Impervious (City of Eldrich Book 1)

by Laura Kirwan

  He gazed up at her, a knowing smile on his face. “You are so like my Zhara.” After a moment he added, “My wife. Jamie’s mother. She never liked to cry either. So strong, my Zhara.”

  “I don’t feel very strong at the moment,” Meaghan said, still sniffling as the words tumbled out in a rush. “I feel like I’m about to go stumbling into something I don’t understand and unless you’ve cooked up a doozy of a plan that you haven’t told me about yet, I don’t know what to do. You say I’ll know what to do, but I . . . I don’t.”

  John didn’t reply. She could see his lips moving like he was sounding out words and she realized he was trying to translate what she’d said.

  “I’m sorry. I know I talk too fast,” she said.

  “Nuh,” he said, smiling at her. “I hear too slow. I don’t know what ‘doozy’ is, but I get what you say. I’m thinking of a plan, but it’s not ready to tell yet. And Matthew had no plan back then and he got me and Jamie out alive. You’ll do the same I think.”

  John stood up. He was standing on a lower stair so their eyes were level. He reached out and stroked her bare arm with his calloused fingers. Meaghan felt an electric rush where he touched her.

  She took a step back. “I . . . it’s . . . this can’t happen,” she stammered.

  “Why not?” He stepped up on the porch, close enough to touch her again. “I made myself alone for so long and today I know how stupid it was.” He stepped even closer. “It’s a long time alone for both of us.”

  Damn you, Russ, she thought, why did you tell him that? Only Russ knew the details of her nonexistent love life. Meaghan took another step back. One more and she’d be backed up against the door frame. “If we . . . if I let you . . . then what happens if we do make it home? Do you stop drinking? Can you stop drinking?”

  Now John took a step back. His face grew red and he stared at the floor. The shame was back.

  Meaghan hated herself for a moment as she watched his reaction. But she’d been down this road before, with her father and with Greg, her long-ago boyfriend with the heavy fist. One detox didn’t change a thing. She wouldn’t subject herself to the betrayal, violence, and broken promises ever again. Her body might be ready to trust him, but her mind knew better.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice stiff. “I am stupid to think . . . I have to talk to Patrice.” He fled down the front steps and around the side of the house.

  “God, I sure handled that well,” Meaghan muttered.

  “Handled what?” Russ appeared on the other side of the screen door.

  Meaghan yelped and whirled around. “Goddammit, Russ. Don’t sneak up on me like that.”

  “I didn’t sneak up on anybody. I was making as much noise as I could. Didn’t want to walk in on a private moment,” Russ said. “Did you kiss him? There’s a pool going.”

  “Did I what?” Meaghan felt her cheeks flame. “Wait, did you say there’s a pool? You assholes are betting if I’ll kiss him?” She glared at him through the screen. “There’s nothing going on. Nothing.”

  “Sure. Right. Nothing’s going on. And it’s not a bet on if you’ll kiss him but when.” Russ pushed the screen door open. “Move. Let me out. Did it ever occur to you that something going on may be exactly what you need? It’s sure something he needs. John’s had more social interaction today than he’s had in the last eighteen years.”

  “He’s a drunk. I don’t need that crap in my life and it’s not my job to fix him.” She refused to meet Russ’s eye.

  “You don’t think people can change?” Russ asked. He plopped down on the settee. “Oh, that’s good. I’ve been on my feet all day.”

  “I do think people can change, but only when they’re ready. I’m an idiot if I think I can convince him to change on my timetable.” She sidled over to the settee and sat down next to him. “You know that. Good intentions won’t fix him. It’s not a freaking fairy tale. One kiss won’t break the evil spell.”

  Russ refused to take the bait. “I’m not saying he doesn’t come with a hefty pile of baggage. But at our age, who doesn’t? I’ve got three ex-wives and you’ve got such raging commitment issues you haven’t been on a date in ten years.”

  “I don’t have commitment issues,” Meaghan said.

  Russ snorted. “Right.”

  “I can’t believe you started a pool, for God’s sake.”

  “I didn’t start it,” Russ said, with a smirk. “Lynette did. After she saw you ogling John in the hall after his detox.”

  “I wasn’t ogling him,” Meaghan said, blushing yet again. “And why the hell is my love life so damn fascinating all of a sudden? It’s not like we don’t have bigger things to worry about.”

  “That’s exactly why,” Russ answered. “We do have bigger things to worry about. But we’ve done all we can from here and there’s nothing to do now but wait until midnight. Giggling over you and John gives us all something to do besides weep with fear.”

  “Well, at least you can check that off the list. I’ve taken care of the weeping. But then I’m betting you nosy little jerks already know that. Some fearless leader I’m turning out to be.”

  Russ reached over and took her hand. “Don’t sell yourself short. You’re impressing the hell out of us all. If it was me knowing I had to go to Fahraya, I’d be hiding under the bed whimpering. Jamie would be screwed.”

  She gave him a wan smile. “You would not. I’m doing what anyone would do in this situation. If Jamie was counting on you, you’d step up. Everyone here would do the same. I’m nothing special.”

  Russ shook his head, serious now. “No. You don’t get it. There are plenty of people who’d chalk it up as hopeless, leave him there to die, and get on with their lives.”

  “But what kind of life would I have if I let him die? If I didn’t do everything I could to bring him home? If I didn’t die trying?”

  “You’d have John’s life. He lived and his wife died. He couldn’t save her, and as far as he’s concerned, he let that happen to her. He didn’t die trying to save her and he’s been punishing himself ever since. If that were you, would you want the first person who made you think forgiveness might be possible—that there might be a way forward with your life—shut you down cold without a chance to prove yourself?”

  “No. That would be awful,” Meaghan said with a sigh. She squeezed her brother’s hand. “How did you get so wise? For once I’d like you not to know me better than I know myself.”

  Chapter 40

  They went back in the house. Russ started rounding up dinner for the troops and Meaghan went to find John.

  John and Meaghan’s not-so-romantic interlude on the porch had kept her from asking the questions she had for him. Meaghan still needed the information, but first she needed to apologize. Not for her doubts about his ability to stay sober, she still had those, but for her abruptness in how she conveyed them.

  If someone was driven to drink by a terrible grief, by a devastating upheaval in his life, could healing that emotional wound, could finding the forgiveness he so desperately needed, be enough to give him the strength to stop drinking? Was there a difference, she wondered, between someone who drank too much because even one drink was too many, and someone who drank too much because the pain was simply too great to bear without it?

  Could she really equate John, the deposed king who’d had his family, throne, and pride all stripped from him, who’d endured days of torture, with Greg, the heavy-fisted lunkhead who drank too much because it was the most interesting thing he knew how to do?

  And then there was Matthew. He drank because he thought he was losing his mind. He drank because he’d lost his family. Because his wife couldn’t accept what she saw happening to him.

  Meaghan had always treated alcoholism like a one-size-fits-all malady. If Greg couldn’t, or wouldn’t, stick with sobriety, then that meant no one could. But her father had. He’d been sober for over thirty years. And who knew what had happened to Greg? Could he be sober somewhere,
living his life?

  The violence Greg had inflicted on her was unacceptable in any context and she knew she’d been right to leave him. And she knew that if John had shown the slightest inclination toward violence over the years, Russ wouldn’t be so glib about a potential romance. Russ was still living in Arizona when Greg assaulted her. It was Russ who took her to the hospital, Russ who wanted her to file a police report, Russ who begged her not to go back to him. And when Meaghan finally left, it was Russ who helped her pack.

  If there was no physical risk to her, and John hurt only himself quelling his pain and guilt—if it was only about the drinking—maybe slamming the door and never looking back was shortsighted. Maybe she owed it not only to John but to herself to give him a chance to prove her wrong.

  She found him sitting on the back porch, staring at the ground. He didn’t look up when she approached. She sat down next to him.

  “Meaghan, I—”

  At the same moment, she said “John, I—”

  “You go,” he said.

  Meaghan took a deep breath. Sitting this close to him, she could feel the warmth of his body and found it hard to maintain any kind of emotional detachment. Her physical attraction to him confused her. Usually the mere hint of a drinking problem was enough to turn off any incipient feelings. Like flicking off a light switch.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I could have handled that better. But your drinking . . . it does concern me. I have history. Bad history and as much as I . . .” Want to tear your clothes off and have sex with you right here, she thought, her face reddening. Instead she said “as much as I like you, I can’t be around you if you’re still drinking.”

  “I know,” he said. “Your father and Russ tried to help me long ago and I know Matthew drank too much once too. But I am always too . . . too drunk,” he said, with a wry chuckle. “Too drunk to listen. I am not your best choice. I know this. You need someone you can trust. He’s not me.”

  The brief flash of humor was gone, replaced by a look of such sorrow that Meaghan, without consciously realizing it, took one of his calloused hands into her own. “He might be you,” she said softly. “But we don’t know that yet. Either of us. And the only way to know is for you to get the help you need and stay sober for a while. You need to be able to trust yourself. And I don’t think you’ve trusted yourself for a very long time.”

  His eyes filled with tears and one fell before he could blink it back. He wiped it away with the hand Meaghan wasn’t holding. “Huh, now it’s my time to cry, I guess.”

  “I’ve been doing enough crying for everybody, but I’m happy to share,” Meaghan said. “But don’t expect to sit on my lap while you do it.”

  John laughed and the tension ratcheted down a bit. “So, what do we do?” he asked.

  “We go get your son back and if we don’t die doing it, then you need to get sober.”

  “I’ll do it for you,” he said, squeezing her hand.

  She shook her head. “No. You can’t do it for me. You have to do it for yourself. It has to be something you want, not something you think I want. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

  “Yeah. I do. It is something I want. I have wanted it for long time now, but I was too proud, too sick to ask for help. Those witches make my head more clear than it’s been for a long time. I missed all those years with my son and his wife and the babies. I don’t want to miss any more.”

  Meaghan teared up. “Oh, crap, now I’m blubbering again.” She sniffled, her nose starting to run. “I need my hand back so I can blow my nose.”

  John smiled and released his grip. He groped in his shirt pocket. “You take all my tissue.”

  “Don’t worry. With my nose I’ve always got one buried in a pocket somewhere.” She found a crumpled tissue and blew her nose. “I still have a lot of questions I need to ask you. That’s why I came to find you in the first place. Before I got all weepy.”

  “And before I got all . . . what’s the word . . . lovey?”

  It was Meaghan’s turn to laugh. “Now presenting Weepy and Lovey in the touring company production of Surviving Fahraya.”

  “Touring company?” John asked, puzzled.

  “Dumb joke, not very funny. Tell me about the giant snakes.”

  Chapter 41

  Giant snakes, giant spiders, giant things that sounded suspiciously like scorpions . . . Fahraya had a lot of giant creepy crawlies. What it didn’t have was arable land, abundant water, or natural resources in any significant amounts.

  Natalie was being complimentary when she’d called it a dump.

  The seasons never changed. It was always about seventy degrees during the day, about fifty at night. The weak sun rose and dropped in the same place at the same time every day. There were no oceans, no lakes, no rivers, no mountains—only low rocky hills riddled with caves and bisected by the occasional shallow ravine.

  Vegetation was limited to low shrubs, sparse plants, and fungi growing among the rocks. The people survived by hunting and gathering. They made all their clothing, weapons, and tools out of stone, bone, sinew, and hide. Some of their water came from rainfall that collected in natural tanks in the rocks, but most of it sprang from magical springs that moved at whim, so the Fahrayans couldn’t even build permanent settlements. They were nomads, living in caves and following the shifting water.

  “It’s just a tiny little place,” John said. “Not like this where there is always more to see. Fahraya just . . . ends.” The farther one flew from the populated area, the darker and colder it grew. The world slowly dissolved. There was a point where the magic stopped working and Fahrayans lost their ability to fly. The ground there was flat, with no distinguishing characteristics, only endless gray sand. No one traveled farther on foot because there was no point. Even the land appeared to fade into a gray void.

  “It’s like that old episode of The Twilight Zone about the omnipotent kid who makes the entire world outside of his town disappear,” Meaghan said.

  John looked at her blankly. “The twilight zone?”

  “Old TV show. Sorry. Ignore me when I say stuff like that,” Meaghan said. “I can see why the human world would be scary but enticing at the same time.” She glanced around the backyard. The grass needed to be cut, at least what grass was visible between the weeds and dandelions. A few tired fold-up lawn chairs sat on the cracked concrete pad that stretched out from the porch. “Well, maybe not this particular little piece of the human world.”

  John smiled, then got serious again. “My father, he saw terrible things and he didn’t know it was only a little part of this world. He was so scared for us that he didn’t look for more or let us look. Others saw only things to steal.” He shook his head. “My brother saw only a way to scare everybody to follow him and get revenge on me.”

  “And what did you see?” Meaghan asked.

  “I saw a better life for them. But I was wrong.”

  “No, you weren’t. I think your father and your brother were wrong. Your brother’s still wrong.”

  “He has to fight big snakes and fight Jhoro and I sit here with a full belly and a pretty girl next to me.” He grinned at her. “You are right. This is better.”

  Meaghan blushed. He thinks I’m pretty, part of her mind gushed. The rest of her mind rolled its eyes. With no clear mental consensus on how to respond, Meaghan ignored John’s comment.

  “So,” she asked, “what do you think your brother is up to? Why grab Jamie now? Why hasn’t he come after him sooner? And how did he get mixed up with those . . .” She was about to say “assholes” and edited herself. “Those stupid wizards in the first place?”

  John shook his head. “I don’t know. In our stories, wizards are trouble. They bring evil. They are not friends to Fahraya. To work with them . . . is very bad.” He sighed. “He was jealous even when we were boys, but we were still brothers. We hated each other, but we loved each other too. You know?”

  She nodded.

  “But he changed when
my father picked me. His mind got bad, I think. He was more than jealous. He began doing evil things, crazy things. Maybe now he’s losing the fight with Jhoro and he wants to look strong. Jamie is easier to take and kill than Jhoro. Maybe even V’hren won’t kill his own son.”

  “I don’t know,” Meaghan said. “I mean I get why V’hren wants Jamie, but I’m still not seeing the need to manufacture a reason to grab him. And it’s not even a good reason. The treaty doesn’t prohibit either of you from changing between human and Fahrayan while you’re here. There’s got to be more to it.”

  John nodded. “I see what you mean. Maybe he gets these wizards and Emily to make Jamie change to scare you into going away?”

  “Yeah, maybe, but there are other ways they could have done that. And it doesn’t make sense strategically. I’d be even more useless right now without the heads-up. At least now, everybody doesn’t have to waste time convincing me this stuff is real.” Sitting this close to John, she could feel the warmth of his body. He smelled of laundry detergent and something clean and pungent like a freshly cut pine tree. They were as close as they could get without actually touching. “Maybe I’m over-thinking it. But I still feel like there’s a big piece here we aren’t seeing.”

  John shifted position slightly so their thighs barely touched. It was such a subtle movement she wasn’t sure he was even aware of it. Meaghan felt a quiver between her legs. Down girl, she thought. No time for that. She eased a fraction of an inch away from him, breaking contact. He didn’t follow her or even seem to notice.

  “You know,” he said. “Maybe these wizards give V’hren power like they do for Emily. And they lie to him. Tell him he can do things he can’t. Like they tell Emily she can make spells on you.”

  “Power to do what? Fahrayans don’t practice magic, do they? Are they even capable of it?”

  “Power to do nothing good, I think. Our stories tell how wizards had a great war and how they destroyed the rest of Fahraya—the gray place now—by stealing all the magic there. Fahrayans learn as babies that making spells is very evil and it can bring back the wizards to take the rest of the magic and then we’ll die.”