Surviving The Tempest: Tempest Tales

by Elsa, Sandra

  He grinned and climbed out of the tank. “I can live with that. Guess that means you don‘t want me to take you back to the hotel?”

  “I’m good.”

  “Want me to come along,” Harrison asked.

  I kissed him. “You’ve been playing in my world for several months. You look happy. If you’re not ready to quit, me and Mom can take one car and you guys can drive the other when you’re ready to call it a day. I got rid of our squatters so I was going to spend another night in the suite. We’re all going the same way.”

  “You sure?”

  “I’m sure. Well I guess I’m assuming your mother is as ready to get out of here as I am.”

  Over at the table we’d been playing cards at, Nan was eating her supper. But she looked up and said “God, yes. If you‘d been traveling any way but dark watery tunnels I‘d have gone with you for supper and not come back.” She smiled serenely at Harrison. “It will give me a chance to get to know Francesca.”

  Harrison squirmed. He turned to look at her, then back at me, then bit his lower lip before saying, “Please be nice. And I’m not just talking to Frankie, Mom. Try to remember she’s my wife, not some eighteen year old girl that father thought I should be seen with to further his political campaign; and not some two bit floozy you can intimidate.”

  Nan placed the fingers of her right hand against her chest while fluttering her left in front of her face. She barely contained her laughter as she said, “How can you accuse me of intimidating somebody, Harrison? What kind of woman do you think I am?”

  “I think you’re an amazing woman, Mom. But I ‘know’ you ran off more than one of my girlfriends. For which I thank you, by the way.”

  “Well Frankie’s a lot scarier than any of the twits you used to date. Besides, I like Frankie.”

  Jesse had tossed Paul his shorts and they joined Nan at the table. I pointed at him and shook my finger. “Nothing we discussed at dinner goes any further. Not about talent or otherwise. I’ll bring it up, all in good time.” I turned to point at Poppy. “That goes for you too. Quit telling people my secrets.”

  She turned her head around and gave a whistling chirrup.

  Paul laughed. “She says if you‘d have told her it was a secret, she wouldn‘t have told the whole pod.”

  “If she‘d have asked, I‘d have told her it was a secret. Especially since I didn‘t even know about it.”

  Poppy was restrained in the tank. It looked unnatural on her.

  Paul got up and pushed a button on the wall near the steps. A clear wall encased the tank and Poppy promptly did a tail-stand and leaped in the air. She chattered the entire time she danced. When she settled back down, Paul laughed at her and pushed the button to open the tank back up. “She says you’re welcome. She knows you must be excited to learn of this, because she would be if it were her.”

  “What is she talking about?” Harrison sounded suspicious.

  “We’ll talk when you’re done playing here. Don’t worry about it.”

  “Frankie…“ He looked back at the AII. “I can leave now if you want me too.”

  “No. I was promised a unicorn. I have other projects for you too, but we’ll discuss those once you get a handle on my unicorn.”

  “I suppose you’ll want that troll you mentioned to father?”

  “Nope, the more I thought about it, the firmer I decided a dragon would be far better suited for law enforcement.”

  “A dragon?” Eyes wide he spun back to his cohorts.

  “Yes, a dragon,” I said. “Don’t think you can do it?”

  My father was already tapping keys. Harrison said, “We can probably make one. But what would it eat?”

  “Didn’t say I worked out all the kinks in the plan. That’s why I married you.”

  “Why don’t you just twist my mind up a few more ways? You’re lucky I love you. Because you know if it can be done you’ll have your dragon.”

  “Here’s a thought, we make it vegetarian. And nobody says it has to be, eat-a-cow-a-day immense. Just bigger and badder than anything else around. But with the ability to reason and obey.”

  My father was looking at the AII. He beckoned Harrison over. “Lizzie’s already working on it. Look, there used to be a reptile called the Komodo Dragon. Isn’t very pretty but it will give us something to start with. When I get back to the university I’ll see if any DNA still exists.”

  They were off and running. Nan finished her food and went to kiss my father good-night. They scarcely acknowledged us as we left. I turned from the elevator door and asked Paul, “You swimming back?”

  “Poppy’s waiting for me, so yeah.”

  “All right. We’ll see you tomorrow.”

  Chapter 30

  Nan didn’t say anything all the way out of the building. We got in her car in silence, but once she backed out of the parking spot, she said, “You might have derailed Harrison, but what exactly did the dolphin tell you?”

  “I think that’s something I need to discuss with Harrison.”

  “How could she know?” Obviously Nan had figured out what I was reluctant to say out loud.

  “You’re asking the wrong person. A better question would be, how could it happen?”

  A frown crossed her face. “I hope you don’t think your father had anything to do with it.”

  “No. I believe in him nearly as much as I believe in Harrison.” I let some affection slide into my voice, then hardened it. “I do believe Jordan Drover had a lot to do with it. I spent a couple days out of it in the hospital, and Paul suspects Leo’s father must be quite talented as far as fertility goes, in order to actually produce a child between a Were and a mage, so there are plenty of suspects besides my father.”

  “Good, because it would crush him if you flipped him back into the suspect pool.”

  “Jordan Drover doesn’t hear a whisper about this. I know what Harrison’s reaction will be, so I couldn’t even think of termination, but I don’t want Jordan to know he won a round.”

  She smiled, then laughed. “You know how many times I left doctor appointments and told him I lost the baby…just so I could watch him twist in the wind. He fell for it over and over, until I started to show. So many blasted doctors, from nearly the first day of pregnancy, and me…not quite sure what would happen if I pissed off a powerful mage. That was the extent of my rebellion in the early days.”

  “I’m surprised he didn’t pay off the doctor to let him know as soon as you left the office.”

  “Never went to the same doctor twice. I lied to him about who I was seeing so he couldn’t get ahead of me. His persuasion hasn’t worked on me since I found myself a resident of District Seven.”

  “Hope nobody thinks I’m going to spend my days in a doctor’s office.”

  “No. That many appointments aren’t at all necessary. His insistence that I get a checkup every three days was the usual, over-the-top, Jordan Drover.

  I relaxed as we chatted. For all her adopted Sevener mannerism, there was still a self-subsistent hooker living in her head. “So what did he do before he became president?”

  She laughed. “He conspired to become president.”

  “Seriously?”

  She laughed again. “You don’t imagine he ever waited tables or changed tires for a living?”

  “I guess not. But I figured he’d have gone to school for something, it obviously wasn’t law, but business…maybe…hmmm…can’t come up with anything other than business that I see him even trying his hand at. Certainly not teaching…or anything that gives back to the world at all.”

  She stared at me with a hugely annoying smile on her face.

  “What? Don’t tell me he was a teacher.”

  “No. Jordan Drover is a musician. He plays the flute beautifully. He was a member of MNU’s concert band, even had some private concerts. But that was never enough for his mother. She is the reason that by the time I gave birth, I found the courage to tell Jordan Drover to take a long walk off
a short pier, and never so much as put his name on the birth certificate.”

  Well, shut my mouth. Drover…playing the flute. I just couldn’t picture it. I could, without the slightest problem, see Martha Drover pushing somebody to be more than they wished to be. This would take some reassessing.

  “I never left that woman alone with Harrison for a minute, until the day he moved out of my house. She tried to sink her claws in him then, but I’d already ingrained a dislike for her. He’s never been rude to her, but he’s never let her convince him to be anything he doesn’t want to be.”

  “But his father carried on the family tradition.”

  Nan sighed. “I guess I could have done better by him. Kept him away from that whole insane family. But I didn’t have the schooling to survive on my own, and I didn’t have the courage to tell him to stay away from me and my son.”

  “My mother didn’t have much schooling, but she survived.” Didn’t mean to make it sound judgmental, but a fleeting look of pain, crossed her face. “I’m sorry. She never let herself get taken to District Seven, where I don’t imagine there are any manufacturing jobs for unskilled laborers to work at.”

  She shook her head, rue evident. “If it can’t be done with magic, it doesn’t get done in District Seven. If they didn’t take such pride in their appearance, they’d be blobs of fat. They’ll spend three hours a day in the gym rather than bend over and pick something up off the ground or walk between desks. Of course it varies by the skill of the mage, but if they can’t do something through magic, they buy charms to make it happen.”

  “I’d have probably gone on a shooting spree, out of sheer boredom.

  “I decided if I was going to be forced to live there, I’d go native. I’d never explored my talents before. By the time I became confident that I could use them for anything worthwhile, Jordan held Harrison over my head so I wouldn’t walk out. He threatened me with enforcing his parental rights through DNA testing. After several aborted attempts to flee, I just decided it was easier to stay.”

  “So what are your talents?”

  “I can shield against solid objects, and I grow flowers. Nothing major.”

  “Grow flowers?”

  “I can encourage their growth. Plant a seed one day, full grown flower the next.”

  Excitement clutched me by the throat. “How can you say that’s not major? You know what we’re trying to do. You could speed the whole process along.”

  “Not this year. Just because I can make things grow, doesn’t mean they’ll survive. The ground is not ready to support life on a large scale. That will be the task. Until that happens I can grow all the flowers I want, but they’ll die for lack of nutrition before they can seed or do anything worthwhile. In fact they may leach what little nutrition is there.”

  “We’ve been using fertilizer. Or we started that way at least, haven’t been able to get back out there since we got shot. Probably have to start all over.”

  “How much time did you have invested?”

  “Spent the better part of two months out there.”

  “I’m sorry you lost it.”

  “Might not have. Jerry disappeared, we haven’t caught him alone to ask where he went. Kinda hoping that’s where he hid out.”

  “You get along with him?”

  “He plucks my nerves, but I think he’s trying to help. And if he didn’t go out there, it’s no big deal. We didn’t plan to stay around here before Jordan Drover found us. This is a place to experiment. Learn what it’s going to take. Not a place to set up and call home. Guess I figured maybe we could leave this in somebody else’s hands to start their own village, or at least offer them the chance to experiment with it—“

  “By somebody, you mean, Paul, William and Jesse.”

  “Let’s not forget Poppy. Our plot of ground is inland a bit, because we wanted to be near the mountains and caves, something to protect us from the storms—“

  Horror flickered across her face. “You’re not planning on staying out in the storms?”

  “Not this year. This year we’re going to see if our plant life turns to crystal. Maybe put up a few small buildings to see if stone or brick or adobe best survives the onslaught. It may be that we’ll never live outside caves. Can’t even dig in, because a hole in the ground would flood. It’s got to be someplace high.”

  “I’m glad to see you’ve given this some thought.”

  “To tell the truth, Jordan Drover has given it some thought. We’re adding our own twists, but Harrison planned with his father long enough to know many of the hazards we’ll face and have an idea about the best way around them. If Jordan wasn’t determined to rule the outside world, along with every dome, I wouldn’t mind working with him.”

  “If his mother had died in childbirth he’d probably be a decent person. But as it stands, I’d say, go with your instincts.”

  “I planned to. He’s very good at lulling a person to complacency. And since he can almost do it to me, I’m going to assume that’s personality and not talent.”

  “That would be a safe assumption. He’s as slick as they come. But I’ve seen the other side. The real Jordan Drover. If he did anything to cause your current condition expect him to find a reasonable sounding excuse to find you in about eight months.”

  “Already thought of that.”

  “I’m glad you’re taking it so well. Better than I did, that’s for sure.”

  “I love Harrison. I know it will make him happy. How could I deny him his child?”

  “And what about you?”

  “I never pictured myself as a mother. It will take some refocus.”

  “Bet you never saw yourself as a wife, either.”

  A harsh bark of laughter left my mouth on the same breath as the word, “No.”

  “But you seem to have adapted well to that unforeseen role.”

  “I’m not saying I can’t do it. Just saying I’m not sure how I feel about it right now.”

  “You know your father and I will be living right next door to you, wherever you end up. I’ll expect my turn at babysitting.”

  “You and my father both, I’m sure.”

  “Am I allowed to tell Harold?”

  Glad she at least asked permission. “As long as it doesn’t go any further.”

  “You’ll tell Harrison tonight?”

  “Pretty sure he already had it figured. For somebody who doesn’t speak our language, Poppy’s got a big mouth. But yes, we’ll discuss it tonight…or probably in the morning.”

  “Hard to say. He was no doubt on the right track, but you threw him off the scent with the whole dragon thing.”

  “He’s easy. Once he gets involved in something he sticks to it. And he loves what he does.”

  “He loves you too.

  “Yeah, but today is all about him and his passion for biogenetics. Why wouldn’t his father put him to good use with something he was so passionate about? If he had, Harrison might still be with him.”

  “Don’t you believe that. I’ve never seen him as foolishly desperate as he was while attempting to find a way close to you. When I met you on the road, I feared he’d die before he convinced you to share your life with him.”

  “He went overboard. Every time I gave an inch, he’d snatch the whole measuring tape. Which scared me back to square one, because I didn’t understand him or his motivations at all. Good as I read people, I couldn’t make sense of him.”

  “I doubt he made sense to himself. The first time I heard from him after he disappeared was when he texted me begging me to get fourteen thousand dollars from his account, but to do so in a manner his father wouldn’t notice. I knew right then he was bolting, but I made him explain why to me. He was so lost.” She looked out the window with a distant frown. “So absolutely sure of what he wanted, with no idea how to get there. He never had to struggle with anything. If he wanted it, it was provided for him. Jordan saw to that. I was afraid he thought he could buy you.”

  “I
don’t think he was ever that stupid. If it crossed his mind he gave it up when we merged our funds to keep them from being frozen. I had more than he did.”

  She grinned. “He explained it was the only way he could conceive of, to keep you close, long enough for him to understand you. Then when he told me he was buying one week of your time with that money…I couldn’t touch that kind of paycheck as a hooker in District Eleven, so I made him tell me what he was paying you for. When he told me you were going to help him survive the outside world because he’d nearly been killed once already…I couldn’t get the money together fast enough. And then Jordan called to say they might have found him, my heart nearly stopped. I couldn’t send the money if Jordan was going to collect him and his belongings, but if it wasn’t him, the deadline was slipping past. That first phone call from you…”

  “I get it. I lived it. It’s in the past. So what do you think about living in the mountains? I’m thinking Rockies. Big canyons lots of caverns. Anasazi cliff dwellers.. No domes.”

  “Sounds like you’ve been planning.” She pulled into the parking lot of the Jonah hotel.

  “A little. Lot rides on this year.” We got out of the car and entered the hotel. Conversation ceased until we were safely in the honeymoon suite.

  She picked up exactly where we left off. “I’ve never studied geography but aren’t the Rocky Mountains a long way from the ocean?”

  “They are. But some of our experiments have already panned out.” I swept the room for beetles. Without the president down the hall I wasn’t too concerned, but it didn’t hurt to be vigilant. I was glad to see our squatters had cleaned up before leaving

  “Harrison can’t possibly travel that far while holding a thunderstorm in check.”

  “He can’t. I can. Thunderstorm. Gentle shower. Whatever you want.” I proceeded to explain the process to her.

  We talked until nearly two in the morning. She spilled many secrets I’m sure Harrison would rather I didn’t know. Things that made me glad my mother wasn’t around to pass on embarrassing stories about my youth. Things I could hold over his head for years to come. We only stopped when Harrison and my father returned.