Page 196 of Gates of Tartarus
“Thereyou are,” she says, relief clear in her voice. “My goodness. You were having a terrible dream!” Moving around me, she adjusts my back in the bed, placing a pillow behind me. “Are you alright? Feeling better?”
Confused, I start to shake my head, but everything feels so strange. My muscles are weak, skin pale, arms thin. Looking back at Elizabeth, I jerk suddenly and try to sit up. She’s dressed oddly–a crisp, white, nurse’s uniform, complete with a little white cap, keeping her hair off her face. She’s wearing a badge of some sort, low-heeled, white shoes, and very neutral, soft makeup. Her face is uncharacteristically soft, and... her accent. It’s full British, with round, unusually quiet notes. All traces of the sharp, mid-Atlantic tones are gone.
“What…” I try to clear my dry mouth, and she clicks, quickly bringing me a small paper cup of water, muttering under her breath, “must have messed up your doses. You’re not usually this bleary. But that’s alright!” she adds cheerfully when she notices I can hear her. “We’ll have you right as rain again in no time.”
“What have youdoneto me?” I whisper harshly, covering my eyes from the cold light, stark and glaring from the white ceiling, white walls, white bed-sheets… white, utilitarian clothing I’m in. “What have youdone? Where am I? Where are the guys? Oh my gods, are they okay? Where’s Gemma? What have you done?”
Elizabeth backs up looking incredibly worried. Ireachout, trying to feel... something… but can’t. I’m numb. Like a wall of soundproofing has been wrapped around me, stapled to my skin. “Why can’t I feel anything?” I say, horrified, nails digging into my skin. “Why can’t Ifeel anything?”
“Oh no,” she says sympathetically. “Oh dear, oh dear. I thought we were beyond this. Let me just call the doctor in.” Turning to the door, she rings a little bell. I try to get up, I do, but my legs are weak, the muscles soft under the flannel pants.How long have I been here?I think in horror.How long have they had me?
The quiet murmur of conversation from the door catches my attention, and I look up to meet the warm, blue eyes of James Tennireef.
“You!” I hiss out, and he exchanges a long glance with Elizabeth. “Do you really think you’ll get away with this,Senator?”
Walking over to me, he pulls up a chair at my bedside and sits down heavily, voice patient and understanding, no hint of his smarmy, politician’s mask. “Kailani,” he says, radiating kindness and sorrow. “We’ve been through this before. See if you can remember for me. Ground yourself for me. Don’t panic, Kailani.” Spots start to appear at the edge of my vision as my breathing speeds up. “Let’s go through it together again.”
His voice, it’s... different as well. British accent, and less… It’s friendly and compassionate. “I am not an American senator. I am the Head Psychiatrist at the Mount Ida Sanatorium in Wiltshire, England. You are a long-term patient here, who suffers from quite serious delusions. Every so often you refuse your medicine and slip into a world you and a fellow patient here have created over time.” His eyes twinkle softly at me, and he smiles sweetly. “It’s a tremendously interesting world, Kailani. We’ve encouraged you to write it down! Your journals are on the shelf over there–” he indicates a small white bookcase near a window covered in pale curtains. “You would make a wonderful author! But that does not negate the fact that it is, in truth, fiction.”
“No,” I say flatly, hands trembling, gripping the sheets with white knuckles to match the surrounding decor. “No. That’s not... that’s not possible. Deo, Gemma…” my throat closes, and Tennireef reaches out to take my hand gently. I don’t have the strength to pull away.
“Maddox, Walker, and Jonah...?” he finishes for me. “They are all wonderful, fully developed, fascinating figments of your imagination, Kailani. They aren’t real. We all play a role–your nurses, fellow patients, myself…” he shrugs, the hint of a smile on his lips. “I must admit, my character is... well. I wish he were a little more kind, in any case.”
“No... you and Elizabeth…”
“Ah yes! Thatwasan interesting development. Elizabeth is one of our newer nurses on staff…” he sends her a mildly censuring look, which, more than anything else, raises my alarm bells. There’s no way in real life he’deverget away with chastising her like that. And she’d never look so... abashed. And embarrassed.
“Nurse Cole took over for your main caretaker, Nurse Gomez, when she retired.” He pauses. “Really, Kailani. This is all in your journals…” He takes in my pale face, my wide, scared eyes, and sighs. “You and Elizabeth formed a rapport of sorts. A friendship, almost, though those are highly discouraged between patients and nurses.” His tone hardens slightly. “Nurse Cole was given a warning and removed from your care team temporarily, which had an unexpectedly negative result. You haven’t spiraled like this in months. So we asked her back ina highly regulated capacity.” He frowns thoughtfully. “Though I’m not convinced of the wisdom in that, given the current situation.”
“If any of this is real, how would you explain me being in England?” I say defiantly. “I’m American.”
In answer, he turns to Elizabeth, brow furrowed. “You didnottell me she’d regressed this far. How long has this been going on?” He flips through a folder in front of him. “I saw her two weeks ago!”
Elizabeth looks almost frightened and incredibly apologetic. “She, uh, was with another patient during her garden time a few days ago, and…”
“Ms. Driscoll, I presume?” he replies, voice thick with frustration and anger. “I havetoldyou that the delusionsspiralwhen they’re together, that all interactions need to be carefully controlled.”
“It was unintentional,” she says, voice low and defensive. “I had the garden signed out for her outdoor time. There was a scheduling error.”
Tennireef presses his fingertips against his eyes and sighs deeply. “I dislike revisiting this with you, Kailani. It’s very painful for you, unnecessarily so, but needs must. You had a traumatic childhood. None of this is your fault. I must stress that. You were abandoned–do you remember that much at least?”
Mutely, I nod.
“Your parents were addicts. They…”
“They weren’t!”
“They were, Kai. They were. I know this is painful. They were addicts and abandoned you. It was days before the sheriff found you. Days. You were wild. Uncontrollable. You went into foster care, but... eventually you were adopted by a highly unsuitable couple. They convinced you that you had special powers, had the ability to make them happy.” Pressing my fingers to my mouth, I shake my head, but he continues. “They blamed their downfall on you, Kailani, and then gave you away. And you were passed from family to family, never to find one of your own. Just sent to people who hurt you. Who... harmed you. Harmed you in terrible ways.” My body is shaking now, vibrating.
“How do you know about that?” I whisper frantically, soundlessly. “No one knows about that!Those records are sealed. Not even Gemma, or Deo, or Lachy know…”
“They know. They know, because theyareyou. They exist only as part of your psyche. In any case, those foster parents were reported by a concerned neighbor, and you were removed from their home. The stress was... it was too much. You weren’t able to stay in any home after that, kept running away. A relative of your parents was finally contacted. They were willing to place you in long-term care but didn’t live in the States. You moved to be closer to her, so she could visit. Burns, I believe, was her name. Nana, you called her. But you only met the once, when you arrived here. She passed away shortly after, leaving a trust for your care.”
“This is a lie,” I whisper against my fingers, then scream. “This is alie! Icanfeel emotions! I can! And my teamwillcome for me.” The thought wraps around me, heavy and comforting, and I feel myself again, if only for a moment.
“Oh, Kailani,” he says, the gentleness in his voice scaring me. “Which is more likely, dear? Occam's Razor. That you are a secret agent? Who works for, what, a government task force and who can feel and broadcast emotions? Or that you are a deeply wounded woman who has been dealt a bad hand, and whose brain has suffered greatly under the stress of abandonment and abuse? Look at yourself, Kailani. Look at your body. You can barely spend an hour in the garden. You think you can fight crime?”
As I stare in petrified silence at my thin, weak arms and fragile hands, not recognizingthem as my own, Tennireef makes a quick, sharp nod at Elizabeth, who scuttles away from him and gets a long, wicked-looking needle ready as he turns back to me.
“I do have power,” I say, panic now writhing in my stomach like snakes. “And theyarecoming.”
“You have no powers, Kailani, other than that imagination of yours. And no one is coming, because theydo. Not. Exist.I’m sorry, I am, but you must acknowledge reality in order to heal. It’s time to wake up, Kailani.Wake up!”
There is a sharp prick at my neck, and I turn to meet the soft, sorry eyes of Elizabeth, before light fades again.