Stolen Hearts: Book 1 (Grim's Labyrinth Series) (6 page)

When the room had finally filled and the chairs were taken, another door opened, this time behind the two of them. They turned around in time to see what looked for all the world like concert venue doors opening, giant wall panels that rotated on a hinge to let masses of people enter. A barricade rose up from the floor immediately behind them as more people began to push their way into the room.

The room had almost reached capacity, but the eerie thing about the auditorium wasn’t the fact that it now began to look alarmingly like a courtroom, with Jessica and Conlan on the hot seat as the defendants. Instead, it was the complete silence. Even the bodies still pouring in the back didn’t make a sound as the people walked, no murmuring, no apologies for stepping on feet, no rustling fabric from the eclectic mixture of styles. Silence, as though the people had appeared instead of moved.

“Conlan, I’m not too proud to admit this is freaking me out more than a little bit,” she said, tugging on his sleeve as she slid both hands together in the crook of his elbow. He pulled his arm away gently and placed it around her shoulders instead, pulling her close to his side protectively.

“Don’t worry, we’re only outnumbered by a little bit,” he whispered. “I’m sure we can take them on.”

“I’d settle for knowing why we’re here and what they want.”

“Looks like you’re about to get your wish,” Conlan replied, pointing to the center of the half circle where a tall man approached a podium that had appeared. All eyes turned to him and he waited while looking out at the group. No one spoke, and Jessica realized he was waiting for all of the people to stop thinking, to quiet their minds and give him their attention.

He stood before them and looked very much like a man giving a speech. His eyes roved the room, occasionally seeing the individuals behind him as he turned to look over his shoulder. His hands held the sides of the podium, and from time to time he gripped it hard enough that his knuckles turned white. Jessica jumped when he pounded his fist against it once.

All without speaking.

When the man addressed the group—ignoring Jessica and Conlan for now—his mouth didn’t move. He had all of the characteristics of a man stirring a crowd with powerful and emotional words, but he didn’t speak. For their part, the assembled crowd of gawking onlookers didn’t appear moved or unmoved; they simply stood, existing without responding, as the man acted out his silent play in front of them.

When he finally raised a hand in the air, its fist clenched tightly, then brought it down hard and pointed an accusing finger at Jessica, it was all she could do not to faint. She looked nervously out of the corners of her eyes to see if the crowd had turned into an angry mob at the man’s non-speech, ready to pounce on her from behind. No one had moved, their eyes still transfixed on the man at the front of the room.

“I don’t know what you did to piss this guy off,” Conlan whispered in her ear, “but it must have been epic.” Jessica couldn’t answer, but she merely shook her head, a new look of fearful resignation on her face. It wasn’t just her paranoia kicking in. Even Conlan could tell they were angry with her. She intuitively stepped closer to him, letting the solid feel of his arm against her shoulder give her some tiny measure of comfort.

The lights overhead shifted their glow, each of them rotating on their individual axis until they all came together to shine one incredibly bright spotlight on Jessica. The rest of the room was now swathed in darkness as the light came together, blinding her from seeing anything else outside the light. She knew the people were all still there, but had no capacity to see anything other than the white glow that swallowed her.

After spending so much time in terrorizing and complete silence, the sound of a loud voice was almost enough to drop Jessica to her knees. It wasn’t an unpleasant voice, but there was no warmth to it, not a speck of human emotion. Not even anger.

“We brought you here for a purpose,” the man’s voice said.

“Oh great. I just knew you were tied up in some kind of otherworldly noble cause. Why is it always the girls with a predetermined important paranormal destiny who fall in my lap?” Conlan joked quietly. Jessica glared at him. How could he keep cracking jokes like that? Did the guy have absolutely zero sense of self-preservation? Besides, he was taking all of this far too well to be real. She finally broke her angry gaze and returned her attention to what she hoped was the speaker, still unable to see anything beyond the white light that surrounded her.

“Your purpose is to sacrifice yourself for our society, in order to help us continue our important mission of recivilizing this society,” the voice continued.

“They’d better be talking to you, Conlan. They lost me at the word ‘sacrifice,’ that’s for sure,” Jessica hissed under her breath.

“Maybe it’s like a metaphorical kind of sacrifice, like, giving up your Saturdays to pick up litter along the highway. I totally think we should hear them out.” Conlan’s sarcasm was the only thing holding Jessica together at that point, because on her own she knew she would have fallen to pieces with the strangeness of it all. She clung to his wit and even his stupidity in an effort to stay focused in this weirdness.

The voice continued from outside the light, but it was joined by murmurings from other voices mixed in, all speaking at once, but also still all distinguishable. She didn’t know how she was doing it, but somehow she was taking part in all of their conversations at once, causing a not unpleasant buzz in her brain as she focused simultaneously on what she was hearing.

“You are the Neftali, the one who fights and is victorious,” a new voice intoned dramatically.

“You are the Masago, the ancient, the sands of time,” explained another voice.

“You are the Batoul, the virgin who will redeem us,” the original voice announced.

Jessica froze, that last statement causing a pink blush to creep up her neck to her cheeks as embarrassment flooded from her core. She was ready to approach the group in the front, her face a mask of barely veiled anger. She untangled herself from Conlan’s arms and stepped forward, the shaft of spotlights following her movements. She turned in a circle and looked at the mob behind the waist-high barricade, then turned back to the front and looked directly towards the group who sat in the chairs. She couldn’t see their faces, but she knew they would hear her.

“Actually,” Jessica interrupted, waving her arms to cut off the words she’d heard, “I am the Jessica. It’s pronounced Je-ssi-ca. It might be a strange word to you, but it’s the only word to describe me. And I’m done here. Discussing my status as a virgin pretty much sealed it for me, even if the other hokey crap hadn’t already been a huge turnoff in this conversation.”

She walked to the edge of the light but realized she couldn’t leave its glow as it kept pace with her. She took small, darting steps and shifted direction several times, calling on her runner’s movements to dodge the light. When she finally managed to escape its beam, a stabbing pain in her neck paralyzed her before throwing her to the floor.

Behind her, Conlan yelled her name. She couldn’t see anything but spots in front of her eyes, but at least the light was gone. Her eyes might soon adjust to the room. Conlan was suddenly face down beside her, his attempt to reach her and help her thwarted with the same torturous pain she’d felt.

“Wow,” he gasped, lifting his head only a few inches and turning to look at her, “that was something. You up for round two?”

Jessica only let her eyes close by way of answering, too damaged to even respond.

Chapter 10

Under the pitch-black night sky of a sweltering evening, Rageeb held court over Faydra, announcing clearly for the small group of cronies the charges against her. The mockery of holding a trial wasn’t lost on her. If anyone deserved to be forced to the ground to kneel before the group, hands tied behind his back, it was him. Instead, she was the one who tried in vain to defend herself, looking pleadingly to the others with her one eye that hadn’t yet swollen shut.

Fortunately, it was her very appearance that might save her. As she deliberately looked each of the other council members in the face, willing them to see her as Faydra who was one of them and not Faydra who had left years ago on classified but misunderstood work, she could see the turmoil on their faces. Taking off on a highly dubious, mysterious assignment that required leaving the council was one thing, but being brought back in this state—bound and broken, injured by what could amount to the most basic jealous rage—didn’t sit well with them. She could tell.

She still had friends and supporters within the organization, and more than a few of the council members owed her their lives. Their guilty expressions as they looked away told her they remembered, but those same people who averted their gaze also told her that her fate was practically sealed. They would do nothing to intervene.

“As I have plainly explained and demonstrated through clear evidence, Faydra is guilty of neglecting her duties to this council and our people. She not only abandoned her position for selfish gain, she was so incompetent in her new role that she allowed a dangerous killer to grow to maturity, and then had the willful nerve to unleash that killer on the rest of us. At this very moment, the escaped murderer is in the hands of our enemies, ready for them to bend her to their will and wipe us all out. All because of this woman.”

Rageeb pointed accusingly at Faydra and kicked a toeful of dirt in her direction to show his scorn. The sand and pebbles rained down on the top of her thigh, stinging one of her cuts for a moment. The minor pain only served to anger Faydra, and anger was her only hope.

God knows this council doesn’t care a thing about mercy, that’s for sure, she remembered, calling on years of stored memories. Her years of dedication to the council had been filled with sitting in trials just like this one, with the obvious difference being she was the one staring back at their brutality. Had there ever been a trial in her experience that showed mercy? Of course not. That would be weakness, and if there was anything the council couldn’t tolerate it was sniveling beggars who pleaded for their lives.

If Rageeb lets me address this sham of a court, I’ll win. But he knows that, she thought ruefully as she tried to plot her strategy. These people will listen to me, but that’s only if I’m given the opportunity. Rageeb himself would never allow it, but maybe they’ll require it.

“What does the defendant have to say for herself?” one of the members asked, addressing Rageeb instead of speaking to her. She wanted to open her mouth and remind them that she was completely capable of answering for herself, but she remembered that protocol reigned above all else. She had not been spoken to, therefore she was to remain silent.

“What can she say?” he answered in classic corrupt council fashion. Why answer the question when it could be deflected with a pointless remark instead? “The facts speak for themselves. Faydra was elected to the council—through very suspicious means, I feel compelled to point out—and then when we needed her most, she went running to another agency when they held out a lucrative offer, one that would mean great personal gain for Faydra and very little support for our organization. She basically saw a better offer, so she took it, without thinking once about how her actions would impact our council.

“Even worse, she took a position that she was ill-suited for—again, rumored to have been offered to her only after some possible bribes were paid—and then couldn’t even fulfill the simplest of requests from this council: erase the threat of the killer before she comes of age and destroys us all.

“Her final crime was to let the creature go. As if that wasn’t dangerous and neglectful enough, the creature is right now in the central stronghold of the Balkat.” Rageeb paused for the gasp of disbelief he was sure that mention of their enemy’s name would induce. “I would love to say that it’s not possible that Faydra actually presented the creature to the Balkat, but at this point, I just don’t know anymore.”

Rageeb paced in a circle as he spoke, but at this last accusation, he hung his head and pressed his hands together in front of his eyes, as though the very thought of his ex-wife being so menacing had brought great shame and heartache on him. The effect was both comical and clever.

“You are making serious accusations, Rageeb,” another member spoke. “I don’t say that there’s no truth to them, but I would be far more convinced if there was some piece of evidence that Faydra acted maliciously, or at least with intent. She may be guilty of nothing more than poor judgment, for all we know, but you’re seeking the most severe punishment our council inflicts. I have to wonder if some of your motivation is tied to… shall we say… old wounds?”

Faydar wanted to run and kiss the old man who’d spoken, but that would be more incriminating than if she were to brandish a dagger and stab the man through the heart in front of these witnesses. It would signify an alliance between them, something that had already cost her dearly when she was married to Rageeb. Their alliance and its consequences were a large part of her willingness to leave when the assignment was offered to her.

Rageeb smiled darkly at the man who’d spoken up for Faydra, and she could tell by the look on her ex-husband’s face that he was already calculating not only his response, but also that man’s future downfall. No one contradicted Rageeb, especially in front of an assembly and with so much at stake.

“I appreciate your statement, Jodor, because it gets that fallacy out of the way so we can concentrate on the truth in front of us. We’re all in danger because of this woman and her criminally intentional actions. I ask you to move on, and to weigh the information in front of you before it’s too late.”

This is it, Faydra thought. This is the point where they will either declare my guilt now, or at least let me try to reason with them.

Her unspoken wish was granted. Before Rageeb could get the other council members to agree to pass judgment and move along to carrying out whatever sentence they agreed upon, they insisted on hearing her side of the events.