Paramount

by Nadia Scrieva

  “Were you thinking something about a crowbar?” Amara asked, narrowing her eyes. “Or was that just me imagining your face getting pummeled with various weapons?”

  Pax chuckled. “Go downstairs! I’ll be ready in a sec.” She began to rummage through her drawers for clothing.

  “Okay, Paxie. See you soon! Don't forget to bring some naughty clothes!" said Amara, opening the door and turning to leave the room.

  She ran smack into what felt like a solid wall.

  Amara cursed, putting a hand out to steady herself. “I’m so sorry, Ray…”

  She stopped mid-word because her hand and eyes had settled upon the ultra-soft deep burgundy cashmere of a sweater she remembered buying. It had cost $149.99. Instantly, the strong-yet-gentle hands on her waist which had steadied her from falling unleashed an attack of panic inside her.

  Maybe he gave Raymond the sweater? Yes, of course, that explains it… and Raymond must be wearing his cologne too. Amara didn't think to sense for his energy as she slowly, fearfully moved her face upwards. It wasn't Raymond.

  “Hi,” he said softly.

  Her stomach exploded into terror and dread. Hi? Hi! How do guys do that? How do they have the ability to see their old lover and not care? And act cool and casual like everything's fine?

  He was gazing down at her with familiar warm chocolate eyes. Were his fingers tightening around her waist? Was he inhaling her scent? Alright. Maybe not so casual. Maybe he's just reacting to the effects of the stimulator... simulator. At least my invention works… but I have to get out of here.

  Amara ripped herself away from him. She fought the urge to grasp the wall for support as she straightened and walked away from him wordlessly.

  “Amara?” he asked. There was a note of surprise in his voice at her cold treatment of him. Why did he expect more?

  She paused, turning to throw a callous and appraising glance over her shoulder. Asher's face looked… hurt? She never could stand to see him hurt… maybe she should say hi.

  Her lips parted slightly, as though she intended to speak… but no sound was emitted. If I do say something, it had better be meaningful and epic and… to hell with it. Amara closed her lips. She turned back around abruptly, and marched determinedly down the stairs. I can't fuck you up like Pax did to Thorn. But even if I could, I wouldn't. What's the point? It's unsatisfying. Meaningless physical violence. What I want is to fuck you over.

  She had a date to prepare for.

  Asher stared after her retreating form in silence for a moment. He then shook his head to clear his thoughts. Amara had every right to ignore him like that, and to be as insensitive as she wished. He’d left her in the worst possible way.

  Pushing those thoughts out of his mind, he extended his hand to push the door to Pax's room open. He winced at the sight which greeted him.

  “Eek! Pax, you're naked!”

  Pax, who had been in the process of pulling a t-shirt over her head, froze. She still had the t-shirt wrapped around her arms and head, and was still clad only in her underwear below that.

  "Ever heard of knocking, Uncle Asshole?" she mumbled from under the fabric as she blushed and struggled to pull it down over herself without ripping it. She inwardly wondered why she was blushing at a family member seeing her almost-nude, but then again… things had changed, and she did kind-of have a date with this family member in a few hours.

  "Sorry, cupcake. Whoa! Why are you so bruised up? You're bleeding from everywhere!"

  "Uh. Shouldn't you have commented on the injuries before the nudity?" The shirt had finally been pulled down and it revealed Pax's piercing glare of death.

  Asher's hands went up in a gesture of surrender and he paled, "I'm sorry, Paxie. I'm a guy, and I saw boobs and went into shock. I still have a hard time remembering that you own a pair… Yikes!"

  Asher ducked as a small piece of furniture went flying his way. "Pax! I'm just kidding. What happened to you?"

  "This morning, your good friend Thornton Kalgren tried to have… a conversation with me."

  "I always told that guy he shouldn't mess with you. After all, you were named after the goddess of peace…”

  Pax sighed at her uncle's private joke for her. It was the same silly one he’d been telling her since she'd been old enough to smack him. She pulled on a pair of jeans as he finished the worn-out joke.

  "…and it was sarcasm.”

  "That still hasn't become funny, Uncle Ash," she said, pushing past him. "Now if you'll excuse me, I have to fix my face and book a vacation."

  "Paxie, don't want to hang out with your old uncle? Don't even have a few minutes to catch up?" he asked her retreating form. She turned back briefly. She felt a wave of sadness at the broken relationship, for when she looked at Asher she felt none of that innocent childish love that made her want to hug him endlessly and beg him for ice-cream. No, she felt mostly anger tinged with disappointment and disillusionment. One of her fairytale heroes had turned out to be a villain.

  "Not for you," she answered. "Not anymore. Maybe someday if I can look at you again without feeling upset about what you did to Mara."

  Asher remained silent as he watched her walk away.

  * * *

  With a duffle bag hung over her shoulder, Pax made her way to the library. She moved to the hollow book where she knew the vials of Sakra’s water were kept. When she reached up to remove it from the shelf, she heard a throat being cleared. Turning, Pax saw her father standing in the doorway.

  “Papa. I only need a few drops,” she told him, feeling like a guilty child who had been caught stealing.

  “You don’t need any drops. Sit down and give me your hands.”

  “You learned how to heal?” she asked as she followed his instructions and moved to a sofa.

  “Yes.” He sat across from her, and took both of her hands in his. “Sakra taught me some basic healing along with many other techniques. You’d be surprised what you can pick up living as a monk for a decade.”

  Pax closed her eyes as she felt her father’s strong hands tighten around her palms. A cooling sensation swept over her body, easily erasing all the toxins and inflammation. It was the purest wind and freshest summer rain all rolled up into one revitalizing touch. It reminded Pax of being healed by Sakra himself long ago—she smiled, remembering how the loving energy seemed to have healed her soul as well. The feeling of love was even more powerful when coming from her father. Pax opened her eyes and was surprised when she saw her own bruises and gashes appearing on Raymond’s face.

  “Papa!” she said, pulling her hands away frantically. “You didn’t say you would be transferring my injuries to you!”

  “I heal faster than you,” he said as he fingered the new wounds on his face. “Unfortunately, I can’t heal as Sakra does without there being a price. This is the price.”

  Pax felt guilt and horror replace the sensation of weightlessness. “If I had known I would have never…”

  “Hush. It’s a father’s duty to take on the pain of his daughter,” Raymond said with a smile. He reached out and ruffled her hair as if she were ten years old. “I can’t get over the new ’do. Do you want to talk about what happened, Paxie?”

  “No,” she said softly. She rose to her feet. “Amara’s waiting in the car. I should probably go.”

  Raymond cleared his throat. “I called your work to tell them that you might not be coming in for a few days because you were injured. They told me you hadn’t been to the hospital in months.”

  “Yes, papa.” Pax felt her guilt increase and she rubbed her upper arms idly. “I’m sorry. In my defense, I haven’t really been ‘working’ there—just volunteering. As you know, mom left with me a pretty substantial inheritance and I don’t really need money.”

  “So you have chosen to waste your days away doing what exactly? You’re certainly not helping people anymore. In fact, it looks like you’re doing precisely the opposite of what your grandma raised you to do. The opposite of what it means t
o be a Burnson. Have you considered Grandma Amelia’s feelings in all this?”

  Pax released a gigantic gush of air from her lungs. Raymond knew that familial duty was her soft spot, and he was striking it hard. “Papa, of course. I just didn’t think it would be safe for me to enter an operating room lately. I promise I’ll get back to being myself soon…”

  “Pax, I’m very disappointed with how vengeful you’re becoming.”

  “So am I,” she answered. Feeling remorse congesting her chest worse than pneumonia would have, Pax turned away abruptly. “I really should go. Mara’s waiting outside.”

  “Vincent told me that you killed a woman, Pax.”

  The dark-haired woman stopped moving towards the door. She suddenly noticed that there was a small fire lit behind the screen of the library hearth. Her face wrinkled with emotion as memories of her mother reading to her by that fireplace assaulted her mind. She closed her eyes tightly. As much as she loved Burnson Grove, she despised it doubly.

  “Don’t you feel you should be held accountable for your actions, young lady?”

  When Pax was able to speak, her voice was a whisper. “What are you talking about, Papa?”

  “You don’t know?”

  Her breaths were shallow. She wanted to know, but she was also afraid to know. Was it possible to hate herself more than she already did? Was it possible to feel more uncomfortable in her own skin? Para, she thought to herself weakly. I need to be Para right now. I need to stay Para, for it seems that this woman named Pax has ruined her life beyond repair. I need a different name and a different face. I need to get away from my family so that I can no longer disappoint them.

  “Vincent said that you caught Thorn with another woman, and you burnt her to a crisp. Is this true, Pax?”

  She whirled around, and looked into her father’s dark eyes pleadingly. “I don’t remember. I think—I think it’s true. I blacked out. There’s a fuzzy memory, as though it might have been a dream. Sometimes I see my hands doing things, and they’re not attached to the rest of me. I have nightmares, and… I don’t know what happened. I’m so sorry, Papa. I promised I would never…”

  “Shhh, Pax.” Raymond said, rising to his feet and crossing the room. He pulled his daughter into a hug. “It’s not your fault, darling. In moments of great injustice, the goddess in you will take over. It’s easy to be blinded by her wrath--I could have prevented this. If anything, it’s more my fault than anything.”

  “What do you mean?” Pax asked. The world was spinning at this new information, and she was gripping her father’s arms tightly. She blinked several times to clear her double vision. “What do you mean?”

  “I was the one who chose to prevent you from knowing your power. I decided to forbid you from practicing and gaining control of your abilities—I thought that the amount of goddess in you was small enough that if we ignored its presence, it would remain dormant.”

  “Dormant?” Pax repeated. “But it was the biggest part of my life, and the attribute which defined me! Grandpa would teach me a little more about my powers every day when he was alive. And mother learned ancient languages to read every book she could find…”

  “I know, and I was wrong to try to turn it off like a switch after it was so deeply ingrained in you. I just saw that Amara didn’t care about her powers much, and I figured that you could forget and be a normal girl.” Raymond’s mouth drew into a fine line. “I just wanted you to have a normal childhood.”

  “My childhood ended the day I saw my mother’s body,” Pax answered. “I was forced to be an adult at fourteen, and I tried to do everything you needed me to do. I tried to do everything I could to make you stay, but you left anyway.”

  “Paxie, do you want to know the real reason I left?” Raymond asked. “I wanted to prevent you from doing exactly what you’ve done. I never wanted to you to become a killer.”

  “And I would have been a killer if you had stayed?” she asked incredulously. Tears were springing to her eyes. “If anything I wouldn’t have thrown myself at Thorn so hard—I wouldn’t have needed him so badly, because I could have looked up to you and depended on you. That’s all I ever wanted, Papa.”

  “Listen to me, Pax,” Raymond said firmly, gripping the girl’s shoulders. “I have something important to tell you.”

  She nodded, unable to speak. She wished for the ground to open up and swallow her whole.

  “You need to know exactly how Bridget died.”

  Pax sighed. “I’ve heard the cautionary tale. My mother was meddling with forces far greater…”

  “No, darling.” Raymond released Pax and moved over to the fireplace. He placed his elbow on the mantel tilted his head towards the ground, closing his eyes. “Your mother didn’t kill herself trying to use magick. She was murdered.”

  Pax stared at the man unblinkingly.

  “I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to get angry and do something vindictive. We are devas, and we have a responsibility to be better than that. Nothing can be solved by this whole eye-for-an-eye….”

  “What killed her?” Pax asked hoarsely.

  “You can never take any action on this information.”

  “What killed her?” Pax demanded again.

  Raymond sighed, leaning his forehead against the mantelpiece. “An emissary of the Asura. An energy-sucking creature called a vetala.”

  “You mean the same type of thing that has been visiting me in my nightmares? You mean the same type of thing I mentioned to you, and you said it was nothing?” Pax’s voice was rising as she spoke.

  “Paxie…”

  “You shouldn’t have lied to me. You thought that if I didn’t know I would somehow be a better person? Well, I’m sorry to break it to you, Father. You might have let those things kill my grandpa and my mom, but I won’t sit quietly and…”

  “Pax!” Raymond yelled sternly. “You can’t go up against the Asura. There are too many of them, and each one of them is dozens of times stronger than you are. Stronger than I am! The best defense is to stay hidden and go on with your life.”

  “Wow,” Pax muttered as she grabbed her duffle bag and turned to leave. “Well, don’t worry about that. I don’t have much of a life left to go on with.”

  “You can walk away from me,” her father said in a tired voice. “That’s fine, I understand. I walked away from you when you needed me most. But don’t walk away from Thornton.”

  Pax paused. She pressed her lips together tightly, drawing them between her teeth.

  “Please, Pax,” Raymond said humbly. “Even if you and I can’t fix our broken relationship, I implore you to give Thorn a second chance. I’m not even sure what you saw was real…”

  She dug her nails into her palms. If there was anything she wanted to believe, it was this. If there was anything she could not allow herself to believe, it was this. Pax did not understand why it felt like her father was suddenly not on her side.

  “Has the boy ever given you a reason to doubt him?” Raymond asked.

  “No,” Pax said in a voice that was barely audible.

  “There are many people out there who would seek to manipulate one as powerful as you are,” Raymond said. “What you saw—everything you see from now on. You must take special care to make sure it’s real before taking action.”

  “It was real,” Pax said, “but why would you believe the word of a murderess? I love you, Papa, but I need to go.”

  Feeling like the old Burnson house was suffocating her, Pax ran from the room. She was at Amara’s side in under a second.

  “There you are, slowpoke!” The blonde woman chucked her car keys at her friend and headed for the passenger side.

  Pax swallowed as she caught the jangling metal pieces. “Mara… can you drive today?”

  Amara’s brow instantly creased. “Whoa. Okay, what’s eating you up, girlfriend?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.” Pax lightly tossed the keys back at her friend with an underhanded swing.
She suddenly felt the need to overcompensate her every motion, and be as gentle and careful as possible.

  “You might as well spill. I’m your partner in crime, remember?”

  Pax climbed into the passenger seat and waited for the car’s wheels to begin turning before she spoke. When she was in a moving vehicle, she always felt a little bit safer. “Apparently, I killed the woman I saw your brother with.”

  “Karina Allbright?”

  Pax’s head snapped around to look at Amara. “You knew her name? Why did you say that! I don’t want to know her name!”

  “Relax. I did some research on her. She was the head of a rival company and she recently disappeared. No body was found, and now I know why.”

  “God,” Pax murmured, resting her head against the back of the seat. “I never thought it was possible to forget my own actions. Did I really kill her? I must have. Good Sakra...”

  “When you can disintegrate someone with a thought, it’s easy for murder to be little more than a… passing thought.” Amara chuckled at her little joke, and seeing her friend’s glare, cleared her throat. “Sorry, but I can’t say I’m mourning the chick. I had actually put in a call with Layla Solyst, our good friend in law enforcement—if Karina Allbright lived, I was going to ruin her life the good old-fashioned legal way. Fabricate crimes and put her behind bars for a while in a maximum security prison.”

  “Really?” Pax asked. “You were going to do that for me… and Layla agreed to help?”

  “No one messes with my best friend,” Amara said in a grave tone.

  Pax smiled weakly. “Mara, I don’t know if this is possible… but do you think you can work on a way for us to stay joined as Para for longer than thirty minutes?”

  “I thought you’d never ask!” Amara answered. “Already on it. I can bring the science, but I’m going to need you to investigate the old books. I can’t read those old languages, and I don’t even know how to use magick to translate them.”

  “I’ll work on it,” Pax said. “But I don’t think there’s any magick that can join two bodies forever.”