Silverblood Demons (Daughters of Darkness Book 1) (7 page)

Chapter 8

My sister Amber always was the brave one. Anytime we wanted to sneak outside after dark, she’d be the one to go back inside first to see if the way was clear. One time we came back in really late, like the sun was breaking over the horizon, just as Madame Tutella had woken up. My sister kept her distracted long enough for me to get back in without being noticed.

She was forced to churn the butter by herself every day for a week, but I helped after Madame Tutella went for her meeting at six a.m. whatever that’s about!? Sometimes I would hope she’d
never
come back. Especially lately, she seems impatient with us and I saw her kick Coral again. There was also that time I was in the pantry and I overheard her talking to Ophelexa saying, “
The virgins will taste delicious, like veal, but sweeter.”
Then they both laughed.

I didn’t know what virgins or veal could be, but I was afraid to ask.

***

“Is she sleeping?” I asked. “Is she?”

“She’s snoring,” Amber said, pushing aside her red hair from her eyes. “I can see her drooling again, yuck.”

“Then close her door and come in here,” I said. “I want to know what Elektra talked about to you.”

“Don’t say anything to Coral.” I whispered, but I didn’t have to worry about speaking quietly, Madame Tutella doesn’t wake up once she’s at the drooling stage.

“Yeah, she would have asked if she suspected anything," Looking in Coral and Davina’s direction, Amber said. “I think they’re sleeping.”

“Well, tell me, what did she say to you? Your face was white as pastry when you came out with Elektra.”

“Jade, I’m really, really afraid to tell you. I know you think I’m brave bu
t－
”

“Just take it slow. Who are they? Who is Kylar, he’s different, you know what I mean?”

“Kylar is a man, the opposite of us. Elektra said he was our protector.”

“Protector, for us!? Why do we need protection?” Is someone trying to harm us?”

Amber nodded nervously and I could tell she was from the way she kept making ringlets with her finger in her hair as she spoke, she only ever did that if she was super nervous about something.

One spring morning she was climbing the tallest pine tree in the back yard and was almost to the top and could see further than she’d ever seen before and Ophelexa screamed at her to come down. That’s the last time I saw her do that. While Ophelexa was still yelling she had made a whole bunch of ringlets before the yelling finally stopped.

I reached over and stopped her. “Amber, are we going to be okay?”

“I don’t know, she told me we need to be ready to leave two days from now. She said they’re coming back and that we’re all going to go with them, but not Madame Tutella.”

“I don’t understand. Where are we going?”

“Elektra told me, home, and it’s up.”

“Up? What does that mean? Home is up?”

“I don’t know Jade, you’re the oldest. Should we trust them?”

“Perhaps we should tell Ophelexa or Madame Tutella,” I said. “They’ll be angry with us if we keep this from them.”

“Wait a minute Jade. I want to show you . . . ” Amber reached under her bed and pulled out a large ornate box and after flipping the lid open she took out something I had never seen before. She unwrapped it and handed it to me.

“Where did you get this? What is it?”

“One time when I was out late by myself, I met up with Jasmine,
she
gave it to me. She said there’s a place called New York and that there were ‘
men
’ there. That’s what made me nervous when I saw Kylar.”

“Amber, what is this?”

“Jasmine said she found it in a flower bed, she thinks it fell out of the sky. She told me all kinds of things are coming down because ‘Kylar people’ men, are drilling!? And they’re making holes in the sky and keep losing things that fall down. She showed me how this works.”

“Works? Like what?”

“It’s called an MP3 player and there’s singing on it. Listen.”

Amber held the “MP3” player up to my ear and I couldn’t believe what was going on.

“Don’t be afraid, I listen to it all the time, there’s no one inside of it, it’s just singing.”

Amber had taken the player away from my ears but I could still hear the melodic voices coming from it. It wasn’t like anything I had ever heard before, there were instruments of sound being used with the voices that made the singing sound different, but
good
different. Where was this place called New York, how could we go up without steps or did we need to climb the tallest tree to get there?

Amber continued, “Elektra said that “
bad times”
are going to be here soon but not to be afraid because they’re coming for us and she loves us, so does Kylar and Kira and she said the Madame Tutella that was here is really Sin-dy, an Alter-Witch, like the ones we read about as kids, I didn’t think they were real, but they are!”

My sister was pacing around the room, making ringlets in her hair. So much had just happened. “Can you come and sit next to me?” I asked. “I’m afraid too. What should we do?”

“Sarturas isn’t home
Jade, up there is, that’s home,” Amber said. “I want to go there, I want us all to go.”

“Me too, but I’m getting tired. Can we can talk some more after our chores tomorrow morning, when Madame Tutella is at her meeting.”

We climbed into bed and snuggled together. Across the room Coral and Davina were sound asleep in the other bed. So much had just happened that I wasn’t sure about anything anymore.
Why did these strangers want to help us, who were they?

I fell asleep with Kylar’s words going around my head “
Can you trust me?”
I don’t know why, but I felt a strong connection to him. Was tomorrow a new beginning for us, in a new world, in New York?

***

The morning light was shining through our window and it was warming my face. I turned to say something to Amber, but the bed was empty,
where was she?
My mind went back to our conversation last night and I suddenly realized my sister might be up to something, she must have crept out, because she usually tickles me to wake me in the mornings.

Jumping out of bed I saw Davina and Coral were still sleeping. So I quietly went down the steps and heard Madame Tutella as she was on her way out, off to her meeting. As she closed the door, Amber came out of the pantry and whispered, “I’m going to follow her.”

“Are you crazy?” I asked. “Why?”

“I have to go before she gets too far,” Amber replied. “I want to see what she does at her dumb meetings.”

“I’m coming with you,” I said. “Coral and Davina are still sleeping.”

We caught sight of Madame Tutella as she stopped past the gate at the end of the pasture. Another Tutella had walked up to her and they continued on together. We made sure to stay far enough away that they couldn’t see us. It felt like forever as we went past several houses and I could see girls at each one of them, I’d never seen them before, they were skipping, playing, and doing chores. This was all new to me, I hadn’t been this far ever and started getting anxious. I had to speak so I tugged at Amber’s shirt. “Maybe we should go back,” I quietly said. “We may get lost.”

“Don’t worry,” Amber replied. “I come this way to meet Jasmine sometimes. She lives another four houses that way.”

“Yeah but they’re going the opposite way, not that way,” I whispered.

“Wait,” said Amber. “Get down, they’re stopping!”

We watched as the Tutella’s reached a large stone wall with a section that looks like a doorway and standing guard was a grotesque looking statue that came alive as they stepped up and it opened the door for them. Looking around as though they were making sure they weren’t being followed, they scurried through.

“Hurry!” Amber said. “I don’t want to lose them.” She yanked my hand and we started to run in the direction of the stone wall.

“Amber! Are you serious? We can’t go through the door, the statue will−”

“This way!” Gripping my hand tight my sister headed toward a tree that rose high up above the stone wall away from the door. We ran faster than I’d ever done in my entire life. Amber seemed as though she was in her element, no longer afraid, she ran like the wind, on a mission.

Having reached the tree, Amber pulled up her shirt and started to unwind a silken rope.

“Amber, I didn’t know you had that!”

“This is why I’ve been learning how to weave silk all this time. I wanted to make a rope, to climb with.”

Tying its end around a small rock Amber threw it over a branch, when the rope came back down again she made a loop and pulled the silk rope until it was secure. In an instant she had scaled the tree. “Hurry! I’ll help pull you up.”

“I’ll just slow you down, you go!”

“I’m not leaving you behind,” She was peering over the wall. “Come on, I still see them!”

I made my way awkwardly up and we started to run along the top of the wall until we came to a section that we could jump off from. Ahead of us was a mossy lane and we could hear voices. “Take your shoes off,” Amber said.

Walking as quietly as possible we approached the clearing that the voices were coming from. One voice seemed familiar, we didn’t dare go any closer but without moving the foliage in front of us we could see who the familiar voice belonged to, it was Ophelexa.

“It sounds like she’s ordering the Tutella’s to do something,” I whispered as quietly as I could.

“Yeah, wait here I’m going a little closer.”

I couldn’t stop her, she had already moved several feet in front of me. Looking back, she signaled for me to stay low. After several minutes Amber came back, every hair on her head was a ringlet,
it must be bad news
. “Let’s go,” she said.

We retraced our steps and made our way back out of the walled area and raced all the way home.

“Where were you?” Coral asked. “Davina was hungry.”

Amber and I looked at each other, wondering what we could say not to frighten Coral. “Uh . . . We went for a race, to see who’s the fastest!”

“Who won?”

“It was a tie,” Amber said. “Hey, you and Davina can play with my glass rocks in my box upstairs.”

“Really, can I make another tiara with them?”

“Yeah, go ahead. We’ll make something for us all to eat.”

Coral ran upstairs calling for Davina.

“What did you hear?” I asked. “Was it bad?”

“We
have
to get out Jade. There were about twenty Tutellas and Ophelexa was telling them how to make a sleeping meal for the ‘Feast of Fevronia’ I don’t know what that is but It doesn’t make sense. Why would they want to make a sleeping meal?”

“For us?” I guessed, “and for the other girls we just saw?”

“It must be,” Amber said. “Remember? Elektra told me “
Bad times”
are coming?”

The door opened and Madame Tutella walked in. She took off her hat. “Why are you two dirty, where have you been?”

My heart was thumping, but I managed to say, “We were racing outside, to see who’s the fastest.”

“Where did you race to Jade, I won’t be angry, I just want to make sure you’re both safe. I wouldn’t want you to race all the way to Sector Three, some of those girls aren’t trustworthy.”

“Oh no,” Amber lied without skipping a beat. “It was just around the pasture a couple of times.”

Madame Tutella started to unravel the silken rope that we had climbed up, at the walled enclosure. “Have you ever seen this before, Amber?”

I couldn’t believe it
.
In our haste to get back before being discovered we had left it in the tree.

“No,” Amber stepped forward to touch the silken rope. “If that were mine it would have triple stitches, that one only has two.”

“Look, I made this too,” She opened a drawer and handed a silk scarf that she had made to Madame Tutella and sure enough the scarf had triple stitches. Inside of me I breathed a sigh of relief. “Coral and Davina are hungry,” I said. “We’re going to make something to eat.”

Having made certain Madame Tutella was busy in another part of the house I asked my sister, “Should we just take Coral and Davina and leave tonight? I’m scared, where can we go?”

“No, she would tell Ophelexa and they would find us in a couple of hours, we have to wait until Kylar comes back for us.”

“But what if Madame Tutella cooks us a sleeping meal, I don’t want to eat it.”

“I don’t know if you’re going to like this plan Jade, but it’s the only one I have. Tonight, when she falls asleep, we’ll wait until she’s drooling because we know she’s not going to wake up, we’ll tie her up, she’ll never know until she wakes up in the morning and by then Kylar will be back.”

“I don’t know Amber. If she wakes up she’ll punish us worse than she’s ever done before. What about if we just say we’re not hungry?”

“Yeah but that doesn’t mean Coral and Davina won’t eat the meal, we can’t risk it. It’s tonight or . . . ”