empower: fight like a girl (words empower Book 1)

by Amy Berg

  “Yes, we are! Look how scared everyone is!”

  “Hans, have you ever been on a rollercoaster?”

  “We don’t have them in Cuba.”

  “Right… ” I searched my brain, “But maybe in a movie? Have you ever seen a rollercoaster in a movie? The kind where people go so fast they throw up their lunch? But they ride it again and again because it’s so much fun?”

  “Yes! One time in an American movie about baseball, there was a rollercoaster and all the kids threw up! I’ve always wanted to ride the rollercoaster until I throw up!” Hans smiled the tiniest smile.

  The plane tilted. Hans’ eyes were fearful but he was no longer crying. The rest of the plane had quieted a bit, and somehow, the person most terrified of flying was distracting them.

  “Yes! Exactly. I have an idea. Let’s pretend we’re on a rollercoaster. So every time we feel a little turbulence, we laugh.”

  “What if it’s a really big scary bump?”

  “Then we raise our hands as high as they’ll go and say ‘Wheeeeee!’”

  As if on cue the airplane tumbled. I forced myself to laugh. It sounded a slightly hysterical but Hans bought it. He forced a smile too. Our aircraft shook a few more times, each time we’d laugh harder, our laughter breaking the residual fear.

  Our pilot came over the loudspeaker, “We are beginning our descent. As we come through the clouds, the turbulence will rattle us a bit more so please keep your seatbelt tightly fastened.”

  I looked back at Hans. “Okay, that means hands up! Ready?”

  He smiled. This time, it was anything but tiny. “Ready!”

  The turbulence increased and we started to hit those hard dips that remind you of your last meal. Every time, instead of screaming with fear, we squealed with delight.

  “Wheeeeeeee!” Hans and I both laughed as we dropped.

  The rest of the passengers joined in on our adventure, raising their hands as we continued to shake and sway in the air. Before long we were approaching the runway. As soon as the wheels hit, the entire plane erupted into applause. Sure, it was partly because we were so happy to be there alive, but also because we made our thrill ride, well, thrilling. We literally laughed in the face of danger. And though danger put up a good fight, we won.

  When I stepped off the plane this time I was changed. I had figured out who I was, but only when I realized it was not about me. This whole, beautiful and terrifying life was never just about me. It’s about eating pizza. Riding rollercoasters. And reaching out to others in my most inconvenient time. Because that’s when they, and I, need it most.

  About The Author

  Jess Pineda was born and raised in the sweltering Cuban heat of Miami. While in college, she worked undercover in Cuba, transporting medical supplies and micro-enterprise loans on behalf of an NGO. When she decided she was done with being a "good person" she threw all their crap in a car (including her husband) and moved to Los Angeles to be a Television Writer. Since then, Jess has worked on shows such as The River, Zero Hour, and Workaholics, and even had a short stint as a dolphin trainer at the Seaquarium. If you want to contact her and tell her how pretty she is you can do so on the Twitter.

  Follow her on Twitter: @thejesspineda

  “Stolen Child”

  a Daughters of Lilith story

  by Jennifer Quintenz

  Come away, O human child!

  To the waters and the wild

  With a faery, hand in hand,

  For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand

  —“The Stolen Child” by William Butler Yeats

  She could have been a marble statue in my arms, each miniature feature carved with exquisite care. But this little statue was warm, her beauty made even more perfect by the life flowing through her. Even in the darkness, her skin seemed to radiate a precious glow. She sighed and shifted in her sleep, and my heart swelled. Pain and pride and fear made a jumble of my thoughts. Vulnerable. She is too vulnerable. I frowned. Only five years old. If I couldn’t get us out of this, she might not live to see six.

  I leaned back against the wall of our sanctuary. It was slick with moisture and grime, but I was too tired to care. The old storm drain access tunnel wouldn’t have been my first choice for a safe haven, but Emlyn had been exhausted. She’d never had to run like this before; she didn’t understand what was happening. I couldn’t bring myself to tell her that the life she’d known these past five years was over. But I could give her rest. And so we’d stopped running. I’d pried a metal grate up out of the street and told her to hurry, slip inside. She’d peered down into the darkness, and then those wide, gold-green eyes turned back to me. Fear shone from her face, but she swallowed it, knelt at the edge of the hole, and grabbed the first rung of the ladder tightly. Little hands, still plump with baby fat, curled around the rungs as she lowered herself into the unknown. I’d scanned the street, and then—satisfied our hunters hadn’t seen us—slipped into the shaft after her.

  Darkness was nothing to me. If anything, the lack of light clarified my world. I could pick my path easily through the blackness, but Emlyn was still a child. For her, the darkness fell like a veil over her eyes, blinding her to her surroundings, just as it had for her father. A human weakness. It would be more than ten years yet until Emlyn began to experience her Lilitu gifts. For now, I would have to scout the darkness for both of us.

  Emlyn shivered, and a faint whimper escaped her lips. A nightmare? I scanned the tunnel, torn. I’d heard nothing in the hour that we’d been hiding here, but that meant little. Guardsmen were persistent. Once they realized we’d slipped their net, they’d double back. Just the thought of their return made my skin start to crawl. We needed to move. We couldn’t afford the luxury of sleep, not if we hoped to see the dawn. The Guard was not known for its mercy. Capture would mean my death; Emlyn herself was living proof of my crimes. And as for Emlyn? They would not care that my daughter was innocent of any wrongdoing. To the Guard, we were both Lilitu demons. Succubae. This conflict traced its roots back to the beginning. It mattered little to the Guard that Adam and Lilith were both created from the same clay in Eden. The Sons of Adam and the Daughters of Lilith had been at war since the day Lilith left Adam alone in the Garden. We preyed on them. They hunted us. End of story.

  Emlyn whimpered again. A wave of anger surged through my gut. She needed me, and here I was cowering like a feeble human. Nothing stirred in the tunnel. I pulled in a long breath, weighing the risks. But then Emlyn shuddered, and my resolve failed. A few moments couldn’t hurt. I closed my eyes and slipped into her dream.

  Emlyn stood at the edge of a precipice. Her eyes were squeezed tightly shut, her little toes digging into the dirt at her feet. The earth around us was scorched, black and lifeless. The landscape seemed eerily familiar. I suppressed a shiver. She’d never seen the Lilitu realm, and yet it could have formed the backdrop of her nightmare. Something moved through the air around us, a vague and sinister monster dreamt up by Emlyn’s sleeping mind, fueled by her very real fear. At least I could end this torment.

  “I’m here, cricket.”

  Emlyn’s eyes opened. She gave a soft cry of relief and hurtled toward me, burying her face in my stomach. Her shoulders trembled. I ran my fingers through her dark hair. When she looked up again, some of the fear had eased from her face. “A nightmare?”

  “That’s right.” I felt her arms loosen from around my waist. I caught her hands and dropped to one knee, bringing us eye to eye. “But it’s over now.”

  “In here.” Her eyes darted to the sky. “What about out there?”

  I stared at her, startled. Emlyn—could she be lucid? It would be years before she should be able to navigate her dreams. I gave her a bland smile. “Out where, baby?”

  “In the real world.” At my blank expression, she sighed with frustration. “In the not-dream world. Why are those men chasing us?”

  “It’s—it’s complicated, cricket.” My eyes dropped to our hands. Her
little fingers threaded between mine so naturally. How could this be wrong? My amazing Emlyn. My brilliant, funny, silly little girl. She was as much a part of me as my own beating heart. And if I’d obeyed the treaty, I would never have known her. She would never have come to be.

  Emlyn tilted her head to one side, studying me closely. “I’m not a baby. Maybe you should try to explain it?” She looked so serious, that adult expression so out of place on her cherubic features. My heart twisted painfully in my chest.

  “I will, I promise.” I gave her a gentle smile and reached up to smooth her dark hair back from her face. “But right now you need to rest.”

  “No dreams?” She regarded me with a strange mixture of hurt and relief.

  “No dreams,” I echoed. I leaned forward and kissed her on the forehead, imposing my will on the fragile scaffolding of her sleeping mind. The nightmare slid away from us, and when I pulled back, Emlyn’s eyes were closed. I released her, and she drifted, peacefully, in the formless void of dreamless sleep.

  I slipped out of the bubble surrounding Emlyn’s consciousness, into the vast landscape of the universal dream shared by all living creatures. Dots of light dusted the vast expanse like stars, each one a sleeping mind. I was exhausted and weak; it was tempting to slip into a stranger's dream and garner even the barest amount of sustenance. But more than energy, I needed an ally.

  I focused my thoughts on Mielyn. From the dusting of stars, one gleaming mote began drifting toward me. As it grew closer, I sensed Mielyn’s presence. Confident, independent, mischievous…familiar. Mielyn and I had spent a decade traveling this country together over a century ago. She was the closest thing I had to a sister, though we’d not spoken since before Emlyn’s birth.

  Well, what are you waiting for? I felt Mielyn’s amusement. Come in.

  I placed my hand on the shell of Mielyn’s dream, and then I was standing next to her on the ramshackle porch of an old Victorian boarding house. I smiled. We’d stayed here for several months on one of our jaunts, feeding off of the male boarders in the house across the street. She looked exactly the same, down to her ’20s-era blond bob and fire-engine red lipstick.

  “Look at you, darling. The years have been…” Mielyn’s eyes narrowed, “just wretched to you, Vy. Honestly, what did you do to piss off Father Time?”

  “The Guard’s found us.”

  Mielyn’s smile slipped. “By ‘us’ should I assume you mean—?”

  “I have a daughter.” My eyes welled with unexpected tears. “We’re in trouble.”

  “A—a daughter.” Mielyn licked her lips, unsettled. “You have a daughter. Tell me she’s adopted.”

  “She’s mine. She’s five years old.” I brushed a hand across my eyes, smiling as the image of Emlyn crossed my mind. “You’d love her, she’s a real spitfire—”

  “And you’re surprised they’re hunting you?” Mielyn’s voice hardened. “Vy, we have one rule.”

  “I know, but—”

  “One night. You find a man, you feed from him for one night, and then you move on. No harm, no foul, no turning him into a hollow shell of a body incapable of independent thought. No killing him.” Mielyn turned away from me abruptly. “I can’t believe you got so careless. What the hell happened? You were too tired to look for fresh meat? You know what happens after three nights! Did you lose track of the day?”

  A cold knot of anger seized my stomach. “It wasn’t an accident, Mielyn. I wanted this. I wanted a child.”

  “Oh, well, I’m sure if you just explain that to the Guard, they’ll forgive you for taking a human life.”

  “Mielyn, I haven’t touched a man since that night—”

  “You killed a Son of Adam.” Mielyn glanced back at me, her expression stony. “What about the rest of us? What you’ve done paints a target on all our backs.”

  “Don’t be naive,” I snapped. “The Guard doesn’t care how gently we treat our prey, only that we’re predators. They want us all dead.”

  “That’s not exactly true.” Mielyn spoke so softly that for a moment I thought I’d misunderstood her. “What do you mean?”

  “There is a Lilitu who works with the Guard.”

  I studied Mielyn carefully. “A prisoner?”

  “An equal. They trust her. And there’s more.” Mielyn glanced around, as if worried someone might be listening in. She stepped closer to me, dropping her voice. “They say she’s made a deal with Sansenoy.”

  “A deal? With an angel?” My voice sounded sharp in my ears, full of mistrust.

  “In return for her help, he’s promised to make her human.”

  “That’s not—that can’t be true.”

  Mielyn shrugged. “Perhaps. But I’ve heard it from many tongues.”

  “Are you saying we could—?”

  “Us?” Mielyn chuckled bitterly. “When we’ve been in the business of deflowering strapping young men for centuries? I don’t think so.”

  “What makes her so special, then?”

  “She’s young. She hasn’t taken any lovers yet. But there’s a line, and if she crosses it, the deal’s off.” Mielyn shrugged. “Just a matter of time, if you ask me.”

  “Emlyn,” I whispered. “She’s never hurt anyone. Maybe—maybe the angel would offer her the same chance?”

  Mielyn’s smile faded. “I kind of got the impression it was a one-time offer.”

  “But you don’t know for sure.” The possibilities unspooled in my mind. Emlyn as a human. Free from the specter of execution at the hands of the Guard. Free to love without the fear of destroying her mate. She could have a real life. My eyes refocused on Mielyn. “Who is this Lilitu? Where can I find her?”

  “Her name is Braedyn,” Mielyn said slowly. She gave me a veiled look, as if half-afraid I was losing my mind. “She lives in New Mexico.”

  “What town?”

  Mielyn licked her lips again. “Vy, she lives with the Guard. If they find you walking their streets—”

  “Mielyn, please.”

  For a moment, Mielyn didn’t speak. Then she let out a long sigh. “Just promise me you’ll be careful.”

  “I will.” I caught Mielyn’s hand. “I promise.”

  “It’s called Puerto Escondido.”

  I opened my mouth to thank her, but before I could speak the words—

  —my eyes snapped open. The skittering clank of metal echoed through the tunnel. Someone had stumbled into the pile of rusted cans I’d fished out of the muck. I heard the muffled curse of a man and froze. The beam of a flashlight reflected off the water-slicked walls fifty yards behind us. The light burned in my vision for a fraction of a second before my eyes adjusted. Adrenaline flooded my system. I grabbed Emlyn by the shoulders and shook her, more roughly than I’d meant to. Her eyes flew open, and I clamped a hand over her mouth, muffling her gasp of surprise.

  “It’s me,” I whispered. “We have to move, cricket.” Emlyn’s hands groped for me blindly. I caught one of them and gave it a warm squeeze, and then released her mouth.

  “They found us?” Her voice trembled, even as she struggled to sit up.

  “Let me carry you, baby.” I stood and helped Emlyn to her feet. “One, two, three.” She jumped up into my arms, encircling her legs around my waist and clinging to me tightly. My attention was fixed on the men behind us, growing closer by the moment. I started moving, picking my way quickly along the slick concrete path. I knew their progress would be halting, slowed by the limits of their human sight. We rounded a bend, and I picked up speed.

  But this time, I wasn’t running away. For the first time in a long time, I had something to run toward.

  We climbed onto the damp street at dusk. The grate let us out into an alley, looking out onto a side street. I could hear the buzz of evening traffic, but no cars passed us by. I helped Emlyn out of the hatch and then carefully replaced the grate behind us. It fell into place with a dull clang. Hopefully, the sound was too faint to carry over the noise of the storm-water runoff in the tu
nnels below.

  Emlyn watched me, her small face smeared with dirt. I gave her a smile and bent to wipe away the grime with the edge of my shirt, discovering only then that my clothes were even grimier than her face. I let the fabric fall and glanced around. We needed to get off the street. If there were Guardsmen in the tunnels, there were sure to be Guardsmen searching the streets as well.

  Light flooded an alley across the street from us. I turned. A man slipped through a door and let it close behind him. He was tall and lanky, dressed simply; black pants and a white button-down shirt, rolled up at the sleeves. He fished in his pocket for something. A cigarette. I scanned the street quickly. No pedestrians. I could see the street at the end of the block. Cars zipped past, none lingering long enough to give me cause for alarm.

  “Quickly, cricket.” I clutched Emlyn’s hand tightly and darted across the street. I focused on the man, urging the last of my energy into the task before me. I was filthy, exhausted, and scared, but none of that mattered. In less than a minute, this stranger would be willing to die to protect us. He looked up, lighter poised just inches from the end of his cigarette. I smiled—the inviting kind of smile that makes them think they’re a part of something special, something important. A faint breeze kicked up, teasing my hair back from my face. I held his eyes as we approached. Eye contact helped, and I was weak enough to know I needed to pull out all the stops to enthrall this man. He swallowed, suddenly looking unsure. The flame of his lighter flickered. Went out.

  “I’m sorry to bother you.” Even depleted as I was, my voice came out rich and smooth. My honey voice, Emlyn called it. Not that I made a habit of enthralling men around her, but she’d seen it enough times to know this was different than a normal conversation. “We’re a bit lost. Do you know someplace we might be able to get a bite to eat and clean up?”

  “Yeah—yes. I mean, please, allow me.” He thrust the forgotten cigarette back into his pocket and opened the door, revealing the warmth and chaos of a busy kitchen. I felt my smile falter. Too many eyes. He saw my hesitation. “It’s okay. Really. My kitchen, my rules.” He knelt to face Emlyn. “Are you hungry? I make a mean macaroni and cheese.”