by A. L. Tyler
Her voice trailed off. Lena looked over, and saw that she was drifting off. Her eyes closed and soon she was snoring loudly. Lena turned her back to her and tried to sleep, but her mind was busy. It must have been terrible for her, growing up with a father like Master Daray. It explained a lot about the person she had become; she was a terrible parent, but Lena suddenly found herself forgiving her a little. It was ironic that she would forgive her during a drunken rant, but it was a forgiveness born out of pity. Ava had never had the things that children need—Lena doubted if there had ever been hugs, laughter, or words of love and comfort growing up at Waldgrave. Aaron hadn’t been perfect, either; Lena had faced her own demons in the form of her father’s hidden past. He had been an imperfect parent, but he had done a much better job than some, and it had made all the difference.
It was around three-thirty a.m. Lena had woken with a cramp in her leg for not being able to stretch out; the bed was uncommonly too short. All the lights were out in the room; staring around the darkness, Lena could see Matias’ thin form sitting in the chair in the corner; he must have switched out with Greg some time ago. She pushed herself up to a sitting position to stretch her leg, and suddenly realized that Ava wasn’t next to her. She looked over at the next bed, which was also empty. Her throat went dry.
“Who’s there?” She whispered.
The voice that responded to her was unfamiliar; she had only heard it in her dreams. “I only got to meet you once, little Abbie, but right from the start I knew it would be you. I had a premonition that one day you would follow my steps on one of my little trips. I made a lot of them, but when I was elected to carry out this task, I knew this one was the one. It’s too big, and I fear it’s doomed to failure. I think about you a lot; I wonder why you’re going to follow me…”
The blood in her veins had turned to ice, but her curiosity was winning out. Lena cautiously eased herself out of bed and walked over towards the corner, the cramp in her leg still twisting with pain. “Ben Collins?”
“I’m going back to the cave tomorrow to get it. I left it there because it’s heavy—too heavy to have carted it back here. After that, I’m hoping I can make it back to Colombia before I have to stop again.”
Lena crept closer, squinting in the dark. “Ben? Grandpa?”
“Lena?”
Lena spun around. Ava was staring at her with bloodshot eyes, in the bed where she could have sworn she was absent only seconds earlier. Greg was also watching her with wide eyes from the other bed. Lena turned and looked into the corner, where Matias Rivera was reading a newspaper with the light on, when the lights had just been out. They gave each other questioning looks.
Lena shook her head in confusion. “Did you just say something about…?”
“No.” Master Rivera said with resolution. His eyes were wide; looking around, Lena realized how crazy she must have appeared.
She went and sat on the edge of the bed, still looking around the room in disbelief. She settled her head in her hands, trying to make sense of what had just happened—it had been so real. It had been different a few moments ago. Even in the dark, she could tell it was different. It had smelled different. There had been hardwood floors instead of carpet beneath her feet. The street lights had come through the window differently. It had been so different, but it hadn’t felt different; in that moment it was exactly as it should have been. It felt like it was exactly as it had always been; she hadn’t questioned what she was seeing for a second.
Greg got out of bed. “Are you okay? Should I call—“
“I’m fine. It’s…working. I think it’s working. He was here. He was talking to me.” Lena looked into Greg’s concerned eyes.
“You’re sure you’re just not tired?” Greg said, trying to smooth out his bed-tussled hair. “You feel okay?”
Lena closed her eyes and shook her head. She felt a little dizzy, and she was tired. But she knew what she had seen. It hadn’t been a dream. “He knew I would be here, following him, somehow…He was talking to me, even back then. This mission just got started.”
Nervous looks went around the room. No one bothered to try to sleep the rest of the night.
*****
CHAPTER 8
The next morning, after checking out, the group that had stayed at the crappy hotel met up again with the rest of the Representatives for breakfast in a nearby hotel restaurant. From there, Lena laid out their plans for the day; Ben had gone to the cave next. With any luck, he would have left some sort of further clue there—something Lena could use to maintain her bond with the events of years passed.
Ava gave directions to where she had hidden the portal. She claimed it was a secluded area a few miles outside of town, down a hill, with foliage covering a spot where erosion had worn away a spot on the cliff wall. When they finally got there, however, they ran into a problem. The whole area had been developed into a residential neighborhood at some point in the past ten years. The cliff—and the cave—were gone. Everything had been leveled out and then small, multi-colored houses with gray and red roofs had been arranged in a maze over the whole area.
Parked at the edge of the sprawling suburbia, no one was quite sure what to do.
“You’re sure it was here?” Master Baker, a heavy-set man with sharp eyes and ears that were reminiscent of a rodent asked.
“Yes. Yes, of course I’m sure.” Ava stared blankly out at the houses.
Master Baker turned to Lena. “Well?”
Lena raised her hand to shield her eyes from the sun overhead. “Well what?”
“Well, where do we go from here?” He asked gruffly.
Lena sighed, but didn’t look over. The Old Faith Representatives had become very annoyed with her since the fight she’d had with Griffin. While the New Faith Representatives had become more protective of her, Griffin had apparently been spreading animosity for the fact that she was actually going to go through with her plan.
“I guess we go on to Colombia.” Lena finally replied.
“You guess?” Master Sabina said, his voice seething with frustration and hostility. “You don’t know?”
Lena shrugged. Of course she was guessing—the cave was gone. There was no way to know for sure now.
“That’s great. That’s just great. All this way, and then a dead end. This has been a fantastic waste of our time and money!” Master Sabina stalked off toward the van. Some of the other Old Faith Representatives followed, casting Lena disgruntled looks.
Matias Rivera walked up between Ava and Lena. He kept his back turned to the Old Faith Representatives so they could not see him talking. “You don’t know where it was?”
“No!” Ava almost laughed. “All of these houses look the same—there’s nothing familiar here at all! I couldn’t even guess…”
“And you’re not sure where he went next?” Matias turned slightly toward Lena and raised his hand to shield his dark eyes from the hot, bright sun.
“Colombia?” Lena shrugged again. “I know that doesn’t exactly narrow it down, but we did get a letter from Buenaventura…”
“Buenaventura?”
“Yeah.”
Matias turned and looked back at the cars, his black hair fluttering slightly in the breeze. The Old Faith Representatives were talking amongst themselves; even though everyone had agreed to put politics away until the trip was over, the division was clear and growing. “This is all going to hell really quickly. Do you think you can pick the trail back up in Colombia?”
“I…don’t want to lie to you.”
Master Rivera looked over at her, squinting in the sunlight.
Lena closed her eyes and thought. “Maybe. I might be able to. I’ve had a strong connection up to this point, but I don’t know. If the scenery gets familiar, it could trigger something, maybe…”
He nodded. “Then we’ll go to Colombia.” He walked off toward the cars and started talking to a small group of Representatives. Moments later, everyone had ushered themselves back into th
e cars. Lena had been put in a sedan with her mother and Greg; she was sure this had been done because people were starting to get frustrated with the whole situation, or maybe even her specifically. No one wanted to sit with her; no one even wanted to have to look at her.
They drove back the way they had come the day before; around dinner time they re-crossed the border they had crossed the day before. They had pulled off border crossings fairly well up to that point; luck had been on their side and they had only had one vehicle searched the entire way. As the sun went down in a spectacular array of oranges and reds, the caravan pulled off the road toward a smallish town and everyone checked into a bed and breakfast.
Greg and Master Weller went out and bought food for everyone from a combination of street venders, restaurants, and shops. That night in her room, Lena tried to plot out the areas of Buenaventura that she thought they should drive through, and then went to bed and had her usual nightmare—Ben was not in it. She was traveling alone, seeking something, or possibly someone, always just one step behind. She woke up unnerved and perplexed; somehow, she knew that finding whatever it was in the dream had been of utmost importance, even though she didn’t know what she was chasing.
Despite one building which looked vaguely familiar to her, Lena had no luck in Buenaventura the next day. The Old Faith Representatives were all wearing looks of mocking triumph, as they were sure now that Lena would never find it. If not for Griffin, who had called in support from Master Daray to keep everyone in line, the whole mission might have been called off at that point. Moral was getting low, and people were starting to bicker whenever the opportunity presented itself. Lena pulled out her notes on Ben Collins’ letters; the next one hadn’t arrived until three days later, this time from San Jose, Costa Rica.
The search continued, but many of the Council members were growing tired and disgusted with the waste of time and money—many of them had jobs that they had to support their families. Many of them would rather have been at home with their families regardless. Lena found the number of people wanting to ride with her diminishing, though Greg, Ava, Griffin, and Masters Rivera and Brendon were still willing. Four days later they arrived in San Jose, where Lena picked the hotel on the way into town because she thought it looked familiar. It was a squat little building with cracking foundations, but it had been painted recently and looked cheerful enough. It was an older hotel, which once again made adjoining rooms impossible.
Ava got into the booze again to tolerate sharing her room with Masters Brendon and Rivera. She babbled on for almost an hour, mostly about the hours and hours her father had made her copy out books when she was little. After she fell asleep, Lena asked Master Rivera if it was okay if she wandered the halls for a while to see if anything else looked familiar. He woke up Master Brendon to tell him they were leaving, and they stalked the halls for a while.
“Do you really think we will find it?” Matias’s tone was gentle and hardly interrogative. He was becoming somewhat of a friend lately; he seemed to frequently ask her about the mission just to make conversation. He also used a brand of shaving cream that reminded her of one that her father had favored, which made her smile even though it was entirely a coincidence.
“God, I sure hope so. My whole life hinges on my making this trip worth our while.” Lena said seriously.
“Oh, it’s not so bad…”
Lena stopped and they both turned to look at a painting on the wall. All of the hallways in the hotel looked the same; beige walls and green carpet. This was the first piece of art that they had come across since leaving the room; it wasn’t in a particularly obvious or necessary portion of the hall, but it certainly made a nice break. It seemed almost out of place amidst all of the other barren walls.
Matias continued. “Lots of people have screwed up. The Council will forget eventually, and you’ll get your political standing back.”
Lena studied the painting; it looked familiar, but she wasn’t sure if she had seen it before, or if Ben had seen it. There were horses running through a river; the brushstrokes were barely visible. “I wasn’t talking about my political standing.”
“Oh?”
“No…I need to find this thing so that I can—“
“—assure your safety, Abbie.”
Lena’s head snapped over to where Master Rivera had been standing. In his place, Ben Collins was gazing into the painting. He was older than she had ever envisioned him, with graying hair and a deeply receding hairline. His thin figure had filled out and he had a small potbelly starting to grow. His face looked a little like Howard’s, but with a higher forehead and fuller cheeks, and her father’s bright blue eyes. The hallway had changed; it was more dimly lit and the walls were a rosy pink color. The carpeted floor had turned to tile. Ben was talking very casually to the picture of the horses.
“Bringing this thing back is going to cause an explosive reaction in the Council, but I have faith in the system. They’ll work it out long before this ever trickles down to you, I hope. I got a letter from Pyrallis Daray today,” He chuckled in a good natured way, “God knows how he knew I would be here. He’s your other grandfather, in case he dies before you meet him. Avalon keeps insisting that he is going to die, but then, she’s been saying that ever since I first met her. Says she can see it in his eyes; I don’t know if it’s true or not, but if it is, I hope you don’t have the misfortune of inheriting that ability. What a terrible thing to have to know about people.”
He looked over at her and frowned; Lena looked directly into his eyes, and for a brief moment, their eyes locked on to each other. Goosebumps broke out on her skin—he was seeing her. But it was impossible that he was seeing her—he wasn’t even alive, and none of it had happened back when Ben had originally made this trip. Then, very suddenly, he reached out and started shaking her. Panic pulsed through her veins as she tried to pull away.
“Lena! Lena!”
She blinked, and he was Master Rivera again.
“Lena! Are you okay?”
“Um, yeah…Yes, I’m okay. Ben was here.” She stared at Matias Rivera nervously. This was the second time she had mistaken him for her grandfather. “Are we…are you related to Ben somehow?”
Master Rivera was taken aback. “No. I don’t believe so.”
She continued to stare at him. It was too much of a coincidence. “What about your mother? What was her maiden name?”
Master Rivera was looking at her like she was crazy. “Ferrari.”
Lena’s heart sank. She didn’t know the extended genealogy of her family anyways, so she wasn’t sure what she had expected. Maybe a name that at least sounded familiar. “I’ve never heard of them.”
“They died out. If I recall correctly, the man who married her older sister inherited Master Ferrari’s position in the Council.” Matias shrugged indifferently.
They stared at each other for a while before walking back to the room. Lena went to bed, and her renewed success sparked the usual debates the next morning; no one could deny that the search was back on. She hadn’t received any new information about where Ben had gone next, but people were starting to build faith that she would figure it out even if she didn’t know exactly where they were supposed to go. In celebration, they decided to stop for a nice lunch that day. As was typical, Ava drank slightly too much and Griffin gave her disapproving looks the whole time. Even though she had decided to sit with Greg, Matias (the first real Council ally she had made by herself), and Master Weller, Griffin was in her head for almost the whole meal.
I can’t believe you’re going to go through with this. You’re going to destroy everything we’ve worked so hard to achieve! And you’re playing right into their hands! They’re manipulating you, and you’re too naïve to realize what’s happening…
Not for the first or last time, she wished she had the ability to discretely respond that he himself was one to talk about manipulators. But she couldn’t, and she had long ago lost hope that she would ever develop the abi
lity. Griffin had gotten himself into a particularly bad mood lately, and though he wasn’t showing it as much as Ava, Lena could tell that all the travel was starting to wear him down. He was tired and moody; he kept watching Lena at all hours of day and night. He was as paranoid as Howard, but it felt like there was something else, too. He wasn’t afraid of losing her the way that Howard was…Griffin was a watch dog. It was his duty to watch her, even if the exhaustion was going to kill him. It was his life, and Lena wasn’t sure if she found his devotion more annoying or intimidating.
Soon, they were back on the road again. There was a lapse in the letters between Costa Rica and Central Mexico, and they covered the miles with surprising speed—they took on a new tactic to cover the distance quickly and started sleeping in shifts so that they wouldn’t have to stop at hotels as frequently. While the situation resulted in smellier and crankier Council Representatives, they were traveling much faster.
They stayed in a large-sized town in Mexico for a couple of days to allow Lena to scope out a few sites of interest, where she located Ben twice more, and then they settled into a hotel room to get a much needed good night's sleep before they planned on crossing the border back into the states the following day. The fact that they were drawing close to home, combined with Lena’s growing status among New Faith Representatives who had been skeptical of her previously, had allowed for some leniency in Lena’s usual guard. Griffin, of course, took as much advantage as he could of the lapse. Before Lena could even protest, he had made himself at home in the sitting area in the corner of her and Ava’s room.