Incarnations (8 page)

***

THE HUNGER

"Jaxon, we've had a few days to clean up and get
everything organized here, we can't wait any longer. I know you
aren't anxious to go back to the camp, because of... well, the
memories, but we have to go talk to Caislyn. I haven't heard from
her or Gregore, and that's not right. Something might be wrong
there."

"I just don't want to go back there." Jaxon turned in
a huff, knowing she was being childish, but she couldn't shake all
the animosity she still felt for everyone in that camp. "My life
went to shit when I met Caislyn, more so than it already was."

"Come on, that wasn't her fault, she didn't know
anymore than you did."

"I know that, and it still doesn't help me. I just
keep thinking, if I had never met her, maybe I would have had a
chance to meet my mother and keep her in my life for a little
while. My mom died trying to save Caislyn's. If she hadn't been out
collecting those herbs... If..."

"Jaxon, if you hadn't met Caislyn you may have never
met your mother. You can't keep doing this. What's done is done,
and it's not anyone's fault back at that camp." He was growing
frustrated with her, and he wasn't about to back down now. If she
wasn't going to be a grown up about things, then she wasn't the
woman he thought she was. "I will not leave them in possible
danger, not knowing what's going on." When she didn't respond he
voiced his concerns out loud, "and I can't believe you have become
the person who could do that either."

"It's not that damn simple, Seth."

"Yes, Jaxon, it really is. Get over it already,
there's no bringing anyone back that's been lost. You think Caislyn
hasn't lost? She lost her father. You may not have known him, but
it was a huge loss for her. And She lost you, the only friend who
was there for her when her parents were missing. You were the only
one who helped her, and because she had you, you were both able to
find your mothers. That's something. And then you just took off
without a word. Imagine how she must be feeling. And she's pregnant
on top of that and dealing with Ash and Gregore, training her ass
off in order to tell me where to find you. Did you for one minute,
while you were on your little hissy-fit rampage, think of anything
other than yourself?"

"Seth!" Brigid interrupted.

"No, she needs to hear this. There have been people
bending over backwards to make sure she was okay, to bring her back
and keep her safe. And she hasn't thought of any of them in all of
this. Her mom's gone, the rest of us were still there though."

"Seth, you're being a little harsh right now," Brigid
countered.

"No, Brigid! I am not being harsh. I don't blame you
for our entire family being killed, or for me being turned into
this monster. I blame the evils responsible for those things. You
were tricked. It happens. Caislyn had no control over the things
that were happening, not anymore than you did, Jaxon! And more
importantly, she probably kept you alive a lot longer than you
would have lasted on your own. So, you can either get your shit
together and come with me to the camp, or you can run along on your
own again, doing whatever it was you were doing before. Because, I
am going to check on the camp, and make sure everything is okay.
Then I am going to make sure they know what we've learned. What I
do after that depends on the decision you make right now."

"Are you just about done?" Jaxon turned on him, her
eyes going blacker than night. "You forgot one little thing in your
tirade there. I killed people, I have continued to kill people. And
I like it. I don't just like it, it's a hunger that sneaks up on me
and has to be fed. I can't control that part of me. It just grows
and grows until I sate it. Have you ever taken one second to
consider that I won't go back because I am just as afraid of
hurting them as I am of how I feel about them?" Seth, just hung his
head and shook it. "Look at me!" Jaxon was on him in an instant,
snapping his head back up to look at her. "Does this look like a
person in control? Do I look like I need to be around a camp full
of food bags that also happen to be my friends?"

"Bullshit!"

"Jaxon didn't hold back her temper then, she lashed
out at Seth, pushing him back so far through the room that he fell
into the couch. The audible crack almost broke the spell and made
her laugh as she remembered the last couch they broke, but then her
mind back to her friends and the nightmare she kept having about
eating them. "what happens when I eat Caislyn? What then Seth? Does
that make it all better, because then the prophecy can never come
to pass?"

"Jaxon, how many innocent people have you munched on
in your travels?"

Jaxon stiffened, but didn't say a word. She just
stood in the middle of the room staring off into nothingness as the
truth of those words smacked into her. It was something she
honestly hadn’t considered before.

"That's what I thought. I think you have more control
over your hunger than you think you do." Seth picked himself up off
the now broken couch. “Vesta’s not going to be too thrilled about
the trail of broken couches we keep leaving through her
properties.” The smik died quickly on his face when he took note of
Jaxon again.

"It doesn't matter, Seth, I dream about it all the
time. I close my eyes, and there I am killing little Sasha, or
Vesta, or Caislyn. I can't go back unless I know that won't
happen."

"Then we'll train you, Jax." Brigid said gently,
"we've both learned to control it, you can too."

~*~

It took two weeks of constant training to get Jaxon’s
blood lust under control. Brigid and Seth would randomly surprise
her with wounded people, some of them with fresh, angry wounds that
pumped blood as if a fountain enticing her to drink from them. At
first, Jaxon failed miserably. She pounced on the first three
victims with wild abandon, having to be pulled free from the
lifeless bodies each time. Soon, though, she was able to start
blocking the hunger. With each bloodied person that was paraded
before her, she would gain a little more control. Jaxon would still
vamp out, eyes going black, teeth lengthening, ready to strike, but
she didn’t move. She only eyed the sight with disdain as she licked
her lips, wondering how the hot, coppery fluid would feel flowing
down her throat. As soon as she felt the burn in her throat, she
would turn away from the scene. It did nothing to stop her other
senses from picking up on the slightest cues. The scent of copper
pennies hung thickly in the air, a perfume that made Jaxon salivate
with the hunger. Still, she wouldn’t budge.

An impromptu walk through the park turned out to be
the ultimate test for Jaxon. She just happened to be the person
nearest to a little girl who fell down out of a tree and broke her
arm. It wasn’t a little break, it was a compound fracture, bone
sticking through skin, bleeding freely. Jaxon put aside any
thoughts of hunger and ran to help the girl. She was there before
the girl’s mother could reach her, “it’s okay, sweetie. We’re going
to get you help,” she cooed in English that the girl probably
didn’t understand. When the mother got close, she nervously
side-stepped Jaxon and picked her daughter up in her arms to take
her to the car they had parked nearby. While Jaxon’s eyes were
deepest black and her fangs protruded a little from her lips, the
instinct to eat was not there. She simply felt the emotion of those
around her and wanted to help ease their pain. It was that moment
that allowed Jaxon to relax enough to want to get back to Caislyn
and get things settled.

***

THE CODE

Caislyn sat in her room just staring at the walls,
willing something in her life to change for the better. Nothing
happened. Despite her willing it so. Apparently, Fey magic wasn't
as strong as everyone thought. Or at least her version of Fey magic
wasn't.

"Caislyn, are you okay?" Vesta was suddenly in the
doorway, whispering as not to jar Caislyn from her thoughts to
harshly.

"Hmm?" She questioned without glancing up.

"Do you need anything?"

"No," Caislyn turned away from her mother, not
wanting her to see the tear that was about to fall from her eye.
When she did, something else in the room caught her attention. The
book. The book her mother took the time to hide from the
Brotherhood rather than trying to make sure she and her husband
were safe. The book that she and Jaxon found after teleporting to
the cottage in Ireland, unknowingly. The book that she had been too
distracted this whole time to look at. She slid over to the edge of
the bed, and grabbed hold of it. Vesta had already left the room
again, and Caislyn stood wondering for the life of her if the
answers had been with them this whole time, and they were too blind
to see.

She sat back down on the bed and started flipping
through the pages, hoping something would jump out at her and
immediately make sense. When that didn't happen, she flipped back
to the beginning and began to read.

Once Caislyn was about twenty pages in she tossed
the book across the bed in frustration, "I don't get it. There's
nothing here. How can this damn book be so important?" She got up
to go ask her mother if she remembered why, but no one was in the
RV. There was a note, and some lunch sitting there waiting for
her.

"I figured you would be hungry when you were done
staring at the walls. Eat. Your body needs to be taken care of, if
not for you, then for the baby you carry. I've gone to help out in
the camp. Love, Mom."

Caislyn took the food back to the bedroom and
started flipping through the pages of the book again as she ate.
She continued flipping until she found a page with an illustration
on it. There, she paused and took note of the artistry. Soon, she
noticed the words tracing the page and she began to read them,
turning the book with her as she did. The entire painting suddenly
took on a new life with each turn. Numbers became evident. There
was some sort of pattern emerging and Caislyn grabbed her sketch
pad and began writing it down. It repeated every so often. And soon
she realized what it meant. She heard the door to the RV open and
shut, announcing that someone had come back in, but it didn’t
matter now. All that mattered was that Caislyn had just found a
pattern that pointed her in a new direction. She had something to
focus on again, that wouldn’t depress her. At least, she hoped it
wouldn’t.

She flipped back to the beginning of the book and
started counting the words on the page. For each page in the book,
there was a corresponding number. Caislyn soon realized that the
number, marked the place of a word on each page.

"Oh dear Goddess! Mom!" Caislyn began yelling
through the RV, hoping that it had been her mother who had come in.
Vesta came running into her room only moments later trailed by a
very worried looking Ash.

"Are you okay?" Vesta yelped.

"Caislyn?" Ash questioned.

"Mom, it's the book!" She held the book up to show
Vesta what she was talking about. "We never bothered to really look
at it before, because there was always something else going
on."

"You found the coded reference in the picture too? I
only just found it when the Brotherhood showed up, so I never got a
chance to find the book it was talking about." Vesta explained.

"Mom, I don't know what coded reference you are
referring to, but I found something, and it pointed directly back
to this book."

Caislyn pulled out her sketch pad and showed them
the code that she found in the picture, and explained what it
meant. “I have to go back now page by page and see what it says,”
she told them excitedly.

"That's way more than I realized," Vesta
exclaimed.

"What does it mean, exactly?" Ash asked.

"It pinpoints specific words on each page of the
book."

"Well, what does it say?" Ash questioned as he sat
on the edge of the bed, waiting.

"I'm not finished yet. I'm still trying to copy down
all the words, but so far, it talks about the Brotherhood and a
plan for change."

Vesta tapped Ash's arm to tell him to follow her,
"Let us know when you've finished, Caislyn."

~*~

While Caislyn was working with the rest of the code
in the book, Vesta took Ash into the other room. "Keep an eye on
her. I'm not sure what that code will end up saying, but we do not
need her flying off half cocked the way she does. I'm going to
discuss a few things with the elders in camp. We need to be
prepared for whatever that book has to say. It could mean war, it
could mean something far greater. I just don’t know." A far off
look on Vesta’s face emerged as she remembered all the times her
husband, Mac, and her had debated exactly what this prophecy meant.
They had fought over whether or not to just allow her to fulfil it
or to keep her powers bound for life.

She snapped out of her reverie and looked at Ash,
hoping to stress the importance of her next words. “Don't go in her
room making her think she has a babysitter, because it will drive
her away faster. But also, don’t leave, and make sure you can check
on her periodically. I know my daughter, if she finds something
truly important in that book, and she will...” Vesta stopped
momentarily, hands on the RV door about to step out, “she will find
a way to get past you. Hopefully, you can follow her.”

"Vesta, what do you think she'll find in that
code?"

"I think she'll find the truth of the prophecy and
why she's so important to it." Vesta’s demeaner changed to one of
profound sadness before she walked away. "I won't loose my daughter
too. I lost my husband already. Please, just keep watch until I get
back."

"Of course," Ash said as he sat on the couch while
Vesta disappeared out the door.

~*~