Embers & Ice (Rouge)

  EMBERS & ICE

  ISABELLA MODRA

  Copyright © 2014 Isabella Modra

  www.isabellamodra.com

  Cover art © Renu Sharma|www.thedarkrayne.com

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN: 978-0-9922776-3-5

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, used fictiously. All respective quotes used in this book are for reference purpose only and their copyright belongs to their respective owners. The author holds all exclusive rights to this work. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited.

  FOR THE PEOPLE WHO FEEL TRAPPED IN THIS WORLD. FIND YOUR OWN ESCAPE, AND LIVE IT.

  ALSO BY ISABELLA MODRA

  ROUGE

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  This sequel would not exist if it weren’t for the amazing support I received for Rouge, so I’d like to thank everyone who read, reviewed, purchased, stored away for the winter or mentioned my first novel to their distant relative of some sort – every ounce of encouragement fuels me to write. I am humbled by the praise, and I thank you for that.

  Mum. Thank you for your gift of gossip and all of the books you helped me sell in your salon. Yes, I know, you made me. That deserves some gratitude.

  And, as always, a HUGE thank you to my Heavenly Father, for the brainpower, persistence and heart.

  You are the greater love.

  ‘THE NOIR HERO IS A KNIGHT IN BLOOD CAKED ARMOR. HE’S DIRTY, BUT HE DOES HIS BEST TO DENY THE FACT THAT HE’S A HERO THE WHOLE TIME.’

  – FRANK MILLER

  TITLE PAGE

  COPYRIGHT

  DEDICATION

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  PROLOGUE

  PART 1

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  PART 2

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  PART 3

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  PART 4

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY-ONE

  THRITY-TWO

  THIRTY-THREE

  THIRTY-FOUR

  THIRTY-FIVE

  THIRTY-SIX

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  PART 5

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  THIRTY-NINE

  FORTY

  FORTY-ONE

  FORTY-TWO

  FORTY-THREE

  FORTY-FOUR

  FORTY-FIVE

  FORTY-SIX

  FORTY-SEVEN

  FORTY-EIGHT

  FORTY-NINE

  FIFTY

  FIFTY-ONE

  FIFTY-TWO

  FIFTY-THREE

  EPILOGUE

  PROLOGUE

  HUNTER

  Everyone is wrong about hell.

  They think it is buried thousands of feet below the earth, a dungeon of demons and iron gates and endless, burning flames. If that were the case, hell wouldn’t be so bad for me. It’d just be like having a vacation and picking the wrong hotel. If hell is really as hot as they say, then they haven’t met me.

  But this place I’m in is not warm. This prison is cold. And I have never known such cold.

  It is emptier than a chasm between two canyons, where only the wind blows harsh and bitter. It is lonelier than a single iceberg bobbing on the deep, blue waters. This cold is so dark and endless that I’ve begun to wonder whether warmth exists any longer. Is there still a fire burning within me? Where is the flame? Where is the passion and fury and love when all I feel now is this hollow, bottomless, sickening, inescapable cold?

  That’s when I know I’ve arrived in hell.

  I am lying on a mattress thinner than a slice of bread and splashed with stains. The mattress is placed upon a single bench just wide enough for me to lie on my back and long enough for my feet to hang over the edge, tucked tightly beneath a blanket that I’m sure couldn’t keep even the devil warm. Around me is a cell no bigger than an average bathroom. It’s the color of tea with too much milk. Paint crumbles from the walls and large cracks in the cement floor spider out around me like channels in the Amazon River. The only part of the cell that looks even remotely modern is the toilet beside my head and the giant glass wall at my feet that doubles as a cell door. If I sit up now, I can see a corridor outside running left and right and an empty cell opposite mine. Identical.

  It’s dark now. Not that I would know, since I have no windows. But the lights are off.

  A part of me wants to get up. To start smashing things. To find an escape. But I can’t move at all. My limbs have turned to jelly. I’m tired, I ache, and in my mind, all see is Eli.

  As I drift in and out of sleep, I wonder if this place is a part of my nightmares. Perhaps I am so consumed by grief and bitterness that I’ve somehow retreated into my own conscience and this is all a front for my harsh reality. Because surely I would have been more careful in the outside world and kept hidden from the Agents. Surely I wasn’t so blinded by the pain of losing the only person in this world who calmed the fire. If I had been more careful, maybe I wouldn’t have managed to get myself captured and thrown in this prison worse than hell. In hell, at least I’d be warm. Here, there is nothing but cold.

  The soft hiss of my glass door sliding open wakes me from my thoughts, but I’m too terrified to roll over. Several footsteps on the linoleum floors pad towards me and hands remove the sheet from my body. The sleeve of my white jumpsuit is yanked up and a sting in the crook of my elbow makes me gasp. I flip over and blink at the bright lights from outside my cell. Is it day now?

  I see three men standing before me. They look the same in this bright light; all wearing white with blurred faces and no eyes. They look at me like I’m a piece of science, like a solution in a test tube or a fungus sample in a petrie dish.

  There are people out there who would want to do you harm if they knew what kind of power you possessed, Joshua once said to me. What would he think of me now? Would he care? Would he be worried? Or would he just laugh with that sadistic chuckle I still can’t erase from my mind and tell me I’m a stupid girl, that I brought it on myself?

  Whatever the men in the white uniforms have injected into my blood works fast. My heart begins to pound. A new kind of energy ignites in me as hands haul me to my feet where I waver unsteadily and my vision finally clears.

  I stand between two men who appear rather like guards or orderlies; stoic and emotionless. A thirty-something guard leans against my doorway. He is tanned with wispy brown hair that droops over blue eyes. On his neck I see a tattoo of a weeping angel with wings that curl around his throat.

  “Time for breakfast,” he says and his mouth curves into a smile.

  “What did you inject in me?” My voice is a low croak.

  “B-12. We give it to all the newcomers who don’t have the drive to get up. It gives you just enough energy to walk to the breakfast hall and join the others.”

  “Others? What others?”

  He turns in the doorway, his eyes glimmering with a secret I am most likely about to uncover. “The others like you, Fire Girl. You’re not in Kansas anymore.” He chuckles as he leads the way.

  I should have argued or hit someone or unleashed the anger in
side me in the form of a deadly flame. But I can’t, and for two reasons.

  One; the fire is caged inside me. I feel panic rise as I summon the flames and push with all my might to release them, to form a ball of fire and hurl it at these men who grip me tightly. But it won’t break through my skin. I look down and notice a silver band around my wrist. It glows blue around the edge, and black veins spider out beneath my skin, as if the accessory is poisoning me. The cold sensation comes from more than the chilly air around me; it is ice, seeping through the fire, dousing it down to dying embers. I know without having to guess that this restraint has stripped me of my powers.

  And two; I have no idea what kind of trouble I’d be in if I disobeyed this man. I have to be smart, to wait until I know more about my prison before I stand up and fight.

  So I let them lead me out of my cell and deeper into imprisonment, where I would dine with other mutants like me.

  PART 1

  WELCOME TO DEATH CAVE

  ONE

  Jack always hated the rain. He hated how wet it made his clothes, how it always seemed to slide like a slippery snake down his neck and against his back. Most of all, he hated that it soaked through his shoes and into his socks and made his feet eternally cold.

  But as Jack stumbled out of the warehouse, bloodied, bruised and aching in every part of his body, he found he cared more about making it to a hospital before he passed out than he did about the downpour. As he limped towards the sidewalk and down a path that led to one of the more occupied areas of the suburb, Jack shot a glance back at the warehouse that towered above him. Rain washed over the roof and it looked almost like a scene from a horror movie. The Warehouse of Doom. That’d be a bestseller.

  Making jokes seemed to be an easier way to deal with what Jack had just been through, and what he’d discovered about himself.

  He had a power. A real, slightly confusing power. Some kind of… destruction. Destruction of objects. Hey, that could be useful, he thought. I could get a job as a demolisher. I’d make a ton of money in the trading business. Or maybe the President would hire me as a bodyguard. I’d kick all kinds of ass with this power.

  Jack distracted himself as he stumbled about in the rain, letting every fantasy he’d ever had come to life inside his mind. He could feel more blood oozing from the slash in his ribs as he walked.

  Half of his thoughts were on the pain, but he also worried about Hunter. She had been in terrible shape after he fell off the rack and freed himself, but she changed. She softened. It was something in the rain that turned the fire off, and she just gave up. But had Joshua killed her? Was she safe, alive even?

  A part of Jack wanted to go back and help her. She needed back up in case the psycho Iceman tried to kill her again. But she seemed capable, and she wanted him gone, wanted him safe. He needed to respect that.

  So the next thing to do would be to contact Clare somehow. He wasn’t at all looking forward to explaining to her why he’d been missing for a week and why he was so beat up. But Clare was his only family and he loved her more than anyone. She was his only chance at survival. So Jack searched through the rain for a payphone.

  Once he’d limped a few blocks, the rain stopped and he came to a more developed area with houses and little cafés. He spotted the silver-blue box and limped hard towards it. Hurriedly fishing out quarters from his filthy pockets, Jack dialed home.

  “Come on Clare, please pick up!” He drummed his fingers on the phone box and tapped his foot impatiently. If she didn’t pick up and he passed out, would anyone find him? How could he survive?

  A dirty black van whooshed past him on the road and a great puddle of water splashed against the plastic wall of the payphone box, making him jump a mile in the air. Then, after a few rings, the message machine beeped.

  Jack swore. In a spontaneous rush of anger, he threw his fist into the phone box. Power he didn’t know he had surged through him and immediately, the box exploded. Jack was blown back by a burst of sparks and smoke, landing painfully on the sidewalk. He coughed and winced and felt dizzy again as he peered up at the phone box. It looked as if it had been run over, smoke climbing up into the dark night sky.

  Once more, Jack sat on the wet sidewalk, amazed at his own abilities. That was, until he became so consumed by pain and exhaustion that he just couldn’t stay awake anymore. Finally he collapsed, wondering just for a split second where he would wake up. Praying it was back at his apartment with Clare by his side, he fell into darkness.

  TWO

  Joshua stood between the two steel tables, gazing down at the pale, frozen bodies that lay upon them, and knew without a doubt that this would not work. It was impossible. Science wouldn’t allow it. The revival of complete long-term memory, personality and identity had not yet been proven in cryonics. Only cell structure and muscle tissue have healed within the body.

  Joshua checked the temperature gauges, loosening his collar and taking deep breaths. Even though he did not sweat, he suddenly felt very claustrophobic in the freezer behind his laboratory.

  I’m only a geologist, he couldn’t help but think. The only thing I’m good at is finding rare stones and researching the shit out of things. Can I actually perform one of the most complicated procedures known to man, when I have absolutely no experience at all, or am I basically just wasting time, money and energy on already dead bodies?

  He leant over Jennifer Smart, watching with intense fascination the way her skin throbbed and froze. He wasn’t sure how long he stared at her sweeping eyelashes, at the freckles on her forehead and the small scar on the corner of her jaw. It must have been quite a while, for when he straightened to check her vitals, his neck had cramped up.

  When Joshua initially decided to preserve Jennifer Smart’s body, he was in a panic state. It was just after the high school fire, and Jennifer knew too much about Hunter’s identity for her to safely walk away. Now that he looked back on it, killing her would have been possibly the stupidest thing he’d ever attempted. Jennifer would never have acted on what she knew. She was a teacher; a scientist at heart, but an innocent teacher nonetheless. Putting her into a coma and freezing her at sub-zero temperatures was completely irrational, even for him. He really had no idea what he was doing, but something told him it was right. A voice.

  And then he had to go and do the same to Eli as well. Joshua tried not to beat himself up over his choices, because he was possessed. At least that’s what he told himself as he stared down at the boy. To kill him would break Hunter’s world apart. But then, she believed him to be dead anyway.

  Joshua pinched the bridge of his nose and felt heavy sobs rise in his throat. God I’ve made such a mess of everything. Hunter is gone, drowning in grief that I caused because I was stupid and I let the Iceman control me and screw us both over. Now I’m responsible for two innocent lives that I might never get back.

  In his frustration, Joshua stalked over to the wall and threw his fist against the steel. Blissful pain shot through his wrist like fifty daggers. He cradled his throbbing arm, grateful for the distraction. But the bodies were still there, a constant reminder of the terrible mistake he’d made.

  But what can I do? What risks am I willing to take to get them back?

  You want them back for answers, said a chilling voice and Joshua stopped and glanced up. The Iceman – an illusion of his schizophrenic mind – had appeared, sly and comfortable as he leant on the storage unit near the doorway. You need Jenny to help you understand Hunter’s ability to overpower you. And you need Eli because you’re guilty. Bring them back.

  “How?” he moaned, gripping fistfuls of his greasy black hair. “How do I do that? I’ve spent the last month and a half researching this and nothing has woken them up. Nothing! I’m not a doctor, I’m a geologist.”

  You’re a scientist, the Iceman said shrewdly. You’ve done well so far to find the answers. How else did you discover the physics behind your power and Hunters? How did you make that contraption to keep the fire inside
Hunter? Because you adapt, you have the motivation, and it’s in your blood.

  “Things like that don’t just happen overnight. It takes years of study to learn this craft. It’s impossible.”

  The Iceman seemed to chuckle at his stupidity. Impossible? You’re standing here talking to a figment of your imagination, a voice inside your head, the voice of your ability to wield and control ice, and you’re telling me that it’s impossible to wake two people up from a frozen sleep?

  “I have to give up,” he sighed. “Nothing has worked.”

  The Iceman rolled his eyes and said, Nothing of this world.

  Joshua halted in his tracks and spun, his heart racing. He faced the giant glass tank and a light bulb brightened in his mind. “Nothing of this world? That’s it.”

  Finally, the Iceman groaned.

  Joshua ran to the tank and raised the sealed compressor lid. Liquid nitrogen fog oozed over the tip and spilled out around him. Joshua reached in and pulled out one of the sample rocks. It was freezing, but it would soon heat if he kept it away from the cold. He brought ice to his palms and tried to cool it.

  In a last minute attempt to right his wrong, Joshua placed the rock under the bright florescent light of his microscope and stared down at it. The stone that began it all. It started as a wonderful mystery, turned into a killer and had now become the greatest scientific discovery Joshua had ever and would ever make in his entire existence.

  Now, this supernatural stone was going to help him bring them back. Their memories, their personalities and their identities included.

  Most importantly of all, Joshua prayed for the safe awakening of their souls as he sat down to open the stone.

  THREE

  The dancing streaks of blue light through the water had drawn Hunter into a trance. She lost track of time sitting on the damp wooden stool in front of the giant glass tank, watching the dolphins circle each other and listening to their clicking sounds. A door not far behind swung open and Tom, the manager of the aquarium, limped up to her and sat down, his fingers clamped around a dirty mop.