by Brandon Mull
When a young voice finally responded, Cole was in a narrow passage with a dead end in sight. He always walked close enough to the dead end to make sure an unseen corridor didn’t branch out. White deposits on one wall bristled with glittering crystals.
“You’re not giving up,” said a young girl behind him.
Jumping and whirling, Cole found Tessa standing there, looking much as she had when Trillian the torivor sent Cole to a simulation of her castle during the trial to rescue Honor. Tessa looked a couple of years younger than Cole, with straight brown hair and dark, soulful eyes.
“Tessa?” Cole asked. “Destiny?”
“Tessa,” she said. “I’ve been following you.” Her expression was serious, her voice grave.
“For how long?”
The young girl shrugged. “Did Miracle really send you?”
“Yes,” Cole said. “I even have proof. The first is a code phrase. The haystacks have fallen down.”
“Honor knows you,” Tessa said. “She thinks I can trust you.”
“Honor is here?”
“Her imprint,” Tessa said. “She’s making sure nobody bothers us.”
“Wait,” Cole said. “You would have come here before Honor. How can you remember her?”
Tessa glanced over her shoulder. “I can still see her against the wall down there.”
“Where?”
“On the left.”
“Oh. Yeah, I kind of see her.”
“If she passes out of my notice, I forget she’s here,” Tessa said. “Or so she tells me.” Tessa held out a hand. “Don’t you want to test me?”
Cole passed his hand through hers. “My job would be a lot easier if this was really you.”
“Sorry. We’re only imprints. Is Mira okay?”
“She’s on the run but doing all right.”
“What does she want?”
“We’re looking for you and Honor. We’re trying to help. Your mom put stars in the sky. You’re in big trouble.”
“I’m not surprised,” Tessa said, shuffling her feet, eyes downcast. “Somebody is after me. Maybe he finally caught me.”
“Who is after you?”
“A powerful echo. I don’t know his name.”
“Nazeem,” Cole said.
“Maybe.”
“Probably. He’s after me and Mira too.”
Honor gazed at him. “You don’t work for my father?”
“No,” Cole assured her.
“Or anyone who wishes me harm?”
“No.”
“You’re with Mira and you’re trying to help me?”
“Yes.”
Tessa gave a small smile. “I can tell when people are lying. You’re not. At least I don’t think so. Can I trust myself as an imprint? I feel normal, but I can’t feel my power anymore. Not at all.”
“I’m here to help,” Cole said, and he meant it more than ever. Tessa was only two years his junior, but her small build, big eyes, and pretty face made her seem even younger. Anyone would want to protect her!
“Father is looking for me too,” Tessa said. “I have to be careful what I share. Even when people mean well, they could accidentally give away clues.” Tessa looked young, but like Mira, she hadn’t aged for more than sixty years. Though still a kid, she had a lot of experience living on the run.
“The real you is already in trouble,” Cole said. “You’ve probably been caught. We’re not just trying to find you—we’re trying to rescue you.”
“Mother sent a young boy to rescue me?” Tessa asked.
“We have an adult with us,” Cole explained, trying not to feel inadequate.
“Does that mean there are other kids?” Tessa wondered.
“Well, yeah, three others,” Cole said. “Four if you count Mira.”
“Who sends kids against soldiers and evil weavers?”
“We’re what Mira has,” Cole said for want of a better reason. “We rescued Honor and got her power back. Constance too.”
“You found Costa?” Surprised joy lit up her expression.
“And restored her power,” Cole said. Tessa’s excitement at the news helped him feel less defensive.
“All right, I’ll talk to you,” Tessa said. “Where do I begin? Tell Mira I’ve been all right. She always worries. After father took my weaving power, I didn’t feel like myself for years. I went around in a daze. You know the feeling when you forget something important you want to say? You just had it in mind, but then you can’t remember? I felt like that all the time. Something was missing.”
“That sounds terrible,” Cole said.
“Not too bad,” Tessa said. “I just felt . . . off. More annoying than terrible. Anyhow, a few years ago, I started feeling more like myself again. I began to get impulses about where to go and what to do. I started saying things that disturbed people.”
“Disturbed people?”
“I used to do it all the time,” Tessa said. “I didn’t stop to think about what the words meant. They just showed up. That stopped after father took my power.”
“Then your power started coming back,” Cole said. “It happened to your sisters too.”
Tessa puckered her lips off to one side. “I don’t feel it now. My power, I mean. Being an imprint. But it was coming back. And people were after us.”
“Us?”
“Me and Leo,” she said. “My bodyguard. He didn’t come in here with me. I hope he’s all right.”
“Why’d you come here?” Cole asked.
Tessa shrugged. “On a hunch. My hunches saved us a couple of times, so Leo was starting to trust them.”
“Where were you heading next?”
“That’s the big question,” Tessa said. “If you know where I went, you’ll run off to save me.”
“Is that so bad?”
“Not bad. I want to be saved. I just wish I could feel what would be best for you. And for Mira. And for me, too. The feelings were coming back to me. As an imprint, I don’t have the gift at all.”
“We’ll be careful,” Cole said.
“You’ll try,” Tessa said. “Honor tried too. She had some soldiers with her. If you’re here, Honor failed. If Honor couldn’t do it, what are Mira and some kids going to do?”
Cole remembered Desmond and Oster, knights from Blackmont Castle who had joined Honor in her quest to find Destiny. “We have to try,” Cole said. “We can get more help if we need it. Mira will never give up on you.”
“I know,” Tessa said. “But maybe she should.”
“Not going to happen,” Cole said. “We’ll just end up looking for you with less information. It’ll take longer. Mira will be in more danger.”
“I guess,” Tessa said reluctantly. “When I first arrived to this cave, I didn’t know what I was looking for. That’s how it always used to work. I said what I felt, did what I felt, and interesting things would follow. Back home at the castle, I was never in danger, but people around me always told me how what I said or did changed their lives. Sometimes it was good. Saved their marriage. Helped their business. Cured their cat.”
“You cured cats?” Cole asked.
“I shared some recipes,” Tessa said. “Just don’t ask me to remember them. The words spilled out. I didn’t know how people would take them.”
“Your mom has a gift like that,” Cole said. “Knowing things.”
“We had some things in common,” Tessa said. “But hers was different from mine. Nobody was like me. My gift is . . . weird. Poor Mother.”
“Why?”
“I would always say the most dreadful things to her.”
“Like what?”
Tessa rolled her eyes and extended her arms like a sleepwalker, then spoke in haunted tones. “You will lose everything you love most. Enemies plot behind every door. Your joy will turn to ashes, your peace to turmoil, your dreams to ruins.” She lowered her arms, and her voice returned to normal. “I was fun at parties.”
“Those words just came?”
“What you told her kind of came true,” Cole said.
“Doesn’t make me fun to be around. Who wants bad news? Not many people liked speaking to me.”
“What about the people you helped?”
“I like to think about them. But my messages didn’t always help. What if some girl started telling secrets from your past that could destroy your career? I got people arrested. I ended friendships. I could be scary. What if I explained how your cousin felt when he drowned, though you didn’t know what I meant at the time and it didn’t happen until the next day?”
“Freaky,” Cole said.
Tessa brightened. “Mira liked me, though. I never knew things about her. Words didn’t come when we were alone.”
“Never?”
“Not once.”
“Did you ever try?”
Tessa’s face grew serious. “I never tried. With anyone. I couldn’t stop the feelings or cause them.”
“Did you miss your feelings when they were gone?” Cole asked, wondering if it might have been a relief.
“I did,” Tessa said. “More than I would have guessed. I didn’t know how much my power guided me until it was gone. When my abilities started to come back, my life was more dangerous than before. The feelings have helped me.”
“What did you learn here?” Cole asked.
Tessa frowned. “Are you sure I should tell you? Mira is with you. My power doesn’t work as an imprint. I have no feel for whether telling you will be good or not. It could be so dangerous.”
“I told you: we’re not going to stop looking for you,” Cole said. “You might as well help us.”
Tessa covered her eyes with both hands, as if trying to hide. “Have you heard of Gamat Rue?”
“No.”
“The old prison? Abandoned centuries ago?”
“I’m new to Necronum.”
Slightly lowering one hand, Tessa peeked at Cole. “Once, Gamat Rue held the worst criminals in Necronum. But people haven’t used it for hundreds of years. An imprint here told me about an echo imprisoned there.”
“It’s a prison for echoes?”
“Not at first. But an evil echomancer took it over. The echolands side has lots of prisoners now. That’s why it was abandoned.”
“What’s an echomancer?”
Tessa dropped both hands and stared. “For somebody who wants to save me, you sure don’t know very much.”
“So teach me.”
“Echomancers are echoes with weaving powers,” Tessa said. “Your shaping power doesn’t usually cross with you into the echolands. Echomancers are the exceptions. The imprint told me the echomancer at Gamat Rue is named Nandavi.”
“You needed to find Nandavi?”
“No, I went to find an echo named Ragio that Nandavi holds prisoner.”
“You went to the prison?” Cole asked.
“Unless somebody stopped me,” Tessa said. “That was my plan.”
“How were you going to talk to an echo imprisoned in the echolands?” Cole asked.
“I wasn’t sure,” Tessa said. “Not exactly. People stay away from Gamat Rue. Not much is known about it. I’m no good at seeing the echolands. But Leo was coming with me, and he’s a talented weaver. I hoped he would help me contact Ragio.”
“What about Nandavi?”
“Nandavi.” Tessa shivered. “I didn’t want to meet her. I had no idea how much she could bother us from the echolands. But I’m looking for my shaping power, and when I heard about Ragio, I knew I needed to find him. I felt the tug, so I went.”
“Your power told you to go?” Cole said.
“My power doesn’t usually explain much,” Tessa said. “I get a feeling to say something or do something without knowing what will happen. But I was looking for the rest of my power, and it felt right to come to the cave, and then finding Ragio felt important.”
“What did you learn about Ragio?” Cole asked.
“He was a shapecrafter spying for the Grand Shaper of Necronum,” Tessa said. “He was caught and killed. The imprint I met here said Ragio was involved with those who were trying to gather and control my power. Ragio’s echo ended up at Gamat Rue.”
“You could be at Gamat Rue too,” Cole said. “That might be where the trouble happened.”
“Maybe,” Tessa said. “If so, be really careful. Honor might have fallen into the same trap. Don’t be the third.”
Cole hesitated before asking his next question. “Who is the Grand Shaper of Necronum?”
“Really? You don’t even know that?”
Cole winced. “I’ve only been here a few days. Part of that time has been on the run.”
“Prescia Demorri,” Tessa said. “My aunt. Mother’s big sister. They were never very close. I met her at the castle when I was younger. I haven’t seen her since then. She’s been in hiding.”
Tessa signaled Honor, who came toward them. The imprint looked perfectly like her.
“Hello, Cole,” she said.
“Hi, Honor.”
Honor reached a hand out to Cole. His hand passed through hers.
“I told him,” Tessa said.
“That’s hopefully for the best,” Honor said. She turned to Cole. “Costa?”
“She’s fine,” Cole said. “We found her and restored her power.”
“That’s a relief. I gather events have gone poorly here?”
“Your star is up,” Cole said, not wanting to explain why they had recently come down. “Tessa’s too. Your mom told me you were in extreme danger.”
“You spoke with her?” Honor asked.
“Not too long ago,” Cole said. “I took the monorail from Zeropolis to Junction.”
“Mira is with you now?” Honor asked.
“Yes,” Cole said.
“Don’t let her come after us,” Honor said. “She is no warrior, and her powers are irrelevant here. I had Desmond and Oster with me. I knew what you know. If I failed, something is really wrong. Who knows what you’re up against? Send help, surely, but not Mira. We can’t risk losing her. She could do more good by rallying others to help us.”
That made sense to Cole. “I’ll try to convince her. It isn’t always easy.”
“I know,” Honor said. “I’m sorry this responsibility has fallen to you. I should have found Tessa.”
“Don’t apologize,” Cole said. “We don’t even know what happened yet.”
“I imagine you are in a hurry,” Honor said.
“Actually, yeah,” Cole said. “You don’t know the way out, do you?”
“I was in a hurry too,” Honor said. “The common wisdom has it that you just need to keep going uphill.”
“I’ve heard the same,” Cole said. He stared at Honor and Tessa. They looked so real! “Any last requests?”
“Tell Mira I love her,” Tessa said. “Tell her to be careful.”
“Watch out for echoes,” Honor said. “There is a new force at play in the echolands.”
“Nazeem,” Cole said.
“He has a name?” Honor asked.
“Seems like he has just revealed himself lately,” Cole said. “I’ll try to be careful.”
“Tell Mira I order her not to come for us personally,” Honor said. “And that I care for her.”
“I’ll pass it along,” Cole said.
“Thank you, Cole,” Tessa said.
“I’ll do my best,” he replied.
Turning away from them, he hurried back the way he had come. It wouldn’t be long before they forgot him. Cole wondered if he would see their faces again.
CHAPTER
9
SHIVER
Twilight had fallen by the time Cole exited the Cave of Memory. He assumed it was evening but supposed it could be morning. It was hard to be sure how long he had wandered the caverns.
Finding the entrance had been no trou
ble. He followed upward slopes for less than an hour before he met once again with the imprint of the woman who waited near the opening.
As Cole walked out, he had looked back and seen himself standing near the woman. His imprint had waved. Cole waved as well, aware that his duplicate wouldn’t remember the gesture.
When Cole had hesitated to round the bend that would conceal his imprint from sight, his imprint called out, “Go save everybody. I’ve got this!”
Cole had turned and exited, happy to know he could be so brave about an eternity stuck in a cave. Well, at least he could act brave about it.
Cole found Dalton, Jace, Mira, and Joe waiting with Hunter not too far beyond the mouth of the cave, their horses tied up nearby. Cole saw them before they looked his way.
“Dalton!” Cole called. “Jace! You made it!” He jogged over to them.
Jace snorted derisively. “If you made it, of course we did.”
“Slower than me,” Cole observed.
“Our road from the crossroads took us the wrong direction,” Jace said.
“And a guy tried to swindle us when we bought horses,” Dalton said. “One of them was basically lame.”
“Nothing I couldn’t handle,” Jace quickly clarified.
“Do you think you showed the guy your freemark enough?” Dalton asked.
Jace shoved him playfully. “At least I wasn’t apologizing.”
The dynamic between Jace and Dalton seemed friendlier than Cole had seen it. In times past, Dalton’s joke would have made Jace genuinely angry. Perhaps the time alone together had been good for them.
“Did you find Tessa?” Mira asked.
“Would I have come out if I hadn’t?” Cole replied.
“Maybe if you were hungry,” Hunter said. “You didn’t bring food. We had some. I called out once I noticed, but you didn’t hear.”
Cole did feel hungry. Just the mention of food made the void in his belly seem to double in size. But he put on a brave face. “I’m fine. I ate some bats.”
“Whatever,” Dalton said.