The Hidden Prophecy Trilogy

5. Fever Dreams of Clarity-1

Kinza did not plan on keeping to the agreement in the slightest. She clearly wasn’t going to muscle her way out of Zaid’s grip, but maybe she could sneak away somehow. She couldn’t lie to herself either. The things he said about the tribal mark and how he knew she had that tattoo had rattled her a little. Everything he had said prior to that could be explained away by drugs or psychosis, but that little bit of information had stuck with her. While looking for a way to escape, she could see if he truly knew anything about it in the meantime. He might as well be useful.

The sun was on its downward arc, and Kinza could tell it was close to rush hour based on the sound of the traffic coming from the highway. Her stomach grumbled, confirming the time. She hadn’t eaten since the night before, and she was starting to feel light-headed. Looking down at her hands, she saw that the cuts on her palms from the rock weren’t as bad as she originally thought. They were already scabbed over.

After agreeing for the seventeenth time that she wouldn’t start screaming again, Zaid led her out of the building and down the street. Looking around, she guessed she was a good mile from her house. The warehouse was definitely in a neighborhood where she wouldn’t walk at night, and she hoped they would leave soon. Zaid said nothing as he walked to a car on the side of the road and, in broad daylight, slammed his elbow into the back window.

“Yes, please keep making that much noise. Maybe someone will hear you and rescue me.”

Zaid just gave her a tolerant look and hot-wired the car in under a minute. Sliding into the driver’s seat, he said, “Get in.” She didn’t know why she expected less of a kidnapper.

Looking around one more time, Kinza rushed over to the passenger’s side and climbed in. The car was clearly as old as she was and looked like a dump. Fast food bags and paper cups littered the floor. A few articles of rancid clothing were in the back, making her roll down the window for a single breath of fresh air.

They sat in silence for the first few minutes before Kinza pointed out a drugstore on the corner.

“We can stop somewhere out of town. I’m not stupid enough to stop so close to where you live,” Zaid said. He had moved the seat back as far as it would go, but he still looked like an elephant crammed into a clown car. So this wasn’t his first rodeo. Great.

She just rolled her eyes to the ceiling and stared out the window, watching as they entered and eventually exited the horrible Chicago traffic. The city slowly drifted by as they got further and further out of town. She realized that Grams and Mitra would be worried sick about her. Her professors must have thought she skipped class, and Karin would probably count this against her somehow when she got back.

If she got back.

If “How are we getting to Tanzania? The airport is the opposite direction,” she asked after a while.

“I don’t use airports. We are headed to upstate Michigan, on the east side of the lake. A friend of mine has a portal there we can use,” he replied. Kinza gave him a deadpan look and turned back to the window. She had to admire the sheer level of commitment he had to his fantasy world.

“Oh, yes. Of course,” she said, overly agreeable. “A portal. How could I have been so silly?”

* * *

Zaid drove for another thirty minutes before pulling into the parking lot of a d**g store. Usually, by now, he would have had his mark bound and gagged in the trunk, but he wanted to ask the girl, Kinza, more questions. From the start, everything about this mission had gone totally sideways, and he was starting to wonder if he had been given the wrong name.

But she has the tattoo, he thought to himself. The only Anunnaki outside of Rhapta were venari, who had special circumstances, and ubir. This girl seemed to be in a group of her own, and he intended on finding out what that meant.

But she has the tattoo,venariIn the meantime, trying to keep her calm was like trying to bathe a cat.

“You can get whatever you need, but I’m coming with you,” he said, turning off the ignition. Even with the still-mild September air, the breeze from the broken window would cool down fast, and they still had several hours to go. As they walked inside, he kept his eyes peeled for another car to boost. Venari tried to stay out of human civilization as much as possible, but he had needed to learn to drive a long time ago, and that meant learning to steal cars.

VenariKinza grabbed a basket and stalked down the aisles, throwing in seemingly random crap. Who needed a family-size bag of Doritos? She stood a solid foot shorter than him, and the bag looked as big as she was. Toiletries and snacks filled the basket. Never in his years as a venari had he purchased deodorant for an ubir. It’s not like it was actually coming from his bank account, though.

venariZaid took a deep breath and felt for the heartbeats in the store. Two of them were coming around the corner of the next aisle, and he heard keys jingling. As they rounded the corner, he angled his body to collide with a man with a receding hairline and a horrid corduroy shirt.

As the man stumbled, Zaid moved his arm faster than human eyes could track and slid the keys from his belt loop.

“Whoops, sorry!” the guy said. Zaid just dipped his head in acknowledgment and pocketed the keys. He watched them move back to the pharmacy to wait in line.

Perfect.

When he looked back, Kinza was fiddling with something on a shelf but clearly eyeing the front door. As she turned back around, she jumped, seeing him staring at her. Honestly, she was the most conspicuous person he had ever met.

“Hurry up,” he said.

She rolled her eyes, and the gesture made him want to strangle her. “How much do you get paid?” she asked.

“What?”

“How much do you get paid for capturing me? I’m dying to know.”

“Fifty-thousand shillings.”

“Pirate money?”

“What? No, Rhaptan shillings. It’s equivalent to about two thousand American dollars.”

“That’s it?” she asked, wrinkling her nose. “I’m a little insulted.”

He didn’t know what to say to that, so just asked, “You’ve seriously never heard of Rhapta before? From your parents or relatives?”

“Nope,” she said, heading up to the counter. “Not once.” As the cashier rang up her stuff, Kinza looked at him expectantly. He pulled out a beaten-up credit card from his pocket. He’d get a new one every few years when the fake accounts started attracting the attention of the FBI. It came in handy when he needed to buy things outside of Rhapta, as the tribal city had a limited supply of modern niceties like sweat-wicking t-shirts and zip ties.

Kinza grabbed her stuff, and he followed close behind her out to the parking lot. “Not that one,” he said as she walked toward the old beater. He clicked the fob on the keyring, and the lights of a silver pickup flashed a few spots away. She just looked at him with an unapproving stare.

As they got in, she asked, “So if these Abracadabra people have all these, like, powers or whatever, why hasn’t it been in the news? I’m sure people would’ve freaked out by now.”

“Anunnaki,” he corrected. “And you are right. That’s why it’s hidden behind a barrier. Humans can’t see it or cross it. I told you, all Anunnaki have to stay in the city.”

“Or they get hunted down and murdered, yeah, yeah, I’m abundantly familiar with that part.” She ripped open the giant bag of chips and started devouring them. “So let me get this straight,” she said with a mouthful of orange dust. “A bunch of people with powers live in an invisible city in Tanzania, and they are not allowed to leave, right?”

“It’s immensely more complicated than that,” he said, pulling back onto the highway headed north.

“Sure, right, okay. I have a hard time believing that.”

“And I have a hard time believing that you are not an ubir when you clearly have a tribal tattoo, some sort of abilities, and that woman had a Deathstone.” Zaid was starting to get irritated. Maybe he should have put her in the trunk. “I think you’re lying and that you are an ubir with some weird ability to hide your Aura and other abilities. I’m guessing you completed the rite recently, yeah?”

some woman “That is not my problem,” she said, crumpling the top of the chip bag and snatching a giant bottle of water. “I was living my life all by myself, and you ruined it. It’s not my fault you and your stupid tribe got the wrong person. Maybe you should take it up with them before k********g and assaulting innocent people!” she yelled. “It sounds like you are all just a bunch of murderers that keep their own people locked up like animals.”

not you Zaid"s vision went red, and the buried image of his brother’s body flashed in his mind. It took years of control not to shove her out the door and onto the highway. Instead, he yanked the steering wheel to the right causing the tires to screech and slammed the truck to a stop on the shoulder. Cars honked and swerved around them.

“Okay, you spoiled brat. You clearly know nothing. I’m getting that. But you should refrain from judging things you don’t understand. If you’re innocent, then great, the council will free you, you can go back to your special life, and I won’t have to listen to your annoying voice a moment longer. Until then, have a shred of respect and keep your mouth shut.”

your mouth shut“Excuse me?!” Kinza dragged the words out, and he braced for a battle. “Who the hell do you think you are? I could not care less about you and your imaginary city. I wanted nothing to do with this. You followed me home. You blew up my house, not me, and do you think we can pay for that? No. Because the hours that I put into work go toward my tuition, and I’m not giving that up. And you physically injured my grandma and me. Pardon me, but you have not earned any respect!” She drew her feet up, crossed her arms, and turned her face toward the window, signaling the end of the conversation.

cuse mehours earned Zaid clenched his jaw, breath whistling in and out of flared nostrils. Without saying another word, he pulled back out into traffic.

* * *

They sat in silence for two hours, the majority of which Kinza was fuming. The cityscape faded as they followed the highway up the side of Lake Michigan, the trees slowly becoming denser as they got farther north. For a portion of the drive, the sparkling water of the lake sat to their left before the highway moved deeper inland, and they were surrounded by trees on both sides.