House of Forbiddens [COMPLETE NOVEL]

9: My Parents Attempt Homicide

Kaden

Bom! Ba ba bom! Ba ba, bom bom bom, ba ba ba, bom bom bom, ba ba ba, bom! Ba ba bom! Ba ba, bom bom, ba ba ba...

I layed in bed, staring groggily at my spazzed out phone as it blasted the Star Wars theme song right in my ear. Typically, I turned off my phone or put it in silent when I went to bed, but with all of the chaos of what is now yesterday (seeing as it is the early morning), I must have forgotten. Blurry-eyed, I rose my head from the squishy Tinkerbell pillow (NOT the movies, the books!), and answered the phone.

"Kaden!" I recognized Christine's voice immediately. She spoke in short gasps, as if she were in pain.

I was immediately awake. "Christine, what's wrong?"

"Come, quick! Please!"

Christine

It was just your average afternoon. After confronting Ares at a gun show with all my new demigod friends and discovering that the goddess of discord wanted me and pretty much the rest of the world obliterated, I went home, ate dinner, did homework... you know, the usual.

For the past two days, now, I have come home from this mythological chaos to a calm home life, and both times I've felt like Alice coming out of the looking glass. It's just a completely different reality.

Now, I'd already known that I was the daughter of Selene. I had been claimed before, but that's another story. Then there's the matter of my parents who obviously aren't my parents: When I was little, I'd tried to tell them about the things I saw, but they just thought I was making things up, dismissed it as a child's imagination. So, eventually, I gave up. I still don't know how they've come to raise me, but I don't question it. Why should I? Nothing alarming has happened with them... Until, of course, they tried to kill me.

After I finally finished my homework, it was pretty late, so I promptly passed out. After what only felt like seconds later, I was awakened abruptly by my dad standing at the foot of my bed, smiling, and my mom holding a knife to my chest, poised to plummet into my heart.

I screamed and tried to get away from the knife, all while a million questions were running through my mind. The impact as I hit the ground shattered me, and there was a sharp pain in my side. I raised my hand to my stomach, and felt the warm, thick blood as it streamed past my fingers and onto the floor.

"She'll bleed out soon enough, let's leave while we can," I heard my dad say. Then I heard two pairs of footsteps leave the room, and suddenly I was all alone, my life flowing out of a stab wound just below my rib cage.

Audrey

I was actually asleep, and enjoying it, when Kaden barged into my room. But when she told me what had happened, I was up instantly. We woke up the rest of the household, grabbed our gear, and in a mere few minutes we were all loaded in the big white van we use when there's simply too many of us to take in one car (We call that precious mode of transportation: The Chariot. Great name, isn't it? We're considering painting blue flames on the sides.).

The minutes before we reached her house were agonizing, and interrupted by moments of sheer terror when Mr. Kaden's-Dad would swerve at a high speed to make the right turn across the empty streets illuminated by lamps towering over the asphalt. When there's an emergency, you can count on anyone to be a scary driver.

Before we had come to a halt, the doors were sliding open, and we were dashing out. The front door was locked, so Ian broke the handle with the pommel of his sword, and we came flooding into the house.

In the years we had lived together and worked together, we had become so accustomed to each other that it was as if we could read each other's thoughts. Tonight was no exception, and we all spread out into different avenues of the house until Riley yelled from upstairs, "Over here!"

When I arrived in her room, Jack was already there. He's the son of Apollo, so of course he understands a little about healing, more than most of us, at least, but his real talent is with a bow. Kaden sat with her legs folded under her, her hands cupping Christine's face. Kaden is probably the most nurturing person I know, and if I were in Christine's place, I would want Kaden right beside me the whole time.

Then my eyes fell directly on Christine. I had seen a lot of stab wounds in my time, but this... this was bad. She was paler than a ghost, her face and even her lips white as printer paper. The white, almost grey, complexion contrasted sharply with her hair, dark as the night sky. Thick, crimson blood seemed to envelope her entire abdomen so that I had no idea where the wound was, and the blood pooled around her, too. It was staining Kaden and Jack's jeans.

I think that was what made me turn away. That wound wasn't just meant to hurt Christine, it was meant to hurt all of us.

My feet propelled me out of the room and all the way down the stairs. I could no longer listen to Jack telling people what to do and Kaden whispering calming words to the almost-dead. I could no longer watch the blood absorb into the carpet, could no longer watch it rub onto my friends.

Why must people like us be hunted? Why must there always be a war, a conflict? Why must so many of us die? Riley once told me that "pain and suffering is the soil of strength and courage," but it seems like pain and suffering is only planting more pain and suffering.

I went through the house, out the back door, and into the yard. Being in the fresh, night air with the moon and the stars looking down at me, as if to say, "It's going to be okay," was serine, and eased my mind.

My knees seemed to give way, and I laid down in the grass, brushing the tips of the plants with the palm of my hands, enjoying the feeling, when an idea came to me, as quickly as the lightning.

I stood up, now excited, and, sure enough, there were tracks! Slight ones, across the grass, but they were the newest ones, I could tell. Two sets of footprints, going straight across the lawn. And the bushes by the fence were slightly ruffled, and there were more stray leaves at its base than the others. It was a combination of many little things, but it was something.

I ran back into the house and up the stairs.

"We need Will," Ian filled in for me.

Will was Jack's twin brother. He went to Camp Half-Blood, where I couldn't go, and where Jack had chosen not to go because of me (I know, isn't that sweet?!), and because his poison would act up. Will, unlike Jack, is an amazing healer, and the only person in Camp Half-Blood that we trust. We know about them, but they don't know about us, and we'd like to keep it that way.

I nodded. "There's tracks in the backyard. Christine won't be able to tell us who did it for a while, but if we leave now we might be able to catch them. I can take Ian and Riley, but the rest of you are needed here," I spoke quickly, eager to go.

"What?" Jack pulled his bag over his shoulder and looked at me, he looked hurt.

I sighed, aggravated. "If this isn't a dead end, then we need to leave now."

"Then go," Mr. Kaden's-Dad said, "It's the right move. Meet as back at our house."

"Great!" I gave Jack, Kaden, and Mr. Kaden's-Dad a quick hug, then turned to Ian and Riley. "Ready?"

They both shrugged and said in unision, "Sure," then gave each other a weird look. The two of them were complete opposites, and yet, strangely, very similar.

As we scrambled down the stairs to chase our white rabbit, I realized that I had some blood on my jacket.

By: Elizabeth Pallan