by Hilary Duff
. . . and suddenly I was with her.
She hadn’t been anywhere specific at the time, so I found her in that limbo space . . . but at the same time I was also with the seals.
I was equally in two places at once. There’s no good way to describe how that feels. It’s not bad, or painful . . . and it’s not like I was less in one place because I was in the other at the same time. It was just . . . dizzying. At first I felt like I’d pass out, but I quickly got used to it, and the wild thing was I could function perfectly well in both places. I told Mother what I was doing, and she was amazed. I wanted her to join me, so she could experience it too . . . but she couldn’t. If she thought herself to the seals, she left the limbo space, and vice versa. Even years later I was still the only one in the family who could be in two places at once.
Grandfather chalked it up to my brain being so young when we first took the Elixir. As the next youngest after me, Mother swore she’d be able to do it too one day. As far as I knew, she never had. Given everything that happened later, that was probably a very good thing. In fact, I sometimes wished I’d never told her being in two places at the same time was even a possibility for us.
For me, even after all this time, it was still a trick that amazed me. I’m very good at it now. All the weirdness is gone and it feels completely natural, like the way pianists and drummers train their hands to do two completely different things at the same time. It’s exhilarating, but it takes a lot of energy. When I do it, I’m exhausted afterward and can’t do much of anything. If I push too hard, it can leave me so tired that I disappear in that terrible dead-but-not-dead way, and I don’t even realize it until I come back.
All told, life as pure consciousness wasn’t ideal, but it wasn’t without its surprises and pleasures. I knew we all wanted to get back to our bodies, and I knew Grandfather was working hard to find a way to make it happen, but I never in a million years would have guessed how far he, Mother, and Father were willing to go.
They were willing to kill someone innocent and turn monsters loose on the world, just to get our bodies back. When I tried to talk them out of it, I became the enemy. Mother in particular was so furious, she tried to hurt me . . . and she succeeded. That was a surprise—I didn’t know we could hurt one another in this state.
I had to be careful. I knew my mind was stronger than any of theirs, but Mother’s skills seemed to be growing, and she wouldn’t let anything get between her and resuming her normal life. She had a plan in place that involved Lila and using her to drive a wedge between Clea and Sage. I’d have loved to tell Clea all about it, but Mother didn’t trust me, and she was paying close attention to me.
How could I help Clea and Sage without Mother knowing?
I had an idea, but it was risky. I’d leave Clea a message. Soon, while Mother was hopefully weak from bringing Clea’s dreaming mind to see Lila and Sage. The message would have to be vague, but it was my only chance. I had to hope Clea would be clever enough to figure it out.
Everything depended on it.
five
* * *
PETRA WAS GONE, but her words echoed in my head.
If you love someone, shouldn’t you try to stop their pain, even if it hurts you?
I thought about Sage’s ruined back. I knew the Elixir of Life that flowed in his veins would heal him from tortures even worse than that, but I also knew it didn’t spare him from pain.
It didn’t make sense. Sage had been captured by the Saviors of Eternal Life, a group descended from the Society, an ancient guild dedicated to protecting the Elixir. Sage had been a member of the Society hundreds of years ago, and the lone person intentionally spared when their meeting was attacked. “Spared” wasn’t exactly the right word, since he was forced to drink the Elixir and endure horror after horror as his captors tested its ability to keep him alive.
Although almost all the other Society members were brutally murdered, their families and descendants took up the cause to find and protect the Elixir, which now existed in Sage’s body alone. My dad had believed the Saviors of Eternal Life would treat Sage like a treasured museum piece under lock and key, but that wasn’t what I’d seen. The kind of brutality I’d witnessed is what I expected of Cursed Vengeance, the descendants of those who attacked the Society and destroyed the Elixir beyond what remained in Sage. Their name came from the fact that their lives were cursed, and would be until the Elixir—meaning Sage—was destroyed forever.
So was Sage with the Saviors, or was he now being held by someone else? And if he was with the Saviors, why would they harm him? And why did Lila say they’d keep doing it until he gave up on me?
Petra said if I loved Sage, I’d stop what was happening to him, but if that meant giving up on him, that was impossible. Sage and I were tied together for eternity. We couldn’t change that; we just had to find a way to defy fate and make it better. Even if I could change it—if I could snap my fingers and change the past so Sage never existed—I wouldn’t do it. A life without Sage would be easier, maybe, and it would surely be safer, but it would be life under novocaine, numb and empty.
I looked at my computer and tried to figure out what I could possibly put in a search engine to help me find that room where Sage was held. I couldn’t think of anything specific enough. Maybe caffeine would help. I took the tray of tea my mom had made for me yesterday and carried it downstairs, relishing the early-morning quiet. While I brewed a new pot, I looked around for something to eat. I saw a cork-sealed glass jar of granola that looked and smelled amazing, but just as I was scooping myself a huge bowl, I remembered Piri’s homemade horse snacks and dumped it back in the jar.
Instead of going back to my room, I went down to my father’s studio and pored through more of my dad’s books and computer files, hoping to find something connecting the Saviors to a frilly room decorated heavily in white wicker. It was a long shot, and after a couple fruitless hours I went back upstairs to shower.
I made it to the main floor.
“Clea!” Suzanne cried.
Oh, great. I shouldn’t care, but running into Suzanne felt worse when I didn’t look at least somewhat put together. I was wearing what I’d slept in—thrashed green sweatpants and an ancient T-shirt of my mom’s that featured Grimace from McDonald’s. Suzanne, on the other hand, was so buffed and polished, I could have sworn I saw the sun glint off her perfect skin.
Reflexively, I reached up to smooth back my hair, as if I could possibly conquer this rat’s nest on my head with a single pat. “Hi, Suzanne.”
“The senator was very sad she missed you last night. I was about to get her breakfast. Care to join us?” She looked me up and down. “Although I’m sure you’ll want to put yourself together first.”
Of course. Because who’d even dream about wearing nightclothes to have breakfast in her own house with her own mother at the wildly late hour of eight a.m.? But she had said “us,” so . . .
“Yeah. I’m just going to run upstairs. Please tell Mom I’ll catch up with her later.”
“I will.”
She said it like she was finished with me, but she didn’t turn on her heel and clip away. She just stood there, as if she wanted to say more but wasn’t sure she should. This was so unlike her, I forgot how rumpled I looked.
“Suzanne?” I asked.
The uncertainty left her face and she somehow managed to pull herself up even taller. “You and Ben,” she said. “Normally I wouldn’t pry, but you’re the senator’s daughter, and I don’t want to step on any toes.”
She stared down at me, waiting for an answer, but I was having trouble believing the question. Was Suzanne asking my permission to date Ben? I couldn’t figure out what surprised me the most: that she wanted Ben in the first place, that she was bothering to see what I thought about it . . . or that my stomach had started to twist in an uncomfortable knot that had nothing to do with wanting breakfast.
“No toe stepping,” I assured her. “Ben and I are . . .”
&n
bsp; I’d been about to say “just friends,” but that sounded like an absurd thing to say about someone I didn’t talk to anymore. It also didn’t do justice to what we’d been to each other before.
If my hesitation sent mixed messages, they didn’t bother Suzanne. She smoothed out her unrumpled skirt and smiled. “Good. That’s settled then.” She clicked down the hall with what looked like an added spring to her step . . . but I could have been mistaken.
I slipped up to my room but staggered back when I opened the door, overcome by a distinctly pungent odor. I recognized it immediately. When we were sixteen, Rayna had a mad crush on a guy who played in a Native American drum circle.
I know.
For six months she went to see him play several times a week, and she begged me to come along so her stalking wouldn’t be so obvious. The circles started with a smudging ceremony. A leader would light a bundle of herbs, then douse the flame to smoldering embers, and wave the smoke around “to rid the space of evil spirits.”
The herbs were sage, and their exact same odor coated the air of my room.
I shut the door and stalked downstairs. There was just one person in this house who actively battled evil spirits, and I’d thought we had an understanding that I’d rather her not battle them in my room. Apparently it was time to once again make that clear.
I found Piri in the laundry room, folding sheets. Piri is shaped like a fire hydrant, yet her whole body seems to elongate when she folds sheets. She never needs help, never needs to lay them on a flat surface, they never touch the ground, and they somehow end up in perfectly crisp rectangles.
Piri was humming happily to herself as I approached, but she groaned when she saw me enter out of the corner of her eye.
“Piri . . . ,” I began.
She turned as if surprised to see me.
“Ah, Clea! I was just folding sheets. Hard on the old back, you know.”
I did know. I knew she had no trouble with her back but thought she’d get more appreciation for her work if she did it through great hardship. It wasn’t necessary—we knew the house couldn’t function without her, but we went along with it since it made her feel good. Normally I’d play into it, but right now I just wanted answers.
“Piri, why were you burning sage in my room?”
“Burning what? Why would I burn sage in your room?”
Piri’s not above lying, but she’d be a terrible poker player. She doesn’t look you in the eye when she’s avoiding the truth. Now she was looking right at me, and her face was genuinely confused. She was even letting the edge of the sheet in her arms touch the floor, which meant she was seriously thrown. She looked so befuddled that I felt crazy for what I was about to say.
“Because you wanted to . . . get rid of . . . evil spirits?”
“You have evil spirits in your room?”
“No! No, I don’t. I just thought if you thought I did . . .”
“Why would I think you had evil spirits in your room? Did something happen?”
“No, I just—”
“Good.” Piri snapped the sheet and went back to folding. “Holy water.”
“What?”
“That’s how you expel evil spirits. Holy water. Nothing else. You need some? I get it for you. I show you how to use it.”
“No, that’s okay. Thanks, Piri.”
Piri nodded, then turned away from me, back in laundry mode. I watched her for a moment, then walked back up to my room. I moved slowly, breathing deeply, waiting to see when the scent would again hit my nose. It didn’t. Not on the stairs, not in the hall, not two inches in front of my door. Not until I opened my door . . . then it slammed into me.
My nerve endings started to prickle.
This wasn’t normal. An odor this strong wouldn’t just sit in the room. It would seep out. And it would dissipate. Yet the scent was just as strong now as it had been when I’d first encountered it. Maybe stronger.
I walked in warily and went straight to the window, which I pulled open. There was a breeze outside, and my door was open, so the cross ventilation should have done the trick. I gave it a few minutes, leaning out the window and breathing in the fresh air. Hope made my pulse race and my heart pound, but I wouldn’t give in to it yet. I had to be patient. I couldn’t handle the disappointment if I was wrong. Part of me didn’t want to pull my head back in, but finally I needed to know. I leaned in . . . and the scent was stronger than ever.
The scent of sage.
I was breathing heavier now, and excitement threatened to cloud my reactions.
Okay, Clea, calm down, I told myself. Look for the logical answer first.
I went methodically through my drawers and closet, looking for incense, a candle, potpourri . . . something that might have been placed here and would explain what I smelled. When I’d exhausted every hidden nook and corner, I closed my door, sat on my bed, and let the truth sink in.
There was no logical answer. The aroma of sage . . . was from Sage. He was reaching out to me. I didn’t know how, but I knew it was true. He had seen me when I sat by his side in my dream, and he was trying to tell me he needed me to be strong. No matter what Petra and her otherworldly family said or did, no matter how lovingly Lila cared for him, no matter how weak and lost he seemed, the two of us were bound together for eternity. I would find him. We would be together again, and this time would be different. We would survive, and we would be happy.
But that was ridiculous. Sage didn’t have that kind of power. He couldn’t be in one place and make something happen in another.
But Petra could.
Was Sage reaching out to me through Petra?
Impossible. Petra made it very clear that for whatever reason, she wanted Sage and me apart.
Then I remembered Amelia, and the way her eyes belied her words. Could she be helping Sage reach out to me?
It was possible, and possible was enough.
Then my eyes lit on my computer screen . . . and I froze.
Since I’d come back from Japan, I’d changed my screensaver. It used to be one of the ones that came with the computer—a randomly changing design. Rayna had thought it was strange that I didn’t use a slide show of my photojournalism assignments, but I was critical of my work, and seeing those photos frustrated me with thoughts of everything I should have done differently.
Now, however, I did have a slide show . . . of the pictures I knew held Sage deep in their backgrounds. I could barely see him in these uncropped, unenlarged shots, but I knew he was there, and it comforted me.
But Sage wasn’t anywhere on my monitor now. None of my pictures was. The screen was dark . . . except for several words written in a bright blue, twelve-point font that scrolled along the top of the screen, too small for me to read from across the room. I walked over, staring as the words became clear.
“Find Charlie Victor . . . beneath the flying pig . . . time is short. . . .”
Over and over again it scrolled by.
A message from Sage. A cryptic message, which made sense if Amelia was helping him, and wanted to keep her intentions from Petra.
I scrawled the message on a notepad, then tapped my keyboard. It hurt to do it—seeing the words blink away was like losing a bit of Sage. I Googled “Charlie Victor.” I imagined he might be one of the Saviors, perhaps the leader. Or maybe he was peripherally connected to them. Maybe the place I’d seen Sage was owned by him, and I could track it down by his name. Maybe Sage wasn’t with the Saviors at all, and Charlie Victor was the one behind the torture.
I used every form of the name I could imagine: Charlie, Charles, Chaz. I found countless versions of the man on endless social-networking sites, websites featuring businesses owned by him, homes he last bought. I wrote down every lead, but it was pretty clear that chasing down each one would be like trying to catch every bit of dandelion fluff once you’ve blown it off the flower.
I tried “beneath the flying pig,” but those results were even more random, although the reference s
tarted to feel more and more appropriate. The longer I scoured the Net, the more I thought Sage had been so clever with his clue that I would figure it out when pigs fly.
Time is short. . . .
I didn’t need Google for that one. Whatever his captors were going to do with Sage, they were going to do it soon. If I wanted to find him, I needed to do it now, which meant I didn’t have the luxury of stumbling through on my own. I needed help, and while he certainly came with issues, I could imagine just one person to give it to me.
After more than a month of near complete silence, it was time to go back to Ben.
six
I STOOD OUTSIDE my father’s office, my hand on the knob.
Ben and I hadn’t discussed it, but I knew he worked with the door closed for my benefit. I often rummaged through things in Dad’s studio, moving them around and tossing them aside, but I did it in Dad’s own spirit. The chaos I created came from following the same mystery he had loved. I was keeping his vision alive. I knew he’d approve.
What was happening in the office was different. Mom was having Ben disembowel it. Even though I’d made a kind of peace with Dad’s death, Ben knew I wouldn’t want to watch as he scrubbed Dad’s memory out of our lives.
My stomach fluttered. I tried to convince myself it was because of the office, but I knew better. Turning to Ben might be smart, but it wouldn’t be easy.
I remembered the last time we spoke. It had been a week after we got back from Japan, and I was quarantined to my bed. I claimed it was because of the gunshot wound I’d suffered in Japan, but that wasn’t it. I was too heartbroken to function. I hadn’t showered, my hair was a frizzy tangle, my face puffy from crying and screaming . . . and Ben would just stare at me with saucer-huge eyes, like I was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. I stared up at my ceiling. I couldn’t even look at him.