Chapter 19 #2
I don’t want to be seen. I am invisible.
Repeating that wish in a prayer-like mantra, I retreated from the group of prisoners, carefully stepping around the soldier focused on the flickering flames and billowing smoke.
He didn’t react whatsoever as I moved past him.
My pace quickened as I realized it was working.
Faster. I jogged, still chanting inside my head, tense and sweating, fearful at any second I’d be noticed.
But no one yelled, and soon I was out of sight of the crash, the soldiers, everyone. I’d gotten away, but now what?
Cedric wiggled. “Put me down.”
I set him on the ground, murmuring, “Now what?”
“We find somewhere we can regroup and plan our next move.”
Which turned out to be a seedy motel. Since we had no money, I became invisible again, reaching over the motel’s check-in counter, barely daring to breathe as I grabbed a key from the pegboard. The clerk never once looked my way, riveted on his television show.
With key in hand, I headed to the indicated room, trembling and exhausted despite my four-day nap. Using my magic so soon took a toll on my still-recovering body.
“I need food,” I muttered as I opened the motel room door to see a very basic space. A faded tile floor, dingy walls in need of paint, a bed with a mattress that sagged in the middle, a beast-sized television from the nineties.
“I’ll go and try to score us some cash,” Cedric stated. “Will you be okay here for a few hours on your own?”
“Yeah.” I hoped. Given the weakness quivering my limbs, I probably wouldn’t last more than a few seconds if I had to fight. But, with Valefor dead, maybe nothing hunted me anymore and I could relax.
“Open the window for me,” Cedric demanded. “That way I can get in and out easily if I need to make a few trips.”
The window didn’t want to open initially, no matter how I heaved, so I used a bit of magic and poof. With how easily I repaired it, I suddenly had the option of a new career as a handywoman in case this whole save-the-elves thing didn’t work out.
Cedric leapt from the window to the neon sign missing a few letters, to the roof of a car, then the ground. Would he have the same ease returning? Guess we’d find out.
I spent the time he was gone napping. I slept a solid six hours, according to Cedric, who sat by the pillow and stared at me. A jarring sight to wake to.
“Geezus, way to act creepy,” I grumbled as I rolled out of bed.
“Some people find it comforting to have a familiar face greeting them after suffering trauma.”
“Not when it looks like you’re trying to suck out my soul.”
“As if I’d want it.”
“How did the money quest go?” I asked, rubbing the sleep from my face.
“Well, thank you. I even brought you back a snack.” He pawed a small paper bag by my side, and I opened it find a sandwich.
“Did you steal someone’s lunch?”
“Yes.”
Maybe that was why it tasted like the best sandwich ever!
Or it could have been because I’d not eaten in four days.
Whatever, I devoured it and then felt energetic enough to take a tepid shower in the rusted tub.
Rather than put back on the hospital scrubs the military had dressed me in, wrapped in the towel, I flopped on the bed face first.
“Don’t tell me you’re going to nap again,” an annoyed Cedric grumbled.
“I’m still tired.” And sad. And overwhelmed.
“More like hungry and in need of movement to rid yourself of the sluggishness. While it is tempting to retreat into depression, given you are mourning the death of the elf, you don’t have time to wallow.”
“If I want to mope in bed and cry, I will.” It hurt to think I’d failed him.
“Oh no you aren’t. We have to get moving.”
“Why? We’re in Moscow, and I thought we’d agreed it wasn’t a big deal if I took a day or two to sightsee.” Not that I really wanted to play tourist anymore.
“That was before the military you escaped put out a statement demanding anyone with information of your whereabouts to contact them.”
“What?” I sat up and stared at Cedric. “Those fuckers.”
“Surely you didn’t think they’d let you just walk away. Not only were you a witness to a wildly improbable monster attack but the other passengers made it clear you were very much involved. The story being pushed out to the public blames you for the incident, citing terrorism.”
“That claim won’t stand up for long once the witnesses are released and start talking, not to mention the videos likely already posted.” These days, at the first sign of danger, people tended to whip out their phones.
“One, what makes you think the passengers will ever be set free? And while I haven’t been able to check due to a lack of thumbs, I would assume those that did manage to upload anything have already had it scrubbed.
The Russians are quite adept at controlling what they allow their people to see on the internet. ”
“Surely they can’t keep the passengers imprisoned indefinitely?”
Cedric replied with a snort.
“How are the military explaining the goblins and their giant bug god?”
“For one, no one knows about them, as they’ve cordoned off the area.
And two, part of your supposed terrorist act included spilling chemicals, which necessitated medical intervention and led to casualties amongst the passengers as well as vivid hallucinations.
” So even if the witnesses talked, no one would believe them.
“Damn. They’ve got an excuse for everything.” I rolled to my butt and sat up. “How bad is the artist sketch they’ve given the public to identify me?”
“Why draw when there are several actual images of you? Some taken from the scene with background details removed. Another of you lying in the hospital bed. And since you were wearing your belt bag with your driver’s license, they also know your name.”
“Just fucking great,” I grumbled. “Guess it’s a good thing the hotel clerk never saw me.”
“He didn’t, but you did drop the invisibility cloak after we escaped and we walked in the open for many blocks before we checked in.”
“What you’re saying is a woman in scrubs and barefoot would have been noticed.” I collapsed back onto the flat pillow. “Guess I won’t be doing any sightseeing.”
“Afraid not.”
“What am I supposed to do now?”
“Continue our quest.”
“How? Misha never did tell us where his people hid.”
“I had time to think about that while you slept. The spirit within you would know where it was stolen from. Perhaps if you tapped into it, it would guide you to its former home.”
“An interesting idea only how do I tap”—I did finger quotes—“the entity into coughing up coordinates.”
“You could start by asking.”
“Isn’t talking to myself one of the first signs of insanity?”
“In your case, you did technically absorb another personality.”
“Not helping,” I snorted. “Guess it’s worth a try. But let’s say it does give me a direction, how are we travelling?”
“Car.”
“You say that like it will be easy and cheap to buy one.”
“Who says we’re buying?”
“Cedric, we can’t steal someone’s wheels,” I exclaimed.
“I don’t see as we have a choice. You can’t exactly walk into a rental place. Between your lack of identification and your face being plastered on the news, you’d get ratted out in a second.”
He made sense, but still… “I don’t know how to hotwire a car.”
“Why would you when I’ll just confiscate some keys?”
“From who?”
“One of the drunks currently slumped in a bar.”
“Who won’t notice it gone likely until he sobers up and returns in the morning to drive it,” I mused aloud. Cedric’s idea had some promise. I glanced down at my towel-wrapped body. “I’m going to need clothes, too.”
“There is a shop with secondhand garments across the street that’s open for another hour. You’ll have to make yourself invisible, though, to grab some garments.”
Dressing myself proved easier than expected, although I did feel sorry for the woman running the till who saw clothes moving on the racks and being removed and completely freaked out.
She exited the shop screaming, and when I exited, fully garbed, Cedric mentioned she ran up the street claiming her store was haunted.
Oops.
Still holding the I’m-not-here magic in place, we moved away from that area, just in case someone took the woman seriously. Cedric knew of a few bars in the area, and we soon found our ride with the keys tucked in the visor, as if the owner wanted his car stolen.
Once I sat in the driver’s seat, the dilemma hit. Which direction should I go? Cedric made it sound so easy. Just ask the spirit inside me. Because we totally chatted all the time.
Still, I had to try. I closed my eyes and pushed a thought. Hey, spirit inside me. We need to find your home. Care to give me a clue?
No reply. Not surprising.
Come on. You know we lost Misha, and without him, we don’t know where to go.
Nada.
I sighed as I opened my eyes and then squeaked because a goddamn butterfly floated in front of me.