**NB. This story is as it comes – straight out of my head and may contain typos**
CHAPTER 21 – BLANE
“Put me through to Zion.”
“Mr. Zionberger doesn’t take calls.”
I recognised Minerva’s voice, and she sounded bored.
“Tell him it’s his sparring partner.”
Unsurprisingly, Zion managed to find his way to the phone reasonably quickly, and the next voice I heard was his. He sounded slightly nasal, probably thanks to the swelling.
“What do you want?”
“Is that any way to speak to a client? I’m calling for a progress report.”
“You know how hard it is to find a woman who a man like Laurent doesn’t want to be found?”
“Yes, which is why I hired a professional.”
“Yeah, well, I’m Vegas. The girl ain’t in Vegas; I got that on good authority. Now I gotta check all the other places she might be. It’s like lookin’ for a grain of flour in a brick of coke.”
“And that’s something you have experience with?”
“Flour in coke? Nah, man, the stuff I sell gets cut with creatine and vitamin powder. Got the healthiest buyers in Sin City.”
Zion seemed oddly proud of that little oxymoron. Me? My blood only boiled hotter.
“Oh, really?”
“Swear. Everyone knows if you want the good stuff, you come to Zion. You interested?”
“In drugs? Certainly not. The clock’s ticking, and I suggest you focus on finding Caria.”
“Laurent only works at night. There ain’t nothing I can do while the sun’s shining.”
“Then I suggest you get some sleep because you have a busy evening ahead of you.”
I hung up, turned off the burner phone, and tossed it into my desk drawer. No way would I be giving that intolerable scumbag my actual number. Joseph watched me from the couch, drink in hand.
“Bad news?”
“No news, which is almost as disappointing. Caria’s not in Vegas, apparently, but beyond that, the fool has no idea. And I suspect he’s too busy feeding addictions to care.”
“You think we should hire someone else?”
“Like another investigator?”
“When the soul who previously inhabited this bag of bones did lawyer stuff, he used investigators. I saw the notes in his files.”
“Tempting, but if we need to bend a few earthly rules in order to retrieve Caria, I don’t need external scrutiny.”
“No questions about dead bodies?”
“Mortals get strangely attached to flesh and blood, what with their carved headstones and decorative urns and murder investigations.”
Years ago, I’d struggled with the concept of human feelings, but now that I’d spent time in Plane Five, I understood. Humans loved harder and deeper because their time was limited. Friendships ranged from fleeting to lifelong, but there was an intensity to them not found in the other realms. I’d experienced it myself with Nev.
And last night, I’d felt that connection again with Wren.
Entwined souls found their way back to each other, Aurelia always said, and that had been true with Lola. But how did Wren fit in?
I’d peeped into her room this morning to check she was still breathing, then left her to sleep. She’d felt it too, the connection between us; I knew she had. And it had surprised her. Maybe even shocked her the way it had shocked me, but for a different reason. She was shocked because she’d felt the power of the aetherbond for the first time. I was shocked because I’d felt it for the second.
There had been much speculation about the aetherbond through time. Aurelia found it a fascinating topic, so much so that she’d absorbed every mention she could find in the celestial library and loved to regurgitate the snippets over dinner. Did you know that when a soul bonds with another, they’re bound for eternity? Please could somebody pass the salt?
Not every soul was bonded, and with the way they got shuffled around in Plane Four, few on earth were lucky enough to find their soulmate, although air travel had made things easier. And it was perfectly possible to fall in love with another. But the aetherbond amplified every emotion, leading to a deeper connection, a familiarity that stretched across the ages. Legend said that bonded souls were always linked, even across long distances, a cosmic thread that helped the bonded to find each other through the ages.
The way I’d found Nev.
And Wren.
How could I be bonded to two women? They’d been alive at the same time, so it wasn’t a simple case of soul recycling.
“You want me to give Zion a kick up the ass?” Joseph asked.
“Not yet. We’ll save that treat for another day. If he’s in the hospital having his bones screwed back together, he won’t be out looking for Caria.”
“You’re no fun anymore.”
“We still have fun; it’s just a different—”
The door cracked against the wall, and Myrtle stomped in. Girl Myrtle, not cat Myrtle. Celestial beings matured more slowly than mortals, so she was in the equivalent of her early teens now, a delightful ball of angst and whining.
“You need to tell the new girl to put more syrup on my pancakes. Like, a teaspoon is not enough.”
“She’s probably thinking of your health.”
“Seriously? I’m freaking immortal.”
“Yes, but Wren doesn’t know that. You forgot to take off your collar.”
“Gah.” Myrtle’s fingers flew to her throat, and the tags jingled as she tossed the offending article on my desk. “I hate that thing.”
“Some women in the club wear collars by choice.”
“But those are cool, edgy collars with spikes, not pink glitter.”
“You want a spiky collar?”
“Decima told me it would look dumb with the fur.”
“That’s one of the rare instances where I have to agree with her.”
“Can you take me home? I’ve seen every show on the strip, and I’m soooo bored. Plus I haven’t hung out with Aurelia for ages.”
At least if I took Myrtle home, she’d stop complaining. Or if she didn’t, she’d be someone else’s problem. I was about to answer in the affirmative when Joseph cut in.
“Would your desire to visit Aurelia have anything to do with the fact that Orwell’s birthday celebration is happening tonight?”
“Is it?” she asked, going for innocent but missing the mark by a mile.
“Myrtle, Myrtle, Myrtle… You need to learn to lie better than that.” I put an arm around her shoulders. No way was her timing coincidental. “What’s your plan?”
Silence.
“Myrtle?”
“Okay, okay, I was going to shit on the cake.”
“And then you changed back into human form? Awkward.”
On the plus side, at least she hadn’t needed to claw at my pants to request a trip back home this time.
“I mean, I still could.”
Good grief. Even Joseph looked faintly disgusted.
“Let’s not go there. I’ll drop you off in Plane Three, and you can collect an assortment of slugs from Sawney Bean’s vegetable garden. Cut the cake in half and put the slugs in the middle.”
“Slugs?”
“Did you forget Orwell has molluscophobia? Add a few snails for a bit of a crunch.”
Her eyes lit up. “Oh my gosh, you’re a genius. We need to leave, like, right now.”
I smiled to myself. Myrtle was a pain in everyone’s behind, but at heart, she wasn’t a bad kid. I’d been a little surprised when she showed up with Aurelia one day and announced she wanted to move to Plane Five, but I understood the sentiment, which was why I’d offered her a home. Meanwhile, Aurelia spent her spare time scouring the library for a way to reverse the hex Orwell had put on Myrtle, but with no luck so far.
Travel between the realms was severely restricted, and the rules were complex. We couldn’t have folks sliding back and forth to wreak havoc. Only senior members of my family had the ability to leeper freely, and we were able to bring other celestial beings with us if we chose. I could take Myrtle to Plane Three, Decima could leeper her to Plane Two, and Aurelia could bring her back to Vegas again.
All I had to do was visualise a portal, take Myrtle’s hand, and step through to a new dimension.
After checking carefully for witnesses, of course.
She gave Joseph a finger wave, and a moment later, we were back in the pits of Plane Three. Right in the middle of a fight. Cleopatra and Mark Antony again. One of the Electi had quite rightly dumped the pair of them into Plane Three, and now they were destined to bicker forever after. The only thing that could make it worse would be if Julius Caesar— Oh, there he was. Right on time.
“I’m just saying that if you hadn’t hired a celestial assassin as your messenger, we wouldn’t be in this predicament,” Mark Antony whined in Ancient Greek.
“How was I supposed to know he’d betray both of us?”
“You didn’t get suspicious when he just happened to have an asp?”
“Well, if you hadn’t asked him to stab you in the stomach because you were too cowardly to do it yourself…”
“He offered!”
“Serves you right for stealing my wife, stultissime,” Caesar put in.
“You were already dead, matula.”
“And you didn’t have a hand in that? The Electi just happened to appear in the senate?”
Then Decima steamed in. “This is your final warning. The final final warning! If you disturb the peace one more time, there’s a cave on Mount Malum with your name on it.”
Final final warning? You didn’t give warnings. You just acted, and people got the message. But this wasn’t my circus anymore. These weren’t my monkeys.
“Have you considered a three-way?” I asked. “It’s a great way to relieve sexual tension.”
“I do not have sexual tension,” Cleopatra snapped.
“Sure you don’t, queenie. That’s why you flush every time Marcus stares at your cleavage, and everyone’s seen you checking out Julius’s package. I’m just saying a three-way would be a win-win for everyone. A win-win-win,” I corrected.
“It’s not the worst idea the Lord has ever had,” Caesar admitted.
“No, that was the archery contest with live targets.”
Ah, yes. When the prey started hurling the flaming arrows back at us like kiddie-sized javelins, I’d realised the error of my ways.
“What are you doing here?” Decima demanded. “You can’t just walk back into this plane and undermine me.”
“Relax, sister. I’m not here to stay. Myrtle just needs to collect some slugs for a project, and if you could just drop her in— Actually, I’ll take her myself. It looks as if you’ve got your hands full.”
“Then collect your slugs and stop interfering.”
“One more tip before we go—if there’s no peace, you can’t charge people with disturbing it.”
“He makes an excellent point,” Mark Antony said.
Decima pointed toward the garden full of rotting vegetables. “Get out of here.”
***
“Blane!”
In stark contrast to Decima, Aurelia greeted me with a squeal and a hug, which I returned gladly. If there was one element of celestial life that I missed, it was my baby sister. But I couldn’t complain about her staying in Plane Two. Aurelia had the most vibrant of rainbow souls, and better for her to be sheltered from the evils of the other planes than to have that light dim.
“I didn’t know you were coming,” she muttered against my chest as I blew her fine blonde hair away from my face. “I would have made cookies.”
“Myrtle wanted to attend Orwell’s birthday celebration.”
“Oh.” Aurelia looked up at me. “Oh dear.”
“I also want to pick your brain.” As Plane Two’s unofficial librarian, Aurelia had access to aeons of information. “And of course I’ve missed you.”
“I’ll make coffee.” She crinkled her nose. “Such that it is.”
Decaf. Plane Two had decaf. Father insisted the pure souls of Plane Two had no need for artificial stimulants and had deemed them unwelcome. Now, I wasn’t fond of the hard stuff, but the concept of caffeine-free coffee was ridiculous. Ditto for alcohol-free wine, and cigarettes were banned completely because my mother hated the smell. They’d even sucked all the fun out of chocolate.
Aurelia made us mugs of the mildly flavoured water that passed for coffee, cut us a slice of flavourless cake—because sugar was also considered unhealthy—and curled up in her favourite overstuffed armchair. Although she was entitled to digs at the palace, she chose to live in a cosy cottage near the library, opposite the park and close to the beach. Mount Olympus rose in the background.
“What do you want help with?” she asked. “Are you struggling with the whole ‘sin is fun’ thing again?”
“Always, but that’s not why I’m here today.” I told her about the mess with Caria, the fact that Wren was sleeping in my guest room, and the strange connection I’d felt last night. “I thought the aetherbond was a one-time-only deal. You found your soulmate, and that was it. Nev’s soul is in Lola, I’m confident of that. So how can I be feeling the same thing with Wren?”
“That’s…that’s a question I can’t answer.” Which annoyed Aurelia; I knew it did. “But it’s not entirely unknown.”
“It isn’t?”
“Great Uncle Tiberius did a research study on the aetherbond several thousand years ago, and three participants reported experiencing a connection with more than one person.”
“On celestials?”
Aurelia nodded. “A footnote said there was also anecdotal evidence from Plane Five, but he didn’t run a formal study there. And besides, Celestials have stronger reactions to the aetherbond than humans, so it stands to reason that they’d provide a more conclusive response. Humans often get love and lust confused.”
And money. “So, the dual connection… A sister? A half-sister?”
Nevaeh did have a sister, but Eden was firmly ensconced in the family firm. With no brother, she’d become their father’s designated heir. One day, the five campuses of the Fellowship of the Sacred Way in Tulsa, Oklahoma would all be hers, along with the church’s TV channel, its airplane, and the twelve-bedroom mansion Pastor Michaels had bought to use as his “parsonage.”
But a half-sister wasn’t beyond the realms of impossibility. Pastor Michaels was fond of visiting strip clubs in his spare time, and I knew all too well what went on in the VIP rooms.
Could Nev and Wren be related? I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.
“Oh, no, the aetherbond specifically can’t work with siblings or even half-siblings. Not when they’re born in the same cycle, anyway—there’s a genetic component of the bond that doesn’t allow such things.” She glanced out the window in the direction of her beloved library, a behemoth of a stone building that contained millions of books, notes, and papers and a very poor cataloguing system. “Let me look into it.”
“If anyone can solve the mystery, it’s you.”
“Maybe. Or perhaps finding the answer isn’t important?” Aurelia smiled softly. “Just let your heart guide you.”
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Go to Chapter 22
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