The Blood In the Beginning (28 page)

‘I apologise.'

‘Not forgiven!'

His mouth turned down. ‘Teern has to know of you.'

‘Yeah, you said that.' I thought about the images I'd seen, of Rossi growing up in a long ago Roman Empire. ‘You understand about human rights, don't you? It's against the law to steal people?'

‘I'm not stealing you.'

‘It's called kidnapping.' He seemed to need the reminder. ‘I did not agree to go out to sea.' We hit a small wave and I white-knuckled the rail. ‘Where's Teern?' I lifted my chin toward the open expanse. There were plenty of boats in the distance. None headed our way.

‘He's coming.'

‘And what is this big revelation, exactly? The must-know insight we couldn't send in an email?'

‘What I saw on the slide. Your own blood feeding off itself.'

‘That's right.' I said it slowly. ‘Exactly what happens in auto-immune diseases.' Had he lost his marbles?

‘It's what would happen if your Mar blood fed off your human half.'

‘What half?'

‘If your mother is human and you have functional lungs, like her, oxygenating part of your blood, and your father is Mar, giving you Mar blood, which requires seawater, or human blood to survive on land, you are a completely self sustaining Mar, land or sea. Though …' He pinched the bridge of his nose like these thoughts were hurting his head. ‘How you function in the sea remains to be seen. We have to tell Teern.'

All I could do was shake my head.

‘Ava, if it's true, it means you're a first.'

‘First what?' I snapped at him.

‘The first Mar-human ever born.'

‘As opposed to hatched?'

He narrowed his eyes at me. ‘Did you learn nothing from the memories I shared?'

‘Those coral-encrusted tombs?'

‘Ma'atta.' His voice became reverent. ‘We rise from the Ma'atta. Oldest living thing on earth, said to have come from ancient falling stars. Ma'atta literally means, “the beginning of all life”. Encased in it, our DNA mutates and, when ready, if the turn is true, we rise from our tombs, Mar.'

I licked my lips. There just wasn't anything to say to that.

Finally, Rossi broke the silence. ‘Who else knows?'

‘About my mother?'

He nodded.

‘Rourke hunted her down for me. I told Cate, of course.' My mind wandered to her for a moment. ‘I haven't had a chance to tell Tom.'

‘What about Bane?'

‘I told him about my meeting, yeah.' His warm comforting arms and that sweet honey kiss came flooding into my mind.

‘We should have done more tests from the start. You're at great risk.'

‘From Bane?'

‘Him, or any Shen.'

‘How can I tell who's Mar? You all look like humans to me.' I had to laugh. I mean, could I even take this seriously?

‘For one, if you listen, you can hear Mar thoughts.'

There was that. ‘Can I read human minds too?'

‘Unfortunately, no.'

But I knew I'd heard Zoe's thoughts, and Tom's and I'd caught Rourke's too recently. They sure as hell weren't Mar, Shen or otherwise.
Interesting
. I decided to keep that little nugget to myself for now.

‘The shades are also a tip-off.'

‘What's with that?'

‘The glare. Our blood vessels can't be exposed to sunlight.'

‘Alright.' I relaxed my grip on the weapon. There was a hell of a lot of messed up shit going on in my life right now, but for all the crazy behaviour Rossi was exhibiting, his theories at least attempted to explain it. I couldn't work myself up to feeling overly scared of him. Angry, yes, but frightened? I guess Rourke's background check helped ease my mind. I handed over the knife. It wasn't like I was going to carve him up anyway. And how would I get back to shore if I did? ‘I'll consent. Take me to Teern, but let's make it quick. I want to be home before dark.'
And I'll never let myself be alone with you again!
I didn't like the idea of a shipboard rendezvous, but I wasn't so scared I would miss an opportunity to unveil my past now that I was out here. Maybe Teern was ex-CHI Tech, like Rossi, and this was the only ‘safe' way to meet. ‘Rossi, just so you know, if you ever lock me in a room again, I will break your legs. That's a promise.'

He met my eyes. ‘Fair enough, but if you really are from a human-Mar coupling, you'll forgive me, I promise.'

Don't hold your breath.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

‘You can let go of the railing, Ava. It's smooth as glass out here.'

I glanced at my grip. ‘Shut up.'

He sighed, his expression nudging over to pity. ‘It shouldn't be like this.'

No shit. We should be on land, where people belong.

I still can't believe you think you're a Lander.

I still can't believe you're mentally ill.

He tried to convince me of his theories, again. I ignored the absurdities. They were too uncomfortable to dwell on, so I focussed on the place we would be returning to, hopefully soon, once I'd met Teern: the harbour, and jagged coastline was distant, but clear. In the city, I rarely had the chance to test my long-distance vision. With contacts in, it was darn good. Nice skyline.

‘You have to admit, it's beautiful out here.' Rossi was gazing in the other direction, out to sea, his hands shading his eyes, even with his sunglasses on.

‘Says you.' I sounded puerile, but his calm state, and trust in the boat, gradually wore away at me. I found a natural rhythm to the rise and fall of the prow and loosened the death grip a further notch. The spray misted salt crystals over my face. I licked my lips. I always liked a briny taste. It couldn't be fresher than this. Hopefully, low on radiation and heavy metals.

‘We're crossing the Riviera. Lean over. Take a peek.'

‘I'm good.' Part of me wanted to see the new sunken-treasure dive spot of the century, the aquatic wonder that was once the famous Riviera Country Club; another part of me would only look at the middle of the boat.

Rossi jumped up to bring in the sail. He was as agile as a cat.
Easy to watch.
‘This'll do.'

‘For what?' I spoke a little louder than I needed to. Nerves. There were a few boats further north and south of us, at varying distances from shore, but I didn't see any on an intercept course. Actually, they looked like toys on the horizon. ‘Where's Teern?'

‘I'm going to call him now.' I heard the anchor rope running out of the hull. The current was strong, but we were holding position.

I let go of the railing with one hand and pushed hair out of my face. It blew straight back into my eyes. What a day to forgo the French braid. The churning motion of the boat was less than pleasant. I knew motion sickness was caused by a disturbance in the vestibular system's sense of movement. Judging by how ‘disturbed' I was feeling, my sense of balance was way out of whack as well. ‘Call him how?' I expected him to pull out his phone. ‘Is there reception?'

Rossi took his shirt off instead and my thoughts vanished clean out of my head.

Whoa. That's unexpected.

He gave me a playful smile, as if for a moment, we really were on a date, or at least, two friends sailing in the bay. But he went serious again, and undid his pants.

What the …?

He laughed aloud.
Get used to it. Mar aren't exactly modest.

Damn. I needed to avert my eyes.
Like hell I would do that
. ‘Are you seriously going to swim?' The sun was still behind the clouds, the wind cool. Everything took on a green-gold hue, to me, and I watched, thinking he'd put on his board shorts, or wetsuit or whatever, but no. The man was stark freaking naked.
Holy hallelujah
.

‘I won't be long.'

‘What?' I tore my eyes off his body, which was lining up to dive over the edge, and found his face. ‘No no no! Wait. You can't leave me alone.'

Stay on board
, his thoughts swirled into my head.

Dive. Swoosh. Gone.

‘What the hell, Rossi. No way!'

I didn't see any scuba gear, not even fins and mask. No snorkel. No rebreather. For the second time in a matter of days, I wanted to burst into tears. ‘You bastard.' I spat the words out. How could he leave me here? What if he didn't come back? I was working myself straight into the swirling vortex of panicsville. The sky was closing in; the sea would swallow me up. Tunnel vision made my eyes slam shut.
Not good not good
.

Stop.
A quieter part of my mind spoke.
Find your centre.
My voice echoed the tone and demand of Rourke, coaching me before a competition.
Breathe.

I obeyed my higher guide, who clearly had more grace than me at the moment. After a few conscious breaths, the walls retreated, a little.

Big picture, Sykes,
I told myself.
No one's beating you with a pipe. You aren't being chained to an altar and your heart cut out, or being buried alive.

All true things.

Just chill out. Relax. He'll be back. How far could he go, anyway?
I kept up the commentary until my heartbeat slowed to something below a grand mal seizure rate.
Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.

Oh, hell.
I sucked in large gulps. After a few moments, I started to realise Rossi hadn't surfaced, that I could tell, and I really was alone on the sea, which triggered the fear-abandonment-panic cycle again. Too bad I wasn't hooked up to an ECG. This would make great research for my internship next year. I was lost in those thoughts when a wave hit the deck, drenching me. The sea had been smooth as glass. Hardly a ripple.
What was that?
When I opened my eyes, sputtering, the answer was in front of me. I screamed like a college chick in a horror film, because suddenly I wasn't alone any more. A naked woman, tall and gorgeous, stood on the rail.

I slammed back into the seat, my eyes glued to her. There was only one thought in my head.
She's. Not. Human
. Her height, her stance, the way she balanced on that narrow rail and jumped to the deck, her walk. Hell, the way she'd sprung out of the sea. Gravity didn't appear to be much of an issue for her. Her arms were long, her expression sensual and curious. I'd call her stunningly attractive, if you didn't count the pointy eye teeth.
Definitely not human when she showed that off.

And you think you are, sweetcakes?
She shot the words into my head like they were turbocharged. My neck snapped back with the force of it.
Let's have a little look-see, shall we?
Her hands came up to her flawless face, pushing the lengths of long wet hair back. No mean feat as it fell down her creamy skin and over naked hips to the backs of her knees. It was honey-blonde, at least in the late afternoon light. She had to be over six foot tall, an Amazon, with eyes so dark, they looked like black holes. She wasn't shy, either, given her lack of clothing, and obvious lack of weapons.

Except for those teeth.
Instinctively, I jumped to my feet. Something about her cocky smile screamed ‘run.'
But on this tiny cork floating around on the sea, where to?

She laughed, and put her hands on her hips.
You're Rossi's Ava Sykes?

My knees tried to absorb the rise and fall of the boat to lessen the head spins. ‘That's me, but I'm not
his
anything.'
Especially after this string of events.
‘You?'

‘Salila.' Her voice was velvet smooth seduction, whether aloud or in my head. She pronounced it Sah-LEE-lah. Hindu?

‘Assuming you aren't another hallucination, what do you want?'

‘You.' In two strides she grabbed me, hoisted her arms high, holding me over her head like a feather-filled pillow. ‘This way, pet.' She threw me up in the air, over the railing and into the sea.

I've never screamed louder in my life.

* * *

I bellyflopped onto the cold surface. It stung hard, like hitting concrete. The air rushed out of my lungs, cutting my wail short. I flailed around, beating the water, trying to punch my way free, until my head followed the rest of my body, down under the waves. I sank like a stone, as in my hallucinations, only this time, I was quite sure it was real. My contacts popped out, and water poured in my open mouth, down my oesophagus, into my stomach, and down my trachea into my lungs. It filled up every space inside me with its cold, salty hunger. Pain ripped through my chest as it rose and fell, trying to breathe air out of the sea. It couldn't happen. I was conscious enough to note that in the midst of the madness.

Help me! Help!
The louder I screamed in my head, the more I heard laughter rising like bubbles, tickling and taunting. It brought a memory to the front of my mind: me, as an infant, underwater and laughing up at my own mother who was trying to drown me.
Maybe I'm having a psychotic breakdown
. Part of me knew it would be over soon, that I'd already burned through what limited oxygen was left in my bloodstream. Even for me, the one who could hold her breath the longest of anyone and resist tapping out from even the tightest chokeholds, this was it. Consciousness was slipping away, darkness inking in.

Only it wasn't.

I continued to feel everything, including tons of water over me, and even though I had a good two hundred feet of visibility, this was aqueous fluid, not air.
Not air, Ava. Think what you are saying.
I was still conscious. Alive, and starting to feel, um, better. The excruciating spasms in my chest subsided. My feet touched lightly on the top of a metal perch that turned out to be a slightly bent streetlight overlooking a sunken intersection. I clung to it, wrapping my legs around the pole to keep from drifting the rest of the way to the seafloor. The desperate need to breathe was gone.

I sat there, on top of the pole, mostly dumbstruck, while part of me enjoyed the view. I'd never witnessed anything more surreal, or more spectacular. Fifteen years under the sea had turned this part of the coast into a coral encrusted page out of California history, salt preserved. I saw everything clearly, and that didn't make sense. My contacts were gone and I was batshit-blind without them.
Not anymore.
Rows of streetlights, like the one I clung to, poked out of the silt and sand. Cars that hadn't been worthy of salvaging lay on their sides or upside down, brown with rust and covered in anemones, green, yellow and brilliant red.
Huh? Red?
I could see it.
Inexplicable.
The red spectrum vanished at fifteen feet under the surface, and I was way deeper than that.