Mourning Sun

  Astral Plane Publishing

  Mourning Sun

  The First Highland Home Novel

  Shari Richardson

  Astral Plane Publishing Books are published by Astral Plane Publishing 120 Oak Road

  York, PA 17402

  Copyright © 2011 by Shari Richardson All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

  All Astral Plane Publishing titles, imprints and distributed lines are available at special quantity discounts for bulk purchases for sales promotions, premiums, fund-raising, educational or institutional use.

  Special book excerpts or customized printings can also be created to fit specific needs. For details, write the office of the Astral Plane Publishing Special Sales Manager, Astral Plane Publishing, 120 Oak Road, York, PA, 17402, Attn: Special Sales Department.

  ISBN:978-1460983263

  First Astral Plane Publishing Trade Paperback Printing: March 2011

  Printed in the United States of America

  ii | Mourning Sun Other Titles by Shari Richardson are available via Astral Plane Publishing

  http://astralplanepublishing.blogspot.com/

  Shari Richardson| iii

  About The Author Shari Richardson holds a master's degree in English Education and has spent much of her life teaching students the joy of reading and writing. Her love of writing began when she was in elementary school and has carried through her entire adult life. Shari lives in Pennsylvania with her two Chihuahuas.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1..............................................................................................................1

  Chapter 2............................................................................................................22

  Chapter 3............................................................................................................36

  Chapter 4............................................................................................................47

  Chapter 5............................................................................................................64

  Chapter 6............................................................................................................75

  Chapter 7............................................................................................................93

  Chapter 8..........................................................................................................108

  Chapter 9..........................................................................................................122

  Chapter 10........................................................................................................128

  Shari Richardson| v

  Chapter 1

  The young woman sat beside the bed, holding the boy's hand. Her lips moved in silent prayer, pausing only when he moved restlessly and moaned.

  "Mathias?" Her voice was soft but rich.

  He moaned again, but didn't wake. The young woman began to pray once again.

  "Kathryn!" Mathias sat upright, searching the room with blind eyes. "Kathryn, run. Don't look back, just go!"

  "Mathias, my love, I'm right here." She helped him lay back, smoothing her hand over his fevered brow. "Rest, my darling. You'll be well soon." Mathias lay down, tossing restlessly. From time to time, he would whisper "Kathryn," before slipping farther into unconsciousness. Each time he spoke her name, Kathryn kissed Mathias and resumed her prayers.

  Hours passed, but Kathryn, consumed by the life that drained from the man she loved, didn't notice the light draining from the day. She prayed. She held Mathias' hand. She soothed him when he was restless. Outside the window, the sun sank into the horizon. The sound of waves crashing against the shore slipped into the silence that now filled the room.

  As the last of the light left the room, Kathryn rose to light a candle. When she returned to her place by his bedside, she set the candle on the table and leaned down to see Mathias better in the flickering light. She put her hand upon his chest and then sat by his side and lay her ear against his still chest.

  "No," she whispered, curling her hand into a fist on his chest. "Oh Mathias, I can't live without you." Tears slipped down her cheeks as she closed her eyes and let the grief take her.

  Mathias' eyes snapped open. Had she been watching, Kathryn would have seen that warm, dark eyes of his life were gone, replaced by pools of deepest, coldest black. He reached for Kathryn's hand where it lay on his chest, pulling it up to his lips.

  "Mathias?" Kathryn blinked away her tears. Her eyes opened wide in disbelief, but there was no fear in her gaze, only the love she had for this beautiful boy. Mathias licked his lips and ran his nose along the length of Kathryn's arm. She stayed frozen by his side, mesmerized by his gaze, which never flickered from her own. Even after his teeth sank easily into the warm flesh at the bend of her elbow, Kathryn never flinched. The room filled with a wet sucking, disrupted only by Kathryn's one brief gasp. Mathias lovingly cradled her arm against his lips as he drank, insensitive to the monstrosity of his act.

  When Kathryn lay pale and still, Mathias blinked slowly. He looked down at the beautiful, pale and cold woman whose glassy eyes were riveted on his face. He brushed his hand along her cheek, lovingly caressing her face as he had done so often in life. It was only when she didn't smile and ask for his kiss that understanding slowly dawned in his gaze and he screamed.

  "Kathryn, my love, my heart, my sun. What have I done?" His hands pulled at his face, drawing it into a gruesome mask of pain and anguish. Lifting her body with infinite care, Mathias lay Kathryn on the bed from which he had so recently risen to this new and monstrous life. He closed her eyes and kissed her pale lips lovingly. "I will mourn you for eternity," he whispered before he threw himself out the window.

  *** My eyes snapped open, my heart galloping along as though I'd just run a marathon. The last image of the young man's anguished face, hauntingly beautiful in his pain, lingered in my mind.

  "Mairin, are you okay?" my mom called from the hall outside my bedroom. "Yeah Mom," I said. "Just a weird dream." Mom stepped into my room and sat with me on my bed. "Want to tell me about it?"

  I shook my head. I wasn't sure how to explain what I'd just dreamed. I knew from the clothes the two people had been wearing that the dream wasn't one of my premonitions, but I had no explanation for who Mathias and Kathryn were or why I would be dreaming about them.

  "I think I've been reading too many romance novels." I said, laughing and trying to ease my mother's anxiety. "This one was set in the 1920s I think. Just a boy and a girl. Nothing to worry about."

  Mom kissed my forehead. She always worried when my dreams woke me, even when they weren't nightmares or premonitions. "Think you'll go back to sleep tonight?"

  "Probably. It wasn't really a bad one." Unless you counted murder as bad, I added silently

  "You need to sleep more, baby. Tomorrow's the first day of school and you'll want to be on the ball."

  "I'm fine, Mom. Really. It was just weird, not scary and definitely not a premonition." OK, so that was a lie. Watching that boy drain the life out of his love made my stomach somersault with horror, but I didn't feel like explaining that to my mom in the middle of the night. Despite what he'd done, Mathias didn't strike me as evil or sinister. His obvious grief over what he'd done in my dream hinted at a deeper, purer soul than the act would seem to allow for.

  "Okay, okay, I can take a hint. Sleep well, baby. I love you."

  "I love you, too, Mom." I curled onto my side, clutching my pillow after Mom went back to her room
where her partner Tawnya was probably waiting for a report of my dream. I knew sleep should have been a dim hope after the dream I'd had, but strangely I didn't feel frightened or threatened by this dream. There was something so compelling about Mathias that I found myself hoping he would be waiting for me when sleep claimed me once again. I closed my eyes, whispering his name and willing him to come to me. When he appeared, waiting at the edge of darkness where dreams live, I reached for him.

  ***

  "Mom, where's my backpack?"

  "Where'd you leave it, Mairin?" That was helpful, I thought. Why was the first day of school always so chaotic? I'd done this at least ten times before and yet I was still running at least fifteen minutes late and I couldn't find my backpack. I dove back into my closet, still on the hunt, hoping it would turn up soon. The last thing I needed was to be late on the first day.

  "Mairin, here," Kerry said, bumping the bag against my butt.

  "Thanks, sis," I mumbled, digging through the bag to make sure I had everything I needed.

  "Can I get a ride?" she asked.

  "Sure. Five minutes." Kerry bolted down the hall to her room. She was excited about starting high school and I didn't have the heart to burst her bubble. Highland Home High School was not the sparkling castle on the hill Kerry thought it would be. It was a cesspool of class warfare and guerrilla tactics that would shame the Taliban.

  The two years I'd been at Highland Home had been, to put it mildly, hell. Two years of getting tripped in the hall. Two years of being called a dyke and a lesbo. Two years of pity in the eyes of the teachers who knew about the taunts but who wouldn't risk their jobs by punishing the kids whose families ruled our little town.

  The Golden Ones, as I liked to call them, ran Highland Home like a prison camp. The "haves" had it good. The "have-nots" suffered in silence if they knew what was good for them. I tried to be invisible, but when your mother lives with another woman and runs the metaphysical shop downtown, invisible isn't possible.

  The best I'd been able to accomplish was transparency. Most of the time the people in Highland Home looked through or past me. There were, of course, some notable exceptions, but I could usually make it through any given day without suffering any permanent damage.

  Don't get me wrong, I love Tawnya, my mom's girlfriend, and I wouldn't want Mom to do anything other than what she did at the shop, but I had to admit that my life would be easier if our family were a little more mainstream.

  Kerry poked her head into my room. "Ready when you are," she said.

  "We're going, Mom," I shouted from the foot of the stairs.

  "I'll be at the shop late tonight," she said. "Tawnya will be here when you get home." Kerry and I slipped into my car and I cringed as the engine roared to life. I knew my mom and Tawnya had saved for ages to help me buy the car, but I also knew it would be just one more thing for the Golden Ones to laugh at. They drove sleek little sports cars. I drove an ancient Chevy Nova that needed a new muffler.

  I parked and turned the car off quickly. If I were lucky, no one had noticed the deafening roar of my antique. Sometimes, though, I thought if it weren't for bad luck, I'd have no luck at all. That was surely the case today. Stephanie Bartlet, queen bee of the Golden Ones and her boyfriend, Braden Lambert were already pointing at me and the Nova, laughing uproariously.

  "Kerry," I said, "No matter what, remember that high school only lasts four years."

  Kerry looked at me like I was losing my mind before she dashed out of the car to join a gaggle of freshman girls clustered around the gym door. I didn't want to be the one to tell my sister the secret of why Stephanie Bartlet had made it her life's goal to make my life miserable. I was actually hoping Kerry would never have to learn first hand what a spiteful and bitter bitch Stephanie was, but I knew better. Someday Kerry would do or say something Stephanie didn't like and Stephanie would delight in spilling family secrets to my sister. I only knew the truth behind the hideous taunts and nasty rumors because Stephanie herself had screamed it at me during a particularly nasty argument we'd had in ninth grade.

  I'd always known my parents hadn't had a "normal" marriage. Mom had a girlfriend and Dad had lady friends who sometimes joined the family for trips and holidays. I'd always wondered if Mom married Daddy because of me. She'd gotten pregnant young and although I knew she loved Daddy, I only had to see her with Tawnya to know where here heart truly lay. She'd always called Daddy her best friend and she always made sure to tell me and Kerry that we had been blessings to them both.

  For reasons I'd never asked about, around the time Mom got pregnant with me, Daddy had had an affair with Stephanie Bartlet's mother. Stephanie was the result of that affair, though neither the Bartlets nor the Cotes acknowledged the fact. Sometimes I would catch Stephanie staring at me with a bitter and sad expression on her pretty face. I used to think she'd gotten the better half of the deal, growing up with the Bartlet money and name, but I'd seen Stephanie and her family at the summer street fair one year. Stephanie had been standing off to the side, separated from her brothers and parents. She had watched them laugh together with such deep envy that I'd truly pittied her. When Mr. Bartlet finally realized Stephanie wasn't keeping up with the family, he'd shouted at her and both Stephanie and her mother had cringed. I knew Mr. Bartlet was pretty nasty in general, but he seemed to truly enjoy treating Stephanie like a leper. She, in turn, took out her anger on me.

  I knew none of the things that happened in the past truly excused Stephanie's behavior toward me, but I did understand her anger. I tried to stay away from her, or at least not give her fuel for her taunts. I hoped Kerry could do the same.

  Knowing that delaying the inevitable would only mean more spectators for the insults I could see Stephanie working on, I heaved the Nova's door open and slammed it shut. The ensuing boom couldn't drown out the laughter coming from the crowd gathered around Stephanie and Braden. I kept my head down and headed toward the school.

  "And I thought dinosaurs were extinct, Braden," I heard Stephanie shout.

  "Apparently they only come out for dykes." I kept walking. "It isn't worth it," I repeated silently until the door to the school closed behind me, blocking out the Golden Ones' laughter. I knew it wasn't worth getting upset over. I'd learned that lesson the hard way. The more upset I got, the worse the insults got. The more I stood up for myself, the harsher the taunts became.

  "She's a worthless bitch, you know," my best friend, Cecelia said, slipping up behind me.

  "Yeah, I know. Besides, I like my car. It has character."

  "Your car could eat hers for breakfast and crap out a Mini Cooper."

  I laughed and hugged Cecelia. "You always know just the right thing to say."

  "So how was your last weekend of freedom?" she asked.

  "Not bad. Mom and Tawnya took us to the beach. Kerry got burnt, I finished the summer reading list."

  "Only you could turn a beach trip into an excuse to do homework." Cecelia and I stopped at the open door to our homeroom, reluctant to start the school day. She was right. I could turn almost anything into an excuse to do homework. It was the only way I could see for getting out of this town before it sucked me in the way it had my mom. I guess there was nothing wrong with falling in love and having kids, but I was determined to get out of Highland Home and see the world before I let that happen to me. I wanted more out of life and college was the one way I knew I could get it.

  "How many applications did you fill out last week?" Cecelia asked. She knew of and approved of my obsession to get out of Highland Home. We planned to go to college together, find our paths to success together and end up married and living next to each other so we could be friends for our entire lives. Sure, it was a hokey dream, but so what?

  "A few," I said. Fourteen, I thought.

  "Uh huh."

  "What about you? How many?"

  "Excuse me, ladies," a silky smooth, yet somehow incredibly rough voice broke into our conversation. "Can you tell me where Mr. S
tevens' classroom is?" I looked up and found myself drowning in two pitch black pools of molten heat. My heart stopped. Recognition slammed into me, stealing my breath and my good sense. The vision in designer clothes waiting patiently for me to stop acting like a guppy on land and answer him was the boy from my dream. Fear and desire twisted in my belly and I finally raised my hand to point across the hall.

  "Thank you," he said before turning away.

  "You're welcome," Cecelia quipped. She waited until my dream had disappeared from view before smacking me in the forehead. "What's wrong with you?"

  "Who was that?" I asked, still reeling from literally meeting the man of my dreams.

  "How should I know, nitwit? You just blew your chance to ask him, though." I groaned. "What the heck is wrong with me?" Cecelia shrugged. "I'm sure he'll be around. Next time, promise me you'll use that enormous brain of yours for something other than a paper weight."

  I nodded and followed Cecelia into our homeroom when the bell rang. Cecelia knew about my dreams, but we didn't talk about that stuff often. I knew she was my friend no matter what, but the premonitions made her nervous. I think she worried that one day I would have a dream about her future, or lack of it. What would she say if I told her I'd dreamed of that gorgeous boy last night. Not only did I dream of him, but I dreamed he was a vampire who killed the woman he loved. Cecelia would be supportive, but freaked out. I wasn't willing to do that to her on the first day of school. We were under enough pressure without the metaphysical baggage. We took our usual seats at the back of the room and I tried to sort out what had happened in the hall.

  He was gorgeous, sure, but there were other good-looking guys in our school. I let my homeroom teacher drone on while I reconstructed his face in my mind. Deep, dark eyes. Hair like a raven's wing, but with just a touch of curl. Tall, he'd towered over me. I shook my head. What did it matter? He'd find the popular gang soon enough and never think of me again. At least that's what I thought.

  ***

  "We're going to start this year with The Crucible," Mr. Stevens said. The class groaned in unison.