Alight: The Peril

by K. C. Neal

  “Wait, the dream world?” Sophie’s fear intensified and her eyes looked a little wild. “We’re not stuck here, are we? How do we get back?”

  “It’s okay. All we have to do is wake up in the regular world.”

  “But . . . I don’t know how! I’m awake here. How do I wake myself up there? This feels like my real body. What do I do?” She started breathing in short, shallow gasps. I laid a hand on her arm.

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’ll wake myself up, and then Mason, Ang, and I will wake you up. Just make sure Harriet doesn’t try anything. If she looks like she’s coming to, smack her with the book again. Only . . . don’t, like, kill her or anything. It’s going to be okay, Sophie.”

  Sophie looked down at Harriet with loathing that I knew all too well.

  I winked out of the hypercosmic realm and bolted upright in the waking world. Ang and Mason had been leaning over me, and they both jumped back. I scrambled to my feet.

  “We need to wake Sophie. She’s okay. She just doesn’t know how to wake herself up from the dream world.”

  “She’s in the dream world?” Ang’s eyes were wide.

  “Ang, try her phone.” I started pounding on the glass door. “Sophie! Wake up!”

  Mason joined me, hitting the door with his fist, and Ang pulled out her phone.

  After an excruciating minute, Sophie emerged from the back office and made her way a bit unsteadily to the shop’s door. She held a ring of keys, and she tried several until she found one that worked the lock.

  Mason, Ang, and I crowded through the doorway.

  Ang threw her arms around Sophie. “We were scared to death!”

  I headed to the back room with Mason on my heels. Harriet lay heaped on the floor like a sack of potatoes. Her mouth lolled open, and her eyelids parted to show slits of white. I drew back a little. Serious creep fest.

  “What the heck are we supposed to do with her?” I said.

  Mason regarded Harriet warily. “How ‘bout we call Aunt Dorothy and see what she thinks?”

  I dug my phone out of the pocket of my hoodie. It hadn’t even occurred to me to talk to Aunt Dorothy about all of this. I’d been amped up with panic, and there hadn’t exactly been much time to chat with anyone.

  Mason knelt on the floor and held the back of his hand near Harriet’s nose. Then he picked up her hand with his thumb and forefinger. “Breathing and pulse seem okay.”

  My great-aunt picked up on the first ring. I gave her a quick run-down of the situation.

  “What do we do with her? I mean, I don’t want her to die or anything, but I’m not going to hang around if she’s going to attack me again.”

  “She cannot hurt you now. She will be very weak when she wakes up, and will remain so for days or even weeks,” Aunt Dorothy said. “You said there’s a cot there?”

  “Yeah.” In addition to the cot, there was a mini fridge, a small shelf with a few dishes and some flatware, and a refrigerated water dispenser. It was almost like a little apartment. The thought of anyone sleeping and eating here sent icy fingers walking up and down my spine.

  “Move her to the cot, then go home,” Aunt Dorothy instructed. “I will make sure she is taken care of.”

  “You’re not going to . . .” What did she mean by “take care” of Harriet?

  “Do not be ridiculous, my dear.” Aunt Dorothy made a disapproving sound. “What I mean to say is that I will make sure she is okay and gets medical attention if she requires it.”

  “Oh! Right.” My great-aunt wasn’t a murderer. Duh.

  “Let’s move her to the cot. Aunt Dorothy said we should go, and she’ll make sure everything’s okay with Harriet,” I said to Mason.

  “Don’t you think we should stay? In case she wakes up and tries to go all nutballs? I don’t want Aunt Dorothy to get hurt.”

  I shook my head. “She said Harriet will be really weak now.”

  “Wish we could just do something with her so she can’t pull anything like this again,” Mason muttered. He stood with his hands on his hips, frowning down at Harriet. “Is it illegal to keep someone doped up on sleeping pills? I mean, I’m not serious, of course. I just want to do something so she’s not dangerous anymore.”

  “Yeah, I know.” I sighed. The rush of adrenaline was long past, and my limbs were dead weights. “We better get out of here.”

  Mason slid his hands under Harriet’s shoulders, and I lifted her feet. I hated touching her, even through her olive green pants. I had to keep reminding myself she wasn’t going to wake up and attack me. But if her eyelids popped open, I’d probably run screaming from the room.

  We joined Ang and Sophie on the landing outside the shop’s door. Sophie wore Ang’s jacket, her arms wrapped tightly around her body. She looked pale.

  “If she tries that again, I’m taking her down. I don’t care if she’s an old lady!” Sophie sounded confident, but she kept nervously glancing into the shop.

  “She won’t be bothering us. Not for a while, at least,” I said. I repeated my conversation with Aunt Dorothy for Ang and Sophie’s benefit.

  Mason’s face pinched with concern as he tilted his head to look down at Sophie. “How did this happen?”

  “Can we get out of here first?” Sophie hugged herself tighter.

  The four of us turned toward the dark staircase, Sophie in the lead. Ang touched my arm and paused, holding me back a couple of steps. She dipped her chin and leaned toward me, her blonde hair swinging forward. “Sophie’s pretty freaked out,” she whispered. “She wouldn’t go back in there.”

  I nodded. Sophie’s anxiety poured through our link. I couldn’t read her exact thoughts, but they were jumping around like crazy.

  Ang drove us back to my house, and she, Mason, and I formed a protective little group around Sophie as we walked up the driveway. We didn’t say much, but we all kept shooting vigilant looks up and down the street.

  Down in my room, Mason settled on the chair of purple velvetiness, and the girls and I sat in a row on my bed. Sophie pulled a decorative lavender silk pillow onto her lap.

  “Okay, how did all of this happen?” Mason asked. He leaned forward, his elbows resting on his knees, and watched Sophie with a worried, unblinking gaze.

  Sophie picked at a loose thread on the edge of the pillow and drew a deep breath. “I drove home from school and went in the house. My aunt is always paranoid about weirdoes pulling off the highway and, I don’t know, ransacking our house or something. She insists we always keep the doors locked. Usually, I do lock the door when I come in, but I had dance team stuff in my car and I wanted to bring it in. So I dumped my bag on the sofa. I heard the door open, but before I could turn around everything just went all . . . slack and foggy.” She paused and bit her lip.

  “Did you pass out?” I asked.

  “No, I was conscious, just. . . . It’s hard to explain. Remember that hypnotist at Summer Solstice Carnival when we were in sixth grade? It was a little like that, but not fun at all. I felt like I was under her spell. She made me get in her car.” Sophie frowned and her foot started jiggling like crazy. “I was in the backseat and the windows were tinted, so I’m sure no one saw me. She took me to her shop and made me lay down in that room. I was totally . . . powerless. I couldn’t move, and I didn’t even want to.” Her frown clouded to anger, and for a moment I thought she might start crying.

  “She did the same thing to me,” I said, my voice soft. “I know exactly what you mean. All I cared about was whatever she wanted me to do next. It was . . . horrible.” I shuddered at the memory.

  If she ever tries anything on me again, I’ll do way worse than a book to the head, Sophie said. Her words were fierce, but her fear swept through our link so strongly that for a second it felt like my own.

  I’ll do everything I can to make sure she doesn’t, I said to her. A mixture of guilt and sympathy flowed through me. I should have realized sooner that Sophie needed me, before Harriet had dragged her away.

 
“Did she do anything to you while you were there?” Mason asked.

  Sophie shook her head. “Just kept me helpless.”

  I cringed and Ang shivered.

  “There’s, um, something else,” Sophie said. She cleared her throat and her eyes met mine, then she looked down at the pillow in her lap. “I think she took over my link with you. She wasn’t just controlling me, she was in my mind. She called me her Guardian.”

  Mason looked as grim as I felt. “She’s trying to form her own pyramidal union, isn’t she?” I said.

  || 16 ||

  “DOES THAT MEAN HARRIET is going to try to take me and Mason, too?” Ang’s voice wavered on the verge of tears.

  “I wish I knew,” I said. I rubbed my temples with the tips of my fingers. Now that the excitement had faded, a worry headache bloomed behind my eyes.

  Sophie straightened. “We need to do something. A plan.”

  I glanced at Mason, hoping he’d pull something brilliant out of the air.

  He ran his fingers through his wavy hair. “For starters, we need to keep an eye on each other. Check in. Don’t go anywhere alone.”

  “Yeah, if any of you need a ride somewhere, just call me. Usually, I can get my mom’s car,” Ang said.

  “Ugh, this sucks,” I groaned. “I don’t want you guys to be worried and paranoid. I’ll try to come up with something, I promise.”

  We made a schedule for checking in with each other and letting everyone know where we’d be and when. Sophie protested, saying she didn’t want to have to answer to the rest of us, but she couldn’t come up with a better idea.

  Unease churned through me as my friends went their separate ways. I dead-bolted the front door behind them.

  * * *

  I spent the rest of the week constantly looking over my shoulder, wary of the possibility of another attack by Harriet. Before I fell asleep each night, I formed the image of the white pyxis bottle in my mind and shared it through our link. Mason said he was sure that if that image got disturbed, he’d notice. We figured if Harriet tried to influence me, the white bottle would disappear from my mind, and then—we hoped—that would alert Mason. We couldn’t figure out an alert for Harriet influencing him or one of the Guardians. But we banked on the fact that I could save them from Harriet’s influence, while they couldn’t save me. And I couldn’t count on Zane being there if it happened again.

  I reported the whole Sophie and Harriet incident on the website. On Thursday, Ione came through with a bit more false Pyxis history. She posted on the message board:

  My aunt says a false Pyxis usually has to hibernate for a time between attacks. Not only is she not as strong as the true Pyxis, it takes a lot more out of her when she uses the influences. She thinks a couple of us working together may be able to contain her, but it isn’t clear to me yet how we’d do that. More soon . . .

  Well, that wasn’t exactly a breakthrough.

  We had another drill session at the cove on Saturday. I shuttled Mason, Mr. Sykes, and Aunt Dorothy in my great-aunt’s old Buick. I looked up at the overcast sky as we crunched down the dirt road toward the beach, hoping the threat of rain in the air would hold off ‘til the afternoon.

  The beach was quiet and the picnic tables deserted. I set my bag on one of the tables and pulled out my phone. It was a quarter after nine. Ang was supposed to meet us here with Sophie, and it wasn’t like Ang to be late. A ripple of unease passed through me as I wondered for a moment if Harriet had reemerged and found one or both of the Guardians. I tuned into the background chatter of the two Guardians’ in my head, but didn’t detect anything amiss.

  Ang? Everything okay with you?

  I’m fine. I can’t find Sophie, though. She’s not home, not answering her phone. And she’s not responding to me through our link. I’m pretty sure she’s okay, but I don’t know how to find her. I don’t know what else to do. I’m almost at the cove.

  I frowned and relayed Ang’s message to the others, and they watched me expectantly for further news. I wasn’t worried yet. I could feel Sophie’s presence through our link, and as far as I could tell, she was relatively okay.

  My phone chimed and I saw Sophie’s name on the caller ID.

  “Are you all right?” I said by way of greeting. I wasn’t going to get irritated about her tardiness until I made sure she was unharmed.

  “Corinne, I’m stuck in Danton,” she said.

  “Danton? You knew about the drill. What are you doing that’s so important?”

  “I know, but I’m um . . . just busy with something and I can’t get away.”

  “So you’re saying you’re not going to make it?” I didn’t bother masking my accusation.

  “I don’t know. I’ll get there when I can.”

  “Fine,” I said, and hung up on her.

  Ang pulled up and jumped out of the car, and my phone rang again. My mom.

  “Hi, what’s up?” I said.

  “It’s Bradley. He’s sick.” She sounded worried, but not panicked. It didn’t stop my heart from taking off at a gallop as the vision of Brad in the hospital bed, black fog puffing from his mouth, burst unwanted into my mind. My stomach began to weave itself into a knot, and I pushed the image away.

  “What’s wrong with him?” My fingers tightening around my phone, I met Aunt Dorothy’s eyes.

  “He’s got a fever, and his stomach hurts. I’m taking him to the clinic to make sure it’s not his appendix. I think it’s probably just an ordinary bug, but I’m going to take him in to be sure.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Keep me posted and tell Brad I hope he’s feeling better soon. If he wants anything from the café, text me, and I’ll pick it up.” My brother and I weren’t as close as we used to be, but since his illness, I’d always been ready to jump in to take care of him, even if he just had a cold.

  I told the others that Sophie was in Danton and didn’t know when she’d get here. We waited a half hour for her to show up, and finally Aunt Dorothy decided we should get started without her.

  I frowned at my great-aunt. “How can we do a drill without Sophie?”

  “Angeline can try casting a net using the one that blankets the meadow.” She tilted her head and considered the meadow for a moment, then turned to Ang. “Find an edge that Sophie created, and begin your weave there. Sophie’s edge will anchor your net. It is nowhere near as strong as one created by the two of you, and this is not a technique you should ever use in a non-drill situation, but I think it will do for now.”

  I had no idea how Ang could cast a net by herself, but she didn’t seem to think it would cause her any problems.

  Aunt Dorothy gave me, Mason, and Ang each a drop of the neon green liquid, and lit a flame beneath the grooved piece of wood. We all took our positions around the meadow. Mason and I stood, side by side, facing the forest. Adrenaline coursed through me as I tried to imagine what nightmare this drill would unleash.

  I searched the trees for telltale tendrils of fog, and sniffed the air for the spoiled, burnt smell. A few moments passed and nothing emerged or changed.

  “You think something went wrong with the drill?” I asked Mason.

  “I don’t know.” He kept his eyes on the forest, and his voice was wary. Then he tensed. “Who the heck is that?”

  I followed his gaze and watched as a guy around our age wove his way through the low brush, working his way toward us.

  “Hello?” I called, and took a step forward. I looked over my shoulder at Mason. “Does he look familiar?”

  “Corinne—”

  Mason’s warning came too late. I watched as the stranger raised his hand, and a flash of cool blue lightening streaked through the air, too fast for my eyes to follow. Before I could even turn my head, Mason cried out and collapsed.

  “Mason!” I crouched over him as he writhed in agony.

  Don’t touch me! he said. Whatever that was, it sucked everything out of me. Watch him!

  My frantic gaze met the stranger’s, who hadn’t
moved from the edge of the meadow. I hesitated, torn between trying to restore Mason’s power and searching for a way to disarm the guy.

  I’m rolling the net into a tube and aiming it at him, Ang said. Her energy was tense, but admirably calm.

  In a flash, the gossamer net coiled over itself. It wasn’t the perfect funnel the Guardians had created together last time, but it was all we had to work with. I gathered influences, with no time to try to attenuate a blend with any precision, and let them fly down the center of the coiled net.

  Nothing happened. Who was this intruder? Instead of trying more influences, I reached out and began to search the stranger’s mind. Within seconds, I realized that no mind existed within this human-looking form. I pressed my awareness into a mass as black as the fog. In fact, I was pretty sure the guy was somehow made of fog. I reached deeper, searching for the core as I had before.

  Just as I located the pulsating, putrid center, another zap of blue lightening raced past me. But this time, it targeted Ang. Panicked, I gathered influences in full force and hurled them at the core of the fog within the stranger, praying it was enough.

  I whipped my head around to see if Ang was okay, and watched as she stumbled backward several steps, half turned, and nearly regained her balance before tripping over a tree root and smacking her head against the base of a Ponderosa pine. She crumpled into an unmoving heap.

  “Angeline!” I screamed and raced toward her. I rolled her over so I could see her face. An angry red scrape marred one cheekbone, and her eyelids were half closed, her eyes rolled back in her head. I brushed blonde strands of hair from her forehead. “Angeline? Can you hear me?”

  Aunt Dorothy knelt beside me and folded a handful of blooms into my best friend’s limp hand, holding it in a fist, and a few seconds later, Ang’s eyelids fluttered open.

  “Poor thing.” Aunt Dorothy tsked. “Going to have a bit of a headache.”

  Worry swelled my throat with the pressure of tears, and I pulled Ang to me as she tried to sit up. I sat on the ground next to her and slipped my arm around her shoulders.