Craft

by Lynnie Purcell

  “I don’t see any Coopers, but that don’t mean they ain’t around,” Neveah said. “Best to be cautious. We don’t want to let the non-crafters see us crafting.”

  Cousin nodded in agreement. He took his pipe out of his mouth and put it in his shirt pocket. He looked at the others in the van.

  “We’ll be back directly. Give a shout if you see a Cooper.”

  The cousins nodded in unison. Their grins suggested they would do more than shout if they saw a Cooper. Neveah gestured for Ellie to get up. Ellie did as Neveah commanded out of habit, though her mind was racing. She did not feel prepared for wherever they had ended up. Cousin threw back the door of the van. Ellie blinked away the bright sunlight and focused on what was in front of her. Her surroundings were unexpected after such a long journey.

  The van was in a small alley across from a large parking lot. The parking lot belonged to a square building, which had ten levels, and uniform windows that suggested a corporate use. A sign was in front of two large double doors. It read: Cherry Hospital, Psychiatric Services.

  Neveah jumped out of the van and looked at the hospital eagerly. Ellie could tell that her sister had spent a lot of time planning whatever mission they were on. Her eagerness increased Ellie’s worry. Ellie stared at the building, wondering how a hospital held the answer to Neveah’s bloodlust.

  Ellie followed Cousin and Careen out of the van. Cousin closed the door behind them and gave a nod at the cousins. Neveah pushed Ellie to get her walking. They crossed the small road and moved to the side of the building. There was a small access door hidden by bushes and an air conditioning unit. Neveah flicked her wrist and the door swung open. Ellie followed the others inside. Neveah had a warning as they stepped inside.

  “Stay with me,” Neveah said. “Don’t be stupid. Lives are at risk.”

  Ellie nodded in agreement and looked around the interior of the hospital. The halls were drab. They were completely devoid of color. Fluorescent lights burned bright overhead. The halls were long and full of medical equipment. Sounds of distress filled up the space. It was the sound of patients seeking an outlet to their various mental conditions. There were no bars on the windows and doors, a hopeful sign to Ellie that the patients were not violent. The lack of security did not make the sounds any more comforting.

  She held her chest tightly and walked in a tight formation with the others. People looked out from their rooms as they passed. Some were curious about them, others merely stared without seeing.

  Neveah was certain of their destination. She took the turns as if she had spent her life walking the hallways. She stopped at an open door. Ellie peeked inside. A woman was on a comfortable-looking bed beyond a male nurse. She stared up at the ceiling and did not respond to the man as he checked on her. Neveah ushered the others back around the corner as the man left the room. They waited silently for him to pass, then they moved to the room again.

  Neveah stopped in the doorway, to take in the scene in front of her. Neveah was cold and distant for a long moment, and then she smiled. Neveah’s smile reached a level of malevolence Ellie had never seen on her face. There was only primal emotion surging through Neveah’s veins. It went beyond bloodlust.

  Careen looked equally as affected by the sight of the woman. For the first time, Ellie saw true darkness in Careen’s face. Cousin was less emotional, but even he did not appear as in control as he would have liked at seeing the woman. He brought Neveah back to the present. He was focused on the task, instead of the emotions behind seeing the woman.

  “We best get on with it,” Cousin said.

  Neveah nodded in agreement. Ellie stared at the woman, trying to understand her sisters’ reactions. The woman stared right back. Her face was a shallow mask of a person, her brown eyes deadened by the weight of unspeakable madness. Her sunken cheeks and dry, withered features scared Ellie. The woman did not look real. She had to be a dream or a nightmare. There was no way a living person could look so dead.

  “Who is she?” Ellie asked.

  “She’s our ticket to ending the feud for good,” Neveah said.

  “Ending the feud,” Ellie repeated. “How do you think you’re going to do that? It’s impossible to stop the feud.”

  “It is possible. You just have to cut off the head of the family,” Neveah said.

  “She’s the head of the family?” Ellie asked.

  “Course not, girly,” Cousin said. “How is she running the feud from here? She can’t even move.”

  “I just thought…” Ellie said.

  “This is his wife,” Neveah said. “We can draw him out if we have her as leverage. With him and his sons gone, the Coopers don’t have a chance of continuing the fight. They’ll falter. We can hit them when they’re weak. We’ll finally be rid of our Cooper problem and can get on with things.”

  Ellie looked at the woman in sudden understanding. The truth was alarming. This woman who looked more dead than alive was not a random patient in the hospital. She was not simply a Cooper they planned on hurting. She knew whose wife she was. She knew the sons were not some nameless Cooper.

  It was Thane’s mother. And Neveah planned on using her to kill Thane and his family.

  Chapter 11: Betrayal

  When Ellie had first heard about Thane’s mother, she had never thought she would meet her. Ellie had thought the woman would be nothing more than a story told by Thane, a sense of sadness when he mentioned her. Two of her worlds had collided in a dramatic way. The collision rocked Ellie to her core.

  Questions circled her mind as she tried to understand. How had Neveah known about her? How had she known to come here? Had they waited for the solstice on purpose, so that the Coopers would be safely distracted? What did they plan to do with her once they had drawn out Thane’s father?

  The others were not eager to explain. They were eager to leave before they were caught in the middle of Cooper territory. Cousin moved around the comfortable bed and pulled the woman into his arms. She did not resist the touch. She did not even seem to be aware of it. She set her head against his chest, and he moved around the others on his way down the hall. Ellie shook away her shock at seeing Thane’s mother. She needed to understand. She did not care about punishment for daring to be curious. She had to know. It was the only way she could figure out how to remedy the situation.

  “What are you planning?” Ellie asked. “How do you know about this woman?”

  Neveah grabbed Ellie’s arm and forced her to fall in behind Cousin and Careen without answering. Ellie’s panic grew as they made their way down the hall. They were kidnapping Thane’s mother and she did not have the strength to stop them.

  Neveah, Careen and Cousin were tense. Their eyes were everywhere in the hall. The low moans of the other patients took new meaning. Every stray sound was a nurse or guard coming down the hall. Their nerves stretched to the breaking point. It took all of their training and willpower not to craft everything in sight.

  It took all of Ellie’s willpower not to craft against her family to make them leave Thane’s mother alone. Ellie knew attacking them was not the right way to keep Thane’s mother safe. She would never win a fight against all three of them. Their combined craft was stronger. If she attacked them now, they would know how she felt and she would never get the chance to warn Thane. Warning Thane was more important than picking a fight she could not win. She could not let Thane walk into Neveah’s trap. If that meant ruining the only chance they had at ending the feud, she would do it. If it meant she would never be counted as a Bumbalow again, she would do it. It was a matter of what was right.

  Ellie went through a profound shift as she followed her family down the hall. Even as her mind plotted ways to free the woman and to warn Thane, she felt all of her fear and feelings of insignificance drop away. She was not the same terrified girl. She was not afraid to do what needed to be done. She would no longer be judged by Neveah’s scales. She would do her own judging. And her judgment was that Neveah had finally crossed
a line. It was a line she could not uncross. It forced Ellie to pick a side. Ellie knew her side was not with her sister.

  They made it back to the side door without meeting anyone in the halls. Neveah closed and locked the door behind them with a triumphant flick of the wrist. They had escaped.

  Her triumph was short-lived.

  Four cars had pulled into the parking lot. They were similar in design to Thane’s car. The people inside the cars were in the process of getting out.

  Ellie did not need Neveah’s hiss of “Coopers!” to know who they were. She knew in a glance. It was impossible to miss seeing Thane. Her eyes went to him immediately. He looked up as she rounded the corner. He took in the sight of Cousin holding his mother, Careen, Neveah and, finally, Ellie. His eyes moved to her last, as if he was afraid to face the truth that she was there. His eyes filled with horror as they moved back to his mother.

  Ellie could tell from the look on his face that he had jumped to the wrong conclusion. He thought she had told her family about his confession, that she had told him about his mother. Ellie tried to tell him with her eyes that she did not betray him, but he was not open to her communication. He believed what he saw, nothing more.

  The other Coopers missed the silent exchange. They saw Cousin with Thane’s mother and immediately started moving forward. They did not craft. They knew the risks as well as Neveah and the others did. They did not want to draw attention, but they were working on the indifference. It would not take them long to start crafting. They would do whatever it took to get Thane’s mother back.

  Ellie looked past Thane. She saw Connor, his face full of anger. He was livid at what he saw. He would have never dared to believe the Bumbalows would kidnap his mother. Ellie did not see anyone in the group who looked as if they could have been Thane’s father. It was the only thing that kept Neveah from cursing everything in sight. She wanted Thane’s father more. She did not know she had his sons in front of her.

  The cousins were already out of the van. They were ready to fight. They did not care about odds. Neveah knew better than to get in a fight on Cooper territory. It would not end well.

  Neveah ushered the cousins back inside the van with a gesture. She grabbed Ellie’s wrist and pulled her after her. Ellie did not resist the touch. She was too focused on Thane to fight back. As they ran, Neveah flicked her wrist once. Neveah had decided to break the rules.

  A thick wall of darkness moved toward the Coopers. As one, the Coopers dropped to the ground to avoid the darkness. Neveah shoved Ellie inside the van as her craft moved across the parking lot. Neveah jumped inside after Ellie. The back doors of the van still open, Ellie’s cousin stomped on the gas. Dark craft from the Coopers followed them as they sped down the street.

  Ellie saw Thane at the front of the group, crafting for all he was worth. His eyes were full of the same horror of before. His craft worked to bring his mother back. She could not escape the sense of betrayal in his eyes. It followed her.

  Thinking fast, she remembered the book he had given to her. It was their way of communicating. She put her hand into her pocket and grabbed it. She focused on what she wanted it to say. She focused on the truth and applied her craft to the words.

  When the van took a sharp turn to the left, Ellie made the book to fall out of the back of the van with silent craft. No one in her family noticed the book as it fell. It rolled on the harsh pavement and came to a stop near the gutter. She was not sure if Thane saw it fall or would connect the dots. Even then, she was not sure it would be enough to convince him of the truth.

  When the Coopers were out of sight, the cousins started cheering. They were proud of themselves; they were proud of what they had accomplished. Neveah smiled as the others complimented her on the success of the plan. She glowed with their praise. Ellie listened to the compliments in quiet hate as she tried to see a way to get Thane’s mother home safely.

  Around the compliments, the others talked about the plan. The truth slowly came out with their words. Ellie listened to the truth, wanting to understand. She needed to piece it together so that if she ever did see Thane again she could explain.

  A month ago, Neveah had overheard a pair of Coopers mentioning the hospital. It had taken Neveah a while to connect the dots, to figure out what the hospital had to do with the Coopers. She had visited the hospital several times before the truth came out. That was when she came up with her plan to abduct Thane’s mother.

  Neveah was better at figuring out the Coopers’ secrets than she was Ellie’s. If Neveah had known what Ellie was plotting, she would not have been smiling so happily.

  Cousin kept an eye on the road behind them as they drove back to the house. He did not even attempt to appear as if he was smoking his pipe. He was alert and guarded for an ambush. The hour drive back felt shorter to Ellie than when they had gone to the hospital.

  When they pulled up to Ellie’s house, the family was waiting. The party paused expectedly as Neveah threw back the doors of the van. Neveah pulled Thane’s mother to the front of the van.

  “It seems as if we stumbled across a Cooper!” Neveah said to the group.

  Ellie’s family started hollering and cheering at Neveah’s words. Ellie had never felt more unlike her family than in that moment. She had never felt so different. For the first time in her life, she was glad for the difference.

  Neveah jerked Thane’s mother down to the ground with craft and paraded her around the group. Thane’s mother did not react to the abuse. She did nothing to try to free herself. Her impassive expression did not change. Insults were hissed to Thane’s mother and compliments yelled to Neveah. Neveah circled the entire house, so that everyone could get a look at the Cooper Neveah had captured. Then Neveah took her captive inside.

  Ellie followed after them. Her anger threatened to take over her common sense. Her hands trembled with the impulse to put powerful craft over them all. Her anger told her to forget the odds.

  Neveah sat Thane’s mother on the paisley sofa and crafted ropes around her hands. They were not necessary to keep her in place but the ropes made Neveah feel better. It made her prisoner feel more like a prisoner. Neveah turned and saw Ellie staring between the two of them.

  “What?” Neveah asked.

  Ellie fixed her expression. She did her best to look eager. “I’m supposed to be part of things now, right?” Ellie asked.

  “I guess…” Neveah said.

  “I’d like to keep an eye on her…make sure she doesn’t escape,” Ellie said.

  “I don’t think you have talent for that,” Neveah said.

  “It doesn’t take much to look after a woman who can’t even move on her own,” Ellie said. “Besides you and the others have to focus on drawing out her husband, so you can fight him.”

  Cousin, Eugenia and Careen had followed them inside. They did not share Neveah’s worries. They knew the house was protected by the Bumbalows surrounding it. The Coopers would not be able to get to Thane’s mother without a fight.

  “The girl has a point,” Eugenia said. “I’ll stay with her if you’re worried about the Coopers sneaking up on us.”

  “There’ll be no sneaking,” Neveah said. “There’s just going to be me killing the man who killed my father.”

  Ellie froze. Did Neveah really know who killed their father? Was it Thane’s father all this time? How could she know for certain? No one had witnessed the murder. At least that was what Ellie had been told.

  “How do you know he killed our papa?” Ellie asked. “How’d you find out?”

  “A recently caught Cooper told me,” Neveah said. “He had no reason to lie.”

  Careen and Neveah exchanged a secret smile. It was a smile with hidden darkness. Ellie did not doubt from the looks on their faces that they had found out the truth. They had found the man who had murdered her father.

  Kidnapping Thane’s mother was not about ending the feud as Neveah had claimed. It was about revenge. Neveah wanted to punish the man who had broken thei
r family apart. Ellie shook with the realization. Thane had been closer to the truth than Ellie had thought. Had he known the truth all along? Had he known since Ellie had admitted her papa had been killed in town? Had he put the pieces together? Thane would not be afraid to ask about the past. He would discover the truth quick enough.

  Ellie felt her plans falter. Did she want to free Thane’s mother before Neveah had a chance to face his father? She was uncertain. Her resolve waivered. What was the harm in waiting? The fight felt more personal than it had ever felt before. It was about her father, a man she had never really gotten to know. Neveah did not notice Ellie’s struggle. She was focused on the task.

  “We have to send out a message,” Neveah said. “Cousin, I want you take a bunch of the others and make sure we know who’s coming our way. Give a shout when he arrives.”

  Cousin nodded and left the house. Neveah followed after him with Careen. Ellie heard her family asking about the attack as Neveah left the house. Eugenia pulled a chair near the sofa and sat. She kept a stern gaze on Thane’s mother. Her eyes did not show any sympathy. She would kill Thane’s mother without thinking twice.

  Ellie was still wrestling with the information Neveah had left on her shoulders. She did not know how to focus her emotions. Letting Thane’s mother get hurt because of vengeance was wrong. Was letting Neveah get revenge for their father’s death also wrong? Ellie wanted someone to pay for what had happened. She wanted some form of closure. She realized that was the whole problem. There was always a reason for the vengeance. There was always an explanation. It would not change things. It would just make her like Neveah.

  Ellie sat on the sofa next to Thane’s mother and tried to keep her body from giving away her emotions. She tried her best to sit still. She held her hands on her lap to keep herself from doing something rash. They twisted endlessly in her lap. She could not hide her emotions. She was lucky that people were used to ignoring her. Eugenia did not notice her agitation. She was more focused on her captive.