Becomings Page 13

  “Don’t try,” she said.

  “I’m fine.” He got to his feet again, more slowly and deliberately this time. He swayed beside her, unsteady. “We don’t have the time.”

  “They’ll be looking for us.”

  “I’m thinking about him.” His face had regained a determined and steady look she remembered from their first meeting, his eyes bright and alert once more. “You helped me, Katharine. Now I’m gonna help you.”

  “I'm worried you're in no shape to fight,” Katharine said.

  “I've fought in every kind of shape there is,” Jake said. “Here's what we're gonna do.”

  * * * *

  KATHARINE WALKED with deliberate steps down the center of the street. As she took her measured paces, she kept her head up and her gaze fixed to no place in particular. She stopped only when he stepped out of the shadows near her sister’s house, fifty feet away.

  “You’ve come back,” Preston said. “That’s good. I was getting tired of waiting, Katharine. You recognize the choice you have?”

  “I do,” she said.

  She began to take careful steps backward as he approached her. She glanced to the window where Grace slept, and her vision blurred as she focused the way she had done earlier on this night. For several seconds, the dark stretch of midnight blue was warmed by a small figure lying in her bed. Katharine felt a wave of love that transformed her face. She breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

  She looked at him once more as he advanced, each step he took matched by one of her own, preserving the distance between them.

  “You're a pathetic creature that preys on others who are weaker,” she said in a low voice. “When I fled from your tonight, you came here rather than pursue me. My utter contempt for you is matched only by my belief in your cowardice.”

  “You'll regret those words,” he said softly. “And you will join me, in the end.”

  “Then try to catch me again, as you failed to do earlier tonight, and you'll have earned your prize. Because I'm not going to make it easy for you. Coward.”

  She turned and began to run. She heard his footsteps accelerate with a burst of speed as she raced away, not looking back. As she ran, her mind cleared, thinking only of what she must do, rather than focusing upon the rapid beat of steps that followed behind. Her cloak rippled behind her while she ran, captured by the wind that flowed past her ears.

  She turned, slowing enough to make her intentions clear and allowing him to gain just a little, to feel a sense that his quarry lay almost within his grasp. She slowed again on another turn down a narrow street, now tasting the sensation of triumph in his breath so close behind her. She bolted to the right even as she felt his fingers grasp the cloth of her sleeve. They headed toward the open entrance of a livery stable.

  As she raced into the dim space, she saw Jake rise up from beside the door, a shovel already sweeping in a wide arc that cut the air just behind her. A loud clang split the enclosed space, with a sharp sound of wood splintering. Katharine brought herself up short as she grasped a post to halt her momentum. She turned to see Preston stagger to his feet, his bloodied features distorted with rage.

  He fumbled for the revolver at his side. Jake slammed the shovel down hard on his hand before he could raise the gun, shattering the wooden handle and sending the blade flying off into the darkness, along with the pistol. Preston came up with his knife instead. He wiped blood dripping from a large gash in his forehead, and scowled.

  “You're tough. I'll give you that,” Jake said. He grasped the splintered shovel handle as he circled, his keen eyes assessing the exploratory motions Preston made with the Bowie knife as he flicked the blade toward Jake.

  Jake nodded, and then he dropped his arm low beside his body, the shovel handle loose in his grip. “Let's see what you've got.”

  Preston lunged forward. Jake pivoted sharply, blocking the knife with one arm while he swept his other arm up. He rammed the splintered handle into Preston’s gut, driving it upwards as hard as he could.

  For a frozen moment, Preston’s eyes reflected shocked disbelief, a question poised forever on his open lips. And then he collapsed into a spray of gray and formless ashes, scattering across the floor amid a heap of clothes.

  Jake tossed the handle aside and nudged the clothes with a foot. He glanced at Katharine, who stood behind him, her hand still holding onto the post.

  “Guess it didn’t take cutting his head off after all,” Jake said.

  * * * *

  KATHARINE STOOD, cloaked within the shadows, watching the solitary window. The glass was hidden behind a whitened shimmer of frost. But through it she could see the dim glow of light within, a promise of warmth that lay beyond the cold darkness.

  It was Christmas Eve, and the snowfall was waning, leaving behind a still and bitter chill that she barely acknowledged as she stood, boots half-buried in the snow. She breathed slowly, the air condensing before her face into tiny crystals she could taste against her lips. She felt the warmth of Jake’s hand on her shoulder as he stood close beside her.

  “What do you want to do?” he asked her in a quiet voice.

  She blinked away a few scattered snowflakes before answering. “It isn't about want I want anymore.”

  “I’m sorry, Katharine.” His arm wrapped around her in a close hug.

  “It will be all right,” she whispered, as if to herself. “Somehow.”

  The light in the window dimmed, flickering to darkness, leaving the frosted glass a mirror to the night. Katharine’s lips formed silent words of a prayer she had spoken each night with her daughter as they engaged in a cherished ritual together, their bond and a promise. The hushed murmur of wind seemed instead a low rustle of covers, with warmth beneath them found in a final brush of lips against a soft cheek.

  Katharine waited a long while, never moving, her eyes never leaving the window. At last, she sighed, a quiet sound that spoke of journeys whose ends one can never imagine, and lessons of acceptance of the moments in which one finds oneself.

  She walked with slow and measured steps, watching the window grow like a white portal that lay between her and all she had ever known. She found herself beside it now, and she stretched out her hand, finding the solid sense of it, hidden behind its shield of frost. She lowered her head, her hand resting in place, touching in her memories forever what she could no longer do in this life.

  After a long while, she let her hand fall, floating down beside her like the gossamer wings of a fairy. It rose again a moment later, a fragile shape now held preserved within her palm. She set it carefully onto the windowsill, nestled in a bower of snow. Then she turned and walked away.

  * * * *

  GRACE AWAKENED with the light of a clear Christmas morning streaming through her window. She blinked and turned her head, raising her arm to shield her eyes from the prism of light refracting through the crystalline glass. For a moment, she had a sense that she had been awakened by something else, a beloved memory that stretched back in time to each Christmas that had ever come before.

  She turned her head to look more closely, her eyes open now, and stared at the window. She barely noticed the blankets shift around her as her feet slipped to the floor, nor paid heed to the quiet creak of the floorboards that marked her passage across the room. Her hand stretched out, filling a small shape that fit within a larger pattern that had been molded into the ice on the other side. Her palm pressed against the cold glass. Her lips parted in awe, and her eyes closed.

  She stood there for a long time. In her mind, she imagined a warmth that held her hand as she ran, never too far away, and yet with just enough freedom that she could feel secure. When she took her hand away at last, she opened her eyes and saw through the cleared portion of the glass something that lay just outside.

  She worked her hands on the window, finding the latches and unlocking them, then lifted with her body. A crisp cold like a half-frozen stream flowed beneath the glass as she slowly raised it, wrapping her in a mo
mentary embrace before passing beyond. Her bare fingers reached out tentatively, afraid to touch what might be no more than a fragment of a waking dream, a last reluctant vestige of the night. Yet her hand closed around it, lifting it up and out of the cloud of whitened snow in which it rested.

  She opened her fingers and held it close before her eyes. She stared in wonder at what lay in her palm, an ethereal creature made real, a fairy whose delicate wings were spread just so, as though she had only now descended from flight.

  Grace reached up with her other hand and pulled down the window, latching it once more. For a moment, she saw the fairy illuminated from behind by the low sun, shining through a cleared portion of glass like a five-pointed star, a single handprint that seemed to promise now that she would forever be watched over.

  She turned and walked carefully to her bedside table, and then set the fairy down beside the other carving, of a rearing horse whose flaring tail spoke of its loyalty and untamed spirit. She watched them together, and saw the way they seemed to fit somehow, and smiled.

  * * * *

  KATHARINE CRADLED the head of the young woman who lay limply across the back seat of the car, her thoughts troubled as Jake steered the vehicle through nighttime Los Angeles traffic. She brushed away matted hair that was sticky with blood from the girl’s cheek. The girl’s skin felt cool beneath her hand, although it should have been as warm as her own.

  She stared down at the girl, caressing her cheek, watching the slow rise and fall of breath behind a deep and troubled slumber. “Malcolm should have stopped Jerome.”

  Jake cleared his throat. “Well, she gave back what she got. Jerome's not going to be walking for a couple nights.”

  “He almost killed her, kicking her like that.”

  Jake glanced in the mirror at her. “I'm sorry, Katharine.”

  “She's someone's daughter. I keep thinking about that.”

  He nodded, and slowed the car as he made a turn into the parking garage of the high-rise in the Westwood district of Los Angeles. He pulled into a parking place, coming to a gradual stop, and shut off the engine. He got out, glanced around, and then opened the back door.

  “I have her,” Katharine said.

  She lifted the girl in her arms and followed Jake to the stairwell that lay beside the elevator bank, a dim enclosed space whose dusty smell spoke of disuse. They climbed fifteen flights of stairs in silence. Jake preceded her into the hallway and down to their apartment.

  Once inside, he followed Katharine to the guest bedroom, where she laid the girl down carefully onto the bed. The girl’s limbs settled limply beside her. Only the muted sound of her breathing gave any sign that a stir of life still resided within her.

  Jake studied the girl, dark-haired and fair-skinned, captured forever now in the still-unfolding bloom of her early twenties. “You want any help setting that leg?”

  “No, I can manage.” She looked down at the girl, whose peaceful face belied the injuries she had endured on this night. “Whether or not she went willingly with that renegade, Jerome just made a bad situation worse.”

  “He's a problem, that's for sure. Someone should take that bastard out.”

  “As attractive as the idea might be, it would only cause problems we don't need right now. Malcolm will have to address him.”

  He sighed. “Yeah, well Malcolm won't.”

  He walked into the adjoining bathroom and retrieved a washcloth, wetting it beneath warm water from the faucet before returning. He handed it to Katharine.

  “Thank you, Jacob.”

  She began to gently clear away the mask of sticky and drying blood that covered the girl’s face. Only a few hours into her new life, the girl’s skin had not yet changed to absorb what lay upon it. As Katharine worked, the girl’s injuries became more clear, her body’s ability to heal overwhelmed by their extent.

  The girl’s lower lip was deeply lacerated from where Jerome had kicked her, and one eye had swollen shut around a fractured socket. Broken glass was embedded in her face and arms. Her eyelids twitched in sleep. Katharine wondered idly what it was she dreamed of, and whether she had managed to find any kind of peace from the nightmare in which she had become drawn tonight.

  Katharine looked up. “We’re going to have to feed her.”

  Jake nodded, and left the room.

  Katharine touched the girl’s temple with her fingertips, feeling a shift of bones beneath the thin and frail fabric of skin. She worked downward, her hands exploring with light pressure, finding the edges of broken ribs. A kneecap was dislocated and swollen below a hard knob of bone that pressed white against the skin. She took a breath, and then separated and reset the femur. She lifted each of the girl’s arms and examined them, noting the three crooked fingers of her left hand.

  Jake leaned in the doorway. “It's a surprise she could even fight Jerome in that condition.”

  “Jerome is responsible for some of this.”

  He nodded, his face showing compassion. “I know.”

  He walked into the room and began to set up a stand for an intravenous drip. Katharine was sitting quietly, staring at the girl. Her face was cleared of blood now, but very pale. It possessed a child’s sense of vulnerability, drawn behind a curtain of deep and uncertain sleep.

  He rested a hand on Katharine’s shoulder, giving it a brief squeeze. “Thinking about Grace?”

  “Yes.” She remained quiet for a moment, contemplative as she stared at the sleeping girl. “And I'm thinking about something you told me long ago, that the omission of good is no less reprehensible than the commission of evil.” She looked up at him. “I don't like what happened tonight. All of us just standing around, watching while Jerome . . .”

  She shook her head and looked away.

  * * * *

  JAKE WALKED into the room. Katharine was sitting on the bed beside the girl, watching her, as she had the past four nights. The dark fan of hair on the pillow now framed skin whose color was the natural shade the girl had last known. The swelling had subsided, but she remained held captive by sleep’s embrace, as though reluctant to join a world from which she had sought to escape.

  “I don’t think she knew what she was.” Katharine spoke quietly, although she knew the girl wouldn’t awaken from her voice, any more than by her touch.

  “Why do you think that?”

  “Because she was scared.” She looked at the girl, lying peaceful now, her face composed in her sleep.

  “Of course she was scared. Trent was about to cut her head off. And Jerome . . .”

  Katharine shook her head and turned to look at him. “The scout said she went willingly with the renegade from the bar. But that doesn’t mean anything. He could have enraptured her.”

  He looked thoughtful. “It wasn’t his style to make another like him. What did Isabel say?”

  “That everything would be all right.”

  “That's it?”

  “You know how Isabel is.” She looked down at the girl again, and laid her palm for a moment against her cheek. “This girl was so desperate, she went headfirst through a third story window. Maybe she was trying to flee the renegade, rather than Malcolm's team.” She turned back to him. “What did you see?”

  He shrugged. “She was already gone by the time we broke into the room. The renegade didn't put up much of a fight.” He glanced down at the girl. “Whatever happened, she's certainly tenacious.”

  Katharine nodded. She rose and followed Jake from the room, pulling the door closed after them.

  They settled onto the couch together. Jake sprawled comfortably with his legs stretched across the low table.

  “I don’t think she should be left alone,” he said.

  “I don’t think so, either.”

  “And we need to have a better idea of what she knows about what happened, and whether—”

  Their conversation was interrupted by a loud thump against the closed door of the guest bedroom, then the sound of scrambling in the room, akin to tha
t of a wild animal that has discovered it's been trapped and is frantic to escape.

  Jake raised his eyebrows. “Better stop her before she tries the window. It's a lot longer way down this time.”

  “I know.” Katharine walked briskly toward the closed door. She hesitated for just a moment with her hand over the knob, and then gently pushed the door open.

  “Don’t be afraid,” Katharine spoke into the darkened room. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  About The Author

  Matthew Lee Adams has a lifelong love for the written word, with reading tastes that have ranged through genres and categories. Before pursuing a degree in Russian Studies and later a postgraduate degree, he was a student at the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, which cultivated his passion for artistic endeavors. He lives with his wife, the poet Carolyn Adams, and a symphony of well-fed backyard squirrels and other wildlife.

  He can be found online at:

  www.matthewleeadams.com

  Other Books (as of this writing):

  Urban Fantasy – Winter Fade Series

  Winter Fade (Book One)

  Firefly Kiss (Book Two)

  Snowflake Promise (Book Three)

  Becomings (Winter Fade Stories)

  Paranormal Romance

  Glowstar