The Phantom Oracle (Vampire Innocent Book 5)

by Matthew S. Cox

  She grins. “No, they’re friendly. Little creepy, but nice. Well, Lucy over there doesn’t like me because I can still walk around, but the others are telling her to leave me alone. Lucy doesn’t like people.”

  Aurélie breezes into the room.

  “Oh, your dolls are so lovely,” says Sophia in a faintly British accent, a huge grin on her face.

  “Oh! Tu trop mignon!” Aurélie clasps her hands beneath her chin. “If my heart was not so soft, I’d want to keep her.”

  I chuckle. “Did you do that on purpose?”

  “Do what?” Sophia asks, all innocence.

  “Use that accent. We’re not actually in a creepy manor house in the English countryside circa 1802. We’re only dressed like it.”

  She giggles.

  “Aurélie?” I ask.

  “Hmm?” She pivots toward me.

  “She’s started seeing auras. Do you know how that happened or what it means?”

  Sophia nods. “Hers is dark blue with a bit of white at the edges. And I see ghosts, too.”

  Aurélie glides closer and sits on an ottoman so she’s eye-level with Sophia. “May I?”

  Sophia shrugs, then nods.

  They stare at each other for a moment.

  “Your sister has been affected by magic. Someone displaced her spirit and took her over.” Aurélie narrows her eyes. “Who did this?”

  I explain the mystics, the rival lodge that probably used her to search our house for Coralie’s body.

  “Ahh. Perhaps. Being exposed to this magic unlocked something inside her. It has always been there, though she may not have ever known or been able to access that part of herself without the touch of supernatural energies.”

  “Cool,” whispers Sophia.

  “So it’s harmless?” I ask.

  “Oui. The only risk to her is possibly seeing something she cannot handle. Not all spirits are… pleasant to the eye.”

  Sophia turns a little paler.

  We return to the living room, where Sierra—surprisingly still in her doll dress—is engrossed in the video game. Our parents are on the sectional, Sam between them, out cold. Sophia dashes over to the relatively open area nearer the door in and proceeds to try dancing while wearing such a fancy gown.

  Aurélie vanishes back down the hallway.

  I head over and sit by the parents.

  “You look so beautiful,” says Dad. “The three of you. Like something straight out of a fairy tale.”

  “We look like characters from one of those boring movies Mom likes,” says Sierra.

  “Oh, Sierra,” calls Sophia in a passable British accent. “Come and see the garden! I bet there are faeries.”

  Mom smiles, then giggles.

  I glance at her, then dad, and hold up three fingers.

  He holds up four.

  Is she that worried? I ask in Dad’s mind.

  He shakes his head, thinking, No. The wine is amazing. Expensive stuff. She kinda overdid it.

  I grin. Okay, at least Mom’s not having a stress attack.

  Aurélie returns carrying the large canvas. She brings it over and turns it so we can see her work… and wow. Dad was right. We do look like something straight out of a storybook. Sam’s depicted in an outfit like that painting The Blue Boy. Kinda weird she painted him wearing shoes, but I guess a barefoot boy in a painting looks more like a pauper than ‘innocent.’ The way we’re posed resembles a painting of some king’s brood.

  Sophia, predictably, gasps in glee and gushes about how beautiful it is. Much to my surprise, even Sierra appears impressed. Mom and Dad whistle, in awe of Aurélie’s skill. I’m sure neither one of them expected to see a painting that looks like an old master did it.

  “That is beautiful work,” says Mom. “You really painted that in… two and a half hours?”

  I wag my eyebrows. “She works fast.”

  “Thank you.” Aurélie curtsies at Mom. “I am glad you like it.”

  “It’s fabulous. You’ve got an amazing talent.” Mom, no longer seeming quite so tipsy, leans close and studies the canvas. “It’s nearly photographic.”

  “You are far too kind.” Aurélie fakes a blush. “Oh. If you like, I can create a copy for you.”

  “No, please,” whispers Sierra.

  “It’s all right. I’d love that, but I couldn’t ask you to go to the time or expense.” Mom fans herself. “Is it warm in here?”

  “Yeah, it’s eighty… four-glasses-of-wine degrees.” I poke her in the side. “I’m wearing this elaborate thing and I’m not even uncomfortable.”

  “You’re also a vampire,” says Sierra.

  “Are you overheating?” I raise both eyebrows at her.

  “Only my face from blushing.”

  Aurélie waves at Mom as if dismissing a triviality. “It is no bother. I insist.”

  “We can hang it right in the living room,” says Dad with a huge smile. “Right above the TV.”

  “Please no,” whispers Sierra. “Everyone will see it.”

  I throw an arm around her. “It’s not bad. You look so adorable.”

  “But, I’m not adorable.”

  Dad gives her a ‘yeah, you are’ look.

  “Are you really that upset by it?” I ask.

  She shrugs. “I just don’t wanna be teased.”

  “No one will tease you for wearing a dress. You’re a girl.” Sam yawns. “They’d tease me if I had a dress on.”

  Sierra gives up with a long sigh. “Fine. Just… not the living room, please?”

  Dad nods. “Okay. Dining room.”

  I lean down and whisper in Sierra’s ear. “If anyone teases you, I’ll blot the painting out of their memory.”

  She grins. “Awesome.”

  Aurélie sits with Sophia and me on the left side of the sofa, and I can’t help but feel like my sister and I are dolls at the table of a giant child having a tea party. Sierra keeps playing the game, so engrossed in such a massive screen she’s almost forgotten how frilled up she is. Or maybe she’s just tolerating a dress she can’t stand because she can’t remove it without help.

  The parents mostly watch the video game while having wine and cheese. Yeah, I’m going to need to drive us home.

  28

  The Graveyard of the Pacific

  Sunday is an irritatingly sunny day, so I spend the daylight hours in my room doing schoolwork.

  At least until Ashley shows up. She’s got a rare day off work and has no classes today, so she comes over. Michelle’s bogged down with stuff to do for school, and Hunter’s both working and drowning in studying as well.

  Other than my being stuck in the basement, the day feels pretty close to old times hanging out with my best friend. We even break out the ping pong table… though Ashley gets frustrated fast when I start exploiting my reflexes without even thinking about it. I can’t not do it, so rather than play for score, we devolve into her just trying to send a ball past me.

  We laugh like idiots the whole time.

  The parents invite her to stay for dinner. She’s unusually hesitant, citing her mom’s been on the lonely side lately. As kids, we’d often randomly eat dinner at the others’ house. Ever since her parents divorced a couple years ago, her mother has been growing increasingly quiet and withdrawn. Ashley having dinner here means her mom eats alone. Since our moms are close friends, my mother says she’s going to invite Mrs. Carter over, and runs off to find her phone.

  Dinner is nice, especially with Ashley’s mom being in a good mood.

  Ashley decides to go home and spend some time with her mom. So, I head downstairs to throw the rest of the night at homework. Since Sierra kept up her end and helped Mom wash windows all day, she’s on the PlayStation. Sam goes upstairs to his room for computer games while Sophia drapes herself over the couch to read her Kindle.

  Alone, I no longer have a need for pants, so I change into just a long T-shirt and flop at my desk to read more sociology.

  Not quite a half hour later,
my phone rings. Great. The universe must really not want me doing homework.

  The caller ID shows the number on Darren’s card.

  Oh, goody. Tonight’s going to be cold and wet.

  I pick up and swipe at the screen. “Hello?”

  “Sarah?” asks Darren.

  “That’s me.”

  “We have created a tool that should assist you in locating the books we need.”

  I scuff my toes back and forth over the carpet. “Great. How’s it work?”

  “It’s an ordinary compass that we’ve enchanted to react to magic instead of magnetism. It should point toward the strongest source of magic in an area.”

  “And I’m guessing there isn’t too much of that on the ocean floor.”

  “Doubtful. When do you think you would feel inclined to uphold your promise?”

  “Might as well do it tonight.” I stare at the ceiling. All my life, I’ve always hated having assignments hanging over me. The sooner I deal with this, the sooner I can stop worrying about mystics.

  “Excellent. I’ll stop by your house in about an hour with the compass.”

  “Okay.”

  He hangs up.

  I spend a moment wondering if I’m supposed to wear anything under the wetsuit, but decide to change into my bikini, then slip into the wetsuit. It covers everything but my head, hands, and feet. I bought one toward the midrange that the place had in terms of cost. Hopefully, this thing will hold up to me swimming at vampiric speed. Oh, I checked Google. Riptides that move at five miles an hour are ‘unusually fast.’ Riptides can steal swimsuits. So yeah… I had to be doing at least fifty underwater at my fastest.

  Eventually, my phone tweeps with a text from Darren’s number: ‹I’m outside.›

  It’s like two hours after dinner, so everyone’s still awake. Guessing he didn’t want to disturb the family—or be seen. I head upstairs and go out the front door, not bothering to put shoes on. A small dark silver BMW sports car sits in the middle of the cul-de-sac.

  Darren and Landon get out as I walk over. Both raise eyebrows at me.

  “What? Never saw a wetsuit before?”

  “It is a bit unusual to see someone wearing one in the suburbs. Especially at this time of year.” Darren chuckles to himself, then offers me a camouflage metal compass.

  I take and examine it, underwhelmed. “This? It looks like you ordered it off Amazon.”

  “We did,” says Landon. “An object does not need to be unusual or precious to absorb an enchantment.”

  “Though it helps.” Darren points at it. “Look more closely.”

  When I glance back down at the compass sitting in my hands, it hits me that the needle appears to be gold, with a tiny diamond at the tip. “New needle.”

  “Indeed. Please try not to lose that. We would appreciate it back if at all possible.” Darren gestures at it.

  “Okay. Let me, umm… go start looking then.”

  Landon waves his hand around in a weird gesture that reminds me of something a priest might do when blessing a person. He mutters a few words in Latin, then switches to English. “May Poseidon guide you.”

  “Thanks.” I force myself to smile, but don’t fire off a wiseass comment. Hey, I’m a vampire, and this guy did something to the house that trapped Coralie in there. If he wants to invoke Poseidon to help me, whatever.

  After they get back in their little car, I return to the house and find the parents plus Sierra and Sophia in the living room still.

  “Gonna go out for a bit.”

  Everyone except Sierra—who’s glued to the PlayStation—looks at me.

  “In a wetsuit?” asks Dad.

  “Yeah.” I hold up the compass. “Got the device that’s supposed to find the missing trunk. Gonna go roam around the bottom of the Pacific for a while, searching shipwrecks.”

  “Okay, dear,” says Mom. “Try not to stay out too late.”

  “Watch out for sharks.” Sierra pauses the game. “You’re supposed to do the biting, not be eaten.”

  I give her a thumbs-up. “That’s my plan.”

  “To bite sharks?” asks Dad.

  “No…” I roll my eyes. “To come home without being shark food.”

  “Be careful.” Mom stands up and walks around the end of the sofa to hug me. “Call us if you need anything.”

  “I’m not bringing my phone. Don’t want it to die. And this thing doesn’t have pockets.”

  Mom tugs at a small zipper at the stomach. “What’s this?”

  Upon further examination, I come to the realization that the wetsuit does have a pocket. “Oh, neat. Well, I can put the compass in there.”

  “You need a knife,” says Dad.

  “Why?” Mom twists back to look at him. “What on Earth would she need a knife for?”

  Dad peers over his book at us. “All divers carry knives. It’s just what they do.”

  “Dad…” I hold up my right hand and sprout claws. “I am a knife. Besides, I’m going out the door now. Amazon doesn’t deliver that fast.”

  “Give ’em a few years.” Dad resumes reading the Kindle. “In fact, they probably heard me through this thing and a diving knife is already on its way here.”

  I laugh. “Okay, guys. Be back as fast as I can.”

  Mom hugs me. “I’m going to be a nervous wreck until you’re home.”

  “Heh. So will I. Never done anything like this before.”

  “Hey.” Dad looks up from the device again. “Can you get the bends?”

  “Umm. I don’t think I’m going down that deep. But I’m not sure.” I decide not to mention that I regenerated from a broken spine, so the bends probably won’t kill me—again. “I’ll take it easy.”

  They nod.

  I head out via the kitchen patio door since the backyard offers more privacy for takeoff. It’s pretty easy to figure out which way is west, and once I’ve climbed up to a thousand or so feet of altitude, I can kinda match up the shape of the coastline with the maps Darren gave me. Yeah, it’s a giant area of ocean, but I’m hoping this compass will give me some clue of where to be before I go under. I can cover much more mileage in the air in less time.

  We’re about a hundred miles from the Pacific Coast, so I’m looking at almost an hour just to fly to the shore. Luckily, the Graveyard of the Pacific is right up against the land, so I won’t need to go out to the deep ocean. As best I can tell from their notes, the boat carrying the books never made it to the Strait of Juan de Fuca, so I’m looking at an area from the mouth of the strait south to around Astoria. So it could be anywhere within a rectangle like eighty miles potentially out to sea and 140 or so south.

  It’s probably around nine when I reach the coast. Some planes went by overhead, but I’m low, small, and slow enough that I doubt anyone saw me. Also, all-black wetsuit helps. From this altitude, it’s super easy to find the strait’s mouth and head for it. This modified compass is useless for actual directions, so I have to guess from here.

  The scent of sea salt fills my nostrils as I descend to skim a couple feet off the surface of the water. Honestly, whether I tease the waves this close or go a little higher probably won’t make that much difference in the compass picking up magic at the bottom. The fifth time an icy spritz of seawater hits me in the face, I pull up a bit.

  What the heck am I thinking?

  Am I really going to swim in the ocean and go down to the bottom? The idea of it is terrifying. Even though I know I can’t drown, there’s just something about the sea. Especially a location where so many people have died. Maybe this area is charged with bad energy.

  I never imagined I’d ever be out at sea at night, alone like this. It’s simultaneously sad, creepy, scary, and awesome.

  Of course, I also never imagined I’d become a vampire—or that they even seriously existed.

  Waves froth and churn over a seemingly endless expanse of darkness below me. Ugh. Salt water isn’t the same as lake water. I have no idea how well (if at all) I’ll b
e able to see when I go down. Again, I remind myself that a face mask would never stay on me as fast as I’ll be going, so I don’t feel like too much of an idiot for not getting one.

  I start off watching the compass to see if the needle reacts to anything, but after an unexpected wave slaps me in the face, I pay a little attention to my surroundings as well. Ugh. Being soaked makes me feel half frozen already. For well more than an hour, I fly back and forth from east to west, going south for ten seconds each time I reach the coast or my estimation of the outside edge of my search area.

  Eventually, the needle stops drifting around aimlessly and seems to want to point to my left. I lean into a gradual turn until it orients straight ahead, then fly in that direction for a while until it drifts left. I stop and watch it, and the needle keeps going all the way around until it’s pointing the exact opposite way.

  Ugh. It’s reacting too sluggishly to pinpoint anything, probably because of distance. I peer east. Okay, it looks like I’m only about twenty miles from shore here. Screw it. I could go back and forth for hours above the surface, constantly chasing a point that moves after the fact. It would be like playing an online game with tons of lag. In short: frustrating as hell.

  Here goes nothing.

  I lower myself into the water, and shiver for a minute until my body adjusts to the ocean temperature being normal. It’s pretty obvious when that happens as the wind blasting over my face starts to seem warm and cozy. Well, if nothing else, that means getting out of the water later will feel great. I already miss my bed, but… I promised. Due to force of habit, I take a deep breath.

  Down I go.

  Once I’m under, my eyes adjust. If it hadn’t been obvious to me before that I’m no longer a normal, living human, being submerged in the ocean confirms it. I can kinda see, and the saltwater doesn’t sting my eyes too much. I can’t call the sensation pleasant, or anything I’d even want to experience if I could avoid it, but it’s tolerable when I have no choice. Kinda like house music.

  Specks of unidentifiable stuff drift around in my vision. Could be little shrimp or fragments of debris, or even plants. They’re enough to convey a sense of motion and that I’m going downward. My surroundings are way darker than I’m used to, almost reminding me of what it felt like at night before my Transference.