Vanished Read online

  “I guess we’d better get going.”

  “Indeed yes, Empress. If you would be so kind as to follow me…”

  The owlish attendant with her wide, unblinking yellow eyes, led Harper and Shad out of the bathing room and into a long, dark, echoing corridor.

  It had, Harper thought, a distinctly horror-movie type atmosphere. Wordlessly, she reached for Shad’s hand and felt instantly better when their fingers entwined.

  As long as we’re together, we’ll be okay, she thought. And refused to think again of how soon they were going to be parted.

  At last they stopped at a rounded black door with a foggy window set in the center of it.

  “Here is the steam bath which will rid you of impurities, both emotional and physical,” the attendant said. “But first I fear you must undress.”

  “Really?” Harper sighed and told herself it was no use feeling shy. After all, the thin fringes of her green dress didn’t really cover anything and anyway, Shad had just seen everything in the pleasure room. Still, she felt nervous about being absolutely naked, even though the big Kindred at her side was completely bare and didn’t seem to be bothered by it at all.

  “It is the rule,” the attendant said firmly.

  “Well…all right.” Harper fumbled at the back of the collar of the dress and finally managed to unfasten it. She pulled it off and held it in her arms like a shield across her breasts. “Where should I put it?”

  “I will take it for you,” the attendant held out her hand. “All of your personal clothing and accoutrements will be waiting for you at the exit to She Who Alters’s audience chamber.”

  Harper had a sudden thought.

  “Oh—my cloak of thorns! I left it back in the pleasure room!” She felt immediately guilty. Though she had learned by reading on the Interweb that the cloak didn’t have to be fed or given any kind of liquid to live, she still felt like she was neglecting it and wondered if it thought she had abandoned it.

  “I will bring it with your other things, Empress,” the bathing attendant assured her.

  “But you have to be careful—it bites,” Harper told her anxiously. “It hates everyone but me. No one else can even touch it. It even bit Shad—I mean, my bodyguard.” She nodded at the big Kindred who also nodded.

  “True. It has fucking sharp teeth when it wants to.”

  “Have no fear, please Empress,” the attendant spoke serenely. “You are not the first to wear the royal cloth here. We have the necessary tools to handle your cloak of thorns safely. I promise it will be waiting when the Goddess is finished with you.”

  “Well…all right,” Harper said reluctantly. She had removed her shoes back in the pleasure room she was now completely naked and there didn’t seem to be any other excuse to delay. “I guess…guess we’d better get on with it.”

  “Yes, Empress,” the attendant nodded and drew back the rounded door revealing an echoing area of pitch blackness. A puff of strongly scented steam came out and wafted into Harper’s face, making her cough.

  “Wait—you want me to go in there?” She peered into the blackness but couldn’t see a thing. “I’ll trip and kill myself. I can’t see in the dark!”

  “I can.” Shad squeezed her fingers. “I’ll go with you, sweetheart.”

  “Oh, no!” the attendant exclaimed, looking agitated. “Only the one who will stand in the presence of She Who Alters may enter.”

  “I don’t care what you say,” Shad growled. “Anywhere Harper—I mean my Empress—goes, I go.”

  “Oh dear, this is most irregular…” The attendant wrung her hands and even got excited enough to blink once or twice.

  “We paid a lot to be here,” Shad reminded her. “And the social secretary did tell you to give us—to give the Empress—whatever she wants.”

  “Yes…yes, that is true.” The bathing attendant calmed visibly. “Yes, if anything goes wrong, I can always remind her that she told me that. I also documented it, to be certain it is in the permanent record.”

  “See? There you go—it’s in the permanent record,” Harper said soothingly. “So let Shad come in with me, all right? Because I really don’t want to go in there alone.” She looked into the dark, steamy room and shuddered.

  “Very well.” The attendant nodded, still a bit hesitantly, Harper thought. “You may enter—both of you.”

  “Come on, sweetheart.” Pulling her gently by the hand, Shad stepped across the threshold. Reluctantly, Harper followed him.

  The door swung shut behind them, cutting off the last sliver of light. There was a metallic clicking sound, like a loudspeaker, and the attendant’s disembodied voice floated in to them, as though she was speaking over an intercom.

  “Please make yourselves comfortable. I will release the mechanism and open the door once all extraneous impurities and emotions have been sweated out.”

  “Ugh,” Harper muttered. She hated to sweat. Raising her voice she said to Shad, “Can you really see in here?” She shuffled forward in the dark behind him, keeping her free hand out in front of her to stop herself from hitting anything.

  “Not as well as I can in broad daylight but enough to get around.” His deep voice echoed off the walls in a hollow-sounding way that made her think of a tiled area—a bathroom maybe or an indoor swimming pool.

  “What’s in here? What are we supposed to do?” Harper asked, squeezing his hand tighter. The heat from the steamy room was already making her sweat and she didn’t like the feeling of clammy humidity.

  “There are some wooden benches over here,” Shad grunted. “I guess we’re supposed to just sit and perspire.”

  “Well…all right.” Carefully, Harper followed his lead. Once he was seated on a bench, he pulled her down beside him.

  “There. That’s not so bad, right?” he asked, his deep voice low and intimate in her ear.

  “It’s not so good either,” Harper pointed out. “I don’t like being all hot and sweaty and sticky. I might as well go back home to Florida if I wanted that.”

  “You will go back home.” His voice was softer now…suddenly somber. “As soon as She Who Alters is finished with you we’ll reach the end of the loop and you’ll be transported instantly back.”

  “What about you?” Harper had a difficult time speaking the words but somehow she forced them out. “Where…where will you go?”

  Shad shrugged—she could feel the roll of his shoulder against her own in the darkness.

  “I think I’ll go back to my own time. Back to a future where the Hive never blew up the Mother Ship or took over the Earth.”

  “That will be nice,” Harper said but her voice came out flat. She cleared her throat and tried again. “I mean, all your people—your brothers and your friends and parents, they’ll all be back together again, right? All alive and healthy and happy.”

  She told herself that alone was enough reason to be glad they were so close to the end of their quest. So many of Shad’s people had been killed and lost—it was wonderful to think of restoring them.

  “Yes. It will be…perfect. Just as it should be.” His voice was flat too, quiet in the steamy darkness.

  “And I guess by that time I’ll be in my fifties—if I’m still around,” Harper couldn’t help saying.

  “I’ll come to you.” His voice was suddenly hoarse and fierce. “I don’t care about the age difference—I love you, Harper. I’ll find you as soon as I can—as soon as I’m of age.”

  “But you’ll be eighteen and I’ll be something like forty-eight,” she objected. “And that's the best case scenario. What if the time loop puts you back to your time at the age you are now and I'm somewhere in my late fifties or early sixties? I can’t ask you to spend your youth with me when I’ll already be middle aged or older.”

  “I don’t give a damn for any of that.” He put his arms around her and drew her close. “I love you, Harper. I always have. I’ll never stop.”

  “Oh, Shad…” She felt tears rising in her eyes at his im