The Curse of M

by Stevie Barry

  The second wolf stepped toward her, answering her growl with a snarl, and she hit it hard with her telekinesis.

  It went flying backward with surprising force, yelping as it flailed for purchase on the ground. When it crept forward again it was slinking, wary, and she grinned.

  "Not so cocky now, are you, mate? There's more where that came from."

  Her stomach heaved again, but she didn't take her eyes off the wolf. It regarded her cautiously, but its teeth were still bared, the flickering dance of the firelight reflected in its eyes. Lorna used her telekinesis to flick an ember at it, making it jump. She felt too damn sick to keep this up for long, though, so she sought whatever mind it had. Screw physical displays of domination -- she was human, she had a brain, and she was going to use it.

  She didn't bother with words, since it was an animal. Instead she gave it images, all the injuries she'd inflicted on Von Ratched -- the stabbing, the biting, the good old-fashioned punches. Even a primitive consciousness couldn't fail to get the message -- or the threat. Wounded and sick she might be, but she was still the biggest predator.

  The wolf whined and ducked its head, backing away, so she left off her assault. Wasn't that an odd thought -- for the first time, Lorna realized that the woods contained nothing more powerful nor terrible than her. Her curse had seemed so insignificant compared to Von Ratched's, but out here she had no competition at all. The idea would have made her feel invincible, if her stomach hadn't chosen that minute to start dry-heaving again.

  So much for that, she thought, curling up and wrapping her coat tighter around her. The immediate threat had been neutralized; she could go back to being miserable, and wishing she could pass out.

  Eventually she did just that, only peripherally aware when something warm and furry came and lay down beside her.

  She woke some time later, or thought she did; she was never certain, afterward, if it were a dream or not. A bright fire still crackled on a scraped circle of earth, and beyond it sat a woman.

  She was the second tallest woman Lorna had ever seen -- if she wasn’t at least six-foot-eight, Lorna would eat her socks. Her skin was so black it seemed to shine almost blue in the dancing light, but her eyes were a light amber, shining out startlingly bright in her dark face. She wore a simple garment of dark green -- dress, robe, or bed sheet, Lorna couldn’t tell, nor did it matter, for though Lorna was certain she’d never seen the woman before in her life, she was somehow extremely…familiar.

  And she had wings.

  They were a bit like angel wings, but only a bit -- instead of being white they were black, but black like a starling’s wing, shot with glints of green and blue and purple. The feathers were long and silky, the plumage of an eagle rather than something more tame and domestic.

  Lorna stared, belatedly shutting her gaping jaw and swallowing. As with the Lady of the Garden, this woman was so obviously inhuman that it wasn’t worth the bother of pretending otherwise. In her bright amber eyes was a depth of knowledge and experience no mortal could ever hope to acquire, and a touch of sadness as well, as though she had seen things no one should ever have to know.

  “Uh, hullo,” Lorna said, sitting up. Perhaps she was dreaming, because her joints didn’t shriek in protest at the motion, nor did her stomach threaten mutiny. “I, uh, I don’t think we’ve met.”

  The tall woman smiled, revealing blindingly white teeth. “We have, little one, but that is not important now. You will come to know me in time, and understand of what I speak. I am here to help you remember.”

  Lorna blinked. “Remember what?” she queried. Her eyes widened. “Oh, aye, hey now, the Lady said I wasn’t to remember that, not ever--”

  The angel-woman raised a hand, shaking her head. “Not that, little Lorna. Do you not know?”

  Lorna considered this a moment. “If I’ve forgotten, how could I know it?” she asked. “This isn’t some kind'v Zen question, is it?”

  The woman smiled again. “No, indeed it is not. Mother spoke of your physical journey, on which the wolves will guide you, but I am here to lead you through the…other journey.”

  “So you’re what, my guide to enlightenment?” Strangely, she felt a certain amount of relief at the thought -- she certainly wasn’t likely to find any kind of enlightenment (or much of anything else) without a guide, or at least some kind of map.

  “…In a manner of speaking, yes. You do not need to find enlightenment, as you put it, so much as you need to remember. You are not yet ready to do so, or you would have already done it; I am here to make you ready to receive that which you have forgotten.”

  Well, that was nicely cryptic. “Are…what are you?” Lorna asked, unable to help herself. “Are you an angel? Or like a fairy, or…something?” She felt a bit stupid for even asking -- the woman had bloody great wings, for fuck’s sake -- but she had lived too long in what she thought of as the normal world to fully accept the idea of a supernatural messenger. After the Lady, she probably shouldn’t have an issue with it, but she still very much did.

  “Those are terms I have been known by,” the woman said gently. "If it helps, you might call me such. I am here to help you follow the path that has been laid before you.”

  There was something in her voice, her face, in her every movement, that gave Lorna pause. She was different than the Lady, and yet they were akin in the feeling they inspired -- calm, peace, and a sense of belonging that was extremely alien to Lorna, because she had so rarely known it. The difference came in somewhere else, somewhere equally nameless and elusive; though the woman wasn’t human, she felt much more so than the Lady. Lorna felt she could talk to her as she would a mortal woman, whereas with the Lady normal speech seemed somehow…off.

  “I…see,” she said at last. “What’s your name?” she asked.

  The woman inclined her head. “You may call me Amadai,” she said, and rose to her feet in one almost impossibly fluid motion, laying something on the moss beside the fire as she did so. “I must go, but I will not be far. Trust your own thoughts, Lorna, and your feelings; you know a great deal more than you give yourself credit for, but you will only realize this when you cease to fight it.”

  And before Lorna could speak, could ask her what in the name of hell that meant, she was gone.

  ----

  Von Ratched was immensely frustrated, because Lorna appeared to have vanished off the face of the Earth.

  He ran an hourly cycle of every satellite radio band he could find, and finally started pulling down infrared maps of most of Alaska, painstakingly poring every human-sized blob in the wilderness.

  There simply wouldn't be enough fuel to search all of goddamned Alaska. Unfounded instinct told him she was probably much farther south than ought to be possible -- he suspected she might even have crossed into Canada. It was a thought without any rational support, one that logically made no sense, but it was all he had to go on.

  He'd touched down in the wilderness again, figuring there was no point searching in the dark. He hadn't properly slept in days, and he knew it was making him a little punchy, but there was no help for it. Every time he closed his eyes, he was assailed by Lorna's memories. Whatever had given them to him had cursed him very well indeed.

  Maybe Von Ratched was more of a masochist than he'd ever thought, because he'd brought his copy of Gray's Anatomy with him. He hadn't opened it, hadn't looked at the flower pressed so carefully between its pages, but he couldn't leave it behind. The damn thing was mentally tethered to him, a physical reminder he couldn't bear to abandon.

  He stretched his legs out, leaning back against the wall of the chopper cabin. It was cold in here, and his breath had already fogged the windows. His various injuries throbbed in spite of the morphine, and he didn't dare take more. The shoulder was the worst, radiating pain all through his chest -- it was a tangible reminder of why he was out here, what he had to do before he could die.

  Eventually sheer exhaustion felled him, and he drifted into a fitful, uneasy s
leep.

  He dreamed of forests, vast expanses of snow-dusted green under a red sunrise. It was so vivid he could smell the clean forest air, feel the morning chill on his skin. The trees were still, a motionless wilderland undisturbed by even a slight breeze, and silent but for the faint babble of a creek beside him.

  The remains of a campfire sat not far ahead, and Von Ratched approached it. It still smelled like charcoal, though when he knelt and put his hand on the charred remnants, they were cold and dewy to the touch.

  This was Lorna's fire. He knew it with all the certainty that only came in a dream. Yes, she was still alive, though how she was managing to move was beyond his guess. She was out here, but where was here?

  He glanced around the silent forest. This was much further south than Alaska -- there was far too little snow for it to be anywhere near where he'd parked his helicopter. It would be quite a long flight, especially given how wide his search parameter would have to be.

  While he was no tracker, Lorna had left a few footprints on the bank of the creek, enough to tell him she'd continued south. They were dragging, uneven prints, alongside depressions probably made by a walking-stick. How far could she go in a day? How had she gotten this far in the first place?

  Von Ratched didn't know, but he meant to find out. As soon as he found her.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Lorna woke feeling much less sick, though she was weak and wobbly. Her hands were so unsteady it took her a good fifteen minutes to rekindle her fire.

  The wolves had gone, but they'd left her breakfast, the sight of which turned her stomach. Did she dare eat yet? And just what the hell was she to do about water? There was even less snow now, and she really didn't want a repeat of last night.

  Her dressing her breakfast was even sloppier than usual, and she could only eat a little. She cooked everything she could, though, and wrapped it in the leaves of some nameless bush before sticking it in her pocket. A little bit of food and the warmth of the fire fortified her, but actually walking anywhere was out of the question just yet.

  Lorna looked at the creek and then at the fire, frustrated. All she needed was something to boil water in, dammit. Then she could drink all she wanted, without risking another bout of giardia. The Lady had given her a knife -- why couldn't a tin pot have been included? It didn't even have to be a big one. Obviously the Lady expected Lorna to do something about this herself, but what?

  She glanced up at the boughs above her. She'd curled up between the roots of a massive cedar, the bark smelling bittersweet in the cold morning air. Hadn't she read something about cedar bark, years ago? The native tribes in the northwest of America had used it for bloody everything, even clothes, and would boil water by filling a basket and then dropping hot stones in it.

  It was a good idea, but hardly practical in her case. She hardly knew anything about weaving, and working with bark would take an expert. You'd have to make it tight enough to hold water, for one thing, and how the hell was she to manage that?

  Pitch, she thought. Maybe pitch could be used like glue, though it might not hold if the water got too hot. Still, she didn't have a better idea, so she took out her knife and started to work.

  Four hours and three nicked fingers later, she was ready to cry. The soft inner bark wove surprisingly easily, but her efforts still looked like something produced by a drunken monkey. It was flat, too, a little mat, and she didn't know how to turn it into a bowl. She was so thirsty her tongue felt like it was coated in glue -- she would have risked the creek water, if she'd thought she could even make it that far. She was going to bloody die out here -- but it was still better than the Institute. Lorna would rather snuff it in the wilderness than survive in that hellhole.

  When she looked up from her sad attempt at weaving, she saw a wolf looking at her from the other side of the fire. Unless she was much mistaken, it was the same one that had defended her last night -- and it had a small tin pot, the handle clenched in its jaws.

  "…What," she muttered. Just…what. She was in the middle of flipping nowhere, so where had the creature got that thing, and how did it know she needed it? If this was the Lady's doing, it could have come a lot sooner.

  The wolf dropped the pot, and Lorna crawled over to grab it. Getting to the creek and back was no fun at all, but at least the fire was hot enough to bring it to a boil in a hurry. She forced herself to sit and count a full five minutes, and even with her gloves she burned her hand when she took it off the fire.

  She didn't bother letting it cool all the way before she drank, and she made herself take little sips, so she wouldn't just throw it all up again. She fancied she could feel herself re-hydrating, some of the burn leaving her muscles. Moving onward today wasn't an option, but she could probably manage it tomorrow.

  "Thank you," she said, to whoever or whatever might be listening.

  ----

  Ratiri slept a full fourteen hours after the raid, and only woke because Katje came pounding on his door.

  "Take a shower and get dressed," she said, as soon as he'd opened the door. "Miranda wants us. We have trouble."

  "What now?" he grumbled, gathering up some clothes.

  "Better if she tell you," Katje said, glancing around his messy apartment.

  Ratiri sighed. At least a hot shower properly woke him, washing away the grime and smoky stench from the Institute. He debated shaving, but decided it wasn't worth it. If Miranda wanted to see him in such a hurry, she could deal with him scruffy.

  Ignoring Katje's impatience, he scarfed a donut and took a painkiller for his leg, limping after her on his crutches. Gerald had insisted he use them, after inspecting the damage he'd done during the raid.

  The DMA's corridors and indoor streets were busier than he'd ever seen them, so much so that he almost tripped over someone every few feet. "What the hell is going on here?" he demanded.

  "News travel fast," Katje said grimly, unceremoniously shoving people out of his way. "Alice's footage aired last night."

  Oh. He didn't want to know what kind of bomb that had set off, but he was afraid he was going to find out. He'd eaten so little that the painkillers were already making him lightheaded, and now he almost tripped over Katje.

  The conference room she led him to was surprisingly empty. Miranda and Julifer were there, as well as Geezer and Gerald, but there were only four others, only one of whom Ratiri recognized -- Shivshankari, the weather-manipulator.

  "Sit down," Miranda ordered, and he did, rather clumsily.

  Julifer passed him a Styrofoam cup of coffee, and he inhaled its fragrance before he took a sip. It was so hot it almost blistered his tongue. "What's this about?"

  "The U.S. and Canadian governments are making noises about wanting our prisoners," Miranda said, scowling. "And I'm damn sure they want to make all those bastards disappear. They want to know where we're holding everyone, and I'm damned if I'll tell them about this place. I hate legal bullshit."

  Damn. They should have seen this coming. Knowing Miranda, she probably had. "So what do we do?" he asked.

  "Their crimes are all against former prisoners," Julifer said, "and you've come from all over the world. We're stonewalling the governments so we can push to try this before the U.N. We need you and Katje to get testimonials from everyone else not from North America. We're trying to charge them with crimes against humanity."

  It was a good thing Ratiri had taken some painkillers, or he'd be getting a headache right about now. "Katje said something about last night's broadcast," he said, rubbing his forehead.

  One of the men he didn't know snorted. "Half the viewers want revenge for you, and the other half want to murder you. That firebug kid didn't do much to prove you're not all dangerous."

  Ratiri winced. No, Wrigley wouldn't have helped their image at all. "Have you told everyone that Von Ratched left the gas on in an attempt to kill us all?"

  "Not yet," Julifer said. "As many of us as are capable are going on the air soon, so we can tell everyone
just what happened. I need you four to pick out the escapees you think can handle it."

  "What about them?" he asked, nodding to the others.

  "They're our liaisons with the U.N. Once they've got our ducks in a row there, we'll take our case to it," Miranda said. "I gotta ask -- d'you think Lorna could capture Von Ratched?"

  "No," Ratiri said slowly, "but I think she could kill him, if she's not in too terrible shape physically."

  "I think she damn near did already," Geezer put in. "Guy I talked to said he looked like hell when he left, and I saw his office. Between the two of 'em, they'd wrecked it. If he does catch up to her, I pity anyone within five miles of 'em."

  "It is too bad we couldn't film that," Shivshankari said. "Many people don't believe Von Ratched could really be as bad as we are claiming."

  "I think I can understand that," Katje said thoughtfully. "Who would want to believe anyone could be that evil?"

  "Doesn't make it any less irritating," Miranda groused. "I'm going to need you to testify before the U.N. As many of you that can, anyway."

  Ratiri honestly wasn't sure how many that would be. He wasn't even sure how well he would manage it. The interview had been nerve-wracking enough -- standing up before the United Nations was a terrifying thought.

  While Katje had a point, it still made him angry. They'd all gone through too much hell to deal with doubt, with the dismissive attitude of people too ignorant -- or too callous -- to care what kind of nightmare the inmates had endured. Fuck them. Fuck all of them. How dare they accuse the survivors of lying?

  "Ratiri?" Gerald's voice was quiet, his expression nervous. Dammit. Ratiri still didn't know how Gerald's empathy worked, but it was definitely inconvenient now.

  "I’m fine," he snapped. "Well, no, I'm not. But I didn't survive all that to have people insinuate I'm full of shit. None of us did."