Five: Out of the Pit (Five #2)

by Anderson, Holli

  “Thanks Heather. You’ve been a really big help to me. I really appreciate it. Is there anything I can do to repay you?” He smiled, and this time, it actually reached his eyes.

  I thought she was going to faint. Her face flushed red as she stared into his eyes, mesmerized. “Umm… I get off in a half hour. Maybe we could go get something to eat? Or some ice cream or something?” As an afterthought she added, “Your friend could come, too.”

  I shook my head. “Thanks for the invite, but my boyfriend is waiting for me to get back.”

  Alec perked up a little more. “Why don’t you and Johnny come with us? He never turns down an opportunity to eat ice cream.”

  He had a point. Johnathan never turned down any opportunity to eat—especially dessert. “I’ll ask him when I get back to the hotel. Where were you thinking of going? We could just meet you there.”

  Heather’s smile overtook her face and her eyes teared up a little. You’d have thought she just won the lottery or something. “Great. Awesome. Let’s meet in forty-five minutes at Coldstone. There’s one on University Parkway, do you know where that is?”

  “Yeah, I think we passed it on our way into town.” Alec winked at the unwitting young woman, and I rolled my eyes at him. “We’ll see ya there in forty-five minutes, then.”

  Wow. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a bigger smile on a girl’s face before. The corners of her mouth nearly reached her eyes. “Cool. See you then.”

  As we walked away from the hospital, looking for a place we could portal without being seen, I said, “Hmm. What about Mariah? She isn’t going to like you seeing someone else.”

  Alec shrugged. “I only met her like less than a week ago. We haven’t agreed on any exclusivity or anything.”

  I raised an eyebrow.

  “Hey,” he said. “There’s only one of me to go around and so many beautiful girls that should have the opportunity—no, no, the privilege—to go out with me. I would feel terribly guilty if I left one out.”

  “Whatever, Alice.” I shook my head.

  We found a copse of trees to hide in as we portalled back to the hotel.

  e portalled into the boys’ room, as we’d discussed doing earlier so we wouldn’t be seen by anyone. It would be quite difficult to explain to someone who saw us appear from nowhere.

  The first thing that made me aware something was amiss was Alec, sprawled on the floor next to me. I nearly joined him as my feet hit something slimy and slipped out from under me. On pure instinct I reached my hands out and grabbed the first thing they hit. Luckily, I stood right next to the dresser and I was able to grasp the edge to steady myself and prevent the inevitable fall.

  A quick look around the room showed a disaster. Joe was collapsed on one of the beds, obviously unconscious, face down, with a patch of sticky blood oozing from somewhere beneath his hair. Seth and Johnathan were on the other bed—covered with the Elvin net strung so tightly on top of them, the exposed areas of their skin protruded through the small openings like quilted toilet paper. Everything was covered with the slippery slime substance. Housekeeping is not going to like this.

  “Paige, watch out!” Johnathan yelled.

  I caught a glimpse of something moving wicked fast from between the beds as Alec slipped while trying to stand up, almost taking me down with him as he grabbed my arm. Using my shield bracelet, I threw up a shield between whatever the blurry, speedy object was, and Alec and me. The thing leaped and slammed into the shield with a sickening plop, then slid down the invisible wall, leaving a streak of slime hanging as if in midair. Before it could recover from its unfortunate encounter with the shield, I blasted it with a binding spell.

  I dropped the shield and looked down to inspect our now bound attacker. The creature was small, maybe two and a half feet from toes to head. The homely little thing reminded me of one of those hairless dogs—pink skin poked through small tufts of hair sporadically placed about its head and body. It wore a loin cloth of sorts, with a strap of leather tied around its waist like a belt. Elf-like ears covered two-thirds of the sides of its head. A hooked nose and toothless mouth reminded me of an elderly man’s face. Its only redeeming quality was its eyes. They were enormous. And the most beautiful—and unnatural—color of violet.

  “What are you?” I asked.

  Thin lips quivered and snot dripped from hairy nostrils. “An Imp m’lady. I’m an Imp. P… p… please. Lets me go. I sorry.”

  “A-hem.” Johnathan’s face was still squished against the net. “Ya wanna get us out of here before you interrogate that thing?”

  I couldn’t help but smile as I skated my way across the slime to figure out how to free them of the net. Alec joined me at the bedside. We soon figured out that just trying to lift it off them wasn’t going to work. It wouldn’t budge. “Imp,” I said. “Tell me how to free them of this net.”

  “For a reward, I will. What’s m’ reward?”

  I gave it the look—the one that all females have that lets boys and creatures alike know we mean business. “How about I won’t kill you for your transgressions. Is that reward enough?”

  The Imp half closed its eyelids and said under its breath, “She disn’t know what a reward is.” I had to force myself not to laugh as it tsk-ed and shook its head within the confines of the binding spell.

  “Tell me.”

  “I hasta’ do it. I hasta’ release it. Unbinds me and I’ll do it.” Huge eyes innocently stared at me.

  I had to stifle a laugh. “No. Tell me how to do it. I don’t trust you enough to let you loose.”

  The Imp sighed. “Fine. You must touch each a the corners and say ‘solutus’. That’s it. That’s all. Simple as slicin’ a sloop.”

  I had no idea what a sloop was, so I hoped it truly was simple. I did as he instructed, touching each corner of the net as I said the word and infused a bit of my magical will. As soon as I completed the process with the last corner, the net snapped into the air and folded into a square the size of a cell phone.

  Seth and Johnathan both sprang up off the bed and nearly fell as their feet slid out from under them on the slime covered floor. “I’m gonna’ kill that freaky little creep,” Seth seethed.

  I held a hand up. “No, Seth. I promised we wouldn’t kill it.”

  “You promised you wouldn’t kill it. I didn’t make any promises.”

  “Seth. It’s harmless now that it’s bound. Let’s give it a chance to explain itself,” I said. “John, tell him.”

  Johnathan shook his head. “That thing came out of nowhere and… did all this. It hurt Joe. Knocked him clean out. Made this slime. I think I’m with Seth on this one.”

  Halli had been in the other room during this whole ordeal. Her knock on the door averted our attention from the strange little creature.

  “Who’s there?” Alec asked.

  “Halli. What’s going on in there? Let me in.”

  Alec did a hockey player-like slide over to the door and let her in.

  She looked around the room, eyes widening as she took it all in—the slime covered floor, a bleeding Joe laid out on the bed, and lastly, the Imp, bound on the floor. It looked at her with those huge amethyst colored eyes. A look that would put any puppy to shame. Big eyes, tears forming in the bottom lid—it was too much for tender-hearted Halli to take.

  She gracefully made her way to the downed Imp and knelt in the goo next to it. “Ohh. You poor thing. Why did they bind you?”

  “You ‘r beautific, m’lady. Pretty as any I seen.” The Imp’s eyes were fastened to hers.

  Halli smiled. “What’s your name?”

  “M’ name is…”

  “No.” Joe moaned as he sat up.

  “Surpy,” finished the Imp with an ear to ear grin.

  Joe groaned. “Great. Just what we need.”

  “What?” Halli asked. “What are you talking about, Joe? I just asked his name.”

  “He’s an Imp, Halli. You just bound him to you. You never ask an Imp its name.�
�� Joe touched the back of his head gingerly and winced. He pulled his hand away and looked at the blood on his fingers. “If it gave you its true name…”

  “I did! I surely did m’lady. We ‘r bound. I will protect you and you ‘ll protect me. I love you m’Halli. I surely do.” He batted his eyelids at her.

  “What does that mean, exactly?” Halli directed her question to Joe.

  “It means what your friend there just said. You are bound to protect it and it is bound to protect you. It’ll remain with you until it’s bound to someone else.”

  “Great,” Seth said, slumping down onto the bed. “That means I can’t kill the stupid thing unless I want to tangle with Ninja Halli first.”

  “Dang it, Halli,” Johnathan growled. “Just what we don’t need is that annoying little creature hanging around.”

  “Sorry. I didn’t know. We’ll just have to find someone else to bind with it, I guess.”

  The binding spell was wearing off. The Imp rose to a sitting position. “No, m’Halli. I will stay with you forever. You ‘r beautiful.”

  “Great,” Halli said.

  I laughed. I couldn’t help it. It looked like we now had ourselves an Imp, whether we wanted one or not. “Well, let’s get this mess cleaned up. Alec, Johnathan, and I have a date in like thirty minutes.”

  “We do?” Johnathan asked.

  Alec and I explained our visit with his mom while we cleaned. The easiest way we found to clean up the slime was to dry it out with bursts of air, crunch it up, sweep the crumbs onto a pizza box and deposit the dried pieces into the garbage. The Imp, Surpy, tried to help, but mostly just got in Halli’s way as he followed and mimicked her every move. Telling her every few minutes how beautiful she was.

  Finally, Halli said, “Surpy. Sit down in that chair over there and let us clean this up. You can tell us how you came to be here and why you were tormenting my friends.”

  “Oh. M’Halli. I wasn’t tormenting them.” He grunted as he climbed into the chair. “I was just obeying my bond. Ilindra, the Faerie Queen, bound me to the net. I was trapped there, only to come out if the net was out of her possession for a set time. I was s’pose to bring it back to her. These Troll-baits… uh… I mean your friends… uh, wouldn’t lets me take it. So, I slimed ‘m. That’s the only spell I can do.” He shook his big-eared head. “Well, and I activated the net. I did that, too.”

  “And knocked Joe on the back of the head with an alarm clock. Don’t forget that, Imp.” Seth glared at Surpy.

  Surpy ducked his head. “Yes, yes. I did that, too. Sorry, Joe. I’m sorry. You scared me. Is very distressful-ing to pop out of a bounding and see a big head right there.”

  “Yes, I can imagine it is,” Joe said.

  Alec, Johnathan, and I portalled to an area as near the ice cream place as we dared and then walked the rest of the way. Seth, Halli, and Joe decided to go out, too. They headed off in a different direction than us, seeking dessert as well.

  Heather waited just inside the door of Cold Stone as we arrived. Alec surprised me when he picked her up in a big bear hug and swung her around like she was a long lost friend instead of a virtual stranger we’d just seen less than an hour ago. He introduced her to Johnathan before saying, “Thank you, Heather, for all your help today. It was incredible to see my mom.”

  He kept an arm around her as we got in line. It amazed me how easy it seemed for him to act familiar with a girl. Johnathan and I had taken months to let each other know how we felt.

  Her smile was so big I thought her face might crack. “You’re welcome. Thanks for meeting me here. I’m sorry you had to witness a patient’s death. That isn’t something that happens very often there. It was so totally bizarre. He’d been acting strange ever since waking up this morning, so I guess I’m really not too surprised.”

  “Strange how?” I asked.

  “Well, usually he talked to everyone. He didn’t always make sense, but he talked and said ‘hi’ to everyone, making the rounds. One of the aids said that today he stood in a corner and just watched everyone. He didn’t say a word. His eyes looked weird, too, she said. Disconnected like.”

  “You must see a lot of disconnected looks there,” Alec remarked. “It is a mental facility.”

  She laughed. “Well, yeah, I guess we do. But not George. His eyes were always focused even if his brain wasn’t.”

  We ordered and sat down with our ice cream.

  Johnathan asked, “Does Natalie freak out like that very often? I mean, are there certain patients there that set her off?”

  I had to admit that was a good question I hadn’t thought of asking.

  Heather looked at Alec, as if to seek his permission before answering.

  “Yeah, who else sets her off?” Alec asked.

  “Well, not any patients that I know of right now—other than George, but that was just today, before this evening she was fine around him. There have been some in the past that they’ve had to separate her from completely. The funny thing is, those patients have always, without fail, turned out to be trouble in one way or another. They’ve all either been moved to a different, higher security, facility, or, they’ve been relegated to seclusion indefinitely. She has a sense for trouble that’s for sure. We’ve talked about it before in staff meetings.”

  “You said no patients set her off right now…” I prompted.

  “Yeah. No patients. But, there are a couple of staff members who can’t go anywhere near her. They’ve had to be reassigned to another ward, even.”

  “Hmm. Doesn’t that set off some red flags?” said Johnathan. “I mean, you just said she has the ability to pick out the ‘bad’ patients, the ones who cause trouble. What about the staff members?”

  “I don’t know. I guess it should be a red flag. But I don’t really think anyone takes her too seriously. It’s more of a… a joke, I guess.”

  “Maybe we should check out these staff members,” Johnathan said to Alec.

  Heather looked at him with raised eyebrows. “Why would you want to check them out?”

  Johnathan choked on his ice cream. “I… well… I don’t really mean we should. I just think maybe someone should, you know, because of Natalie’s track record.”

  “Yeah… maybe,” Heather said uncertainly.

  “Do you know them?” I asked, butting in to take the heat off Johnathan. “The staff members that set Natalie off? Do they still work there?”

  She scrunched her eyebrows together and chewed on her bottom lip, turning to Alec for help. He turned on the charm, taking ahold of her hand on top of the table. The physical contact appeared to make his charm work even better. He smiled and said, “We’re just curious. You can tell us about them. It isn’t like we know who they are or will ever even see them. We aren’t even from here, you know.” I could feel the familiar push of his spell.

  Heather smiled and proceeded to spill her guts. “Okay. You’re right, of course, Alec. There are only two that still work there. One of them is a housekeeper. His first day there, when Natalie saw him, she dropped the books she was carrying and backed up, crying. When her back touched the wall, she sat down and hid her head in her arms. The nurses had to practically carry her back to her room and sedate her to get her to stop shaking and crying. It happened again the next day only this time she screamed when he came toward her. They moved him to another wing after that.”

  “What does he look like?” I asked. “I’m just curious to see if there’s a resemblance between the people that set her off.”

  “There doesn’t seem to be. This guy, his name’s Carl. He’s huge, like six foot ten or so. He has to duck to get through some of the doorways. He’s… well… quite unattractive. His skin is pitted, he has a big nose, deep set eyes and a long, bushy beard. They moved him over to the medium security wing, but he’s still in our building. I see him sometimes when I’m clocking out and he’s clocking in.”

  “Does he scare you?” I asked.

  “No. Well, maybe a little
. I think it’s just because he’s so dang big. And he has a speech impediment. It’s hard to understand him when he speaks.”

  “Who’s the other one?” Alec asked, still holding her hand.

  She smiled, eyes partially glazed over. I don’t think she was even aware she was spilling her guts. “Oh, Tiffany. She isn’t scary at all, though. She’s a social worker who was assigned to Natalie’s team. The story is that the first time she walked into a session with her, Natalie screamed, ‘Demon! Get it away from me!’”

  “What was this social worker’s reaction?” Johnathan leaned forward in his chair.

  Heather laughed. “Jason said she had a look of shock on her face first and then she smiled. He said it was kind of weird, not the reaction he expected at all, because then she leaned toward Natalie and whispered something. Jason was holding onto Natalie’s arm at this point and he swears Tiffany said, ‘how did you know?’”

  “Seriously?” Alec asked. “What did my mom do?”

  “She jerked her arm away from the other nurse and scratched the crap out of Tiffany’s face. Jason swears Tiffany didn’t even flinch. She just nodded and walked out of the room with a strange smile on her face.”

  “And, this Tiffany still works there, you say?” Alec asked.

  “Yeah. She’s over with the non-forensic patients now, I guess. I never see her except in the parking lot sometimes. She’s usually just getting there as I’m leaving at night. She’s hard to miss with her bleached blonde, curly hair flying all over.”

  I had a sudden thought. “How is Natalie at night? She’s locked in her room, right? So it would be hard for… someone to get to her?”

  Heather cocked her head to the side, speaking slowly as if in thought. “Yesss. All the forensic patients’ doors are locked at night. I’ve heard that Natalie quite often has what they call ‘night terrors’ where she totally freaks out and they have to heavily sedate her. Last week, the night nurse said she found her door unlocked even though she and the security guard had checked it earlier.”

  Alec and I looked at each other.