The Gemini Child

by Shea Meadows

  The house at 522 York had been built by Norton Reston in 1922. A wealthy world explorer and respected congressman in the Minnesota legislature, he had commissioned its creation for his wife Emily. She had enjoyed the area around Lake Harriet and had cajoled her husband to build nearby. He agreed, as long as he picked the lot.

  Norton Reston’s secret persona was that of a spirit communicator. His fascination with the traditions of ancient cultures and their occult rituals influenced his decisions. If he built a house, it would be more than a place to inhabit. It would have features proven to assist with out-of-body exploration and spirit world contact.

  He had engaged Brewster Hooking, a man renowned for his knowledge of ley lines. Norton wanted an evaluation of which area near Lake Harriet occupied the optimum energy configuration. Being near the lake had been a start, since properties near bodies of water were seen as “softer” areas; those spots that allowed better communication with higher frequencies. To “soften” it up even more, Brewster had charted the points where ley lines intersected and advised Norton Reston to buy the empty lot that would be 522 York.

  Its design differed from the usual house built in that decade of the twentieth century. As was appropriate for a family of wealth, the building had a spacious main floor and two upper floors, all serviced by a state-of-the-art cellar with a coal burning boiler to heat both air and water. Wired for electricity, it was an example of modern design and the rooms were decorated in the decor of the day.

  Besides all of these givens, Reston commissioned special features. The roofing of the house was copper and included two specially constructed cupolas with crystals imbedded into the ceilings of the third-floor rooms. Many hidden nooks and crannies on that level contained metaphysical features to aid his goal of creating portals to other dimensions.

  Deep within the walls of the cellar, he had built a sanctum sanctorum with reinforced walls and a hidden entrance, so said the history of the house Moon had conveyed to Ricky. Both sisters had attempted to find the lever that opened the wall, but neither had succeeded. More important work, such as saving humanity from the control of the Soul Stealer, occupied their time during the first year of Ricky’s residence. The second year had been taken up by seminars, writing, and trainings to assure Moon’s work continued. Not to mention Ricky’s pregnancy that had seemed to go on for years.

  All of this flashed through Ricky’s thoughts as they unloaded the baby and her belongings from the car. Three jubilant women joined the parents and Grandpa George in the unpacking project.

  Ricky had worked with Katera Maybum and her twin daughters in Georgia when they had volunteered to help her rid the Earth of the Soul Stealer. The twins, Bonta and Gimma, were as identical as she and Moon, and looked like clones of their mother. All had deep ebony skin and wore their hair in dreadlocks. All the women were athletic, so their bodies were trim from the yoga exercises and running they tried to do daily.

  “The princess has arrived,” Katera announced with her New Orleans accent. “Can I hold her, Dear Heart?” Ricky passed Nory over to their trusted friend and watched as love streamed back and forth between the child and Katera.

  Bonta and Gimma, who Ricky called her Radiant Sisters, helped remove the countless parcels of baby supplies George purchased while Ricky and the baby were being discharged from the hospital. Thank heavens the nursery was finished two months ago, Ricky thought, or Nory might be sleeping in the dresser drawer where the large black Siamese cat named Wingless Pigeon liked to sleep.

  The exhausted parents sat in the living room, holding the baby as Katera, and the girls brought everything to the child’s room next door to Ricky and David. Sleep remained a faint memory, what with feedings every two hours and Nory’s ongoing dialogue. Nory had gained nearly a pound, and Ricky looked forward to the day when she ate larger amounts and slept longer. Even with all her activity, the newest member of the Clark family inspected the living room and urged her parents telepathically to take her upstairs.

  “Okay sweetheart,” David said, as Ricky handed the baby to him. “We’ll let Mommy rest a little longer, and Daddy will show you the new pictures on the walls of the stairway. You’ll recognize our friends from Georgia.”

  Ricky stretched out on the soft couch and exhaled an exhausted sigh. “Moon, how am I going to work and take care of an enlightened being? Katera and Gimma are staying for a week, and Bonta is staying until school starts in October, but after that…It’s scary thinking about it.”

  “You’re not losing me,” Moon replied. “I’ll stick around as long as she’s incarnated. And as for baby time, I’ll draw a new nanny to you after Bonta leaves. Someone who won’t be afraid of a budding psychic and ghost buster. Nory will lead you into adventures which will be learning experiences for everyone in the spiritual network.”

  Ricky yawned. “I dreamt about doing a seminar with her attached to my stomach with a baby sling. Not much different than teaching while pregnant. She’s brilliant, Moon. She told me yesterday she’d spent most of last week in China. Something is drawing her there. She thinks it’s someone from her last life.”

  Moon was silent for several moments then replied, “I checked it out. Got some fuzzy images of a rural area of China with lots of excavation in progress. I made the intention to see where Nory had been. Nory’s energy trail is visible in a wide area, some of it underground. She has concerns about Norton Reston, her former father. Strange, Nory likes to give play-by-play descriptions when she travels but didn’t clue us in this time.”

  “She’s getting used to her new body,” Ricky replied. “It takes considerable energy to fit a light being into a third dimensional energy construct that weighs six pounds.”

  David called to Ricky from the second floor. “Nory’s ready to spend quality feeding time with her mom.”

  Ricky got up from the couch, stretched and climbed the stairs. Katera was completing Nory’s tour of the nursery after having changed the baby’s diaper. “And this is a giraffe, and this a lion, and a rather large tropical bird. I brought all of these back from my last trip to Africa. You will travel with me when you are bigger.” She glanced at Ricky as she came into the nursery. “Here is your mommy who we call Dear Heart. She will feed you.”

  Ricky sank into the rocking chair near the cradle and positioned her daughter for her next meal. Nory talked as she ate. “You were talking to Moon about my trips to China. I heard you. Do you want me to tell you what I’ve been looking for?”

  “Yes, dear heart,” Ricky answered.

  “Well, it’s like this, Mommy. There is a strong vibration emanating from the cellar that I hadn’t felt in years. There’s a secret room there, created when the house was built.

  “When I was little Nellie, my former father traveled all over the world. He and my former mother would travel for months, leaving the other two kids with a governess. When I was in my former mother’s womb, they traveled to China. I watched them digging in old caves near the gigantic burial plot of a famous emperor.

  “Former father sent former mother home because she didn’t feel well; she got worse in the bumpy airplanes they had then. I was born as Nellie right after former mother made it to Minneapolis. I came at eight months that time, too.

  “Former father was upset when former mother sent a telegram telling him to come see his daughter. He had discovered something that was more important than his third child and didn’t come back to Minnesota until I was six months old. All this happened in 1936.

  Nory paused in her narrative to burp, and Ricky slipped in a question. “Did he bring something home with him that’s hidden in the cellar?”

  Nory latched back on for more of her meal then answered. “Yes, I never saw it, but I felt it. It’s a prickly feeling.”

  “Why are you investigating this object? Do you think it’s something we should worry about?”

  Nory sighed. “I’m not sure, so don’t get too worried, but after my former father came home with whatever he found, one by one
people died. My oldest brother William was in boarding school and was only home on holidays. He became ill but was fine as long as he only came home now and then. He’s still in a body and is an old man now. My sister Sandra was four years old when my former father returned. She died before she was six. My former mother had another baby two years after me, and he died at birth.

  “I was the strongest of the children and very interested in archeology. My former parents took me with them on two digs. When my former mother became too weak to travel, I was eight. My former father explored without us. I left my body just after I turned nine. That was one reason I stayed after dis-incarnating; I was trying to find the thing that made the prickles.”

  Ricky could feel her heart skip a beat and her breathing tighten. “Is that why you came back, Nory?”

  Silence in response, then a subdued answer. “That’s partially true. I, ah, have other reasons too, but you might not like them.”

  Nory finished eating and nestled against her mother in silence.

  “How convenient for you. It’s time to sleep, but I know your pattern. When you’re sleeping you’re out of body, so I have a request: meet me in the cove in spirit world.

  Ricky then shifted her telepathic message to David, Moon and Katera. She requested David to be present at the cove and asked Moon to join them. Katera came into the room, and offered to watch over the sleeping infant as the family meeting began.

  * * *

  Chapter 3

  While the Clark family appeared to be napping, their etheric bodies had popped into the spirit world frequency. Moon Angel greeted them and they hugged some former Spirit friends that Ricky suspected would be helping with the current issue. They included Shri Kria Baba who sat next to Moon, and Ricky’s guide Maya, as well as Moon’s guide Megon. There was one other who did not surprise them at all.

  Ricky smiled when she saw Nory. Instead of the old Nellie persona or Nory as a baby, her daughter appeared as a teenager with bright blue eyes and long black hair, dressed in the same jeans and halter top that Bonta wore when helping to unload the car. It was like seeing a picture of her and Moon when they were teens, except her curly hair and her blue eyes came from David’s side of the family.

  Ricky and David kissed her before sitting down on the comfortable couch Moon had provided for them; both looking proudly at their daughter.

  “Hello, Nory, trying on a future look?”

  Nory smiled but held her hands clasped tightly together, obviously anxious. “I’m not quite sure why you called this meeting. You could have asked me anything in our physical forms.”

  “Something you said put up a red flag, and your dad and I need some clarification,” Ricky answered.

  “I told you why I was searching in China; it was the area where my former father found his artifact. It seemed logical to trace its path to us,” Nory said with a tinge of anxiety in her voice.

  “Back up a little, sweetie. We knew the basic version of the creation of the house and its special metaphysical features. Beth Ann, who took me through my first tour of the house, also told us the story of your death and the death of all but one of your siblings. But we never knew an artifact had a part in it,” Ricky said.

  “And we certainly didn’t know that the artifact is hidden somewhere in the house,” David added, his voice sounding a little shaky. He turned to Moon. “Did you know about this when you bought the house?”

  Moon nodded. “Nory told me when she was a ghost, but since I didn’t plan to have a baby living there full time, it wasn’t a concern.” Moon turned to Ricky.

  “We talked about the hidden room in the cellar, Ricky; you and I searched the wall for some latch or lever to activate the door. This was way back before you started tracking the Soul Stealer,” Moon reminded.

  Ricky shook her head. “I vaguely remember; we gave up on it. Nothing showed up when they put in the furnace this year and tore up the cellar.”

  “So the big unanswered question: is Nory in danger with the artifact so close to her body?” David asked.

  Moon glanced over to Nory. “This isn’t only about you and me anymore, Nory. Your parents have a right to know. They have to be active in the investigation.”

  Nory sighed and looked at Moon with an uncomfortable expression on her face. “So here’s how it is: after my then father brought the artifact home from his dig in China, I started hearing sounds. I was six months old. It was very high-pitched, and oscillating back and forth between two notes. The noise made my skin prickle. I was less than four when it was really bad, so it was difficult to express what I was hearing and feeling. My former mother claimed not to hear anything out of the ordinary. My former father looked at me with a nasty grimace and pretended he didn’t understand the question, but I noticed he’d stop and listen when he thought no one was watching.

  “My sister Sandra said she didn’t hear it either, but that’s when she started having the headaches that led to her death. William, my oldest brother was gone most of the time. He preferred school to home and stayed with friends on holidays. Once he came home for his birthday and admitted he felt and heard the same thing I did, but he didn’t want to talk about it. Why talk to a bothersome little sister?

  “Before the baby was due, my parents argued so loudly I could hear them everywhere in the house. My mother wanted him to take the artifact out of the cellar and store it in the salt caves in St. Paul. He, of course, refused and told her she was crazy if she thought something as sacred as the object could do harm to anyone.” Nory stopped and took a long trembling breath.

  “My father said that even if it was somehow involved in Sandra’s death, it was more important than any human on earth, even if they were his children,” Nory said with a sob escaping as she spoke

  Ricky reached over and held her daughter’s hands. “It’s hard to imagine someone metaphysically trained acting that way. It must have been horrible for you and your family.”

  “She’s right, Ricky,” Moon said. “I explored Norton Reston’s Akashic Record. He built a fabulous house, but he didn’t have a heart. And here’s the kicker. He died mysteriously in China after the death of his wife, their infant son and Nellie. His body was never found, and his spirit guide lost track of him completely.”

  “Is that even possible?” David asked. “I thought the guides can always track our whereabouts. Is his death described in his Akashic Record?”

  “You’re right, David. It’s very rare for a guide to lose an incarnate. The record stops with his last trip to China. He literally appears to have been swallowed into the Earth somewhere near Shanghai,” Moon answered.

  “Let’s get down to the meat of the matter,” David urged. “Why did you keep this from us?”

  Moon smiled. “It became obvious when you were tracking the Soul Stealer in Chicago that the two of you were becoming a couple. After your escape from Prime, you had already started to plan the wedding. And then a fetus showed up. Some soul was going to be your child.”

  “I asked Moon to look at the record,” Nory chimed in with a tremor in her voice. “I stopped feeling and hearing the artifact energy when I was a ghost, but when I visited the house after I’d gone to spirit world, I could tell it was still there. I knew about the history of this artifact with the Reston family. I was the logical person to become the first Clark child. Besides that, I love you guys and really wanted to learn from you as your daughter.”

  “Why didn’t someone tell us? Moon, if you knew about this, why not let us in on the problem?” David asked. “We could sell the house and move somewhere safe. As much as I enjoy having Nory as a daughter, she shouldn’t have to volunteer to be placed in danger as a new born.”

  “Nory insisted that if I opened resources to her in spirit world, she could identify the object by how it feels,” Moon answered. “And she had a good point. The vibration from the object is unique. It stands to reason that since it was in the same location for over three thousand years, there should be some residual echoes wh
ere Norton Reston found it. We could use that energetic Akashic path to travel back to its formation and discover its origins.”

  “Obviously, that didn’t work out or Nory wouldn’t be leaving her baby body and flitting around China like a blood-hound on a trail,” Ricky contributed.

  Nory sighed. “I did make a little progress, though. The most likely origin location is near the burial array of Emperor Jingdi in Xian. Once I found that out, Moon called in an historian named Sima Qian who happens to be in spirit world at present. He traveled with us back along the path, and we watched the building of the terracotta warriors.”

  “The artifact was created then?” David asked.

  Nory shook her head. “Sima Qian says the vibration is from a time before that, but agrees there has to be a connection between the necropolis and the artifact because the energy signatures are similar. Someone involved in the building of the warriors and all the other figures might also have created the artifact.”

  “This is fascinating, Nory, but I can’t think of a single reason why you wouldn’t tell us,” Ricky said. “You talked to me nonstop from the time you revealed you’d be our daughter. Never once did you suggest that there was something in our house that was a danger to children born there. If we’d known this, we could have easily moved out.”

  Nory’s voice was almost a whisper. “I didn’t want to alarm you when you were growing my body. I thought Moon and I could take care of it before I was born, but I guess the artifact energy is dangerous even to a fetus. I knew I’d have a better chance of surviving the vibrations if I was out of the womb.”

  She smiled lovingly at Nory. “I understand your thinking, but I would have liked to be part of the plan, pregnant or not.”

  “So what are we supposed to do about this,” David asked. “We can’t stay in our house and risk your death a second time.”