A slow smile formed across her face.
“What?” I asked.
“Nothing. That was just easier than I thought it would be.”
Warning buzzers went off in my head. “How do I know you’ll keep your word?”
“How do I know you’ll keep yours? After all, this is your body, not mine.” She patted the wall of the cave and chills went down my spine. She was right, it was my body and they were all trapped inside; free to do whatever damage they pleased. I had to find some way to make peace with them. I had a feeling this wasn’t the only time I would have to barter away control.
“All right, all right. I get your point. I need just one more thing from you – I need you to let me know about the other personalities in here, who would be best to target for certain spells, powers, all that.”
She nodded in agreement.
“Let’s get this over with.” I waved away a small sliver of the wall, just large enough for her to fit through, then quickly closed it again behind her as a surge of gaseous forms rushed for their opportunity to take over the ledge. Those to hit the wall first actually bounced back and I could hear a few whimpers of disappointment. “Tell me how to complete the spell.”
“Like I said, the dream or spiritual world is a mirror image of our world. When you are working with energy meant to be transferred in that world, even your tools should be a mirror image. So your salt, instead of sitting North, should sit South. Your fire should be North.”
I gritted my teeth to find the fix that simple, but I probably would have never figured it out otherwise. “Fine, I want you to wait here until I get back. Don’t try anything funny.”
She agreed, “Do not be gone too long.”
I turned the wall solid again, the other personalities disappearing from view, and lifted my arms, only making the ascent to join my body once I was sure I didn’t have any unwanted stowaways. I opened my eyes, and found Alex staring at me.
“You were doing it again, weren’t you?”
“Doing what?” I set the athame down on the table and gave him an innocent look.
It didn’t work. He put his hands on his hips, glaring at me.
“Well okay, I was exploring the energy and personalities of the athame but it was necessary. The dream spell wasn’t working.” He held out his hand to help me down from the table. “But now I know what to do.”
“Cato said—”
“Cato said no more experiments,” I interrupted. “This isn’t experimenting. I know what I’m doing.”
He still stood, arms crossed, looking down his nose at me. “So what is the consequence now?”
“Consequence?” I moved toward the refrigerator, keeping my walk casual and my gaze downcast to avoid looking him in the eye.
He came up behind me and shut the door as soon as I opened it. “Yes. Consequence. Results of a previous action. Cause and effect. There’s always an effect that comes along with the things you do, and most of the time they’re unpleasant. So out with it.”
“Fine. I agreed to let one of them have control of my body for a short, short amount of time in exchange for some information.” Before he could protest I quickly gave orders, “So, help me back up on the table so I can finish this spell. Then you can go get some handcuffs.”
“Why handcuffs?”
“We can’t have someone running off with my body now, can we?”
The glare faltered slightly. At least he seemed satisfied I was taking precautions.
Once back on the table, I reversed each element, recalled the dreaded dream once again and chanted the spell. This time upon finishing, I felt a significant vibration in the energy around me and it didn’t dissipate.
It will stay with you until you sleep again.
“Well thank you very much, Miss Arianna,” I mumbled.
I met Alex in the hallway and we made our way to the living room together.
“Selling your body for favors –” he mumbled, binding my hands and feet. “Technically you’ve become a prostitute.”
The comment should’ve earned him a slap in the face, but seeing as how my hands were rendered immobile I settled for an equally belittling retort, “And that makes you a pimp.”
“Touché.” He tightened the handcuffs around my ankles extra hard, looking somewhat satisfied to have emitted a squeak of pain from me. “Okay, we’re ready to go. Do your thing.”
“I’ll only be gone a couple of minutes. Just don’t answer too many of her questions, and for both our sake’s keep her under control.”
He nodded and I took a trip back inside myself for the second time that day. Arianna still stood inside the circle of stone, waiting, not that she had much of a choice.
“It worked,” she said.
“What? The dream spell? I’ll find out after tonight.”
“Trust me, it worked. Now it’s my turn.” She lifted her arms as I had, and disappeared into the blinding light that emerged. If I concentrated I could hear her voice talking to Alex, but I couldn’t make out exactly what she was saying. I gave her several minutes, careful to pay attention to the tone of her voice and the energy in the cave, relying on it to tell me if something was wrong. At some point, when I grew tired of straining to hear her, I briefly crystallized the wall and was shocked to find dozens of gaseous forms just on the other side, feeling for a way in. When they saw the wall change, a quick surge of both physical and not-so-physical bodies pressed against it. I quickly solidified it and called Arianna back. She didn’t answer right away. She just continued talking. I fumed, but didn’t dare try calling the light for fear of what two bodies accessing the same consciousness at once might do. After about the fifth call, she finally came and I made room for her in the tiny space.
“That was exhilarating!”
“Yeah, well just come back when called next time,” I scolded her with my hands on my hips. “It’s time for you to finish your part of the bargain.”
“In a hurry to get somewhere? You won’t be going far with all Alex has done. Are you sure you are not a prisoner there?”
“Alex and I have an agreement, don’t worry about me.” I held up my hand for her to take. She hesitated only briefly, and then consented. Just as with the air elemental, I felt my body tingling with energy starting at my hand and moving rapidly through my veins. I could feel the knowledge in her mind and sensed it becoming a part of me. I allowed myself to explore, finding memories and powers she wasn’t necessarily transferring to me willingly. Finally I reached a barrier. I could tell there was still much to discover behind it. She dropped my hand.
“You’re holding back.”
She shrugged. “If I gave you everything now, what else would I have to bargain with?”
Smart woman.
It didn’t matter, I felt sufficiently overloaded as it was. I would need time to practice with my new powers, before absorbing more. “Fine. It’s time for you to go. I’ll call you when I come back, but in the meantime, stay out of my head. Next time I want to talk to one of you…you –”
“We call ourselves Shades.” She interrupted.
I paused. “Shades?”
“Yes, Shades – like shadows, spirits, apparitions.”
“Ok. Next time I’d like to talk to a Shade who knows all about the one who controls the Gaia’s powers.”
“Controls?”
“Not the Ardwyad, but the one who controls the merging of powers between elementals and the Gaia; the one who can add or subtract to the Gaia’s energy.” I was trying to refer to Shawn, without knowing if his position within the organization had an actual name.
“Oh.” She understood. “Not every Gaia has one of those, but there are a few in here who might know. I will find the best.”
I began ushering her to the wall opposite the stairs. “And, why are there only female Shades? I have reason to believe the athame has touched males, too.”
“The athame does hold male personalities. They are just separate, somewhere inaccessible to us. It separates us out to keep the balance. If the athame starts to hold an overwhelming amount of female or male power, it will start to release power from one side to balance itself out.” She paused as she realized which way we were facing. “The stairs are on the other side.”
“I know. That side is, well, let’s just say temporarily closed.” Before she knew what I was doing, I waved open a large slit in the wall and pushed her off the ledge. I quickly closed the wall, even before I heard the loud splash down below. She wasn’t going to be too happy with me, but there had been no other choice. I waited for the chatter and heightened energy coming from the rest of the Shades to subside. I wouldn’t want them to take that momentum and find some way to push themselves into my protected ledge. Once satisfied, I lifted my arms and found Alex staring me down.
“Took you long enough.”
“I had a few more items of business to take care of.” I held my cuffed hands out to him, “Mind releasing me?”
“I’m tempted to leave you just like that. It would be far less trouble for me.”
“Just curious, did you see me use my hands when I created that fun little wind cocoon around you?” My threat was obviously worse than his, because my hands and feet were freed in seconds. “That’s better. Now, tell me what you’ve found out about the islands.”
Sun Tzu - it
“Both the Heard and McDonald Islands and the Southern and Antarctic Lands sit smack dab in-between Australia, Africa, and Antarctica.” Alex assumed the position of an important lecturer, using the kitchen counter as his podium, looking down his nose at his only pupil – me. “Recent satellite imagery, and communications I’ve been able to collect from each of the islands, show no indications that Shawn is there. If he is, he’s covering his tracks extremely well.”
In our usual custom of working until we were dead tired, we were still at it by one a.m. He continued, raising his voice slightly over the noise of our second pot of coffee brewing. “In fact, I don’t think we will know quite where Shawn is until we get there. In any case, we have few options as far as transportation and have no choice but to visit the Southern and Antarctic Lands via a French oceanographic ship. It travels there four times a year from Reunion, an island just east of Madagascar.”
I groaned, “Not a boat…” Seasickness plus seven months pregnant was not a good combination.
“The next ship is scheduled to leave in four weeks.”
Make that eight months pregnant. Alex ignored my griping. He was getting good at that as of late.
He babbled on, “The French Southern and Antarctic Lands is French territory with no permanent population. Those there are either military personnel, other civilian officials, or scientists.
“There is a merchant marine fleet with cargo ships, tankers, and other carriers, which provides potential transportation to the Heard and McDonald Islands, if we determine Shawn is there.”
“And the boats just keep on coming.”
“The Heard and McDonald Islands are uninhabitable and barren. There is no population.”
My ears perked up. “No people - sounds like my kind of place.”
“Sounds like
Shawn’s
kind of place,” Alex retorted. “At least one where he can plan, run operations, and conduct experiments in relative peace. It’s a nature reserve. The islands are bleak, rocky, ice-covered, and actively volcanic.”
I flashed back to the Galapagos, another nature reserve with very little population. “I’d bet you anything Shawn set up shop there.”