Vanishing Rain (Blue Spectrum Chronicles Book 2)

by L. L. Crane

  Orion placed our dishes in the sink, turning back toward me. “Are you ready?” he asked me, expectantly, his deep blue eyes piercing mine.

  I thought back to another time when I had wondered if I would ever be ready for someone like Orion. But I knew the answer to the question this time.

  “Yes, I am. More than ready.”

  He smiled at me, taking a bite of jerky.

  Just then there was a loud rapping on our door. It felt like the entire hut was going to collapse.

  Orion jumped up, opening the door in one swift movement. I could barely make out who it was but after waddling over to the door, I recognized the voice, could barely see the face that I still loved and missed.

  It was Troll’s.

  “We’re under attack,” he yelled hoarsely, as if he had been screaming those very words over and over again. “It’s the Reds, and they’re moving in on us.”

  Before Orion could answer, Troll was gone. We were under attack? I couldn’t fathom it. My pulse quickened, and the Peanut kicked me furiously. Ice started crying, picking up that something wasn’t right.

  Orion wasted no time, jetting into the bedroom. “You’re going to have to take Ice and go to the safe house,” he ordered. Nodding, I grabbed Ice’s hand, pulling him up off the floor. He was still crying, horrible screams that sounded like a wild animal’s. “Shhh,” I told him calmly, even though I was more terrified than I had been in my entire life. “It’s going to be okay.” I rubbed his back, trying to calm him. He would have to be quiet if we were to make it to the safe house. I wished that I could just pick him up and carry him, but I was too far along for that. He continued to wail, and I was immobilized, not sure what to do.

  Orion flashed out of the bedroom, having changed out of his claiming robe. He was dressed in full battle gear. Blue leather gripped his entire body, every muscle bulging because it was so tight, designed to deflect the crude weapons from battling bands. He held a shield and several spears in one hand. A quiver of arrows rested on his back and his belt was full of knives. He quickly tossed me my old knife belt. Grabbing it, I felt helpless, knowing it wouldn’t do me much good against an attack.

  “Take care of Ice,” Orion ordered in full military style. He stopped for a moment, his eyes blazing more than the smoky blue I had come to love so much. I had never seen him like this, and it scared me. But he cupped my chin in his hand and kissed me, a different kind of urgency behind it than any I had ever known. His eyes bored into mine. “I love you.” Then he gently shoved me from behind. “Get going now.”

  I turned to him, knife belt in hand. “Orion…”

  “Go,” he screamed to me. “Fuck, Rain, I love you both. Get to the safe house.

  Chapter 56

  The Peanut

  I clasped Ice’s sweaty hand and pulled him out the door, glancing back at Orion. He was stuffing some more weapons into his belt, some that I had never even seen or heard of before.

  “I love you,” I called out to him, my heart pulsing rapidly in my chest.

  He paused for the briefest second. “I love you Rain. Now vanish!”

  I pulled at Ice’s hand and opened the door, waddling as fast as I could down the path, my little brother still wailing hysterically.

  As soon as we left the hut I could tell we were surrounded. Perched in battle position around the huge crater that we called home were soldiers dressed in red, weapons flying at us from all directions. There was mass hysteria all around me, soldiers in blue racing for their own battle positions, arrows ruthlessly raining down on them from above, rocketing down on Ice and me as well.

  I flew my pregnant body toward the conference center, as fast as I dared, dodging arrows and spears, knives and some kind of flaming rock I had never seen in my life. I yanked at Ice, time and again keeping him from getting hit. If we could just make it to the conference room, we would be safe. I had already been shown the secret door from the inside.

  Orion thundered past me, not even acknowledging my existence as he rallied his troops. His eyes were steel, and his legs were machines. He called for names I didn’t even know, and people flocked toward him, the hysteria calming a bit. Still weapons battered at us. I gasped as a woman was hit in the chest with an arrow, and I turned to go back for her.

  “Leave her and get to the fucking safe house.” It was Orion’s voice, and it launched me into action.

  I caught one last glimmer of Orion as we dodged weapons, arrows and spears that ruthlessly poured out of the orange sky. He was headed in the opposite direction, toward the edge of the crater with a band of our soldiers bottling him in. I tried to freeze that image in my brain, afraid I might never see him again. A fire erupted in one of the huts, orange and yellow flames licking the sky. Even the constant pouring of rain didn’t put it out. I shook my head, knowing we needed to get out of the battle zone. I yanked on Ice’s cold hand, his wails a siren that I couldn’t put out.

  Ice squeezed my hand. “Wion,” he called out. “Wion come back.”

  I didn’t have time to explain anything to Ice as we barreled down the path, and it seemed like a year went by for every step we managed to take. Ice continued to cry, death rattling screams that sent a chill through my entire body.

  We tumbled along, the conference center in my sight now. I dipped and dodged as well as I could, dragging Ice along with me. It felt like my heart might jump out of my chest, and my arms were aching from pulling at Ice.

  Suddenly my huge belly tightened, and a pain like I had never felt before shot through my body, as if it might just cut me in half. At first I thought that I was hit by a weapon, but then the pain stopped, almost as quickly as it started.

  I gasped for air, my pulse echoing in my ears. I ignored the pain and pushed forward. I made a several more steps when the pain returned, and I almost fell to the ground, it hurt so badly.

  I wasn’t dumb, had read enough about childbirth in our Health classes, the explanations of labor and delivery so explicit and detailed, we all knew they were designed to keep us from getting pregnant. Another Administration trick. I huffed just as another pain gripped my stomach, huge hands that dug in so deeply I never thought they would let go.

  Shit. I was going into labor.

  My stomach tightened again, and Ice started screaming.

  “Wain, he wailed. “Wain.”

  I doubled over in pain but staggered ahead. At last the door to the conference center was a few steps away. I knew then we could make it. Panting like a dog as another pain took hold of me, I grabbed onto the side of the building, grasping my humungous, tightening stomach.

  Only a few more steps, I told myself. A few more steps before Ice and I were safe.

  I stumbled forward, falling onto the ground as the most intense pain I had ever felt strangled my stomach. I couldn’t move. I was stuck on the path with Ice screaming at the top of his lungs.

  Oh Gods, I had no idea it would be this terrible.

  Ice.

  Ice.

  I had to protect Ice, but somehow, in all of the pain, I had let go of his hand.

  I tried to squish air into my already filled and burning lungs, searching for Ice. The battle raged all around me, screams and thundering explosions, arrows whizzing by. I took one last look into the horrible scene, praying that Orion and Troll were safe. The odds didn’t look too good. There seemed to be an endless supply of red soldiers, and our band was doing little to stave them off. Desperately, I pulled myself up, trying to make it to the door of the conference center, which was only a few feet away. I caught my breath, searching in every direction for Ice. But he was gone.

  “Ice!” I screamed as another pain immobilized me. I fell to the path again crying, grabbing my stomach. I was being split apart. Every pain cruelly divided my body into two distinct pieces and I had no control over it.

  I gasped, another pain holding my body hostage, so close to the last one that I couldn’t move. Arrows continued to fly around me, an occasional spear sailing overhead, as I
rolled around on the ground, fighting the most intense pain I had ever felt.

  “Orion,” I screamed. “Orion!!”

  But Orion didn’t come and Ice was gone. I tried to pull myself up, but another pain took over my body, the cruelest tyrant of all. I screamed out loud then, not even caring if an arrow or weapon hit me. At least it would take me out of my misery.

  Just then hands, familiar hands, grabbed me by the armpits and pulled me up. I let out a scream as another pain crashed through my body. Tears in my eyes, I turned around, found the face of who had lifted me up.

  It was Troll. I started to speak, but he shushed me, so much like Orion that I started bawling like a baby. I leaned into him, twisting my head around. Troll had grown. He was quite a bit taller than me now, and the thin chest that I had leaned on in the subway tunnel, in our home, had filled out to be quite muscular, almost as thick as Orion’s. Troll handled me as if I were a plaything.

  He half carried and half drug me into the conference center, shoving me through the door none too gently. Another pain seized me, just when he let go, and I huddled into an immobile ball, my back and stomach searing into one giant spasm.

  “Ice,” I screamed out through that intense pain, doubled over and holding my stomach. “Get.” I moaned. “Ice.” I was paralyzed with pain. “For.” I screamed, the loudest one of all. “Me.”

  The door slammed behind me, and for a moment there was only silence. No Troll. No Ice. Certainly no Orion…he would be leading his forces. My mind spun a trick on me then. Orion never wanted anything to do with the military, had fought against it on so many levels, yet here he was, the leader of the Blue Spectrum. Forced into the military of one sort or another. Just as he had been trained all his life to do.

  Shit! I had to get my shit together. Thinking about Orion out there…about Troll. It only made things worse.

  My body curled into the most massive ball of all, and I felt something move within me. The Peanut. He wanted out, there was no doubt about it.

  This contraction hurt more than ever, and I begged for medication, help, anything to make the pain lesson, to make it stop. Just for a minute. I would take one minute without pain and be happy.

  For a second, my wish was granted, and I slowly drug my body, arm by arm, leg by leg, like a walrus out of water, toward the door to the safe house.

  I somehow reached the door, but there was no satisfaction in it as a group of hands pulled me through.

  “Ice,” I screamed at them as another contraction spread through my body, a crippling virus that I was sure would kill me.

  “Get Ice,” I panted, begging to the strange grey eyes that hovered over me.

  “Breathe,” someone told me. “Take deep breaths. Focus on something.”

  “Fuck you,” I screamed as another pain threatened to strangle the very life out of me.

  I twisted into a ball from the most intense pain yet, wondering how I had been so happy just a few minutes ago and how quickly it had all been taken away from me.

  “Ice…Orion,” I screamed between the contractions that only seemed to stop for mere seconds. I barely got a rest from one and the next one started.

  “This baby’s coming fast,” an older woman’s voice announced to someone, but I was sweaty and foggy and in so much pain, I couldn’t make out who it was. If I had paid more attention, I might have picked up on worry or concern.

  Someone had laid me down on a soft blanket, a pillow pushed behind my head and some water placed to my lips, but I shook my head, refusing the water.

  “Get Ice,” I panted as another pain shot through my body, a bullet ripping me not in half this time, but into at least four pieces, and I couldn’t begin to name who they belonged to. Orion was first on my list, and for a moment I wanted to strangle him.

  As I struggled against the pain that never seemed to end, my brother missing, and the two boys I loved in completely different ways fighting it out in a deadly battle, my world turned to one thing.

  The Peanut.

  Whether I liked it or not, with our without Orion, Ice, or Troll, S.L.A.G. or no S.L.A.G., the Peanut was making his way into this world.

  Other Books by L.L. Crane:

  Mark of Power Series:

  From the Mountain

  To the Moon

  Into the Black Night (to be released)

  Blue Spectrum Chronicles:

  Forbidden Rain

  Rain Born (to be released)

  For more information:

  www.llcrane.com

  lisa@llcrane.com

  Author’s Note

  Thank you for reading Vanishing Rain. I am busy at work on the third book in the Blue Spectrum Chronicles, Rain Born. You will find out if Rain can make the best out of her situation and forge a family of her own. And, of course, you will get to meet some new arrivals. Rain has changed so much since the first book, Forbidden Rain. You will love how she actually turns into a true Lordess and mother!

  I was recently asked, before I even finished Vanishing Rain, who my favorite character in my books would be, and I had to say Orion. But by now, it’s a toss-up between Orion and Troll.

  Have you ever loved two people in entirely different ways? I have. Orion started out in my head as some beefy guy who dumps a girl when he finds out she’s pregnant, but he changed into an entirely different person along the way. What greater gift can you give someone than something that person asks for? Rain wanted Ice away from the Clinic, and Orion made it happen. Orion makes a lot of things happen. That’s one of the many things I like about him.

  However, my true intention of this series was to bring awareness about the plight of autism to readers in an interesting way. As an educator, I regularly work with autistic children, deal with their parents, and know the horrible statistics that are bearing down on us as of 2015. One boy in 50 is now being born with autism. One girl in eighty-eight is. The prognosis is dim if we stand by and do nothing about it. Many of these autistic children are nonverbal, locked in their own silent hell. They will need round the clock care when they grow up, often needing up to two people at a time to care for them.

  Sadly, we won’t have the resources for this, and it is a cruel burden to pass on to our non-autistic children. I certainly hope it doesn’t get to the point where autistic people are dealt with as they are in this series, and that is why I wrote about it. What I didn’t plan on? A love story.

  Orion and Rain, of course, have that chemistry that almost everybody has shared with someone at some point. I enjoyed watching Orion grow up and change. I kind of fell in love with him myself!

  But Troll, oh what a sweet, good soul he is. You will find out more about just how much he loves Rain in Rain Born. I kind of fell in love with him, too. He reminds me so much of my one true love. Tony is resourceful, funny, kind, and always thinks of others before himself. He loves with all of his heart and asks for nothing in return. That is love!

  And that is what brings me to this next part. I don’t know if you noticed that this book is dedicated to Lily, and the lyrics from the song All I Need by Awolnation, next to it.

  I figured that Rain had held up pretty well considering all she had been through. I loved her determination to keep her baby, even if it might have autism. She was scrappy underneath all of that obedience, and she deserved someone to love her unconditionally. At first it was Troll, but one day while I was editing the book, I realized that Rain needed a dog. But not just any dog. She needed Lily.

  We all needed Lily.

  Lily was real and looked exactly as described in the book. She acted exactly as described in the book. My son was seventeen when he found her running wild on a highway. Someone had dumped her and she was starving. I was in the middle of working three jobs, having a new house built, taking care of three children, and not wanting to face the fact that I was in a failed marriage. The last thing I needed was another dog. How wrong I was!

  My ex-husband loaded Lily into the car and drove around all day, but there wasn’t a
dog shelter around that would take the pitt bull mix. He brought her back home, and I sent Nathan back to where he found her in hopes that he could find the owner of this huge, wild, untamed and unwanted dog. Some neighbors told him that she had been abandoned. Her name was Lily.

  My heart seized. Lily was ours.

  Never was a dog happier with a family! She rode in go carts next to the girls as they made mad circles of dust. She swam in our pond daily. She stared at the endless dog food in her dish by the hour, letting out the most gigantic sighs of contentment. She was afraid to take her eyes off of that dog dish for about a year, afraid that it might disappear. Lily couldn’t believe her good fortune, and yes, she got a little overweight.

  Right away, I sent one of the kids in to have her inoculated, spayed, and micro-chipped. Like playing a board game, we knocked the pieces of Lily’s life around, cards being dealt out according to the busiest schedule. As luck would have it, I was designated to pick Lily up from the vet’s.

  I waited in the room for her, and finally they brought her to me, a big cone wrapped around her head. She instantly fell to the ground and started crying, terrible howling sobs. At first I thought that she was in pain, and then I realized that Lily had thought we abandoned her. She had probably never been to the vet before.

  When we got home, Lily was elated! I didn’t think her tail would stay on, she wagged it so much. Lily wanted to make sure that we knew what she went through, how abandoned she felt at the vet’s office. She would come up behind us, with all one hundred pounds of her body, and knock us around with her cone. We called it being coned by Lily.

  We were all relieved when that cone was taken off and we wouldn’t have to be coned again. Little did we know that a cone would one day become a major part of Lily’s life.