Except now they were on Plan C, dressed in their long thermal underwear, woolen socks, and fleece hoodies. The extra layer wasn’t necessary now, but it would be after half an hour of sitting still as their fire slowly burned down. An air of urgency kept them focused on the invisible world – not on adding more wood.
The sword that used to belong to Ash was bared, laying across Cooper’s thighs. His arms were draped over it, with wrists propped as far as he could while sitting up straight.
Ash marveled at the sight. Cooper was strong and competent, and he was growing into his powers with confidence that rolled off him in waves. After a moment’s hesitation, Ash adjusted his pillows and scooted forward just enough to reach to Cooper’s fingertips. Their socked feet barely fit, pushed together like pieces of a puzzle. Neither of them wanted to sit in a half-lotus position for what could be hours.
Ash centered himself in his meditative trance, shutting his eyes and tuning Cooper out as best he could. Only once he felt his power source and its surroundings did he reach out and gently touched Cooper’s fingertips with his own.
A jolt of energy passed through them. His skin prickled with a shimmer in the air, as though something had to readjust, and in a moment Ash’s vision extended past the normal human range. Now, as he cracked his lids open, he could see the overlay of charged color over their material world.
The sphere was still there, strong, yet fluctuating in a slow drift of soap-bubble colors. Ash didn’t know what those colors meant, if anything. The candles they had lit glowed with more than just firelight – a nimbus of energy tinted the air around them, and merged with the random patterns of their shield.
So clever of Cooper, making a three-dimensional shield instead of mere circle!
[: Yes, he is, :] a familiar voice agreed. Old Man Allegheny was back.
[: I never left, not as long as your circle is up and drawn with my waters, :] he huffed. [: And I’m not leaving. I’ve spread the word that the Healer of Rivers is in for a rough ride, and might need a bit of help. :]
There was no telling whether Cooper heard what Allegheny just said. He hadn’t even twitched. Ash blinked hard, though, thinking. Who might the Old Man have called? And what kind of a hard ride? They were safe from the activities in the lodge, after all. Cooper had wanted to find out what he’d been missing, and now he knew.
Now he didn’t want what was being offered – to Ash’s intense relief.
Ash hoped Cooper’s family wouldn’t forsake him as a result.
But who were the other entities Allegheny had invited? And why?
[: Nothing’s certain yet. I can’t guarantee their coming, either. Just sit still, and keep your guard up. :]
Even though Allegheny was a worthy ally, and his words were meant to reassure, Ash had never been more terrified.
THE FIRE WITHIN his soul warmed Cooper better than any brazier could. He saw, with the talent loaned to him by Jared, a connection that stretched like a twisted umbilical cord, running from the whirling orb of energy in his center down below.
Through him, and through the pillows.
Through the snow and frozen soil.
Through the gently dipping strata of the lake basin, past ancient geothermal intrusions and a stray salt dome, past shale imbued with organic gasses and onward through layers of sediment that had petrified into solid bedrock over countless millions of years.
And down there, just where his umbilical began to grow pale and thin, Cooper saw that red, fiery glow of molten rock that oozed through the still-solid crust.
The magma didn’t intimidate him. [: Hello there, :] he whispered gently, greeting the Earth. [: You helped me before, and I thank you. :]
The warm glow he felt intensified, and he smiled. This was good, this connection to the life underground. He knew this is what he came here for.
Not his family’s customs.
Not their irrational desire to bribe a rogue lake spirit with the gift of their life force.
But this, the connection to his prime element that was earth, and that was, by extension, a new form of fire. He embraced it, for without it, life on Earth would’ve been impossible. [: Will you guide me today? :]
[: Only if you promise not to hurt my lake-child. He, too, is suffering and he’s lashing out in his pain. :]
Cooper’s mind froze momentarily. Such thought was unthinkable [: I’d never hurt Ash! :]
The voice in his head uttered a patient sigh. [: The man you call Ash is not my lake-child. I now speak of the one that appeared as a great fish to you. The one who is poised for revenge. Can you not feel his anger? :]
Cooper shook his head, which severed their tenuous connection. Startled at the loss, he opened his eyes wide. Ash was sitting right across from him, with their fingers gently entwined. “Did you feel that? Did you hear any of it?” Cooper asked frantically. The earth spirit – if that was who he had just spoken with – was as comforting as she was scary.
Ash shook his head. “No. Old Man Allegheny is still with us, and he’s calling for reinforcements. Except I don’t know for what, and I have no idea who they might be.” He paused, thinking. “Or what they might be. It’s... I’ve never felt like this before, and no river has spoken to me before using words.”
“The Earth has never spoken to me before either,” Cooper said slowly. “And she feels strongly about us not harming her lake child.” At Ash’s quizzical look, he raised his eyebrows. “That pissed-off lake spirit we escaped from? Apparently, he’s coming back.”
ASH GRIPPED COOPER’S hands tight. “Oh, honey.” The lack of understanding in Cooper’s eyes was apparent. “This is the worst thing that could’ve ever happened. We have invoked something we cannot control.”
“More so than usual?” Cooper asked with a wry grin.
“Very much so, yes.” Ash didn’t share his amusement. “This is... it’s bad, Cooper. It’s disastrous. Don’t you see?” He waved one hand around, as though to indicate the world in general and their situation in particular. “I have the river spirit backing me, and he’s bringing friends. You have the Earth, and you’ve invoked fire when we cast the circle.” He cocked his head. “Is there fire?”
“There’s the heat under the mantle, yeah. The magma. I’ve...” Oh crap, and now he’d sound like a total lunatic. Cooper forged on with a wince. “I’ve felt it.”
“Okay. So both of us have some friends. Except we pissed off the lake dude somehow. And if there’s a fight, your family and friends over there are generating a lot of power, which will be an attractive morsel to a lake spirit in pain who feels we owe him something. And Allegheny had been ready to duel in the past.” He gave Cooper a significant look.
Oh. Oh. This wasn’t good, not at all.
“And I’ve been told She’ll guide me, but only if I don’t hurt her ‘lake-child,’ and she didn’t mean you.” Cooper’s face contorted into a grimace of pain. “I’m not going to fight you, Ash,” he whispered. “She can do her thing, and your allies can do theirs, but I’m not raising my hand against you. Not even if you have your allies pissing her off by kicking the lake’s butt. He’s been an ass anyhow.”
Ash gave a serious nod. “And I won’t do anything that would ever hurt you. Even if the lake is after me.” Then he paused. “She said the lake was angry? I don’t feel a thing.”
“Maybe because not much is going on yet,” Cooper mused. Their hands were securely linked again. “Or maybe it’s the shield. But something’s about to go down, and if it does, then we should define our victory conditions right now. Just so we’re clear on what’s okay, and what’s not.”
“Your family, Cooper. We’re okay here, shielded so hard we can’t even feel the lake’s anger. I think we can hear what they’re doing in the regular sense. But... but we’re deaf and blind outside these shields.” Suddenly Ash knew he was right. Cooper’s family was a bunch of fat, sitting ducks who have offered themselves to the Lake through a strange and ancient ritual.
He hoped they
knew what they were doing.
And that they knew how pissed the lake was.
Yet he’d been told that very fact, and didn’t feel a thing.
CHAPTER 14
Jared
“Did I understand correctly that Cooper and Ash are supported by deities who might war with each other?” Shika asked with a serious frown. The pate of his head was shaved, but the rest of his hair was pulled into a samurai top knot and a thin tendril of strong, black hair slithered out and formed a graceful arc by his ear.
Not realizing where all these wild feelings were rushing from, Jared smiled fondly, reached out, and tucked Shika’s hair behind his ear.
The gesture was familiar.
Like he had done it before.
Their eyes met, wild and searching.
“You.” Shika’s voice trembled. “I... I feel as though I should know you, and yet...”
“I know.” Jared shrugged helplessly. “I’m sorry. I just... I’m worried for Cooper. For Ash, too. I wasn’t thinking. It’s... it’s nothing.”
It wasn’t nothing, and he knew it. The knowledge reflected in Shika’s eyes, but his new – or was it old? – friend let it pass for now. “We should ask the Maker,” Shika said.”
“I haven’t met the Maker yet. Who is he?”
Shika gave him a small smile. “He is an old man with a limp. He’s the one who had forged this sword and died doing so. Or so he says. Nobody knows for sure. But he is familiar with these powers, because sword makers are like priests.” He paused. “Back when I was still alive, I had met one. He sacrificed to the spirits and meditated, and purified himself before he even began working a new blade. His wife lived alone for many months while the sword was being completed. This is the way of the Maker.”
All this was new to Jared. To him, a decent Japanese blade likely came from eBay or from a gun show, where someone was selling a cool sword his great-grandfather had brought from Japan after World War II.
They got up, and Jared followed Shika from under the cherry tree and across the creek. He picked his way with care due to the dim light, but Shika just floated across the rocks and water like the spirit he was. He turned, raised his eyebrows at Jared’s careful progress, and smiled. “I see you’re still bound to the ways of the living.”
“I haven’t technically died,” Jared confessed. “It’s a long story.” Shika’s comment gave him food for thought, though. He could see the power currents of the spirit world already – and if if he could see them, unencumbered by his physical form, then maybe he could learn to do all kinds of things he could never do before he had dematerialized.
For now, though, he’d focus on their task. “So where is this Maker? Will you introduce me?”
Shika only turned, trusting Jared to follow his gracefully floating form.
They made their way around the wooden porch to the other side of the house. Here, away from the murmur of the creek and the crowd alike, two men knelt on cushions. A game of go was laid out on a low table between them.
Shika knelt and bowed low.
Jared copied him immediately. This was different, and he didn’t understand the customs of the land, but he’d seen enough martial art movies to get the general gist of what was expected.
The older man, one with his long white hair tied with a string and his long, white beard trailing down to his belly, turned his milky-white eyes toward them. “Youngsters. Always interrupting.”
“I’m so sorry, Ojii-san,” Shika said in a low voice full of respect. “I made a friend, and this friend knows the outside world. That world is now shaping our world. There are... spirits at work.”
“Sit up, you two.”
Once Shika straightened into a proper seiza, kneeling while sitting on his heels, Jared did the same. He had to sit like that, but at least his feet wouldn’t scream with pain once his blood began to flow to his feet again. He had no feet anymore, and he had no blood, he reminded himself.
Shika looked at him, then at Ojii-san. “Ojii-san, may I humbly introduce my friend Jared, who has never truly died. I am deeply honored that you would grant us this audience.”
“Huh.” The old man remained silent. Then he turned his blind eyes toward Jared, and Jared felt his assessing stare.
Like him, this man could see the flow of power.
Jared dropped the shields it had taken him so long to cultivate.
The man nodded once, and Jared felt the careful touch of his energy upon him. Reading him. Assessing him.
“Interesting.” He withdrew, then turned to the other go player. “Arashi. Call a meeting.”
ASH AND COOPER
The drumming from the lodge was now accompanied by sounds which were as familiar as they were embarrassing. Cooper couldn’t meet his lovers eyes. Not now. Not while his parents, cousins, uncles and aunts and all their friends and lovers raised power in a ritual which seemed as awkward as it seemed primitive – and never mind that he and Ash had resorted to similar measures in the past.
Except it had been more... private. Just them, with others too absorbed in combat.
Just them, alone on a creek with a dam about to burst, and nothing but their combined talents to minimize the damage and help the river find her voice again.
But not this – not this almost coerced group orgy.
Moreover, Cooper discovered a valuable fact on this trip. He didn’t need the heat of passion to “raise power.” Not anymore. Maybe not ever again – as long as the entity deep beneath, upon whose generous body they all made their homes, favored him.
And if she didn’t, there were always ley lines and nodes to tap. Cooper had never suffered from the lack of power. Lack of control seemed to be a more pressing issue.
A touch of Ash’s hand on his elbow, careful and fleeting, made him raise his eyes.
“Is there a way we can have a circle and not a sphere?” Ash asked. “My thoughts are, the circle is traditional, and may be that way for a reason. We’ll be able to feel what they’re doing. Right now, we’re locked in a vault. Safe, but useless.”
“Maybe.” Cooper strove to overcome his embarrassment. Focusing was hard with all those sound effects. And once that energy came down, suppose he reacted to the surge of lust which would flood in? Suppose they lost control – and then they would be just as useless as they were now.
Embarrassed, he shielded his thoughts from Ash.
[: Tutt, tutt. You’re a man, not a beast. You have self-control. :] The voice in his mind was one of an ancient crone now, scolding and disapproving. [: Trust yourself. You would never do anything he doesn’t like, would you? :]
No, no he wouldn’t. Consent was everything, and Ash’s pleasure was predicated on a certain level of intimacy. Not that Ash had minded baring it all on Sycamore Island – but they had been alone out there, and shielded by trees.
They entertained each other’s company to heal. Also, to genuinely love one another. Not to raise power, or to engage in a command performance such as this one. “Okay,” Cooper said. “Let’s open it up and see what happens.”
ASH HAD FELT Cooper’s mind close to him. It stung. Even once Cooper came to agree with opening up their protective sphere Ash still felt the distance between them. He didn’t know what had caused it.
It felt like a rebuke. One which he had not earned.
[: He’s embarrassed, :] Old Man Allegheny whispered in his mind. [: Give him time. He’ll tell you later, if things go well. :]
The river spirit’s ability to read is thoughts was disconcerting. That particular loss of privacy had stung, too, and Ash suddenly gained more sympathy for Cooper’s need to keep something, a thought or a feeling, to himself. [: And if things don’t go well? :] he asked.
[: They must. :]
Oh, great. They were likely to die here, or die trying. Suddenly he felt foolish for having left the lodge, despite the obvious activity going on inside.
There was strength in numbers. The drummers weren’t engaged with anyone. Perhaps they were
keeping an eye on the whole group. All that sex people in there were having was consensual – wasn’t it? Wasn’t it only his own naivete and ignorance that had them back out so awkwardly?
“Cooper,” he said, trying to formulate his thoughts. Perhaps they could go back. Maybe...
“Yeah, I’m on it.” Cooper knelt and gripped the sword. Then, slowly, he rose. “Sorry. I’m a bit stiff after sitting like this.”
Ash clambered to his feet, fished out his phone, and checked the time. “It’s been two hours. That’s a long time to sit still.”
Ash bit his tongue. Cooper had a plan, and going back to the lodge didn’t figure into it. As he looked around, he noticed the way the thick tapers had burned shorter during their seated meditation. Their flames were still steady, though, and the four elements and the spirit they had called upon as they lit them were still with them. With a night this long, however, the candles wouldn’t last till morning. Impulsively, acting on a sudden and atavistic fear, Ash added more firewood onto the brazier, and poked the charred pieces with a wrought-iron hook. “Just in case it’s a long night,” he said, feeling a need to explain himself.
“You want any food or water? Anything before things get going?” Cooper’s question gave him pause.
“People usually fast before doing these things,” he said. “So if we eat, maybe we’ll be more grounded. More inside our own bodies. What do you think?”
Cooper’s lips quirked into a half-smile. “Not sure about the logic behind that, but I know I’ll be less hungry and thirsty.”
They split an orange, standing while the naked blade rested on a meditation pillow and reflected the dance of the flames in the middle of the gher. Cooper ate a cookie, chased it by a sip of water, and took a deep breath. “Y’know,” he started in a voice that gave Ash the chills, “I have a feeling about this. And my feeling is, we better be ready for anything. And that includes spending time outside.”
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