Halcyon

by Rio Youers

  38

  His name wasn’t Quint. It was, somewhat aptly, Sharky, a nicknamed he’d earned not from hunting great whites, but from the massive shark tattoo on his back.

  “Its tail ends midway down my left ass cheek,” Sharky said. “I’d show you if it wasn’t so cold.”

  “I’m okay with not seeing it,” Martin said. “Really, let’s just go.”

  Sharky could kindly be described as meticulous—manually adding up his bar bill before paying, zipping and fastening all winter apparel before venturing outside, double checking his and Martin’s lifejackets prior to departure. Martin opted for the less kind description: slow-as-fuck. It was 11:40 when he’d pulled in to The Hull’s parking lot, and 12:18 by the time Sharky’s trawler finally chugged out of the marina.

  “How long before we’re there?” Martin asked, shouting above the rumbling engine and rising wind.

  “She’ll go nineteen miles an hour when all’s fine,” Sharky said, patting the boat’s wheel. “But these conditions’ll slow us up some. So I’ll say … shit, maybe forty minutes.”

  Martin looked through the cabin windows. The heavy cloud that had been distant earlier was now dangerously close. Snow choked the air. Visibility was down to half a mile, maybe a little more.

  “This is pretty bad, huh?” Martin asked.

  “Seen worse.”

  What Sharky lacked in speed, he made up for in hardiness. His trawler was built for rough water, he said, and the GPS would lead him right back to the marina. “Biggest danger is another boat hitting us. That’s why we got these.” And he gestured at the navigation lights mounted on the cabin sides and masthead.

  They rolled on, slow and steady, cutting an uneven white line across the gray water. Martin told himself that every minute on the boat was a minute closer to being with his girls, but the voice in his head wouldn’t let him relax. He bunched his hands into fists, pressed them against his temples.

  Sharky worked the wheel and whistled.

  * * *

  The SUV skidded across the sleety asphalt and missed Shirley by inches. The driver buzzed down his window and shouted. His voice was muffled, as if heard through a vat of water. Shirley saw his blustery face, his wife in the passenger seat looking alarmed, and two kids in the back with wide eyes and open mouths.

  Shirley shook her head, rattling Mother Moon loose for just long enough to realize what had happened. She looked around the parking lot with a dazed expression, then raised one hand to the angry driver.

  “Sorry.”

  “Watch where you’re going,” he snapped at her. “You’re going to get yourself killed.”

  “I know … sorry.”

  The driver’s wife leaned over. Shirley thought she might say something kinder, but she didn’t. “Goddamn stoner,” she yelled as the SUV pulled away. “Get your shit together.”

  Shirley watched the SUV’s taillights fade into the falling snow. Some crowded part of her brain drew the parallel, where she was the taillight, and Mother Moon was the snow. If someone had asked her name at that moment, she would’ve struggled to tell them.

  “I’m a nobody,” she mumbled.

  A muscle in her back throbbed. She straightened her shoulders, feeling every ounce of the jacket’s weight.

  You’re not a nobody, Mother Moon said, crawling into her mind again. Don’t ever think that. You’re a goddess. You’re beautiful.

  Shirley continued across the parking lot. Cars zipped around her, looking for spaces. People flooded one way with empty arms, and the other with bags and boxes.

  And we’re so close now. Shirley pressed a knuckle to her forehead. Sometimes the voice hurt. It felt like a corkscrew, twisting deeper. So close to the next world and all the light it will bring.

  The mall loomed ahead, new and bright. More people bustled around Shirley as she neared the main entrance. She heard excited chatter and Christmas music and the clear, adorable chime of children’s laughter.

  * * *

  There was a period of time after her mom died that Edith felt incredibly alone. Her dad and Shirley were never far away, but were lost to their own grief. This, as much as the escape it offered, was the reason she’d spent so much time in her garden. It was a place of warmth, enhanced by her mom’s memory. Edith often believed this was how she’d built it so quickly.

  Standing in the clearing, Edith felt that loneliness again—a sense of being severed from the people who loved her. She had no idea what was going to happen. It was terrifying.

  “We’ll do it here,” Mother Moon said, spreading her arms and turning her face to the snowy sky. “Isn’t this a beautiful spot?”

  Edith imagined her garden with its bright flora and soothing breeze. She could be there in a blink, and although she ached to be, she kept herself rooted in this world; Mother Moon had lost her mind—if she ever had a mind to begin with—and Shirley was in serious trouble. This wasn’t the time to run away.

  Edith closed her eyes. She reached.

  Shirley, are you there?

  Her brain ticked, working to find the connection—or disconnection—that linked her to Shirley’s mind.

  Shirley, talk to me …

  There was a mild buzz but nothing more. Edith mostly found huge swaths of silence and darkness. That particular psychic muscle, which she’d used so effortlessly in the past, was weak now. Or perhaps it was because she was so cold and out of her element. She found it difficult to—

  “I said, isn’t this a beautiful spot?”

  Edith opened her eyes. Mother Moon stood over her, arms still spread, hair flicking around her face in the wind.

  “Yes,” Edith managed. “It’s beautiful.”

  “And a good energy, too.” Mother Moon grinned, looking from one side of the clearing to the other. “It’s perfect for the Skyway. Imagine it—that great bridge of light arcing directly into the Glam.”

  Shirley, where are you?

  Mother Moon stepped into the center of the clearing. The cardinal was still there, sheltered in the cracked boulder. It riffled its bright feathers as Mother Moon approached, but didn’t fly away.

  “I need you to open the window,” she said, looking at Edith. “The place between.”

  “I don’t know if I can,” Edith replied. “I’m cold and—”

  “You can and you will.” Mother Moon plucked a watch from her pocket and pointed at it. “Your sister is almost in position. She’ll make the connection at precisely one thirty. You need to give her something to connect to.”

  “That doesn’t even make sense.”

  “But you told me to do this.” Mother Moon stepped toward her, lips peeled back from her teeth. “You told me to pay. You wrote it on your bed sheets. In blood.”

  Edith stepped backward. Tears gathered in her eyes again.

  “Remember?”

  “I don’t … I can’t…” She touched her arm where she’d cut herself—where she’d purged. And there was something about that. The stream, whatever terrible thing she’d seen … it bumped and nudged her mind but she couldn’t make the connection. Her instinct—separate from her psychic ability, closer to her heart—told her it had something to do with Shirley.

  She wiped her eyes and reached again.

  Shirley, please—

  This time her focus was broken by Mother Moon’s hand. It whipped across her face in a pale blur. Edith’s head jolted sideways. Her cheek throbbed in the cold.

  “Ouch.”

  “Does it make sense now?”

  Edith nodded.

  “Stand in the middle of the clearing.” Mother Moon pointed. “Open the window.”

  Edith shuffled past Mother Moon, stopping near the boulder where the cardinal still huddled. It brought to mind a memory of Calm Dumas, sitting in their backyard with a female cardinal hopping along her arm. This trickled into another memory: Calm twirling a willow leaf—the only leaf in the world—between her fingers, instructing Edith on how to build her shelter. The beauty of a powerful m
ind, she’d said. But it can be dangerous, too.

  “Yes,” Edith whispered. “It can.”

  Our power is real, Edith. This had been too broad for Edith to comprehend to begin with, but not anymore. You don’t want to go so deep that you can’t find your way home.

  “No. That would be bad.”

  The cardinal flew away, disappearing quickly into the snowy sky. Edith couldn’t shake the idea that it had stayed just long enough to deliver this memory.

  Mother Moon edged toward the center of the clearing. Her eyes flashed.

  “The window,” she snapped. “Now.”

  Edith recalled the last time she’d opened the window—how Mother Moon had reached in greedily, drawn by the light on the other side.

  My flowers, she’d said. Her hand had felt so cold.

  Mine, Edith had corrected her, slamming the window closed.

  An idea formed. A plan of attack, her dad might have called it. Edith didn’t know if it would work, but it was all she had.

  Our power is real …

  She’d built a garden in a matter of months.

  How quickly could she build a bridge?

  39

  Something Shirley had said recurred to Nolan, and with new meaning: I can’t get her out of my head. He pressed his palm against his forehead and growled. Yes, he knew exactly how that felt.

  You can have everything, Nolan.

  He found Simon Song in the storage barn, retrieving snow shovels from behind a pile of tools in the corner. Simon had his back to Nolan—didn’t see him at all, didn’t hear him, either. Nolan got to within two feet, leveled the pistol, pulled the trigger. A small hole appeared in the back of Simon’s bald head. Blood and bone exited the front and hit the barn wall steaming. Simon fell with a snow shovel clutched in two hands, as if he meant to use it.

  Wendy Noakes was in the recreation hall, dragging a mop across the floor. She looked up when Nolan walked in, saw the gun in his hand, and frowned. “Nolan, that’s a gun,” she said, and Nolan put a bullet in her chest. She flew backward, kicking her bucket over. Blood and water everywhere. Nolan left via the backdoor, checking for anyone else. There was no one. He cut through the trees and found Eliza Martino and Aiden Lythe in the canteen, cleaning tables. Good ol’ Dr. Lythe, always willing to help out around the island when the clinic was slow. Nolan shot him point blank and he was dead before his knees buckled. Eliza screamed and ran. Nolan fired at her and missed—may have grazed her arm. He fired again, didn’t miss. She hit the wall shoulder first and slumped there like a person resting. Joe the chef came out of the kitchen to see what in blazes was going on and Nolan shot him twice, first in the stomach, then in the throat.

  Everything, Nolan. Is that what you want?

  Six dead. Nolan checked the mag. Four rounds remaining, plus the loaded spare in his jacket pocket.

  * * *

  Alyssa had finished her duties and returned to her cabin, expecting to find Edith there. She’d been playing her guitar on the front porch when Alyssa had left, but that was before the weather turned. There was no sign of her now. Her guitar was just inside the door, though, propped against the wall. So she’d probably returned to her own cabin, and hadn’t taken her guitar because of the snow. Or maybe she was at Mother Moon’s with Shirley.

  Alyssa showered quickly, then put on her winter clothes and went to find Edith. Martin was due back later that day, and she and Edith had planned a surprise party for him: good food, homemade party hats, live music. They had learned “Behind Blue Eyes”—one of Martin’s favorite songs—for the occasion. Edith was excited to play it for him. She wouldn’t have gone far.

  Alyssa checked Edith’s cabin first.

  “Edith? Shirley?”

  Silence.

  “Anyone?”

  She crossed the top of the meadow, then cut through the woods toward Mother Moon’s cabin. As she approached, she noted no smoke pluming from the chimney. The windows were cold and dark. Alyssa climbed the front steps and knocked anyway.

  No answer.

  She peered through the window. No light or movement.

  “Where’d you go, Ede?”

  The rec hall? Maybe. Or the canteen for a lunchtime snack. Alyssa started down the steps, looking south across the meadow. She saw someone ghosting through the snow, moving determinedly. Not Edith, that was for sure. Alyssa was about to head west toward the canteen but then noticed the smoke billowing from Brooke’s chimney. Brooke shared a cabin with Jordan Little—had become something of a big sister, or a mother even, after Jordan’s real mom returned to the mainland and, true to the rules, never came back. Jordan had been a baby at the time. Mother Moon sometimes called her the island’s child.

  Jordan and Edith were friends. Not super tight or anything, but the closeness in their ages gave them a natural bond. Alyssa thought they’d probably been playing in the snow together, then had gone back to Brooke and Jordan’s cabin for hot milk.

  She’d try there first—it was closer—then she could scoot across to the canteen and rec hall.

  Only so many places you can hide on an island, Alyssa thought.

  She trudged past Gilda Wynne’s cabin—also with its chimney pluming, a single warm light burning inside—and carried on past the woodshed to Brooke and Jordan’s. She saw that figure ghosting through the snow again, then climbed Brooke’s front steps and rapped on the door.

  * * *

  “You’re right,” Edith said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “My world. It is Glam Moon.” Tiny snowflakes fell onto Edith’s eyelashes. She blinked but didn’t drop her gaze from Mother Moon’s. “It’s been calling to you for many years.”

  Mother Moon stood at the edge of the clearing, regarding Edith with an expression that appeared both suspicious and hopeful.

  “It’s why I’m here,” Edith said.

  “You’re what … ten years old?” Mother Moon shook her head, her body curled against the cold. “I was there thirty-two years ago, before you were even born. If it’s anybody’s world, it’s mine.”

  “My body is ten,” Edith said, “but my psychic soul has been around a long time.”

  The wind scraped across the clearing and the snow circled, mixed with wet leaves and the crisp smell of the pines. Edith huddled, determined to hold her focus.

  “You’ve earned your place,” she said. “It’s waiting for you.”

  “Yes. That’s why we came here. To open the Skyway—”

  “It’s called the Crossover, and it’s already open.”

  Edith spread her hands and pushed with every ounce of her psychic energy, channeling it—projecting it onto the place between. The window yawned with an electric thrum and that familiar smell of summer rain.

  “What do you mean it’s already open?” Mother Moon asked. “What are you doing?”

  The tips of Edith’s fingers glowed pale blue. She shuddered, fighting to contain the energy. Imagine it, Mother Moon had said, providing the blueprint—the single leaf—from which to work. That great bridge of light arcing directly into the Glam. The window offered a tempting glimpse, the first few steps, a shimmering light beyond …

  “This is what you’ve been looking for,” Edith said.

  “I don’t see anything.”

  Edith shifted position, taking two delicate steps toward Mother Moon. The window stretched, like a bubble filling with air.

  “Focus on the place between,” she said. “Like you did before. When you saw the Glam.”

  Mother Moon swept snow and hair from her eyes and looked harder, tilting her head this way and that. “But I have to wait for the price to be paid,” she said. “For the bomb to go off.”

  The window flickered … faded. Bomb, Edith thought miserably, and remembered Mother Moon pointing at her watch. Your sister is almost in position. She’ll make the connection at precisely one thirty. That déjà vu–like feeling bumped and nudged Edith’s mind again. She saw Shirley (… jacket, she’s wearing a black
jacket…) and the word PAY but nothing more. Not that it mattered; everything she needed to know was in that single terrible word: bomb. Fear surged inside her, brighter than the light she had created. She used it like fuel and threw it at the window. It expanded beyond Edith’s hands and towered into the snowy sky.

  Mother Moon suddenly dropped to her knees. She opened her arms and a long moan escaped her. “I see it,” she said, and shook her head as if she didn’t dare believe it. “My God, I see it now.”

  A tear tracked down Edith’s face. “We’re waiting for you.”

  “We?”

  “All of us. Your sky. Your flowers.”

  * * *

  Maria Santos opened her cabin door with a towel wrapped around her head and another around her body. She’d just stepped out of the shower. “Oh, Nolan, could you come back after—” Nolan pressed the tip of the suppressor to her forehead and squeezed the trigger. Pok. Maria flew backward, over her sofa, then rolled and hit the floor. The towel around her head kept the blood from spreading.

  Seven down.

  Nolan’s strategy—if it could be called a strategy; it was really just smarts—was to hit the cabins with smoking chimneys first. With any luck, the last eight islanders were tucked up inside, easy to pick off.

  “Easy,” he slurred.

  Jesus, he might even have time for another Dunkin’ Donuts before going to fetch Martin.

  “Yum.”

  He trudged past empty cabins, looked up, and saw someone ahead of him—impossible to say who, and they were too far away to get off a clean shot. Oh well, he’d get them soon enough. He clomped up the steps of Ainsley and Franklin’s cabin, firelight flickering in the window, looking all Christmassy in the snow.

  Franklin opened the door. He was the older queer, swarthy and broad—the fucking bear, or whatever he called himself. He didn’t put up a bearlike fight, though. One shot—pok—and down he went. Ainsley came in from the bedroom, shirtless, one hundred and twenty pounds of not fucking much.

  Nolan took aim. Melted snow ran into his eye a split second before pulling the trigger and the shot went wide. Ainsley didn’t run away or cower, didn’t register any surprise or fear. He grabbed a knife off the kitchenette counter and ran at Nolan, one hundred and twenty pounds of ire.