Chapter 26: Christmas

Authors Note.

I would like to thank neuroparenthetical for all his help, advice and hard work on this project so far. This story would definitely be very different without his input. I am sad that we will no longer be working together on it.

As they say, the show must go on, so please welcome a new editor Dr Mark, who will be attempting to make some sense of the illiterate scratchings I send to him, and turn out something worth reading.

Please take a moment to rate – or, better still, leave a comment.

I woke the next morning curled around Ness. Amanda and Mary were behind me and Jules was on Ness’s other side. To my surprise, for the first time since I could remember, I didn’t have morning wood. Apparently, my autonomic nervous system was smarter than I gave it credit for.

I attempted to disentangle myself from Ness, but she grabbed my arms tighter, whining slightly in her sleep. Eventually I managed it and slid out of bed to begin my morning routine.

I spent a couple of hours entertaining the dogs, then we all went out for a run. When I returned, the rest of the family had risen.

I went for a shower, and then joined Ness in the kitchen as she was cooking breakfast.

“Good morning,” I said, walking up behind her, hugging her, and planting a small kiss on the top of her head.

She pressed into the hug for a second, and then returned to cooking. “Morning,” she replied.

“Did you sleep well?” I asked.

“It was so good,” she said. “It felt so right being together like that. I know I’m going to miss it when you guys go back after Christmas.”

“It will only be for a few months,” I said. “You’ll be with us before you know it.”

She made a face. “It’s going to seem much longer.”

“But we’ll be coming back up for a few days for your birthday,” I said.

Her eyes lit up. “I thought since it was such a short break...”

“None of us would miss it,” I said. “We’ll be here.”

Taking care to move the pan she had been working with off the heat, she came and hugged me again.

Later that morning, Dean and I were working on his truck when his phone beeped. He looked at it.

“We’d best get cleaned up,” he said. “They’ll be here in half an hour.”

We were all standing out front when Gerry’s car pulled into the driveway and disgorged my parents and Dianna. Obviously, they had to be vetted by the dogs before they could be allowed on to the property, but by the time Terra and team had done their due diligence, Gerry had unloaded all the luggage and driven off.

My parents each got a hug from Cheryl; my mother got a hug and my father a handshake from Dean. Dianna stood back, knowing that her reintroduction wasn’t going to be quite so simple.

“It is good of you both to allow me back into your home,” she said when she finally faced them. “My behaviour last time was beyond inexcusable. I violated both your and your family’s trust, and if my word has any value at all, I give it solemnly that I will never do so again.”

“Right now,” said Dean in a measured tone, “your word has no value to us. For the sake of our future ‘daughters-in-law,’ your granddaughters, we are willing to give you the opportunity to change that. You get one shot, Dianna; don’t squander it.”

“Thank you,” said Dianna, and held her hand out to Dean. After a moment, he accepted the handshake.

Dianna turned to Cheryl, who said, “Just remember who gets hurt most if we cannot be friends. It’s your granddaughters who will suffer. If you love them as much as we do...” She didn’t finish that sentence.

Dianna nodded. “I know, and I do,” she said. “I never want to see them hurt like that again.”

Cheryl nodded too and said, “Welcome to our home.” She gave her a brief hug.

My parents then came over and were more than a little shocked when I introduced my four fiancés, each of them dying to show off their rings.

“How is that even going to work?” asked my father. “You can’t marry all four of them.”

“I know,” I said, “but we can have a ceremony with all four, like a wedding but with no legal standing. Then I’ll work out the legal aspects so that we all have the same rights as if we were legally married. It will be a longer process, but I’m certain it’s possible.”

“It’s not,” said Dianna, “but there are things you can do to get close. There are also things you probably shouldn’t do, though. Demanding unanimous agreement from four people when the fifth is unconscious in the hospital for something serious is a terrible idea.”

Dean and Cheryl were a bit taken aback. My parents weren’t. It occurred to me – and had obviously occurred to my folks, too - that a family of Empaths going back hundreds of years had probably given such matters considerable thought.

“Isn’t Ness only seventeen?” asked my mother. “Surely you’re not...”

I looked at my mother levelly until she blushed and looked away.

“Sorry,” she said. “I should have known better. It’s just that so much has changed with you recently.”

Dianna hugged the twins and Jules. Ness, however, who hadn’t seen Dianna since the last time we were there, was more hesitant.

“Vanessa,” said Dianna. “I know that last time we met, I behaved in such a way as to cause you a good deal of hurt. I am trying to rebuild my relationship with Caleb and the girls, and now you are one of those girls. I would love to get to know you too. We are going to be family, after all.”

Ness looked from Dianna to me and then to her parents. I could see from her aura that she was uncertain, but still angry at Dianna. She said nothing.

Dianna, far better at reading auras than I, nodded and moved on to me. We hugged.

Since it was almost lunch time, I went with Ness into the kitchen. We worked together making lunch. She showed me some things that she knew, both from Cheryl and from her own experience. I, in return, shared some of the knowledge I had gained from Daisy. We both had a good time.

After lunch, we all sat in the living room. It was a little cold to be sitting out on the deck despite the sunshine. Dianna was sitting chatting with the twins. Ness was with her parents, and I decided to spend some time reconnecting with mine.

It had been a while since I had seen my parents, and so I caught them up on what had been going on in my life. I told them about Rachel, the dean’s daughter, and how Amanda and I had found her. I described in detail the coffee shop incident, and my mother found it hilarious. I also told them that I had started my own hypnotherapy business and was making decent money, and also about how I had learned to cook. I hadn’t made lunch alone, but I told them that I’d helped, and they seemed impressed. I supposed I’d come a very long way. A few months prior, my ‘help’ could’ve easily ruined their meal.

Despite the fact that we had ‘reconnected’ following what had gone on, I couldn’t help feeling that there was a distance between me and my parents that hadn’t been there before. I knew our relationship had been damaged massively, and doubted that it would ever be the way it was. I felt sad that there were two places I called home, and neither of them was my parents’ house.

I saw Jules curled up with another old-looking book off and on the entire day. In the late afternoon, I went over to her.

“What you got there?” I asked her.

“It’s the memoirs of Constance Miller,” she said.

“Who was Constance Miller?” I asked.

“She was Sarah Miller’s youngest sister’s granddaughter,” she replied.

“As in, Edward Everson’s wife, Sarah Miller?” I asked.

She nodded. “Maggie’s interns apparently turned it up. Dianna brought it with her. It’s on loan. It’s a fascinating insight into the lives they had back then. Constance, apparently, fancied herself something of a family historian. There are stories in here about many of her family.”

“Anything about Sarah?” I asked, genuinely interested.

“Not so far,” she said. “I started to skim through, but then got interested in something I was reading, and decided to just read it. If there is, I’ll find it.”

I left the twins and Dianna to catch up. Since my parents and Dianna were only there for the weekend, I thought it was only fair that they got to spend as much time together as possible. I looked across the room at all the people there. Ness was curled up on her daddy’s lap while he and Cheryl chatted to my parents; Mary and Amanda were sitting with Dianna, talking animatedly; Jules was curled up on a chair, engrossed in the book Dianna had brought with her.

Feeling a little bit sorry for myself, I went into the kitchen, grabbed a handful of carrots, and went down to the stables. I decided to spend an hour brushing Blaze.

Blaze, at least, was pleased to see me, or at least pleased to get the carrots. He munched them happily as I went to work, brushing his sleek white coat. He didn’t need it, since the stable hands took good care of him, but I found it therapeutic, and he didn’t mind the attention either.

I felt a prod in the bond from Ness.

“Ness?” I sent.

“Where are you?” she asked.

“In the stables, brushing Blaze,” I returned.

I walked back to the house and jumped in the shower. Almost exactly twenty minutes later, I joined Ness in the kitchen, and we made dinner.

After dinner, there was a change in the normal routine. There was no ‘Man Time.’ Instead, we exchanged Christmas gifts with those who wouldn’t be present on Christmas Day. It turned out that my parents had brought quite a haul. I got a new watch; the twins got matching bracelets. They bought an entire series of science fiction books for Jules, and for Ness they’d purchased another cookbook.

For Dean and Cheryl, they bought a painting, which, although small, looked expensive. It was by an artist that Cheryl apparently liked. It was only then that I figured out they must’ve tapped Jules for some ideas, just like I had.

Dianna loved her locket, and when she saw the picture inside she smiled softly. I caught her thought about a new family.

After all the other gifts had been given and received, we once again sat in the living room, and passed the time in conversation until it was time for me to go to bed.

I had been in bed for about three hours when Dean came into the room and tapped me on the foot, waking me.

“Caleb,” he said quietly, “we have a problem. Someone cut the fence on the east pasture and we have about a thousand cows out. Will you come help?”

I was out of bed and half dressed before he had left the room. Only Ness woke up; the others were used to me getting up at odd hours.

It was pitch dark and bitterly cold. I looked at my watch – one thirty in the morning.

Blaze didn’t look to happy to be roused from his warm stall either, but I soothed him and sent him a mental apology. The carrots I fed him as I got him ready also helped to cheer him up, although he made it quite clear that I owed him. I grinned. We were starting to build up quite the rapport. I wasn’t exactly communicating with him Telepathically, but we were sharing emotion and he seemed to be able to understand.

When we got to the east pasture, we could see where someone had not only cut the fence, but had torn down about ten of the fenceposts. It looked like they had also driven the cows from the pasture. Normally cows wouldn’t go far at night - they sleep too - but it was clear to me that someone had deliberately roused them and set them moving to cause problems.

Dean set a couple of the hands who had joined us to fixing the fence. I could have done it much more quickly, but there were too many witnesses. There were about thirty people there, all told.

“We need to split up and search for them,” said Dean. I did a quick scan. My range was up to about a mile, and I could feel many confused and annoyed cows in that area. I pulled Dean to one side.

“The majority of the herd is that way,” I said, pointing. “There are three other groups and a couple of stragglers all within about three quarters of a mile. I doubt that any have gone further than that, but I’ll keep my ‘eyes’ open.

He split the party up into three and sent each in the directions I had indicated. He and I went after the smallest group, which I reckoned had only about thirty animals in. We found them soon enough, exactly where I expected them to be. Dean and Blaze – I left him to it again – corralled the cows back to the gap in the fence and into the east pasture. We were just getting through the fence when I felt Ness’s spike of anger.

“Ness?”

“There’s people at the house, trying to break in.”

“Dean!” I yelled. “With me!”

Blaze suddenly had a real sense of urgency to be back at the house, and he took off like a rocket. I did my best to hold on and not unbalance him. To his credit, Dean didn’t ask any questions. He just spurred his horse on and tried to keep up.

We were still too late to help.

Dianna had everything in hand. As we clattered onto the driveway, we found ten men, led by none other than Jasper Green, kneeling on the pavement. They all appeared to be drunk; I did a surface scan of their minds and found that the plan had been to lure the men away from the house, break in, and ‘have some fun’ with the women.

My anger flared without me even realizing what was happening.

“CALEB!!!” Dianna snapped at me as my fury built. I felt her power, and the power of Mary and Amanda, too, all hitting me with love, soothing, and calm. I took a breath and controlled my rage, letting their power help. I surely needed it.

Blaze, who was currently standing off to one side and recovering himself from his gallop, walked over to where Jasper was knelt on the floor, I saw Dianna’s eyes widen, but she was too late to stop him. Blaze stood over Jasper and pissed on him.

Jasper, for his part, wasn’t able to move. Although he tried, his muscles just wouldn’t respond and so he had to sit there while the stallion emptied a rather full bladder of about a gallon of pungent horse piss all over him. When he was done, Blaze turned away, but since his cock was still hanging down from his piss, it slapped Jasper in the face. Jasper sat up, steam rising from him in the icy air.

Dianna looked at me, a mixture of mirth and annoyance on her face.

“Was that really necessary?” she asked.

“The alternative was Blaze planting his hoof in the middle of his face,” I said without emotion, “so yes. They attacked my family. If I had been here, you would be sweeping up bodies, not cleaning up horse piss. There is no duty of retreat in this state.”

Dianna looked at me for a second. I think she was surprised by how little her power, plus the twins’, had managed to soothe me – especially since I hadn’t fought back.

The sound of sirens approaching ended the moment. Dean was talking to Cheryl.

“They kicked in the front door,” she said to him. “Waving guns around. Then Dianna appeared and just shut them down. Next thing you know, they are all out here on their knees.”

“Where are the dogs?” asked Dean.

We went to look. Terra and the other dogs were slumped unconscious at the side of the house. There were lumps of meat scattered around them. Obviously, they had been drugged. I hoped they would be okay. Dean called the vet, who said he would be there directly.

By the time we got back to the front of the house, there were a number of police cars there, along with a black SUV. Dianna identified herself to one of the officers, and the men kneeling on the ground were loaded into the back of patrol cars.

Jasper was last to be moved. The police avoided him for the obvious reason; none of them wanted him in their car. Eventually, one unlucky pair was forced to take him. All the weapons were gathered from inside the hallway and loaded into evidence bags and also placed in the trunk of various police cruisers.

“Make sure you charge them with assault on a federal agent,” Dianna said. “I clearly identified myself and they did not desist.”

“Why is Ness holding a baseball bat?” I asked, moving to Dianna’s side.

“She was going to go down swinging,” said Dianna, “She’s a fiery little thing. Jules and Amanda had to hold her back.”

Dean came over and faced Dianna.

“You protected my family,” he said. “It doesn’t erase what happened before, but it goes a long way towards earning our trust and forgiveness. Thank you.”

Since the excitement was over, I went into the kitchen, grabbed, a double handful of carrots. I collected Blaze and took him back to the stable. Dean followed with his horse.

Both of them had run hard and were lathered, although they had had time to cool down. The smaller horse was actually shivering a little in the frigid air.

We rubbed both horses down well, and then combed them as they munched on the carrots we had brought. I surrounded Blaze with feelings of trust and gratitude. As we finished with them, I went to stroke his nose before we left. He stepped forward and put his head over my shoulder, pulling me into his chest almost a hug. I patted his neck.

“Thanks buddy,” I said, and he snorted.

After we returned to the house, we found that there was someone already securing the front door. Having tradesmen working directly for you had its advantages.

It was after seven, and everyone was in the kitchen. Ness was making breakfast. It had taken hours for all the statements to be taken since nobody could tell the actual truth as to what had occurred. We had to come up with a believable story as to why Jasper’s friends all ended up disarmed and kneeling on the drive. Dianna had had me ‘implant’ some memories in the men as they were loaded into the cars so that their stories, when they were eventually persuaded to speak, would match ours.

The mood was subdued all morning, and it was almost a relief when Gerry turned up at around ten to collect my parents and Dianna to take them home.

This time Dianna got a hug from both Dean and Cheryl as well as from all the girls. Her status had gone up quite markedly with them. When it got to my turn, Dianna looked up into my face.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“You mean am I going to go on a revenge spree?” I countered.

She half smiled. “Are you?”

“I’m not going to go looking for them,” I said, “but I’m done holding back. If they come after me again, then what comes after is on them.”

She looked at me sadly. “You’re changing Caleb - becoming harder.”

I shook my head. “No,” I rebutted. “You just never saw me this angry before. My powers have nothing to do with this. This is all about some asshole attacking those I love. If I didn’t have powers, I’d be borrowing Ness’s baseball bat and going after them. In many ways, my powers are the reason that I am not. Not because they are tempering me in any way, but because I know that no matter what, if any of those boys ends up seriously hurt or dead, it would be my ass no matter whether I used powers or not.

“I still have to think of my family – and being there for them. The last thing I want is to give you an excuse to take me off the board.”

“You think I want that?” she asked.

“I don’t know what you want, Dianna,” I said. “You are always three moves ahead of me. A part of me, albeit a very small part, has the suspicion that you set this whole thing up just so you could be the hero and get back into everyone’s good books. Jasper was out on bail or whatever when he rounded up those guys to come after me on campus. The fact that he got out again after that is more than a little suspicious.”

Her eyes widened a little at that.

“I am making an effort to get along with you, and Maggie,” I said. “Partly for the girls, and partly because I am hoping to one day actually trust you. Today is not that day.”

“I thought...” she began sadly, but then sighed and shook her head. She turned away and got into the car.

“I thought you and grandmother were okay?” Mary said, looking upset.

“We are – ish” I answered. “She still has a lot of work to do before I will trust her though.”

“Does that mean...” she asked, her eyes wet.

“Absolutely not,” I said. “You, I trust completely. You, I love completely. You are a part of my family, and I’m never going to let that go.”

“Promise?” she asked, her eyes sparkling with unshed tears.

I took her hand and brought it to my face, kissing it and the ring she wore. “Promise.”

She threw her arms around me and held me tightly. Amanda, Jules, and Ness joined the group, and we all stood revelling in the feeling of each other for a while.

“How you doing Little Miss Fierce?” I asked Ness when we finally released each other.

Ness grinned a little self-consciously. “I’m good,” she said.

“She’s like her father,” said Cheryl from behind her. “More balls than sense sometimes. How did you persuade Blaze to piss on that boy?”

“I didn’t,” I said. “I asked and he agreed. He found it amusing.”

“You’re talking to the horse now?” she asked with a look of surprise on her face.

“Not talking per se, but we share a connection.”

Dean’s phone rang, and he spoke on it for a few minutes. “That was the vet,” he said. “The meat was drugged with diazepam. He’s given the dogs an antidote, but he wants to keep them overnight to observe them. If all is well he’ll bring them back in the morning.”

“Caleb,” he continued, “why don’t you and I go do a proper repair on that fence? They won’t have done more than a jury rig overnight.”

I nodded. After kissing all my girls goodbye - paying special attention to Mary - we climbed into his truck.

“I heard what you said to Dianna,” he said. “Do you really think that she could have set that up?”

“Could have?” I asked. “Definitely. Did she? No – I don’t think she did. She’s got a vengeful streak in her when it comes to men who are shitty to women. Jasper doubly qualifies.”

“But you still don’t trust her?”

“Outside of my girls,” I answered, “I can count on my thumbs the number of people I trust completely.”

I saw from his face he was trying to figure it out.

“I don’t trust my parents either,” I said, giving him a hint. “Jules said I need to trust more, but I find it difficult. Every time I lower my guard, someone tries to sucker punch me. When I get back, I have to decide whether to trust a complete stranger or not. If I don’t, I can’t learn Healing.”

“Jules told me,” he said. “What she says makes sense. If you can find someone with powers that you trust, it will make life a lot easier for you - particularly if they are a network. I can’t help you trust, and I am hoping that your thumbs are Cheryl and I. But Jules is right, you do need someone. Being on your guard twenty-four-seven will wear you down.”

James had said much the same. That seemed like years ago.

We had arrived at the hole in the fence. The hands had hammered some stakes into the ground and strung some wire across the gap. It wouldn’t last. I was weary, but not fatigued. I was tired of holding back and hiding. Before Dean could get out of the truck, I removed the wires, pulled the stakes, pulled up and replaced the damaged poles and restrung the wire properly. It took less than thirty seconds.

Dean looked at me. “If you could do that,” he asked, “why have we been spending days fixing the fences?”

I sent him the memory of our first day in the field, when he said that he enjoyed the work – it got him out in the fresh air.

“I didn’t want to spoil your fun,” I said. “Besides, I was enjoying it too. It felt good to be out working. Also, how would you explain all the fences suddenly being repaired in a single day?”

We sat side by side in the truck, staring out of the windshield at the repaired fence.

A lone cow wandered up to the fence line, on the wrong side. We were easily about half a mile from the nearest gate. Dean cursed, and then laughed as the cow simply floated up and over the fence, back into the pasture, and then began to wander down the fence line as if nothing had happened. I did a quick area scan and couldn’t detect any other cows outside the pasture.

We sat in companionable silence all the way back to the house, having been gone less than thirty minutes.

“I was going to make you guys an early lunch,” Ness said when we got back. “I wasn’t expecting you back so soon.”

Dean chuckled. “Blame Clark here,” he said.

“Ness,” I said. “Why don’t I take you, and...”

Ness’s eyes widened. A wealth of possibilities presented themselves to her mind, each one more graphic than the last.

“Teach you to make Moussaka?” I finished.

Ness grinned wryly. “Okay,” was all she said. What she thought was unrepeatable.

Having Moussaka for lunch cheered everyone up. Once we had eaten and cleaned up afterward we were almost back to ourselves, although sitting in the living room and chatting without the dogs around was strange.

I was surrounded by my girls, although technically Jules was on me rather than around me. Curled up in my lap, she was still reading the book that Dianna had given her. I was just contemplating making a start on dinner when she suddenly sat up in my lap. I grunted a little as she ground her hip bone into my unmentionables, and not in a good way.

“Guys,” she said. “I think I found something.”

We were all instantly paying attention.

She told us that Constance had been researching her genealogy, but rather than just looking at the lineage, she’d documented the history of all the people that she found.

Jules had found the entry for Sarah Everson, Nee Miller. She read it aloud. “Sarah Jane Everson, born Miller, was the oldest daughter of James Maxwell Miller and Jennifer Ann Miller. She was born in seventeen eighty-four and died aged just eighteen years and ten months. The circumstances surrounding her death are the only remarkable thing about her life.

“James Miller had an agreement that Sarah would wed the son of the local cooper, but Sarah was in love with another, by the name of Edward Everson, the son of the local healer woman. In order to defy her father’s wishes, Sarah allowed Edward to bed her, taking her maidenhead. While this would normally be just cause for a lynching - and, indeed, both the Miller and Cooper families went to the Everson house for that purpose - it did not occur. Instead, they were persuaded by some miracle to allow the young lovers to marry, and the wedding took place that afternoon in front of the local justice.

“Sadly, their marriage didn’t last. Edward, having moved into the Miller household, did not take to his matrimonial responsibilities, and spent his evenings drinking and carousing in the tavern. He would return home well into his cups. He would then wake his new bride, insisting that she fulfill her ‘wifely duties,’ no matter that he himself was unable to perform due to excessive drinking. His own failure he blamed on her, and he became abusive and violent.

“Less than six months after they were wed, Sarah was found at the foot of the stairs in their home, her neck broken. What shocked everyone was Edward’s reaction. They had been certain by his treatment of Sarah, both while drunk and while sober, that he had had no love for her. They thought the pursuit of her had been driven by lust rather than affairs of the heart. Indeed, the father was convinced that Edward had been instrumental in her death and wished the justice to investigate.

“Edward, however, apparently did love Sarah, despite appearances, as that very afternoon he took his own life due to his loss.

“There is a little bit more,” Jules added, “but that is the meat of it.”

“I don’t understand,” I said. “How could he have abused her - even killed her? The bond is supposed to enforce love.”

“Is it?” asked Jules. “Or was that just our assumption? What if the bond was just that: a bond? What if it just tied them together - no more, no less? The requirements were met. At the time, they were both virgins and they were both willing participants. There is nothing we have found anywhere to say that love had anything at all to do with it. Think about who forged the bond. Why would she, of all people, have wanted to create, or even just reinforce, love between Edward and Sarah?

“What if the love you see in the bond is just the love that Mary and Amanda have for you? You assume that the bond Compels it, but does it? If the bond Compelled love, then when you suppressed your emotions, why didn’t the bond prevent it, or get disrupted by the lack of love? It’s quite reasonable to infer that neither thing happened because love has nothing at all to do with the bond.

“If I’m right, and I believe I am, the bond is nothing more than a tether. As you said, there is no way that a man in love could treat his lover like that. They even suspected that he killed her. Again, could he have done that if he loved her? What he didn’t know was that if he did kill her, the bond would enact its own revenge.”