Bless the Child (27 page)

Y
ou will do as I say!” Ghania demanded harshly. Her eyes flashed angrily; she did not like to be defied.

“No,” Cody said, shaking her head vehemently. She bit her lip and backed away, trying desperately to link up with Mim in her mind. If she only had the button with her . . .

“You will do as I say, or I will make you sleep with Malikali again tonight. In the dark. All alone.”

Cody’s mouth was a grim line of resistance, but it quivered at the mention of the great snake Cold and terrifying, not slimy as she’d thought he’d be, but something much worse . . . cold as death and strong enough to keep you from breathing, when he squeezed you. Even though Ghania had left the snake caged beside her bed,
that
night of punishment had been the worst of all the many punishments. Lying there, too scared to move, or breathe, hearing it slither and stretch itself against the bars . . . Less certainly, she shook her head no again and pressed backward, but the wall was behind her and there was no place left to go. The little girl shrank in the corner as the huge woman held out the horrid drink, one more time.

“Makes me sick,” Cody said softly, trying hard not to cry. “Makes me throw up.” The smell of blood emanated from the frothy liquid in the cup, blood and something much worse. Cody had known from the first sip that she must never, never drink this concoction.

Ghania cursed audibly, a mean hissing sound. She laid the cup on the table with a disgruntled snort, and grabbed the little girl’s arm in a grip of steel. Cody cried out at the shocking pain of the unexpected wrench. Without another word, Ghania dragged her from the room, down the nursery stairs, bumping and thudding hurtfully, as Cody’s small body twisted and flailed, trying to get its balance. The little legs scrambled to keep up, but Ghania barreled through the living quarters beyond the nursery, heedless of Cody’s plight. Down, down the back cellar steps the child was dragged, into pitch blackness.

There were sounds of suffering, somewhere in the darkness.

Ghania yanked the sobbing, terrified child to a halt, and threw a switch that lit the room. Cody tried to focus through her tears. In front of her eyes there were big cages, like the ones at the zoo. She blinked hard, and gasped in shock. The cages were full of animals in agony. Eyes gouged out, bleeding sockets, limbs cut off , desperate dogs and cats and rabbits strapped to torture devices, too horrible for her mind to take in. The child snapped her eyes shut and squeezed back the awfulness.

“Behold, my willful one,” Ghania said triumphantly, pushing her past the animals, to stand before the cages of the naked, suffering men and boys.
“The Screamers!”

Shock opened Cody’s eyes. She saw them hunched and bleeding in their prison cells. Then, she more than saw, she
felt.
Their agony engulfed her like a river of fire. She had never experienced such naked pain.
Everywhere,
in her arms, in her stomach, in her heart. And there was
more
than pain. Torturous emotions raged through her, ravaging, grown-up emotions, too intense to be borne by a child . . .

“No!” she screamed, flailing out with her hands to push away the unbearable anguish. “No! No! No! . . .” echoed off the stone walls in a harrowing staccato . . . shriek after shriek after tortured shriek. Only Ghania’s laughter mingled with the haunted sound of Cody’s sobs.

Ghania dragged the child back to the nursery. The limp rag-doll body that was Cody, let itself be pulled without protest. The pain, that lingered inside her now, was too great for sound to express. It wracked her, crackled inside her, oozing through her meager defenses. She was
one
with it, and it was
everything that mattered.

Wordlessly, Ghania tossed the child onto her bed and left, locking the door behind her.

Cody lay where she’d been thrown, tears running in rivulets down her cheeks; she was unable to move or think or breathe past the pain within. It took her a while to realize that the Treasure-Bear lay beneath her, in the bed. Feebly, she reached for its familiar form, and feeling it, warm beneath her fingers, she pulled it close to her heart, and cried herself toward sleep. She felt herself sliding into a dream . . .

She was in a strange hot place of sweeping sands and oddly shaped buildings. And, she wasn’t a little girl anymore. She was a young woman in an ankle-length white dress with a purple border, hurrying toward a great building, where another woman beckoned her from the steps. She knew the other woman was Mim.

Hurry!” Mim said. “He’s calling for you.”

The two women were ushered into a great chamber, past many soldiers. In the center, a man lay on a magnificent bed with curtains all around it. Everyone in the room was murmuring, but Cody paid no attention to what they were saying, for she could feel the man’s suffering clearly, and she had to help him.

She placed her hands expertly on his head and heart, and saw that Mim was standing at his feet, holding one foot in each of her hands, as the flow of lifeforce began to surge through them both . . . seeking out the agonizing pain that wracked the man’s body, and transmitting it into something bearable. She could feel the energy surging, healing, transforming everything in its path . . . feel the electric warmth . . . feel the reviving life flow.

It was her gift . . . and Mim was teaching her how to use it.

Mim was . . .

Mim was. . .

Now.

Mim was standing in the bedroom of their house, in a nightgown. She looked very, very scared.

Maggie
stood disoriented beside her bed.
Something
had forced her to leap up from a sound sleep, not knowing why. She felt electrified with fear. It raced through her veins as if her blood were molten.

She could
feel
Cody, in every cell.

She was sick.

She was terrified.

She was alone.

T
he morning after Cody’s ordeal dawned clear and bright, just as if nothing unusual had happened. Eric and Ghania had taken her from her room after breakfast; now they walked in a leisurely manner along the carved stone path of the Shakespeare Maze on the estate. Cody had run on ahead of them, and was wandering tentatively between the hedges. She was absolutely terrified of Ghania, now. And very, very confused. Some days the Amah was almost nice to her, and then,
sometimes—
like last night—she was more horrible than the wicked witch in
Snow White.
And there was never any way to know which way she would be . . .never any way to stay safe. Cody’s eyes felt scratchy from all the crying, and a residue of the pain she had touched in the cellar still lingered in her body, making it sensitive and hurtful to the touch. She wished there was somebody to talk to who wasn’t mean.

The maze was very beautiful, but the high thick hedge felt dangerous; she knew if they left her there, she would never find her way out. In this terrible house, anything bad could happen, and no one would save you.

“Is the woman pleasurable for you, Eric?” Ghania asked casually, in a tone far too intimate for a servant. “Do you require that I train her for you in your special needs?”

“She is a consummate bore in conversation, my Amah,” he responded with a sly smile, “but her body is superb and, God knows, she’s willing enough, when it comes to the pleasures of the flesh . . . though unschooled, of course, by our standards. Perhaps, it would be amusing to see if she has hidden talents. The clay is lovely, who knows what you could sculpt from it.”

He walked on silently for a few more steps, then looked at Ghania, with amusement. “Do you ask this for a purpose, my wise one, or do you merely wish to see to my happiness yourself, as in other days.”

Ghania laughed lasciviously. “I am hard to forget, am I not, my young charge?”

“No one ever had a better teacher in the pleasures of the senses, as you well know.”

Ghania chuckled. “The pleasure was mine as well, Eric. You have a lovely body and an imagination as creative as any I have ever trained. But, you are astute in assuming that I ask this question for a purpose. Jenna will make an unlovely sacrifice if she is too far gone into drugs to feel true terror, and she has already served the purpose for which we chose her so carefully. The child is perfect, just as I said she would be.”

Eric nodded complete agreement. “You have certainly worked skillfully with Jenna’s weaknesses, Ghania. Although, I must confess when you told me I must marry her to ensure possession of the child, I had my misgivings.”

“Surely, when saw the body, your pain was somewhat assuaged,” Ghania said wryly. She knew Eric to the bone.

“Nonetheless,” he answered, ignoring the rebuke, “one cannot help but wonder what the Old Ones had in mind when they chose so leaky a vessel.”

“The Old Ones have a notorious sense of humor, Eric,” the woman replied. “You know that the mother of the Chosen One must be chosen, too, and with great care. The Prince had to scan the entire planet in his search, and our opponents of the Light sought to keep her potential hidden from him. It is good that he is a sportsman and enjoys the game. How droll to make her an addict and a prostitute. She must have pissed on the Sacred Flame in the Great Mother’s Temple to deserve such karma.”

Eric smiled acknowledgement; it was apparent he respected Ghania, and just as apparent that he was the master, and she, the trusted retainer.

“I will tutor her in the arts of Eros for you, Eric, if you desire . . . in return for your leave to dispose of her at my discretion. Let us use her death to ward off the mother’s inquiries, should they come too close to the Work. Jenna is the only link between the child and the grandmamma, and when the adoption proceedings are complete, I propose we do away with your
wife
at the same time, in a manner that will allow her to be most useful to us.

“And you perceive that to be
what
, Mother of Guile?”

“If the grandmamma impinges upon our plans in any way, let us devise a death for the girl that will live in her mother’s nightmares for eternity. And let us see to it that only she knows precisely how it took place. Let her try to convince the world, and the world will think her mad. We must make her
fearful,
Eric, and then control her fears . . . as you well know, fear will make her vulnerable on the Inner Planes. She has a strong mind and will, this Maggie O’Connor, and power she does not remember how to use. It will be an entertaining match, I think.”

“She seems impotent enough at the moment,” he said dismissively.

“That can change in an instant. Many a game is lost to overconfidence, Eric. She is the Guardian, do not forget that. She was not chosen for her ineptitude.”

“The child seems sullen today, Ghania,” Eric said, tiring of the subject; he had never enjoyed being shown his own lapses in logic. “Is there some reason for that?”

“I am teaching her about pain, my lord, as I once taught you. And she rebels against the blooded cocktail. She has a formidable spirit for one so young; she defies me, not out of fear, but out of inner strength. I find her a most challenging student as, of course, the Messenger must be. I cannot damage the outer layer, needless to say . . . but we must make certain she is capable of exquisite fear by the time of the sacrifice. The energies generated by the terror of a virgin child are matchless for our purposes.

“We cannot fail in our design this time, Eric. The Master would punish us severely for a failure, when we have come so close. To wait for the stars to be propitious enough to create another child could take a century and I tire of the wait. Crowley failed because he attempted the transubstantiation with a baby whose planets were not precisely those called for in the formula. He lived his remaining years as a powerless fool, because of his blunder.”

Eric shook his head. “We will not fail, Ghania. And you have my leave to do as you will with the girl who thinks herself my wife. But before you dispose of so ravishing of a specimen, my Amah, do let me see what your tutelage can produce.” He reached over casually, and slipped his hand inside Ghania’s dress to fondle her breast; Ghania smiled knowingly. His rampant sexuality was his strength and his shortcoming; she had used it for both over the years. She pushed her djellabah aside to allow him easier access.

Cody turned back and stared at the two grown-ups nervously. Why was the Daddy-man touching Ghania,
there?
And why was he being so nice to her when she was such a bad person? The Daddy-man beckoned her to come toward them, but she held back, repelled by the tableau. He wasn’t a
real
daddy . . . a real daddy would never let somebody do bad, hurtful things to his little girl. Cody turned suddenly and ran down the path as fast as she could . . . but there was no place to run to.