Brush of Shade ((YA Paranormal Romance/Fantasy) The Whisperer's Chronicles)

by Jan Harman

  My hard fought for equilibrium—still so new and more fragile than my pride liked to acknowledge—wobbled. Doubt fed me a diet of my past hysterical episodes and debilitating depression. While I took slim comfort that this couldn’t be classified as one of my episodes, I had to scramble to find solid footing to cope with this strange, new life.

  Hands clasped beneath her chin Aunt Claire leaned closer, resting her weight on her elbows. “Olivia, how are you doing?”

  Her words floated amongst my thoughts, reminding me of when I’d drift off during a television show and wake up long enough to snatch a word here and there of a conversation. Marshaling a response took more effort than I expected. “Shade’s everywhere. It’s kind of hard to think straight.”

  Aunt Claire frowned. “Shade, perhaps you should pull back a little. This is her first time.”

  “I’m hardly projecting,” he answered.

  “For an accomplished linker I expect that is true. When was the last time you connected with a new initiate? Years, if ever? Withdraw,” Aunt Claire ordered. “You’re scaring Olivia.”

  I swallowed and tasted blood from where I’d bitten the inside of my mouth. Memories tumbled out of the darkness. Anxiety ratcheted immediately up to panic that was out of my control. The catalyst, tree limbs that morphed into ghostly, long-fingered hands caressing my face, released months of suppressed terror. I didn’t want to, but I was compelled to peer into churning eyes. My heart banged against my ribs. Injured and pinned in place I couldn’t stop splayed fingers from clasping the top of my head. A callous voice snaked between memories and disrupted thoughts, igniting the inside of my skull. I screamed and begged as my brain burned. The brogue thickened with frustration, demanding answers. Like greedy, grubbing talons, cruel images clamped hold, driving my consciousness deeper into the disjointed nightmare. Blood pooling in my shoes. Rasping breaths. Cruel hands delivering searing, immobilizing pain. Screaming. A seductive voice owning my name. Daddy!

  Memories collapsed helter-skelter one into the other, momentarily unearthing a dark, frightening place filled with malevolent purpose. I recoiled straight into the terrible quiet. Alone, I waited for death. The voice had promised.

  Reassurance plunged into my private hell. A steadfast presence ruffled across my raw consciousness. It tugged and prodded, trailing an enticing whisper that refused to yield to the quiet. My heart quickened in response, although I couldn’t explain why. Fear fizzled out. Loss loosened its crushing grip. Caring curled about the empty places in my heart. I sighed, drinking in the comfort and oh so natural brush of Shade.

  Warm hands squeezed mine. I tried to return the gesture. My head, too heavy for my neck, fell forward until my chin rested on my chest. That figures. I made a mess of everything, just when it had been going so well. Why didn’t my dark memories stay buried? It’s not like I wanted to see that hand or feel the press . . . The last piece of memory that I’d been having trouble seeing clearly fell into place. I gasped, frightened, my wide eyes automatically seeking out Shade.

  “I’ve joined before,” I exclaimed, going cold all over. “But it was cruel.”

  “Who was that man?” Shade demanded, speaking over my words.

  “What? You can’t have. Wait, what man?” my aunt asked, her voice far less certain than it had been moments before.

  “The tree limbs were hands on my face. They hurt! His voice . . . I can remember now the sinister sound of it tugging and prodding. Then he got angry and brutal. Why did he hurt me? Why did he do that to us?” I whispered, clutching Shade’s hands.

  Shade and Aunt Claire exchanged a tense look. Where our skin touched, it felt like I’d grabbed a stinging nettle bush. Long, tanned arms dissolved into the air. Gentle warmth ignited. Shade jerked his hands away.

  “Do you know what this means? We can prove one of us killed Warden Ethan,” Shade exclaimed.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t . . . know more.” I said in broken fits, watching Shade’s arms resume solid shape. “That voice . . . memories hit me sometimes, more lately since coming to the valley.”

  “You’ve nothing to apologize for.” He rolled his shoulder as he studied my face. “This won’t do. Share joy with me, so this first of many joinings in our valley doesn’t end on a note of fear.”

  Joy? I had none or at least none that I’d go in search of. The last thing I wanted was to end up in that dark place. I knew it was all in my head, but I still felt the weight of my father’s body constricting my chest. It would be some time before memories of that voice ceased haunting my thoughts. I did a mental shudder. My wobbling boulder came close to toppling.

  A hot pulse of air skimmed my cheek. “I am here,” Shade said, blanketing me with his support.

  I had this irrational urge to order him to saturate my mind with his vibrant personality. I forced my eyes to blink, focusing on slow moving spirals floating on mountain lakes and that deep, southwestern drawl that made me feel impossibly right and safe and home. Pride salvaged the moment. I sipped some water, and then nodded for him to continue.

  One moment I was staring into Shade’s frosted eyes, and the next billowy clouds descended below the timber line to settle into the high country meadow, shrouding our exploits from unwanted eyes. Crisp, damp air filled my lungs and glided across my bare arms. Excitement throbbed the air, like the beat of a marching drum. I felt invincible.

  Another snippet, this one full of sharp detail, unfurled the stars of the show, two young boys so very similar that I needed more scenes to tell them apart. I smiled with them as they raced across the meadow, leaping over damp, moss covered logs and burbling brooks. Deep breaths drenched in the sweet aroma of wildflowers tickled my nose. Cool air slapped my hot cheeks. Wispy seed pods scattered in a pouf of air. A flock of birds screeched and lifted out of the tall, dewy grass taking flight, keeping pace. Exuberance. Sheer joy of life folded over me, belonging to me for that brief instance of awareness as I raced the wind as one of them.

  Energy drained out of my body. I sort of folded forward. Trembling hands cushioned my head before it struck the table. Disorientated, I listened to the steady drum of a heartbeat while I tried to sort out who I was.

  “Shade?” A woman asked, her voice high and tight. “Is she alright? Shade, are you?”

  With both hands pressed flat on the table, a man pushed up onto his feet, got halfway up, and then sunk back onto his chair.

  “Is she in some kind of shock?” the woman demanded.

  “If she’s not, I am. Olivia?” he asked with a pronounced tremor in his voice.

  Warm hands cupped my chin, tipping my head up to the light. I squinted then gave up trying to keep my eyes open; it only made the room spin more. At least I agreed with the name he’d given me. Pieces started to settle back into place, rebuilding Olivia Pepperdine.

  Vibrating fingers squeezed my chin. “For the love of God, Olivia, say something.”

  “What a rush! Is it always so mind spiraling?” I asked, opening my eyes to foamy seas battering against growing ice fields.

  “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.” He leaned closer our noses almost touching. “How do you feel?”

  “I know who I am now.”

  “Shade!” Aunt Claire gasped shrilly, grabbing my hand.

  He dropped his head into his hands, breathing noisily against his palms. “I gave her a basic taste of what it can be like. To end on a good note, I pushed feelings of tranquility and initiated a withdrawal.”

  “So who won the race, you or Shadow?” I asked innocently.

  Shade’s head jerked up, his mouth dropping open. Waves crashed against icebergs that were rising out of frigid seas. He scraped his chair back from the table, thrusting vibrating hands through his hair and clasping them behind his neck. “You did it. You pulled out a memory. Either that or I slipped up big time.” His astonished expression dissolved, replaced by concern. Tension laced his voice when he said, “Maybe there’s something wrong with me. Maybe I made a mistake. Maybe your
initial order proved too much, and I bowled you over.” Massive ice wedges ground against each other in overcrowded seas. His chair legs rattled against the floor. “Olivia, you need to learn to be more careful. I could’ve permanently scarred you.”

  “Are you sure about the tranquility part? Cause the drowning in anxiety at the end was a bit of a spoiler.”

  “You took that too? But I’d pulled back.” He spun away from the table, backing into the refrigerator. “I should . . . I need to speak with Sister Willow.”

  Aunt Claire stood. “Our link was perfectly controlled. What is wrong with Olivia?”

  “Wrong?” He shook his head and stared back at me like he’d never really looked at me before. “Didn’t you hear me? Olivia might’ve pulled out a memory. For certain, she scooped up my emotions.”

  “Caught up in the emotions of the moment, you drifted too deeply and allowed her to see; there’s no harm. It was your intention all along to establish a deeper connection. She caught it. We should be pleased, not panicked,” Aunt Claire replied, her voice back to normal now that she’d come up with a solution.

  “No, I decided to hold off until another time. I used my happy memory to graze her mind to make her feel good. You know my control. I took extra care with Olivia. I tell you, she took the memory. That explains its unusual degree of crisp details and why I had trouble shutting it off. It’s been a long day. I should be going. You did great, Olivia,” Shade said, his tone far from convincing. “I’ll be back first thing in the morning. Lock up after I leave.” He vibe faded before he was halfway out the door.

  Confused by his abrupt departure, I stared at the empty doorway while my aunt silently tidied up the kitchen. Her continued silence and Shade’s alarmed reaction hung heavily over the room. Finally, I said without expecting a response, “I thought the idea was to connect. Figures, I can’t even do that right. Great warden I’ll make.”

  I chose to ignore the sinister memory if that was truly what it was. Too many pieces were jumbled in my head. Many of them had melded into my strange nightmares making separating facts all but impossible. For all I knew, what I’d felt was a residual from my immobility induced panic at the Cassidy’s. I was even more messed up than I’d feared.

  “Connecting was the purpose, but the Whisperer in the link controls the access and the depth,” Aunt Claire surprised me by responding. “If all Shade was giving you was his emotional state, then that is all you should’ve received. In deeper links, we exchange thoughts. It’s faster and more complete than speech where people’s motives are obscured. Memories are rarely exchanged because they’re so intimate and generally confusing without a broader context. I don’t understand how you picked up on something he wasn’t aware of displaying, especially if he was withdrawing. Shade is usually overly cautious with his human partners. This is troublesome.”

  “Hang on. You said he got carried away and went too deep. Which is it? Is it me? Am I broken?” I asked shakily.

  “What? Of course not. After all, you’re a Pepperdine.”

  “You say that like it has some significance. What could be more shocking than having nonhuman neighbors that expect me to lead them? Aside from their strange ability to run like the wind and get into your head, what else do I need to know?”

  She spun around to face the sink, shoved the faucet on full blast, and snatched up her sponge. Darn her avoidance. I wanted answers, not protection. Quite possibly she was once again contemplating packing me off to boarding school.

  I ground my teeth in frustration while she scrubbed my plate spotless. “Silence is another lie. If I’m going to commit to staying in the valley, then I’d prefer to know the facts up front. Considering some of the horror flicks I’ve seen, trust me, what I think up will be pretty frightening.”

  “Not like this,” she said hesitantly. “Personal things are always the most terrifying. I suppose you have the right to know, and it would be better coming from me than someone else.”

  Like Mr. Cassidy. Anything coming from him would be staged to shock. Knowing any show of fear would send her back into protect mode, I tried to recapture the feelings from Shade’s memory. “I can’t go to bed with this hanging over me. Just tell me.”

  My stomach clenched while I waited for her decision. By the time she was rinsing the sink, I was reconsidering my plans to visit JoAnna. Aunt Claire might even agree at this point.

  “Alright, I’m just going to say it, and then we’ll deal with your reaction,” she said at long last, turning slowly around. “Roland Pepperdine married a Whisperer woman and they had children. Even though there were other interspecies marriages over the years, we can trace our connection back the farthest to the first human with a natural ability that allowed joint human to Whisperer connections. It’s what made the Pepperdines compatible to act as wardens.”

  The last of it competed with the buzzing in my ears for my attention. I wrapped my arms across my chest, feeling the thumping of my heart rise up into my throat. It took me two tries to get the words out. “I’m . . . I’m not human! Is that it?” I asked, pretty certain that I didn’t want to know more. My stomach hurt. I wanted to crawl under my covers and hope this was a nightmare.

  She wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “Your mother, Marie, was half Whisperer and your dad was a fifth, approximately. Technically that isn’t accurate because as I said we go all the way back to the time of Roland. The percentages get rather complicated. Are you alright?”

  “So what does that make me, a science experiment?” I said in a high, thin voice. “But I’ve seen plenty of doctors. My blood work would show something abnormal, wouldn’t it?”

  “The two species are not that incompatible, especially over the years as more offspring have been produced. Roland lost several children through miscarriages and in the first days of infancy as did others who joined. But now things progress fairly smoothly. As a rule though, we don’t donate blood, nor do we go in for test outside of Spring Valley that would look to closely at our genetic makeup. That’s why you always traveled with detailed medical records obtained from tests performed at our lab when you were too young to remember. That’s why your dad made sure we had excellent medical facilities here in the valley staffed by our doctors.” She paused and stared at me closely. “Maybe you should lie down. You’re looking a bit pale.”

  I rubbed my arms. I was still me and yet I wasn’t. “I need to be by myself.”

  She blocked my way. “Now that you know do you think differently of your mother or of me? We’re the same as we’ve always been. There’s nothing to be frightened about.”

  “Easy for you to say. You didn’t just learn that you’re not one hundred percent human.” My voice broke as a hysterical laugh burbled out. “They don’t have a box for this on college application forms.”

  She sat down in the chair next to mine and pulled me back onto my seat, gripping my shaking hands. “Get a hold of yourself. We can’t call Dr. Martins about this revelation. You have to deal. Olivia, listen to me. As a people, the Whisperers are struggling to survive. The fact that we are compatible is a godsend. You’re still you, just with a special twist, an amazing twist.”

  Chapter 12

  An amazing twist? I debated the validity of those words as I stared unmoved at the calendar-worthy scene outside my window. Overnight, eight more inches of snow had fallen. Under the bright morning, sun ice particles sparkled as though my garden had been sprinkled with fairy dust. My sad smile reflected back at me in the glass. Daniel used to tease me when I’d say things like that when I was younger. Was he just being the smug older sibling tolerating the naivety of his little sister, or had he already known that some wonders were actually true? I sighed softly. This place was coloring how I looked at everything.

  I leaned my forehead against the cold glass, trying hard to avoid thinking about anything in particular. I wasn’t having any more success now than I had all night. Normally during break I would crawl back into bed and sleep until noon. But Shade
had said he was coming. Early, he had said, so where was he; it was almost ten thirty?

  I wandered down to the living room, turned on the television, and started flipping channels not really caring what was on. Thankfully, Aunt Claire didn’t put in an appearance. Currently creeped out was edging aside anxious fascination. Every few minutes, I swiveled towards the door, certain that I’d heard a sound and relieved when I hadn’t. A part of me wanted to get something for my nerves. I’d sure picked the worst time to go cold turkey.

  The bickering between two guests on a talk show distracted me for almost twenty minutes. When the doorbell rang, I vaulted off the sofa. I skidded to a halt in front of the door and yanked it open. My comment about punctuality died on the tip of my tongue.

  “Um . . . Mrs. Cassidy, come in,” I said, the words coming out stiff and uninviting.

  I stepped to the side and called up the stairs, “Aunt Claire, Mrs. Cassidy is here.” When I turned back, I caught her assessing look that quickly morphed into an anxious half smile. It was all I could do to speak above a faint whisper. “My aunt will be down in a minute. Won’t you have a seat in the living room?” I gestured towards the sofa. I didn’t know about her, but I needed to sit. Unfortunately, she took a couple steps in the direction of the living room but stopping just short of entering. I gave a mental sigh when my aunt came in sight.

  Aunt Claire held herself stiff with her expression guarded as she came down the stairs. She paused briefly to smooth the collar of her shirt before asking, “Sadie, what can I do for you?”

  Sadie Cassidy had the grace to appear contrite. With her head lowered so she didn’t return my aunt’s gaze, she spoke in her quiet, refined manner. “Claire, I’ve come to beg your forgiveness. It would seem we might’ve frightened poor Olivia last night. Mark meant no harm. It’s these trying times and his tendency to throw himself full barrel into situations. He regrets that he got carried away. The man’s got a heap of pride as you well know. Sometimes it falls upon us women to play the peacemakers. So I came here this morning on my own to plead for forgiveness and to apologize to dear, Olivia.” She gave us a tremulous smile. “And of course to you, Claire, for any perceived slight.”