When we had returned, Emerick had opened a large cabinet in the corner of the room and programmed what looked like a computer touch screen. A moment later, Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata began drifting through invisible speakers all over the room. Whenever the song reached the end, it began all over again—we had now listened to it three times.
It was harder than I had imagined to cross over with Emerick. Instead of letting go, I worried about how to drag him with me, I worried about getting Caleb and Sophie out of those cells, and I worried about how exactly I was going to get us all back up to the surface and out of this building.
Stop, I had to stop or I would never have the opportunity to at least try and do any of it.
Nothing is wrong, I lied to myself. You are perfectly safe and so is everyone you care about. I listened to the sound of my breath, imagined it was the rush of the wind as it echoed down a long, deep cave. When it rushed from my body, it was the ocean swirling and crashing against the shore.
This is all there is. Nothing else. I am here in this moment only.
I felt it, the uncomfortable sensation of separation—the initial resistance to leave my body, and then the frightening freedom from physical restrictions. I opened my eyes and watched myself, sitting quietly, breathing steadily, on the expensive couch directly across from Emerick’s chair.
At the sight of him, my eyes narrowed. His eyes were closed and his chest rose in a steady rhythm—he seemed deeply relaxed, but he had not managed to leave his body.
All around his physical body, I could see his soul straining to escape. It pressed up against the outer edges of his body, like a bubble trying to break free. Emerick hovered on the verge of the astral plane, but he didn’t seem to be able to get any further.
That first time I had crossed in India, Mohan had pulled me over. I had experienced being dragged into the astral plane, but I wasn’t quite sure how to pull someone else. Closer to him, I reached out my hand and felt the bubble that was Emerick’s energy pressing to escape the prison of his body.
I could feel the intensity of his vibration pulsing through my hand.
Everything here was about intention. Thinking the thought of where you wanted to move, visualizing the movement, and then going with it. The trick was to not second guess yourself halfway through—like when I plummeted from the balcony in China.
Okay, so I intended to rip Emerick from his body and into the astral plane. I reached out both my hands and placed them on Emerick’s shoulders and thought about pulling him up.
“What are you doing?”
My concentration broke and I spun around. “What are you doing here?”
“I just asked you that question.” Hayden moved closer and his eyes burned into mine.
I shut my thoughts to him but I couldn’t be sure how much he had already felt. So stupid, I should have realized Hayden would come the moment I crossed. I had no idea how much of my plan he had sensed—but I knew for certain he would try and stop me.
I braced myself, “I won’t do what your father asks until I know for certain that my mother is safe. I am pulling him into the astral plane so he can take me to her.”
Hayden’s head turned to the door leading to the hallway of prison cells holding Caleb and Sophie. “Not just your mother,” he accused.
I hesitated, I still needed Hayden to believe I intended to come with him after this was all over. “No,” I confessed. There was no point trying to lie about caring for Sophie and Caleb. “Not only my mother. Whatever you may think, they don’t deserve to suffer simply because they love me. I wanted to make sure they were okay before I agreed to help your father.”
His eyes returned to mine. “So, now you know they’re fine, and once you see for yourself that your mother is also fine—your plan is to, what, give my father everything he wants?”
I swallowed, “Of course.”
Hayden rushed towards me and grabbed my arms, “I don’t believe you.”
“What other option do you imagine I have?” I raised my voice hoping it would force Hayden to back off.
He searched my face for some sign and I could feel him in my brain, trying to comb my mind for something, some shred of evidence to support his suspicions. When he couldn’t find anything, he released my arms and his shoulders slumped. “I don’t know,” he finally said as his hands moved to his head and gripped his hair. “I don’t know anything anymore.”
His desperation was palpable and it made me want to reach out to him, to reassure him. Regardless of my plans and intentions, I was still deeply and irrevocably tied to Hayden. Like an instinct, I felt his pain and wanted to ease it.
I resisted.
He hands released his hair and he fixed his gaze on me. “Promise me,” he whispered. “I can wait,” he closed his eyes. “A little longer, just so long as I know we will be together soon.” He opened his eyes. “Promise me Charlotte.”
The lie twisted in my chest. “I’ve already—”
“I need to hear it!” he shouted but then took a deep breath and shook his head. “I need to know Charlotte. I need to know that, soon, we will be together. Always together.”
I nodded my head because I could not at first force the words from my mouth. “We will,” I whispered.
He took another deep breath and nodded his head, it made me think that the act brought him some comfort.
I watched him, waited a moment more, I had never seen him this unraveled. At the far corners of the room, I suddenly noticed that a darkness was collecting and then I saw movements. Scurrying, rapid flashes of what looked like shadows, a pair of eyes peered out from behind the far side of Emerick’s large desk.
Hayden turned and saw what I was looking at, “They follow me everywhere now.” His exhausted eyes turned back to me. “I think I even see them in the real world…” his voice trailed off.
“That can’t be true.”
He shook his head, “Maybe it’s not. It’s harder and harder for me to tell what is real anymore. Except when I’m with you. That’s why I need you Charlotte. If you knew…” his voice caught. “If you knew the things that haunt me—I need you.”
Emerick stirred in his seat next to us. Time was wasting and I still needed to get Emerick into the astral plane. “As soon as I’ve given him what he wants,” I said hoping that Hayden would be placated for now. “I’m sorry this is so hard on you, but right now I have to focus on this,” I pointed to his father.
Hayden nodded his head as he glanced back over his shoulder to the creatures staring at us from the edges of the room. “I’m coming with you,” he announced.
“What?” I asked.
“I’m staying with you in here. I’ll help you pull him through and then I’m coming with you both to see your mother.”
Panic surged through me. I wasn’t entirely sure I was going to be able to manage Emerick in the astral plane—now I would have Hayden to contend with as well? My mind raced to try and figure out a way to convince Hayden to go—but there was nothing that wouldn’t make him suspicious about my plans. If I really intended to do everything he and his father believed I would, then there was no good reason for him to not be here with me.
“Okay,” I said, hoping that, when the time came, a solution would present itself. “Where are you right now?”
My question seemed to confuse him at first, but then he realized I was talking about his body. “In a hotel, up the street.”
I nodded my head and forced myself to smile as I turned back to Emerick. Up the street was not great, but it was better than here in this building. It would at least give me a little time once we were out of the astral plane.
As I reached again for Emerick, a ripple of fear made me falter but I forced my hands to connect with the energy pushing against the shell of his body. Immediately, nausea wormed through my core and I released my connection with him.
Shaking, I stared at the man in front of me, suddenly sick with the awareness of just how dark an individual he was.
Emerick’s soul was enmeshed in evil—I had felt it.
Hayden stood beside me, “Should we do it together?”
At first, I couldn’t look at him. Shame wove through my every fiber, but I nodded my head and together, we reached out for Emerick. I wished there was some way to spare Hayden any further pain.
It wasn’t possible.
The sick sensation of being connected with Emerick washed over me again, but this time I hung on and, when I closed my eyes, I imagined Emerick’s energy lifting from his body, shifting from his physical form and into the astral plane with me.
Beneath my hands, Emerick moved and then, all at once, it was like trying to hold onto a snake as it slithered into a hole. I forced myself to not let go until it seemed like he was all the way over, then I opened my eyes and released him all at once.
Before me, Emerick Wriothesley stood inside the astral plane.
I could only hope it gave me the advantage I believed it would.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Kovin
As soon as Emerick entered the plane, the darkness at the edges of the room drew in closer. He opened his eyes. Was it my imagination, or had I noticed a momentary shock cloud his expression at the sight of Hayden? If he was surprised to see his son, Emerick quickly regained his perfect composure.
“Hayden,” he acknowledged with a narrowing of his eyes so slight, I almost missed it.
“Father.”
Taking his eyes from Hayden, Emerick gazed up in wonder and then all around himself, his chest expanded and his eyes closed, as if being here was deeply satisfying in a way he had not experienced in a very, very long time.
His chest deflated and his eyes met ours, “Can you feel that?” he asked as his arms spread out in a V from his sides.
Hayden and I looked at each other, feel what?
Emerick smiled as if he were indulging small children, “Power,” he whispered. “Pure, undiluted power. Access…to everywhere, to everyone. From this place, the right mind, coupled with the necessary will, rules the world.” He almost laughed but controlled himself.
“My mother,” I interrupted him. “Where is she?”
His eyes focused on me like a laser. “Of course,” he said although being reminded that we were only here to carry out a task as mundane as viewing my mom in the physical world was clearly disappointing to him.
I wondered what exactly Emerick thought he could do in this place. I had been to the astral plane several times now, but I still did not understand it. Certainly not the way he seemed to, even though he was incapable of getting here on his own.
“So let’s go,” I said, impatient to see actual evidence that my mother was okay.
“Very well,” Emerick smirked. “Let’s go,” he said mocking my American accent. “She is being cared for at the Kovin Psychiatric Hospital just outside of Belgrade.
“A psychiatric hospital?” my voice shook. I tuned on Hayden, “You said she was in a home,” I accused him.
Hayden eyed his father, “That is what was told to me.”
Emerick shrugged his shoulders, “It is a home of sorts. Most of its residents spend their entire lives there.”
“Take me to her, right now!”
Emerick’s smile broadened, “But it is you who must take us there,” he lifted his hands and looked all around us. “I am a, how should I say it…a stranger in a strange land. I have not been to the astral plane in nearly eighteen years, never mind having the skills to navigate within its territory. It is you who will have to take us there.”
A surge of panic rose in me, I had never moved farther than a few hundred feet inside the astral plane. I had no idea how to transport myself, and another person, into an entirely different country.
For a moment, I considered carrying out my plan immediately. Taking hold of Emerick and just hoping he was telling the truth about my mother so that I could go and save her as soon as I had released Caleb and Sophie.
Emerick laughed again, “What’s wrong dear Charlotte, has Franzen left you unprepared for the challenges that face you?”
Anger surged inside me, and I was just gathering the nerve to leap for him when Hayden suddenly spoke up.
“I can do it.”
Emerick stopped laughing immediately and both he and I turned our attentions to Hayden.
Emerick narrowed his eyes, “Is that so?”
“Yes,” Hayden said. Was it my imagination or did he stand a little straighter, almost as if he were issuing a silent, albeit defiant, statement.
“So this is not your first time here?”
“No,” Hayden answered.
Emerick watched his son for several seconds as if weighing him anew. “You are full of surprises for me it would seem. She has brought you here before and yet you chose to keep that information from me?”
Hayden did not at first respond, I could actually feel his fear. “No. No she did not bring me here. I learned to come on my own.”
Any trace of amusement Emerick had been toying with immediately drained from his features as his face took on the hard lines of tightly gripped rage. “That is impossible,” his voice was ice.
All around us, the darkness and the creatures in it moved closer. I had not seen any of this before. Not when Mohan brought me, not in the cave in China—only in the presence of Hayden. And now, with his father here, the darkness took up more space, it grew larger and stronger with every passing moment he spent here.
“It is possible,” Hayden said. “But only because of my connection to her,” he explained.
“And what exactly is this, connection, you two believe you share? I mean, beyond the cloying need of infatuation, for which I have indulged you, if my memory serves.”
Emerick didn’t know. Hayden had never fully explained to his father what I was to him. My head turned and I watched Hayden face down his father. I wished with every fiber of my being that Hayden would not say anything else. Somehow I knew that, with Emerick, information was power, and this was information Emerick would use to his benefit.
“She is everything to me,” Hayden said.
A heavy dread filled my chest.
Emerick seemed to digest this information. “Have you forgotten? You have sworn allegiances to powerful people.”
“That are no more than whispered words compared to the bond I share with Charlotte.”
Emerick swung his gaze to me, “And Charlotte shares your sentiments?”
The question hung in the air all around us. I had no idea how to answer such an interrogation and, with every passing second, my silence seemed to gather the force necessary to reveal my true thoughts without me ever uttering a single word.
Emerick smiled and was about to speak—I interrupted him.
“Hayden is my twin flame. What he says is true.”
Emerick looked from me and then back to Hayden. His expression was impossible to read and maybe that was because he himself did not yet know if the information was a powerful tool now at his disposal, or one that would be used against him. “Take us to see Elizabeth. We will discuss this further when we are back on solid ground.”
Hayden looked like he was about to say something else, express some further defiance, but I placed my hand on his arm. “Please,” I asked him. “Let’s just go.”
Emerick watched his son obey my request with intense interest and the look on his face made me worry about what this whole interaction might eventually lead to.
Hayden, exhausted and looking much older than eighteen, nodded his head at me, “Fine. Let’s just get on with it then.” Hayden wrapped his arm around my shoulder and pulled me close before he reached out his hand uncomfortably towards his father. “We need to stay connected, so that our energy moves all together. Because the distance is so far, if we break the connections one of you could end up left somewhere between here and there and it would take me a while to find you.”
Hayden closed his eyes and a moment later I felt myself being pulled at until we began to
move, together, through the astral plane farther than I had ever gone before. The sensation left me feeling vaguely nauseous, like being on a roller coaster that plunged at a steep angle towards the Earth. Only, unlike a roller coaster, this feeling kept going on and on and on and there was no way of knowing for how much longer it might continue.
Just as bright panic started to explode in my chest in a way that made me want to rip away from Hayden’s grasp and force the whole experience to stop—we stopped. Disoriented and confused, I closed my eyes and hoped my senses would quit the tumbling, sickening spin.
Hayden released me and I opened my eyes. He appeared completely unaffected and if Emerick was suffering from our trip, he wasn’t showing any sign.
I doubled over and clutched my sides. “I’m going to be sick,” I warned.
“With what?” Hayden asked. “It’s all in your mind Charlotte,” he said. “Think about it, your body isn’t even here, it is sitting quietly back in France. What do you have to get sick with?”
I got hung up on the location—France? That’s where we had been? That’s where Emerick’s secret underground offices and private prison were?
“It’s only your mind that thinks your body should feel sick from that experience.”
I thought about that and the longer I did, the less sick I felt. Seconds later, I stood up straight feeling completely fine, except for my ears. A horrible moaning sound had replaced the vibrations of traveling fast through the astral plane.
I looked all around us, at the dingy, paint chipped walls, the dirty linoleum floors—all the people. Bent and broken people everywhere—this is where the sound in my head was coming from.
“What is this place?” I whispered.
Emerick moved ahead of us down the dimly lit hallway lined with filth and chaos, “Kovin Psychiatric Hospital,” he said.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
I See You
At first, I couldn’t move. There were people everywhere. Standing, rocking, several were lying on the hard floor with their knees pulled tight against their chest. All of them had the same lost, ghostly expressions.
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