The Lie Spinners (The Deception Dance Book 2), page 1
The Lie Spinners
book two of
The Deception Dance
Rita Stradling
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, incidents and places are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locations, or real persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2013 by Rita Stradling.
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit this book in any form or by any means. For subsidiary rights please contact the author.
Email: ritastradling@yahoo.com
Cover Model Photographer: Anastasia Osipova photographer
http://nastiaosipovastock.deviantart.com/
Edited by Grace Marian MD
For my mom.
A lady never afraid to live.
A lady never afraid to love.
Last night, once more, I dreamt of you…
…and woke screaming.
I used to have so many dreams.
I find comfort in the unpredictable, when my mind is at rest.
The inconsistency of dreams is what my mind knew consistently.
I only have one dream now.
One memory…
…of you…
…from it, I feel only terror.
The Lie Spinners
Prologue
About a Year Ago
As Copenhagen City Hall crumbles, its pillars tumbling to crater into the marble floor, Andras pushes back to his feet. The burns have crept up to his eyes, down to his fingernails and have encircled his toes. The little bit left of his once giant wings still flicker with flames.
“You told me, you would make a deal,” he coughs out.
“Yeah,” my voice is also choked and croaky, “That was before you stabbed Stephen.”
He slumps further, almost toppling toward me, “You will, or you will not?”
I don’t have a choice, really. I nod. “I will. But these are my terms: you can’t kill me and you have to not open the gates of Hell!”
His eyes, the only part of him beside his hair not blackened, fix on me, “And for that, if I do what you say, you will not fall in...” He coughs, “Fall in...”
“Fall in...Love,” I supply, knowing that he, as a demon, can’t say the word ‘love’.
“...with anyone, until I return.” His voice, movements, everything about him seems unsteady; he probably doesn’t have a minute left until he will burn out entirely.
“Alright!” I nod, “If you leave me alive, do not open the gates of Hell, break the seals of Solomon, or ascend in your demonic form I will not fall in love with anyone until you have returned to earth.”
“And you will give me another chance. When I have a new body you will spend a month with me...”
“No.” I say, pleading, “Maybe, a week...”
“A month. You will spend a month with me, I will not negotiate.” His eyes blaze into me but his body teeters from side to side.
I bite my lip and inhale, “Okay, it’s a deal.”
“If I do leave you here alive and do not open the gates of Hell, do not fail me, Raven. If you do, I will ascend in my true form and the first person I will murder is the man you care for." He grins; his face is completely charred and webbed with fissures. His green eyes stay fixed on me. “Don't even dare to hope that you will ever escape me."
"That's what you think," I say, “We’ll see. I will never love you.”
Chapter One
Day One
The clouds above the Humboldt State University’s track bulge like old, worn water bottles, begging to spring a leak. So far today there hasn’t been so much as a drop; but I’m not fooled. I know the sky just waits for the perfect opportunity to douse us poor co-eds.
Sitting at the lowest steps of Redwood Bowl stadium bleachers, I work at the knot in one of my threadbare tennis shoe laces. Jeez, I need new shoes. I can smell them from here. Thank you, Northern California Mold, nothing like stinking like bad cheese to start the summer off right. I keep at the knot while peering over the track.
No sign of Albert. Again. That man seriously lags.
But, I do see my nemesis, making another round around the track. Cassie. Cassie just happens to be in all of my classes and sets the curve for our every test. Not to mention the fact that she’s taller than me, thinner than me, has flawless dark skin, and a model perfect face. Oh, and she has more friends than God.
Or… she would be my nemesis if I was even a blip on her radar.
I have no friends. Nope, none at all. Unless you count my sister, Linnie, but I think that’s cheating.
When I finally manage the heroic task of tying my shoes, I consider waiting for Cassie to finish her run before I start to warm up. Not that I’m a vain person, but I really don’t want to look like an ostrich trying to race a gazelle.
A guy finishes his run about ten yards from where I’m sitting and walks toward me, holding his sides while visible droplets of sweat spray around him. He makes eye contact with me and I’m locked in a moment of panic. I’m about to dash for the track so there can be no possible way the guy can start up a conversation with me when the guy calls over, “Hey.”
I’m stuck between being completely rude by just running off or staying put and risking the very possible dire consequences.
I inhale, and say, “Hey…?”
“Do you got the time?” he asks, breathily.
“You’re asking me for the time,” I say loudly, and not as a question.
“Yeah…?”
I lift up my arm to look at my watch, “It’s—”
A tall, burly (yet kind of pretty), African American guy steps between me and the poor runner who just wants to know the time. “Hey babe, you okay?” says the guy that I’ve seen a hundred times but never spoken to in my life. “Can I help you?” he asks the runner.
The runner lifts both his hand in conciliatory gesture, “Just asking for the time, bro.”
“Three-forty, bro. Now, move along.” The guy keeps his body between me and the runner the entire time. “And, bro, don’t talk to my girl again.”
And this, Ladies and Gentlemen, is why I have no friends.
At least no one got tackled this time. As the runner sprints away, the guy who’s always around, but I don’t even know the name of, takes a seat a row behind me, looking to all the world like the run-of-the-mill psycho over-bearing boyfriend. If only I was so lucky. I consider saying something to the guy, like, ‘boy, did we scare the pants off that guy. Let’s see if we can make the track team pee themselves.’ but I know better. I’m more likely to get conversation from the bleachers I’m sitting on than one of Albert’s cronies.
I was planning on stretching on the field, preferably away from anyone to spare them from the rank odor emitting from my shoes. But ya’know, here’s as good a place as any to stretch. I back up on the bleachers, stretching out my leg toward the crony, maybe bumping him once or twice with my shoes. The crony only gives one sideward glance toward my feet, but otherwise doesn’t change his stoic, watchful expression.
“Raven!” I hear from the field. I was concentrating so much on stretching; I didn’t even notice Albert approach. “Why aren’t you running laps?” he yells. The sight of Albert should be terrifying, he’s about twice as wide as a person should be, and looks like Thor the Thunder God (Norse, not Hollywood). But this isn’t the first time I’ve seen Albert pissed at me, it isn’t even the first time today he’s been pissed at me. To be perfectly fair, Albert pretty much lives in a constant state of: Pissed. At. Me.
I want to shout, ‘Yes, drill master!’ but don’t. Instead, I just jump up and away from the bleachers (and the crony). I don’t give Albert excuses (like shoelaces or stinky shoe revenge), as Albert likes excuses even less than he likes training me. I just sprint for the track and try to catch up to, and maybe even pass Cassie.
As my body goes through its rhythmic, automatic motions my thoughts arrange themselves. I just took my last Art History final and I am officially on summer break. Everyone else who’s finished is celebrating (emphasis on ‘everyone else’). At least when school is in session I can pretend like I’m normal. I could have taken summer school, I was going to take summer school, but when I mentioned it to Albert our conversation went like this:
“No.”
I said, “But…”
“No.”
So, yeah.
I’d say he has power over me only because I give him power over me, but no-- he has power over me because he has an unknown number of highly trained soldiers at his beck-and-call (and pretty much diplomatic immunity). So I’m on a 24/7 training schedule until school is nice enough to start its fall semester.
In most ways, it’s what I want. I asked to be trained. Need to be trained. Andras is coming back for me. That is pretty much the only certainty I have in this life. Andras will always come back for me.
Even though I’m starting to sweat from my run, my thoughts send chills to burrow deep into my core. I didn’t even notice that I passed Cassie until she catches up; unless she’s lapping me, which would so suck.
“One more lap,” Albert yells as I pass. “Up your speed, people are lapping you.”
That would be Cassie. Crap.
I sprint the last lap, racing Cassie. It’s only a little less satisfying when I beat her, as it’s obvious she has no idea she’s in the race (but sti
“So you are done with your school work,” Albert says while handing me a water bottle, as I try to catch my breath.
“My finals went great, thanks for asking,” I mumble before gulping down some water.
“Did you say something?” Albert asks.
When I shake my head, Albert huffs out his nose and shakes his head back. “I’ve planned something special for you today,” he says. “Think of it as a welcome to summer training exercise.”
Oh, jeez.
He continues, “I just had my men clear out the forest behind your school. Hayvee has planned a very special dinner for you tonight, but you need to earn it. I have armed ten of my men with paintball guns; you will get a five minute head start and then you need to evade them for a full hour. Then, if you are free of paint, we’ll head to dinner. “
I lean back to look at Albert’s crony still sitting on the bleacher, in the first interaction I’ve ever been able to illicit from one of the cronies; the man raises a black eyebrow at me. I’m really starting to regret the stinky shoes thing.
Albert smiles at me. “Alright, let’s jog.”
With Albert ahead and two cronies behind (one just popped out of the bleachers, they do stuff like that), we cut through the back of the school to the hill that leads down to the forest. One of my favorite things about my university, about Arcata, really, is the forest that wraps around it. Just steps away from the lecture halls, dorms and run-down party houses, is the lush redwood forest, filled with thick, towering, ancient trees who’s soft red bark contrast so strongly with the blanket of ferns that cover every inch of underbrush. The forest probably has looked close to the same for hundreds of years; except for the squatters and stoners that evade the campus police by camping out in the hollowed-out-redwood-trunks.
We stop by a small crowd of men, who stand in the middle of the trail.
Albert speaks loudly, “There is a clearly marked and guarded perimeter, if you come to it, turn around. The area has been cleared of people, but if you sense any danger, press the button on your watch.”
“My go-go-gadget watch?” I ask. It’s possible that my lack of normal social interaction has driven me loony-tunes. Very possible.
Albert looks to the sky and inhales through his nose, as if he’s trying to find the patience to deal with me, then continues, “It is four fifteen now, at four twenty, these men will attempt to track you down and shoot you.” He leaves off the ‘with paintball guns,’ which I think is an important detail worth reiterating. “Return here at five twenty, or when shot.” He looks at his watch, “Go, now.”
I do, I sprint down the path determined to at least get the majority of a mile between me and the band of cronies. I should have the advantage, as I’ve been playing in this forest since… forever, but if they only roped off a small section, I’m screwed. I cut into an uphill deer trail that I’m pretty sure goes along Jolly Giant Creek, then branches off, hopefully leading me deeper in rather than to a perimeter line. I glance at my watch, seeing that it’s four twenty-one. Alrighty. I keep running, leaping over root after root. I disturb some birds, sending them to fly to a higher perch. Great, I’m sending up signals. I slow down.
The best idea now would be to find a safe place to hide. An ideal vantage would be up a tree, but it’s possible (if you’re good) to climb a redwood, getting down is a bit trickier. So basically, if I even managed to get up, I’d be stuck. I climb up and hurry across a downed tree, and head into the thick of the forest. It’s hard going, but I see a hollowed out trunk that could be ideal. The trunk is not visible from any of the main paths and if I climbed it, it’d be a hell of a lookout spot.
I climb into the hollow, peeking my head out to take in the forest. Staying very still and partially obscured by the trunk, I take in my surroundings, a few downed trees, many standing ones, and a field of clover covering the ground until it submerges in a small swamp area. There are a couple of rustlings, a couple of sounds, but they’re more likely squirrels than cronies.
Then it occurs to me: why didn’t I get a gun? This game seriously sucks.
Then I see a movement, but not from my surroundings. I see it inches from my face. A seam in the bark of the tree splits, and a human eye peers out.
I just manage not to scream.
My mind races: hallowed ground, this whole place is hallowed ground. Demons can’t enter here. The entire area around Arcata was blessed by seven priests the year I was born; and blessed again after Andras had a soul-bound desecrate a path leading to the graveyard, and within the doubly blessed graveyard, so he could enter while I was a child. Priests check the whole area within and surrounding Arcata every week.
The eye fixes on me. And another seam opens, a second eye blinks; then a third seam and a mouth opens. I’m backing away, grabbing for the button on my watch, when the tree-face speaks, “Wait a moment, Raven.” The Arcata tree has an Irish accent.
The tree bulges forward, moving as if the bark exterior is a thick membrane covering the figure within. Undefined, featureless hands thrust forward, stretching toward me.
I jump back; but the hands instead reach up and dig into the eye and mouth holes, then they stretch and rip through the bark membrane tearing a hole in the tree. Out of the tear spills long red curls attached to a head I recognize. Madeline.
The volatile earth-witch who despises me with a passion, Madeline; and…the person who I owe my life to, plus some, Madeline.
I hear a quick patter, patter; then, the sky starts to pour.
Chapter Two
Day One (Continued)
“You owe me.” This is the first thing to come out of Madeline’s mouth after she climbs out of her tear in the tree. The tree had closed the minute she climbed out, knitting back together like a healing wound on fast forward.
She stares at me, water dripping down to streak the dirt and tree matter hanging off her face and hair. The tree spat her out fully clothed—thank Mother Nature for small favors, but her clothes are soaked within seconds in the rain “You owe me,” She repeats, staring hard into my eyes.
“Yeah, I know,” I say, after ducking into the hollow in the tree, because, I think she’s waiting for a response.
“Good,” she says, and then she visibly relaxes. She climbs into the hollow and sits in the dirt, stretching out her legs and arms.
“Cramped journey?” I say, because, for whatever reason possibly because she just climbed out of a tree, and now we’re huddled together in the small confines of said tree, our silence feels awkward.
“You have no idea,” she says, rolling back her shoulders. “I have been trying to contact you for a week. You’re a difficult person to get to.”
“I guess that’s a good thing,” I say. “You have some stuff… on your face.” I add because the large hunk of tree hanging from her cheek really bugs me, but even after I tell her she doesn’t rush to wipe it off.
Madeline straightens up and sits cross legged. “I’m here to call in your life debt, Raven.” Her words sound strange, layered, as if her voice is three simultaneous voices.
Somehow I know that her words hold a sort of magic. I know I should stop her talking, I know I should cut off what she says before it becomes binding, or something.
I look up into her eyes and—I can’t do it. She didn’t just save my life. She went against who she was, her beliefs, her morals, to bring me back to life—to recompose my corpse. She sacrificed trees and five of her friends to do it. It’s the kind of debt you never pay off. Unfortunately, I have a lot of those debts out there.
I could be callous, I could say, screw you—I didn’t ask you to save me. I didn’t ask for any of this. The mistakes I made weren’t even in this lifetime. Maybe, I messed up in a past life, fell for the wrong guy, but I’ve paid the price for that; I’ll never stop paying the price for that. When I follow this line of thinking— ‘the leave me alone, it’s not my fault’ line of thinking—part of me feels right with it, but that same part starts to feel a familiar feeling, a vast emptiness inside. This feeling, the emptiness, scares me more than anything that Madeline could ask me to do.
