The Tears of Nero (The Halo Group Book 1)

by Jason Brannon

  Kellan pondered the significance of this then realized he was back in the Domus Aurea, standing before the towering shadow, the same malevolent shape who had guided Nero so many centuries before.

  The figure whispered again, and Kellan leaned forward to hear, but the winged shape began to fall apart, casting off layers of blackness like unwanted clothes, spreading darkness to all parts of the room, leaving behind no evidence it had ever been. As the last shadow slithered back to its rightful place a whisper came to Kellan, and he heard it clearly.

  His mind raced as he clutched the black feather tightly in his hand, considering the possibilities and what the future might hold if he did what the shadow asked of him. Could he go through with it? What would his mother think if she could see the path he was about to choose?

  In a moment of decision, he was no longer filled with grief. Instead, he was filled with purpose. A new life was before him, and a dark song filled his heart.

  “Revenge!” was the word the shadow had whispered to him.

  In Kellan’s opinion, that single word was the best eulogy he could imagine for his poor, sweet mother. God rest her soul!

  Chapter 1

  When Edward opened his eyes, he was nervous. His heart beat an erratic staccato, and his pulse raced. His instincts told him he should be running away from something dangerous or falling to his knees in prayer. Only he didn’t know why. He couldn’t remember.

  The alien sound of massive wings beating against the sky reinforced the confusion. Edward was too disoriented to understand what he was hearing or to think about what kind of bird could be responsible, but the noise made him edgy. Adding to his anxiety was the roar of rushing water and the bothersome squawk of gulls. A few black feathers were scattered around his feet, deepening the mystery.

  He wiped his eyes with his palms and took several deep breaths to clear his head. Where was he? How had he gotten here? The last thing he remembered was the dinner party, and most of that was fuzzy. The address on the dinner party invitation had directed him to a horrid part of town known for its squalor and crime rate. This place, by contrast, was pleasant like a vacation scene from a postcard. The spectacular natural beauty of the locale was at odds with the unease that washed over him in waves. This all felt so wrong. He had been plucked out of the bowels of Purgatory and dropped in the middle of Paradise.

  This place of sand and surf was the antithesis of the address on the invitation. He thought back to the day he had received it in the mail. He remembered opening the envelope and being confused at what was inside. Devoid of any postmark, the envelope had been nondescript save for a crimson ‘N’ emblazoned in the center. The note inside was equally plain and puzzling.

  “Why does God allow bad things to happen to good people? For insight please join me for dinner on April 22 at 8:00 p.m., 1313 Archibald Street.”

  The note was signed “N.”

  By itself, the invitation wouldn’t have been enough incentive to attend the dinner party. Edward avoided social gatherings these days. Going out and having fun didn’t seem right anymore. Putting on a smile and trying to fool the world into believing he was done grieving was a lie and an insult to the memory of his dead wife and son. He also had no idea who “N” was or why this mysterious person might be summoning him to the squalor of Archibald Street. Yet there was something sent with the invitation that convinced him to go when his gut told him to avoid the party at all costs.

  Edward felt nauseous as he thought about the way the picture of Jenna and Connor had slipped out of the envelope and fallen to the floor. He remembered picking it up, studying it with confusion and longing, and wondering why anyone would prod such a painful emotional wound. There wasn’t a day that went by when he didn’t think about them or the car accident that had taken their lives.

  “Why does God allow bad things to happen to good people?”

  Against his better judgment he had attended the dinner party, and as it turned out his misgivings about the event had been correct. He knew that now.

  As he took a few haphazard steps along the beach and struggled to keep his footing, Edward noticed that a large “N” similar to the one on the envelope had been drawn in the sand to his right.

  Sand? The sight of the beach anchored him to a reality he wanted no part of, and he realized that he was in serious trouble. The dinner party had taken place in a squalid little section of Fairpointe where the homes were so ramshackle and close together that at times they seemed to be leaning on each other for support. This place looked nothing like that.

  He stood on a white beach bordering water so blue it looked artificial. The world had thousands of beaches, none of which were anywhere near Fairpointe. Which meant he was far, far away from home.

  A vague sense of unease weighed him down, making him jittery even though there were no signs of danger. He tried to shake the feeling, but the fear wouldn’t let go. With the sun beating down on his back, the chill in his soul persisted. Something wasn’t right, and he shivered despite the warm climate.

  Seeing the bodies on the beach heightened his anxiety.

  Chapter 2

  The bodies were motionless and strewn about the sand like driftwood washed in by the current. Edward scanned the beach and then peered out into the waves, looking for a shipwreck, a life raft, any sign of how they ended up here. Maybe the ocean had simply coughed them up, and he was the only survivor. It was only as he got close to one of those washed ashore that he noticed the gentle rise and fall of their breathing. Another twitched in his sleep. They were all alive and in the same predicament as he was. He had just been blessed with the misfortune of waking up first.

  There were four others. Two men, two women. All of them were unconscious, their faces pressed into damp sand. All were dressed in attire that seemed better suited for board meetings than beach combing. Edward had the vaguest memory of waking up to scenes like this after those all-night frat parties he frequented in college. This could have doubled as a kegger flashback if the people lying face down on the beach had been wearing Greek letters instead of businesswear.

  Trudging through wet sand in search of answers, he took special care not to let the waves touch him. He hated the beach, and his aversion to the ocean showed in every calculated step.

  His face was damp, and the inside of his mouth felt like it was lined with shag carpet. His eyes were matted at the corners, and his face was rough with stubble. Although he had no memory of a shipwreck, he imagined himself a modern-day Robinson Crusoe, a castaway on a deserted island in the middle of nowhere.

  The world teetered and tottered around him. The first couple of steps he took were nearly disastrous. Part of that came from walking in shifting sand. Part of it was the lingering effects of something pharmaceutical. His skull felt like it had been filled with wet cement.

  After regaining his equilibrium and making sure he could stand on his own, he slogged over to the people lying in the sand. None of them looked injured. Edward didn’t see any blood. He didn’t see any bruising or lacerations either. They seemed to be napping peacefully. They all looked vaguely familiar, and he thought he recognized them from the dinner party.

  “Are you okay?” he asked a woman with flaming red hair. The woman groaned and pulled away, wanting to be left alone.

  “Miss?” Edward said. “Can you hear me?”

  The woman rolled over and glared at him through narrowed eyes. “Leave me alone, Burt. I’m trying to sleep.”

  Edward looked around uncertainly, not sure what to do. He shook the woman again. “Wake up. I’m not Burt. Please talk to me.”

  This got the woman’s attention. She opened her eyes and stared at him for a moment as if trying to decide whether or not he was a figment of her imagination. She wiped the sand from her cheeks and tried to focus on him. The faraway look in her eyes suggested she was still partially asleep.

  “Who are you? Where are we?” she said, slurring her words.

  “My name is Edward Mills. I don�
�t know where we are exactly. I was hoping you might know.”

  The woman stared at the frothing waves that rolled in and sucked the sand away, revealing half-buried seashells. “How did I get here? Where is...here? Wait a minute…the party. I‘m supposed to be at a party. Only it wasn‘t a party at all.”

  “That‘s the last thing I remember too,” Edward admitted. “I woke up a few minutes ago not far from you.”

  “So you don’t know how we got here?”

  Edward shook his head. “I don’t remember anything. What’s your name?”

  “Sadie,” she said. “Sadie Gale.”

  “Do you know any of these other people, Sadie?”

  Sadie studied the unconscious figures through glazed eyes. “No. They‘re all from the party. Same as you. But I don‘t know any of them.”

  “We need to wake them up and see if we can get some answers.”

  Sadie nodded and tried to stand up. Just like Edward, she was shaky at first. Edward offered her his hand and helped her to her feet.

  The two men who were busy sleeping their lives away looked like accountants. One of them was completely bald save for a patch of silver hair that formed a halo around his liver-spotted head. The other had a thin head of dark brown hair that was beginning to gray.

  “Hello,” Edward said. “Excuse me.”

  Neither man stirred. Sadie shook one while Edward shook the other. “Are you okay?” they asked.

  Both men grumbled before finally opening their eyes. They both looked like they had emerged from a night of bad dreams. “The beach,” the older man muttered. “Great. God must be punishing me. I hate the beach.”

  “Who are you and what am I doing here?” the younger man asked, sitting up quickly. The moment he did so a lightning bolt of pain shot through his head, and he pressed against his temples to ease the ache.

  “I’m Edward and this is Sadie. Who are you?”

  “Franklin Griffith III,” the younger man said, placing special emphasis on the fact that there were two Franklin Griffiths that came before him.

  “I’m Henry Lincoln,” the older man sighed. “How did I get here? How did you two get here? I remember you from that bizarre dinner party. But I don’t remember traveling here. Where are we anyway?”

  Edward and Sadie both shrugged. “That’s the million-dollar question,” she said. “We were hoping you guys might know what was going on.”

  “I certainly don’t,” Henry said.

  “Neither do I,” Franklin said.

  “I might be able to shed a little light on this subject,” the final member of their group said as she slowly got to her feet.

  “Who are you?” Franklin asked.

  “My name is Kelly Avery.”

  “All right, Miss Kelly Avery, what can you tell us?” Franklin demanded.

  Kelly pointed to an object that was partially buried in the sand. “I would be willing to bet that a clue to our problem might be found there.”

  The group immediately focused on a yellowed old tequila bottle that looked like it hadn’t touched human lips in more than a century. The bottle contained a message.

  Chapter 3

  The bottle’s contents begged to be read. Sadie hummed “Message in a Bottle” by The Police as Kelly removed the cork and pulled out the rolled scrap of paper.

  “Dear lambs, I think God is mad at us. If you don‘t believe it, look at your own lives for proof. You have all been punished to some degree. That is why you are valuable to me. You are here to help me understand why bad things happen to good people. You are part of an experiment in cosmic justice. You are here to help me come to terms with my own life and to set free the horses of Armageddon. You are all good people. As a result, expect bad things to follow.”

  “Is this for real?” Sadie asked, running her fingers through her close-cropped hair. Even dressed in a black pencil skirt and charcoal blouse, she looked like a fire-haired pixie who was ready to get into mischief.

  “This is for real,” Kelly said. “We’re in big trouble.”

  “That’s a logical assumption,” Henry said. “Someone went to great lengths to bring us here against our wishes. I don’t think they have our best interests in mind.”

  “I don’t know why anyone would want to hurt me,” Sadie said. “A few boyfriends have wanted to strangle me to make me shut up sometimes. But I don’t have any real enemies.”

  “Neither do I,” Henry added. “And yet here we are.”

  “Who wrote the note?” Franklin asked.

  Kelly shrugged her shoulders and glanced back over the letter. “It’s signed Nero.”

  “Nero?” Edward said. “Like the Roman emperor?”

  “Does that mean something to you?” Franklin asked.

  “Maybe,” Edward said. “I was thinking about the letter ‘N’ on the invitation I received. There’s an ‘N’ in the sand over there too. That could stand for Nero. Did anybody happen to meet our host at the party?”

  “I didn’t,” Henry said.

  “No, but I wish I would have,” Sadie added. “I would have given him a piece of my mind. I never should have gone to that party. The only reason I went was because of the picture.”

  “You got a picture too?” Kelly asked. “I thought I was the only one.”

  “Nope,” Edward confirmed. “You weren’t. Our gracious host saw fit to include a picture of my dead wife and son. They were killed in a car accident a little over a year ago.”

  “That’s terrible,” Sadie said. “Mine was a picture of my stepfather.”

  Sadie didn’t elaborate, leaving everyone to form their own conclusion about what made her memory so difficult to bear.

  “I had a picture of the alcoholic husband who used to beat me every night before stumbling off to bed,” Kelly said. “What about you two?” she gestured toward Henry and Franklin.

  “A picture of my sweet Margaret,” Henry said, choking up at the thought. “I was married to her for fifty-two years and would have stayed married to her forever if the Lord had given me the chance. I spent nearly a year watching the cancer eat away at her until there was nothing left. Finally she was gone.”

  Everybody turned to Franklin expecting him to tell what had been in his invitation. Instead, he looked at the ground and kicked at the sand. “I’d rather not discuss mine right now,” he said in a quiet voice. “Let’s say it was bad and leave it at that.”

  “Fair enough,” Edward said. “Let’s focus on what to do about our little predicament here instead. Why don’t we spread out and have a look around? We’ll all stay where we can see each other. If someone finds something, all they have to do is yell.”

  “What if a homicidal maniac steps out of the jungle with a machete?” Franklin asked, not bothering to hide the sarcasm in his voice.

  “Try not to get cut,” Sadie said, flashing a fake smile.

  “Everybody be careful,” Edward added. “We don’t know who or what we’re up against.”

  Soon everyone was leaving their mark in the sand. Footprints fanned out in five different directions as the group went their separate ways looking for answers. Under normal circumstances, the beach would have seemed like paradise, but viewing this scene through fearful eyes cast everything in a sinister tint. Edward walked up the treeline and searched the edge of the jungle, scanning the shadows for anything substantial. Sadie and Kelly walked north up the beach, taking off their heels and letting the waves suck the sand out from between their toes. Henry, meanwhile, went south, stopping every now and then to pick up a shell and throw it out into the blue currents, remembering how his dear Margaret used to love the beach and how he‘d always pretended to like it too because he knew it made her so happy. Never one to do more than he absolutely had to, Franklin half-heartedly searched the immediate surroundings.

  As his mind wandered, he paced back and forth across the sand, not really searching for anything. That was when he tripped and fell on his face. Confused at first, Franklin lifted himself up, spit
out a mouthful of sand, and brushed himself off. He looked for what had caused him to fall. A sharp corner of something jutted out of the ground. Thinking it might be important, Franklin began to dig, raking sand away with his fingers. As he uncovered more and more of the object, he realized it was a box of some sort. “Over here,” he yelled. “Everybody come quick! I think I’ve found something.”

  The group converged on Franklin’s location and discovered what had him so excited. It was a chest like the kind found aboard a pirate ship. It was encrusted with barnacles and covered in a thick carpet of seaweed. Bands of oxidized steel wrapped around the ancient box, holding it together. Once it might have glimmered in the noonday sun. Now, everything that wasn’t rusted was covered in a thick green coating of ocean muck.

  “I’ll bet there’s gold inside,” Sadie said, her eyes lighting up at the prospect.

  “Don’t be naive,” Franklin said. “I’m sure someone didn’t kidnap us and dump us out on this island so they could reward us with a million dollars.”

  “I agree,” Edward said. “The chest is there for a different reason. But we’ll still need to open it to find out.”

  “Wait a minute,” Henry said, raising his voice enough to get everyone’s attention. “This seems too convenient. We’re stuck on an island with no clue as to how we arrived or why we‘re here. None of us know each other. We‘re at the mercy of our friendly neighborhood whackjob, Nero. And now we stumble upon a nice, convenient treasure chest. For all we know that thing could be filled with explosives or poisonous snakes or any number of dangerous things. We could be walking right into a trap.”

  “Maybe not,” Sadie argued. “What if this is some sort of reality show? Like Survivor. That treasure chest looks like something that might contain clues or instructions for a task of some sort.”

  “Well, I’ve only watched Survivor a couple of times,” Franklin interjected. “But I’ve never seen them drug and kidnap any of the contestants. Maybe they’ve changed the rules a bit to boost ratings.”