Vengeance (27 page)

I blow out a breath
and lean back in my chair, wincing at the muscles that ache in my
lower back.  Learning to hobble with the walking stick has been
hard, taxing.  “What about sounds?  Could you hear
anything? Smell anything?”

She shoots me a
contemptible look.  “Smell?”

“Just humor
me.  I know how this stuff works...or at least I used to,”
I amend, feeling frustration over the continued lack of not being
able to use my abilities.  I’m not really sure that I can
truly remember what life was like before.  Before I knew that I
was deadly, before I could turn invisible or create tornados with my
mind.  When emotions didn’t threaten to tear down entire
cities.  I have spent the past two years hating my abilities,
for the responsibility that was placed on my shoulders because of it,
and yet now...when they are lost to me I find myself feeling empty.

These past couple of
months have taught me one very important thing: my abilities are a
part of who I am.  Who I am meant to be.  I cannot split a
soul in half any more than I can strip my abilities away and be
grateful for it.  

Natasha glances over
her shoulder at Hyde and then shrugs.  “I heard the hum of
the lasers and screaming of course.”  She screws up her
mouth, chewing on her lower lip.  Raising her legs she tucks
them under her, balancing crisscross on the chair.  “I
heard engines,” she says, her eyes widening.  “I
think they were ours.”

I glance at Hyde.
 “You have a way off this rock and didn’t tell me?”

“No.”
 He looks down at Natasha.  “We don’t.”

“I meant
Caldonian ships.  I don’t think they were very big.  Maybe
one of the smaller scout ships.  It was all sort of jumbled but
I’d swear to it.”

I run my hands
through my hair, thinking it over before looking to Hyde.  “Do
you think they can find us way out here?”

He shakes his head.
 “Doubtful.  We’ve been trying to track down
Drach and his men for years.  They come and go with hardly any
spacial disturbance.  It took our best guys to catch even a
small trace of their ship before we were attacked on Calisted.  We
hardly had any time to put ourselves in position to be taken before
they were gone.  In and out.  Precision attacks.  They
excel at that.”

“And do you
think there are more of them?  Now that Drach is gone?”

Natasha snorts and
we look over at her.  “Seriously?” she says.  “You
haven’t told her yet?”

Hyde has the good
grace to at least look slightly embarrassed.  “I didn’t
think it was the right time.”

“Whatever,”
she rolls her eyes.  “Are we done here?  It’s
past my bedtime.”

I start to say
something but Hyde steps in.  “Nah.  We’re
good.  Thanks, Tasha.”

She shoots me a hard
glance and then leaves, her book long forgotten on the table.
 “Tasha?” I arch an eyebrow.  “You two a
couple?”

Hyde snorts.
 “Hardly.  She’s like a little sis to me.  I
guess after her brother fell it was only natural.  She’s a
good kid for the most part.  You just have a knack at getting
under her skin.”

I purse my lips and
lean back into my chair.  My head has begun to pound.  Pain
jabs behind my right eye.  I’ve been getting more and more
frequent headaches the past few days.  “So if she’s
got Seer blood in her how come she didn’t know her brother was
going to die?”

Hyde sighs heavily
and sinks into a chair beside me.  He places his legs on a chair
before us, crossing them at his ankles.  He laces his fingers
together and rests them in his lap.  “She did know.”

His words take a
moment to fully sink in and when they do I can feel my throat clench.
 “That’s why she was there.  She knew he was
going to fall into that crevice and she tried to save him.”

He nods and remains
silent.  I close my eyes for a moment, thinking over how truly
horrible that must have been for her.  To not be strong enough
to hold on to him as he slipped from her fingers.  “She
must have just been a kid,” I whisper.

“Only a few
days past fourteen at my best guess.  She wears a necklace that
he gave her on her birthday.  Never takes it off.  Don’t
think she really can.  She’s still trying to hold on to
him.”

I offer Hyde a weak
smile as I look over at him.  “She’s lucky to have
you.”

“A lot of good
I did for her.”  His grim expression melds into a grimace.
 “I couldn’t even stop those beasts from hurting her
on that ship.”

I
reach over and take his hand, placing it in mine atop my leg.  He
looks down at me and I can see confusion in his eyes but I ignore it.
 “You saved her life, gave her something to fight for.  I
know something about that.  Having a reason to get up each
morning and keep fighting is priceless.  Without that she
wouldn't have made it this long.”

He remains silent
beside me for several minutes, long enough for me to think over how
drastically I have begun to rely on him.  Without Hyde I would
struggle to get around.  I feel safe with him.  Something I
was sure I could never feel with anyone other than Eamon, Bastien or
Kyan.  

“You saved me
too,” I whisper.  His fingers flinch against mine but he
doesn’t pull away.  “You know, when we first met I
figured you for a real pain in my backside.  I’m glad I
was wrong about you.”

He clears his throat
and straightens up, withdrawing his hand.  “Don’t go
getting all soft on me now, Queeny.  Not sure you really want to
see this old guy start blubbering.”

“You’re
not old.”

“Trust
me...I’m a lot older than I look.”

I
nod, glad to know that my guess about him was right.  He is
Caldonian and as such ages differently than I did on Earth.  By
appearances I would say that Hyde is at least eight or nine years
older than me but by Caldonian math he has probably lived ten times
as long as I have.  

“When are you
going to tell me why you’re really here?”  He blinks
and turns to look at me, his chin resting on his clasped hands, his
elbows perched against his knees.  “Come on, Hyde.  We
both know you’re not in it for the sake of helping countless
innocent people.  You may be a good guy, but you’re also
looking out for number one.  Niyah is a big girl and she doesn’t
need you to watch out for her so I’d like to know what’s
in this for you?”

His adam’s
apple bobs several times and still he remains quiet.  I wait,
knowing that the longer it takes for him to speak the less chance I
have of getting an answer from him.

“Fine,”
I grunt, pressing heavily against my walking stick to rise to my
feet.  I waver, threatening to topple over.  With my center
of gravity thrown off by my ballooning stomach I know without Hyde’s
quick reflexes I would have spilled over onto the floor.  

“Darn it,
Queeny.  You’re gonna go and get yourself hurt!”  He
growls at me as he rises and helps steady me.  His hands feel
hot and clammy against my shoulders.  I can feel the tension
coursing through him as he looks away, gritting his teeth.

As a slight flush
rises in his cheeks a dawning realization falls over me.  “You’re
here for a girl.”  His jaw clenches as he refuses to look
at me.  “You’re...you’re in love, aren’t
you?”

“Love?”
he snorts.  “Never been in love before, at least not like
the way I’ve seen Niyah look at Bastien.”

When I stiffen he
mutters a halfhearted apology.  I sway on my feet and he reaches
out for me, frowning.  “You’re pale as a ghost.”
 Without stopping to ask, Hyde lifts me into his arms and
carries me back to my room.  The feel of the familiar cot
beneath me is comforting as I lay back.  He grabs a blanket off
the side table and drapes it over me, too lost in thought to realize
how hot it is in here.  

“There is
someone you care about here though, isn’t there?” I press
as gently as I can.

Hyde nods slowly and
rises to his full height.  “I had a girl once.  She
was taken about a year ago.  No one saw the attack coming.
 Pulled her right out of my hands.”

He scratches at his
beard.  Though he has made some effort to keep it at bay since
my health decided to improve, I can tell he doesn’t take near
the amount of care with his beard as Donan does.  “What
was her name?” I ask.

“Thesa.”

I smile.  “It’s
a lovely name.”

Hyde nods absently.
 “People disapproved of us.  Said it was unnatural
but I never cared.  She was who I wanted and that’s all
that mattered.”

I push up onto my
elbows to stare up at him, deeply touched by the pain on his face.
 “Why was it unnatural?”

He glances over at
me and then walks away.  I watch until he reaches the open
doorway.  He pauses and looks back.  “She was a Faeas
from the planet Bristar,” he responds.  When he realizes
my confusion he almost smiles.  “On your world you would
have called her a fairy.”

The assassin's base
is a hive of near constant activity these days.  Intel has
started to arrive giving away recent movements of the Duturi camp.
 They are nomads, feeding off the land, using all of its
resources before moving on. They are smart. Too smart.

Hyde has been gone a
lot, out on patrols.  He leads groups deep into the swamps,
leaving me alone for hours on end.  The longer I am forced to
remain behind, the harder it is to accept that this will be my life
now.  It is not just my unborn children that forces me to rest.

It
feels like a constant battle for me to keep depression at bay. I put
on a brave face for Hyde and Reyes when they are around, but their
free time has diminished and there is no one else here that I feel
comfortable with.  Since my last chat with Natasha I have
discovered that she has been volunteering for the extended hunting
trips.  I don’t really know if it’s because she
would rather not face me in person or if it is my questions that she
fears most.

Some part of me
wonders if she lied about what she saw.  That she held a little
back, but if so...why?  She certainly doesn’t hold any
loyalty toward me so what reason would she have to be dishonest?

Sitting in the main
room, watching men gear up all around me, I feel exactly what I have
become: utterly useless.

“Cheer
up, sweet cheeks,” Hyde calls when he enters the room.  He
is dressed in a wash of muddy brown and green, much like the cammo
the military of Earth donned.  These clothes are a brighter
green though to match the vines that dangle from the trees, providing
cover for them as they move about.  “I’ll only be
gone a day this time.”

I smile up at him.
 “What makes you think I’ll miss you?”

He offers me a
lopsided grin.  Seeing it reminds me of just how much our
relationship has changed.  He still has his tougher moments,
those times when he needs to be stern, like an older brother but
there is a softer side to him too.  

It took me a few
days to finally draw out all of the details about Thesa.  A
winged being of extraordinary beauty is not something you see every
day.  He told me her skin was as blue as the sky and her eyes
the color of the seas, lavender and filled with life.  She liked
to laugh, he had told me.  It was the first thing that drew him
to her.  Her laughter sounded like the tinkling of bells.  Her
wings were made of gossamer, as dark as a plum and spanning from
shoulder to her calves.  I wish that I could have met her.  I
am sure I would have liked her.

I know why Hyde
leaves each day.  He is searching for her.  She is his
reason for being here.  Not for some stupid war, or money or
power.  Love drives him.

Hyde leans down and
ruffles my hair.  “See you around.”

I watch him motion
for his group to follow him.  Five men, each dressed similarly
instant fall in line behind him.  They jog toward the exit and
are gone.  I can hear the clattering of pots from another
corridor and sigh, knowing that I’m not even fit to help in the
kitchens now.

Grabbing my walking
stick, I attempt to rise.  “No!”

Startled by the cry,
I turn and look to see Vanata and Donan rushing toward me.  “I
just wanted to take a walk.”

Vanata loops her
hand through my arm and Donan through the other.  Together they
help me stand, holding on to me as I struggle to find my balance.  It
is nearly impossible to see my foot now.  My stomach has grown
at an alarming rate the past month.

I expect them to
release me and let me pass but when they don’t I look to Donan.
 “What’s wrong?”

He shares a loaded
glance with Vanata before speaking.  “We need to give you
a checkup.  Make sure the babies are healthy.”

Even though his
words sound sincere I sense a deeper meaning.  “What is
wrong with my babies?”

Vanata’s grip
tightens on my arm for a brief second and I turn to look at her.
 “Vanata?”

She purses her lips
before meeting my gaze.  “I am worried about how rapidly
they are growing.  You can’t be more than six months along
but you look nearly full term.”

“Well, they’re
twins, right?  I mean, it makes sense that they would be large.”

“No.”
 She shakes her head.  “Not this large.  I need
to examine you.”

Fear roots itself
deeply in my heart.  I look toward the exit of the cave, wishing
Hyde were still here.  I have grown to depend on him for
strength when I am most afraid and right now, I’m terrified.

I
lie with my hand over my closed eyes, trying not to think of all of
the possible causes for the rapid growth.  Vanata’s hands
feel cold against my leg as she examines me.  I hold my breath,
praying for good news.  “Well?”

She
lowers the blanket, covering me fully as she helps me lower my leg.
 Turning her back on me, she walks to the basin and cleans her
hands without speaking.  I watch her, waiting with bated breath.

Donan stands by the
exit to my room, his arms crossed over his chest, his face grim.  He
exchanges a glance with Vanata then turns to leave without a word or
second glance at me.  Finally she turns to face me and I can see
fear in her eyes.