Disclaimer: I don't own DP or HON or WOTO
Chapter One: Betrayed and Broken
October 5th, 2004
Clover's POV:
"Bye Chloe!" I waved frantically at the car, trying to get my best friend's attention.
After a moment, I saw a figure move in the tinted glass window and Chloe's blonde head popping out from underneath it as it rolled down. "Bye Clover! See you tomorrow!"
I was still waving as her car pulled away, Chloe moved a lot and when her dad, Steve, had moved them again they'd come to Syracuse to be near me. I'd been so happy when that had happened, and they'd moved in March of this year so Chloe and I would be together for grade 4. We'd spent the entire summer together and when August came we were together still. Chloe and I hadn't been together last year for our parents' anniversary so Steve was making it up this year by living close to Mom and me.
Daddy. It's been four years now since Jenny and Daddy died but they've never faded away from Chloe and I, their memory forever etched into us.
I began the twenty minute walk home. I didn't mind the walk or the dangers, there practically were none, as long as you stayed in public areas and on main roads you were safe enough.
Walking home from school was always relaxing in my books and it was a good way for me to organize my thoughts before I got home.
Mommy would be waiting for me as usual, my mom and I get along alright… most of the time. After Dad died she decided that I might actually mean something to the world and, at the very least, started doing a half-assed job to take care of me. That was a step forward actually; before, when my dad was alive, she couldn't care whether a bus hit me or not.
Still she and I had a strained relationship, like she knew I wasn't her daughter or something crazy like that. It wasn't true obviously, I know that but it's always gnawed at me like somewhere deep in me that said it was true, that I wasn't my mother's legitimate daughter. I shook my head, that's crazy talk I'm turning into Mom.
But still… that damned feeling kept troubling me. Mommy was blonde with brown eyes and had sun kissed skin year round, she basically screamed Californian bottle blonde. Me? Dark hair, bright blue eyes, and a ghostly pale parlour that screamed emo. My near black hair was from my dad, I knew that much, but my blue eyes and pale skin? Neither of my parents had that. So I was stuck in a pickle and forced to live on.
Oh god! I sound like a hormonal 15 year old! I'm only 9! Save me!
I rounded the corner onto my street and stopped short. The road nearest my house was vacated by black SUVs' with windows so tinted that the people inside couldn't see out.
I continued strolling down the street, cautious now. My body and my mind screaming to flee, turn around and get as far away as possible as soon as possible.
But what about Mommy? And Chloe? If I turned around and Mom was being held hostage I could be the one who was at fault for her death because I was a little cry baby and couldn't face my fears. Chloe would be devastated, though, if I died because the people had come after me for only god knows why. I kept ambling towards my house.
I made my way across the small lot of lawn and up the steps of my falling apart house, the rotting wood of the steps groaning underneath my weight. That was saying a lot, I weighed 71 pounds soaking wet could make wooden steps groan, it's just one of the many examples that the house is crumbling before our feet.
Now the challenge was the door, a dead bolt door that kept intruders out and me in most of the time. But it wasn't the lock that made me hesitate, I knew it wasn't locked, it was what I might find beyond the door – images of Mommy gagged and bound with a gun to her temple, a single shot and it was bye-bye Mommy. I loved Mom and didn't wish her dead but would I risk my life to save hers? I jerked my head, don't think about it just go in.
I twisted the knob and nudged the door open; wincing at every creak it made, each sounding like a gunshot.
"Clover?" Mommy called from the kitchen then I heard her socked feet padding down the hall towards me. She rounded the corner and gave me a small smile that didn't reach her eyes. "Hello sweetie, how was your day?"
"Good we started learning about multiplying fractions," I dropped my knapsack down and kicked off my sneakers. "But Mrs. Pierceton said we wouldn't spend much time on it because we'll learn about it more in grade 5."
She nodded and waved me into the kitchen where my afternoon snack awaited me. After Daddy died she started going to work earlier and coming home earlier, figuring it would be better for her to be home when I got home from school rather than being with me in the morning. Mom was a business woman working for a pharmaceutical company and when she wanted to take earlier shifts they gave her a bit of a fuss but it worked out in the end. So every morning I would hitch a ride with the neighbours to school when Mom left for work and then walk home where Mommy would be waiting for me.
I was halfway through eating my apples and plum sauce when I finally asked her the question I'd needed to know since I saw the SUVs on the street. "Do you know about the people outside?"
She had her back to me so I couldn't see her facial expression but I saw her straightened, the muscles in her shoulder bunched and her back tense and rigid. "No I don't sweetheart," her lie sliced right through me, it didn't matter that she lied but she knew about what was going on. I needed to know too.
"Liar," I muttered and she whirled on me, I shrunk back. "Mom you're not a very good at lying and I just want to know what's going on."
"You need to leave," her voice dripped with venom, I started away from her advancing on me. "Clover you need to go with the people outside and never come back here."
"Why?" I asked her and her face warped into a look of pure disgust. Then I knew, no mother would ever make a face like that to her child – at least that's no biological mother. This woman wasn't my mother; she never truly cared or loved me.
"Because you're a little brat," she spat in my face, I fixed her with a hard look and she looked a bit startled. "You are a freak, a little monster like the rest of them. A failed little beast, you're father was a fool, showering you and spoiling you to no end until he was finally six feet under."
My anger flared and I lashed out at her, but I was only 9 and she was twice my weight and thrice my size. So when my flying fist tried to make contact with her she caught my wrist easily and flung me across the room, I crashed into the wall. Pain exploded in the back of my head and my eyesight blurred.
I felt the traitor grab me and drag me to the door. The sunlight blinded me again, boots clomped on the drive, car engines revved, and I was scared silly. My brain screeching for me not to piss my pants no matter how terrified I was.
"You want her?" the woman who I thought was my mom yelled at the people in suits and some who were wearing dark clothing that looked like hunting gear. "You can have her!" she tossed me toward the closest person, a blonde woman who glared down at me.
"Thank you Tess," a male voice said from the crowd and the blonde woman pulled me away from my life. I struggled; I couldn't let them take away everything I built for myself. What Daddy had built for me.
Suddenly I remembered a lesson that Dad had seared into my head. I'd only been five years old but he wanted to teach me the address of a place just in case something were to happen to me and he wasn't able to save me.
Flashback
"Clover please I need you to listen to me," Daddy knelt down and caught my chin in his hand. "This is very important and I want you to learn it right away just in case something were to occur and you need to run."
"Why would I run?" I asked and gave him a puzzled look. I was only 5 but with going to regular school then coming home and having Daddy home school me, I had the IQ of at least an 8 year old. "Daddy will protect me and we go together."
"I know baby, but you still need to listen to me," he picked me up and pulled me into his lap. Mommy was gone and Daddy and I were playing but he needed to tell me something, important apparently too.
I nodded and he wrote down something on a piece of paper. "No matter what you don't throw this paper out," he held the paper in front of me and I told him I understood.
I looked at the paper; in Daddy's untidy scrawl was an address: Jeremy Danvers, 13876 Wilton Grove Lane, Bear Valley, New York.
"Who's Jeremy Danvers?" I asked him.
"He's a werewolf and that's where he lives with his Pack," Daddy gauged my reaction when he saw there wasn't one he sighed. "Werewolves exist Clo, supernaturals are real."
Daddy was being silly but I kept the torn sheet still, just in case.
Flashback over
At the time I thought Dad was either trying to scare me or was just being ridiculous as usual. Now, I wasn't so sure.
The sheet was still in my room, tucked underneath my socks safely out of reach of my mom. It didn't matter, after Dad died I made sure I memorized the address but I'd always said to myself that I was being paranoid. Dad's protective streak rubbing off on me, always on high alert.
Paranoid? No, just extremely cautious, and that caution would've paid off if I'd just listened to my intuition and allowed my body to run away like it had wanted to. Damn it! I'm so stupid; I continued to resist with the woman, my mind screaming to get away and run like hell away from this.
"Feisty little bitch, isn't she?" the woman's vise-grip tightened around my arm even more. "Sedate her."
Hands clamped down on my limbs but I still fought back. When I felt the needle poke my arm a lead weight settled into my stomach, cold, pure fear ran through me.
I'm going to die! Screamed through my brain, my body suddenly felt very heavy like I hadn't slept for days and was finally getting permitted to. The iciness of sleep raced through my body and I had to battle to stay awake, the blackness reach my brain and I couldn't fight anymore.
My vision blurred and the world swayed, my conscience slipping back into an easier time.
Daddy's rich laugh, Jenny's tinkling giggle, Chloe's and me rolling in the tall grass. Safe and sound with our parents to protect us.
I blinked and dimly saw the blue sky and the sun disappearing as I was towed into the back of a van. I closed my eyes again, going back to my happy place.
Black and white curls ruffling in the breeze, porcelain the shade of snow only marred by slivery swirls on the skin, and a flash of molten azure. My eyes.
I fell into the endless abyss.
My body felt so heavy, I didn't want to wake up. Mommy could just phone in and tell them I wasn't feeling well, we could stay home and have a jammy day.
My bed felt hard and cold instead of fluffy and warm. I realized my head wasn't on a pillow or my blanket, underneath my fingers was metal.
I tried opening my eyes but it felt like they were sewn together, I had to pry them open. Even still my vision was hazy and the bright light above me stung my eyes.
I swallowed and found out that I couldn't, my throat was too dry and I gagged. My mouth felt fuzzy and tasted weird, like waking up after a long sleep and your mouth was so parched that you couldn't talk.
I blinked to clear my eyes of sleep then took in my surroundings. Everything in this room was modern and sanitary, or so I sincerely hoped it was. Too sanitary actually, like in operating rooms at a hospital. What was this place? Too sanitary, metal instruments, a counter with a steel sink, machinery like at hospitals. A hospital but not a hospital, this place was a scientific laboratory. My thoughts reeled at the conclusion.
A voice from my left then another and another. More voices followed, I caught my name and Chloe's too. My eyes snapped open, my thoughts racing through the possibilities of Chloe being caught with me. No not Chloe, please not Chloe!
"…the other one, Chloe, wasn't there," a male said. What was he talking about? "Weren't they supposed to be together?"
The relief I felt at that moment was so great that I almost smiled, Chloe was safe. We were supposed to have a play date today but we cancelled it this morning when Harry, Chloe's driver, told me that Chloe had a rescheduled swimming lesson after school and that tomorrow she could come over. If we hadn't cancelled then Chloe would be here as well, that thought sacred me but at least it wasn't real.
Chloe was safe and that's what mattered.
"Shhh I think she's waking up," a woman's voice then feet shuffling across the linoleum. I shut my eyes quickly before they knew I heard their conversation.
A hand pressed against my forehead.
"Clover?" a new woman's breath tickled my face. That voice, I knew that voice. I'd heard it just a few days ago when Chloe's aunt, Lauren, had come to pick her up.
I groaned, making it look like I was just waking up. That traitor! Lauren was sweet and kind to Chloe and I, she'd even taken us for ice cream last week when we'd completed our first month of grade 4. I liked her a lot, she was just like Jenny but not.
Lauren was a bit stricter but Chloe said she didn't used to be like that. Jenny's death didn't just take a toll on Chloe and I, Steve and Lauren were affected too. Steve worked more often and left Chloe in the care of housekeepers and drivers while Lauren spent as much time as she could with Chloe. Lauren disapproved of Steve's behaviour towards Chloe, leaving a girl alone with maids after her mother died and depriving Chloe of the essential fatherly shoulder to cry on and consol with. Chloe thinks it's because he's trying to avoid her but not because he doesn't love her, Steve does very much, but because Chloe looks like Jenny.
Still I knew Steve loved his daughter greatly, I'd seen it when he surprised her last year by picking her up after school and taking her and I to the mall. It wasn't the novelty of spoiling his daughter and her best friend that made me realize that he loved Chloe. When she took hold of his hand, he beamed at her and kissed her head. The littlest gestures that they had showed that they loved each other; even if Chloe's dad was estranged he still loved her.
After Jenny died Chloe's dad had done the right thing, given her space to grieve; I was the opposite, I needed somebody to hold me and tell me it was going to be alright and that they love me. Mom didn't do that, I was locked in my room and left to deal with the emptiness I felt weighing me down so heavily. But at least Chloe was there, if she hadn't been then I was sure that I wouldn't be who I was today.
"Clover, hon?" Lauren's concern hit me and I felt angry with her. I opened one eye and sure enough Lauren was standing over me, her young face lined with worry. With straight pale blonde hair, Persian blue eyes and a round face, Lauren was quite average for a 30 year old but she was still pretty.
"Clover, how are you feeling?" a man who looked like a vulture leaned down assess me with his beady eyes.
I open my mouth to speak but the words couldn't come out, my throat was still too dry. I sat up but then found out that I couldn't do that either, I was strapped to the steel table.
Oh my god! I'd seen this before in a scary movie, the scared, helpless girl chain to a metal table so she wouldn't escape when the mad scientist started poking and prodding her until she didn't have a voice to scream anymore. I thrashed against the manacles but Lauren stopped me.
"Clover, if you are going to be difficult then we can't untie you but if you are willing to listen to us then we can arrange for you to be in a different sleeping quarters," the man had this look on his face like he was bidding me to trust him, genial and kind but I wasn't having any of his BS. But I played along with his petty little game; if it got me out of here then I'd grit my teeth and cooperate with it.
I nodded and heard the snap of the restraints freeing me but I didn't move, not until Lauren helped me up and off the table. The world tipped when my feet hit the ground and I lost my balance, my legs felt like hundred pound weights trying to be lifted by a person with no muscle whatsoever. Lauren and Mr. Vulture man tired to help me regain my balance but whatever they gave me, they gave me a bit too much and I couldn't walk. After I was given metallic tasting water to help clear my throat and mouth of the dehydration they plopped me in a wheelchair and rolled me to a different room.
A bedroom like room to be exact, too cheery and bright. My eyes hurt from the artificial light coming from the room to make up for the fact that there was no windows and no natural sunlight. I rubbed them and squinted until they adjusted.
"This will be your temporary bedroom until we figure out what to do with you," the guard who was pushing me said with a sneer worthy of a child. Mr. Vulture waved him away and wheeled me to the bed.
I scrambled out of it and onto the bed, the door closing almost the whole way leaving just a crack open so he could get out. He put the wheelchair near the door then turned at me with an amiable smile so fake it almost made me laugh. I chomped on my cheek to keep me from smiling, I was to play model patient – follow the rules and be sugary sweet and then backstab them when they least expected it. But first I had to gain their trust or some of it at least.
So I fixed Mr. Vulture with a syrupy smile, showing him I was willing to be pleasant and that I'd just been startled to rouse and find myself chained to a table. His grin widened when he saw my expression, god sometimes I love how adults are such fools, this was going to be easier than I thought.
"Sorry about the restraints and we didn't want you to wake up like that," he sat next to me on the bed, far enough to not invade my personal space but close enough for it to be uncomfortable. "Clover, do you know why you are here?"
I shook my head, my hair flipping back and forth with the movement. I didn't even know this guy's name much less where I was and why I was here.
"I should probably introduce myself first before I start asking questions and answering yours," his thin lips twisted into a wry smirk. "I'm Dr. Davidoff."
Dr. Davidoff was extremely tall and hunched like he had to lean down to hear what others were saying so he'd permanently stayed that way. He was nearly bald aside from a thin halo of greasy hair and a big sharp nose that held glasses to hide is beady eyes. I didn't think his name fit him that well so non-verbally I would call him Dr. Vulture.
"The reason that you are here," he continued. "Is because you are special."
Where'd I heard that before? From every adult trying to reassure you that special was good. Tell me something I don't know.
"Clover, you are a necromancer," Dr. Davidoff assessed my reaction through his glasses then pushed them into place. When he saw my blank but confused look he explained what he meant. "A necromancer is a type of supernatural that can communicate with the deceased and some powerful ones can even resurrect the dead."
Okay, there's something I don't know.
Fright muddled my brain, the dead. Communicate with the dead, maybe even raise them but as I continued listening to Dr. Davidoff I learnt that if a necromancer does raise a corpse that the body will still rot and the zombie will be theirs to control. A zombie who didn't have any say at whether or not it wanted to do something, it had to obey its master and their word actually made a zombie do things.
"You'll learn more later but I want you to know that Tess does work for us and that she isn't your biological mother. She was merely your caregiver until we were ready to see you and make sure you were alright."
She didn't do a very good job though. I didn't say that out loud but the distaste must've shown on my face because Dr. Davidoff squirmed.
"We'll speak later, for now you should sleep and regain your strength," he patted my head as he stood. "Tomorrow I hope that you will be rested enough to take a look around this place."
I nodded; throughout that entire conversation I hadn't said a word. Just nod for yes or shake for no. Dr. Davidoff left and I was left alone.
I analysed the predicament that I'd gotten myself into. If Daddy was here he'd save me and run like a bat outta hell with me in tow and once we were somewhere safe he'd make sure I was alright. He wouldn't yell at me about how I was stupid enough to get here, he wouldn't hit me – he never did hit me, the thought never crossed his mind and he knew it was cruel. He'd assure me it was okay that I'd messed up and train me as best as he could so I'd be prepared just in case it happened again.
But Daddy wasn't here; he would never be there for me again. Tears sprung into my eyes and I wiped them away before they could fall. I had to think of a plan to get myself out of here, so far I had to play perfect little angel to gain their trust then plot an escape but for that I needed a vague idea of the building structure and where everything was.
Even if you do gain their trust and somehow break out of here where would you go?
Ah I was waiting for my inner voice to surface and question my every move. I knew this was going to be asked, I would go to Chloe and take refuge with her.
Good plan until Steve and Chloe figure out that you're crazy and send you back here. Remember they want Chloe too so you need to stay away from her if you want her to be safe.
Damn my inner voice, go away. It's the only escape option I have right now. And Chloe has a right to know.
You can't go rambling about supernaturals through the streets of New York; you'll be in a padded room at the New York State Asylum for the Insane in no time. And you don't even know if Chloe's a supernatural and besides Dr. Vulture said that you're powers won't even come in until you're a teen so isn't it better for Chloe not to know at the moment.
She had a point but still I felt like Chloe wasn't going to be safe for very long, I needed to warn her about her aunt. Lauren was a traitor, her betrayal was even worse than Tess's. I wasn't going to call her Mom anymore because she wasn't my mother, and she had no right to the title anymore.
Be hurt about Lauren and Tess's betrayal later. For now you need a plan to get out of here and you can't go to Chloe, to keep her safe you can't see her again. You can't go to anyone if you escape, at least not anyone who you don't know is a supernatural.
Well then I'm screwed. Thanks a lot but I don't know anyone who's a supernatural!
Jeremy Danvers.
Hope raced through me so fast it hurt. Yes! Jeremy Danvers was the answer! Dad had said he was a werewolf and that's where his Pack lived with him. He could help me, but did he want to? For all I knew this guy could be a dead beat and kill me as soon as he saw me.
It's the only option you have. And would you really think that Daddy would want you to go to a person who might kill you?
True. A sardonic smile settled on my lips. I was going to get out of here, dead or alive but preferably alive. If I had to make a deal with the devil I would get out of this hell on earth.
I crawled under the covers, exhaustion taking over and mingle with the remaining sedative. The sheets were cool at first but after a few seconds a warm air blew over me and I was wisped into the land of dreams. Or nightmares, I was too tired to know and didn't really care.
I'd get out of here and run to Jeremy, and then I'd be safe with him. After being betrayed and broken I knew I would be out of harm's way with Jeremy Danvers
But for now I was a guinea pig used for experimentation at the will of crazy scientists.
And I was scared to death.
A/N:
AAAAAAHHHHH!
Damn it poor Clover! Screw the damned Edison Group!
Review please!
Thanks Shawna~~~~
