Son of Sun (Forgotten Gods (Book 2))

by Clair, Rosemary

  “You tricked me!” I yelled at her, totally at a loss how our conversation had gone from me having bad dreams to running the redwoods with her.

  “And you walked right into it. Be ready at sundown. No excuses.” Mattie grabbed her shower bucket and robe and headed out the door.

  I was still sitting on my bed, wondering how in the world that had just happened so fast. Of course it was totally lame, but I was looking forward to ordering a pizza and watching a movie, my usual Friday night routine. Now that Seth and Sam were together, I hated being the fifth wheel.

  But a bet was a bet, and Mattie wasn’t the kind of girl that took ‘No’ for an answer.

  At sundown, I was dutifully dressed in a pair of Mattie’s running shorts, tee shirt and a fleece jacket. The nights were already getting chilly, and the shady forest was always colder than St. Annes campus.

  It seemed silly, but the lingering human parts of me were secretly excited about the night’s adventure. Running the redwoods on a full moon was a right of passage for St. Anne’s students, though I had never been invited.

  Mission Park closed at sundown. Luckily for us, the park was always open to St. Anne’s campus, even though we weren’t supposed to enter after dark. Breaking this one rule earned you entry into some secret society that was only ever talked about in whispers—or got you kicked out of school.

  Nerves somersaulted around my belly as we carefully made our way across campus to the designated meeting point. If we were spotted wearing running clothes by faculty, they would know what we were up to and the night would be ruined. But the secrecy totally added to the fun.

  Darting from oak to oak, I followed Mattie like a shadow. We popped out from behind an overgrown hedge to see about thirty students, silently milling around one of the paths into the forest.

  “Is Sam coming?” I whispered to Mattie. She nodded her head, and pointed ahead, where Sam was jumping up and down in silent celebration.

  “Yay!” she whisper-screamed as she threw her arms around me. “I knew Mattie would be able to get you out of the dorm. It’s about time!” Sam was whispering, but even though she was barely making any noise, Mattie put her finger to her lips to shush her.

  Sam rolled her eyes and fell in line between Seth and me. I waved hello to Seth and looked around for Thomas, knowing he would not be far from Mattie.

  “Glad you could make it, Faye,” Thomas said as he handed me a glow necklace with a smile.

  “Thanks,” I said, taking the necklace from his hand.

  “Don’t break the glow thingy until we’re in the woods, okay?” Mattie instructed, pulling my hair away so Sam could secure the necklace around my neck. Everyone had a glow something or other. Some guys had them over their heads like bandanas, others wore them looped around their wrists as bracelets. A few brave souls were already in the tree line, spraying themselves down with fluorescent paint.

  “This is insane,” I whispered excitedly to Mattie.

  “It’s so much fun. Everyone has a glow stick so we can keep up with each other and not run into one another. We run to the river and back. Last one back has to buy everyone’s pizza.” Mattie squatted to double-knot her shoes, which looked like a really good idea, so I joined her on the ground to do the same. “Oh, and stick to the path. You’re on your own if you get lost. I refuse to buy pizza for this bunch!”

  “Are you ready, Faye?” Sam asked, bending to knot her shoes as well.

  “Yeah, I am,” I said, standing and taking a deep breath as we walked into the cover of the woods. Overhead, trees limbs hung like thick drapes, blocking the moon’s glow. Mattie took one hand and Sam grabbed the other. All the students formed a line, hands linked, as we stepped through the tree line to the nearest trail that sliced through the woods.

  A guy who looked like he was in charge jumped up on a tree stump when we neared the trail.

  “Remember, to the river and back.” He raised his hands to quiet everyone. “Ladies and gentlemen…” He said with a ceremonious flourish. “Break your glow sticks.” A giggle drifted up from the crowd and the popping of a hundred glow sticks sounded like a kind playing with bubble wrap. Suddenly, the woods were aglow in the neon hues of glow-in-the-dark jewelry.

  Mattie, Sam, Thomas, Seth and I all wore purple glow necklaces. Up and down the line, similar colored necklace were grouped together, suddenly making the whole necklace thing make sense.

  “On you mark,” the guy whispered. “Get set,” again he whispered and line stirred with restless energy. “GO!” he yelled so loudly I was sure the dean heard him, but I was pretty sure no faculty members were brave enough to go running into the darkened woods after us.

  Once we were on the trail the moonlight lit our path in a beautiful silvery ribbon. Thomas was in front, striding like the track star he was. Mattie was second. I ran in the middle and Sam and Seth were pulling up the rear, neither of them seasoned athletes like the rest of us.

  Thomas set an easy pace that put us in the middle of the group, but was slow enough for Sam and Seth to keep up with. At that point, I don’t think it really mattered what kind of shape you were in. Adrenaline could have carried me around the world twice. Something about running in the woods at night when you weren’t supposed to with a group of people was exhilarating, and I found myself pulling even with Mattie and then playfully running ahead.

  “You sure you want to race me, Faye?” Mattie questioned, not the slightest bit winded by our pace.

  “I thought that’s the reason I was out here?” I shot back at her, unable to keep the smile off my face.

  “You think you can handle these two, Thomas?” Mattie asked, pointing over her shoulder to where Sam and Seth were already panting.

  “No problem, babe,” Thomas waved her on. “You go show Faye a good time,” he encouraged, his smile tinted purple by the glow necklace around his neck.

  “Start us off, just so it’s fair,” Mattie looked over her shoulder at me in a pitiful way. “I hope you don’t mind losing, Faye.”

  “I hope you don’t either, Mattie. I hate to embarrass you in front of your boyfriend!” I joked with her.

  “All right you two. On your mark. Get set. GO!” Thomas yelled as we continued his easy pace. As soon as he barked go, Mattie and I took off, passing the other runners like they were standing still.

  Mattie weaved through the crowd like a sharp needle, while I seemed to catch every elbow that swung my direction. Mattie had told me to stay on the path, but she was beating me, and it wasn’t because she was faster, it was because she was meaner and didn’t mind pushing people out of her way.

  There was a break in the trees ahead, and I ducked off the path so I could run unobstructed for a few strides to hopefully get passed an especially thick group of runners.

  It was pitch black on the opposite side of the tree line, and for a moment I was running completely blind. With the lose of sight, my other senses heightened, alert to what was around me like I had been the night Dayne found me in the woods. My ears pricked to the sound of running feet to my left and the sounds of forest creatures scurrying away from the intrusion to my right. I inhaled deeply, and smelled the familiar evergreen scent that always made me think of him.

  Maybe that’s why I hadn’t come in these woods before. I told myself it was because the green was just too close to Ireland’s fields, a memory that would inevitably bring the entire summer crashing back over me. In the dark, the green was gone, but Dayne’s familiar scent lingered as if he had just passed by.

  Without the crowd to block me, my feet hit the ground harder, with more purpose than before, no longer concerned about catching Mattie, but now chasing the hope that Dayne was hiding somewhere in these woods. A slightly delusional part of my brain thought I could run fast enough to catch him. Maybe he had come back for me.

  My eyes adjusted, and the woods lay before me, bathed in silver light like those long ago nights in Clonlea. The way the moonlight lay bright white on the ferns, only to disappear the mom
ent I rushed passed, had my feet hitting the ground harder, hoping that if I ran fast enough, I might be able to catch those memories long enough to hold onto them for a while.

  The woods came alive around me, the crowd of runners to my left had disappeared. With every heartbeat and panting breath, the forest seemed to find its way deeper into me, until I could feel it coming to life around me.

  I no longer needed to keep my eyes open to see where I was going. My skin prickled, the hairs turning to goosebumps, like an internal sonar device, telling me when I needed to shift my path to avoid colliding with a tree or a stump. The gentle rustle of fern banks perked my ears, telling me when to lift my legs and jump over them. I was no longer running by sight, but by feeling the woods. My magic was waking up, here in the darkest of places, where no one could see me.

  For months I had tried to run from this inevitability happening, but clothed in the night’s shadows it was finally safe, and if it brought me one step closer to him I was ready to embrace what magic lived in me.

  “Show me,” I whispered in the darkness, my head thrown back to the moon like a coyote ready to howl. Closing my eyes again, I drank in the forest smells and called Dayne back to me. Straining my brain for the tiniest memory of him, the tiniest hint he may have given me that would show me how to harness the great magic he feared lay within me.

  “Faye!” Mattie called out, searching for me in the darkness, but I couldn’t stop. Faster and faster I ran, trying to catch a memory that might show me where to start, and afraid if I stopped I might lose whatever was taking over my body. Trees flew by me, and I ripped the glow necklace from my neck, no longer wanting to be found or visible to human eyes.

  Faster, harder, stronger. My body began to transform in ways I didn’t know it was capable of. My muscles felt stronger, invincible even. I suddenly feared nothing. My senses were so heightened I would’ve taken on a starving grizzly bear, certain I could beat it. I took a deep breath, held it and exhaled with all the force I could manage, kicking up a strong wind that blew the branches from my path.

  That’s when I found him.

  Dayne was sitting at Rose’s table. It was the night he had rescued me from death. The night I learned his secrets. He was just as irresistible as ever and my heart ached to see him so plainly before me. Happily joking with me, the way I was dumb enough to think our life would always be.

  “I just think about it, really hard. Concentrate. It’s telekinetic.”

  He had offered this explanation with a bored shrug as if it were the simplest of things in his world. But for me, it was proving impossible.

  “Show me, Dayne. Show me how to do this,” I pleaded in the dark.

  Dayne still sat at Rose’s table, but the scene in my mind changed. I was no longer in a memory, but in some new reality where he had actually heard my plea.

  He took my hand, and kissed it. As he released it to the table, he looked at me, his eyes heavy with regret.

  As I stared into his warm gaze, our hands felt slippery, and when I looked down I saw they were covered in blood. Bright, red, deathly blood, dripping from my hand and mingling with his. The vision morphed again and he was in a silvery white tunic, an outfit he wore only in LisTirna. As my worst nightmare began to unfold before my eyes, his bright white shirt soaked with blood. His blood, and he fell to the ground. Slowly, I turned my hands over, staring at their red stain, and then fell to my knees beside him.

  “The only way I can love you is to let you go,” he whispered in a barely audible voice.

  My mind exploded with the unexpected rage of what I was seeing. I slapped my hands against my face, trying to make it all go away, but it didn’t budge.

  In one last effort to stop the horrific visions, I cut loose a scream that echoed in the woods, reverberating off the trees, shooting through the night like a bullet. My throat burned with the effort, but the vision vanished.

  I opened my eyes just in time to see the actual earth disappear from under my feet, and my heart fell to the watery depths swirling beneath me in automatic panic. Arms and legs flailing wildly in the air, I barely had the tip of my big toe still on the ground when I saw how far away the other riverbank was. I could never make a leap like that, but I had too much momentum to stop.

  Focusing every ounce of strength I had on my toe, I pushed off and sailed through the air, coming to land in a graceful, squatted position on the other side of the bank as if I had planned it all along.

  What?

  I stood slowly, disbelievingly, eyes wide as the moon, and walked to the bank, staring down into the river that I should’ve landed in. Shaking all over, I wrapped my arms around my waist, hugging myself as I tried to comprehend what had just happened.

  Dayne had come back to me. Though his message was the last thing I wanted to hear. My magic was waking up, and in my quest to find Dayne, I had stupidly welcomed it, running way faster than any human possibly could, and leaping over a bank that only an Olympic pole vaulter could traverse.

  I was stuck, incapable of leaping back across the river when I had time to think about it.

  “Faye!” Mattie slid to a stop on the opposite side of the river, rocks sliding down the bank and plunking into the water. “What are you doing over there?”

  “I jumped,” I answered, not able to lie to her, and too confused to come up with a better answer.

  “How?” Her eyes were wide with fear and shock and maybe a touch of admiration.

  I stood dumbly staring at her, shaking my head back and forth.

  “Well, do it again. We aren’t supposed to cross the river,” Mattie was now looking all around, mainly behind her for the rest of the group to catch up to us.

  The forest began to rustle and Thomas popped out of the trees behind Mattie.

  “Faye!” He yelled when he saw me. “You’ve got to get back on this side, right now!” His insistence seemed odd, and I shook my head helplessly. A few more runners popped out of the woods, all stopping in their tracks when they saw me on the far side of the bank.

  “How did she…?” No one could figure out how I had managed to cross the river without getting wet.

  “She was running too fast when she came out of the trees. Her only option was to jump. Luckily she made it,” Mattie offered an answer to the runners who stood gawking at me on her side of the bank. I wasn’t sure if Mattie thought she was lying to cover for me, or if she honestly thought it was normal for me to have leapt the bank like a gazelle.

  “Faye, you have to get back across,” Thomas said again, this time more urgently than before.

  “I can’t!” I yelled over the roar of the rushing water.

  “Climb down the bank. I’ll swim out to meet you.” Thomas offered, taking off his shirt and shoes. I peered down the bank to the river, not seeing an easy way to get to the water. The moon shone against slick grey rocks, their flat faces too smooth to get a toe hold in all the way to the water.

  “Uh-uh,” I shook my head, not trusting my magical body at that moment, fearing I might suddenly fly, or something worse, if I started to fall.

  “Do you have a better idea?” Mattie snapped as she helped Thomas down the bank. When her head popped back up to me, her face blanched ghost white and her eyes went wide as melons. Goosebumps immediately prickled along my body.

  Mattie was no longer staring at me, but into the woods just behind me, utter and total fear washing her features down her face. My eyes filled with tears of fear as I noticed every other face was frozen on the woods behind me as well. Other runners started to back away, fleeing into the safety of the woods behind them.

  Slowly, I turned to face what held their attention.

  I didn’t see it at first, staring deeply into the woods, thinking maybe they were playing a joke on me.

  Only they weren’t.

  A mist began to develop in the woods several yards away. It looked like fog rolling in off the ocean at first, only it was pitch black in the forest, and fog wouldn’t have been visible, even
in the full moon. The longer I stared, the stronger the light became, rushing through the woods toward me.

  “Faye, run!” Mattie screamed, all the other runners jumping and yelling behind her.

  I didn’t bother to look for the best way down the bank this time. Instead, I launched my body, feet first down the slope, rolling and falling, scraping and tumbling my way down to the water. When the mist reached where I had been standing it evaporated, as if it was only interested in me.

  My blood ran cold again, heart pounding in my ears so loudly I could hardly hear Thomas calling to me.

  He was wading out in to the water on the opposite side, grabbing onto rocks as he went to keep himself out of the cold water.

  With the mist gone I could focus again, and all I wanted was to get out of the woods.

  “Try to stay out of the water as much as you can, Faye. Jump from rock to rock. This river is really deep in places,” Thomas instructed as he looked for his next foot hold.

  Moonlight painted the black rocks silver, the backs slicked with algae and breaking water. Normally, I would’ve taken my time, but I was too bothered by whatever was hunting me to be careful. I plunged in and started swimming to Thomas.

  He was yelling at me to wait, but I didn’t care. I had always been a strong swimmer, and I was ready to get out of there.

  Halfway across the river, I knew why he had wanted me to be careful. An undertow swirled around my legs and began to pull me off the straight line I was swimming toward Thomas. Paddling harder, I pulled my body through the water, but try as I might, the undertow wrapped further up my body. It wasn’t long before I was struggling to keep my head above water.

  “Faye! Grab onto this!” Thomas yelled and tossed a long branch my way. I lunged for it, only to have a wave swell overhead and crash down on me the second my fingers found rough bark.

  Water burst into my nose, searing a path straight to my lungs. My chest constricted with the need to cough, which would only have pulled more water into my lungs. With every ounce of strength I could spare I fought against the instinct to breathe. Thomas was so close. If I could find my way to the surface, he could pull me from the undertow.