The 13th Child
an excerpt

I. Slip of Time

“Dion! Dion wake up,” Stefan called.
I jerked awake, panting and trembling as a cold sweat prickled at my back. Stefan's arms wrapped around me and I held him tight as if my life depended on keeping my grip. The nightmares were getting worse. If they were just plain old nightmares I'd roll over and go back to sleep. Unfortunately, nothing was that easy with me.
“You okay?” Stefan asked.
I pulled away and managed a nod. “I guess,” I said.
Stefan was my older brother and the only family I had. 5 year my senior he had been taking care of me since I was 13. 13 was a special year for our people. Some come into their power and others get burned at the stake. Guess which one I was. I still had the scars on my back and chest. Living proof that lighter fluid is indeed combustible when met with a lit cigarette. Sometimes those completely benign nightmares were the ones that woke me. Tonight was not one of those more pleasant nights.
“Did you see something?” Stefan asked when the trembling had stopped.
“I heard them. They said I couldn't keep running, and they would find me,” I looked up at Stefan. “They're right you know. One of these days they'll catch up,” I said.
I didn't tell Stefan what they had shown me. The memory sent a chill down my spine. They were carving him up like a side of beef. He was alive and screaming with each chunk of flesh they took. The message was clear enough. If they caught me, Stefan would end up dead on the butcher's block after a nice slow death. If I went back on my own, they'd leave him be.
Three years had passed since Stef had kept me from being burned alive, but our last escape had been dangerously close.
“Shut up,” Stefan said and gave me a brotherly shove. “No one's gonna find us. At least for the moment.”
His black hair reflected blue as the motel light as it flashed on and off through the curtains. Next door the sounds of someone getting one hell of a ride came through the thin walls. The car and cheap motels had been our home for almost 4 years. Occasionally we found rat hole apartments to stay in for a few months, but never very long. We'd find jobs, save up cash, and move again. He did it all for me and until these nightmares started just after my 16th birthday, I had been content to let him. Most of this year I had been debating whether to keep letting him protect me. I would be 17 in just a few weeks. I wasn't a kid anymore.
Stefan grinned suddenly and motioned to the wall where all the sound was coming from. “I hope he gives her a tip. That's the best fake orgasm I've heard all week.”
Penny Sweet lived in the kitchenette next door. She was a cute little red head who did tricks on the side when she wasn't dancing. She sent most everything she earned to her parents who were raising her daughter in Nebraska. She only did tricks when her father was in the hospital so she could send them extra money. The past week she'd been doing two a night, as well as doing several private dances.
Stefan liked Penny. He really liked her. They had never had sex or, as far as I know, ever even kissed, but the attraction was there and mutual. I'd heard him once, when he thought I wasn't around as he watched Penny accept a future 'date'. He had muttered about, if he had a real job and made real money he'd like to take her away. It had gotten me thinking what his life would be like without me in it to drag him down. Would he, right now, be with Penny and maybe her daughter too, in a nice little apartment, playing house and enjoying a good life?
“I gotta get ready for work,” I said and got up out of bed to hit the shower.
“Are you okay, Dion?” Stefan asked. “Did you see something you aren't telling me about?”
I forced a small smile and pulled fresh clothes from my gym bag under the bed. “I'm fine. Relax, would you?”
“If you see something, you tell me. Right away,” Stefan said.
“Yeah, sure. I haven't had a Slip in weeks. I'm good Stef,” I glanced at the alarm clock between our two beds. It read 2:45 am. “I gotta go. I don't even have time to shower. I'll see you back here later, okay?”
Stefan nodded watching me through those skeptical blue eyes of his. I didn't give him the chance to question me further. Throwing on some clothes I washed up and headed out the door.
I worked at Mama's Oven, a little bakery a half dozen blocks away. I was going to be late, but thankfully, Mrs. Lutz was a nice older woman and usually just had me stay later. I worked hard, which made people more forgiving of occasional mistakes.
Rounding the corner to the bakery, I came to a dead stop as lights flickered around the plaza where the bakery sat between a pet store and craft shop. Cops were everywhere. I moved closer unable to tell which store was buzzing with activity and more than a little worried it was the bakery.
“Dion! Oh Dion, thank God!” Mrs. Lutz shouted from the crowd.
The plump little woman broke from the crowd and I braced myself for her embrace. If I was careful, I could touch people besides Stefan without having to worry about Slipping.
Mrs. Lutz grabbed me in her strong arms and gave me a crushing hug. “Oh God, I thought it was you.”
“Huh?” I said and pat her back, feeling a little awkward.
“This is him!” Mrs. Lutz shouted to one of the police officers.
“What? What'd I do?” I asked pulling away from her. “What happened?”
A police officer in a cheap suit came forward. “Are you Dion Fletcher?” The cop asked.
“Uh, yeah,” I said looking up at him a little worried. “What happened? Am I in trouble or something?”
Mrs. Lutz patted my arm, mopping away her tears. “Oh no dear. We thought it was you.”
“Thought what was me?”
“There's a body in my shop,” Mrs. Lutz said.
“A BODY?” I gasped. “As in dead?”
The cop smiled at Mrs. Lutz. “Why don't you let Officer Gibbons take you home, Mrs. Lutz?”
Before she could say a word, a uniformed officer gently moved between us and led her away.
The cop smiled at me. “Hello, Dion. I'm Detective Louis Matthews. Mrs. Lutz told us you were supposed to be opening the bakery this morning.”
“Uh, yeah. I usually do, but I lost track of time and was running a little late.”
“You live close by?”
I nodded. “Down at Christy's Motel a few blocks away.”
“You walked here?”
“Yeah. I walk everyday. Who's the dead guy?” I asked.
“We don't know yet. Mrs. Lutz thought it might be you. I'm told you have keys to the bakery.”
I nodded and pulled them from my pocket to show him. “How else would I open the shop?”
“And you've been working here only 3 months?” The detective said looking me over with a skeptical look.
“Yeah. Look, I work hard I don't touch any money. I'm just a baker. That's it. The only money I handle is my paycheck.”
“What made you say that?” Detective Matthews asked.
“You!” I said. “You're looking at me like I did something. It's a bakery, Dude. I'm like the fat dunkin doughnuts guy, 'Time to make the Doughnuts'. Nothing more. We don't open to the public for hours yet.”
“Do you know anyone else with keys to the Bakery?”
I thought about it a moment. “I don't know. Mrs. Lutz, maybe Jorge?”
“Jorge, what?”
“Uh... Jorge Montoya, I think. He works late sometimes. I don't usually work with him much. I work 3-11, he works 11-7.” I turned as a gurney was wheeled out past me. The people pushing the thing hit a bump and a charred arm plopped out.
I jumped back, my hand reaching unconsciously for the visible burn scar on my neck. He had been burned, like they had tried to do me. I felt the warmth drain from my face and took a step back.
“Are you okay, Kid?” Detective Matthews asked.
“Burned? He was burned?” I asked in a weak voice. I heard the rumble of Stefan's Cutlass and turned to watch Stefan pull up.
“Looks like it. Hey, Kid, are you okay?” Matthews asked.
I jumped as he touched my shoulder and felt my head start to spin. “Oh no, not now,” I whispered pulling away from him.
I grabbed my head and light flashed behind my eyes, followed by a throbbing pain as the Slide began.
Reality slid away, and someone caught me before I fell. I squeezed my eyes shut as everything began to spin.
“I got you, Dion,” I heard Stefan say, but his voice was so far away, like I was hearing it from down a long muffled hall.
I grabbed onto my brother tight and buried my head into his shoulder as the spinning stopped and I was somewhen and somewhere else.
The sewers.
A long dark tunnel spread out in front of me and I could see Stefan walking slowly through knee deep water. Rats squeaked, their calls echoing off the walls. A glow stick hung from Stefan's neck his pistol in hand as he crept toward a branch in the tunnels leading right and left. The glowstick made his face look a ghastly green.
“Sewer tunnels,” I whispered to him. “You take the right branch. Rats are everywhere. Water to your knees.”
I watched as he continued down the right branch. There was a blood hand print on the wall and a painted pink fingernail embedded in a crack.
“A bloody hand print and a pink finger nail in a wall, like it was broke off. Hot pink nail polish. Voices further down. My voice, I think, but others too. The water's getting shallow. To the right there's an access tunnel, you take it.”
The vision continued as Stefan walked into the access passage way, the water was gone. Stefan finds me kneeling in the middle of the passage fire all around but it's blue, not yellow or white.
“You find me in the access tunnel. I'm just kneeling there, waiting for you. Fire, blue fire is around me. I smile at you... I'm not me.”
Something dark and cold flowed over the motion picture like vision blocking out everything to see. It hit me as if aimed straight at my brain behind my eyes. Pain danced through my skull like a hard cold icicle was stabbed into my eyes. The vision shattered and blood ran from my nose.
“I'm not me,” I whispered and all went black.
#
#
#
“I said, he'll be all right. Back off!” I heard Stefan shout. “He has migraines, that's all.”
Stefan had me on the ground laying against him. Detective Matthews and a couple of paramedics hovered around us. I was trembling, my head throbbing with blinding pain. Stefan dabbed blood from my nose. I moaned and grabbed my skull, trying to squeeze out the pain. It didn't work.
“You okay?” Matthews asked.
I winced at the blinding lights still flickering from cop cars a short distance away. “My head hurts. The lights.”
“Come on,” Stefan said. “I'll take you to the room. It's nice and dark there.”
Stefan helped me to my feet and I felt my stomach twist. My head felt like an explosion went off as the blood rushed from my head, leaving me dizzy.
“Are you gonna be sick?” Stefan asked.
I didn't speak, but lurched behind the car and heaved my guts up as Stefan kept me relatively upright and pulled my dark hair from my face. Now that was a brother there, someone to hold you up and pull your hair back while you puked your guts out.
I laid my head against the cool trunk of the car wishing the throbbing in my head would stop.
“Come on, Dion. Let's get you back,” Stefan whispered and helped me into the car.
I let him help me into the car and he took me to our room, helped me undress and put me to bed. I hated needing a caretaker worse than I hated having to have a protector, but I loved Stefan. Loved him for everything he did and all the shit he put up with.
The room was dark and quiet as tomb. I huddled around my pillowed and downed the Tylenol and water he gave me. He washed the last of the blood from my face and let me have a cool, damp cloth for me head.
“A bad one,” I said, closing my eyes. “They caught me looking.”
“Just rest and recover. You can talk later, you'll just make things worse if you try to tell me about it now.”
“I didn't mean to Slip. That cop... he pulled it right out of me.... Damn it hurts. Sorry Stef. I didn't mean--.”
“Shut up and go to sleep.”
I smiled into the dark and slept.
#
#
#
A knock at the door woke me. The night hadn't been a good one. Nightmares, headache and nausea hit me with a triple blow, leaving me exhausted and weak and still in pain. Stefan sat with me the whole night, dumping my puke bucket and soothing away the dreams.
I buried my head under the pillow, trying to dull all sound. My head throbbed like something was trying to hammer its way out. Stefan had already doped me up with stuff a lot more powerful than Tylenol but my body burned through stuff quicker than most. Then again, I'm not sure if you can call witches human, so maybe that had something to do with it.
“Stefan Fletcher, Right?” A voice at the door asked. “I'm Detective Matthews. We met at the Bakery last night.”
I heard Stefan grunt. “Yeah, I saw you. What do you want?”
“How's your brother?”
“His migraines last a couple of days. He just needs rest.”
“Have you taken him to a doctor?”
“Sure,” Stefan said sarcasm dripping from his voice. “I can just afford to call off work, pay an expensive doctor to tell me what I already know, to prescribe equally expensive meds that don't work. We live in a motel room, Detective, what do you think?”
I might have laughed, if I had left better. I needed to go to the bathroom, but didn't want to move. Movement caused pain and pain caused nausea. I had to keep something down eventually.
“Can I come in?”
“No,” Stefan said.
A long silence followed that.
“You two have parents?”
“Nope. They're dead,” Stefan said.
“I'm sorry to hear that.”
“I'm not. What do you want, Detective?”
I couldn't stand it any more. I moved slowly and pulled the pillow off my head. I winced as light shined in from outside. I felt like a vampire. The light hurt.
“What are you doing, Dion? You shouldn't be moving,” Stefan told me.
“Bathroom.... The light, Stef,” I whispered. I moved slowly trying to ease myself out of bed.
“Hold on. Don't move yet,” Stefan told me. “Well, come in I guess. I can't have the door open right now.”
A few seconds later the door closed and blackness reigned again. Stefan helped me up and took me to the bathroom. I did my business and he brought me back to bed. Propped up against the pillows, he went to fetch me some more pain killers and pulled a bottle of water from the mini fridge of our kitchenette room.
“What is that?” Detective Matthews asked.
Stef returned and put a few pills in my hands and opened the bottle for me. “Let's play the don't ask, don't tell game, okay, Detective. Or I can tell you they are simple aspirin and you can pretend to believe me.” Stefan handed me a package of saltines. “Try to eat a few, it'll help keep the pills down.”
I felt Detective Matthews eyes on me, taking in the burn scars on my chest. “You might be cute Detective, but you aren't really my type.”
Stefan frowned at the Detective and threw a blanket over me.
I ate a few crackers and downed the pills with some water.
“I talked to Mrs. Lutz. She seemed to think you were special,” Detective Matthews said. “Said you had a talent for knowing things.”
“Me?” I asked. “No, you have the wrong brother. Ask Stefan. He knows things.”
I smiled at Stefan and my brother took the Detective in a long moment. “What do you want to know, Detective? You wanna know if your partners baby is yours? Or maybe you're wondering if your wife knows about your affair? Calling your wife Lucy in bed last week, was a really bad move. Do you think she didn't notice?”
I watched the blood drain from Matthews' face and smiled. I liked to watch Stefan work. When he was really pissed, he could have grown men reduced to blubbering sacks of snot and tears. My brother's talent was to play with emotions and he knew things. I don't know how, he just did.
The talent was limited to the person he was working on and drew on what they knew, not what they thought they knew. Like, he couldn't tell the Detective who murdered someone unless the Detective himself knew this to be a fact by having actually committed the crime. He was like a natural truth detector. Lucky for me, he couldn't work his magic on me. I had enough problems without Stefan knowing my every truth. It was a two way street too. I never got a Slip of the future by touching him, nor could I make myself. It always had to be triggered by another.
“Who told you that?” Matthews asked.
Stefan smiled. “You did.... All those women, a shame they don't get you really off. All that work to prove to yourself you aren't gay, but you're dying to try it just once. You like my brother, sorry, he's too young for you, and he's more into women than men. What do you want to KNOW Detective? You may not like the answers you're given. People always say they want to know the truth, but they like their illusions much better.”
Matthews stepped back toward the door. “I think I should leave.”
Stefan smiled again. “Come back any time.”
Smiling I rolled over, putting my back to the door so the light wouldn't hurt my head, I went to sleep.