by Raine Thomas
Shortly thereafter, the reality of leaving behind the world she knew had sunk in. She had curled into a ball on her bed and cried for the better part of a day. How could she possibly leave the mother who had raised her? What about her friends and her future plans? She was on her way to college, for goodness’ sake! She couldn’t just step away from all of that. But in the end, nothing had changed when she again emerged from her bedroom to discuss everything with Jean.
And now here she was, sitting on a chartered plane eating granola with a girl with a face piercing and tattoos. Who happened to be her sister. Her friends at St. Ignatius Prep would take one look at Skye and not know what to make of her.
Thinking of her high school turned Olivia’s thoughts to the stylish but homey apartment she and Jean lived in on the south side of downtown Chicago. She thought of the bagel shop they walked to every Sunday morning after Mass, and the Jewel grocery store with the cute bag boy she had had a secret crush on for more than a year. She thought about the public library where she had spent the bulk of her weekends during her senior year when she wasn’t babysitting or tutoring other students to earn some money. She thought of Chicago-style hot dogs and deep dish pizza, which she rarely ate but would miss more than she would have ever thought possible. Did they have such things on the other plane? She hadn’t ever thought to ask.
Even as the first tear slipped over her lashes, Skye was reaching over to touch her arm consolingly.
“Hey,” she said quietly, her expression more somber than usual. “I know this is kind of scary. And I know you’re going to miss your mom and the people you’re leaving behind. I am, too, and I’ve had a long time to prepare for this. But, well, try to think of the positive things about what we’re going to experience.”
Olivia wiped her eyes with her beverage napkin and said, “Like what?”
“Well, what about our powers?” Skye answered, her smile wide. “Ini-herit said we’ll Become, though I don’t know exactly what that means. But we’re bound to have some non-human powers on the other plane. Won’t that be something?”
Olivia considered that. “You think we’ll end up like Wonder Woman or something?”
“I think even better. Nick says he believes that on the other plane, they haven’t had to curb the level of powers they can achieve because humans can’t detect them anymore, anyway. So it follows that over the years, Estilorians have evolved to amazing levels.”
“Really? Did he say what kinds of powers?”
Skye looked a bit sheepish. “Well, he didn’t exactly know, being human and all.” Then she brightened. “But he always taught me that you’re only limited by the size if your imagination. So, that’s got to mean that the possibilities are endless!”
Holding back a concerned frown, Olivia nodded. She didn’t find it necessary to go into the fact that she had never had a very active imagination and, in fact, preferred to deal in fact and logic. Dampening Skye’s enthusiasm wouldn’t benefit anyone.
In an effort to switch the subject, she said, “So, what do you think the guys will be like over there?”
“Oh,” Skye said, her brilliant blue gaze shifting to Gabriel. “Well, I can only hope they’re that nice on the eyes.”
Olivia laughed.
“But I’m worried they’ll have Ini-herit’s personality.”
That stopped the laughter. “Er, really? You think the guys are all like that?”
“Well, Gabriel came over here to learn about our emotions, right? So that has to mean that they don’t really, well, have them.”
“No emotion?” Olivia repeated. A feeling of dread crept over her.
“I don’t know about ‘no emotion,’ exactly. But I think that Gabriel wouldn’t have given up his entire existence to come here if they didn’t at least lack the big ones.”
“Big ones?” Olivia echoed weakly.
“Yeah. You know…love, passion, humor. Those kinds of deep emotions.” Then, finally noting Olivia’s expression, Skye added hastily, “But, well, our father obviously fell in love with our mother or we wouldn’t be here, right? So, um, I think it’s just the ones who’ve been around for a long while who kind of forget about those kinds of feelings.”
Surprisingly, that made sense. Olivia relaxed a bit. She couldn’t say that she had ever sat around thinking about a future with a human male any more than she had considered what life among Estilorian males would be like. With Jean, a college professor, as her role model, she had always imagined going to college, earning her MBA and then becoming a successful professional. She hadn’t been foolish enough to pin herself into one field. Keep your options open, she thought. But certainly at some point she had imagined getting married and starting a family. The thought of living among males like Ini-herit made such a thing seem completely unachievable.
Her gaze again shifted to Amber and Gabriel. She could only see the back of Gabriel’s head, but she noted that it was tilted toward her sister with obvious attention to whatever it was she was saying. And Amber’s eyes were more avid, more filled with emotion when she focused on Gabriel than they were otherwise. Their love for each other was painfully obvious.
And Olivia had to ask herself as she studied them whether it was better to have never experienced a love like theirs…or to have experienced it only to face losing it.
Chapter Seventeen
They landed in Fairbanks almost exactly an hour after they had taken off. The airport where they landed was definitely not a large one. Gabriel released his seatbelt and pressed closer to Amber so he could look out the window as they taxied to the gate. All he saw was a line of trees.
Her scent floated up to him. Unable to resist, he bent down as she leaned toward the window so he could kiss the side of her neck. She turned slowly to look at him over her shoulder, the look in her eyes both interested and amused. The amusement faded to seriousness when she saw his expression. Thinking only that they didn’t have much time left on this plane of existence—and what a crazy thought that was—he leaned the remaining couple of inches between them and kissed her.
He was still kissing her when the plane rolled to a stop. Only the loud clearing of a throat finally got through enough that he pulled away. He glanced over his shoulder and saw Olivia and Skye staring at them with huge grins.
“Time to disembark,” Skye said cheerfully.
“Thanks.” Glancing back at Amber, who caught his gaze with one eyebrow raised, he repeated, “Time to disembark.”
He waited for the girls to get up and move toward the front of the plane and then he followed them out the door and down the stairs. Since they only had to wait for Olivia’s cat to be retrieved and a quick bathroom break for everyone, it wasn’t long before Ini-herit led them to a shiny, new-looking, black Land Rover. Ini-herit opened the rear hatch and the pilot settled the pet carrier in the back. As Olivia crooned wordlessly to the cat before stepping back to allow the door to close, Gabriel exchanged a look with Amber.
“Okay,” he said, waving his hands as if in defeat. “I have to ask. What the heck is up with the cat?”
Olivia smiled. “I wondered how long it would take you to ask. The short answer is that she’s my feline friend, Aurora.”
“Oh! Like the princess in Sleeping Beauty?” Skye asked.
“Uh…no, actually,” Olivia answered as though the thought had never occurred to her. She moved around the side of the car when Ini-herit indicated they should get in and clarified, “Aurora as in Borealis. I’ve always had a fascination with the Northern Lights.” Her gaze shifted to the sky, where the powerful light energy swirled, hidden by the continuing sunshine. “I guess now I know why.”
There was a moment of discussion about the seating arrangements since Amber couldn’t touch her sisters without having a reaction. She ended up in the front passenger seat while Ini-herit drove. Gabriel sat in the back with Olivia on his left and Skye on his right. They were so closely pressed together that the fuzz from the electric blue sweater Skye had put on for the
trip clung to his hoodie’s sleeve and Olivia’s elbow kept poking him in the side. Oh, well. Nothing to be done about it.
In an effort to distract himself from feeling penned in, he looked over at Olivia. “So, what’s the longer version of the story with your animal friend back there?”
She had been staring out the window and turned back to him at the question. “Well, thanks to my recent power surge, as Ini-herit calls them, I now share a mental bond with Aurora. Ini-herit believes she’ll cross the planes with me. The Scultresti are apparently even now finishing the creation of her Estilorian form.”
“Really?” His eyebrows winged up. “That’s...um. Interesting. So, you can tell what she’s thinking?”
“Sometimes. If the thoughts are loud and direct enough.”
“Loud thoughts? Huh.” He let his mind drift back to the time in Nick’s office when he thought he had heard Amber’s voice in his head. Even as that memory crossed his mind, she turned in the front seat and caught his gaze. He nodded. “Very interesting.”
Can you hear me? he thought while he held Amber’s gaze.
Her eyes widened. Yes!
Too. Cool.
She broke into a smile. He glanced up and saw Ini-herit’s eyes on him in the rearview mirror. He realized that Olivia and Skye were also studying them. Amber turned back around with a laugh and a shake of her head.
Grinning, he asked, “So, what if Aurora can’t cross the planes with you?”
A troubled look crossed Olivia’s features, making him want to kick himself. She answered, “Then she’ll be on her own in the wilderness, because I won’t be here to protect her.”
“I’m sorry,” he said, trying not to wince.
Good one!
Reaching to the front, he lightly smacked Amber’s upper arm in response to her thought. She laughed again. Choosing to ignore her, he turned to Skye. “So, what about you? Did you bond with anyone—or anything—when your power surged?”
Skye shrugged casually. “Nothing more than usual. I’ve always had the ability to communicate with the spirit of Sky Tomaganuk, the elder whose name I share. He’s with me still. Maybe a bit clearer in my mind, I guess.”
“Your powers are all growing,” Ini-herit said, drawing their attention to him. “But we have no way of knowing what these links will do on the Estilorian plane. They could become stronger or disappear altogether.”
What a ray of sunshine, Gabriel thought toward Amber.
A humored snort issued from the front seat. Ini-herit again looked at him in the rearview mirror, so Gabriel kept his face blank.
“I should tell you all a bit more about this transition,” Ini-herit continued when he returned his attention to the road. He had no map or GPS and Gabriel had to wonder how he knew where he was going. “You should not be entirely unprepared for what is about to happen.”
“Is it going to hurt?” Skye asked.
The quickness of the question made it apparent that she had been thinking about it for some time, and Gabriel looked over at her. Her eyes were downcast and she was fiddling with the cuff of her sweater in a young and endearing way.
“I do not know. You girls were wailing newborns when you made the initial transition between the planes. There was no way for your Corgloresti to know whether your cries were from pain or some entirely different reason.”
Rolling his eyes over Ini-herit’s frank response when Skye inhaled sharply beside him, Gabriel reached over and patted her on the hand. “You have tattoos on your neck and a stud pierced through your chin. Why are you worried about pain? If anything, that should be me. We all know guys don’t handle pain as well as gals.”
She relaxed a bit at that. “Hey, you’re right! Thanks.”
“It should not—”
Knowing that Ini-herit was about to point out that it wouldn’t hurt Gabriel at all because he was an Estilorian whereas the girls were only half, he interrupted, “Why don’t we avoid dwelling on that part of this experience? Whether it hurts or not, we’re going through with this. So…tell us about the other side.”
Nodding, Ini-herit turned the vehicle off of the main road and onto a narrow dirt path into the forest. The move had them all bouncing in their seats on the uneven surface. He said, “Very well. One of the first things of which you should be aware is that your appearance will be different on the other side.”
“Different how?” Amber asked, her brow furrowed.
“You have to understand that what exists of you on the Estilorian plane right now is mostly a nebulous being. The exact form of your Estilorian self will not develop until your full essence reaches that plane, so it is impossible to answer your question,” he explained.
Of course it is.
Gabriel fought back a grin in response to Amber’s sarcastic thought as Ini-herit continued.
“Zayna, the Scultresti elder who created your human forms, did her best to mimic your predicted adult physical characteristics. But she had never done such a thing for a newborn baby before, so she was really working off of experience and instinct. You will note, for example, that each of you girls has a different shade of hair. She knew it would be brown, but exactly what color she could only guess. The same applies to most of your other physical characteristics. Thus, our prediction is that you will look similar to your current forms, but more likely a combination of each of your physical traits.”
There was a moment of silence as they processed this new information. Then Skye spoke up.
“I want Amber’s hair. All those blonde and red strands mixed in—I’ve wanted hair like that for most of my life!”
Olivia laughed as Amber blushed. “Can I have Skye’s nose?” she asked, her green eyes twinkling. “I’ve always thought mine was too big.”
Say something about Olivia, Gabriel thought toward Amber.
She turned and caught his gaze. Then she looked briefly at Olivia with an assessing eye. “If I had a choice, I’d want Olivia’s eyebrows and forehead. I’ve never liked mine.”
The three sisters smiled at each other. Ini-herit caught Gabriel’s gaze in the mirror. “Indeed,” he said. He evidently sensed enough not to tell them that they had no real choice in the matter. “It will be interesting to see what human traits you carry over to the Estilorian plane.”
Another heavy pause in the conversation.
As he maneuvered around a nearly blind turn in the thickening forest, he continued, “The Estilorian form can be impacted by damage done to the human form. If a Corgloresti is killed while in human form, for example, the Estilorian being is also killed.”
“So, I could still have a scar on my neck and a healed break in my left arm from my fall out of a poplar tree when I was five?” Olivia asked.
“You could,” he acknowledged. “Or no impact from that at all. We don’t really know.”
“You say that a lot,” Amber said dryly.
“Well, you are completely unprecedented,” Ini-herit replied. “How are we to know anything about you?”
He had her there.
“We are operating off of the assumption that your human personality traits will transfer into your Estilorian forms,” Ini-herit said. “As I have explained to each of you, we have no way to—”
“Confirm this,” all three girls said at the same time.
Startled, Gabriel looked around at each of them. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up at the surreal sound of their three voices chiming simultaneously. He again caught Ini-herit’s gaze in the mirror and realized the Estilorian was as unfazed as ever.
“That is correct,” he agreed. “I can tell you that Estilorians assume a large variety of forms on the human plane. As Estilorians, we often look nothing like the human forms we assume. In the case of you girls as well as Gabriel, we tried to stay as consistent with the Estilorian form as we could in an effort to make the transition between the planes have less of a psychological impact upon you. It seemed…the right thing to do.”
They rode along quietly for a mo
ment, bumping up and down in their individual seats as the vehicle hit jagged bumps in their path.
What if I look completely different?
The thought came through as clearly as a voice. His expression softened. He was all too aware of Amber’s insecurities. Focusing, he thought toward her, Do you think I fell in love with your appearance?
He heard her sigh. No. But it’ll be weird, won’t it?
Raising a corner of his mouth, he thought, Only if I can’t tell you apart from your sisters.
As he had predicted, she laughed. The sound was a welcome break to the substantial silence. Ini-herit glanced beside him at Amber and then looked again in the rearview mirror. Gabriel would have thought his gaze was disapproving if it hadn’t been so devoid of emotion.
“We are here,” Ini-herit said. And stopped the vehicle.
Chapter Eighteen
The Land Rover jerked to a shuddering stop in the middle of the woods and Ini-herit turned off the engine. After a moment of almost stunned silence, they all watched him open his door and get out, leaving the keys in the ignition. Olivia quickly followed suit, so Gabriel exited on her side of the car and walked over to the passenger side. Since neither Skye nor Amber had emerged, he walked around and opened both passenger side doors.
“Ladies?”
Skye grinned up at him. “I wonder if you’ll be so polite on the other plane,” she said, giving his arm a friendly pat as she got out of the vehicle.
He didn’t respond since she was already whirling away from the vehicle and looking around with wonder etched on her features. She loped gracefully over to Olivia and linked arms with her, saying something he couldn’t hear and pointing up into the trees. Turning, he looked down at Amber, who had also gotten out of the Land Rover and was now quietly staring at him. He closed the doors he had opened. Then he took her hand and started walking determinedly in the opposite direction of where the others stood.