by Blair Drake
Her mother chimed in “Me too.”
“Do you think I can open a portal anywhere to travel home again?”
“I don’t know,” Luke said. “I don’t understand how this works. I can only observe. I got in trouble for trying to help you in the first place,” he admitted.
Her mother’s warm voice flowed through her mind. “He did. However, because of the darkness, we’re allowing him some leeway. We can’t afford to lose you too.”
She studied the darkness pounding on the glass panes of the window, seemingly trying to creep in through the creases and cracks in the wall around the window. She thought she could see a gray presence in the darkness of the hallway through the open door to the headmaster’s office...just not powerful enough to get to her. But it wouldn’t take much for it to take over. “In a portal, I won’t have the security of this building to keep the darkness out.”
“You no longer have it now either. Stay safe.”
Both voices disappeared from her mind.
She realized that was very true as even now the darkness crept closer, weaving through the spaces between the window and the walls, long skinny tendrils reaching for her. With Gideon firmly in her arms, Winter tucked under her long hair against her neck, she clasped the talisman, closed her eyes, opened a portal to the frozen tundra right at the point where she entered—her safe 2-D place with no dark cloud presence—and stepped through. She snapped the portal closed behind her, hearing the angry wail of the darkness.
The icy wind beat at her skin, the chill making her hunch against the harsh climate. Yet again, it wasn’t as horrible as the first time she’d been there. Thankfully. She opened her eyes, turned around to make sure she stood in the same place as her first arrival here, and then turned and opened the portal to go back home.
She took a deep breath and stepped through. She could hear Luke’s whispered, “Good luck.”
Then the portal closed behind her. She watched, trying to see what was happening, because the journey wasn’t instantaneous last time.
It wasn’t instantaneous this time either. There…she could see the school and the rooftop terrace. But just as she was about to step onto the roof, her heart glowing with euphoria, laughing, and cheering because she made it back again, the darkness raced forward, snatched her up in its grasp, and the world around her disappeared.
She struggled to free herself, cried out for help, but the pressure was suffocating. It closed in on her until she curled up in a tiny ball. Gideon was clenched in her arms, one hand reassuringly on Winter, and she screamed in despair until she could feel no more. Then the world went dark.
Chapter 22
The darkness threatened to choke her. She struggled to stay calm, but her panic was threatening to take away her sense of control. Somewhere in the darkness she heard a faint squeak.
“Winter!” She searched her neck, hair, and clothing, but there was no sign of him. Tears threatened as she settled back, shuddering in horror. That’s when she realized Gideon had somehow disappeared from her arms too. She screamed out, “Gideon, where are you?”
Only a muffled silence surrounded her.
The animals had disappeared, leaving her all alone.
She wondered, “Is this what happened to you, Trace?”
She thought she heard a cry from somewhere near her, but she couldn’t see anything. There was no break in the absolute midnight blackness around her—like somebody turned out the lights everywhere in the world and the atmosphere above her. She could barely see her hand in front of her face. This just wasn’t normal.
She stopped struggling and took several deep breaths, shudders wracking her frame. It was as if she were caught between portals, between dimensions, between realities.
A terrified laugh broke free. “Listen to me. I sound like a lunatic.”
But the truth was, she could say nothing that would make this sound any better.
There was no answer from Trace.
There was no sign of him either. She couldn’t stand the thought of Gideon or Winter being hurt because of her actions. “Gideon, Winter, stay safe. Go to wherever it is you need to, just stay safe.”
Her mind churned so fast she could barely capture her thoughts. The animals could travel through the portals easily as they were of the natural order. She thought she’d gotten to a point where she could do that too.
She ran her fingers over her arms, feeling the tremors rocking her frame. She hugged her chest, trying to figure out what to do.
Was this part of her lesson?
She had been alone. She’d found various animal friends. She’d reconnected with the parts of her life where she’d slammed the doors. And now here she was; everything was gone yet again. So, was this the ultimate test? Was this a case of Do you really get it now?
If so, then no.
She didn’t understand if the darkness was part of the test or if she’d been hijacked. She suspected it was a bit of both. She tried to open a portal, but instead of opening it wide, it hissed and spit at her as if the sparks had no connection to fire up into a portal. She pulled her talisman from her pocket to see she was down to two lights. Even as she attempted a portal right now, the second light faded.
“No. Stop. Stay strong. I need you. I need to get home.”
And then it occurred to her. What was it she was trying to get home to? Her friends, her family, her home world, and the animals? All of the above.
Could the darkness only grab her if she was heading home? She had no clue. Maybe if she trusted it, it could carry her home.
Yet the darkness didn’t exist with Luke. Didn’t she know the darkness was the wrong side of what she was trying to do?
She glanced around the darkness. “That’s it, isn’t it? You’ve crossed dimensions. You have come with me in many places but not when I went to see Hettie, my mother, my father, or Luke. They are in the future, or in a higher dimensional level. So, your limits are the same limits I put on myself.”
She smiled. Now she understood.
She pulled out her talisman, looked at the single light, and chuckled. “Darkness,” she commanded, “take me home. Take me back to the rooftop where I first saw you.”
At first she heard nothing but an odd wind. That was followed by an even harder sound in the background. For a moment, she hesitated, wondering if she was wrong.
She shook her head. “No. I’m not wrong. I open the portals, but in your case, you are a portal. You have snatched me from between dimensions, but you are connected to all of them. You can take me home.”
And she laughed with that last bit because such a feeling of relief came over her. She understood now, not so much what started the darkness, but that it was grounded in the same places she was grounded. She finally understood something else.
“You are a portal,” she cried out. “And a broken one. It’s not me you want—it’s the talisman. Here, I no longer need it.”
With a smile, she held it out and said, “Take me home to my rooftop and my dimension, open the doorway so I can cross, and this is yours.”
She almost saw the energy shifting, thinking, wondering. Then suddenly it stepped back, and she was surrounded by clear air in a place she knew very well. She turned, opened her arms wide, and smiled while throwing her head back and yelling, “Yes!”
She laughed and laughed.
But the darkness was still there, only a good six to ten feet away, and she knew what it was waiting for.
She smiled. “You don’t even know how to trust, do you?” She opened her palm with the talisman. There was only one fading light. And she knew the darkness needed it.
“Here,” she cried, “take it before it’s gone.”
She threw it into the darkness where it was whisked out of midair. Instantly, the darkness backed up slowly, sliding, drifting back off the roof of the building where she stood. She was alone, without her talisman. without her parents, without Auster or Hettie, without Winter or Gideon, without Luke, without Annalise,
and without her classmates.
Just her standing on her own two feet.
She knew exactly where she was. She didn’t need the talisman; the darkness needed the talisman. For whatever purpose, it needed that positive energy to heal something gone badly wrong.
Maybe the elders, the headmaster, and headmistress would be horrified at what she’d done. But she sensed the dark cloud had a wound. Something was wrong, and it needed help. The talisman was her gift to the dark cloud. It was also her lesson in letting go and standing on her own—all alone.
The darkness represented her fears. Her own terror turned her fears from being just something minor into something evil. She watched the darkness as it faded ever-so-slightly to a pearly gray color as it slid farther and farther away from her.
With a strong, sure stride, she headed toward the door on the rooftop. She opened it and raced down the steps. There was nobody in the hallway, nobody around, but it felt different. It felt right. It smelled right. And, in the background, she heard music.
She raced toward the headmaster’s office. When she arrived, she didn’t even bother knocking. She turned the handle, flung the double doors opened wide, and stepped inside.
Hettie, looking a little more tired and a little more worried, bounded to her feet, “Oh, my goodness. Melissa, you’re back!”
Melissa grinned. “But then, you always knew I would return, didn’t you?”
The headmaster walked to stand behind Hettie. He chuckled. “We did wonder at times.”
“No need to wonder. I finally got it. I might be slow, but I’m not completely stupid.”
The two let out a sigh of relief.
“Although you may not be terribly happy at something I did.” She wanted to tell them what she’d done. Instinctively, she knew they wouldn’t like it. But hey, she had to be herself.
The smiles fell from their faces. “What do you mean?” they both asked.
“The darkness is wounded. I can’t tell you how or why. All I can tell you is it’s trying to heal. I was caught up in it for a couple moments until I realized it wanted my talisman.”
There was a gasp of horror, shock.
Melissa nodded. “I knew that would be your reaction. I only had one light left on the talisman, and I gave it as a gift to the darkness. After I did that, the darkness shifted from grayish black to a lighter gray, and it receded.”
They looked at each other, then at her in horror.
The headmaster cried out, “What have you’ve done?”
“I refuse to look at this as a bad thing. Besides, there was barely enough energy left in the talisman to do anything. She shoved her hands in her pockets, twirled around, and froze. Slowly she withdrew her hands, and there was her talisman. Only it was dark, no lights glowed. She held it up and said, “How is it in my pocket again? Honestly, I gave it to the darkness, and it accepted it.”
The two of them looked at her with relief on their faces.
She turned to stare down at the now calm, normal-looking pin. Then she smiled. “I guess the darkness used up what it could then didn’t need it anymore. Or the talisman couldn’t stay in the darkness.” She turned to look around. “I’m back home again. Where is everyone else? Are they back yet?”
The headmaster reached out a hand. “You’re the first. Now we have to wait and see how the others do.”
She chuckled. “Look at that. I finally came in first at something.” Her smile fell away. “What about Annalise? She wasn’t ready for this.”
The headmaster and headmistress stared at each other then turned to face Melissa. With her shoulders back, Hettie said, “We don’t know what’s happened to Annalise, but we will find out.”
“We have no way to know who will come back next,” the headmaster said. “I promise we won’t forget Annalise.”
“And what about Trace?” Melissa asked gently. “How do we get him back?”
They both smiled and said, “With your help, we can get them both back, but not until all the students return first. It’ll take all of us to reverse what’s happened.”
“Can I go visit Luke now?” she asked anxiously. “We have a lot to catch up on.”
“You can indeed.”
She opened a portal beside her. Luke stood there with a grin on his face and his arms wide open. On his shoulder sat Winter—at his feet. Gideon. She ran into his embrace, laughing and crying at the same time.
Just before the portal closed behind her, he whispered against her temple, “Welcome home.”
She realized that’s exactly what she’d done—come home.
And she couldn’t be happier.
If you enjoyed reading this novel, I would appreciate it if you would help others enjoy the book, too.
Review it. Please tell others why you liked this book by reviewing it on the site where you purchased the book, on your favorite book site, or on your blog.
Lend it. This eBook is lending-enabled, so please feel free to share with a friend.
Recommend it. Please help other readers find the book by recommending it to readers’ groups, discussion boards, Goodreads, etc.
Want to be the first to know about new releases,
get advanced sneak peeks of new novels, and fun giveaways
Subscribe to Blair’s mailing list.
If you’re not a newsletter subscriber, here’s your chance.
This is open to international readers too.
*must be deliverable online
Click here to get the newsletter!
* * *
Blair loves hearing from readers, contact via email: [email protected]
Find all of Blair Drake’s books here:
http://blairdrake.com/books/
The Finding Magic Series
Melissa's Quest: http://littl.ink/+YBlO
Reese's Quest: http://littl.ink/+A3Mr
Jaspers's Quest: http://littl.ink/+oBl7
Elijah's Quest: http://littl.ink/+n7Ee
Dylan's Quest: http://littl.ink/+DxN6
Natasha's Quest: http://littl.ink/+vxo0
Piper's Quest: http://littl.ink/+9KM8
Rebecca’s Quest: http://littl.ink/+5AMR
Alex's Quest: http://littl.ink/+eK9l
Annalise's Quest: http://littl.ink/+PzvB
Sneak Peek of Reese’s Quest
The last place Reese Calamita thought he’d wanted to be was standing on the rooftop of the Gray Cliffs Academy like a gargoyle looking out to the ocean with a bunch of the other kids from his class. But for some reason Headmistress Hettie Lalane decided they all needed a guided tour of the rooftop deck in the middle of a damned thunderstorm.
That in itself should be the weirdest thing that had happened to Reese. What was even stranger was that he somehow ended up on the basement floor of the school. How the hell had that happened?
He shouldn’t be here. Not on the rooftop, not at the Cliffs, and certainly not in the basement. Reese had always known that, and this stunt Lalane just pulled only made it clearer. If he were a normal kid, he’d be out somewhere looking for an after-school job so he could make enough money for something other than snacks from the student bookstore. He’d be saving money to buy a sweet car so he could drive right out of this school in a few weeks after graduation, and get anywhere other than here. Maybe he’d even have a hot girl in the seat next to him. Yeah, that’d be sweet.
But at the Cliffs, there wasn’t any time or room in his life for girls other than sneaking a quick kiss in the hallway between classes before Auster, the headmaster caught them. Not that any of the girls he knew wanted a guy with no money. And Reese had none. Not enough to bribe someone to sneak in some beer for a Saturday night party or even to take Emma Garrett out on a date, not that she wanted to anymore. The girl from their rival school Reese had met during a track meet had flipped her long blond hair over her shoulder, and turned on her heels away from him when she learned he didn’t even have money for a cheap cell phone. She’d made it clear that all Reese had to offer was
a jock championship title that was worthless to anyone but the Academy admins.
For all the money his stepdad had, Reese knew that any money his mom managed to send him, which wasn’t often, came out of the petty monthly stipend George gave her, the cheap bastard. The only thing George ever splurged on from the day he met Reese’s mom was tuition to send Reese away to the Cliffs. Just to get him away from his mother.
Reese sat up on the concrete floor. How the hell had he gotten here? He thought back to walking into school this morning. Immediately the headmaster and headmistress had called a bunch of students down to the office, most likely to ask why none of them had filled out applications for Gray Cliffs University.
No way was Reese going to GCU. He’d spent four years at the Gray Cliffs Academy, and as soon as he got his high school diploma, he was gone.
But…had anyone talked about GCU this morning? He couldn’t remember.
He’d been in the headmaster’s office. He’d seen a bunch of applications on the desk, and then…they were on the rooftop of the school. How had that happened?
He didn’t remember. He did remember the gusts of wind whipping his hair around his head, slapping strands against his forehead and stinging his skin. It was so windy, Reese had planted his feet firmly on the weathered boards of the deck in order to keep his balance.
And Jasper was talking to him.
“Did you see her?” Jasper had asked, pulling at the collar of his blue blazer, a uniform meant to strip them all of their identities and keep them invisible. Screw that.
“See who? The new girl?” Reese asked. But he was barely listening to Jasper. He’d noticed some of the girls with them were scared. Melissa had tears in her eyes. Annalise looked as though someone had told her she had to jump off the roof in order to get away. If it hadn’t been so ridiculous, it’d be comical.
“Yeah, Sable. Did you see her going to homeroom?” Jasper had asked.