Approaching Storm (Alternate Worlds Book 2)

by Taylor Leigh

  When Sam saw the house she let out a groan. The construction crew was not there. Even as hopeless as she was it still crushed her. It was completely deserted.

  Sam’s pace slowed in distress. She scanned desperately. But there was nothing to see. Sam took a deep, shaking breath. What else should she have expected? She’d missed her chance. She had to move on.

  And then, much to the entity’s annoyance, her eyes caught sight of something.

  A thin figure was standing in the red, sandy dirt, back to her, in the shadows of a shroom tree.

  It was him! It was actually him! His scrawny arms were crossed across his chest and he was looking hard down at a spot in the ground. The spot where the box had come from—Sam was sure of it.

  Her heart gave a painful lurch. She was so close to safety. Help was just on the other side of the street. Wild relief flooded her, threatened to drown her. Sam almost stumbled into the road, just as a fleet of automated transports swept by, whining loudly.

  Sam was thrown back.

  She could just barely see him through the line of machines. He stood still; head tilted up, almost waiting, but Sam felt paralysed. Her feet might as well have rooted to the pavement.

  The wait for the street to clear was taking too long. Her chest ached now with how hard her heart beat in desperation. Despite the harsh emotions of the thing inside her, a feeling of incredulous wonder that she’d actually found him again burst within her. Sam didn’t know how to explain it, but she felt with dead certainty that she was meant to find him. After all the chance sightings, so many crossed paths, they were destined. Sam had never believed in destiny, but she had no other way of explaining it; and after all the inexplicable things she wasn’t about to discount this. She needed to be with him. He was the only one who could help her. And he was so close.

  It was in an alarmed moment she realised her insides where changing. Sam could only whimper in panicked protest as she gradually felt her body going stiff and cold, locking down into some coiled, angry darkness. Against his will, her joints were freezing up. Turning to ice. The thing in the ring raged, surged with all the power she must have given it through the night, and it flooded her body with lead.

  Hurry up, go to him! Run! Forget the traffic! GO!

  He was beginning to stride away. Panic filled her. She couldn’t move! The street was still filled with automobiles and her own body was betraying her; frozen in place by some inside force.

  Wake up, stupid! He’s leaving! DO SOMETHING!

  ‘Tra—’ Sam’s cry was silenced by a brutally swift force clamping round her throat. She gasped for breath against the invisible, binding strength. She might as well have had a rope thrown around her neck. Her lungs burned from the lack of oxygen; her limbs started to grow weak, heavy.

  The ring shone with a bloody brilliance. With watering eyes, Sam watched her saviour walk away from her, deaf to her strangled cries. Completely unaware. She sank to her knees, gasping, choking, as her breath slowly came back to her. Her head swam at the blinding rage burning like acid through her.

  The last of the automated vehicles rattled by and Sam was left staring at emptiness with watering eyes. She pounded her fist to the pavement in frustration. Movement was once again being granted to her. Whatever had overcome her slowly receded, proud of its work. Slowly, unsteadily, Sam’s body uncurled. She felt like she’d aged a hundred years, the stiff, reluctant way her muscles responded.

  The street was once again abandoned. Sam daren’t go after him. She wouldn’t survive the trip across the street if she tried. She was no longer in control of her own body. It was all-too-clear he was a hostage to the little band round her finger. There was nothing to do but stumble in the direction of school.

  By the time Sam finally saw the imposing black building, the skull-cracking bell was already sounding the time. She let out a distressed cry and ran despite the pain to reach her class before the bell rang its last note.

  With shaky legs Sam claimed her seat and sat down heavily. She was well aware of the amused faces turned her way and tried her best to ignore them. She was uncomfortably hot and sticky, all the more so now that she was in the cool air. Her hair must be a mess, she was more than likely red in the face and her shirt clung to her like a wet towel. Sand was sticking to her palms from when she’d fallen to the pavement. She didn’t care. She didn’t care about anything besides what had just happened.

  With an unhappy moan she leaned forward against her desk and rested her head in the palm of her hand. An unmistakable snigger came from a few desks back. She couldn’t even begin to care.

  To add to the day’s discomfort, Sam had to sit through double history. For someone who had once enjoyed the subject, she now hated the it with a passion. It wasn’t history. It was propaganda, and Sam was often singled out as the example. She always dreaded walking through the doors to this room, but on a day like this, it was salt in her wounds.

  ‘Morning class.’ Ms Shryr strode in, picking over her scant collection of students. Her voice had lost some of the dramatic quality it had held the first few days of school. Perhaps she was getting to the point she was just as sick of it as the rest of her students.

  The rest of the class offered up a half-hearted moan that the woman took to be her greeting. She let out a slight tsk as she swept toward her desk. Sam gave her best effort at being as invisible as possible. Around her, the room had grown silent except for a few coughs at the back. Her heart sank and reluctantly raised her eyes from the words on the page. The woman was staring straight at her with a look of mild revulsion.

  ‘Ms Turner, are you quite all right?’

  ‘Yes, ma’am,’ Sam said flatly.

  ‘Will you care to explain why you look so dishevelled?’

  Sam licked her lips. ‘I was late this morning.’ It was the best explanation. She doubted the truth would do.

  ‘I see.’ Her red lips curled back into a puckered expression. ‘I do not know the policies on Scottorr, Ms Turner, but in the future will you please try to arrive on time? We have standards and cannot allow such unkempt students; it is not healthy.’

  Sam lowered her brow but bit her tongue. The last thing she needed was detention. ‘Of course, miss,’ she muttered.

  Ms Shryr turned back to the class in a tiny pirouette and moved back liquidly to the holoboard at the front of the class.

  ‘All right, class. Please turn to page 231 where we will begin to talk about Queen Victoria, the first Scrabian documented to travel to and from Scottorr some five-hundred years ago. Her return to Scrabia was rumoured to mean great things, till her mysterious disappearance some short months later. There is, of course, suggestion that she was murdered by her Scottorrian companion who returned with her, Andrew O’Neill, who also disappeared about the same time. Can anyone tell me who became ruler in her stead?’

  Her lesson always began in the same clipped, quick explanations. And soon Sam was lost in her thoughts, barely aware of the names and dates she was automatically scribbling out.

  None of it mattered anymore. Nothing but the Traveller and what was happening inside of her. Her mind went back to the street, back to what had happened. Seeing the Traveller standing there, staring down at the ground. Probably giving up on whatever mission he was on, now that the ring was gone. Perhaps booking his ticket to leave the planet. It felt completely, terribly hopeless. She’d run out of time. She was too late. She was on her own.

  She bit her lip hard and dragged her stylus across the pad with more force than was necessary. The screen flashed error and she cursed under her breath as she scrabbled to reboot the machine before the teacher could move on.

  Of course the Traveller hadn’t left the planet yet. There was some window of time, however small. And this takeover had given her a grim determination. She would fight through pain, or death, whatever it took. Their paths had crossed too often for her to believe it couldn’t happen again. How else could she explain seeing him everywhere she’d turned if she wasn’t mea
nt to find him? What other reason to explain him filling her dreams as a distant shadow since they’d met? He was always present in her subconscious. If there was something supernatural about all of this then there damn well was something supernatural about him, too.

  But how exactly did one find a man with no name in a city the size of Layers? Sure, he’d been to the construction site several times, she’d seen him in the Night District, but now that he knew the ring was gone, he would be moving on.

  So what was she supposed to do? Wander the streets till she eventually bumped into him—assuming that she actually would?

  Her plans sent a punishing wave of anger and fear through her with a crushing, violent force. It was clear that the entity hated the very thought of the Traveller. Finding him was going to be the hardest struggle of her life. But this couldn’t continue. She hardened her resolve. Let the bloody thing hurt her. She’d made up her mind.

  Finally, hours later, the dreary toll of the bell sounded out the time and the students around her jumped up in a relieved mass, all packed to get out of the door as quickly as possible. Sam grabbed her bag and hauled herself to her feet. She’d been unaware of the time.

  She’d found herself growing more and more desperate to talk to Nelly and Terrance. She wasn’t about to tell them about her problem, but she needed the company of actual humans—and perhaps she could get some theories. Posing hypothetical queries about the supernatural was always an easy thing to get away with. Maybe they knew something helpful, unlikely as it was.

  The dining hall was filled with students by the time Sam finally arrived. She spent a long, frustrated moment trying to spot her friends in the crowd and finally noticed them seated at one of the far tables against the window. Food was one of the last things Sam wanted at the moment, so she bypassed the queue and headed straight for the table where they were sitting.

  ‘You look bloody awful,’ Terrance said by way of greeting. ‘Have nightmares last night?’

  Sam glowered at him as she sat down. ‘I look like I’ve been having nightmares?’ Nothing Terrance said was ever innocent.

  Terrance shrugged. ‘Just that time of year, I suppose. Scrabia’s just full of ghosts. People from Scottorr always seem a bit freaked out by it. Takes a while to get used to.’

  She studied him closely. ‘Do they really? Actual ghosts?’

  Terrance pulled a face, showing how comfortable he was with such things. ‘The whole bloody planet is haunted with them. The evidence is everywhere.’

  ‘Of course it is. With its evil past, how could it not be? Think of all the sacrifices, gladiator fights, wars, slaves! It all keeps adding up!’ Nelly cried.

  ‘Scottorr doesn’t have many reports of them,’ Sam said, mildly surprised by just how easy this conversation had been. ‘Have you ever experienced anything, Nelly?’

  Nelly shook her head slowly. ‘Not on Scottorr, no. But here…here things happen. People have stories. You hear screams from the desert. The ancient ruins all off-limits. It makes you wonder,’ she said in a sing-song voice. ‘One of my friends came home to find her room completely trashed. Weird stuff happens; there’s no denying that. Why all the questions?’ Nelly leant in. ‘Did something happen to you?’

  Sam bit her lip. She didn’t want to sound over-excitable, superstitious. She would like to have thought she was neither. She had struggled all morning to find a way to talk about the subject without sounding like a complete nutter. So far, there was no easy way to go about it.

  ‘I didn’t say anything happened. I was just wondering about your opinion on the subject,’ she said as calmly as possibly.

  Terrance tore into his sandwich with a bite big enough to make a desert wolf impressed. ‘Already told you my stance on it. Guess you don’t know till it happens to you.’ He spoke around his food. ‘Nice ring. Looks old.’

  ‘Terrance, don’t talk with your mouth full,’ Nelly said, disgusted. ‘Oh, your ring! It does look lovely.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Sam said. She fought to keep from curling her hands together to hide it. ‘Wish I didn’t have it,’ she said, despite herself. It had just slipped out. With nothing on her mind but the bloody thing and her hope to rid herself of it there wasn’t much helping herself.

  ‘Why is that?’ Terrance drawled. ‘Did you steal it?’ He grinned, delighted.

  ‘I’ll be happy to take it,’ Nelly said. She leant forward and took Sam’s hand in hers to study it more closely.

  Sam pulled her hand back, panicked about what the thing might do to Nelly if she touched it. ‘I can’t. I’m sorry.’

  Nelly gave her a dejected look. ‘Can’t I just try it on?’

  Sam made a face. ‘I’m afraid it’s a bit stuck.’

  Terrance, in mid-drink, burst into laughter, slamming his glass down on the table and sloshing water everywhere.

  Nelly wrinkled her nose at Terrance and looked at Sam in mild concern. ‘Oh, that’s rotten luck. Have you tried a bit of soap?’

  ‘Maybe the ghosts want you to keep it on,’ Terrance said. He wiggled his fingers and made spectral noises, grinning widely.

  ‘Stop acting like you’re five, Terr,’ Nelly rolled her eyes.

  ‘Why say that?’ Sam asked cautiously.

  Terrance glanced up at the arched ceiling, chewing in contemplation. ‘I don’t know.’

  Sam clenched her teeth in frustration. He was certainly helpful. ‘Really? You, with all the answers, you don’t know? Can ghosts possess objects?’

  ‘I haven’t the faintest…’ Terrance sat still for a moment. Then his eyes lit up with a new gleam. ‘Then again, it is getting close to the Passing.’

  ‘Passing?’ Sam asked.

  ‘Yeah, don’t tell me you haven’t seen that hulking planet of yours looming up in the sky. I’d guess it’s about two days now till it’s directly over us. Things always act up this time of year, so they say.’

  ‘What kind of things?’ Sam asked slowly.

  Terrance and Nelly both looked at her.

  ‘You mean to tell me you don’t have stories about all the paranormal things that happen when the planets cross?’

  Sam shook her head. ‘No, it’s just one of those things.’

  ‘Well, according to Scrabian legend, all the ghosts and Denizens start acting up like crazy when the planets pass. I suppose that goes for objects as well.’

  Sam mulled over that for a minute in silence. Was that what was in the ring? A trapped ghost? She supposed it was possible, but it certainly wasn’t a nice one. If what Terrance said was true, Sam probably only had two days before the ring’s power was at its fullest. The thought filled her with dismay. How could she find the Traveller in such a short amount of time?

  ‘What’s the matter, Samantha?’ Nelly asked gently. ‘Something’s wrong. Come on, out with it.’

  Sam sighed, fighting down her irritation. She didn’t want her emotions to be as plain as they clearly were, yet, if it helped her, then she’d use it. And there was one question left to ask. It was a long shot, but, well, she was this deep in. ‘Terrance, this might be a weird question, but have you ever heard of someone called the Traveller?’

  ‘You’re kidding, right?’ Terrance huffed around his food.

  Sam shrugged. ‘No.’ She narrowed her eyes. ‘Why?’

  Terrance put his sandwich down with a tentative smile. ‘I thought everyone knew who that was.’

  Sam’s heart gave a lurch. It took everything in her to keep her expression blank. ‘Well, I don’t. Care to fill me in?’

  Terrance glanced around, like he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing. ‘You’re playing, right? I mean, you don’t actually know?’

  Nelly rolled her eyes, already growing bored. ‘Would you please just enlighten us?’

  Terrance, frowning in cautious confusion, raised his shoulders. ‘Well, he’s just in all those stories, isn’t he? You know, kid stuff. Mum used to always tell me stories about him before I went to bed. Always saved kids from monsters and things l
ike that. Guardian of sorts. You have to know about him. Every kid does.’

  Nelly breathed. ‘Oh, yes, I’d completely forgotten about that! Been a well long time!’

  Sam stared out the window, vision going blurry. She couldn’t believe it. It was true. She hadn’t really realised it till he said it out loud. The Traveller was real. A real myth, legend, but real all the same. And he was somewhere here in the city. He saved people from monsters. He could save her, too. All she had to do was find him.

  ‘You all right? You look a little off-colour,’ Terrance asked in a rare moment of concern.

  Sam swallowed, pulling her eyes away from the view outside. She blinked away tears. ‘Fine. I’m just exhausted. Late night.’

  ‘You need a break from all of this, that’s what you need,’ Terrance said in his most knowledgeable voice.

  ‘Time you got out; relaxed. Forget about all these exams and the Passing.’ Nelly nodded decisively.

  Sam sighed. She wished it were as simple as that. But at the moment, she was having trouble seeing through the cloud of depression lurking over her. Sam could physically feel it crushing the spirit from her with hungry strength. She didn’t know how much longer she’d be able to last under its weight. Two days felt so long. If she didn’t find her saviour soon, she was going to die.

  She was surprised that she didn’t feel as terrified as she would have assumed under the circumstances. Instead, she just felt desperation. She couldn’t shake the Traveller’s brown eyes and strange, comforting smile from her mind. It was all she could think about.

  ‘So, are we doing anything tonight?’ Nelly asked, glancing around at her friends.

  Terrance shrugged. ‘I’m game.’

  Nelly cast her eyes in Sam’s direction.

  ‘I’m afraid I can’t,’ Sam said slowly. ‘Too much homework, you know.’

  Nelly’s face fell a notch. ‘Oh, all right. There’s always tomorrow night.’