Time's Daughter

by Anya Breton

  My fingers went to my mouth now that we were safer. Alex was a three-foot tall beast with black fur, which mean I’d have no idea if he were hurt or not until he’d shifted back. If the screams I’d heard from him earlier were any indication, he had sustained at least one injury.

  He padded carefully around the creature then stopped in front of me. I dropped down to my knees and felt him for wounds. Within ten seconds a deep rumble that sounded suspiciously like a purr met my ears. The cat was nuzzling my chin with its big nose moments later.

  I blushed crimson then burst into nervous laughter. “I’m worrying about your wounds and you’re trying to get your ears scratched?”

  “Aeon.”

  Anna’s voice made my blush deepen. I turned guiltily to face her. She stood several feet from the dock in a white bathrobe. Over her arm was a pile of robes I assumed were for the others.

  “Come away from the dock,” she demanded in an even voice.

  A glance at the thing on the decking showed it was still frozen. It seemed safe for the time being to leave it. Alex refused to move until I did. He stayed beside my legs, nearly tripping me as I moved.

  One by one the Chattan clan appeared from the darkness dressed in a robe until Alex was the only member left in cat form. Anna held out the final white garment. Warily I watched as the eldest members spoke together a distance away while casting glances back at me.

  “Alex,” she spoke firmly to the cat at my feet.

  He grunted in return but he let her drape the robe over his back. I watched him run into the darkness. Anxiously I bit my nails as I worried that he’d emerge limping or bleeding. A few moments later the Alex I knew stepped into the moonlight. His perfectly bronzed fingers were tying the robe around himself. He walked toward me purposefully. I noted that the robe was still immaculate white.

  He spoke first, eyes scanning up and down me as quickly as mine did to him. “Are you okay?”

  I couldn’t help but smile at him. “Yes. Are you?”

  He nodded slowly. Our attention switched to the figures gathered in various spots on the lawn. I eyed them angrily. There were many things I wanted to say but I knew I wouldn’t be able to control my fury if I dared utter a single word.

  “Thanks for the backup,” Alex growled at them with a resentful delivery.

  “I helped her out of the water,” Drew said defensively.

  “Thank you, brother.” Alex’s volume lifted for the benefit of everyone else. “Why didn’t you help?”

  “Arnold forbade us,” Anna admitted quietly.

  Alex stomped across the lawn to where the elders stood then shouted at his father. “What happened to protecting her? What happened to protecting the clan?”

  Arnold spoke up in lieu of the leader. “We were protecting the clan, Alex. It was a wendigo.”

  Arthur’s darkened eyes fixed on his son. “We’re going to have to isolate you for a few days to see if you were infected.”

  “Infected? What are you talking about?” Alex’s eyes and mouth crinkled. He appeared as confused as I was.

  The elder explained, “Their madness is spread through their fluids. You bit it, Alex.”

  Alex clamped his mouth shut but was still visibly angry.

  “We haven’t finished this yet.” Drew interrupted with a hand stretched toward the dock. He asked a question of his own. “And what happened to it anyway?”

  Arnold pointed at me. “She froze it.”

  “But nothing else froze.” Drew’s point was made when a falling leaf passed in front of him.

  The clan elder spoke gravely, “She’s learned another power.”

  My eyes widened in shock. The dark gazes of Antonio and Alicia fixed on me suspiciously. I shrunk back then recalled that the creature was still on the dock behind me.

  “It needs to be burnt,” Arnold was telling the others.

  Another clan member questioned him. “Will it stay frozen in time while we burn it?”

  “I don’t know. It all depends on how powerful she is.”

  Anna stepped beside me and spoke quietly while the others debated. “Thank you for helping my son.”

  I scowled at the ground. “He was helping me, not the other way around.”

  “You tore your lovely skirt to go back for him,” she reminded me. “We will not forget your bravery.”

  “Is he going to be all right?”

  Anna looked to the group of males with concern in her eyes. “I hope so. We’ve only heard tales of the wendigo. We’ve never come across them in the wild. They are northern creatures and we’ve always been in the south.” Anna glanced back at me. Her features softened. “You must be freezing. Let me get you a blanket.” With a single nod of her head Anna requested Abby join her.

  While the pair retreated to the house to get something to warm me the males lowered their voices in discussion. Their conspiratorial huddle worried me. Was I an enemy again now that I’d learned another power?

  If I were, then they had yet to inform Anna. She returned quickly to pull a soft blanket around my shoulders. It hadn’t seemed like she’d been gone for long but she’d had time enough to get dressed again. Maybe she’d been designated my guard to keep me from interrupting the others.

  The next few minutes were surreal. I stood wrapped in a warm blanket, shivering uncontrollably while watching the family of bathrobe clad people set fire to a creature I hadn’t known existed prior to a half hour earlier. Shudders shook my legs enough that I nearly fell over. Anna steadied me silently and kept her arm behind my back to help me remain upright.

  Despite the flames licking its tattered clothing the seven-foot creature in front of us remained completely still.

  “This is horrible,” I whispered to no one in particular. “I shouldn’t be able to do that. No one should.”

  “That thing was an abomination.” Anna said in an effort to sooth me.

  “No more than I am.”

  “You are nothing like that creature.” He tone took on a fierce note to it. “It would have killed until there was nothing left to kill.”

  Another argument broke out from within the ranks of the Chattan clan. I could hear Alex’s voice above the others. From the tone and word choice I could tell he was still furious.

  “No! I am fine. No thanks to you. I am taking her home.”

  “Your mother will take her,” was Arthur’s firm response.

  “There isn’t a scratch on me. I’m taking her back.”

  “This isn’t open for discussion, Alex. You are to go to your room and you aren’t to leave it except to use the restroom until your grandfather gives you a clean bill of health.”

  “You are being completely ridiculous. If you’d been so worried about my health then why didn’t you step in and help me?”

  “Because we couldn’t risk infecting the entire clan.”

  Alex faced off with his father silently for several seconds. In the end he shook his head in disappointment. He stalked toward the house but not before calling out, “Coward.”

  “Come,” Anna patted my back in what was probably meant to be a soothing gesture. “I’ll take you home now.”

  Simultaneously I wanted away from the Chattan family as soon as I could manage it and I wanted to run inside after Alex. Would he be okay if the thing hadn’t scratched him? Would they bother to tell me if he weren’t?

  I let Alex’s mom guide me to the garage where her Volkswagen was stored. A noise to my right startled me enough that I nearly screamed. Anna shot toward it with supernatural speed.

  Her voice exclaimed in surprise a half second later. “It’s the cameraman!”

  Peter spilled out of the Chevy as soon as she’d opened Alex’s car door.

  The camera guy slumped to the ground, breathless with fright, “Oh, thank god it’s you!” He exclaimed with eyes wildly darting around the garage. “Something tried to attack me!”

  Anna’s tone reverted to her calm manner. “What attacked you?”

  “I
don’t know,” the cameraman exclaimed. “It was like seven-feet tall and really ugly. I ran to the car, hid in the floorboards and then I guess I passed out. It was gone when I woke up but I was too scared to get out of the car.”

  “Come with us,” Anna said in such a way that it brooked no argument.

  While we crossed the gravel to the deck he relayed the tale of how he’d been walking toward his car when the creature had emerged from the woods surrounding the driveway. Once inside the house, Anna settled him on the sofa near the fire and left us to fetch the others.

  Three minutes later Arnold and Aaron appeared within the inner room clothed in what they’d been wearing prior to the attack. They listened to the tale, questioning him here and there and glancing at each other at key moments. I awkwardly stood damp beneath the blanket contributing nothing and wishing I could take a hot shower.

  Anna soon returned to grant my wish. I would simply have to sit through the uncomfortable drive home first. We headed back outside while the others continued questioning the frightened cameraman.

  Little was said in the car until we’d pulled onto the smoother roads. Anna glanced at me, forced a smile and then asked me about my family. I answered with the bare minimum of information. Eventually she gave up trying. I hoped she’d realize I was worried and not trying to be rude.

  “Drew is just behind us,” she gestured to the headlights that had turned onto Eagle Drive. “He’ll be watching out for you. The others said that if you get in a pinch, you can use your newest power. It won’t send shockwaves out. But they would prefer it if you continued to refrain from using the other.”

  I nodded mutely.

  “It will be okay, Aeon,” Anna assured me even though she didn’t know that. “I’m so sorry that your visit to us was spoiled. It was nice having you over.”

  “Thank you,” I answered quietly. “I’d better go in before my mom wonders.”

  Without waiting for permission I hopped from the car then set the blanket they’d loaned me down on the seat first. I folded my arms in front of my chest and hurried to the door.

  My mom was watching television in the dark. I took advantage of the lack of light to sneak through the room toward the bathroom in hopes that she wouldn’t see the state of my skirt.

  She called after me. “How did it go?”

  “It was good,” I lied. “Until I stupidly lost my balance and fell off their lake-side dock into the water.”

  “Oh no! You’re all right?”

  “Yeah, I’m fine. I’m just going to take a shower to warm up.”

  “Okay.”

  I stripped the tattered skirt and muddy shirt off, started the water then stepped beneath it to cleanse myself of the attack. Though the shower was steamy I continued to shiver. Rinsing my hair several times kept my mind occupied but it didn’t last for long.

  “So…” Mom prompted from the door of my room minutes later.

  I stood rubbing the moisture from my hair with a towel. “He has a huge family, a massive house that you’d love and his little sister is adorable. Other than that, there isn’t much to tell.”

  “What do his parents do for a living?”

  Every question she could think of was answered to the best of my knowledge without letting on that anything bad had happened. In the end I told her I thought I’d caught a cold because of falling into the water. It was the excuse I needed to call it an early night without rehashing the entire visit down to the second.

  In bed beneath my blankets I couldn’t seem to get warm. After doubling up on socks, pulling a sweater on and fetching the afghan from the other room I managed to get my shivers down to a mere chill. I considered taking aspirin for a possible fever but knew a cold wasn’t my problem.

  My problem was that I’d assisted in killing a living creature. I’d used the power my father had given me to destroy something instead of to protect.

  I knew that it had been trying to harm us, but surely there was something we could have done to stop it that didn’t involve death. And such a shameful way to go, frozen in time and set aflame.

  I was an abomination.

  * * * *

  The car at the end of the street had a familiar looking black-haired male in it, Aaron, Alex’s youngest uncle. I puffed out my breath, stepped onto the sidewalk to the right and then started for school. Two days had passed without news from the Chattan family. It was Thursday, my day off from work and I was conscious that it had been less than a week since I’d gone on the photography trip downtown with Alex.

  He was my every worry now. I resisted the urge to demand my stalker tell me what was going on for the thousandth time. But with Guy recording my every word, I knew it would be impossible to explain why a member of the Chattan family was casing my house.

  I went through the motions in my classes. At lunch my friends sent me retreating to my tree when the inevitable question of where my boyfriend was came up. I stepped into the photography studio in dismay to find it empty of shining faces.

  It was then I realized that in a frighteningly short span of time Alex had become an integral part of my life. Now that part was gone and I missed it terribly.

  I walked to the library downtown with my head hanging after a lonely gym class. Thursday was nearly over and still I knew nothing about Alex’s health. No news was not good news. There was little doubt that the Chattan family would see no need to tell me if something had happened to their youngest son.

  The thought of him becoming like that thing that had attacked us made me ill enough that I raced to the bathroom in the county library and didn’t emerge until everything I’d eaten, what little it was, was purged from my system.

  At the end of the visit I walked to Eagle Drive with a stapled paper in my backpack and little memory of what I’d put on that paper. It was the poorest work I’d done in my entire high school career and there’d be no way I could explain my way to a make-up assignment without making myself seem crazy. But right then I didn’t care about grades, college or my future.

  All I cared about was whether or not I’d ever see Alex Chattan again.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  “I’m going to ace this test. What about you? Aeon? Aeon!”

  A hand shoved at my shoulder with a quick jab. I forced myself to look over at the person who had hit me. Ashley was frowning at me as usual with an expression that did little for her features. As usual she stood surrounded by her posse of friends outside the chemistry room.

  My intelligent response was, “Huh?”

  Her stubby lashed eyelids lowered over her eyes. Ash’s tone soured. “The chemistry test today? Did you study?”

  “Oh.” I answered robotically. “No.”

  I’d forgotten there was a test this morning. Ordinarily that would have made my stomach flip but today I couldn’t muster the energy to care. Tests meant little in the grand scheme of things.

  Ashley snorted in disgust. “I hope you know this stuff already, cuz I hear the first test is a killer.”

  “I heard that too,” Jenny added with a comically sober nod of her head and gravely widened eyes. “That’s why I took biology two instead.”

  Melissa leaned over to speak quietly near my ear so that the others wouldn’t hear. “Are you still sick?”

  “Yes,” I lied through my teeth.

  My chills had subsided over night and by Tuesday I’d been back to normal. But the guilt and concern had me in a different kind of sick state.

  She gave me a sympathetic smile I thought she actually meant. “I’m sorry. I hope you feel better for the weekend.”

  “Me too.”

  But I wasn’t sure I’d ever feel better again.

  I heard Ashley’s sound of surprise but thought nothing of it until the others made similar noises. It occurred to me that a normal person would look up as well but I didn’t care if I appeared normal anymore. I certainly didn’t care about whatever it was that interested them so much.

  My arms folded in front of me petul
antly as I scowled at the floor. Why did I even need to be here? I hadn’t learned anything useful in days and all I was doing in my art classes was ruining perfectly good paper with awful sketches and photos.

  A pair of black-clad legs stepped a few feet in front of me. Cautiously I lifted my eyes. My gasp was loud enough that the discussion inside the chemistry room behind me came to a halt. If that hadn’t gotten their attention my cry would have certainly done the trick.

  “Alex!” I launched myself forward into his waiting arms and kissed him without a thought to who might be watching. “I was so worried. Are you okay?”

  He kissed me twice more before answering in code. “Yes. My fever broke early this morning. The doctor gave me a clean bill of health a half hour ago. I raced in as soon as I could.”

  My friends reluctantly left us alone to head to their classes moments later. I clung to him even though I knew he had to leave too.

  “I would have called you,” Alex told me while looking down into my eyes with a lovely earnest expression. “I wanted to so badly. But I didn’t know your phone number. We tried to get the information out of the cameraman but he was useless.”

  I blushed that somehow I’d neglected to give it to him. What kind of girlfriend was I?

  “I’ll give it to you in history,” I said.

  He gave me a little push toward the door. “You better go study.”

  “You heard that?”

  “Yeah,” Alex chuckled. It was so nice to hear that sound again that I almost forgot I was going to fail a test in a few minutes. “Go on, I’ll see you next period. Good luck.”

  My lips turned down because he was leaving me. “Thanks.”

  He kissed my frown a last time then walked down the hall in the direction the others had gone. I rushed to my seat, yanked open the textbook and studied like mad until the test was in my hand. Now that I knew Alex was well, the prospect of flunking one of the few tests we’d have in chemistry worried me more than a little.