I hoped he wouldn’t cut me off from the card. I didn’t exactly have easy access to income right now. Well, $580 was just going to have to last us.
I hurried back to the car and hopped into the front seat, which Farida had vacated while I grabbed my cash.
“All set?” she asked as I started the car.
I glanced in the rear-view before responding, startling myself when I saw my reflection. I almost didn’t recognize myself in Farida’s enormous sunglasses. Swallowing past the sudden lump in my throat, I quickly pulled off the glasses and met my own familiar grey-blue eyes in the mirror. Unfortunately, it didn’t make me feel any more normal. “Yeah, we’re good to go.”
~
I was nervous as I eased the car back onto the highway — especially since I had an audience. But driving on open road was less chaotic than the times I had driven in Charlottetown, the closest thing we had to a city back home. Aside from when I had to pass the occasional transport truck (an ordeal that, as a passenger, I always closed my eyes through), I was pretty calm.
Or, well, I was as calm as I could be, given current circumstances.
The light rasp of Farida and Masika’s snores told me they had both conked out. I tried not to worry too much about navigating through New Brunswick without one of them guiding me. Farida had given me a rough outline of what signs to look for and what turns to take, but I was notoriously good at getting lost.
I switched on the radio, turning the volume super low and flipping through the channels until I found the drone of a news station. At the moment, they were talking about some kind of trade deal the Prime Minister was organizing with China. I didn’t really care — there was too much on my mind to worry about global politics right now — and my fingers itched to flick to a new station, but I resisted. Local news would be on sooner or later.
Sure enough, a few minutes into the drive the reporter shifted back to local news. He had a soothing voice that normally would have made me feel sleepy. What he said, however, kept me wide awake.
“A second attack rocked the museum just after midnight today, not a full day after what the community is calling the ‘Dragon Attack’. Officials have yet to give a detailed account of what occurred and what, if anything, was stolen from the museum, but journalists stationed on-site have reported spotting a young African-American woman loitering around the scene. Allegedly, she continued returning to the site even after being told by authorities to leave the area several times. They cannot confirm if she was spotted on site at the time of this second attack.”
I hadn’t realized how hard I was clutching the steering wheel until my hands started to shake. I tried to relax my grip, taking deep breaths and wondering if I should wake Farida or Masika. But I wasn’t sure if this was related to anything involving magic. There was no mention of any creatures sighted.
“… Amber Martel,” the reporter was saying. I nearly jumped out of my seat, jerking the steering wheel to the right. I quickly straightened out and turned the radio up a little.
“… search continues. Police confirmed yesterday afternoon that she is not dead and has, in fact, had limited contact with family and friends. The question still remains as to whether she is culprit or kidnapped. Along with a statement from her ex-boyfriend about her behaving unusually and suddenly moving to a new city, police have just given word that she was caught on camera leaving a motel with a young African-American woman of similar description to the one seen on the museum grounds, as well as a second, elderly African-American woman. The footage shows that she is uninjured and appears to be going with the women willingly. Police have released this footage and opened an anonymous tip line. They have asked anyone who sees or has information about these individuals to please call.”
He rattled off the phone number and I fought hard not to be sick. Driving didn’t help matters. I searched for some excuse to pull over and get out before I had to roll down the window and puke all over the side of the car. Thankfully, a gas station appeared on the horizon.
It was a sweaty and nauseas few minutes before I finally pulled into the lot, stumbled out of the car, and vomited my guts all over the pavement.
“What happened?” Farida asked groggily. I hadn’t heard her get out of the car behind me. “Are you okay?”
“Fine.” I straightened, trying to get my breath back. I spotted a sign for a washroom in the gas station window. Good. I could try and get a little cleaned up there.
With a quick glance at where Masika remained in the car, Farida grabbed my elbow. “Seriously, what’s wrong? People don’t vomit for no reason. Are you sick?”
She reached up to touch my forehead, but I swatted her hand away. “I’ll explain in a minute. I just wanna clean myself up first.”
“We shouldn’t split up.”
“I’ll only be a minute.”
“It only takes a minute to be arrested or killed.”
I heaved a sigh — then had to fight my gag reflex as I tasted and smelled my own vomit breath. “Fine,” I blurted. “The police have footage of us leaving the motel uploaded along with an anonymous tip line. And they think you look like some black woman who was loitering around the museum.”
“Shit.” Farida’s eyes were saucer-wide and she actually stumbled back a step. Then she turned to the car and swung open the driver-side door, leaning in to shake Masika as she said, “Wake up! Imani! They’ve seen Imani!”
“Who’s—”
She waved me to the car impatiently before climbing into the backseat. I slid into the front seat, shut the door, and looked at her expectantly.
“She’s my cousin.” The blood had drained from her cheeks, leaving her ashen. “She was raised with magic — we grew up together. We might as well be sisters. But, when her parents…” She paused, glancing at Masika.
The old woman gestured for her to continue. “If Amber is going to work with us, then it’s only fair that she knows all the details.”
“Okay.” Farida paused, taking a few slow, deep breaths, clearly trying to calm herself. “During the Stone Age—”
“Age of Magic,” Masika snapped. “It was less than 3000 years ago, not 8000 years ago.”
Despite everything, Farida cracked a little smile. “The Age of Magic is the Age of Magic Stones, so it’s the Stone Age. Anyway, during the Stone Age, Masika and her group of magicians knew that someone should be able to watch over the stones forever, that way there would still be someone around who remembered the power they held and the danger they posed. They developed a way, using their magic, to pour their lifeforce into someone.”
“Does that mean magic can basically grant immortality?”
“No,” Masika said. Her voice wasn’t as sharp as I would have expected. And there was something about her eyes that seemed… sad. Defeated. “Not truly. And not without enormous sacrifice.”
“When someone gives you their lifeforce,” Farida said, “it kills them. So in order to live forever…”
“You must take others’ lives for your own,” Masika said gravely. “Forever.”
“That’s my family’s job.” Farida’s expression was torn between pride and sadness. “Every generation performs the ritual to pour their remaining lifeforce into Masika once their children are deemed capable of fending for themselves.”
I stared at Masika, trying to hide my horror. That woman had lived for millennia — had lived through multiple empires — and basically killed dozens, if not hundreds, of people so she could keep living. She met my gaze with a sort of grim defiance.
“Imani and I are only a year apart in age, so our parents decided to do the ritual together about half a year ago. We had been raised knowing that our parents would die young, and that we ourselves would die young, but…” Farida looked down at her hands folded in her lap, shaking her head. “Imani took it hard. Really hard. She… She wasn’t herself. And she ended up turning against us.”
“Against me, you mean,” Masika said. “She blamed me for her parents’ death. N
ot you.”
Farida nodded. “She attacked Mut, but I stepped up and protected her. She tried to convince me to fight with her, not against her, and when I refused, she fled.”
“With one of the stones,” Masika added.
“So… what is she planning?”
“That’s the problem — we don’t really know. I’m pretty sure, given the chance, she would come after Masika again, but…”
The old woman’s lips pressed together in a thin line. After a long pause, she murmured, “I have a theory.”
Farida frowned and sat up a little straighter. “Since when?”
“A long time.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I don’t want you getting wild ideas in your head.”
She looked affronted. “I’m not the one who had ridiculous ideas! That was Imani’s job! I was the one who always talked her out of stuff!”
Masika ignored her. “Not long before your parents died, Imani came to me with an idea. She thought it was pointless to run around tracking down stones and gathering them all up, only to do nothing with them. She thought we should try to destroy the stones.”
“But we aren’t sure what that would do. For all we know, destroying the stone will just release the creature that’s trapped inside it.”
“Yes. You know that and I know that, but Imani seemed to believe it was a risk worth taking. She was angry when I turned her down.”
“You think she’s seeking out stones to destroy them?” I asked.
“I’m almost positive that’s what she’s doing.”
Farida sucked in air suddenly, eyes widening. “The news said she was hanging around the museum?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“Because she probably heard that your dragon came out of there and is hoping to find more magic stones in that collection.”
“That’s the other thing: The museum got broken into or something this morning.”
Farida let out a string of profanity, some of which wasn’t even in English. “And we were so close by, too! Do you think she knew we were in the area? Do you think she’ll try following us?”
The hair on the back of my neck lifted; I glanced around the parking lot with a sudden sense of being watched. But no one was looking our way. In fact, it was still early enough that the lot was relatively empty — just some truckers and a minivan.
Still, I didn’t like the idea of staying in one spot for too long. “Let’s go inside. I wanna clean up my vomit breath and we should stock up on anything me might need at the convenience store. I’m buying.”
Chapter Six
We were quick in the washrooms, as promised. I cleaned my face with some wet paper towel and all of us tended to nature’s call. While Farida and I washed our hands and Masika was still in her stall, Farida leaned over to me and whispered, “Buy my grandmother Mountain Dew. She’ll love you!”
It was a pretty random suggestion, but I figured I could use some help convincing Masika to at least not hate me. While Masika and Farida went out to gas up the car, I went around the store collecting as many snacks and beverages as I could carry.
Once I had paid the $73 I owed for food and gas, I headed back out to the car. I reclaimed my place behind the wheel, passed my backpack to Farida to set beside her on the backseat, and started divvying out food and drinks from the shopping bags. Masika and Farida complained that I was bad at buying on-the-run food (“Chips are not going to keep us going for long!”) and when I handed Masika a bottle of Mountain Dew, she snorted slightly. After taking a few gulps from it, she gave Farida the side-eye while saying stiffly to me, “Thank you. I don’t get to drink this often.”
It felt like we had lingered too long at the gas station, which was still too close to Fredericton for comfort. So we ate while I drove, my hands leaving sticky crumbs all over the steering wheel. Farida ordered me to turn the radio on to her favourite station as loud as it would go (which Masika quickly corrected to medium volume) and entertained us with a horrifically off-key sing-along performance. I sang with her to the songs I knew, and laughed and cheered her on for the songs I didn’t. Masika winced and cringed and resisted all attempts to get her to join in. According to her, humanity had perfected beverages in the last several decades, but we had absolutely ruined music.
“Come on, Mut,” Farida begged, prodding the old woman on the shoulder. “I’ve caught you singing a few times before. You have a beautiful voice!”
Masika said something in Egyptian that was either very scathing or very embarrassing, because Farida blushed, sank back in her seat, and didn’t say anything for the next five minutes.
~
We had a fairly long drive to get to the next squat they had in mind — it was almost half an hour past Midooguay, which itself was twenty minutes outside Fredericton. It was quarter to three when we left the gas station. With any luck, we would make it to our destination a couple hours before the sun came up and be able to catch up on some sleep.
I was feeling the strain of being up late in spite of getting a few hours of sleep at the motel. Maybe it was the lingering effects of my paralysis from accidentally summoning a dragon. Maybe I was tired from all the stress. Or it was just that being up after dark felt wrong. Nonetheless, I kind of appreciated seeing the night — I so rarely was awake this late (or early). The near-black sky was thick with a blanket of dazzling stars. I wished I could stop and admire the beauty — it was so much brighter than what I could see in even a small city — but we couldn’t really afford to stop.
I tried to pass the time with some idle conversation, but normal small talk was so mundane as to seem alien with Farida and Masika. It felt silly to comment on the nice weather we’d been having lately.
I did ask Farida if my stone would let me use healing magic like her (“No, each person’s magic is particular to the stone they carry and the creature inside the stone.”). Masika looked agitated by my line of questioning, though, so I didn’t pursue the topic any further. I didn’t exactly want to make her hate me more.
So we drove along in silence.
The more time I spent behind the wheel, cruising along the relatively empty highway, the more my driving nerves began to re-emerge. Sure, I didn’t have to worry about the recklessness and chaos of city drivers, but, well, I was on the highway. Transports rumbled past now and then, making me grip the steering wheel extra-tight. I wasn’t a fan of driving at night, either, and I especially wasn’t a fan of driving at night in an unfamiliar province, even if I did have Farida giving me directions. Plus, I was in the middle of nowhere. Surrounded by woods. Where moose lived. We didn’t have any moose or deer or anything like that back home. The only animals you really worried about hitting were all pretty small — certainly not as likely to total your car as a giant moose. What was I supposed to do if one lumbered into my path?
A massive animal leapt into the road in front of us. Shrieking, I floored the brake, jerking the car to a stop just a few feet away from the — wolf? No, it couldn’t be — I knew wolves were supposed to be big, but this thing was enormous.
I caught movement in the corner of my eye. Something slammed onto the roof of the car, buckling it slightly inward.
“Shit!” Farida was rolling down her window. She stuck her arm out and lobbed a fireball toward whatever was on top of the car, but the flames must have sailed past it, narrowly avoiding the tops of the trees. She swore again and I heard her smack the outside of her car door. In front of me, the hood began to glow with heat, casting a sinister red glow over the dark road. The creature on top of the car roared in pain — an instant later, it landed in a crouch beside the huge wolf. But it wasn’t an animal or mystical creature; it was a man. Tall, broad shouldered, with a reddening face twisted into a vicious grimace. His blue jeans were tattered and a tight black t-shirt strained against his muscular frame. Before I could blink, he was at Masika’s door. His fist crashed through the window in a shower of glass.
“No!” Farida screa
med at the same time as I lunged to cover Masika. My seatbelt locked, but I managed to get my arms around the old woman’s frail shoulders just as the man grabbed a fistful of my hair. The feel of it nearly tearing from my scalp almost overpowered the dozens of sharp pains all over my arms where shattered glass pierced my skin. A burst of scorching heat shot past me. The man let out another animalistic roar of pain and let go.
The tinkle of glass filled my ears as I lifted me head, hesitant. I craned my neck, not willing to sit all the way up but trying to see the man or the wolf or Farida or something to indicate what the hell was going on.
Then Farida was vaulting over the hood of the car, a jet of fire bursting from her feet and slamming into the man, who was still recovering from her earlier blast. He roared incoherently and charged, his shirt still half on fire as he slammed a fist into Farida’s temple just as she landed in a crouch. She was thrown, splayed out on the ground. He dove after her, fists slamming into her back again and again. I could barely see anymore — they were both too low on the ground.
“Farida?” I started to sit up, reaching for the passenger side door.
Masika grabbed my wrist. Her tone was acidic as she said, “Stay. You’ll only be a deadly distraction.”
I didn’t have a chance to retort before a concussive blast of fire sent the man flying backward onto the hood of the car. He was on his feet far faster than should have been humanly possible, lunging toward Farida, who deftly evaded him. She ended up between him and the car, panting, bleeding, glancing wildly from us to him.
I saw the resolve settle in her expression a moment before there was a great rush of air. Suddenly, we were surrounded by a ring of fire, once again casting the dark night in red light. Farida’s arms were raised as sweat poured down her face.
She Who Rises Page 5