Banners created by WickedPleasures ©2002 Please, contact for usage restrictions.

Featured Artist (s)
Submission Rules
Artist of the Month
Get the AOM Award          AOM Archives

Site Updates
Sign the Guestbook
View the Guestbook
FAQ
Feedback, Insults and Slander
Site Awards

Back to Main

[ The Indentured - Forward ] [ Welcome - Prose ] [ Parting ] [ The WereCat's Tale ] [ Chapter 1 ] [ Chapter 2  ] [ Chapter 3 ] [ Chapter 4 ] [ Chapter 5  ] [ Chapter 6  ] [  WereCat's Directory  ]

Chapter 5

***Cards On The Table***

She looked up at him. "What's your name?" "Does that matter?" he asked. "It might later. Don't worry, I'm not stalling." She was however, just beginning a plan of sorts, one that just might get a message home. It was 'slightly' un-ethical, far from her usual style, but it was looking like there wasn't a chance of a quick escape and she had to get a message home. What good did her ethics do her if the rest of her group was still at risk? It wouldn't be nearly as quick as she would like, but it was all she could think of as yet. She asked again. "What's your full name?" He shrugged slightly, as if to suggest it didn't make a difference to the end result. "O. K." He smiled. She liked his smile. At least it wouldn't be unpleasant to do what she would have to. "David Andrew Rand," he mad a small gesture, as if to tip a nonexistent hat, "At your service." "Alright, David. You need what information." At his frown, she tried to reassure him. "I just need to know where to start. You want to know how I know how to use that thing?" "The Enhancer? Yes, That's a good start" He leaned back with his arms folded across his chest waiting. She reached for the teapot and topped off her cup. She took a drink, and a deep breath. "I told you I'm half English." She waited till his _expression confirmed he remembered the comment. "Well, my mother is my English half. She was born and raised in London. That's nothing unusual or uncommon, I know. Her family originally came from Inverness, Scotland." She was a little surprised to see him lean forward. He was more than just casually listening now. He was almost straining, eager to hear what came next. What in her dozen words or so had so caught him up? She looked at him, about to ask him.

"Nothing. Don't worry." He shook his head, but he was still giving her that feeling that she had somehow said something very important. "Go on, your mother's family came from Scotland. Still with some apprehension she went on. "Yes... my mother's family came from Inverness. My uncle was able to trace the family line all the way back to the clan tartan." She stopped here for a moment, not sure how to continue. She cocked her head to one side and looked at him for a second longer, looking for the right words. A sudden horrid thought occurred to her. Almost in a panic she asked, "You are human, right? I mean, with what you've said about the way they take people from worlds that they consider less advanced, you wouldn't have to be, but are you?" Gods! Please let him be from home. If he wasn't, her plan would do her absolutely no good. There would be no way to warn her family, her friends, and her circle. "Where are you from?" 'Oh, great', he thought. 'She's going off the deep end.' "Calm down..." he got up and went over to where she sat and put his hands on her shoulders. "It's alright." Damn! He really thought she was going to make it. Inverness and everything. She should have been O. K. She shrugged him off and stood up. "I'm not nutz!" She was almost screaming. She heard herself, stopped, took a deep breath and more calmly continued. "I'm not nuts. Don't treat me as if I am." She outwardly shook off her fear. If he was from home (and she prayed to the gods he was), him thinking she'd gone 'round the bend' would only make her plan that much harder. The "Pointed- Ear" squad might even figure her worthless as a nut case and she'd do the people at home oh so much good as a corpse. She took a slow, deep, quiet breath. "Look...I'm just a little jumpy. That's all" she lied. "If you are from home, it means I don't need to go into so much detail on some things." Well, that much was true... as far as it went. "Are you from home?" He still looked somewhat concerned, but nodded. "Denver, Colorado. We were camping in the mountains when they took me." "You said thirteen, right?" Again he nodded. "How much do you know about Scottish history? Do you have any knowledge of Inverness?" He reached up to finger the knot work medallion that hung from the chain mail choker absently, " a little." Now he was lying and she knew it, but didn't say anything.

"Oooooh Kay." She stretched out her hands and slowly paced as she spoke. "Now, in the current history, Christianity is everywhere. It is so wide spread at times people forget that there are older belief systems. What is now Inverness was once the seat of one of these older belief systems. My family is full of 'gifted' people... Tarot readers, healers, clairvoyants. A wide assortment of what the main stream called crackpots. They were actually followers of this older belief. They knew how to tap into the energy that flows around and through everything." She paused a moment for drama or simply to prepare herself for the expected reaction, either abject disbelief or ridicule. She sighed, "Inverness was, and still is to a certain degree, the seat of the pagan faith. The home of the wiccan belief. I come from a wiccan family history. I am a witch and when they took me it was from the midst of my ritual circle. Only by the grace of the gods and whatever positive energies watch over people like me, had my family, my coven, and my friends, all gone on to their homes. In my foolish desire for privacy, I returned to cast my majick alone." She went back over to sit down and hide behind her cup of tea, not even looking at him.

"You're a witch?" She heard the question in his voice and answered without looking up. "Yes, that's how I knew how to use that 'thing'. I have been focusing energy in the same way for as long as I can remember." Finally, she set down the cup to look at him and judge his reaction. His back was to her. He just stood there, his head down, arms hanging limply at his sides as if he just lost an argument with his mother. Slowly, his head came up, but as yet he didn't turn around. "What was the spell?" That wasn't expected. "What spell?" "The spell you were casting when they took you." He turned around slowly to face her and wait for the answer. "Oh. It was a spell for a new beginning." She shook her head, sort of laughing. "In my eagerness to change the pattern of my life it never occurred to me to specify what 'new beginning' meant. I was just tired of the way my life was going." She shrugged and thought of how often she'd done that of late. "This..." she looked up and waved to include everything around them, "was nothing I could have expected, so I never thought to safe guard myself from the possibility. There's always a lesson in life experiences. This one may be to 'expect the unexpected'"

"Will your group search for you?" It was a simple question, but it rather surprised her. He entirely skipped the reaction she was so used to, accepted what she told him and moved on to the next question. "I don't know how much luck they'll have... we would normally track each with our pentagrams. The gemstones set in them were cut from the same natural crystal. It sort of joins them and us. Your pointy-eared friends took mine I guess. That, and my locket of family pictures, were both missing when I first woke up here. They may be able to figure out I'm no longer on the planet. That, simply because they wont be able to track the charm to anywhere home. Don't tell me you're afraid of a small town coven of mismatched solitary practitioners?!" She laughed. She couldn't help it. This was a culture far advanced technologically. An interstellar ship that cruised the galaxy hunting living cargo for trade in an indenture market, and he wants to know if they will come looking for her?!

He walked back to his chair and practically fell into it. He set his elbows on the table and leaned down, running his head and hair through his fingers before he looked back at her and let his arms fall on in front of him, seemingly at a complete loss. He let out his breath in one long rush before taking another. "If they're anything like you? Working in a group... there might be... repercussions let's say". She laughed. "Don't worry about that." Poor kid sounded like he was expecting flashy, special effects magic al'a David Copperfield, or maybe that 'Charmed' television show. "Even working in a group, we had limits. Mostly it was sort of like playing with... the odds would be a good way of putting it. We could give 'chance' a little push in the right direction to get the result we wanted." She gave a half giggle, half snort. Thinking to tease him a little, she told him "if you're going to worry about that, I probably shouldn't even mention the darker allied sorcerers that know me well" She expected him to realize she was teasing, maybe that he'd be a little nervous. But the outright terror...? "What?!!!" He was like some bloody yo-yo, up down, up down. At least this time he slammed his thighs against the table so she didn't feel such a klutz for the time she did. He began pacing. "Sorcerers? What exactly do you mean 'sorcerers'?" Oh, he looked absolutely horrified. "Calm down!" Couldn't he take a joke? Just a little teasing? "They're just two of them." "That's enough." He was taking this way too seriously. "What... exactly did you mean by 'darker allied sorcerers'?" "Would you relax? Please? They're just friends... sort of" He just gave her a look that said he wasn't buying it. "Really! O. K. They have a very different set of ethics, far more of an 'end justifies the means' attitude than me, or any of my regular group. They're very chaotic. Not evil, just more concerned most days with their own needs and desires than the effect attaining what they want will have on other people." He still wasn't satisfied. It wasn't difficult to figure out. His body language screamed it.

Very calmly, very distinctly, he drug out every word as he finally asked what it was he really wanted to know. "Are-they-majick-users?" "Fine! Yes!" She was beginning to get fed up. "So What?" "How do they feel about you? Do they care for you? This is important." He had reached out and taken her by the arm. Oh, this was quit enough. She rotated her arm around the way she had been taught, breaking his grip. She got up, smoothly this time, and walked up to face him. She was tall for a woman, but he was just a little taller. She looked up at him, her eyes flashed. She was so close her breasts were practically brushing his vest. If she had known what her eyes now looked like, she might have taken even more advantage. Even without knowing, what she did was enough to cause him to take a half step back. "That is none of your business!" He had no doubt she was bordering on furious. "I was trying to tease you. I never expected you to take me seriously." she turned her back to him and walked a few steps away from him before looking over her shoulder to tell him "chill!" "Will they come looking for you?" He was talking as if trying to deal with a 'slow' child. "How?!" She looked at the ceiling for divine intervention, then back at him. "You're the one who said we're on a star cruiser" She turned and walked away to begin her own pacing in frustration. "That may not matter to them." He ran his hand through his hair. "Will they look for you?" "Gods! You’re like a dog with a bone!" She glared at him. He stood his ground this time. "Oh, fine then. I don't know. Maybe." She shook her head. "It would depend on their mood. I doubt they'd work together. Like I said, they're very chaotic. One minute they want one thing. The next, they want something entirely different." She thought a moment longer. "They enjoy my company. They respect intelligence and talent. Honestly, I don't know. Neither of them wants to admit to anything. I care for them, but I've never been absolutely sure that they didn't think of me as a very valuable tool. Coming after me would depend on their mood at the time." He still wasn't finished. "They don't love you? You're sure?" "No, I'm not sure. Listen to what I'm telling you... I have no clue what they really feel about me. Neither will admit anything, but I don't believe so. Get off it already!" "I'm sorry." Finally, it looked like he was done. "It's just that, depending on how much value they put on you, a majick user without ethics could be very dangerous. I can't help you prepare for something that I don't know may happen." He sighed and sat down again. He made a motion to suggest she join him. Her arms folded across her chest, she was stubborn a moment or two longer just to make him sweat. Shit! There was that infectious smile again. What the hell was it about young men that made her want to strangle them with her bare hands one moment and giggle her self silly the next. She must be getting old.

"Anything else?" He asked, still smiling. He had pushed her about as far as he was willing to. It was just that risking her anger, with or without the Enhancer, was far safer than dealing with a dark mage who felt he was protecting what was his. "No. Other than that," she informed him. "I'm quite average. I've shown you my hand. Now it's your turn to 'come across'" She would have giggled over the inadvertent play on words considering what she planned, but then he might begin to suspect her sanity so she just covered it with a hic-up. "Fair enough." He made squinchy faces for a second while he straightened out his thoughts. O.K. Sometimes he did behave like an eighteen-year-old male. He took a breath as if to start, but she held him off. "One moment." She reached out and began to arrange things on the table. She kept aside the teapot, sugar, and what passed for milk. The little plate of lemon wedges and both water glasses were pushed to the center of the table. She pointed to the collection and told him, "I want to trade that in." "What???" "I want to trade that in." She told him again, "for a pack of cigarettes, lighter and ash tray" "It's not the same as the real thing", he warned. "No nicotine...it tastes and smokes the same, but it won't help a 'nic-fit''. "Humor me." She sounded casually bored. He nodded, looked up and said whatever it was that got the job done because a moment later an ashtray, lighter and the wrong cigarettes appeared. "Ultra-lights if you would, please." He cocked an eyebrow. "Please?" She requested again. The correction was made. She pulled two from the pack and flipped them over before pulling a third out to light. She took a long, slow drag. "That's better," she exhaled the smoke and tapped the cigarette on the side of the ash tray, more out of habit than any need. He shook his head at her. "Don't even get on that soap box. You said yourself there's no nicotine." He just looked at her. "It also gives me something to do with my hands... you were saying?" "I... a... yes, I was saying." Good, he was off balance. For an eighteen year old he was very poised and too sure of himself by far. If she could keep him just a little less sure, she could keep a bit more control. Keep him just a bit in awe and he might give a bit more than he intended. She knew she'd take more than she would be offered. "Yes, my turn." She watched him give a mental and physical shake to clear his head. 'Oh, yeah' she thought. She wasn't used to looking as she did now, but a few things were universal. She leaned forward, one elbow on the table, the cigarette held in that hand. The other arm resting on the table, her breasts resting on her arm as she made sure her body language lead him in the direction she wanted. It also gave him an excellent view of cleavage. She took another drag of the cigarette, this time making sure to moisten her lips first. She mentally smiled as she watched his eyes go from her breasts to her lips. She set the cigarette to her mouth, puckered her lips and slowly sucked. His reaction was priceless. Oh, Goddess. This is going to be fun. He got up and started pacing. She smiled while his back was turned. So she wouldn't get any farther with her plans now, but that was fine. She knew what she needed to. He wasn't going to be hard to seduce. She felt only a small prickle of guilt over what she had in mind. He was so much younger than she was...and she wouldn't have his permission. Mental battles sucked, but she had no choice. She had to get a message to her coven. Damn! That was it. She'd seduce him and while his conscious mind was busy with what she was doing with his body, she'd slip a suggestion into his subconscious, a message to be delivered to her sister once he made it back to Earth.

InternetUnderground
GothicUnderworld.com
SinfulGothic.com
Gothic.net
Immortelle.org
GothFox.com
Vampress.net
GothicSluts.com
GothicRose.com
Shattered-Roses.org
DigitalDarkness.net
DarkLinks.com
DarkArena.com
UrbanChillers.com
Death'N Dementia.com
LifeIsHell.de
A Darker Shade of Bleaux
Dark Dream Dolls
7Deadly.com
DarkDesires
GothWorks.com
Goth.net
SubKultures.net
MagicWave
NightRose.com
AmIEvil.com

Want to add your site? Contact WickedPleasures.