Timesurfers Page 25

  “Why will I get him?” Cate asked.

  “Family can’t fight against family in the hand-to-hand combat round, which sucks because I’d love to go a few rounds with him.” Balthazar and Gaspar nodded their agreement with Mel.

  “How are you related to Austin?”

  Mel gave her a puzzled look. “He’s our half brother.”

  “What!” Cate thought that through. “So you have the same father?” The doors to the holding pen rocketed open. The boys jumped around for a few seconds to loosen up. The ground trembled as the crowd roared.

  “Let’s do this.” Balthazar marched through the gate with Mel and Gaspar close behind.

  She hurried to catch them.

  The arena was bare except for the four enormous circles marked on the ground. Ropes hung from the top of the perimeter wall to the dirt floor. Timesurfers dressed in the same black singlets and jeans as those who fired the arrows earlier were grouped around the ropes on the roof. Fluorescent yellow numbers emblazoned on their fronts and backs. The group with the number one marked on their singlets must be her opponents.

  She made her way to the circle marked with the number one as the Timesurfers climbed down the ropes. Rafe was at the start of her line and Austin at the end. The tall Asian guy in front of Austin held her gaze for a moment, openly curious. She breathed a silent prayer that there was no Rose or Jonah in the group. They had made her spar for hours every day these last few weeks. Toward the end, she wasn’t hitting them, but they weren’t hitting her as much either. If she could handle them, she could handle anyone.

  “Koombi!” A loud voice reverberated around the arena. Everyone snapped to attention. “Shi Jak!”

  Rafe approached hesitantly. “This is going to be like fighting blindfolded.”

  Cate blocked his punches easily and was surprised when he left his entire right side wide open for her to attack. He was struggling because he was used to reading people’s minds to anticipate their moves when he fought. The dome had robbed him of that and his super strength.

  The three boys each stood calmly near an unconscious body.

  “I’m sorry, Rafe.” Her jumping sidekick to the temple knocked him out before he hit the ground. Mel gave her two thumbs up, and the Timesurfers in her queue clapped and whooped.

  A girl similar in height to Cate approached quickly. “It’s the legendary Catherine! I see you were showing off your freak skills this afternoon.”

  Three kicks to Cate’s chest in quick succession made her stagger and gasp for breath. She scrapped her way through the rest of the minute.

  “You’re nothing special.” The girl clipped Cate’s ear with her hand. “Keep your guard up or next time that’ll be my foot and it’ll be lights out for you, Catherine.”

  After what seemed like much more than eight minutes of being punched and kicked on every inch of her body, the tall Asian stood in front of her. He smiled a deadly smile. “So you’re Austin’s infamous Cate! I’m Godfrey.”

  A punch came straight at her head. She stumbled back as Godfrey came at her again. She blocked two kicks, but the third made a solid thwack against her ribs. The air left her lungs with a loud rush. His next punch grazed her temple. Panic set in. This guy could kill her. She stayed as far out of his reach as she could for the rest of the allocated minute.

  “Keep your guard up or you’ll get pummelled,” Austin growled as he approached.

  She struggled to put her arms up. Her fists were like bricks dangling on string. Austin’s fist slammed into her side, and his foot smashed into the same spot. She gave an angry shout and dodged the foot aimed at her head. Austin certainly wasn’t pulling his punches. She visualised all the crosses Rose had painted on Jonah and went after them one at a time. She didn’t make contact, but Austin only got through her guard and smacked her a few times.

  “You’ve got this!” he called as he backed away.

  With no Rafe to fight, she had a minute’s reprieve. Doubled over, hands on knees, she sucked in some deep breaths. If she had to go two more rounds with Austin and Godfrey, she needed more recovery time.

  The girl was quick to attack but slow to get back and protect herself. After each attack Cate pounced and landed a kick to the girl’s upper body. She didn’t knock her out, but did get through the minute unscathed. Her next few opponents were easier. She tore one’s shoulder, broke another one’s leg with a monster elbow strike and knocked out four others.

  When Godfrey charged in it took all her efforts just to block the punches and kicks he rained down on her. “I thought you’d be more impressive,” he said when his minute ended.

  “I don’t care one bit what you think.” She gave him her best basilisk stare.

  Austin floated in. He punched and kicked her relentlessly. For every attack she managed to block, he made contact with three others.

  She hung back, contemplating her next move.

  “Attack me! Stop cowering. Show some fire,” Austin yelled.

  “I’m trying.” She fended off another head high kick.

  “They’ll fail you if they think someone took it easy on you.”

  She hadn’t known that, and she certainly wasn’t ever going through this again. Her knife hand strike to Austin’s shoulder found its target. She punched hard up and under into his stomach. He twisted away at the last second. He was slippery like Rose and Jonah, but even faster.

  “Far more convincing that time, Beautiful.” He wasn’t even breathing hard.

  Cate sagged at the knees. She had a minute before that girl came at her again and then six minutes until Godfrey and Austin got their last shot. Three minutes of sparring and it would be over. When the girl approached, Cate dodged in, punched her hard in the ribs, twisted behind her, and whacked her temple with her heel. “That’s lights out for you, sweetheart!”

  She only had to survive two more minutes. Austin and Godfrey both looked irritatingly carefree about the situation. She paced and waited. When they both came at her, she rushed backward.

  “It’s all in now!” Godfrey called as he and Austin fanned out around her. Godfrey ducked in and dealt a fierce blow to her kidney. Austin smashed her from the other side. Cate’s internal organs shook from the impact. She fought as hard as her depleted arms and legs would let her. When it ended, she slowly crumbled to her knees. Hands reached under her armpits and fingers dug into her side as someone lifted and hugged her.

  “You did it, Beautiful,” Austin breathed.

  “I did it.” She couldn’t open her eyes, and had no energy to raise a smile.

  Chapter 27

  Consort

  A cold, hard surface pressed against the nape of her neck. Water pounded nearby, and a citrus smell invaded her head.

  “Arms up.” Rose tugged at the bottom of Cate’s shirt.

  “I can do it.” Cate peeled her shirt off. A chill rippled across her bare back as it brushed the icy tiles. Pain sliced through her bicep. She’d been oblivious to the slash from the razor disk while she sparred, but now it throbbed and oozed blood.

  Rose twiddled the cold-water tap a few times and checked the water temperature. “The shower’s ready. I’ll be back to check on you. You did well today.”

  The bathroom door shut with the same thunk the arrows had made when they hit a body. Cate wriggled out of her jeans and crawled under the shower, gritting her teeth as fiery needles of pain rained across her shoulders. Her head made a dull thud against the shower wall. Red tinged water swirled toward the drain.

  Uncontrollable sobs battered her spine as they wrenched their way along her throat. A plethora of people died today at the hands of her zombies. There was nothing shiny and bright in her future. It was full of grimy, vile acts. She scrunched into a tight ball and cried. The self-loathing within her grew with every gut-wrenching sob. Her reprehensible actions at the GTs proved she was despicable to the core. Now on top of that she’d found out she was a murderer. Well she should have been. The water stopped and someone heaved her from the f
loor.

  “If you drip on me...I won’t be responsible for my actions.” Rose wrapped Cate in a gigantic, fluffy yellow towel and manhandled her to the bed.

  Rose wore a strapless floor-length black gown with a diamond choker around her neck. When she turned, Cate gasped. Strands and strands of glittering diamonds were draped like a giant spider web over her bare back. “What are you all dressed up for?”

  “I’m going to the GTs ball. You’re required at the GTs toga party with all the other under twenty-five-year-old riffraff.” Rose threw a white sheet at Cate. “Put it on.”

  Cate buried her head in the sheet. “I’m a despicable person.” A cold, sharp sting worked its way along her arm. The strong smell of antiseptic burned the inside of her nostrils.

  “Hold here and don’t bleed on that sheet.” Rose pressed Cate’s hand against the cloth on her bicep and then rummaged through a tray of bandages. She brushed Cate’s hand away and pressed strips of flesh coloured tape across the cut. “Put your toga on.”

  “No.” Cate’s voice sounded robotic. All her humanity had seeped out with her tears. She was physically and emotionally drained. “I want to wallow in self pity and despise myself for a few hours, possibly with some ice cream. Then I’ll shake it all off and find Xavier.”

  Rose pinched the bridge of her nose between her thumb and fingers and exhaled slowly. “I understand how you’re feeling.”

  “Is that so? You know what it’s like to be so filled with self-loathing that you want to rip out your heart and watch it beat for the last time?”

  “I know exactly what it’s like to be too repulsed to look in the mirror and to be desperate to die but too spineless to do it yourself.” She handed Cate a glass filled with black sludge. It smelled of liquorice and had the consistency of lumpy mud. “It’s a vitalising tonic. It tastes better than it looks.”

  Cate took a tentative sip and gagged at the sickly sweet, slimy texture. “Gross!”

  “But not as gross as it looks.” Rose gave her a wry smile. She smoothed an imaginary crease from her dress and wiped droplets of sweat from her upper lip. “Drink it all and you’ll feel better. Let me tell you a little about me.”

  A talk with Rose, about Rose. A poke in the eye with a blunt stick would be more appealing.

  “Drink.”

  Cate held her nose and drained the glass. She flopped on the bed as she struggled to keep the sludge down. Even her bones were exhausted.

  “I was a professional party girl, back in the day. A consort. You call them hookers, or prostitutes.”

  Cate looked directly at Rose. “Are you sure that’s what you mean?”

  Rose nodded.

  “So you, umm...”

  “I think we’re both clear what a prostitute does.”

  “But you weren’t always...umm...in that line of work?”

  “No.” Rose smiled sadly. “My mother died during childbirth. She chose the name Anna for me before she died. Father always called me by my second name, Rose. It was only the two of us for a few years before he remarried. It was fun having sisters and brothers, and his new wife was so kind. She loved me because she loved Father.”

  “What did your dad do?”

  “He designed ships, which other people built. On Tuesday, a week before my thirteenth birthday, Father didn’t come home. The constabulary arrived on our doorstep and delivered the news that he had been murdered for the money in his wallet. My stepmother endeavoured to make ends meet—but there was no money for anything. What furniture we didn’t sell, we burned for heat.”

  Cate had never pegged Rose for someone who wanted for anything. Let alone food and heat.

  “The night before the bank was due to evict us, an unsavoury man called Leonardo offered to buy me from my stepmother.”

  “Did you say ‘buy you’?”

  “Yes, you heard that correctly.” Rose’s face was devoid of expression.

  “To marry you?”

  “If Leonardo wanted to marry me, he would have offered my mother a dowry. I was a business acquisition.”

  She must have looked blank, because Rose lifted her shimmering curtain of black hair and parted the diamonds draped across her back. Red welts started on her neck, continued down her spine and under her dress. “He gave me these.”

  “What are they?”

  “He paid for a whore he could rent to his friends by the hour.”

  Cate stifled a gasp with her hand.

  “He branded me with the initials of anyone prepared to pay that little bit extra.”

  “I’m so sorry you had to go through something like that.” Cate couldn’t imagine the horror Rose experienced at the hands of that monster.

  “I’m not. My actions ensured my family was secure. It will always be a part of me. Every day I choose not to forget, I grow stronger. Decent people do dreadful things every day. How they deal with the consequences is the true test of character. Naitanui allowed me to use his cubes to see how that despicable piece of dirt ended up. He got what was coming to him. He was one of the first victims of the 1831 cholera epidemic in London. Karma can be a complete bitch. It’s decision time for you.”

  “You did what you had to for your family, and you weren’t killing people. My soul is blacker than that gunk you had me drink. I cavort with the undead. The boys said that I killed Zach, or I should have killed Zach...I’m sure you know what I’m trying to say.”

  Rose sighed. “Zach deserved everything he got in that time line. I would happily knock him off again for you if it was guaranteed to realign the time line. Leonardo made me sleep with men. He could have made me murder children and collect their hair to sell to the wig makers. I still would have done it. When you’re fighting for your life, or your family’s life, you do what you have to do. You fought for your life today with all the resources at your disposal. You create and command the undead. There’s no cavorting with them that I’m aware of.”

  Cate grabbed Rose by the hand. “You know what I’m going to become. Can you honestly say the world wouldn’t be better without me?”

  “No, it wouldn’t.” Rose stood and picked up the toga sheet. “Heroes only exist because there is evil. Hope only exists because there is despair. Theirs is a symbiotic relationship. One can’t exist without the other. You’re also special to Jonah and his only chance at any type of real happiness. That’s more important to me than you will ever know.” Rose bunched the sheet and fastened it at Cate’s shoulder with a broach made from an emerald jewel the size of an egg. She wrapped a belt made from a row of the same emerald stones around Cate’s waist.

  “Imagine if these were real?” Cate stroked the green stones.

  “They are.”

  Cate opened her mouth, but was unable to form any words.

  “They’re yours now. Put these on.” Rose dangled a sparkling green Converse sneaker from each hand. “There will be glass everywhere at the end of the night.”

  “How did they become mine?” Cate’s hands trembled as she laced the sneakers.

  “The trainer of every successful grommet selects a gift for them from jewels which have been collected over centuries from ancient civilisations. These emeralds came from the Incas.”

  “You chose these for me?”

  “Yes.” Rose crinkled her nose in disgust as she held out Cate’s rainbow hair extensions to better dry them with the hairdryer. “I was your trainer so it was my responsibility.”

  “Thank you.”

  Rose nodded.

  Cate stared at herself in the mirror. The black sludge had put a flush on her cheeks. “I overheard you and Jonah talking about erasing Austin’s memory of Catherine the other night.”

  Rose’s gaze remained steady. “All memories fade. Good and bad. I stand by what I did.”

  “I know how you did it. You had Austin, Naitanui, and Jonah pose for a photo together. When Jonah put his arm around Naitanui for you to take the photo he accessed his power to erase memories.”

  “Do you hav
e a point?”

  “Someone else might tell Austin about him and Catherine?”

  “No one else knew about it.”

  That wasn’t true. Godfrey knew. When they were fighting he had said she was Austin’s Cate. “What if I tell him?”

  “You won’t.” Rose wiped a hand under her eye to clear some smudged makeup and fanned her face. “It’s getting warm in here. Sometimes we protect our loved ones by keeping secrets from them, even leaving them. We endure the immeasurable pain of these actions every day because we love them.”

  Cate’s next step etched itself clear and bold in her mind.

  Rose ushered her into the hallway.

  Her heart instinctively glowed warm at the sight of Austin sauntering toward her. With his toga wrapped low over his hips and draped across his chest and shoulder, there was a significant amount of skin over smooth muscle on display. Only he could wear a toga with that much swagger.

  Rose’s hot breath washed over Cate’s neck. “If you do anything to hurt my son, I’ll hunt you down, and kill you slowly with a thousand cuts from a poisonous knife.”

  Austin was deep in thought, head down and eyes focused on the ground. When he looked up, he grinned. “Wow, Mum, you look great.” His eyes glittered with happiness as he twirled Rose, whose cheeks were flushed red.

  Rose frowned. “You’re hot, Austin.”

  Austin gave her a quizzical look. “That’s not at all creepy. But thanks...I think.”

  “Not hot to look at. Hot to touch.” Rose pressed her hand against his forehead.

  “I’m fine! Are you meeting Jonah?”

  “I’ll see you later.” The thick floor rugs muffled the click of Rose’s heels as she hurried away.

  “That’s a yes. You look amazing.” Austin grabbed Cate’s waist and spun her around.

  She blinked a few times. “You did see what happened in the arena?”

  “You were phenomenal!” Austin threw a nonchalant arm around her shoulder and shepherded her along the brightly lit corridor. Heat radiated from him. He did feel hotter than normal. The glow from the lamps resting on smooth stone pedestal tables highlighted their shadows gliding along the cream limestone wall.