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The Official Release Date of The Children of Ankh series
The Official Release Date of the
first book in the
Children of Ankh series
Sweet Sleep ☥
is August 7th 2014
May 25, 2014
Author Tara Maya The Unfinished Song
A DEADLY INITIATION
A DETERMINED GIRL...
Dindi can't do anything right, maybe because she spends more time dancing with pixies than doing her chores. Her clan hopes to marry her off and settle her down, but she dreams of becoming a Tavaedi, one of the powerful warrior-dancers whose secret magics are revealed only to those who pass a mysterious Test during the Initiation ceremony.
The problem? No-one in Dindi's clan has ever passed the Test. Her grandmother died trying. But Dindi has a plan.
AN EXILED WARRIOR...
Kavio is the most powerful warrior-dancer in Faearth, but when he is exiled from the tribehold for a crime he didn't commit, he decides to shed his old life. If roving cannibals and hexers don't kill him first, this is his chance to escape the shadow of his father's wars and his mother's curse. But when he rescues a young Initiate girl, he finds himself drawn into as deadly a plot as any he left behind. He must decide whether to walk away or fight for her... assuming she would even accept the help of an exile.
Blue-skinned Rusalki grappled Dindi under the churning surface of the river. She could feel their claws dig into her arms. Their riverweed-like hair entangled her legs when she tried to kick back to the surface. She only managed to gulp a few breaths of air before they pulled her under again. She hadn't appreciated how fast and deep the river was. On her second gasp for air, she saw that the current was already dragging her out of sight of the screaming girls on the bank. A whirlpool of froth and fae roiled between two large rocks in the middle of the river. The rusalka and her sisters tugged Dindi toward it. Other water fae joined the rusalki. Long snouted pookas, turtle-like kappas and hairy-armed gwyllions all swam around her, leading her to the whirlpool, where even more fae swirled in the whitewater.
"Join our circle, Dindi!" the fae voices gurgled under the water. "Dance with us forever!"
"No!" She kicked and swam and stole another gasp for air before they snagged her again. There were so many of them now, all pulling her down, all singing to the tune of the rushing river. She tried to shout, "Dispel!" but swallowed water instead. Her head hit a rock, disorienting her. She sank, this time sure she wouldn't be coming up again.
"Dispel!" It was a man's voice.
Strong arms encircled her and lifted her until her arms and head broke the surface. Her rescuer swam with her toward the shore. He overpowered the current, he shrugged aside the hands of the water faeries stroking his hair and arms. When he reached the shallows, he scooped Dindi into his arms and carried her the rest of the way to the grassy bank. He set her down gently. She coughed out some water while he supported her back.
"Better?" he asked.
She nodded. He was young--only a few years older than she. The aura of confidence and competence he radiated made him seem older. Without knowing quite why, she was certain he was a Tavaedi.
"Good." He had a gorgeous smile.
A wisp of his dark bangs dangled over one eye. He brushed his dripping hair back over his head. Dindi's hand touched skin--he was not wearing any shirt. Both of them were sopping wet. On him, that meant trickles of water coursed over a bedrock of muscle. As for her, the thin white wrap clung transparently to her body like a wet leaf. She blushed.
"It might have been easier to swim if you had let go of that," he teased.
He touched her hand, which was closed around something.
"What were you holding onto so tightly that it mattered more than drowning?"
Find out what happens next
Initiate is free everywhere except on Barnes and Noble (where it’s $0.99). You can download a free .epub version via Smashwords.
LINKSTara’s blog http://bit.ly/MtlSRJTara’s Twitter http://bit.ly/162sCtEThe Unfinished Song on Facebook http://on.fb.me/1400mMqAmazon http://amzn.to/15ciwYcBarnes and Noble http://bit.ly/13yM5DrKobo http://bit.ly/1aFhg1PiTunes http://bit.ly/1baddhNSmashwords http://bit.ly/17zK8Xn
May 9, 2014
March 6, 2014
Sweet sleep teaser part two
As Kayn lay peacefully in the grass, suddenly a sharp pain seared through her core. She grabbed her stomach, sucked a deep breath in and gasped, “What the hell was that?”
“You okay, Brighton?” He sat up and touched her arm.
Kayn winced again and doubled over, her insides afire with another strange penetrating pain. Kevin placed his hand on her stomach, watching her face calm. The pain disappeared again as quickly as it had begun.
He looked at her and stated, “You probably need a big glass of water, maybe some dinner?”
She stood up, trying to shake off a sense of impending danger that had been replaying in her mind. With the pain suddenly gone, she said, “Yeah, that’s probably it.”
“Did you skip lunch again?” he scolded with a disapproving look on his face.
“I do believe that I did not eat lunch today.”
There was a very simple explanation for the sharp undefined pain that she had experienced. Kayn was often practicing at lunchtime and would forget to eat. She felt the urge to look behind her again. She looked around in every direction trying to shake off the uncomfortable feeling that had been plaguing her all afternoon. Something in her mind was still whispering, Be careful, Kayn.
She shook off the anxious feeling, remembering that the last horror movie that she had watched with Kevin only days earlier had taken place at a lake. There they stood by the turn off to Lakeshore Drive. It’s all in my mind, Kayn thought. She started to laugh a little at her seriously overactive imagination. Kevin had looked a little concerned earlier, but he now had obviously recalled the hillbilly cannibal movie that they had watched the week before. He kneeled in the grass and picked up a handful of it and he smelled it.
“Just what I thought,” he said looking seriously concerned now.
“What is it?” she asked.
“It’s hillbilly urine; we had better get our tasty selves home before they come to eat us,” Kevin said, pointing toward home proving if there was ever any doubt that he had no acting ability at all.
“Let’s get out of here, you geek,” Kayn said shaking her head at him and smiling.
“Okay, let’s go to my house. It’s got to be like five by now; dinner’s probably on the table,” Kevin said and smiled again.
They looked at each other and smiled and started running through the field before the trails. This was the ritual race home they’d had since they had first been allowed out of their yards alone as children. Kevin had always been sneaky. He knew using fair play there was no possible way to beat Kayn in a race. He shoved her over per usual, and she fell with a gentle thud into the grass.
“Cheater,” she yelled, out of breath as he kept running away from her. She lay sprawled dramatically in the grass laughing. Kevin was laughing hysterically as he covered a good twenty feet.
“Cheater,” she yelled again and slowly rose to her feet spitting out the freshly mown grass from her mouth.
She would let him win; it was good for him to win sometimes. Kayn could take one for the team today, especially to see him this happy.
Kevin let out an obnoxiously loud cheer as he vaulted over the fence to his yard. He raised his arms in a silent fake fanfare and took a bow. He had never once won graciously in the whole ten years of their friendship.
Sure enough, they walked inside Kevin’s house to the amazing smells of his mother’s cooking. Her stomach began to grumble loudly the second that they walked into the house. The delicious aroma of Kevins mothers cooking filled her senses.
Kevin’s mom greeted her with a giant bear hug and said, “Hello there, beautiful. Go wash your hands and I’m not going to ask you why you are both just covered in grass.”
His mom raised her eyebrows curiously and added, “We are at the table ready to eat so hurry up, you two.”
She glanced into the mirror and pulled the grass out of her hair letting a little smile escape as she washed her hands in the bathroom sink. She started giggling as she thought about how wrong it looked when two teenagers of the opposite sex showed up covered in grass. Well, anyone else—with them platonic wrestling would be completely normal. Kayn was sure that if her dad walked in and they were wrestling on her bed. He wouldn’t even flinch.
Kayn sat at her usual spot at the table with his family. Kevins family mirrored her own. They were always cracking jokes, and talking loudly about their day.
She loved everything about the Smith house, from the mismatched frames filled with family photos in the dining room to the extremely outdated green shag carpet in the living room. The living room was completed with a mismatched, yet cozy, couch set with two fluffy lounging felines that could always be easily seen from the dining room table. Kayn swore they had not moved an inch in years.
Kevin’s granny sat at the end of the table, her wispy white hair wildly untamed. Kayn could envision Kevin’s grandmother as a beautiful younger woman. There was a black and white picture in the hallway. Beautiful didn’t quite encompass Granny in her youth, for she had been enchanting. She had rich crimson curls and exquisitely structured high cheek bones. There was obvious power, and immeasurable strength of spirit in her innocent wide doe eyes. Physically she looked as thin and frail as a newborn fawn. She had untold stories in her eyes. She was a girl with many secrets. The chapters were written in the creases of her smile. She was not the picture of pin up perfection, but she had an unexplainable quality that made you curious. You wanted to know more about her with one look into her eyes. Granny had worn the same shade of dark blood burgundy lipstick even then. She always wore lipstick ten shades too dark, and her teeth were worn, yellowed from age, always seeming to have something stuck in them. If she got some false teeth it would make her look ten years younger, but she didn’t seem to care in the least. She stared at Kayn the whole meal without speaking a single word to her. It was very unusual.
Kayn couldn’t help herself; she said, “Is there something wrong?”
“You know something is amiss, don’t you?” Granny whispered. It was as if she were afraid of the words that might slip from her lips.
“Kayn had some stomach pain earlier; she’s probably coming down with the flu or something,” Kevin answered for her.
“Perhaps,” Granny Winnie replied.
She glanced back down at her plate. Granny looked a little bit ill herself today. It looked as though she had more to say, but for once remained silent.
She looked directly into Kayn’s eyes with unmasked sadness and said, “Always listen to your instincts, child. They are never wrong.”
As Kayn was preparing to leave, Granny stood up and made her way over to Kayn, hugging her so tightly that she had to squirm away in order to breath.
Granny leaned in and whispered something in Kayn’s ear, “You survive. You fight hard.”
Granny Winnie always said very strange, random, and sometimes ominous things. Kayn knew that there would be a three-hour long conversation about spiritual things if she asked her what she meant.
Kayn excused herself to go to the bathroom. She attempted to call home on her cell. It went straight to voicemail. Chloe was probably on the phone; heaven forbid she ever had some kind of crisis and needed to talk to her own parents.
Chloe had a cell phone, too, but was always grounded from it; yet they still let her talk on the landline which meant nobody else could get through; heaven forbid, someone spend two dollars on an extra line or call waiting.
She sat on the toilet trying her mom’s cell; she was obviously going to be a few minutes late tonight. Then she put her phone down after leaving a message and sneaked down the hall to Kevin’s room for a quick prank or two before she went home.
Kevin’s mom gave her a bag with some fresh eggs in it for her mom. It was starting to get dark, so Kevin’s dad offered to drop her off at home. She thanked him with a huge hug as she got out of the car. The air smelled amazing, like cherry blossoms in full bloom. It must have been raining while they were eating dinner.
Kayn stepped out of the car, into a puddle, and twisted her ankle. Of course, she thought. Soaked foot, eggs and school bag in hand, she limped up the steep driveway toward the front door. The door was partially open which was not normal. However it was a little windy out and quite normal for the door to be unlocked, so maybe it was left ajar, flung open by the wind?
She turned around to see that Kevin’s dad had driven away. Kayn felt off, apprehensive as she walked toward the door that seemed to have a life of its own. The door shifted from cracked open then almost shut again with the wind. She looked at her cell phone. It was a quarter after eight. This was obviously a prank. They had left the front door open, and entrance lights off to freak her out. Chloe was probably hiding around the corner. Practical jokes were an almost daily occurrence in the Brighton household.
It was almost dark outside. She stopped again for a second time, feeling uneasy for some reason as she walked up the long gravel driveway. Her heart felt tight, and her chest felt hollow as she paused again. The surrounding giant trees made it extra dark in her yard. The slivers of light flashed through the trees as they moved in the wind.
They lived in a beautiful area but very isolated. Kayn shoved her cell back in her pocket, and pocket dialed Kevin by accident. She stepped toward the darkened doorway’s threshold and paused for a moment again before pushing the doorway completely open
“I’m home,” Kayn yelled as she walked in the door, kicking off her shoes and dropping her school bag.
She tried clicking on the front hall light; it was burned out or something. Kayn had seen lights on upstairs as she walked up the driveway, so she knew the power wasn’t out. It’s just a burned out light bulb, she thought.
As Kayn tried to pull off her wet socks, she tried to balance on one leg, but a small stab of pain from her freshly twisted ankle caused her to put her hand against the wall in order to balance herself. Her hand slid off the wall, and she struggled to pull her second soaking wet sock off.
She massaged her ankle for a second and noticing it was swollen, said aloud, “Great, there goes the track meet.”
“Kevin’s mom gave us eggs,” she said, speaking in almost a whisper, suddenly aware that she seemed to be alone in the house. Where would they have gone this late? Her mind began to sort through the possible scenarios.
“Mom…Dad?” she called out from the front doorway.
Kayn was answered by silence, and then touching the wall, she felt the stickiness on her hand. She held her hand up to the faint sliver of light streaming through the trees that made it to the doorway. The palm of her hand was covered in blood. Ripples of adrenaline coursed through her body. She felt as if thousands of spiders had run across the surface her skin. Kayn froze for a split second, paralyzed with fear, shivers of terror crawling across her flesh. She started to gingerly step backwards out the door. She saw movement in the form of a dark figure in the hallway.
She heard her sister’s voice scream, “Run, Kayn.” It was raw, primal, and shrill.
She turned and ran, bringing the eggs in her hand with her. She knew that someone was behind her. She could sense them there. She knew there was no time to look behind her. Kayn ran with no rhyme or reason in the direction that she was pointed in. She slipped in the wet grass, turned around somehow, and then she saw the opening to the trails in the distance. It seemed to beckon her toward its mouth.
The neighbor behind them was closer than the neighbors on either side of them, making the trails a somehow logical yet illogical split second decision. Kayn wasn’t able to think or breathe, and her basic animalistic instinct for survival was guiding her.
She had let go of the bag of eggs halfway across the back lawn, throwing them behind her, hoping to slow her attacker. Kayn sprinted toward the trail’s opening, its entrance overgrown with foliage. She burst through the branches which had partially hidden the familiar pathway. The branches of the prickle filled blackberry bush tore at her flesh as she pushed through. The pain heightened her survival instinct which now possessed her. It was only that which drove her forward.
Kayn barreled into the overgrown trail, forcing her way through where she instinctually remembered the trail had been. She had played in these trails as a child. She had found a place to hide a thousand times, but there was no time for strategy or thought. The crunching of leaves and twigs in the pathway behind her told her he was close; far too close to do anything but react.
Kayn slipped in the mud again, skidding yet not falling. She ignored the stinging of her knees, thrusting her body with a violent jolt as if starting a run on the track. Kayn had now lost that precious half a second lead; it had allowed her hunter to close the space between them.
Her heart pounded in her chest threatening to burst right through her skin as her tired legs propelled her body through the winding bike trail. The rocks and clay mud cut her bare feet. The sharp reaching twigs and branches slashed at her legs, and the prickle bushes sliced at her flesh.
“You have to run faster, Kayn, run faster,” her sister’s voice mind screeched inside of Kayn’s terror driven mind.
Kayn heard the branches crunching behind her; the dark figure’s rhythm, as steady as the rhythm of her running. He was so close behind her that she could feel his breath on her hair and neck as he panted. He was almost touching her. He was so fast, inhumanly fast; she needed a rush of adrenaline to edge her ahead.
Kayn could see lights from someone’s house peeking through the trees. She was going to make it, she thought as her bare feet pounded over the rocks and twigs slashing at her ankles and legs; she was almost there. She drove herself forward knowing she had only a half second lead from the hunter that pursued her. She was almost to safety…just over the creek. Her bare feet hit the small wooden bridge…she was almost there.
Kayn felt the elation of victory as she was about to burst through the bushes when she felt heat plunge into her back. Her eyes widened in terror as the knife plunged into her again; its blade seared a molten trail of excruciating pain through her body. A sweaty hand muffled her gasp of shock as she sunk to her knees in disbelief.
Her captor’s arms were slick with perspiration; like a python, they constricted around her neck crushing her larynx. Screaming and pleading for her life was now impossible. He continuously brought her to the brink of strangulation and then shook her awake, harshly reviving her.
Kayn tried to close her eyes; maybe he would believe her to be gone. He would leave her in the trails to bleed alone, allow her to slip peacefully away, becoming one with the forest floor around her. Instead every time her eyes slipped shut she felt the slicing, searing pain of his knife again and again in her stomach and chest until her eyes opened wide with terror. The next pain stole Kayn’s breath causing blood to sputter from her mouth. She gazed ahead of her and through the trees which were glimmering in flashing flickering light; she saw a figure in the distance.
Help me, oh, God, please help me; see me, please, I’m right here, Kayn’s mind screamed. She could see his shadow on his patio through the trees in the luminescence of his porch lights; he was so close. A man was on the back porch having a cigarette.
He punched her stomach or cut her…she was unable to distinguish one kind of brutality from another…only that something was searing a hot excruciating fire through her stomach. He’s killing me…please, her soul pleaded as her vision blurred from her tears. Kayn couldn’t speak; she tried to scream; her throat crushed, the only sound she could make was a gurgling as she choked and sputtered out her own blood.
Why, why are you doing this to me? Her mind cried to the stranger who breathed quickly with joyous excitement and stimulation in her ear. She felt the competing rhythms of their pounding hearts, her back against his chest. She saw the twigs and rocks on the forest floor around her. Kayn could smell damp moss and the scent of tree sap and the sweet metallic taste of her own blood.
On her hands, she could feel the warm stickiness that she bled out into the dirt, trickling down her arms as it escaped from her body. Her clothing was heavily soaked in her essence that moistened the earth around her. He let her go for a second; she landed on all fours and tried to crawl away, but she couldn’t will her body to move forward. She couldn’t breathe. Now on her knees, her breath came in short labored attempts. She tried to grasp ahold of the ground with her fingertips. His hot repulsive breath and quiet laughter echoed in her ear again and then he began whispering things that Kayn couldn’t understand. His hot sweaty body was behind her pressing against her back. She felt her stomach churning, revulsion mixed with blinding pain.
She tried one last struggling movement to get away from his grasp, and then suddenly felt some horribly blinding pain across her head and face. The lights flickered and then went out.
In the woods lay a bleeding angel in all her glory. Her arms posed gracefully above her head, and her hair soaked in the mud, blood, and feces in which she lay. Dying, fading into the other realm, her form was christened by the rain as though the trees had begun to weep upon her for the brutality she had endured.
There was someone waiting in the trails; a dark presence lingered nearby waiting for her to regain consciousness.
Kayn awoke in frigid darkness. The pain that pulsated through her seemed to recycle in waves until it began to slowly dull and became a tolerable numbness. She struggled to open and focus her eyes. She could smell a familiar scent; it smelled overpoweringly sweet but somehow like metal. Kayn could taste the sweet repulsive flavor of it in her mouth; it made her want to vomit.
She was lying in mud, and she felt hot stickiness behind her. She suddenly remembered what that taste had been. It was her own blood that she could taste inside of her mouth. Kayn could not manage a single breath. Shuddering, she began to relive the brutality that she had experienced. Her mind began feeding her slivers, flashes of inhuman savagery. Her mind numb and disoriented from blood loss clicked through scattered memories from her childhood.
Help me, please, her mind pleaded into the forest through the tapping sounds of the rain tapping the branches above where she lay. They seemed to be shielding her, and as her vision came into focus she imagined the lush green branches above as giant arms. They protected her, covering her from the elements allowing her one last peaceful moment. They are beautiful, she thought. Her mind wandered through mystical visions of the majestic cedar trees alive and somehow capable of offering her protection. The calm smile on her face that had been contorted with anguish signaled his essence back to her.
Her vision came into focus and once again the trees came to life. They cackled and mocked her." You’re going to die, you silly bitch," they chanted.
They waved their branches, howling as the wind whistled through the trails which had suddenly become icy cold. Kayn’s consciousness snapped back to reality; she had lost a lot of blood…none of this was real.
A man stood by that same tree whose imaginary arms had shielded her from the rain, still waiting, veiled in mist. The change in temperature had caused the forest floor to come alive with a dancing mist that seemed to add a thickness to the tapping sound of the rain drops.
Writhing in the mud, Kayn willed her body to move; her fingers clawed at the ground around her until she was spent. She lay in stillness for a moment, feeling like a half dead animal waiting to be finished off by its hunter. She concentrated on each breath…in and out…a little air. She was alive. It felt like she was breathing through a straw and somebody had pinched the end.
The streams of light from the moon that had been dancing through the dark stormy clouds had now vanished, leaving only a cold dark night with no final visions of beauty. Kayn longed for some light but was left with only the flickering of blurry dark images. She couldn’t see anything in the absence of light and began to panic again, for she could feel her grasp on her life being absorbed into the mist. I’m so scared; I don’t want to die; please help me, her soul sobbed. The only answer was the crackling quiet sound of the rain.
Kayn couldn’t see anything at all now with her vision clouded with tears, so she had to stop herself from crying. Her head pounded with the blinding pain that had abruptly returned. She could sense that he was still nearby watching her. His dark shadow loomed in the distance as it had in the hallway of her house.
Please, please, no more, Kayn begged in her mind as he came closer to her, standing a few feet away from her now, watching with his head tilted to one side. Her heart was begging, please don’t hurt me anymore.
Kayn was trying to wriggle, but no movement came from her now. She willed herself to grasp at the moist cold earth with her fingers. She was unable to move at all; now her body was nothing more than a broken shell. How cruel for her mind to still see; to still desire life at this point. Kayn looked into his eyes. In them, one easily read desperate plea, why are you doing this to me?
She was so cold her body gave an involuntary shudder. Kayn realized then that she was naked, completely exposed to the elements. Why was she naked? Her eyes were full of tears again; she felt instant, almost overwhelming shame. Kayn could still feel the sticky heat behind her as her blood drained from her body, soaking into the dirt. The pain in her head began to numb as the lights through the trees began to flicker again.
The dark mass of her violator suddenly appeared beside her, leaning in so close that she could smell his putrid breath, moist over her face. Every hair on her body was standing on end. The electrical power between Kayn and the man in the dark was like a charge.
He ran a finger over her exposed breast and said, “You were never to be born; this situation had to be corrected.”
Kayn saw his knife glint in the light from the moon. It was raised above her chest. Yes, she thought, let it be over now. She shut her eyes as the knife sliced into her chest. Kayn opened her eyes again with acceptance; she felt no more pain. She stared deeply into his eyes as hers filled with tears.
He tried to regain his composure and with a voice thick with emotion he said, “To this life unto the next.”
He slowly began to cut some kind of symbol on the skin on Kayn’s chest above her heart. She lay limp in his arms, still conscious of what was happening, yet free from the pain and fear now. He pulled her close to cradle her naked body in his arms like a baby, rocking her broken, violated flesh in his arms, stroking her blood soaked hair. He began to sob as if he were repentant in some way for how he had tortured her.
As her vision flickered one last time, the man was gone; it was her mother looking into her eyes. Her mother’s eyes were filled with so much love that it seemed to release her from her pain and fear as it had when she was a small child. Her mother cradled her as a baby, rocking her back and forth. She was safe now in her mother’s arms. She was at peace. Mommy, her heart sang, you’re here to save me.
The warmth of her mother’s love enveloped her tortured soul. She looked into her mother’s eyes. She touched Kayn’s face and started to sing a song that she had sung to her every night when she was very small.
Sleep, sweet sleep till the morning
Just dream away and close your eyes
My love you’ll be safe until the morning
Sleeping in my heart, all through the night
Although bad dreams come to scare you
My love will scare them all away
My heart…
The lights flickered, the pain went away, and her mother was holding her, singing: “Sleep, sweet sleep.”
The Beginning
“You okay, Brighton?” He sat up and touched her arm.
Kayn winced again and doubled over, her insides afire with another strange penetrating pain. Kevin placed his hand on her stomach, watching her face calm. The pain disappeared again as quickly as it had begun.
He looked at her and stated, “You probably need a big glass of water, maybe some dinner?”
She stood up, trying to shake off a sense of impending danger that had been replaying in her mind. With the pain suddenly gone, she said, “Yeah, that’s probably it.”
“Did you skip lunch again?” he scolded with a disapproving look on his face.
“I do believe that I did not eat lunch today.”
There was a very simple explanation for the sharp undefined pain that she had experienced. Kayn was often practicing at lunchtime and would forget to eat. She felt the urge to look behind her again. She looked around in every direction trying to shake off the uncomfortable feeling that had been plaguing her all afternoon. Something in her mind was still whispering, Be careful, Kayn.
She shook off the anxious feeling, remembering that the last horror movie that she had watched with Kevin only days earlier had taken place at a lake. There they stood by the turn off to Lakeshore Drive. It’s all in my mind, Kayn thought. She started to laugh a little at her seriously overactive imagination. Kevin had looked a little concerned earlier, but he now had obviously recalled the hillbilly cannibal movie that they had watched the week before. He kneeled in the grass and picked up a handful of it and he smelled it.
“Just what I thought,” he said looking seriously concerned now.
“What is it?” she asked.
“It’s hillbilly urine; we had better get our tasty selves home before they come to eat us,” Kevin said, pointing toward home proving if there was ever any doubt that he had no acting ability at all.
“Let’s get out of here, you geek,” Kayn said shaking her head at him and smiling.
“Okay, let’s go to my house. It’s got to be like five by now; dinner’s probably on the table,” Kevin said and smiled again.
They looked at each other and smiled and started running through the field before the trails. This was the ritual race home they’d had since they had first been allowed out of their yards alone as children. Kevin had always been sneaky. He knew using fair play there was no possible way to beat Kayn in a race. He shoved her over per usual, and she fell with a gentle thud into the grass.
“Cheater,” she yelled, out of breath as he kept running away from her. She lay sprawled dramatically in the grass laughing. Kevin was laughing hysterically as he covered a good twenty feet.
“Cheater,” she yelled again and slowly rose to her feet spitting out the freshly mown grass from her mouth.
She would let him win; it was good for him to win sometimes. Kayn could take one for the team today, especially to see him this happy.
Kevin let out an obnoxiously loud cheer as he vaulted over the fence to his yard. He raised his arms in a silent fake fanfare and took a bow. He had never once won graciously in the whole ten years of their friendship.
Sure enough, they walked inside Kevin’s house to the amazing smells of his mother’s cooking. Her stomach began to grumble loudly the second that they walked into the house. The delicious aroma of Kevins mothers cooking filled her senses.
Kevin’s mom greeted her with a giant bear hug and said, “Hello there, beautiful. Go wash your hands and I’m not going to ask you why you are both just covered in grass.”
His mom raised her eyebrows curiously and added, “We are at the table ready to eat so hurry up, you two.”
She glanced into the mirror and pulled the grass out of her hair letting a little smile escape as she washed her hands in the bathroom sink. She started giggling as she thought about how wrong it looked when two teenagers of the opposite sex showed up covered in grass. Well, anyone else—with them platonic wrestling would be completely normal. Kayn was sure that if her dad walked in and they were wrestling on her bed. He wouldn’t even flinch.
Kayn sat at her usual spot at the table with his family. Kevins family mirrored her own. They were always cracking jokes, and talking loudly about their day.
She loved everything about the Smith house, from the mismatched frames filled with family photos in the dining room to the extremely outdated green shag carpet in the living room. The living room was completed with a mismatched, yet cozy, couch set with two fluffy lounging felines that could always be easily seen from the dining room table. Kayn swore they had not moved an inch in years.
Kevin’s granny sat at the end of the table, her wispy white hair wildly untamed. Kayn could envision Kevin’s grandmother as a beautiful younger woman. There was a black and white picture in the hallway. Beautiful didn’t quite encompass Granny in her youth, for she had been enchanting. She had rich crimson curls and exquisitely structured high cheek bones. There was obvious power, and immeasurable strength of spirit in her innocent wide doe eyes. Physically she looked as thin and frail as a newborn fawn. She had untold stories in her eyes. She was a girl with many secrets. The chapters were written in the creases of her smile. She was not the picture of pin up perfection, but she had an unexplainable quality that made you curious. You wanted to know more about her with one look into her eyes. Granny had worn the same shade of dark blood burgundy lipstick even then. She always wore lipstick ten shades too dark, and her teeth were worn, yellowed from age, always seeming to have something stuck in them. If she got some false teeth it would make her look ten years younger, but she didn’t seem to care in the least. She stared at Kayn the whole meal without speaking a single word to her. It was very unusual.
Kayn couldn’t help herself; she said, “Is there something wrong?”
“You know something is amiss, don’t you?” Granny whispered. It was as if she were afraid of the words that might slip from her lips.
“Kayn had some stomach pain earlier; she’s probably coming down with the flu or something,” Kevin answered for her.
“Perhaps,” Granny Winnie replied.
She glanced back down at her plate. Granny looked a little bit ill herself today. It looked as though she had more to say, but for once remained silent.
She looked directly into Kayn’s eyes with unmasked sadness and said, “Always listen to your instincts, child. They are never wrong.”
As Kayn was preparing to leave, Granny stood up and made her way over to Kayn, hugging her so tightly that she had to squirm away in order to breath.
Granny leaned in and whispered something in Kayn’s ear, “You survive. You fight hard.”
Granny Winnie always said very strange, random, and sometimes ominous things. Kayn knew that there would be a three-hour long conversation about spiritual things if she asked her what she meant.
Kayn excused herself to go to the bathroom. She attempted to call home on her cell. It went straight to voicemail. Chloe was probably on the phone; heaven forbid she ever had some kind of crisis and needed to talk to her own parents.
Chloe had a cell phone, too, but was always grounded from it; yet they still let her talk on the landline which meant nobody else could get through; heaven forbid, someone spend two dollars on an extra line or call waiting.
She sat on the toilet trying her mom’s cell; she was obviously going to be a few minutes late tonight. Then she put her phone down after leaving a message and sneaked down the hall to Kevin’s room for a quick prank or two before she went home.
Kevin’s mom gave her a bag with some fresh eggs in it for her mom. It was starting to get dark, so Kevin’s dad offered to drop her off at home. She thanked him with a huge hug as she got out of the car. The air smelled amazing, like cherry blossoms in full bloom. It must have been raining while they were eating dinner.
Kayn stepped out of the car, into a puddle, and twisted her ankle. Of course, she thought. Soaked foot, eggs and school bag in hand, she limped up the steep driveway toward the front door. The door was partially open which was not normal. However it was a little windy out and quite normal for the door to be unlocked, so maybe it was left ajar, flung open by the wind?
She turned around to see that Kevin’s dad had driven away. Kayn felt off, apprehensive as she walked toward the door that seemed to have a life of its own. The door shifted from cracked open then almost shut again with the wind. She looked at her cell phone. It was a quarter after eight. This was obviously a prank. They had left the front door open, and entrance lights off to freak her out. Chloe was probably hiding around the corner. Practical jokes were an almost daily occurrence in the Brighton household.
It was almost dark outside. She stopped again for a second time, feeling uneasy for some reason as she walked up the long gravel driveway. Her heart felt tight, and her chest felt hollow as she paused again. The surrounding giant trees made it extra dark in her yard. The slivers of light flashed through the trees as they moved in the wind.
They lived in a beautiful area but very isolated. Kayn shoved her cell back in her pocket, and pocket dialed Kevin by accident. She stepped toward the darkened doorway’s threshold and paused for a moment again before pushing the doorway completely open
“I’m home,” Kayn yelled as she walked in the door, kicking off her shoes and dropping her school bag.
She tried clicking on the front hall light; it was burned out or something. Kayn had seen lights on upstairs as she walked up the driveway, so she knew the power wasn’t out. It’s just a burned out light bulb, she thought.
As Kayn tried to pull off her wet socks, she tried to balance on one leg, but a small stab of pain from her freshly twisted ankle caused her to put her hand against the wall in order to balance herself. Her hand slid off the wall, and she struggled to pull her second soaking wet sock off.
She massaged her ankle for a second and noticing it was swollen, said aloud, “Great, there goes the track meet.”
“Kevin’s mom gave us eggs,” she said, speaking in almost a whisper, suddenly aware that she seemed to be alone in the house. Where would they have gone this late? Her mind began to sort through the possible scenarios.
“Mom…Dad?” she called out from the front doorway.
Kayn was answered by silence, and then touching the wall, she felt the stickiness on her hand. She held her hand up to the faint sliver of light streaming through the trees that made it to the doorway. The palm of her hand was covered in blood. Ripples of adrenaline coursed through her body. She felt as if thousands of spiders had run across the surface her skin. Kayn froze for a split second, paralyzed with fear, shivers of terror crawling across her flesh. She started to gingerly step backwards out the door. She saw movement in the form of a dark figure in the hallway.
She heard her sister’s voice scream, “Run, Kayn.” It was raw, primal, and shrill.
She turned and ran, bringing the eggs in her hand with her. She knew that someone was behind her. She could sense them there. She knew there was no time to look behind her. Kayn ran with no rhyme or reason in the direction that she was pointed in. She slipped in the wet grass, turned around somehow, and then she saw the opening to the trails in the distance. It seemed to beckon her toward its mouth.
The neighbor behind them was closer than the neighbors on either side of them, making the trails a somehow logical yet illogical split second decision. Kayn wasn’t able to think or breathe, and her basic animalistic instinct for survival was guiding her.
She had let go of the bag of eggs halfway across the back lawn, throwing them behind her, hoping to slow her attacker. Kayn sprinted toward the trail’s opening, its entrance overgrown with foliage. She burst through the branches which had partially hidden the familiar pathway. The branches of the prickle filled blackberry bush tore at her flesh as she pushed through. The pain heightened her survival instinct which now possessed her. It was only that which drove her forward.
Kayn barreled into the overgrown trail, forcing her way through where she instinctually remembered the trail had been. She had played in these trails as a child. She had found a place to hide a thousand times, but there was no time for strategy or thought. The crunching of leaves and twigs in the pathway behind her told her he was close; far too close to do anything but react.
Kayn slipped in the mud again, skidding yet not falling. She ignored the stinging of her knees, thrusting her body with a violent jolt as if starting a run on the track. Kayn had now lost that precious half a second lead; it had allowed her hunter to close the space between them.
Her heart pounded in her chest threatening to burst right through her skin as her tired legs propelled her body through the winding bike trail. The rocks and clay mud cut her bare feet. The sharp reaching twigs and branches slashed at her legs, and the prickle bushes sliced at her flesh.
“You have to run faster, Kayn, run faster,” her sister’s voice mind screeched inside of Kayn’s terror driven mind.
Kayn heard the branches crunching behind her; the dark figure’s rhythm, as steady as the rhythm of her running. He was so close behind her that she could feel his breath on her hair and neck as he panted. He was almost touching her. He was so fast, inhumanly fast; she needed a rush of adrenaline to edge her ahead.
Kayn could see lights from someone’s house peeking through the trees. She was going to make it, she thought as her bare feet pounded over the rocks and twigs slashing at her ankles and legs; she was almost there. She drove herself forward knowing she had only a half second lead from the hunter that pursued her. She was almost to safety…just over the creek. Her bare feet hit the small wooden bridge…she was almost there.
Kayn felt the elation of victory as she was about to burst through the bushes when she felt heat plunge into her back. Her eyes widened in terror as the knife plunged into her again; its blade seared a molten trail of excruciating pain through her body. A sweaty hand muffled her gasp of shock as she sunk to her knees in disbelief.
Her captor’s arms were slick with perspiration; like a python, they constricted around her neck crushing her larynx. Screaming and pleading for her life was now impossible. He continuously brought her to the brink of strangulation and then shook her awake, harshly reviving her.
Kayn tried to close her eyes; maybe he would believe her to be gone. He would leave her in the trails to bleed alone, allow her to slip peacefully away, becoming one with the forest floor around her. Instead every time her eyes slipped shut she felt the slicing, searing pain of his knife again and again in her stomach and chest until her eyes opened wide with terror. The next pain stole Kayn’s breath causing blood to sputter from her mouth. She gazed ahead of her and through the trees which were glimmering in flashing flickering light; she saw a figure in the distance.
Help me, oh, God, please help me; see me, please, I’m right here, Kayn’s mind screamed. She could see his shadow on his patio through the trees in the luminescence of his porch lights; he was so close. A man was on the back porch having a cigarette.
He punched her stomach or cut her…she was unable to distinguish one kind of brutality from another…only that something was searing a hot excruciating fire through her stomach. He’s killing me…please, her soul pleaded as her vision blurred from her tears. Kayn couldn’t speak; she tried to scream; her throat crushed, the only sound she could make was a gurgling as she choked and sputtered out her own blood.
Why, why are you doing this to me? Her mind cried to the stranger who breathed quickly with joyous excitement and stimulation in her ear. She felt the competing rhythms of their pounding hearts, her back against his chest. She saw the twigs and rocks on the forest floor around her. Kayn could smell damp moss and the scent of tree sap and the sweet metallic taste of her own blood.
On her hands, she could feel the warm stickiness that she bled out into the dirt, trickling down her arms as it escaped from her body. Her clothing was heavily soaked in her essence that moistened the earth around her. He let her go for a second; she landed on all fours and tried to crawl away, but she couldn’t will her body to move forward. She couldn’t breathe. Now on her knees, her breath came in short labored attempts. She tried to grasp ahold of the ground with her fingertips. His hot repulsive breath and quiet laughter echoed in her ear again and then he began whispering things that Kayn couldn’t understand. His hot sweaty body was behind her pressing against her back. She felt her stomach churning, revulsion mixed with blinding pain.
She tried one last struggling movement to get away from his grasp, and then suddenly felt some horribly blinding pain across her head and face. The lights flickered and then went out.
In the woods lay a bleeding angel in all her glory. Her arms posed gracefully above her head, and her hair soaked in the mud, blood, and feces in which she lay. Dying, fading into the other realm, her form was christened by the rain as though the trees had begun to weep upon her for the brutality she had endured.
There was someone waiting in the trails; a dark presence lingered nearby waiting for her to regain consciousness.
Kayn awoke in frigid darkness. The pain that pulsated through her seemed to recycle in waves until it began to slowly dull and became a tolerable numbness. She struggled to open and focus her eyes. She could smell a familiar scent; it smelled overpoweringly sweet but somehow like metal. Kayn could taste the sweet repulsive flavor of it in her mouth; it made her want to vomit.
She was lying in mud, and she felt hot stickiness behind her. She suddenly remembered what that taste had been. It was her own blood that she could taste inside of her mouth. Kayn could not manage a single breath. Shuddering, she began to relive the brutality that she had experienced. Her mind began feeding her slivers, flashes of inhuman savagery. Her mind numb and disoriented from blood loss clicked through scattered memories from her childhood.
Help me, please, her mind pleaded into the forest through the tapping sounds of the rain tapping the branches above where she lay. They seemed to be shielding her, and as her vision came into focus she imagined the lush green branches above as giant arms. They protected her, covering her from the elements allowing her one last peaceful moment. They are beautiful, she thought. Her mind wandered through mystical visions of the majestic cedar trees alive and somehow capable of offering her protection. The calm smile on her face that had been contorted with anguish signaled his essence back to her.
Her vision came into focus and once again the trees came to life. They cackled and mocked her." You’re going to die, you silly bitch," they chanted.
They waved their branches, howling as the wind whistled through the trails which had suddenly become icy cold. Kayn’s consciousness snapped back to reality; she had lost a lot of blood…none of this was real.
A man stood by that same tree whose imaginary arms had shielded her from the rain, still waiting, veiled in mist. The change in temperature had caused the forest floor to come alive with a dancing mist that seemed to add a thickness to the tapping sound of the rain drops.
Writhing in the mud, Kayn willed her body to move; her fingers clawed at the ground around her until she was spent. She lay in stillness for a moment, feeling like a half dead animal waiting to be finished off by its hunter. She concentrated on each breath…in and out…a little air. She was alive. It felt like she was breathing through a straw and somebody had pinched the end.
The streams of light from the moon that had been dancing through the dark stormy clouds had now vanished, leaving only a cold dark night with no final visions of beauty. Kayn longed for some light but was left with only the flickering of blurry dark images. She couldn’t see anything in the absence of light and began to panic again, for she could feel her grasp on her life being absorbed into the mist. I’m so scared; I don’t want to die; please help me, her soul sobbed. The only answer was the crackling quiet sound of the rain.
Kayn couldn’t see anything at all now with her vision clouded with tears, so she had to stop herself from crying. Her head pounded with the blinding pain that had abruptly returned. She could sense that he was still nearby watching her. His dark shadow loomed in the distance as it had in the hallway of her house.
Please, please, no more, Kayn begged in her mind as he came closer to her, standing a few feet away from her now, watching with his head tilted to one side. Her heart was begging, please don’t hurt me anymore.
Kayn was trying to wriggle, but no movement came from her now. She willed herself to grasp at the moist cold earth with her fingers. She was unable to move at all; now her body was nothing more than a broken shell. How cruel for her mind to still see; to still desire life at this point. Kayn looked into his eyes. In them, one easily read desperate plea, why are you doing this to me?
She was so cold her body gave an involuntary shudder. Kayn realized then that she was naked, completely exposed to the elements. Why was she naked? Her eyes were full of tears again; she felt instant, almost overwhelming shame. Kayn could still feel the sticky heat behind her as her blood drained from her body, soaking into the dirt. The pain in her head began to numb as the lights through the trees began to flicker again.
The dark mass of her violator suddenly appeared beside her, leaning in so close that she could smell his putrid breath, moist over her face. Every hair on her body was standing on end. The electrical power between Kayn and the man in the dark was like a charge.
He ran a finger over her exposed breast and said, “You were never to be born; this situation had to be corrected.”
Kayn saw his knife glint in the light from the moon. It was raised above her chest. Yes, she thought, let it be over now. She shut her eyes as the knife sliced into her chest. Kayn opened her eyes again with acceptance; she felt no more pain. She stared deeply into his eyes as hers filled with tears.
He tried to regain his composure and with a voice thick with emotion he said, “To this life unto the next.”
He slowly began to cut some kind of symbol on the skin on Kayn’s chest above her heart. She lay limp in his arms, still conscious of what was happening, yet free from the pain and fear now. He pulled her close to cradle her naked body in his arms like a baby, rocking her broken, violated flesh in his arms, stroking her blood soaked hair. He began to sob as if he were repentant in some way for how he had tortured her.
As her vision flickered one last time, the man was gone; it was her mother looking into her eyes. Her mother’s eyes were filled with so much love that it seemed to release her from her pain and fear as it had when she was a small child. Her mother cradled her as a baby, rocking her back and forth. She was safe now in her mother’s arms. She was at peace. Mommy, her heart sang, you’re here to save me.
The warmth of her mother’s love enveloped her tortured soul. She looked into her mother’s eyes. She touched Kayn’s face and started to sing a song that she had sung to her every night when she was very small.
Sleep, sweet sleep till the morning
Just dream away and close your eyes
My love you’ll be safe until the morning
Sleeping in my heart, all through the night
Although bad dreams come to scare you
My love will scare them all away
My heart…
The lights flickered, the pain went away, and her mother was holding her, singing: “Sleep, sweet sleep.”
The Beginning
