by A. S. Oren
“Derren!” She runs to him and gives him a hug around the neck. His arms go around her as he hugs her back. She pulls back from him and smiles. “I haven’t seen you in months. Thought you finally decided to run away. You promised to take me with you, when you figured out how to break my curse.” Her eyes fall on the boys and then me. She’s so plain.
‘I think she’s really pretty. Her hair is cool and her ink is interesting. I have never seen designs like those.’
‘Of course you would like her; look at yourself. What are you going to do when I’m not around to make you pretty?’
‘I’m fine with the way I am.’
She touches her hair and straightens her shirt. “You brought guys with you. Really hot guys.” She sends him a glare, but a playful smile still traces her lips. “Thanks for the warning.”
“This is an emergency, Vex. I need Angita’s help to fix my friend.”
‘Friend? That’s the first time I’ve heard him refer to me like that.’
Her eyes light up. “I’m sure you don’t need her. Which of these guys do I get to fix?”
The boys step aside, revealing me to her. Her smile falls, and she snarls. She looks me up and down. “She looks fine to me.”
I cross my arms, and she mimics me. What crawled up her butt and died?
‘Seriously.’
“Her mind has been warped. We need Angita to fix her.”
Vex walks up to me. “Warped? Let me see for myself.” She takes hold of my chin; her hands are ice. I try to pull away. Her nails dig into my skin. “Don’t fight me girl. I’m older than your species. You don’t want me fucking more of your mind up, do you?”
I swallow hard and keep myself from moving. Her eyes stare into mine. She blinks, and in an instant both her eyes have turned entirely black. My vision goes tunneled. Images of my life and the other version of me swarm my mind’s eye. Blood rushes through my ears, like crashing ocean waves. Her hand releases me. I fall back, bound for the floor. Strong arms catch me. I stare into the blue-green eyes of Maverick. Flashes flood my mind.
Sitting in an apple tree with the sunset on the horizon. Two others are sitting with me. ‘Don’t worry, Lon. You won’t have to transform alone tonight. We have a surprise for you.’ My head turns to the voice; a younger Maverick sits to my right.
‘What the Hell was that? Was that one of your fake memories?’ asks the inner Avalon.
‘No. Yours?’
‘Hell no. It can’t be. I hate that guy.’
‘That’s not what I felt in that memory.’
Maverick’s grip on my arm tightens. “Are you okay?”
I pull away and nod. “Yeah, at least, I think I am.”
Vex turns to the rest of the boys. “How many times has she had her mind warped?”
“This is the first time,” Dante says .
Vex shakes her head. “No it’s not. She’s had it done to her at least three times. Bits of her soul’s personality are fragmented. The older embedded memories were done by a professional. The new ones are sloppy and half-assed done.” Her green eyes turn to me again. “That’s why you are hearing another part of yourself in your head. Wasn’t silenced well enough. I’d say the modification before last was done a year and a half ago. The memories aren’t very old. The first warp was done about a decade or more ago.”
‘What?’
I stagger back into a long red sofa. “What?”
“Someone doesn’t want you to remember something. Why? I haven’t got a clue.”
“Girl, go run the restaurant. I will take over here.”
A tall Chinese woman stands at the door. Her beauty almost takes my breath away. Long ebony hair falls down to her waist. Scarlet lips stand out against her pale skin. Between her fingers, she holds a long black cigarette holder; the scent of clove fills the room. She wears a black pencil dress with a gold peacock embroidered on the lower half.
Her perfect lips surround the tip of the cigarette holder, and she takes a long drag, all the while watching me with her black eyes.
“Are you aware what my fix will do to you, girl?”
“No.”
Payment
“Everything that has been done to your mind will be undone. All versions of you, real and fake, will be mixed and twisted. It will take your mind months if not years to heal, and you will have to figure out for yourself what the truth is.” Her voice does not match her young body.
“Why can’t you leave the real and take the fake?” Horace asks.
Angita gives him bored eyes. “Do I look like a brain surgeon, boy? It is simple to embed false memories; it is impossible to remove them.”
Lusk clears his throat. “So she’s going to be like this version for the rest of her life?”
“No. I said she would me mixed with all versions of herself, reforming her soul and making it whole. It’s up to her when it comes to believing her memories and unfolding her true self. I’m simply sewing her back together.”
Paden steps forward. “But she will remember everything?”
“Every last detail that her mind held onto before it was warped.”
‘Do you want this?’
‘Yes. That girl said I had my mind warped a decade ago. I need to know the truth, even if it takes me years to figure it out.’
‘I guess this means I won’t be gone for good. Think you can deal with that? You’ll finally have a fashion sense.’
‘You hope. I’m stubborn.’
‘So am I.’
I sit up straighter, overcoming my shock. “How much?”
Another drag off the cigarette. She takes some steps toward me. “You assume I want money. I don’t need money.”
I lift an eyebrow. “I don’t get the feeling you do things pro bono, so what do you want in return? My soul?”
A graveled laugh leaves her, and she tips her head back. After a moment, she stares at me hard.
“I’m not Lucifer, girl. I’ve met that fallen angel, and I can assure you I don’t deal in souls. Too riddled with loopholes.”
“Then what do you want?”
“I want a scale—”
“Take one of mine,” Dante says. Shifting his arm and pinching one of his scales between two fingers.
Angita holds up her hand, freezing him from going any further. “Boy, if I wanted a male scale, I have plenty of resources. Your kind are prevalent.” Her attention comes back onto me. “I want one of hers. Rare, valuable.”
“Fine.” I shift my arm now. I ignore the pain that aches into my bones. My dark grey scales sit on top of my skin.
Her lip flares. “No. I want your original form.” One of her long nailed fingers comes to press into my forehead. Electricity burns through my body. I bite my lip until it bleeds. My arm shakes, as the grey turns to metallic gold. With her other hand, she rips one of the larger scales from my body. I let out a scream, before she lifts her finger from my head.
I shift my arm back. One large black and purple bruise covers the whole of it. I wince and wipe the blood from my lip.
She bites the scale with her back teeth and smiles. “Yes, this will do just fine for payment. I will return in one hour with the broth required to repair you. You will need at least two anchors to tie you to your old self, something or someone who knew you before your mind was warped.” She tosses the scale in the air and catches it, before leaving the room.
Where am I going to find something like that?
Anchors
A pregnant silence falls over the room, as all their eyes stare at me, as if I know of any anchor that knew of me before my mind was warped.
‘Edgar is the only person I can think of, and he . . . he died.’
“I have no idea,” I say out loud.
“Maybe one of us can do it; you said we’ve known you for six years. Maybe, that can cheat the system somehow?” Amr asks.
I shake my head. “No, I don’t think it works like that. It would have to be someone or something that was in my possession be
fore, Dad . . . I mean Roseman, did this to me.” I glance at Maverick. Were those memories real? I was young in them, really young. If they are real, then that means he knew me and so did someone else.
‘Paden? They are brothers after all. Why would I have not known Paden when I knew Maverick? Paden also knows a ton about me. Things that not even father knew. I never posted my real name or personal email to anything. He shouldn’t have been able to find anything, and yet, he knows my secret fantasies.’
‘That does make sense.’ I look to the brothers now. “When that girl was digging in my head, she uncovered something. I’ve only seen one memory, but it doesn’t belong to either me or the version of me that I can hear in my head. So that must mean it’s from before, and I don’t think I was four or five. Maybe seven. I was sitting in an apple tree, just at the beginning of a sunset. There were two others with me. Maverick and I’m assuming Paden.” I point to Maverick. “You told me that you two had a surprise for me that night and you called me Lon. No one has ever called me that. Is that memory real or fake?”
The brother’s look at each other, before their eyes move to gaze at the ground. There’s my answer.
‘So my memories of Maverick being my tormenter weren’t real?’
“She wants to know if her memories of Maverick tormenting her are real?”
Paden shifts his feet. “No.”
‘I don’t understand.’
I swallow hard. “Why lie to her?”
Maverick’s unique blue eyes meet mine. “We were forbidden.”
Triton folds his arms. “When did they warp her mind?”
“It was just before I went off for my first year at Spearwood, you were six months away from turning twelve.”
‘That means Maverick was around for a year after I was warped, when I thought he was Damien incarnate. So the memories of him always coming around were real?’
The door that the woman left through opens, and she comes in carrying a tray with a single silver chalice. “Have you decided on your anchors?”
“Yes.”
She looks to Maverick and Paden. “Go sit with her then and place a hand on her shoulders.”
How did she know it was them that I chose?
They sit on either side of me. A warm hand touches each of my shoulders. An odd sense of Déjà vu flows over me; it’s almost like that memory.
She lowers the tray to me. “You must drink it all, or it will not work.”
I take the chalice. Steam rolls off the almost clear broth; it doesn’t smell too bad. I press the rim to my lips and open my mouth. Bile, the second the liquid touches my tongue, is all I taste. My body fights me to spit it out, but I force it down. I need this to work. I need to know the truth. The last drop passes my lips, and I throw the chalice away from me.
My muscles seize and convulsions start. Is this what a seizure feels like? Why am I still aware of my surroundings? My skull feels too small to house my brain.
“She needs a third and earlier anchor, you two aren’t enough!” yells Angita.
A door slams off in the distance.
“What the hell!” Dante yells.
“This will help her.” I know that voice.
A wooden box comes into my line of sight. I feel like I should know it somehow.
‘The locket.’
The person bends over, their eyes meet mine. One blue, one green.
‘Kearn.’
Sewn Together Fragments
It takes every ounce of my strength to lift my shaking hand up and touch the glass shards that lay in the wooden box; the locket Edgar gave me—before I was sent to Spearwood—barely a month ago. It feels like it has been so much longer than that: closer to years.
The shards glow with a faint yellow light. Image upon image flood my mind. Faces I don’t recognize spin, like a carousel. The glow grows brighter. Kearn places his hand on my and a warmth surges through my arm. The glass shards float up and out of the box like a mini tornado; they begin to swirl. All at once, they come together, fitting the picture of Edgar and me inside.
He lets go of my hand and reaches into his pocket. He pulls something out and opens his hand. The silver screw that made everything fit together just right. The screw I thought I had lost on that very first day at Spearwood. It floats through the air and makes its way into its rightful place.
My body quakes harder. The muscles in my thighs and back constrict so hard they could tear at any moment. The locket hovers before me: whole and new. Kearn places it around my neck.
Everything glows, almost to a blinding degree. My stomach lurches. I need to puke, now. I lean forward. The Sea Witch shoves a wastebasket under my face. I open my mouth and instantly the bile tasting broth comes back up; it burns more than when it went down.
As soon as all of the broth and what little breakfast I had that morning leaves my stomach, my muscles relax. The images moving in front of my mind’s eye stop. A memory of a man, with sandy blond hair and hazel eyes, stands above me. I can’t be more than three or four. He crouches down to my level and places his hand on my shoulder. “Avalon, you will be staying with Grandpa Edgar from now on. He’ll keep you safe from the bad men, okay?”
“Where are you going?” I turn my head to look at a woman standing near a door. Her hair is long and dark brown, and her eyes an almost grey. In her arms a little boy sleeps.
“We are going to make sure the bad men can’t find you. Someday we will see each other again.” He leans forward and places a kiss on my forehead.
“Amr, wake up, sweetheart.”
“Don’t wake him, Igraine. He won’t remember any of this.”
The woman shakes her head. “No, they need to say goodbye regardless; they are twins. We can’t just rip them apart.”
Amr opens his eyes and looks around. “Where are we, Mama?”
She smiles at him, before placing him on the floor. He sways slightly on his feet. She crouches down to his level. “Amr, we are going to have to leave Avvi here for a while, so she can be safe. It’s time to say goodbye.”
Amr turns to me and smiles. Running to me, he gives a hug. “Bye, Avvi. I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you too.”
I don’t think I fully grasped what was going on. Or else I think I would have been crying from fear.
Edgar steps up to our family-goodbye. “I need to modify your minds now. We don’t have much more time. I need to get the barrier up around this orchard.”
The memory stops there. I can’t remember what happened next. Hot tears flow freely down my cheeks. I don’t even remember starting to cry. Those people were my parents. They were in my life; they didn’t abandon me . . . right from the beginning.
I look to Amr. The recognition we felt when we first met at Spearwood, it wasn’t just some type of blood bond; somehow our old memories came through, even if we didn’t realize it at the time. I have an undeniable urge to hug him.
I stand, and my legs wobble, still recovering from the effects of the broth. Paden, Maverick, and Kearn’s hands shoot out to steady me. My heart flutters, at the touch of Kearn’s hand. Apparently, I still have a liking for him, even though I know nothing about him, and I’m not even sure I can fully trust him . . . how did he know I would need the glass locket as a third anchor, and how to find us?
I brush all of them off. I can’t think about that right now. The fresh memory still swirls in my mind. The image of Amr hugging me plays over and over again. I stumble over to Amr. He frowns and braces me by the shoulders, keeping me from falling into him. I look up into his eyes. They are darker than mine by just a shade. I give a slight smile. I remember him from the long ago past. More tears stain my cheeks. I wrap my arms around his neck and pull him into a hug.
He hesitates for a moment before returning it. The flood gates open and a sob erupts from me. I have never cried like this while in my right mind . . . is this my right mind? Between breaths, my lip quivers.
“Shhh…” he says, patting me on the back. �
��Everything will be okay.”
I tighten my hold on him. I just wish he knew what I know now. His mind was warped that night too; by Edgar of all people, who was the man I came to love as a father. Amr stiffens in my arms before he lets out a groan. He falls to his knees and grips his head.
I fall to my knees with him. “What’s wrong?” I touch his shoulder. The same faint yellow glow that had happened when I was being put back together emits from him.
“Are you twins?” asks Agnita.
“Yes,” I say. “What’s wrong with him?”
She smiles and takes a long drag from her clove cigarette. The holder clicks against her teeth. “Twins are tricky creatures. No matter the type, they always seem to have a kind of bond that can’t be replicated. What happens to one, will happen to the other, sooner or later. Obviously, his mind was warped at some point. Since you were repaired, he will be also.”
“He doesn’t have enough anchors!” I cry.
She shakes her head. “Unlike you, he doesn’t need three. You are enough. I doubt his mind has been warped as many times as your has.”
Amr heaves. Puke spills out of his mouth and onto my pants. I rub his back. “It will be okay. The worst is over.”
He moves to sit up and grips my arm. Now, he looks into my eyes. “I remember,” he whispers. He pulls me to him. “I remember that night at that house. Mom woke me up and told me I had to say goodbye. Then an old man took my memories of you.”
“Edgar, my father. He wasn’t all that he seemed.”
She’s Alive
“The sun will be setting in a few hours. I assume you will need a place to shift? Unless, of course, you have figured out a way to break the curse the females of your kind are under?” She cackles. “Not even I could break it. It’s the only curse I have never succeed in breaking. That Sibi is one powerful sorceress, to my dismay.”