by KD Knight
"I said let us go!" I shouted.
"Don't you want to know who hired me?" He asked with a devilish grin. "I guarantee you'll be surprised."
The fire crept through my shoulder blades and squeezed the base of my neck. He smiled brightly. My heart beat raced violently as pressure seized my chest. I focused on pushing the pressure away, just as I had during my run in with the Ancient I had met in the market. To my right, out of the corner of my eye, the neighbour's car slowly inched off the ground. My heart thundered as the car rose higher. The light pole next to the car shook then dislodged itself from its cement foundation. Sparks flew as the downed power lines thrashed. A flash of fear registered in his eyes.
No more talking. He will see.
The fearful expression subsided and was replaced with a smug look, as if he were welcoming the challenge. He grabbed my free wrist with his second hand. As I looked in his blood-filled eyes, the pain crept slowly up my neck and settled behind my ears. The intense burning reached my temple within a few moments. I clenched my fist with my last bit of strength and focused on the ground beneath him. I shook the sidewalk so violently it reduced the concrete below our feet to rubble. I lifted the remains of the sidewalk from under his feet and threw it and him as far away from me as I could manage. I watched his face tremble as he was swept away with the rubble.
Sparks shot like firecrackers behind my eyes. "Lisa." My voice was no louder than a whisper. I turned to search for her though my head was swirling. My brain felt like it was on fire. All of a sudden the world went black and my body hit the cement.
~Boothe~
Chapter Twenty-Three: Bandulu Bizness
{Corrupt Venture}
When I left Jane's house, I decided to cool down with a walk. I hadn’t gotten far when I heard the scream. I ran as fast as I could but I was too late. I found Jane lifeless on a bed of rubble. Lisa, shaken and badly bruised told me what happened. Rage pulsed through my veins as she described the ambush. By the look of the ripped up asphalt road, dancing electrical wires, and mangled cars, Jane put up a good fight. But that only made me feel worse. I should have been out there with her.
Cradling her in my arms, I carried her home.
"Oh mercy, mercy!" Aunt Dar cried as I stepped through the door. She grabbed Jane's hand and began to shake it. Getting no response, Aunt Dar buried her face in Jane's lap.
I carried Jane upstairs and placed her carefully in her bed. I sat at the edge of the night table staring at her and wishing there was something I could do to bring her back from this coma. In the end, there is nothing that I can do that will ever make up for not being there for her. I didn’t keep my promise.
I knelt down beside her bed and cupped her warm cheek. "I'm sorry," I whispered. "I keep failing you and you keep paying for it. I promise I'll make it right."
The door creaked open behind me and I stepped away from the bed.
"You alright, big man?" Mark asked, patting me on my shoulder.
I looked at Jane laid out on her bed, her chest barely elevating as she breathed. I bit down on my tongue so hard that the sweet metallic taste of blood pooled under it.
"We called a doctor," Aunt Dar said as she entered the room. "He'll be here soon." She bent over and kissed Jane lightly on the forehead then sat at her bedside, gripping her hand. But Jane didn't squeeze back.
"I have to go," I said finally. According to Lisa, her condition would only get worse. I had to do something other than watch her suffer.
I took the stairs two by two, with Lisa on my heels.
"Where are you going?" She asked as I grabbed the door handle.
"I'm going to hunt down Aramos and his soldiers and eliminate them one by one."
"Jane needs you here."
"Jane is unconscious," I said louder than I expected. I bit my lip and took a deep breath. "I can do more for her out there than I can in here."
"What if the Neph who did this comes back? What if…"
"The road's ripped up, power lines on both sides of the street have been uprooted, cars flipped over. If the neighbours weren't awake before, they are now. The police will be swarming this place. No Neph is going to risk coming back, not with all the witnesses. I'll be back soon."
"Why do you have to leave?"
"Both of you could have been killed," I said as my heart raced in my chest. "It's time I put an end to this."
Lisa ran out the door after me, shouting something, but I was already pulling out of the driveway. I drove through the night to the first point on my mission—a quiet residential complex in St. Ann. It was a new development filled with rows of uniform houses painted in a pale colour that looked grey in the moonlight. I pulled my car up to the small manicured lawn and stepped out into the humid night.
I knocked hard on the front door. No answer. I stepped back and noticed shadowy movement in the window to my right. I went back to the door and knocked harder until the wood caved under my pounding fist.
"You're going to break down my door" Millicent said as she opened the door. She left only a crack wide enough to expose her face.
"If I wanted to break down your door I would have."
"What are you doing here? It's nine o'clock at night. No. Let's start with how you found out where I lived."
"I’m learning to be resourceful."
She opened the door and leaned forward, glancing up and down the lonely street.
"I want the names of everyone involved in the attacks against Jane. You know who they are. You are going to tell me. Now we can do this out here if you want." I gestured to the open veranda. "Or you could let me in before I wake the neighbours."
She pulled her robe together tightly.
"You're feeling particularly dark and destructive this evening." She looked me up and down carefully before stepping aside and allowing me in. "You should learn to keep that temper in check."
Millicent furnished her home sparsely with a leather sofa and a matching love seat, a side table and a desk. Her dark minimalist furniture stood out against the Hibiscus pink walls.
"A Neph got Jane tonight. He touched her and somehow knocked her unconscious." I picked up a hand-painted porcelain plate. It was one of only two colourfully decorative elements in Millicent's space. "Who was it?"
"There are thousands of Nephs out there. I don't know all of them." She grabbed the plate from my hand and set it back on its stand. "You guys were attacked. How's Mark? I mean, out of all of you he's the most fragile…"
"Not who I came to discuss."
"Why did you come here?" She folded her arms across her lap.
"I told you, I'm here for names."
"Well I don't have any."
"Liar. There's a free-for-all on Jane. Your boy Glenroy is a part of it." I took a seat opposite her. I sat on the edge of my seat with my elbows firmly on my knees. I wanted to look her straight in the eye. "I want to know if the whole Council is working with Aramos or just you and Glenroy."
Her jaw tightened. "I am not a traitor!"
"So it's Glenroy and the Council?"
"To the best of my knowledge, most of the three-member Council board doesn't know that Glenroy and the Council Guard have switched their allegiances. I think the Chairman has some idea but is turning a blind eye."
"I already knew Glenroy was corrupt. I asked the question to find out if I could trust you to give me the truth."
She sighed. "For a long time I couldn't understand why anyone would do Aramos's dirty work. Watching Glenroy, I realized that Aramos seduces people by promising them their hearts desire: money, fame, power, privilege. Whatever you want, he will give it to you. The only thing he asks in return is for the occasional favour. The cost doesn't seem like much, but what they don't realize is that in the end it will cost them everything and they will gain nothing."
Millicent hung her head low as she spoke. "At one time, Glenroy was one of my closest friends. He was loyal, considerate, honest…" She let out a deep sigh. "I watched him fall from being a good Es
hkar to being a Corrupt."
"Why doesn't anyone do something about Glenroy before he succeeds in carrying out his agenda to kill Jane?" I asked.
"Because there is no actual proof. I knew the Glenroy before and the Glenroy now, so I knew right away. The Council is not willing to act without any real evidence that's he's Corrupt."
"So what if I get you proof?"
"How?"
"You let me worry about that. I'll just need one thing from you."
"What's that?" She looked up at me. Her eyes were misty.
"Glenroy's address."
She looked at me hard. Her eyes widened. "I think what you're about to do is dangerous and stupid. Glenroy is not going to give himself up. He'll die before he gives you any info on Aramos."
"I need to try. You won't understand…"
"I do. You care about Jane. So watching her go through this while you sit on the sidelines is the hardest thing you've ever done, right?"
I tried to shake the image of Jane lying on the road from my mind. But I couldn't. It was seared there, possibly forever.
She laboured to her feet and walked over to the credenza in the back corner of the room. She handed me a small piece of paper with an address in St. Catherine scribbled on it. "The only reason I am giving you this is because I understand what you are going through. If I could have saved Glenroy, I would have. But for the record, I think that you are going to get yourself killed."
"I stand a better chance of surviving a fight with Glenroy and Aramos than Jane does."
"There is more than one way to help someone," she said with a sombre glance. "Jane may not need you to fight her battles. She may just need you to stand by her."
"Thanks for the address," I said as I approached the front door. "Before I go, have you heard anything about Marcus?"
"No." She knitted her brows. "He's been keeping really low over the last few weeks."
Marcus is not the type to keep low. A quiet Marcus is a dangerous Marcus.
I stepped into my car and revved the engine. On to stop number two.
It was 10:30 p.m. by the time I made it to the St. Catherine community of Portmore. I quickly noticed an eerie trend. Every turn that brought me closer to Glenroy took me further away from civilization. Each turn led to a street that was more vacant and dark than the last. Glenroy's street was the darkest of them all. He lived on a dark dead-end street with three streetlights and only two houses. I drove to the end of the street and parked the car by a large low hanging patch of bushes.
It was hard to imagine a street like this existed in busy Greater Portmore where the houses on some streets were packed together like sardines. Staying in the shadows, I slowly made my way to Glenroy's house.
There was only one other house on the street apart from Glenroy's, and it was completely run down. The wood-shingled veranda awning looked like someone had grabbed the edges and folded it like a piece of paper. The veranda itself had large holes like someones foot had gone through it. The door, well, there was no door, just darkness.
Glenroy's house had one light bulb stationed close to the roof by the front of the house. He lived in a one-floor house with a white and grey exterior and a white-painted iron gate. A string of four foot shrubs lined the stone walkway leading to the veranda.
I scaled the fence at the corner of his property and made my way towards the front door, careful to stay outside of the light. I wanted him to be surprised when he finally saw me.
I perched behind the shrubs that lined the walkway and did a visual sweep of the area. Glenroy is a leader of the Council Guard, the Eshkar Council's elite band of fighters. He would not have left his house open and vulnerable to attack. There must be something that I’m missing. I peered through the bushes, searching for a surveillance camera, motion detector, a watchdog, anything. The house looked unprotected, vacant even. Maybe Millicent gave me the wrong address. In any event, I need a closer look.
I was about to rise when I noticed movement coming from the side of the house. I ducked down and continued to peer through the thickets as two figures came into view.
Glenroy was standing closer to the light. The other man's face was cloaked in darkness.
"We had a deal! Don’t double cross me," the man said. A feeling of dread washed over me as I realized the voice was my adopted father's, Henry Boothe
"You haven't kept up with your end of the bargain," Glenroy replied bitterly. "I asked you to do a simple task and you failed."
"You wanted me to kill her. Under no circumstances will I ever do something like that," my father shot back.
"That was always your problem, Henry, you miss the bigger picture. But where you were unwilling others were eager. She's been taken care of. She is no danger to Aramos now. But I still need that information, Henry. Aramos wants to be sure there is no one else in that girl's line that he needs to worry about."
"If I give you that information, you promise to keep my son out of Aramos's hands?"
"We'll see."
"That is not good enough." My father was getting angry. "Since Hasani was seven you’ve been tormenting me with this. We made a deal. I resigned my position as Chairman and kept my mouth shut about the arrangements you were making with Aramos. You promised you'd take our secret to the grave. Yet at every turn you find a way to dangle my son's past in front of my face to get me to do your work. This is the end. I'll get you the names of those left in the Miller family as long as you promise not to hurt them. After I give you the names you leave us alone for good."
"Aramos has mentioned nothing to me about hurting Jane's family. As far as we know, the rest of them are simple Normals. Normals are like ants to him…no, they’re like the crumbs that the ants carry on their backs. He just wants to be sure that there are no more earth benders to worry about. And yes, after you give me the information, I will never contact you again."
My father nodded as he made his way down the pathway. He paused just as he reached the gate and turned back to Glenroy. "What did you do to Jane?"
"Sudden attack of the conscience, Henry?"
"My boy cares for her. She is his friend."
"He has time to say his goodbye."
"Glenroy, she's just a child," my father pleaded. This is the first time I'd seen my father express such tender emotion. It felt odd as I was convinced that he hated her.
My cell phone rang loudly as it vibrated in my pants pocket. I scrambled to cover the speaker in hopes of dulling the noise, but it was too late. They heard it. I pushed the ignore button and I lay perfectly still as their eyes scoured the darkness.
"Someone's here," My father hissed. "I thought you said this place was protected!"
"It is," Glenroy shot back. "No sane person would ever come down here."
"If you burn me, Glenroy, I promise you will regret it." My dad stormed off, slamming the gate behind him.
Glenroy stood for another few moments searching the darkness. He laughed.
"Marcus did say you were predictable. No. Not predictable. Easily goaded," he spoke into the night. “Although, I have to admit, I didn’t expect you to show up tonight." He paused as if he was waiting for me to reply.
I thought hard about getting up but decided there was more going on here. I needed to figure it out.
"I'm glad we were able to give you a good show. I’m sure you’re shocked, to say the least. If you survive tonight, and I do mean if, you'll soon realize that there is a lot that your father has been keeping from you."
Glenroy mounted his veranda. I watched him through the thickets. He looked straight at the bushes as if he knew where I was.
"Damien," he said loudly, "take care of our guest, will you. Show him how we do things around here."
I let out a sigh as Glenroy stepped into his home and closed the door behind him. I lay in the grass for another few moments as I tried to piece together what I just witnessed. One, the secret that my father has been desperately trying to protect is about me. Two, whatever the secret is, it's big
enough to keep my father on the hook with Glenroy. Three, my suspicions about Glenroy were right; he's behind tonight's attack on Jane. Last, and definitely worse, it sounds like Jane's condition is fatal.
I pulled out my phone and noticed that it was Mark who had called. I’d only dialed the first four digits of his number when a large pair of hands reached down and grabbed my shirt. Before I knew it, I was thrown into the air and landing on my back on the other side of the street.
Before I could roll over onto my side, I was picked up again, hoisted high into the air, then thrown hard to the ground. I attempted to catch my breath when the large hand reached for my collar once again.
"Give me a second," I said, knocking his hand away. "Let me get to my feet, and then we can have a real fight."
The large figure grunted as he backed up a few paces. I rolled onto my knees then staggered to my feet. Before I was fully erect the figure lunged forward, again.
"Wait, I'm not ready." I stepped backward. My knees, back, and arms cracked as I stood tall. I finally got a look at my attacker as he stood under the dim streetlight. He was extremely big, standing at least seven feet tall. His had a stocky build with wide set shoulders, broad muscular arms, and a square jaw line covered with a carpet of hair. He was an Ancient, that much I knew for sure.
"Damien," I said aloud.
He grunted. His small shiny eyes narrowed on me. "Time’s up."
His first blow landed square in my ribs sending a ripple of sharp pain through the entire left side of my body.
I ploughed my knee into his square jaw in reply. He stumbled but regained his composure quickly. He lunged again. He landed a punch on my jaw followed by a kick to my chest that knocked me against the light post.
I fell to my knees. My cheek, back, and jaw pulsed with pain. Damien was tough. It's going to take more than my fists to take him down. I punched the concrete sidewalk breaking the uniform slab into three sizable pieces. I sent each piece hurling towards the giant. The first piece struck him square between the eyes. He staggered, shook the blow off and continued forward. The second and third pieces he swatted away like they were flies.