Night Forbidden

by Joss Ware

  “Remington Truth?” Ana leaned forward. “I know that name. But I’m not sure why.”

  “He was a member of the Cult of Atlantis,” Fence said, “a core member, and something happened around the time of the Change. We’re not certain what, but apparently he disappeared.”

  “He died?”

  “Not then. But we know that the Strangers have been trying to find his ass for fifty years—and they’ve been sending their zombies out looking for him. We’re not certain when he died, but we do know that his granddaughter is still alive. Her name is also Remington Truth, and she’s a real piece of work.”

  “Do you know why they would be looking for him?” Sage asked Ana.

  She frowned, trying to remember what she knew about Remington Truth. She wasn’t even certain she’d known he was a man. It was just a phrase she’d heard, like a password or a motto. Always spoken with a sort of malicious reverence. “I didn’t understand he was a person until you told me.”

  Now, knowing that Truth was a man, not a thing or phrase, she thought she might remember more than she realized. Then all at once . . . her breath caught. “Wait. I remember now. I think . . . I think he disappeared around the same time as the Mother crystal went missing.” Ana frowned, trying to extract the details from her groggy memory.

  “What’s that?” Sage asked. “The Mother crystal?”

  “It’s a very important crystal to the Atlanteans . . . the source of their energy. I mean . . . it’s more like a key to their energy source, rather than the source. I don’t know,” Ana said, shaking her head, trying to remember, knowing she sounded vague—but she hadn’t even been thirteen, and only heard snippets of conversation. “Whatever it is, they need it. They’re desperate for it. I think there was a suspicion that Remington Truth destroyed the crystal somehow. All I know is it went missing at the same time he did.”

  “How in the world could Truth have gotten it if it was in Atlantis?” Sage asked.

  Ana shook her head. “I have no idea. I’m just repeating bits and pieces that I heard . . . I could be totally wrong . . . You were starting to say something about Truth.”

  “Oh yes.” Sage nodded and continued, “Simon and I found his flash drive, and on it was a list of numbers. Theo and Lou have been trying to figure out what they meant for the last few months, and only recently realized that the numbers were probably coordinates on the globe.”

  Ana shook her head. “I don’t know what you mean by that.”

  “They’re numbers used for plotting a specific location on the Earth,” Fence explained. “But since the Change, not only has the geography been altered, but so have the axis points of the Earth. Things have shifted, and we’re only just now beginning to understand how much and how to account for that change. I’ve been drawing maps up the ass and trying to use what I know of astronomy to figure out where the hell things are.”

  “Anyway,” Sage continued, “based on what they found in Yellow Mountain, Theo and Lou have come to believe that this list of numbers are geographic points that are the locations the Strangers—or the Atlanteans, or both—used when they set the Change in motion.”

  Ana felt a sudden prickling burst of understanding, and she and Fence turned to look at each other. “The energy centers,” she said.

  “Where all those ley lines connect up—just like in Sedona,” Fence said, glancing at Sage. “Strange shit happens.”

  The redhead was nodding. “When I gave Theo the update about everything you told us, Ana, he suggested that maybe one of the sets of coordinates—the geographic points—would be a logical location to place the Goleth stones.”

  “That makes sense,” Fence said, already leaning over Sage’s shoulder to look at something on the computer screen. “The one closest to us would be the most obvious. I’m going to have to look at these and transpose them onto one of my maps.” He glanced over his shoulder at Ana. “It’s going to take some time.”

  She stood. “The moon is at its greatest size tomorrow night. You’d better work fast.”

  And while they did that, she had other things to attend to.

  “I’ve never seen them like this before,” said Selena. “It’s almost as if they’ve gone crazy. Like they’re looking for something.”

  “Crazy zombies? Isn’t that an oxymoron?” said Wyatt, looking down over the horde of gangas staggering toward them.

  They were at the top of the wall surrounding the old estate in Yellow Mountain, where Selena, and now Theo, lived. Twenty feet of two-foot-thick brick separated them from the monsters. But the sight of the masses, toddling madly toward them with their glowing orange eyes and stinking, rotting flesh, made Wyatt more than a little uneasy. Selena was right: there was something different about the way these zombies were acting.

  Wyatt had seen many disturbing sights in his lifetime—from the charred corpses of children and pets burned to death because their parents were too stupid to install smoke detectors, to the remains of marketplace shoppers after a suicide bomber in Iraq, to his first glimpse of an eerie post-Change city—but this one raised the hair at the back of his neck. Especially knowing, as he did now, that the zombies were nothing more than terrified, insane human souls trapped inside stretched and rotting bodies.

  They were souls conscious of their skin and bones captivity, but unable to communicate or to control their desperate need for human flesh. And that made them bloodthirsty and dangerous . . . and yet pitiful, so desperately pitiful, at the same time.

  Wyatt had been there. He’d been with Theo and Lou, and had seen the place where the Strangers turned men and women into zombies by injecting a tiny orange crystal into the skull of semiconscious humans. Thank God there was Selena, who had the special and strange ability to free the humanity trapped inside those terrible bodies.

  Ruuu-uuuuth-ruuuthhhh-ruuu-uuuthhhh! the zombies moaned and cried, over and over, in a mournful desperate way.

  “Are you sure you want to do this tonight, Selena?” Theo asked. His voice was tight, and he was watching her in the moonlight with serious eyes. It was a dangerous prospect, her need to mingle with the crazed beings and get close enough to help release them. “There are at least two dozen of ’em.”

  She nodded and climbed down from the platform that acted as a lookout post. “It’s going to be fine,” she told him, and Wyatt saw her reach over and touch Theo’s arm, sliding her hand casually along its length.

  A simple gesture, meant to comfort. An easy one, between two people familiar with each other, who loved each other. Who trusted, respected, knew each other.

  He turned away and focused his attention on the zombies. “I’ll keep watch to make sure they all make their way over to the holding area,” he said, knowing that his voice sounded clipped and harsh.

  Selena did her special something with the zombies in a unique space built by Theo and his brother Lou, along with the vociferously bad-tempered old man named Frank. Actually, Frank—who had to be at least ninety—had done most of the actual building, with Wyatt’s help, while Theo and Lou used a cache of electronics and pinball machines to create a sort of funhouse experience that confused and hypnotized the zombies. That allowed Selena to do whatever it was that she did with the glowing pink crystal she wore around her neck.

  Wyatt didn’t know, they hadn’t offered, and he hadn’t asked for a detailed explanation. He’d come to believe that the less he knew about this hellhole of a Changed world, the better off he’d be.

  Because if he knew everything that had happened, who’d caused it . . . if he allowed himself to even consider, to imagine what had been done to the world fifty years ago—to his friends, family, wife, and children—he’d go mad.

  Right now he was holding onto simple existence by a very slender thread.

  He looked back out at the mob of Frankensteinian monsters, noting that most of them had turned toward the north side of the wall, which was where Selena and Theo were waiting for them. The twin pinpoints of their glowing eyes marked their pro
gress, along with the shadows cast by a nearly full moon. Small pairs of orange lights jerked and jolted as their owners tried—

  Wyatt froze.

  Orange crystals.

  Something chilly rushed down his spine. Remy had a glowing orange crystal.

  He was swept back to the incident last night, when he’d found her writhing on the ground, that glowing orange stone set in her sleek belly like a large and gaudy navel piercing.

  Definitely not what he’d picture a woman like Remy wearing, despite her explanation that it was just a piece of jewelry.

  He knew she was lying. Remy lied and prevaricated about everything. Of course she had something to hide—it was obvious since the moment he and the others found her in the small home where she had her pottery shop.

  When she’d shot at him.

  I wasn’t shooting at you.

  Bullshit.

  He remembered her standing there with the gun in her hand, those blue, blue eyes cool and determined. Settling on him as she warned them not to move, then pulling the trigger when he did. The memory of her taking that risk still made him cold with anger.

  But his fury was offset by the remembrance of dragging her battered, bruised body from where she was chained beneath the bounty hunter’s truck. She’d looked just as bad as some of the gang-raped women he’d seen in Iraq. Maybe worse.

  His belly tightened with nausea at the thought of the evil men could inflict on others.

  A soft, urgent bark caught his attention, and Wyatt’s tension eased. He climbed down the ladder and found Dantès pacing uneasily, ears up at full attention. He wasn’t panting with enthusiasm, as when it was time to play—he was silent, clearly worried, on alert.

  “Do you sense it too, big boy?” Wyatt asked, crouching next to the big dog. “They’re on a tear tonight, aren’t they? It’s like they’re searching for something and finally think they’ve found it.”

  Dantès smelled like comfort and warmth, and Wyatt wasn’t ashamed, there in the moonlight with that big furry body next to him, to squeeze his burning eyes tightly shut for a moment as he embraced the animal.

  Not only had Dantès brought the light into his dark world simply by being loyal and unconditionally loving, but he reminded Wyatt of his own, long-gone companion Loki.

  When he released the dog, Wyatt realized that he hadn’t seen Remy since she ran back to the house last night, after he helped her remove that burning crystal.

  He rose slowly, uneasiness settling over him. He tended to avoid her as much as possible, but everyone in the house generally ate together unless they were involved with something. She hadn’t been at dinner, he knew that.

  It wasn’t as if he wanted to seek her out. He had no desire to do that—he knew he wasn’t in any condition to be human toward anyone, let alone a woman who couldn’t help but piss him off by her very presence. Especially one as damaged as she was. But something was up. He’d been in enough tense situations to know to listen to his instincts. And Dantès was acting oddly as well.

  “Where’s mama?” he said, forcing excitement he didn’t feel into his voice. “Where is she? Let’s go find her!”

  Dantès had leapt to attention at the question and then gave a little whine that did nothing to ease Wyatt’s concern. Shit.

  “Come on, boy, let’s go find her!” He gestured with his hand, and the dog took off for a few paces, then came circling back around with another little whine and a short, high-pitched bark. He danced in front of Wyatt, as if asking for assistance, confusion in his very stance.

  And that was when he knew for certain: Remy was gone.

  It was well into the evening when Ana heard the knock on her door.

  She’d just returned from visiting her dad, who was relieved to see her, once he emerged from his absent-minded fog and realized how long it had been since he’d done so. She hadn’t told him about her plans to help stop the tidal wave, knowing that Mayor Rogan would make sure everyone evacuated—and having seen Flo in action, Ana was confident that the nurse would make sure Dad left his experiments behind in exchange for saving his butt. According to Quent, he was currently examining Kaddick’s crystals and comparing them to the one Elliott managed to obtain from one of the Strangers.

  She’d come back to her room to change before going down to eat in the communal dining area, and was even planning another slide into the ocean to see if anything had changed.

  She certainly had no intention of meeting up with Darian again. If he was waiting for a sign from her near their meeting place, he’d be otherwise occupied and out of her way.

  But now someone was knocking on her door.

  Ana opened it to find Fence standing there. He looked tired, especially around the eyes, and her annoyance and anger wavered.

  “Uh . . . can I come in?” he asked when she didn’t move from the threshold.

  He leaned against the side of the door, his body taking up a good portion of the opening, all dark and beautiful. Ana had to force herself to remember what an ass he’d been, what a crazy, flipped-out jerk . . . but it was difficult, especially when she recognized the uneasiness in his demeanor. That reality behind the veneer of nonchalance.

  She drummed up the memory of him standing there on the beach, eyes raging, face dark and angry.

  I’m not fucking coming into the goddamn water.

  “I don’t think so,” she managed to say now. “I don’t think it’s a good idea, Fence. We’re . . . what do you want?”

  He gave a little sigh and his full, luscious lips shifted into a ghost of his normal smile. “I wanted to tell you what Sage and I figured out. We think we’ve found the location, based on the general area of each set of coordinates and the maps I’ve been able to plot. I mean, we found the coordinates that are the closest to Envy.”

  “When can we leave?” Ana asked, ignoring the way his muscled arm crossed the threshold as he leaned against the inside of the doorjamb.

  “Tomorrow morning.”

  “Good,” she replied, thinking of Darian waiting at their meeting place to meet up with her. She’d be gone before he realized it.

  “Quent and Zoë are going to come with us. Vaughn got one of the fishermen’s boats arranged for us to take, and Zoë’s working on a sort of contraption that we can use to help you move the stone—as long as it isn’t too deep.”

  Ana nodded. “Sounds like we’re as ready as we can be, if the location is right. Thanks for bringing me up to date. What time are we leaving?”

  He glanced down at his feet, then back up at her. “At sunrise.”

  “Okay. I’ll be ready.” She started to close the door, but his foot—and arm—blocked it.

  “And, uh, I’m sorry I got so uptight today,” he said in a rush. “It wasn’t you—it was me.”

  “That’s for sure,” she replied tartly.

  He looked at her, startled, and a little glimmer of humor showed in his eyes. “You sure don’t mince words, do you, sugar?”

  “I don’t see any reason to float around it,” she replied.

  “Ana, would you mind some company?” He seemed to sense that sincerity was a better bet than that carefree smile, so he kept his face sober. “Tomorrow . . . well, I know tomorrow’s going to be risky and tough, and I know you . . . well, hell, Ana, you saved my ass from drowning, you escaped from Atlantis, you even stonewalled Zoë downstairs, so I know you’re a tough cookie . . . but I thought you might want to . . . might not want to be alone.”

  Her heart squeezed and she wavered inside. But common sense ruled.

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she told him. “I find you very hard to resist—just like most women probably do—but at the same time, I don’t see any reason to pursue this. You obviously hate the ocean, and for me . . . it’s the best part of my life. I don’t see how this thing between us can go anywhere.”

  His dark eyes were fixed on her, and she felt a tremor of attraction start deep in her belly and flutter up and out. No. She was not going to f
all for that.

  “Here’s the thing, Ana-sweet,” he said, dropping his voice to its deepest pitch—in the timbre that seemed to rumble deeply and deliciously inside her. “I’m going to be straight with you. I want to be with you tonight. Not anyone else. You keep mentioning other women—now and in the future—and the truth is, I don’t want to be anywhere but here. With you.”

  Her heart was thudding, and she knew better, but her reservations were softening. She didn’t want to be alone either. Tomorrow she was going to embark on a journey and task that could easily end unhappily—for her and for others.

  The last time she’d undertaken something so risky had been her escape from Atlantis . . . and look how that’d left her.

  Fence seemed to know she was wavering. He eased farther in, grasping the door frame on either side with his hands, so that more of him was inside than out.

  And before she could react, before she could gather her wits, he leaned in even more and covered her mouth with his.

  Oh.

  Soft and sensual . . . God, the man was a master at kissing. He took his time, convincing her with his mouth, with the slick, languorous swipe of his tongue, the gentle bussing all along her lips.

  Ana closed her eyes when that smooth, delicious mouth eased over to her neck, taking its time to taste her cheek and jaw and even that delicate spot under her ear. Heat shimmered through her, weakening her knees, causing her heart to race and her lungs to forget to work.

  He moved one of his hands from its place on the edge of the door, lifting her hair from her shoulder, sliding his palm around to cup her at the nape of the neck.

  She was liquid and heat, and when he pulled away to look down at her, she saw the same heavy desire in his eyes.

  “I want to spend the night with you, Ana,” he said, skimming his hand down her spine. To his credit, he didn’t push or pull her into him, or move into the room. He waited, his own breathing not quite steady, not quite silent and easy. “Just be with you. Not for any other reason than to be there for you . . . if you want.”