by T. G. Ayer
Now she hurried through the hall toward her mother’s office, feeling a slight twinge in her knee as well as her shoulder. Though Gianni had been kind enough to save her from death, he’d inflicted a few unnecessary injuries on her instead. Nothing that needed medication though. Not yet.
Vee ventured into her mother’s front office where Kesha—her personal assistant—stood, arms akimbo, staring down at a collection of plas readers that were spread across her desk. Devi and her team, which included Vee, had long ago gone the green route in that the entire building was run off solar power generated from the solar panels and blinds installed on every window in the building.
They were completely off the grid with only backup generators at the ready in case of a power failure. In addition, Devi had insisted they move away from paper, so staff no longer printed documents out on destroyed trees. Devi had been impressed by the plas reader tech, and now every staff member used plas readers to send files that in the past would have been printed on paper, whether for visual aid, or as a discussion or sharing point in meetings, or just to keep in a tray, the plas sheets had become such a commonality in the building and at home that seeing a sheet of paper sometimes offended Vee.
Kesha’s dense black curls hid her face as she studied the plas screens, but before Vee could call out to her, she looked up. With a welcome smile, she waved Vee inside.
Devi stood in front of her plasma screen, pausing and rewinding a video. She shut it off quickly as Vee walked deeper into the room. But not quickly enough. Vee had seen enough of the recording to know that her mother’s mind was still focused on the golem that had entered Vee’s lab and had attempted to kill her.
The lab surveillance had caught the entire thing on tape and Devi seemed to be studying for clues to…what? Vee would have to ask her at some point.
But Vee had come for an entirely different reason. She went to her mother, and they embraced. Vee kissed her mother’s cheek and smiled. Since the night that everything had changed in their lives, since her dad had been returned to them in exchange for Radhima’s life, since Mac had moved out of their home, since Vee had been bestowed with the trishula—not to mention having her wings reveal themselves—her relationship with her mother had changed.
A subtle difference—a tiny bit more affection, a kiss on the cheek, a touch on the arm, Devi straightening Vee’s hair—little things that had raised Vee’s awareness that she actually did have a mother capable of affection.
Vee smiled and then drew back. “You look tired, Mom.”
Devi smiled almost absently. “You look damaged, child.” She frowned as she studied Vee’s face, then traced a finger along the bruise on her daughter’s cheek. Vee smirked. “Wish I could say you should see the other guy.”
“What happened?”
“In the battle between Vee and the sidewalk, the sidewalk won.”
“You fell?” Her mother’s tone implied that she found that hard to believe.
Vee sighed. It wouldn’t pay to play games with her mother about what had happened. The woman had her ways and would find out eventually and then she’d nag Vee to death about not being told earlier. It was a lose-lose situation.
“Someone tried to run me over. A creeper detective shoved me to safety.”
Devi’s jaw dropped. “Please tell me they caught the asshole?”
Vee shook her head. “He’s the one that got away in this instance.”
“How the hell is that possible?”
“Cab was empty when the cops went over to check it out. Was only seconds after I was hit.”
“What are you saying? Demon attack?”
Vee nodded. “Yeah. Auras confirmed it. Besides, how else would the driver’s seat be empty within seconds of impact? The airbag would have hindered a quick escape. And even if you consider the vehicle being on autopilot, the seat held enough aural presence to confirm a demon did sit in it. Plus, the driver swerved to avoid hitting a parked truck.”
“Not something an autopilot would do,” Devi murmured.
“Still, it makes no sense. If you’re a demon and you want to kill me, won’t you use your super easy appearing-disappearing ability? A hit and jump would be more likely.”
“Someone trying to scare you?”
“Possible. But it would mean that someone has demons on their payroll.”
Vee rolled her eyes. Exactly what part of ‘the demons are out to kill me’ didn’t surprise her?
Chapter 17
Devi sighed and waved a hand at the double sofa seating arrangement in the corner of her office. Vee sank into the soft cushion and sighed with relief as she leaned her head onto the backrest.
“Sore?”
“Somewhat.”
“What drugs?” Devi asked.
“Nope. Not taken any yet.”
Devi brought Vee a glass of pomegranate juice, to which Vee responded with a wrinkle of her nose.
“You know I despise that stuff,” she said, making a face at the drink.
“Drink it. It’s good for you.”
“Sometimes I think mothers were invented to torment.”
“Ditto.”
Vee rolled her eyes, accepted the drink, and sipped. She swallowed and set the glass on the coffee table, careful to ensure she used one of the many coasters her mother had set around the room. The woman was totally OCD about watermarks on her furniture.
“So, I need to speak with you about something.”
“I knew this wasn’t a social visit,” Devi said, bringing her own glass with her and drinking. She took a seat beside Vee and set her drink on the coffee table before turning her attention her daughter.
“What is it?”
“It’s about Radhima.”
Devi’s mouth tightened, and her eyes glistened. The mention of her mother was enough to bring her back to the reality that the matriarch was gone.
“Are you finding it hard to cope, honey? Need to talk?”
Vee shook her head. “No. I mean yes.” Vee paused and took a breath. “I’m coping, but I need to ask you a sensitive question.”
“Okay,” Devi said carefully, her lip curving in an amused smile.
Vee cleared her throat. “So…I’m not sure how to approach this exactly but here goes.” Vee sat up and shifted to face her mother. “Was Radhima unhappy in her marriage?”
Devi’s face paled as she stared at Vee. It only took a second for her to shake her head. “Not that I know of. Why do you ask?”
Vee had never known she’d be able to tell off the bat when her mother was lying to her. But, Devi had this tiny little eye-twitch thing she did when she was being evasive or outright lying.
When had Vee gotten so good at reading her mother?
Vee let out a soft controlled breath. “Mom, you don’t have to lie to me, okay? I can take the truth. If they were unhappy, or if he was abusing her in any way, I can take it. I didn’t know Babaji, so you’re not going to be destroying any of my loving preconceived notions about the man.”
Devi’s eyes widened for a moment, and she played for time, reaching for her glass, sipping and wiping a droplet of condensation from the side of it carefully.
Then she sighed. “I think something happened that she wouldn’t speak of.”
“Liar,” said a voice beside Vee. Though the word was harsh, the tone was somewhat amused. Vee had to force herself not to turn and give Radhima’s ghost a warning glare.
She wasn’t sure she could talk to her mother about the issue if the ghost was sitting there listening to every word she said. A voice in Vee’s head reminded her that at least she’d made Vee aware she was there. She could just as easily not have manifested physically, and instead remained a silent voyeur—which would be all the more uncomfortable.
So she chose to ignore her grandmother and focus on her mother. “I don’t believe that, Mom. I know she told you at some point.”
Devi tilted her head and stared suspiciously at Vee. “So how do you know this?”
; “It doesn’t matter,” Vee waved her hand, then paused as she considered her reasons for not telling her mother the truth. It seemed strange that she was dealing with her own mother as if she were interrogating a suspect. She let out a sigh. “Okay. You do need to know the truth. Radhima told me.”
“What?” Devi’s jaw dropped as she stared at her daughter, amusement catching the corners of her eyes.
“I’m not joking, Mom.”
Devi’s amusement fled then and then she sighed and got to her feet. She went to stand at the picture window, the light from beyond her revealing only her profile to Vee.
Her sigh was long and painful, her shoulders hunching over as she stared into a past filled with what Vee could only suspect were terrible memories.
“It’s not what you think. He didn’t beat her. At least not with his hands.”
Vee’s stomach tightened as her mother’s words drove a shard of horror into her heart.
“His words were his weapons, the insults, the demeaning way he spoke to her as if she wasn’t worth a damn, as if she had no rights, deserved nothing. I used to listen to him when he’d speak to her. He always used this almost-kind voice, as if he were disciplining a young child. ‘I’m only doing what’s good for you’.”
Devi let out a pained laugh that sounded a lot like a sob. Taking a shuddering breath, she continued, “She had no authority over anything. Not even my upbringing. My aunts—his sisters—were allowed more control over what I wore, where I went, and what my daily choices were. We’d always had that disconnect, and I think as a child I blamed her for not standing up to him.”
“Did he do that to you too?”
Devi nodded, her spine stiff. “To him, we were woman, chattels, things to control, to barter. And because I refused to bow to his will, he disowned me.”
“Oh. I had no idea.”
Devi shook her head and turned to look at Vee. “We never told anyone what happened. Mom and I left him and went into hiding with the Guild.”
“The guild?” Guild possibly meant there were many more apsaras out there than Vee had thought. Now Karan’s words made much more sense.
Her mother’s voice drew Vee’s attention back. “Yes. The Apsara guild. They’re an organization that looks after Apsaras in need.”
“I don’t get it,” said Vee, folding her arms around her waist. “For such a powerful supernatural race we seem to be pretty powerless. We need a guild to take care of things, to make the higher level decisions?”
Devi shook her head. “That’s where you’re wrong.”
“About what? Being powerless,” Vee smirked. “I can’t jump, I can’t fly—well not high enough that I’d be impressed.”
Devi sighed. “I mean that you are wrong about being supernatural—not that you’re right about the Guild either.” Devi ran her hands up and down her thighs, as if she didn’t know what to do with them and had to keep them moving. “Our familial line does not belong to the supernatural race. It’s a technicality, but the apsaras were heavenly winged warriors. The emphasis on heavenly.”
Vee frowned. “So what? We’re not supernatural, we’re divine?”
“Something like that. The race of the apsaras as we know it was one descended from the Sage Narada and the General of the Kings Guard, Tilotamma. That’s a blend of human, although an ascended spiritual human, and a divine creature.
“But because of the anomaly that meant not all descendants would receive the ability of the apsara, it meant that the powers were diluted and sometimes didn’t rear its head for generations. We lost our standing as a divine race. For years, the Guild sought to ensure we gathered and trained all the apsaras we could find who had any significant form of power. Latent and mild talents were also put to use. Latent and mild talents like mine.” Devi had the power to calm a person down, like a sponge, absorbing the stress and fear only to replace it with peace and tranquillity. Though she’d never talked openly about her powers in the past, since Vee’s dad had returned to them, she’d begun to mellow where her apsara ability came into play. Now she nodded, “Ma’s powers were much stronger, but she bound herself willingly.”
“She got her powers bound?” Vee couldn’t stop her outrage from filtering into her voice.
Devi shook her head. “No. The fear she experienced through her life, the sense of self-preservation she possessed, told her to hide her power. But your power, on the other hand, is explosive in comparison. You, your very existence is confirmation of who and what the apsara line truly is. Had our race continued to merely possess mild levels of power, you could have classed us as telepaths or telekinetics. Powers along those lines. But there isn’t anything supernatural about us.”
“So we get off on a technicality,” Vee muttered, still unsure how to process her mother’s revelations.
Devi gave Vee a quizzical look. “Until you,” she said softly. “You spelled change.”
Chapter 18
I still don’t understand what is so special about me. I don’t mean me Vee, but me special apsara.”
“Did you miss the part of the warriors of heaven?” Vee frowned at her mother’s words. “The apsaras were the royal guard. They protected Lord Shiva in his abode, and wherever else he went. They weren’t limited in their powers either. Everything you have and more.”
“The books imply there was a battle, after which the apsaras were ousted, and the gods began to disappear,” said Vee.
Devi nodded. “It’s more complicated than that, but that’s the gist of it.”
Vee stiffened. “Okay, wait. I thought you weren’t an apsara?”
Devi nodded. “I’m not truly one, but your grandmother was. My father found out about her heritage. I think Mom blamed herself for being careless. You’re not really meant to keep your identity from those you love. Just as the sage and the Apsara who began our line were very much in love, every Apsara hopes to have the same with their partner.
“But Mom knew from early on that he wouldn’t be receptive. But after I was born, the guild needed confirmation that I didn’t carry the gene. She’d assured them that I didn’t, but they insisted that they needed to test me for themselves. She should have arranged to see them out of the house, but she hadn’t counted on how suspicious he was. He’d set up secret security cameras and microphones around the house to watch her every move, and he’d heard everything she and the guild discussed.
“They told her that it was still possible that I’d come into my wings when I came of age and warned her to keep me safe either way because I carried the gene. They also asked if she still refused it bring her husband into the guild core, saying that all around support was important.
“He used that against her when he confronted her about it. Insisted she show him her wings.” Devi let out a hiccupping sob, and Vee felt sick. She knew what her mom was about to tell her.
“She showed him. In her terror they just revealed themselves. And he…he ripped them right off her shoulders.”
“She stayed with him after that?”
Vee’s ears were ringing, and she barely heard her mother’s response. “Yes. She stayed. The guild wanted to take her away, but she told them it wasn’t possible. He’d threatened to kill her if she ever left, but he also took steps to ensure people would not trust her. He had a psychiatrist friend declare her unfit to be alone with her child and brought his sisters into the house to watch over me instead. She was supervised at all times when she was with me.”
“This sounds like a bad Hollywood movie.”
Devi let out a harsh laugh. “Yes. It does. But her life…you just couldn’t make it up.”
“Why did she marry him in the first place?” asked Vee, still confused as to how an Apsara with such power could end up abused at the hands of a human.
“You have to understand something about the Apsara line. The power is extremely diluted. Wings, the power to fly, the power to read residual auras, fighting strength and skills…there is a list of them, all powers most Apsara have, some
in a combination of two of those abilities but that’s rare in itself. You are the rarest purist of them all. The only Apsara in history having all of those abilities together.
“Mom had a little bit of the aural reading, and she could read emotions very well. Perhaps that’s how she knew he was serious.”
“When did you know something was wrong? That she needed help.”
Beside her Radhima whispered, “Where exactly are you going with this?” Vee gave a slight shake of her head then stiffened. She probably looked like she had a tic or something.
Devi was speaking, and when Vee looked up, she found her mother staring at her, an odd expression on her face. “In my late teens. I’d been acting out, and we’d had an argument. Not that it could have gotten heated what with my aunts being in the room. To be honest, it was more me being frustrated that I couldn’t be with her in private, but I took it out on her.
“I later found her crying in the bathroom. I’d opened the door to see what was happening—perhaps I should have knocked, but stubborn teenagers rarely follow house rules. Ma was tending to a wound on her side, putting some a salve onto a bruise where the skin had broken. It was just on her ribs, at her back, a location that made me realize it had to have been inflicted by someone else. I had my suspicions, but I allowed myself to be side-tracked by first investigating my aunts. A sort of self-protection I guess.”
“Oh dear. I never knew she saw that,” whispered Radhima from my side. I glanced at her, sad for what she’d been through, sad that her daughter had seen her pain in its truest form.
When Vee looked back at Devi, she found her mother giving her that suspicious glance again. Vee threw a question at her quickly, realizing that she was getting too close to having to fess up. “I take it you found out it wasn’t them?”