chapter 6

CHAPTER 17

There was something odd, and mysterious in the air that morning, I could feel it down in my bones, down to my very core and I had known something was wrong. Very wrong.

It was my wedding day, and my wife's stuff was going to arrive at first light, I had known for I have been the one that had ordered and picked the workers that were to get the job done after Fredrick and my secretary had a long talk the day before of unsettled matters I had to arrange.

I, and Marina were breaking our fast when a rush of cold shot to my brain, and the butter knife I was holding between my fingers fell from my grasp and into the soup bowl making a hard plunge on the way thus causing red dots to smear on the table cloth as my knuckles started turning pale white.

I'd had it controlled for years, I had gone through hell and back educating myself on the peculiar matter and how to keep it at bay. Reading every witchcraft, and book of spell I could get my hands on, I had strived to make myself the person that I was now, a controlled person. Days of uncontrollability were behind me, for now, I had a full grasp on my being and self. But on that morning, I knew something was wrong, freakishly wrong, utterly wrong.

Sitting across the table, Marina rushed towards me, as she made sure not to get any physical contact with me, she said, "Someone had broke in."

I knew a person had crossed the property without my consent the moment flashes started to prick inside my head, but little did I know it was her. She that was causing me the pain.

The angel that had struck me senseless, possessed my nightmares, and brought me out of my mind the moment I set eyes on years ago was back, in my property bringing me to my doom.

She was back.

She was my wife. My wife whose very presence was all over my room as she slept heavely and soundly on my bed, and under my sheets.

Images of her swaying body, tender touch, and beautiful laughter were haunting me in a maze that had no entry nor and exite.

Years ago, before the black dust of evil had been lifted off the chests of the heathens, there had been a time when the world was led and ruled only by magic, chants, and spells. Nothing from that era of time had made it alive to this time but some enchanting books that were kept hidden, people would teach their little children at a tender age the arts of magic, the children would grow to form a group named the Fiathful whose life they would provide for the sole purpose of coping the wods of the books in lettres then burying them under the ground so they wouldn't be found by the kings' men.

Religious practice involving magic and affinity with nature, usually within a pagan tradition had been banned and the children of good, or the faithful, were believed to be vulnerable to the fire of jealousy the kings' med would set on their bodies, burning them alive. However as years flew by, the that books had remained for years a secrecy from the kings that started the orders of burning men that had faith in witchcraft, black magic, and sorcery after the kings were defeated were brought out by the Fathful.

My uncle used to tell me that my parents had a fancy of this kind of magic, and to protect both me and my little sister they had casted a spell on the house which made it to anyone without my own or my sister's consent impossible for them to ever be able to set a foot it it, but she did; she managed to cross the magical border.

I was the one who had let her in, and more had let her roam, wander and even get lost inside it before I had asked the valet to bring her to my office. I was trying to test myself around her. She seemed to like wandering in the house, and even after getting lost I would have let her roam some more, but her father had barged into my office as a mad man, and had made a fuss, and demanded to bring her to him, as if I were holding her hostage when she was the one invading my home, and my mind.

At first, I was going to marry her sister, even though I had never met her before, as a matter of fact I couldn't even bring my self to recall her name; it was heavy on the tongue, and rather tedious. I didn't care about my bride's looks or the first name she carried because all that mattered and was of real value to us was laying in her her last name.

Her father, Fredrick O James, had outgrown his pride and come begging for my help. I wanted to bruise his pride more than anything else, I wanted to smudge it with dirt and blood and let him soak in it until it dries out, or drowns him to death, because I cared about nothing but his ruin.

However, there was always something or rather a stronger reason that the eye was never able to reach that we craved for. I, myself, had grown out one of my bad traits that was foolishness of boyhood. Yes, I craved revenge for all the spilled blood and gory the man had caused, but now I understood better, or at least I thought I did, and there was something more, far more important than revenge and vendetta and if the only way to reach it was by marrying an O James lady that I have never met, nor seem to remember the name of, than be it.

It was all set, I was going to marry her sister, and try to find the solution I craved to reach, but the moment she had bursted into my office in a fake wig and a servant outfit, I had lost my wits. It was her for real, and she was an O james. That had turned on all the tables for me, for us.

It was her, the same girl that had robbed me of my sanity years ago, and now we were going to start playing a fair game, at last.

I still recall the day when I was still but a lad of ten when the covered up stranger had first come in our lives, bringing along with him all the secrets.

It was a wintry starless night in early February when he through the biting wind and a driving snow that made one's ears freeze was walking from the railway station, and carrying a little black bag in his thickly gloved hand. He was wrapped up from head to foot, and the brim of his soft felt hat hid every inch of his face but the shiny tip of his nose; the snow had piled itself against his shoulders and chest, and added a white crest to the burden he carried, the burden of my family.

He staggered into the only inn that was in the village of lost souls more dead than alive, and flung his large travelling bag that was typically made of stiff leather and that had an opening into two equal parts down on hard wooden ground. "A fire," he cried,"in the name of human charity and hospitality! A room and a fire!" He stamped and shook the snow from off himself in the hall, and followed Mrs. Tumble into her guest parlour to strike his bargain. And with that much introduction, that and a couple of sovereigns flung upon the table, he took up his quarters in the inn.

At the time, my mom and dad were both lost, both gone. I and Marina were taken care of by Mrs. Tumble whose loving and caring heart couldn't leave us that day alone in the big house so she brought us back with her to her home that was the inn she ran after her husband's death.

Mrs. Tumble lit the fire and left him there while she went to prepare him a meal with her own hands. A guest to stop at The Inn in the winter time was an unheard-of piece of luck, let alone a guest who was no "haggler," and she was resolved to show herself worthy of her good fortune. As soon as the bacon was well under way, and Lilia, her lymphatic maid, had been brisked up a bit by a few deftly chosen expressions of contempt, she carried the cloth, plates, and glasses in to the parlour and began to lay them with the utmost eclat. Although the fire was burning up briskly, she was surprised to see that her visitor still wore his hat and coat, standing with his back to her and staring out of the window at the falling snow in the yard. His gloved hands were clasped behind him, and he seemed to be lost in thought. She noticed that the melting snow that still sprinkled his shoulders dripped upon her carpet. "Can I take your hat and coat, sir?" she said, "and give them a good dry in the kitchen?

"No," he said without turning to meet her worried gaze.

She was not sure she had heard him, and was about to repeat her question when He turned his head and looked at her over his shoulder. "I prefer to keep them on," he said with emphasis, and she noticed that he wore big blue spectacles with sidelights, and had a bush side-whisker over his coat-collar that completely hid his cheeks and face.

"Very well, sir," she said. "As you like. In a bit the room will be warmer."

He made no answer, and had turned his face away from her again, and Mrs. Tumble, feeling that her conversational advances were ill-timed, laid the rest of the table things in a quick staccato and whisked out of the room. When she returned he was still standing there, like a man of stone, his back hunched, his collar turned up, his dripping hat-brim turned down, hiding his face and ears completely. She put down the eggs and bacon with considerable emphasis, and called rather than said to him, "Your lunch is served, sir."

"Thank you," he said at the same time, and did not stir until she was closing the door. Then he swung round and approached the table with a certain eager quickness.

As she went behind the bar to the kitchen she heard a sound repeated at regular intervals. Chirk, chirk, chirk, it went, the sound of a spoon being rapidly whisked round a basin. "That girl!" she said."There! I clean forgot it. It's her being so long!" And while she herself finished mixing the mustard, she gave Lilia a few verbal stabs for her excessive slowness. She had cooked the ham and eggs, laid the table, and done everything, while Lilia (help indeed!) had only succeeded in delaying the mustard. And him a new guest and wanting to stay! Then she filled the mustard pot, and, putting it with a certain stateliness upon a gold and black tea-tray, carried it into the parlour.

As She rapped and entered promptly. As she did so her visitor moved quickly, so that she got but a glimpse of a white object disappearing behind the table. It would seem he was picking something from the floor. She rapped down the mustard pot on the table, and then she noticed the overcoat and hat had been taken off and put over a chairin front of the fire, and a pair of wet boots threatened rust to her steel fender. She went to these things resolutely. "I suppose I may have them to dry now," she said in a voice that brooked no denial.

"Leave the hat," said her visitor, in a muffled voice, and turning she saw he had raised his head and was sitting and looking at her.

For a moment she stood gaping at him, too surprised to speak.

He held a white cloth--it was a serviette he had brought with him--over the lower part of his face, so that his mouth and jaws were completely hidden, and that was the reason of his muffled voice. But it was not that which startled Mrs. Tumble. It was the fact that all his forehead above his blue glasses was covered by a white bandage, and that another covered his ears, leaving not a scrap of his face exposed excepting only his pink, peaked nose. It was bright, pink, and shiny just as it had been at first. He wore a dark-brown velvet jacket with a high, black, linen-lined collar turned up about his neck. The thick black hair, escaping as it could below and between the cross bandages, projected in curious tails and horns, giving him the strangest appearance conceivable. This muffled and bandaged head was so unlike what she had anticipated, that for a moment she was rigid.

He did not remove the serviette, but remained holding it, as she saw now, with a brown gloved hand, and regarding her with his inscrutable blue glasses. "Leave the hat," he said, speaking very distinctly through the white cloth.

Her nerves began to recover from the shock they had received. She placed the hat on the chair again by the fire. "I didn't know, sir,"she began, "that--" and she stopped embarrassed.

"Thank you," he said drily, glancing from her to the door and then at her again.

"I'll have them nicely dried, sir, at once," she said, and carried his clothes out of the room. She glanced at his white-swathed head and blue goggles again as she was going out of the door; but his napkin was still in front of his face. She shivered a little as she closed the door behind her, and her face was eloquent of her surprise and perplexity. "I _never_," she whispered. "There!" She went quite softly to the kitchen, and was too preoccupied to ask Lilia what she was messing about with now , when she got there.

The visitor sat and listened to her retreating feet. He glanced inquiringly at the window before he removed his serviette, and resumed his meal. He took a mouthful, glanced suspiciously at the window, took another mouthful, then rose and, taking the serviette in his hand, walked across the room and pulled the blind down to the top of the white muslin that obscured the lower panes. This left the room in a twilight. This done, he returned with an easier air to the table and his meal.

"The poor soul's had an accident or an operation or something" said Mrs. Tumble. "What a turn them bandages did give me, to be sure!"

She put on some more coal, unfolded the clothes-horse, and extended the traveller's coat upon this. "And they goggles! Why, he looked more like a diving helmet than a human man!" She hung his muffler on a corner of the horse. "And holding that handkerchief over his mouth all the time. Talking through it! ... Perhaps his mouth was hurt too--maybe."

She turned round, as one who suddenly remembers. "Bless my soul alive!" she said, going off at a tangent; "ain't you done the matters _yet_, Lilia?"

When Mrs. Tumble went to clear away the stranger's lunch, her idea that his mouth must also have been cut or disfigured in the accident she supposed him to have suffered, was confirmed, for he was smoking a pipe, and all the time that she was in the room he never loosened the silk muffler he had wrapped round the lower part of his face to put the mouthpiece to his lips. Yet it was not forgetfulness, for she saw he glanced at it as it smouldered out. He sat in the corner with his back to the window-blind and spoke now, having eaten and drunk and being comfortably warmed through, with less aggressive brevity than before. The reflection of the fire lent a kind of red animation to his big spectacles they had lacked hitherto.

"I have some luggage," he said, "at the station," and he asked her how he could have it sent. He bowed his bandaged head quite politely in acknowledgment of her explanation. "To-morrow?" he said. "There is no speedier delivery?" and seemed quite disappointed when she answered, "No." Was she quite sure? No man with a trap who would go over
Mrs. Tumble, nothing loath, answered his questions and developed a conversation. "It's a steep road by the down, sir," she said in answer to the question about a trap; and then, snatching at an opening, said, "It was there a carriage was upsettled, a year a goand more. A gentleman killed, besides his coachman. Accidents, sir,happen in a moment, don't they?"

But the visitor was not to be drawn so easily. "They do," he said through his muffler, eyeing her quietly through his impenetrable glasses.

"But they take long enough to get well, don't they? ... There was my sister's son, Tom, jest cut his arm with a scythe, tumbled on it in the 'ayfield, and, bless me! he was three months tied up sir. You'd hardly believe it. It's regular given me a dread of a scythe, sir."

"I can quite understand that," said the visitor.

"He was afraid, one time, that he'd have to have an operation- - he was that bad, sir."

The visitor laughed abruptly, a bark of a laugh that he seemed to bite and kill in his mouth. "_Was_ he?" he said.

"He was, sir. And no laughing matter to them as had the doing for him, as I had--my sister being took up with her little ones so much. There was bandages to do, sir, and bandages to undo. So that if I may make so bold as to say it, sir--"

"Will you get me some matches?" said the visitor, quite abruptly."My pipe is out."

Mrs. Tumble was pulled up suddenly. It was certainly rude of him, after telling him all she had done. She gasped at him for a moment, and remembered the two sovereigns. She went for the matches.

"Thanks," he said concisely, as she put them down, and turned his shoulder upon her and stared out of the window again, then looked back at.. Evidently he was sensitive on the topic of operations and bandages, because when he looked at me there was a frown printed on his.

He extened his hand for me, asking me to come near him. Putting Marina in her cradle, I walked to him, chin and shouldres up.

Mrs. Tumble kept looking at us but didn't disapprove or "make so bold as to say," however, after all. But his snubbing way had irritated her,and Lilia had a hot time of it that afternoon.

The visitor remained in the parlour until four o'clock, without giving the ghost of an excuse for an intrusion. For the most part he was quite still during that time; it would seem he sat in the growing darkness smoking in the firelight--perhaps dozing. Once or twice a curious listener might have heard him at the coals, and for the space of five minutes he was audible pacing the room. He seemed to be talking to himself. Then the armchair creaked a he sat down again.

That man was Richard, the only man beside my uncle that ever loved and raised me as his child.

He was now in my office sitting carelessly on my desk.

"She is the daughter of Frederick O James."

"I'm aware," Richard mused in a thoughtful manner as he sat on the edge of the desk, legs dangling, eyes looking far behind the open window at the water of the small lake in the garden. "He has requested several meetings with our men already. What I want to know is why she is with you, married to you under such a short notice."

"Her father owes us a great deal of money. I promised to take care of it once I, and his daughter were bond by marriage, and I have payed all his debts yesterday right after she said her vows." Richard's dark eyes moved to mine, lancing right through the half-truth, striving to make me say more but failing. "Do not trifle with me, Thornton, I have raised you to be this man, I know you like the back of my hand, you're not telling me everything, I can see it lurking in your eyes." Bringing the cigar up to his, he added, " Do tell, my son."

Moving across the room at the door of the office that someone knocked on slightly before stepping in, my eyes fell on Joe who has finally made an appearance, a blue mark graced his left eye. I have gifted that to him last night when I saw him burying his tongue down the throat of my sister. His face was barred of any bandages despite the fact that bruises marked all of it, then again it was not our way to hide pain, we wore it like a crown. and he is absent of the smug expression he typically wears. It's safe to say he has come back with his tail between his legs. I always had know he had feelings for marina, but last night I was not taking care of my little sister, I was taking care of my best friend; she would give him nothing but heart break, he deserved far better than to be wounded by a nonchalant girl because if she was my little sister he, too, was my best friend and I knew them both like the back of my hand.

"Does this have any relation to your father's business dealings in the past?"Richard asked again when I ignored his first question. Returning my attention to Richard, affronted by the observation. Discretion is a quality I take great pride in possessing, and it never crossed my mind that he would so clearly guess my intentions.

"there are not so many who know of the mater, but I do know what happened years ago, son." Richard said as he brought another cigar from his front pocket, pursing it between his lips as he added. "You grandfather himself had once spread the rumors that your mother ran off with another man from her clan."

"That isn't true." My tone is careful and deliberate, but it makes little difference. The fact that I am defending my mother at all is the answer to his question. When she disappeared from my life at the age of one, the only explanation I was given was that she was a bad person, and I was never to speak her name again. It was ironic since I never knew what it was in the first place.

I used to always picture her as a small child as tender angel with soothing words, her love never ceasing. She was an Alison for me, the name seemed fit.

Richard gestured for my lighter, and I handed it to him. As he was lighting up his cigar he seemed to think far away, and taking a few puffs of the cigar he seemed to be settling on the right words to say. "The truth is, I'm not certain what happened to your mother, either. She was a good girl. Too sweet to be caught up with the likes of your father. If you do discover the truth, son, I would like to know myself." His words left barred. I did not ask for his blessing, but in his own way, Richard has given it.

He is aware of my true intentions, and I can do what is necessary now that we have come to an understanding. Richard checked his watch and abruptly decided the conversation was over. He announced that the meeting with his men was about to start, and social hour with with his chosen son was over. As he hopped off from my desk of my office and started walking away when he reached Joe, he shook hands with him before looking back at me as though one last thought has occured to him."There is just one thing I must insist on."

"Yes?" I cleared my voice.

"After you're done with her I beliave you're inteding on returning her back to her family?"

"Yes," I said agin, nor completly honest.

His nose wrinkles in distaste as he added, "No matter how beautiful she looks, or how tender her words might sound. She is a great trouble, that you have to steer away from once your problem is solved."

"I'm aware."

Leaving the door a bit open on his way out, I was left with Joe in the room. He seemed to be holding back his tongue.

"I was the that kissed you shouldn't be mad at her, I am the one who dessreves your rage," he said after taking a long sigh.

Taking my sweet time to pour the brown whisky in my glass, I said, "She is my sister, but sometimes it is had for me to understand her. You're my best friend, on the other hand, and I know you more than anyone else. I have told you not to get near, and I trust that you didn't, she did."

"But I kissed her back."

"When she feeds your heart to rats don't come crying back to me, I hit you for your own good to wake up a bit and realize the mess you're driving yourself in."

"But I love her."

The beautiful thing about a woman like Mara is that's all it takes. We are both too jaded to believe in love. She uses me for the void that Daddy left her, and I use her because it's uncomplicated. She does her best work on her knees, and there's no shame in that.Long red fingernails scrape up my thighs. When she sucks my dick into her mouth, I lean back on a sigh and finish off my cigarette while she bounces up and down between my legs.He flicks a piece of lint off his jacket, the gesture symbolic of a warning. "So don't get attached to her."What I did not anticipate was that she would be so lovely to look at. When Manuel offered up his prized daughter as collateral for a debt, I had decidedly painted her as a gargoyle in his image. But in truth, she looks nothing like him.A waifish girl, she is too thin for my tastes. Her body is the testament of a struggle between femininity and girlishness. Caught in the clutches of both, it's undecided of which she wants or needs. But there is no denying the unnatural grace she carries. Whether it's the subtle flip of her hand or the curve of her leg, she is almost inhumanly beautiful. She is elegant, manicured, and well groomed. In short, she is everything I am not. Yet when I first saw her, I was admittedly captivated to the soft-spoken beauty in a way that was unfamiliar to me. She is nothing like the Russian girls I am accustomed to. She is nothing like any girl I am accustomed to.She is undoubtedly intelligent, but the level of her naivety gives me whiplash. There is an innocence about her that provokes doubts in me. Doubts that are at odds with every value I stand for. The longer I endure her presence, the clearer it becomes. I would do well to stay away from her because she is of no importance to me. And as shameful as it may be to see something so lovely destroyed, it might come to that in the end. I must remember this. Whatever fate befell my mother, so too will Tanaka's be.

They continued up the stairs until the ground leveled out and Jessica found the familiar path winding through the thick timber to the estate. As islands went, in the surrounding sea between Washington and Canada, it was small and remote, no ferry even traveled to it. That was the way Dillon had preferred it, wanting privacy for his family on his own personal island. In the old days, there had been guards and dogs. Now there were shadows and haunting memories that tore at her soul.

In the old days the island had been alive with people, bustling with activities; now it was silent, only a caretaker lived somewhere on the island in one of the smaller houses. Jessica's mother had told her that Dillon tolerated only one older man on his island on a regular basis. Even in the wind and rain, Jessica couldn't help noticing the boathouse was ill-kept and the road leading around and up toward the house was overgrown, showing little use. Where there had always been several boats docked at the pier, none were in sight, although Dillon must still have had one in the boathouse.

The path led through the thick trees. The wind was whipping branches so that overhead the canopy of trees swayed precariously. The rain had a much more difficult time penetrating through the treetops to reach them, but drops hitting the pathway plopped loudly. Small animals rustled in the bushes as they passed.

And she had tried. She had tried desperately to drown out the sounds of chanting. The vision of the black lights and candles. The scent of the incense. She remembered the shouting, the raised voices, the sound of the gun. And the flames. The terrible greedy flames. The blanket of smoke, so thick one couldn't see. And the smells never went away. Somet

Jessica was furious. Furious. Why would someone suddenly, after seven years, send old newspapers and tabloids to the twins? Tara had innocently opened the package wrapped in a plain brown paper. The tabloids had been brutal, filled with accusations of drugs, jealousy, and the occult. The speculation that Dillon had caught his wife in bed with another man, that there had been an orgy of sex, drugs, devil worship, and murder, had been far too titillating for the scandal sheets not to play it up long before the actual facts could come out. Jessica had found Tara sobbing pitifully in her room. Whoever had seen fit to enlighten the twins about their father's past had called the house repeatedly whispering horrible things to Trevor and Tara, insisting their father had murdered several people including their mother.