The Lie Spinners (The Deception Dance) (29 page)

“
It’s
on my wrist…” Linnie trails off as she glances down at
her wrists, then looks up at me. “I swear to God, it was…”

I
attempt to stay calm, rational. “Did you put it away somewhere
when we got back… without thinking about it?”

“
No,
Raven!” Her eyes widen; obviously, Linnie has no plan to stay
calm. Her voice shrills when she continues, “I mean…until
I glanced down, I felt it on my wrist.”

“
No
one knew about it. Let’s just stay calm and look around the
room.” But Linnie doesn’t help search, she just stays
rooted to the same spot as I check the bathroom, her backpack, still
on her back, her bed, the nightstand, even on the porch…

When
I come back inside Linnie still stands in the same spot, staring at
her wrist. Her voice sounds dreamy as she says, “It was a
little tight on my wrist, and it pinched a bit, I felt it the whole
time…the whole time until the moment I looked down.”

“
No
one knew about it,” I repeat. “Maybe it fell off while we
were dancing…” Even though I said it, I know that
there’s no way that Albert would give me a ‘save-me
button’ watch with a faulty clasp.

“
No.
You don’t get it!” Tears form under my sister’s
eyes as she says, “The moment I looked down at my wrist, I felt
the pinching release. I’m not imagining things…”

For
the third time I repeat, “No one knew about it.” But, I’m
not convincing anyone. I open my wallet, wanting to make sure we have
the baht handy to get a taxi and ferry ticket, but I pause. “My
credit card is gone too,” I whisper. “All the baht is
there, but my credit card disappeared; what kind of thief does that?”
I had my credit card tucked into the same spot the whole trip; not
using it once fearing that if I used it my dad and Albert would be
able to track me…

A
rattling like gunshots hits the roof in a sudden and continuous
burst. We hear someone scream and I jump for Linnie.

“
Rain,
it’s rain!” Linnie says as I try to tackle her to the
ground. I spin and see that, yes, there is a torrent of rain
streaming over our closed windows. And sure enough the screams stop
and someone starts shouting a, ‘woo hoo,’ sound instead.

Linnie
and I make our way to the door and stand on our little porch. The
rain comes down a wall of impenetrable grey, cascading from the roof
above our little patio. A crack of lightning illuminates the night
and we see people running for their rooms. A roll of thunder drums
around us the moment the lightning disappears.

“
That’s
close,” Linnie whispers. And then the lightning and thunder
overlap each other and I can see the strikes above us and in all
directions. The wall of water shifts from vertical to almost
completely horizontal in an instant, and within a second, Linnie and
I and our backpacks are completely drenched.

We
retreat into our bungalow, soaked and dripping.

“
Oh
my God, it’s like a hurricane, or a tropical cyclone or
something!” Linnie says loudly, speaking over the banging on
our roof. “That happened so fast.”

We
open a window pointing away from the wind, and watch the cracks of
lightning dance across the sky as the water whistles past.

“
I
think these storms pass quickly,” I say, but in that same
moment I’m trudging through what I can remember of the Ars
Goetia in my mind, and I know one of them had control of storms. I
close my eyes, concentrate, and surprisingly, I find what I fear
logged away in my memory: Count Furfur, great Earl of Hell, conjures
tempests, hurricanes and cyclones; he shoots lightning from his eyes
while thunder rumbles from his mouth... And when I look, I can almost
imagine I see a shadow, as the lightning ripples across the clouds,
bigger than a bird, floating among the storm clouds.

“
Linnie…”
I say as absolute terror wells up inside of me, “We’re
such idiots, thinking that they don’t know I’m here,”
I whisper, “They know. They brought me here, and, they’re
not going to let me call for help. And they are definitely not going
to let me leave...”

“
You
are correct
,”
Says an unfamiliar man’s voice from behind us.

Linnie
screams as I spin around. Our bungalow’s door opened, water
streaming in from the hole, but no one is there.

“
The
taxis will crash…”
I spin again, because the voice comes now behind us, from the open
window. No one is there. As I slam the window, shut and lock it, the
voice comes again, from the direction of our bathroom.

“
The
ferries will sink…”

I
run to slam the bathroom door, though no one is inside. Linnie curls
into a ball on the floor, covering her ears and screaming.

I
run and shut the front door, locking it with the dead bolt and a
chain.

As
I turn, the window I just locked slowly slides open above Linnie’s
head. At the same moment, I feel water splash up my back and I turn
to see the door opening.

“
Get
under the bed, Linnie!” I shout as I grab the door handle and
yank it closed, but I don’t think she hears me over her own
shrieks.

“
The
more you try to leave this island
…”
whispers the voice, directly into my ear.

I
elbow back but hit only air and almost lose my balance. “Where
are you?” I scream.

“…
the
more people will die.”
the voice whispers into my other ear, “
Starting
with her
.”

I
hear a thwack, and Linnie’s shriek silences. There’s a
skittering sound and a giant spider dashes away from where my sister
lies unconscious on the floor. It scurries out of the bungalow door.
All the doors and windows slam shut.

Day
Thirteen

A
knock at our bungalow door shocks my eyes open; making me aware of
the fact that I must have fallen asleep. My hand still rests against
Linnie’s lower chest, where I had been measuring her breaths
with my palm. I wait for her chest to rise and fall before I pull my
hand away from her.

The
knock sounds again, my heart jumps making my stomach clench in a
queasy way.

Last
night, after checking that Linnie was still alive and laboriously
moving her to the bed, I had tried to wake her for hours.

Shouting.

Screaming.

Begging.

Nothing
.

As
I had predicted, the storm had passed quickly and abruptly. The sun
had risen well before I grew too tired to continue screaming Linnie’s
name. No one had complained or come to check on us, though I could
only imagine the noises that I had been making.

In
unison, every muscle in my face constricts like a boa wrapped around
my cranium, producing a headache that threatens to split my head in
two.

The
knock comes again, but fainter, more muffled; and I realize that
whoever was knocking gave up on me and moved to the next bungalow, as
I hear a door open and someone shout, “Oi, it’s that man!
Do you have any news on the ferries, then?” Says a guy’s
(somewhere from the UK) accented voice.

I
can barely hear the response so I climb off the bed to open the
window a crack; I can’t see the people talking from my vantage
point, but I can hear them.

A
Thai-sounding man’s voice continues, “…very sorry
to tell you that they are still not running, too much damage. They
say that they will have at least one ferry running by tomorrow. The
police ask that no more people go to the dock, they have closed it
off and the crowd there is very big and very angry.”

A
woman’s replies, breathily irate, “Are any boats taking
passengers, then?”

“
Some
cargo boats and fishing boats survived the storm but too many
passengers tried to board them, the police stopped all boats now. The
police will tell people when the harbor opens. I am very sorry.”

“
Thank
you, please, update us if you learn anything... we’ll pay you.
Here you go, for now,” says the UK man. Then a soft ‘snick’
of the door closing, and after a couple seconds there’s another
knock, further away. I close the window, lock it, and return to
Linnie. I hold a hand above her mouth, feeling her breath whistle
across my fingers.

After
a few breaths, I grab her shoulders and say, “Linnie. Linnie…”
over and over again, until the throbbing in my head threatens to
expel my eyes.

I
cover my face with my hands, rubbing my forehead. I haven’t
eaten or drank anything in who knows how long and I’m so
exhausted that only the fierce stabbing pain in my forehead stops me
from passing out again.

If
I was back home, I’d call the police, or an ambulance, heck,
I’d carry her to the hospital if I needed to; but here, on this
island with a powerful magician and twenty-seven greater demons, in a
foreign country where we don’t speak the language, I have
absolutely no idea what to do. Also, I have the distinct feeling that
what that giant spider did to Linnie can’t be cured in the
Urgent Care. Not even mentioning the fact that now I have no credit
card or proof of medical insurance for Linnie, I probably don’t
have enough to even check her into the hospital.

And,
I know I can’t contact Stephen; now that I know that my
bleached hair fooled no one, I can only hope that Stephen wasn’t
sighted with me thus far.

“
I
need help,” I whisper, to no one. “Somebody help me.”

With
a ‘wham,’ the front door crashes open, falling until it
only hangs from the chain that used-to secure it. Three men calmly
stand in front of the hole that was my door. Their sunglasses make
seeing their eyes impossible; however I can still tell that they’re
looking at me. They wear suits, and white webbing inks every inch of
their exposed skin, contrasting with their caramel-tone skin,
including their fingers and faces. One man carries a large black
plastic bag draped over his arm; I’ve seen enough crime shows
to know you never want your attacker to be carrying large plastic
bags with them.

Goons,
I presume?
The first one presses his shoe down on the door that swings in front
of the opening, snapping the chain that tethered it. And they enter.

Maybe
if I wasn’t so startled, maybe if I didn’t have the
headache from the infernal place of my origin, maybe if I just wasn’t
so tired, I could jump up and fight them off, or threaten them—or
at least make a witty, pithy remark; as it is, I just sort of sit
there, grabbing onto Linnie, glaring. Of all the demonic powers to be
damned with, ‘visions of the future’ kind of blows; why
couldn’t I have gained death-ray-eyes, cat-like-reflexes or, I
don’t know, spider-webs-shooting-arms (—not very
original, I know).

I
manage to get myself between Linnie and two of the goons, but the
other one walks around the bed. They’re the biggest Thai guys
I’ve seen yet, not quite the girth an American goon might
manage, but they look perfectly capable of overpowering me and my
unconscious sister.

“
Good
morning, Raven Smith,” the goon closest to me says (I guess
even goons can be polite?).

“
What
did you do to her?” I ask, “Is she dying? A giant
spider…”

“
No,
she’s safe, only unconscious; I am not permitted to give you
details,” responds the Polite goon. “Please, get up, get
dressed, you’re coming with us.” He uses the articulation
of a person who has learned English as a second language and uses it
too properly, better than a native speaker.

“
Is
that a request?” I snap, about as pithy as I can manage.