“Thank you.”
“I shall accompany you to your room and we will check for further injuries. Simon, you may wait in your room. When she is ready, she will knock.”
I was puzzled, because Zora, this female who looked no older than seventeen, spoke as if she was born in times past. “I’m really okay, you don’t have to—”
“This is not a request. You are a guest and I will see to your health. If you have misgivings, don’t. I’m a biologist and received my medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania. My examination will be professionally administered and should have taken place when you first arrived. I was not informed of your injuries. Mother is quick to anger. I recommend you keep that in mind when dealing with her.” She stepped closer and tilted my head back gently to examine the obvious bruising around my neck.
“Thank you. I’ve learned that lesson.”
“Zora is a competent doctor,” Simon said, but I didn’t miss his anxious overtones. He and I followed Zora up the stairs and he snaked an arm around me in support to ease my knee. She moved down the hallway with brisk steps, her gear packed up in a designer tote, her hair and nails expertly done, but not showy like Mother’s. I had no doubts at all that I’d just met the real brains of the operation.
Chapter Nine
My examination was quick and relatively painless, although she poked at my badly bruised shoulder and swollen knee a little too firmly for my tastes. I was given three over-the-counter painkillers and an icepack for my knee. My wrists and ankles were chaffed, but healing, so she used some salve, but felt they needed no bandages.
She laughed when she saw me take the two rolls out of my pants before I could pull them off, but she didn’t make me throw the rolls away. I set them on the table next to my bed along with the two slices of bacon.
She grumbled as she examined my knee. “If ice had been administered immediately, the knee would have healed more quickly. However, you’re fit and should heal in a few days.”
“This state isn’t normal for me.” I swept my hand over my entire body, frowning in irritation.
Zora smiled for the first time, understanding exactly what I’d meant by my comment. “You’ll be using magic again shortly, I promise you.” I touched the torc, remembering the way Mother had strangled me. Zora noticed the gesture. “Showing her deference costs you nothing. She is easily appeased.” Zora strode into the bathroom and started the shower. “Shower and dress in the gown Mother has left for you. Simon is in the room to the right. He will give you a tour of the facility, then put you to work. Follow the rules and the orders you receive from me or Mother, and you’ll live.”
The shower felt amazing, and I forced myself to scrub my skin a little harder than I normally would have. The harsh journey and the bleak night in the cold cell had unraveled me. Other than the tears I’d shed because of my physical pain, and the episode after breakfast, I’d pretty much kept my emotions on lock down. But here, alone in the soothing heat, I allowed my fear, my sorrow, and my anger to surface.
I leaned my forehead against the wall and sobbed out my frustration, my salty tears mixing with the soapy water running off my unrinsed hair. How could I have been so unaware? I’d trusted my instincts my entire life, but they’d abandoned me when I needed them the most. Why now?
My knees gave out and I slid down the wall and knelt in the bathtub, the water pounding against my shoulders as if in punishment for my stupidity. I tried again to reach Garrett or Charlie with my mind, but like before, there was no connection. They’d be working hard to find me, but that thought brought very little relief. It was the first time I hadn’t been able to reach Garrett since he was Fionna’s prisoner, a nightmare I’d hoped to bury and not relive.
Someone was knocking on the bathroom door. “You okay, Jackie?” Simon asked.
I stood slowly and wiped my eyes. The crying jag had been cathartic, just what I’d needed, but it was time to man up. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m good. I’ll be out soon.”
“Okay. I’m next door when you need me.” Fifteen minutes later I rapped on his door. His eyes widened as he got a good look at me.
“This dress is…it’s ridiculous,” I whined.
“You actually look lovely. Mother makes all the females wear garments like this, at least at first. She thinks it encourages good manners.” Simon was dressed in wool slacks, a white shirt and a nice vest, looking quite debonair. “C’mon, I’ll give you a tour.” He was grinning cheerfully, as if he didn’t have a care in the world. Weird.
We passed many closed doors, which Simon didn’t open, but he did mention that some of them had patients and that we should try to quiet as we walked down the hallway so we didn’t disturb them.
“Are they ill?” I asked several times.
“They are recovering,” was all I’d get in response.
As we walked down the stairs to the first floor level, I gave him the third degree. “How did you get caught?”
“Zora researches the most likely matches, then sends out her squad to bring them in.”
A non-answer. “What kind of matches?”
“I’m not…not sure.” His aura betrayed the lie. “It’s just what I’ve overheard. She doesn’t care to speak about her research.” We came to a halt outside a door. On the sign to the left was written the word ‘Lab’. “This is where she works.”
We were in the back of the house, near the basement stairs and the kitchen. Someone was crying. I could hear them through the door. Simon ushered me away. “Shouldn’t we see who’s in there? Maybe they need help.”
He waved his hand dismissively. “Zora deals with many problems. Sometimes the patients are homesick and they cry, but we don’t hold them here for long. I’m sure she has the situation in hand.”
It was as if he’d left my room in a normal state and allowed his airheaded twin to take over the tour. “Did you…um…have your dose of medicine today?”
“Yes. While you were in the shower.”
“Ah. How does the medicine make you feel?”
“Very good. I’m so proud to be a part of this project.” Simon smiled widely as we walked.
“What exactly is this project?”
“The witches have a special plan, but no one knows exactly what it is, only that the result will be marvelous.
He was certainly in a talkative mood. It was a good time to get answers. “How did Freddy disguise himself to look so much like you?”
“He’s a dermallagi—a rare unseelie species. Most supernaturals refer to his kind as skin changers, because what he accomplishes is all on the surface. He can copy someone else’s appearance to perfection, but he’s not able to match the original’s scent. He can only block his own. And he has moderate success with giving his version of his victim a muddy aura, something anyone might have if they were ill or emotionally troubled. I understand his own people kicked him out, but he found a home here with the witches.”
“How nice for him,” I snapped, then apologized. “I shouldn’t be taking this out on you.” Even though he was acting totally brainwashed.
“I was careless. If I’d been more observant I wouldn’t have been caught.”
“Same here.” I rolled my eyes. “Tell me what happened to you.”
“I was in my office at Stanford and it was very late, later than usual. Lately I find myself spending longer hours there because I seem to get more work done at night. When I’m home it’s basically just to eat and sleep, perhaps watch a TV show. Elizabeth visits when she can, as I do her, but our lives have always traveled different paths. Neither of us is willing to give up the direction of our personal journeys and that seems to suit us fine.”
“Are there campus guards at the university?”
“We have excellent security in my building’s wing, but Frederick had turned himself into one of my students—Sandra, a leopard shifter. She’d missed my last two lectures. He showed the security officer her ID and he allowed him into the building. It made perfect sense that she
would come to speak to me even at that time of night, so I opened the door. When I turned my back, I felt the prick of the needle.” He glanced at me sheepishly. “I should have noticed the lack of scent, but as you see, I did not.” He grinned, spread his hands dramatically and shrugged.
So the drugs made being a prisoner tolerable. He was compliant, even enthusiastic about his predicament. Interesting.
I frowned remembering my own carelessness. “Neither did I, at least not until it was too late. If Garrett or even Hercules had been home, it might have been a different story. But I still can’t figure how the witch and her buddy got past our security.”
“The one called Mother is one of the strongest blood magic users I’ve ever encountered. Lately she seems to be working with someone even more powerful, someone she calls the Crone, so I imagine, between the two of them, your protection spells were unwoven by experts.”
“Blood magic stinks.” I wrinkled my nose. “But the scent in the house isn’t overpowering.”
“They’re careful and Mother’s been practicing since the 1800s. She would know well how to hide the evidence of her hobby.”
“Zora’s another powerful witch?”
“Oh yes. She envisions herself as The Maiden, I believe.”
I nodded. “The youngest aspect of the Goddess.” I’d learned about the witches’ goddess from Elizabeth. The Goddess took three forms. The Maiden, The Mother and the Crone, although some believed those three aspects were only the main servants of the Goddess. “So there’s another nutcase in the house who thinks she’s the Crone? I hope I don’t have a run-in with that one.”
“It’s better not to ask about the Crone,” Simon whispered. We came to a stop and he smiled. “Come and meet my patient, Sandra. She was also my student.”
“Your patient is the shifter Freddy impersonated to get into your office?” He nodded. “Why do you even have a patient?” Simon was definitely not a doctor. He taught Ancient Languages.
He chose to ignore my question, coming to a stop in front of a door at the end of the second floor hallway. Simon knocked and entered without waiting for a reply. The room was fairly large for a Victorian bedroom, but all the furniture had been removed except for a small table with two straight-backed chairs, a double bed with a down comforter and several pillows. On the far side of the room was an item that was much less likely to have been found in your average Victorian home—a cage, which happened to be the same size as the basement cell. My chin was probably scraping on the floor, but I was too surprised to care.
A young woman, a leopard shifter, was huddled against the far wall of the cage—the only section that wasn’t made of metal. She was shivering, and for the first time I noticed the windows were open in the room. I walked quickly in that direction, meaning to close them, but Simon grabbed my arm firmly. “No. She must have fresh air. It’s part of her treatment.”
I’d been smart enough to wear the shawl they’d left on the bed for me, but my head and hands were cooling off fast. “She’s only wearing a lightweight long sleeved shirt and a pair of pajama pants. She’s barefoot. Can’t you get her a robe at least? And some slippers?”
“She’s fine. We take her body temperature every two hours. If it drops too low, we close the windows.”
He sounded like he was reading from a script. Oh boy. There was no way in hell I was going to let those witches dose me up with the same meds he was on. The girl was shivering. She needed my help. Time to get serious. “It’s gotta be below forty degrees in here. And it’s breezy. Simon, this is bullshit!”
So far, Sandra hadn’t raised her face to look at me, but my strong language and loud voice finally motivated her to lift her chin. The girl was pale and thin, with large brown eyes and stringy, unwashed dark brown hair. She reminded me of my fraternal twin, Bridgett—the way she’d looked when I’d first met her in Gasquet. At least maybe there was something I could do for this girl.
“This is your student?”
“Yes. Frederick did such an amazing job impersonating her. When he told me what he’d done, I didn’t believe him, but he transitioned right in front of me to prove it. He’s quite extraordinary.” My father was smiling—smiling while a girl he used to mentor was suffering.
I’d definitely fallen through the rabbit hole. This wasn’t the way my un-drugged dad would have reacted to a girl in a cage. I hurried to the bed and pulled the comforter onto the floor, dragging it toward her cell. Simon blocked my path and clasped one of my wrists. His pupils were twice their normal size and his skin felt clammy.
“We have orders not to give her a blanket.”
“From Mother?”
“Yes.”
“She’s a cruel bitch.” I wiggled and he let me go, but not until he took the blanket away and threw it back on the bed. I looked at the girl and something clicked. “She was a prisoner before they took you. And you were a prisoner before they came for me. How did they know about me?”
“They learned about you from me, as they learned about me from Sandra.”
You just… You just told them?” That couldn’t be true. He must have been drugged, like now.
“I’d never betray you, Jackie.” His expression changed and I saw a flash of the old Simon struggling for control. “I’m…I’m here.” Another drug-induced smile wiped him away. They were changing him, but he was trying to fight it.
“I want to believe that, but…” I rubbed my face to clear my head. Real fear made it difficult to focus.
“You see they don’t need us to tell them anything at all. They can take information from our minds.”
“They read your mind?” Now I was starting to shiver and not entirely because of the cold. I wrapped my shawl more tightly around my shoulders and attempted to squirm out of his grasp.
“It’s more than that.” He actually sighed with pleasure, as if being robbed of your mind was a pleasant experience.
“Explain it to me.” I was inching back toward the bed, hoping to grab the blanket again.
A clock chimed somewhere in the house. Simon turned away and fished out keys to unlock the cell door. Like in the basement cell, Sandra had no privacy when it came to taking care of her personal hygiene. Her accommodations included only two buckets and a bench. I glanced around and was relieved to see there was a bathroom connected to the bedroom. I’d make sure she had a chance to use it.
Sandra didn’t rise when he entered the cell. “Get up. It’s time for your tests and your meds.” She shook her head and tried to scrunch up her body to make herself smaller. “I don’t want to drag you like the last few times. Please, Sandra.”
The girl’s bare feet were scraped up. He’d dragged her out of the cell. This was so wrong.
Simon was off with a capital O. This was not the man I’d gotten to know very well over the last year or so. He was generous with his time, smart, a great teacher. He’d never behave so callously with this poor girl. “Why don’t we try to get away, Dad?” Maybe if I reminded him that we were family, he’d come back to himself.
“There’s nowhere to go, now is there? The fields surrounding the house are spelled with strong magical traps. It’s not pretty what happens out there. They’ve made us watch. Cameras are everywhere inside and out, the closest car is a mile down the road, and we don’t have access to phones or computers to call for help. I believe the best thing to do is to make the most of our time here in the hospital.”
“Make the most of our time?” I couldn’t believe he’d just said that.
“Yes. We can do some good here.”
“You call it a hospital?”
“Yes. The patients are being helped.” He grinned widely. “Sandra is responding to the meds better than any of the others.”
“She looks like she’s ill.”
“Oh, she’s doing just fine, right Sandra?” The girl wouldn’t look at him.
“You say you were just given a drug while I was in the shower, correct?”
“Yes. Zora came in righ
t on schedule. They’re very good that way.”
“They give you a shot?”
“Yes.”
“Why don’t you fight her? Why do you allow her to drug you, Dad?” I touched his arm and made him look at me.
He frowned. “I fought them at first, but they strap you down and give it to you anyway. And they… He turned away and lifted his shirt, exposing his back. I gasped. He’d been branded in two spots on his lower back—a pentacle and a crescent moon. They still looked painful. “I was in the basement cell for three weeks, but…” He shuddered, then turned with a smile. “I deserved it. I’d disobeyed orders. Now I take the meds when they’re given and I’m never hungry anymore. In fact, I feel ill if they don’t give me the medicine.”
I moved closer and took his hands. This time his smile seemed like the real one. He’d been through so much and I’d treated him without compassion. “I’m sorry that happened. But can’t you see what the drug does to you, Dad?”
“I feel fine,” he said firmly.
“It makes you agreeable to their suggestions. Easy to influence.” I looked again at Sandra, who’d stood and was moving toward me hesitantly. “Without the drug, you never would have agreed to…to this.”
He glanced at her and frowned. “I…I don’t think… I mean…” But it seemed he couldn’t go against them. I squared my shoulders. Now I had a more immediate goal. I’d figure out a way for both of us to avoid the meds.
“Fight it, Dad.” I hugged him. “Please.”
Sandra was standing at the bars now. “That’s how it is at the beginning. You fight against it and they hurt you. The first doses make you feel really good. Happy even. You want to please them. When that seems to be working, they give you more potent meds to the point where you feel really sick when you don’t get the shot. You beg them for it and that’s when they give you the worst meds. You lose your will completely. You’ll do whatever they say.” She looked out the window. “Even walk into the field when they’re done with you.”
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