Page 10 of Finding Her Heart
The day felt heavy. Muffled. If ever there was a cloud of woe over her, it was now. The stormy threat of it surrounded her. Instead of letting it suffocate, she used the sense of purpose to drive her forward, her feet moving. Staying hyper-alert to her surroundings, she expected to see someone on the walk. See something normal.
She saw no one. Nothing, other than the quiet, amplifying the tension of her every step.
Her chest burned, perspiration beading between her shoulder blades as she walked. Houses were scarce along this back road. Smaller structures belonging to people who didn't have big farms. Fishermen, workers saving for better, married couples waiting on their chance to inherit or saving to buy a permit from the council and build in one of the few empty plots of land left. All kinds of people.
As part of the first settlers here, her family took part in the planning of the Peace River Treaty lands before anyone ever set foot here. What village would go where, how many people, and how each village would function. The 'humble life' was an intentional way of living. A controlled choice."We must make sacrifices for peace. Finding safety in this greedy, selfish world was hard,"Mama said.
As if time held its breath, that feeling of disconnect she'd had all day worsened. By late afternoon she'd only seen a couple of silent birds in the sky, and no other living things. She heard no dogs barking or farm animals as she approached the town. No noises from rickety wagons.
This was not good.
Where was everyone? Had that evil reached the town? How was it possible? Her throat burned with a need to shout, to call out to someone. To see any number of the people who routinely shunned her and to call out to them. She'd run up to them, grab them by the shoulders and kiss them.
She'd be grateful to see someone. Stifling the frightened sounds wanting to escape her mouth, Annabell kept moving, desperate to see a familiar face. The sense of isolation hurt today. She couldn't take it. She had to see someone. At any moment a person would come around the bend of the path, or she would hear a human-caused sound.
There were houses coming up. She'd see someone there.
There had to be someone there.
The little wood slat shack where the young seamstress lived with the cobbler's son was the first house close to the path. The mud yard where they kept the geese was empty, no goose in sight, and the door going in the house hung open. The place gaped at her. Like a scream. Like her Benjere's house.
She hugged herself. Afraid.
Pulled by the string of the unknown, she kept walking until she saw more houses, better, well-kept homes. Even their backsides were well kept, some with fences, most without. These people she knew too. Name after name. No child played outside. No good wife in the garden. There was not an animal to make a noise.
Shivering in the middle of the road, looking at the backs of houses belonging to the townspeople, she wondered what to do. She wanted to run. She wanted to talk to her brother and the town council and get their help. Make them fix this thing.
"Ho now, what do we have here? Look at you, pretty thing. Where did you come from?"
A man came out of the house carrying an open jar of preserves, his lips and beard coated with jellied fruit. Unable to place him, she stood frozen. As if a feral dog in the street said hello instead of barking, the man on Mac Hessy’s front step made no sense. He was wrong, out of place, wearing strange clothes of shiny cracked and worn material. His roughness gave the impression of hard work and long use, but his slated, wrinkled face, and eager grin belied anything as honorable as work ethic. He looked dangerous.
This was a bad man who did very bad things.
Run.
A rabbit chased by a mangy, starving dog, Annabell ran. She ran toward Vejere's place. The closest to her location, he could fix this. He would help her. Heart in her mouth, she darted that direction, between houses, to her brother's. Mind racing. He could fix this.
Laughter followed.
"Oh, pretty thing. We own this town. Own what's in it. All the pretty, fresh, helpless things, like you. Where could you go?" The sound sent a chill through her. Three more demon men.
Annabell ran past Vejere's old founder's home. She assessed it in a harried glance. It looked different. Its beautiful, proud austerity brought low. Tainted. The potted plants that usually lined the front were missing, and she knew, just knew that Vejere, his wife, and sons were not home. Not even alive anymore.
Now that Annabell experienced violence, felt the true heartache of woe, it stained her, stuck to her senses worse than pitch, and smelled like death and madness. Everywhere she looked, she saw it. Smelled it. The hair on the back of her neck prickled. Where to go, what to do?
Veering right, she kept running, not daring to look behind herself, heading through the shortcuts, through yards and alleys of her childhood.
Behind her, all around her, she heard voices yelling back and forth. Jovial and profane.
"Looks like some straggler pussy, boys. You know how I feel about all these fresh, untouched things. Someone grab a bag, and let's go chase this little wildling kitty."
The announcement was loud and too close. Reverberating all around her, their voices came from above and from around corners. She wanted to stop, look around, figure out what was happening, see how close the enemy was to 'bagging' her.
But Annabell couldn't lose her momentum. Hide. She had to hide. There was no defense. If these were the men who killed her neighbors, her brother, even the children, there would be no mercy.
There was a crash- an explosion of black and red in her ears that stole light and air, replacing everything with sharp pain. It burst over and through her in a flash.
Then nothing.
