by Vered Ehsani
“It’s me, your great nephew,” I said, with a little less certainty. Something about Bibi didn’t look quite right. It reminded me of something but I couldn’t remember exactly what. I quickly glanced towards her left thumb and then to her neck. Yup, the oddly shaped blotch of a birthmark was there, as were the chickenpox scars. It was definitely her. “You know, you gave me a tarantula for a birthday present a couple years ago.”
Bibi looked impressed. “That is a great idea for a present, but I’m sorry. I don’t believe we’ve ever met. Or at least, I don’t remember.”
“And then a couple months ago,” I pressed on, ignoring her interruption, “you gave me that crazy Book of History and….”
This got her attention. “Really? So that’s where it ends up.” She thumped the end of a solid looking walking stick on the ground as she contemplated my existence. Her fingers were gripped around a thick knob of wood on top of the stick; in the right hands, that knob would knock a person senseless.
I peered closer at Bibi. She looked fresher than usual, less tired and worn. She definitely didn’t look at all faded. And then I remembered: she reminded me of the last time I had talked with her, in the veil. Her character had kept fluctuating between the Bibi that I knew and some alternative version that I didn’t. I was also pretty sure that the alternative vision was right here and had no clue who I was.
“Oh my gosh,” I whispered. “You really don’t know me.”
“No, not yet,” she responded offhandedly.
“But how did you get here?”
“Ok, as touching as this little reunion is,” Juna commented sarcastically, “shouldn’t we be finding a way out of here?”
Bibi gave Juna a quick appraisal, her sharp eyes missing nothing. “Actually, I’ve been trying to find a way into here.”
“Kali has the map,” I blurted out.
“Oh, so you know about that as well, eh?”
“Ash,” Juna muttered crossly.
“Just a minute.” I waved her away impatiently, stretching my mental capacity to the breaking point as I tried to figure this out. Maybe Bibi had something like my book that allowed her to go back and forth in time, and I was meeting her right before she visited my family for the first time and met me. That would explain why she didn’t know me right now.
Wow, talk about mind-bending stuff. More importantly, maybe this back-in-time version of Bibi would give me the answers that her future self wouldn’t. “Is this place Crossings?”
Her eyebrows rose. She seemed momentarily confused but it passed. “No, dear,” she explained as if this was just too obvious to miss, which it probably was. “Crossings is what happens here and now. Our theory is that this place might be kind of like an intersection of time paths and from here, we can jump to…”
“Ash, they’re here,” Juna snapped and pointed ahead of us.
Bibi spun around. “What’s here?” she asked. Juna and I didn’t answer.
In every direction, shifting shadows twirled through the mist, as if dancing with each other. Tentacles seethed and snapped, curling through the air as if searching. Indistinct shapes morphed into other, equally nameless forms. But one of them was clear and solid and rapidly approaching.
Kali.
Untouched by the cold, he strolled towards us. White mist and dark shadows swirled about him in alternating patterns. His blue eyes glowed like an iceberg on fire, if such a thing were possible. He smiled. That should’ve scared me more than the shadows, but somehow it didn’t. Either he was losing his scare factor or I was getting braver. I’d go with the first option. Something was different about him. His gaze flickered over Juna and me and then settled on Bibi. Obviously, we were not an issue for him.
“Wait,” I whispered to my aunt who didn’t have a clue who I was. “How does someone cross over from here? And to where?”
“First, you have to find the place. That’s what the map is for,” she whispered back, her gaze fixed on Kali. “And then, I believe we would go through the key.”
“Key?” I glanced around and saw, immediately behind me, a sliver of shimmering, ghostly light, as if an invisible door was open ever so slightly, allowing a bit of light to seep out. Around the sliver, the air glowed, just like the veil did when I opened it. The key was another portal. But to where?
“From here,” she continued as if in response to my silent question, “we should be able to cross over to wherever the map is, at any point in time.”
“And he wants to go where his reflection is,” I murmured back, but Bibi wasn’t listening.
“What the heck are you babbling about, Ghost Boy?” Juna hissed.
“Merry Christmas, Aruhi,” Kali called out from several paces away, as if greeting a neighbor instead of a mortal enemy. I stared at my aunt. So she was Aruhi?
“Kali,” Bibi raised her voice and nodded.
“So what’re you going to do?” Kali asked. “Wave your walking stick at me? You’re a bit young to need one. And you’re a bit inexperienced to take me on.”
“How touching,” Bibi replied. “You care.”
“I need a distraction.” I leaned towards Juna. “Kali cannot get past us.”
Her eyes narrowed and she looked like she was about to argue. Instead, she nodded. “What kind? And for how long?”
“The distracting kind. And it doesn’t have to be long.”
“Not really,” Kali snapped at her. “I used to, but you ended that. You’ve only yourself to blame. And stop nattering back there, you two.” He glared at Juna and me. “It’s very rude. Can’t you see I’m having a conversation?”
Ok, that was weird. “Since when did you become Miss Manners?” I blurted out. Juna snickered.
“And who are you?”
I stared back into those blue eyes and thought: What the heck? “Don’t you remember me?”
Kali gazed at me, like I was a rather unappealing bug that had just crept out from between his shoes. And I know exactly what I would do if I saw a bug near my shoes.
“Young boy,” his words twisted and sliced through the air, “why would I know you?”
“Because you tried to kill me several times in 1773.”
Kali’s eyes popped open and his mouth dropped slightly. It was such a human response that I wondered if maybe Kali had an evil twin lurking around somewhere, because this dude was not the freaky master of shadows I had met at the Boston Tea Party. “I do believe,” he finally stated in a soft voice, “that you are quite mad. It’s 1860, boy.”
Now everyone was staring at me, like I really was mad. Maybe I was, but not THAT mad. How could Kali not recognize me? I peered at him closely. There was something different about him too, something a little less… something.
Yeah, that’s really helpful.
“Unless…” Kali mused softly and his eyes lit up. “Unless we were right and it really does work. But 1773?” He shook his head.
“What did you do?” I whispered, because my voice box wasn’t working properly at this point. “What did you change? Why can’t either of you remember me?”
Kali frowned, as if something I said reminded him of something important. Then, he shrugged, nodded to Juna and in a matter-of-fact voice calmly advised her, “You should really take your friend to see a doctor.”
“Kali, this is crazy,” Bibi, or Aruhi or whoever she was, said. “I understand you’re angry about the map.”
That got his attention. “You kept it hidden from me on purpose,” Kali snarled, his eyes flashing. “We were supposed to come here together.”
Ok, now I was confused. I also noticed the shadows getting darker and bigger. I think the two octopus-type house shadows had just showed up at the party and were adding their weight, so to speak. Kali and Bibi didn’t seem to see all the agitated commotion around them.
“We can’t do it, Kali,” she reasoned. “It’s too dangerous. We could get trapped in another place or time, or stuck in between. Even worse, if things go really wrong, we could be split in h
alf, and our energy scattered between two points in history, never fully whole, dangerously unbalanced.”
Kali growled and he stepped closer. “You knew the risks when you agreed to make the map. You promised you’d help me.”
“Yes,” Bibi replied, her voice calm. “I did.”
“We can master time, go where and when we want, change destinies.”
“I know.” She closed her eyes for a second, and she looked weary, as if this was an argument she’d been having with him for a while. Then her eyes opened and they sparkled with determination. “But I don’t think it’s worth it. The risks are too great…”
“Not for me!”
By now, the shadows had formed a solid wall of darkness and had begun to seep through the knee-high mist towards us.
“Bibi! I mean, Aruhi. Be careful,” I called out, knowing she had the ability to see what was surrounding us. “The shadows. Watch the shadows.”
They looked towards me and exchanged a glance. Very clearly, they both thought I should be in a straight jacket and locked away in a padded room. They couldn’t see what I was seeing swarming all around us, getting closer, ready to consume us.
“Sorry, Aruhi,” Kali murmured, dismissing me with a sneer. “I’ve come too far and done too much to turn back now. I have the map. I’m here. I’m going through.” He stared at her, and for a second, he didn’t look like the scary dude who enjoyed a war the way some people enjoy a baseball game. He looked human. His voice lowered. “You can come with me if you want. I’d like you to. If you don’t want to, I understand. But please don’t try to stop me.”
That’s when a lot happened in a very brief space of time.
Kali started marching toward the key, the portal, through which he could cross to wherever he was planning to cross. Bibi tried to raise her walking stick, as if to block him, and opened her mouth to speak. In that moment between the flick of an eyelid and the beat of a heart, flat, oily tentacles of darkness snapped through the air, smashing Bibi to the ground.
She writhed in the snow, a shocked and confused expression on her face, rolled over and grabbed at Kali’s leg, but it didn’t slow him down. More shadows hurtled towards us as Kali’s momentum carried him forward, his determined glare fixed on me. I couldn’t move, even as I saw on the edge of my vision darkness rapidly blocking out the light as shadows reared up and oozed through the air above us.
“Ash, run!”
I couldn’t. I just stood there, frozen by Kali’s piercing eyes and the madness I could feel forming in them. Suddenly, Juna rammed into my shoulder. I fell, fluffy snow pushing up into my nose and mouth.
And then, in between coughing snow out of my lungs and wiping the stuff off my face, I had to cover my ears as a shrill whistle rang around us and the storm resumed its attack.
I glanced up, expecting to see shadows descend. Instead, I saw Juna standing between Kali and me, her eyes closed, her teeth clenched. A small tornado began to form above her. All around the clearing, snow was rising up from the ground and swirling about. My view of the shadows was obliterated by a wall of white that sounded like a swarm of angry bees.
“Go,” I shouted at her. “Find me back in our time.”
“I won’t leave you,” she yelled back, her eyes still closed.
“It’s ok!” I was almost screaming as the noise became unbearably loud, snatching my voice away. I stood up. “I’ll be alright. Trust me and let go.”
She glanced at me and then upwards. Her jaw dropped in surprise. “I did it.”
“Yeah, you did. Now go.” I pushed her and then she was gone in a swirl of snow. Not waiting to see the impact of her disappearance on Bibi and Kali, I instinctively opened up the veil, my portal back, and flashed through.
I landed on Shanti and we fell onto the tiled floor. The deep silence was shocking and my ears buzzed with the memory of the storm I’d just left. For a couple of heartbeats, I just lay on the ground, relishing the stillness. Then Shanti smacked me on my head.
“Get up, Ash. What…”
I pushed myself upright and slammed the book shut, while reaching for the parchment. The map quivered in my hand. The drawing was filled with squirming lines, like skinny maggots over a slab of meat that was way past the expiry date. I tried to tear the map apart, but it was tougher than it looked.
“Matches,” I shouted at Shanti. The parchment began to pulse and the squirmy lines were now racing around the sketch of the clearing. I could almost feel the portal opening up. I balled up the thick paper, as if that could stop it.
Shanti was frantically rummaging through drawers and I joined her, the map scrunched in one hand while I tugged open a drawer with the other.
“Found them.” Shanti pulled out a small box and opened it with shaking hands. Several matches fell out and scattered around her.
“Take it easy,” I told her, trying to keep calm myself. The balled up map pushed against my fist and I felt the suction sensation I felt every time I touched the veil.
Kali was coming through.
In the dim kitchen, a spark flew, a flame spluttered to life and immediately died.
“Damn cheap…” Shanti cursed as she dropped the finished match and plucked up another one.
Something bulged through the map.
The spark. The flame. It flickered. I held my breath, in case the slightest movement of air might extinguish the little fire. I tugged out a corner of the quivering parchment and touched it to the match.
Nothing happened.
Shadows danced around us, mocking us, as the parchment began to unfold, the creases glowing with unnatural light. Shanti shifted the match closer. The shape of a hand pushed against the surface of the map, as if someone was underneath the paper.
Smoke curled lazily between us.
Shanti tossed the almost-spent match onto the map, pulled out three more matches and struck all of them against the side of the box. They flared up and she thrust it at the smoking hole that was forming on the parchment. The edges began to glow and then, finally, burst out in heat and light. A small fire consumed the map.
Something like nails against a chalkboard screeched out and echoed around the kitchen, before fading away. Ashes and bits of charred paper fluttered to the floor. Shanti and I stared at each other in silence for a moment. She opened her mouth to say something.
That’s when the tornado hit.
Chapter 10
“Well, you told me to find you.”
Juna was still sulking as we neared my house.
“Yeah, but he didn’t tell you to drop a tornado on our aunt’s cottage,” Shanti interjected before I could respond.
Not that I was about to try. I’d given that up shortly after introducing the girls to one another and updating Shanti on what had happened in the clearing. Just as we had left the destroyed cottage, Shanti had seen a spider and freaked out, and Juna had made the really monumental mistake of commenting on how funny my sister had looked bouncing about like a kangaroo on caffeine. So now, the two girls were getting along like a house on fire, and I was the furniture getting burned up in the process.
“It was only a little tornado,” Juna retorted, “and you managed to escape before the roof caved in.”
“Hmm, that’s comforting. I’m sure my aunt will be thrilled about that.”
“Hey, the building was already condemned. I did everyone a favour. At least I didn’t destroy your house when I landed on top of it. At least, I think it was your house.”
I glanced up at her. “You went to our house first? How did you know…”
Juna shrugged. “I was focusing on finding your home. I figured that’s where you’d be. As I was standing on top of your roof and wondering how to get down, I thought of you and wham, another tornado appeared and…”
“Oh, look, here we are. And the roof is still intact,” Shanti announced as we reached our driveway. Then she continued in a dangerously sweet voice, “I guess you’ll be going home then? See you!”
I
knew that tone. If Juna had any sense, she’d keep walking. Then again, this was Juna.
And I thought having three sisters was difficult. I was exhausted.
Before she could say anything to further inflame the situation, I explained in a weary voice, “Juna’s going to stay with us for a while.”
“Why?”
“Because,” Juna explained in her own sugar-sweet voice, “I’m a fugitive. You know, on the run from the law. Because, technically, I escaped custody. Or died while falling out of a plane. Take your pick.” Then she paused, and turned to me. “I wonder if ‘death’ is a good excuse for breaking my parole.”
I groaned and closed my eyes.
“Is she serious?” Shanti demanded. “We’re going to harbour an escaped criminal? Oh, that’s just great.” She tossed her arms dramatically into the air. “On top of destroying private property…”
“An abandoned, derelict dump,” Juna snapped.
“Now, she’s going to stay with us?”
I kept walking, hoping my silence would serve as an example. Yeah, right.
I tested the front door. It was unlocked, so I pushed it open. The shards of a broken pot crunched underfoot. A couple of picture frames had been knocked off the wall, along with some knickknacks that had decorated a small side table. I could see through to the living room, where the bookshelf’s contents were strewn around.
“Oh man,” Juna exclaimed, following me in. “What’s that awful smell?”
“That’s what happens when our babysitter cooks,” I muttered, gesturing towards the kitchen down the hall and trying not to breathe through my nose. I lead the way inside and locked the door behind us.
“Hey, what happened to your house?”
“It’s always like this,” Shanti responded sarcastically.
“Ah, nothing,” I quickly interrupted that little interaction. “Just an unwanted visitor.”
“What kind of visitor destroys your living room?” Juna asked.
“The unwanted kind,” Shanti snapped back.
“And doesn’t your babysitter,” Juna emphasised the ‘babysitter’ part, “kind of notice?”