The Affliction Read online

  If they resorted to tracking our scent, then they really couldn’t see us. Were we invisible? I thought with a thrill. Of all the superpowers I had wished I possessed when I was younger, invisibility was a pretty good one to have just then.

  I wanted to talk to Gabriel, but I understood that he must have used an immense amount of concentration and skill to achieve our undetectable status. I also acquired the urge to tell him to move faster when a frightening prospect occurred to me. Invisibility can’t relieve us of our scent, just our visual appearance, I thought. But as I watched the creatures with noses bent to the ground, I recognized their identical looks of confusion and frustration. They did not draw nearer to us and indeed crossed the track back and forth and around in circles like hounds unable to pick up a scent they had lost.

  I was now in complete awe of Gabriel, who continued to carry me safely away, apparently invisible and somehow leaving no trail to pursue. Finally, we reached the edge of the parking lot, and as he stepped onto the strip of grass that lined the sidewalk, he broke into a jog and crossed the street, heading for the refuge of the forest on the opposite side. The last glimpse I stole of our hunters was the sight of them running off in the complete opposite direction.

  After Gabriel ran about fifty yards into the forest, I made him stop and put me down.

  “I can run with you,” I said, and he looked at me dubiously, so I started off without him.

  “Wait, you don’t know where you’re going” he called, trying to remain quiet.

  “Okay, then I’ll follow you,” I replied stubbornly.

  He gazed at me, decided not to say anything, and we ran further into the woods.

  It was even darker in the midst of the thickly clustered trees, and the night’s rain had left everything damp, but we ran uninhibited, free. I could not see a path, but he seemed to know where he was headed, never hesitating to leap over fallen logs or scramble up steep hillsides. I still wore the same clothes I had changed into after the shower at my mother’s, and as we hurried through the trees, the wet leaves and weeds lashing out at us gave me a cold shower. I shivered involuntarily when we passed through a soaking wet patch of ferns, which left my bare legs slippery with moisture.

  He kept looking back at me as though he expected me not to be there, which I supposed was a reasonable assumption since we ran at a speed most humans wouldn’t achieve or maintain. It felt amazing to run with him, though. I didn’t need to pretend I was slow or tired and I even had to work to keep up with him.

  Finally, we broke out of the confines of the trees into a clearing, where a softly hissing, large green tank suggested we had emerged onto a gas well road. Gabriel headed for a midnight blue hatchback with rusted fenders and a dent in the passenger side door, and procured keys from his jeans pocket.

  “I thought superheroes were supposed to have super cool cars,” I said as he stopped and looked at me in amazement.

  “What was that?” he asked me, ignoring my jibe at his car.

  “What was what?” I asked, confused.

  “How did you keep up with me?” He demanded, throwing his arms out to the side.

  “I don’t know, I’ve always been able to run fast,” I explained.

  “You’re not even tired.”

  “Neither are you,” I pointed out.

  “No, but I’m…” he didn’t finish.

  “You’re what? An angel? A superhero?”

  “Ugh, never mind. I’m not an angel or a superhero.” He relaxed and walked to the passenger’s side of the car. “And what, you don’t like my ride?” he asked jokingly.

  “Well whatever you are, I would’ve expected like a Ferrari or a Lamborghini or something,” I replied as he opened the door and motioned for me to get in. He shut my door and then jogged around to the driver’s side and hopped into the duct-taped leather seat beside me.

  “The idea here is not to stand out,” he said as he turned the key in the ignition. “This old girl fits in just fine around here.”

  “Won’t we need something a little faster, though?” I asked. “I think speed is usually helpful when it comes to a getaway.”

  “Put on your seat belt.” He laughed and threw the car into reverse. “One, I’m a pretty good driver.” He spun around backward, so we faced the drive that apparently led out to the main road. “Two, this car has had some major modifications.” Then we flew down the narrow dirt path as he shifted through the gears and my shock soon turned into exhilaration. I loved speed.

  I could see the main road ahead, but he didn’t slow down much. I grabbed the handle on the door, and he drifted onto the pavement, fishtailing slightly. He grinned over at me once he straightened the car out, probably to see if he had sufficiently scared me. He didn’t. I just laughed and told him to go faster, and he obliged.

  Eventually I processed the fact that our route traveled south away from Ellenville and as I processed that, a horrible feeling grew inside of me and my vision blacked out for a few seconds.

  “No, we can’t go this way!” I shouted. He looked at me, puzzled.

  “The only other way is back through Ellenville, and unless you want to meet up with your friends, I don’t think that’s a good way to go.”

  “No,” I disagreed stubbornly, “we really can’t go this way.”

  “Why not?” He said, frustrated.

  “I don’t know. I just have this feeling something awful is gonna happen if we keep going,” I said hesitantly, in danger of sounding like a lunatic. Gabriel considered that.

  “You have a feeling?” he asked, glancing over at me with an unrecognizable expression on his face.

  “Um, yeah…my intuition tends to be correct. Like all the time,” I emphasized. Then he muttered something, and I heard a hint of revelation in his voice, but I couldn’t decipher what exactly he had said. He slammed on the brakes, and spun the car around in the opposite direction, accelerating back towards Ellenville, to my relief.

  He whispered under his breath, as though talking to himself, words such as “impossible” and “makes sense” occasionally decipherable. And he kept glancing over at me, ogling me as though I were some animal on display in a zoo. He appeared to concentrate again, so I was afraid to say anything to him. He just continued to mutter, shook his head, looked out the window, and looked at me.

  As we soon reached the edges of Ellenville, Gabriel tensed, as though waiting for a bolt of lightning to strike us. I knew we were in no danger there, and sure enough, we passed quickly through without a confrontation. After my “feeling” had proved to be true, he seemed to reach a conclusion.

  “Your last name’s Lander?” he asked.

  “Yes,” I answered, not sure what my surname had to do with anything.

  “That can’t be right. Not if…you’re sure your dad’s last name is Lander?”

  “No. That’s my mom’s name, her maiden name.”

  “Oh!” He said excitedly. “Then what’s your dad’s last name?” I didn’t want to answer that question. I had never told very many people that I didn’t know my father.

  “I…I don’t know.” I breathed, looking out the window. “I don’t know who my dad is. My mom doesn’t even know.”

  “Oh,” he said again, with much less excitement. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude, I’m just trying to figure out how this is all possible.”

  “How what is possible?” I asked. “What doesn’t make sense to you?”

  “Aubrie, you are…special,” he said cautiously. I didn’t know whether to laugh or take offense. I threw him an exasperated look, but he just seemed relieved. “Nathaniel is going to take back everything he said.”

  “Could you maybe please explain to me what’s going on?” I finally snapped, tired of not knowing anything. I must have expressed an appropriate look of annoyance on my face because he broke down and decided to talk to me.

  “Okay. You need to know, just let me make some arrangements,” Gabriel said while he pulled out his phone. He spoke quick
ly and seemingly had plans already worked out in his head.

  “Isaac, I need you in Aurora, half an hour…Yes, I’m with her…Isaac, stop, she’s one of us! No, I don’t know, just be there…I know, that’s where I’m taking her, the elders need to see her…yeah…bye.” My heart raced as I listened to one side of the conversation.

  “What do you mean I’m one of you? Where are we going? What…” I would have continued to run with the questions, but he interrupted me.

  “Aubrie, it’s okay, you’re safe now. We’re going back to your apartment. I told you I would explain what’s going on; you’re just going to have to be patient…this is kind of difficult.” I inhaled deeply, and then let it all out in a huff.

  “Okay, sorry, I’m just getting a little frustrated with all of this. Everyone keeps talking so cryptically; I have no idea what anything means and I’m a little freaked out because I’m pretty sure you made us invisible back there, and I don’t know why I’m even saying that because it’s not possible. And I didn’t ask for any of this.”

  I felt somewhat relieved when I finished my rant. Gabriel reached over and gently squeezed my hand, and at his unexpected touch, my heart fluttered wildly, and my insides felt suddenly constricted. I could not believe what I felt; I denied it, and I ignored it.

  “Aubrie, I know you didn’t ask for this, and probably don’t want it, but it’s pretty much inevitable. You were born into it.” He looked at me as though he searched for my encouragement.

  “All right, well then I guess I’ll just have to deal with it.”

  “Are you sure you’re ready to know?”

  “Yes,” I breathed.

  And hence, Gabriel’s revelations marked the beginning of my awakening.

  Chapter 10

  We talked the whole way to my house, which we reached in record time. He allowed me to ask the questions and tried to answer them as best as he could. As he poured out the mysterious unknown, I realized that I had been somewhat wrong when I predicted that the ordeal would change my life. Beyond changing my life, Gabriel’s disclosures restarted it.

  “So what am I one of?” I asked.

  Gabriel took a deep breath and paused for a few seconds, as though trying to organize in his mind just how he planned to explain it to me. Finally, he said, “You’re a member of The Mystic, Aubrie. We’re hunters, a society of people with extraordinary talents and abilities we use to seek out and destroy the Davos.” He glanced at me to see if I followed and politely added, “You have to see a Davo to understand, but know that they’re pure evil.”

  I just nodded, committed to let him articulate as much as he could while I attempted to absorb it all.

  “I’m just not one hundred percent sure how you’re a Mystic. Having these gifts is genetic and strictly hereditary, passing down from one generation to the next. Your mom’s not one of us, so your dad must have been. I’m just trying to figure out who he could be. Generally, Mystics don’t have one night stands and leave the resultant kids to grow up as outsiders.”

  “Well, according to what you’re saying, someone must have. Lucky me,” I added sarcastically.

  “Yeah, I guess so. I’m pretty sure it has to be someone in the Black Shadow.”

  “Umm, what’s the Black Shadow?”

  “Ugh, right, sorry. It’s so weird you don’t know anything. Guess I’ll start from the beginning, then. Our legends say we were brought into this world with the purpose of maintaining the peace and order of the earth, by combating the Davos. For hundreds of years, we sought them out and destroyed them. Over the years we started to develop more advanced abilities that allowed us to find and kill them easier. We have become so skilled that the Davos are now what you would call an endangered species.”

  “So, that’s a good thing right?” I asked, wondering what any of this had to do with me.

  “Well yes, it is. Fewer monsters preying on humans. But since there’s been less of a need, our numbers have been dwindling, too. It seems God or nature is maintaining the balance, and very few Mystic kids have been born in the past thirty years. Around that same time, a group of Mystics started turning. They thought we were wasting our talents trying to save the world all the time and felt that they could use their power more often than rounding up the last of the Davos, so they broke off and formed the Black Shadow. They’ve been causing havoc for us ever since and now we have to spend most of our time and energy trying to keep them from destroying the world as we know it. So yeah, that pretty much sums it up, I think.”

  Even at this point, the background Gabriel explained was a major information overload. I managed to follow along though and caught on to what he suggested.

  “So you think my dad was one of them then, one of the rebels?” I asked.

  “He must have been, and I think I have an idea of who it is, if we assume your dad is from this area. Plus, he will have the same calling as you,” he said, “I’m just trying to grasp that you might be who I think you are.

  “Wait, hold on a sec,” I said, lost again. “What is a calling? And what do you mean by who you think I am?”

  “Well, everyone’s born into a calling, and that’s always hereditary, too. I believe you’re already familiar with a couple. For instance, I’m a Guardian, and Cyrus is an Exterminator. Each member of The Mystic possesses a certain set of abilities in one of six areas, which are the different callings.”

  “So what are the other four?” I asked curiously, wondering where I fit into the scheme, and not missing the fact that he had evaded my second question.

  “Silencers, Shamans, Informers, and Sages.” He looked at me as he said the last and I understood the meaning in his expression.

  “You think I’m a Sage.” I didn’t ask, I confirmed, because I thought that it must be a joke, and I couldn’t keep the sarcasm out of my voice.

  “I know you are.”

  “Sorry, I’m not buying it. I don’t see the future.”

  “No. But you can feel things that are going to happen, can’t you? You can see things nobody else does?” I thought about that for a minute.

  “Oh. I see what this is about and you’re wrong. It’s called intuition, and normal human beings have it if nobody’s told you.”

  “Intuition, huh?”

  “Yes, that and nothing more.”

  “So pure human intuition matched you evenly against a deadly Silencer? Dahlia’s no joke, Aubrie, she would effortlessly kill any normal human. And just intuition is what got us safely away from Ellenville? How do you explain being able to keep up with me? And seeing things that aren’t there?”

  “Fighting against Dahlia was just pure luck. She wasn’t expecting me to resist her the first time and the second time, you showed up.”

  “She was only distracted for a couple of seconds…”

  “I knew she would be before she looked away,” I interrupted.

  “See, exactly. An outsider wouldn’t have known that.”

  “Intuition,” I said stubbornly, turning my head to look out the window. I could not believe that I was what he said I was. I was Aubrie Lander. I wasn’t special or made for something more than the mundane life I had previously lived. I’m not Harry Potter, I thought. A giant is not about to rescue me from my current pathetic excuse for a life by delivering a message that I am indeed a wizard.

  Yet, there I sat, blinking out into the avocado blur, knowing that a similar revelation awaited me, but it would not sink in.

  “All right, let’s try a different route. I can bet that you didn’t fit in at school, am I right? You didn’t have friends, right?”

  “Cara was my friend,” I said defensively.

  “Ah, yes, and look where being her friend brought you…right to us.”

  “Coincidence. And anyway, if that were the case, then Adam would have realized what I am, if I’m anything at all, because he’s one of you, am I right?” I threw back at him.

  “Yeah. But you never revealed your strange so-called intuition or strength to
Adam, did you?”

  “Well, no. I usually prefer for people to think I’m not insane.”

  “See. It wasn’t just by chance that the one person you befriended fell in love with one of us; for those of us in The Mystic, hardly anything is coincidence, and such is true in your case.”

  If it was a joke, then he was the best actor I’d ever seen, and despite my reservations, I began to give in, as he stared unrelentingly at me with those bottomless cyan eyes. Sometimes blue, gray, or green, mostly always somewhere in between, and they took my breath away.

  “All right, so maybe Cara and I were supposed to be friends. But what does my lack of social skills have to do with any of this?” He chuckled at that, and I caught myself noticing how adorable he was when he laughed. And then just as quickly averted my eyes.

  Just the day before I had still been wholly obsessed with the death of Michael, the one whom I believed I had loved. I realized now that whatever feelings I had harbored for Michael, they had not been true love; however, I still struggled to let him go. I acknowledged that I was not prepared to start falling for someone else and honestly did not want to be involved with anyone, not even the ironically angelic Gabriel.

  “Believe me; it was not a lack of skills, but rather an excess of them. You and me, our kind, we don’t belong with ordinary people. It was probably excruciating for you to have to live with them.”

  Things started to add up and everything I had ever felt suddenly made sense to me. The way I didn’t fit in with anyone, how I couldn’t classify myself, my inability to identify with the trivial teenage drama, and above all else, the feeling that I moved through life with a completely different perspective from everyone else.

  I mentally time traveled back through the events in my life, and finally knew the reason behind it all. Images of my childhood and high school flashed before me, but as I watched my life a second time through, it seemed as though I had impaired vision the first time. Gabriel’s soft voice woke me out of my musings, and I saw in a different light.

  “You are one of us, Aubrie…I can see you know that now.” I turned my head slowly to look at him, mouth slightly agape.