Visioness (9 page)

“How long will we be
staying?” Again, naturally the next question.

“Only an hour or so. I’m
pretty busy, but I owe it to cousin Larraine. She’s asked me to go as she
can’t.”

“How is she?” asked
Charlotte. She hadn’t seen cousin Larraine since the Nhyx attack, as—again—she
couldn’t understand it at all. The simple proximity to Aunt Marie was enough to
bring Charlotte out in a cold sweat and drain the brilliance from her visage.
Having to see Larraine was a simple addition to these worries.

“Surviving,” she replied.
“She’s been healing okay. She’s going to be in there a bit longer, though. She
had a turn the other day, and she’s been having a bit of trouble getting over
it all. That’s why we’re going to see Aunt Marie. She’d be getting lonely.”

“Did they say when she’d be
out?”

“Soon, hopefully,” Adabelle
replied, hopeful. Once the girl was out of hospital, they could protect
one-another. She could avoid a visit to the Halls of the Oen’Aerei.

“I’ll come, then,” Charlotte
said. “I suppose I owe her that much. But the moment she has a turn, I’m out of
there.” There was no trace of uncertain fear in her voice. She was bluntly
sincere, her tone containing maybe the slightest tint of anger. She wasn’t
usually so fervent, holding the quieter, more reserved personality that
Adabelle seemed to lack. Adabelle inherited the fierce passion and zeal her
mother had possessed, while Charlotte kept mostly to herself, only calling out
when necessary.

Of course, there were the
odd occasions when Charlotte surprised her. And these surprises were never done
in half-measures.

“She won’t,” she said,
hopeful that she wasn’t lying to her own sister. “And if she does, you can
leave. I won’t make you stay.”

Charlotte nodded. “Thank
you.”

As
she had promised Larraine, the following day after her violin lesson, Adabelle
collected Charlotte from her room, and headed off to the hospital. The tram was
a little late today, but the number of stops between the University and the
hospital were reduced because fewer people on board. They got off at the
bridge, and went the last few blocks on foot. Charlotte seemed to hang back,
her trepidation about visiting the hospital becoming quickly apparent.
Adabelle wasn’t one to judge, though,
and allowed her that small mercy as they walked.

The pair
signed in, and then made their way up to Aunt Marie’s room. Charlotte seemed
incapable of hiding her fears. She was unusually skittish today, so Adabelle
let her wait at the door.

Aunt Marie fidgeted
and shuddered more than was normal. At first, it worried Adabelle. These types
of actions usually preceded bad turns. That her face expressed only serene calm
meant Adabelle wasn’t too concerned. She dare not extend her thoughts into the
Dream Frequencies, in case Aunt Marie’s reveries changed suddenly to something
more powerful and consuming, as they sometimes did. There had been times where
the dreams had been so potent, they had appeared in the real world floating
above her head in shimmering mirages, connected to her head by beams of
serpentine blue light. Those had been particularly traumatic to see, especially
as the dreams that caused them were usually filled with dark, nightmarish occurrences.
It was one thing going through a nightmare yourself; an entirely other thing to
have to watch someone else suffer, knowing you were incapable of assisting.

But she went
in, leaving Charlotte at the door, and took a seat next to her Aunt.

“Hello, Aunt
Marie,” she whispered. “It’s me, Adabelle. I hope you’re okay today.”

No response.
She just lay there, occasionally twitching or muttering words under her breath.

“I’m here
because Larraine isn’t well. She’s in hospital, and she got attacked by a
Sturding Nhyx.” She laughed quietly at herself, and at the ridiculousness of
the statement. “I didn’t know they even existed till she got attacked. But
apparently they do. And…” she hesitated, glancing quickly at Charlotte. She had
retreated even further out the door into the hall. She was sure Charlotte
wouldn’t hear her. She whispered, “…And it seems Therron has returned, in one
manner or other. I haven’t had confirmation, but Therron may have broken free
of the Oen’Aerei’s spheres. And I’m scared.”

Aunt Marie
stirred a little at mention of Count Therron’s name. Her fidgeting hands played
with themselves, her head twitching, eyes fluttering beneath closed lids. The
muscles in her neck bulged and tensed beneath pallid skin.

“I don’t
know whose help I should seek. Most people would turn to their parents,
but…well…I have none of which to speak. And while Mrs. Abeth has done a
wonderful job looking after us, she’s not really a mother. What I mean to say
is, a mother would be able to make me do what I don’t want to. A mother would
give me the courage to go and seek the truth—go to the Halls of the Oen’Aerei.
But I have no mother. I have no one to give me strength. And…” she hesitated,
as she felt herself growing emotional.
No,
she thought.
Push through
it. Be strong.
“…It makes it all the harder knowing that I cannot protect
Charlotte.”

Again, the
woman stirred, muttering. “Therron,” she whispered, so softly Adabelle almost
lost it.

“I need to
keep her safe, and yet…it is her who needs to protect me. She’s the only one
who Therron can’t affect. Until he’s gone, I’m in danger, and she might be left
alone, and I can’t have that happen. I have to protect her.”
But how can I
protect her when I can barely protect myself?
“I need to be there. I’m all
she has left.”

Aunt Marie
continued muttering, shifting and stirring. Those muscles in her neck pulsed
now, her eyes moving more rapidly.

“I don’t
know why I’m talking to you.” Adabelle extended her hand to Aunt Marie’s. “I
suppose I should talk to Larraine, find out what she thinks about having to
look after someone she’s meant to look up to. She might be able to help me, so
I can tell Charlotte.”

Somehow,
despite their closeness in age, Adabelle always felt like the gap between her
and her sister was a wide canyon of time. She was the baby in the family; her
baby sister, now and always. Adabelle sometimes forgot that Charlotte was old
enough to care for herself now without falling too far astray. She was mature
and kind-hearted and could be strong when she needed to. It had seemed like
only yesterday that Adabelle had been nursing her baby sister in her arms, and
then only a short time more that she had been fighting off bullies in the
playground at their primary school.

When Charlotte
turned thirteen, thereby allowing her to leave school and take on private tuition,
she had become more independent. She seemed to be growing minute-by-minute
before Adabelle. Charlotte was a young woman now—Adabelle needed to remember
that—and yet she also didn’t want to let go of that sweet innocent girl she had
once been able to cradle in her own tiny arms; the one she had stood up for in
the playground; the one she had assured everything would be okay, though they
had no parents. She didn’t want to let go, and yet there would come a time when
she would have to stop playing surrogate mother and let the girl make her own
choices.

She turned
to Charlotte in the doorway. She was short for her age, yet Adabelle could
already see the first signs of womanhood beginning to blossom. It made her
smile and forget her worries, if only for a short moment.

Charlotte
was more fully in the hallway than the room.

Adabelle
touched Aunt Marie’s hand, turning back to the woman, unable to wipe that
somehow serene smile from her face. In that face, though, there was also fear.

“I just need
some help.”

Suddenly Aunt
Marie’s eyes snapped open, wide and white and mad with distance. They moved
rapidly side-to-side, as if she was unable to settle her eyes on one thing for
any longer than a moment.

“THERRON!”
she screamed, her voice loud and hoarse from lack of use. “THERRON, LEAVE!”

“Aunt
Marie?” Adabelle whispered, going to remove her hand. She pulled back, rising
up, but Aunt Marie didn’t let go. Her head swung suddenly to Adabelle, looking
her directly in the eyes. The Dream Buffer sickness held her fast, for she was
soon blubbering nonsense, and screaming.

“Nurse!
Nurse!” cried Adabelle, unable to let go. Vines of blue light grew from Aunt
Marie’s head, spreading out above her. Each one expanded, ballooning out. Their
centres blurred, revealing strange images, misted sights. Charlotte fled,
screaming.

“COUNT
THERRON!” Aunt Marie roared. “LEAVE ME!”

“No, no,
no,” Adabelle whispered, using her other hand now to break free of the woman’s
vice-like grip. All the while, the tendrils of thought extending from the
woman’s mind shimmered, revealing images of dreams she experienced; nightmares
she was forced to suffer. In one she was chased, in another she was tied up, in
another she was falling from an impossible height, and Adabelle couldn’t help
but stare. The Dream Buffer sickness wasn’t contagious, so to speak, but other
Dreamers could get caught up and carried away.

She found
herself drawn towards those dreams, however horrible many of them were. Her
mind begin to fuzz in reality, her inner ear playing tricks on her to make her
experience falling and running, her thoughts suffering through all the fears
and worries Aunt Marie had to experience. They shared this mutual nightmare,
and both of them screamed.

In these
images passing before her, flickering quickly one to the next, one thing became
consistent. One sound. One song.

The
Dreamer’s Lullaby
drew
her into its soft tune, each gentle shift in the notes forcing her to hum. Like
music from a music box, the tinkling noises created an echoing harmony from the
way it reverberated within the Dream Frequencies.

And that
scent! The smell of the cologne, so rich and musky. It floated in the air so
thickly it seemed to make its own cloud, wafting on the winds of thought.

Get out
of here, Adabelle!
she
thought, shaking her head, running away from the music and the choking aroma.
Get
away from him!

“You cannot
run,” Count Therron Blaise said, his voice deep, carefully enunciated and
considered. It was the voice of a man who’d had everything from youth, the
voice of an educated man.

The smell
won’t leave! It won’t leave! I can’t leave!

But she had
to. She had to run. The Buffer Sickness had drawn her in. She had to get out!

The world
swirled around her, the setting of the living nightmare changing as often as a
clock ticks. She fell, she ran, and she drowned. She flown one moment and was
buried alive the next. All while the scent of Count Therron followed, and the
music played. Whether in the chimes of the music box, or in the pitch of the thunder
crack, the music followed.

Have to
get away…have to get away…
she thought, again and again, wondering if she would ever truly
escape.

She was
running down an endless hallway, and she instinctively knew the door was
somewhere behind her. The door to hell, the door to horror. The door to the
end. Every one of her steps made a different sound. A lyric.

The door
swung open, snapping against its hinges. Like thunder it cracked against the
wall.

A single
figure stood, silhouetted in the doorway. Despite her best attempts to run, the
door only drew closer. And so did the man. And the music. And that scent.

It was
Therron.

The dream
snapped around her.

She swam
through a turbulent ocean, waves metres tall crashing over her, endeavouring to
drown her. Within this dark ocean, Adabelle choked on salty water, blinded by
the pelting rain falling from a storm-bruised sky. The wind sung. Sung to her.

It occurred to
her soon that someone controlled those waves. Those maddening, crunching,
crushing waves, gnashing on the ocean’s surface.

She saw him
on a far distant cliff-top. He smiled.

It was
Therron.

The dream
snapped around her again.

The city
streets were burning, exploding as bombs went off. They shook the ground,
blasting her ears. Flames licked at the heavens, eating the breathable air, the
sturdy wooden foundations, and the fleshy humans, a ravenous, igneous beast.

Each
detonation rocked Adabelle off her feet, every wave of heat resolutely and
absolutely unflagging.

Someone held
the detonator.

It was
Therron.

Running
along the hilltops; the lightning flashed, the rain pelted. Cold.
So cold
.
With each bolt of lightning, the earth quaked beneath her, shaking her to her
core. The clouds swirled tumultuously above, black and grey and blue. With each
burst of lightning, the clouds dazzled. The wind carried the scent of Therron;
the winds whistled that painfully familiar song.

A face
appeared within the clouds above, formed from the wisps, revealed by the light.
Rolling upon itself, the misty, airy clouds kept substance. It looked at first
like liquid, then ice, and then skin, but grey and ever-shifting.