“Have you ever seen a more beautiful sight?” Malek asked. “Besides when you look in a mirror or look at our daughter I mean.”
Jacyntha blushed. “You flatter me too much, Malek. But no, not even the Cliffs of Quall can match this view.”
Malek sat next to his wife, their feet dangling over the edge. In the distance, the sun began to set, and the sounds of night in the desert came alive around them.
Troubled as they were by their inability to communicate with the Atlantean Exploration & Trade Advisory, they chalked it up to some sort of a glitch and they were sure they’d make contact in the morning.
Little did they know that the night they’d spend on the South Rim of what would one day be known as the Grand Canyon wasn’t an aberration. There wasn’t to be a return trip home.
They were no longer citizens of Atlantis, they were part of the Great Atlantean Diaspora.
Malek leaned over and kissed his wife softly on the forehead, then the side and back of her neck, causing goosebumps to appear all over her shoulder and down her right arm.
“Careful, Malek,” she scolded playfully. “That’s how we got this one, remember?”
“Do I ever,” Malek grinned.
“Calista will have a little sis-,” Jacyntha began.
“Brother,” Malek interrupted.
“How about sibling?” She offered. Malek smiled and nodded. “But let’s wait until we’re home.”
Malek wrapped an arm around his wife’s shoulders and they admired the view as a breathtaking panorama of stars came into view.
9 Briar
“This sounds like, no offense, but this sounds like a bad episode of Star Trek. Or the Twilight Zone,” I said. I expected Calista to come clean, of for Josephine to confirm that Calista had been engaging in creative fiction, but instead I just got “the look” from Calista, and a mild scolding from Josephine.
“She’s telling you the truth, Briar. Just listen.”
I held up my hands in surrender. “Fine. Okay. I’ll suspend disbelief. Your parents were Atlantean, what, merchants? And they were in Arizona when they found out Atlantis was on the bottom of the ocean?”
“That’s one way to put it,” Calista conceded. “Although the concept of ‘Arizona’ didn’t come around for a few millennia.
“They tried and tried to communicate with home, to find someone to come and retrieve them, but there was no one to answer their pleas.
“For centuries, Atlantean scientists, traders, and scholars traveled to all corners of the globe, exploring and setting up commerce. In Atlantis, science and magic were interchangeable concepts. ‘Powers’ like mine and Aleta’s, and all of yours, were commonplace, although the levels varied.
“Think of it like this. Anybody can sing a song, or shoot a basketball, right?
“But only a handful of people can be Pavarotti or Michael Jordan.
“The average Atlantean could communicate telepathically with someone nearby. Many required physical contact to do so. But only the rare few could do what Aleta can. Likewise, most any Atlantean could move, say a spoon or a pencil with their minds. I can lift a battleship with mine.”
I reconsidered every aggressive thing I’d ever said or done to Calista. A freaking battleship? And I thought it was a good idea to dunk her in the ocean? I pictured myself kicking my own self in the rear end like on a cartoon.
“There were other abilities, of course,” Calista continued. “The healing. Flight. Teleportation, like Zillah. Controlling fire. All sorts of things. If you can conceive of it, somebody in Atlantis could probably do it.
“Atlantis produced, or housed, some sort of energy they called ‘The Spectral.’ Harnessing and manipulating that energy gave Atlanteans their powers.”
“But we aren’t from Atlantis,” Emma interjected. “I’ve never left North America. Pretty sure Briar hasn’t, either.”
“Nope,” I concurred.
“I’m getting to you two,” Calista answered. “To be able to do what you two do, as powerfully as you do, means that you’re both loaded with Atlantean DNA. Dozens of centuries old, but especially on your mother’s side, you’re direct descendants of Atlantis.”
“If Atlantis sunk or was blown up or whatever, then how can that be?” I challenged.
“Not if,” Calista objected. “Atlantis was definitely sunk. But like my parents, there were Atlanteans scattered all over the Earth. Many of them eventually found each other, and they wound up marrying and starting families to keep the Atlantean bloodline clean. Others wound up intermarrying, and today there are children of Atlantis in every country on Earth.”
“Why aren’t there superheroes all over the place, then?” I asked.
“Three reasons,” Calista explained. “Number one, the more Atlantean blood someone has, the stronger their connection to The Spectral can be.
“Second, most people don’t have any idea they can do anything unusual. Think about it; you might be the greatest concert pianist ever, but if you’ve never sat down at a piano in your life, how will you know? Or if you were an Olympic-level skier, but you grew up here in South Carolina, would you ever know your true potential?”
“That makes sense,” Emma said. “I was healing people before I ever knew I was, or could, and didn’t you do things with your powers that you weren’t aware you were doing, Briar?”
“At least twice, probably more, yes,” I responded.
“You said there was a third reason?” Emma asked.
“Yes, I did. And it pertains to your conversation with Aleta, Emma.”
We sat at rapt attention.
“My parents, and most other Atlantean travelers, whatever their specific job or mission, were involved in gathering, planting, and exchanging seeds.
“Horticulture was an important part of Atlantean life. There were varieties or fruits and vegetables there that have been lost forever, but many species of plants were saved by travelers who carried seeds and planted them wherever they went. Many failed to take root, but that was all part of the research. Some could never survive outside Atlantis, and others could thrive only in specific areas due to climate and soil and other considerations.”
I watched Emma connect the dots in her mind.
“The live oaks. On Frogmore. And Angel Oak. You’re telling me they were planted by Atlanteans?”
Calista smiled. Seeing a genuine, warm smile cross her pouty, perfect lips was as rare as seeing… well, as rare as seeing a living, breathing Atlantean. Which she claimed to be.
“Exactly right, Emma,” she said. “And those trees are the little piece of Atlantis that allows you and me and the rest of the Belles to access The Spectral. The Atlantean plants act as a… lens, I guess? Or a prism. They receive the light and refract it in every possible direction. There are pockets of power all over the world.”
“Sequoias?” Emma asked.
Calista nodded. “I’m fairly certain my mother planted them. And the bristlecone pines in the Sierra Nevada’s. Oldest trees in the world, older even than I am. They weren’t planted by my parents, but they’re Atlantean in origin. Some of them are 5,000 years old.
“Baobab trees. Durian trees,” Callista continued.
“In grade school I did a report on Venus flytraps,” I offered. “They’re only found in the wild in one place in the world. A strip of coast from Myrtle Beach to Winston-Salem. What about them?”
“Yes. Now give me a bowl of that,” Calista requested, pointing to the mountain of popcorn. Josephine laughed and filled a bowl for her sister Belle. She withheld it until Calista agreed to a hug. Calista begrudgingly agreed to receive a hug, but she didn’t give one.
We sat in silence, but for the munching of popcorn, absorbing all that we’d learned.
10 Emma
It hit us all at once, rocking us out of our popcorn-and-truth-induced stupor.
Palmer and Lukas were just pulled out of Charleston Harbor. Barely alive. They’re being rushed to MUSC. Don’t any of you look at your
phones?
Aleta’s voice in our minds was as frantic as I’d ever heard it.
As Calista had been giving us our Belles’ history lesson, we’d all abandoned our screens. We scrambled for them now and Josephine shrieked. “No!”
“What happened,” Briar asked aloud, as if any of knew.
They were in human form. Out in the water.
The new information from Aleta made no sense. Why would two mermen shift into human form during a long swim in deep, dangerous water?
“Ezekiel.” Calista spat. “It could only be Ezekiel.”
Get to MUSC as quickly as you can, Aleta urged.
They’re going to need your help if they’re to survive, Aleta said, just to me.
Fortunately, Virginia’s home was only blocks away from the Medical University of South Carolina and the trauma center. Briar white-knuckled us there in the Land Rover, with Calista ensuring we hit only green lights thanks to her power of techno kinesis.
We left the truck running outside the emergency room and dashed inside, guided by Aleta’s telepathic commands. Doors opened feet before we reached them and people in our way received a gentle nudge as we approached. We found Aleta outside the trauma unit, standing vigil.
“I’m getting nothing from Palmer,” Aleta said with tears in her eyes. “He was in worse shape. He swallowed a lot of water. I’m so sorry, Jo. Lukas is in there. They’re both in there. Emma…”
Rage burned inside me. “Clear me a path, Aleta. Get me to their bedside. Right now.”
Aleta approached the door with me. “The three of you be alert. I’m keeping us ‘invisible’ to everyone in this part of the hospital. Calista, you do the same with the security cameras. Keep Josephine out here. Emma needs to focus.”
Josephine was being held up only by Briar, who was sobbing alongside her, her grief and concern amplified by Josephine’s empathic abilities.
Aleta and I burst through the doors, winding our way through nurses and doctors working on a gunshot victim and two men who’d been ejected through their windshield when their car had hit a parked cement truck.
As we hurried through, I tried to focus on extending the field of my healing energy to everyone around me. My moral dilemma was acute; I wanted to save Josephine’s boyfriend and Briar’s new love, but did these strangers deserve my gifts any less? Could I even save any of them without exhausting myself anyway? These were bodies mangled beyond my certain capability to heal.
Saving Dr. Ibis from Zillah’s blade had taxed and exhausted me. I wasn’t sure if I could heal a paper cut in the immediate aftermath. What if Palmer and Lukas both needed my help, but I could only save one?
We found Palmer and Lukas across a narrow passageway from each other, in triage. Lukas wore an oxygen mask. Palmer I knew only because Aleta alerted me that it was him under the sheet, which had been pulled up over his face.
They were both listed as John Does. According to the chart hanging at the foot at Palmer’s bed, he was brain dead and had been for several minutes.
Try to help Palmer, Aleta instructed me telepathically. Lukas is still being aided by doctors. No one can see you. Do whatever you can to bring Palmer back, and then we’ll see about Lukas.
I shook out the nerves from my hands and stepped to the top of Palmer’s bed and folded the sheet down from over his face.
Palmer had saved me from drowning in the Cooper River. I never expected to get the chance to repay him, but here I was.
He looked awful; puffy and bluish. I wanted to cry. I dropped to one knee behind his head and put my hands on his collarbones. I still wasn’t sure exactly how to trigger my abilities; they just sort of happened. If there was an on/off switch or a “volume control” I didn’t know how exactly to access or operate them.
I thought of Palmer, the Palmer I knew, vibrant and full of life. I pictured him in my mind’s eye swimming with Josephine, their laughter and shared joy.
The healing energy began to flow. I felt it tingling in my fingertips, a warmth radiating from me, into Palmer. But where in the past I’d felt a sort of joining, the injured or sick person taking a journey with me, this time I felt… nothing.
I made eye contact with Aleta and shook my head. She entered my mind instantly.
Give me permission to take over, Emma. I can tap into reserves of will and mastery of your abilities you don’t even know you have. Let me help you.
Tears streamed down my face.
God, yes. Do it, please, use me any way you have to.
This may be jarring, Aleta replied.
It was an understatement.
My mind and body locked up. It felt like complete paralysis. But like I was a marionette, in a way. My hands moved, but without me telling them to. I felt like a stranger in my own mind.
The panic was overwhelming, and I felt my lungs filling up with water. Aleta was taking my powers past death’s door and pulling Palmer back.
His drowning was happening to me.
I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t move, and I’d never in my life been so terrified. I could still see Aleta standing across the bed from me, staring right into my eyes, her hands on Palmer’s ankles, but sight seemed the only motor function left to me.
I tore my gaze from Aleta’s and glanced down to see Palmer’s eyelids flutter. Just barely. Maybe it was my imagination. Maybe I just wanted so desperately to see him move. To be the one to save him.
Aleta relinquished control to me, and it felt like my soul jumped into the most perfectly crisp, cold swimming pool on a one-hundred-degree day.
My relief and endorphin rush at being back “home” again in my body was short-lived.
Aleta was sobbing and shaking her head.
Palmer Martin was gone, beyond my gifts, even augmented by Aleta’s immeasurable power.
I collapsed to the floor, scooting back away from Palmer, staring at my hands in disbelief.
I’d seen and experienced so many things that were beyond belief and defied my old concept of reality during my short time in Charleston that I never stopped to consider that there were times our gifts wouldn’t be enough. Our powers could fail us.
Josephine is going to be destroyed, Aleta said softly into my mind. She was still standing at the foot of the bed, hugging herself tightly.
I thought about my parents. My sister. Walter.
As old as some of the Belles were, as immortal as Calista seemed, people could still die. Life was still fragile. Playing superhero was fun, but there were consequences.
I pulled my knees up to my chest and rocked slowly.
And then it occurred to me.
I jumped to my feet and rushed to Aleta’s side. She looked at me like I was crazy. Maybe I was.
“We have to get Palmer to Angel Oak. Like, now!” I said urgently.
“What? Angel Oak? Why, Em?”
“Calista told us a story tonight. About our powers, where they come from, how they work. I don’t know everything, hell, I barely know anything, but she told me the same thing you told me, that the trees are the key. And I could feel it when we were there. I can save Palmer. I know I can. But only there. And it must be soon, before he’s…”
“Before he crosses the water,” Aleta agreed.
Having been telepathically contacted by Aleta, the rest of the Belles burst into the triage section of the trauma center. Thanks to Aleta, none of the doctors, nurses, security officers, or patients were the wiser.
Calista lifted Palmer off his bed into the air with her mind and we headed toward the exit. Briar straggled.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, turning back as the rest of our group proceeded toward the exit.
“Can we…” Briar started, then stopped, pushing her hair back out of her eyes and wiping a tear. “What about Lukas?”
In the rush to help Palmer, I’d forgotten all about the merman clinging to life across the room.
A heartbeat later, Lukas joined us thanks to a telepathic command from Aleta to Calista.
We reached the parking area, where I assumed we’d commandeer an ambulance, or Aleta would “convince” an EMT to drive us to Johns Island.
Calista had other ideas.
“Join hands around Lukas and Palmer,” the eldest Belle instructed.
“Talk about flight for life,” Briar whispered to me.
I nodded and took a deep breath. I’d never been a fan of heights, and ever since the incident on the bridge, even thinking about being higher of the ground than my bedroom at Virginia’s mansion nauseated me.
“You got this, Em,” Josephine said, edging closer to me. Her voice and touch calmed me instantly.
And then, we were airborne.
11 Briar
Aleta assured us we wouldn’t be seen, and Calista guaranteed our safety.
We rose as one, clearing the hospital and moving out over Charleston Harbor toward Johns Island.
The view was spectacular, and although Aleta obscured us from human eyes, a pair of pelicans did a double take as we flew past.
A chilling thought occurred to me, although too late to save us if what I feared came to pass.
“If Ezekiel could turn off Palmer and Lukas’s powers, couldn’t he do the same to Calista?” I asked Josephine. “While we’re all, you know, up here?”
“Let him try,” Calista said coldly. I hadn’t intended for her to hear me. Her voice was ice cold. “There’s a difference between a merman and a daughter of Atlantis.”
I’d visited Angel Oak before, first as part of a middle school field trip and later when a College of Charleston guy I’d met waitressing at The Dixie Garden took me there, thinking it would be a one-way ticket to getting in my pants.
My friend Mara wound up having to pick me up after I punched the guy in the face after he got too handsy with me in his truck in the Angel Oak parking lot.
Carolina Conjuring Page 6