Unmasked

by Dale Mayer

  At that, he chuckled out loud.

  Several people talking with Sebastian stole glances their way.

  “That also bothers you, doesn’t it?” Hunter asked.

  “What? The sideways looks? The not fitting in? The gossip? Sure. Doesn’t it bother everyone?”

  “No,” he said. “Eventually you get to the point where you don’t care anymore.”

  “I’m not there yet,” she said. “I’ve spent a lot of time without friends. I lost so many people when I stayed home to look after my mom.” Her voice was soft. “My friends seemed to fall away. When you find yourself standing at a grave site all alone, you look up and around, realizing how very alone you are, how much you’ve lost over the last few years. You don’t really know how to start again. I hadn’t expected to make friends here, but I knew Chana was here. We’ve always been close, and I figured I would at least fit in. And I did initially. But since Sebastian’s arrival, that’s changed.”

  “It’s not Sebastian’s arrival,” he said. “It’s that you’re opening up to everything around here. Psychics tend to give off an odd air. It doesn’t make other people terribly comfortable to be around us.”

  “And yet, we’re no different,” she said.

  “Our energy is sharper, keener. It makes others uncomfortable.”

  “I wouldn’t have said that about you or Sebastian,” she said. “And Jeremiah. I didn’t notice anything different about him either.”

  At Jeremiah’s name Hunter turned to look at her sharply. Then he nodded as if she’d said something he understood.

  She frowned at him. “You are different. You know that, right?”

  He stared at her for a long moment, then gave her a wicked grin. “But you like me anyway, don’t you?”

  She nodded. “Absolutely.” She beamed at him. “I like Sebastian and Jeremiah too.”

  He nodded. “Right, and that makes total sense.”

  Just then Chana called over to her. “Lacey, we’re breaking for lunch. Are you joining us?”

  She nodded. “Coming.” She turned to look at Hunter, only to find he wasn’t here. She spun around, looking for him. She could see him retreating into the trees behind her. “You’ve got to stop doing that,” she called out.

  “Why is that?” he called back in a laughing tone.

  “Because you’re one scary dude when you can disappear into nothing.”

  Then he was gone, leaving only his laughter behind. She hopped to her feet, grabbed her camera bag, putting her camera away. Then she walked to where the group was gathered. “I didn’t even think about making lunch this morning,” she said to Chana. “Did you?”

  Chana shook her head. “No, but Sebastian had the guys bring in a bunch of sandwiches.”

  Lacey glanced at her watch and saw it was almost twelve o’clock. “Where did the morning go?” she exclaimed. “I could have sworn it wasn’t even ten-thirty yet.”

  Chana reached into a large box, pulled out a couple sandwiches and handed one to her. “When you get caught up in your images, apparently everything else disappears around you.” She plopped beside the group against a nearby tree.

  Lacey nodded. “Apparently.” She unwrapped the sandwich, settled back, close to Chana, but not so close she didn’t have some space and studied the ruins as she ate. Mark walked up and handed both women a cup of coffee. “Thanks, Mark,” Lacey said, accepting it. “Love all this service.”

  He walked around delivering coffee to the rest of the team.

  She let her gaze roam the site. Somebody came around the side of the partially excavated site. Hunter? She looked up with a bright smile. But, instead of Hunter, she saw a dark face inside more of a black cloud. Her smile fell away. She could feel that horrible tensing coldness she’d experienced earlier. Her heart slammed against her chest, and her jaw froze. She stared, unable to pull away her gaze.

  A slap on the back of her shoulder had her coffee spilling over the rim of her cup. She cried out at the hot coffee on her legs, but it wasn’t bad. She turned to look up at Sebastian, and she pointed.

  He nodded gently and whispered, “I saw it too.”

  *

  Sebastian had seen the cold energy force approaching Lacey but only as a vague outline—until he’d stepped closer to her, nudging his leg up behind her back. As soon as he came into contact with her, the strange apparition became so much more. Not enough to clearly see any features though but a more defined male form. It was definitely some sort of spirit entity, standing and staring at the group. But no doubt his focus was on Lacey herself.

  Every day here with Lacey was something new. Every day it seemed like the spirits got closer and closer to her, touching her, pushing her, trying to get her to do something or not do something. It was definitely concerning. Lacey appeared to be wide open, receptive and completely vulnerable, but not only that—she was unaware of just how much danger she was in.

  Sebastian hated to think of her getting injured on this site, like his friends had on the Mayan site, but every day something had happened back then. He couldn’t forget the ugly end from ten years ago. It was hard to keep those memories at bay. Everything around him was a constant reminder that people who hadn’t paid enough attention to the forces around them had died.

  He glanced down at Lacey. Her arm was wrapped around his lower leg, a tremor barely visible in her hand as she squeezed his calf muscle. She stared, her gaze locked on where the apparition was.

  “What’s the matter, Lacey? You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Chana joked.

  He watched the words hit her almost like a blow. She hunched closer to his leg. He knew she didn’t want anyone to think something was between them, but right now she needed comfort.

  He jumped down until he sat beside her, wrapped his arm around her shoulders and squeezed her gently. “It’s all right, you know.”

  She twisted slightly so she could look at him. He studied her large pupils, the shock already setting in. In a low voice he asked, “Why this? Why after everything else does this bother you?” He could hear the others walking closer.

  “Hey, is she okay?” Tom asked.

  “She doesn’t look very good,” Mark said. “Is this all from that same head injury?”

  Sebastian wasn’t sure what to say. He hugged her gently. “Do you need to go back to the apartment?”

  She shook her head violently.

  He sagged back and looked at the others. “She’s not feeling well all of a sudden. The head injury is likely causing migraines, and the heat is not helping.”

  One of the other men from the crew stood behind them. “Maybe she should lie down.”

  “I’m fine,” Lacey said in a faint voice. “I’ll be fine.”

  “At least go lie down in the shade somewhere,” Mark said in concern. “Honestly, this heat wave is rough on everybody.”

  She gave a faint nod and smiled at him. “I think that’s a good idea.”

  “You’d be more comfortable though,” Chana said, “if you were back in bed. You hardly got any sleep last night.”

  Sebastian studied the two women, his gaze going from one to the other, wondering what was behind their restless night. But Chana appeared no longer concerned, and Lacey certainly wasn’t volunteering any information. He glanced around the site and found a spot in the shade, which he pointed out to her. “Why don’t you stretch out over there for a bit?” Considering it was in the opposite direction of where they had seen the darker energy, he figured it might not be a bad idea.

  She studied it for a long moment and then gave him a clipped nod. “Maybe I’ll try that.”

  He hopped to his feet and helped her stand.

  She grabbed her camera bag, handed him her half-eaten sandwich, but did take his bottle of water out of his hand and marched over to where he’d suggested.

  As everyone watched, she plunked down her bag and water, then stretched out on the spot. She crossed an arm over her eyes as if to block out the light. The others kind of lo
oked back at him.

  Chana whispered, “I’m sorry. She’s not normally this easily upset.”

  “It’s not your fault,” he said. “She’s had a trying few days.”

  The others waited to see what he would do.

  He motioned at the lunch mess. “Is it time to clean up and get back to work?”

  They all groaned good-naturedly but cleaned up the mess and then spread out to their assigned jobs.

  He wanted to join Lacey but didn’t want to disturb her if she was truly resting. Neither did he have any intention of walking away. She shouldn’t be alone anywhere. He needed to talk to Stefan, Hunter, or even Bruno about these spirits, to figure out what they wanted and why they wanted her and how to dissuade them from bothering her. If she was stronger, it wouldn’t be so bad, but he wasn’t sure she had the inner strength to deal with this type of spiritual onslaught. It was not only dark forces but heavy anger and rage, often hatred, driving these people. It was hard to understand how so much bottled-up emotion could survive through the centuries, but there were cases reported of exactly that happening over and over again.

  He surveyed the dig site, wondering what his next move should be, when his phone buzzed.

  “Do you have any more pictures for me?” Stefan asked.

  “No, she hasn’t been drawing any.”

  “That’s too bad,” he said. “I’d really like to know more of what she sees.”

  “I think we all do,” Sebastian said. “But she’s struggling in many ways. She was eating voraciously, now much less, the same for her thirst. I don’t know if it’s the head injury, but she’s certainly more and more susceptible to the different forces around here. She’s also seeing more spirits.”

  “Sensitives are like that,” Stefan said. “Once they’re wide open, it’s hard for them to filter out the spirits they don’t want to talk to. And, once contact is made, you know yourself just how many clamoring voices can overwhelm you.”

  “I’m not even sure it’s so much clamoring voices at this point,” Sebastian said, “as much as she’s seeing things and feeling things.”

  “Like what?”

  “Cold chills, dark apparitions. She was buttressed between two different forces this morning in a way that was completely bizarre. Hunter saw it as well.”

  “Interesting,” Stefan murmured softly. “I need to connect with him then too.”

  “I don’t know what Hunter has said to you up until now,” Sebastian said, “but a lot of stuff is going on here. Like a vortex is building.”

  “Are you sure?” Stefan’s voice sharpened and deepened at the same time, definitely signs that this news had shocked him.

  “Yes, I’m sure. Since Lacey arrived, we had some minor incidents before, unexplained. Then a few days of calm. Now we’ve had incidents every day, sometimes multiples in a day, like today. Her energy is getting spun around. She’s doing a great job subconsciously to rebuff it, but, as she’s opening herself up to figuring out what’s going on, others are taking advantage.”

  “Have Hunter teach her some techniques to protect herself,” Stefan murmured.

  “I have discussed a couple basics with her but we need to do more, Hunter could be a huge help, but you know Hunter …”

  “I do indeed,” Stefan said, a note of humor entering his voice. “He’s a good man.”

  “Yeah, but a little hard to pin down.”

  At that, Stefan laughed out loud. “Keep in touch.” He clicked off.

  Sebastian pocketed his phone, glancing around to see Mark with an odd look on his face. Sebastian studied Mark’s expression, searching for signs he’d overheard Sebastian’s conversation. When Mark didn’t change expressions, Sebastian said, “Earth to Mark. You in there?”

  Mark gave a slow nod, his gaze narrowing on Sebastian’s features. “Oh, I’m in here,” he said. “But something’s going on that I’m not sure I like at all.”

  Sebastian raised one eyebrow and stared him down. Normally Mark was a very nonaggressive, happy-go-lucky kind of guy, but no doubt things going on lately had set them all on edge. Sebastian didn’t know how much Mark knew or indeed what Mark might have seen on his own. His behavior was more aggressive but not enough to be a problem, just a cutting tone to his voice, sharp facial expressions. Then everyone was feeling the tension here. Not to mention everybody had the ability to see psychic phenomena. So how many here were? Still most people weren’t open or accepting of what their eyes were telling them. And, over time, the images and visions faded. But Sebastian didn’t know how anybody here in his site crew stood in regard to psychic phenomenon. “What do you mean, something’s going on?”

  Mark gave an odd sound. Almost a sneer.

  Sebastian jumped off the ledge and walked closer to him. “What are you saying?” he demanded.

  Of all the things he understood about a dig like this was there had to be one boss and everybody had to get along. Arguments and strife had to be sorted out at the beginning stages; otherwise it grew into monumental arguments that served no purpose. It caused tension and disruption on a dig site.

  Mark stared at him for a long moment and then shrugged. “Maybe it’s nothing.”

  “What is it? Maybe it’s something,” he said encouragingly. “Tell me what’s going on.”

  Mark shook his head. “It seems like a lot of incidents here I’ve never seen on other digs before. I am not a superstitious guy, but sometimes you have to wonder just how much somebody is deliberately trying to vandalize our dig and how much of it is supernatural.”

  “Interesting,” Sebastian said, keeping his voice neutral. “Are you thinking you’re seeing ghosts or we’re being visited by ghosts?”

  “It sounds stupid when you ask it like that,” he muttered, backing down.

  “I’m not sure it’s stupid at all,” Sebastian said. “It’s not like you can do these kinds of digs and not wonder if there’s an odd presence when you open up a grave and you see mummies, bodies that have lain there for centuries. You have to wonder if there are spirits, pieces of their souls still around.”

  “Have you ever seen any?”

  “Mummies, graves, souls, spirits? What are you asking?”

  “Have you seen ghosts?”

  Sebastian contemplated him for a long moment, then gave a clipped nod. “I thought I did once. I don’t have any proof of it though.”

  An expression of relief crossed Mark’s face.

  Spiking Sebastian’s curiosity in a big way. “Have you?”

  “I’m not sure,” Mark said. “But, in the last few days, I’ve seen things I don’t understand—shapes, lights.” The corner of his mouth quirked up. “I figured you’d call me crazy.”

  “No, I wouldn’t call you crazy. I’d say you had a healthy respect for what’s going on in the world that we don’t understand. I don’t think those types of entities can break tools though or can steal them either.”

  Mark thought about it for a moment and then said, “I guess they can’t really pick up anything either, can they? And, if they can’t pick up anything, they can’t break anything. So, therefore, they aren’t the ones causing this trouble.” On that note his face lightened and brightened at the same time, and he smiled. “That’s good to know. I’ll get back to work then.” He turned and walked back over to the group.

  Leaving Sebastian to wonder how extensive the energy shifts were here, and who all was involved.

  Chapter 16

  Lacey rested on the ground for a good thirty minutes, getting her thoughts together. She hated that she appeared neurotic and weak to the rest of the team. She’d never had a problem holding up her end before, but nobody could have prepared her for what she had found here. Well, even more than that, the coldness, the fear that came with that one particular energy was terrifying.

  She sat up and reached for her camera, taking security in that normalcy. She caught pictures of Mark and Sebastian talking, the changes on Mark’s face during their conversation before he turned and walk
ed away. Again she caught Sebastian’s expression as he turned to look at her. Hastily she dropped the camera, but he knew. He always seemed to know. But, instead of walking toward her, he headed to the Stabian Gate.

  That surprised her. After everybody had urged her to go to the apartment or to lie down in the shade, she thought for sure he would want her to return with him. She kept taking pictures of his back, that strong, forward-moving determined stride, that loose-limbed walk of his that implied power, and yet, wasn’t threatening. He disappeared into the dark gate’s entranceway as she kept clicking.

  Finally she put down her camera, lay back down, took a deep breath, stretched for several long moments in her prone position, mentally pushing out all the angst that had been following her this morning and then sat back up again.

  Seeing Hunter standing in front of her, she let out a light shriek. “Why do you keep sneaking up on people?” she demanded.

  He grinned at her. “Because it’s fun.”

  She groaned. “That’s not fair.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m supposed to be resting after another incident,” she emphasized. “I hate that they are hitting my system with a whack.”

  “What else do you expect them to do? There’s no point in these entities appearing to you if you’re not seeing them. It takes them a lot of time and energy to accomplish what they’re doing.”

  “Did you see the one at lunchtime?”

  His lips pursed as he studied her face. “I saw the dueling forces earlier. But I haven’t seen anything since the time the three of us were together.”

  She motioned to the corner where she had seen the black apparition. “Then I have to tell you about the one I saw after that.” She explained. “It was only about half an hour or forty-five minutes ago. I never even got to finish my lunch.”

  He squatted down in front of her and checked her forehead temperature.