“You have an amazing gift, and I trust you’ll be able to use it to save Wallerton.”
Wow. That’s a lot of faith in some unknown man who waves his fingers in midair. I look into her shining face and realize what I’m looking at. It’s not faith in me, it’s faith in her beliefs, in the underlying interconnectedness of everything, in powers and energies that she can’t see but can still perceive, in things she can’t explain but knows are there. She believes—no, knows, in her heart—that I can do what I claim.
I hope she’s right.
“Okay, great,” I say. My words feel inadequate in the circumstances. “Thank you, Sylvana. Stay right on this spot. I’ll be as quick as I can. And I promise nothing will happen to you, okay? I’ll come and get you if I can’t stop the volcano.”
She nods, her thumbnail long since out of her mouth and her face serene. Then she frowns.
“What about Anna?”
“The sooner I stop this eruption, the sooner we can concentrate on finding Anna and getting her out of trouble. But the volcano has to come first. We don’t have long.”
Without further ado, I press the loose ends of the lauvan into her abdomen. I spread my fingers in a pulsing motion and hover them over her stomach. The strands tease apart to mingle with her own. She tenses slightly.
“Do you feel that?” I ask, curious.
“A little,” she says. “Mostly from the necklace.”
I nod and bend to plant her ankle lauvan in the ground, then draw a makeshift lauvan cage over her body as I did with Jen.
“Okay, all done. I’ll be back for you soon.”
“Blessings on you, Merry.” She brushes my cheek briefly with a butterfly’s touch of her hand.
I give her a crooked smile in return, and turn to run along the lauvan ring.
The presence isn’t far. Soon, I will confront it. I will solve this riddle, fix this cursed center, save Jen and Sylvana—and Anna, wherever she is—and get out of this town. I think briefly of the hotel room I haven’t yet slept in, and my teeth bare in a mirthless smile. I glance to my left at the Three Peaks. Are their smoke clouds a tiny bit smaller? I hope that’s not just my imagination. I hope grounding with Sylvana made a difference and bought me some time.
I pass through a rolling meadow alongside the lauvan ring, and slow my pace to approach the cable. I don’t know what I’ll be facing. I presume there will be spirits in the cables here, but I know so little. Can they come out of the cables and be lying in wait for me? Is there another person here controlling them, perhaps the writer of the lauvan-note from Anna’s apartment?
I climb a small hill through some scrubby bushes toward a low promontory. It looks familiar, and I realize that it is the Michelson Lookout where Anna and I shared a coffee and that intimate lauvan-touching moment two mornings ago. It feels so much longer.
I climb up the promontory and stand in front of the park bench. The lauvan ring runs directly in front of the bench, and the cable lies along its left side. I step up to the cable where it intersects with the lauvan ring. There’s nothing out of the ordinary here, nothing I can see that would indicate another presence. I look around cautiously, but there’s no sign of anyone nearby, nor can I see any strange lauvan shapes that I should be worried about. Where is the presence? Has it left, or is it within the cable itself? Perhaps the presence has moved on somewhere else. It’s been a while since I last checked its location, after all. There’s a pang in my gut when I think of Jen, standing frightened in a field with a smoking volcano above her.
“Hurry up, Merlin,” I chide myself. “Get going.”
I prepare, then plunge my hands into the cable to find the presence again. Immediately I feel it—there’s no distance between us. The presence is here, right here, and it’s ready and waiting for me. A surge of energy races toward me, but I’m ready for it also. I meet it with strength of my own, and our two forces meet. It’s a battle of willpower—whoever can force the energy to move to the other will make their opponent suffer. The presence has a wicked psychic punch, as I can attest. I have no idea how my earlier blow affected the presence. If it’s a renegade spirit, does it feel pain? Whatever I did certainly made the presence back off, so it worked in some way to my advantage.
One thing is certain, though—the presence is right here, somehow. Either invisible, which I’m pretty sure is impossible, or within the cable itself. Anna’s spirits came out of her amulet, as if they were within the lauvan of the necklace itself, or were able to access the physical world through it. Perhaps they live in another plane of existence that can be accessed through the cable? There’s so much I don’t understand, and it makes me feel helpless in a frustrating way that I haven’t experienced in many centuries.
Sweat breaks out on my brow as I concentrate on bending the presence to my will. I don’t want to lose. I want the presence to feel my wrath, to understand that I’m not someone to trifle with, that it should think twice about blowing up this mountain. I’m certain the presence is behind this. I don’t know why the spirits want to destroy this center, but it’s obvious they are culpable.
Suddenly, the presence is not alone. I distinctly feel another join it, right here in the cable. Then there is another, and another, and the cable starts to feel positively crowded. My sweat turns clammy and I fight to maintain my position against the extra force. The presences pile up, all working against me, far more than the three spirits I saw coming out of Anna’s necklace. My willpower slips against their sheer numbers. Closer and closer, the spirit force draws near until with a surge it meets my hands and rockets into my body. It pushes me up and away and breaks my connection to the cable. I fly through the air and an excruciatingly hot pain sears my abdomen at my lauvan’s center.
I land hard on my side and clutch my stomach. I wheeze there for a moment to catch my breath and try to manage the pain. The skin on my stomach is red and blistered, covered in knotted lauvan. They would take far too long to untangle for me to do now. I’ll have to deal with the pain the regular way. I stagger to my feet, massaging one of the knots in a futile effort to relieve the pain.
A tremor throws me off balance. I look up and note with dull resignation that the mountains are acting up again, worse than when I left Sylvana. There’s not much time left. I need to ground again. I need more time. But will more time help? I still don’t know what to do. The spirits are dead set against my meddling, and getting the better of them is the only way I can see to fix this, since they are the cause of this center’s disintegration.
Grasping at straws, I plunge my hand into my pocket and dig out the two halves of the fire opal. Maybe the lauvan have reinstated themselves somehow? I don’t know. It might be possible. I’ve never seen lauvan stripped from an object like that—maybe the lauvan can come back just as suddenly. It’s becoming painfully obvious in the past few days that I don’t know everything.
No such luck—the opal glistens with its inner fire clear for me to see. There’s no trace of rainbow lauvan anywhere. I shove the pieces back into my pocket, disgusted. Panic is licking the edges of my consciousness, like fire through a sheaf of paper. I swallow hard. I can’t afford to let panic get the better of me. Jen’s counting on me, Sylvana believes in me, and Wallerton needs me. I have to find a way.
Another tremor shakes the promontory and all three mountains puff out large billows of smoke sequentially. I need more time. I need to ground the center again. The only person here is me—maybe if I ground the lauvan ring right next to the cable, I can act as a grounding as well as fight the spirits.
It’s the only plan I have, and it’s better than standing here doing nothing. I leap to the intersection of the ring and the cable and feverishly collect loose lauvan. Once I have enough—it’s not all of them in the vicinity, but it will do—I squash them into my own center, wincing at the nausea, and force the lauvan to join. A brief combing of my ankle lauvan allows me to act as a grounding. The billows of smoke reduce slightly.
I bought myself
time—now I have to use it.
“Okay, spirits.” I face the cable. “Prepare to meet your doom.” Maybe if I show my strength, they will back off. Ha. That trick might work sometimes on the battlefield, but I have a sense that spirits don’t work on the same set of rules as humans do. Suddenly, I long for the simplicity of battle with sword and spear. It was easy to know what my opponent would do, was capable of doing. I grin fiercely at the memories and roll up my sleeves. I always had the advantage, too. That didn’t hurt. Now I can empathize with my enemies in the past. It’s incredibly frustrating and frightening to face someone who outranks you in abilities beyond your comprehension.
But there’s nothing else I can do besides pit myself against my little-known foes. Jen and Sylvana are counting on me to pull this off, or at least get them out of here alive. I take a deep breath that stinks of sulfur from the billowing smoke rolling my way, before I plunge my hands into the cable once more.
Immediately, a backlash of force hits my own, and the mental grappling begins. I grunt with effort, and through watering eyes I see my own lauvan twitch spasmodically as I strain against the pressure forming from the spirits. Heat builds in my outstretched fingers. I pull out whatever strength I have left and scream aloud, pushing everything I have into the combat.
It’s not enough. More spirits pile up against me. In the small corner of my mind that is not wholly focused on the battle, I note with satisfaction the number of spirits it takes to subdue me.
But subdue me they do, and with a crackle of static a tremendous, hot pain in my center hits me, aggravating the previous injury that I haven’t yet healed. The shock winds me and I have no breath left to shout out. My hands leave the cable as if shot out of a cannon, and I am flung backward. I don’t fly through the air this time—my grounding keeps me in place. I merely bowl over and slam with excessive force into the ground, bruising my hip and slamming my head. My torso burns with heat from the spirits’ attack. Stars shoot above me as I lay for a moment, stunned.
As my eyes clear, I make no effort to get up. I failed. I can’t win against these spirits and I have nothing left to try. I can’t even leave my position now, because one less grounding will destabilize the center and bring forth the eruption, I have no doubt. The mountain will eventually explode with fiery carnage, and there’s nothing I can do about it.
CHAPTER XXIII
Jen’s face swims before my mind’s eye, terrified and confused. I have to go back for her, and Sylvana too. I made promises I have to keep. I sit up slowly and my head swims. My hand reaches back to massage the lauvan behind my head. They are more than twisted this time—a few knots also meet my exploratory fingers. I grimace. Hopefully a little massaging will be enough to reduce distractions for my transformation to a falcon. By foot is too slow. If I fly, I might just manage to collect Jen and Sylvana in time.
Billowing smoke makes my eyes water and my lungs cough dramatically. Through my streaming eyes I see a shadow of a figure approaching. My heart clenches. Has Jen or Sylvana left her post? If so, the mountain is liable to go at any moment. It’s too unstable to allow for any reduction in the groundings. A small breeze pushes over the promontory and the smoke clears briefly to expose a figure.
“Anna?” I gasp. She’s between me and the mountain, which I can now see thanks to the shifting winds. I gulp in the fresher air. Smoke flows down to my right and I’m intensely grateful that Jen and Sylvana appear to be out of its path.
Anna contemplates me, still sitting on the ground where the spirits left me.
“What on Earth are you doing here?” She stares at me for a moment longer, then nods. “No, you know what? I’m not surprised. You felt the changes, didn’t you? I bet you wanted to be a part of what’s happening here.” She raises her arms and lifts her chin with eyes half-closed, as if reveling in the moment. “Feel the glory of the fire all around you. Isn’t it incredible?”
Is she high?
“Anna, we need to get out of here. The volcano is about to erupt. We will die if we don’t leave now. I can’t overemphasize the danger here.”
She ignores me and continues on whatever train of thought she’s riding to Crazy Town.
“I knew you were different, someone special. I could feel your aura glowing like a beacon in the night. And when I touched it, your reaction was more than I’d ever dreamed of.” She smiles at me then, a lazy, confident smile that is entirely out of place in this situation.
“Anna, I know you’re in the thick of something here, with the spirits you can summon—”
“How do you know about that?” she interrupts. A small frown creases her brow.
“I just—I know what the necklaces can do. Jackie told me.”
Anna purses her lips at the mention of her former friend.
There’s no time for this. How can I make her understand?
“You’re deep into something, but it’s hurting you and everyone around you. I don’t know what the spirits promised you, but they’re going to blow up the mountain and destroy Wallerton. Along with us, if we don’t get moving.”
Anna shakes her head at me, a half-smile of knowledge on her face.
“Oh, Merry. You don’t understand. I know what the spirits are capable of. The volcano is all in the plan. It will erupt in a few minutes. The spirits will keep me safe here.”
I stare at her, horrified.
“You knew? You’re content to let your hometown burn?”
Her mouth twitches. She whirls around and sits on the park bench, spreading her arms along its top.
“Unfortunate casualties. I have to think of the bigger picture. Much more is at stake than you can imagine. Besides, everyone was evacuated.”
“Jackie is still here, looking for you,” I say quietly. I slowly rise from my seated position and turn to face Anna. She looks discomposed. Her eyes drop to the ground for the first time. After a moment, she looks up at me again, her eyes hard.
“Jackie made her choice. I’m sorry for it, but it can’t be helped.”
“What’s the bigger picture, Anna? What are you doing this for?”
“The power of the spirits—it can be ours, Merry. Think of it.” She leans toward me with her eyes wide and excited, almost fanatical. Her lauvan spread out from her body as if searching for me. “We’ll be able to join with the spirits, make their power our own, manipulate the elements, see the future, read people like books—the power of the necklace is only the tiniest taste of what we could have. The spirits will give us all our desires. The power, Merry—” She sighs with longing. “Think of what we could do. Where we could go.”
I misread Anna so badly, yet all the signs were there. I didn’t want to see her true nature. The spirit communication, the reveling in the volcano, her rift with Sylvana—and yet I didn’t want to put her in the villain’s chair. I didn’t want to believe that she would go so far as to destroy her hometown and risk the lives of her friends in pursuit of power. I gave that duty to the faceless spirits that were so easy to blame. How could I believe it of Anna, of someone I was so intimate with? I’m intensely angry at myself for being so stupidly blind. I should have known better. What’s the point of having an endless history if I don’t learn from it?
“Think about it, Merry,” she repeats. “The spirits can give us everything and tell us anything we want to know.”
I freeze. This is a development I haven’t considered. I could communicate with the spirit world, find out more about this unknown plane of existence hidden from me for so long. Could this lead me to my father? My heart clenches with longing. The central enigma of my life, my powers—is this the key? I could find out. The spirits don’t tolerate me, but they talk to Anna. She’s offering me the chance of a lifetime.
“How does the necklace work?” I stall to buy myself time, in order to calm the turmoil in my head. “Why isn’t that enough?”
“I was told that the necklace was made especially for me. A part of my aura was woven into the energies of the spirit world an
d trapped within the pendant. With it I have the ability to summon the spirits at will, especially at the sacred location.” She sweeps her arm around languidly to indicate the promontory. “This is where the spirit world is closest, but only for those with a connection. The necklace won’t work for anyone else. I have to be careful with it. If it were destroyed the spirits wouldn’t have access to our physical world through me and would be pulled back to their world.
“It’s connected to Jackie and Bethany’s too, unfortunately.” Her mouth twists in annoyance and her purple lauvan twitch. “I don’t know why Drew did that. We were supposed to be a team, I guess. Stronger with three. Luckily, they love the powers the necklaces give them, and take good care. Otherwise, mine would stop working. They were supposed to be helping me, ungrateful bitches. They got the necklaces for free. They owe something for that. A little bit of spirit summoning, some lava, and then endless power? I say that’s a fair trade.” She pulls herself up straight and lifts her chin. “Luckily, I didn’t need them. I did it all on my own and I’ll reap the reward on my own too.”
A tremor rolls through the promontory. Anna smiles at me.
“Unless you want in, of course. I like you, Merry. I think we have something pretty great between us, and I’d love to know you better.” She stands and steps up to me, placing her palm on my chest. I look down at it and then into her face. Her beautiful brown eyes gaze into mine, confident and sure. “Join me, Merry. Be one with the spirits, and with me. We can go places, you and me, and the spirits will take us there.”
My mind whirls with Anna’s suggestion. She’s offering me a chance to finally know the truths that have eluded me for fifteen hundred years. And I can’t do it without her. The amulet will work only with Anna, and the spirits will only respond to her call. I think of Jen and Sylvana waiting for me in the meadows below. They’re protected from the volcano by the lauvan cages. Probably. Maybe. Then I think of the spirits and all the answers I could have. A moment later, I’m decided. I know what I want.
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