The Glass Wall (Return of the Ancients Book 1) (27 page)

I inched along the side of the house and peered through some rhododendrons and into the back porch. The porch was bare, but I could easily see through the sliding glass door into the kitchen.

I caught my breath.

Two forms hovered over a figure slouched in a wheelchair. The light came from something resembling a large solar panel propped up behind them. It flashed at intervals and when the next beam of light came, I could clearly see Rafael and Zelphie holding glowing sticks over the huddled occupant in the wheelchair.

I knew it must be Melody, but I had to be sure. Though my heart was pounding so loudly I thought it might explode, I forced myself to wait.

After a few minutes, they moved to the side just as another beam swept through the yard.

I almost screamed.

It was indeed Melody, but not the same woman that I had seen before. I only recognized half of her face, the part creased with the withered skin of an old woman.

The other half of her face was now young with skin tight and smooth.

It was as if someone had drawn a line straight down the middle of her nose and had merged the faces of a young and old woman together. Rafael and Zelphie moved in front of her again, and I bolted.

Zipping across the street, I burst through the door, locked it behind me, and tossed the forks from my pocket in the general direction of the kitchen as I fled to my room.

It took me quite a few minutes to calm down and think straight. When my thoughts were somewhat coherent, I realized that I now had my proof. The police would take one look at Melody and summon every governmental agency, scientist, and paranormal expert in the world.

First, I needed to gather my evidence: my science notebook, the mirror, and the red tube. I’d show them to the police after they saw Melody. It wouldn’t make sense to do it before.

I searched in my closet for my sweatshirt. Plunging my hand into the pocket, I grabbed the mirror. As I did so, the scrap of paper with Jareth’s phone number fluttered to the floor. I snorted and stomped on it. He would be the last person I would ever call. He’d lied to me about Jung.

After grabbing my science notebook from my backpack, I flopped on my belly to fish for the red tube under my bed and pulled it out.

It seemed unusually light this time. I squinted at it closer and then drew back in surprise as something moved inside the red glow. My heart stopped. Red and grey tendrils were coming
out
of the top of the tube. Whatever it was, it was alive, and as its tendrils stretched in my direction, I discovered in horror that I couldn’t let go of the tube.

I opened my mouth to scream, but no sound came from my lips.

With terror gripping every inch of me, I watched more red and gray feelers stream out of the tube. A shape was beginning to form, hovering in front of my face. It looked like some kind of semi-transparent sea anemone with tentacles radiating in all directions.

A couple of tentacles extended toward my face, and I tried to jump backwards, but I found my movements lethargic. It was starting to feel like a dream, and I was dimly aware of collapsing onto the floor, still clutching the tube.

The tendril creature, or whatever it was, was almost completely out of the tube now and hovering over my head. As my cheek smashed against the carpet, I saw Rafael’s mirror, face down, in front of my nose, along with Jareth’s phone number resting on top of it.

Virtually paralyzed, I watched the tendrils inch toward my eyes, nose, and ears. I had never experienced such terror, but the moment the tendrils touched my flesh, I found the terror replaced with sensations of pure rage and fear. I
became
those emotions as they consumed my very soul.

Deep inside and from very far away, a tiny part of me knew the thing in the tube was changing me into itself. It was consuming my energy, growing stronger and bigger, converting me into what it was: rage and fear.

It was almost impossible to think, let alone direct my body to do anything, but I knew if I didn’t do something I would be dead in minutes. I could still see Rafael’s mirror and Jareth’s phone number just inches from my face.

Moments ago, I had been ready to turn them all into the police, but now I knew they were my only hope. Recalling that Harmony had used the mirror to summon Rafael at school, I hoped it would do the same for me.

It seemed to take years before my fingers finally touched the mirror. Summoning my last shred of strength, I flipped it over and as I did so, Jareth’s phone number floated in front of my face, but I couldn’t see the numbers and didn’t trust him, anyway. Looking into the mirror, I frantically hoped that it would be enough to call Rafael to help me.

It was.

Both Rafael
and
Jareth appeared in my bedroom at once. Somehow, they must have sensed my desperation, because they both arrived in fighting stance, one arm raised while the other hand held the small metallic pen-like object.

They took one look at the grayish-red sea anemone creature hovering over me and gasped in unison.

“What is
that
thing doing here?” Jareth inhaled, repulsed.

Dropping to his knees by my side, Rafael wrenched the tube from my frozen fingers in a single, swift motion, but the thing was already free. “It’s too late. It’s feeding off her energy!” he gasped in stunned disbelief.

“But how could it be here?” Jareth hadn’t moved. He was still staring, dumbfounded.

After a hurried inspection, Rafael’s gray eyes darkened and his voice was grim. “She does not have long. This can’t be right! This can’t be the end for her. Her fate line is far too strong and powerful to end here!”

That seemed to jolt Jareth out of his stupor. Joining Rafael to kneel by my side, he touched my cheek lightly and said, “But the strong line is
Blue
! We can’t take the chance, Rafael. It’s better to end it here than to risk such disaster!”

I knew that he meant to let me die. I wanted to scream and cry, but I couldn’t move. I wanted to yell no, that it was
not
better to have me end here! Why was he assuming that if I lived it would be a disaster?

Drawing me up gently, Rafael clasped me close and focused his piercing gaze on my forehead. “No! I will not let her die. Death is not the correct fate line for her at this point!”

Jareth’s mouth drew in a thin, straight line. Adopting a fierce expression, he shook his head, insisting, “There is nothing you can do. That Tulpa has almost converted her. She has only minutes left.”

Rafael passed his hand over my face, still staring at my forehead and then he arrived at a decision. Taking a deep breath, he met Jareth’s gaze boldly. “There is one way to save her.”

“How? It is …” Jareth’s face darkened as understanding dawned. “No! I can’t allow it, Rafael. If you take her to Avalon, they will only kill her. They’ll never let you take her back here, and they’ll never let a human stay there. You know that! It would only be one dangerous step away from breaking the Glass Wall!”

“Then that’s a chance that I will take!” Rafael swore passionately. “I’ll remind them of what we once were and make them understand. I won’t allow them to take her life!”

Jareth choked. “You can’t risk all of humanity for her!”

“You see her fate line as well as I do!” Rafael’s voice rose sharply. “It is so strong, it may be more important than the Glass Wall itself!”

Jareth tried to pry Rafael’s hands away from me. “This is your moment, Rafael! This must be why you are Blue. Let her go. Let her die. It is her destiny!”

Clenching his jaw, Rafael’s hypnotic gaze trapped mine. I wanted to shout at him, to tell him that I was scared and that I didn’t want to die, but my lips were no longer mine to control. I had almost become the twin emotions of anger and fear. The thing was moments away from converting my soul completely.

“I will not let you die.” Rafael mouthed the words in a promise before subjecting Jareth to a contemptuous glare. “You have complained often that I fail to question what we’ve been taught, but it’s you who are failing to question now! The mere presence of this Tulpa signals something is horrendously amiss. Until we can inspect the Glass Wall, I will give us all more time to find the truth!”

Jareth roared in protest, but it was too late.

One moment I was in Rafael’s arms, lying on the floor of my room, dying. The next moment, I was still lying in his arms, but on a field of blue flowers and looking at a rose-colored sky with two moons.

The thing he had called a Tulpa was gone, and I was once again in complete control of my own body.

Chapter Nineteen - Avalon

Immediately, nausea overwhelmed me in intense waves. I screwed my eyes shut and drew a ragged breath. I could feel Rafael’s strong arms steadying me.

“Just breathe deeply.” His tone seemed cold and distant. “The nausea will vanish shortly.”

He sounded upset, but I was too queasy to look at him to verify it. I could only stay huddled as I was and it took some time before I managed to open my eyes and look around.

My brain didn’t want to acknowledge the incredible landscape spread out before me. It was simply too alien. Two moons took up half of an entire sky that swirled with pink clouds. The moons were so bright that even though it appeared to be nighttime, I could see a great distance in every direction.

We were on top of a gentle sloping hill. To one side spread a vast forest of plants reminiscent of giant blue celery stalks as tall as twenty story buildings. On the other side, I could see small hills covered with grass and more flowers, predominantly blue. Mountains circled the horizon in every direction. It was warm and pleasant. A heavy perfume hung in the air and little creatures sang, making sounds somewhere between a frog’s croak and a crow’s caw.

Noticing that I was looking around and alert, Rafael let me go and rose to his feet. His face was pale and he looked nauseated himself.

As he stepped away, I snapped out of my strange reverie and recalled the red tentacle creature that had almost sucked my life away. Shuddering, I gasped, “What
was
that thing?”

His hands clenched tightly. Keeping his eyes trained on the distant mountains, he replied, “It was a Tulpa.”

Not exactly sure that I really wanted to know, I asked hesitantly, “What is a Tulpa?”

It didn’t seem like he was going to answer me at first. He was still staring at the mountains. His arms were clasped tightly now, and I could see the hard outline of his muscles through his form-fitting shirt. When he replied, it was in as few words as possible. “A Thoughtform.”

“Never heard of a Thoughtform, either,” I muttered.

“You humans create them,” he answered distractedly.

At that, my mouth dropped open. “Huh?”

“As a race, you are not yet aware that you create these manifestations in the Second World.” He turned on me then, and I saw that he was shaking. His face was gray, and I couldn’t tell if he was angry or sick, or both.

Alarmed, and feeling a little defensive, I clambered to my feet. “Well, you can’t blame me! I didn’t create that thing. It wasn’t my …” I was going to say “fault”, but it suddenly struck me that it 
was
 my fault. I had stolen the red tube.

His gray eyes were tortured. “You have no idea what I’ve done, Sydney! I’ve broken the most sacred rule of the Fae!” He paused, struggling to form words, and when he did, it was in a voice so low that I could hardly hear him. “I’ve brought a 
human
 to Avalon—the most cardinal sin! What if I’m wrong? What if you 
were
 supposed to die?”

I gulped in shock. “But … you told Jareth that I wasn’t supposed to!”

“But maybe I’m wrong, Sydney!” He strode back to me and grabbed my shoulders, digging his long fingers into my flesh and half shaking me. His lips were white. “What if I’m wrong and Jareth is right? What have I 
done
? How can I even contemplate what I’m thinking? It’s an unimaginable crime!”

He wasn’t making much sense. “I don’t know! What are you contemplating?” Unbidden tears formed in my eyes.

He wasn’t even listening to me. He was staring at me, talking, but I could have been anyone. “How can I even wonder if the Glass Wall is a farce? How could I even think of breaking it? I’ve spent my entire life protecting it! No one has done what I have, no one! I’ve brought a 
human
 to Avalon!”

“What is this Glass Wall?” I found myself shouting at him. Tears were streaming down my cheeks now. I tried to smack his hands from my shoulders, but he was holding me too tightly.

“We are supposed to 
protect
 humanity! What am I doing?” Rafael was shouting now too, obviously caught in the grips of panic. “What have I done, Sydney? I’m not really certain 
why
 I did it. You clearly had fate lines leading to your death! Why did I ignore those?”

“Well, I’m not sorry you saved my life!” I burst into tears.

He kept shaking me, yelling in my face, and I just couldn’t take it anymore.

I hauled off and punched him in the nose.