Grave Danger (21 page)

An advantage of being invisible to most humans was
that Clarissa didn’t have to pay for her ticket to see the show.
Though she thought she would slip the money in to the theatre
somehow, feeling that it was still wrong to watch the movie without
paying for it.

Leah had ordered the movie tickets ahead of time and
as she was passing out the tickets to Jackson and two of his
friends, Clarissa casually slipped some money into the ticket both.
The friends, a girl and boy about the same age as Jackson, couldn’t
see Clarissa, but they knew she was there. Being friends with
people like Leah and Jackson, you had to get over the unusual
acquaintances they kept, that for them were almost normal. Leah
handed Clarissa her ticket as she followed behind Jackson and the
two other livings. Clarissa looked down at her ticket, reading the
title of the movie.

“
Deadland: Flesh of the Fallen,” Clarissa read
the title aloud, not quite sure what the turmoil of emotions she
was feeling inside meant. They were watching a horror movie,
usually a good choice as far as genres went, but this particular
one had a plot line that struck a certain dissonant chord within
Clarissa. Though she had never seen the trailer for this movie, it
didn’t take a genius to realize that the movie would feature
certain un-dead characters that would be, if Hollywood stayed true
to its monster traditions, nothing like the creatures she had
encountered the other evening.

Clarissa sat between Jackson and Leah, the two young
livings sitting farther down on Jackson’s right. As they were
watching the before movie trailers, Clarissa absentmindedly reached
for Leah’s soda cup. It was a habit of the livings to consume food
and drink while watching a movie and Clarissa was no different in
mind-set. It was only when she caught Leah looking at her with a
strange peculiar expression that she realized what she was
doing.

She quickly put the drink down into the arm-cup
compartment, facing forward as Leah and Jackson exchanged a knowing
look. It hadn’t been Clarissa’s intention to reveal her strange
ability to connect with the tangible objects of this world on a
level beyond the normal spirit. She couldn’t take it back now.
Thankfully the lights dimmed and Jackson and Leah were forced to
keep their questions to themselves until after the movie.

Clarissa told herself that it was just a movie, that
the characters and themes of the story were fictitious and quite
frankly only Hollywood could dream up some the most ludicrous
concepts of the paranormal world. It was sensationalism, nothing
more. She sat back, preparing herself to be as unmoved by the movie
as possible.

The zombie character on the screen was consuming
another helpless human, its mouth full of blood and gore. In truth,
everything about the creature was in complete contrast to the true
form of the flesh-eaters. Except for the fact that the creatures
were eating the flesh and blood of the poor helpless human victims,
there was nothing else that would make Clarissa believe that the
character on the screen was the real deal. Even the eyes weren’t
right.

The memories of looking into the eyes of a handsome
flesh-eater had a strange effect on Clarissa, a ripple of tangible
awareness that crept over her skin and made her insides flutter.
Those blue iridescent eyes had held her in enthrallment and they
had been alive with fire not dead and glassy like the creature on
the screen in front of her. Then there was the unexpected and quite
unorthodox kiss they had exchanged under the cover of nights
blanket. It had been exceptional, exquisite and wrong on so many
levels.

Clarissa pulled herself out of her mind and focused
once again on the movie. More death and gore plastered the wide
screen in the theatre. The screaming and wailing of the vulnerable
livings followed by the sickening crunch of their bones as they
snapped, followed by sucking sounds. Unfortunately, Clarissa was
unmoved by what she was seeing on the screen, her mind retreating
back into the past, to the moment when her world had changed yet
again.

Clarissa was finding it difficult to separate what
she had come to know and hate about the flesh-eater with what she
had learned on encountering the flesh and blood creatures in
person. Corrigan LeMoyne had been for one perfect moment the
completion of body to her soul. Everything before and after that
kiss distanced itself, as if separated by a great divide. So this
was what people meant by an epoch. There was before that soul
shattering kiss and then there was after. And it had indeed almost
shattered her very soul. It was when he had drawn away from her,
taking that glimmer of perfect completeness with him.

Clarissa branded herself a romantic fool for even
contemplating secret thoughts about a man who could very well be
responsible for the deaths of the S.S. members. And even if he
wasn’t, he was still a flesh-eater. Corrigan killed to survive, so
many victims that it almost made her sick to think about those
faceless people who had had life snuffed out. Death and murder was
every aspect of his character and she should hate him above all
things evil in this world. Too bad evil could kiss like an
angel.

What he and his family were permitted to do in this
city was murder and the blood of their victims was on all of their
hands. The Eidolon community had been at a disadvantage in the
past, striking a deal with the devils in the hope of sparing at
least some innocent lives. That wasn’t good enough anymore. And now
there was a new player in this battle, Clarissa Schofield, death
bokor.

With a sigh of bitter resolve, she knew what she had
to do. Forcing herself once again out of her minds wanderings, she
focused her complete attention back on the movie. Clarissa would
think no more about Corrigan or his exceptional kissing techniques.
In the end she hoped he got what he deserved.

***∞***

“
Spill, Clarissa. I can’t wait any longer.”
Leah Moon was sprawled on Clarissa’s bed as Clarissa folded her
spectral clothes and placed them neatly into her bureau draws.
Though the articles of clothing were spectrally made, they were not
without substance. Just like the livings tangible items, hers
existed because they were composed with the natural elements of the
universe; the magick of it being unexplained science.

Clarissa closed the drawer, turning around to face
her living guest. Jackson had left after the movie along with his
friends. He had to be home because he had school in the morning, so
he and his bike took off for home shortly before the sun sank away
into night. Leah, who was quickly becoming a good friend, had
stayed behind to visit with Clarissa. But more importantly, she had
stayed to wheedle information out of her ghost friend.

Clarissa thought to feign confusion, but decided
against it. She had yet to tell anyone of her experience the other
evening, afraid that if she told Eleanor she would be angry and
have Henry or Richard tag her. Clarissa didn’t want to be escorted
everywhere she went. If any of the Eidolon knew she had interacted
so intimately with one of the others they might grow suspicious.
And right now she wanted – needed to keep the fact that she was
bokor from them until she could figure out how she was going to
deal with this startling revelation.

“
What exactly do you want me to tell you?”
Clarissa hedged. The incident in the movie theatre had peeked
Leah’s curiosity, but as far as she knew, Leah couldn’t put being a
bokor to the ability to interact more personably with the living
world.

Leah rolled over onto her stomach, looking up at
Clarissa as she spoke. “Tell me what you are, Clarissa.” Before
Clarissa could answer she continued. “And don’t give me the
runaround. You’re not just a ghost are you? There is something more
about you that isn’t like the others. I want to know what that
is.”

Clarissa sighed, walking across her bedroom to sit
on the edge of her plush queen sized bed. Leah turned to take her
hand which was clutched tightly in a fist on the comforter. It was
strange to be touched by the living, but Leah’s touch was somehow
different than when she had touched Corrigan, though his skin
seemed to be the same as any other living flesh.

Leah pushed comforting thoughts into Clarissa. She
was one of the few livings who could touch the souls. Even among
the S.S. members, she was one of few who could interact on a
personable level with the Eidolon.

“
I’m a bokor,” Clarissa whispered, as if
saying the words too loud might awaken things best left alone in
the world. “I’m a death bokor, which means even though I have
passed the living world, I have retained these talents. I can
interact with the living world as well as the dead and I have the
means to control them both.”

Leah took the disclosure of Clarissa’s forgotten
identity in good stride. She didn’t react except for a raise of her
delicate black eye brows as she quietly studied Clarissa, all the
while still keeping hold of her hand. After several moments of
silence Clarissa couldn’t bare it.

“
Go ahead, Leah. I’m waiting for you to ask
me.” Clarissa waited expectantly for the young living woman to
question how Clarissa had come to know this about herself. She
wondered if even then Leah would make much of a reaction over the
news.

“
Alright, I’ll ask. As you can guess I’m dying
to ask.” Leah made a frown at her poor choice of words. “I’m sorry.
That was a really bad word to use there. I know better.” Clarissa
shrugged, un-offended. “How did you find out you were a bokor in
life and are now apparently a bokor in death? You told me before
that you knew nothing of the death bokor or even the flesh-eaters.
How could you have suddenly come to the conclusion that you are one
of these legendary beings?”

“
Because I had the fortune or misfortune,
however you’d like to see it, to use my talents on someone the
other night and he confirmed that I was one.”

If she had never encountered Corrigan or his family,
Clarissa wondered if she would have ever learned her true identity
as a bokor. Would she have remained in the dark forever? Even now,
knowing what she was didn’t bring back the memories she’d hoped
would be revealed. As if finding out she was a death bokor would
somehow reveal who she had been in life. It had not. Clarissa was
no closer to knowing Clarissa Schofield, living person, than she
was to grasping the full spectrum of her deathly talents.

“
He,” Leah said meaningfully. “And who would
this ‘he’ person be? How is it that he knew what you were when none
of us could tell?”

Leah sat up on the bed, tucking her legs under her
skirt. It billowed around her like a black sea, rippling with her
movements. Clarissa came to sit fully on the bed, folding her
longer legs under her body. The two women sat facing each other.
Clarissa would tell Leah everything and hope that her new living
friend could keep her secrets.

“
He knew what I was because he is a
flesh-eater.”

Clarissa allowed Leah a few moments to digest this
before she continued. “After the town meeting I decided to venture
out on my own to see these creatures, face to face, for myself. It
was the only way I could think, at the time, to understand them.
Everyone seems so afraid of them that there are little documented
recordings. In order to take a monster down, you have to know
everything about it, its strengths and its weaknesses.”

“
You were out all alone during their roaming
hours. Are you crazy, Clarissa? He could have killed you – I mean
really killed you, as in no more Clarissa; forever.”

“
I know,” Clarissa interrupted. “I know what
they are capable of, the destruction they can reap on us. But,
Leah, I had to know.” Clarissa looked to her open window, the
slight breeze outside unsettling the sheer curtains to dance to the
silent song of night. “It was more than just curiosity at that
point. I felt like I was being led by some unseen force that wanted
me to see them, to know them. And he was…” Her words stopped
suddenly, forced back down into her soul.

“
What was he like?” Leah asked after several
seconds ticked by, breaking the dead air between them. “Are they as
fearsome as in the movies? You know you’re one of the few people
who have actually met a flesh-eater and been able to retell the
adventure. Only the council members can boast to that and they keep
their distance just the same.

Clarissa turned away from looking out the window. “I
didn’t actually think I would be successful on my first attempt.
And it was only by accident that they found me. They speak to each
other on this stream of psychic energy that seems to flow naturally
between each of them. I’m not sure how they achieve this
connection, but from what I could overhear they use it to
communicate when they’re on the hunt or to warn each other of
danger. It was when one of them sensed my presence listening in
that they came after me.”

“
Oh my God,” Leah exclaimed, her hands coming
to her mouth. “One of them attacked you?”

“
Yes, and before I could even think to react
the one male had me. He grabbed me and of course threatened me. I
won’t lie and say I wasn’t afraid; I was. Then it just came to me.
I don’t know how or why, but suddenly I knew that I could hurt him.
The next thing I know, he lets go and goes flying off his feet away
from me.”

Clarissa looked down at her arm, rubbing the ghostly
casing of her form. It radiated with untold potential.

“
But I didn’t know then that it was because I
was bokor, that I could do that. Some of the council members can
hurt people with the expulsions of absorbed energy. At the time I
just assumed that I was like them.”