Eve's Hollow by Charles Bedlam (best free e reader .txt) 📕

“Boss,” Mike said. “Mr. Grigori. I brought her.”

“You can go,” a dark voice spoke from the chair.

Mike looked down at Estelle and made eye contact with her for just a moment. In that moment, Estelle could have sworn that she saw a hint of fear in his eyes. She understood the look of fear in human beings. She had seen it many times. He moved out of her sight and the door closed behind him, making the room instantly darker. There were two lanterns situated on either side of the desk top, giving the room a soft orange glow. In the following silence, Estelle could hear her blood pumping through her head. The chair at the desk turned around.

Sitting before her like Dracula on his throne was an older man who looked to be in his early sixties. His eyes were dark and sorrowful. His salt and pepper hair was slicked back. He wore an elegant business suit, the colors Estelle could not make out in the darkness. A gold ring on his right ring finger glinted and the light of the lanterns cast dark shadows on his face. Even in the shadows though, Estelle knew his face. That was how she was used to seeing it.

“It's been a long time.” His voice was dark and a little husky. His accent was the same as hers, just thicker and more pronounced. He sounded the same way he did the last time she saw him.

“Not long enough,” Estelle said.

Silence again. It was much heavier this time.

“Please sit,” Mr. Grigori said, gesturing to the chair before his desk. “I only want to talk.”

Estelle hesitated. Ever fiber in her told her to turn and run out the door, but Mr. Grigori's voice gripped her and pulled her in anyway. Before she could stop herself, she was already settling into the cushioned chair across from Mr. Grigori. She sat back and nervously rested her hands in her lap.

“What happened to you?” he asked. “I haven't seen you in decades, yet you appear before me from days of your youth.”

She felt an incomprehensible obligation to respond. “I was... reborn.” She tried to change the subject. “You look very much older than I remember you.”

“I appear the way I did on the day that I died,” he said, folding his hands with his elbows on the desk. “You said the prayer.”

“So did you. That means you wanted a second chance, no?”

Mr. Grigori was silent. For a moment, Estelle thought that she had upset him.

“What I did to you was wrong,” he finally said.

She never thought she hear him say such words. They came unexpected and swift like an assassin's blade from the shadows. Estelle was caught off guard.

“Do you truly mean that?” she asked.

“I do. Tell me. Why are you here?”

“Because you kidnapped me with a vending machine.”

“I mean- in the Hollow?”

Instinct from her past life told her to lie. Especially to him. There was hardly a truth that she told in her previous life, but with this new opportunity, she sought to maintain her purity of character. She opted to tell him the truth.

“I'm looking for someone,” she said.

“Who?”

“He's the Supernova Samurai.”

Mr. Grigori's eyes narrowed and he peered at Estelle in disbelief.

“Why would you be after a monster like that?”

Here we go again, Estelle thought to herself. She defended her mission once before against Baron Ransley and was prepared to do so again.

“He's my Guardian,” she responded, firmly. “I'm supposed to find him.”

“I do not want to disappoint you,” Mr. Grigori said, “but that.. beast isn't capable of protecting anyone.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I have witnessed firsthand the overwhelming destruction and and devastation left in the wake of this madman.”

Estelle felt her face scrunch together with confusion. Mr. Grigori still peered into her eyes.

“We have all heard rumors about the Supernova Samurai,” he continued. “The Punished speak in whispers that are heard through the cracks in our walls. I have seen it for myself though. I had been scavenging with a group of my people. We had been attacked and I was the only survivor. After leaving a refugee center, I desperately tried to reach this compound, the sky turned black. I thought it was a Soul Storm. That's when I saw the lightning. Lightning had never appeared here before.”

He took a couple of moments to think to himself.

“I had been atop a roof while I was en route and that's when I saw them fighting. Blue and purple lightning clashed in the sky. They matched the descriptions that the Punished spoke of. Their speed and strength was great. They leaped through the air as if to fly. Just as much as each other, they destroyed the surrounding environment. They fought mercilessly. As far away as I was, I could hear their roars as if they were standing next to me.

“As I watched their battle, I watched him gather his power into a single bolt of white lightning. He shot it at his enemy and his own attack was thrust back at him. His attempt in blocking it resulted in the bolt veering off into the city. The bolt crashed into the very refugee shelter that I had come from.”

Mr. Grigori let this sink in. He could see and feel Estelle's mood plummeting as if a hiker falling from a cliff.

“Did anyone survive?” she asked.

“The entire block was incinerated. The two kept fighting. There's no telling how many more perished.”

Estelle took a deep breath that she meant to silence, but she was sure he heard her.

“You are a Seeker?” he asked her. She nodded and he thought to himself for a moment.

“Listen. Estelle.” Mr. Grigori said.

He already knew her new name. This fact made her angry. She could not, however, express this anger. Everything about this man made her angry and it was a standard task to from her past life to try and appear emotionless and cold before him.

“I did not mean to disappoint you and you look as though you've been through a lot. Why don't you rest here. You've already seen what those streets are like. With monsters like them running around, you'd be safe here.”

At first, she thought he was talking about the Punished. She knew better though. He was talking about her Guardian. He was right, though. She didn't want to be there, but it was safe from the horrors that she had witnessed, as far as she could tell. Where fear should have existed in her heart, there was excitement. Where she should preserve her new life, she was willing to risk it to escape Eve's Hollow. She should remain at Grigori Estate where she can survive. However, she felt as if she were in more danger in this room with him. The notion that she'd rather be in Hell bothered her and it came in the form of guilt. What sane person would prefer the streets of Eve's Hollow? Darkness began to creep in her mind. She began feeling small and hope was extinguishing like a dying flame. She felt ungrateful for the life that she had been given.

“I'll have a room prepared for you,” he said before she could say anything. “Just... think it over. Don't worry about it.”

Estelle was at a loss for words. Instead of saying anything, she hung her head so that shadows cast over her eyes. Caught in an impasse, she drained all emotion from her heart and mentally distanced herself form the situation. She stood to her feet and walked toward the door. As she turned her back, Mr. Grigori's lips curved into a slight smile. She rested her hand on the cold knob of the door.

“Thank you,” she said.

In the silence that followed, a heavy, sinister tension manifested between the two of them. Estelle could feel a mental pressure as if someone were looking down on her from above with treacherous intent. This was another feeling that she recognized. She hated all of these feelings from her past life. Since she had come into physical being such a short time ago, the only memories she had were of Eve's Hollow and her wicked past life. In this situation, seeing no other way to diffuse it, she did what she would have done so long ago.

“Daddy...” she whispered.

The tension in the room cleared and she exited the room.

Mike was waiting for her outside. He apparently already knew that Mr. Grigori would want Estelle to have her own room. She looked at the ground and without a word between either of them, he began to lead her. The room was situated on the floor below Mr. Grigori's and sat in the middle of what was called the West Wing. There was a marble statue of an angel separating her room and the room to the right. This is how she remembered her room.

Mike opened the door for her. Eyes forward, she entered the room. Mike closed the exquisite wooden door behind her. Golden light was cast around the room by a chandelier's candles , she could see a large space with tall white walls. A patterned carpet covered the floor. Furniture included a canopy bed with the softest white sheets, a matching nightstand, chest of drawers, and bureau with mirror. A closed door on the right side of the room from the entrance indicated the closet.

Estelle walked over to one of two tall windows in the room, delicately embraced by flowing white curtains. She stood there and gazed out. Her eyes opened wide and that sick feeling crept up inside her stomach again. Out of the window of the room that Mr. Grigori assigned to her, Estelle could see the clear outline of a massive, hulking shape. It was jagged and box-like. There was a very thin outline of the structure created by the fire lights on the outside of the compound casting a shadow.

While gazing at the numerous makeshift hearths around the courtyard, she could again make out small, tightly packed clusters of survivors. She directed her sight to the monstrous shadows. One person stood behind and in front of another, creating a line from the structure to the compound. From so high up, it was hard to tell, but these people didn't look like soldiers or maids. They looked hungry, tired, and dirty – like she was. It was then that she came to the heavy conclusion that the massive structure that she was looking at was the very vehicle that transported her to Grigori's facility. That line of people was a steady river of more survivors, looking for safety. The one question that plagued her was whether or not this vehicle was a different one or the very same that she was abducted with. As must as she didn't care for Mr. Grigori, she had to give him credit for taking in so many people.

Tired of seeing the wretched machine, Estelle closed her curtains. Pushing everything out of her mind, she emptied her pockets of her gun, knife, and snowflake charm. She placed them on the nightstand. With a relieving sigh, she let herself fall into the bed. It was comfortable, soft, and warm. Her white comforter held her in a warm embrace like a mother would. It was the closes thing she knew to a genuine, loving hug. She lay on her back and stared up at the canopy, made translucent by the warm, soft light.

As Estelle contemplated her new life, second chance, and past life, she couldn't help but to feel a sense of regret for her current circumstances. In her past life, she wound up in Mr. Grigori's bed before. There she was, yet again, in a bed of his choosing. Although she had been offered a second chance and she was hopeful before, she couldn't help but to think of a darker, traumatizing past with this man who, like herself, desired a second chance. So many feelings and so many memories overwhelmed her despite her trying to keep them at bay. Like all people, though, she