Voices of the Sea (18 page)

“I think I might love you,” she replied, fitting her body into his. Someone called her name. Torn from her revelry, she turned her focus toward the cottage where she saw Devin. Aware of their intimacy, the couple stepped away from one another. But Ryan continued to study her with a beautiful smile, making his face shine like a twinkling sea.

Devin approached them from behind. “You’ve found your counterpart,” she said, her voice light with happiness. Lora turned with open arms, her face glowing.

A noise, much like the popping of a balloon, startled her and, at the same moment, Devin’s body lurched forward. Her eyes narrowed as she looked at Lora, a confused expression on her face, before they trailed to the large red stain, spreading over her white shirt. Lora reached out and touched the crimson circle. Its warmth surprised her. Then, she watched in stunned horror as Devin’s legs gave way and her body collapsed into the rough sand, sprawling at Lora’s feet.

Chapter Nineteen

F
or the second time in Lora’s life, the sea stayed silent.

In fact, the entire world was silent. Lora could not hear the gulls crying overhead, or the wind blowing through the grass and cypress. She could not hear the waves crashing along the rocky shoreline. Even her heart had, for a moment, stopped beating.

Lora fell to her knees next to Devin, whose limp body lay strewn across the rough ground, now crimson with her blood. Devin’s long, silver hair spread stark white against the rocky floor, a dove in the desert.

Next to her, Ryan pulled out his phone and dialed 911. Together, they pulled Devin with them, toward the shelter of the rocks. Ryan used his body as a shield to protect her in case of more gunfire. She heard him speaking to the emergency operator on the other line, but found herself unable to concentrate on his words.

“Devin?” she whispered. Her grandmother’s face stayed serene despite the violence. Slowly, her eyes opened.

“Θεωρώ granddaughter. Δική μου θησαυρό.”
My granddaughter. My treasure.

Tears fell from her eyes as she stroked her grandmother’s hair and grasped her hand. “You’ll be fine,” she said, choking back sobs. “Just look at me, and everything will be okay.” All color had retreated from her grandmother’s face, leaving only pale skin and white lips.

At once, the sound rushed back. The roar of the ocean returned, its pounding waves a dirge in her ears, playing its death soundtrack behind Ryan’s desperate pleas to the emergency operator. His voice took on a hysterical note as he begged them to hurry. Shaking her head, Lora leaned closer to her grandmother. “You’ll be fine,” she said again, though the lie in her voice sounded evident even to her own ears. “Hang on, ουσ Γιαγιά,” Lora whispered. “Hang on, grandmother. Help is coming.” Ryan still held the phone to his ear as he knelt beside her, his eyes filled with tears.

“They’re on their way,” he said, his voice faint among the noise of the ocean’s waves crashing against the rocks around them.

Devin let out a gasp, struggling for breath. She squeezed Lora’s hand and pulled her even closer. “You can defeat the Sons of Orpheus,” she whispered. A drop of blood appeared at the side of her mouth, and Lora wiped it away, unwilling to accept the fate it brought with it.

“I can’t,” she whispered. “Not alone.”

A painful grimace appeared on Devin’s lips. “Not alone,” she said, her breath coming in short gasps now. “You have Ryan. You have your father.” A horrible racking cough came from deep within her grandmother’s body as she convulsed with pain. When the coughing stopped, Devin gasped again. “And you’ll have me. I’ll never leave you, Loralei.”

Devin’s eyes closed, and a final breath escaped from her lips.

Lora leaned over Devin’s body. “Devin?” she whispered. Her grandmother didn’t move now, only a still, pale body decorating the rocky landscape. Lovingly, Lora let her fingertips trail over Devin’s forehead, down her face, resting her palm on her grandmother’s cheek. Tears streamed down her face in torrents. “Devin?” she said again, her voice almost inaudible.

With a sob, Lora’s head fell to her grandmother’s lifeless chest. She cried harder than she ever had before, pulling Devin’s body close to hers as she rocked back and forth, not noticing how her grandmother’s blood soaked her own shirt. “I love you,” she whispered to her dead grandmother. She kissed her forehead, burying her face in Devin’s long silvery hair, which smelled of eucalyptus and sandalwood.

Police sirens sounded in the distance, and Ryan hung up the phone. He wrapped his arm around her shoulder. “She’s gone, Lora,” he said as he pulled her close to his side. His eyes darted around, shifting back and forth, but Lora’s grief prevented her from worrying about the possible danger surrounding them. The roar of the ocean thundered in her ears, but no music or song streamed from the sea.

Her body racked with sobs, Lora buried her head in Ryan’s chest, clutching him tightly, afraid to lift her head and again see the lifeless body of her grandmother. Ryan murmured soothing words, but she could feel the tension in his arms and was keenly aware he remained on alert, afraid of another attack. It had only been minutes since Devin was shot, but Lora felt years older, tired and feeble.

Then, from far away, she heard the music swell from far beneath the ocean’s depths. Mysterious voices sang a mournful funeral song. With puffy eyes, she lifted her head and met Ryan’s eyes, which were as confused as her own. “What is that?” she asked. The melody sounded haunting. Ryan shook his head and turned to stare at the sea, which had begun to rise.

The ocean remained as still as a sheet of glass, as green as a hurricane sky, and it rose, higher and higher. The water climbed up the rocks, creeping along the rocky shoreline with nimble fingers, crawling toward Devin’s body. Startled, Lora and Ryan stepped back as the water approached.

She had never seen the ocean behave in this way before. In swift speeds, the water reached Devin’s bare feet and swept over her body, covering every inch of her skin in a circular cocoon. It stopped as it reached her head, until she wore a pale, watery dress.

Lora panicked and rushed toward her grandmother to stop the ocean from taking her body, but Ryan grabbed her hand and pulled her back. “Wait,” he said, wrapping his arms around her in a firm embrace.

With eyes as amazed as they were helpless, she witnessed the water envelop Devin’s body and turn a brilliant golden color that pulsed and glimmered. The color did not dissipate, but inch by inch, the water seeped away from Devin and melted into the ocean, taking her spirit but leaving her body. Her soul had become one with the sea. The ocean’s song changed from a mournful melody to a song of joy, celebrating the Guardian who was bound with it forever.

She thought the water might retreat permanently, but as swiftly as it had ascended upon Devin’s body, the water reached out toward Lora, calling to her, the voices of all her ancestors singing together. Every inch of her body tingled with magic. She couldn’t resist the music and moved forward. This time, Ryan did not stop her. Lora stretched out her fingers, touching the pale green water which still teemed with her grandmother’s spirit.

The golden glow from the sea traveled up her arm and down her torso, filling her body with its light. She gasped, stunned at the warm feeling surrounding her and by the power her grandmother’s spirit unlocked from deep within her.

Lora was becoming the next Guardian.

Voices filled her head, the voices of her clan as they moved about in the morning, and she could hear them more clearly now, less jumbled than before. She could feel the ocean’s salty water mix with her blood, and sensed it would do her bidding at any time. More than anything, however, the responsibility of her clan’s safety settled on her shoulders and filled her with unfamiliar confidence. “Loralei. Είστε ο θεματοφύλακας του ειρηνικού ελαιώνα.
You are the Guardian of Pacific Grove,
” Lora heard her grandmother say. “Από τώρα μέχρι θανάτου σας.
From now until your death.
”

Devin had been right. She would always be with her.

Despite the pain lingering in her heart for her lost grandmother, Lora had also acquired a massive gain, a sense of belonging. She was now the Guardian of her clan. The glow in her skin faded, leaving only the slightest tinge of light, like the sun behind a cloud. The ocean, too, retreated until it revealed the rocky shore. Lora barely heard the singing of her ancestors now, for the loud wailing of an ambulance mingled with the sounds of the morning.

With heavy eyes, Lora watched the paramedics work on Devin in vain, administering CPR to a lifeless body whose spirit now swam in the sea. She stayed close to Ryan, shivering in the cold morning. Dense fog clung to the hairs on her skin. Inside her lingered a strange mixture of emptiness and power, mingling together, each fighting for attention. Ryan’s arm stayed steady around her, holding her upright, for her legs threatened to buckle beneath her. Even though she was looking right at Devin’s dead body, Lora had a difficult time accepting her grandmother’s life had left it. But she’d seen Devin’s soul enter the ocean. It swam nearby, keeping a part of her grandmother alive.

How strange; death was not nearly as final as most believed. Though she’d not seen her mother’s soul become one with the sea, she knew her mother was there, and the understanding gave her strength.

The police and emergency personnel moved with a graceful rhythm, each fulfilling the tasks required of them as if they lived only for one purpose. The police examined the crime scene, escorting Lora and Ryan to the far side of Devin’s property, asking them endless questions until Lora’s head felt thick with stress and exhaustion. Her father had arrived at some point during the interrogation, but she barely noticed him standing next to her, arguing with the detectives, convincing them to let Lora and Ryan go home. But the police were overly cautious, particularly since Lora had been the one to find Victoria’s dead body two months ago. Their questions verged, at times, on accusatory.

Had she seen the person who shot Devin? No.

Did Devin have any enemies? No.

Did her grandmother have a will? Probably.

Didn’t she find it strange that she was involved in two murders in the same month?

Despite the nature of the questions, however, Lora barely noticed their tone. She was caught up in her own despair, wishing she could speak to Devin one last time. There were so many questions she wanted to ask her grandmother, but she had put them off for another day. She answered the inquiries of the police in a haze of confusion, sipping on the water they brought her to drink. Her throat felt so dry.

Lora clung to Ryan, who stroked her head, kissed her temple when she began to tremble again, and wiped away the tears that continued to flow. The ambulance finally left to take Devin’s body to the hospital morgue; one by one, the police began to dissipate as well, until only the detective and a few other officers in uniform lingered in the cordoned area, staring at the ground still saturated in Devin’s blood. Lora’s father sat next to her, staring out to the ocean.

“Maybe I should try and contact the Clan,” he said. “I think we need to tell them.”

Lora sighed. “Don’t tell them. Not until we’ve stopped the Sons of Orpheus. It will only make them more upset and confused.” The ocean water turned gray as it crashed against the rocks, its music barely audible now. The sea, too, mourned. Her father opened his mouth as if to argue with her decision, but closed it again.

“You are Guardian now,” he said in a quiet voice. “The decision is yours.”

Every truth in Lora’s world crumbled with those words. Every rule her father or grandmother made, every reality she’d experienced, was broken.
She
was in charge.
She
would make all the Clan’s decisions.

Heaviness overcame her, settling in each limb. Her own father, who had taught her right from wrong, who had directed her every move as a child in order to keep her safe, now deferred to her. At the same time, the confidence in her abilities began to wane as the responsibilities she inherited weighed on her shoulders. Responsibility did not give her strength the way she had hoped it would.

“What do you think?” she asked her father. “Would you tell them?”

Smiling, her father shook his head. “No. I agree with you.”

Ryan, who had gone inside the house to use the bathroom, came out and sat down next to Lora, taking her hand in his.

“Can we leave now?” he asked, staring at the detective who knelt in the distance, next to where Devin’s body had fallen. “Does the detective have more questions?”

Lora shook her head. “I hope not.”

The detective continued to circle the crime scene while other police officers snapped pictures and bagged evidence. Every once in a while, he paused to look at Lora and Ryan, but even from far away, Lora could tell his glances were not menacing. Instead, his looks appeared curious, as if he suspected the three of them possessed some crucial information.
We do,
thought Lora,
but nothing you could ever comprehend in your lifetime.
She needed to keep their identities a secret. The Sons of Orpheus already had too much information about them. The Sons were one step ahead of them, stalking the Clan, following their patterns, even when they were meeting secretly.

The Sons must be following them. She had no other explanation, no other way they could know all of their moves and intentions. This type of clandestine movement frightened her more because of the care and planning which lay behind it. The Sons of Orpheus might be a bigger group than she first imagined.

From over the horizon, a storm approached. The black clouds began to take over the sky, covering it with darkness, bringing strong wind which whipped Lora’s hair around her face. The sea churned, singing a tune forewarning the Sirens of the dangerous weather, while the police and detectives scrambled to finish their investigation. The wind blew harder and pushed their clothing tight against their bodies. They sat in front of Devin’s cottage and Detective Russell hurried toward them, tripping over the rocks and the sand in his smooth-soled work shoes.

“You can go before the storm hits,” he said. “I’ll get in touch with you when we have further questions.” Lora glanced behind her at Devin’s house. It was empty except for Penelope, who stared forlornly out the window, searching for her master. Her pitiful whines made Lora wince with pain.

Ryan’s hand intertwined with hers, warming her spirit.

“You should get home,” Detective Russell said again. Nodding, Lora’s father entered the house for a moment, then emerged with a leashed Penelope. Together, they traveled down the wooden porch steps.

“Be careful,” the detective said, stopping Lora. “I worry you might be in a great deal of trouble.”

Frowning, Lora pulled away from him. “Are you insinuating I had anything to do with this?” she asked.

“On the contrary,” Detective Russell said, more to her father than to Lora. “I worry you are in danger.” Giving them a sad grimace, the detective loped toward his vehicle, leaving the three of them to hurry to their car to escape the impending storm.