Rise of the Magi (28 page)

Laerni’s song ceased. “He will understand in time, Lila Gray.”

I turned to her, confused and leaned around Parthalan to say, “How do you know that?”

Her smile told me nothing, only that it was another of those tidbits I either had to figure out for myself or wait until it happened.

“I hate your cryptic shit.”

She rounded the Host Lord, patted my face and began singing again, her eyes closed as she passed me and kept going, maneuvering with ease as if she, like Gallagher, didn’t need her eyes to see. If I had a millennium to spend with that woman, I didn’t think I’d ever completely understand what made her tick.

“It’s just beyond that ridge, I think.” Nix thumbed toward the top of the hill we’d been climbing. “At least, that’s what my gut’s telling me.”

“Considering we have nothing else to go on, your gut’s going to have to do.” Winded from a spurt of nervous excitement and desperation to find Liam, I propped my hands on my thighs to help my climb. The sight from the top took the bottom out of my stomach as well as if I’d stumbled upon a salivating demon. “The pond.” Twenty feet across and lined with cattails, it wasn’t large. “But there’s no portal here. In Dun Bray, there was a suspended door and into the Overseers, there was a painting. This is just … a regular old pond.” Andrew’s story niggled at me. What did the water have to do with the Magi? Was there some ritual I had to perform with the water to open the doorway?

“Stop looking with your eyes and use something deeper, Lila Gray. We’re seeking the entrance to their prison, so your wishing for a flashing arrow over the correct spot is futile.”

I gave Laerni a squinty-eyed glower before accepting that she was probably right, as usual.
Use something deeper
, she’d said. My mind flew in such a tizzy, and my heart ached with the broken expectation that somehow Liam would have been there waiting for me, that I wasn’t thinking clearly.

Eyes closed, I summoned my Light. It didn’t burn as hot on my skin as normal due to the heavy blanket of magic trying to smother me. I listened, probing outward for minds beyond my company. Mental whispers returned to me, curious and without fear. “There’s something here. Or someone.” After lifting my lids, I swept the oasis below, finding nothing but lush green and a pristine pond. “There’s no scum on that pond, no frogs that I can hear. Something’s weird about this place.” I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. The water didn’t look right. No breeze danced through the trees to disturb the surface, but it was too still. “I’m going down.”

Parthalan thrust his hand out and caught my arm. “I do not like this, Mistress. Like a thousand eyes watching us from somewhere close. My skin grows cold and tingly beneath it.”

I stared at his hand, at his tight expression, his gaze darting around the moonlit valley.
Moonlight!
I held my hands up and turned them over, noting the ethereal kiss of the moon. It was full, shining down like a silver sun. Arms swinging to quicken my steps, I descended the hill through the tall grass. “There’s no reflection in the water. That’s what’s weird about it. With the moon directly overhead, we should see a reflection, shouldn’t we?” Maybe the water didn’t open the portal. Maybe the water
was
the portal.

“What does this tell us, Lila Gray?” Laerni joined me.

“Geez, I don’t know. I’m making this up as I go, remember?” I turned to look at Nix who trotted down beside Parthalan. “Andrew said something about the vines taking his father into water to drown him. What if they didn’t drown him, but held him so Alseides could take his mind and make him jump in of his own volition?” I turned to Nix. “Did they take you through the pond? Is that how we get to their reality?”

He stopped at the edge of the reeds and peered into the murk of the water. “I told you I was out of it when they brought me, but … something is ringing my bell right now. You sure that’s even water?” Crouching at the side, he circled his finger in the substance.

Knowing so many waited for my signal to start busting our people out, my anxiety cranked up a notch, making it even harder to think. Parthalan picked up a stone and tossed it. When it hit the water, the noise it made sounded nothing like liquid. More like … silence, as if it had disappeared on contact.
Bingo
.

I wanted to discuss the options, but couldn’t in case the Magi were listening, which they most certainly were if the heebie-jeebies having a dance on my nape were any indication. If they had people acting as conduits on the outside, I couldn’t detect their minds. Something else was off, too.

“I will go.” Parthalan squatted and dipped his own finger into the substance, grimacing. “It feels like nothing. No warmth. No cool. Just … nothing.”

Nix shot up, his eyes wild with fury. “Tell me you don’t trust him that much. Who’s to say he hasn’t been working for them all along?”

I bristled and worked my fists open and shut. “He’s not who he once was. Believe me, I’ve been in his head. In fact, he was willing to give his life, and did for a bit, to help me with Alastair. So, yeah, I trust him.”
More than I trust you
, hung out there unsaid.

“Although I do not agree with your former captain’s reasoning, Lila Gray, I do agree that Parthalan is not the wisest choice to send, as he is male and many of his brethren were also taken. If the males are more susceptible to Alseides’ charms, he may be taken sooner than you will, giving the Magi yet another weapon to use against you.”

“Right. Good point.” Not that they didn’t have enough weapons already. Liam alone would have been enough to get me there, raising the question again of why did the dryads need the others? Forcing my shoulders back and head high, I joined Parthalan by the pond-that-wasn’t-a-pond. We needed him for the rest to work. “I’ll go, and Laerni, too, so she can signal you if it’s safe for you and Nix to come through.”

The faint whispers that had been chattering in my head grew louder. Excited. Waiting. All attempts to pinpoint their origin failed. “I think we’ve got their attention, boys and girls, and I don’t think I’m hearing them from this side of the gateway, but from the far side. Get ready to move.” A subtle nod to Parthalan, and he shut his eyes, hopefully to relay the message to the other teams.

“Keep all you hold dear deep in your heart, Lila Gray. I will attempt to be your anchor, but failing that, you will need to find your own.” Laerni grasped my hand, a devious smile stretching her lips wide. “For our lost ones. For Freymoor.”

I squeezed her fingers in mine, exhaling my utter terror upon the night breeze. “Yeah. For Freymoor.”
For Liam.

26

Laerni and I jumped into the pond feet first. Instead of feeling wet or sticky as I’d been expecting, nothing touched me back. Just like Parthalan had said. A void empty of sight, sound and sensation. No current of water shifted my legs. No air movement whispered against the hairs on my arms. My body was free to move, but there seemed to be no bottom, no sides, no surface, no temperature to note. Nothing touched me anywhere except where Laerni’s fingers intertwined with mine. I’d have freaked right the hell out had she let go. She tugged on me, drawing me upwards. At least my brain told me it was up even though I couldn’t remember my head having ducked under anything.

My mind tried to convince me I’d gone underwater, making me gasp and thrash in panic, but breath continued in and out like normal.

One last jerk of Laerni’s hand brought sight and sound back, though I emerged alone. When her fingers had slipped from mine I had no idea. Panic started to rise like a funnel cloud in my center, stalling when it reached my resolve to keep it away.
I will do this because I have to. For my boys.
My hair and skin were bone-dry. A quick search of the surface and surrounding area revealed no elf, and no Parthalan or Nix either, despite my hope they might have jumped in after us.

Had the portal rejected her? My pulse jackhammered in my throat as I hoped she’d arrived safely back on the other side. Without Parthalan, I had no contact with the other groups, and without Laerni, I had no hope of getting a glimpse into the Magi mind or to use her as my anchor to reality. Not that I held much hope she could read dryads with such power. Without her, my lifeline had disappeared. I shoved it all aside and concentrated on the moment.

Overhead, the sky winked at me. Zillions of pinpricks shone against a black backdrop while I gathered my nerve. I was alive, determined, and I would change our future.
In the background of my thoughts, I acknowledged that I’d known it would come down to me and the Magi in the end, anyway. The sooner I accepted the task and ran with it, the faster I could get it done.

Whispers continued from somewhere straight ahead of me. I peered at the reed-lined edge of the water and up at the same moon I’d left behind. Maybe it had been me who’d been rejected and the rest had gone through?
Fuck
.

I climbed the bank for a better look and peered through the red leaves of a small bush on the far side of the pond from where I’d entered. Not a soul inhabited the shallow valley that I could see. The place appeared identical to the one on the underside of the pond, alive with wild grasses and bouquets of buttercups, all highlighted by the full moon.

I slowly stood and noted the thick wall of trees that gathered around like spectators for a coming fight. Had they been like that when I’d entered? I couldn’t recall, since my focus had been on the pond. Would Andrew’s father still be alive in the Magi’s realm? I had no doubt about what had happened the day Andrew was attacked, but why hadn’t they taken his mind, too? Did he have an immunity to Alseides like me?

The sound of muffled crying drew my eye to the far side of the water. I scanned the woods and approached in a wide arc. Amongst a tuft of tall grass, a young girl sat on the ground hugging her skinny knees. Long, black hair painted a sleek line down fur clothing: a basic skirt and bra in a tawny shade of brown. When she raised her striking ice eyes, I sucked in a breath that refused to blow out for a moment.

“Juliet?” I knelt beside her body, thinner and more frail than when I’d first seen her in the hospital after Alastair had stolen her mother’s soul. “How did you get here? Why did they take you again?”

“They’re coming,” she said, her voice a pitiful wobble of sound. “I didn’t think anyone would ever find me. Please, I want my mom. I’m scared!”

Another scan of the woods. More nothing. “Who’s coming? The Magi? Alseides?”

A shake of her head sent black hair into a fan around her body, suggesting she was afraid to tell me rather than giving a negative answer.

Unable to take the utter panic in her eyes, I wrapped my arms around her, rocking her against my body. “I won’t let them hurt you. Do you hear me? Go back through the pond. You’ll find my friends on the other side.”

Her trembling ceased. She leaned back and put her palm against my cheek, her innocent face as calm and pleasant as morning mist.

Juliet smiled up at me before leaning in to kiss my chin. “I’m so glad you came, Lila.”

I blinked and stood alone in the center of a dark forest full of shadows and moving lights. Not lights. Insects. My breath came hard and ragged as I connected the dots
. That little shit!
The hair, the fur. If I’d been a betting woman, I’d have put my money that Juliet was one of the demon spawn the Magi produced with some unsuspecting human and used as a conduit. Scenarios I didn’t want to think about jumped into the forefront of my mind. The whole hospital scene and the story about the Shadowborn taking her mother had all been a fucking lie. She could see through my glamor. After everything that happened with the Shadowborn, I’d completely forgotten to ask Gallagher about it. She’d had her fingers so deep in my heart she just about broke it to bits. She’d played me like a pro and I’d swallowed it whole because she was a freakin’ Magi spawn. How could I have not sensed any deception at all? I usually read people pretty well. I hadn’t doubted her for a second.
Not a Goddamned second.
Did she do some spell on me to make me more vulnerable like she did to Nix? That didn’t make sense, or she’d have been able to get me into their realm the same way. Had it been her that had lured him there, and he didn’t remember? If one little girl could cause such havoc, it was no wonder the Magi were dancing deadly circles around us.

While I fumed over being so thoroughly duped by a ten year old, I scanned where I’d landed. The valley appeared to be essentially the same, except instead of an inky pool above, the sky had turned violet, the moon a pale pink ball in its center. An odd shade of jade replaced the usual grass green. Fireflies hovered around the edges of what I could see, blinking iridescent yellow, red and purple, their wings rimmed with neon green.

My gut told me I’d finally made it to Alseides’ realm.

How could evil live in such a magical, serene-looking place? How could our last stand be in the middle of an outtake from the Wizard of freakin’ Oz? I knew better than to buy it. The last time I’d felt that peaceful was when I’d found the farm where Liam, through Parthalan, had laid his trap for me. As bait went, I couldn’t imagine anything better to lure a girl with than Liam. I only hoped Alseides would fail to get what she wanted from me as miserably as Parthalan had.

Fog swept over my mind, eating thoughts I tried to have.

Why had I come? The answer flitted away into internal mist. Snippets of memory danced just outside of my inner vision, but I couldn’t find the will to grasp at them, to make sense out of the faces and sounds. Did someone leave me?
Am I lost?

The cheerful call of some night bird rolled across the forest, snapping up my worries and flying off with them. A beautiful, humming silence inhabited me. I reached up to wave my hand through the glowing insects. Their wings caressed my fingers and induced a laugh that unfurled the knots in my muscles. As the tension drained out of me, I wondered why I’d been so uptight. Another glance around the moon-kissed land had me droopy-eyed.

“Welcome, Lila. I’ve waited so long for you to come.”