by Amber Kizer
“Find out! Call up to the Pagoda—one of our people should know. He was paid to run into all those cars. Can no one do what they’re asked anymore?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What are you waiting for—open the doors!”
“Sir, I can’t call up to the boxes; we jammed the communications.”
“Don’t scream—I’m about to slide out next to you.”
As Tens’s thoughts registered, his hand brushed mine. He leveraged himself out from under the truck.
The old man spit and launched himself at the computer geeks, Sergio in particular. “You said we could stop them from talking, but not us.”
“I d-don’t know why it’s not … um … I’m trying to fix it.” Sergio’s voice shook with fear.
Kinda hard to feel bad for him.
“Do you see what I see?” I pointed at the tiny pipe flowing between bricks along the waterline. If I hadn’t been up in the tree, I never would have seen the movement of the water. “The lake is fed by the artesian well.”
Tens answered me, “How’d you see that, Supergirl?”
“Luck.”
“You see the bags lined up in that truck over there?”
I followed Tens’s head nod and saw bags with pretty pictures of healthy, flourishing corn and wheat. “No one’s farming this land.”
“Nah, but done right, fertilizer makes for a big boom.”
Horrifying memories of the train derailment and inferno rushed to the forefront of my thoughts. “If we get the computers and disable them, will that stop the explosion?”
“Possible. Lots of their electrical equipment is parked too close to the water. Not smart.”
“Why did I ever let you all talk me into using this ridiculous technology?” the old man mumbled. “We don’t have much time. Has my successor arrived? He’s late.”
“Sir, last we heard, he was on his way.”
Two of the Nocti conferred with heads lowered, whispering.
“Tens? They look scared.”
“Yep.”
“But why? I wish I could talk to Auntie.”
“You can, Supergirl. Call your window.”
“What?”
“You’ve done it before.”
“Not on purpose.”
He raised his eyebrows. I didn’t need to read his mind. I focused, closing my eyes, not because I needed to at this point, but because it still felt odd to be in both worlds.
CHAPTER 54
Juliet
“You did it!” Fara shouted as we watched the bunny capture Smith’s car in an obliterating embrace. The impact threw bits of car and pink material in every direction. Flames danced up the bunny’s face. The fuel from the car must have leaked.
“It’s not over.” I didn’t feel right. Not yet.
The tow trucks and fire trucks, ambulances, and a fleet of other vehicles raced toward the crash, spraying white foam on the invisible fuel.
Someone in a jumpsuit ran across the low cement wall from the pits to the main track and frantically motioned cars to drive to their respective spots. I wondered if this was a team member or a Woodsman. It didn’t matter; the sight of a person on the track was so alien that all but one car pulled into the pit lane. As the drivers turned off their engines, people held their breath, their eyes turned to the screens and the fiery mess in turn three. The silence was oppressive.
Like a flash mob, people peeled out of the infield crowd and headed toward the lake. It looked choreographed and planned. Nocti?
“Where’s my father?” I asked Fara.
“I don’t know,” she answered.
CHAPTER 55
“Auntie?”
I stood at my window and saw the living room of Auntie and Charles’s house in Revelation. I recognized the piles of quilts and crazy knickknacks from all over the world. This isn’t here anymore; it burned. But Auntie’s scents of apple blossoms and fresh grass told my heart this was real.
“It’s still here on this side because I remember it. Everything changes, sweet one, but nothing disappears, not completely.”
“Auntie!” I wanted to fling myself through the window and hug her. Eat her chocolate cake. Talk about everything that had happened to me since Tens and I said goodbye to her and this place.
“We don’t have time for all of that. You know what you must do.”
“I don’t!” I disagreed.
“You do. Just as Juliet can call energy, so can you.” She nodded her head like I was being stubborn. “The world and its elements are yours for the calling. They move through your Light. Perimo wanted to kill you before you took over for our family. When he couldn’t do that, he wanted you to join them, right?”
“Yes.”
“You can call the window yourself to help souls over who have lost their faith in light and love. That’s a gift. I almost didn’t recognize it when your window changed with the soul’s desire. You can visit this between without needing to be in a place where the line is thin.”
“What does that do for me?”
“You’ll see in the years to come. It’ll allow you to aid the dying and the living both. It’s why the Sangre, Josiah, helped you. You’re special, more than a Fenestra. More than a lovely young woman.”
“But—”
“It’s time for me to go to the Light.” She gave me a gentle nod.
“What about your bones? They’re not buried. They’re not marked—”
“A Fenestra who goes through a Fenestra is never lost. Did you forget? I do not need to be buried. We move on when we’re ready; now you’re ready for me to go. It’s not the physical a soul is trapped by; it’s the emotion. You weren’t ready for me to leave you, so I didn’t.”
“Roshana’s wounds?” I asked, confused.
“Guilt, fear, terror. She’ll be healed of them when Juliet frees her. That’s why they say forgiveness is the ultimate gift, why karma is so important to our friends.”
“The Woodsmen?”
“We didn’t have them in Revelation. Too small a town, too quiet a life in my later years maybe. They’ll continue to aid you. Help you find more Fenestra, teach your gifts and your truths.”
I nodded. “But how do I stop the Nocti today?”
I heard a man’s voice call down the hallway. Charles?
“It’s time for me to go. You’ve learned all I can teach you. And you’ve taught me.”
“What? How?”
“You’ve reminded me of what love that’s just starting out can promise to the world. Cherish Tens, let him treat you like the precious gift you are. Be strong for each other. The battle is only beginning. You can live on the tangible plane and still help souls, without skipping a beat. You are on your way.
“But, Auntie—”
“1-4-3.”
I blinked and found myself staring at the water of the lake. “I love you too.”
“Tens? You know how to swim, right?”
“Sergio is coming right at us.”
“What?” I lifted my eyes and met Sergio’s fearful, troubled gaze.
CHAPTER 56
Juliet
I saw flashes of light moving toward the infield. I wondered if my dad was dispatching Nocti as he came across them or if there was lightning on the ground. The words my dad have such a delicious sound.
“What now?” Fara asked.
The wind yanked at our clothes and I felt the heat from the roof through the soles of my shoes. I tasted cranberry sauce, Yorkshire pudding, pho, and rocky road fudge on my tongue. There are victims already today.
I reached out and took her hand. “We can’t make it to the infield to help Meridian, can we?”
“Not unless you can fly now too?” Fara joked. “But we don’t have to be down there, you know.”
I turned to her. “You’re right.” I’d called the firefly, the lightning. I’d asked the tree to bend. She needed energy and I could call it.
Fara faced across the track, her body positioned toward the straig
htaway of turns two and three, the far side of the complex. She started chanting. I recognized the words from confronting Ms. Asura.
I tasted the soul dust of generations who visited this place, from corn cakes to catfish to short ribs to peanuts.
I let my eyes unfocus and relax; I saw with my heart, the way Faye saw our light. I saw my mother’s smile, felt her arms, tasted her joys and heard her voice singing to me:
“When I die, hallelujahs hand in hand,
I’ll fly away
Home to family evermore,
You’ll fly away
Set your heart free,
Leave the pain behind,
We’ll fly away
Down the creek we will float
When we’re Light
Hallelujahs fly away.”
I began humming the tune as I remembered Kirian bringing me rosewater pastels he stole from one of the DG nurses because he knew I hungered for new flavors, of him giving me pretty fossils he collected, of crowning my head with daisy rings and planning a fantastic future with me. I let the pain of his betrayal go. I let the wind carry it away.
I thought of Mistress’s anger and the beatings I took, but stood taller instead of hunching in, because I survived and I was fiercer for it. I opened the fist of those memories, shoving them away into the wind.
I heard Bodie’s giggle as he tried to swing from the branches of my tree into the deep glen of the Wildcat creek last summer. I knew he and Sema both were healing, making s’mores by wood fire and running after fireflies, seeking their secrets. I had no words of gratitude to Joi for taking them in and giving them the family and future I hoped for.
I thought of the last patients at DG, Enid and her sister Glee, whose frailty was only of body and not of soul. I smiled in memory of their bond and squeezed Fara’s hand because I knew that feeling now. I knew what to accept and what to give.
I smiled, seeing Tony run toward me after the tornado, his embrace of all my wounds, his acceptance of the little I was able to give him in return. His anxious interior decorating that gave me a home and a bedroom like the ones I dreamed about in my early days of Dunklebarger, of pink and sparkles and cotton candy. Who stayed with my mother’s remains because he knew without asking I couldn’t leave her again, not alone, not there. He taught me that faith was tangible and touchable.
Meridian, who was out there among the worst of darkness, battling for people she would never know and who, if she succeeded, would never know exactly what could have happened. She who searched for me and never gave up, even when I most wanted her to.
Bales, whose devotion to Nelli cost him his life. Who gave me lavender and his grandmother’s recipe for shortbread because he heard I liked food. The way he gazed at Nelli when she wasn’t looking was the expression I hoped someday was turned in my direction by a man even half as steady and good.
I felt Fara’s hand in mine and glanced over at her. With eyes closed, fervently calling for Light and Good, she looked like the heroines in action films Tens made me watch as part of my education about the real world. With her funky hair, metal, leather, and affinity for black anything, I knew the heart under that kick-ass shell would always have my back, whether I liked it or not.
I thought of Faye and Gus, who gave love, before and after life, faces to see and hands to hold. How much love can two people share in one lifetime, in a single exchange of powerful words? Immeasurable.
I turned back to the stands, thinking only of the joy of life and love and light. I sang my mother’s song low and under my breath, but I watched the crowds of people stand. As if with the engines shutting down, the noises dropping away, the solemnity of the day changed. Black, yellow, and red flags were flown from the tower over the finish line.
I felt them begin to pray, to who or what I didn’t know, didn’t care. I knew they wished for hope that Smith would walk out of the fire alive and well.
I kept singing and calling for Light, along with Fara, as a geyser rocketed into the sky.
CHAPTER 57
Behind us, the Nocti leader shouted, “Where is my successor? We’re running out of time! He should be here by now.”
Tens grabbed Sergio and knocked his feet out from under him. For a second I almost felt sorry for the little boy behind his eyes.
“Get out of here,” Sergio gasped.
Tens dragged him back between truck tires. “Keep focused, Merry.”
I could hear them struggle behind me.
My attention was completely fixated on the stream of water flowing out of the pipe. I knew if Rumi was right, then there was pressure forcing the water to the surface, lots of untapped energy. If I can call it, maybe it’ll short out the electrical system, the generators.
“They’re emptying the stands and evacuating people. It’s too late,” Tens said.
“You don’t have time to beat me up. Get out of here,” Sergio pleaded. “I can’t stop it. I’m dead anyway.”
I saw yellow shirts and uniformed policemen moving among the crowds, which slowly began to disperse. Are there Woodsmen up there holding vigil too?
The water’s steady trickle flowed like an open faucet. The brick wall around the pipe cracked, water finding weaknesses and flowing through.
Call the elements and the energy. I repeated Auntie’s declaration over and over again.
I asked the water to surface. The level of the lake rose dramatically, as if filling from underneath as well.
Tens swore, but I didn’t break my concentration. “What’s the plan?” Tens growled.
“I don’t know. I swear. I think that dude is retiring,” Sergio muttered.
“You don’t know much, do you?”
Sergio sniveled, “I just wanted to find my brother, I swear. Not kill people. Here, take my computer. There’s a backup, but take it.”
I saw a knife flash in the sunlight and worried until I realized Tens wielded it.
I asked the water to keep coming.
A golf cart sped toward us. The man driving seemed possessed and determined. I froze for a moment before I recognized Timothy in the seat next to him, holding on as they bumped and swerved as fast as they could.
I shivered. The heat of the sun seemed to turn on inside me. My fingertips burned and itched.
The driver strode off the cart before it was even stopped. He didn’t say anything but waded into Tens and Sergio, backhanding the younger man with the strength of ten men. I heard the reverberation and the smack. He kept walking toward the Nocti in the trailer.
“You!” the leader called to him.
Tens grabbed the computer, tossed it into the lake, then scooted back to me. “Who’s that?”
“No idea,” I muttered as the water pushed over the banks. It lapped at the computer and the tires of the trucks parked at the edge, waving over the cords and reels of wire along the ground connecting the trailers.
Sergio slunk away out of my sight. “Tens—”
“Let him go. I’ll find him later,” Tens answered me. “What do you want me to do?”
Timothy motioned to us. I squinted at the well. I pictured a great gush of water surfacing. Carrying the Nocti away, shorting out their equipment, washing this place free of their poison.
“Enough!” the driver shouted, raising his hands, light already flowing from his fingertips.
“He’s one of us,” Tens said. “Don’t stop.” He picked me up and carried me to the golf cart.
Water, pour forth, out of the dark and into the light.
“That’s our friend Argy,” Timothy informed us.
“Juliet’s father?” Tens put the pieces together immediately.
I swallowed back questions, my eyes never leaving the lake, which was now twice its size and growing fast.
I saw the brick wall crumble completely, the pipe became a projectile, and an explosion of water filled the air as a blinding light told me Argy enlightened the Nocti near him. Saturated, Tens drove near Argy, who jumped onto the side of the cart and we dodged fl
eeing spectators and sympathizers ahead of the massive wave.
Behind us water poured up, pushed up hundreds of feet into the air; it fell like a heavy rain. Trucks began to float; circuits shorted out. The electricity everywhere at the track blacked out. The screams we heard weren’t of fear but of frustration, of thwarted evil.
We drove onto the track, through turn four and toward the tunnel that would lead us to the outside. I saw the finish line, the line of bricks the winners kiss, and knew that today we’d won. The war wasn’t over, but this victory belonged to us.
CHAPTER 58
Juliet
It seemed as if the water was the last bit of excitement officials needed before they hurried to get people away from the track. People threw around the words terrorism and terrorist as they joined the throngs. They passed along pieces of gossip in loud voices, faster than the speed of light.
“We have to find my dad,” I urged Fara as we were swallowed into the hordes of exiting people.
“He knows where to find you. He’s fine. I’m sure of it.” Fara tugged me along, and even though I knew she was right, I hated leaving before we knew everyone was safe.
“I don’t remember where we parked,” I said.
“Doesn’t matter. Argy has the keys. We’ll hitch.”
“We’ll what?” I asked as she started to jog. We dodged around people, who stumbled, shocked and shaken, into the neighborhoods around the track, as we headed toward the massive parking lots in the distance.
I stopped questioning Fara as she got us from place to place and finally into a cab that could take us home. “Wait.” I didn’t want to go back to the condo. “Let’s go see Faye.”
“You sure?”
“Yes, Gus’ll know what’s going on and I think it’s time.”