L.O.S.T. Trilogy Box Set

by R. S. Collins

  “Center yourself.” Even at arm’s length from him, I could feel his unfocused energy, leaping like toads from his mind. “Draw your thoughts together, and—”

  “I can’t, okay?” Bren’s voice was hard, and his gaze was suddenly furious. “I have problems with focusing. It’s called ADHD. At home, I’ve got medicine. But here, it’s just going to be a problem.”

  “But if you try—”

  “It’s not about trying!” Bren whirled and grabbed my arms, startling me so badly that I almost hexed him into a snail. “If all I had to do was try to pay attention and concentrate, don’t you think I’d do it? You think I like making rotten grades, pissing my dad off constantly, losing everything I own—or having to work four times as hard as other kids to learn anything? Would that be fun to you, Jazz? Something you’d do on purpose?”

  I stood still as a piece of rock in Bren’s grasp. His eyes were wide and shining with pain. He seemed to want me to speak, but words failed me.

  As my nervousness increased, the dirt on his shoes seemed to grow larger and more threatening. I started to shake, worrying that if it touched me, that if flakes of the filth actually made contact with my skin, something awful would happen. I didn’t know what, but something. My eyes kept darting to the dirt, no matter how hard I tried to keep them on Bren’s face.

  His mouth twitched.

  I jumped and zapped his boots.

  Just a little. Just enough to rid them of the dangerous dirt.

  Instantly, the knot in my stomach turned loose, and that feeling of impending doom receded.

  Bren glanced at his clean boots, then stared into my face. I felt my cheeks heating up beneath his scrutiny.

  “The dirt.” He shook his head. “I was trying to talk to you, and you—the dirt. Everything has to be perfect, doesn’t it? In order, no flaws, just right, or it freaks you out. You can’t stand anything that doesn’t meet your little mark in the sky.” With a snort of disgust, he let me go and strode toward the window. “You’re just like my father.”

  I stared at Bren’s stiff back, and I wanted to go to him. My feet tried to move, but shame held me back like hot iron hands. My skin was on fire, and all I could do was quietly use my magic to remove the bar from the door, hang my head, and slip out of the drawing room.

  For a few days, Bren and I spoke without really speaking, about the weather and training sessions and whether or not all hags were ugly. Sometimes, when he looked at me, I sensed even more intense emotions roiling out of him. Was it confusion, perhaps? Anger more likely, perhaps even hatred.

  I could scarcely blame him. After all, I had wrecked his life, and he knew about me—my weaknesses, and my failures, and my…problem with dirt.

  By now, he had sensed the real truth, that I was not a fit partner in the battle with Nire, and that we were certain to fail in our quest.

  Because of me.

  With Rol’s help, I tried to teach Bren simple spellwork, but as he had warned, he had terrible difficulty keeping his mind on the task. Even after several days we were still where we began—lifting the wooden bar. A toddler’s game.

  I didn’t wish to widen the chasm between Bren and me. And so at dinner, when he asked me to clarify how time passes in the Sanctuaries, I nearly choked on a mushroom in my soup.

  Rol looked uncomfortable as well, but the training master kept his large hands on his leg of mutton and his eyes on his plate.

  “Well?” Bren’s gaze was suddenly intense. “If we defeat Nire, can you drop me back in the parking lot—with Mom’s truck—the same day you took me? You know, go out of the Sanctuary and back in at the beginning?”

  My food stuck in my throat as I swallowed. I took a slow drink of ale and tried not to notice the crumbs all over the dining table. Dozens of answers and apologies rushed through my thoughts, but all I could manage was, “No.”

  Rol coughed. I glared at him, and he returned his attention to the mutton.

  Bren put his silverware down. He looked angry again. “Why not?”

  My stomach started to hurt. How could I explain everything to him and make him understand? “Because…it doesn’t work that way. I can’t go back in time.”

  Bren smiled as if he thought I was kidding, then slowly frowned. “You trot back and forth between times every day. And how else did we end up here, two thousand years away from where we started?”

  “It’s true that I can move across time on the Path, from location to location.” The ache in my stomach turned into knifelike pains, spreading to my chest. I closed my eyes. The crumbs were overwhelming me. I opened my eyes again and forced myself to meet his gaze. “But, time is always passing. Yesterday is yesterday, in your time, or this time, or any other.”

  “I don’t get it.” Bren’s deepening frown clearly communicated his belief that I was holding back the truth.

  “You have my apologies.” I tried to sound sure of myself, but my voice was hushed. Ashamed. No wonder he didn’t believe me. “When you return home, it will be on whatever day we complete our task. A month, two months—the time will have passed, here in Shallym, and in L.O.S.T., too.”

  “That’s just great.” Bren shoved his plate away.

  I flinched.

  Rol turned his eyes to me, waiting for me to react.

  By the Goddess. One minute Rol adores me, the next he waits for me to blunder! It’s maddening. Well, if he’s so certain I’ll show my ire, why disappoint him?

  I stood. With a flourish of my aching fingers, I blasted the crumbs from the table.

  Bren sat like a post, his frown glued to his face. I thought about blasting it from his lips, but I didn’t want to hurt him. Besides, I had vowed that I wouldn’t cause harm to the Shadowalker.

  Not that he would give me the same consideration.

  I turned and fled toward the drawing room. My footsteps echoed as I ran, but I didn’t care. I had no place at that table, with those people. I had no place left anywhere, in any world, and the only one I could blame for that was myself.

  It was early that same afternoon, and the sunlight held a particularly gray cast as Bren failed once more. How could he have breached the Path so easily, yet fail at every minor enchantment?

  “Try the bar movement again.” I gestured to the closed door, wishing Rol would hurry back from the smithy. “Put the force of your thought behind it this time. Moving natural objects is basic—our simplest option.”

  Bren glared at me before turning his angry eyes toward the door. He put his hands on his temples, pressing as he closed his eyes. Even with such an effort toward focus, his feet moved against the leather of his boots.

  Seconds passed.

  Bren’s skin took on a silvery sheen, and my hopes rose. Whatever his power, perhaps he could use it productively.

  More seconds passed.

  My hopes fluttered back to resting position and became still, like the bar on the other side of the drawing room door.

  “This is stupid.” Bren’s eyes flew open. “I’ll just fight with my sword. I’m better at that kind of stuff.”

  I sighed. “No doubt because this kind of stuff is what I want you to do.”

  “Do you still think I’m screwing this up on purpose?” Bren wheeled around and lunged toward me, stopping only a few feet away. “Failure’s always deliberate, right? No mistakes allowed. No flaws, no imperfections.”

  Images of Mother berating Father for every mistake he made flashed through my mind. More images followed, of myself blaming Father for dying and speaking angrily to his memory.

  No!

  Heat rose to my cheeks. “I never should have told you about my problem. Why not shout it from the rooftops to be certain I’m properly humiliated by my shortcomings?”

  Bren hesitated, then smirked. “Now that’s a thought. You’re working hard to make sure I’m humiliated by mine.”

  “I am not.” I straightened myself, outraged. “I merely want you to give the task proper effort.”

  His smirk faltered
a bit. “You don’t listen to me. You don’t even listen to yourself, I swear. I’ve tried to explain about my attention problems, but you just won’t hear me. I guess selective hearing goes along with your dirt thing.”

  Once more, my face filled with fire. “If I must be reminded of that fault every five minutes, what does it matter if I push you to do better with your spells training?”

  “Crap!” Bren clenched his hands and bounced up and down as though he wished to hit me. A full sheen of silver covered him. “Don’t you get it? I can’t. If I could just point at that bar and zap it, I would!” He jabbed a finger toward the door—and I heard the bar rattle. Something shattered, there was a loud thump, and someone swore.

  Rol.

  Bren blinked as the training master pushed the door open, holding the wooden bar in his large hands.

  “Very good,” Rol murmured. “Though I fear one of the royal urns has been eliminated.”

  “I didn’t do that.” Bren shook his head, his hair flopping into his eyes.

  “Yes, you did.” My cheeks were slowly returning to normal temperature. The bare drawing room seemed brighter, and I realized my heart was beating rapidly. “Perhaps overdid it a bit, but you did it nonetheless. Excellent!”

  “‘Excellent’,” Bren mimicked. He snatched the wooden bar from Rol’s grasp, and for a moment, I feared he would launch it in my direction. “You’re just trying to make me feel better. Admit it. You moved the stupid thing.”

  My hands lifted on instinct, and my fingers flexed. “I did no such thing.”

  Bren didn’t believe me. I could tell from his furious stare, and it was all I could do to hold back a hex. He was distracted, and thus probably couldn’t concentrate enough to resist my spell—as when I turned him to a donkey. At the moment, I wanted to turn him into a snake so badly I could feel it in my toes. The energy of the earth cried out for me to act, but I held myself in check. Barely.

  “You moved the bar, boy.” Rol’s voice was gruff but proud.

  “How do you know?” Bren’s gaze flicked from the bar in his hands to the training master and back to me.

  Rol shrugged. “Her Majesty would never break a vase during a simple spell—or make the wood behave like a sword.”

  “Of course not.” Anger left Bren’s expression, but his infuriating smirk returned. “That would be dangerous. And very messy.”

  “Oooh!” I fired a blasting spell over Bren’s head, blowing a round hole in the wall behind him.

  Rol’s gasp was audible, and for a moment, Bren looked almost frightened. I felt a charge of satisfaction before being overcome with horror at my loss of control.

  There were too many people in the drawing room. I tried to breathe, but the air felt stale. I needed to take a walk. Monitor. Fly to the village. Anything but stand in that room for another instant.

  “Are you—” Rol began, but I didn’t wait for him to finish. In seconds, I was running down the hall, down the front steps, and out, out toward Shallym.

  What was wrong with me? I had never been one to flee, but if I didn’t get away from Rol and Bren, I might do something I would forever regret.

  It took me no time to call a proper live oak branch, and with a push of my feet, I sped down Shadowbridge Hill.

  It was afternoon by the time I finished routine monitoring and landed in Shallym. The town was fairly busy with trade and conversation, though my arrival at the market was greeted with nervous stares and sideways glances. Hags scattered like fat ants as I landed just before the branch caught fire. The wood smoldered as I discarded it, lacing the rich smells of fruit, meat, and spices with an edge of acrid smoke.

  A few witches were brave enough to nod at me. I nodded back, wishing I could find it within myself to speak to them.

  They would probably scream.

  Was I so formidable? I folded my arms and shook my head. When I sighed, a nearby elfling dodged beneath a cart bearing pears and peaches. The cartman shivered, but kept a false smile pasted on his heavy-jowled face.

  Why were these people so infernally concerned with my slightest mood? I had never harmed a single one of them. Ever. A few moments of temper, here and there, but I only ever blasted stones and old sticks. What had I done to earn such tremendous fear?

  A mother tugged the hand of a child who strayed too close to me. The child, so much smaller, fairly lifted off the ground, but not before I saw the look of frightened respect flicker across her face. Not respect for me, but respect for her mother. The way I respected my mother—and feared her.

  Of course…

  That was it.

  My arms relaxed as the realization trickled through me. The villagers didn’t fear me because I had hurt them. They feared me because I could hurt them. Because of my greater power and my control over the Path.

  Those who didn’t show outright fear gave me glances of grudging respect or anger, like Bren.

  Did Bren stay angry with me because he feared I would hurt him with my power? Or—no. Perhaps he stayed angry because I could hurt him with my tongue. Because I was hurting him with my disapproval.

  Dear Goddess. Do my opinions cause him pain?

  The bustle of the marketplace swelled around me as my mouth fell open.

  Bren’s opinions of me certainly caused me pain. Why had I not realized that he might care what I think of him?

  I was selfish. I was completely selfish.

  My stomach knotted, and I found it difficult to breathe. That instant—seeing myself through Bren’s eyes—stabbed me deeply. My breath came short.

  “No. Stop being ridiculous. He doesn’t care about me.” My voice sounded low and hollow to my own ears. “I ruined his life. I’m impossible, obsessed with cleanliness. He’s said so a hundred times, at least.”

  Tears made the village blur and distort.

  I was being ridiculous. If I allowed myself to think Bren cared about me as deeply as I was beginning to care about him, I’d be in for nothing but pain.

  My duty came before such trivialities, anyway. It was time for me to get my focus back. And to do that, I had to rid myself of the fantasy that Bren ever would come to feel anything but contempt for me.

  My cheeks burned.

  It would be unpleasant proving the truth to myself, but I could see no other way.

  The market was emptying quickly, and from nearby came the reedy keening of a klatchKoven Keeper, singing to her beautiful brood.

  Most of the villagers hurried away as it became clear that the Keeper intended to enter the market with her charges. Even I shivered, though I had learned as a child how to contend with klatch hypnosis. A few cartmen put cotton or wax in their ears and held their ground. Brave fools. But they had learned some measure of resistance, living here so long.

  The song grew louder, and the young witches spilled into the square, dancing. The six were slight and beautiful, fair of hair and eye and demonstrating impeccable grace. Behind them, the Keeper walked with assurance. She was even more striking than usual, with glittering golden tresses and flawless lines beneath her billowing white robes. Her eyes met mine, and I nodded—and then I felt a jolt of awareness.

  Yes. They would meet my needs quite nicely.

  “Keeper,” I said in my most respectful tone. “I would ask a favor of you and yours.”

  ***

  Chapter Seventeen

  Jazz’s chin had been high in the air as she practically ran from the drawing room and disappeared out the door. A chunk of rock fell from the hole she had blasted into the wall, and it landed on the floor with a loud thunk.

  The smoky-sulfur smell drifting across the room reminded me of Todd’s plastic cap gun from when he was a little kid. When my brother was six, he used to sneak up and scare the crap out of me with it. I wondered how the twit was doing. I had a hard time keeping track of the days, but I figured it had been at least a week or more since I’d seen him, and I had to admit I missed him.

  Rol shook his bald head and sighed. “Apparently your trai
ning is in my hands for this afternoon.”

  I clenched the wooden bar and gave a quick nod. Good. Anything was better than being cooped up inside with Jazz. Tension that had knotted my shoulders began to ease. Shards of the shattered vase crunched under our boots as I followed Rol out of the drawing room. Purple and green ceramic littered the floor, from what used to be a pretty cool urn.

  Did I really do that?

  Just as I was about to ask Rol if we should clean up the broken pieces, Acaw and his crow-brother appeared out of nowhere. Rol nodded to the elf, who zapped the mess and disappeared into the drawing room, probably to take care of the hole in the wall. How did the little guy know what had happened?

  Did Jazz tell him somehow? Or Rol? Maybe the crow-brother knew. Jazz had said the bird was some sort of “familiar”—a magical partner who helped Acaw survive and kept him company.

  After I slid the bar back into the door, I followed Rol through the manor, and I thought about what happened with the vase. Did I really do magic? Did I make that bar fly off and smack into the vase and Rol?

  We stepped into the courtyard, and I shook my head.

  No.

  Yet I had felt a surge of something when I pointed my finger at the door. Like lava bubbling inside me and heat shooting through my arm. My skin had shimmered silver as the feeling of power flooded me, and then the shimmer and the power vanished as quickly as they had come.

  Our boots kicked up dust as we strode toward the smithy, and I drew my sword from its sheath. The blade glittered in the afternoon light as I thrust my sword into the air, jabbing at an imaginary opponent.

  I couldn’t wait to work out my frustrations and could almost feel the satisfaction of my muscles aching from physical combat. “Are we going to spar some more?”

  “Nay.” Rol barked the response, and for a second I wondered if he was ticked at me. But when we reached the smithy, he turned and the corner of his mouth quirked. “It is about time you discovered your magic.”

  I shook my head. “I still don’t believe I moved that bar.”

  Well, maybe I sort of believed it. But I wasn’t convinced. Yet.

  “Certainly, you did.” He held out his hand. “Your weapon.”