by Jamie Magee
“You never saw him before?” Landen asked.
“I think I might have, but I was too busy hunting my ashes, a way out. Pointless for me to focus on The Fall if I couldn’t get through it.”
“He lingered near The Fall?” Landen questioned.
“From what I heard, that is where he came from, how he left,” Phoenix said with a smirk, waiting for a quick response from Landen.
“How in the hell did he make it through The Fall, and why would he leave his family behind? That can’t be right.”
“What Fall?” Brady asked.
“It looks like water falling, a waterfall. It divides two realities. Some people call it Heaven’s Gate,” Landen explained. He glanced at me. “At one time, certain souls could pass through easily, usually at death, but that has been blocked, trapping everyone on the side they were in.”
“From what I gather,” Phoenix said to Landen, clearly not wanting to take the time to explain anything, “he meant to, his intent, life plan, was to get Charlie here and take his lover home. They say he left her here on purpose.”
“Selected?” Landen said under his breath.
Phoenix shrugged, saying that was a possibility. I wasn’t clear on what The Selected were, but I thought they said they lived against that Fall, had really long lives and such.
“Did he have a Yod?” Landen asked.
“Nope.”
“What?” I asked, growing frustrated with this coded conversation.
“It’s a mark in your birth chart,” Landen answered.
“A mark that Landen has,” Brady added, glancing at Marc. I felt their dread rise.
“Is it a bad mark?”
“Just a mark,” Landen said to me.
“Don’t be modest, mate,” Phoenix stated. “Sunshine, it’s a God-like mark, the finger of God. Where it points is a direction fate has set for you.”
“Where does it point?” I asked nervously.
“In mine,” Landen answered, “to you, and to the service of others.”
“It has been his battle cry from day one, completing you, bringing balance,” Phoenix said, glancing across Landen to me.
“Why would you ask if her dad had one?” I pressed.
“I have no idea how he could have managed his way through without it,” Landen mused.
“I thought the same thing. All I can gather is that the other side is sending help. They said he left a path for his daughter to discover, that he had to do it that way because if she knew it all, it would overwhelm her. Something about her remembering slowly.”
“August has been trying to unravel a message her mother left her,” Brady said, sitting forward.
Landen moved his head from side to side. “That is all we need, another distraction.”
“My point exactly,” Brady muttered.
“It’s her message. She needs to unravel it,” Landen stated, sitting forward, lowering his head.
“Sunshine,” Phoenix said, looking past him. “I heard another rumor...can I see your medallion again?”
Landen glanced at me and slightly nodded, telling me to trust him. I unclasped it as the others sat nervously forward. They did not share Landen’s trust.
“What rumors are the dead filling your head with?” Landen muttered.
“They said this is dated, what it was in the beginning. They say your blood, essence, will tell us what we’re up against now.”
Landen sat up immediately. “Seriously?” he asked, passing my necklace to him.
“Well, that is what I read between the lines. Wouldn’t hurt to take a peek. Just need a drop,” Phoenix said as a small dagger appeared in his other hand.
Phoenix held his hand out, and the necklace floated over the coffee table, which shocked no one. I was sure that working on controlling energy was something everyone did daily.
His fingertips beckoned a flame from the fireplace and the boys leaned back, not sure what was about to happen as they watched the fire flutter past them.
Phoenix stood as the fire aligned itself under the medallion. A few seconds later, the necklace started to vibrate again then all at once a burst of energy pushed through the room, swaying everyone back in their seats.
The four rings appeared, the two universes side by side, the wall of energy that looked like water dividing them, the bright spot in the center lined up with the points on each end of the circle.
Phoenix nodded for Landen and me to stand. We did, and so did the others. The illusion rose a few inches so it was just below my eye level.
“Why is the looking glass in your living room?” Marc asked in disbelief.
“One too many rings to be mocking that,” Landen answered.
“Not anymore. A few hours after you left, right when Stella and I went back to Esterious, another ring was added. It’s still under water, but it doesn’t look as solid as the others. Stella said she thought that it would be soon.”
“You built this?” Phoenix asked in dismay.
“Donalt did. He had the star.”
“He had half the map. I bet he thought if he had her energy, he would have the rest,” Phoenix said in disgust.
“I don’t understand this. Why do you need my blood?” I said with a shaky voice.
“Your soul absorbs your body, your blood. Your soul knows where you have been, what you have done.” He handed the dagger to Landen. “Just a drop on the top of it. Same time would be best.”
Landen took my hand gently and kissed my fingertips, letting his warm hum absorb me before he stretched my fingertips above the illusion. He pulled the knife between our fingers, letting drops of blood fall down on the illusion. Phoenix pulled the knife from his hand as Landen’s energy healed my wound before I could feel the pain of it.
As our blood rained down, it absorbed the illusion, taking everything out of sight for a second or two. When it became clear again, the planets on each side were still there, the wall was, the light, but now what I thought was The Realm was not before the wall. It was veining through the planets, around the strings. It caused one side of this to look almost completely dark. The other side was dimmer, but holding on. Through the light in the center, there was what looked like a crack, probably not noticeable to the boys. I only saw it because of my eye for art, detail. I also noticed that what was The Realm in the last image, the darkness before the light, seemed denser on the dim side.
“What does this mean? We are really losing now?” I asked the silent room.
“You could say that,” Landen said under his breath as anger engulfed him. “The Realm, the lost souls, has grown so massive that it is closing in on reality. The veil between the living and dead is nearly gone.”
“Oh, don’t be so downtrodden,” Phoenix stated. “It also says help is coming from the other side. Among other things that have been made apparent by Skylynn, Charlie Myers made it through that Fall, left his daughter here. Now we know how to track how we’re doing, so we’ve added a few billion souls to the list of people to save,” Phoenix offered, only to get a dismayed look from everyone.
Something was off about him. I was almost sure he and Landen already knew that something had made it through that Fall. What I didn’t know. But I had the notion, was that it had to do with me in some way. More importantly, someone else. Maybe the scarf girl. I should have added the question of who she was into my impromptu interview with Phoenix.
Marc was looking down at the sphere of energy. He leaned down to see beneath it. “These eight points line up with that light in the middle.”
“Sirius,” Phoenix and Landen said at the same time.
“The star?” Marc questioned.
With a blank stare, Landen nodded. “It’s the gate to the other side.”
“Why are we trying to get there?” Marc asked.
“Balance. We are supposed to move with each life, but we haven’t. It’s hurting us as a whole. If we are trapped here and fail, darkness will override one side and spread to the other...our destruction will
come.”
“Why on Earth would the darkness want us to end as a whole? Why would it be that self-destructive?” I said in exhausted wonder.
Landen glanced down at me. “We rarely see how our actions impact us as a whole. We think we make decisions that will never hurt anyone or anything, that they are insignificant. But the truth is, every action has a reaction. This darkness does not want an end. It wants power, and it does not see that power as its death as well. The light is not much more innocent. They are defending themselves, thinking that by gaining over the darkness they will know when and where to stop. No one is thinking of balance.”
“We are, right? We can undo this, right?” I asked him as the hope that my sister would be fine began to fade.
“We know that we have a web of spells to undo. We know who we have to stop. We are stronger now that we starting to come together. Now that we’ve found the souls we were all looking for back when this began.”
Phoenix tensed, then looked away as what I thought was sadness engulfed him.
“You and I are talking about this later,” I thought.
“I’ll explain it a thousand times.”
“No, not this. Whatever is going on with Phoenix and his scarf girl.”
A ghostly grin echoed on his lips. “Nothing gets past you, does it?”
He sat down and pulled me next to him.
“Not when it comes to matters of the heart,” I thought.
I curled up against Landen’s humming body as I gazed at the illusion in the center of the table. All at once, the illusion collapsed and the necklace fell to the table. Both Phoenix and Landen glanced at the wall like they were watching something mysterious unfold.
Chapter Fourteen
The others followed their gaze, trying to understand what they were looking at. I felt compassion within Landen, but no reason for alarm.
“Who turned her up anyways?” Phoenix muttered.
Landen looked at Brady. “When did Madison’s insights start to bring her pain?”
“She woke up like that, ” he answered.
“She’s in pain?” I said, moving to go and help her. Landen tightened his arm around me.
“Kinda what you went through,” Landen said. His intent was solid. He wanted me to leave Madison be.
“Something happen?” Chrispin asked.
“She’s just repelling energy,” Phoenix answered.
“Olivia is working with her to find a calm. I’ll go check on them,” Chrispin said as he went to leave.
“I’m going to go back to Esterious, make sure nothing like what we saw is reflecting in the looking glass,” Marc said as he followed him.
Brady leaned down, carefully grabbed my necklace, and handed it back to me. He settled back down into his chair, silently stating that he was not going anywhere.
I put my necklace on and pulled the blanket from the back of the couch around me. It was late, and I was getting tired.
“I have a plan,” Phoenix said as he vanished.
“Is he always like that?” Brady asked Landen.
Before he could answer, Phoenix appeared again with an old book in his hand. “Always like what?” he asked, setting the book on the table and carefully opening it.
Brady never bothered to answer.
“Am I right in thinking that Xavier is lurking around Esterious?” Phoenix asked.
“Yep,” Brady mocked.
“We need to get him out in the open, catch him off guard.”
“He should be at the ball tomorrow night. I doubt he will be off guard,” Brady said.
“He’ll be more focused on Drake, the others, though,” Landen countered.
“That is what I thought,” Phoenix stated. “We need to make him weak before our night. I bet Skylynn has a way in her book of Shadows.”
“Would it not be faster to ask her?” I muttered, trying to hold my eyes open.
Phoenix glanced at me, clearly not enjoying my bluntness. “Sure, go right ahead, Sunshine. Call your mate over.”
I ignored him as my eyes fell closed. I listened to the three of them ramble through ways they could constrain Xavier. I was proud of Landen. He was adamant about not letting what we would do disturb the charade Drake and the others would put on. It wasn’t long after that point that I drifted to sleep, dreamless at first, but then somehow my mind drifted back to the scene I’d watched over and over again in The Realm.
What was odd was that my gaze always went to the pentagram, to where Landen was standing with the others, to Madison’s image. That felt real to me, that perspective. Running across the field didn’t. I mulled over that, taking in every detail. The only thing that made me sure I was wrong was the silver chain I saw around the neck of the girl that was killed in Drake’s arms. I couldn't see the medallion, but it was like I knew it was there. Somewhere in the night, I left that gruesome scene and found myself on the banks of the river I loved so much.
Not long after that point, Landen appeared and pulled me against him.
“Finally sleeping?” I thought.
“I was just trying to make sure we were ready for tomorrow.”
“Are we?”
“I guess we’ll find out.” His gaze fell to my medallion. He reached for it and tilted it, allowing the sun to shine throughout the black glass. If you really focused, you could see all that it had revealed to us before.
“The gift that keeps giving. Did I have this then? The night of the spell?”
His eyes grew sad. “You did before that point. I don’t know if you had it when you died. The Realm opened, pulling your body into it. Why?”
“Just thinking.”
“About?” he thought, pulling me closer to him.
“About how this medallion has my energy in it, how you were in tune with it. I wonder if that is what you felt.”
“I felt you. I was fooled,” he thought as he reached to caress the outline of my eyes.
“I just want to remember it, too. You said before that even if you could see the pasts of others, you would not see their perspective...a lot happened on that field. I just want to get it right.”
“Are you upset that you died in his arms?” he asked as his gaze feverishly searched my sorrowful expression, like he was mad at himself for not picking up on my emotions sooner.
“I’m upset that Dane lost half his soul that night, that because he did, he was possessed over and over again. I’m upset that Madison and Drake were on the same field. I’m upset that we may need Charlie, Draven—Monroe to undo this, and we can’t ask them.”
Understanding me, he relaxed a little. “The power of suggestion can alter fate. We do not want to use that power on our newfound friends. Trust me, they will be pulled into place if they are meant to.”
“I get it.” I glanced over him. “Now spill it. What’s up with Phoenix?”
Grief seized his expression and emotion. “He found the girl he has searched an eternity for…she’s in trouble.”
“Then why is he hanging out in our living room?”
“He’s helping her, too. It’s just really complicated. I wouldn’t mention it to him. It’s a tender topic.”
“What does Skylynn have to do with it?”
“They are friends, she and Phoenix’s girl. Only Skylynn failed to mention that.”
Oh, that would make me mad, too. “Did she have a good reason for that?”
“She did. But still…it’s not good right now. And if this goes bad, it may not be good for all of us. His girl is very unique.”
I knew this girl had to be remarkable. Phoenix’s energy was so vibrant that not just anyone could love him.
“She would have to be.”
He smiled. “You knew her in a past. I left you in her care when Phoenix and I left.”
I grimaced.
“What was that look for?” he thought in an amused tone.
“I’m not the best company when you are not around.”
That made him laugh.
“Are you sure we don’t need to help them?” I pressed.
“I tried. There is nothing more I can do than what I’m doing now. Phoenix feels the same way.”
“You’re worried?”
“I just don’t want to see my brother in pain, and right now he is. He’s not showing it, but I see it. It’s just not fair.”
“I’ll send good thoughts his way.”
We let silence fall as we both rambled through our thoughts.
“What are you thinking?” he asked when he felt elation in my soul.
I grinned. “About the first time you found me...the relief...what Phoenix must have felt...what she is feeling.”
He pulled me into his arms and let the hum of his energy meet mine. Silence took over, and eventually we both let go of our focus and drifted into our own thoughts and separate, scattered dreams.
Feeling his warm lips on mine caused me to open my eyes. He’d already showered and dressed for the day, and I was still wrapped in a blanket on the couch.
“I’m going to go and seal off the beach house, make it safe for Charlie and Draven and have a look at the message Charlie’s mom left her.”
“What do you mean, ‘seal’?” I asked, rubbing my eyes and sitting up.
“I think before tomorrow they are going to need some time alone. The beach house is the quietest place I know. We can seal it off from bad energy with herbs.”
“Herbs that a witch would give you. Are you telling me that you and Skylynn have a date this morning?” I said as the taste of blood ushered itself into my mouth.
His hands moved to my arms, sending a calming energy through me.
“No. I sent Brady to Perodine to get them. He and I will seal it, and it’s afternoon.”
“Did you figure out how to make Xavier weak?”
“Think so, but we will need Skylynn for that.”
My stare captured his. “Of course,” I said under my breath.
“Get ready. I’ll be back as fast as I can,” he said just before kissing my lips once more.
