by Emily Mckay
“You really scared us, kiddo,” my dad says.
My mom squeezes my hand. I feel it all the way through my body. Her love. Her endless support. How much she needs me.
My dad’s gentle fingers brush hair off my face. “I love you so much, kiddo.”
Of course, he’s always loved me. I never doubted his love. Only his sanity.
But this is too good. Too much of what I’ve always wanted.
My mother, happy and relaxed. My dad…himself.
Who wouldn’t want that?
As soon as I say it, I know the answer. I wouldn’t want that. I don’t want the lie of a perfect world.
The Crimson Miasma may be able to give me a perfect fantasy, but it can’t give me what I really want: the ability to make a difference. The ability to control the course of my own life.
To do that, I have to leave the fog.
With my free hand, I reach up and take my father’s hand in mine. I pull it away from my hair and hold it up against my heart for just a second.
“I love you, Daddy.” I study his face, trying to memorize it as it is right now. “And I forgive you.”
I say this last bit for me, because the image isn’t my real dad. He doesn’t need my forgiveness as much as I need to give it.
I hold his hand tightly in mine for just a moment. Then I squeeze my eyes closed and stand up on the deck of The Blossom.
I keep my eyes closed as I reach out a hand, swinging it through the air until I find a railing beside me.
I just stand there for a moment, getting my feet under me, and listening. I hear only the lapping of the water and the creaking of the boat.
“Hello?” I call out. “Is anyone else still here?”
Maybe the Crimson Miasma has captured them all. Maybe whatever it is showing them is much more enticing than this reality.
Or maybe the Crimson Miasma simply doesn’t work on Dark Worlders. Maybe the things we imagine in our deepest hearts are simply too unbelievable.
If that’s true, then it will be all on me to steer the ship through the fog.
Panic claws through my chest. “Anyone?”
“Child of the Dark World…” Kendal’s low voice drifts to me out of the fog. “I am here.” And then, I feel her brush against my legs.
Unable to help myself, I drop to my knees, careful to keep one hand on the hull. I reach out until I feel her beneath my hand. “Thank God.”
She comes closer to me, putting her front paws on my thighs and bumping her head against my chin. “I too am glad to hear your voice.”
I am tempted to bury my face in her fur. Before I can, she leaps off my lap. But she stays close, my hand still on her back.
“How long did it take you to fight off the Miasma?” I ask.
“The Miasma does not seem to affect Kellas cats.”
So all of this time, she was simply alone in this fog?
No wonder she seems so glad to see me.
“Is there anyone else?”
“You appear to be the first one to have fought off the Miasma’s effects.”
“Any ideas what to do to help the others?”
“We must find a way to wake them, or you and I will have to steer the ship ourselves.”
Okay, so we’ve got to wake some people up.
“Crab said his people were affected strongly by the Miasma. So let’s leave him for last. Do you know where everyone else is?”
“I can lead you to my dowt-mate.”
“Lead the way. Just go slowly. I’m going to try to hold on to your back so we don’t get separated again.”
“If you must.”
There is something in her voice that sounds almost like relief. I don’t think she wants to be alone on this ship any more than I do.
Our progress is excruciatingly slow. I think we’re both okay with that.
Finally, she stops and says, “He is here.”
I drop to my knees and reach out a hand until I find him.
My hand lands squarely on his chest. I still for an instant. This feels too intimate…touching him while he’s vulnerable. But how else can I wake him?
I shake his shoulder. “Kane, you’ve got to wake up.” There’s no response. I shake again. “Kane, we need you. You have to wake up.” Still nothing. What are we going to do if I can’t wake him up? Search for Morgan, I guess. But I don’t know where he is. “Come on. I know you can fight off whatever it’s showing you. You’re stronger than this. There are people here in this world who need you.”
The muscles of his shoulder twitch under my hand, and I feel like he’s trying to fight off the vision. I lean closer. “The princess needs you. The Curator needs you.” I hesitate only an instant before adding, “I need you.”
The words are barely out of my mouth when he sits bolt upright, something I feel rather than see, since my eyes are still closed.
“Where am I?”
“You’re on The Blossom. With Morgan and Ro and Crab and Kendal.”
“Who the hell is Kendal?” he asks.
“Child of the Dark World,” Kendal murmurs. “I do not believe you told Kane you have given me a name.”
“Kendal is the cat?”
I can hear him shifting position and imagine that he is standing up. I stand up as well. Kendal bumps against my leg and I exhale in relief.
“Um, yeah. Sorry about that. I thought she needed a name. I just forgot to tell anyone.”
“Good point. One question. Why are your eyes closed?”
“Um…” Obviously, his eyes are not closed and yet he’s still here. Tentatively, I squint through one eyelid to see what happens. I’m still on The Blossom. So I open both my eyes, feeling rather foolish. “Long story. I’ll tell you later.”
Kane is facing me, standing closer than I could have guessed. For once, there’s more in his gaze than just amusement. An unexpected intimacy. Almost as if he is as glad to see me as I am to see him.
Which is undoubtedly a side effect of the Crimson Miasma. Of course, he is glad to see me.
“Okay, Cupcake, what’s the plan?”
“First, we wake up Morgan and Ro. Then, some of us need to turn the paddle wheel by hand, and someone needs to get up into the wheelhouse to try to steer. Do you know where the others are?”
I had turned to Kendal, but it’s Kane who answers. “Morgan was near the paddle wheel. Ro was heading up to the wheelhouse to help Crab. That was the last time I saw them, just before the fog rolled in.”
“You look for Morgan,” I tell Kane. “When you wake him, the two of you will be able to get the ship moving again. I’ll find Ro.”
Kendal says, “I will be able to find the hull. Kane, if you follow the hull you will find your way back to Morgan. After that, I will lead you to the wheelhouse, child of the Dark World.”
“Good plan,” Kane says.
“You should both hold on to my back,” Kendal suggests. “So that we do not get separated.”
I lean down to touch Kendal’s back. I have to bend my knees only a little. Kane, who is at least a foot taller than I am, has to nearly bend at the waist.
“Can’t I just hold on to your tail or something?”
Kendal flicks her tail with annoyance. “No. You may not.”
“All right,” Kane says.
“Hold my hand,” I suggest.
Kane reaches out and grabs my hand. His hand is so much bigger than mine, and strong. Despite the fog, it isn’t cold or clammy, but reassuringly warm. Solid. I have never held a boy’s hand before and even though I know this is not a romantic situation, I feel his touch all the way to my very core.
It takes Kendal only a few minutes to lead us to the hull.
“Thanks for waking me up, Cupcake.” Even though the fog is too dense for me to see him clearly, I can hear the
smile in his voice. “If you can make it up to the wheelhouse, can you keep her on a steady heading?”
“Yes,” I say, thinking of the compass in my bag. “I can.”
“Then I’ll see you on the other side. Good luck.” He gives my hand a squeeze, his fingers drifting away slowly, as though he’s reluctant to lose contact.
Kendal apparently does not have the patience for long goodbyes, because she immediately walks off in the other direction. I have no choice but to follow or lose her in the fog. I am several steps away when I hear Kane say, “Glad you need me, Cupcake.”
“Wait. What?” I can hear Kane chuckling through the fog. “What did he mean by that?”
“Child, he is referring to what you said when you were trying to wake him. That would appear to be obvious to me.”
“Sure, it’s obvious to you. You can read his mind.” I cut myself off abruptly. “Wait. You can read his mind.”
Kendal makes a noise almost like a purr. Or she’s laughing at me. Either one. “Yes, child.”
“Does he—” I cut myself off again. I certainly don’t want this conversation getting back to him. “Never mind. Forget I asked.”
“In fact, you did not ask.”
“Exactly. I didn’t ask. I don’t want to know.”
Yeah, Edie. Way to play it cool. If Kane is listening in to this conversation, I’ve come off really well. Not at all awkward or needy.
“If you are curious, child, about his feelings for you, you should ask him.”
Great. Relationship advice from a cat. This has to be some sort of record low for teenage girls everywhere.
“Well, I’m not going to ask him. Because I’m not curious. Besides which, this is a life-or-death situation. I’m pretty sure we all have more important things to be thinking about than whether or not Kane likes me. Not that I think he likes me. “
Oh my God. Stop. Talking. Now.
“As I said before, child, I do not know how he feels. Kane is ever vigilant in keeping his emotions from me.”
Her unspoken message is clear. I need to shut up and keep my emotions from her as well.
With my free hand, I give her a mock salute. “Gotcha.”
I will be playing it cool. Keeping the crazy to a minimum.
“You know, it’s not my fault I’m this flustered,” I mutter. My life in the Dark World did not prepare me for meeting my book boyfriend. Or for him to have dimples. And honey brown eyes.
I manage to keep my mouth shut until we make it to the wheelhouse. There is a ladder leading up to the small building on the starboard side. Kendal scampers up the ladder with surprising grace.
A moment later, she calls out, “Ro is up here.”
I follow Kendal up the ladder and find Ro flat on her back near the entrance. After a quick exploration of the wheelhouse, I find Crab slumped over in a chair.
I make my way back to where Ro is on the floor. Waking her is easy. I lean over and whisper in her ear, “If you don’t wake up and help, I’ll never be able to tell Chuck Wallace that you’re funny.”
She sits up so fast, we bang heads.
“Ow!” I run my hand over the spot where her head hit mine.
She scoots back. “Was that supposed to be some kind of a joke?”
“Nope. I just said what I thought would wake you up.”
She grins. “Good point. What do we do next?”
“Do you know how to steer a boat?” I ask.
She scrambles to her feet, looking from me to the ship’s wheel and then to Kendal. “No. Do you?”
“No. But I have a compass.”
“I’ll see if I can help down by the paddle wheel.”
Ro disappears down the ladder to the main deck, leaving Kendal and me alone in the wheelhouse with the sleeping Crab.
Outside, I hear the paddle wheel creak and then a slow and unsteady, thump, thump, thump.
Which means Kane, Morgan, and Ro are turning the paddle wheel by hand. I pull my phone out and open up the compass app. There is a ledge running beneath all of the windows around the wheelhouse. Kendal leaps up to sit on it and stare out the windows into the dense fog.
“Do you know where to go?” she asks.
According to the compass, the ship has drifted so that we are now going just west of north. If we continued to drift on this path, we would slide right past the island and come out on the other side of the Crimson Miasma. I reach past the ship’s wheel and prop my phone on the ledge against the window.
“I do.”
I grasp the wheel in both hands and turn into the Crimson Miasma. Toward Gull Veston Island.
Excerpt from
Book Five of The Traveler Chronicles:
The Traveler Undone
Oh, you wanna know what the Crimson Miasma showed me? You wanna know my deepest desire?
I’d sooner tell you my binding name.
I’m not a dumb-ass. Despite appearances.
CHAPTER THIRTY
By the time Crab wakes up, the fog is melting into thin wisps. He groans, struggling to sit straighter in his chair, as he rubs a pudgy hand over his eyes.
“How are you doing?” I ask.
“Well, now, that was quite the display of power. I fancy myself to be in the same general field as whoever created that Miasma. But that was work like I’ve never seen.”
He shakes his head again, and I notice that when he lowers his hand, there is a faint tremor to it.
“Want to talk about it?” I ask.
“Want to talk about what you saw?”
I chuckle. “Nope.”
“That’s what I thought.”
“Who was the first to break through the Miasma?” he asks.
I clear my throat. “Actually, I was.”
Crab gives me a slow smile. “I’m impressed. That’s quite a trick for a Dark Worlder.”
“That’s me, defying expectations.”
He nods toward the ship’s wheel. “I believe I’ll take that back, if it’s all the same to you.”
“She’s all yours.”
Crab stands and takes the wheel from me. I step aside and Kendal leaps down from the ledge and brushes against my legs once before leaving the wheelhouse.
“She’s obviously glad to have you back at the wheel. I don’t think she had much confidence in me.”
“You did just fine, Cupcake.” He squints out the window. The Crimson Miasma has dissipated entirely. Above are clear blue skies. A glance out the back tells me that the sun hangs low in the sky, still several hours away from setting. Ahead, there is maybe a quarter mile of open ocean. Towering out of it, encompassing the entire view, is Gull Veston Island.
With Crab awake, the paddle wheel takes on a powerful, rhythmic thump, thump, thump. It’s not long before he slows down and we coast toward the cliffs ahead.
The others join us in the wheelhouse.
“Can you angle in next to the cliff?” Kane asks Crab.
Crab reaches down and pulls out a pair of rubber bumpers that he hands to Morgan and Kane. “Now then, boys, if you’ll just go down and drop these over the side of the boat, I’ll pull up alongside the cliff.”
He hands two more to Ro and me before turning his attention back to the wheel. We all head down the ladder to the deck. I watch carefully as Kane and Morgan wind the rope from the bumper around the cleat on the railing. I do the same, and then drop my bumper over the side.
A moment later, the ship nudges against the cliffs. Crab scampers down the ladder and joins us on the starboard side of the boat.
“Well, Cupcake. What do you think?” Kane asks.
I glance at him. “Looks like the Cliffs of Insanity to me.”
Kane nods. “Just like you described. So far, that’s two for two.”
“Three for three,” Morgan corrects. “If y
ou count the Kellas cats.”
I glance in Kendal’s direction and, uncomfortable with the reminder of the fight that cost her her dowt, I change topics. “Ro, do you think you can get a reading on where the stairs are?”
“You wouldn’t have brought me if I couldn’t.”
I tip my head back and look straight up at the towering height of the cliff. It’s darker at the base, where the water splashes against the stone, but above my head, it lightens to a cream color. And it seems to stretch on forever. I sure hope Ro can find a staircase, because there’s no way we’re climbing that.
Ro turns to face the wall and reaches out for it. For an instant, she plants her hand flat on the wall, but the waves bump the boat, pitching her forward so she almost tumbles over the railing.
“Any way you can steady the boat?” I ask Crab.
“I can try.”
For this, he sits back against the hull, palms flat against the wood. There is a calm, meditative quality to him, as if he is communing with the boat. But his affinity is with water, not wood. More precisely, it is with the oxygen in the water. If it took tremendous power to move the water through the paddle wheel and get the boat here, I can only imagine how much more it must take to calm the waves around us. But slowly, they do calm. Not to a perfect glassy stillness, but they become gentle enough that Ro can plant her hands on the stone to perform her own, much less powerful, form of magic.
I glance over at Kane, who is standing just a little off to the side, turned away. He’s looking down at something in his hand. Something gold and round, like a compass or a pocket watch. A second later, Kane looks up, catches me watching him, snaps the watch closed, and puts it back into his pocket.
I can’t think of any sinister reason why Kane would be looking at either a compass or a pocket watch. So why didn’t he want anyone to notice he was doing it?
Was that his mother’s medallion? But if it is, then why did he pretend earlier not to know what I was talking about?
Before I can wonder more, Ro’s hands drop away from the wall and she steps back.
“I got it.”
Crab’s shoulders sag, and the tension holding him taut releases. He gets to his feet, moving slowly.
“There is a staircase that goes all the way to the top. It’s maybe a quarter mile around the island from here. It’s more than ten thousand steps,” Ro says.