With Shards of Broken Glass
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marysuevirusTitle: With Shards of Broken Glass
Chapter Three: Fragmented
Fandom: Anita Blake universe
Rating: 18 and up
Warnings: mature. this one is set in the darkness that is the Beyond Death universe. language, murder, gore, non-con, violence and sex apply as warnings. possibly others. we'll see when we get there
Disclaimer: the recognizable characters and places contained herein are the property of LKH. i'm merely borrowing for the sake of entertainment. no money is being made from this venture. the concept and title of The Mary Sue Virus are used with permission from Dazzledfirestar. though i do not view this as an actual MSV story, the original characters established in Beyond Death still belong to their creators and i am merely borrowing them for the purpose of this fic
Author's Notes: so... hey. here's a fic that i probably should have just let go. but a dive down the Wikipedia hole a couple months back brought this to life. this fic starts roughly two to three months after the ending of Beyond Death
With Shards of Broken Glass - The Index
"Why are you here?" Aedan asked the moment they were away from the square, squat building that housed the city's morgue. She turned to face him, anger darkening the blue of her eyes and tightening the corners her mouth. It was an almost hateful expression, one he wasn't sure he'd seen her wear before. He almost took a step back at that. Almost. She'd grown and changed so much in the past year. Hell, in just the past few months. She'd gotten more powerful. More dangerous. That scared him. But he wasn't going to let her know that. He wasn't going to give her that kind of power over him. It was bad enough that she knew he cared. "Minette called you, didn't she?"
"She's worried about you, Aedan. Everyone is," Edward replied quietly. It was an attempt to keep her from hearing the things he was thinking and feeling.
She stared at him for a long time, longer than he was comfortable with. As if she was staring straight into his soul. He didn't like that feeling. He didn't like the idea of her knowing who and what he really was. It went on so long, he was afraid she wasn't going to say anything else. But then the look was gone and the anger finally deflated, slipping away from her face as easily as it had come. Its departure somehow left her smaller. Thinner. Less solid. She was teetering on the edge. She'd obviously kept pushing beyond her limits after the thing with Vittorio. Minette had been right to call him.
"I know," she responded, surprising him with the answer. He had expected her to tell him she was fine, that there was nothing wrong. This was as close to an admission that she was not fine as he felt he'd get. Aedan's hands came up to scrub at her face, a faint tremble in her fingers. "I know they are."
She sounded exhausted. She sounded so worn down, he was surprised she was capable of functioning. When she looked at him, her eyes were large and haunted. "You haven't found someone to talk to, have you?" he asked her. He made sure it was the softest voice he could manage, made sure she could hear the concern in his words. She shook her head before looking away. The way she stared, he was sure she saw something he couldn't. Maybe the ghosts of her dreams. "You need to talk to someone, Aedan. Before this eats you alive."
"I know," she repeated, the words spoken on a defeated sigh. "I know I do. But tell me honestly, Edward. Do you know of any therapist that would be capable of handling the shit we've seen?"
He noted that she'd used the word 'seen' and not 'done.' As if she was comfortable with the things she'd done to survive the past few months. As if taking lives indiscriminately was no big deal. And he knew she'd taken lives indiscriminately. There was the matter of her missing half-brother, the serial murderer. The one the police were still looking for. The one he suspected had long been a corpse. The one whose death he suspected she'd had a hand in. The story she'd told, time and again and to more people than just him, had only been a partial truth. He was sure she'd intentionally kept the most important part of the story to herself.
And then there was the matter of his kidnapping and subsequent rescue. He'd talked to Janika about the events leading up to his release from Vittorio's hold. She'd told him all about Aedan's single-minded determination and the trail of bodies she had left in her wake to get him back. Hell, he'd seen some of it himself. And what she'd done to Vittorio and his people? Edward had not yet been able to shake those images from his brain.
"You need to find someone. Before you can't hold it in anymore. Before it affects your ability to function," he warned.
"Too late," she said, a huff of dull laughter accompanying those two words. He saw nothing funny about the situation and he was damned well going to tell her so.
"Aedan--" he began. But her phone chirped out, a loud sound that cut almost obscenely across the silence of the morgue's parking lot. She made some sound in the back of her throat even as her hand reached into a pocket to retrieve the annoying device. She didn't bother to look at the screen, simply tapped the button to connect the call and put the thin bit of electronics to her ear.
"Kinkade," she said tersely. Gone was the exhaustion and the faint hint of horror that had been in her voice only seconds earlier. He had a moment to marvel at the sudden change, then it was gone when tension pulled her shoulders tight. "Slow down. Slow down. Take a breath and tell me what's going on. I can't understand you because your words are running together," she said, her tone much softer.
Edward listened to the silence as whoever was on the other end spoke. The look on Aedan's face changed slowly, from annoyance to concern. After a few moments, she shot him a look before starting for her vehicle. "Okay. Take a breath and calm down. I'm on my way and I'll be there in ten or fifteen minutes. Just don't panic and don't make any sudden moves. I'll handle it. Okay?"
Five seconds later, Aedan was dropping the phone into her coat pocket with one hand while the other hand fished out the keys to her car. Edward had a hand on her arm before she could even put the key in the lock. "Where are you going? You're in no shape to drive anywhere."
"Angel's house," she responded, tugging her arm free of his hold easily enough. Edward put his hand on the car door and held it closed, forcing her to turn and look at him. He saw worry in her stare.
"What's going on at Angel's house?"
"Something happened with Tina and Angel says she's freaking out. There are zombies around her house and that's freaking her out. I've got to go put the zombies back and then see what spooked Tina so hard."
Had it been anything else, Edward would have told Aedan to leave it for someone else to handle. But there was no one else who could handle Tina and her freak out. Aedan was one of only a very small handful of people who could help Tina with her problems. Which meant she was the only one who could go because there wasn't another living necromancer within fifty miles of the city. He lifted his hand from her car door and wrapped it around her arm. "I'll drive. Call Jean-Claude and have him pick up your car. You're in no shape to drive right now."
"Okay," she agreed. It was frightening how easy she gave in. Which made him worry just that much more about how far she'd actually pushed herself. Aedan never gave in so easily.
He didn't take the time to dwell on it, simply steered her toward his car on the other side of the lot. Aedan fell silent, to the point where it seemed like she wasn't even there. Edward took it to mean she was getting in touch with Jean-Claude through their link instead of over the phone. Maybe she didn't want him to hear it if the other man chewed on her ass for being stupid. It was smart of her, but it wouldn't protect her. If he wanted to know what she said to the other man, Edward would find a way to get that information.
She folded into the seat of his car easily enough, her actions slower than usual. Edward left her to buckle her belt and crossed around the back of the vehicle so that he could let himself in to the driver's seat. He cranked the engine over before sparing a look her way. Aedan already had her belt buckled and looked as if she was about to drop off to sleep. As a matter of fact, her eyes dropped closed as he wheeled the car out of the parking spot.
So it startled him when her voice came softly from the darkness as he edged to a stop at the exit onto the street. "Left here. Go three lights up. Turn right and get on the highway."
He said nothing, simply did as she'd instructed. After pulling out and going left, he counted off the lights silently. He took the instructed right at the third light, then found the entrance ramp to the highway not too far up the road. They were cruising down the highway at speed when she spoke next.
"Twelve exits up, Get off. Take a left at the light. Six lights up. Left. Four intersections. Angel's house will be on the right. The house number is sixteen three zero four. Can't miss it. She's got a porch on the front of the house with granite columns. A couple really large oaks are on either end of the yard. And there's a brick fence topped with wrought iron surrounding the whole thing.."
"How many times have you been to her place?" he asked, mostly to make conversation.
"Too many. Tina doesn't want to learn. She think she knows enough to get by. She thinks I'm going to make her use her powers the way Carter Solomon wanted her to use them. I can't get her to understand that I won't do that to her," Aedan told him, her voice filled with disgust. No doubt she hated the idea of being compared in any way to Solomon.
"She's traumatized, Aedan. Just like you. This is her way of taking control of her life," he said gently.
She rolled her head toward him, letting him see in her eyes that she didn't need him to remind her of the events in her past. "I know that. But she has to learn how to control her necromancy or it will control her," she retorted, though there was nothing but exhaustion in her words. Her head turned back to face the windshield. This time, her eyes stayed open. She stared straight ahead at the rush of traffic around them. Or maybe she stared at the buildings that blurred past as they zipped down the highway. Or maybe she stared at nothing at all. "You know that as well as I do."
He didn't need the reminder. He did know. He remembered what it had been like when he'd first taken Aedan under his wing. But Aedan and her sister were two different people. And if Aedan was trying to take the same approach with Tina that Edward had taken with Aedan... Well, he could see how that might not go over so well. "She isn't you," he reminded her softly.
The leather of her seat made a noise as she shifted and he felt her gaze on him. He kept his eyes forward, despite the intensity of her stare. Or maybe because of it. He could feel it against the side of his face, and something in him was loathe to turn and see the look she was sending his way. He'd never been afraid of a simple look before. He didn't know why he was now. And he didn't like it one bit. "Surprisingly, I know that. And, also surprisingly, I am not treating her like she's me. But that doesn't take away the fact that she needs to get this shit under control before it goes horribly wrong."
"You can't force her to learn control," he said. "It wasn't all that long ago that she had Solomon to deal with. And he no doubt used every last bit of his voice to push her to do as he ordered. She's gun shy and you know it. The harder you push, the harder she'll resist."
"And what happens when she raises something she can't control? What happens if I can't be there to bail her out? What happens to Angel, who will most assuredly try to protect Tina, when she gets in the way? What happens to anyone who gets in that zombie's way? What happens to Tina when the police come for her? Do you think the court will accept a plea of 'I'm sorry. I didn't mean to do it!' from her? You know they won't. You know what will happen to her then."
"And if you push her too hard, she's going to collapse in on herself. And then you won't be able to get her to do anything," he shot back. He wasn't sure why she was being so stubborn about this. "You have to allow her time to come to grips with everything. Let her be a kid, for fuck's sake."
"I would love to let her be a kid, Edward. Gods know I never got the chance. But there isn't really a childhood for people like us unless we have parents who have the same abilities, too. And Tina does not. She's got me. I'm a piss poor mother figure. And an even worse sister," Aedan said, her voice almost containing a snarl of anger. "I can't help that. But I can help her learn how to control her abilities so she can have a more normal life. Something I never got to have. That's the best I can do."
"You can't bully her into being you. Not everyone is capable of running past exhaustion," he snapped, for some reason annoyed with her logic.
Aedan was silent for far too long, and he swore he could feel her withdraw from him. Physically and emotionally. Why did she always drive him into the realms of irrational so that he made snarky, hurtful comments? He was about to open his mouth and try to make it right when she made a sound that sounded very much like a snort. "If you think I want her to be me, then you don't know me as well as you think," she said, voice quiet and empty in the silence of the car.
"Then why are you pushing so hard, Aedan?" he asked, utterly confused by her determination to teach her young sister control.
"Because I don't want her to be me at all," Aedan returned quietly.
The road before them was mostly clear, only a few cars ahead and several more behind. No one was close enough that he was worried about them. So he took his eyes from the road for a moment, allowing them to flick her way. She was staring into space again, but he could see that making that admission had wounded her in ways to which she would never admit. The urge to reach out and lay a hand on hers rose up within him, but he quashed it. He wasn't an overtly physical person and she knew it. And she'd take it as a hollow gesture, as something that was supposed to be done in a token effort to try and make her feel better. It wasn't him anymore than it was her.
"There are worse people she could be, Aedan," he told her. She was silent a moment, then gave a snort. He saw the disbelief on her face. It never ceased to amaze him just how low the opinion she held of herself was. It was on the tip of his tongue to remind her that she wasn't a horrible person, but the words never touched the air. She cut across him before he could speak, tone and tongue as sharp as a razor's edge.
"Don't tell me I'm not fucked up and terrible. We'll both know you're lying." Her tone indicated that she was done discussing herself and would hear no further comments or arguments on the subject. And before he even had a chance to ignore her command, one of her hands was flicking toward the window on her right. "That's our exit."
Edward pressed his lips together in a thin line, a sign for anyone who cared to look that his temper was starting to bubble up. Not that Aedan seemed to care if he was angry with her or not. She was more than capable of trying the patience of a saint. And Edward was far from a saint.
He took the exit, decision made to remain silent on the subject of Aedan's most endearing qualities, and rolled down the ramp to the surface street. The light was red when he reached it, so they idled in pained silence while they waited for the light to change. The silence continued as he took the left she'd told him of before they'd even gotten onto the road. He turned his attention to the stretch of road before him,
They passed under the bridge and drove by two strip malls, one on either side of the road, which were filled with yuppie-type boutiques and high-end bistros that spoke to the neighborhood they were getting ready to enter. A line of trees and a stone fence later, they were treated to the sight of large homes that screamed wealth and privilege. But none of the houses spoke to individuality. There was a sameness in the way they were presented, even if their architectural styles were slightly different.
Every single house was covered in what he suspected was faux stone, with large windows meant to give the home personality. Every one of them was curtained over so no one passing by could see the lack of soul inside. The homes all had wide, sweeping drives that took a vehicle up to a detached garage that could house a family of four, and every property was edged by a thick stone fence that made sure visitors knew they were not welcome, All in all, it was an unimpressive neighborhood.
He was glad when they finally arrived at Angel's place. And it was hard to miss the house because every single light blazed through windows that were not covered by curtains, casting golden illumination on the figures standing silent and still in the grass around the dwelling. He pulled the car over at the curb, put it into park, and drew the key from the ignition. Aedan sat and stared. He suspected she was getting a lay of the land, as it were.
"There are at least a dozen zombies surrounding the house," she said quietly. The exhaustion was gone, pushed back behind some wall that allowed her to do whatever magic it was she did. It almost felt like she wasn't quite all there, as if some part of her was already off doing zombie herding things. "I was afraid that this was going to happen."
"Should she be able to raise that many zombies?" Edward asked, because he still didn't know how most of the zombie stuff worked. Tina was young. And he was pretty sure power matured as the person who had it matured.
"Her power is doing most of it for her. Which is bad, because she can lose control of them so easily," Aedan told him, then pushed the car door open so she could get out. He followed suit, watching as she moved with sure steps toward the closed gates."Its also good. Because it means I can take control of them with little problem." She paused at the gate and turned to look at him. "You wait here until I have the zombies under control. I don't know what will happen if they see you. Or if Tina sees you."
Left unsaid was the fact that she didn't want to see him get hurt. Edward pretended he didn't hear the implication and simply nodded his head. Aedan reached up to press the button on the box set on a post next to the drive. There was no answering voice, just a buzz and then a metallic click that saw the gate sliding open. Aedan took a breath before stepping past the gate into the drive. He watched her go, something sitting tight and darkly ominous in his chest.
Edward had never been one to believe in magic. It had taken him a long time to buy into the idea that people like Anita and Aedan could use magic to make the dead appear to be living again. Even with the proof in front of him, it was still sometimes hard to believe. He had no magic to speak of, which never troubled him much. But now, with Aedan standing in Angel's yard with a dozen ore more uncontrolled zombies, he wished he could feel magic, Feel it or see it or touch it. Because he couldn't sense anything happening, even though he knew something was happening.
For several long seconds, nothing seemed to happen. Aedan stood in the middle of the yard, in plain view of the milling zombies, and seemingly did nothing. And then, slowly, one head after another turned her way. One by one, the zombies faced her. He knew then, without needing to be told, that she had control of the mindless undead.
"I'm going to put them back," Aedan told him, not shifting her attention away from the zombies around her. There was some strain in her voice. "Go inside and see if you can talk Tina down. She's fighting me. Its going to take time to put the zombies back unless she gives it up."
"Angel will let me inside?" he asked, already on his way to the front door. He kept one hand on the butt of his gun as a safety measure, even though he knew that shooting a zombie would do nothing to stop it.
"Tell her you're here with me," Aedan replied. She sounded like she was distracted, so he said nothing and continued on up to the door. None of the zombies looked his way, their focus solely on Aedan as she did whatever it was she was doing. Edward had barely gotten onto the porch when the door swung wide and Angel Cervantez stared at him with wide, frightened eyes for a moment. He watched as her gaze flashed to where he knew Aedan stood in the center of a group of zombies, then it came back to his face.
"Marshal Forrester?" she asked softly, confusion warring with the fear.
"Where's Tina?" he asked, making sure to use a soft and genial voice. "Aedan asked me to go speak with her."
"She's this way," Angel responded, glancing at Aedan and the zombies one last time before stepping back and allowing him into her home. She was in motion before the door clicked shut, heading toward a doorway on her left. Edward caught sight of a young girl standing in the middle of the room, hands fisted at her side as she stared out one of the uncovered windows. Her shoulders were tense, pulled tight with frustration or anger, and her fists shook ever so slightly. He'd seen the pose before, more than once.
Edward moved into the room cautiously, circling around the girl until he could see her face. There were tears rolling down cheeks gone pale with emotion and exertion. He made his way around her, stopping only when he was before her and she'd looked at him. He offered her a soft smile. "Hi, Tina. My name is Ted. I'm a friend of Aedan's," he said softly. The girl blinked at him, frowned to let him know she wasn't pleased to see him, then turned her attention back to the window.
"She took them from me!" she snapped, voice high with her anger. "She's mean and a liar. She's a rotten sister and I wish I'd never met her." Her face screwed up in a look of concentration and, a moment later, Edward heard "SHIT!" ring out loudly from outside. Angel moved to the windows and looked out, then backed away.
"Tina, stop it!" Angel ordered, using her lawyer voice to do so. Tina ignored her. "Tina, right now!"
"You're not my mom! You can't tell me what to do! My mom is dead and I'll never see her again and I hate every one!" the little girl yelled. Angel looked stricken to hear those words said, her mouth opening and closing as if she'd planned on speaking and couldn't find the words.
"No, Angel isn't your mom. You're right about that," Edward began, shooting a look toward the woman a moment in hopes she'd let him do the talking. "But she obviously cares about you very much. She's taken you into her home, hasn't she?"
"They made her do it," Tina snapped angrily. By they, he took it to that the girl meant Aedan and Jean-Claude.
"How do you know? Did you hear them order her to let you live here?" he asked. Tina glanced at him a moment before giving a shake of her head. "Did Angel say anything about being blackmailed or coerced in any way? Did they give her money?"
Again, Tina shook her head to let him know that those things had not happened. Edward regarded her a moment, then glanced around. "Is this a horrible place to live? Are you being treated badly?"
"No," Tina whispered. Her gaze flicked briefly to Angel, who was watching them silently, tears clinging to her lashes. Thus far, she seemed inclined to let him do the talking. Which was probably a good thing. He didn't talk like a lawyer. Tina would understand the point he was trying to make better that way.
"So maybe Angel wants you here because she really likes you," he suggested gently. Again Tina glanced at Angel. When her attention came back to Edward, he could see the doubt and confusion in her eyes. "Has she made you think that she doesn't care about you?"
"No. She buys me things that I want even when I don't ask. And she doesn't yell or hit or do anything I don't want her to do," Tina said, her tone suggesting she was figuring it out in her head even as she spoke. "She's nothing like him."
It was obvious who him was. Tina spoke about Carter Solomon the same way Aedan did. It was highly likely that their trauma was similar. Edward filed that away, possibly for a later conversation with Aedan. He'd never pried into her life with Solomon. And she'd never offered. Maybe it was time to pry some of that out of her. "I love having you here, Tina. You're smart and funny and beautiful. You're talented. You constantly surprise and amaze me," Angel said. There was raw emotion in her words that told Edward she wasn't saying what she thought the girl needed to hear. She was saying exactly what she was feeling.
Angel's words brought Tina's gaze her way one more time. Edward took the opportunity to study the girl. She bore no physical resemblance to her sister. Edward couldn't see any of Aedan in the girl's face. Her cheeks were fuller, her face rounder. Aedan's face was lean, her cheeks almost hollow. Where Aedan had blue eyes, Tina's eyes were a deep, rich brown. They were filled with intelligence, though. And pain. That was familiar. The girl had hair in almost the same shade of brown as her eyes, with touches of honey and fire here and there. Even in the dim light of the lamps, he could see the flashes of red and gold that gilded the long length of Tina's hair. Tina had a button nose. Aedan's was pert. And kind of non-descript.
There were more differences between the two of them. They seemed to have nothing physical in common that would mark them as sisters. If someone stopped at the exterior, if someone only took the physical into consideration, they might think the two of them had nothing in common. But, if they looked past the surface to the inside, they'd see that Aedan and Tina were very much cut from the same cloth. He saw similarities in the set of the girl's jaw, had seen that look on Aedan's face too many times to count. The way the girl held herself, the line of her shoulders, her posture. All of it said much louder than any words that they shared blood.
No wonder Aedan looked like she'd been banging her head up against a brick wall.
Tina's eyes slid back to him, some of the anger sliding away under the weight of her curiosity. She obviously had questions, but he could tell she wasn't ready to let go of her anger. He knew he could beat around the bush. Or he could get right to the heart of the matter. Seeing as he was always pragmatic, he cut to the chase. "Do you want to tell me what all that out there is about?" he asked her softly, one hand motioning back toward the windows to indicate the yard just outside.
"She took them away from me," Tina said again. Though the anger was mostly gone and sadness had taken its place, the words still came with the same force behind them as the last time she'd uttered them.
He wasn't sure who 'they' were. "The zombies?"
Tina shook her head so fast that her hair flew in a whirlwind around her head.
"Who did she take away, Tina?" That question came from Angel, who moved closer to the two of them.
"My brothers and sisters," the girl admitted. There was a hitch in her voice this time, suggesting tears might be close to the surface now. Her gaze drifted back to the window. And her anger came back in the blink of an eye. Her hands clenched again and he was fairly certain her power was running rampant over her. Edward didn't know if he could see Aedan and the zombies out there in the dark and that had prompted the spike in temper or if it was simply mentioning her siblings. Either way, it saw the girl's temper rising. "She took them away from me and I hate her for it."
"Tina, honey," Angel said, moving to kneel before the girl. Tina didn't look at her, but Edward felt certain she was listening to the woman. "Aedan didn't take your siblings from you."
"Then why don't I get to see them? Why don't I know where they are? Or how they are?" The questions came with such anguish that it was obvious this had been building ever since Tina and her siblings had been discovered by the police.
"Oh, sweetie. I'm so sorry. I didn't even think... Of course you can see your siblings," Angel promised. Tina stared at Angel, her expression clearly saying she didn't dare hope it was for real. Angel reached out and tugged Tina into a crushing hug.
Edward left the two of them to their moment of emotions. He got to his feet and moved to the window to check on the situation in the yard. He saw no sign of the zombies. And Aedan was on her knees in the grass, head down and hands limp in the grass. "Damn it," he muttered. When he turned to head for the door, Angel was looking at him inquisitively. Tina was still wrapped up in her arms, resting almost bonelessly against Angel's torso. "Excuse me," he said by way of answer and picked up the pace.
It didn't take long to pass through the doorway of the room. To make it to the front door. To pull said door open and step outside. To cross the yard until he stood at Aedan's side. He knew it didn't take that long. But it felt entirely too long. Kneeling down so that his knees sank into the perfectly manicured lawn, he reached out a hand and lifted Aedan's face. She was way too pale, chest heaving the slightest bit as she panted for air. As if she'd just run a marathon. "Can you make it to your feet?"
Her mouth opened as if to snap off an answer. But closed it again and he watched as she gave his question some serious thought. "With help," she finally admitted. He bit back a sigh, along with the urge to call her a fucking idiot, and offered her a hand. It took her a moment to put her hand in his. When she did, her fingers shook faintly against his own. It looked as if she'd hit rock bottom. "Wait until I tell Jean-Claude a ten year old girl kicked your ass," he said in an attempt to rile her temper.
"She didn't kick my ass," Aedan insisted, struggling to her feet after he stood. It took her a couple seconds longer than he liked, and she wobbled when she was finally upright. But she did it. He noticed she didn't let go of his hand right away.
"You okay to make it inside on your own?" he asked, this time letting some of his anger leak into his voice.
"If you're going to take that tone, I'm more than capable," she retorted as she intentionally put distance between them. He watched her wobble at first, then stand straight and steady. She almost kept the 'Ha! Fuck you!' look of triumph from her eyes. Almost. Then she turned and, with deliberate steps, headed for Angel's front door. Edward muttered something very uncharitable about her stubbornness and followed after her.
Somehow, despite being exhausted, she made the door before he managed to catch her. He should have taken her to task for her stupidity, but there was no time to do so because she headed for the living room, where Angel was still holding Tina to her in a hug that suggested she might not be willing to let the girl go any time soon. Aedan moved without a word to the couch and settled down on it, waiting patiently for the two of them to acknowledge her presence.
It took several more minutes before anyone took note of Aedan. Edward lingered in the doorway, watching everything with an attentive eye. Aedan wouldn't last much longer. He could see it in the strain around her eyes. Whatever had happened with Tina's zombies, it had taken what little energy and strength she'd managed to recover. As soon as he was sure things were on the up and up between her and her sister, he was taking her home and putting her to bed. Whether she liked it or not.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity of silence, Angel pulled away from Tina. The little girl backed up a couple of steps, her sniffling loud in the stillness of the room. Angel's dark gaze slid Aedan's way and she offered a faint smile before turning her attention back to the girl standing before her. "You need to apologize to Aedan," she suggested gently, though there was more than a little sternness underneath.
Tina nodded and turned slowly toward her half-sister, pale face streaked with tears. She sniffled again, reaching up with one hand to rub away some of the moisture that still clung to her skin. "I'm sorry, Aedan. I didn't mean it," the girl said, Her voice was watery but she sounded sincere. Aedan sat forward so she could regard her sibling. He watched as she put her elbows on her knees, bringing her closer to the young girl.
"I know, Tina." Aedan responded. Her tone was gentle and soft. Edward was surprised, yet not, at the patience and kindness in her voice. He'd known for some time that she would be an amazing mother. The maternal instinct was there. In ways he didn't understand and refused to examine, he was saddened that she was in a relationship with a vampire because it meant no children for her. Calling himself a fool, certain he was going soft, he brushed those thoughts aside and waited for Aedan to go on. "And this is why I've been trying to teach you control. Sooner or later, you're going to lose your temper and your power will take that as an invitation to do what it likes. Like tonight."
There was no judgement or censure in her last statement. Tina looked contrite anyway.
"What happened?" Aedan asked. There was a faint thread of steel that said she would not let Tina get away with not answering.
"I got mad," the young girl admitted. Her words were thick with contrition. Aedan nodded, as if she'd expected the answer.
"You got mad. And your power ran wild because your emotions were high." It was a simple, basic explanation, made without an iota of accusation. And it wasn't a question. Tina nodded her head anyway. "Why were you mad?"
"Its stupid," Tina whispered, her gaze shifting to the side.
"Tina," Aedan sighed, a touch of her temper coloring her words.
"When I first met Aedan, she didn't know what she was," Edward interrupted, giving Aedan a chance to collect herself before she got angry and did damage to her relationship with Tina. The girl's brown eyes drifted his way, a touch of surprise in them. It seemed like she'd forgotten he was there. "She didn't know anything about necromancy. The only thing she knew is that everyone looked at her as a freak. Even her own flesh and blood."
There was some low, indiscernable muttering from the vicinity of the couch, but Aedan didn't try to stop him. He took a few steps into the living room, moving so that he was close to the couch where Aedan had settled. His position allowed him to keep an eye on everyone in the room and be on the look out for anything that might pop up out in the yard. Tina watched him, a touch of curiosity in her eyes. Apparently Aedan had told her very little about her younger days.
"She was older than you are now. And she didn't know about necromancy. She didn't know that she had powers that allowed her to call the dead to her. All she knew was that the dead flocked to her. When she was really sad or scared or angry. The dead came."
"Like me. Tonight." Tina's voice suggested she was already thinking. Something she appeared to have in common with her sister.
"Yes. Like you. Tonight. You were mad and maybe a little scared and your power reacted to those feelings. It called up zombies. Maybe it meant to do so to offer you some kind of protection. Or maybe to make you feel less scared. Or maybe it called them up simply because you weren't in control of it. The reasons don't matter. What matters is that it happened. And Aedan's right. It will happen again."
"Did it happen to her?" Tina asked, obviously curious about the woman who shared blood with her.
"It did. And it was worse because she didn't have anyone who had necromancy to teach her how to control her powers. She just had me. I didn't know anything about them, really. I barely believed they were a real thing. I had to teach her control without understanding what that meant for her. And without understanding what her childhood had been like. Because that was a lot of the reason she kept reacting instead of thinking."
The girl's eyes went wide, swiveling from his face to Aedan's and then back again. As if she didn't believe what she was hearing. It was likely she didn't, because the Aedan that existed now was a completely different person than the one that existed then. It was an alien concept that Aedan had ever lost control on the regular. "How did you finally teach her control?"
"He took me on hunts for vampires," Aedan responded. He could still remember her face the very first time she'd confronted an enraged vampire. She'd freaked out for several long seconds before her necromancy had spurred her to action. He'd thought she would run away screaming into the night. But she hadn't. "And he taught me how to shoot a gun."
Tina's expression was suddenly very easy to read. She was intrigued and she wanted to do the same things. Angel, though, looked much more shocked.
"It was a hard way to teach her, Tina," Edward said, drawing the girl's attention back to him. Despite the fact that Aedan's matter-of-fact statement had made it sound like that had been the best time of her life, he knew different. He knew how scared she'd been. Of him and her powers and the methods he'd been trying to teach her. Looking back, he could say with absolute certainty that he'd gone about everything the wrong way. But he'd worked with what he'd had at the time. "There were times when she got hurt. She could have been killed if I hadn't been there to watch her back."
"That's no life for a young girl," Angel protested.
"It was the only way Ted knew," Aedan responded, shifting her attention to the lawyer. He noted absently that she'd used his public persona. Even as wiped out as she was, she was still cognizant of the fact that no one knew him as Edward. "He didn't have anyone to turn to for advice. So he taught me what he knew because he knew it would bring about the discipline and control I so desperately needed."
"That's why Aedan is trying to teach you control, Tina. So you don't have to live through the things she did," Edward told the girl. "That's why it probably feels to you like she's being hard on you. Maybe even like she's being mean. Because she doesn't want to put you through those things. She doesn't want to see you struggle to accept yourself. And your talents."
"He told me they were evil and that the only way I could keep them from making me evil was to use them for God," Tina whispered.
He saw Aedan's shoulders tense up. It was one of the few tells she had when it came to discussing Carter Solomon, one of the few things that let him know that the mention of his name was enough to see her trying to crawl back into her shell. "He was a liar, Tina," Aedan said. Her tone was harsh. Tina blinked at her in confusion. Maybe she thought Aedan was angry with her. It would be a logical conclusion.
Aedan slithered off the couch, a move that should have been graceless and awkward because she was so tired. But she made it look fluid and easy. She went to her knees on the floor in front of her sibling and stared the girl straight in the eyes. "He was a liar. What you have is a gift. So very few people have it. So few that there are people out there that would try to use it. Like he did. That's just one of many reasons why I want you to learn how to control your powers. How to use them instead of letting them use you. I do not want you to live the life I've lived, Tina. That is super important to me. Do you understand? I care about you and I don't want you to spend your life thinking you're a freak and that no one will want you in their lives unless they can get something from you."
Tina nodded her head, letting Aedan know she understood the woman's reasoning. There was pure honesty in her eyes. Unadulterated childish trust.
"I'm going to ask you again. Why were you mad?" Aedan's voice was soft. Gentle. But there was an edge of steel under the words that told everyone in the room she would have her answers.
"Because I thought you took them away from me," Tina admitted. Her voice was barely above a whisper. Aedan's gaze slid from her sister to Angel and then to Edward, then slid back to the girl before her.
"Your zombies?" she asked, though he was sure she knew that wasn't the answer. She was giving Tina the opportunity to answer her questions without being forced into it.
"No. My brothers and sisters." It was difficult to hear Tina, her voice had dropped so low. And she'd lowered her gaze to the floor so that she spoke to it. But he had no doubt that Aedan had heard her. Because in the next second, the woman reached out and put her hand under her sister's chin and made the girl look at her.
"I would never take your siblings from you, Tina. I'm so sorry that you felt I had," Aedan told her gently. "Everything has been so hectic lately. And I didn't even stop to think how you might see the craziness in my life. You should have come to me and said something. Give me a little bit of time and I'll arrange something so that you can see them. All of them. I promise."
"You mean it?" Tina asked, hope rising in her like the sun coming over the horizon in the morning.
"I do, sweetie. I'm so sorry." Tina regarded her a moment or two, then launched herself into Aedan. The force of impact nearly toppled the woman over backward, but she managed to stay upright. She wrapped her arms around her sister and hugged her tight, whispering more promises into the girl's ear.
"You know where all of her siblings are?" Angel asked, a touch of concern in her voice.
"Yes. There are files and..." Aedan's words came to a halt with the abrupt shrilling of her cell phone. She shot a look of regret toward Angel and Tina before reaching into her coat to find the device. As with earlier, she didn't look at the screen to see who might be calling her. She just connected the call and put the cell to her ear. "Kinkade."
It took approximately two seconds for her face to go empty and blank, telling Edward exactly who was calling. "Send me an address. I'm on my way."
The phone was dumped into her pocket without ceremony. Aedan sighed and gave Tina a forced smile. "I have to go, little sis. I have work to do. I'm sorry. I wish I could stay longer, but this is one of those things that I can't get out of. Police work."
"Okay," Tina replied. It was hard to tell if she was upset by this turn of events or not. Edward suspected she was.
"Don't sweat it, kid. You get a night off. I'm not going to hear from Angel again, am I?" she asked.
"No. No more zombies tonight. Promise."
"Good. I'll call you later to schedule time to work on your control," Aedan told her, letting the girl know it would be her decision instead of Aedan's. Aedan squished Tina into a hug before rising to her feet. She didn't wobble, which Edward was vaguely shocked about. "And I'll have Jean-Claude call you to coordinate something with all of the other foster homes so that Tina and her siblings can get together and play."
Angel nodded, moving over to stand beside Tina. "Thank you. And be careful out there."
"I will," Aedan promised, then turned to look at Edward. "Let's go."
~*~
It wasn't until they got into the car that Aedan let her control slide. Just a bit. She sagged into the seat and closed her eyes, head tipped back against the headrest behind her. Edward started the engine and let it idle while he waited for an address from her. It didn't take her long to give it. After a few seconds of giving in to her exhaustion, she shored the walls back up and once more gave the appearance of being in control. Then she rattled off an address and let her gaze slide to the window.
"You going to be okay to work a scene?" he asked her as he pulled the car away from the curb. Aedan snorted, a sound that was filled with a lot of derision and not much else.
"Going to have to be, aren't I? Because there's no one else that does what I do," she replied.
"You could have told Storr that you weren't available," he suggested lightly, finding a place to turn the vehicle around so that they could head back the way they'd come.
"Wasn't Dolph. He doesn't call me anymore. Zerbrowski is always the one who contacts me now," she informed him. That was news to him. He was under the impression that Dolph was the one who made the decision to call Aedan in on a crime scene.
"Since when?"
"Since Dolph hates me." There was nothing to let him know what she was feeling. He decided not to pry.
"You could have told Zerbrowski no." For a moment, it looked like Aedan would argue with him. But she eventually just shook her head and turned to look out the window. He frowned at her lack of self-preservation. He didn't like that she was effectively killing herself with all of the commitments she'd made to various people and places. She was worn thin. As thin as he'd ever seen her. Considering he'd known her for years, and had met her under less than perfect circumstances, that was saying something. "You don't have to kill yourself for them," he reminded her, letting his temper show in his voice.
"I'm not killing myself for them. I'm not doing this for them at all," she snapped, sharing with him her own temper.
"Then why are you doing it?" he demanded.
"I'm doing it for the victims, Edward. I'm doing it because they deserve better than the local cops will give them." There was a quiet kind of determination in her voice that he rarely heard her use. Whatever this was for her, calling it personal barely scratched the surface. "The locals are stretched thin and most of them have issues with the preternatural community. If I leave it to them to solve, they'll probably end up chasing down the wrong leads and punishing the wrong people. And the killer will go free. And I can't live with that. I can't let these women get brushed under the rug because the cops don't care enough."
"You are one person, Aedan. And you cannot take on the burden of saving the world by yourself," he informed her. If there was an edge to his voice, he didn't bother to take it back or try to hide it. All the better to make his point.
"I'm not," she snarled, those two words very heated.
"Then what are you doing?" he demanded. He didn't like that she invested so much of herself in the hunt for a murderer. He didn't like that she seemed bound and determined to get herself killed trying to take down the bad guy. He didn't like that getting herself killed would leave a hole in his rapidly melting heart.
"My job," she retorted. "In case you've forgotten, Edward, this is my job. And you're the reason that this is my job. You're the one who pushed me toward all of this."
"I never pushed you into anything," he shot back.
"You did. Whether you meant to or not, you pushed me into being here. Into doing this job. Into becoming this... thing. Whatever it is I am."
He bristled at the accusation in her tone. At the implication that she was some thing and not simply a human being. "I never pushed you into becoming a marshal. Never pushed you into becoming a vampire's side kick. I never wanted any of this for you."
"Yes. Because I'm so much better than you," she snarled. The self-derision was back. He frowned, opened his mouth to rip into her, then stopped. Because it was what she wanted. She was over worked and over tired and she was spoiling for a fight. Because she was going to pick at her own wounds just a little more, rip the scabs off and make them bleed because she believed that it was what she deserved. He closed his mouth and turned his attention back to the road. He wasn't going to hand her the keys that would allow her to destroy even more of herself.
She must have realized it after a few minutes, because she turned to glare at him. "You may not have wanted any of this for me, Edward. But what did you expect would happen when you put a gun in my hand the first time? What did you think would happen when you taught me to hunt vampires? What did you think was going to happen when you started teaching me how to control my powers? Because people like me are prizes to be caught and kept. And used. Whether that's what you want to happen or not!"
"So that's what this thing between you and the vampire is? You're his prize and he's keeping you?" he asked, trying to throw a wrench in the abstract argument she was crafting in her brain. And could have smacked her senseless when she stubbornly refused to answer. "You are such an idiot. Do you honestly believe he doesn't care about you?"
"You were the one who told me that vampires were opportunistic and would use whatever tool or weapon they had at their disposal," she reminded him. It was a needless reminder, because he remembered exactly what he'd told her. And while he still didn't like the idea of her being tied to a vampire, he was willing to admit to himself that Aedan could have been tied to so much worse than Jean-Claude. "And what am I if not a tool? A weapon that he can wield against anyone who dares threaten his way of life? What am I?" There was possibly a touch of mild hysteria in her voice
"You're a human being, Aedan," he told her softly. He cast his gaze her way to find that she was staring sightlessly through the windshield. She didn't even appear interested in trying to convince him he was wrong. "You're a human being who has suffered a great deal of trauma in a short amount of time. You're a human being who needs to find someone to talk to in order to deal with that trauma. And you are a human being worthy of love."
She snorted in response to that.
"You're also a human being who needs to get several nights of uninterrupted sleep. Or you're going to crash and burn hard. You almost did out there with Tina's zombies." He made sure she heard the displeasure in his voice as he spoke the last. She snorted again, but said nothing. Edward made a mental note to speak with Jean-Claude. Maybe it was time to resort to the tranq gun to ensure she got the sleep she needed.
Aedan made no reply to that. In fact, she didn't speak to him again for the remainder of the drive to the address she'd given him. Edward mulled over the things he'd seen and learned. He wondered if he'd ever manage to get it through Aedan's thick skull that she wasn't the monster Carter Solomon had convinced her she was. He also wondered if they'd ever find a way to get her to actually rest up. Neither thing seemed possible. She was too stubborn to believe him. Too determined to help to bother with taking care of herself.
It was enough to make him want to strangle her out of frustration.
He thought maybe she dozed on the way to the crime scene. She was terribly still and silent the whole trip. But even before he turned onto the street that was home to their destination, she sat up straight in her chair and reached up to make quick work of her hair. She put it into a sloppy braid and produced a tie from somewhere in her pocket with which she secured the plait. By the time he pulled up to the curb, she had her badge attached to her coat and her professional face on.
The car hadn't even come to a halt and she had the door open, was stepping from the vehicle as if there wasn't a world of shit still lingering in the air between them. He had to admire her ability to compartmentalize even if it wasn't healthy. He felt like they should sit down one day and talk about the shit Solomon had put her through. Whether she wanted to talk about it or not. The mother fucker had done one hell of a number on his own flesh and blood and Aedan was no exception.
It surprised him to see Zerbrowski waiting by the tape for her. It surprised Zerbrowski to see Edward with her. "Kinkade. Forrester. What are you doing here? I wasn't aware you were in town." Edward didn't imagine the subtle undertone in Zerbrowski's words that suggested that Edward should have called him to inform him of just that thing.
"I have business in St. Louis. I thought I'd stop by and say hi to Aedan. Just my luck she gets called to a crime scene when that happens," he said, replying honestly with his good old boy voice. Zerbrowski gave him the evil eye a moment or two, then lifted the tape and allowed both he and Aedan to enter the crime scene area.
"You look like shit, Aedan," Zerbrowski said to the woman by way of greeting.
"I did it so I could match your clothes," she retorted absently, eyes already focused on the tent set up in the distance.
"Such wit," the man commented, his gaze sliding back to Edward. There was a question there. Edward just shrugged and made a 'You got me' gesture with his hands.
"Is it the same killer?" Aedan asked, cutting into their silent conversation tersely. Edward suspected she knew that Zerbrowski was fishing for information from him.
"Looks like it," Zerbrowski responded. That stopped her in her tracks, prompting the man to do the same. He turned and looked at her.
"What does that mean?" Edward didn't like the suspicion in her voice.
"It means you'll see what I mean when we get into the tent," Zerbrowski told her, not an ounce of give in his voice. Edward took it to mean there were prying ears in the crowd and he didn't want any information finding its way into the wrong hands.
"Dick," Aedan retorted, though there was little heat in the word. She started forward again, ignoring the smirk Zerbrowski sent her way. When she was even with the detective, he picked up his feet and continued toward the tent.
It was interesting to see the worn down, terribly human version of Aedan fold away in order for her professional side take the stage. It was almost like she was shedding one skin in order to wear a different one. It was kind of amazing. And kind of frightening. Because it made Edward wonder just how many different versions of Aedan lingered under her skin. And it made him wonder how many of them he still hadn't met yet.
A uniform stood at the flap to the tent, presumably guarding it against intrusion from anyone not wearing a police badge. He saw them coming and snapped to attention, one hand reaching out to pull the flap back and allow them entry. The cop was young, almost a kid, and fresh to the force. There was a crispness to him, an eagerness. Something that would be worn down by time and by to many cases and by too much violence. He wouldn't stay fresh faced for long.
The interior of the tent was crowded with people. The corners were filled with spotlights set up to illuminate every inch of the corpse. It made the air hot and stifling. It made the smell that much worse. They paused just inside the flap to put on their gloves and to cover their shoes. Aedan was done before either he or Zerbrowski and she was already beside the corpse when Edward had finished.
"This one is fresh," she said, voice sounding clinical. It was and wasn't a question.
"Helena McInnery. She was reported missing six hours ago by her roommate. A couple of kids found the body," Storr replied. The man shot Edward a look as he moved up to stand behind Aedan. She was crouched down, looking at a sheet covered body as if this was an every day thing for her. Maybe it was.
"Someone needs to give the kids' parents the number to a good therapist," Aedan said, one hand reaching for the edge of the sheet. "The magic is thick here. I can almost smell it."
"You can smell magic?" Zerbrowski asked, genuinely curious.
"All magic has a smell. Mine smells like death. Anyone who practices Earth magic smells like green, growing things. Even the preternatural crowd have their own smells. Vampires smell like graveyard dirt and death. Lycanthropes smell musty and furry." The answer was given absently. Aedan's hand still hovered near the edge of the sheet, as if she didn't want to lift it. He wondered what she sensed or smelled or felt.
"What does the magic here smell like?" Dolph asked, obviously intent on finding out if it could help them find the killer.
"It smells like blood," Aedan replied, then finally curled her fingers over the edge of the sheet. Edward thought she might pull it off as one would pull the cloth off a table, but she folded it back upon itself until the corpse was exposed to the knees. "Mother fucker!" she muttered.
This victim did not look like the others. Oh, she was a redhead like the others. And there were the bites and bruises that had been visible on the other bodies. There was a pool of blood between Helena McInnery's thighs, and the light glittered across the surface of broken glass so that they knew the same killer had been responsible for this body. But there was more. The killer had taken the time to leave them a message.
The word 'whore' had been carved into Helena McInnery's abdomen. The letters were rough and ragged, meaning they were made by someone with a shaking hand or someone with a dull blade. Either way, it was not good.
"Why did the perp do it?" Zerbrowski asked.
Edward watched as Aedan slowly rose to her feet. As she slowly turned to look at the man. He could see by the look in her eyes that she was about to lose her shit. "You're asking me? Why? What makes you think I've got an answer? Do I look like I fucking know?
"You're the expert in these things," Storr started, but his words halted the moment she turned to look at him. Her expression was murderous and her cheeks flamed with her anger.
"In what things? Murder? The preternatural world? Or really freaky, fucked up shit? Which one is it?" she asked. Her voice had gone low, a warning that she was at the end of her rope. Edward inched closer to her, intent on trying to stop the blood bath before it started.
"You're our resident expert on the things that go bump in the night," Storr said, ignoring the warning in her voice.
"I see. Then I guess its going to be disappointing for you to know that I don't have a fucking clue what that's supposed to mean. The murderer likely has her reasons for carving a woman up the way she has. Hell, I'm sure she's got her reasons for raping and murdering these women. But I don't know what the fuck those reasons are because I'm not a goddamned mind reader."
"Her?" Storr asked, voice as sharp as the gaze he settled on her.
"I can't tell you anything that you don't already know. The bite marks are the same. The scratches are the same. The method of death is the same. Its the same killer. Who's thrown a wrench into the works. If you have nothing else, I'm going home. I'm going to bed. I'm goddamned exhausted from trying to solve your fucking case for you."
"Aedan," Edward said gently, drawing her attention his way. He could see, buried under the anger shining in her eyes, the fear and the concern.
"She's escalating, Ted." One hand motioned toward the body and the word carved into her belly. "She thinks we know something and she's escalating. So she can send us a message. There's only one thing I don't understand."
"What's that, Aedan?" he asked.
"Is the message for them?" Aedan motioned to the cops standing behind her. "Or is it for me?"
"Why would it be a message for you?" This from Zerbrowski.
"Because people have a habit of calling me a whore," Aedan said casually, as if it wasn't something that bothered her
"Back up just a moment," Storr said, apparently oblivious to any inner turmoil Aedan might be suffering. She turned to look at him, her body language suggesting she was waiting for him to accuse her of whatever she thought he felt she was responsible for. "You said she."
"Yes. Our killer is a woman," she replied.
"What makes you think our killer is a woman?"
"The size of the bite marks. The fact that the magic is used. The glass phallus." Aedan rattled those three things off as if they explained every thing. Apparently, they didn't.
"Explain," Storr ordered.
"The size of the bite marks suggest a small mouth. The lack of ligature marks anywhere on the victims' bodies suggest that the magic is being used to restrain them. Because the perp is not strong enough to physically restrain them. And the glass phallus would suggest someone who doesn't have a dick of their own."
"So that means that our perp is a woman?" Storr asked, sounding very much like he didn't believe it.
"You think its a boy who hasn't hit puberty yet?" she shot back. "Send her to the ME and get the woman's report. She won't tell you anything you don't already know. The carving in her belly was likely done with broken glass. That would explain the jagged edges. And I won't be surprised if the ME finds vaginal secretions in it. Because I'm willing to bet that the killer used the broken glass from the phallus."
Aedan stepped away from the corpse, away from the two men who stared at her in surprise. She stopped next to Edward and turned back to them. "Now, if you've got nothing else you need to know or that you want to accuse me of, I'm going to go home. I'm exhausted and I want to sleep. Good night."
She continued toward the tent's flap and didn't look back.
"Gentlemen." Edward smiled and gave them a salute with one hand. Then he turned and followed Aedan from the tent.
Chapter Three: Fragmented
Fandom: Anita Blake universe
Rating: 18 and up
Warnings: mature. this one is set in the darkness that is the Beyond Death universe. language, murder, gore, non-con, violence and sex apply as warnings. possibly others. we'll see when we get there
Disclaimer: the recognizable characters and places contained herein are the property of LKH. i'm merely borrowing for the sake of entertainment. no money is being made from this venture. the concept and title of The Mary Sue Virus are used with permission from Dazzledfirestar. though i do not view this as an actual MSV story, the original characters established in Beyond Death still belong to their creators and i am merely borrowing them for the purpose of this fic
Author's Notes: so... hey. here's a fic that i probably should have just let go. but a dive down the Wikipedia hole a couple months back brought this to life. this fic starts roughly two to three months after the ending of Beyond Death
With Shards of Broken Glass - The Index
"Why are you here?" Aedan asked the moment they were away from the square, squat building that housed the city's morgue. She turned to face him, anger darkening the blue of her eyes and tightening the corners her mouth. It was an almost hateful expression, one he wasn't sure he'd seen her wear before. He almost took a step back at that. Almost. She'd grown and changed so much in the past year. Hell, in just the past few months. She'd gotten more powerful. More dangerous. That scared him. But he wasn't going to let her know that. He wasn't going to give her that kind of power over him. It was bad enough that she knew he cared. "Minette called you, didn't she?"
"She's worried about you, Aedan. Everyone is," Edward replied quietly. It was an attempt to keep her from hearing the things he was thinking and feeling.
She stared at him for a long time, longer than he was comfortable with. As if she was staring straight into his soul. He didn't like that feeling. He didn't like the idea of her knowing who and what he really was. It went on so long, he was afraid she wasn't going to say anything else. But then the look was gone and the anger finally deflated, slipping away from her face as easily as it had come. Its departure somehow left her smaller. Thinner. Less solid. She was teetering on the edge. She'd obviously kept pushing beyond her limits after the thing with Vittorio. Minette had been right to call him.
"I know," she responded, surprising him with the answer. He had expected her to tell him she was fine, that there was nothing wrong. This was as close to an admission that she was not fine as he felt he'd get. Aedan's hands came up to scrub at her face, a faint tremble in her fingers. "I know they are."
She sounded exhausted. She sounded so worn down, he was surprised she was capable of functioning. When she looked at him, her eyes were large and haunted. "You haven't found someone to talk to, have you?" he asked her. He made sure it was the softest voice he could manage, made sure she could hear the concern in his words. She shook her head before looking away. The way she stared, he was sure she saw something he couldn't. Maybe the ghosts of her dreams. "You need to talk to someone, Aedan. Before this eats you alive."
"I know," she repeated, the words spoken on a defeated sigh. "I know I do. But tell me honestly, Edward. Do you know of any therapist that would be capable of handling the shit we've seen?"
He noted that she'd used the word 'seen' and not 'done.' As if she was comfortable with the things she'd done to survive the past few months. As if taking lives indiscriminately was no big deal. And he knew she'd taken lives indiscriminately. There was the matter of her missing half-brother, the serial murderer. The one the police were still looking for. The one he suspected had long been a corpse. The one whose death he suspected she'd had a hand in. The story she'd told, time and again and to more people than just him, had only been a partial truth. He was sure she'd intentionally kept the most important part of the story to herself.
And then there was the matter of his kidnapping and subsequent rescue. He'd talked to Janika about the events leading up to his release from Vittorio's hold. She'd told him all about Aedan's single-minded determination and the trail of bodies she had left in her wake to get him back. Hell, he'd seen some of it himself. And what she'd done to Vittorio and his people? Edward had not yet been able to shake those images from his brain.
"You need to find someone. Before you can't hold it in anymore. Before it affects your ability to function," he warned.
"Too late," she said, a huff of dull laughter accompanying those two words. He saw nothing funny about the situation and he was damned well going to tell her so.
"Aedan--" he began. But her phone chirped out, a loud sound that cut almost obscenely across the silence of the morgue's parking lot. She made some sound in the back of her throat even as her hand reached into a pocket to retrieve the annoying device. She didn't bother to look at the screen, simply tapped the button to connect the call and put the thin bit of electronics to her ear.
"Kinkade," she said tersely. Gone was the exhaustion and the faint hint of horror that had been in her voice only seconds earlier. He had a moment to marvel at the sudden change, then it was gone when tension pulled her shoulders tight. "Slow down. Slow down. Take a breath and tell me what's going on. I can't understand you because your words are running together," she said, her tone much softer.
Edward listened to the silence as whoever was on the other end spoke. The look on Aedan's face changed slowly, from annoyance to concern. After a few moments, she shot him a look before starting for her vehicle. "Okay. Take a breath and calm down. I'm on my way and I'll be there in ten or fifteen minutes. Just don't panic and don't make any sudden moves. I'll handle it. Okay?"
Five seconds later, Aedan was dropping the phone into her coat pocket with one hand while the other hand fished out the keys to her car. Edward had a hand on her arm before she could even put the key in the lock. "Where are you going? You're in no shape to drive anywhere."
"Angel's house," she responded, tugging her arm free of his hold easily enough. Edward put his hand on the car door and held it closed, forcing her to turn and look at him. He saw worry in her stare.
"What's going on at Angel's house?"
"Something happened with Tina and Angel says she's freaking out. There are zombies around her house and that's freaking her out. I've got to go put the zombies back and then see what spooked Tina so hard."
Had it been anything else, Edward would have told Aedan to leave it for someone else to handle. But there was no one else who could handle Tina and her freak out. Aedan was one of only a very small handful of people who could help Tina with her problems. Which meant she was the only one who could go because there wasn't another living necromancer within fifty miles of the city. He lifted his hand from her car door and wrapped it around her arm. "I'll drive. Call Jean-Claude and have him pick up your car. You're in no shape to drive right now."
"Okay," she agreed. It was frightening how easy she gave in. Which made him worry just that much more about how far she'd actually pushed herself. Aedan never gave in so easily.
He didn't take the time to dwell on it, simply steered her toward his car on the other side of the lot. Aedan fell silent, to the point where it seemed like she wasn't even there. Edward took it to mean she was getting in touch with Jean-Claude through their link instead of over the phone. Maybe she didn't want him to hear it if the other man chewed on her ass for being stupid. It was smart of her, but it wouldn't protect her. If he wanted to know what she said to the other man, Edward would find a way to get that information.
She folded into the seat of his car easily enough, her actions slower than usual. Edward left her to buckle her belt and crossed around the back of the vehicle so that he could let himself in to the driver's seat. He cranked the engine over before sparing a look her way. Aedan already had her belt buckled and looked as if she was about to drop off to sleep. As a matter of fact, her eyes dropped closed as he wheeled the car out of the parking spot.
So it startled him when her voice came softly from the darkness as he edged to a stop at the exit onto the street. "Left here. Go three lights up. Turn right and get on the highway."
He said nothing, simply did as she'd instructed. After pulling out and going left, he counted off the lights silently. He took the instructed right at the third light, then found the entrance ramp to the highway not too far up the road. They were cruising down the highway at speed when she spoke next.
"Twelve exits up, Get off. Take a left at the light. Six lights up. Left. Four intersections. Angel's house will be on the right. The house number is sixteen three zero four. Can't miss it. She's got a porch on the front of the house with granite columns. A couple really large oaks are on either end of the yard. And there's a brick fence topped with wrought iron surrounding the whole thing.."
"How many times have you been to her place?" he asked, mostly to make conversation.
"Too many. Tina doesn't want to learn. She think she knows enough to get by. She thinks I'm going to make her use her powers the way Carter Solomon wanted her to use them. I can't get her to understand that I won't do that to her," Aedan told him, her voice filled with disgust. No doubt she hated the idea of being compared in any way to Solomon.
"She's traumatized, Aedan. Just like you. This is her way of taking control of her life," he said gently.
She rolled her head toward him, letting him see in her eyes that she didn't need him to remind her of the events in her past. "I know that. But she has to learn how to control her necromancy or it will control her," she retorted, though there was nothing but exhaustion in her words. Her head turned back to face the windshield. This time, her eyes stayed open. She stared straight ahead at the rush of traffic around them. Or maybe she stared at the buildings that blurred past as they zipped down the highway. Or maybe she stared at nothing at all. "You know that as well as I do."
He didn't need the reminder. He did know. He remembered what it had been like when he'd first taken Aedan under his wing. But Aedan and her sister were two different people. And if Aedan was trying to take the same approach with Tina that Edward had taken with Aedan... Well, he could see how that might not go over so well. "She isn't you," he reminded her softly.
The leather of her seat made a noise as she shifted and he felt her gaze on him. He kept his eyes forward, despite the intensity of her stare. Or maybe because of it. He could feel it against the side of his face, and something in him was loathe to turn and see the look she was sending his way. He'd never been afraid of a simple look before. He didn't know why he was now. And he didn't like it one bit. "Surprisingly, I know that. And, also surprisingly, I am not treating her like she's me. But that doesn't take away the fact that she needs to get this shit under control before it goes horribly wrong."
"You can't force her to learn control," he said. "It wasn't all that long ago that she had Solomon to deal with. And he no doubt used every last bit of his voice to push her to do as he ordered. She's gun shy and you know it. The harder you push, the harder she'll resist."
"And what happens when she raises something she can't control? What happens if I can't be there to bail her out? What happens to Angel, who will most assuredly try to protect Tina, when she gets in the way? What happens to anyone who gets in that zombie's way? What happens to Tina when the police come for her? Do you think the court will accept a plea of 'I'm sorry. I didn't mean to do it!' from her? You know they won't. You know what will happen to her then."
"And if you push her too hard, she's going to collapse in on herself. And then you won't be able to get her to do anything," he shot back. He wasn't sure why she was being so stubborn about this. "You have to allow her time to come to grips with everything. Let her be a kid, for fuck's sake."
"I would love to let her be a kid, Edward. Gods know I never got the chance. But there isn't really a childhood for people like us unless we have parents who have the same abilities, too. And Tina does not. She's got me. I'm a piss poor mother figure. And an even worse sister," Aedan said, her voice almost containing a snarl of anger. "I can't help that. But I can help her learn how to control her abilities so she can have a more normal life. Something I never got to have. That's the best I can do."
"You can't bully her into being you. Not everyone is capable of running past exhaustion," he snapped, for some reason annoyed with her logic.
Aedan was silent for far too long, and he swore he could feel her withdraw from him. Physically and emotionally. Why did she always drive him into the realms of irrational so that he made snarky, hurtful comments? He was about to open his mouth and try to make it right when she made a sound that sounded very much like a snort. "If you think I want her to be me, then you don't know me as well as you think," she said, voice quiet and empty in the silence of the car.
"Then why are you pushing so hard, Aedan?" he asked, utterly confused by her determination to teach her young sister control.
"Because I don't want her to be me at all," Aedan returned quietly.
The road before them was mostly clear, only a few cars ahead and several more behind. No one was close enough that he was worried about them. So he took his eyes from the road for a moment, allowing them to flick her way. She was staring into space again, but he could see that making that admission had wounded her in ways to which she would never admit. The urge to reach out and lay a hand on hers rose up within him, but he quashed it. He wasn't an overtly physical person and she knew it. And she'd take it as a hollow gesture, as something that was supposed to be done in a token effort to try and make her feel better. It wasn't him anymore than it was her.
"There are worse people she could be, Aedan," he told her. She was silent a moment, then gave a snort. He saw the disbelief on her face. It never ceased to amaze him just how low the opinion she held of herself was. It was on the tip of his tongue to remind her that she wasn't a horrible person, but the words never touched the air. She cut across him before he could speak, tone and tongue as sharp as a razor's edge.
"Don't tell me I'm not fucked up and terrible. We'll both know you're lying." Her tone indicated that she was done discussing herself and would hear no further comments or arguments on the subject. And before he even had a chance to ignore her command, one of her hands was flicking toward the window on her right. "That's our exit."
Edward pressed his lips together in a thin line, a sign for anyone who cared to look that his temper was starting to bubble up. Not that Aedan seemed to care if he was angry with her or not. She was more than capable of trying the patience of a saint. And Edward was far from a saint.
He took the exit, decision made to remain silent on the subject of Aedan's most endearing qualities, and rolled down the ramp to the surface street. The light was red when he reached it, so they idled in pained silence while they waited for the light to change. The silence continued as he took the left she'd told him of before they'd even gotten onto the road. He turned his attention to the stretch of road before him,
They passed under the bridge and drove by two strip malls, one on either side of the road, which were filled with yuppie-type boutiques and high-end bistros that spoke to the neighborhood they were getting ready to enter. A line of trees and a stone fence later, they were treated to the sight of large homes that screamed wealth and privilege. But none of the houses spoke to individuality. There was a sameness in the way they were presented, even if their architectural styles were slightly different.
Every single house was covered in what he suspected was faux stone, with large windows meant to give the home personality. Every one of them was curtained over so no one passing by could see the lack of soul inside. The homes all had wide, sweeping drives that took a vehicle up to a detached garage that could house a family of four, and every property was edged by a thick stone fence that made sure visitors knew they were not welcome, All in all, it was an unimpressive neighborhood.
He was glad when they finally arrived at Angel's place. And it was hard to miss the house because every single light blazed through windows that were not covered by curtains, casting golden illumination on the figures standing silent and still in the grass around the dwelling. He pulled the car over at the curb, put it into park, and drew the key from the ignition. Aedan sat and stared. He suspected she was getting a lay of the land, as it were.
"There are at least a dozen zombies surrounding the house," she said quietly. The exhaustion was gone, pushed back behind some wall that allowed her to do whatever magic it was she did. It almost felt like she wasn't quite all there, as if some part of her was already off doing zombie herding things. "I was afraid that this was going to happen."
"Should she be able to raise that many zombies?" Edward asked, because he still didn't know how most of the zombie stuff worked. Tina was young. And he was pretty sure power matured as the person who had it matured.
"Her power is doing most of it for her. Which is bad, because she can lose control of them so easily," Aedan told him, then pushed the car door open so she could get out. He followed suit, watching as she moved with sure steps toward the closed gates."Its also good. Because it means I can take control of them with little problem." She paused at the gate and turned to look at him. "You wait here until I have the zombies under control. I don't know what will happen if they see you. Or if Tina sees you."
Left unsaid was the fact that she didn't want to see him get hurt. Edward pretended he didn't hear the implication and simply nodded his head. Aedan reached up to press the button on the box set on a post next to the drive. There was no answering voice, just a buzz and then a metallic click that saw the gate sliding open. Aedan took a breath before stepping past the gate into the drive. He watched her go, something sitting tight and darkly ominous in his chest.
Edward had never been one to believe in magic. It had taken him a long time to buy into the idea that people like Anita and Aedan could use magic to make the dead appear to be living again. Even with the proof in front of him, it was still sometimes hard to believe. He had no magic to speak of, which never troubled him much. But now, with Aedan standing in Angel's yard with a dozen ore more uncontrolled zombies, he wished he could feel magic, Feel it or see it or touch it. Because he couldn't sense anything happening, even though he knew something was happening.
For several long seconds, nothing seemed to happen. Aedan stood in the middle of the yard, in plain view of the milling zombies, and seemingly did nothing. And then, slowly, one head after another turned her way. One by one, the zombies faced her. He knew then, without needing to be told, that she had control of the mindless undead.
"I'm going to put them back," Aedan told him, not shifting her attention away from the zombies around her. There was some strain in her voice. "Go inside and see if you can talk Tina down. She's fighting me. Its going to take time to put the zombies back unless she gives it up."
"Angel will let me inside?" he asked, already on his way to the front door. He kept one hand on the butt of his gun as a safety measure, even though he knew that shooting a zombie would do nothing to stop it.
"Tell her you're here with me," Aedan replied. She sounded like she was distracted, so he said nothing and continued on up to the door. None of the zombies looked his way, their focus solely on Aedan as she did whatever it was she was doing. Edward had barely gotten onto the porch when the door swung wide and Angel Cervantez stared at him with wide, frightened eyes for a moment. He watched as her gaze flashed to where he knew Aedan stood in the center of a group of zombies, then it came back to his face.
"Marshal Forrester?" she asked softly, confusion warring with the fear.
"Where's Tina?" he asked, making sure to use a soft and genial voice. "Aedan asked me to go speak with her."
"She's this way," Angel responded, glancing at Aedan and the zombies one last time before stepping back and allowing him into her home. She was in motion before the door clicked shut, heading toward a doorway on her left. Edward caught sight of a young girl standing in the middle of the room, hands fisted at her side as she stared out one of the uncovered windows. Her shoulders were tense, pulled tight with frustration or anger, and her fists shook ever so slightly. He'd seen the pose before, more than once.
Edward moved into the room cautiously, circling around the girl until he could see her face. There were tears rolling down cheeks gone pale with emotion and exertion. He made his way around her, stopping only when he was before her and she'd looked at him. He offered her a soft smile. "Hi, Tina. My name is Ted. I'm a friend of Aedan's," he said softly. The girl blinked at him, frowned to let him know she wasn't pleased to see him, then turned her attention back to the window.
"She took them from me!" she snapped, voice high with her anger. "She's mean and a liar. She's a rotten sister and I wish I'd never met her." Her face screwed up in a look of concentration and, a moment later, Edward heard "SHIT!" ring out loudly from outside. Angel moved to the windows and looked out, then backed away.
"Tina, stop it!" Angel ordered, using her lawyer voice to do so. Tina ignored her. "Tina, right now!"
"You're not my mom! You can't tell me what to do! My mom is dead and I'll never see her again and I hate every one!" the little girl yelled. Angel looked stricken to hear those words said, her mouth opening and closing as if she'd planned on speaking and couldn't find the words.
"No, Angel isn't your mom. You're right about that," Edward began, shooting a look toward the woman a moment in hopes she'd let him do the talking. "But she obviously cares about you very much. She's taken you into her home, hasn't she?"
"They made her do it," Tina snapped angrily. By they, he took it to that the girl meant Aedan and Jean-Claude.
"How do you know? Did you hear them order her to let you live here?" he asked. Tina glanced at him a moment before giving a shake of her head. "Did Angel say anything about being blackmailed or coerced in any way? Did they give her money?"
Again, Tina shook her head to let him know that those things had not happened. Edward regarded her a moment, then glanced around. "Is this a horrible place to live? Are you being treated badly?"
"No," Tina whispered. Her gaze flicked briefly to Angel, who was watching them silently, tears clinging to her lashes. Thus far, she seemed inclined to let him do the talking. Which was probably a good thing. He didn't talk like a lawyer. Tina would understand the point he was trying to make better that way.
"So maybe Angel wants you here because she really likes you," he suggested gently. Again Tina glanced at Angel. When her attention came back to Edward, he could see the doubt and confusion in her eyes. "Has she made you think that she doesn't care about you?"
"No. She buys me things that I want even when I don't ask. And she doesn't yell or hit or do anything I don't want her to do," Tina said, her tone suggesting she was figuring it out in her head even as she spoke. "She's nothing like him."
It was obvious who him was. Tina spoke about Carter Solomon the same way Aedan did. It was highly likely that their trauma was similar. Edward filed that away, possibly for a later conversation with Aedan. He'd never pried into her life with Solomon. And she'd never offered. Maybe it was time to pry some of that out of her. "I love having you here, Tina. You're smart and funny and beautiful. You're talented. You constantly surprise and amaze me," Angel said. There was raw emotion in her words that told Edward she wasn't saying what she thought the girl needed to hear. She was saying exactly what she was feeling.
Angel's words brought Tina's gaze her way one more time. Edward took the opportunity to study the girl. She bore no physical resemblance to her sister. Edward couldn't see any of Aedan in the girl's face. Her cheeks were fuller, her face rounder. Aedan's face was lean, her cheeks almost hollow. Where Aedan had blue eyes, Tina's eyes were a deep, rich brown. They were filled with intelligence, though. And pain. That was familiar. The girl had hair in almost the same shade of brown as her eyes, with touches of honey and fire here and there. Even in the dim light of the lamps, he could see the flashes of red and gold that gilded the long length of Tina's hair. Tina had a button nose. Aedan's was pert. And kind of non-descript.
There were more differences between the two of them. They seemed to have nothing physical in common that would mark them as sisters. If someone stopped at the exterior, if someone only took the physical into consideration, they might think the two of them had nothing in common. But, if they looked past the surface to the inside, they'd see that Aedan and Tina were very much cut from the same cloth. He saw similarities in the set of the girl's jaw, had seen that look on Aedan's face too many times to count. The way the girl held herself, the line of her shoulders, her posture. All of it said much louder than any words that they shared blood.
No wonder Aedan looked like she'd been banging her head up against a brick wall.
Tina's eyes slid back to him, some of the anger sliding away under the weight of her curiosity. She obviously had questions, but he could tell she wasn't ready to let go of her anger. He knew he could beat around the bush. Or he could get right to the heart of the matter. Seeing as he was always pragmatic, he cut to the chase. "Do you want to tell me what all that out there is about?" he asked her softly, one hand motioning back toward the windows to indicate the yard just outside.
"She took them away from me," Tina said again. Though the anger was mostly gone and sadness had taken its place, the words still came with the same force behind them as the last time she'd uttered them.
He wasn't sure who 'they' were. "The zombies?"
Tina shook her head so fast that her hair flew in a whirlwind around her head.
"Who did she take away, Tina?" That question came from Angel, who moved closer to the two of them.
"My brothers and sisters," the girl admitted. There was a hitch in her voice this time, suggesting tears might be close to the surface now. Her gaze drifted back to the window. And her anger came back in the blink of an eye. Her hands clenched again and he was fairly certain her power was running rampant over her. Edward didn't know if he could see Aedan and the zombies out there in the dark and that had prompted the spike in temper or if it was simply mentioning her siblings. Either way, it saw the girl's temper rising. "She took them away from me and I hate her for it."
"Tina, honey," Angel said, moving to kneel before the girl. Tina didn't look at her, but Edward felt certain she was listening to the woman. "Aedan didn't take your siblings from you."
"Then why don't I get to see them? Why don't I know where they are? Or how they are?" The questions came with such anguish that it was obvious this had been building ever since Tina and her siblings had been discovered by the police.
"Oh, sweetie. I'm so sorry. I didn't even think... Of course you can see your siblings," Angel promised. Tina stared at Angel, her expression clearly saying she didn't dare hope it was for real. Angel reached out and tugged Tina into a crushing hug.
Edward left the two of them to their moment of emotions. He got to his feet and moved to the window to check on the situation in the yard. He saw no sign of the zombies. And Aedan was on her knees in the grass, head down and hands limp in the grass. "Damn it," he muttered. When he turned to head for the door, Angel was looking at him inquisitively. Tina was still wrapped up in her arms, resting almost bonelessly against Angel's torso. "Excuse me," he said by way of answer and picked up the pace.
It didn't take long to pass through the doorway of the room. To make it to the front door. To pull said door open and step outside. To cross the yard until he stood at Aedan's side. He knew it didn't take that long. But it felt entirely too long. Kneeling down so that his knees sank into the perfectly manicured lawn, he reached out a hand and lifted Aedan's face. She was way too pale, chest heaving the slightest bit as she panted for air. As if she'd just run a marathon. "Can you make it to your feet?"
Her mouth opened as if to snap off an answer. But closed it again and he watched as she gave his question some serious thought. "With help," she finally admitted. He bit back a sigh, along with the urge to call her a fucking idiot, and offered her a hand. It took her a moment to put her hand in his. When she did, her fingers shook faintly against his own. It looked as if she'd hit rock bottom. "Wait until I tell Jean-Claude a ten year old girl kicked your ass," he said in an attempt to rile her temper.
"She didn't kick my ass," Aedan insisted, struggling to her feet after he stood. It took her a couple seconds longer than he liked, and she wobbled when she was finally upright. But she did it. He noticed she didn't let go of his hand right away.
"You okay to make it inside on your own?" he asked, this time letting some of his anger leak into his voice.
"If you're going to take that tone, I'm more than capable," she retorted as she intentionally put distance between them. He watched her wobble at first, then stand straight and steady. She almost kept the 'Ha! Fuck you!' look of triumph from her eyes. Almost. Then she turned and, with deliberate steps, headed for Angel's front door. Edward muttered something very uncharitable about her stubbornness and followed after her.
Somehow, despite being exhausted, she made the door before he managed to catch her. He should have taken her to task for her stupidity, but there was no time to do so because she headed for the living room, where Angel was still holding Tina to her in a hug that suggested she might not be willing to let the girl go any time soon. Aedan moved without a word to the couch and settled down on it, waiting patiently for the two of them to acknowledge her presence.
It took several more minutes before anyone took note of Aedan. Edward lingered in the doorway, watching everything with an attentive eye. Aedan wouldn't last much longer. He could see it in the strain around her eyes. Whatever had happened with Tina's zombies, it had taken what little energy and strength she'd managed to recover. As soon as he was sure things were on the up and up between her and her sister, he was taking her home and putting her to bed. Whether she liked it or not.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity of silence, Angel pulled away from Tina. The little girl backed up a couple of steps, her sniffling loud in the stillness of the room. Angel's dark gaze slid Aedan's way and she offered a faint smile before turning her attention back to the girl standing before her. "You need to apologize to Aedan," she suggested gently, though there was more than a little sternness underneath.
Tina nodded and turned slowly toward her half-sister, pale face streaked with tears. She sniffled again, reaching up with one hand to rub away some of the moisture that still clung to her skin. "I'm sorry, Aedan. I didn't mean it," the girl said, Her voice was watery but she sounded sincere. Aedan sat forward so she could regard her sibling. He watched as she put her elbows on her knees, bringing her closer to the young girl.
"I know, Tina." Aedan responded. Her tone was gentle and soft. Edward was surprised, yet not, at the patience and kindness in her voice. He'd known for some time that she would be an amazing mother. The maternal instinct was there. In ways he didn't understand and refused to examine, he was saddened that she was in a relationship with a vampire because it meant no children for her. Calling himself a fool, certain he was going soft, he brushed those thoughts aside and waited for Aedan to go on. "And this is why I've been trying to teach you control. Sooner or later, you're going to lose your temper and your power will take that as an invitation to do what it likes. Like tonight."
There was no judgement or censure in her last statement. Tina looked contrite anyway.
"What happened?" Aedan asked. There was a faint thread of steel that said she would not let Tina get away with not answering.
"I got mad," the young girl admitted. Her words were thick with contrition. Aedan nodded, as if she'd expected the answer.
"You got mad. And your power ran wild because your emotions were high." It was a simple, basic explanation, made without an iota of accusation. And it wasn't a question. Tina nodded her head anyway. "Why were you mad?"
"Its stupid," Tina whispered, her gaze shifting to the side.
"Tina," Aedan sighed, a touch of her temper coloring her words.
"When I first met Aedan, she didn't know what she was," Edward interrupted, giving Aedan a chance to collect herself before she got angry and did damage to her relationship with Tina. The girl's brown eyes drifted his way, a touch of surprise in them. It seemed like she'd forgotten he was there. "She didn't know anything about necromancy. The only thing she knew is that everyone looked at her as a freak. Even her own flesh and blood."
There was some low, indiscernable muttering from the vicinity of the couch, but Aedan didn't try to stop him. He took a few steps into the living room, moving so that he was close to the couch where Aedan had settled. His position allowed him to keep an eye on everyone in the room and be on the look out for anything that might pop up out in the yard. Tina watched him, a touch of curiosity in her eyes. Apparently Aedan had told her very little about her younger days.
"She was older than you are now. And she didn't know about necromancy. She didn't know that she had powers that allowed her to call the dead to her. All she knew was that the dead flocked to her. When she was really sad or scared or angry. The dead came."
"Like me. Tonight." Tina's voice suggested she was already thinking. Something she appeared to have in common with her sister.
"Yes. Like you. Tonight. You were mad and maybe a little scared and your power reacted to those feelings. It called up zombies. Maybe it meant to do so to offer you some kind of protection. Or maybe to make you feel less scared. Or maybe it called them up simply because you weren't in control of it. The reasons don't matter. What matters is that it happened. And Aedan's right. It will happen again."
"Did it happen to her?" Tina asked, obviously curious about the woman who shared blood with her.
"It did. And it was worse because she didn't have anyone who had necromancy to teach her how to control her powers. She just had me. I didn't know anything about them, really. I barely believed they were a real thing. I had to teach her control without understanding what that meant for her. And without understanding what her childhood had been like. Because that was a lot of the reason she kept reacting instead of thinking."
The girl's eyes went wide, swiveling from his face to Aedan's and then back again. As if she didn't believe what she was hearing. It was likely she didn't, because the Aedan that existed now was a completely different person than the one that existed then. It was an alien concept that Aedan had ever lost control on the regular. "How did you finally teach her control?"
"He took me on hunts for vampires," Aedan responded. He could still remember her face the very first time she'd confronted an enraged vampire. She'd freaked out for several long seconds before her necromancy had spurred her to action. He'd thought she would run away screaming into the night. But she hadn't. "And he taught me how to shoot a gun."
Tina's expression was suddenly very easy to read. She was intrigued and she wanted to do the same things. Angel, though, looked much more shocked.
"It was a hard way to teach her, Tina," Edward said, drawing the girl's attention back to him. Despite the fact that Aedan's matter-of-fact statement had made it sound like that had been the best time of her life, he knew different. He knew how scared she'd been. Of him and her powers and the methods he'd been trying to teach her. Looking back, he could say with absolute certainty that he'd gone about everything the wrong way. But he'd worked with what he'd had at the time. "There were times when she got hurt. She could have been killed if I hadn't been there to watch her back."
"That's no life for a young girl," Angel protested.
"It was the only way Ted knew," Aedan responded, shifting her attention to the lawyer. He noted absently that she'd used his public persona. Even as wiped out as she was, she was still cognizant of the fact that no one knew him as Edward. "He didn't have anyone to turn to for advice. So he taught me what he knew because he knew it would bring about the discipline and control I so desperately needed."
"That's why Aedan is trying to teach you control, Tina. So you don't have to live through the things she did," Edward told the girl. "That's why it probably feels to you like she's being hard on you. Maybe even like she's being mean. Because she doesn't want to put you through those things. She doesn't want to see you struggle to accept yourself. And your talents."
"He told me they were evil and that the only way I could keep them from making me evil was to use them for God," Tina whispered.
He saw Aedan's shoulders tense up. It was one of the few tells she had when it came to discussing Carter Solomon, one of the few things that let him know that the mention of his name was enough to see her trying to crawl back into her shell. "He was a liar, Tina," Aedan said. Her tone was harsh. Tina blinked at her in confusion. Maybe she thought Aedan was angry with her. It would be a logical conclusion.
Aedan slithered off the couch, a move that should have been graceless and awkward because she was so tired. But she made it look fluid and easy. She went to her knees on the floor in front of her sibling and stared the girl straight in the eyes. "He was a liar. What you have is a gift. So very few people have it. So few that there are people out there that would try to use it. Like he did. That's just one of many reasons why I want you to learn how to control your powers. How to use them instead of letting them use you. I do not want you to live the life I've lived, Tina. That is super important to me. Do you understand? I care about you and I don't want you to spend your life thinking you're a freak and that no one will want you in their lives unless they can get something from you."
Tina nodded her head, letting Aedan know she understood the woman's reasoning. There was pure honesty in her eyes. Unadulterated childish trust.
"I'm going to ask you again. Why were you mad?" Aedan's voice was soft. Gentle. But there was an edge of steel under the words that told everyone in the room she would have her answers.
"Because I thought you took them away from me," Tina admitted. Her voice was barely above a whisper. Aedan's gaze slid from her sister to Angel and then to Edward, then slid back to the girl before her.
"Your zombies?" she asked, though he was sure she knew that wasn't the answer. She was giving Tina the opportunity to answer her questions without being forced into it.
"No. My brothers and sisters." It was difficult to hear Tina, her voice had dropped so low. And she'd lowered her gaze to the floor so that she spoke to it. But he had no doubt that Aedan had heard her. Because in the next second, the woman reached out and put her hand under her sister's chin and made the girl look at her.
"I would never take your siblings from you, Tina. I'm so sorry that you felt I had," Aedan told her gently. "Everything has been so hectic lately. And I didn't even stop to think how you might see the craziness in my life. You should have come to me and said something. Give me a little bit of time and I'll arrange something so that you can see them. All of them. I promise."
"You mean it?" Tina asked, hope rising in her like the sun coming over the horizon in the morning.
"I do, sweetie. I'm so sorry." Tina regarded her a moment or two, then launched herself into Aedan. The force of impact nearly toppled the woman over backward, but she managed to stay upright. She wrapped her arms around her sister and hugged her tight, whispering more promises into the girl's ear.
"You know where all of her siblings are?" Angel asked, a touch of concern in her voice.
"Yes. There are files and..." Aedan's words came to a halt with the abrupt shrilling of her cell phone. She shot a look of regret toward Angel and Tina before reaching into her coat to find the device. As with earlier, she didn't look at the screen to see who might be calling her. She just connected the call and put the cell to her ear. "Kinkade."
It took approximately two seconds for her face to go empty and blank, telling Edward exactly who was calling. "Send me an address. I'm on my way."
The phone was dumped into her pocket without ceremony. Aedan sighed and gave Tina a forced smile. "I have to go, little sis. I have work to do. I'm sorry. I wish I could stay longer, but this is one of those things that I can't get out of. Police work."
"Okay," Tina replied. It was hard to tell if she was upset by this turn of events or not. Edward suspected she was.
"Don't sweat it, kid. You get a night off. I'm not going to hear from Angel again, am I?" she asked.
"No. No more zombies tonight. Promise."
"Good. I'll call you later to schedule time to work on your control," Aedan told her, letting the girl know it would be her decision instead of Aedan's. Aedan squished Tina into a hug before rising to her feet. She didn't wobble, which Edward was vaguely shocked about. "And I'll have Jean-Claude call you to coordinate something with all of the other foster homes so that Tina and her siblings can get together and play."
Angel nodded, moving over to stand beside Tina. "Thank you. And be careful out there."
"I will," Aedan promised, then turned to look at Edward. "Let's go."
~*~
It wasn't until they got into the car that Aedan let her control slide. Just a bit. She sagged into the seat and closed her eyes, head tipped back against the headrest behind her. Edward started the engine and let it idle while he waited for an address from her. It didn't take her long to give it. After a few seconds of giving in to her exhaustion, she shored the walls back up and once more gave the appearance of being in control. Then she rattled off an address and let her gaze slide to the window.
"You going to be okay to work a scene?" he asked her as he pulled the car away from the curb. Aedan snorted, a sound that was filled with a lot of derision and not much else.
"Going to have to be, aren't I? Because there's no one else that does what I do," she replied.
"You could have told Storr that you weren't available," he suggested lightly, finding a place to turn the vehicle around so that they could head back the way they'd come.
"Wasn't Dolph. He doesn't call me anymore. Zerbrowski is always the one who contacts me now," she informed him. That was news to him. He was under the impression that Dolph was the one who made the decision to call Aedan in on a crime scene.
"Since when?"
"Since Dolph hates me." There was nothing to let him know what she was feeling. He decided not to pry.
"You could have told Zerbrowski no." For a moment, it looked like Aedan would argue with him. But she eventually just shook her head and turned to look out the window. He frowned at her lack of self-preservation. He didn't like that she was effectively killing herself with all of the commitments she'd made to various people and places. She was worn thin. As thin as he'd ever seen her. Considering he'd known her for years, and had met her under less than perfect circumstances, that was saying something. "You don't have to kill yourself for them," he reminded her, letting his temper show in his voice.
"I'm not killing myself for them. I'm not doing this for them at all," she snapped, sharing with him her own temper.
"Then why are you doing it?" he demanded.
"I'm doing it for the victims, Edward. I'm doing it because they deserve better than the local cops will give them." There was a quiet kind of determination in her voice that he rarely heard her use. Whatever this was for her, calling it personal barely scratched the surface. "The locals are stretched thin and most of them have issues with the preternatural community. If I leave it to them to solve, they'll probably end up chasing down the wrong leads and punishing the wrong people. And the killer will go free. And I can't live with that. I can't let these women get brushed under the rug because the cops don't care enough."
"You are one person, Aedan. And you cannot take on the burden of saving the world by yourself," he informed her. If there was an edge to his voice, he didn't bother to take it back or try to hide it. All the better to make his point.
"I'm not," she snarled, those two words very heated.
"Then what are you doing?" he demanded. He didn't like that she invested so much of herself in the hunt for a murderer. He didn't like that she seemed bound and determined to get herself killed trying to take down the bad guy. He didn't like that getting herself killed would leave a hole in his rapidly melting heart.
"My job," she retorted. "In case you've forgotten, Edward, this is my job. And you're the reason that this is my job. You're the one who pushed me toward all of this."
"I never pushed you into anything," he shot back.
"You did. Whether you meant to or not, you pushed me into being here. Into doing this job. Into becoming this... thing. Whatever it is I am."
He bristled at the accusation in her tone. At the implication that she was some thing and not simply a human being. "I never pushed you into becoming a marshal. Never pushed you into becoming a vampire's side kick. I never wanted any of this for you."
"Yes. Because I'm so much better than you," she snarled. The self-derision was back. He frowned, opened his mouth to rip into her, then stopped. Because it was what she wanted. She was over worked and over tired and she was spoiling for a fight. Because she was going to pick at her own wounds just a little more, rip the scabs off and make them bleed because she believed that it was what she deserved. He closed his mouth and turned his attention back to the road. He wasn't going to hand her the keys that would allow her to destroy even more of herself.
She must have realized it after a few minutes, because she turned to glare at him. "You may not have wanted any of this for me, Edward. But what did you expect would happen when you put a gun in my hand the first time? What did you think would happen when you taught me to hunt vampires? What did you think was going to happen when you started teaching me how to control my powers? Because people like me are prizes to be caught and kept. And used. Whether that's what you want to happen or not!"
"So that's what this thing between you and the vampire is? You're his prize and he's keeping you?" he asked, trying to throw a wrench in the abstract argument she was crafting in her brain. And could have smacked her senseless when she stubbornly refused to answer. "You are such an idiot. Do you honestly believe he doesn't care about you?"
"You were the one who told me that vampires were opportunistic and would use whatever tool or weapon they had at their disposal," she reminded him. It was a needless reminder, because he remembered exactly what he'd told her. And while he still didn't like the idea of her being tied to a vampire, he was willing to admit to himself that Aedan could have been tied to so much worse than Jean-Claude. "And what am I if not a tool? A weapon that he can wield against anyone who dares threaten his way of life? What am I?" There was possibly a touch of mild hysteria in her voice
"You're a human being, Aedan," he told her softly. He cast his gaze her way to find that she was staring sightlessly through the windshield. She didn't even appear interested in trying to convince him he was wrong. "You're a human being who has suffered a great deal of trauma in a short amount of time. You're a human being who needs to find someone to talk to in order to deal with that trauma. And you are a human being worthy of love."
She snorted in response to that.
"You're also a human being who needs to get several nights of uninterrupted sleep. Or you're going to crash and burn hard. You almost did out there with Tina's zombies." He made sure she heard the displeasure in his voice as he spoke the last. She snorted again, but said nothing. Edward made a mental note to speak with Jean-Claude. Maybe it was time to resort to the tranq gun to ensure she got the sleep she needed.
Aedan made no reply to that. In fact, she didn't speak to him again for the remainder of the drive to the address she'd given him. Edward mulled over the things he'd seen and learned. He wondered if he'd ever manage to get it through Aedan's thick skull that she wasn't the monster Carter Solomon had convinced her she was. He also wondered if they'd ever find a way to get her to actually rest up. Neither thing seemed possible. She was too stubborn to believe him. Too determined to help to bother with taking care of herself.
It was enough to make him want to strangle her out of frustration.
He thought maybe she dozed on the way to the crime scene. She was terribly still and silent the whole trip. But even before he turned onto the street that was home to their destination, she sat up straight in her chair and reached up to make quick work of her hair. She put it into a sloppy braid and produced a tie from somewhere in her pocket with which she secured the plait. By the time he pulled up to the curb, she had her badge attached to her coat and her professional face on.
The car hadn't even come to a halt and she had the door open, was stepping from the vehicle as if there wasn't a world of shit still lingering in the air between them. He had to admire her ability to compartmentalize even if it wasn't healthy. He felt like they should sit down one day and talk about the shit Solomon had put her through. Whether she wanted to talk about it or not. The mother fucker had done one hell of a number on his own flesh and blood and Aedan was no exception.
It surprised him to see Zerbrowski waiting by the tape for her. It surprised Zerbrowski to see Edward with her. "Kinkade. Forrester. What are you doing here? I wasn't aware you were in town." Edward didn't imagine the subtle undertone in Zerbrowski's words that suggested that Edward should have called him to inform him of just that thing.
"I have business in St. Louis. I thought I'd stop by and say hi to Aedan. Just my luck she gets called to a crime scene when that happens," he said, replying honestly with his good old boy voice. Zerbrowski gave him the evil eye a moment or two, then lifted the tape and allowed both he and Aedan to enter the crime scene area.
"You look like shit, Aedan," Zerbrowski said to the woman by way of greeting.
"I did it so I could match your clothes," she retorted absently, eyes already focused on the tent set up in the distance.
"Such wit," the man commented, his gaze sliding back to Edward. There was a question there. Edward just shrugged and made a 'You got me' gesture with his hands.
"Is it the same killer?" Aedan asked, cutting into their silent conversation tersely. Edward suspected she knew that Zerbrowski was fishing for information from him.
"Looks like it," Zerbrowski responded. That stopped her in her tracks, prompting the man to do the same. He turned and looked at her.
"What does that mean?" Edward didn't like the suspicion in her voice.
"It means you'll see what I mean when we get into the tent," Zerbrowski told her, not an ounce of give in his voice. Edward took it to mean there were prying ears in the crowd and he didn't want any information finding its way into the wrong hands.
"Dick," Aedan retorted, though there was little heat in the word. She started forward again, ignoring the smirk Zerbrowski sent her way. When she was even with the detective, he picked up his feet and continued toward the tent.
It was interesting to see the worn down, terribly human version of Aedan fold away in order for her professional side take the stage. It was almost like she was shedding one skin in order to wear a different one. It was kind of amazing. And kind of frightening. Because it made Edward wonder just how many different versions of Aedan lingered under her skin. And it made him wonder how many of them he still hadn't met yet.
A uniform stood at the flap to the tent, presumably guarding it against intrusion from anyone not wearing a police badge. He saw them coming and snapped to attention, one hand reaching out to pull the flap back and allow them entry. The cop was young, almost a kid, and fresh to the force. There was a crispness to him, an eagerness. Something that would be worn down by time and by to many cases and by too much violence. He wouldn't stay fresh faced for long.
The interior of the tent was crowded with people. The corners were filled with spotlights set up to illuminate every inch of the corpse. It made the air hot and stifling. It made the smell that much worse. They paused just inside the flap to put on their gloves and to cover their shoes. Aedan was done before either he or Zerbrowski and she was already beside the corpse when Edward had finished.
"This one is fresh," she said, voice sounding clinical. It was and wasn't a question.
"Helena McInnery. She was reported missing six hours ago by her roommate. A couple of kids found the body," Storr replied. The man shot Edward a look as he moved up to stand behind Aedan. She was crouched down, looking at a sheet covered body as if this was an every day thing for her. Maybe it was.
"Someone needs to give the kids' parents the number to a good therapist," Aedan said, one hand reaching for the edge of the sheet. "The magic is thick here. I can almost smell it."
"You can smell magic?" Zerbrowski asked, genuinely curious.
"All magic has a smell. Mine smells like death. Anyone who practices Earth magic smells like green, growing things. Even the preternatural crowd have their own smells. Vampires smell like graveyard dirt and death. Lycanthropes smell musty and furry." The answer was given absently. Aedan's hand still hovered near the edge of the sheet, as if she didn't want to lift it. He wondered what she sensed or smelled or felt.
"What does the magic here smell like?" Dolph asked, obviously intent on finding out if it could help them find the killer.
"It smells like blood," Aedan replied, then finally curled her fingers over the edge of the sheet. Edward thought she might pull it off as one would pull the cloth off a table, but she folded it back upon itself until the corpse was exposed to the knees. "Mother fucker!" she muttered.
This victim did not look like the others. Oh, she was a redhead like the others. And there were the bites and bruises that had been visible on the other bodies. There was a pool of blood between Helena McInnery's thighs, and the light glittered across the surface of broken glass so that they knew the same killer had been responsible for this body. But there was more. The killer had taken the time to leave them a message.
The word 'whore' had been carved into Helena McInnery's abdomen. The letters were rough and ragged, meaning they were made by someone with a shaking hand or someone with a dull blade. Either way, it was not good.
"Why did the perp do it?" Zerbrowski asked.
Edward watched as Aedan slowly rose to her feet. As she slowly turned to look at the man. He could see by the look in her eyes that she was about to lose her shit. "You're asking me? Why? What makes you think I've got an answer? Do I look like I fucking know?
"You're the expert in these things," Storr started, but his words halted the moment she turned to look at him. Her expression was murderous and her cheeks flamed with her anger.
"In what things? Murder? The preternatural world? Or really freaky, fucked up shit? Which one is it?" she asked. Her voice had gone low, a warning that she was at the end of her rope. Edward inched closer to her, intent on trying to stop the blood bath before it started.
"You're our resident expert on the things that go bump in the night," Storr said, ignoring the warning in her voice.
"I see. Then I guess its going to be disappointing for you to know that I don't have a fucking clue what that's supposed to mean. The murderer likely has her reasons for carving a woman up the way she has. Hell, I'm sure she's got her reasons for raping and murdering these women. But I don't know what the fuck those reasons are because I'm not a goddamned mind reader."
"Her?" Storr asked, voice as sharp as the gaze he settled on her.
"I can't tell you anything that you don't already know. The bite marks are the same. The scratches are the same. The method of death is the same. Its the same killer. Who's thrown a wrench into the works. If you have nothing else, I'm going home. I'm going to bed. I'm goddamned exhausted from trying to solve your fucking case for you."
"Aedan," Edward said gently, drawing her attention his way. He could see, buried under the anger shining in her eyes, the fear and the concern.
"She's escalating, Ted." One hand motioned toward the body and the word carved into her belly. "She thinks we know something and she's escalating. So she can send us a message. There's only one thing I don't understand."
"What's that, Aedan?" he asked.
"Is the message for them?" Aedan motioned to the cops standing behind her. "Or is it for me?"
"Why would it be a message for you?" This from Zerbrowski.
"Because people have a habit of calling me a whore," Aedan said casually, as if it wasn't something that bothered her
"Back up just a moment," Storr said, apparently oblivious to any inner turmoil Aedan might be suffering. She turned to look at him, her body language suggesting she was waiting for him to accuse her of whatever she thought he felt she was responsible for. "You said she."
"Yes. Our killer is a woman," she replied.
"What makes you think our killer is a woman?"
"The size of the bite marks. The fact that the magic is used. The glass phallus." Aedan rattled those three things off as if they explained every thing. Apparently, they didn't.
"Explain," Storr ordered.
"The size of the bite marks suggest a small mouth. The lack of ligature marks anywhere on the victims' bodies suggest that the magic is being used to restrain them. Because the perp is not strong enough to physically restrain them. And the glass phallus would suggest someone who doesn't have a dick of their own."
"So that means that our perp is a woman?" Storr asked, sounding very much like he didn't believe it.
"You think its a boy who hasn't hit puberty yet?" she shot back. "Send her to the ME and get the woman's report. She won't tell you anything you don't already know. The carving in her belly was likely done with broken glass. That would explain the jagged edges. And I won't be surprised if the ME finds vaginal secretions in it. Because I'm willing to bet that the killer used the broken glass from the phallus."
Aedan stepped away from the corpse, away from the two men who stared at her in surprise. She stopped next to Edward and turned back to them. "Now, if you've got nothing else you need to know or that you want to accuse me of, I'm going to go home. I'm exhausted and I want to sleep. Good night."
She continued toward the tent's flap and didn't look back.
"Gentlemen." Edward smiled and gave them a salute with one hand. Then he turned and followed Aedan from the tent.
(no subject)
Date: 2020-06-13 10:22 am (UTC)I don't know what it is, but I LOVE Aedan - so many dimensions to her. I loved how you touched on a number of those in just this one chapter - although the angst about seeing her about break is a little maddening (fun but maddening! ;) ).
I also love Tina! Poor kid's been through her own shitstorm. Hope she and Aedan can form a real sisterly bond - this chap kinda makes me think they're on the way already. :-)
Gotta feel for Edward too - the helplessness at watching Aedan driving herself toward complete and total breakdown. I kinda hope he kicks her ass (when she's well enough) for this...lol. ;)
LOVE your take on this 'verse more than LKH...SO much more fun! :-) Great chappie!!
(no subject)
Date: 2020-06-13 10:49 pm (UTC)i think Tina will be a force to be reckoned with once she gets older. right now, she's kind of at a crossroads. she isn't sure she wants to be this thing that her father tried to use to his advantage. but she also thinks it would be cool to be like Aedan. so she's torn. plus, she's been kind of thrust into a world she doesn't fully understand and her security blanket (her siblings) has been taken from her.
Edward has found himself in a position he doesn't really enjoy. caring about someone other than himself. i mean, he cares about Donna and the kids, of course. but Aedan is blood and that's a different thing. he does not know how to deal with her without threatening and/or maiming her. i'm sure he'll get there, tough.
glad you enjoyed, bb. thanks for taking the time to read
(no subject)
Date: 2020-06-17 07:32 pm (UTC)Edward has feelings?! What? It must be the end of the world. But seriously, I really enjoy the interactions between him and Aedan. Always have. And speaking of Aedan, she really needs to get some rest. Like yesterday. Edward wasn't lying when he said she was gonna burn out hard.
Poor Tina. I agree that it looks like she'll be a powerhouse someday. Hopefully Aedan can help her learn how to control her powers before something bad happens.
Lovely distraction, bb. I enjoyed it muchly.
(no subject)
Date: 2020-06-17 10:26 pm (UTC)surprising, isn't it? i, too, like the interactions between he and Aedan. they just feel... organic. like, half the time, it seems like Edward is used to remind people that Anita isn't quite that far gone yet. and to be some kind of odd boogie man. you know? and yeah. Aedan is heading for a serious crash. we'll see if someone can't cut it off at the pass.
Tina will likely have some power under her belt. Aedan can recognize it and she's trying so hard to help train Tina and get her ready. but, as you can see, its not going as well as she'd like it to. i'm sure they'll get there. just need some time.
glad you enjoyed, bb. thanks for reading