Valle : Book 2 of the Heku Series

by T. M. Nielsen

  Through clenched teeth, Emily asked, “Why can’t I ash him?”

  This time Chevalier did laugh, “He’s not a heku. He’s a familiar, they are their own animal.”

  “Ok, then go jump off a cliff,” she growled at him.

  “As you wish,” Sam said politely, and headed for the door.

  “Emily!” Chevalier said, surprised.

  “Fine… stay,” she said, glaring at Sam.

  Sam stopped in place and turned back to her.

  “Ok, let’s do this. Tell Sam to obey me. It might be easier if I have some control too,” Chevalier said, and smiled when Sam cringed.

  “Sam, obey Chevalier,” she grumbled.

  “Yes, Emily,” he replied calmly.

  “Good, then get the door, Sam,” Chevalier said, moments before Emily heard a knock.

  Sam went to the door and came back with a silver tray. He sat it down beside Emily as she glared at him suspiciously. He lifted the silver dome and stepped back.

  Emily hadn’t realized how hungry she was until she smelled the fried chicken and Brussels sprouts on the plate. She stabbed a small green cabbage with a fork and started to eat.

  Emily looked up and blushed when she realized both Sam and Chevalier were watching her eat.

  “Go away,” she said to Sam, and he left the room quickly.

  Chevalier laughed, “You should be nicer to him. He could actually come in handy.”

  “Then you take him,” she said between bites of chicken.

  “Oooh no, he’s yours.” He was grinning, and it was starting to irritate her.

  She knew how to stop that, “I’d rather have David up here than Sam.”

  Chevalier’s eye widened, then he realized her motive and turned his head so she didn’t see him smile.

  “I’m glad you find me so funny,” she said, and hit him in the back of the head with the saucer from her plate.

  “I can’t help it,” he told her when he grabbed the saucer and put it back on her tray.

  “Well… try harder,” she said, grabbing another piece of chicken.

  “You have no idea how absolutely adorable you are.” Part of his mind told him to shut up, but he ignored it, “You are just so tiny and the baby makes you look fragile and about to fall forward all the time. You have such a vicious attitude and it’s endearing when I realize that you actually think you are tough.”

  Just as he’d finished with a warm smile on his face, he felt the heel of Emily’s left foot connect with his lower jaw, breaking it in two and displacing half of it.

  “Damnit, Em,” he said as his jaw reattached. “Did you hurt yourself?”

  She kicked at him again and her eyes flared as he dodged the kick.

  He put his hands on her feet and held them to the bed, “Stop it.”

  “I’m not tiny,” she said, glaring at him.

  “Ok,” he told her, holding his face steady.

  “I’m not fragile.”

  “Ok”

  “I’m not weak.”

  “Dear, you are far from weak,” he agreed.

  “Get out,” she said angrily.

  Chevalier nodded and stood up. He felt a piece of chicken bone hit him in the back as he stepped out the door and shut it behind him. Both Kyle and Sam were out in the ante-chamber and looked up at him.

  “Temperamental?” he asked Sam.

  Sam nodded, “Every one of them.”

  “That’s an understatement,” he said, leaving the ante-chamber and disappearing into the hallway.

  ***

  Emily looked down the hallway curiously, and watched as a row of tall heku in dark blue robes visited with each other with the full hoods covering their faces. She inched closer to see if she could see who they were or what they were talking about, then became irritated when she got even closer and all she could hear was the tone of their voices.

  Crouching low, Emily quickly maneuvered into the room and slipped under the table to hide under the table cloth. She crawled under the table toward them and stopped when she came face-to-face with Kyle. He was looking at her, frustrated.

  “What are you doing?” he whispered angrily. He was also in a long blue robe, but his hood was pulled back.

  Emily cringed and crawled back the way she came. She knew she was about to get chastised for this. Once she was safely in the hallway, away from the robed figures, Kyle grabbed her arm.

  “You promised,” he whispered harshly, leading her back to her room.

  “I want to know what’s going on,” she said.

  “We told you, it’s more important today than ever that you stay in your room. You swore to us you’d do that and here I find you running around.” He was glaring at her.

  “Just tell me,” she begged.

  “No, get back upstairs.”

  Emily set her jaw and crossed her arms, “No.”

  Chevalier grabbed her arm from behind her, “What are you doing out here?” he hissed.

  “I want to know what’s going on,” she told him again, and her eyes widened when she saw he was also in a long blue robe.

  “Get upstairs, now,” he said, through gritted teeth.

  Emily knew when she was about to cross the line, and she allowed Chevalier to lead her back upstairs, not saying a word.

  The guard on duty at her door gasped when he saw Chevalier leading Emily down the hallway. It had been his job to keep her in her room. He watched Chevalier nervously as he roughly pulled Emily into her room. Kyle followed them and shut the door, glaring at the guard.

  “What do you think you’re doing, Emily?” Chevalier asked her angrily.

  “I don’t like being a prisoner in my own room,” she said, facing him and rubbing her arm.

  “You promised,” he said.

  “Oh, I see, and neither of us ever breaks a promise,” she hissed at him.

  “Stay up here,” he said, and headed for the door.

  “No”

  Chevalier spun toward her, “Your blood could cost you your life today. These heku do not know you. They aren’t used to the scent, and I’m personally not up to fighting off the eleven of them that are coming.”

  “Then just tell me what’s going on.”

  “Fine… we’re making a new heku,” he said, angry.

  She smiled, “Oh, can I watch?”

  “No!” he shouted at her and she jumped.

  “Stay here. If I catch you out again, I’ll have no choice but to stick you in prison for the day,” Kyle said to her.

  “You wouldn’t!” She knew as soon as she said it, that he wasn’t lying.

  “Watch me,” Kyle hissed, and left as he pulled his hood up.

  “How are you getting out? Just tell me.” Chevalier’s voice was softer now that Kyle was gone.

  She frowned, “Why should I tell you? So you can lock me up any time you think I might stub my toe?”

  “It’s more dangerous than that and you know it.”

  “Why? Just because the heku can’t resist my blood?” She wasn’t convinced.

  “Making a heku is dangerous. We have to turn ourselves over to our instincts and it’s not safe for any mortal, let alone you. I realize you don’t understand how appetizing you smell to the heku, but trust me on this, you wouldn’t last long.” He reached up and touched her cheek softly.

  She lowered her eyes and sat on the bed watching him. He knew she still wasn’t happy, but at least she would be safe here away from what was going on.

  “Fine”

  “Stay here. I can’t protect you from that many heku.” He smiled slightly and walked out of the room, pulling his hood up.

  He joined the other heku in the foyer moments later.

  “Shall we head down?” he asked and they nodded and followed him through a hidden wall and down into a large room.

  The room was round, with no windows or seats, and the only door was the one they had come in through. The dirt floors and low ceiling made the entire room feel stuffy and uncomfortably clo
sed.

  Quietly, the twelve heku in blue robes lined the walls and a low hum escaped them. They were as still as statues when the door opened again. A heku in a black robe stepped into the room followed by a mortal. He was tall and slender with black hair and a long goatee. He glanced at them nervously and moved to the center of the room and looked around.

  Chevalier spoke, though it was hard to tell who was speaking, the hoods blocked all light from their faces and they were all perfectly still.

  “Mortal, do you know where you are?” Chevalier asked.

  “I do,” he said, turning slightly toward the voice.

  “Do you know what is about to happen?”

  “I do.” He was sweating nervously.

  “Do you do so willingly and without coercion?”

  “I do.” His voice began to shake.

  “Proceed,” Chevalier said to the heku in black.

  The mortal dropped to his knees and looked up at the heku in black. He heard hisses from around the room as the heku held him down while the twelve heku in blue converged on him and began to feed. He screamed in agony as thirteen sets of sharp teeth sank into his soft flesh and he could feel the life draining out of him.

  Just when the mortal was about to lose consciousness, he felt something pressed against his lips and he opened his mouth. At first, the salty blood was repulsive, but as he tasted more of it, he found himself drawn to it. It numbed the pain of the bites that covered his body, and replenished the blood that was ceremoniously being drained from him.

  The twelve heku in the blue robes pulled away from the man and stood back along the circular walls. The heku in the black robe stayed knelt by the man as the man drank heartily from her wrist. After a few minutes, the heku stood up and pulled herself forcefully away from the almost dead man.

  The heku then took a stick and wrote runes in the dirt around the man as he began to convulse, his eyes rolled back in his head. The twelve in blue began to chant and sway slightly in place as the runes were written. When she was done, she took the stick she had written with and brought it high above the seizing man, and then plunged it deep into his chest, piercing his heart.

  The screams echoed off of the walls as blood poured from his chest and congealed around the runes. Slowly, they began to glow and the light from them shone brightly on the stone ceiling. The heku in the room all grew silent and watched as the mortal man began to change into the immortal.

  When his seizing stopped, he fell motionless to the cold, dirt floor. Blood no longer poured from him, and his chest was no longer rising and falling.

  Chevalier pulled back his hood quickly and went to the man and knelt.

  “What happened?” Kyle asked, joining him.

  Chevalier reached out and touched the man’s neck, “He’s dead.”

  “He can’t be dead,” Elder Selest said, also dropping her hood.

  Chevalier stood up, his eyes wide, “What happened?” He scanned the room as the rest of the heku dropped their hoods and looked at the man, surprised.

  “No one has ever died during the process,” Selest said, kneeling down to verify for herself.

  Selest sharply inhaled as she found no traces of life in the man.

  Elder Leonid stepped forward, “If he’s dead, then what killed him?”

  Chevalier shook his head, “I don’t know.”

  The heku in the black robe pulled her hood down and fell beside the man.

  “Mike?” Her eyes were horrified as she took his hand in hers and looked over his body.

  Kyle touched her shoulder lightly, “He’s gone, Corine.”

  “No, he can’t be!” she yelled, lowering her head. If the immortal could cry, she would be.

  Elder Selest was still looking around at the heku gathered, “This has never failed. For thousands of years, this has never killed a mortal.”

  Chevalier looked around the room, “Someone… something had to have been done wrong.”

  Elder Leonid moved to Chevalier’s side, “This is an experienced group of heku, what could have gone wrong?”

  Elder Selest spoke up first, “We all saw what happened, and nothing went wrong.”

  “Could he have been sick?” Kyle asked.

  “No,” Corine told him. “He passed the physical requirements, he was healthy.”

  “We are sorry, Corine, there’s nothing we could do,” Elder Selest told her, and touched her shoulder lightly.

  The robed figures all walked out of the round ceremonial room and back into the foyer. They were quietly contemplating what happened and no one spoke. The tension in the air was thick. Each heku looked at the others, wondering who had done something wrong.

  The two Elders present said their good-byes first and headed out to the helicopter that was waiting for them. The rest left on foot for their houses out on the island. Chevalier and Kyle were all that was left in the foyer, and they were deep in conversation in the corner when a commotion sounded up the stairs.

  Shouting came from up the white marble staircase. Kyle looked up the stairs, his mind finding it hard to grasp another tragedy when the body of the mortal still lay downstairs on the cold earth. Chevalier sighed and headed back toward his office, any emergency could be handled by his staff. He had to find out how a mortal died in his house during a routine ceremony that had been done successfully for thousands of years.

  When he heard Emily’s name, he flew up the stairs barely passing Kyle on his way. Chevalier entered Emily’s room and focused in on her.

  Emily was lying in bed, unmoving. A trickle of blood fell from her nose. Chevalier yelled at her guard to call Dr. Edwards and get him here on the helicopter. Kyle noticed the hesitation by the guard and took the orders himself.

  Chevalier sat down by Emily and touched her softly, “Em?”

  Sam shifted from one corner of her room to the next and watched everyone carefully.

  Emily didn’t move. The red stain below her head told him she had been bleeding for a while before it was noticed. He watched her breathing, it was slow and steady, as if she were simply sleeping.

  “What happened?” he yelled at the guard.

  “We just had a feeling that we needed to check on her, and when we knocked, she didn’t answer. We thought she’d snuck out again, so we came in and found her here like this. She wouldn’t answer us, and there was blood pooling under her head.” He was in a panic, afraid of what the Chief Enforcer would do to them. His temper was legendary.

  Chevalier took Emily’s hand in his, “Em, if you can hear me, squeeze my hand.”

  He waited a few seconds, “Come on Emily, just squeeze it.”

  He sat with her, holding her hand and watching her breathe as he waited for Kyle to return with the doctor. He breathed a sigh of relief when he heard the familiar sounds of the helicopter landing on the roof.

  Dr. Edwards ran into the room, his black bag ready, “What happened?”

  He began by pulling out his stethoscope and listening to her heart and lungs while Chevalier explained.

  “The guards found her like this. She was fine when I saw her two hours ago.” He watched the doctor carefully.

  He put the stethoscope away and began pressing his hands down her back, on her abdomen, desperately trying to find a reason for her to be unconscious.

  “Has she had nosebleeds before?” the doctor asked.

  “Yes, some lately, they come with a headache,” Chevalier explained.

  “She’s bleeding from her ears, too. Have you seen that?”

  “No”

  “Any triggers for the nosebleeds? Stress? Hunger?” the doctor grabbed a small monitor and pricked Emily’s finger. He put a drop of her blood onto the monitor, and then waited for it to finish.

  Chevalier suddenly looked up at Kyle, and both of them had wide eyes. There was a trigger, overuse of her abilities, abilities that could kill a heku.

  Kyle finally spoke, “No, no triggers we can find.”

  Chevalier turned and looked at Emily.
He wondered if that small person, who looked so pale and delicate on the bed, could prevent a ritual older than her own species.

  He could tell the doctor was getting frustrated, “Her blood pressure is good, her blood sugar is good, and I can’t find an injury. I may need to get her back to the hospital.”

  “Make arrangements to move her to the hospital in Bangor,” Chevalier said to the doctor. He nodded and went to the balcony to make the calls.

  Kyle ordered everyone out of the room and moved up to Chevalier, “Sir, could she have done that?” he whispered.

  Chevalier hesitated, and then answered, “It’s the only explanation. But was it a conscious effort?”

  Sam hissed at them from the corner, and when they turned to him, they saw he was glaring at them both. They turned back to each other, ignoring the moody familiar.

  “She wouldn’t do that, would she?” Kyle asked.

  “I hope not,” Chevalier said, taking her hand. “I’m not sure how I’d deal with that.”

  Emily brought her hands to her head and groaned.

  “Emily?” Chevalier asked, looking down at her.

  “My head,” she whispered.

  Kyle ran to the balcony and got the doctor, who came back in instantly.

  “Emily?” he asked, sitting on the edge of her bed.

  “Make it stop,” she whispered, her hands digging into the hair on the side of her head.

  “What’s wrong, Emily?” the doctor asked and pulled a small pen light out of his pocket.

  “Please, make it stop,” she whispered again.

  “She said it was her head,” Chevalier told the doctor.

  The doctor readied his light, then pulled her eyelid back and gasped. Chevalier looked down and saw that the whites of her eyes were now blood-red and her pupils were dilated. He checked her other eye and it was the same.

  “What causes that?” Chevalier asked.

  The doctor shook his head, “With the headache… I’m thinking either an infection or a tumor.”

  Chevalier stiffened.

  “I’ve made the arrangements, let’s get her to the hospital,” the doctor said, grabbing his bag.

  Chevalier picked Emily up and she screamed out in pain. He threw a blanket over her, and beat the doctor to the helicopter, then cradled Emily in his lap and fastened the belt over them both. When the doctor climbed in, he dropped a bag on the floor that Sam had packed, and the helicopter rose and quickly took off. Emily was unconscious again.