"James, I think we have a problem. That was my mom first and then my dad."
"You better pick up the messages." James led to a spot near a building where they would be out of the way of the foot traffic and could kickstand their bikes while Lizbet got up her courage to listen to the messages on her phone.
Both of her parents said the same thing—"where are you?" and "what is going on?" and "are you in danger?", and finally, "please come home, you won't be in trouble." She could picture their worried faces, and it made her feel awful. They probably thought that she'd run away from home or worse, been kidnapped. She supposed she had run away, but not like they thought. She would have to call them, try to reassure them. She knew that she couldn't just ignore them and leave them hanging.
James threw an arm around her shoulder and gave her a quick hug for moral support. "I agree that you have to call them. They need to know that you're okay."
Lizbet screwed up her courage and called her mom's number. "Mom? I'm sorry…"
"Honey, what is going on? Tanji stopped by last night and didn't know you were at your father's, which just sounded suspicious to me. I called you at your father's, and you weren't there. He said he never called to ask if you could stay. Where are you? Are you okay?" Her mother's voice was strained and worried.
"Mom…I'm okay. Really, I am. It's difficult to explain. I'm in Scotland. I just thought I could get back before you knew I'd gone."
"Scotland?" her mother said in her quietest and most controlled voice, a voice that meant Mom was ready to go nuclear.
Lizbet took a deep breath and replied with one great whoosh of words, "Eamon pretended to be Dad so that he could get me to Scotland so that we can keep the fae from being destroyed. And I'm reincarnated from a long line of people. And you don't have to worry—James is with me, too. And everything is fine. I should be back within a week. I mean, really soon, Mom. There's nothing to worry about." She didn't add that the monks could change that plan any second.
"I can send you a picture of Eamon that I took and sent to Tanji when I thought he was one of your garden gnomes. He's a gruagach…", as she listened to her own words, she realized what she was saying sounded dog-ate-my-homework ridiculous and there was no way her mother was going to believe it, even with pictorial proof. She started to choke up. She felt so young and useless all of a sudden. How could she possibly accomplish what Eamon and the fae expected of her?
James took the phone from her hand. "Mrs. Moore? This is James, from next door. Lizbet really is okay. It's pretty much impossible to explain what we're doing in Scotland, but everything is okay."
"James—why do you have my daughter? If you harm her…"
"Mrs. Moore, it's nothing like that, really. There's nothing weird going on. In fact, Lizbet asked me to come, not the other way around. But really, Lizbet is okay, and I'm here to protect her."
"She needs to come home right now!"
"Mrs. Moore, please."
"Let her come home!"
Lizbet grabbed the phone back from James. "Mom, I really am okay—but I need to go now. I'll see you in about a week. James hasn't done anything wrong. He really hasn't. He's helping me. I have to go now. Please don't worry about me. Talk to Tanji. She has something she can show you."
Lizbet disconnected and immediately called Tanji. Tanji picked up, and Lizbet had never been so glad to hear her voice. Lizbet walked away from James, pacing the sidewalk as she talked to her best friend.
Lizbet quickly filled Tanji in on everything that had just happened and answered her questions. She asked her to go call Mom and send her the video and the picture of "mom's hideous garden gnome" she'd sent to Tanji when it first showed up in the garden.
"…yes, Ay-mon…I don't know how to spell it. It doesn't matter…just try to get her to understand I didn't run away, and James didn't kidnap me, and I'll be home soon. And tell her to please not try to find me, because that would really mess things up…I know…just believe me on this, no matter how crazy it sounds. I might be able to email you, but don't let my parents know that. They could track me. It's really important that they don't track me. Please try to make them understand that…You're the best bestie in the world, Tanj…I'll see you when this is all over, 'kay? I can't call you or text you again."
Lizbet clicked the end button on her beloved purple phone and then tossed it into the street. Within minutes, it was just scraps of plastic and metal scattered beneath the tires of the ceaseless traffic.
Her phone. Pretty much her whole life happened to her through that phone, and she had just thrown it into the street. With her phone gone, life as she knew it ended. But, if it had, a new life was definitely starting. In a few days, she'd find out what kind of life that was…hopefully not one where she didn’t leave the house again until she was eighteen.
She returned to where James waited with the bikes. "We have to go."
"You could have turned it off, you didn't have to get rid of it," James said, as he pulled out his own phone and powered it down.
"I know I didn't have to. But sooner or later, I'd call my parents if I had it. I hate making them worry like that!" Lizbet said, "And don't even think about letting me near your phone. I'd call my mom in a heartbeat. Now that they know we're together, they'll probably be calling you to try to track us, so it's smart you turned yours off. I don't think you should use it again until this is all over. You should probably pick up a pay-as-you-go just in case we need one."
"Yeah, wouldn’t want to lose contact with the gruagach." James smirked at her and mounted his bike.
Within minutes, they were moving carefully along the city sidewalks, headed for the castle on the hill, where Lizbet hoped Eamon would be waiting.
CHAPTER TEN
Burning Point
IT TOOK THEM longer to get to the castle on the hill than it should have. They didn't have a map, so they tried to keep sight of it as they made their way through the city. Eventually, they ran into the barrier of the river and had to follow it until they found the bridge and crossed it to enter the street that was marked out for the tourists as "The Royal Mile". Lizbet didn't recognize any of the buildings as belonging to Maude's time. Despite this, when she closed her eyes, she could hear the sounds and smells of times past, with animals and peddlers thronging the streets. Maude had lived within one of the crowded closes of King James's time. In brief bursts, Lizbet saw and experienced Maude's Edinburgh—crowded, filthy, and glorious.
They walked their bikes through clusters of tourists and residents. She noticed how awed by it all James seemed, too. His eyes roved hungrily around them as he took in the architecture. They both stood and stared for a while at a blackened gothic tower with a high spire. It was beautiful. Everything around them was old, grand, and heavy with a sense of history you just don't get even in the oldest cities she’d visited in the United States. She wished they could just sit down, be tourists, and soak it all up.
As they entered the short esplanade that would lead them up the path to the castle, Lizbet felt suddenly weak and terrified. She had to hang on hard to the handlebars of her bike to stay upright as her knees gave out beneath her. She found it difficult to breathe, and her heart was beating so rapidly she felt she was going to faint. She couldn't possibly be so worked up from the slight hill they'd traveled.
"Support her, lad. I've got the contraption." Eamon appeared in his human guise and eased the bike away from her as James lay down his bike and rushed to her to support her with an arm around her waist. He helped her over to a short wall at the opening of the esplanade, and she sat down, breathing heavily and trying to recover from the strong rush of out of control emotion that had overtaken her. Her head was full of screaming and fire and pain.
She got herself under control and lifted her head up. Eamon was standing directly in front of her, his large golden eyes full of concern. "I didn't think of where I was sending you. I'm sorry, lass. Are you alright?"
It hit her then: the full horror of the place fill
ed her mind and emotions. It was where they burned the witches in the time of King James. It was where they'd burned Maude because she had dared to use the gift of healing. She stood up and snatched her bike from where Eamon had placed it. "We're going. Now."
She walked swiftly back down the hill from the castle of Edinburgh. She never wanted to see the birthplace of Queen Mary's son again.
Eamon responded to James' questioning look with, "Not now, lad. She'll tell you in her own good time."
~*~
Lizbet didn't stop until she'd led them down the hill, turned left and crossed the river, then turned left again past the train station, and on into a park. She didn't look back at the castle once, but she also couldn't escape its presence above the city.
She didn't stop moving until she collapsed on a bench in a tree-shaded nook. Now that her driven escape from the old town center of Edinburgh was done, she nearly collapsed. James sat down next to her and enveloped her in a spontaneous hug as she burst out crying in great, racking sobs. She cried for a long time, and he continued to enclose her protectively until her sobbing ceased. Eamon stood by, no longer bothering to disguise himself in the hidden place where they had stopped. He shook his lowered head gently and was silent until she spoke to him.
"How could you lead me there?" Lizbet said as she pushed away from James's arms and looked directly at Eamon with red rimmed eyes.
Eamon didn't raise his head when he replied. "I can't tell you how sorry I am. I don't know how I was foolish enough to ask you to meet me there. It was just…I knew the castle would still be there if nothing else from Maude's time was left. I didn't think…"
"They burned Maude as a witch."
"Aye. Because she was a healer and a midwife. Even in a world without magic, she was burned as a user of it. Maude couldn't give over the amulet before she died because her hands were bound behind her as she went to the stake. There was nothing I could do to help her. And I'm ashamed I didn't think what that remembrance would do to you."
Lizbet leaned forward and placed her head in her hands. "There's nothing you can do about it now. Nothing. I just feel so empty. I don’t even turn sixteen for two more weeks, but now I know how it feels to be burned alive. I don't like this job. I don't want these memories in my head. I don't need any of this. I want to go home to my Mom and Bobby and my Dad. I just want to go home now."
"I'll take you home if that’s what you want, but even if we stop now and let the fae perish, the memories will always be there. There's nothing I can do to stop them that wouldn't rob you of all your memories, including the ones in your life as Lizbet. That's the way the amulet works."
Eamon looked deeply into her eyes; he appeared to be looking for the other women behind them. "Think back for the way that Morgan created it. It was to be a ward against evil and couldn't be removed from the neck of the wearer except by her. In all of the other lives, I was with you there before death, waiting, and the woman she was went to it without memories. I could only reclaim the amulet from Maude because she was burned to ash. There was no body left to remove it from. When Morgan created it, the amulet wasn’t meant to carry memories from life to life—it was only when she was close to the end she realized the power it had. And she didn't know that all memories would be lost once it was removed. That's the thing about magic. Sometimes, there's an unanticipated cost."
Lizbet knew that Eamon was telling her the truth. She couldn't just take off the amulet and walk away. All the lives and the one death she had experienced were hers forever because of a decision made in her first life. She understood then that Morgan, despite having been a healer and woman who protected others, had been willing to sacrifice her unknown future lives to achieve her goal.
Suddenly, Lizbet felt very tired and older than her years. But at the same time, she understood that a horrendous wrong had been committed against the fae out of hatred and religious intolerance. She also knew she had committed fully to the cause when she'd thrown her phone away. Morgan had made the first decision, and the other lives that flitted around the back of her head were always there to push her when she felt like giving up, but in the end, this final decision was hers alone. Lizbet knew she would do whatever it took to break Faolan's spell
James reached over to her and squeezed her hand. She gave him a sad smile. Her memories were starting to give up some of their secrets, integrating, as Eamon had said they would over time, and she was aware that 'whatever it takes' might be more difficult than she’d understood only a few days ago.
~*~
Lizbet wanted to be alone for a while, so she went to scout out food while James filled Eamon in on the Mom-knows-where-we-are problem. She thought about picking up a replacement phone for James but didn't feel she could resist calling her parents if she did.
It felt good to be on her own (as much as she could be alone with all the others rambling around in her head), and the part of the city she was in didn't exist in Maude's time, so there were no memories to be found there. By the time she returned to the park with meat pies wrapped in paper, James and Eamon had already decided it was best if they continued their journey by bike.
With only two bikes, Eamon would have to ride with someone, which would be fine: he could travel along weightlessly and invisibly on either of their handle bars on the fae side but be immediately available if they ran into trouble. No one would know he was there.
Eamon had explained to her that everything in each realm is there all the time, but things that are human or made by human hands exist insubstantially on the fae side. If the fae want to walk through them, they can do that if they move quickly and give it a good, strong push and a little bit of will. They can also interact with them as solid but not move or influence them in any way. And things that are only fae can't be seen on the human side at all. The fae tend to stick to the forests and other natural places which exist equally in both realms because interacting with human objects can be tricky for them.
Although magical beings can pass through objects in the human world, it's uncomfortable, and they prefer to avoid it. If they remain too long within something human-built, they could be trapped in it. Eamon had explained that this is what endangered the Tree of Life. Although not a being, the Tree's life-force came from magic rather than photosynthesis. If humans built a building where it stood, the building would trap the Tree and it would die. And that would lead to the death of all the fae, for the great power of the Tree was the only thing preventing the shadow realm from collapsing into nothingness.
On the way out of town, Lizbet and James bought sleeping bags and some small camping supplies, and James also picked up a cheap phone for emergencies. Lizbet bought a hat so that she could tuck her long red hair up underneath something other than Eamon's questionable cap. It wasn't like red hair was a big rarity in Scotland, but there was no point in taking the risk when the brothers definitely had her picture and the local police could have it, too.
With their new gear securely strapped onto the carrier racks on the bikes, they cycled out of Edinburgh and away from the terror of Maude's memories with Eamon phased out of sight on Lizbet's handlebars.
~*~
It was dark by the time they got to the outskirts of Linlithgow. They found a small wooded patch outside of town where they would be hidden from the road and the houses along the roadway and set up their camp for the night. James made hot chocolate on a small camp stove, and they all sat back against their rolled sleeping bags in a half-circle around a small campfire in a vain effort to ward off the evening chill.
"Now, Dunipace, Lizbet, you've seen it already, that first night. It's where the grave is. It's where Morgan witnessed Myrddin's murder. What you don't know was how famous Myrddin became after his death and how the name that was handed down with that fame changed as time went by." Eamon stared into the fire with a far away expression.
"Your Myrddin began to be known as Merlin, for one reason only—the French writer who took the tales of Arthur’s court as his own thou
ght that the name Myrddin sounded too much like the French word, 'merde'. You don't want your readers to think of excrement every time one of your main characters names is mentioned."
James looked from Lizbet to Eamon. "Seriously, you know where Merlin was buried? The Merlin? Camelot, King Arthur, and the Round Table? That Merlin?"
"Laddie, the round table, Camelot, all of it, was a myth. Nobody cared what shape the table was. Much of what was handed down as legend has been twisted round and never really happened. The round table was a metaphor-like for how Arthur led his people—he was a Celt, and they didn't lead the way the Romans did. The King was the father of his people and they had a say in their own leadership. Not a democracy, mind you, but more nearly so than the Roman way."
"The myths also said that Myrddin was born of a human mother and a succubus demon. Also a lie of the Romans. They brought the tales of demons to frighten people into believing what they wanted them to believe. No, like Morgan, Myrddin was half fae. So was his sister, Langoureth. Their father was of the elves. Myrrdin grew up without his father because his father was executed by the elves for taking a human to be his wife. Elves and humans are not so different as you might think: they can both be quite small minded and violent."
Eamon paused, and the reflection of the small fire danced in his eyes. "I know these stories must seem fantastical to you, but may be I'm trying to prepare you. Morgan will eventually give up all of her memories of Myrddin, and I think it'll be soon now. What you really need to understand right this minute is that we need to open the grave, take a small piece of bone, and then be on our way to gather the last items Morgan needs to defeat Faolan's spell and return the fae to their place in this world."
Riot Girls: Seven Books With Girls Who Don't Need A Hero Page 22