Ninovan (Hypernaturals 10)

No Remorse

Angel went back at the two for details. "I do not recall my life from then. Too young. I do not have this totem thing you speak of. You tracked me: Tell me about my early life."

"They found you in an alley. New Orleans police officer said you were curled up asleep against a dead man's body. Neither of you had any identity papers. He appeared to be Native American, in that he had dark hair, darker than Caucasian skin, and he wore very odd clothes. Clothes that looked like they came from donated clothes: ill-fitting, did not match, out of season, not that men's clothing has many fashion cycles. The kind I see when I am at work. You were only a baby. They guessed a few months old. The Catholic church took you in and found you a foster home. You were there until you turned five. They had other children, and they were afraid of you because you always knew what they were up to, and you told on them. They set upon you and beat you to a pulp, and the foster parents returned you to the church to find you a new home. They gave the reason of the other children, but the people that knew you and knew what you could do thought you told them something that scared them too. Maybe you said one was having an affair, or maybe you said that one did not love the other, or who knows? You read souls already. That you were an Astral was obvious to us."

The oldest sister stared off into the past it seemed from where I am. "That started a series of homes until you learned to stop talking about what you knew about other people. You can read a person like a book, and until you learned to stop talking about what you knew, you scared people. People dislike that much exposure. We think a reason the Astral's seclude themselves is not only how the world affects them, but how they affect the world. The way your step-siblings attacked you is proof."

"When I was ten, my foster family moved to Galveston. My dad got a new job at the port. I was with them until I turned eighteen. They were by far my most stable family. It is as you say: I learned not to talk about what I could see and feel about other people. I assume you all followed me there at some point. I did not meet Andrea for years after that, but I was trying to work my way through school. My parents had no money to send me. They were my only real mom and dad: They took me in and loved me because that is the kind of people they are."

The former Priestess smiled slightly, it seemed. "Yes. Well, it took a great deal of work on Pierre to move and take Andrea to your family's new home, and then later it took even more work on Andrea to get him to break up with his boyfriend in Galveston and make a move on you. Pierre demanded that he stop seeing his lover, and he mostly did. He worked him in on the side. That was Andrea's gift; He could make that poor fellow accept being relegated to the role of lover on the side. I am sure he told his lover that it was all temporary, and then he would be free and they could be together. You were working at the strip club by then, and that made it easier for Andrea to walk in and introduce himself."

When I sent Andrea away, it never occurred to me he might have someone in Galveston. Maybe not that guy from a decade and a half ago, as Andrea lived alone, but he might have been serious about someone. I'll never know. I Juiced him, made him forget, and told him to leave and never come back.

"He was, as you say, beautiful. I have never seen a prettier man. I felt weird things about him at first that I could not understand. It all makes sense now. I somehow turned off my gift because I wanted that beauty in my life. Damn stupid." I could see the head shake and hear Angel berating herself.

"Well, honey, you did not have a Vampire girlfriend back then. If you had not fallen for Andrea, we were ready to take you. Once Andrea decided to go through with it, he could see his lover, get a glow on, and then work on YOU. It worked. You fell. He kept his lover for a while. It was far better that way: Pierre was all set up to take you, in case Andrea did not do what was needed. You are lucky he found his path via his lover. Pierre possessed all the things required to restrain and impregnate you, had it come to that. With some of his underage girlfriends, it required Pierre to use such means. Andrea did not want to have sex with you because you are a woman. Pierre did not because you are a GROWN woman. Since Andrea was the gifted one, the breeding plan preferred it to be him. Had you not fallen for Andrea as you did, you would have been strapped down and impregnated that way instead if need be. This way you were free, raised your child, and never knew before now how close you came to that fate."