Slayers: The Making of a Mentor

by C. J. Hill

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  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Begin Reading

  Saint Helena is not just the most remote island in the Atlantic Ocean. Its plants, descended from prehistoric forests growing ten million years ago, are a piece of the ancient world, castaways from another time. In the mist-shrouded cover of jutting peaks and sloping hills, a person almost expects to see dinosaurs lumbering through the tree ferns, but very few people would expect to encounter a dragon in a place like this.

  Looks can be deceiving.

  The beginning of June, over two decades ago

  Jamison Daniels missed three things about living on the island of Saint Helena: Bianca Fenton, Bianca Fenton, and Bianca Fenton. Well, technically he missed his family and friends too. He thought of them often enough while he was at Oxford. He also missed the island’s mild weather, its three-hundred-meter-tall cliffs, and the privacy of its back roads. Parts of the island were only accessible with four-wheel drive. But despite Saint Helena’s many benefits, when Jamison thought about coming home after his first year away, Bianca stole the top three slots on his missed-items list.

  Jamison’s parents met him on the wharf. He walked through the customs shack and only had time to set his suitcases down before his mother rushed over and hugged him. “Jamie, I’m so glad you’re home!” She stepped away from him, surveying him. The wind tugged her curls this way and that. “You look older.”

  He looked exactly the same: tall, lean, with wild brown hair that didn’t behave any better in England’s rain than it had here in an ocean breeze.

  Mr. Daniels stepped forward and hugged Jamison too, more stiffly. Jamison’s father wasn’t the hugging type. He was tan and muscled. His years as the cattle-boss on the Overdrake Plantation kept him fit and strong, something he took an inordinate amount of pride in.

  Despite the fact that Jamison had only been away for nine months, Nathan, his thirteen-year-old brother, seemed to have grown six inches. In many ways Nathan was a carbon copy of Jamison. He had the same lean build, unruly brown hair, and light blue eyes. The brothers’ similarities, however, ended with their looks.

  Nathan only took a few things seriously, and his trademark smirk revealed that he wasn’t all that serious about those things either. He excelled at sports. All of them. Jamison, on the other hand, had always been too busy ensuring his spot as head boy at Prince Andrew to care much about cricket or football. Winning games didn’t bring you success in life. Earning high marks in school did.

  Jamison hugged Nathan, then looked him over again. “What are you feeding this boy? He’ll be seven feet tall if you don’t stop.” Jamison was six one and Nathan was gaining on him fast.

  “Isn’t that the truth,” Mrs. Daniels said, reaching up to ruffle Nathan’s hair. “He goes through clothes the way you go through books.”

  “That bad?” Jamison shook his head with mock concern.

  Mr. Daniels picked up one of Jamison’s suitcases, letting out a grunt at the weight. “How many books did you bring home? It feels like you’ve got Pembroke’s whole ruddy library in here.”

  Jamison picked up his other suitcase. “I’m just making sure you’re getting your money’s worth for my tuition.” Saint Helena was a British territory, so Saints paid a reduced rate, but even at that, Oxford was an expensive university.

  Nathan took the suitcase from his father, showing off his strength. “Right, bro. You just can’t bear to part with your books. It’s unhealthy. You need a girlfriend.”

  “I have a girlfriend,” Jamison said.

  Mr. and Mrs. Daniels exchanged a look, one that said they knew something they weren’t saying. “The jeep is this way,” Mrs. Daniels chimed, and they headed down the wharf toward the car park.

  Nathan fell into place beside his brother. “Are you sure Bianca is still your girlfriend?”

  Technically, when Jamison left the island they had put their relationship on hold, but that had only been until he returned for the summer. “What do you know about Bianca?” Jamison asked.

  Nathan shrugged. “I’ve seen her around with Brant Overdrake. They look pretty, you know, close.”

  “They’re just friends,” Jamison said. In her letters, Bianca had mentioned doing things with friends. Brant’s name had come up more than once. She never said there was more to it than that. Was there? “What do you mean, close?”

  “Going about school together…” Nathan stole a glance at their parents to make sure they were out of earshot. The two were walking faster than their sons, and the waves and the wind had a way of muffling words. Nathan kept his voice low anyway. “Brant took Bianca to the plantation.”

  “What?” Jamison asked. Bianca never mentioned going to the plantation. And none of his other friends’ letters had said anything about it either. It would have been news worth gossiping about.

  The Overdrake Plantation was on the south side of the island, two and a half square miles composed of hundreds of acres of beautiful, grassy hills and also quite a few acres of rocky, worthless land. Technically it had stopped being a plantation generations ago, but plantation sounded more genteel then cattle ranch, so the name stuck.

  Langston Overdrake, Brant’s father, was the richest man on Saint Helena, and he had firm rules about his property. His most bizarre rule was that no women were allowed to set foot on his land. Besides Langston’s wife, two daughters, and a few longtime servants, women were strictly banned. The plantation was fenced and a guard booth stood by its only paved road. It was manned twenty-four hours a day.

  Langston Overdrake never explained his ban, although speculation on the matter ran rampant. On an island of only four thousand inhabitants, the Overdrakes were the most interesting thing to talk about. Some people said Langston’s ban on women was the result of a previous tragic heartbreak that made him mistrust the entire female gender. Others claimed he was a misogynist. A few said it was really Mrs. Overdrake’s rule. She didn’t want any women around who might tempt her husband. The last theory didn’t have many proponents. Anyone who had ever met Langston knew he didn’t let anyone tell him what to do, not even his wife.

  Everyone at Prince Andrew knew the rules. It became a sort of challenge for girls to try and wheedle invitations to the plantation from Brant. The fact that he’d taken Bianca meant something, and it wasn’t good.

  “Are you sure?” Jamison asked.

  Nathan slowed his pace so their parents were farther away. “I was there. I saw him driving her to the gate.”

  Both Jamison and Nathan helped their dad with the cattle during the summers and occasionally on the weekends. With a plantation that big, there was always work to do.

  “Well,” Jamison said with a grunt, “I hope the trip satisfied her curiosity. It’s a real thrill to see cows milling around eating grass.” He let out a scoff. “I don’t know why everyone thinks the plantation is going to be so interesting.”

  Nathan cocked his head at his brother. “Have you ever noticed anything odd about the plantation?”

  Jamison’s suitcase thunked along the pavement. A huge jutting gray cliff edged one side of the wh
arf. The slate-blue ocean sloshed around on the other side. “Just the fact that Mr. Overdrake guards the place like the crown jewels are sitting on his kitchen table.”

  Nathan kept his gaze on Jamison. “You’ve never felt differently while you were there?”

  “You mean like a peasant? Certainly. The Overdrakes go out of their way to show people that kind of hospitality.”

  “I mean, do you feel stronger when you’re on the plantation? Do you see better?”

  “No, mostly I just feel like a peasant.”

  Instead of laughing, Nathan looked disappointed. “You’ve never noticed any changes in yourself when you’re there?”

  “Besides the plunge in my self-respect? Nah.” One of the best benefits of attending Oxford was that after Jamison graduated, he would never have to go anywhere near cows, manure forks, or any of the Overdrakes again. “What else do you know about Bianca and Brant? Are they going out?”

  Nathan shrugged. “You’re going to see her, aren’t you? Ask her.”

  Jamison was going to see her, and the sooner the better. This wasn’t the sort of thing you talked to someone about over the phone.

  He gripped his suitcase handle in aggravation. It wasn’t surprising that Brant was chasing Bianca. He had dated every beautiful girl at their school and Bianca was on the top of that list. Her long blond hair, bright blue eyes, and quick smile could stop you where you stood.

  Bianca was smarter than to take up with Brant, wasn’t she? She planned on going to a university in England, would leave in a year once she’d saved up some money.

  Nathan leaned a little closer to Jamison. “And don’t tell Dad I was at the plantation. I’m not supposed to go there anymore.”

  This sentence was enough to pull Jamison’s attention away from thoughts about Brant and Bianca. “You’re not serious,” Jamison said. “You need certified proof of your own death before Dad excuses you from cattle work.”

  Mr. Daniels was always dragging his sons to the plantation to work on one project or another: replacing stock tanks, clearing rocks out of the corrals, bringing in hay bales. Mr. Overdrake paid the best wage on the island. He paid so much, in fact, that once a man started at the plantation, he wasn’t likely to quit. Mr. Overdrake, however, was slow to hire anyone, even when he needed somebody. He had an endless assortment of background checks, interviews, and probationary periods he made new hires go through—teaching them early, Jamison supposed, that they had to jump through hoops to deserve their jobs. As a result, whenever the plantation needed an extra hand, Mr. Daniels used his sons’ hands.

  Nathan gestured to their parents. “Dad will tell you I’m not allowed on the plantation because I need to work on my studies. That’s rubbish, though. He won’t let me go to the plantation because he’s seen what happens to me there.”

  “What happens?”

  “I told you already.” Nathan dropped his voice to an insistent whisper. “I get strong. I’m not exaggerating. I picked up a cow once.”

  “A cow?” Full-grown cows weighed between one thousand and fifteen hundred pounds. He must be talking about a calf.

  Nathan smiled despite himself. “I’ll never admit it, but I put the thing in the Overdrakes’ lawn. It murdered their flowerbeds.”

  “This is the sort of thing you do while I’m away—cow vandalism?”

  “I can see in the dark too. And I just discovered something else I can do.” Nathan shot another look at their father. “You’ve got to promise not to tell Dad.”

  “All right,” Jamison said, sure he was about to hear the punch line of a joke.

  “I can make a wall with my mind.”

  “What?”

  “A wall,” Nathan said. “A big one. It’s invisible, but I know it’s there. I can feel it.”

  “You can feel an invisible wall.” Jamison nodded. “I suppose that will come in handy if you ever decide to build an invisible house.” He patted Nathan on the shoulder. “Don’t worry. I won’t tell Dad.”

  Nathan shrugged off Jamison’s hand with a laugh. “I swear it’s real. A couple weeks ago, one of Overdrake’s dogs came after me. Right as he hurdled toward me, I held up my hand and the wall was there. The dog smacked into it so hard, he stumbled around like a drunken sailor. He didn’t even make a second try.”

  Mr. Overdrake kept guard dogs in pens during the day: Rottweilers that were all muscle and teeth. They were trained to roam the grounds at night looking for intruders.

  “Wait a minute,” Jamison said. “When were you at the plantation that you had a run in with one of those hellhounds?”

  “I’m banned from the plantation,” Nathan muttered. “I can’t very well go there during the day. I have to sneak in at night.”

  “How?” The fence wasn’t the normal kind just meant to keep cows in. It was six feet tall with barbed-wire coils on top.

  “You know the tree that looks like a pitchfork? I dug a hole under the fence there. I use it to get to the plantation. On the way back, I have enough strength to jump over wherever I like.”

  Jamison stared at his brother. There was no smirk in his expression, no hint that this was a joke.

  “I’m not lying,” Nathan said. “Something about the plantation gives me superpowers.”

  Jamison continued to stare at him, waiting for a break in his brother’s expression that would explain all this. It didn’t come and they were almost to the family’s jeep.

  Nathan set his jaw. “You think I’m crazy, don’t you?”

  “Let’s see, you just told me that you sneak out at night to break into the Overdrakes’ plantation—a place with security guards and vicious attack dogs. Forget invisible walls—trespassing on Overdrake’s property is a good indication of craziness.”

  “I can prove I’m telling you the truth.” Nathan sent a cautious look at their parents’ backs. “Come with me tonight.”

  “To visit the demon dogs? I don’t know. I’m not sure I have time in my schedule for an unplanned hospital trip.”

  “I can protect you,” Nathan said.

  A chill of apprehension crept up Jamison’s back. It wasn’t Nathan’s claim of superpowers that bothered Jamison, although that was disturbing too. It was the earnestness in Nathan’s voice. He wanted Jamison to believe him.

  What in the world had happened to Nathan in the last few months? Was this a sign of mental illness? Could it be something that serious? Jamison immediately dismissed the fear. Nathan was just getting better at pulling pranks. All of this would lead to some sort of joke. Superpowers. Sneaking onto Overdrake’s plantation in the face of rabid, growling guard dogs. When had Jamison become so gullible?

  “My thirteen-year-old brother is offering to protect me,” Jamison said with a laugh. “Should I be touched or insulted?”

  “How about just trusting me?”

  They had reached their jeep, so Jamison didn’t answer. He was sure he would hear more about this later.

  Chapter 2

  It didn’t take long for Mrs. Daniels to get dinner on the table. She asked about Jamison’s classes. She liked hearing about his friends from Oxford. They all seemed exotic to her, like characters from Dickens novels.

  Finally Jamison said, “So have you been working Nathan twice as hard now that I’m gone?” He half expected that Nathan’s story of being banned from the plantation was completely made up.

  Mr. Daniels spooned a second helping of fishcakes and gravy. “Nathan has to spend more time on his studies if he wants to make it into university. He’s got to concentrate on that, not cattle.”

  “My grades aren’t that bad,” Nathan said. “Mostly As and Bs.”

  Jamison sprinkled some salt on his squash. “That’s good enough to get into most schools.”

  Mr. Daniels nodded in Nathan’s direction, a smile softening his features. “If Nathan keeps playing football like he does now, I’ll send tapes of his games to universities and we’ll have every recruiter in England sniffing around here. And that’s another reason
he can’t work on the plantation. He has to practice.”

  Mrs. Daniels put a pat of butter on her squash. “I always said you boys spent too much time working for the Overdrakes.”

  Jamison stiffened. “You did not. Last summer when I spent forty hours a week shoveling manure, you told me it built character.”

  Mrs. Daniels let out an airy laugh and waved a hand in Jamison’s direction. “Well, Nathan’s character doesn’t need as much building as yours did.”

  “Right. I was the only first year at Oxford who’d ever dewormed a cow. That’s the sort of thing that makes you popular with your mates in the dining hall.”

  Mrs. Daniels laughed again. “Oh, stop moaning. Even when you were working on the plantation, you still found enough time to read every book on the island.”

  Mr. Daniels took a bite of his food. “You needed to earn more money than your brother because you didn’t want to go to a university unless it was older than Chaucer.” There was a bit of ice in his words, a frost that occasionally showed itself. Mr. Daniels disliked people who were, as he put it, overeducated. He thought expensive schools made people put on airs. “And when you come down to it,” he’d said more than once, “educated people are just as stupid as everyone else. Stupider maybe, because they think the money they spent on their degree means something.”

  When Jamison’s acceptance letter had come, Mr. Daniels hadn’t hidden his opinion that Oxford wasn’t worth the price. As far as Jamison could tell, his father only financed his tuition for one reason: to prove that he was smart enough to make money without a high status university degree. This was a surprise to Jamison in more than one way. He had known his father had purchased stocks and made overseas investments. Jamison had never realized the extent of his father’s assets, though, until Mr. Daniels not only agreed to help pay for Oxford, but wrote a check for fifteen thousand pounds on the spot—a sum that most Saints didn’t make in a year.

  Now that Mr. Daniels had brought up the cost of Oxford, Jamison couldn’t complain about the amount of work he did on the plantation, or Nathan’s lack of it. His parents were right. With Nathan’s athletic ability, he would most likely get a scholarship somewhere. No one would need to make the sacrifices for Nathan’s education that they made for Jamison’s.