is barely paying attention to the interviews I’ve been giving.”

“The man is lucky to be alive; we weren’t expecting to be interrupted by… outsiders,” Catherine says, hanging her head in shame. “He will not be so lucky the next time; whether he’s named king or not, I promise he will not make it to his coronation alive.”

This is the first time I’ve felt Cassie’s anger ease since I’ve connected with her mind. Now that I know her plans, I tell myself it’s time to sever the connection but I’m greedy for more information.

“Good, that’s what I want to hear,” Cassie says. “Although it’s pitiful that those water-traitors got the better of you.”

“They surprised us, that’s all,” Catherine says.

“News reports state there were three of them,” Cassie says. “But after we killed the author and the actress, the only two who could’ve escaped were the slave rescuer and the athlete. Have you figured out who the third woman was with them?”

“We didn’t get a good enough look,” Catherine admits. “But I’m certain I killed one of them along with all the future king’s guards. Don’t worry, if the other two try to interrupt the next time, they will meet the same fate as their friend… as well as the rest of the Amazons that betrayed you.”

My heart sinks at the thought of one of the remaining true Amazons being killed. Realistically, I knew from the moment I left that life that Harriet, Babe and Amelia would face a life-or-death struggle trying to stop Cassie; but now that death has actually happened, I’m sickened by how responsible I feel. I might still be witnessing Cassie’s life through her eyes, but my own thoughts have taken over, my own overwhelming sadness and despair of walking away from the women who once relied so heavily upon my leadership. I still hear Catherine the Great talking but I’m so focused on myself that I barely register the words she’s saying.

“Once the first word leaks about the king’s brother’s whereabouts, he will not have long for this world,” she promises her Keeper. “And then once your precious Count Cristiano finally takes power, we’ll make sure he also suffers the same… Is everything okay?”

The rare display of concern in her voice – something I’ve
never
heard from Catherine – snaps me out of my gloomy thoughts. I hadn’t even realized Cassie stepped away from her and now stood in front of another mirror, peering into it intently. She stares into her eyes, though I can’t shake the horrific feeling that she’s staring into
my
eyes. My stomach swirls with butterflies at the thought but at that exact moment, Cassie’s brow furrows in confusion; she felt the same thing I just did.

“Please, My Keeper,” Catherine says. “Is something wrong?”

Cassie continues to look confused. “I feel something I haven’t experienced in a long time, like
someone
familiar is out there – ”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

My eyes snap open as the sun begins to peek around the mountains. My heart leaps and I nearly fall out of my chair at the sight of someone standing right above me. In my split second of fear, I nearly attack and even find my hands instinctively reaching over my shoulder for a bow that’s no longer there. Thankfully the person in front of me isn’t large enough to be one of my enemies.

“Did you fall asleep outside again, Mommy?”

Janey frowns and shakes her head; she looks exactly like John does on the rare occasion he tries disciplining her. Seeing her makes me realize how disturbed I feel about the vision I just had, how worried I am about ruining the anonymity of our life here. I sit up straighter and pull Janey toward me; the more she squirms, the tighter I’m sure to hug her.

“Jeez,
Mom
, what’s
that
all about?” Janey asks once I let go. “Are you okay? Did you get hurt?”

I don’t realize I’m crying until her tiny hand reaches for my tears; the touch of her soft skin against my cheek makes my heart want to crumble even more. But I get my racing emotions in check and wipe away the rest of the tears; I have to stay strong for her.

“Mommy’s okay,” I tell her. “I must’ve been having a nightmare, that’s all.”

“What was it about?” Janey asks.

I remember the way Cassie’s cruel eyes seemed to stare into my soul; the thought sends a shiver through me.

“I don’t remember,” I say.

Janey raises an eyebrow – she’s clearly suspicious. Her expression is the first reason I’ve had to smile since John gave me the newspaper last night. Janey suddenly realizes something and turns away from me, looking toward the surrounding mountains. She seems afraid, which in turn makes
me
afraid; she’s proven recently to have strong instincts so I’m worried she senses some sort of danger nearby.

“It’s not the goat monster, is it?” she asks. “Is that what you dreamed about?”

I smile again even though Janey clearly does not.

“Maybe that’s what my nightmare was about,” I tell her. “But now that I’m awake, I no longer need to be afraid because I know there’s no such thing as a goat monster. You know that too, right?”

“Yes,
Mom
, you’ve told me like a hundred times,” she says, though she looks no less afraid.

Actually, I would’ve guessed it was more like a
thousand
times I’ve told her over the last few years. Some of the surrounding lands are home to mountain goats, which often wander close enough to our house to see from our porch. The animals mostly stay away since some of our neighbors don’t turn down the chance for a free meal if a goat wanders too close. We’ve been to several village gatherings where one of these goats ends up on a spit over an open fire. When Janey was old enough to understand, one of the village’s only children – a boy who now has one less finger than when we first arrived on Andros – told her the goat died when it was attacked by the goat monster. Though we mostly speak English to her in our house – minus a few Spanish curse words when John unsuccessfully tries to fix something – Janey picked up enough Greek in her life to understand the boy’s warning. Since that time, we’ve had to tell her countless times that monsters aren’t real.

At least
those
kinds of monsters.

“Do me a favor and go wake up your father,” I tell her. “Tell him he’s losing the daylight.”

This seems to perk her up. She happily runs off, calling out ‘Daddy’ as soon as she’s inside. I stand from the chair and walk over to the porch’s railing, where I search the valley for any sign of danger. But all I see are the movements of a few villagers already working on their gardens and olive trees. Not that anybody coming after us would be clumsy enough to let themselves be seen…

My mind instinctively wanders back to Catherine’s words about killing one of the women, one of
my
women. I feel sadness welling up inside me but force myself to calm down; I don’t want to become too emotional and leave my mind open for Cassie. Hopefully she doesn’t know about this ability we share so I’ll never have to worry about my thoughts – my life – being invaded. It was foolish of me to lose my composure last night and connect with her, even more foolish that I let it linger so long until she sensed my presence. The connection had been very strong, very clear, and I wonder if the intensity of the experience has anything to do with us both being Keepers, both more powerful than most Amazons ever become.

I inevitably think of Celeste and wish she were still here to answer my questions about this strange connection. After her turn as Keeper ended and she headed off into the jungle, Celeste arrived back in camp just as Cassie stole the job from me, just as I was angrier and gloomier and more emotional than I’d ever felt in my life; I’m starting to realize that wasn’t just good-timing or coincidence. I’ll have to be more careful than ever to keep my emotions under control, which I’m sure will be tough while constantly on the lookout for danger.

“Janey says you fell asleep outside last night?” John asks as he trudges through the door. His hair is disheveled and his eyes puffy; he’s not going to have a fun morning in the gardens, which will hopefully make him think twice before trying to keep the same drinking pace as the other villagers. “At least tell me you slept here and not near the spring again.”

“It’s not what you think, I didn’t even go to the water,” I say. “I just fell asleep on the chair thinking about Cassie.”

John frowns and looks at me suspiciously. It’s like he can tell that something happened; I simultaneously love and hate that he knows me so well. But he doesn’t ask what’s wrong so I don’t tell him. Instead, he kisses me, content in pretending that everything is okay. He wears torn clothes and sits in the chair to pull on old, crusty work boots.

He plods off the porch and carefully heads down a small dirt path to the gardens on the steppe below. I watch him begin his daily routine of digging ditches around rows of vegetables and fruit trees. He’ll spend a few hours doing this, at which time he’ll properly water the crops. One of the first things he did when we moved here was build a small aqueduct just downstream from the water source farther up the mountain. All it takes is a simple turn of a lever for water to flow into the trenches he’s dug and absorb into our gardens. The distant traces of special water still remaining in the tiny spring has been enough to guarantee our fruits and vegetables grow larger and faster than anyone else’s in the entire valley. Our garden – like our life on Andros – is always plentiful.

“I have to see Mrs. Anagnostou today,” John says, wiping sweat off his brow though the sun won’t be at its strongest for several hours. “I’ve owed her a basket of veggies the last few days for those eggs she gave us.”

“You better hurry up then,” I tell him. “The last thing you want is for her to come here and yell at us. I hear she swings a nasty rolling pin.”

“Hopefully I never have to find out whether the villagers just joke about that,” he says.

“Don’t worry, Daddy, I’ll help you fill the basket,” Janey says.

She stands at the railing next to me, looking down at her father. She’s dressed herself in her oldest clothes, the ones she wears whenever she plays in the dirt with her dad. I’m impressed that she was able to pick out her work clothes and put them on correctly; she even managed to avoid putting her shirt on backwards. She begins to rush toward the dirt path until I stop her.

“Actually, I was thinking of taking a rid to Batsi today,” I tell her.

“Really?” she asks. “
You
know how to drive?”

I glance down at John, who also looks at me with an eyebrow raised. He does most of the driving but I doubt that’s the reason he looks at me so suspiciously.

“Yes, I can drive when I want,” I tell Janey “We’re running low on some supplies so it wouldn’t hurt to stock up.”

“And what supplies would those be?” John asks.

“I want bread,
real
bread. Batsi has the only bakery on the island,” I say. “Plus I figured we could go to one of the island’s other beaches instead of the same ones we go to around here.”

“Yes!” Janey calls out, her squealing voice echoing in the morning air. “Sorry, Daddy, you’re on your own today.”

She excitedly rushes inside to get ready. If I were smart, I’d follow her inside and avoid John’s gaze. But it wouldn’t be fair to stop him from asking me what he wants.

“Would more
newspapers
be part of those supplies you’re stocking up on?” he asks.

“It can’t hurt to have as much information as possible,” I say.

If I told him about my vision – or my dream or
whatever
it was – I don’t know if he’d be more understanding or less about why I want to find out more about the chaos happening in Spain. I know he’s mentioned his own ability to connect to Cassie in the past but I doubt that’s happened for him again since he’s been so focused on leaving that part of his life behind. John nods but frowns as he does so, stopping his work to look around at his peaceful surroundings. Janey rushes out the door moments later.

“Ready to go!” she says, though in her excitement she’s put on her shirt backwards.

“I thought you said we needed stuff from the market and bakery,” Janey says.

We drive by the few stores on the outskirts of Batsi, the main tourist destination on Andros. I slow as we turn a corner and downshift our small car – at least I
try
to downshift. The car doesn’t quite go in gear and it makes an awful grinding noise as we jerk forward. It was a miracle that we drove the half-hour through the mountains without the transmission falling out; it would seriously suck if the car blew out now that we’re finally on flatter land.

“I thought you said you could drive,” Janey says.

“I
can
drive,” I snap, struggling to get the stick into the proper gear. “But I never said I could drive
well
. Just make sure your seatbelt is tight.”

My driving is probably just as big a hazard to my life as Cassie and her queens. In hindsight, it probably would’ve been smarter to wait until later for John to drive us. But I feel much better once the town – and more importantly
parking spots
– appear just ahead.

“I thought we’d head into town, take a walk around the little shops first to see if there’s anything else we want to buy,” I say. “We can stop at the market on our way back.”

Janey nods but I can only assume she’s smiling; her face is nearly pressed against her window as she takes in every detail of town. We rarely travel as far as Batsi and then it’s just to pass through. This
is
the first time we’ve actually stopped within the town since Janey was a toddler. The main beach is located within the town’s cove; farther into the sea we can see the large ferries and shipping boats headed toward and away from the port in the next town over. Across from the beach are several tiers of shops and restaurants, a few dozen in all. The town is quaint and scenic – and many more people wander around here than our section of mountain – but Janey looks on with utter amazement. It shouldn’t surprise me that she’d be excited by this type of environment; I don’t really think we’ll be able to keep her tucked away in the mountains forever. I just wonder how she’d react if she saw one of the world’s
real
cities, Barcelona or New York or Athens…

I feel much better when I safely pull into a parking spot. Our journey featured plenty of narrow roads, no guardrails and steep drops off the side of mountains. I expect Janey will want to jump out of her seat but she looks away from the scenery and stares at me.

“I thought you wanted to avoid bigger towns like Batsi,” she says.

I’m surprised and consider denying the truth but she’s growing up so quickly – and is so observant – that there’s no point of me lying to her. It won’t be long before she realizes I’ve kept the complete truth from her; the last thing I want is for her to grow up being distrustful of me.

“How did you know about that?” I ask her, not denying her claim.

“I heard you and Daddy talk about it before,” she says.

I want to shake my head in annoyance but my frustration is aimed more toward myself than Janey. For the first part of her life – several years – John and I were able to openly discuss anything around the little girl without consequence. We both have to realize how much older she’s getting, how smart she is, how much she picks up and understands what we’re saying.

“Are we hiding from something?” Janey asks. “Or some
one
?”

“Didn’t you listen to the story I told last night?” I ask, smiling. I’m referencing the truth but I hope Janey thinks I’m joking; unfortunately she’s too smart for that.

“I
did
,” she says. “But I couldn’t concentrate on my book and I couldn’t fall asleep for a while because I thought about it too much. I didn’t believe the story at first but then realized
nobody
would make up such a bad ending unless it was true.”

My natural instinct is to deny, to make sure I never tell the story to her again now that she’s remembering all the details. But I can’t hide the truth from her forever so there’s no use starting now.