Meridian Page 9

  "You'll find yourself holding people while they die. This is a gift to them, but it's also a gift to you. As Fenestras we have daily reminders of what is important in this world."

  "I get it."

  "Are you sure?"

  "I do. I understand better."

  "Good. Let's go have a slice of pie before we leave. Sheila does amazing things with homemade crust and frozen fruit." Auntie hugged me and chuckled. "I'm partial to her rhubarb custard."

  "I've never had rhubarb."

  "Then you'll have to taste hers. You're doing well, little one. I know this can be tough."

  * * *

  The next morning. I put together a light breakfast for us, thinking Tens would appear at any moment. When he didn't. I began to get worried. Auntie alternately sewed and dozed, her eyelids slipping shut between stitches. Her chin would hit her chest and she'd rally awake.

  "Where's Tens?" I asked.

  "He had a few things to take care of. He'll be back soon."

  I put down the journal and watched her stitch. Her fingers flew through thread and fabric. "Teach me to quilt?" I asked.

  She smiled joyfully. "I'd love to." She patted the sofa and hoisted a basket of scraps into my lap. "Pick two pieces." She dug around in another basket for a needle and thread. "I quilt so I can clear out the memories. Every Fenestra has to find her way of coping—some cook, some paint. I quilt."

  "Memories?"

  "Each soul leaves odd bits of information with us. Things that are important to them."

  "That's why!" I exclaimed, dropping the fabric.

  "Why what, dear?"

  "Celia loved Oreos and Cheerleader Barbie, and her guinea pig was named Shrek. I thought I was making all that up!"

  "No, dear. I bet if you thought about it, you'd notice things from animals, too. The sound of mosquitoes is so electric. The smell of spring. The taste of clean water."

  I nodded. I had memories and experiences that didn't seem to make any sense. I tried to thread the needle, but on the fifth miss,

  Auntie took it from me.

  "It gets overwhelming. Too much. I make fabric stories from each life that moves through me."

  I glanced around at the stacks of quilts that were everywhere. "All of these?" There had to be hundreds—thousands—of stories represented.

  "They do add up, don't they?"

  I attempted to tie a knot at the bottom of the thread as instructed, but it was hopeless. Auntie patted my leg. "You'll get it eventually. It entails practice."

  "Like everything else?"

  "Yes." Her face suddenly paled to the color of chalk and her head snapped toward the door.

  Custos growled deep in her throat

  I froze. "What?"

  Auntie shook her head infinitesimally.

  I waited, my heart pounding. I felt the fear in the air. And something else.

  Custos skulked over to the front door and waited, her head and tail lowered.

  We sat there, frozen like trapped prey, maybe seconds, maybe hours, until Auntie stood. "It's okay."

  "What? What is going on?" I asked, licking my dry lips.

  Auntie set her quilting aside and removed a shotgun from hooks on the wall.

  "What the hell?"' I cried, aghast. A tiny old lady holding a shotgun is incongruous at best.

  "Stay here," she commanded.

  I followed. "No."

  She peered out the window by the front door.

  "Where is everybody?" Tens suddenly shouted, banging the back door closed and stomping through the kitchen.

  We both skittered and turned around as he came down the hallway.

  "What happened?" He rushed to Auntie and tugged the gun from her shaking hands.

  "I don't know," I said.

  "Did you see anything?"' Auntie asked him.

  "No. I came through the back woods. What's going on?"

  "Someone was here." Auntie answered him.

  "Who?"

  "It felt like a Fenestra, but maleficent."

  "The Nocti?"

  "What?" I gasped. I hadn't heard anything.

  "I don't know. I've never been in the same room with one. I don't know how their energy feels."

  "When?" Tens moved us away from the door. He opened it a crack and told Custos to stay. His shoulders blocked my view, but his reaction had me forcing him away so I could see.

  An arrow, its end on fire, was lodged in the front door. A decapitated and disemboweled tabby cat lay on the door step. Blood congealed and darkened around her corpse. Her stomach produced the remains of what I knew instinctively were kittens.

  I gagged as I scanned the carnage. I moved outside and stumbled down the steps. My breakfast lurched as I knelt in the snow by the side of the house.

  "Shit." Tens walked down the steps and surveyed the mess. "Shit."' He kicked at the steps and the Land Rover's tires.

  Auntie leaned against him. "Oh dear. Not again."

  I moved toward clean snow and wiped handfuls of it across my face, reveling in the cool and clean feel.

  Auntie came over to me and handed me a handkerchief. "Let's go back inside. We'll make tea."

  "But—"

  "I'll clean it up. Go on." Tens didn't glance at me as he all but shoved us back into the house.

  "Why?" I asked Auntie as I helped her in the kitchen. There was no reason in the world that would suffice. All her strength seemed to have flowed out of her.

  "A warning. A promise." She seemed haunted.

  "From?"

  "Did you feel anything? When we were sewing?" Auntie measured out loose tea leaves into a pot, but her movements were jerky and slow.

  I slid out a chair for her and took over brewing the tea. "Fear? My heart sped up. My mouth went dry."

  "Good. Good."

  "Why?"

  "You felt them too. The Nocti were here, little one. You must always remember that feeling, because it's the only warning you'll get. I'd heard they leave behind arrows and desecrated corpses. But I'd never experienced it."

  "Has anything happened before?"

  "Silly things—toilet paper, eggs, paint—but nothing I couldn't attribute to bored children."

  "From the church?"

  "Maybe."

  "Are the Nocti churchy?"

  "To blend in, maybe, but with so many people moving here and those I know leaving? How do we know who it could be?"

  The teakettle whistled. I poured the boiling water into the teapot and watched the steam rise from its spout as the brew steeped.

  "You must trust yourself. Be alert at all times, or they'll capture you. They aren't above murder, but they'd rather make you one of them than lose your energy to the other side. If they can, they will turn you."

  "How?"

  Auntie wrung her hands. "I don't really know. I've never faced a Nocti. I've heard a Fenestra must kill herself in the presence of one and then, rather than send her soul on, somehow put it back into the body."

  "Well, I'm not killing myself, so we're okay."

  Auntie's expression was stormy. "I'm sorry. Meridian. I should have prepared better for the Nocti. I should have done more to—"

  "Stop." Tens interrupted her as he strode into the kitchen. "You've never done this before either, right?"

  "No."

  "So you have nothing to apologize for. We can handle it. Right. Meridian?"

  I wasn't sure I agreed, but Auntie was beyond troubled by what she seemed to believe were her inadequacies. At the moment, she appeared as if a strong wind could blow right through her. "Right. Tens and I can figure it out."

  Thank you, he mouthed.

  Auntie pursed her lips, then sighed. "I have to go lie down. I can't seem to stay awake these days. Will you be okay?" She was already shuffling out of the kitchen before she finished speaking.

  "Are you sure? Do you need help?" I followed, but she climbed the stairs, not answering me.

  "I'm sorry," Tens said, standing in the doorway.

  "For what?" I glance
d at him, momentarily stunned by the intensity of his expression.

  "I should have been here. I should have—"

  "What? Used the shotgun?"I tried to make light, but my joke fell flat

  Tens slapped the doorframe, agitated. Clearly, he felt responsible for us. "It's important. I'm supposed to—"

  "Tens, you didn't do anything wrong. Why are you apologizing?"

  He shrugged out of his coat and folded his long limbs into a chair.

  I poured him a cup of tea, unsure of what else to do.

  "I should have been here. That's all." He swallowed great gulps of tea, almost as if scalding his throat were an earned punishment.

  "We're fine. Forget it."

  "How's she doing?"

  "Until that, okay, I guess." I chewed on my bottom lip, not sure I wanted to ask my next question but needing to know the answer. "How long? You know, for Auntie? Do you know? Before she ..." I couldn't make myself finish.

  "Not long."

  "Years? Months?"

  Tens frowned and finished his tea without answering.

  "Come on." I reached out and gripped his forearm. "Seriously how long?"

  "Days. A week or so if we're lucky."

  "What about medical care? Shouldn't she be in a hospital or something?" I hated feeling powerless.

  "She made me promise she wouldn't die in a hospital. Meridian, she's one hundred and six. How much longer do you think they could keep her going anyway?"

  "That's harsh!"

  "Am I wrong?"

  I swallowed. Tears pooled in my eyes and one slid down my cheek. "You're asking me to—"

  "No. I'm not." Tens knelt in front of me and wiped the droplet from my face. "If you can get her to go be checked out by a doctor, maybe they could make her more comfortable. But Fenestras don't live longer than one hundred and six. They just don't. And she wants to die here, in this house. She's not insane, Meridian. She knows exactly what she wants. We can give that to her. This last thing, we can do. Even though it means it's harder in some ways on you, I get that." Tens stopped, seemingly shocked by his long speech. "Can we not do this right now?"

  I nodded, not wanting to add to his pain.

  "Should I make you a sandwich?" I asked, my appetite completely gone.

  "No, thanks. Maybe later."

  I picked at my sweater and realized I was still wearing my pajamas. "I, um. I'll go get dressed."

  He grunted. His focus lay on the journal I'd forgotten about.

  "I was looking up the Aternocti, hoping—"

  "If Auntie doesn't know it, it probably doesn't exist."

  "Oh."

  "I'll check. You go."

  "I can stay—"

  ''Go!" He bit off the word, anger vibrating in that one syllable.

  I scurried up the stairs, but I could have sworn I felt eyes watching me.

  Chapter 15

  Smoked sausage and a jolly tupping. Ale and folly. Fickle bosoms and bar fights. That is the sum of experiences my souls gathered from their lives. Why do I attract all the unsophisticated fancy men? For once could one love the opera and his mother?

  —Lucinda Myer, b. 1702-d. 1808

  A crow sat outside my bedroom window and cawed incessantly. I walked over and stared into the one beady eye it turned my way. I expected it to drop out of the tree dead at any moment, but it only called and hopped around the branches. Movement in the field below caught my attention and I pressed my face against the glass, trying to get a better view.

  It was Tens, on snowshoes and carrying an oversized hiking pack. He was loaded down with bulging pockets, and packages tied onto the pack. It had to weigh at least seventy-five or a hundred pounds. He trekked out of sight. Something must have been terribly important, for him to leave us alone again so quickly especially given his earlier feelings of guilt.

  Custos trotted at his side to the edge of the trees, her tail wagging. Then she turned and raced back toward the house. Where is he going? What is all that stuff on his back?

  I picked out clean clothes, grabbed the stack of fashion magazines Mom had packed for me, and padded down the hall. I hoped to soak away this oppressive reality in a claw-foot tub, the likes of which I'd only ever seen in movies. My chest felt so tight it was difficult to get a full breath. Phone calls were scary, but eviscerating a helpless animal crossed the line of crazy.

  I sighed, opening drawers in the ancient vanity, hoping to spot bath salts or bubble bath. No luck.

  A brisk knock at the door startled me. "Meridian? It's Auntie."

  I opened the door. "Is it okay for me to bathe in here?"

  "Of course. I used to spend hours soaking in the tub too. It was like a minivacation, almost as good as the hot springs up the road." She smiled and held out a basket full of bottles. "Bath salts and bubbles and I don't know what else. Use whatever you like."

  Guilt flooded me. "Do you need me for anything?"

  She smiled. "No, you enjoy."

  "Okay."

  She closed the door.

  I yanked it back open. "Auntie, where did Tens go?"

  She paused, but didn't turn around. "He's running an errand for me." She disappeared around a corner.

  "On foot?" I asked the empty hallway. I shrugged. Clearly, I wasn't to know. That bothered me. I'm supposed to be learning and trusting and doing what I'm told, and yet I'm not trusted with the whole truth. I'm either part of this or I'm not.

  Soon the bathroom filled with scents. I stripped my pj's off and dipped a toe in, then a foot and a leg, until I was all but submerged up to my chin. Bubbles tickled my nose like butterflies.

  I ran my hands over my body, trying to imagine what it would be like to be the recipient of quick, careless caresses, Sam was the only person in my family who ever touched me without hesitation. Tears leaked from beneath my lids. What does Sammy think? What has he been told? That his sister just disappeared? Does he think I don't love him anymore? Where are they?

  I grabbed the top magazine from the pile. I'd lugged twenty pounds of magazines across the country, but I knew Mom thought she packed what I wanted most in the world. She always thought I wanted to be a magazine writer or editor. She never understood that in those glossy pages I saw the material world of normalcy. It didn't matter how many issues I read, but that elusive world of everyone else's never looked like mine. There were no happy Christmas scenes photographed with dead reindeer under the tree or the family dog being buried in the backyard beneath fairy lights and falling snow.

  I'd never had a friend. Not since I'd made the mistake of telling Jillian the truth after her hamster died in my hands during a playdate. I told her everything died around me. She must have relayed this to her mother, because pretty soon Jillian was always busy. Finally she told me she didn't want me to kill her, too.

  I tossed magazine after magazine toward the wall. None of them brought the distraction they used to. I closed my eyes and a montage of Tens flashed across my eyelids. I remembered the feeling of him carrying me. He was safe and dangerous all at the same time. He made me want to trust him with every dark secret, but also to run away as fast as I could. My lips tingled as I imagined what kissing him might feel like. What I'd give for him to regard me with the warmth and love he showed Custos.

  Did he wonder what kissing me might be like? Did he even know me as anything other than Auntie's pesky, sickly niece? Auntie's imminent death loomed above me.

  Frustrated, I dunked my head underwater and held my breath.

  And held it.

  And kept holding it until I was past the point of bursting. Then I pushed to the surface, gasping great gulps of air into my burning lungs.

  The tub suddenly felt like a coffin. I grabbed a bar of soap and a razor and shaved my legs for the first time in weeks. I scrubbed my skin with a washcloth until it was red and sensitive. I used a handful of shampoo on my hair. My long gorgeous hair that my mother refused to let me cut, that took forever to wash and even longer to dry. The red color was fading back to its n
ormal dark brown. I lifted the plug in the tub so I could rinse off in clean water.

  It took nearly a year to get all the soap out of my hair. Suddenly my eyes snapped open. I had an idea. I needed scissors. Sharp scissors.

  There was no one to tell me no. No worlds to collapse if I did this. No one was going to care. I rubbed the towel on the huge antique mirror so I could see myself. My hair hit the curve of my back, right above my tailbone. I dressed in an old turtleneck and jeans.

  I dumped my pajamas on my bed and rummaged around in the bureau drawers. I found a set of skeleton keys. Most of the doors in the long hallways of the house were locked. The temptation was irresistible. My mission for scissors shifted as curiosity got the better of me. I felt a bit like a pirate searching for treasure. Behind one of these doors was the tool I needed. I wandered down the hall, trying keys in the locks until one worked.

  The door creaked open. A musty cloud of cold air hit my face and shivers broke down my body. Spiderwebs hung like tinsel from the ceiling, and a thick coat of dust made my nose twitch. I tried the light switch. A lamp emitted a soft glow, one made even dimmer by the dense layer of dust on the shade.

  I caught a whiff of pipe tobacco. Heavy masculine chairs flanked a fireplace, and easels of stretched canvas with half-finished landscapes on them faced the windows. But the crown jewel of the room was an enormous, intricate desk. The top was bare, but when I opened drawers I found bits and pieces of treasures.

  Old photographs of a young man in uniform. A postcard with a hospital on the front and a note in spidery script on the back: Will be here at least six more months—terrible and exhausting. Much love, M.

  A dried rose crumbled when I picked it up. Pens and pots of ink hid behind carved doors with knobs made of onyx and ivory.

  Bundles of letters flanked the desk. Most were yellowed and fragile with age, tied together with grosgrain ribbons, but others were clearly more recent.

  I picked up the top batch; the envelopes were still white and smooth. All were addressed to Nurse M. Laine Fulbright.

  I glanced at the door and sat down in a chair, ignoring the plume of dust that enveloped me. I untied the ribbon and opened the first letter.

  Dear friend,

  Our little prophet grows stronger each day. But these weary bones are fading and will be called home soon. I have given him lessons in hunting and scavenging, He does well for a young man of eleven, Gods willing. I will put him on a plane when I know I’m close and let you know when to pick him up. I’d trust him to no one but you. He will be quite a man, one we will be very proud of. His mother would have adored him. He has her eyes and her loyalty. He has memorized your address so he can find you on his own if he must. The future is not clear and it frustrates me. I can’t see the visions as I used to. But I know he needs you and you him. This I trust.