Chapter 257
My sister and Aaron were back in the apartment by the time Brandon and I got there. It was odd that Aaron was home since he was almost always in his office when something like this was happening, and the fact that he was pacing around the living room made me think he would be leaving again as soon as I told them what I’d discovered.
“Well?” Cadence asked, as soon as I was fully in the room.
“Hello to you, too,” Brandon remarked smugly, not letting go of my hand.
With a humph, my sister said, “Hi, Cassidy! Hi, Brandon! How are you today? Cold enough for you out there? Now, what the crap did you find out?” The first part was delivered in an overly syrupy voice like one might use if they worked in customer service. The last part just sounded downright mean.
“Well, that was rude,” Brandon murmured, crossing the room to sit in a recliner nowhere near where my sister sat on the couch. I waited for Aaron to stop pacing long enough to cross in front of him and sat down on the other end of the sofa. He stood between the coffee table and the door, but he didn’t say anything, and I just wondered if he even thought these powers of mine were real. He’s been around a long time, and there’s a chance he probably thinks he’s seen everything.
“I made contact with a Vampire, and I think she’s in that RV park in Butler,” I said, finally deciding to just let it all out.
“What did she say?” Cadence asked, leaning forward like she thought I might run away before I told her, and she’d have to catch me.
“She didn’t say much, honestly. But she did confirm that they are moving.” That had Aaron’s attention, and he took a few steps forward but still didn’t speak. “She said, ‘The time is now,’ just like I did the other night.”
“Did she say what that means?” Cadence asked, her eyebrows knit together.
“Only, ‘We must get into place,’” The words seemed eerie coming out of my mouth.
“What do you think that means?” Cadence wasn’t talking to me now, looking at her fiancé. He only shrugged. She returned her attention to me. “Anything else?”
“Yeah, when I asked her what they needed to get into place for….” I swallowed hard. I had told Brandon as much as I could on the way back over here, and even though I felt a lot more comfortable when it was just the two of us, it had been hard for me to say the first time. It was even harder now. I wanted to get it out myself, though, not rely on him to pass off the information secondhand. “She said… ‘destruction.’”
“Destruction?” my sister echoed, once again, her head swiveling to Aaron and then back to me. “What the crap does that even mean?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “But I got the impression they are all moving for a specific reason, that something is directing them to do so.” Something, or someone. I wasn’t sure which it was, and I didn’t know what or why. But that was the feeling I’d gotten when I was in this woman’s head.
Cadence wasn’t satisfied with that answer. Once again, her eyes were on Aaron. “What do you think they’re up to?”
He finally moved to a nearby chair, one across from Brandon, and I felt much better without him standing there with his hands on hips. But he was still puzzled, which made us all uncomfortable. “I don’t know.” At least I wasn’t alone in admitting my ignorance.
Once again, Cadence didn’t like that answer. “Destruction,” she repeated, leaning back against the sofa. We all sat in silence for longer than I liked, and I was just about to offer more information when she spoke again. “Do you think this has anything to do with the portal?” She asked the question like she hoped he’d say no, but Aaron’s resounding yes came too quickly for him to have even stopped to think about it. I agreed with him, even though I knew my sister didn’t want it to be the case. She wanted to believe that nothing had come through with Elliott and Grandma Janette. But I was beginning to get the impression we were wrong and that wasn’t the case.
“Who did you get this information from?” Aaron asked in the calmest panicked voice anyone could produce.
“I don’t know her name, but I could see her past,” I began, trying to explain it the best I could. After the situation with Gibbon, I had sat down with Aaron and Elliott (because I felt more comfortable with him there) and they’d asked me to explain what had gone on when I was calling to Gibbon. I think Aaron sort of understood what it was like for me to enter that state when I can see into other Vampire’s memories, but I’m not sure he quite gets it, and I know my sister doesn’t. Brandon is doing his best to understand, but I think it’s hard for anyone who hasn’t done it themselves—and obviously none of them have.
“What did you see?” the Guardian Leader asked me his elbows on his knees.
I took a deep breath. It would be hard to tell them everything I saw, felt, everything I somehow knew, but I would do my best. “I saw a prairie, flowers, a woman I knew was my mother. I saw a small cabin on the edge of a wood. I knew I had lots of brothers and sisters and parents that loved me. I felt safe. Until I didn’t.” I remembered the night of the attack as if it was my own memory, old and faded, but still there. “Most of her family died, but she survived. As a Vampire. She felt all alone. And then, suddenly, I was with her now, at an RV park. I’m pretty sure she’s in Butler, though at the time I had trouble recalling the name of the place.” I had even looked at pictures of Butler and the RV park before I reached out, but in the end, that hadn’t helped it to stick any more.
“Do you have any idea how many of them are there now?” Cadence asked, and I was thankful she’d moved onto a useful question since we planned to raid that very RV park soon enough.
“I don’t know. I saw at least seven, maybe eight RVs. And I think ten or twelve people sitting around a fire. It’s hard to tell who is who sometimes. It’s like an old television set that loses reception, and the pictures blur.” I hoped that made sense. Old television sets were before both my time and my sister’s, but Aaron nodded, and I figured Cadence had seen enough old movies to know what I was talking about.
“Do you think they realized who you were or what you were doing?” Aaron asked, and I could hear the concern in his voice. He is, by nature, and overly cautious person.
“I don’t think so,” I said, but I turned to look at Brandon, and in that hesitation, Aaron’s eyes narrowed, and he shifted so that he was rubbing his chin in thought. “I told her I was a friend, and then she told me they were getting in place.”
“For destruction,” Cadence finished.
I nodded.
“It seems like she didn’t know, then,” Cadence said with a shrug.
I agreed. I don’t think she had any idea who I was, and I imagined she thought I was just another Vampire out there in the world looking for direction.
