Dark Traveler

by Catie Rhodes

  The initial torpor of Miss Ugly’s poison lessened. I couldn’t move my body yet, but my mind went into overdrive.

  Even if my silly little ritual hadn’t changed my fate, it had changed the scar tissue blocking my full use of Priscilla Herrera’s mantle. I turned inward and probed at the scar tissue. Now, rather than being hard like armor, it felt softer, maybe looser. Good enough to put up a serious fight. I drew on the mantle, calling to the magic of all the elements, and pleaded with them to help me.

  Earth responded first, sending a little ping of an answer to my black opal. The ground trembled beneath my back. The grass rippled, and a ripping sound came from it. A bulge rose out of the grass and headed straight for Miss Ugly.

  My third eye spot burned, and I turned my attention to it. It let me see a man made of grass grow out of the ground and tower over Miss Ugly. I lay drained from the effort but filled with foolish, childish hope. The grass man tried to cover Miss Ugly.

  “Hoooooo,” she screamed. The force of her howl blew him over the side of the ravine. He lost form, and a clutch of torn grass floated down.

  Tanner had regrouped and advanced on Miss Ugly again, fists in a boxing pose. Again, I tried to get to my feet. My legs did nothing but twitch. Despite my increased mental acuity, Miss Ugly’s poison still pumped through me, seasoning my meat for her to dine on later.

  “Come on, bitch,” Tanner spat at Miss Ugly. My third eye showed me his family, swirling around him, trying to offset his foolhardy actions.

  They didn’t matter to Miss Ugly. She circled around Tanner, swinging with her extra-long arms.

  Wait a minute. I could help. Tanner needed to ask Miss Ugly a question to make her shrink back to normal size.

  “Ask her a question,” I tried to yell. My words came out in the barest of whispers.

  Tanner danced around Miss Ugly. She stood very still while he did this, every once in a while darting forward to slash at him. Tanner’s reddening face told of his flagging energy. He wouldn’t last forever.

  Then I saw the nine irons amulet dangling from one hand. He’d made me give it back as soon as we got home, and now I was glad he did. Miss Ugly swung at him again. He jerked out of the way at the last second. Her arm arced around her, the force of her strike carrying the momentum. Tanner darted forward and pushed the nine irons amulet against her ear.

  “Hoooooo.” Miss Ugly’s howl of pain hurt my ears. She clapped one hand over Tanner’s amulet. He danced away, ran to me, and pulled me to a sitting position.

  “I’ll pick you up now.” His chest rose and fell with harsh breaths. Sweat beaded his face. He didn’t have enough strength left to carry me back to camp. And even if we made it, what then? He tried to roll me into his arms, but I was limp with no control over my muscles. I slid right out.

  “Just go. Get out,” I whispered.

  Tanner clenched his jaw and shook his head. “Can’t just leave you to die. Not like my girls.”

  Miss Ugly, apparently having gotten over her injury a little, stalked up behind Tanner. Despite my vow not to scream, I did. It didn’t make any sound, but there was enough force behind it to make it feel as though it was stripping my throat raw. She grabbed Tanner’s shoulder and spun him around.

  “Go now. Peri Jean Mace wants you to let her go.” This must have been Miss Ugly’s idea of fairness.

  “Never.” Tanner shook his head.

  Miss Ugly cocked her head at him, bug eyes getting even wider. “You are serious.”

  Tanner widened his stance.

  Miss Ugly slowly nodded at me and touched her finger to her third eye spot. I opened mine again, but it did nothing other than show Miss Ugly as a huge monster towering over a fragile mortal.

  She leaned down to speak to Tanner. “I only kill for food.” She moved so fast she was a blur, tearing Tanner’s shirt open and making her mark on his chest. Tanner fell limp just as I had.

  “Dummy,” I tried to scream at him. He’d sacrificed himself for nothing. Now we’d both die.

  Miss Ugly tucked me under one arm and Tanner under the other. She straddled her broom, and we took off, jetting through the night sky.

  In this state, with my third eye active, the columns marking the entrance to the underworld appeared as solid as the boulders I’d used to cross that pool. The human skull sitting on top of each column marked this as the private entrance to Miss Ugly’s domain.

  I felt a lot of things at that moment. The strongest one was horror that tonight’s fun would end with Tanner and me getting served up as a meal for Miss Ugly. We passed between the columns, and the world flashed black and white for just a second. The poison in my system pulled a dark curtain over my vision. I passed out.

  I woke with a start and stared into darkness. A dank, earthy smell surrounded me, and frogs sang somewhere nearby. The smell of woodsmoke tickled my nose. How I’d gotten here came roaring back. Miss Ugly had me and planned to do away with me for good. Oscar had won.

  My hate for him seeped over me, hot and pure. I’d get him. Even if I had to do it as a ghost, I’d get him. The anger gave me enough energy to move.

  I pushed myself to a sitting position, marveling at the nubby hardness of the floor I’d been lying on. My fingers couldn’t figure out what it was made of. Jadine probably would have been able to reason it out, but I was glad she wasn’t here with me, mentally preparing to be eaten.

  My eyes adjusted to the darkness, and I could now see stars above me, multicolored, bigger and brighter than on my side of the veil. I watched a streak of red shoot across the sky. The earth rumbled with it.

  Whatever I was inside swayed back and forth, bumping against something. Each time the structure hit, grains of sand hissed against a hard surface. Where the hell was I? And where was Tanner?

  I concentrated on the stars, searching for the power of the mantle. It came back to me, weaker than usual. No matter. It was enough for what I wanted to do. I pulled the light from the stars toward me. The enclosure brightened. It took me a couple of seconds to focus on the details, to realize what I was seeing. What I saw made me wish I hadn’t bothered.

  Above me, starlight glowed on a dull white crosshatch grid. I could have told myself it was just de-barked pieces of wood, but I could see the knuckles and joints of human bones. At each corner was a half skull, the bones fused to it by some means I couldn’t detect. The sides of the structure came into focus. More bones tied together with something leathery and white. Steeling myself, I lowered my head to see what I sat on. The rounded humps of skullcaps made up the floor of the cage.

  My eyes pulled in more light, and I made out a still form on the other side of the bone cage. The broad shoulders rose and fell with deep breaths. Tanner. Still alive.

  But for how long? Miss Ugly was stumping around somewhere nearby preparing to cook and eat us. Or maybe make some sort of human sushi out of us. My skin tightened at the thought.

  Tanner turned and moaned in his sleep. “No, no. My baby. No, no.” He began to sob.

  I crawled over to him, aware of the bone cage swaying with my movements. The cage was suspended on something. I could still see stars above us, but from the sides of the cage came only pitch blackness.

  Tanner’s sobs picked up in intensity. I hurried to his side. I held my hand over him, suddenly afraid to touch him. The ghosts of his wife and daughters might see my efforts as a threat.

  I searched for them. They hovered protectively around Tanner, ready to fight for him. I’d always had a talent for feeling the emotions of the dead but had learned to separate myself from it. Now I opened myself to the ghosts and sorted past their desire to protect Tanner. Next to me, Tanner bawled like a kid, reliving the wreck that had claimed the lives of his family.

  The ghosts’ emotions came to me in a tangle. Desire to move on. Worry about Tanner. Fear he’d join them before it was time.

  The intensity of their love for him welled in my chest, almost too big for me to take. It both touched me and made me scared for Tanner
. He was destroying himself piece by piece every day he refused to move on. His wife, the beautiful Bea, moved toward me.

  Save him, she whispered in my head. I sent back a message of comfort but knew only Tanner had the power to save himself. But I could wake him up.

  I gripped Tanner’s shoulder and gave him a hard shake. “Wake up. It’s not real.” He wept on. I had to repeat the exercise several times to get him to wake up. When he did, he jerked into awareness with a harsh inhale. He lay still for a few moments and then curled away from me. I scooted back and gave him space. As I did, my hip pack bumped against the rounded skulls making up the floor.

  “Dorky damn thing.” I moved to take it off. Dead, I wouldn’t need it. The wheel of life, my last chance to save myself, was in the pack. I zipped the pack open and removed the wheel.

  It still felt warm to the touch, and my black opal jumped on my chest. It had power. Why had my ritual not worked?

  I’d let go of all the injuries I held dear. The hurt my mother caused by hating me, the hurt my true nature caused, which led to me wishing for normalcy, and the guilt I felt over letting a jerk like Tim McSwain into my life, which resulted in the destruction of the only pregnancy I’d ever had. Then I’d almost drowned in that pool of water but fought my way back to the top. What else was there? I caressed the wheel with my thumbs, searching for the answer.

  Across the cage, Tanner spoke in a near whisper. “What is this?”

  I slipped the wheel back into my hip pack and crawled near him. “It’s a bone cage.” I echoed his whisper.

  Tanner let out a disgusted moan and shifted around, making the thing rock. “Are we suspended?”

  “I think so, but I don’t know where. Look up.” I followed my own command, fascinated by the multicolored stars. One of them fell and left a streak of red in the sky.

  Tanner did as I asked and let out a horrified gasp. “What is that?”

  “We’re on the other side of the veil. Miss Ugly’s taken us to her lair to cook us.” I scooted closer, wanting the comfort of another person.

  Tanner stared at me, whites of his eyes glittering in the murky light, but didn’t shoo me away. I settled into a sitting position and leaned against the wall. The long bones pressed hard against my back. I tried not to think about what they were, that they had once been part of someone living and breathing.

  Tanner brought his knees up and put his hands over his face. “I should have never come to Texas. My mother always refused to come here when Dad wanted to go with Grampa to visit old friends and places. She said it’s like the Old West, full of outlaws and bad people.”

  I bristled at the implication but let it pass. Knowing you’re going to die soon really highlights what’s important and what isn’t. “Coming here wasn’t all bad for you. You’re going to rejoin your family. ”

  “Huh?” Tanner slowly lowered his hands and fixed his gaze on me. Even in the darkness, I sensed that primal nature of his, that caged beast pacing.

  I didn’t answer right away. The swirling ghosts around Tanner’s head weren’t my business. But Bea had asked me to save her husband. That meant convincing Tanner to let them go. I wasn’t sure how much good it would do him in the last hours of his life, but it’s always wise to honor a ghost’s request. Especially one that benefits the living.

  “What did you just say to me?” Tanner moved closer, got in my face.

  I gave his shoulder a hard shove. “Don’t fuck with me.”

  He raised on his knees, gripped my shoulders, and drove me to the cage’s floor. The rounded skullcaps jabbed painfully into my back. I strained against Tanner, stomach muscles trembling. His weight gave him the advantage. I was trapped.

  Tanner hovered over me like we were about to play a violent round of hide the salami. Fury filled me, pounding against the backs of my eye sockets, turning the world red. I was pissed that my whole life had brought me to this end, pissed that I’d never had a real chance with Wade, and doubly pissed that Tanner thought he could overpower me and bully me with no consequence.

  I brought one knee up, aiming for Tanner’s nuts. He shifted his weight and used his legs to hold mine down. “What did you say about my family?”

  I took my hand off his wrist, where I’d been trying to push his hand off me, and made a fist. I let it fly and slammed it into his ribcage.

  Tanner jumped and grunted in pain but didn’t let me go. “Say it. Now.”

  Other than sparing Tanner’s feelings, there wasn’t any reason to keep what he was doing to himself a secret. Why spare his feelings? “The reason you feel like shit every day of your life is that you’re forcing your wife and daughters to haunt you. Their presence keeps the grief raw. You might as well die tonight because you’re not going to have any kind of life if you don’t let them move on. Plus, they’re ready to go.”

  The ghost swirled faster around Tanner’s head, sometimes stopping to whisper to him. He didn’t want to hear it.

  “Liar,” he growled.

  “No,” I grated through bared teeth. “When I woke you, I did it because you were dreaming of their deaths and crying. Let them go, or you’re going to burn yourself to the ground.”

  “Liar. You just want me to feel like shit because you feel like shit every day of your life.” He gave me a hard shove. Pain shot down my arms.

  I’d had enough. I began to gather the mantle. Bea was wrong. I couldn’t save Tanner. Sorry as I felt for him, I wouldn’t let him hurt me. I’d scramble his brains and be done with him.

  The power swirled inside me, pulling on the energy left in the bones and from the dank smelling earth surrounding us. My third eye opened, and I saw inside Tanner. Hurt roiled red and ugly. Underneath that was uncertainty. He almost believed me.

  If only I could make him see. I had made other people see before, but how could Tanner see without a mirror?

  I poured my power into Tanner, shaking with the effort of trying to control it. He jerked against me when it hit him, the movement primal and erotic. My body responded immediately, reminding me how I’d wanted Tanner.

  “See them. They want to go to the next plane, but they want you to be happy first. Bea wants to save you,” I whispered and closed my eyes to concentrate on what he needed to see.

  Tanner stiffened against me, setting my nerve endings on edge even more. I tried to ignore it and concentrated fully on him seeing what he was making his loved ones do to him.

  Tanner raised off me, breaking the connection. He stood, clunking his head on the roof of the cage. He doubled up one fist and smashed at the bones, making the cage jiggle wildly.

  “Don’t.” I stood but kept my distance. “We might fall, and I don’t know where we’ll end up.”

  Tanner’s shoulders shook, and he clapped his hands over his face again so I wouldn’t see him crying. I moved toward him, unsure if I was walking into the jaws of a lion, but coming anyway. I slipped my arms around his waist and pulled him close.

  His sobs rose in intensity, garbling the flood of words coming out of him. I could only pick out a little. “I want them back. I want to change that day.”

  “You can’t. I’m sorry.” I stroked his back, waiting for him to push me away, maybe give me a few punches for good measure.

  Tanner cried himself out like a fire burning. First it flamed hot and wild, then it dimmed until only a few embers crackled. Finally, he said, “I’m sorry I pushed you down and hurt you.”

  “I antagonized you.” I kept stroking his back “Just because I’m a girl doesn’t mean I get a free pass.”

  Gently, he detangled himself from me. I moved away, but he gripped one hand and squeezed it. “Thank you for letting me see the truth. I wish I had seen it sooner. I guess I’ll be with them soon.”

  I shook my head. “I have to get out of here. People are depending on me. You have to get out of here so you can live your life.”

  “But how?” Tanner nearly shouted.

  “I’m going to figure out why the rebirth ritual did
n’t change my fate. You’re going to help me. Then I’m going to do whatever it takes to change my fate.” I leaned into his face and said the most important part. “We’re both going to live.”

  18

  Tanner sat on the floor, motioning me to sit with him. Tears streaked with the neon of the stars shone on his face. He scrubbed them away. “Let me see the wheel of life.”

  I took it out and handed it to him. He weighed it in his palm, tracing one finger over the top of it. “What you did had no bearing on fate or the wheel. Maybe you didn’t let go of the right thing so you could access its magic.”

  And maybe I still didn’t have enough access to the mantle. I let out a frustrated grunt, took the wheel from him, and laid it on the floor of skullcaps. We both sat staring at it.

  “I don’t know what else to let go of.” In the myth, Inanna had let go of her worldly treasures. She’d given away everything she was proud of, everything she felt she needed to retain her dignity. Then she’d died and was reborn. What had I not let go of?

  I raked through my mind, digging for ideas, but couldn’t think straight. My upcoming fate at Miss Ugly’s hands fractured my thoughts into nonsensical shards. This sucked. I had all the tools I needed but couldn’t figure out how to use them. Think. But I couldn’t. A sense of deep loss, a feeling I’d missed out on something big and important, blocked out my ability to focus.

  My hand rested close to Tanner’s, and I thought of taking it for the comfort. And to touch him again. I had to be honest about that. Seeming to read my mind, he took my hand, threading my fingers through his.

  “I wanted you so bad back in Pale Horse. But I couldn’t even give you a proper kiss.” His teeth flashed in the dimness. I thought he’d done a pretty good job of kissing me but said nothing. It was over. He rubbed his thumb over the back of my hand. “I’m sorry, because I like you. Life is sort of fun again when I’m with you.”

  He thought my life was fun? I turned to stare at him. Our eyes locked, and my desire for him writhed, begging to be allowed to do something embarrassing and stupid.