The Prodigy Slave, Book Two: The Old World: (Revised Edition 2020)

by Londyn Skye

  “Hey, Elijah!” Isabel had greeted her brother that day. “You’re back in town for a while, huh?”

  “Yeah, just a few days.” Elijah walked over to where his sister was sitting at the sewing machine and kissed her on the cheek. “What you doin’?” he asked.

  “Makin’ a dress for Lily,” Isabel answered in her usual giddy mood. “William wants to send it to ’er.”

  “Looks like a weddin’ dress.”

  “It is,” Isabel replied, her silly grin still in place. She was so focused on the stitching that she did not see the sudden grimace that came over her brother’s face.

  “Who’s she marryin’?”

  Isabel suddenly stopped sewing. The tone of Elijah’s voice had immediately snuffed out her jovial mood. She knew how a truthful answer would make her brother react.

  “Who’s she marryin’?” Elijah asked again, suddenly leaning down near his sister’s shoulder.

  Isabel swallowed hard and refused to look at him.

  “You ain’t gonna answa’ me?” Elijah continued.

  “D-does it matta’ who she’s marryin’?”

  “Don’t play stupid! You know it does!”

  “A-are you hungry?” Isabel asked to evade the topic. “Afta’ all that travelin’, I know you’d love a home-cooked meal. I-I can fix you somethin’ to eat if you want,” she said, trying to get up from her seat.

  Elijah lightly pushed her back down in the chair. “Don’t change the subject. I want an answa’.”

  “You don’t have to shove me, Elijah,” Isabel said as she began to get emotional.

  “Why’re you evadin’ the question, Isabel?”

  “If you’re just here to pick a fight, c-can you please just leave?” Isabel replied nervously, slightly turning her body away from her brother.

  “Why?!” Elijah suddenly snapped.

  Isabel jumped. “Elijah, y-you scarin’ me.”

  “Oh, daddy ain’t here to protect you anymore, and now you scared ‘a me, huh?” he asked, a sinister tone in his voice. He grabbed his sister’s shoulder and forcefully made her look up at him. “You know why he ain’t here anymore?”

  Tears began to trickle out of Isabel’s eyes.

  “DO YOU?!”

  Isabel flinched and snapped her eyelids closed, forcing more tears to cascade down her cheeks.

  “’C-cause he d-dead,” she sniffled.

  “Tell me why he’s dead!”

  “H-he was m-murdered.”

  “And who murdered him?”

  “Th-the Ghost Rida’s.”

  “And whose fuckin’ fault did I say that was?”

  “It ain’t n-nobody’s fault Elijah.”

  “I said! Whose. Fuckin’. Fault. is it?!”

  Isabel just sat there trembling.

  “ANSWA’ ME DAMMIT!”

  “James!” she finally blurted.

  “And you have the fuckin’ audacity to sit here and handmake his bride a dress?!”

  “B-but, Elijah, I-I just don’t believe James was the one to tell the Ghost Rida’s to do what they did,” she replied, attempting to defend him and her reason for making the dress.

  Elijah suddenly snatched his sister from her seat, grabbed her by the throat, and slammed her up against the wall. “How do you know he didn’t?!” he snarled through gritted teeth.

  Isabel wanted to reply but her air supply was cut off.

  “Even if he didn’t tell the Ghost rida’s to do what they did, that filthy white boy was still the one that brought that little slave bitch to our house!” Elijah continued. “If it wasn’t for that, we’d be on the porch eatin’ dinna’ with our parents right now! That white bastard didn’t do shit but destroy everybody’s lives and put an end to our motha’ and fatha’s!”

  Isabel remained plastered against the wall by her own brother’s hand, shaking with fear as tears continued to drain from her eyes. Elijah tightened his grip on her neck and pushed her even harder into the wall. “I dare you to make anotha’ fuckin’ excuse for that filthy white boy again, and I’ll snap your neck in two!” He put a finger in her face. “Put one more stitch in that damn dress if you want to, and I swear to God, you’ll be listed in tomorrow’s obituary!” He released his sister and watched her crumple to the floor, shaking and crying, trying desperately to catch her breath. He then turned to leave her apartment but suddenly stopped and turned around near the door. “Is William attendin’ that weddin’?”

  “I-I th-think s-so,” Isabel coughed, still trembling on the floor.

  “You go on and finish that damn dress, ya’ hear?” Elijah demanded. “We’re goin’ to that fuckin’ weddin’,” he told her, after quickly realizing that it would be foolish to pass up on the opportunity to finally settle his vendetta against James. He then walked out, slammed the door, and left his sister there alone and in shock.

  Isabel was sick to her stomach over the fatal mistake she had made by passively bringing up the fact that James and Lily planned to wed. Elijah had been ranting and raving to her for weeks before that incident about his hatred for James. She, therefore, knew that divulging that information to her brother would cause him to snap, but she let her mouth get ahead of her mind as usual.

  Isabel felt an immense amount of guilt for never divulging to William what Elijah had done to her. She was positive that William would have had the bandits rectify the situation. But after the way her brother had completely unraveled on her, she was now sincerely afraid for her life. Elijah’s constant threats of violence toward her since then had even managed to turn her usual jubilant chatty ways into a forced facade in the face of others. Her once loving brother had bullied her into paralyzing silence. As a result, the one time she needed to speak up, she simply could not bring herself to utter a single word about the demon lurking inside of Elijah Ridley, one that was hell-bent on surfacing for revenge.

  … Isabel’s silence had now cost Samuel his life. She never would have suspected that an innocent man would be a casualty of her brother’s mission, but she was convinced that James was going to fall at Elijah’s hands. The possibility of that fact had Isabel a nervous wreck during the wedding. Her nerves were tenfold while riding back with William on the train, knowing that her brother was finally going to be alone with his intended target … but still, she maintained her silence.

  Ironically, Elijah’s presence had equally affected Samuel during the wedding. Samuel still recalled the explosive argument that he had overheard between Lily and Elijah inside of her hotel room after the art auction in Manhattan. The whole ordeal had left a bitter taste in Samuel’s mouth about Elijah. Recalling that incident left Samuel with a sense of discomfort that he just could not shake during the wedding. It drove him to watch Elijah carefully throughout the ceremony. But Elijah had been so calm during the event that Samuel felt as though he could literally let his guard down when Elijah walked up on him in the woods. It was a mistake in Samuel’s judgement that quickly proved to be fatal.

  Despite how intoxicated he was the night of the art auction, Elijah had also not forgotten the way Samuel had dragged him out of Lily’s hotel room after their massive argument. For that fact alone, Elijah felt irrationally justified in shooting Samuel between the eyes. In Elijah’s mind, Samuel was a useless man, who once stood in the way of him being with the woman he loved. This time around, Elijah was wise enough to permanently ensure that Samuel did not stand in the way of his path to vengeance, or any other path for that matter.

  Elijah had gotten a taste of what it was like to spill a man’s blood and watch the life drain out of him when he shot Tucker McCormick, and he loved every minute of it. To have that kind of power made him feel like a God. He especially felt invincible after having gotten away with it the first time around. Wanting that godlike feeling to wash over him again, Elijah now sat eagerly anticipating the moment he would be able to put a bullet between the eyes of the white man that he hated beyond measure.

  Elijah had to fight hard to keep his hatred under cont
rol during James and Lily’s wedding. But now, he was free to let that emotion run rampant. As he sat next to Samuel’s lifeless body, Elijah’s mind became inundated with the moments he had witnessed during the wedding that burned him up inside. He was sickened that James and Lily could stand at the altar, jovially celebrating their love, just four months after his parents’ tragic murder. Elijah cringed at the sight of James lighting up with a smile whenever he touched Lily’s growing belly. It enraged him that James could express such joy over his new family, despite having maliciously destroyed another not long ago. Elijah noted the way that Lily looked at James with such love yet looked at him with such disgust when she first saw that he was in attendance. He noticed how she spoke to James with such tenderness in her voice but sounded so cold while addressing him. He even felt the coldness in her embrace when she hugged him, but Elijah could sense the warmth with which she held James after their union. Every repulsive memory from that night had Elijah sitting next to Samuel’s dead body with his violent urges escalating to a fever pitch. Instead of just shooting James, he now wanted to injure him, tie him up, and force him to watch as he gutted Lily and pulled their fetus from her womb. He wanted to visually torture James and then set him ablaze, allowing him to slowly roast to death the way his parents had.

  As it was turning out, Mary Jo Parker had a partner in crime that she did not realize she had. As unstable as his mind had become, Elijah Ridley would have been a model citizen in Mary Jo’s hometown of Looneyville. The parallels between two people who did not remotely know each other were startling. Their homicidal desires, their jealousy, envy, greediness, and self-centered ways continued to ensure the demise of two people who simply wanted to love each other in peace. Neither deviant could mentally handle the fact that their feelings were not remotely reciprocated. Both preferred to see James and Lily’s lives destroyed before seeing them happy together. The unwitting diabolical duo had both even gotten away with murder yet continued to live their lives as if such an evil was just as necessary as breathing. Having so much in common, the pair would have indeed commiserated well with one another while residing in the land of lunacy, both neighbors probably laughing hysterically together as they gossiped over the fact that their jealousy and envy had garnered such catastrophic results.

  While Elijah lay in wait for his chance to bring his sadistic fantasies to fruition, Jesse had set out to find his son while thinking of equally sadistic ways to torture Lily. Since he did not know where James and Lily were headed or how far they had gotten, Jesse knew he was going to need help locating them. He rode hard to the Ghost Rider rally, certain that his brethren would be eager to capture someone who had so blatantly spit on the rules of their secret society. While riding, Jesse was summoning the courage to set his pride and humiliation aside before speaking to everyone. When he arrived, he led his horse out into the middle of the circle that all the men had formed around the sixteen-foot wooden cross that Duke was just about to set ablaze. As always, Jesse’s presence commanded their attention. Everyone halted their ritual and remained silent while they waited for him to speak.

  Jesse locked eyes with J.R. for a moment and then turned to look at every face surrounding him. “I wouldn’t normally say this, but I need y’all to turn that nigga’ loose what y’all got tied up to that tree ova’ yonda’,” he said, motioning his head toward the man who was to be the casualty of their weekly entertainment killing.

  J.R. locked eyes with his father again. He had a hateful grimace on his face this time, wondering if this was further proof that his father had gone completely soft.

  “I got anotha’ nigga’ I’m itchin’ to torture here t’night instead…” Jesse explained, his eyes still trained on his namesake. “Along with ’er nigga’ lovin’ thief!”

  J.R.’s grimace suddenly morphed into a look of pride.

  “Behind my back, my own son done betrayed me!” Jesse continued. “He done violated our ultimate unwritten law! He crossbred with a nigga’!” He turned in a circle on his horse. “And I’m gonna prove to each and every one of y’all t’night that ain’t no nigga’ lovin’ white man exempt from the wrath of the Ghost Rida’s!” He looked at J.R. again. “Not even my own fuckin’ flesh and blood!”

  As with all his bloodthirsty speeches, every Ghost Rider yelled out in excitement while thrusting their torches in the air. J.R. stretched his thin lips into a sinister smile, feeling proud that the “take no prisoners” father he knew was back.

  “James done run off with my house slave, and I want ’em both caught!” Jesse explained. “Mount up and break off into groups ‘a two and radiate out in all directions. They have at least one to two hours on us, so ride hard until you cova’ every fuckin’ square inch ‘a Virginia! When you find ’em, I want ’em alive! You leave the fuckin’ torturin’ to me!” Within minutes of Jesse’s short speech, every Ghost Rider had partnered up, loaded their pistols, mounted up, and were pushing their horses hard out into the darkness of the woods with torches in hand in search of James and Lily.

  With the stop that James had made to get help from Gideon, he had lost valuable time trying to make his escape. The fact that they were rolling in a wagon further slowed their progress. Despite it, though, all had been quiet for the two hours that James sat in the back vigilantly watching over Lily. He had finally treated all her wounds and rectally given her another more powerful medication to help reduce her fever and internal swelling. He especially hoped it would quickly alleviate the swelling in her brain and free her from her crippling comatose state. He now sat with Lily’s head rested in his lap, patiently waiting for her to wake up. While patting her with a cool cloth, he was whispering words of encouragement and love to her, hoping to give her the emotional strength to keep fighting.

  From time to time, James would glance over at the satchel that contained his deceased child. Thoughts of her would leave him fighting to maintain the mental strength to weather their current storm. He lost the emotional grip on his strength even further when he thought about the fact that he would have to explain to Lily the loss of their child and relive the devastation all over again. In those moments of weakness, James would simply start to pray. He would pray for Lily to pull through, for God to help him maintain his sanity, and for his child to rest in peace in His heavenly realm. Amid one of his prayers, he suddenly halted and opened his eyes when he heard a noise far off in the distance.

  “James, I think we got company. I hear horses approachin’,” Gideon said, further confirming the sound James thought he had heard.

  James gently laid Lily’s head on a pillow and got up to peek out of the back of his covered wagon. He turned toward the sound of beating hooves, which was growing louder with every second. When he got his eyes to focus, he saw a set of torches and familiar ghostly robes flapping in the wind that quickly gave away the identity of who was blazing toward them. “Shit!” James mumbled under his breath.

  With his heart suddenly pounding, James quickly scrambled to the front of the wagon to brief Gideon. “Looks like my fatha’s finally sent out his henchmen. Those’re definitely Ghost Rida’s trailin’ us.”

  “What should we do?” Gideon questioned.

  “Puttin’ a bullet between their eyes would be my preference, but just go ahead and let ’em approach. I’ll hide and keep quiet back here. They’ll probably just ask you if you’ve seen me or Lily. They’ve known you too long to give you much of a hassle. Keep calm and keep your answa’s brief. I’m sure they’ll be on their cowardly way afta’ that.”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  James scurried to the back and hid under a pile of blankets, covering himself and Lily completely. “Stay strong, Lily,” he whispered, kissing her lightly on the cheek before settling in under the covers as close to her as possible. He lay there as motionless as Lily, his heart beating just as loudly as the horse hooves he heard closing in on his wagon. Within minutes, the sound of neighing horses were just feet away, and he felt the wagon slow to a crawl.


  “Stop this goddamn wagon!” James heard one of the Ghost Riders call out to Gideon.

  “Whoa!” Gideon called out to his horses, pulling the reins, and stopping the wagon completely.

  The pair of Ghost Riders prompted their horses to stand in front of Gideon’s wagon to impede his path. Just as James told him to do, Gideon kept calm, despite the rifles the Ghost Riders had slung over their shoulders, accosting him like they were the law.

  “Aww shit! It ain’t nothin’ but Dr. Whitfield,” one of the Ghost Riders complained, snatching off his hood and revealing his face. The other Ghost Rider took his off as well.

  With their hoods off, Gideon recognized them immediately. “Willard. Jethro,” he greeted, glancing calmly from one to the other. “Can I help you two gentlemen?”

  “We’re lookin’ for Jesse Adams’ boy, James. You seen or heard from ’em today?” Jethro asked.

  “Can’t say that I have. Is he all right?”

  “He done run off with one ‘a Jesse’s slaves,” Jethro explained.

  “Wait a minute, ain’t James workin’ with you these days?” Willard asked, suddenly glaring at Gideon with lowered eyelids.

  “He sure does.”

  “And you ain’t seen ’em at all today?”

  “No. We alternate shifts most days.”