“He was there right after us, and then Nell helped him defend his claim once she’d bonded with her Territory,” said Trill.
“Defend it from whom?” I continued.
“All sorts… It was like everyone wanted to live on that spot. Mostly supernaturals, but some humans, too.”
“And how did Gus find his rock? Are stone spirits born with their rocks, or what?” I asked.
“No, they find them and bond with them. Just like Nell did, only they have about one-gajillionth of a gnome’s power,” Iris said.
“So Gus was drawn to his rock, just like all these creatures have been drawn to the Grays’. Remember what we were talking about earlier?” I asked.
“Why Rockabill?” Blondie said, apprehension dawning.
“Exactly. Why Rockabill? We agreed something drew supes here… Now we’re finding more specific places within Rockabill that are doing the drawing.”
“So the place that’s close to your heart must be somewhere that’s close to everyone’s heart,” Blondie concluded.
“And that can only be one place,” I said. All faces turned toward me expectantly.
“I know you’ve already searched there, but it has to be the cove.” Blondie frowned at my words, but I continued. “Think about it. My mother took me there as a child. She was drawn to it. All these years, Nell kept it glamoured. She said it was to keep out local kids, but why did she even care in the first place? She was obviously drawn to it.”
“I love it as much as Jane does,” Trill said in her oil-slick voice.
“See? We’re all drawn to it. Even Anyan hangs out there.” I felt a cold nose press against my foot from where doggie-Anyan lay under the table. “It’s gotta be the place.”
“But there’s nothing under it,” protested Blondie.
“So it’s not underneath. It’s somewhere else,” I insisted.
“But you’ve never seen anything, Jane. And you’re there all the time,” she pointed out.
“I was never looking. Take me back there. I promise you we’ll find the glyph.”
Blondie sighed. “C’mon then. It’s no skin off my back. And I do hope you’re right.”
I made sure to grab my cell phone and slip it into my back pocket at Blondie’s words. Then I felt the now-familiar gut-wrenching sensation of apparation, a second before I felt cold sand under my bare feet.
Caleb and Iris were scouring the north wall while Blondie and I scoured the south. We’d left Trill at home, as it was feeding time. As for Anyan, he was having a great time peeing on things, and then sniffing appreciatively at the wet spot.
I’m never kissing him again after this, I thought, and then fruitlessly tried not to wonder if my only opportunities to kiss Anyan again would forever be doggie kisses. We’ll find a way to change him back, I told myself. Even if it takes the rest of my life.
Not that he’ll live that long, my brain interjected. As a dog, he’s not using his magic. Without his magic, he’ll age. And a big dog like that will live, what, twelve years if he’s lucky?
I felt my anxieties settle into grim resolve. My life was littered with too many losses. There was no way I was losing Anyan.
Confident that Anyan’s cure was tied up in our victory, I searched the cove with new determination. We were all peering under rocks and into crevices. Iris sat on Caleb’s shoulders so she could look higher up the walls. We backed away from each surface to try to get a big-picture view, in case there was something we could have missed.
But we found bubkes.
Swearing, I flopped down in my sand. “I know it’s gotta be here,” I said and groaned. “It has to be.”
“Babydoll, I see nothing,” Iris said, squatting down next to me.
“Nor I,” said Caleb, taking a seat on the giant driftwood tree. Shaking her head to indicate her own lack of success, Iris perched next to the satyr. Anyan busied himself with peeing on the free end of the tree.
We nearly made out right there, I thought, in that exact spot. And now it’s your toilet.
I felt like that moment encapsulated all of my pent-up frustration, and I buried my head back in the sand to glare accusingly at the stars swirling above me.
But as soon as I did so, the cool sand sucked at all my previous get-up-and-go, and though my mind was still whirling, I felt my body relaxing. The cove always had that effect on me.
The others discussed where else to look while I stewed.
It has to be here, I thought. It has to be…
Sleep now, and dream, whispered the cove, as it had in the past. Sleep now, and dream.
I was back with my sisters and brothers again, their peace my peace—and together we played. [Wait, I have no sisters, no brothers…] I was so happy, and they were so happy. We dreamed together and then woke to the bright blaze of the stars [I see the stars, too, Jane thought through half-lidded eyes, before wondering who “Jane” was]. The stars danced into patterns that we followed with delight, until, entwined together, we fell into sleep.
[deep in her own mind, Jane stirred, recognizing that fall of limbs. She knew it meant comfort, a nightly ritual, but deep down she knew it wasn’t her comfort, nor her ritual. But still, looking up at the sky that mimicked what lay below, she knew that pattern…]
“Earth to Jane!” Blondie’s sharp voice broke through my reverie. She had stood and was looming over me menacingly.
“Hmmm?” was my sleepy response.
“What are you, a narcoleptic? We need your help, so sit up and fucking pay attention,” the Original snapped at me.
Part of me bristled at her harsh tone, but the majority of me was still half asleep, almost hypnotized by my dream. I stretched in the sand, feeling my ocean call to me for a swim. And feeling an equally strong pull from the sky above.
“Jane, I said sit up,” Blondie repeated, her voice grown cold.
I stayed right where I was, peering up at the stars. “You seem to think I’m falling asleep on the job,” I said, putting one arm behind my head like a pillow. “But I’m not. In fact, I’ve solved our riddle.”
“You have?” she asked, skeptically. “Was the answer written on the inside of your eyelids?”
“Nope,” I replied, letting her stew.
“Then where?” she said, through gritted teeth.
“The answer,” I drawled, letting her steam, “is up there.” And with that, I pointed to the heavens.
“Up there?” she echoed, looking from the sky, down at me, and then back up at the sky as if to ask And what have you been smoking?
“Yep. We’ve been looking from the wrong angle,” I said, as I finally sat up. “Can you grow wings big enough for two?”
“Um… yes? But why?”
“Because, babydoll, we are going for a little flight. Now come on… pay attention… Do what you need to do to get us flying.”
I watched her strip off her long-sleeved shirt, only just managing not to wink back at her nipple rings reflecting the light from our mage lights. Around her, the air shimmered with power as a set of lustrous white wings sprouted from her tattooed back. They looked as comfy and clean as two big, soft duvets, making me crave a nap even more.
She’s like the love child of an angel and a drunken merchant marine, I thought, marveling at the sight. Anyan must have appreciated it too because he barked so hard at Blondie’s metamorphosis that I think he choked on his own tongue.
Distracted by doggie-Anyan’s shenanigans, it took me a moment, when I looked back at the Original, to realize that I was marveling at her boots as she launched herself up in the air. Without me.
Oooo she’s a bitch, said my brain.
I’m so in love, thought my libido. At this point, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be Blondie or make out with her. Or both, I wondered, in what would be my philosophical conundrum of the decade.
We all watched her soar up into the heavens and then hover on a cloud of magic as her white wings scythed through the air in slow, powerful sweeps. She was up there for only a few minutes whe
n she began flying hither and thither.
She’s opening the glyph, I thought, as she must have finished, only to hover above us, again.
But nothing happened. So she did it again. And then again.
Then she was landing beside me, swearing like a she-devil between hoarse pants.
“It’s not fucking working!” she cursed. “If those fucking harpies got here first, I am going to rip off their beaks and shove them up their—”
“Take me up,” I interrupted calmly. “Let me see.”
What I didn’t tell her was that every time she’d flown her complicated pattern, I’d felt a kick, but not from below us.
It came from the ocean.
For a second, it looked like she was going to turn her tongue on me—and not in the nice way. But at the last second she paused, and then held out her arms. While Anyan bounced around us barking, I walked over to where Blondie stood.
“Caleb, Iris, you need to take Anyan and get somewhere safe,” I said, turning to where the satyr and succubus stood watching us. “I’m not sure if this is going to work, or if we’ll just set off another trap like we did before. But I think this is going to be it, and if we lose—or if we get incapacitated in any way—it’s going to be up to you two to call in the Mounties.”
Caleb shuffled his hooves, and Iris looked at me, concerned. “Are you sure?” she asked, looking to Blondie as if hoping the Original would contradict me.
“Jane’s right. This is something we need to do alone.”
I frowned, looking at Blondie. That wasn’t what I said, at all, I thought, again feeling like Blondie was talking about something I wasn’t necessarily clued in to.
Iris was still frowning, but she’d taken Caleb’s hand and grabbed Anyan by the scruff of his neck. Blondie’s power flowed around us as she apparated my friends somewhere safe.
And then I finally experienced the stuff about which songs are written: Blondie Supermanned this ho.
Scooping me up underneath my armpits, she used a combination of her powerful wings and even stronger magics to lift us both into the night air. I resisted the urge to squeal and hide my face in her neck, à la Lois Lane. I also concentrated on not peeing myself in terror. Flying without a plane is very scary.
After what felt like an eternity but was really just a handful of magic-laden wing beats, we were hovering well above the cove.
And then I saw it. The intricate sigil that we’d been chasing and tracing, carved from my cove. The wreath was part of the top of the walls, with the soft sand upon which I’d lain, loved, and grieved making up the wreath’s center. I’d always known the cove’s walls were very thick, but because they were also very, very tall, I’d never seen them from above. In fact, when I thought about it now, the mere existence of my cove didn’t make any sense. It was more like a rock fence than a normal cove. I realized we’d all been duped, and I didn’t know if it was Nell’s glamour, the powerful magics that must have formed the cove, or a combination of both that had made what was really a completely unnatural structure seem normal.
“Ready?” Blondie yelled in my ear, the volume carried off by all the empty space around us.
I nodded.
And with that she swept me away, tracing the sigil with the tips of her fingers or her wings, whichever was easiest. But just as before, nothing happened. At least nothing where Blondie was looking, which was beneath us.
I couldn’t help but laugh as I saw the real culprit. It’s always been about you, hasn’t it? I thought.
“Do it again!” I shouted. Before she could protest and say that it was a waste of time, I continued. “And this time, look over there!”
I was pointing at the Old Sow.
This time, as she flew her pattern, we both kept our eyes on the Atlantic. And we both saw it—piglets lit up like underwater flares in a pattern that could only be one thing.
The last glyph.
When Blondie stopped flying, they stayed lit for about ten seconds, and then they went out.
“Fuck,” she said. “It’s a double lock. Yeah, there are four glyphs, but the third unlocks the presence of the fourth. Goddamn Alfar,” she panted.
“Are you going to be okay?” I shouted, remembering what she’d said about flying. “You’ll have to make a few more circuits so I can see to unlock the last glyph!”
“I’ll fly, keeping them lit,” she replied grimly, winging me over to the water. “And you swim.” I nodded, understanding that I was the obvious choice for this mission.
And then she dropped me, clothes and all, into my ocean.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
It was one thing to see the pattern of lit-up piglets from above, but it was another thing to be among them, at ocean level. At that moment, I knew what it felt like to be that apocryphal squirrel in the Christmas tree: lights all around me, turning randomly on and off.
Only this Christmas tree has swirling branches that will kill you if you get too close.
Even on the outer edge of the Sow, where I was treading water, I could feel her power. I’d been told that the whirlpool had been tempestuous lately, and people hadn’t exaggerated. Normally I enjoyed my jaunts through the piglets, but even at this outer edge I had to keep my shields toward maximum to keep from getting sucked up into one like a dust bunny by a Hoover.
And I’m going to have to go way farther in, I thought, watching as a piglet placed alarmingly close to the Sow herself blazed at me briefly.
Thankfully, as I didn’t really fancy getting pulled apart by my favorite water feature, I had no idea where to start. Unfortunately, however, I also knew that Blondie’s flying a repeated pattern above the Cove would attract attention. Either she was unglamoured and being seen by everyone, including the bad guys, or she was glamouring the shit out of herself and attracting the attention of anything remotely magical in a fifteen-mile radius.
Which means time is of the essence, and I have to try something, I thought, swimming toward one of the lights. I felt a surge of power coming from it, but it ebbed before I could reach it, and I didn’t see the next light pop up till I turned around. But by then it was too late.
I waited till another piglet lit up close to me, and then I used my mojo to propel me forward. Again, I felt that pull of magic, but again I was too late.
There has to be a better way to do this, I thought. Just then the piglet next to me blazed, along with that same signature pulse of power. Suddenly, I knew what I had to do.
Well, libido, said my brain to its most exasperating enemy, you’ve always favored things that pulse. Now is your time to shine.
My libido bowed to its sensei, and I closed my eyes as I put out my magical feelers.
Left, I felt, as I moved toward the power tracking over my skin. It was more than a little crazy to be swimming around the fifth largest whirlpool in the world with my eyes closed, but—similar to Peter Parker—I had to trust my selkie senses. That didn’t mitigate the buffeting I was getting, though, as I neared the source of that magical pulsing.
Right, came the next set of instructions borne to me on the ocean current, just before the buffeting became too much. This one was close. Then left… far away this time… have to motor…
The power called and I answered, zigzagging across the periphery of the Sow, weaving and darting. Sometimes I wasn’t fast enough and I’d have to start over, this time putting more mojo into my swimming. I drew from the ocean even as I did so, and the very pulses of power that I followed crept under my skin. Their force was so potent that, despite the amount of energy I was expending, my reserves were more than full.
Straight ahead… now left… now right… back, and hurry… back again… right… As I got better at the game, the pulses grew faster, more powerful, letting me know I was on the right track.
The game was also drawing me closer and closer to the Sow. Every pattern we’d traced was an intricate wreath, weaving inward into a final, central point. But while sticking your finger, or your wing, into the middle o
f an empty circle was easy, I’d come to realize that the circle I was currently swimming had the Old Sow herself at its epicenter.
Not so easy, that.
Meanwhile, although I was doing my favorite trick of ignoring the pertinent facts of a given situation, the ocean wasn’t making that easy. Despite the pull of the power bursts, the ocean herself was battling my every move. Currents pushed and pulled me, slowing me down considerably.
I’m not gonna make it like this, I realized, trying to think of a way around the water.
But then I thought about that underwater battle between Trill and that evil kappa, when we’d been investigating Iris’s disappearance. That night, Trill had taught me to use the ocean, rather than submit to her.
It’s like a metaphor for my life, I realized, as I stopped to tread water and think about the problem. I’m always trying to work with everything, go with everything… I don’t like to shake things up or fight or assert myself. But being submissive is a luxury I can’t afford. Not right now.
Right now, I need to take what I need, without apologies.
And with that thought, I shut my eyes again. But when I felt a pulse of power from my left, I didn’t pull myself through the water.
This time, I told the water to take me.
Guzzling up all the swirling energies around me, I expended an equally large force, demanding from the water, rather than asking it—forcing it to do my bidding.
And grudgingly, eventually, the Atlantic obeyed. This time, when I sensed a target, I moved so quickly through the water it stung. The energy I was using was tremendous, and under normal circumstances even the swirling power of the Old Sow wouldn’t have been enough to power me. But it was like the whirlpool had suddenly gone supernova. So much so that I could still keep my own reserves topped up while throwing around so much mojo.
Scything through the water, I felt the pace of the appearing symbols become more frenetic as I drew the sigil. Meanwhile, the spiral pulled me tighter in toward the Sow. Strengthening my shields beyond anything I’d ever done before, I could still feel the press of the water all around me. Indeed, “pressure” was the word of the day. There was the pressure of the situation—knowing Rockabill would be destroyed if I failed; that I’d lose everyone I loved, including my father and Anyan, who would die a dog. There were the literal pressures of all that magic forcing itself into me as I forced it back out again, plus that of the ocean and the buffeting currents of the Sow and her piglets. The part of me that only ever wanted to be normal and quiet and grounded whispered to me to give up… to let other, more powerful and more capable beings handle the situation.
Eye of the Tempest (Jane True) Page 18