Kelly Gay - The Darkest Edge of Dawn

Gone.

My entire body trembled. I swallowed, slowly reaching up and pulling down a towel from the rack on the wall behind me while Brimstone rooted around the spot where Llyran had just been, confused that his prey had suddenly vanished. The towel flopped down and I held it in front of me, the end under my chin, as Brim stepped over, sniffed my ankle and calf, and then my head where he licked my forehead with his fat, slobbery tongue.

“Mom!” Emma ducked through the massive hole in the door, kneeling down next to me, her arms going around my shoulders. “Oh my God. Are you okay? What happened?”

My hand came up, closed on her arm, and squeezed. Her skin was so warm. My teeth clattered. “Mmm hmm. I’m fine.”

Rex slammed into the door next, not making it through the hole, but knocking the top hinge plate off the doorframe. His momentum sent him skidding across the bathroom floor and straight into the tub, flipping ass over end into the basin. I hadn’t realized he’d been holding my gun until the shot rang out and hit the ceiling, sending bits of plaster raining down.

Rex’s shout of surprise mingled with Emma’s scream as I grabbed her, shoving her down and shielding her with the top half of my body.

Small bits of ceiling pinged the tile. The shower still ran. I released my hold on Em. “Jesus!”

I could just see the top of his wet head as it bobbed up. My gun was next as he slapped it on the rim of the tub to push himself to a sitting position. Thankfully the gun wasn’t pointed at us. I set Emma aside and lurched for the weapon, snatching it out of his hand and flicking the safety. “What the hell possessed you to get my gun?”

He blinked, sputtering out the water as it fell on him, completely dazed and pale from his somersault into the tub and the gun firing. “We heard you scream. Got Brim … Emma said … I thought …”

A few seconds of stunned silence went by.

“Mom. It’s okay.”

I took the towel from her, having dropped it when I went for my gun, and sat back down.

Our gazes went from one to another. Rex to Emma. Emma to Me. Me to Rex. And then Emma burst out laughing. It was no time for joking around, but the last few minutes, the shock of it all … I started laughing, too, and it didn’t make an ounce of sense.

Emma pointed at Rex. “You should’ve seen your face when you poked your head out of the tub.” Her giggles were contagious, but Rex seemed to be the only one who didn’t find it funny. He was still in shock.

His pale face finally grew pink. “You’re not funny,” he said, turning the water off. “Neither one of you. I don’t know what I was thinking.” He pulled himself over the ledge until he sat on the edge of the tub. “Moving in here with you crazy women.” He ran a hand down his face and then slicked his hair back off his forehead, shaking his head in disbelief. “I need a drink.” He stood and then shuffled passed us, mumbling about gun-toting women and talking hellhounds.

Once our giggles subsided, Emma slipped her arm over Brimstone’s lowered neck and hugged him. “Good boy,” she whispered, her face turning into his bald, corded neck. “He knew something was wrong. You did good, Brim, real good. Exactly like I told you.”

Brim panted, tongue lagging, totally at ease and, unless I was imagining things, leaning slightly into her. It was the way she spoke to him, the tone of her voice, that wound its way into my clearing mind and set off the five-alarm bell.

“Em …” I squeezed my eyes closed against the sudden sting of tears and swallowed hard before looking at her again. “Please don’t tell me you can communicate with him.”

Her head remained against Brim’s neck, but she turned her round, solemn eyes in my direction, looking so young and innocent, so brave and yet so scared. “I was going to tell you …” Her small voice held a faint edge of defense. “But I knew you’d get all freaked out and—”

“Here’s your robe. You want to tell us what happened, Charlie?” Rex interrupted from the doorway, holding out the cotton robe I hardly ever used.

Brimstone jogged through the doorway and into the bedroom as Emma helped me to my feet. I snatched the robe, turned away from Rex, dropped the towel, and covered myself. Then I made careful steps over the floor, avoiding the sharp splinters of wood and glass. Once on the bedroom carpet, I stopped to brush off the pieces that stuck to the soles of my feet.

“Just got paid an unexpected visit by someone I met once. It’s nothing.”

“I wouldn’t call breaking into a warded house and destroying the bathroom ‘nothing.’ Unless you want us to believe you two were just showing off powers. You know, like”—he used a deep Arnold Schwarzenegger voice—“‘my powers are bigger than yours’ …”

I shot Rex a glower. “That’s exactly what it was.”

He rolled his eyes and whistled to Brim. “Come on, mutt. Let’s get that drink. A Valium would be nice …”

“There’s some in the medicine cabinet!” I yelled after him, making sure the sarcasm was clear. “Take as much as you want!”

Once the door was closed, I removed the robe, some of the wood pieces falling off my back and shoulder. My skin had dried, so Emma helped brush the remaining debris off my back. I had the shakes, bad, and couldn’t control it.

“What have I said for the past two months?” When she didn’t respond, I answered for her. “At the first sign or gut instinct of trouble, you run for your room and lock the door.”

She gave a guilty shrug and asked, “So what happened?”

I slumped on the edge of the mattress in defeat, still achy in my head and not ever wanting to revisit the horror of having someone violate my mind. “I don’t know, Em. He appeared in the bathroom—don’t ask me how—wanted to chat, and I wanted him out. How long have you been communicating with Brim?”

“He tried to kill you?”

I shook my head, unnerved by that question coming out of my kid’s mouth. “No, Em. He didn’t try to kill me. He wanted me to listen, and I didn’t want to.”

“You’ll need to shower again, get all this little crud off you,” she mumbled.

“Are you going to answer the question?” I went to the dresser drawer as she sat on the end corner of the bed, her hands tucked together and resting in the crook of her bent knee. She stayed quiet as I jerked on a pair of underwear, boxers, and a T-shirt, as though awaiting the firing squad. She, apparently, had the greatest impression of me.

Being a single parent, I always had to be the bad guy, and I hated that. Yes, I was upset, stunned, and pissed off at the universe for giving my child some kind of ability. But it wasn’t her fault. It was in her bloodline. In the traces of ancient off-world genes passed down from generation to generation since the time of biblical cohabitation when some of the off-worlders chose human mates and produced offspring.

Those old and diluted bloodlines were responsible for creating powers in humans. Clairvoyants, mediums, shamans … The Madigan bunch, however, had the distinction of having not one off-worlder ancestor (which was rare in itself), but two—a Charbydon and an Elysian. It’s what made me the perfect subject for Mynogan’s gene manipulation. It’s what gave my sister her extraordinary abilities. And what had now been passed on to Emma.

I sat back on the bed. “So how long have you known?”

Her lips puckered together, making two dimples in her cheeks, and she scratched the tip of her upturned nose. “I don’t know. For a while now, I guess.” She shrugged. “But I didn’t know I could talk to Brim until a few days after he came home. Well, I mean … it’s not like we can talk to each other, like have conversations and stuff. I can sense what he wants and feels, and he can do the same. Are you mad?”