by Bella Abbott
He pulled his cell from his pocket, pressed a speed dial key, and raised it to his ear. A moment later his expression softened a fraction.
“Did you feel it?” he said into the phone. He listened and nodded once. “Do what you think is best. But if they got Carl, then they’re onto…they might know about the gathering.” He listened some more. “I’ll wait until I hear from you,” he said, and disconnected.
“Christina?” I asked.
He nodded and dialed another number, but got no answer. When the call went to voicemail, he thumbed the phone off and removed the battery with a few deft moves.
“In case they can track it. I don’t think they can, but if they have Carl’s phone, anything’s possible.”
I eyed him with concern. “You’re absolutely sure? This couldn’t be some kind of mistake?”
His expression hardened again. “I’m sure.” He took my hand. “Come on. I want to stay on the move.”
I didn’t resist, and he led me down a long tree-lined block to the seer’s house. This time when he knocked, a voice called from within, and moments later a woman who looked to be in her seventies with her hair in a bun peered at us over the rims of round steel spectacles. She spent a few seconds looking at me and then turned her attention to Jared.
“What brings you to me, night stalker?” she asked, her voice low and heavily accented – Russian, as far as I could tell.
“I’m in need of your services, Mother.”
“You bring this one to my abode?” She narrowed her eyes at me and then shifted her attention back to Jared. “What game is this?”
“No trick. We need answers that are buried in her past, and we have too little time.”
“Answers?” she hissed. “You must know the answers to any questions I could ask. Your kind always does.”
“I need you to help her remember. A past from long ago. Another life.”
The woman’s demeanor changed, and her expression softened a little. “Does she know what you are? Have you explained the…the danger?”
I cleared my throat. “I’m right here, you know. And yes, I know everything. But this isn’t about him.”
The woman appraised me with eyes as black as coals. “Well, then. I am Madame Véronique. Come into my salon and we’ll see what we can learn.” She looked back at Jared. “This is neutral ground, you understand? No tricks.”
Jared nodded. “I mean you no harm, Mother. I know the rules.”
“See that you abide by them, traveler,” she warned with a dark look, and then motioned for us to enter. “This way. On the right.”
The salon was a medium-size room, its tall windows draped with crimson velvet curtains suspended from ornate brass rods by wooden rings. Madame Véronique – unlikely name for a Russian, I couldn’t help thinking – followed us in and gestured to a loveseat by the window. “Traveler, sit there.” She eyed me and pointed to an overstuffed easy chair that faced one just like it. “And you, my dear, take a seat here.”
I did as instructed, my stomach a knot from sudden nerves. I gave Jared a troubled glance, and he offered me a reassuring smile that looked strained – understandable, given that as far as we knew, one of his closest companions had just died.
Madame Véronique took a step toward me. “Now, before we begin, what’s your name, child?”
“Lacey,” I answered in a small voice.
She leaned over and patted my arm reassuringly. “Don’t worry, Lacey. This will be painless, and when it’s over, you will feel relaxed and refreshed, as though you’ve taken a long nap and had the deepest, most satisfying sleep ever.” She paused. “Are you nervous?”
“A little,” I admitted.
“There is no reason to be.” She lit a candle on the table between the chairs and then walked to the light switch and flicked it off. The room was plunged into darkness, the only light the flame in front of me. “There. That’s better,” she murmured. “Are you warm enough? Comfortable?” she asked, moving to the chair opposite me and lowering herself into it.
“Sure. Everything’s fine.”
“Perfect. Now, what we’re going to do, Lacey, is hypnotize you so you can access your deepest memories.”
I pursed my lips. Everything I’d read in psychology about hypnosis was inconclusive at best. My skepticism must have shown, because Madame Véronique offered a smile that reminded me of a moray eel at feeding time.
“Not ordinary hypnosis, Lacey. What I do is…special. You don’t have to believe it works. You don’t have to do anything but follow my voice and do as I ask. Do you understand?”
The word special made me giggle nervously, but I nodded. “Sorry.”
Madame Véronique gave me a doubtful look. “Very well. Look into the candle’s flame, Lacey. Watch it carefully. In a still room, it appears to be motionless, yet it is anything but. Gaze deeply into it, and let it be your guide.” She paused for several seconds. “Now, Lacey, I want you to keep watching the flame, but as you do, I want you to repeat a word in your mind. Over and over, at the same tempo I’m speaking, but ever softer each time. The word is Noram. Repeat it to yourself in the deepest recesses of your mind, over and over and over and over. Noram. Noram. Noram.”
I did as she requested, repeating the odd word internally as she said it softer and softer, until it was just me. Madame Véronique sat motionless, her eyes also focused on the flame. After countless repetitions, I began to feel sleepy, and my eyelids began to droop. I continued repeating it, and then Madame Véronique spoke, her voice soft as a lover’s whisper, encouraging me to close my eyes and continue my inner repetition.
I did so, and my limbs grew heavy as I sensed myself going deeper and deeper into a trance, as if my consciousness were following the word down into some unplumbed depth of my soul. I had an odd feeling of weightlessness and of rotating within my head, as though my mind were detached from my body and floating free, with no sense of up or down, left or right. When Madame Véronique spoke again, her voice was like a shadow at the edge of my awareness, barely audible to me in my deeply relaxed state.
I stopped being consciously aware of what she was saying or what I was feeling; I was now in a vacuum where nothing could reach me, enveloped in warmth and well-being. Some part of me realized that I was revisiting my time in the womb, but the thought was fuzzy and distant, an inconsequential flitting idea that came and went without stirring me from the absolute peace and calm I felt.
I continued to enjoy the weightlessness and tranquility, and then something flickered in the darkness that surrounded me, like a distant star. I felt my spirit rushing toward it, even as a part of me fought unsuccessfully to stay wherever I was.
Then, suddenly, I was beneath the stormy sky of my nightmare – only there was none of the usual terror that accompanied it, just total peace, as though I were watching the scene as an observer instead of a participant. Just as quickly, I transitioned to another scene, this time in a massive hall with polished marble floors, dancing to a minuet, wearing a long, flowing ball gown, swirling around and around with a partner in a Victorian suit. I looked up to see who it was, and vivid blue eyes held mine with rapt adoration. I gasped in my dream, and my vision expanded to reveal the figure’s identity.
Jared held me in his arms as we spun, impossibly handsome, his hair slicked back and longish, but unmistakably him. I tried to speak, to call out to him, but I couldn’t – I was a spectator rather than actively in the scene, able to watch but unable to control anything else.
A shift, and the surroundings dimmed, and then it was just Jared and me, he lying on disheveled sheets and I with my head on his naked chest as he stroked my hair in a room with a thousand candles. I traced a finger down his rib cage and across his washboard abdomen, and then raked long nails across his stomach, to his delight. I felt myself glowing, my entire body vibrating with an energy I’d never experienced before, as though connected to him at a cosmic level, the two of us one.
The scene shifted again, and I was ridi
ng a black stallion into a forest at night, a stippling of stars overhead and a tangerine harvest moon’s glow illuminating the surroundings, the trees reaching into the dark sky like spectral limbs.
On and on came the visions, and then I drifted back into the comforting darkness and was again in my weightless state, floating peacefully without care.
When I opened my eyes, tears were streaming down my cheeks, though whether from joy or sorrow, I couldn’t tell. Madame Véronique’s face was a mask, inscrutable as a brick wall. Jared was standing by his chair, his expression radiating concern and the same unmistakable adoration as in my vision.
“Oh, Jared,” I cried, and anything else I was going to say was choked off by sobs. He rushed to me and took me in his arms and held me close, his scent ambrosia and his energy like a jolt of adrenaline. “It’s all true. All of it,” I finally managed, and he squeezed me tighter, as though to shield me from unseen harm.
“I know, Lacey. I know,” he whispered, his voice so soft I could barely make out the words.
I pulled away. “I’m ruining your shirt,” I said, snuffling and wiping away tears.
“I’ve got more.”
Madame Véronique rose and moved to the light switch. The room brightened, and Jared reached for his sunglasses. She stood for a moment, lost in thought, impossibly still, and then after a painfully long beat, fixed me with a penetrating stare.
“Remarkable,” she said. “Really remarkable. I’ve never heard of such a thing.”
“Reincarnation?” Jared asked.
She cocked her head and studied me like a lab specimen. “Past lives are common. This, though…I’ve never seen one of your kind brought back. Never.”
“How does this happen?” I asked, blotting my face with my sleeve, Jared’s arms still encircling me.
Madame Véronique gave me a grim smile. “If you think of time as a continuum, where the past and the present are just different directions on the same line, that offers a clue. And if you consider that everything contains the remnants of its interaction with everything else embedded in it as information, that explains yet more.”
That’s an explanation? Then why am I even more confused?
She went on, “It’s said that when a soul departs with unfinished business, it returns until it is able to complete its task, learn its lesson, and live out its destiny.” She hesitated. “Until now, I had always believed that his kind had no soul.”
It was Jared’s turn to smile sadly. “Then we all learned something today.”
Madame Véronique approached and took my hands in hers. “My child, this is a precious gift. Cherish it, guard it carefully, and do not take anything for granted.” She glanced up at Jared and then back to me. “You have returned to fulfill a destiny. But that is only one possible future out of many. Be wise in your choices, and know that no path is ever easy.”
Jared pulled me closer and nuzzled me. “Do you believe now?” he murmured.
I drew a deep breath and sighed. “How can I not?”
Jared released me and faced the seer. “Thank you. How much do I owe you?”
She named an astronomically high number. Jared didn’t blink. He pulled his wad of hundreds from his jacket, counted off several thousand dollars, and set them on the table by the candle. “Not a word of this to anyone, Mother, or I will return to settle the score,” he warned. “You must abide by the rules, too.”
“You don’t have to remind me,” she snapped, and then her eyes narrowed to slits. “Be careful, traveler. I sense your future is also uncertain.”
He shrugged. “As always, Mother. It is my curse.”
Jared led me from the salon, and we walked slowly up the drive. It might have been my imagination, but everything seemed more brilliant – the azure sky more dazzling than ever, the green of the trees vibrant as neon. I told Jared as much as I could about the visions I’d seen, finishing with my ride into the forest.
He frowned at my last words. “That must have been when you were made. You were hunted by one of the most powerful and oldest of your clan.”
“I was? Why?”
“Your beauty must have captured his attention. When it was still permitted for us to hunt and to make new vampires, it was common to select only the very best.”
“Was that how you were picked?” I asked.
“No. I was a special case. My maker came across me after a carriage accident. My back was broken, and my life was slipping away. For me, the curse came as a gift. For you, though…you had your entire life ahead of you.”
The image of his naked body lingered in my imagination. “We were lovers, Jared,” I whispered.
“I remember like it was yesterday, Lacey. Believe me.”
I took his hand. “I didn’t know…special people…could…you know.”
“I’ll answer any questions you have.”
I wanted to tell him he could show me, but I didn’t. “Everything seems more alive now, after Madame Véronique,” I said. “That’s a little weird, isn’t it?”
“Not really. By recalling the past, you might have somehow activated the part of your brain that can sense things differently. I’m not sure of the physiology, but even after you become…special…it’s still the same basic structure. You just use more of it, and different areas, I suppose.” He glanced around. “Do you know what I’m thinking?”
“Um…no.”
“I mean, can you read my thoughts?”
I stopped, closed my eyes, and tried to concentrate, but drew a blank. I opened them to find him watching me closely.
“Well?” he asked.
I shook my head. “Nothing.”
He smirked. “You couldn’t before, either. Although you could intuit future events sometimes.”
I swatted his arm again. “Why are you like this? I just went through an emotionally traumatic event. Show some sensitivity, would you?”
We both smiled. Apparently he could read me well enough to see I wasn’t being entirely serious, either.
“Sorry,” he said, and looked down the street. “I’m going to have to do something about the car, or it could lead them right to me.”
“Which raises the question of what we do next, doesn’t it?”
He nodded. “It does.”
I snuck a look at his profile, the sun kissing his pale skin, his hair tousled like he’d just awakened. The vision of him lying on the bed with my chest on his head sprang to mind unbidden, and this time I didn’t push it away. In a past life, Jared had been my everything, and I his. No matter how things turned out, nothing could take that memory away from me.
And a growing part of me wanted it again. This time…forever.
Which raised more problems.
But it was still how I felt. Like I’d been robbed of something precious, but then been gifted a second chance.
I thought about the seer’s parting words to me and shivered, even though it was mild out.
Jared glanced at me. “You okay?”
I smiled at the memory of his abs and his delight at my nails teasing his skin.
“Never better.”
Chapter 23
Jared and I held hands as he navigated the road from Bar Harbor. The Porsche purred along quietly, with Jared driving at a sane speed. My thoughts were a cyclone of conflicting emotions as I processed the events at Madame Véronique’s house. I had no doubt anymore that Jared was correct about my prior life, but I wasn’t sure what to do now that I had all the information. Only a few days earlier I had been on a well-considered academic path, and within a matter of hours, the rug had been jerked from under me, and I was afloat in a tumultuous sea.
“So what now?” I asked.
“I need to call Christina. We have an appearance scheduled for tomorrow morning in New York, and I want to see if I can cancel.” He hesitated. “And I need to know if she’s been able to find out…anything about Carl.”
“Go ahead,” I said, and reluctantly let him have his hand back. He reconnected t
he battery and assembled the phone while steering with his knee on the wheel, and dialed Christina. When she answered, they kept the conversation brief, and at one point he turned to me and smiled.
“You up for a plane ride?” he asked.
My eyes widened. “I…I guess so.”
He returned to the call and, when he hung up, eyed the dash clock. “We have four hours to get to the airport. Christina will charter a plane to take us to New York.”
“Is that…is it smart to do an appearance if hunters are after you?” I asked.
He shrugged. “There’s almost no risk. It hasn’t been announced. I just drop in at the studio and borrow a guitar, sing a song, do a short interview, and then I’m gone.” He grinned. “Besides, I’m not sure hiding is such a great idea. They have no idea I’m onto them right now. If I stop showing up for shooting or cancel events, I lose that element of surprise.”
“What about the tracking chip? They’ll figure out you found it.”
“Not necessarily. The car was hit pretty hard. It’s just as likely that it was knocked loose and fell out on the road.”
I frowned. “Yet I still can’t go back to the dorm?”
Jared matched my scowl. “That would be a bad idea, Lacey. I can’t take the risk with you. I’ve already lost you once. I won’t let it happen again.”
“So…what? I hide in hotels or something? What about classes?”
He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. “Let’s cross that bridge when we come to it, okay? It’s Saturday. We don’t have to worry until Monday. And you can always be sick for a day or two.”
“I told you I’m on a scholarship…”
“I haven’t forgotten. But Lacey…surely learning the truth about your past changes everything, doesn’t it?” He gave me a sidelong glance. “You aren’t who you thought you were.”
He was right, but acknowledging it threw me off balance. It was all overwhelming and too new, and I said as much. “I need some time to work through all this, Jared. I mean, I just learned you’re a vampire last night, and now I find out I was one…and that I’m reincarnated. Or something. It’s a lot to handle, you know?”