Weird to be thinking of her future as something she chose, and not something that she was either forced into or did because she had no other options. Three years since the Church had found her, three years since theyd approved her scholarship and shed left the Corey Home, and the idea still hit her sometimes, hard and fast like a pissed-off foster fathers blow to her head and leaving her almost as stunned: She might have an actual future. She would have an actual future, if she managed not to fuck it up.
Jillian pulled a little velvet bag out from under the Warings bed. See? Its aoh, no, just some rings. Huh. Anyway, go ahead and start in the closet, and let me know if you see anything weird or interesting or whatever.
Chess nodded and crossed the dull tan carpet to the walk-in closet. The Warings clothing was about as adventurous as their bedroom. Lots of earth tones and pastels, the colors nervous people wore so they could hide. Everything cut rather loose, so it seemed, but then Chess hadnt really seen how big the Warings were, considering that theyd been chopped into pieces.
Ugh, and she was going through their things. Like some kind of ghoul. Those people were dead, theyd been taken to the City of Eternity below the earth to live forever and theyd never be back, and there she was judging their clothing choices. It would have made her sick if she didnt already knowhad known for yearsthat she was a bad person, a twisted one with filth and darkness in her soul.
She shut her eyes for a second, squeezing the thought from her head, and got back to work. Lots of pictures, boxes and boxes of them. Jewelry boxes, shoes, bags of fabric and craft stuff, a low white box Oh, shit. Jillian.
Yeah?
Come look at this.
Jillian appeared in the doorway, her hair shining beneath the overhead light. Yeah, whatsoh. Wow. Is there a license in there for that stuff?
I dont know, I havent touched it. Should I?
Jillian nodded. Chess reached into the box and lifted the Bible sealed in heavy plastic, the framed sampler embroidered with a quote from same under a large cross, a couple of pictures of Jesus. Shed never seen anything like it beforewell, of course she had, the Church had plenty of artifacts of the old religions in the Archives, in the Restricted Room and the museums andshed seen that sort of thing before, was the point. But never like that, never in someones actual home. Certainly the kinds of houses where shed grown upthe kinds of people shed grown up withwerent really the type who would have cared about religion even if it wasnt illegal.
But the Warings items were in fact legal; Chess found the license at the bottom of the box. Shed definitely never seen one of those before. Its made out to the Warings and the New Hope Mission.
Huh. Jillian scanned the document, set it back in the box. Well, I guess they were religious. I bet Glorias too young to remember it, though. She was born in ninety-two, so she would have been five for Haunted Week. Thats pretty young to really remember stuff like that.
Should we ask her?
Jillian shrugged. Maybe later. Its not a big deal. Lots of people were religious before and wanted to keep a few things from it. We see it fairly often. As long as its licensed its okay.
So should I set it aside, make a note or something?
Nah, dont worry about it. Keep looking.
About half an hour later Chess had found two small luck charmsones she was pleased to note that she identified right away, even though they hadnt covered all the permutations in class yet, ha!some house-dedication supplies, and four protection spells, which seemed excessive, but what did she know. Behind them sat another bag, a small red velvet one. Shit. She knew what that probably was.
She glanced toward the bedroom, where Jillian was going through drawers. Jillian would come pick the thing up for her if she asked. And she could ask. She was only eighteen, only a student; she could ask.
Except that asking would make her look like a pussy. Asking would be the kind of thing Jillian might report back, with a sorrowful I dont think Cesaria is ready sort of comment thrown in.
Asking would be like admitting that something was wrong with her. That she was terrified; that she had reason to be terrified. That she wasnt normal.
So she didnt ask. She gritted her teeth and reached for the thing. Maybe the gloves would help protect her, maybe theyd form some kind of barrier against
Or maybe the gloves wouldnt do a damn thing, or at least not enough. Energy crawled up her arm, greedy sex energy eager to find a home. Someone elses sex energy, forcing itself upon her, insinuating itself across her skin and down into her belly, lower down, dancing a slow cruel path through her body and making her heart kick in her chest.
That wasnt just the sex, either. That was panic, the bright painful cry of it in her soul, making her eyes sting. Shit, she couldntcouldnt handle that, couldnt do it, not in that strange claustrophobic room with its cloying too-warm air. It was too much, too much for her, hard hands on her skin, holding her down, her lungs fighting for oxygen, she had to