Ice Blue - Anne Stuart [44]
The house was completely silent. No traffic noise, not even the sound of birds disturbed the stillness. Another day was dawning in this strange, nightmare world she’d stumbled into. And she closed her eyes, rather than face it.
“The child is unhappy, your holiness.” Brother Kenno’s soft voice was hesitant.
The Shirosama opened his eyes, blinking rapidly. It was past time to change his contact lenses. Each time he remembered to change the extended-wear contact lenses, he expected his eyes to have changed as well. It was always a shock when his own brown ones looked back at him, bloodshot and bleary.
It was happening, he knew it was. His vision was getting milkier and harder to focus—it was all part of the preordained change that was coming. By the time of his ascension he would be complete: Shirosama in body, mind and spirit.
“Are not all children unhappy?” he replied. “Are not all people unhappy? It is the way of karma. Her soul is at war, and the more she fights the more unhappy she is. Have you done nothing for her?”
“Your holiness, she refuses. She kicked Brother Sammo, and she refuses to wear our robes or listen to your holy word. I’ve told her that the gift we offer her is invaluable, but she is stubborn. Should we have Brother Heinrich deal with her?”
The Shirosama shook his head, the white hair settling around his shoulders. “Not until she is ready to receive the gift of moving past her karma. For now simply keep her contained and quiet. She’s still in the induction room?”
“Yes, your holiness. She tried to block the speakers but she was unable to reach them.”
“Good. Sooner or later my words will penetrate her stubborn mind, moving past the veil of illusion that rules humankind. When she is ready she will listen.”
Brother Kenno bowed. The Shirosama couldn’t see his expression, but it didn’t matter. Kenno had been with him for the last five years, and his devotion was absolute. “And then she will be blessed?”
“Then she will join her sister on the next level, and all her worldly cares will be done with. They will have ascended before Armageddon—a gift indeed.”
“Indeed,” Brother Kenno echoed solemnly. He backed out of the room, leaving the Shirosama to contemplate the bloody, glorious, necessary future.
And whether Jilly Lovitz would need to learn personal instruction from the Shirosama himself, before she accepted her preordained fate.
She wasn’t quite a child, but she was young enough. She wouldn’t fight, not once Brother Sammo made certain she ingested the proper combination of medicines necessary for true enlightenment.
The Shirosama couldn’t afford to indulge the child’s needs right now, not until he found out where her sister was, and let the woman know that Jilly was under his protection.
The news would finish any resistance, and Summer would come to him herself, bringing the bowl.
He would also mine the stories his aunt Hana had filled her head with. Before he’d killed her.
Part of his karma was to live with that miscalculation. He had let frustration and anger get the better of him thirteen years ago, and he had acted rashly. In truth there were no mistakes—everything happened as it was meant to happen, and he was preordained to kill that infuriating old woman who had stood between him and his destiny.
Just as it was his fate to labor onward, gathering the pieces of the puzzle, the pieces he needed in order for his ascension to become complete. In the past thirteen years he had amassed followers and wealth, power that should have been his by birth. They followed his vision—thousands of them, hundreds of thousands of