The Rising King

by Shea Berkley

  “Yes, sir,” we both say and jump in the Jeep.

  Our conversation is sparse. We’re both exhausted, and I need time to think, but I’m having a hard time putting two thoughts together. I have no idea where Kera is or what she’s doing. I keep playing our last moment together, and the more I do, the more I’m convinced she ran because she wanted to save me from the evil she couldn’t control. I tell Leo what I suspect and he nods in agreement, but I know deep down he’s only agreeing to make me feel better.

  It’s past midnight when we get back to the ranch. Mom is dragging. Grandpa must have chewed her out because when Grandma steps out onto the porch, Mom bolts from the car and starts crying all over again.

  The light from the front porch barely extends to where Grandpa stands. He leans on his police car and crosses his arms over his chest. “You happy now, woman? She’s back and these two knuckleheads aren’t going to a federal penitentiary. Obviously, there is a God.”

  Grandma tucks Mom against her shoulder and gives him a watery smile. “I had every faith you’d fix the problem. You always do.” She then pulls Mom into the house, telling her everything is going to be all right. I wish I had her confidence.

  Leo hands the keys over to Grandpa, and happily leaves me alone with a man who I have no doubt can split wood with his bare hands. I wait for the yelling to commence, but he only stands there staring at me.

  “Aren’t you going to say something?” I cringe, expecting him to lose it just from me saying that.

  “Boy.” His voice is calm. Tired. “You got more trouble on your plate right now than most people will have in their entire lives. I’m not planning on adding to it. You look like hell. Get some rest.”

  “I can’t.” He must know that. “Kera’s out there. Alone. Scared. And she has what I need to help Teag.”

  “You’re no good to her like this, but…suit yourself.” He pushes off his car and goes inside.

  I throw my head back and breathe deeply, looking up at the stars as if they have answers. “I have to find her.” Not just to get the magic back, but to help her.

  I sway on my feet, trashed, light-headed. It’s like I’m sleepwalking already.

  Lightbulb moments are few and far between for me, but I have one standing there in the front yard. I have to go to sleep. It’s how I’ve always found her before when I needed her the most.

  I drag myself up the steps and into the house. All I need is a few hours to find her, talk to her, and convince her to come back. Once in my room, I rake off my shirt, set the alarm, and fall into bed. Concentrating on Kera is easy. I do that most nights, but this time I do it with a desperation I’ve rarely felt. I breathe deeply. Once. Twice. Three times and darkness enfolds me. An awareness of time and space vanishes as I plunge into sleep.

  The alarm sounds, and it takes me longer than it should to struggle out of sleep. I lie there, confused for a moment, and then panic drives me upright. I didn’t dream of Kera. I didn’t dream at all. “Damn!” I glance at the time. Five thirty a.m.

  The summer sun slowly rises outside my window, painting the misty morning air with touches of gold. All that time…lost. I bolt out of bed, still tired, and now I’m starving. I can’t believe I slept. As I find a clean shirt, one question flies through my mind. Why didn’t I find her? Now more than ever I want to turn back time and help Kera before the dark magic got to her.

  “With all the stupid powers I have, why can’t I have that one?” I mutter as I wrench my bedroom door open.

  I go to the kitchen expecting to see Grandma, but there’s only Grandpa, reading his paper and stirring his coffee. He doesn’t look up when he asks, “Feel better?”

  “No.”

  “Well, you look better. Sleep has a way of clearing the mind. Sit down.” He points to the chair opposite him. “Toast and coffee will help.”

  “Help with what?” I rub my aching stomach. “I think I’m getting an ulcer.”

  “I wouldn’t be surprised with all that’s happened. You’re empty. A man can’t think when his belly’s scratching his backbone.”

  There’s a sound outside the window. When I look, Blaze presses his hot nose to the glass and breathes out a puff of steam. His image is obscured for a second, and then he sneezes, rattling the pane.

  Grandpa gets up and shouts at Blaze to move away. The dragon finally obeys and Grandpa mumbles, “Snotty windows and a dug-up lawn. That dragon is a nuisance.” He plops a plate with a scorched piece of toast in front of me, followed by a strong cup of black coffee. “Eat.”

  He takes his seat again and the only sounds are those of me gnawing at the burned toast and him turning his newspaper pages.

  “Magic.” The single word, spoken very clearly, startles me.

  I lift my eyes and stare at him. But he doesn’t say anything else. “What?”

  “Magic. That’s how you should find her.”

  I’m not stupid. “Tried it already.”

  He shakes the paper straight and clears his throat. “Sometimes, when I’m trying to find someone, I don’t look for them, I look for something they need or have, or even a place. Addison keeps whining about that necklace. You could start with that.”

  And then there are times when I feel stupid, because…I’m going to blame this on lack of sleep. “Yeah.” I bob my head. “That was my next choice.”

  “Good.” He puts down his paper and looks at me expectantly. “Go ahead.”

  “What, now?”

  “Women aren’t the only ones who can multitask.” He takes a big bite of his toast and points it at me. “Eat and do your thing.”

  Under his watchful eyes, I feel a bit like a performing monkey, but I take a big bite of toast, close my eyes, and concentrate on the ancient magic I want and demand that it come to me. Minutes pass. Over and over again, I call its name, Álainn.

  I stop and look at Grandpa. “It feels close, like I should be able to find it easily.”

  “Maybe Kera is close by. Try again.”

  I home in on the feeling and call, but the sound of Grandpa’s name being shouted interrupts me. Standing, I look outside and see someone running toward the back gate.

  “Grandpa,” I say. The worry in my voice has him peering out the window.

  I go to the kitchen door and hold it open. Grandma darts inside; her face is flushed, her breathing labored. She goes directly to Grandpa. “It’s Addison.” Her voice is colored with fear. “We were walking and talking…just like we used to… I was showing her the field of rose angels and baby blue eyes, you know how she’s always loved them… She’s hurt. She fell. Blaze is with her.”

  Grandpa presses her into a chair and tells her to stay put. We rush outside and into the woods. I follow him to a field filled with white, blue, and pink wildflowers and find Mom, lying among the flowers, breathing rapidly as if she’d just run a four-minute mile. Blaze stands guard over her.

  I drop to my knees beside Mom. “What happened?”

  “My side,” she moans. “It feels like it’s ripping apart.”

  “Like it did at the casino?”

  “This has happened before?” Grandpa asks. She nods and lifts her shirt and all we see is the tattoo scrawled low on her right hip and dipping beneath her waistband over her belly.

  Grandpa rolls his eyes. “When your mother sees that, she’s going to have words for you.”

  “I’m not twelve. I can have a tattoo if I want.”

  “She tried to get it removed.” I don’t know why I tell him, like I’m trying to make her seem more responsible in his eyes.

  “Not all drunken mistakes can be easily erased.”

  She bristles at the tone of his voice. “Who said it was a drunken mistake?”

  He hitches his eyebrow up. “I know one when I see one.” He lowers his gaze to the tattoo. It’s oddly red, and I wonder exactly what Augustus did to try to remove it. Grandpa presses on it. “How’s that feel?”

  Her voice gives a little catch. “Stings, but that’s all. T
he pain comes and goes.”

  “Could be her appendix.” Grandpa helps her up, and we take her back to the house and settle her on the couch in the living room where Grandma can fuss over her while she fixes a nice big breakfast. I call Grandpa into the den and whisper, “She’s going to be okay, right?”

  “If you think you have to stay, don’t,” he whispers back. “Your mother’s always been high-strung. I suspect she’s a mite stressed out about everyone thinking she’s crazy. And that it could be—though I’m not saying it is—it could be partly my fault. I wasn’t the kindest to her on the way back.”

  “I gotta find Kera.”

  “I know.” He walks toward the kitchen and then pauses. “If you think she’s close, I’d try your mojo one more time. See if anything comes of it. Don’t worry about your mother. We’ll tend to her.”

  He leaves to go sit at the kitchen table and I plop down on the couch in front of the television. It feels like it’s been forever since I’ve sat and done something as mundane as watch a TV show.

  I can’t let myself get distracted now. I shake myself. Roll my head back and forth and generally loosen what muscles I can before I settle in to call the magic Kera took one more time. Its name pops into my head and I concentrate on it. Suddenly I hear Mom screaming from the other room about her abdomen burning. I stop and see Grandma drop whatever she’s doing and run into the living room with ice wrapped in a dish towel. After a while, Grandpa glances my way and mouths that she’s fine. I may get angry at Mom, but I don’t like hearing her hurt.

  I close my eyes again and call. Mom’s scream jerks my head up. Even Grandpa comes out of his chair. He looks at me, then toward the living room, a frown centered on his face. “Dylan? Come here.”

  I immediately go to him. He sits me down at the table. “Do your thing.” At my confused expression, he says, “You know, your thing. What you were just doing in there.”

  “Okay.” I close my eyes and concentrate. Once again, Mom cries out.

  I immediately stop and look her way. Grandpa looks at me and then Mom. I go and stand over her. Grandma is holding the homemade ice pack to Mom’s side while Mom whimpers about the pain right where her dragon tattoo is.

  “Mom, when did you get the tattoo?”

  My question takes her by surprise. “I don’t remember,” she says. “I’ve had it forever.”

  “Before you left home?” I press.

  “I think so. Yeah. Why?”

  I turn to Grandma. “Did she get it before she left home?”

  She shakes her head. “I never saw a tattoo on her, and I would have. She lived in her bathing suit that summer.”

  Grandpa snorts. “All the boys liked that. Made them all into Peeping Toms. The little shits.”

  “George,” Grandma warns him.

  “Well, they were,” he mutters. “That’s why half of them have buckshot scars from me chasing them off.”

  I squat near Mom and take her hand in mine. “Mom, this is important. How did you get the tattoo?”

  She pushes a dark curl off her face with her free hand. “How do you think I got it? I went to…” Her hand stills over the curl and a frown clouds her face. “I had, um…I must have gone to town to get it.”

  She sounds exactly like Grandma when I asked her about the coin. It must be part of the magic. “You don’t sound too sure about that. You would remember getting a tattoo like yours. It looks expensive.”

  Grandma bites her lip and shakes her head. “She couldn’t have paid for it. She had no money.”

  “I had money. I had a coin, and…” Her frown deepens.

  She remembers the coin. I look at Grandma. “She turned the magic into a tattoo. It was never the necklace.” I’m such an idiot. That’s why Augustus couldn’t get rid of the ink, and that’s why Kera could take the necklace so easily. “The necklace really is just a necklace.”

  Mom looks from me to Grandma, and it’s like a light suddenly turns on. “Oh. My. God. I have magic on me?” She pushes Grandma’s hands and the ice pack away and rakes up her shirt to see the tattoo. Because of me, it’s once again red and swollen. “Get it off! Get it off of me!”

  She starts crying, and looks at me with pleading eyes. “Get it off, Dylan.”

  “I can’t. I don’t know how.” Baun never told me what to do if the magic refused to be taken.

  Her sobs grow louder and she slumps back onto the couch. Grandpa shakes his head. “For crying out loud, Addison. It’s been on there for seventeen years and hasn’t hurt you. Get a grip.”

  Her cries grow louder, and she complains to Grandma how mean he’s being. Grandpa pulls me into the kitchen and sits me down. “Look, son, I’m not one to tell you what to do. This is your life and your people, but you’ve got to get that off of her. She’ll drive us all batty if you don’t.”

  “I’m not kidding, Grandpa. I don’t know how to do it.”

  “Someone has to know.”

  “Faldon, probably. Bodog maybe. I’d have to take her back to Teag.”

  “No. I won’t go,” Mom sobs from the next room. “Baun hates me. He’s been taunting me in my dreams.”

  I remember her freaking out about someone trying to find her when I “visited” her after I got poisoned by the millispits. Figures Dad’s been terrorizing her. Not all of his “old” self is completely rehabilitated, no matter how much he’d like everyone to believe otherwise.

  Grandma pats Mom’s hand. “I’m sure he doesn’t hate you, sweetheart.”

  “Oh, I’m pretty sure he does,” I mutter, but not softly enough because it sets Mom off on another wail. I quickly jump in when she takes a breath. “You won’t even see him. We’ll find someone who can tell us how to transfer the magic to me. Then you can come back here without him even knowing you were there.”

  Finding Kera will have to wait. It’s killing me to think of her out there alone, fighting the darkness she can’t control, but Teag is my main priority. It’s what Kera would want me to do. And after delivering the magic, only then can I fully concentrate on finding her.

  A big paw of a hand slaps me on the shoulder, and Grandpa gives it a nerve-searing squeeze. “Sounds like a plan. I’m going with you.”

  I know my mouth has fallen open. I can feel the air rushing in. Grandpa in Teag? Why does that not sound like a good idea?

  The Weight of a Stone

  The necklace hung under Kera’s shirt, solid and heavy as the stone rubbed against her collarbone every time she moved. She had put it around her neck so she wouldn’t lose it, but she wanted more than anything to tear it off and bury it so deep, no one would ever find and use the magic it held.

  It was nearing dawn as she stumbled through the streets and alleyways of Ainsbury Cross. The shop signs swung in the breeze, clattering with the sound of neglect. Her village echoed like a ghost town since everyone had moved to the Ruined City hoping for some form of protection against the Dark Souls and the marauders who’d terrorized Teag since Jason’s death. Kera knew it was dangerous cutting through the town, but she had no choice. Her destination lay at the opposite end.

  As she traveled down an alleyway, a Dark Soul slowly slid into view. She quickly pressed her body close to the building and stared at the alley’s entrance, praying the evil soul would keep moving. When it did, she let out a soft sigh, turned, and came up short.

  A Dark Soul hovered in front of her. Its inky blackness obscured everything in her sight. Slowly the mass took shape until Navar stood like a shadowy stain in the air. “Alone again? You are reckless.”

  Kera’s heart thudded within her chest. “Out of my way.”

  “I could kill you now.”

  She touched her fingers to the necklace and felt a sense of calm descend. “I don’t think so. The last time we met, neither of us went away unscathed.”

  “You were lucky.” The curls of inky shadows slipped closer, teasing her with the threat of his touch.

  “So were you.”

  Navar leaned close an
d sniffed. A knowing smile outlined his shadowy mouth. “You smell…”

  Kera leaned back, repulsed by his closeness, but stood her ground. The last thing she needed was his thinking she was scared. “I smell?”

  “…like rot.” He nodded to her injured wrist she kept covered by the tight leather bracelet. “Someone has been using dark magic.”

  Her stomach tightened as her jaw flexed. She drew her incordium dagger and hissed, “Get away from me!”

  He slithered back, a curling, swirling oily mass of evil, and smiled. “Welcome to the dark side.”

  Deep, thick laughter rolled over Kera, causing her stomach to clench. She lashed out, slicing into Navar’s wavering mass, slicing it into tiny bits, until she was on her knees, stabbing at the black puddles that stained the alleyway’s cobblestones. The last click of her blade hitting the stones filled the air. Her breathing ripped in and out of her lungs as she trembled from the rage beating in her chest. She glanced at the entrance. Another shadowy form began to cross. Kera rolled to her left and hid behind a wooden barrel, her blade held tightly to her chest. The blackness that was Navar’s soul began to swirl together. When he reappeared, it would end in a fight she wasn’t sure she could win. She calculated the distance to the end of the alley. If she were fast, and she was very fast, she could be there and gone before either Dark Soul reached her.

  Quietly, she tucked her feet beneath her, eyes focused on her exit, and sprang forward. If anyone looked, all they would see would be a blur of movement as she dashed to the end of the alley and down a connecting street. She didn’t stop running until she reached Faldon’s home on the outskirts of town. Her fist pounded the door. She waited, shivering from the exertion and terror that filled her.

  The door cracked open to reveal Bodog, pale and googly-eyed.

  Dirty, sore, and heartbroken, Kera stood in front of her scowling, unkempt friend. He thumped his stick in front of him and leaned heavily on it.

  The Dark Souls had scared everyone off…everyone but Bodog. Faldon’s house was the little man’s refuge. His whole life moved in a steady, unhurried existence ten feet beneath the centuries-old floorboards.