Alight: The Peril

by K. C. Neal

  “We’re going to be . . . stuck with each other.” The amusement evaporated from Ang’s voice. “I don’t know if I can deal with this. I mean, it’s not even that it’s Sophie. It’s the whole idea, being linked to someone that way forever. I feel way too young to have something this huge happening to me, you know?”

  Anxiety stirred through my chest. “I know. Sometimes I feel like if I think about it too much my brain will start whirling like a Tasmanian devil, and then just . . . explode, or something.” I sat up and scooted over so I could rest my back against the wall. “But it’s not like no one’s ever been through this. Maybe we should ask Aunt Dorothy what it’s like. I mean, what it’s really like to be in this situation.”

  “Yeah,” Ang’s voice brightened. “I’d like to hear her story anyway.”

  I squinted, trying to imagine my grandmother and great-aunt as teenagers, new to their pyramidal union. I shook my head. “So, topic change,” I said. “What’s new in the Angeloby department?”

  “Toby is sooo sweet, Corinne!” Ang’s voice took on a cooing tone that made me want to laugh and make barfing noises. “He came by and surprised me last night and took me for ice cream.”

  “Aw, did you get a banana split and share it with two spoons?” I teased.

  “Actually, yeah, that’s exactly what we did,” she said, and we both laughed.

  Ang described the extreme adorableness of the flop of hair across his forehead, and how they’d made out in Toby’s car for, like, twenty minutes. When she’d run out of Toby anecdotes, we said goodnight and hung up.

  Mason came over late that night when I couldn’t sleep and tried to cheer me up with stories from his time in Africa. I laughed in the right places, but couldn’t help thinking about how Ang and Sophie would have the same kind of link I had with Mason. There was something so intimate about being in syndesmo with someone else. With Ang getting involved with Toby and now she’d have such a close connection with Sophie . . . would I get squeezed over to the sidelines of her life? The larger part of me knew that was irrational, but I couldn’t help the anxious little twinges every time I thought of my best friend.

  “You want to talk about Sophie at all?” Mason asked after I’d hardly reacted to his story about his dad losing his watch down one of the wells they’d built.

  “Not really,” I said. “Sorry I’m such a buzz kill right now.”

  “I don’t blame you. It sucks.”

  “I’m sorry about my general state of crankiness, too. I know I haven’t been much fun.”

  “Well, life hasn’t exactly been a Disney vacation lately,” Mason said. “But I understand that better than anyone.”

  I rested my head against the hollow just below his shoulder, his arm warm around my back, and his heartbeat thumping in my ear. My thoughts turned from Sophie to Mason. On the surface, he and I looked like any high school boyfriend and girlfriend, but still, something clouded the space between us. I remembered Mason’s angry words when I’d used the red influence on him. Maybe it was the Sophie thing? It occurred to me that we’d never officially acknowledged any boyfriend/girlfriend status. But I couldn’t think of a way to bring it up without sounding extremely lame.

  It seemed crazy that anything could keep us from being as close and in love as two people could be, like Toby and Ang. Mason and I had years of friendship, hundreds of moments of shared history. Heck, we had a psychic link. And still this space, or hesitation, or whatever it was kept us from falling completely into each other. Maybe it just took time to switch from friends to boyfriend and girlfriend.

  I yawned. Mason’s legs twitched a little, and I realized he’d fallen asleep. I let my eyelids close. After a moment, the world seemed to tilt, and my feet sank into sand. The cove.

  My heart in my throat, I turned in a half circle, vigilant for signs of the fog. Tiny ripples of water lapped against the beach with a sound as soft as a mother’s whispered, “shhh, shhh.” The dark circle of the fire pit stood empty. I doubted I’d ever be able to hang out around the bonfire again without seeing Bradley in the flames, black fog puffing from his lips as he begged me for help.

  Corinne, over here, Mason’s voice whispered through my mind.

  Straining to see in the dark, I scanned the beach.

  Where? I asked, just as a swatch of beautiful aqua light danced a slow twirl across the night sky. By the light of the twilight rainbow, I spotted Mason near a stand of Ponderosa pines about twenty feet to my right.

  As I began walking toward him, the ground beneath my feet changed and softened. Instead of scuffing over fine grains of sand, I pushed my legs through six inches of fluffy, cotton candy-like material. To my right, Tapestry Lake shimmered like gossamer. I looked harder and realized a body of water no longer occupied the space. Instead, the reservoir held an undulating sea of tiny threads that seemed to have their own faint source of illumination.

  “Mason?” I called, my voice cracking with apprehension. “What’s happening?”

  “I don’t know, but I think it’s okay. Just keep walking toward me.”

  With each step, the temperature dropped, and the air took on an almost solid quality, like cold metal against my skin. I drew a sharp breath, half expecting there’d be no air to pull in.

  I finally reached Mason and stopped before him, my teeth chattering so hard I doubted I could form coherent words.

  Is this a dream like last time? Echoes of my fear during the vision of my brother ricocheted through me.

  Yeah, a dream, but real at the same time. But not like last time. His crooked smile reminded me of a little kid who’d been sneaking candy before dinner. He stepped toward me and pulled me to his chest, circling his arms around me. The scent of his soap wafted past. My chattering and shaking subsided to occasional shivers. Mason didn’t even have goose bumps. His breath made opaque white clouds in the frigid air.

  Why is it so stinking cold?

  I think I might be, um, doing this, Mason said.

  What? I pulled back a little and looked up at him, but shadows obscured his eyes.

  Watch.

  I turned, pressing my ear into the warmth of his chest, and looked out at the mass of glowing strands that used to be Tapestry Lake. Twilight rainbows began streaking upward like fireworks.

  Blue . . . red . . . yellow . . . purple . . . Mason named the colors before each one appeared.

  What are you doing? How are you doing it?

  I think this is my dream, and you just got drawn into it.

  I shook my head. That’s just . . . wow. So if you can control what’s going on here, can you maybe make it less cold?

  Yeah, I probably could, but. . . . His arms tightened around me, and a flush spread through my body in spite of the cold. Then his arms loosened a bit, and he leaned back and tilted his head toward mine. I looked into his hazel eyes, and then noticed something looming over his right shoulder.

  “Main and Wild Rose,” I whispered. It was the street sign. The corner where Mason had kissed me last winter, before he left for Africa. “You’re recreating that night, Winter Solstice Fest?”

  He shrugged one shoulder, his eyes shining in the pale light. “Good memory. It was before . . . well, everything.”

  Before I gave him the silent treatment . . . the dreams . . . the pyxis.

  His face inched toward mine, so slowly I thought he’d never close the gap between us. Then his lips finally met mine, and I melted against him. His fingers slid up the back of my neck and tangled in my hair.

  With a snap that left every muscle in my body pinging, I woke in my bed. I pushed myself up to sitting just as Mason did the same. We stared at each other in the nearly dark room. His hand caught mine, and he twined our fingers together. He drew me toward him, and meeting me halfway across the coverlet, he kissed me. When he moved away, he stared earnestly into my eyes.

  “The stuff that happened after winter solstice, when you thought I was with Sophie, when we didn’t talk for months. It changed something for m
e and you, and I hate that,” he said. “Can things be right between us, now?”

  Could it be that simple? I nodded in the dark, and his arms enveloped me in warmth.

  I woke up once in the middle of the night, for a moment absorbed in the glow of Mason’s nearness and the dream or hallucination or whatever it was that we’d shared. But the glow gave way to a knot of worry. It was up to me to get Sophie to agree to come to Aunt Dorothy’s. And even if I could get her there, I couldn’t imagine trying to explain the pyxis, the pyramidal union, and getting her to understand and take it seriously. Even with the power of the pyxis influences.

  Brushing a c-shaped curl of hair from Mason’s forehead, I watched his still face. A second later the curl fell back exactly like it was.

  I needed to practice with the influences some more before I tried them on Sophie, and I imagined my great-aunt would disapprove of practicing on unsuspecting people. That left Mason. Or maybe Ang. I pulled my knees up to my chest, curling myself around the ball of doubt and uncertainty growing within me.

  Two months, Aunt Dorothy had said. We had two months before summer solstice to pull everything together.

  || 6 ||

  THE NEXT EVENING AFTER DINNER, Mason tried to help me with my thought-blocking. We sat cross-legged on the floor of his tree house, facing each other. This time, I imagined my thoughts encased in a vault deep in the earth, cut off from the rest of the world. It worked for about a minute, but holding the mental image required too much concentration.

  “Ugh, I just can’t do it.” I swiped my fingers through my hair.

  “Don’t worry. You’ll get it.” Mason grinned.

  “You,” I narrowed my eyes and pointed at him. “Stop enjoying this so much.”

  He chuckled and grabbed my hand, squeezing it in his.

  Mason walked me home, and after he left, I called Ang. I twirled a strand of hair around my finger.

  “Hey, can you talk?” I said when she answered.

  “Yeah, I’m in my room. Wait, let me shut the door.” I heard some rustling and a muffled click.

  “So are you ready to mind-meld with Sophie Marcelle?” I attempted lightheartedness, but knew I failed.

  “I’m nervous, Corinne,” Ang said.

  “Yeah, I’m nervous about having Sophie in my head, too.”

  “It’s not just that.” Ang hesitated. I bit my bottom lip and pressed my phone harder against my ear. “It’s all of it. I mean, how do I say this? This link thing, like you have with Mason? It’s, like, permanent, right?”

  “I think so.” I chewed at my pinkie nail.

  “I’m going to be linked to Sophie Marcelle forever? I’m just not sure I’m ready for that. For any of this.” Her voice wavered, and I wished we were face-to-face so I could give her a hug.

  “I understand,” I said quietly, and then I waited. The fact was, I doubted I could say anything that really would make any of this easier.

  “I don’t think I get what this is all about, but it seems really scary.” She hesitated again. “And I’ve started having dreams.” Her voice was tiny and far away.

  I sat up on my bed. “You have? About what?”

  “I don’t remember details most of the time, but they’re always about the cove. Sometimes there’s this really gross smell. I know that sounds weird, to be dreaming about a smell.”

  “No, I know exactly what you’re talking about. I’ve had those dreams, too.”

  “Oh. Thank goodness, I’m not crazy.” She heaved a breath that was half sigh, half laugh. “Do you know what it means?”

  How could I explain the dream world to Ang in a way that wouldn’t freak her out even more? I couldn’t just leave her in the dark, though.

  “Well, it’s partly a warning about something bad that’s coming,” I said. “But when you’re having those dreams, your mind is actually going somewhere else. Another world.”

  “Whoa,” Ang said.

  “Yeah, it’s pretty crazy. But Aunt Dorothy will explain it much better, I promise. You know what?” I forced a bright tone and steady voice. “We’ll have time to talk about all this stuff. I know it’s mysterious and scary, but we’re in it together. You and me and Mason, and yes, Sophie Marcelle. And Aunt Dorothy and Mr. Sykes, too. We’re going to figure this out, I promise.”

  “Okay,” she said, and sniffled a couple of times. “What’s it like, anyway? The link, I mean.”

  “Pretty wild. Especially at first. I wanted to jam one of my mom’s knitting needles into my ear and give myself a lobotomy for about the first couple of days. But it gets easier. And once you get used to it, it’s really, really cool. I mean, think about it. We’ll be able to talk to each other using just our minds, Ang.”

  “That is kind of awesome.” She sounded a little brighter. “So did it hurt or anything?”

  “Nah, I was just kind of disoriented and dizzy when I woke up after we first formed the link.”

  “I bet Mason loves being linked with you.”

  I rolled my eyes and felt my cheeks grow warm. I wanted to change the subject, but I took it as a good sign that Ang was teasing me.

  “He totally does; I know it,” she said. I could practically see her grinning.

  “Well, he’s not complaining or anything. But he kind of treats the whole Shield thing like it’s his job.”

  “Good, because if he’s supposed to help you, then I’m glad he’s taking it seriously.”

  “True,” I said. “So, guess what?”

  “What?”

  “Last night, Mason and I were in this dream together, and it was amazing. I don’t know how, but it was almost like we were revisiting Winter Solstice Fest,” I said.

  “And you waited ‘til now to tell me?”

  I described the twilight rainbows, how cute Mason was when he admitted he was manipulating our surroundings, and what he said when we broke out of the dream.

  Ang sighed wistfully. “I wish I could sneak Toby in here.”

  “You do, hm? For what purpose, exactly, Angeline?”

  “I’d just like to have him here.” She was all innocence.

  “Aw, that’s just so precious. Angeloby in love,” I teased.

  “Oh, shut up! And stop with the celebrity couple name.” She giggled, and I could picture her blushing.

  We hung up a few minutes later, and not long after, my phone buzzed with a text from Ang.

  No matter what happens with Sophie, you are my best friend, and I promise that will never change!

  I smiled. I’d need her. Only two days until I had to convince Sophie to join us.

  * * *

  Ang came over to stay at my house the next night, and it required major effort to act like everything was normal. I had to influence Sophie soon—the next day was Saturday—and I was glad I had Ang there for moral support.

  We took Ang’s mom’s car to Aunt Dorothy’s before dinner. Maybe hearing about her experience would reassure me somehow. The three of us settled in the living room, evening sun slanting through the blue and white toile curtains.

  “How well did you know Evelyn and Harold when your union formed?” I asked.

  “Your grandmother knew both of them well,” my great-aunt began. “Being the Pyxis, her relationships with the members of the union influenced who ended up in it. I imagine so, anyway. Evelyn had been her closest friend for three or four years before the union formed.”

  Angeline and I glanced at each other and grinned. Maybe the best friend thing was a common pattern in how unions formed.

  “But,” she continued, “not long before the union formed, Doris and Evelyn had a bit of a falling out.”

  Ang frowned. “What happened?”

  “Doris and Harold were . . . an item,” Aunt Dorothy said. She pursed her lips and unfolded and refolded her hands. “I am not sure it’s entirely appropriate to speak about this to you girls. But . . . well, it was all so long ago.” She cleared her throat and her gaze dropped to a spot in the middle of the floor. She worked t
o restrain a smile. “Harold, well, he had a bit of a wandering eye as a young man. And he had his sights on Evelyn.”

  I snorted a short laugh. “You mean Grandma Doris’s Shield was her cheating boyfriend and one of her Guardians was the girl he cheated with and her former best friend? Oh, my poor grandmother.”

  “Yes, well. We all had some issues to overcome, I suppose.” My great-aunt chuckled, and I laughed with her. Obviously everything had worked out. My grandmother ended up marrying my grandfather, my dad was born, blah, blah, et cetera.

  “How did you handle being linked with Evelyn?” Angeline asked.

  “Oh, it was horrific at first. Being in syndesmo made me extremely dizzy. For the first few days, the vertigo was so bad, I was nauseated all the time.”

  “What about just having someone’s voice in your head? Do you remember how it felt at first? And how quickly it got better?” I said, giving Aunt Dorothy a pointed look.

  “I thought I’d have to commit myself to the loony bin,” she responded. I grimaced and glanced at Ang. Not exactly what I was trying for. “It was terribly disconcerting. I used to sit next to the river for hours. The water thundering down the rapids was loud enough to drown out everything in my head.”

  “How long until it was okay?” Ang sounded so forlorn I wanted to hug her.

  “Less than a month, I would say. Evelyn and I worked out a system. I would turn down her thoughts and she would turn down mine at certain times. It gave us a break, as well as some privacy.”

  I perked up. Would Sophie go for that type of arrangement? It would be so much easier than trying to guard my thoughts from her, which so far I’d proved pretty terrible at doing with Mason.

  “Do you have any advice for us? Anything that can make all of this easier?” I asked.

  “I would not worry too much about getting used to being linked in syndesmo. It will happen in time.” My great-aunt smiled, her eyes crinkling in a rare expression of sympathy. “The bigger challenge is bonding tightly with everyone in the group. You must be able to trust each other. And to do that, you will have to work through some personal issues. I will not say it’s easy. But the very important things in life never are.”