Authors: Jessica Sorensen
Underworld. Besides, practicing might help you when
you drift off into one of your visions without a crystal
bal .”
Okay, time to change the subject. “Okay.” I took a
deep breath and extended my hand out to Nicholas,
my other hand hovering over the crystal bal . “Then I’l
try again.”
“Do you have an idea where you’re going to take
us?” Nicholas asked, taking hold of my hand and
unnecessarily intertwining our fingers.
“Yeah, I have an idea….” I shut my eyes and
brushed my fingers across the cold glass of the
crystal bal .
Yeah, it might have been a stupid idea, but I
figured it was the best way to get an answer to my
current problem. I mean, how bad could it end up
being? I had already seen the world at its end, and
there weren’t many things that were worse than
seeing that.
But with as inexperienced as I was, I knew I was
taking a risk, especial y since Nicholas had warned
me before that when we actual y tried to enter The
Underworld through the Ira, many things could go
wrong.
I needed to know, though, how I was going to do it
—how I was going to get my mother out of The
Underworld. Because I had no idea, and neither did
Laylen. When I had asked him how I was supposed to
get my mom out of there, Laylen had looked as
perplexed as I felt. And asking Alex was not an option,
at least not until he got back, which his release date
hadn’t been determined yet.
It was important that I knew what kind of bargaining
tool we would use to get the Queen to let my mom go,
and the only way I could think of to do this was to see
what I would do. Of course, I wasn’t sure if it was
going to work or not. For al I knew, the vision would
show me that I would fail—that I don’t free my mom.
But I had to try.
I honestly wasn’t sure whether I had pul ed it off, as I
had taken us through the crystal bal , al I kept thinking
was: The Underworld, my mom’s freedom, the Queen.
But even after I landed with a great stumble, and a
bump of my elbow, I stil wasn’t sure I was in the right
place.
“So where’d you take us,” Nicholas asked, rubbing
his hands together excitedly. “Somewhere good I
hope.”
“Um…” I stared down the tunnel we were standing
in, the wal s dripping with musty water and moss
traced the cracks in the dirt floors. Was this The
Underworld? “I think I…” I tried to think of something to
tel him and then I thought, you know what, who cares.
We were here so I might as wel tel him the truth. “I
think we might be in The Underworld.”
He was not happy. And I found out right then and
there that faeries can get very angry very fast.
“You what?” He was struggling to contain himself.
“I think I took us to The Underworld,” I repeated,
feeling like I might need to duck down and take cover.
He opened his mouth and sputtered a bunch of
incoherent words and then kicked the wal of the
tunnel, causing bits and pieces of mud and dirt to
crumble to the floor. He was pissed, and I total y got
that, since he had told me a bunch of times to take us
to a simple places. But then a shriek ricochet through
the air, and al of my attention went to solving where
the noise had come from.
“What’s wrong?” Nicholas fol owed my gaze, even
though he couldn’t see anything. “Is it a Water
Faerie?”
I squinted through the blackness of the tunnel, trying
to see what was at the end of it—something white, but
I couldn’t make out precisely what it was.
“I don’t know…” I moved forward, straining my
vision. “Something…”
“Something what?” Nicholas demanded with
urgency.
“White and wavy and…” Oh no. I’d seen this thing
before, once in a dream, when I had heard my mother
cal out my name. It was the thing that had sent a new
level of fear charging through me. “Ghostly and
boney.”
Nicholas tugged on the back of my shirt and pul ed
me to the side of the tunnel, pressing us up against
the wal . “It’s a Water Faerie,” he hissed.
“Yeah…but it can’t see us,” I pointed out.
He shook his head and whispered, “It’l be able to
sense I’m here.”
I stared at him, shocked. “How?”
“Water Faeries are fey so it’l be able to sense I’m
here because I’m part fey.” His tone singed with
anger. He pushed himself closer against the dirt wal .
“And if it does….” He didn’t finish, taking a
shuddering breath.
I leaned toward him, keeping my voice low. “So
what do you want me to do then?”
“Keep me away from it.” He held out his hand for
me to take. “I can’t see it—you know that—so you’l
have to guide me away from it. Once we get far
enough away from it, take us back to Adessa’s. But
don’t do it while the Water Faeries are close—it’l
more likely be able to sense I’m here, and that’l make
things even worse for me.”
I looked up and down the tunnel, trying to decide
which way to head. The only difference between the
two ends was that one had a Water Faerie floating
toward us and one didn’t.
“Come on.” I grabbed his hand and led him toward
the unoccupied side of the tunnel, moving fast, the air
swel ing damper with each step we took. At one
pointed I shot a quick glance over my shoulder and
saw the Water Faerie a little ways behind us, gliding
through the air, al pale and mirage-like, and close
enough that I could see its eyes were hol owed out
like a skeleton.
We ran faster.
Final y, after what seemed like an eternity, Nicholas
and I were stepping out of the tunnel and out into a
large, open cave. Rays of white light glittered from al
over, hitting the rocky floors and wal s like tiny laser
beams. In the center of the cave stood a throne-
shaped graphite rock, the back of it snaking up to the
domed quartz ceiling.
“Where are we?” Nicholas asked, giving a quick
glance over his shoulder, even though he couldn’t see
anything. “And where’s the Water Faerie? Is it gone?
Can you get us out of here?”
Looking back over my own shoulder, I saw that the
Water Faerie had vanished. “It’s gone.” I turned back
around. “And we’re in some sort of cave with a
throne.”
“It’s the Queen’s quarters.” Panic laced his voice
and he jerked on my arm. “We need to go. Now.”
I didn’t budge. “Just a second…I just need to see
something first.”
Nicholas kept pul ing on my arm, but I refused to
move, digging my feet into the dirt as I waited for
something to happen. I could feel that something
would, I just hoped it was the Queen entering, along
with a future me and future Nicholas as we tried to
strike up a deal to get my mother out of this creepy
place.
“Gemma!” Nicholas hol ered. “We have to get out of
here!”
I looked at him, his expression petrified with fear,
and a realization clicked. “If it’s so bad that a Water
Faerie can sense you’re down here, then how are you
supposed to come down here with me to save my
mom? And…if you want to leave so badly, why don’t
you just take us out of here yourself?”
“Because...” He let out a breath. “Look, I can’t give
you the details, but I can say that there are certain
reasons—rules that won’t al ow me down here…And I
can’t take us out of here, because I can’t—my
Foreseer power is no use down here.”
I gaped at him. “So, if al that’s true then how did
you ever plan on helping me save my mom?” His
silence told me what I needed to know. “You weren’t
ever planning on it, were you?”
More silence and I wanted to smack him.
“I can’t believe this. These last few days have been
nothing but a bunch of lies and games, haven’t they?” I
bal ed up my fist, infuriated. “This whole training thing
was just a charade, wasn’t it?”
He shrugged, being super obnoxious.
“Why would you do that?!” I cried.
He shrugged again, his scared expression now
replaced by a deceitful smile. “To spend time with
you, of course.”
I opened my mouth, ready to scream a few choice
words at him, but then snapped it shut when I saw her
out of the corner of my eye—a woman with long brown
hair and bright blue irises. My mother.
She had entered the cave and walked up to the
throne, where she started to dust it off with a white
cloth, as if she were a cleaning maid. After she had
finished, she stood there for a moment staring at the
throne. Even from where I stood, I could see the
emptiness in her eyes; an emptiness that hadn’t been
there when I had seen her in the previous visions.
Another scream shook at the air, like the one I
heard earlier, and moments later another woman
came into the cave. She was dressed in white; her
eyes were two sunken in holes, and her snow-white
hair trailed down her back like a wedding veil. I knew
she had to be the Queen by how she carried herself;
with utter confidence as if she owned the place. And
also by the way my mom’s eyes lit up with fear when
she saw her.
Unlike the Water Faeries, the Queen didn’t float,
and she looked mostly normal except for that fact that
her skin was nearly translucent and she didn’t have
any eyebal s.
My mom bowed as the Queen walked by her, and
then backed away as if she was terrified out of her
mind.
The Queen sat down on the throne and her voice
echoed out, “Where are they?”
“I think Sarabel a is bringing them in,” my mom
answered with a quivering voice.
The Queen watched the cave entryway with her
eyeless eyes. “Does anyone know why they’re here?”
My mother shook her head. “They haven’t said
anything yet.”
Nicholas tapped me on the shoulder, and
demanded for me to take us away, but I disregarded
him, my eyes fixed on my mother and the Queen of
The Underworld—the Queen known for torturing
people to insanity.
Another scream rang, this time sounding much
closer. But I didn’t move, watching as a tal and thin
figure, with the same snow-white hair and pale skin as
the Queen, strode into the cave, accompanied by no
other than yours truly and…Alex?
What? Why was Alex here with me? And better yet,
how had we even gotten here if Nicholas supposedly
wasn’t able to help me?
Alex remained close to me as we fol owed the
woman across the room and to the throne. I could see
in my expression that I must have been real y
struggling to keep my fear under control.
“Thank you Sarabel a,” The Queen said to the
woman after we al reached the throne.
Sarabel a smiled, revealing that her mouth was
nothing more than a toothless hole. “You’re welcome,”
she breathed, and swept the tail of her white dress
across the floor as she turned around and headed out
of the cave.
The Queen tapped her fingers together the way evil
vil ains do in movies, her bare eyes locked on Alex
and me; her mouth set firmly in a straight line. “So you
two are the humans who dared enter my world without
my permission.” Alex started to speak, but the Queen
held up her hand. “Silence. I do not want to hear your
excuses. Al that is important is there are going to be
consequences for you coming here.” She glanced us
over, like she was contemplating our death in her
head.
“You look familiar,” the Queen remarked to Alex.
“Have you been here before?”
Alex shook his head. “I haven’t.”
“Are you sure?” The Queen’s empty gaze bore into
Alex. “There’s something about you that’s so…
familiar.”
Alex shook his head again. “I swear I’ve never been
here before.”
The Queen continued to stare at Alex. “Tel me then,
what it is that made you enter into my world?”
My mother, who’d been hiding behind the throne,
stepped out and I saw the violet eyes of visions’ self
light up as I realized who she was.
“For her,” Alex told the Queen and gave a nod at my
mother.
My mother looked like a robot, staring at us like she
had no idea who we were.