THE LAST SECRET KEEPER Secret Keeper series books 1-4

CHAPTER 34

"Mom! You've got to see this! What do you think of my new game?"

"What am I looking at?" Lanecea turned her attention to Deklan but was still distracted. 

"My base. Here. That's Daddy, and me and that character with the long hair is you. This is where we live," Deklan pointed to his tablet screen but Lanecea was even more distracted now by the picture of "Deklan's dad" - the man built like a terminator.  No one would be foolish enough to mess with that man, even though it was just a game. "And this is where we live."

Lanecea finally looked away from the male character to the building Deklan was pointing to, a German and American flag waving in the wind directly in front of the house. 

"And this is our machine army. Dad is in charge of them. I stationed them against the wall separating our base from the forest."

"That's really cool," Lanecea smiled as she watched the machines rotate before shooting at the bad guys before they had a chance to emerge from the tree line, the dad character patrolling the fence line between his machine army. "Where are you and I though? I don't see us?"

"Oh, well you are at home making sandwiches cus Dad and I are going to get really hungry and you are safest there and I am infiltrating the shapeshifter armies so I'm on the other side of the forest, but when I come back, we have a meeting and that's when I tell you guys all the information I found out and then Dad knows where he needs to set up his machine soldiers. We are a great team, don't you think? And then, when we are making our plans, you can bring us the sandwiches you made."

"That sounds like a good idea. Dad did say that he wants me to focus on being a sandwich maker."

"You're the best sandwich maker."

"Thank you," Lanecea kissed the top of Deklan's head before stepping away from the couch. 

"C'mon Dekkie, I want to go downtown and stop at the cemetery. I won't be long but today is the anniversary of Sarah's death. She died giving birth to her baby girl and they are both buried together. What colour do you think the rose should be?"

"Purple - like your dress," Deklan decided, looking up just long enough to see that his mother was wearing lavender purple.

****

Lanecea reached for Storm's hand, gripping his fingers tight as they watched the horse-drawn casket approach Sarah's final resting place. Sarah was a widow, her husband leaving her pregnant, but fate tends to be cruel, the young woman holding her baby against her heart in death.

Limestone blocks were already set up in a rectangular shape - just large enough for a casket to fit within. The pastor with his starched collar and long, dusty black robe clutched a faded Bible as he watched the pallbearers lower the roughly hewn pine box into its final resting place.

"The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away, blessed be the name of the Lord."

Perhaps it offered some comfort, but Lanecea highly doubted it as she looked over at the few people who had attended the funeral service as the pastor filled out the record.

"Sarah and unknown baby girl. Buried together July 24th."

The young mother hadn't lived among the British settlers long enough for them to learn her surname - not even the pastor.

Storm untangled his hand from Lanecea's death grip, draping his arm around her instead although it was far from cold outside, the man at her side giving her what she needed in that moment as a large rectangular slab of limestone was hoisted into place, the stone overlapping the limestone blocks by at least three inches. Lanecea's thoughts wandered, for a moment, as she thought about worms and other bugs that feasted on corpses. Perhaps this was the way to go, the limestone protecting the body from insects. That's how she would want to be buried, but at some point they stopped making graves like these, laying the dead beneath the ground instead. What had made them change something that was perfectly good? 

A movement to her left distracted her morbid thoughts for a moment as she watched a woman wearing a dress in the same shade of lavender as her own dress approach the grave before laying a long-stemmed, pale purple rose on top of the limestone slab.

Lani gasped as Lanecea looked over at her as though she could see her second soul before slowly turning away, but it wasn't only Lani's body that was looking at her, but the boy at her side who was gazing at Revna before he smiled, causing her stepdaughter to blush.

"I thought...I didn't think it was possible unless the wall between the worlds is thinnest," Lanecea whispered, frowning, but Storm was also distracted as he looked down into Lani's body's eyes. 

"Why wouldn't it?" Storm said at last, unsure if Lanecea could hear him from where she stood on the other side of the veil. "I'm certain she sees you - or even us. Is there something you're not telling me?"

"I was going to..." Lanecea hedged. "Hans found my body and that's where he took me after my shopping trip with Herja. I didn't tell you because we've been so busy and I was also afraid that you would make me go back to my body, just as you've joined with yours. I'm afraid if I do, everything will change - and the children we have together will disappear as well."

Storm could understand Lanecea's fears, after all, their children were everything to her.

"No secrets, My Queen. When we return, I need to speak with Hans. We will find a way to keep our children, but Lani...we can't leave her behind."

Lanecea agreed as she followed Storm toward the fort, the couple looking back over their shoulders at Lani holding Dekkie's hand, her green eyes looking as though they had seen a ghost. It wasn't far off, Lani's second soul grinned as she hurried to catch up with Storm's long legs. 

Everything was going to change now - she could feel it in her soul.