I took the next couple of steps, walking past the letters until I reached the top. I felt the same evil seep through my feet on each step, going right through me. This was like nothing I had ever encountered before. When I did reach the top of the stairs I looked down to read the letters. I concentrated carefully, remembering all I had been taught.
A
The word was “Molecha”, why did it feel familiar to me, like I had heard it in a dream?
The word also aroused a feeling of apprehension and evil although it was unclear why.
Oh, I thought, the dream. I had heard that word in one of my dreams about the river. What did it mean, and where was my father?
From time to time over the next couple of weeks I would remember shards of what happened next, like the feel of the heavy wooden door I had to shove open with the whole of my slender weight and how it seemed to be covered with a thin film of moisture not unlike recently fallen rain.
Other memories would then flood in like the pestilence infested sewer water that had flooded the kitchen one year before my mother had died; memories of how I had initially been so pleased to see my father sitting with his back to me in his well-worn chair; his cloak draped over the back of it in his usual haphazard fashion and his tall hat perched on the top of the chair.
I had been taken over by a wave of relief that had brought tears to my eyes. I was safe, my beloved father – the only person I had in the whole of the New World to guide and protect me – was safe and would make all of the strangeness disappear.
Except that it didn’t happen like that.
A footstep behind me was the start of everything; the start and the end.
I spun round, hardly daring to breathe – about five feet behind me stood Khalashaya, his eyes blazing and his mouth tight. He’d slithered inside my house and destroyed it. He was evil.
I turned back to my father and was once again afraid. Why had my father not turned to greet me?
“Father” I said, feeling the fear reverberate in my voice.
I’d used my whole weight to shove open the oak door, surely he would have heard me, demanded to know why I did not knock and wait for admission as he had often bid me do.
“Don’t move,” Khalashaya barked, fear and anger in his voice. “I clearly didn’t get here in time”.
I turned back to him, desperately afraid, something was so desperately wrong that I felt the panic I always tried to keep in check bubble to the surface.
“My…father” I managed to gulp.
“Would have been perfectly safe if you had only listened to me,” he shouted, punching the wooden door. I flinched at the noise. Still, my father did not move or even flinch at the shout or the sound of Khalashaya’s bony knuckles rapping the door.
“What have you done to him?” I gasped; my breath short.
Khalashaya looked grimly at me and then at my father.
“This is your doing”.
I turned and ran to my father. I heard Khalashaya’s scream behind me.
Blood, so much blood covered the front of the still form that had been my father. He was clearly dead, his eyes were open and glassy. I felt myself grabbed from behind and dragged from the room.
This went against all of my instincts at that moment, all I wanted was to run to my father and put everything right. Anger and sorrow flooded me like the burning rain. My father, my wonderful father, was gone and lost to me forever.
I wrenched myself away from Khalashaya, determined to wreck revenge on the man who had entered my life, put me in mortal danger and—
My anger and sorrow burned burrows into icy walls that had been erected for survival years ago and I screamed at Khalashaya. I screamed like I hadn’t screamed for a long time, on a day like this one; a day three sun cycles before this day of horrors.
The feelings ravaged my insides, seeming to melt and liquefy all they encountered.
I looked at Khalashaya and wanted to kill him. I felt the anger rising and suddenly felt strange, like I was invisible. I got a grip on myself and prepared to fight.
His green eyes met mine, the depths of his appearing fathomless and his expression like ice.
“Stop fighting me Auriana” the voice was as hard as iron.
I felt the anger burning inside me but then encounter the despair I was trying so hard not to let win. The battle was a short one and I screamed before realising I was falling to the floor. The weak feeling that had completely immobilised me earlier was back in full force. I was about to die.
I saw my tears start to pool on the floor and closed my eyes. I wanted to die, to get away from the agony I was in.
I felt him crouch beside me, his hands on my body as he turned me over.
I saw his face above me, scratched it seemed, with the harsh age lines that he was surely too young to bear. He turned, and then looked down at me.
“It’s coming. We must get away”.
He shoved me to my feet.
“Don’t you hear me? We’ve got to get away NOW!” he shouted.
A shriek issued from the wall nearest my father’s body. I froze in fear and screamed as the wall shimmered and seemed to bubble as if it were no longer solid.
Then I saw something that terrified me to the depths of my soul. A hand was coming through the wall, my formerly solid wall. The hand was black and almost see-through. Following the hand was an arm, the smell of it was rotten.
He caught me as I collapsed again.
“Very well then, force it is.”
I heard new and unfamiliar whispered words but was drowning in blackness before I could get my brain around what he had said.
Do You Trust Me?
The river was there before me, I realised my bare feet were sinking in ice cold mud that had already soaked through the rough white dress I was wearing. I imagined the mud sinking into my skin and changing me into whatever it was. It seemed alive, a sentient thing that sought to claim me.
Across the river, grey and undefined shapes moved in the murky moonlight.
I couldn’t remember whether I always thought this when having this dream but the air I was breathing was…different. It was clean and didn’t make my chest hurt like the air in Zafiya did.
Had the singing always been there? Maybe the huddled shapes across the river had been singing the whole time I’d been observing them from across the river…maybe they had just started.
The sound and muffled words floated across the moonlit water and hit my ears with a gentle but pervasive force. It was beautiful, compelling me to make the journey across the river by any means and join the singers. I did not know why I felt this; only that I did. I was always overtaken by fear before I could start the journey though. I always had a sense that if I crossed the river and gave into temptation then I would be lost forever.
I had always felt like I didn’t belong, even in the harsh and brutal world I lived in I was different. I lived a life of fear and slavery yes, but I was also conscious of something inside me that pulled me through whatever darkness I was suffering. It was something I could not take the credit for. Truly brave people fought against their natural personality to make a difference. I had grown up with an unusual personality since birth without really knowing why. It had always shamed as well as sustained me.
My mother had been the same to a lesser extent, my gentle but ultimately doomed mother. She’d always been a little different, she hadn’t shared my dark looks but she’d taught me my letters at home in blatant defiance of the law just like her mother before her.
Thoughts of my mother reminded me that there was something important in the waking world that needed my attention, something black and oily that now made me sick to the stomach. I wanted to remember, I didn’t want to remember.
Pain, I was being slapped across the face. White light flooded into the nighttime scene and I was being dragged back, back to face this forgotten horror.
I was lying on a hard surface with my wrists tied behind me; they were tied to a surface t
hat chilled my skin.
I opened my eyes and looked into the fiery eyes of my captor. I couldn’t focus properly and so the green eyes that were so much like mine merged into one and then back into two.
I looked around – was there a means of escape? Could I even fight him anyway?
“No” came the harsh voice that was now so familiar to me. “You have caused enough death”.
My vision came back and I could see I was in a small room that looked like it could be Khalashaya’s accommodation. A collection of cloaks was thrown over a cabinet and there were daggers on the mantelpiece.
There was a comfortable looking couch in the corner and an attractive rug on the floor. I would have liked the room if I had not been terrified. As well as the fear that came from being kidnapped, I had also never been in a house that was not my own.
“Am I going to die here?” I thought; the fear and despair made me want to cry but I blinked the hot tears away angrily. I’d face him if I had to. I had done worse in my life and would do so again to make things right.
“However it may seem”, his cold voice cut into my thoughts, “I’m not here to hurt or frighten you”.
I coughed and tried to speak, the hoarseness in my voice suggesting I had been out cold for several hours.
“Then what are you going to do with me?” I tried to keep the fear out of my voice.
"What do you want? Why have you done this to me?"
Silence, he came and sat down next to the bed I was lying on.
"What did my father ever do to you?" I felt my voice break as I whispered the last sentence. My father was dead. I would never see him again. I was all alone, vulnerable and completely powerless. Such sadness gripped me then that I struggled to breathe.
Khalashaya bent down so that his face was an inch from my ear and I could feel his breath on my skin. I shuddered, hating my body at that moment for that involuntary response.
I saw his face up close properly for the first time; he had my high cheekbones and large, slightly slanted green eyes, his hair, while a very dark brown, was not quite as dark as mine and was straight whereas mine was very long and curled in thick spirals. His mouth was thin and had a pronounced cupid’s bow.
I was not sure why I examined the man who would kill me so intimately, yet I knew it was part of my plan to gain control over the situation and extricate myself from it somehow. I had nothing to lose now.
“I’m here to rescue you." He said suddenly, as if he could read my thought.
I looked away from him, this was hardly a rescue. I was about to die.
"So far I have accomplished my mission”, he said bluntly, I read no emotion in his voice or expression.
I tried to look him in the eye as I spoke, trying not to let my fear stop me.
“Your mission to kill my father and capture me;” saying the words made my stomach gripe with despair and I fought once more to stay in control of myself.
“I admit I am responsible for your father’s death,” said the dispassionate, cold voice.
“You admit you…killed him?”
Silence, Khalashaya stood up and walked over to the edge of the room, he suddenly appeared very agitated. I watched in horror as he walked to the mantelpiece and grabbed one of the daggers, advancing towards me.
This was it, the way I was going to die. Would it hurt?
I suddenly realised my wrists were free; he had cut through one of the bonds. He was giving me a fair fight and I stood up to face him. I was going to take him up on this offer.
He grabbed my wrists, his strength surprised me. With his touch came a strong sensation, as if I was being given something. It was as if his skin was porous somehow, like a sponge; however, instead of water soaking through it was something else.
I suddenly saw a face in front of me, no…in my mind. I opened and closed my eyes quickly and saw the face only when my eyes were closed. It was a man's face, a man who looked like Khalashaya but was not him. I was hit with a sharp feeling of grief, a grief that was not even my own but secondary somehow, as if I was feeling someone else’s emotion - Khalashaya’s emotion.
For one horrible second we stood looking at each other; me feeling as if I had somehow seen into his soul. Even though I was about to die I felt dirty. I did however sense one thing; the man in front of me had not killed my father and he did was not responsible for the appearance of the demon.
“I am not here to hurt you”. He pushed me back onto the bed where I sat, extremely winded.
“You are…not going to kill me?” I asked, not looking at him.
“I rescued you from the creature. I came to save you not hurt you”.
Suddenly I was tired, hungry, and weak, my muscles hurt and the despair I’d been fighting got the better of me. I started to cry, despite my efforts not to; releasing all of the horror, pain and grief of the last 24 hours.
“You threatened me, in the library. You said-”
I felt a hand on my shoulder, I pushed it away. I didn’t want any more of those strange flashes.
“I have never threatened you Auriana” he said, his voice dropping to a low hum as he put his hands over his face. “I was warning you of the danger”.
I looked up and him and whispered through my tears.
“But how did you know about that thing? How did you know about my dream?”
He sat next to me on the bed and leaned against the wall. He shook his head as if to stop the questions I was firing at him. I tried another tactic.
“You admitted to being responsible for my father’s death, for that demon that came out of the wall.”
He looked away and walked over to the shuttered window. He opened it a crack, blinking as daylight pierced his eyes. He shut it again and walked over to me.
He looked at me, sorrow and grief in his eyes. I was startled to see the emotion there.
“My plan was to rescue you both, although you were of course my highest priority”.
I didn’t know why I suddenly believed him, maybe it was the genuine emotion in his eyes and in his touch, maybe it was the memory of that evil presence in my home as I discovered the body of my father. Maybe it was what I had sensed from him when I had touched him. He also felt genuine feelings of grief that my father had been killed.
I really had nothing to lose now. I took the plunge and trusted my instincts. I could consider the logic of this some other time.
“I believe you. Why was the creature after my father?”
The look of relief in his prematurely lined face told me I had been right to believe him.
“The creature wasn’t after your father. It was after you”.
“Why me?” I said.
I was not known outside my home, which was the way of the New World. It occurred to me that my nocturnal exploits could have attracted more attention than I had originally thought, they had certainly alerted Khalashaya to my presence the night he had followed me home.
He ran his hands through his hair; he seemed to do this a lot when experiencing anxiety.
“I’m going to tell you everything you need to know, but you need to trust me. I know I have not proven myself worthy of your trust. I shouted at you, incapacitated you and captured you. I have made you more frightened than you’ve probably ever been and for what?”
“Why is that creature after me? Why did it kill my father?”
He looked at me, clearly trying to work out what to say.
I snapped.
“I need to know why my whole life has been destroyed. I need to know why I have lost the only person in the New World that took care of me”.
The last few words were muffled as I fought to keep my grief under control. I could let go when I was safe.
He sat down beside me again and said:
“I’m sorry”.
I was about to reply when he grabbed my wrist and closed his eyes. Suddenly I felt drained and weak.
He opened his eyes and there was anger in them, his mouth formed a thin hard line and h
is jaw set menacingly.
“I am going to take you out of this place Auriana. I am going to make sure you are never ever badly treated again”.
Rather than look at me, he looked directly at the mantelpiece opposite the bed. I noticed the white scars on his face that were incongruous with his long, effeminate looking eyelashes.
“Why do you refer to your world as the New World? What was the Old World?”
“We are not permitted to discuss the Old World” I said, “We still do of course; well I don’t, but I have heard of people whose life purpose is to try and find out more about the Old World before the judgement”.
He looked at me, shifting his frail body and crossing his legs, it made him look strangely childlike.
“Tell me more” he said simply.
“Tell me what you did to my wrist”.
“I have a gift, the ability to touch someone’s skin and sense things about them. If I concentrate hard I can see flashes of their emotions and even their memories”.
I felt sick.
“And you just did that to me?”
He nodded.
“And you have now seen my memories”
“Only the ones closest to the surface; the mind is like a well-”
I interrupted him.
“Don’t you ever do that again without my permission”.
“You did it to me just now. You saw my brother."
I laughed. This was ridiculous; what was all this talk about powers and memories? I had always had special senses but to call them powers and abilities was blasphemous. I would hang or be subject to the same exposure Herena was condemned to if found guilty of sorcery.
“Stop worrying about whether you can trust me” he said. “I’ve told you, you can. I’m not one of your Defenders…the thought sickens me”.
No wonder he hadn’t thought it odd to talk to me in the library and had treated me (capture aside) as an equal. Maybe he was from another country where there were no Defenders.
I voiced this thought and he actually laughed.
“Auriana, I’ve come so much further than one of your countries – to find and rescue you. Your world – and by this phrase I mean your planet – is one of millions of worlds out there, millions, possibly billions. Some places are in different realities, different planes of existence. Some worlds are even in the same space, operating in the same time but completely unaware of each other – in different layers of reality!”
The Long Lost Page 5