He stiffened. “What is wrong?”
I tried to slow my breathing, but I was about to flip out. “Something has my leg. There is something on my leg.”
“What does it feel like?” Calvin asked calmly.
“I don’t know! It’s gross and slimy!”
“Do not move.” Calvin pulled out some sort of hunting knife. I’d had no idea he was carrying it.
I eyed the blade nervously. “What are you going to do with that?”
“Liam, will you hold Charlotte so she does not jump?”
“Sure.” Liam put his hands on my shoulders, his body inches from mine, reminding me of how close we’d been the day before.
“Why does he have to hold me?” The heat from Liam’s body momentarily distracted me from whatever was wrapped around my leg.
“So you do not move and get cut.” Calvin leaned over and grasped my ankle. Moments later, he rose, holding something I could only describe as a half-amphibian, half-fish thing. Green and slimy, it was downright gross-looking.
“Ugh, get that away from me!”
He tossed it a distance away from us.
“What if it comes back?” I asked
Henry chuckled. “It’s not the only—”
Liam punched Henry’s arm. “Would you like a piggyback ride, Charlotte?”
I looked at Calvin. “Uh, I don’t know.”
“I assume that means you want to ride on someone’s back?” Calvin smiled.
“Maybe.”
He reached out a hand, and he helped me on to his back. “That should keep any unwanted creatures away.” If I wasn’t imagining things, he was looking at Liam as he said it.
We continued wading until we came to the first piece of land. The house on it looked rustic, made of trees and other natural materials, but very well put together. Calvin put me on the solid ground. I was just about to examine my leg to check for a bite or bruise when I was grabbed from behind.
“What business do you have here?”
Calvin jumped up onto the floating land. “Let go of her! Do you not realize who you hold?” I half-expected him to grab me away, but something must have stopped him.
“Is the girl supposed to mean something to me?”
I still hadn’t seen my captors face, but it was definitely a male. His arm wrapped tightly around my body above my waist.
“It is the Essence, you imbecile!” Henry stood ready to intervene.
Two men laughed.
Liam pulled himself out of the water. “Look at her eyes.”
“Do you really expect us to believe you?” There was a taunting in his voice—a challenge more for entertainment than anything else.
“Just look,” Liam said.
The man turned me roughly, his arm digging into my ribcage.
Calvin wrapped me in his arms from behind just as Henry and Liam each grabbed a man. “How dare you touch my Essence!”
“Your Essence? Do you claim to be her Gerard?”
“It’s more than a claim. He is my Gerard.” I nudged Calvin so he’d step forward with me.
“We have heard rumors of a new Essence, but why should we believe it’s you?”
Fine. If he wanted proof, he’d get it. I closed my eyes and concentrated. I tried to make the water rise and funnel so that it looked like those soda bottle tornados we used to make as kids. I opened my eyes to a couple of shocked faces.
“Oh, my. We are sorry, our Essence.” Both men bowed their heads for a moment before meeting my gaze.
I studied the men before me. They had honest eyes set in sun-weathered skin. I could trust them. One of the many perks of being an Essence was having the ability to determine that. “I understand, but we need your help.”
Henry looked at me skeptically. “You understand?”
I gave him a look. What good was it going to do if we made things tenser? If we wanted help, we needed to calm things down. I gestured for the guys to let the strangers go. I was pretty sure my demonstration had done the trick. They weren’t going to challenge us again.
The first man held out a hand. “I am Joseph, and this is Nal. What kind of help do you require?”
“Hi, I’m Charlotte, and this is Calvin, Liam, and Henry.”
“It is an honor to meet you, and we will provide any help we can.”
I nodded. “We are searching for a scroll.”
“A scroll?” Nal asked.
“Yes. A scroll,” I repeated.
The men turned and looked at each other. I could tell they were having an unspoken conversation. “We are the keepers of the scroll.”
“The keepers of the scroll?”
“Yes. Although no one can really keep the scroll.” Joseph said the word keep in a strange way, as if it was an inside joke.
“Why not?” Liam asked.
Joseph crossed his arms. “You will have to come with us if you want to find out.”
“Where? Where do we need to go?” I asked.
“Not far.”
“Do we have to get back in there?” I glanced at the water apprehensively. I had no interest in meeting that fish thingy again.
“I would suggest we take a boat.”
“A boat? There are boats here?” I turned to my Guardians. “Did you know about that?”
Henry shook his head. “No. None of us have ever been here.”
Joseph looked at my Guardians triumphantly. “We would never want to subject the Essence to those waters more than necessary.”
“I’m glad you feel that way.” Joseph was really getting on my good side.
We followed the two locals around the house. There was more to it than I originally thought, including several porches. They led us over to a dock. We all squeezed onto a boat that looked as if it should only have held half as many people, and I crossed my fingers that the rickety old boat could hold us. Seated practically on Calvin’s lap, I glanced over at Liam. He was staring out at the water as we made the slow trip across the swamp.
Calvin lifted up my pant leg to examine the red mark. “Does this hurt?”
“Not too much. I’m just glad you got that creature off.”
He kissed the back of my neck. “I wish it had picked me instead, but I guess it had good taste.”
“Lucky me,” I mumbled.
The light faded as we moved into some kind of forest. “Where are we going exactly?” I asked.
“To the last place the scroll was seen,” Joseph answered without taking his eyes off some spot in the distance.
“Where the scroll was seen? I thought you were the keeper? How could you not know where it is?” Henry asked.
Nal laughed. “You will find out soon.”
Calvin stiffened. “That is not good enough. The Essence is entitled to an answer. How could you lose such an important object?”
“You really have no idea what you are searching for.” Joseph wasn’t asking a question.
I folded my hands in my lap. “No. I just know I need to find it.” I bumped against Calvin as the boat hit land.
Joseph hopped out. “This is the place.”
“Will we find the scroll here?” I asked as Calvin helped me out of the boat.
“It is doubtful. No one has seen the scroll in years.”
“Then why did you bring us here?” Calvin was obviously struggling to hold his temper.
“The Essence wanted help finding the scroll. This is all we could offer.”
My heart sank. “Can’t you give us any more information?”
Nal smiled. “It is very old, and you will probably find it in the water.”
“Oh no.” I shook my head. “I’m not getting in there again.”
Joseph smiled apologetically. “I do not know of another way.”
“Fine.” I walked into the water, thinking about how badly I wanted to find the scroll and get back on land.
Hello, Essence.
I jumped. “What?”
Calvin grabbed my elbow. “Charlotte?”
“Did you he
ar that?”
“No. I heard nothing.”
Only you can hear my voice. I am close.
I jumped to the side when something bumped up against my leg.
Do not let me scare you. I realized where the voice was coming from—a turtle. A giant turtle.
“A turtle? The scroll is a turtle?” I ran my fingers over a set of ornate carvings in the shell. I could feel the turtle, and I knew he wasn’t going to bite me or anything, but still, a giant turtle was pretty scary.
Calvin rubbed my back. “Ruth did say it was a scroll that was not a scroll.”
Nal laughed. “Yes. We call the turtle Scroll.”
“A turtle named Scroll… only in Energo.” Liam chuckled.
“What does it say, Charlotte?” Calvin asked.
The words weren’t written in English or in any language I’d ever seen. “I’m not sure yet.” I closed my eyes to clear my head before touching the turtle again.
Complete darkness can only be vanquished with pure light. At the Source, light will prevail as a new one is born again.
“We need to go to Bellgard.” I knew it in every fiber of my body.
“We need to get into the most fortified city in all of Energo, which happens to be the mainstay of our enemy? Great.” Henry shook his head.
“We don’t have a choice.” I thought over the words, terrified by what they meant. It would be a long journey to Bellgard, but I was determined to take advantage of all the time I had with the people I loved. I only wished my family were with me.
Chapter Fifteen
Samantha
I slipped up. I let the circumstances weaken me, and I made a mistake. I was supposed to be awake while Kevin slept, but sleep took me.
Waking up suddenly, I glanced around the car. Everything appeared untouched. Hopefully, my mistake did not cost us more than the emotional toll it had on me. I needed to be more careful. We could not afford any other setbacks.
I had dreamt another dream—the same one—and once again, I didn’t see which man had used the blade. No matter who did the act, why would Monty, Emma’s brother, be part of a plan to kill her Gerard? Nothing about it made sense. The biggest question was why I was having the dream. At my core, I knew it was actually a memory, but that also made no sense. I would have had to have been so young. Why would I have been there?
I was not one to make more of myself than I should, but did my sudden remembrance of the event have some greater meaning? Being raised in Energo, I had been indoctrinated in the belief that the Source ultimately controlled everything. Did the Source somehow want me to witness that event to help us in our current situation? But then again, the dream didn’t help. I hadn’t figured it out in time. I was either too late, or its use was still before us.
I racked my brain, trying to understand. The likelihood of Monty being a traitor was slim. None of his other actions supported that theory. By all accounts, he had given up any semblance of a normal life to care for his sister’s children. I saw the way he was with Charlotte. He cared for her deeply. He also cared for Kevin, but in a different way that made sense considering their genders. I refused to believe I had missed my chance to serve the Source. There still had to be a way to use the dream to our advantage.
I rummaged through the bags until I found a sweater. The garment was made of a soft material the man at the store had called fleece. I would save the new coat for later.
I tried to open my door, but it wouldn’t budge. Kevin had only cleared the snow from his door, so mine was still coated in a heavy layer of ice and snow. If we were to leave, someone needed to clear the front window. The only way out was over Kevin, and there was not much space. That could not stop me. I kneeled and then put one leg over him. In order to reach the door, I had to straddle him. Sitting on his lap brought blood to my face as I remembered what we had been doing mere hours before. I never imagined I would do such a thing before uniting, but it had happened so naturally. Everything between Kevin and I seemed natural.
Just as I reached for the latch, his eyes fluttered open. “Samantha?”
“Hello.” I decided to make humor of the situation.
He gave me a lazy grin. “Either this is a nightmare or a really good dream.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. The question is whether you’re trying to kill me, or you’re about to take off your shirt.”
I punched him playfully on the arm. “I am actually trying to get out of the car to see if I can clear off the front window.”
He smiled. “Likely story.”
I pushed open the door and hopped down into the early morning light. The storm had moved on, and I took that as a good sign.
Kevin followed me out, and together, we cleared off the thick layer of snow. In the light of the morning, I could see the abandoned motel for the first time. The building looked far less appealing than I had imagined. I squinted as the bright sun reflected off the snow. My hands were half frozen when we got back inside the car. We’d left the engine running, and the heat felt good.
Kevin glanced at the dash. “I’m suddenly really glad Dad brought an extra container of gas. I wasn’t thinking when we sat with the car on for so long. At least I remembered to get out and check the exhaust pipe a few times. That would have been a pretty sad way to die.”
“Oh? You know how to add more gas?”
He smiled. “Yeah, I’ve got that difficult skill down.”
***
“Do you want to stop and eat?” Kevin yawned, stretching one arm out to the side.
We had been driving for hours. I would have offered to help, but I had never driven anything motorized. I turned the question back on him. “Are you hungry? We can stop if you are.”
“Where is this side of you coming from? You never worried about me.”
“I just feel useless right now.”
“Useless?”
I touched my seat. “What good am I doing sitting here?”
“You’re very useful. Keeping me company is as an important job as they come.”
“Your humor astounds me.”
He smiled. “I’m glad.”
Twenty minutes later, we reached the outskirts of a small town. The sign was covered in snow, so I did not see the name.
“Hopefully, we can find something open here.” He pulled off the larger road.
The streets in the town were worse, and finding parking was difficult with all of the snow. Kevin finally pulled into a spot someone had just left. “Let’s go get something to eat.” He turned off the car and got out.
I followed him. I may have downplayed my hunger in the car, but I was famished.
“Is this okay?” He gestured at a small building. “I don’t know if we’ll find anything else.”
“Sure.”
We walked in and took a seat in a booth in the corner. Descriptions of the meals available were on the table, but I was not quite sure what everything was.
“I’m getting pancakes,” Kevin said. “I bet you’d like them. They’re one of my favorite foods. You can get them with anything: fruit, chocolate chips, nuts, you name it.”
I remembered the yellow fruit that needed to be peeled. “Do they have the fruit I liked at the airport?”
“Bananas? Sure. That’s pretty typical for pancakes. You want those?”
I nodded. “As long as pancakes are as good as you claim.”
“They are.”
A woman came over, and Kevin ordered two coffees and two sets of banana pancakes. I did not voice it, but I wondered if he ordered bananas with his because of me. I liked thinking I may have impacted his decision.
I discovered right away that coffee in the lost world was just like what we had in Energo, only slightly more bitter. Most foods from my home had comparisons in the lost world. I wondered which of Energo’s foods pancakes were like.
Kevin pushed a small container toward me. “You can add cream or sugar.”
“Why would I do that?” I took another small sip.<
br />
“I don’t know. You were making a face. Some people like it better that way.”
“I just need to get used to the different taste.”
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