by Lanie Bross
Luc knelt and took her hands. “You have to stay away from him, Jas. He’s dangerous.”
“I know,” she said. It hurt to admit it out loud, like the words had punctured her lungs. Once again, she’d completely misjudged someone. Once again, she’d been an idiot. She took a breath. “You didn’t say where you were all this time.”
“I’ve been trying to make everything right.” Luc stood up and raked a hand through his hair. “I wanted to save Corinthe.”
The look in his eyes broke her heart. “Corinthe?”
“The girl I love,” he said. “She …” He exhaled slowly. “She died. I promised her that I would find a way to turn back time so we could be together again.”
Jasmine would have laughed if his words—turn back time—hadn’t sent a shock of recognition through her. “It was you?” Jasmine asked. “You’re the reason?”
Luc stared at her. “The reason for what?”
She stood up. She felt as if bees were swarming her insides. “I’ve been jumping all over the place. Back and forth to different days. Different years, even.”
“Years?” Luc’s voice broke. He passed a hand over his eyes. “Christ, Jas. I’m so sorry. I never meant to hurt you.” He sat down heavily on the bed, as though suddenly exhausted. “This is all my fault.”
Jas knew he didn’t mean just the time-jumping thing.
“You saved me in Pyralis, didn’t you?” she said gently. Luc looked up, surprised. “The Executor was right. You used the flower’s nectar because I was dying.”
“How do you—” he started to ask.
“I know a lot,” she said. “I’ve been back to Pyralis, Luc. I’ve been to the Crossroad.”
“Oh my God,” Luc whispered.
Jasmine sat down next to him. The bed creaked. “Let’s start from the beginning, okay? Tell me everything you know. And I’ll tell you everything I know.” Jasmine slipped her fingers through his just like when they were little kids. “Maybe together we can figure this out.”
Luc took a ragged breath. “It started when I met a girl who tried to kill me.…”
The rest of the story tumbled out, and Jas asked questions, adding more to his story as bits and pieces of memory came back to her: snippets and fragments of images, like pieces of paper carried back on a wind.
“There were these … things. Creatures.” She shivered, recalling the high-pitched whine, like the noise of a thousand mosquitoes. “I couldn’t move.”
Luc went pale again. “The Blood Nymphs.”
“And you came and saved me. You took me to Pyralis. That’s why it all looked so familiar. I’d been there before.”
He nodded, but stayed silent.
“And now these Unseen Ones need my blood to make the flower grow again.” Finally, Jas saw that the big picture was even more hopeless than she’d feared. The highest power in the universe—the forces that controlled everything—wanted her dead.
“It won’t happen. I won’t let it,” Luc said, as if he had read her mind. “If we can all go back—if we can make it so none of this happened—I can save Corinthe. I can save you, too.”
“Do you really think you can do it?” she asked. Luc had told her that the tunnels of time stretched infinitely in two directions, and were so strange and wild and confusing, he had nearly died there twice.
“I can do it,” Luc said, with forced confidence. “I have to.”
“It won’t be that easy.”
Jasmine jumped up, crying out, as Ford suddenly appeared at the window, on the fire escape. Before Luc could block his path, Ford had slipped inside. Luc shoved Jasmine behind him. She wished she hadn’t dropped the knife.
“Get out,” Luc growled.
Ford held up his hands. “I’m not here to hurt her.” He met Jasmine’s eyes, and her whole heart squeezed up. His eyes were so warm. So comforting. She wanted to believe him. “I promise.”
“How did you find me?” she asked.
“Get out,” Luc repeated. He took a step forward, as if he intended to shove Ford back out the window.
“You can’t just go back into the tunnels,” Ford said, speaking in a rush. Luc stopped. “Didn’t you listen to anything Rhys said? Didn’t you see what it did to him? He was a Radical. What chance do you think you have?”
“I know what you are,” Luc said. “I know what you’re planning to do. Why should I trust you?”
A spike of fear drove through Jas. Ford had killed an Executor, he’d have no trouble at all with a human.
“Luc!” she burst out. Both boys turned to face her. “I need to talk to Ford. Alone. Just for a minute.” She tried to pretend the idea didn’t terrify her.
“Luc,” she said, laying her hand on his arm, “can I talk to Ford for a minute? Alone?”
“No way,” Luc said. “I told you. He can’t be trusted. I’ve seen what he can do, I’ve seen it—”
Ford was staring straight at Jasmine as if Luc weren’t even in the room. The way he was looking at her made her whole body feel warm. “I promised to keep you safe and I will,” he said.
She crossed her arms. It was like he could see straight into her—like he could read everything she was thinking. “What about … what about what the Executor said?” she croaked. “She said the Unseen Ones would pardon you in exchange for my life.”
Ford laughed. “Do you think I care about their pardons?” He shook his head. His eyes blazed. “After everything they’ve done to me—after everything they’ve done to the people I love—you think that I’d play nice with the Unseen Ones?”
The intensity in his eyes drove straight into her heart. Her instincts hadn’t been wrong, she saw that now. Ford had more reason than anyone to hate the Unseen Ones.
“Don’t you trust me?” he asked softly.
Emotion clogged her throat and all she could do was nod. Tears blurred her vision, but she could see enough to walk to him. Jas wrapped her arms around his waist and held him tight. She felt his lips brush her ear.
“I don’t like it,” Luc said. Jas had almost forgotten he was in the room. He was still standing rigid, tight as a wire.
“Let me guess,” Ford said, pulling away from Jasmine. “Tess told you I was bad news, right?” He raised an eyebrow. “Was that before or after she tried to kill you?”
“Before,” Luc said grudgingly.
“I want to keep Jasmine safe, just like you do,” Ford said.
“He saved my life,” Jasmine put in. Now she saw how ridiculous it had been to distrust him. She’d be dead if it weren’t for Ford. “He fought off the Executors.”
Luc worked his jaw back and forth. He said nothing.
“How the hell did you find the tunnels, anyway?” Ford asked. His tone was admiring.
“Luck,” Luc said gruffly. Then he sighed. “I had no idea how they worked. I didn’t know what was happening to Jas, either. But I’m going to fix it. Jasmine won’t be in danger anymore, and Corinthe …” Luc trailed off, but Jasmine heard the thick emotion in his voice.
“Corinthe,” Ford repeated thoughtfully. “An Executor?” He pronounced the word carefully, as if testing it for the first time. Luc nodded, and Jasmine remained silent. Luc had too much to worry about without knowing that their grandfather was an Executor and that Jasmine herself had the ability to read the marbles.
“Do you think it’s wise to mess with fate?” Ford said softly. “Don’t you think you might end up right back where you are now?”
“I have to try,” Luc said. His eyes were like hollows. “I love her, and I made her a promise right before she died. What would you do?”
Ford looked right at Jasmine. “I’d tear down the universe, if I had to.”
For just a second, Jasmine saw a look of gratitude pass across Luc’s face. There was a moment of silence; then Ford roused himself.
“I’ll go with you,” he said. “I might be able to help. And if the Unseen Ones happen to fall apart, so much the better.”
“No,” Luc said forci
bly. “I won’t put anyone else at risk. Besides, I need you to stay here with Jasmine. Keep her safe until I can make this all right again. If I fail, I’ll need someone to make sure the Executors don’t get to her.”
Jasmine didn’t miss the look that passed between Luc and Ford. An unspoken agreement, or maybe a warning. Whatever it was, she didn’t like it.
Icy panic slid down her back. She took Luc’s arm. “Please don’t go,” she blurted out. “Please. I can take care of myself. We can leave San Francisco, go somewhere else. LA or Vegas or New York or … or … Maine, for all I care.”
Luc shook his head sadly. “I have to save Corinthe, Jas.”
Then Jasmine knew there was no point in trying to convince him.
“Just promise me you’ll be careful,” she said, her throat tight with emotion.
“I’ll be fine,” Luc said. “I promise.”
She threw her arms around Luc’s neck and fought back the tears. She couldn’t help but feel it was the last time she would ever see her brother. Fear choked off any more words.
“I’ll be back before you know it.” Luc disentangled himself from Jas and turned to Ford. “You better not screw up,” was all he said.
“I won’t,” Ford said, with the ghost of a smile.
Luc nodded. He gave Jas another quick squeeze, then pulled something out of his pocket. “Almost forgot …,” he said, holding the ring in his open palm. It was her ring. Jasmine took it from his palm and slipped it on her finger. It glinted in the light. She wanted to say something else but couldn’t make her throat work. There was a boulder-sized weight in her chest.
“You have to trust him,” Ford said softly, as soon as Luc was gone, as if he could read all Jasmine’s fears on her face.
“I do,” Jasmine said. “I’m just …”
“Scared,” Ford finished for her. “I know.”
Tears burned the back of her eyes, and she could only nod.
“We should go back to the Fort,” Ford said, putting a hand on her back. “We’ll be safer there.”
“No,” Jas said firmly. She wasn’t going to hide. She’d done too much hiding—too much running. “This is my house. I’m staying here.”
“Stubborn girl.” Ford smiled. He kissed her forehead. “But brave, too. I admire that.”
“Hardly,” she said. She didn’t feel brave. She felt tired and worn down and angry and anxious.
“You are,” he insisted. “You’re amazing.” He slid his arms around her waist. Then his lips were on hers and he kissed her. Jasmine melted into his arms and kissed him back. She wound her hands around the back of his neck. They stood there for what felt like years, drowning in each other.
Ford was the first to pull away. He was breathing hard, his eyes closed. When he opened them, Jasmine forgot how to inhale. There was so much emotion shining from them, it took her breath away.
“You make me forget everything except right now, Jas,” he said. His voice sounded raw and rough. “If anything happens … I want you to have this.” Ford took his necklace off—on the thick chain was a heavy key. He gently slipped it over her head. “If your brother fails—if I screw up—if the Unseen Ones find me, they’ll imprison me again.”
Emotion lodged in her throat, cutting off her ability to speak. She didn’t even want to know why he’d been there before, because it didn’t matter. She trusted him and he trusted her.
Ford took her by the shoulders and kissed her again. There was no hesitation, only pure emotion when they came together. Tightness coiled in her stomach, almost painful, but it felt so good.
Nothing had ever felt more right in her life.
Ford slowed his kisses and trailed a slow path to her ear, as if he, too, were reluctant to stop.
“If they put me back in Kinesthesia, you and only you will hold the key to my freedom. Only you.” He brushed his lips over hers again, softly. “I trust you with my life, Jasmine. Just like you’re trusting me with yours.”
Jasmine tucked the odd-shaped key under her shirt and wove her fingers through his.
Her stomach was heavy with dread. For the first time, she understood: If Luc succeeded in altering time, in turning back the clock, Ford would return to his prison in Kinesthesia. Even as her brother saved the girl he loved, Jasmine would lose Ford.
He wouldn’t even know her.
They would never meet.
She had to believe that after everything was settled, she and Ford would be together again.
Ford slid his hand down her arm and tangled his fingers with hers.
She buried her face in his neck and inhaled deeply. “I promise that no matter where you are, I’ll find you,” she said.
The current sucked at Luc’s clothes as he fought his way to the far end of the lagoon. The water was choppy, as if it were resisting him. He kept going, dumbly determined—beyond fear now, beyond exhaustion, beyond thought.
He had lied to Ford: he didn’t know how to control the movement of the tunnels any more than he had days ago. He didn’t know yet which wire was the one that would set everything right. Tess had said that he was putting everyone at risk. Maybe so. But there had to be a way to turn back time. Rhys had done it, so it could be done. Luc would do it, too.
Ahead in the water, a faint glow caught his eye: swirling colors, like an underwater tornado, one that lay sideways instead of reaching for the sky. He surfaced once more for air, then submerged again. He didn’t even have to swim toward the colors: he let himself sink, let the weight of his sneakers and his sweatshirt weigh him down.
Then, once again, the water changed. It became lighter. He could breathe. At the same time, he lost control of his movements. The colors picked him up and spun him, and he found he was caught inside the spinning cycle of color.
The Crossroad was different this time.
Hostile.
The winds tore at his body, trying to rend him. Pain exploded in his arms and legs, and he couldn’t get his bearings. Things were moving too fast. He remembered a story he’d once heard, about people who drowned because they couldn’t tell which way was up.
The pressure on his lungs was so tight that he couldn’t take a full breath. But somewhere in the swirling chaos, Luc felt something solid beneath his feet. He got down on his hands and knees and crawled along blindly until he found the membrane-like walls of the Crossroad.
He wished he hadn’t lost the knife. He took the archer from around his neck and popped the tiny hinge. Luc drove the tiny arrow into the membrane and ripped downward.
It was a small opening, but he managed to push his hand through. He grabbed a piece of the membrane and ripped it open. The Crossroad shrieked around him and the winds picked up, gusts flying at him. He didn’t stop until he was able to drag his whole body in.
His vision grew dark until there were only flickering lights in the corners of his eyes. It was several minutes before he realized that the flickers of light weren’t only in his imagination. They were real. Sizzling flashes of light zipped over his head.
Immediately, Luc felt his blood grow thicker in his veins. It took tremendous effort to push to his feet and even more to draw in a breath. Up and down the tunnel the lights raced.
He trudged along, not even sure which direction he was going in.
It felt like he was making his way through quicksand, and each passing minute his limbs grew stiffer, as if he were turning into a statue.
Miranda was right.
The tunnels would kill him.
He had to find a way to turn back time, but how long did he have until the tunnel claimed him as its own?
There were so many wires—millions of them—it was impossible to tell which was the right one. His throat tightened, and for a second he thought he would cry, or scream. How would he know what to do? How had Rhys known? Rhys, who was always talking about love and unity and the importance of finding your Other. What had he said the last time Luc saw him? The path to righteousness goes straight through the heart.
&
nbsp; “What does it mean?” Luc found himself shouting. “What am I supposed to do?”
Above him, the wires shifted again. From within the thick ropes of steel and copper, a new wire was revealed: thicker than his arm, different from the rest. Instead of bright white sparks along its length, there were red ones. Almost like blood flowing through a vein.
Another wire of the same thickness and weight was severed—buried under more layers of copper.
He had to try. This was it, his last effort.
If he failed, there would be no more. He had barely enough strength left to lift his arms over his head.
Luc reached up and grabbed an end of both wires with each hand. He tugged hard on the ends until he finally got them to meet, and a scarlet fire showered down on him. The tiny embers burned his skin, but he held on. The wire pulsed under his fingers like a heartbeat.
His shirt was soaked with sweat as he struggled to keep them together. A wind began to whip through the tunnel, and it buffeted his body, making it hard to hang on to the wires.
And the wires themselves writhed in his hands, as if trying to escape from his grasp.
The acrid smell of burning flesh filled his nose as the sparks rained down on him faster now. The air around him whooshed harder and he fought to stay on his feet.
Push through the pain, that was what Coach always said. If you want it bad enough, make it happen. Luc had no idea how, but he found the strength to hold the wires, despite the agony in his muscles.
A sudden current rippled out of the wires and pulsed through him. There was no pain, only a sense of weightlessness, of being outside his own body. It wasn’t an electric shock, it was something more powerful. It centered in his chest, where his heart thumped with each heavy beat.
Awareness of the tunnel settled around him. The wires stilled, and he continued to hold one in each hand. He could feel the sparks running across his skin, through his body. It was as if he were somehow a part of the tunnel.
The path to righteousness goes straight through the heart.
Rhys’s cryptic words echoed in Luc’s head. He hadn’t understood what it meant, had thought it was just another one of Rhys’s riddles, but now it felt significant.
