Atlantis Reborn

by Gloria Craw

  Valentine shook his head as they continued past me. “I don’t know,” he said, “but I can’t shake the feeling she’s going to cause trouble.”

  “I suppose we’ll see,” Helen replied.

  “Just promise me you won’t say anything about the offer until we have our proof,” Valentine insisted.

  “Oh, all right,” Helen responded. “I promise.”

  The sound of their voices faded until I couldn’t make out the words anymore.

  I stayed in my hiding place until I was sure they were too far away to see me and then walked to a sun-warmed rock to sit down. My heart was still pounding, and my head was swimming. My mother wanted me to know the Vasitass chiefs were going to present an offer of some kind at the roundtable meeting. Whatever it was had moral implications. I translated that to mean bad consequences for someone or something.

  I blew out a long breath. If I were a betting girl, I would have wagered the house that I’d soon be sticking my neck out to stop the other chiefs from taking the Vasitass up on their offer.

  Chapter Six

  I looked through the clothes Katherine helped me pick out three times before deciding simple would be best and put on a white button-up shirt with a pair of plain black pants.

  My mouth dropped open when I caught a glimpse of myself in the full-length mirror. Katherine knew what she was doing. The clothes that had seemed frumpy on the hangers looked…sort of great on me. The shirt was silk and cut to glide over my curves. Frankly, I didn’t know they existed up to that point. The pants were loose, but the smooth weight of the cloth pulled them taut over my butt. For the first time in my life, I looked like I had some shape instead of being a straight-up-and-down beanpole.

  I checked through my choice of shoes. At home, I’d owned a pair of Converse or Vans in almost every color. I bought those brands because they didn’t make me taller. At almost six feet, I figured I was tall enough. I’d tried explaining to Katherine that black Vans could look dressy, but she’d gone into a sputtering incoherent state at the notion. When she could form sentences again, she made me try on ballet flats, and I now owned three pairs.

  I chose the black ones and then opened the top drawer of the dresser, where I’d put a small velvet box. Getting it out, I opened the lid and smiled. A blue sapphire cut in the shape of a tear glistened and reflected the light.

  Ian gave the necklace to me as a birthday gift. I’d never thought of myself as one of those girls who had a thing for jewelry, but I loved the necklace almost to distraction. I hadn’t been able to wear it, though. It was obviously quite expensive, and I’d worried if my parent’s saw it, they’d make me give it back.

  Taking the necklace out, I put it around my neck and did the clasp. The jewel fell cool and light into the hollow of my neck…like a soft kiss.

  Sudden, hot tears filled my eyes, and I caught myself wondering what my mom would think if she could see me now. She was always on my case to wear nicer clothes. It would have made her happy to see me wear something other than a T-shirt and jeans. I sunk down on the bed, wondering why I never bought a fancier shirt or a dress just to please her. It would have been so easy to make her happy.

  Blinking tears back, I pinched the bridge of my nose and reminded myself that drowning in regret wouldn’t change anything. I made myself take some deep breaths and refocus. Then I got to my feet.

  I had work to do. I’d felt Helen and Valentine return to the Arx shortly after me. Valentine had gone off somewhere with the third Vasitass, but Helen was on the main level. I planned to find her, introduce myself, and strike up a conversation. If I could, I would steer it to the upcoming roundtable meeting. Helen was already dying to say something to someone about “the offer.” I’d give her as much encouragement as I could.

  I was just leaving my room when there was a knock on the suite door. Knowing it was Claire, I opened it with a smile of welcome. My face sort of froze that way as I looked at what she was holding…a tray about as big as she was with a crazy assortment of food on it.

  She’d brought me four different meals. There was a plate with fried eggs, hash browns, and three slices of bacon. Another with a BLT, onion rings, and coleslaw. A third was mounded with pancakes, and a fourth held two slices of olive-and-sausage pizza with breadsticks.

  “I thought you might be hungry,” she said.

  “I am,” I admitted, mentally adding but not this hungry.

  “I didn’t know what you liked,” she said, “so I brought you a bit of everything.”

  I took the heavy tray from her. “Thank you,” I replied. “I’m getting tired of my room, though. Do you mind if I take it down to the dining room to eat?”

  “Not at all,” she said with her small eyes shining. “I’ll show you the way.”

  I followed her toward the circular staircase, and she said, “The Vasitass chiefs flew in a day early. They brought their daughter, Rose, with them.”

  I nodded. “I felt them here earlier,” I remarked.

  “Be careful of Rose,” Claire whispered. “She has thorns.”

  I gave her a quick glance. “What does that mean?”

  “Oh…it will take about three sentences for you to figure that out,” she replied. “Watch what you say around her mother, Helen. That woman breathes gossip. Don’t tell her anything you don’t want the world to know and believe only half of what she says. The other half is probably something she invented to make the story more interesting.”

  I chuckled. “Thanks for the warning.”

  She gave me a conspiratorial wink. “Valentine is a good sort. He has more sense than both of them put together. It’s a shame they’ve got him wrapped around their little fingers.”

  We reached the main floor, and Claire pointed to a set of open glass doors. “That’s the dining room,” she said. “Helen is having coffee in there now. I’d better warn Linda to be on her toes. Helen can be hard on the help sometimes.”

  Determined to learn as much as I could about being a clan chief, I gulped down my squeamishness over the blood-sucking security system and asked, “Can I see the Pradnium today?”

  “Sure,” Claire responded. “Find me when you’re finished eating, and I’ll take you down.”

  I walked into the dining room and saw a dewing I supposed was Helen reading a magazine at the end of a very long table. Her familiar voice echoed across the room to me, “My coffee is cold.”

  I walked forward, wondering if I should offer her my condolences or something.

  “Refresh my cup,” she said haughtily.

  Surprised, I drew up short and put my heavily laden tray on the table.

  “Are you deaf?” she asked still not looking up from her magazine. “It’s not rocket science. You pour hot coffee from the pot into the cold coffee in my cup…thereby warming it up.”

  That’s when I realized she thought I was part of the human staff. Probably the unfortunate Linda whom Claire had gone to warn.

  “What sort of people is Claire hiring these days?” she grumbled.

  A steaming pot of coffee had been left on the table near her, but apparently she was too high and mighty to lift it herself. Deciding I’d play along, I filled her cup to the brim.

  My dad once told me you could tell a lot about people by the way they treated the service staff. If that was the case, Helen was arrogant and demanding. After the conversation I’d heard on the beach, I didn’t expect to like her, but I suddenly detested her.

  “You filled it too high,” she grumbled. “Now I have to…”

  Her words died away when she looked at me. I’d been told more than once that I had my mother’s eyes. The pale-gray color was quite distinctive. I got a bit of satisfaction from how embarrassed Helen appeared when she figured out whom she’d been talking to.

  “You’re the Laurel,” she said, rearranging her expression to smile at me.

  “Alison,” I replied. “You must be Helen Vasitass.”

  “I am,” she replied.

  Hoping I
was hiding my dislike, I asked in a friendly way, “Would you mind if I sit?”

  She motioned toward the chair to her right. “Of course, dear.”

  The way she said “dear” was laden with condescension.

  I took a mental snapshot of her as I moved the tray and sat down. She had short blond hair, reddish-brown eyes, and eyebrows so light they were barely visible. She reminded me of a ferret.

  I caught her staring at my tray with something between amazement and disgust.

  “I don’t plan to eat all of this,” I explained. “Claire wasn’t sure what I liked, so she brought me a variety.”

  Helen nodded. “Claire is a doll, isn’t she? Quite a little mother hen.” She leaned back in her chair and sipped her coffee while I moved the plate of pancakes front and center, and then poured syrup over them.

  “I didn’t expect to meet you until the Thanes arrived,” she commented. “I heard you were living with them.”

  I popped a bit of pancake in my mouth.

  Spencer and Katherine had circulated a story that was close to the truth. They told the other chiefs I’d grown up in the foster care system in Boston and that they believed my parents left me with social services in hopes of hiding me from Sebastian when they were running from him. Spencer claimed he’d come across some documents in my family’s estate papers that helped him find me. Then he and Katherine took me back to Vegas to live with them. Theron had hacked into the social services system in Connecticut and created a background complete with medical and school records to firm up the story.

  After swallowing my bite, I said, “They had some business to finish, so I came ahead.”

  “I hope they bring their son,” she remarked. “He’s such a good-looking boy.” She sort of twittered. “He’s always had quite a thing for my daughter, Rose.”

  I nearly laughed out loud. Ian had never mentioned, Rose. Anyway, it was usually the other way around. Rose probably had a thing for him. I dabbed my mouth with a napkin and tried to humor Helen with a polite smile.

  Maybe it didn’t come off as convincing as I hoped because she watched me over the rim of her cup as she sipped her coffee. “I was just telling Valentine how stressful this all must be for you,” she remarked. “I can hardly imagine it myself. To suddenly learn you’re not even human and then be plunged into the responsibility of a clan chief. It must be overwhelming.”

  She was inviting me to confide all my worries to her. Remembering Claire’s warning about gossip, I gave a little shrug and downplayed everything. “It was weird in the beginning,” I said, “but I always knew I was different, so it was a relief to finally understand why. I wouldn’t say I feel overwhelmed. I’m looking forward to being a clan chief.”

  I saw a flash of disappointment in her eyes. I wasn’t the lost and nervous girl she’d expected me to be. That didn’t stop her from attempting to put me in my place anyway.

  She sighed dramatically. “There’s a great deal to know,” she said. “Which is why none of us expect much from you for the first few years. You can just listen and learn.”

  I put another piece of pancake in my mouth but hardly tasted it as I chewed. Even if I hadn’t overheard her on the beach, the condescension she oozed would have made me furious. She wanted me to feel inferior, keep my mouth shut, and my opinions to myself.

  I drank some orange juice so I wouldn’t tell her she was the last person I’d listen and learn from.

  She kept right on pushing my buttons.

  “I was surprised to learn Lillian Vasitass would be one of your witnesses,” she commented. “Did you know Lillian went rogue over a hundred years ago?”

  I did know. I wasn’t clear on the details, but something awful had happed and Lillian broke all contact with her clan.

  When I didn’t respond, Helen continued: “We were friends once, so it broke my heart to learn Lillian had become so antisocial. Poor thing. Surely Katherine could have suggested someone better suited to be your witness.”

  Lillian had started out as my boss at the Shadow Box, but she’d become like family to me. I didn’t care that she’d gone rouge or that she’d become socially awkward. I wouldn’t have traded her out for anyone else.

  “I’m happy with my choice,” I replied before shoving another bite of pancake in my mouth.

  If all the Vasitass were like Helen, I probably would have gone rouge, too.

  “Who is your other witness?” she asked a little too innocently.

  “Theron Falco,” I replied, figuring she knew that already.

  She clicked her tongue to make a disapproving noise. “A dewing without joining,” she mused. “Such a shame when that happens.”

  I was two seconds away from “accidentally” pouring the rest of my syrup in her lap when another Vasitass walked in.

  “This is my daughter, Rose,” Helen said. “Rose, this is Alison.”

  The girl was a couple of years younger than me and had the same reddish-brown eyes and invisible eyebrows as her mother.

  Rose looked me over. “You’re not what I expected at all,” she said.

  Her upper lip curled back in a universal expression of you’re not worthy to breathe the same air as me. Claire was right. She did have thorns.

  “Did you expect me to be younger?” I asked, faking an amused smile.

  “Everyone is always talking about how beautiful your mother was,” she said. “I expected you to be prettier.”

  Helen blushed. “Alison is quite striking, dear.”

  “It’s freaky that you don’t have a signature,” the girl continued unfazed.

  “You know what’s even freakier?” I asked. “I could be standing right behind you, and you’d never know I was there. I promise not to say ‘boo.’”

  Helen laughed a little, but her eyes had become wary. Rose’s lip uncurled. “We have to go, Mom,” she said. “Dad is going to meet us at the car.”

  Helen checked her watch. “He can wait a few minutes. Sit down with us, and we’ll chat.”

  Rose looked at the ceiling and groaned. “This place gives me the creeps, Mom,” she grouched. “Dad is taking me to the surf shop. If you don’t hurry, I’ll make him leave without you.”

  She turned on her heals and stomped out of the room.

  I almost felt bad for Helen. Her daughter was a brat.

  “Rose can be temperamental at times,” Helen said with another blush. “She’s right, though. I have to go. Valentine and I have our own place in town, so I probably won’t see you until tomorrow at the reporting ceremony.”

  She’d surprised me. I thought all the clan chiefs stayed at the Arx. But I nodded and smiled politely as she got up.

  “I look forward to seeing you then,” I said.

  “Same here, dear,” she replied, hurrying out to join Rose with thorns.

  I picked at my pancakes until I couldn’t sense the Vasitass signatures anymore. Then I gave up and dropped my fork on the plate. The resulting clatter echoed through the room.

  It hadn’t been pleasant, but my talk with Helen had been enlightening. Not only did she think I was incompetent, she wanted me to know my place, and she believed my witnesses were defective. I made a growling noise in my throat. The worst part was that I’d let her get the best of me.

  Her condescension and barbed remarks had thrown me off. I’d let her drive the conversation when I could have been getting information I wanted instead. The next time would be different, though. I wasn’t going to wait for Helen and Valentine to unveil their secret.

  Using my joining on other dewing was difficult. I had to be careful how I did it, too. Unlike humans, they’d know it if I put a blatantly foreign thought in their mind. I had to work with the flow of what they were already thinking or they’d figure out I was messing with them.

  I’d look for another opportunity to talk to Helen, and when it came, I’d bring up the roundtable meeting and thoughtmake her into telling me about “the offer.”

  Chapter Seven

  When I
took my tray back to the kitchen, Claire was chopping onions and putting them into one of the three pots boiling on the stove. “I’m sorry, Alison,” she said. “Linda went home sick, so I have to do the cooking myself. I’m afraid I won’t be able to show you the Pradnium after all.”

  “I can help you,” I offered.

  She shook her head. “Thank you for the offer, but it would take longer to explain the recipes than do the work myself.”

  Logan came strolling in. His cheeks and the end of his nose were red with cold. “The weather’s turning again,” he said as he hung his coat on a hook. “We’re in for a deep chill, more wind, and probably two to three inches of rain.”

  “I hope it doesn’t delay any of the chiefs’ flights,” Claire mentioned.

  My heart skipped a beat. I hoped not, too. Ian and his parents were supposed to arrive the next day.

  “What are you up to today, Alison?” Logan asked, his dark eyes sparkling with good nature.

  “I was going to take her to the Pradnium,” Claire answered for me, “but now I’m up to my neck in food.”

  “I’ve got a few minutes to spare,” he said, giving me a wink. “I’ll take you down.”

  Claire was so busy chopping and stirring I wasn’t sure she noticed us leave.

  I followed Logan across the foyer and into another white room. “They call this the sitting room,” he said with a chuckle. “Probably because of all the chairs.”

  Straight-backed chairs lined three walls, and a grand piano was centered in front of the fourth. “You’ll want to see this,” he said, motioning for me to follow him to the piano. He lifted the cover off the keys and positioned his fingers on three of them. When he pushed them down, a chord played and he winced. Then he held his middle finger out to show me a pinprick and the drop of blood oozing out.

  “Looks like a piano, stings like a bee,” he said. “Our state-of-the-art security system.”

  I searched for signs of blood on the keys or an opening where the needle would have come out. There was nothing to see.