Guardian's Hope

by Jacqueline Rhoades

So this was what Grace meant about punishment and fun! Hope hugged herself and shivered from her shoulders to her toes.

  “I’m waiting,” she said and laughed.

  *****

  They made it back to the room a half hour before sunrise. As soon as the door was closed against the approaching day, Nico pulled out his phone and speed dialed Nardo.

  “Broadbent? Where’s Nardo?... Ah, I see and you’re covering the phone.” he looked over at Hope and shrugged. “No, I was going to ask him to send candy and flowers to the front office here.” He snorted and said to Hope, “The Professor doubts your affections can be purchased with flowers and sweets.”

  Hope laughed. “Tell him he’s right. I should have held out. All I got was cheap wine with cheese and crackers.” She could hear Broadbent’s laughter through the phone and then he said something she couldn’t quite hear.

  “Well there’s the mystery, professor. It wasn’t my wine or cheese… Yes,well… I’ll let her explain…The card should read ‘Thanks. You’re an angel’… No, one woman is enough for me and our angel’s madly in love with someone called Otis… Yes, I think you’re right. We’ll see you tonight.”

  “What’s going on?” Hope asked as soon as he closed the phone.

  “Nothing immediate. They’re trying to get an address on the bartender at Bloodsucker’s. Nardo can’t find a thing on the guy. Goes by the name of Smith, but who knows if that’s real or an alias. He goes to work before dark and never leaves until after dawn, so Nardo got the idea to set up cameras to follow his route. It’s taking some time. Nardo was setting up in the attic of what he thought was an abandoned house. Turns out he was wrong. A dozen squatters showed up to party and now he’s stuck there until nightfall.”

  “Poor Nardo. It doesn’t seem fair. They’re doing all this for me, while I’m here enjoying myself.”

  Nico put his hand on her shoulder. “You’re not to worry about this. The Guardians know what they’re doing and they can get the job done faster than you can alone. The men watching your house are paid by Smith, but we know he’s not running the show. If your sister’s alive, and I believe she is, we don’t want to move too fast and force them to do something we’ll regret later.”

  “I know. I know. It’s guilt, that’s all. I have no right to be so happy while…”

  “You have every right. Nothing you’ve done has taken away from the search for your sister. Now go get your shower and let’s get some sleep.”

  He was already in bed when she returned from the shower. She’d felt so free in her nakedness up on the mountain, but here in the motel, she had a sudden attack of shyness and she wore the white nightgown. She nervously picked at one of the tiny buttons as she stood by the side of the bed.

  “I’m sorry,” she said quietly, “This feels really awkward. It shouldn’t, but it does.”

  Nico drew back the covers to invite her in. “It is for me as well,” he said as she slipped between the sheets. “I’ve never slept with a woman before.”

  “Oh please.” Hope leaned on her elbow and propped her head on her balled fist. As suddenly as it came, her awkwardness was gone. She rolled her eyes. “I know you’ve slept with other women. You said so up on the mountain.”

  “No. I’ve bedded other women, which means I’ve had sex with other women. I have never slept with a woman until now.”

  “Ah,” Hope nodded her head in understanding. “Slam, bam, thank you ma’am.”

  Nico choked out a laugh and shook his head. “Where do you get these things? No. I’ll bet I can guess.”

  “Dov and Col, of course. They’ve made it their mission to bring me out of the Stone Age. They’re developing a whole curriculum of movies, graphic novels, and idiomatic language. I think it’s helping.”

  “And as soon as we get back I’m announcing school is closed. If you need a teacher, I’ll take the job.”

  “Why? Did I get it wrong?” Her eyes sparkled with mischief.

  Nico lay back on his pillow, closed his eyes and sighed. “No. Your assumption was correct, but crudely put.”

  “Oh I know that,” she laughed. “The two of them are dying for me to say something awful in front of the others. I was only using you for practice. After what we did last night, I didn’t think you’d be offended.”

  “The mistake is mine,” he said seriously though she saw the telltale quirk at the corner of his mouth. “I thought you’d make a nice, quiet little mouse of a mate. I see now I was wrong.”

  She fell back on her pillow. He’d said mate. Did he mean it or was it just a turn of phrase? Hope tamped down the shiver of pleasure and asked a question she’d wanted to ask earlier.

  “Nico?”

  “Hmm?”

  “If it’s your secret, you know I’ll keep it, but do the others know about your past? Your scars?” She didn’t want to hurt him, yet it bothered her to think the others knew and never hinted at his history.

  He didn’t open his eyes and his voice remained calm, but she knew it wasn’t easy for him to answer.

  “Not the whole of it. Canaan knows I didn’t receive my skull and tears in the usual way and Grace saw a small portion of my back. I swore her to secrecy. Actually I frightened her into it. She didn’t deserve it. I’d been injured and she was concerned for me. I’ve told you more than I’ve ever told anyone.” He paused and opened his eyes to stare at the popcorn ceiling above. “No. That’s not true either. If I’m to give you the truth, you need the whole of it. The two Guardians who found me after I’d received my skull and tears knew everything. They’re the ones who taught me about who and what I was. They taught me about honor and what it means to be a Guardian of the Race. They gave me purpose. They gave me my life.”

  Her hand found his under the covers and she squeezed his fingers. “You don’t have to tell me if it’s too painful. I don’t need to know.”

  “I didn’t want to tell you, but now that I’ve begun, I must. You need to know who you’re involved with.” He licked his lips. “You’d think, after all these years, it would be easy to tell. It isn’t. I don’t know why.”

  “You’ve kept it locked inside your heart for so long you’ve formed a wall around it. Those kinds of walls are hard to break down. You don’t have to tell it all at once. When you’re ready, I’ll listen.”

  “No. I’m ready and you need to hear all of it. I don’t know how I survived the mauling with the claw. I’ve tried to remember, but it’s a blank. The first thing I remember is waking up in the woods. I was lying in a stream, soaked and freezing. I must have drunk the water but I hadn’t eaten in a long time. I was skin and bones and so weak I could only crawl. I dragged myself along that streambed for days until I came to a small farm. It was a Sunday morning. I know because the family was dressed in their best and gathering at the wagon. The woman carried a Bible. I was so afraid they’d see me lying in the tall grass. I remember how the sun burned on my back. I thought the sun sickness was another sign that I truly was a damphyr.”

  “Anyway, when the family was well down the road, I made my way to the house. There was a dog, but it only wagged its tail and licked my face. I was grateful. I knew I wasn’t strong enough to fight it off. In the kitchen, I ate everything I could stuff in my mouth and promptly threw it up. I thought it was another sign. I needed blood, not food. I actually considered biting the dog. Fortunately for both of us I couldn’t bring myself to do it.” He winced at the memory. “I made up my mind that I would relearn to eat human food or die. I stole a couple of shirts and a bag of food and dragged myself back to the woods. I kept moving. By eating small amounts of food every few hours, I gradually regained my strength. It was years before I learned that my reaction was typical of starvation.” He shrugged. “That’s the way I lived for a long time. Steal food and clothes on Sunday and hide for the rest of the week.”

  Hope rolled to her side and kissed his cheek. “I’m so glad you didn’t bite the dog.”

  He smiled at that. “Me too.”

&n
bsp; He was quiet for a long while and Hope wondered if he knew she was seeing the images from his memories. After a while, he tore himself away from the images and continued, his voice a monotone.

  “Eventually, I made my way to the sea and became a wharf rat. I lived by night. I was a gambler and a thief and a smuggler of anything that could be sold in the hell holes along the docks. I killed my first human when I was around seventeen. He was a sailor who preferred boys over women and I looked like an easy mark. He propositioned me first, offered me money and only forced the issue when I refused. He didn’t know that in spite of my size, I was already stronger than most men. I killed him with his own knife.” Nico’s voice hardened. “Don’t think that killing him had anything to do with honor or self-defense. I was already jaded enough to do anything for money, anything but expose my scars. It wasn’t too long after that my reputation began to grow. I’d learned to control my fangs and buried any emotion that brought them out. No one knew what I was and I never let anyone close enough to find out. I was a boy who could take down the strongest of men and I found I could make my living with my fists. I fought in bars, cellars, stables, anywhere I could find someone to set it up and handle the betting. I fought all comers and some of the men I fought died and every one of them that died was a Rom. It was murder and I knew it. So there you have it, Hope. Thou shalt not commit murder, but I did and at the time I was proud of it. I became the monster they said I was.” His face became hard with the beginnings of rage, the planes of his cheeks so sharp they looked honed.

  Hope knelt beside him and took his face in her hands. Her tears fell to his cheeks. “Stop it. Stop it,” she shouted. “You were a boy! A boy with a man’s strength. Those people flayed you. The damage wasn’t just to your body. They shredded your heart and your soul. They killed the child that you were. Few men could survive what you did and not want revenge. You had no one to show you the world could be different, no one to heal the wounds to your heart. Murder is wrong. I won’t deny it, but you were a tortured child with a tortured child’s mind and reason. I won’t condemn you for that and neither will God. You are no monster, Nico. You never were.”

  Nico held her to him so tightly she could barely draw breath but she offered no protest. She kissed his eyes and cheeks and lips. She kissed the boy that once was and the man he’d become. She whispered as if to the child.

  “As much as my heart bleeds for him, that poor child is gone, Nico. Let him go and rest in peace. You’re the man that replaced that child, the man I love. You’re good and kind and noble. You’re a Guardian of the Race, an honorable member of the Paenitentia. You’ve served your penance for almost a hundred years. It’s enough. Let the boy and the anger go, my love, let it all go.”

  His breathing became easier and his face softened. This woman, this gift, embodied everything decent, virtuous and pure. Her absolution was like a summer rain that cleansed the dust and filth from the earth and left the fresh scent of ozone in its wake. That God forgave him his sins, he could only pray. That she forgave him was everything. She was his Hope.

  “Are you all right now?” she asked softly and when he nodded, she smiled. “Good, because my ribs are about to crack. No, don’t let me go, just ease up a little.” She curled up beside him with her head on his shoulder. “There. This is nice. We’ll lie here holding each other while you tell me the rest.”

  “There isn’t that much to tell. After a time, I hated my life. No. That’s not true. I had no life, no family, no friends. All I had was fighting and I’d grown to hate it. I hated me. I was prowling the streets and alleys one night when I came upon a beast, a demon, though I didn’t know it then. It was attacking a woman, a street whore, in an alley. I was too late to save the woman, but I slaughtered the beast. I thought, ‘This monster is me, my future. It’s only a matter of time.’ I couldn’t face that. I couldn’t let myself become that. It was common knowledge that my kind couldn’t survive on hallowed ground. I took myself off to the nearest church. I doused myself with holy water, tore the cross from the altar and threw myself upon it. I cried out to God that my life was his to take.” Nico laughed and there was real humor in the sound. “I thought he took me up on my offer. I was surrounded by awful power. A magnificent light passed through me and the pain in my heart was excruciating and beautiful at the same time. I fainted. The priest, a good man who knew of us and kept our secret, found me there and sent for Boris and Kurt. When I awoke, I found myself with this.” He laid his hand over the lilies and skull on his chest. “It all came at once, the lilies, the skull and my tears. The rest, as they say, is history. Those two Guardians were the best of our kind. They took me in and taught me everything I know.”

  There was such sadness in his voice that her heart broke for him again. The only image in his mind was blackness. She’d shared this painful journey with him and knew she had to share its end.

  “What happened to them?” she asked in the softest of whispers.

  “I killed them. One begged me, the other fought me, but I killed them both just the same.”

  “They were turned, weren’t they?” She could barely speak the words.

  Nico nodded. “War came and with war comes demons. They thrive on it and they were everywhere. Kurt was turned first and he begged me not to leave him to Boris. He was afraid Boris wouldn’t be able to do what needed to be done. Kurt was the quieter of the two, the gentlest, but in the end, he was the bravest. Boris was gone a month later.”

  At first she couldn’t speak; the ache in her heart was too great. Nico’s grief was palpable. His body had turned cold. She molded her body to his and rested her hand on his chest, covering the symbol of his calling. They lay there for long moments as still as the long dead Boris and Kurt. His body warmed and his breathing became soft and steady. She thought he might have fallen asleep.

  “What happened then, my love? What did you do?” she asked though she expected no answer.

  There was a hitch in his breath and then a deep sigh. “I did what I have always done. I survived.”

  Chapter 27

  Beauty had to eat. Some inner force insisted upon it. She was already dead inside and the dead required no nourishment. Yet the compulsion was there and so she ate whatever was put in front of her. She had no idea what she ate. She tasted nothing. She put the pieces in her mouth, chewed, swallowed and stopped when the plate was empty.

  She bathed and took care of her personal hygiene because she’d been told to. She never looked in the mirror because she didn’t recognize the woman looking back. The woman in the mirror wasn’t Hope. When her mind was clear enough to think, even a little, she thought the creature in the mirror might be Beauty, but she wasn’t sure.

  For a long time she prayed to find the Hope she thought she was deep inside; the Hope who was strong, resilient and enduring. That Hope was getting harder and harder to find.

  She straightened her shoulders and lifted her head. She put what she hoped was an interested look on her face. The devil was talking and would become angry if she didn’t pay attention.

  “So,” Tyn said from his human form, “What do you think we should do about Smith? He’s hanging around too much, asking too many questions and I don’t like the way he follows you.”

  “What you decide is what we’ll do,” she answered as expected. “I don’t talk to Smith. You ordered me not to.”

  Tyn smiled. This was the Beauty he wanted, obedient, compliant. He should reward her for pleasing him.

  “You’ve been a good girl,” he said pleasantly, “Go take care of your minionettes and then clean yourself and change into something pretty. Fix your hair. Put on your paint. I’m taking you out for a night on the town. Make sure you cover the scar.”

  Beauty smiled woodenly and nodded her thanks. She hurried upstairs to her charges, ignoring the guard outside the dining room door and the one at the front entrance. The girls were the reason for her compliance with the devil’s wishes. If she didn’t obey, he kept her from them. Caring fo
r them was both her salvation and her downfall. Without them she would surely die and suffer the tortures of Hell. The thought terrified her more than Tyn and the things he made her do. Hell would be worse than this prison on earth.

  She told the guard in the hallway to bring food and he obeyed. He was a demon like Tyn, as were the others, and they lived in the cellar of the old house. They never touched her and always did as she bid them, but by the covetous looks in their eyes as they followed her every move, she knew that if anything happened to Tyn, she was doomed. There were eight of them now.

  The girls were gathered in one room. They sat with hands wringing in their laps or pacing with short jerky steps back and forth across the room, staring at nothing, recognizing no one, like zombies and yet they always gathered together when the business was closed even though they each had quarters of their own. Beauty’s mind seemed to clear somewhat in their presence.

  They were the innocents in this prison. They had done nothing to deserve this fate. They would be used and abused and then they would die and there was nothing she could do to save them. She could only bathe their battered bodies, comb their dulling hair and treat their injuries with what few supplies their master allowed. Once, when the fog in her mind had lifted sufficiently, she wondered why she bothered to keep them alive. For them, death would be a blessing. But when one died, someone else was captured as a replacement. Keeping these tortured souls alive saved another young woman from sharing their fate. Either way, her soul was blackened.

  Jeri, number thirteen, was fading fast. It was only a matter of days. While Tyn no longer fed from them regularly, the damage was done. Their fate was sealed with death. Her fate was to care for them and to watch them die. No matter how fogged her mind became, she would remember their names.

  When she reached her room and closed the door behind her, she raised the heels of her palms to either side of her head and struck three hard blows. Sometimes the pain helped to clear her mind. Tyn was taking her outside of the prison. There was something she needed to do. She concentrated as hard as she was able and forced more of the fog from her mind. Every time Tyn took her beyond the confines of her prison, she did something. She almost fainted from the effort. There was something she needed to do. What was it?