“You mean you would have liked for us to put a hex on her. And we did, by the way,” Maddy said.
“What do you mean you hexed her?” I asked.
“She and Bill broke up, didn’t they?” Maddy said in a matter-of-fact tone.
I thought back about that one. True, Tiff Stone and Bill Connors did break up. They were the golden couple in school, for Tiff was the head cheerleader and Bill Connors was the team captain for the rugby squad. I know, what a cliché, huh? The head cheerleader and the captain of the sports team dating. What a surprise. Then, one day, the two of them just kinda stopped dating. Everyone was surprised, because it was always assumed that these two would keep right on dating, even when they both went to college.
I started to laugh. “Oh, yeah, thanks for that. I do remember how angry she was that Bill dumped her and started dating that Goth chick. Oh, wait, that Goth chick was you, Maddy!” I had a good chuckle about that. Maddy, who at that time was into heavy eyeliner and tattoos, was always somewhat of an outsider in our school. Well, not exactly an outsider, because she did have her fellow Goth friends, but was certainly not part of the in-group. I wasn’t in the in-group either, although I did have some popular friends. As for Sybil, she was an academic and hung out with the smart kids.
“True that,” Sybil said with a smile. Then she looked at Peter. “Peter, it’s good to see you again.”
What is that supposed to mean? “Huh,” I said, looking right at Sybil. “Well, I see that you and Peter need no introduction.” I raised my eyebrows at her and looked over at Maddy. She, too, looked like she knew Peter. Her face registered no surprise at his appearance, and, in fact, she was smiling at him like one smiles at somebody who is known.
“No,” Sybil said. “I know him. Maddy does as well. I guess you’re soon going to find out everything anyhow, so there’s not a reason to hide things from you anymore.”
That rankled. This business about hiding things from me was nonsense. It hurt even more to know that both of my sisters knew things that I didn’t. It would be one thing if Maddy knew stuff and Sybil didn’t, or vice-versa. I probably would be able to handle that. But being the only one in the dark? That really pissed me off.
I looked over at Peter, who seemed to actually shrug. “Lyra, we can’t get too into the weeds here,” he said. I was amazed at how well he knew colloquialisms, considering the fact that the guy was an ancient Scottish nobleman, but, then again, I supposed that he was able to pick up stuff pretty quickly. “We need to get going.”
I sighed. “Again, Peter, I can’t believe that you refuse to listen to me. I have class in the morning, class that I can’t miss. I’ve already missed two days in my 9 o’clock class, and I get exactly two free absences. After that, you have to have a doctor’s excuse or be attending a funeral or something of the sort. In other words, I have to be there. If I’m not there, I’ll flunk the class.” I wanted to strangle his beautiful neck by then. “So, no, I can’t go to Rome tonight. Why don’t we go during Christmas Break?” That would be three months away. Whatever it is that was so important I find out could wait until then.
“There is not an argument,” Peter said. “Now, we have to go.” He wordlessly motioned to Sybil and Maddy, who both nodded their heads.
“Are we taking the closet?” Maddy asked.
“Yes, of course,mate” Peter said. “There’s not time to go the conventional way.”
Sybil shook her head. “I know, but we’re soon going to go over our quota for the year. You know that we can only go that way three times in a calendar year. This’ll be our second time.”
“There’s no choice,” Peter said. “There’s another three months left in this year, so hopefully we won’t need to go this way too many more times. If we need to see Rhiannon, we can always take a commercial flight.” Then he shuddered. “As much as I hate that idea.” He smiled at me. “In my Hell, I’m perpetually sitting in a coach flight. Needless to say, it’s a problem for me.” He gestured to his body, implying that he had issues with a coach flight because he was so tall. “Thankfully, I usually travel First-Class.”
I looked from one person to another, feeling completely lost. “Okay, what does this mean, take the closet? Does that have anything in common with being in the closet? Because if that’s the case, none of us fit that bill, including Jordan.” That made no sense, considering all of us, except for Jordan, was straight, but that was the only lame joke that came into my mind at that time.
“No,” Sybil said, rolling her eyes. Then she looked at Maddy, who was yanking on her sleeve. “I know, I know, I have to have some patience,” she said. “I can just imagine how disoriented Lyra is feeling. But she’s driving me crazy right now.”
“Hey,” I said, waving my hands in front of Sybil’s face. “I’m right here. Perhaps you didn’t notice that, but I’m right here, listening to every word you are saying.”
“Good,” Sybil said. “If I could cast a spell on you to make you stop being such a pain in the ass, I would, believe me. But I can’t. I can’t because you are apparently more powerful than me.” She rolled her eyes. “If you ask me, that’s total bullshit. I have no idea why you get to have all the fun.”
“Hey,” Maddy said. “We have fun, too. I get to see into the future and you get to see dead people. Both of us can cast spells and heal people.”
“A fine power you have,” Sybil said. “You get to see the future, but you can’t change anything about it. What good is that?” Then she looked at me. “Yet Lyra can change the future. Again, that’s bullshit, if you ask me.”
Maddy looked at me, because she could see that I was just standing there, watching them with my mouth open. What’s all this? Sybil is a medium and Maddy can see into the future? What else could they do? If they were healers, why couldn’t they heal our father, who died of cancer when we were just young girls?
I sighed as I realized that our father didn’t die. It was our adoptive father, although I didn’t know any better. They did, however. They probably always knew that Ruthann wasn’t really our mother, and Michael, who was her husband, wasn’t really our father. Apparently our mother is a powerful witch named for a Celtic Goddess, who lived in Rome. Who was our father, though? I could just imagine.
“I know,” Maddy said. “Seeing into the future is really a curse more than it is a gift. You’re right, I can’t change anything. Whatever is to happen in the future is what is supposed to happen. But I can try to make people prepared. I can at least do that. So, that’s something.”
“Why can’t you change anything?” I asked Maddy.
“Because, you should know well enough that the future is unchangeable. If you try to monkey around with future events, you’re going to cause a whole chain reaction that will alter a bunch of different events. And whatever is supposed to happen, that is prevented, will just happen anyhow. You cannot change fate.” Then she paused. “As for why you have the power to change the future, again, that’s not really explainable. I’m hopeful that one day I can be given that same power, once I prove that I can handle it.”
“So, why are you able to see the future if you can’t change anything?” I asked her.
Maddy shrugged. “I’ve often wondered about that one myself.” Then she motioned to Jordan, who was fast asleep on the couch. “But let me give you an example of what I can do. Let’s just say that Jordan here is going to have his car break down in the desert. I can’t change the fact that his car will break down, but I can make sure that he has plenty of water in his car and enough food for several days. That way he can stay hydrated and fed while he waits for help to arrive. I can also make sure that he carries a flare and maybe something to ignite a tire so that he can signal for help.”
“Isn’t that affecting events?” I asked Maddy. “Perhaps, if you didn’t tell Jordan to do all of that, he was supposed to do other things. Maybe he was supposed to die out there in the desert, because he doesn’t have food and water. What then? Aren’t you affecting eve
nts?”
Maddy shuddered just a little when I said that. “No,” she simply said, although I could tell, just by looking at her face, that she hadn’t yet thought of that particular angle. “Anyhow, let’s get going.” She looked at the clock. “It’s now 11 PM. Your class is at 10 tomorrow, so time is wasting.”
I shook my head. I had no idea what was about to happen, but I did know one thing – it was going to be weird. So far, everything that had happened in the past 24 hours or so had been weird. There was no indication that this would be any different.
10
Sybil led me, Peter and Maddy back to her room. “Okay,” she said. “Now, everyone hold hands. I don’t want to lose any of you, of course. Especially you, Lyra. I don’t think that you would be able to find your way out at this point.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I said to Sybil. I was suddenly fearful. Was I going to be put into another enclosed space? It was bad enough having the four of us in this cramped closet. I was already starting to feel my heart pound. But, apparently, we were all going to be doing something, and Sybil was talking about losing me.
“Just make sure that you don’t let go of my hand,” she said, and then she motioned to Maddy. “You hold her other hand. Peter, you take Maddy’s hand. I’m not worried about you, Peter, because if something happens, and we lose you, I know that you know how to get out. You’re an old pro at this, even more than I am.”
“Old pro at what?” I asked Maddy.
“You’ll see. I can’t explain this. You just have to experience it.”
I sighed. This whole business about not telling me stuff was starting to get on my last nerve. “I expected that,” I said. “You guys can’t just tell me what is going to happen. I just have to let it happen and then deal with it, right?”
“Right,” Sybil said. And then she picked up an ivory nightstick that she kept in her closet and waved it around. She said something in Latin – Sybil knew Latin? – and I closed my eyes tightly. I had no idea why I closed my eyes that way, I only knew that it was some kind a reflex. I knew that something dramatic was about to happen, but…
I couldn’t quite be prepared for exactly what happened. All at once, we were in a tunnel that was lit up in rainbow colors. Dolphins were swimming above our heads, and schools of fish were swimming too. They all seemed to be going in fast-motion – like playing a 16 record on a 78 speed. The scene in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - where everybody is going on that boat and Willy Wonka is singing while everything happens in fast motion and in vivid color – ran through my brain. I heard a high-pitched squealing noise, and I wanted to cover my ears, but I couldn’t, because I had to keep ahold of Sybil and Maddy’s hands. I held tightly, because I had no idea what was going on, and the whole thing was freaking me out.
I shouted to Maddy, but she couldn’t hear me. It sounded like a freight train was rushing through this tunnel. Up above me, I saw sea life, and the occasional ship. We started moving faster and faster and I felt like I was going to puke.
“Hang on,” Maddy said, as the scenery seemed to change. We no longer looked like we were in a tunnel that was moving through the sea, but I started to see the sky and I looked below me, and it looked like there was land. It didn’t quite look like you would see out of the window of an airplane, though – it was more like everything was going a million miles per hour below us. If ever I had a tendency to get air sick, that would have been the time.
Then, all at once, we were someplace else. I looked around, and it looked like we were in some kind of enormous temple. Above us, on the ceiling, were elaborate and colorful paintings. But they didn’t exactly seem like religious paintings. I mean, they were somewhat religious, but I saw no signs of Jesus and Mary and God and all of those other kinds of characters from the Bible. Rather, the paintings were of ancient looking women and men. The men were handsome and young and wore white tunics, while the women were also young and they wore white flowing fitted dresses. The women were busy gathering water and pouring it, and some of them looked like they were laying hands on young children. Others looked like they were gathering food in enormous baskets. I had seen paintings like these, at least it seemed like I had seen them in my dreams – perhaps these were the paintings that were in temples that were built for ancient gods.
“Where are we?” Was I dreaming again? This whole thing seemed like a dream – rushing through that tunnel that seemed to pass, at lightning speed, under the sea, and now ending up here in this temple. All around us were arches and lights and trees that seemed to grow right up through the floor. This place looked ancient to me, from the stained-glass windows that reflected blue and green light onto the floor, to the enormous stone altar that was at the head of this space. I looked around, half expecting to hear the chanting of monks, because, as I thought about it, that was what this place really looked like – a monastery.
I blinked my eyes, though, as I looked up at one of the paintings. A young girl with flowing red hair was playfully flying through the air. She was holding hands with another young girl, who was also a red-head, and….
I shook my head. I had seen doppelgängers, but nothing quite like this.
“Hey,” I said to Sybil, who was standing next to me. “Do you remember seeing that picture of that Civil War guy who looked exactly like Nicholas Cage?” That was a viral photo that had been on my Yahoo page several different times – it was that of a young guy who lived in the 1800s, and his face was exactly that of Nicholas Cage. He even had Nicholas Cage’s expressions down pat. After I saw that uncanny photo, I saw other ones as well – including men through the years who looked exactly like John Travolta and Matthew McConaughey, and there was even an actress who bore an uncanny resemble to Jennifer Lawrence.
Sybil gave me a strange look. “Lyra, I know what you’re thinking…”
“Yeah. You’re damned right.” I squinted at the picture of those two young maidens again and shook my head. Those two young girls looked exactly, and I mean exactly, like Sybil and me. I looked around the room seeing if I could also see Maddy, but I didn’t see anyone who resembled her exactly.
Sybil sighed. “Where is mother? She said that she would meet us here right at…” She looked at her watch. “6 AM Rome time. That would mean that it is midnight in New York City. This is the time that she told us to meet her.”
I started to feel annoyed again. “How are you calling this Rhiannon woman mother? I’ve never met her in my life, so she’s not mother to me. She’s the woman who abandoned me, apparently. I just don’t understand that, either. Why didn’t Ruthann tell us that we were adopted? Or maybe only I’m adopted.” I raised my eyebrows at her and crossed my arms. That would explain everything – Sybil and Maddy were witches, and they excluded me because I was the lowly adopted sibling that they wanted nothing to do with.
Except that theory didn’t really fit. After all, we were all close, and always had been. But I couldn’t think of any other reason why they would exclude me from their fun and games. My being adopted, while they were Ruthann’s natural children, was the only scenario that fit for me.
Sybil was looking annoyed, and she rolled her eyes and looked over at Peter. Peter had his amused expression on his face again, and he smiled broadly, looked back at Sybil, and shook his head. I know, I’ve been dealing with her for an entire day, his eyes seemed to say.
Maddy, for her part, was standing to the side, looking bored. It was obvious that she had been here before, because she wasn’t in the least bit fascinated nor interested in looking around. Everything around me was a revelation, and all I wanted to do was to explore and look at every little detail on the altar, and look up at the paintings to get a closer look, and go and try to look out the stained-glass windows. The fact that there was a tree growing up in the middle of the floor, and that there were birds who seemed to be nesting in these trees, was a wonder to me.
Just then I heard soft music start to play. It sounded new agey, like one of those CDs you bu
y when you want to try to relax or fall asleep. The music was a soft flute, and, in the background, I could hear a waterfall. It was then that I noticed that I couldn’t just hear the waterfall, but there was an actual waterfall that seemed to spring up in the back of the temple. The water rushed over rocks, and there was suddenly green grass that resembled a meadow. I could smell the grass and the flowers that also seemed to spring up out of nowhere. The flowers smelled like lavender and lilacs, which happened to be some of my favorite scents in the world.
“It’s about time,” Maddy said under her breath as she looked at the waterfall scene.
“I know,” Sybil said. “You’d think that she would try to be on time for once in her life.”
Maddy started to laugh. “Well, we’ve been around her, on and off, for three thousand years, and we haven’t yet known her to be on time for anything. I don’t see why we think that she’s going to change.”
What’s that supposed to mean, they’ve been around her for three thousand years? On and off? What the hell?
“I guess next time we do this, we’ll just have to be late too. Make her wait. Of course, you know what happens then,” Sybil said with a laugh.
“Don’t I know it,” Maddy said, and then said, in a mocking voice “Where are you girls? You can’t keep me waiting like that.”
“Isn’t that how it always is with perpetually tardy people?” Sybil said. “They can be late every time, but if you keep them waiting, there’s hell to pay.”
“I’m right here,” I heard a voice say, and then I saw her, literally floating about ten feet above the floor. She didn’t look at day over 20 herself, and she was absolutely gorgeous. Red hair, pale skin, enormous blue eyes, a tiny nose and rosebud lips. Her hair was wavy and thick, and her body was in perfect proportions. Tiny waist, full breasts that were nonetheless youthful and perky, and long legs. She looked like the stereotype goddess that you see in Renaissance paintings – like Venus coming out of the half-shell, maybe, or maybe the paintings of Helen of Troy. She was wearing a long white dress that was cinched at the waist with a colorful sash.
Lyra's Magic: Witches of Manhattan Book One Page 6