One Kiss: An Apocalyptic Urban Fantasy (Transmissions from The International Council for the Exploration of the Universe., #1) (4 page)

In his right hand was his crossbow. Two wolves were running behind him. I pointed and he turned, almost falling. Quickly I had my bow in front of me and, tears almost blinding me, fired at the approaching beasts. I missed but my father's arrow found its mark.  The first wolf fell into the snow, still and dead.

The second wolf leapt onto him, though. I ran up firing arrow after arrow into the creature's back, but it keep up its assault on my father's neck. Out of arrows, my father convulsing under the beast, I picked up a fallen branch. It was heavy and snow fell off as I raised the object. I swung it hard, putting all of my small weight behind the strike. It released my father and the branch splintered.

The wolf turned on me. I looked at the sharp shard of wood in my hand. When it launched itself at me, I held up the stake and the wolf impaled itself on the broken branch, both of us falling to the ground, as the wood drove through the creature's throat, into its brain.

Pinned under the wolf's weight, I realized that it was cold. Not only the body, but the blood oozing out of it. I pushed it off and crawled over to my father. He lay in the snow, his eyes fluttering, blood spattered on his face, caught in his beard, dappling his cheeks. I put my hands over the wound at his neck. His blood was warm.

"Darling," Emmanuel said, holding another sugar packet out to me. They were the brown organic ones, and I could picture him slipping a few extra into his pocket when he got his coffee in the morning.

I took the sugar packet from him and dabbed at my eyes where fresh tears were forming. I reached for the edge of the crypt. As I placed it there I felt that hunger again; the desire licked at my insides, building heat and anger. I had no questions, only requests. "Return her to me," I whispered. 

Stepping back, I clasped my hands in front of me, lacing the fingers together, feeling the bones crush against each other as I squeezed. Tears rolled down my cheeks. Emmanuel didn't say anything; he just handed me a tissue, which I used to wipe at them. "Do you want to go?" he asked gently.

I shook my head. "No, I want to stay for a minute. Go ahead. I'd like a moment alone."

****

A
s the sun set, voices of other visitors faded. I sat down on the ground, my back against the mausoleum across from Suki's, my legs out in front, ankles crossed a foot or so away from the offerings lining the base of the crypt. Street lights turned on as the sky darkened into a rich and brilliant blue. I thought about my father, about the final sounds he'd gurgled out, the way his eyes rolled back into his head. Megan's empty room. I couldn't help but feel a flicker of hope. I didn't know for sure she was dead. Miracles happened.

A group passed outside the cemetery, laughing. I pulled out my phone, swiping it awake; the screen glowed.

"We call it the spark of life for a reason, you know," said a voice next to me. I turned quickly, my speed fueled by adrenaline, to see a woman standing in the cemetery lane. "Those screens will be the end of us," she continued as I scrambled to my feet, shoving my phone back into my purse. The woman wore a long white skirt and loose blouse with a wide lace collar. Her hair was wrapped in a white scarf dotted with red needlepoint stars.

"Don't be afraid," she said shuffling forward, her movements accompanied by a jingle. Bracelets on her wrists, gold, copper, and silver, all tinkling against each other. “Stay," she said. "You are here for a reason."

The woman stood in front of Suki's mausoleum with her back to me as she reached up to the roof's edge and placed a fresh candle there. She struck a match, the scratch of the sulfur head against the rough grain on the box satisfying. "I can help you," she said, raising the match above her head to the candle's wick. The flame melted the wax and grew larger as it caught the cotton fabric. She shook the match, a puff of smoking emanating when the fire died.

She turned to me; her movement produced more jingles. She clasped something close to her side so that it was partially hidden in the folds of her skirt, but I could see black feathers and a strand of beads hanging down. "What do you mean?" I asked her. "How can you help me?"

"I can help you find your friend."

"What do you know about her?" I asked, my voice uneven, as I took an involuntary step forward.

The woman smiled, her teeth yellow in the candle's flickering glow. "I can help you," she said and her smile grew larger. "For a price."

I nodded and pursed my lips. "Of course," I said and reached for my violin case again, figuring she'd been listening in on Emmanuel and me. She was a fraud.

"Because I ask to be paid for my services you think I'm a liar," she said to my back, her voice louder, almost angry. "Do you play for free?"

I turned back to her, my violin case in hand. She was closer, almost touching me. "I don't know what your game is," I said. "But I'm not interested." She grabbed my bicep. "Let go," I said as my body began to shake with adrenaline and fear. I struggled to pull free of her but the woman's hand was like a vise. "You don't want to find your friend anymore?" she asked. "Or are you afraid maybe she left you on purpose?" she cooed.

I stopped struggling and looked into the woman's eyes. They were dark and deep-set. Impenetrable. She held up the object in her other hand. I broke eye contact to look at it. A plume of black feathers surrounded a black and green chicken foot, the skin looking almost like scales. A string of red beads was tied around what was left of the ankle, holding the feathers in place. "Pay me twenty and I will find your friend," she said. "That's much less than you've spent already."

"How do you know?" I asked.

She smiled, her teeth shiny. "Magic," she said as she let go of me, releasing a laugh that ricocheted off the gravestones around us, bouncing back, and sounding almost like a flock of crows. She walked over to the Suki crypt and squatted in front of it, her long skirt bunching on the ground. She placed the chicken foot at the center of the makeshift shrine on the path and then looked over her shoulder at me. "You pay in advance."

I reached into my purse and pulled out a twenty. There was one more in there, and I knew that it represented a larger portion of my total assets than I liked to admit. Bending forward, I passed it to her. She reached over her shoulder, still in a squat at the base of the mausoleum, not bothering to look at me, and snatched the paper from my fingers. The candle threw light around our corner of the cemetery, flickering against the old structures, making their cracks and shadows dance in the little flame's light. Above us the clouds hung low, the lights from the city reflecting off them as a burgundy glow.

"Put down your things," she said. I placed my violin back on the ground. "Your purse too," she said. Pulling the thin strap over my head, I put my small leather purse next to the case, hoping she wasn't about to knock me on the head and take them both off into the night with her. She began to chant, her head rocking back and forth on her neck. Smoke rose up in front of her, big billowing gray smoke that smelled of sage and something else, something slightly rotten.

She stood up quickly, so fast that her bracelets didn't jingle different notes, but released one tone. Placing the feathered chicken foot on the top of the mausoleum, she continued to chant words that didn't mean anything to me. I took a step away from her, and then she turned around, slowly, bringing the smoke with her.

The woman raised her hands above her head, the precious-metal bracelets tinkling as they fell down her arms. There was a smudge stick in her left hand: tightly tied sage, one end of it bright embers with pale smoke billowing from it. With each step she took toward me the sound of her chanting and the clinking of her bracelets grew louder. Her eyes swiveled in their sockets and she bowed from one side to the other, circling with the smoke, her chanting becoming more fervent.

Raising her left foot, she bent her knee up to her waist and then slammed it down hard. Then she raised her right leg before crashing it down. Her chanting turned into yelling, spittle flying from her mouth; the smoke grew thicker as she danced in front of me, the sounds of beads and bracelets and chanting overwhelming. I pressed against the mausoleum behind me. 

She stopped suddenly, falling to her knees, the white skirt puffed around her. Nodding her head forward, the woman kept her hands up in the air. The smoke pouring from the smudge stick was lit by the flames of the candle she'd left on the top of the crypt. She lowered the smudge stick down to her breast, the smoke clouding up over her, creating a thick curtain between us. I heard a sharp intake of breath and then she tipped to the side and collapsed onto the cemetery path. The smudge rolled to my feet, the smoke turning white as the stick tapped against my shoe.

The soft sizzle of burning sage was the only sound. "Hello?" I said, my voice catching on the smoke and turning into a cough. I kicked the smudge stick away and it rolled down the path. I coughed as I bent down over the woman. Her face was totally relaxed. She had a delicate nose, full lips, long eyelashes, and a strong jawline. Lying still on the ground she looked different; younger and gentler, pretty. Her eyes popped open, startling me. "You cannot see her again," she said, her voice strong.

"What?" The wind changed and smoke from the smudge stick blew back over us.

She sat up and grabbed my shoulders, her fingers feeling like claws, reminding me of the chicken foot. "You must stop looking for her."

"Do you know where she is?" I asked, my eyes burning, the smoke growing thicker.

"You must not look for her," she said, her voice booming, bouncing back off the surrounding crypts.

I struggled free of her grasp, pushing back into a standing position. "Do you know where she is?" I yelled at her. "Tell me!" Suddenly she was standing too. I felt disoriented by the smoke. The flame from her candle was glowing brighter. "I'll pay you more," I said and quickly turned to my purse, pulling out the other $20. Grasping it, I spun back to her. The candle backlit her and she seemed to be just a silhouette, a shadow I was begging for help.

"No!" Her voice boomed around me. I thought I heard it coming from every corner of the graveyard. "You must stop looking for her. She is dead but not gone. The most dangerous place to be. Do not join her!"

The candle flickered out, darkening the narrow space between the mausoleums. I felt the money slip from my fingers; a whoosh of air, and she was gone. I bent down over my purse and pulled out my cellphone, turning on the flashlight app. The air was clear; I aimed my beam of light at the altar. The candle was gone, as was the feathered chicken foot. Just a whiff of smoke remained. I could still smell the strong incense of sage, and just a hint of something rotten.

Gathering up my fiddle and purse I hurried out of the graveyard, my flashlight making the spaces between the graves seem that much darker so that I ran, fear creeping up my spine making the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

"
What did you think?"

"I thought it was a hallucination."

"Why?"

<<<<>>>>

I
t had been decades since my last hallucination. But I'd believed the first twelve years of my life, at least my memories of them, were a hallucination. My first memory is of an endless white landscape, harsh winds, and punishing cold. I'm on my father's sled and I can see the dogs in front of us, straining into their harnesses, powering through the snow, steam ballooning with each breath.

I have vivid, joyful memories of growing up with a loving father who cherished me and died to save me. With his final breaths, each word punctuated by a spray of blood, he told me to run home. To climb into the bottom kitchen counter, close the door, squeeze my eyes shut, and wait.

I remember clearly doing exactly what he said. I sprinted through the snow, my body covered in sweat, fear and grief warring inside of me. I wanted to stay with my father and hold his hand, but I knew that I would die if I did that. You can imagine how clearly I remember this. The smell of my home when I burst through the front door. A mix of smoke scent and rosemary, the musk of wet dog, the aroma of antelope stew.

There were pots and pans in the cabinet my father told me to climb in. When I pulled them out, tossing them behind me, they clanged and clattered on the wooden floor. The only things I took in with me were our bows. My father's was almost twice the size of mine, which made sense, because he was about twice the size of me. I pushed it in first, angling it so that it fit.  Positioning myself  next to it, I pulled my bow tight to my chest and closed the door. Light leaked in but when I closed my eyes it was pitch black behind my lids.

That is how I was found. Huddled in a kitchen cabinet clutching a crossbow and squeezing my eyes shut. But on the other side of that door wasn't the two-room cabin my father built.  It was an apartment in a four-story building. The most northern housing project in all of the United Tribes territory.

Police found me after responding to calls from the downstairs neighbors about a putrid leak in their bathroom. Apparently, my "real" father died a very different death than the one I'd imagined.

I remember the police officer who opened that cabinet door as clearly as my father's dying words. It is seamless, and yet, impossible.

When I told the social worker about who I was and how I got in that cabinet she listened attentively, nodding her head and taking notes on a yellow legal pad. I experienced such deep and abiding confusion. She reached across the interrogation table and covered my hands with hers. They were warm and rough. She smelled like sweet summer flowers.

"Darling, sweetie, I'm sorry. You witnessed something horrible—"

"I know," I said.

She shook her head, her gold hoop earrings brushing against her cheeks. "That whole thing with the dogs, Darling—"

"They weren't dogs," I said. "They were wolves. Sick wolves."

"None of that happened," she said. I opened my mouth to speak but she forged ahead. "It's okay," she said. "I'm going to get you some medication that will help."