Return to the Shadows (14 page)

Ashley began to stir almost immediately once
the car stopped its forward motion, coming to a smooth stop on the
gravel driveway that lined the side of the immense house. The porch
light was every bit as bright as I remembered it to be, coming
awfully close to turning night into day. Memories of sitting with
Mark on those wide porch steps in the calm, quiet evenings long
after the rest of the house had retired to their rooms brought a
smile to my lips as I gently rousted Ashley. During those long ago
nights, we had sat side by side and made fun of the intense glare
of the double fixture porch lights, calling them floodlights and
attributing their lighthouse-like beacon to Marta’s fear of
“varmints.” Oh, how I treasured those nights. I could still
remember feeling like nothing could touch us, not here, so long as
we stood together, daring fear and uncertainty to try and do its
worst because, together, we were solid, and for the most
part—unshakeable.

I snorted. “Shows how much I know,” I
muttered, shifting Ashley’s weight higher onto my hip. She had
fallen asleep once again somewhere between exiting the car and
being carried up the stairs. That was probably a blessing, I
decided, taking one last look around the enormous whitewashed porch
and drawing strength from its gleaming brilliance. Taking a deep
breath, I exhaled and stabbed a finger against the brass doorbell
before I could lose my courage and do something foolish, like hop
back into the car and bolt.

The five-minute wait for someone to answer
the door was almost more than my nerves could take; when Marta
answered the door and said, deadpan, “Oh it’s you,” it was almost
anti-climactic.

“Hi,” I mumbled, for lack of anything better
to say. “Uh. Can we come in?” I asked, wishing she would stop
looking at me as though I were something that even the cat wouldn’t
have dragged in; no matter that, at the moment, I did look the
part. Long moments passed while we stared each other down, facing
one another like gun fighters in the street. But finally, the older
woman’s shrewd eyes shifted to the sleeping child cradled in my
arms. “Well, I suppose you might as well come inside.”

I murmured a thank you at her retreating
form, although it was doubtful that she heard the quiet words.
Understandable. I had given her quite the shock and she hadn’t
slammed the door on us; Ash and I would have a clean, comfortable
place to sleep for the night, and we were safe for the moment. When
I would have been tempted to bristle under Marta’s less than
gracious treatment, I reminded myself that the present outcome was
more than I had hoped for only a few short hours earlier.

“You can sleep in your old room. The one you
used the last time you were here,” she spoke crossly, leading the
way past the formal parlor, beyond the floor-to-ceiling stone
hearth, and up the curved staircase to the second floor.

“I remember the room.”

“Here it is,” she announced, flipping the
light switch. “Lay the child down on the bed and I’ll help bring in
your luggage.”

A single light burned in the foyer by the
time I descended the stairway to join a neutral-faced Marta. I
stumbled into the room to greet her, courtesy of missing the last
step. Way to make an entrance, Claire, I mentally chastised.

“You been drunk driving tonight?” Marta
demanded, eyeing me warily from across the room.

“No,” I groaned, righting myself and then
taking a seat on the stair tread that had just tried to kill
me.

“I have not been drinking. I almost wish I
had been. But I’m just tired, Marta. It’s been a while since I’ve
slept.”

“Well, you looked like you might be drunk.”
She shrugged.

“Well, I’m not.” I frowned.

“You show up here in the middle of the night
with bloodshot eyes and you nearly fall down the stairs, and you
take offense that I think you’re drunk.” The cross woman shook her
head, as though she didn’t know what to make of the situation.

“The truth is, I had a hell of a time getting
us here...”

“You’ve been to Lerna, then,” she correctly
assumed.

“Yes. What’s happening here?”

“I wish I knew,” she frowned, then shrugged.
“We’re safe enough here. For now. So,” she commented after a moment
of tense silence, “you’re back.”

“Yes…I know this must come as a surprise,” I
said, fighting through my fatigue to refocus on the
conversation.

“You can say that again. Who’s the kid? Is
she yours?”

“Yes, she’s mine. I adopted her this year.
She’s a wonderful little girl.”

“She’s a pretty little thing,” Marta
conceded, softening a little.

“I’m sorry I left so suddenly before,” I
blurted, suddenly wanting to get everything out in the open,
seeking to dispel the awkward tension in the room.

“It’s not me who needs to hear that.”

“I didn’t want to leave things the way that I
did.” I struggled with the apology. “If there had been any other
choice, any other options…that day...” I held my hands out,
appealing to the stone-faced woman who sat before me.

“The last time I saw you, we were standing in
my kitchen and you grabbed a box down from a high shelf for me,
read the address on the side of the carton, and tore off out of
here saying you would be back by nightfall.”

“And I never came back. I know. I’m
sorry.”

“What trouble did you manage to find in
Keogh?”

“You knew that’s where I had gone?”

“What can I say? You’re not a good liar. I
never did believe a word of that ‘I’m going to scout some leads’
business that you tried to hoist on me that afternoon.”

“I was afraid if I told you I was going to an
unprotected zone—to a guard base—that you would try and stop me,
and I didn’t want you to worry.”

“Worry? We thought you were dead. We searched
for months, Claire. We organized search parties and came up empty
every time. Mark tore up every inch of ground between here and
Coztal looking for you. He was frantic.”

“Where is Mark?” I leaned forward, glancing
up the stairwell. “How is he?”

“I don’t know,” she muttered. “I don’t even
know if my boy is alive.”

“What?” The word felt as though it were torn
out of me.

“When he couldn’t find you, he left. We
haven’t seen him in nearly eight months.”

“What are you talking about? He just up and
left without saying where he was going? Why?” I demanded, firing
the questions at her in rapid succession.

“He told Bob and I that he couldn’t stay here
anymore. He was devastated. We haven’t seen him since,” she
answered, her voice catching before she appeared to rein the
emotion in, her face once again becoming a stern mask of
disapproval. It was clear to me that she held me personally liable
for Mark’s absence. And hell, maybe, in a way, I was. It was a
bitter pill to swallow, sitting across from Marta. For a moment, it
was difficult to look her in the eye. While Marta may have begun as
the housekeeper, once Bob’s first wife Pamela—Mark’s mom—had run
off, Marta had become a mother to him, raising him in addition to
her other household duties.

I scrubbed my hands over eyes that felt
gritty from lack of rest, and filled her in on the events that had
transpired the day I had disappeared from Terlain and the
subsequent year I had spent in my own world. I was careful to leave
out the finer points of Ashley’s adoption, glossing over the
details and making no mention that I had found the girl that day in
the woods near Keogh. I wasn’t sure how that particular bit of news
would be received by Marta, and I wasn’t on her top ten list of
favorite people as it was. Plus, it really wasn’t anyone’s business
but my own, I reasoned. I had rescued the girl, legally adopted
her, and been a good mother to her for the past year. To my way of
thinking, that was what really counted, but I wasn’t positive that
Marta would see my not returning the child to her own land as such
an acceptable act, and we had enough tension between us as it
was.

“You’ve had quite an ordeal yourself,” she
sighed when I had finished my retelling of events.

“I suppose.”

“So your boss is trying to kill you again.”
She shook her head. “Do you have to work to attract this much
trouble, or does it come to you naturally?”

“It would seem that I have a penchant for
it,” I responded glumly.

“You and your daughter are welcome to stay
here with us for as long as you require. You should be safe enough
here.”

“Thank you. You don’t know how much it means
to hear you say that. I’ll pull my own weight around here; you
won’t have to do for us, I promise.”

“Hmm. Well, it might be nice to have a child
in the house again. I suppose she’s an early riser?”

“A little. She’ll probably be up earlier than
usual this morning since she slept the whole way here,” I answered,
smothering a yawn.

“You look like you could use more than a few
hours of sleep. I’ll get up with the girl. Now, off to bed with
you.”

***

I slept for a full twelve hours before Ashley
and Marta decided it was time to rouse me from my slumber.

“There’s coffee in the dining room. And
there’s someone here to see you,” Marta informed me, looking much
less intimidating in the late afternoon sunlight that lit the pale
yellow walls.

“Mama, there’s a lady downstairs!”

“There is?” I frowned. For the briefest of
moments, my spirits had lifted in the hopes that Mark had
returned.

“She looks like a real fairy!”

“A fairy? Well, my goodness. I had better go
and meet her right away.” I smiled at Ashley before looking
quizzically at Marta.

“She says she knows you.” The older woman
shrugged. “You want us to stall her while you take a shower?”

“No, I’ll go down now—the bath can wait.” The
familiar raven-haired beauty with the exotic pixie face was like a
jolt to my system when I entered the dining room. “Aries! Is it
really you?” I cried, launching myself at the taller woman without
waiting for an answer. Of course it was her.

“Claire,” she laughed, returning the embrace.
“I can’t believe you’re really here. Where have you been? I’ve been
looking everywhere for you. The pixies and the sprites formed a
search party after a man came to see us about a missing woman with
honey-colored hair called Claire who had come here in search of her
brother. We knew it was you the man spoke of even before he said
your name.”

“Aries, I have so much to tell you. I was so
worried about you after that day we’d been captured.”

“You saved my life that night.”

“So you did get away then.”

“Yes. I went back to my people. We went back
to find you only to learn you had been taken to auction. There were
no leads after that. Not until the man came to us. Are you all
right?” She held me at arm’s-length.

“Perfectly fine,” I assured my old friend.
“Did you say a man came to find me? When?”

“He was tall with streaked hair. I think his
eyes were green. He showed up about eight months ago.”

“Mark,” I whispered.

“I think that was his name, yes.” Aries
cocked her head. “Is he important?”

“Yes, but I’m afraid that we’ve got bigger
problems at the moment.” I sighed, stepping closer. “The fences are
failing, Aries. From Lerna to Oxbrough, and that’s just what I know
about firsthand.”

“I know. There’s a large group of us who’ve
been trying to assess the damage across Terlain and bring any
survivors to safety. I’m afraid we’re not much of a match for Kahn
and his guards, and especially not for some of the creatures that
have taken free rein across the land.” Her tone was laced with a
bitterness that had grown roots that went deep.

“So we’re all screwed.” Marta sauntered into
the room.

“We might be,” Aries acknowledged. “But there
just may be hope yet.” Her silk-and-honey voice became low and
dramatic. “There’s been talk of an army that’s forming, high in the
mountains, not very far from here. People talk of a man without a
name, the warrior of the ruins, who’s to lead a powerful army.”

She turned to me. “They say he’s tall and
strong, with jewel green eyes and light hair.”

“Sun-streaked—” I broke off, my heart
beginning a slow flutter.

“They say his heart was broken and he took
the mountains, some think to avenge his lover’s death.

But he means to take out Kahn’s empire, and
most people think he can do just that.”

“When did this talk begin to circulate,
Aries?” I asked, holding my breath.

“About eight months ago, maybe less,” she
confirmed.

“Dear heaven, Marta, I think she’s talking
about Mark. Do you suppose?”

“The timing is right,” she nodded, tears
forming in her blue eyes. “The description too. So that’s where
he’s been all this time.”

“It’s possible. Very possible.” I swallowed,
excitement beginning to build. “We have to find him.

Can we get there, to the mountains?”

“Their training camp is in the ruins near the
ranges. It won’t be easy, but we can get there. He might be our
only hope.”

“We have to make the journey,” I decided.
“Marta, can you watch Ashley for a few days?”

“Yes,” she nodded. “Don’t you worry about
your little girl. She’ll be safe here. You go find my boy. Bring
him home.”

***

We had been climbing for days and I was
beginning to have serious doubts about the wisdom of our latest
task. Okay, so maybe “doubt” was not technically an accurate
description of my feelings. In fact, several more accurate and
colorfully descriptive words came to mind. Stupid. Foolish.
Dumb-assed—

“Do you need to break?”

“Break what?” I tried not to look as hopeful
as I felt.

“No, I meant do you need a break?”

“As in rest?”

“Yes, as in rest, Claire.” Aries was looking
down, a wry smile touching her lips.