Authors: Jessica Sorensen
taking a nervous deep breath. “With my emotions…I
mean, am I…is it okay for me to have emotions?”
“I don’t know. I real y don’t anything right now.” He
looked at me funny, and I had the urge to bolt for the
door as the fear raced through me that he might
suddenly whip out the
memoria
extraho
and wipe
away my mind. “For now,” he said, “we’re not going to
do anything. Not until we know what’s going on.”
I was in no way, shape, or form relieved by what he
said. “For now?” I asked.
He didn’t say anything else. He just turned away,
cal ing over his shoulder. “Let’s go get you something
to eat."
I glared a fiery glare at the back of his head,
suddenly wishing I possessed pyrokinetic powers. I
refused to go through this again. Get left out of the
loop. Be given vague answers. I’d find out what I
wanted to know, before it was too late. I’d get to the
truth, whatever the cost.
Before going into the kitchen to get something to
eat, I decided to go upstairs to change out of the
pajamas I was wearing. Alex had told me, when I’d
asked him if there was something else I could wear
besides pajamas, that there were some clothes Aislin
had picked out for me up in the room I’d woken up in.
As I dragged myself up the stairs, I thought about
everything I’d just been told. It felt like I hadn’t been
told anything real y. Like always, I had a huge list of
unanswered questions roaming around in my head.
And I was worried. Worried about whether or not Alex
had told me anything truthful. Worried about why the
Death Walkers had just up and left. Worried that Alex
would suddenly decide I wasn’t supposed to feel
anymore and try to take my emotions away from me.
I reached the top of the staircase and let out a
heavy sigh. Lost. Was lost considered an emotion?
Because that’s how I felt.
I was half out of it, consumed by my thoughts, as I
opened the door to the room. But right as I went to pul
the door open, it swung open on its own, and
someone grabbed me by the arm and yanked me
inside.
I opened my mouth to scream, but another hand
came down over my mouth, and al I could do was
think,
great. Now what?
“Gemma,” a voice whispered in my ear.
I frantical y tried to wriggle my way free from
whoever had a hold of me. My heart pounded inside
my chest as thoughts of who it could be blasted
through my mind. Stephan? A Death Walker? Some
other kind of monster?
Whoever it was had ice-cold skin, so I was leaning
toward a Death Walker or another kind of similar
monster.
“Jesus Christ, Gemma. Calm down.”
This time my brain registered who the voice
belonged to and, feeling kind of stupid, I stopped my
pathetic fight to get away. Laylen let go of me, and I let
my breathing slow down to a normal pace.
“
What
are you doing?” I asked, breathing heavily.
“You scared the heck out of me.”
Again
.
“Shhh…” Laylen put his finger up to his deep red
lips, glanced around the room, and then shut the door.
“Keep your voice down.”
“Why?” My voice came out way too loud so I
lowered it. “Sorry. But why do I have to keep my voice
down?”
He glanced around the room again, seeming
nervous, and then locked the door. “So what do you
think about what Alex told you?”
Hmm…so had I been wrong about Laylen trusting
Alex? “I don’t know…What do you think about it?”
He tilted his head from side to side, wavering. “I’m
not sure…it just seems a little too…”
“Simple,” I finished for him.
He nodded. “Exactly. Aislin and I show up there and
Stephan and the Death Walkers are conveniently
gone. It just doesn’t make any sense.”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought too.” I paused,
considering what it could mean. But in my typical
confused style, I felt as lost as ever. “So what do you
think real y happened?”
He shrugged. “I have no idea. But I know the
chance of the Death Walkers just leaving when they
know you have the star’s energy in you, is slim to
none. And I think it’s real y suspicious that Stephan
just passed out like that.”
“Wel , Alex told me that Stephan passed out
because of this.” I lifted up my locket, the purple stone
reflecting sharply in the lighting of the room. “That this
little stone is sugilite and that because I was wearing
it, and Stephan tried to use harmful magic on me, it
made him black out.”
Laylen took the locket in his hand, rubbing the
purple stone with his thumb. The necklace was stil
attached to my neck, so I had to crank my head
forward, putting my neck in an awkward position.
“That’s interesting….” he murmured and let the
locket go, releasing my neck from its uncomfortable
position. “It’s sugilite, but stil …” His expression
twisted with confusion.
“What? Does sugilite not protect people from
certain kinds of magic like Alex said?” I mean, real y,
the odds were pretty high that Alex had been lying.
“No, it does.” He paused. “But I don’t get it. Alex
gives you this necklace that has sugilite, knowing if
someone uses magic on you, to let’s say take your
emotions or mind away, that it won’t work. And that it’l
end up doing harm to whoever is using the magic on
you. Yet, supposedly, at least according to the
Keepers, you’re not supposed to have any emotions.
So what would be the point of Alex protecting you
from the thing he’s been tel ing you has to be done?”
I frowned, not at Laylen, but at the mention of my
emotions. “So Alex told you everything then?”
“Yeah, but it doesn’t mean I believe every part of
what he said.”
“Me neither,” I agreed. My leg was kil ing me, so I
went over and sat down on the bed, and Laylen
fol owed, sitting down next to me. “So what else did
Alex tel you?”
He gave me a sort of amused look. “Wel , he told
me that you guys took a little trip to the City of Crystal,
where you found out that you’re a Foreseer.”
I swal owed hard. “Did he tel about the vision I had
to go into while I was at the City of Crystal?”
“He did.” Laylen answered with hesitance.
I hated to be reminded of that vision, and just
talking about it shoved the memory of it into my mind;
Stephan forcing my mom to go into lake—the
entrance to The Underworld—where she’d been
tortured to insanity by Water Faeries.
“You okay?” Laylen asked.
“I’m fine.” My voice sounded choked. There was a
gap of silence before I asked, “Do you think there’s a
way she can stil be alive? My mom, I mean.”
Laylen sat there, looking at me, not in a feeling-
sorry-for-me kind of way, but more as if he was
seriously contemplating what I’d asked him. Part of
me grew eager that he might say yes; that there was a
possibility that my mother, who I hadn’t seen since I
was four years-old, and could barely remember a
thing about—thanks to the detachment of my soul
from my emotions causing my memories to be
erased away as wel —might stil be alive.
“I don’t know, Gemma,” he said softly. “She’s been
down there for a
really
long time.”
My eagerness dropped to the floor and shattered
like glass. “Oh. Okay.”
“Now hold on one second before you go getting that
sad look on your face. Al I said was that she’s been
down there for awhile, not that there was no way she
could be alive.”
I tried to keep my excitement to a bare minimum.
“So, are you saying that there might be a chance she
stil is?”
He twisted his lip ring from side to side. “Maybe…
There’ve been some people that have survived the
Water Faeries tortured for a long amount of time
without going too insane. And there have even been a
few people that have escaped The Underworld
before.”
“There have!” I shouted, and then made an oh-crap
face at the loudness of my voice. We both stayed
silent for a moment, making sure no one had heard
and had decided to head upstairs to check on me.
The house was quiet, as stil as the hot desert air, the
only noise coming from the humming of engines from
the cars passing by. “Sorry,” I whispered. “But I’m just
real y confused. The way Alex made it sound, it
seemed like there was hardly any way that anyone
could ever escape The Underworld. That once they
were sent down there, they were basical y trapped
there until they died from the torture.”
Laylen’s bright blue eyes twinkled mischievously.
“Yeah, but Alex doesn’t hang around with the same
kind of crowd as I do, does he? You learn a lot of stuff
when you’re not just limited to the Keepers circle.”
Now I was letting myself get a little excited over
what Laylen was saying. Wel , except for the fact that
he said “crowd.” What kind of crowd were we talking
about here? Vampire crowd? Witch crowd? Black
Angel crowd? Al were possibilities, and there were
probably other possibilities that I didn’t even know
about.
“Is there any way we could find someone who wil
maybe help us find out if she’s alive? And help us find
out if there’s a way we could get her out of The
Underworld if she is?” I held my breath as I waited for
him to answer.
It took him a second, but he nodded. “It won’t be
easy, though…And it’l be dangerous.”
I should have been scared. But after you’ve faced a
swarm of murderous Death Walkers, been hit by their
Chil of Death, and stared into the eyes of a man who
is trying to wipe your mind away, “dangerous”
becomes a little easier to deal with. “So you’re saying
that maybe we could go and talk to someone about
her?”
He mul ed over my question for so long that I was
sure he was going to say no. “Yeah, I think we might
be able to do that.”
“Real y,” I was practical y bouncing. “Are you
serious?”
He nodded. “I think your mom may know more
about what’s going on than anyone does. I think that
might be part of the reason why Stephan sent her
there—so she couldn’t tel anyone what she knew.”
“I think so too,” I agreed. “In fact, in the vision, she
told Stephan that one day he’d get caught and that he
didn’t have everyone wrapped around his finger.”
“Then I think the sooner we can find out if she’s
alive the better. And maybe we can put al this
madness together and get some real answers.” He
paused. “But I don’t want you to get too excited, just in
case things don’t turn out the way…the way you want
them to.”
“I won’t,” I assured him, but I stil couldn’t help but
get a little excited. Wel , okay, I was beyond excited. In
fact, I think I’d hit a whole new level of excitement
and…yep, there it was. The prickle.
I know. I know. I was total y setting myself up for
some serious heart-ache here. But I couldn’t control
myself at the moment. Just seeing my mother…it
would be amazing. Especial y after being raised by
Marco and Sophia, who were two of the most cold-
hearted people I knew. Wel , besides Stephan.
Wait. Hold on. “Laylen, what happened to Marco
and Sophia?”
“I have no idea,” he said with a shrug. “No one
does. They just up and disappeared.”
Hmmm…very strange. So did that mean they were
playing on the good side or the bad side?
I opened my mouth to ask Laylen this, but a knock
at the door caused Laylen and I to jump to our feet.
“Gemma,” Alex’s voice floated through the door.
“Are you in there?”
“Uh…Yeah,” I cal ed out. “Just a second.” I turned to
Laylen and whispered. “Great. What am I supposed to
tel him when he asked why you’re in here?”
“You’re not going to tel him,” Laylen whispered,
searching for a place to hide. “If he knows I am in
here, he’l know something’s up. And if he knows what
we’re planning to do, he'l go out of his way to make
sure it doesn’t happen.”
Excel ent point. Alex would say it was too
dangerous, at least for me anyway. Because that’s