The Return: Midnight Chapter 13

Elena, sleeping serenely with 1 hand locked onto Stefans, knew she was having an extraordinary dream. No, non a dream an proscribed-of-body experience. provided it wasnt want her previous out-of-body visits to Stefan in his cel . She was skimming done the air so quickly that she couldnt hearty y make out what was below her.She looked around and suddenly, to her astonishment, another type appe atomic number 18d beside her.becomingshe verbalize or rather tried to say. But of course in that location was no sound. Bonnie looked corresponding a transparent edition of herself. As if someone had created her out of blown glass, and then put in just the faintest tint of color in her bull and eyeball.Elena tried telepathy. Bonnie?Elena Oh, I miss you and Meredith so much Im stuck here in a hole A hole? Elena could hear the panic in her own telepathy. It made Bonnie wince.Not a strong hole. A dive. An inn, I guess, nevertheless Im locked in and they only feed me twice a solar day and make water me to the toilet once My God How did you get there?Well Bonnie hesitated. I guess it was my own fault.It doesnt matter How long brook you been there, exactly?Um, this is my second day. I cerebrate. there was a pause. Then Elena utter, Well, a couple of days in a bad place can seem like forever.Bonnie tried to make her case clearer. Its just that Im so bored and lonely. I miss you and Meredith so much she repeated.I was thinking of you and Meredith, too, Elena said.But Merediths there with you, isnt she? Oh my God, she didnt fall, too? Bonnie blurted.No, no She didnt fall. Elena couldnt decide whether to tel Bonnie about Meredith or not. Maybe not just yet, she thought.She couldnt see what she was rushing toward, although she could feel that they were slowing down. raft you see anything?Hey, yeah, below us Theres a car Should we go down?Of course. Can we hold hands?They found that they couldnt, but that just trying to unplowed them closer together. In another moment they were sinking through the roof of a smal car.Hey Its Alaric Bonnie said.Alaric Saltzman was Merediths engaged-to-be-engaged boyfriend. He was about twenty-three now, and his sandy-blond hair and hazel eyes hadnt changed since Elena had seen him almost ten months ago. He was a parapsychologist at Duke, exhalation for his doctorate.Weve been trying to get hold of him for ages, Bonnie said.I know. Maybe this is the way were supposed to run into him.W here is he supposed to be again?Some weird place in Japan. I forget what its called, but look at the map on the passenger seat.She and Bonnie intermingled as they did, their ghostly forms passing righteousness through each other.Unmei no Shima The Island of Doom, was written at the top of an lineation of an island. The map beside him had a large red X on it with the caption The Field of penalise Virgins.The what? Bonnie asked indignantly. Whats that mean?I dont know. But look, this fog is real fog. And its raining.And this r oad is terrible.Bonnie dove outside. Ooh, so weird. The rains going right through me. And I dont think this is a road.Elena said, Come cover version in and look at this. There arent any other cities on the island, just a name. Dr. Celia Connor, forensic pathologist.Whats a forensic pathologist?I think, Elena said, that they investigate murders and things.And they dig up bloodless people to find out why they died.Bonnie shuddered. I dont think I like this very much.Neither do I. But look outside. This was a village once, I think.There was almost nothing left of the vil age. Just a few ruins of wooden buildings that were obviously rotting, and some tumbledown, blackened stone structures. There was one large building with an enormous bright yel ow tarp over it.When the car reached this building, Alaric skidded to a stop, grabbed the map and a smal suitcase, and dashed through the rain and the Great Compromiser to get under cover. Elena and Bonnie fol owed.He was met near the entranc e by a very young black muliebrity, whose hair was cut short and shine around her elfin face.She was smal , not even Elenas height. She had eyes dancing with excitement and white, even teeth that made for a Hol ywood smile.Dr. Connor?Alaric said, looking awed.Meredith isnt going to like this, Bonnie said.Just Celia, please,the woman said, winning his hand. Alaric Saltzman, I presume.Just Alaric, please Celia.Meredith real y isnt going to like this, Elena said.So youre the spook investigator,Celia was saying below them. Well, we necessitate you. This place has spooks or did once. I dont know if theyre stil here or not.Sounds inte looseninging.More like sad and morbid. Sad and weird and morbid. Ive excavated al split ups of ruins, especial y those where theres a chance of genocide. And Il tel you This island is unlike any place I chip in ever seen,Celia said.Alaric was already pul ing things from his case, a thick stack of papers, a smal camcorder, a notebook. He morose on th e camcorder, and looked through the viewfinder, then propped it up with some of the papers. When he manifestly had Celia in focus, he grabbed the notebook too.Celia looked amused. How many ways do you need to take down information?Alaric tapped the side of his head and shook it sadly. As many as possible. Neurons are beginning to go.He looked around. Youre not the only one here, are you?Except for the janitor and the guy who ferries me back to Hokkaido, yes. It started out as a normal expedition there were fourteen of us. But one by one, the others have died or left. I cant even re-bury the specimens the girls weve excavated.And the people who left or died from your expedition Well, at first people died. Then that and the other spooky stuff made the rest leave. They were frightened for their lives.Alaric frowned. Who died first?Out of our expedition? Ronald Argyl . Pottery specialist. He was examining both jars that were found Well, Il skip that story until later. He fel off a ladder and broke his neck.Alarics eyebrows went up. That was spooky?From a guy like him, whos been in the business for almost twenty years yes.Twenty years? Maybe a heart ack-ack? And then off the ladder boom.Alaric made a downward gesture.Maybe thats the way it was. You may be able to explain al our little mysteries for us.The cleverness woman with the short hair dimpled like a tomboy. She was dressed like one too, Elena realized Levis and a blue and white shirt with the sleeves rol ed up over a white camisole.Alaric gave a little start, as if hed realized he was guilty of staring. Bonnie and Elena looked at each other over his head.But what happened to al the people who lived on the island in the first place? The ones who built the houses?Well, there never were that many of them in the first place.Im guessing the place may even have been named the Island of Doom before this disaster my team was investigating. But as far as I could find out it was a sort of war a civil war. Between the children and the adults.This time when Bonnie and Elena looked at each other, their eyes were both wide. Just like home Bonnie began, but Elena said, Sh. Listen.A civil war between kids and their parents?Alaric repeated slowly. Now that is spooky.Well, its a process of elimination. You see, I like graves, constructed or just holes in the ground. And here, the inhabitants dont appear to have been invaded. They didnt die of famine or drought there was stil plenty of grain in the granary. There were no signs of il ness. Ive come to believe that they all killed one another parents kil ing children children kil ing parents.But how can you tel ?You see this square-ish area on the periphery of the vil age?Celia pointed to an area on a larger map than Alarics. Thats what we cal The Field of Punished Virgins.Its the only place that has careful y constructed actual graves, so it was made early in what became a war. Later, there was no time for coffins or no one who cared. So far weve excavated twenty-two female children the eldest in her late teens.Twenty-two girls? Al girls?Al girls in this area. Boys came later, when coffins were no longer universe made. Theyre not as well preserved, because the houses al burned or fel in, and they were exposed to weathering. The girls were careful y, sometimes elaborately, buried but the markings on their bodies indicate that they were subjected to harsh tangible punishment at some time close to their deaths. And then they had stakes driven through their hearts.Bonnies flips flew to her eyes, as if to ward off a terrible vision. Elena watched Alaric and Celia grimly.Alaric gulped. They were staked?he asked uneasily.Yes. Now I know what youl be thinking. But Japan doesnt have any tradition of vampires. Kitsune foxes are probably the closest analog.Now Elena and Bonnie were hovering right over the map.And do kitsunes drink blood?Just kitsune. The Japanese language has an interesting way of expressing plurals. Bu t to answer your question no. They are legendary tricksters, and one example of what they do is possess girls and women, and lead men to destruction into bogs, and so on. But here Well, you can almost read it like a book.You make it sound like one. But not one Id pick up for plea for certain,Alaric said, and they both smiled bleakly.So, to go on with the book, it seems that this disease spread eventual y to al the children in the town. There were deadly fights. The parents somehow couldnt even get to the fishing boats in which they might have escaped the island.Elena I know. At to the lowest degree Fells Church isnt on an island.And then theres what we found at the town shrine. I can show you that its what Ronald Argyl died for.They both got up and went farther into the building until Celia stopped beside two large urns on pedestals with a hideous thing in between them. It looked like a dress, weathered until it was almost pure white, but sticking through holes in the clothing were clappers. Most horribly, one bleached and fleshless bone hung down from the top of one of the urns.This is what Ronald was working on in the field before al this rain came,Celia explained. It was probably the last death of the original inhabitants and it was suicide.How can you possibly know that?Lets see if I can get this right from Ronalds notes. The priestess here doesnt have any other damage than that which caused her death. The shrine was a stone building once. When we got here we found only a floor, with al the stone steps tumbled isolated every which way. Hence Ronalds use of the ladder. It gets quite technical, but Ronald Argyl was a great forensic pathologist and I trust his reading of the story.Which is?Alaric was taking in the jars and the bones with his camcorder.Someone we dont know who smashed a hole in each of the jars. This is before the chaos started. The town records make note of it as an act of vandalism, a prank done by a child. But long after that the hole was sealed and the jars made almost airtight again, except where the priestess had her hands plunged in the top up to the wrist.With infinite care, Celia lifted the top off the jar that did not have a bone hanging from it to reveal another reduplicate of longish bones, slightly less bleached, and with strips of what must have been clothing on it. Tiny finger bones lay inside the jar.What Ronald thought was that this poor woman died as she performed a last desperate act. Clever, too, if you see it from their perspective. She cut her wrists you can see how the tendon is shriveled in the better-preserved arm and then she let the complete contents of her bloodstream flow into the urns. We do know that the urns show a heavy precipitation of blood on the bottom. She was trying to lure something in or perhaps something back in. And she died trying, and the clay that she had probably hoped to use in her last conscious moments held her bones to the jars.WhewAlaric ran a hand over his forehead, but shivered at the selfsame(prenominal) time.Take pictures Elena was mental y commanding him, using al her wil power to transmit the order. She could see that Bonnie was doing the same, eyes shut, fists clenched.As if in obedience to their commands, Alaric was taking pictures as fast as he could.Final y, he was done. But Elena knew that without some outside impetus there was no way that he was going to get those pictures to Fel s Church until he himself came to town and even Meredith didnt know when that would be.So what do we do? Bonnie asked Elena, looking anguished.Wellmy tears were real when Stefan was in prison.You want us to cry on him?No, Elena said, not quite patiently. But we look like ghosts lets act like them. Try blowing on the back of his neck.Bonnie did, and they both watched Alaric shiver, look around him, draw his windbreaker closer.And what about the other deaths in your own expedition?he asked, huddling, looking around apparently aimlessly.Celia be gan speaking but neither Elena nor Bonnie was listening. Bonnie kept blowing on Alaric from different directions, herding him to the single window in the building that wasnt shattered. There Elena had written with her finger on the darkened cold glass. Once she knew that Alaric was looking that way she blew her breath across the sentence send all pix of jars 2 meredith now every(prenominal) time Alaric approached the window she breathed on it to refresh the words.And at last he saw it.He jumped backward nearly two feet. Then he slowly crept back to the window. Elena refreshed the writing for him. This time, instead of jumping, he simply ran a hand over his eyes and then slowly peeked out again.Hey, Mr. Spook-chaser,said Celia. Are you al right?I dont know,Alaric admitted. He passed his hand over his eyes again, but Celia was coming and Elena didnt breathe on the window.I thought I saw a a message to send copies of the pictures of these jars to Meredith.Celia raised an eyebrow. Who is Meredith?Oh. She shes one of my former students. I suppose this would interest her.He looked down at the camcorder. mug up and urns?Well, you were interested in them quite young, if your reputation is correct.Oh, yes. I loved to watch a dead bird decay, or find bones and try to figure out what animal they were from,Celia said, dimpling again. From the age of six. But I wasnt like most girls.Well neither is Meredith,Alaric said.Elena and Bonnie were eyeing each other seriously now.Alaric had implied that Meredith was special, but he hadnt said it, and he hadnt mentioned their engagement to be engaged.Celia came closer. Are you going to send her the pictures?Alaric laughed. Well, al this atmosphere and everything I dont know. It might just have been my imagination.Celia turned remote just as she reached him and Elena blew once more across the message. Alaric threw his hands up in a gesture of surrender.I dont suppose the Island of Doom has satel ite coverage,he said helplessl y.Nope,Celia said. But the ferry wil be back in a day, and you can send pictures then if youre real y going to do it.I think Id better do it,Alaric said. Elena and Bonnie were both glaring at him, one from each side.But that was when Elenas eyelids started to droop. Oh, Bonnie, Im sorry. I wanted to talk to you after this, and make sure youre okay. But Im fallingI cantShe managed to pry her lids open. Bonnie was in a fetal position, fast asleep.Be careful, Elena whispered, not even sure who she was whispering it to. And as she floated away, she was aware of Celia and the way Alaric was talking to this beautiful, accomplished woman only a year or so older than he was.She felt a clear fear for Meredith, on top of everything else.