Into the Dark (The Conjurors) (7 page)

She looked at him in amazement, and he grinned. “What? I like to read. You think I didn’t research the place where the map to leaving this planet is? I’m your guardian. I have to know what to expect.”

“Do people know what this place was built for?”

“Well, they don’t know about the test or the map, if that’s what you mean. But it wasn’t built only for that reason. People used it to learn about the stars and the seasons, for religious reasons, and for burying important people when they died.”

“Can you feel the power of this place? It’s humming in the ground.”

“What?”

“Be still and feel it.”

Valerie shut her eyes, and Thai did the same. She felt the hum again, vibrating in her veins. It was the magic, she knew it. She opened her eyes and saw a look of wonder on Thai’s face.

“I feel it too.”

Then, without warning, her vision went black and she collapsed on her knees.

Instantly, Valerie was running through a dark wood. Her feet pummeled the ground and her lungs burned. But she knew that no matter how fast or how far she ran, Sanguina would always find her. Find her and mentally torture her until she did what she asked.

“Stop running, little one.” The whisper came from everywhere, yet nowhere, and Valerie felt her fear spike out of control. She spent so much of her time afraid – she couldn’t take it anymore.

“You have to leave me alone!” Valerie cried.

At that moment, Sanguina stepped out of the shadows and stared at her with such ferocity that she took a step back. “Never. I will never leave you alone. I will always be here. Give me what I want. Tell me about the monster you’ve seen in your dreams. I know there’s a new one.”

Valerie squeezed her eyes shut. She didn’t understand what Sanguina wanted from her, but whatever it was, she would never give it to her. “I’m not telling you anything.”

“It doesn’t have to be this way. Stop fighting and join me. We will bring the universe to its knees.”

“No!” she felt herself suffocating in her fear, and felt her grip on her own sanity start to slip.

“Valerie, wake up!” Thai’s voice cried frantically.

“Come back to me!” Cyrus shouted.

Valerie was yanked out of her vision, and found herself slumped against Thai’s strong chest. Part of her half-awake mind registered that he smelled like vanilla and cookies.

“I’m back, it’s okay,” she said, but her voice was weak. She had never been pulled into a vision like that before, without being weak from a fight.

Her breathing was shallow, and she knew that if Thai let her go, she wouldn’t be able to stand on her own. Luckily, most of the visitors were gone for the day. The sun was setting, and gray clouds made the light dim.

She felt her heart slow to a crawl, and suddenly she knew that it would never speed up again. This was the end. This was a dream that she could not recover from. And to think that she had been so close to experiencing magic! Valerie’s eyes fluttered and she was too weak to keep them open. “I’m so sorry guys.”

“No, please! Stay with me!” Cyrus begged.

Thai fell to his knees and cradled her in his arms. His dark, chocolate eyes looked a little misty. “You’re a fighter, I knew it from the first minute I saw you. No way are you going anywhere!”

Valerie didn’t want to let them down, but she knew that unless a miracle happened, she was going to die. A large drop of rain splashed against her forehead, and in a matter of seconds, water poured from the sky.

Thai started to lift her. “We’ve got to get her out of this.”

“No, wait! Look!” Cyrus pointed the stones, which were being pounded by the rain. As they were drenched, the stones began to glow from within. “Take her inside the circle. I’ve heard that the stones have healing powers. It’s worth trying – there’s nothing any doctor can do to help her now.”

Thai carried her to the ring of stones, and she knew the exact moment that he stepped inside the circle. Suddenly, warmth ran through her body, and with the warmth came energy. She felt her heart beat almost normally again, and strength flow through her body. “Let me go,” she said to Thai, but he still gripped her tightly. “Let me go, seriously!”

He set her gently on the ground, and she laughed. She still felt weak, but she knew that she had enough strength to go on. She walked over to one of the stones, which wasn’t glowing anymore, and touched it. “Thank you,” she said, not even feeling slightly stupid for talking to a stone.

She turned to Cyrus and Thai. “I’m going to be okay – at least for awhile longer. Maybe I’ll even make it off this planet after all.” A feeling of hope spread through her as she realized that maybe she would pass the test of her magic tomorrow after all.

Thai slumped against one of the boulders in relief. “Thank God.”

“I heard that water on the stones can heal, but no one has seen it happen in hundreds and hundreds of years,” Cyrus said.

“Hey, you kids! Get out of there!” A guard yelled, jogging toward them in the rain.

“Sorry sir, only looking,” Thai said.

“Well, you have to be on a private tour to walk wherever you want. Anyway, we’re closing.”

Reluctantly, Valerie followed Thai out of Stonehenge. But as she walked toward the bus, she couldn’t help looking back over her shoulder at the stones that had saved her life.

An hour later, Thai and Valerie arrived at the Stonehenge Touring Park in Orcheston, which was as close as they could camp to the monument. The next day they would have to walk the four miles to Stonehenge in the dark, early morning before the buses started bringing visitors to visit the ruins.

Luckily, the rain stopped by the time they set up their tents. Valerie saw a small bonfire created by some of the other campers flickering in the distance. They decided to bring their cans of beans and stale bread to the fire to warm them up.

As they approached the fire, she looked over at Thai, who still wore his drenched sweatshirt with the hood up. “Why don’t you take that thing off and let it dry? Besides, you look kind of threatening with it on. You’ll scare people.”

“That’s the point. It’s better that people keep their distance.”

“God forbid that we should have any fun tonight,” she muttered.

But she cheered up as they approached the fire. She felt the chill from the rain finally vanish, and the other campers shared marshmallows for toasting with them. Valerie saw Thai’s eyes start to droop, and he made a small sound, like a child who was trying not to fall asleep. He stood up and went back to his tent.

Valerie slept lightly that night, excited to get up and go back to those magical stones, but still nervous that tomorrow would be the end of the only adventure of her life. At first, she thought she was dreaming again when she heard noises coming from Thai’s tent. She sat up, and listened harder. There it was again.

She went to Thai’s tent and pulled back the flap. “Thai, are you okay?” In the dim light, it seemed as if he was tossing and turning in his sleeping bag. “Who are you talking to? Is someone in there with you?”

“Get out of here!” he yelled, enraged, yanking the flap of his tent closed. “Leave me alone!”

Valerie, fully awake now, stood back, shocked. She couldn’t sleep for the rest of the night, and was fully packed and ready to go at 3am, when the two silently began the hike to Stonehenge.

After a mile of trudging in silence, she finally said, “Aren’t you going to say anything? It’s not like I meant to invade your privacy.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Then why don’t you explain it to me?”

“Because it’s none of your business,” he said without emotion as he pulled on his hood and retreated into its depths.

“Fine. But it’s not like I’m going to judge you. It seemed like maybe you needed to talk to someone or something. You sounded so miserable last night.”

Thai didn’t respond, and neither of them said another word until they reached Stonehenge. Valerie could barely make out the giant stones in the light that was starting to creep over the horizon, but her heart leapt at the sight of them anyway.

“So what’s the test?”

Cyrus appeared in front of her. “Simple. To find the map. Finding it will prove that your magic is too strong for you to survive on Earth.”

“Obviously the magic inside her is strong enough. It nearly killed her last night!” Thai burst out, angrily. “So tell us where the map is!”

“I don’t even know, dude,” Cyrus said. “But chill out, she’ll be fine.”

“Both of you, give me some space,” she said firmly, as she saw Thai about to shout at Cyrus again.

Valerie approached the stones slowly. She felt the hum of magic as she walked around the outside of the ring of stones. Inhaling deeply, she stepped inside, and the humming inside of her felt stronger.

Gently, she ran her hands over the rough stones, one at a time. At the fifth stone she touched, she stopped, puzzled. There was something different about the way this one felt. All of the stones contained power, she could feel that, but this one contained something else as well. It seemed – alive.

The dim light caressing the stone changed at that moment, and she gasped. How could she have missed it? Etched into the stone was a face. Were it not for the angle of light casting shadows on the stone, she would never have been able to see it. The etching had obviously faded over the hundreds of years that the monument stood. In direct sunlight, it would be practically invisible.

Valerie hesitated before touching the face with her hand, not wanting to offend it. Her fingertips brushed the cheek of the face, and she made a small sound of surprise. Instead of rough stone, it felt like warm flesh. At her touch, the eyes of the face glowed a gentle blue.

At that moment, her vision blurred, and when she was able to refocus she was looking out over Stonehenge through those blue, glowing eyes. She could now see the monument as it once was in all its glory, with the stones all standing. She could see that another ring of wooden poles surrounded the monument as well. At the horizon, the sun was now peeking over the edge. She followed with her eyes the first direct ray of light from the sun as it passed through the two heel stones in the distance and struck a stone in the middle of the circle.

Suddenly, Valerie was back in her own body, and the stone in the center of the circle, the altar stone, was still glowing. She approached the stone, which was bathed in new morning light. She stepped into the light and a flood of power surged through her. A thousand images flashed through her brain of the Great Pyramid in Egypt, and she knew exactly how to get inside the launch room and operate the vehicle that would transport her to the Globe. “This is it,” she whispered. “I have the map!”

The bright light faded into normal morning sunshine. She was about to shout to Thai and Cyrus when a black shadow flickered in the corner of her vision.

“Val, look out!” Cyrus shouted, pointing to her right. Thai came running toward her.

She turned and saw the enormous man who had frightened her at the Oakland train station a few days ago. Thai was right – he was dangerous. As quick as lighting, the man crouched, and then jumped, farther than any human could possibly jump. As he flew through the air, she saw that his palms were covered in yellow, nasty-smelling slime, and he was reaching for her neck.

Valerie felt her body respond, easily dodging his grasping hands, despite his speed. Without knowing what she was doing, she effortlessly knocked his hand away with the back of her foot with an elegant spin kick. She could feel that her kick packed more power than it ever had before, as if the power of Stonehenge was giving her own magic a boost.