Marked for Vengeance (Book One: The Alyx Rayer Chronicles)

by Pierce, SJ

  She hurried to the agreed upon intersection and leaned against a crosswalk pole, her back facing away from the road while she waited for her ride. She glanced up periodically as each car drove by to make sure it wasn’t the taxi and would quickly turn around to keep her face hidden. She couldn’t chance it being an officer. If they took her in for questioning, it might be hours before she had a chance to check on either of them.

  To know where the cab needed to take her, she closed her eyes and focused in on her draw to Isaac. It tugged her in the direction of his flat. Because the bistro was generally in the same direction, she would need to use it all the way there to know for sure. When accessing the draw, she noticed something different this time. It ached as though there were an urgency of some kind. This new sensation only supported her reasoning to check on him and make sure all was well. She had already worried what would be done to her because of coming face to face with her Marked, but could only imagine the penance for her Marked actually dying.

  He was her sole responsibility, and they needed him alive.

  * * *

  The taxi pulled up to Isaac’s building. “Keep the clock running,” Alyx said and leapt from the back seat. She assumed she knew how to get to his condo from the inside, but if all else failed she would follow her draw again.

  She busted through the doors of the complex, rode the elevator to the third floor, and sprinted to the last door on the left. Finding it was a lot easier than expected. It could have been because she had fantasized about going to his doorstep a thousand times before, and him inviting her into his world that she could never be a part of.

  Unsure of what to say, she rapped her knuckles against the tall, metal door. If anything, she could apologize for her rudeness the day before and promptly leave. As she waited, she noted that her scar didn’t tingle – an incredibly good sign.

  The peephole on the door went black, and she quickly looked to the floor. She could only imagine what thoughts sprinted through his mind as he saw her standing there. She nervously rolled her foot to the side as she waited for the door to crack open, and after a few seconds, she glanced back up with curiosity. The black had vanished. Okay.

  She knocked on the door again, this time louder, and stared directly at the peephole. It then dawned on her that maybe he didn’t recognize her with her hair tucked into her hat, so she pulled it off to allow her perfectly rolled tresses to spill over her shoulders. She held her breath this time as she awaited the shadow.

  As soon as it returned, she forced a tight, pleasant smile to convince him that her sudden appearance suggested a friendly visit, and the black quickly faded again. He wanted nothing to do with her. Fair enough.

  She contemplated trying one last time, but reasoned against it. He was more than likely still wounded from yesterday, and pride kept him from answering the door.

  Practically tearing herself away, she turned to head back outside. Even though she felt confident that nothing had happened to him, she would rest easier if she saw that for herself. The rooftop, she thought. She didn’t want to go there again, but it was the only way to get a visual on him now. Binoculars or no binoculars, she could recognize his silhouette from any distance.

  * * *

  With Micah beside him, grasping his arm, Isaac stood by the front door holding a soiled cleaning rag in his hand. “I don’t understand. Why would you NOT open the door for that woman?” Micah asked. He had peered through first. The initial round of knocking alerted him as he headed to the kitchen for a soda, and he didn’t recognize the attractive woman so he went to get his father, who ran to the door to see who it was. When he laid eyes upon her strained, smiling face, he jumped away from the door, unable to mask his bewilderment.

  “Why did she scare you like that, dad? Do you know her?”

  Isaac needed to give his son some sort of explanation and reinforce a healthy fear for strangers who might approach him. Mainly Alyx. He couldn’t keep him holed up in the apartment forever, and he couldn’t be with him every second of the day.

  He waved the bottle of Windex toward the couch. “Go sit down. I’ll explain.”

  “I can’t wait to hear about that scary, scary Barbie that was at our door.”

  Isaac grinned as he followed Micah to the couch, grateful that he at least felt well enough to joke around. He sat near the end, and Micah laid beside him, placing his head in his lap as he curled into the fetal position. Isaac placed his cleaner and the rag on the end table and thought about how to begin. He couldn’t tell him about his dream and what the old man said, or any of his other dreams for that matter. Their frightening messages were too burdensome for even Isaac’s psychological well being. This time, he didn’t have the strength to bear both of their grief.

  “Ok, son,” he said while stroking his back, the perfect excuse manifesting, “I saw her at the bistro the other day and thought I’d recognized her, so I went up to her and asked her if she knew me. Well, she must have thought I was hittin’ on her or somethin’ of the sort-

  “And you weren’t hitting on her?”

  “Let me finish. So anyhow, we had a brief conversation, and I thought that was the end of it until one day I came home, and she approached me outside of our buildin’. She had followed me home-

  “I still don’t see the problem here, dad.”

  “Well, that’s called stalkin’. Just because she’s attractive, doesn’t mean she’s not crazy. That’s datin’ 101. Make sure you write that down.”

  Isaac felt badly for lying to his son, but reasoned that at least part of it were true. She had stalked him outside of their window, but he didn’t want to divulge that to Micah for fear that it might frighten him. His explanation seemed a little less disturbing.

  As he continued to stroke his son’s back, he was now thankful for the old man’s warning, because he would have let her into his home just then. Her engaging smile and attractive physique enticed him, unbelievably so. Maybe that’s how she lures her victims in.

  Without warning, Micah leaned forward and vomited bile on the rug. “Oh, Micah,” he soothed. When the heaving stopped, he helped him up to his room to rest. “I’m callin’ the doctor right now.”

  * * *

  “Follow me!” she yelled to the cabby as she hastened toward the abandoned building.

  The driver scratched the top of his bald head with confusion but followed anyhow.

  As soon as she made it to the rooftop, she ran to the edge, and her jaw dropped. He covered the windows? What’s going ON?

  She couldn’t muster an explanation for what she saw. Had something scared him? Only moments earlier she determined his aloof behavior was a result from his wounded pride, but to cover his windows like that. Why? He did accuse her of peeping the night that he caught her. Maybe he feared her. She shook her head and made her way back down the urine soaked stairs. Because he refused to speak to her, she would never know for sure. At least he’s ok.

  Understandably perplexed, the cabby eyed her as she jumped into the back seat.

  “It would take all day to explain,” she insisted.

  He threw up his hands.“None of my business, ma’am. Where to?”

  “Tenth and Howell Mill.”

  “On our way.”

  The cab ride to Cindra’s apartment complex seemed unusually fast for Atlanta traffic during lunch rush. Within ten minutes, they pulled up to the gate. She gave him the code for the keypad, and they rode through as she scanned the parking lot for Cindra’s white Volkswagen Beetle, but it was nowhere to be found.

  “Just park right there,” she said, pointing to the closest parking space, “I won’t be long.”

  On her way up the stairs to the third floor, she saw Cindra’s door through the railing. Just like Benjamin’s, it hung open. Shit. She paused, thinking through if her psyche could handle another pummeling. But – just like at Isaac’s – her scar didn’t tingle, either. Besides, her friend made a habit of leaving her keys in the door knob or not closing it all the
way, so maybe the opened door didn’t suggest anything serious. Or fatal.

  She nudged it open and peered through. To her astonishment, nothing awaited her.

  Nothing.

  Cindra’s furniture, her pictures, even the basket she kept by the door to store her shoes in -- gone.

  She pushed through and walked to her living room with a quivering chin. Her friend had abandoned her, in every sense of the word. She had quit her job and left town. The only person Alyx had left to lean on disappeared as quickly as she came into her life, all with not so much as a “good bye” or an explanation.

  To make sure her inspection remained thorough, and to further punish herself for ignoring her ‘friend’ for the past few days, she made her way into the empty bedroom. It appeared much larger now that her wrought iron canopy bed didn’t occupy the center of the carpeted floor, but the empty white room looked as desolate as Alyx’s life now. Her whole support system had vanished in one day. She pressed her fingers into the corners of her eyes, forcing her tears to stay where they were. She couldn’t stand to cry anymore; it had become a daily occurrence.

  She walked to the bedroom closet whose door also remained open. A single white eyelet dress hung lonely on the wooden dowel. Alyx had bought it at Ann Taylor on a whim, but decided its A-frame, short skirt would suit Cindra’s shapely legs better and the light-colored fabric would emphasize her tanned skin, so she gave it to her as a present. Her friend loved it immediately and had worn it a dozen times throughout the summer. Of all things, she left THAT? Alyx couldn’t help but take offense. Her ‘friend’ had left without speaking to her, and the one thing she left behind was the dress Alyx had given to her as a gift. What did I do to her that was so bad?

  She pinched the corners of her eyes again, but the tears bulldozed their way through anyhow.

  When she grabbed the hanger, she noticed a jagged piece of folded paper sticking out of the left skirt pocket. She slid it from inside and opened it guardedly. Scribbled in Cindra’s bubbly handwriting it said:

  I’m sorry I didn’t say goodbye.

  You will understand soon enough.

  See you there.

  She hadn’t bothered to sign it minus a single, bizarrely-happy smiley face. For someone who went out of their way to avoid her, Cindra went through a lot of trouble to communicate with her in the most complicated, vague way as possible. See me where? She couldn’t understand what on Earth her friend meant by that.

  She stuffed the letter inside her jeans pocket and blotted her tears. Her last two visits today were peculiar, to say the least, but at least her worst fears weren’t recognized. Isaac and Cindra were alive. She decided to go back home and brood over everything. She still hadn’t had any time to process what had happened to Benjamin, her grief put on hold.

  The cabby dropped her off at the parking garage, and she paid him a large sum of money plus tip for his troubles. “Thank you, I hope everything is alright,” he said kindly. On the drive back he had continually checked his rearview mirror. Her puffy, somber face must have troubled him.

  “Thank you, sir,” she replied before shutting the door, and held her forehead as she walked to her car. Her cracks had finally deepened to the point of shattering; at any moment she could come unglued. The only thing that kept her together now was that she had to remain strong in case she was summoned to fulfill her purpose, and by the way things went lately, she could only surmise that it would be during this lifetime after all. Something was definitely amiss.

  On the drive back home, she kept her eyes peeled for the police, but the lack of traffic they experienced at lunch had thinned even more. Only a few stray cars crept down the street, the drivers as confounded as her. When she made it to her complex, she noticed the sidewalks were desolate, as well. Nobody walked their dogs or strolled children in buggies. The air hung eerily still.

  CHAPTER 11:

  The Beginning of the End

  Isaac threw the phone onto the couch beside him, irritated that he couldn’t get a hold of anyone at the doctor’s office. Each time he dialed the number it rang a hundred times with nobody bothering to answer. “How do they stay in business?” he griped and rubbed the stiffness from his neck, frustrated that his child’s condition worsened with every passing hour and hardly anything he did seemed to help.

  He then decided to call the pharmacy, hoping that they could recommend something. He dialed the number and waited for the ring when three loud beeps shrieked in his ear. “The number you have dialed is out of service…” the automated woman said. Seriously? He had walked by the store just the other day, and it teemed with customers.

  He trudged up the stairs to check on Micah again, who lay asleep on the end of the bed with the covers wrapped tightly around him, the budding fever drenching his face with sweat. Isaac loosened the comforter from his shoulders to allow his body to breathe, and determined that he would need to take him somewhere after his nap. The doctor’s office may not be answering the phone, but they couldn’t ignore him in person.

  He went downstairs and stripped his dust and grime covered clothes. If they left for the doctor later, he needed to shower first. On his way to the bathroom, he took notice of the weather. The clouds that covered the sky for days had darkened, giving the illusion that evening had stealthily crept in and pushed the lighter glow of afternoon away. The streets seemed unusually quiet also. Usually when storms rolled through the wind would howl, but now he imagined he could hear a pin drop from three blocks away. Nobody hurried down the city sidewalks or sped by in cars, no litter or leaves tumbled down the road, even the animals appeared in hiding.

  He grabbed his MP3 player from the end table, deciding to take a bath instead so he could listen to a local radio station in hopes that they would give a weather report. Sometimes a calming outside meant something more ominous like a tornado, and he imagined it would look like what he had just seen.

  He filled the newly cleaned bathtub with warm water and slipped inside, relaxing his muscles that had become knotted ever since Oman’s visit the day before. He flipped through the radio stations, but the only thing he got was static. “Figures,” he groaned. He switched to the Kansas album he had downloaded the other day, and as “Dust in the Wind” streamed through his ear buds, he rested his head on the lip of the tub and closed his eyes to enjoy a moment of relaxation.

  As he lay there, he wondered what Alyx could have possibly wanted at the door that afternoon. Although, he was quite sure that he didn’t want to know. She looked pleasant enough as she stared into the peephole, what a contrast to the Dark Angel he had dreamt about for so long. If Oman was right, and the contents of his dream were a symbol for something, then what would she represent? Were her black eyes a metaphor for her soul? Her intentions? Or maybe the creature in his dream was something she could turn into, or what she was, like an alien or a demon of some kind.

  He quickly determined that his imagination trailed off into something unpalatable, and if he allowed it to, would continue to roll around in his mind, conjuring images of sinister things that she could do to him or Micah, and thus effectively ruining his relaxed mood. Her looming presence was nothing he could fix or change, and fear would only consume him again if he let it. It was best to let his mind go blank for now and allow the warm bath to do its job.

  * * *

  Alyx left her draw to Isaac wide-open to keep tabs on him for the rest of the day, and its new sense of urgency had begun to throb. She wasn’t used to accessing it this much, and the sensation reminded her of a weakened muscle being pushed past it limitation. It wasn’t pleasant. In fact, it was slightly painful, but she needed to access it for as long as she could.

  She entered her apartment, and the air inside had a fresh and unusual bite. When she made her way into the living room, the broken window reminded her of her temper tantrum that morning. The autumn air had blown through the jagged hole all day. She pressed her lips together and sighed through her nose. I suppose that’s the least of my worrie
s.

  On her way to the couch to find a blanket, the throbbing draw in her chest rumbled. Whoa.

  She halted as it rolled through her limbs, shaking her violently from the inside like a ragdoll. The quaking seized as abruptly as it came, but her body still quivered from the aftershock so she continued toward the couch to rest.

  She stepped with her right foot, and a flash of heat broke free from the same spot in her chest, blazing over her body within a split second. Her skin boiled from the fire as though someone held a torch to it with the intention of melting the flesh from her bones, and she wheezed as she screamed from the pain.

  Her left leg stretched forward in hopes of making it to the edge of the couch, and her body went limp, falling forward onto the first cushion, her knees resting on the floor.

  She lay with her head sideways, staring at the shimmering glass that had scattered along the adjacent arm of the couch. Her head spun as she waited helplessly for the other changes to take place, the changes that meant only one thing. It’s happening.

  * * *

  The powdery sand cradled his feet, and warmth shone down from the crystal sky above, covering his skin like a soft blanket. He recognized the woman who waited by the rolling waves for him, her dark hair whipping around her face as she waited for him to join her. Her long, white dress grazed over the top of her bare feet, her arms outstretched in his direction, waiting for him for find his way into them. “Come with me,” she mouthed.

  His legs moved at her request, slowly bringing him closer. He knew he dreamed again, but not so much as a hint of reservation dwelled within his heart. Once by her side, his hand reached for hers and their slender fingers intertwined, grasping tightly. She smiled sweetly, flashing her pearly white teeth. He was hers to do what she will.

  She tugged him gently to walk along the beach, and they strode beside the sea-foam shoreline. Never speaking, only enjoying the rapture of each other’s company.