“Magnificent!” Astrid called, clapping her hands as she walked toward us. “Is he heavier?”
I laughed. “No... No, he feels about the same weight.” I reached up and scratched his ears, not actually feeling his fur, yet we both reacted as I had done it in reality. Perhaps back in my house, I did.
If I thought about what happened here too long, it confused me and I grew anxious about the situation at home. Was I in a daze or a trance there? I guess Gavin could tell me when we returned.
Kneeling, I urged Nygard off my shoulders before turning my head toward the huge boulder again. The tide was a little higher as more was covered now. Then I saw something else by the rock, a flash of a dark shadow behind it.
I touched Nygard and made a conscious effort to set the cat down. Not the one with me, but the one in my lap at home. I continued to watch the boulder, waiting for another glimpse to determine if that was a yiaiwa, all the while continuing to try to get my body to break the connection with Nygard so he would be safely back home.
“Astrid,” I said with a dry mouth. “I think one of the demons is here.”
She shot a questioning look at me.
“Near the boulder.”
As she looked that way, the shade moved out toward us.
“We need to go,” she said as she eased back to me.
“Focus on going back,” I told her. “Think of my living room and your body. Go back.”
She turned her eyes down, gazing at something in her middle. “Of course.” Then she vanished, her spirit gone.
The yiaiwa began moving faster, flying above the sand. Panic struck as I couldn’t get my body to break the link with Nygard and I couldn’t seem to project back to my body.
Before, when I was done, I always just flashed back to it in an instant, but now I couldn’t seem to connect at all.
The yiaiwa was almost on me. “To me,” I screamed at Nygard and he flew to my shoulder, a growling, hissing cat glaring at the demon. I threw up my hands and willed a burst of energy. A blast flew forward meeting the yiaiwa head-on. Stumbling back several feet, it seemed stunned, but not damaged. I needed more than that to hurt it. I backed up as rapidly as I could to put distance between us while not taking my eyes off the creature. I tried to gather my wits and prepared another blast, this time feeling Nygard’s paw on my cheek along with a blaze of power from him. I tossed the blast again in a pinpoint with my fingers tucked into a cone and it blazed out with a golden light that ripped into the yiaiwa.
The demon shrieked and red oozed from the dark body where the light had hit it. It writhed around in circles, body not touching the ground, but bouncing erratically like a balloon suddenly deflating.
Without warning, the weight left off my shoulders and Nygard was gone. Frantic, I spun around to see if he was anywhere on the beach. No sign of him. I hoped it meant that he was okay at home. I turned back to the demon and saw it had crumpled to the sand. It seemed to push up so that its head lifted and a look charged with pure hatred shot my way.
I shivered, barely able to think as it began drawing itself up again. I shot another blast at it, a regular, but strong burst of energy that knocked him back, but didn’t do any more damage.
Home. Desperate thoughts kept repeating home.
It rose up, red liquid oozing from the wound. Then it stretched out and flew in an arc across the sand, ready to sail into me with that terrifying, debilitating cold. I looked up, both hands readying a final blast—
And I was back in my house, slumped forward in my chair feeling like I might throw up.
“Are you all right?” Gavin asked from where he kneeled beside me.
“I don’t know,” I whimpered. “I think so, but how—?”
Astrid came in from the kitchen with a glass of wine that she held up to my mouth. “Swallow a little. It will calm you.”
I choked on it, swallowed part, and gasped. “Nygard? Is he—”
“He’s fine.” Gavin pointed to the pillow on the sofa where Nygard crouched watching me, a concerned look in his eyes.
I stuttered a couple of more incomprehensible words and Gavin wrapped his arms around me, holding me and rocking back and forth. “It’s okay. You’re safe. Just take some deep breaths and try to calm yourself.”
I nodded. I needed time to process this. I thought it was working, but it hadn’t gone as planned. I was frightened and felt deep despair. How the hell could we fight the yiaiwas?
As I swallowed the last dregs of the coffee I’d been nursing for the past twenty minutes, I began to feel calm enough to talk about what had happened. First, I’d survived another encounter with a pacura yiaiwa, but I hadn’t defeated him and barely managed to slow him. That was with Nygard’s help and the blast had been more powerful than any one I’d pulled off on the Earth plane. I had never been more frightened in my life, not even when I thought I was going to be murdered.
Still holding my hand, Gavin sat next to me, not saying much except to encourage me to breathe deeply and drink more coffee. In the armchair nearest the door, Astrid appeared to be communing with Elias, her spirit guide. I felt a bump on my arm and glanced toward Nygard, who’d butted his head against me. He’d been doing that every few minutes since I’d spaced out on the sofa trying to gather my thoughts and process what had happened.
I cleared my throat. “Well, that was a fiasco.”
Astrid glanced at me. “Not a total one, dear. We did learn some things so there were positives.”
“Want to talk about it?” Gavin asked with a worried look in his eyes. I think my reaction had shaken him.
I hesitated. I wasn’t sure I was ready to recall the whole deal, but if I didn’t break it down, we weren’t going to learn anything from it. So, I gathered my wits and started at the beginning. “At first, it all seemed to be going as planned. Nygard and I were on the beach on an island in the Canaries. It was one where I’d met Zoe a couple of times, so I knew it well enough to get there. Next, I focused on Astrid and she came through easily. Although now, I’m wondering if I did it or if she managed the travel herself.” I leveled my gaze at Astrid with the unspoken question.
She shrugged. “I followed you. I did get the tug of a connection so you did reach me and it was simple enough to slip out and follow it.”
I swallowed that disappointment. “So, you came by your own astral motivation?”
“I do it often, dear,” she answered. “But I was still guided by you or I wouldn’t have gone straight to that island.”
“Which probably explains why when I tried to summon Gavin with the stone, I didn’t get anything. I kept trying to make the connection, but nothing happened. Then when I reached into my pocket to pull the stone out to try focusing on it more, it was gone. What happened?” I turned my gaze to Gavin.
He pursed his lips, took a deep breath, and said, “I told you I’m Earth-bound. I didn’t get anything from you. But I saw you with your hand in your pocket and your eyes squeezed shut trying to do something. I watched you pull the stone from your jeans. You dropped it on the floor and I retrieved it, but you sat there with your hand open as if you were staring at the stone through your closed eyes.”
I could see the disappointment in his every muscle that he had not been able to travel with me. He seemed to fold in on himself as he dropped his gaze to the carpet.
“It’s all right,” I said. “I didn’t think it would work with everyone. Anyway, up to that point, it was going great, so I figured I should at least try the command with Nygard and that’s when I spotted the yiaiwa. At first, I wasn’t sure, but then I glimpsed more movement and told Astrid to return.”
I stopped to focus my mind on what had happened and began telling them the rest in as much detail as I could recall. I mentioned the combined light from Nygard and me as being a golden color. The only thing I lacked to fight the demon was the knife I’d been practicing with, but if it was only a focus object, it wouldn’t have changed much. I couldn’t defeat the pacura yiaiwa.
Silence overwhelmed the room when I finished as Gavin and Astrid seemed to digest everything I’d said. Or maybe Astrid was relaying it to her spirit guide. Then a loud mrrow broke the silence as Nygard expressed his opinion and climbed into my lap, butting his head against me. A sign of affection, his head-butting meant he was concerned about me and wanted attention. I scratched his head, grateful he hadn’t been hurt in this foolish venture of mine. I wondered how much of what happened on the transitional plane he remembered.
Finally, Gavin climbed to his feet and walked around the table to pace back and forth a few times. He put one hand in his jeans pocket while the other swiped through his hair a couple of times, then he rubbed at the back of his neck, likely to relieve tension. I felt the same anxiety now but scratched the cat’s ears instead.
He stopped opposite me and turned. “Okay, here’s what we know. Your blast does have impact against the yiaiwas although it doesn’t seem strong enough to kill a pacura yiaiwa. But combined with Nygard’s energy, you’re much stronger than you are alone and it seems to change the... flavor, if you will...of the blast. By that I mean, the composition. Maybe Nygard’s power is different and more potent in a different way that’s reflected in the color of the blast. The steel adds a blue tone to it. Possibly, the three together are even stronger.”
“How do we find out?”
“There’s the rub. You have to be on the interim plane in order to get the full power of the combination. I would guess that unless Nygard feels threatened, he doesn’t expend his energy, so it didn’t come out in the practice runs we did with the knife.”
“I believe you’re right about that part. He’s a smart cat and saves his juice until it’s needed,” I said, tickling under his chin.
His eyes grew more serious as his mouth tightened into a thin line. “So far as your idea of connecting everyone goes, I believe we’re seeing some flaws in it. Some of them may be Earth-bound, like me, and maybe if they haven’t at least managed a transition to the plane, then they can’t follow you.”
“So, I need to find out if they’ve been to the next plane or have traveled astrally anywhere?”
At that point, it occurred to me how bizarre this whole conversation sounded. Astral travel? Spirit guide? Energy bolts? I was in some weird, mystic comic book only it was real. A hysterical laugh nearly escaped my throat and I choked out a strangled bark of a laugh.
Gavin gaped at me, his mouth dropping, and his eyebrows shooting up in a quizzical expression. Astrid took the outburst better, laughing along with me. It was tension-releasing, not funny.
“Sorry,” I managed. “It just hit me how absurdly strange this is.”
Gavin relaxed, chuckling as he sat on the floor across from me. “Yeah, it does. Except it’s deadly serious.”
“I know, and I’m terrified. I’m seeing things that I thought were nightmares and myths. My whole perception of the universe has been shattered and I still don’t know why me?” My voice broke into a sob at the end and I buried my face in my hands. Why the hell me? I wasn’t anything special. I was just a musician; a girl who hadn’t wanted anything more than a decent life.
Although between my fingers, I could see Gavin’s muscles twitch to move to me, he stayed sitting cross-legged on the floor. Astrid didn’t move either, both letting me have this moment.
After a minute, Astrid spoke. “I know it’s been hard, dearie. None of us knows exactly why we were chosen. I learned about my gift when I was young and was lucky enough to have a family that understood and could guide me. Even so, I have made my living using the smallest bits of my skills. Until now, I have not been called upon to use my full talent. Athena, help us.”
Had she just called on the Goddess of War? An icy chill ran up my spine.
Nygard looked up, blinking at me.
“I think Bastet is already with us,” Gavin commented drily.
I gave myself a hard mental shake. Time to quit whining and realize I had help. If I was chosen, there had to be a reason. Together, we would find a way.
TWENTY-FIVE
Moss met me outside in front of his office. We sat on a bench near the back entrance in the chilly afternoon air, both wrapped in heavy coats with puffs of frosty breath pouring out as we breathed.
“You’re just full of mischief, aren’t you, Foster?” he grumbled.
“When I get a tip, I get a tip,” I replied. “Even if it comes from an unconventional source. Does this make me an informant?”
He chuckled. “I suppose it does. One I can’t really elaborate on to my boss. For the record, I didn’t tell Deputy Bancroft that much about your ability. I just said that you sometimes had psychic insights. He was suspicious about that from the get-go, but you checked out.”
“Uh huh,” I acknowledged. That was still a sore spot. Then I said, “So... about Roger. Is there any chance you missed a murder instead of a suicide?”
“Between us, it’s a possibility. Initially, we thought there might be foul play and the vehicle seemed to support a possibility of sabotage. We couldn’t tie it in though. The damage could have resulted from the vehicle hitting a boulder under the snow. We have a lot of rock out in that meadow that could do the job. Identifying if one was hit would probably have to wait until spring.”
“Does that mean you’re still looking into it?” I could scratch this one off my list if he still had the case open.
“Not actively,” he answered, canceling my mental erase.
“Drat! Look, if I can try to do a read on it, I might pick up something. Is that possible or is it still evidence?”
He tucked his hands into his coat pockets for warmth as he thought about it. “Well, we still have the wreck. It hasn’t been turned over to the family yet. It possibly could be repaired, so they may want it. But, if I have reason to keep it longer, I could.”
“Okay, then. Will you?”
“How sure of this are you, Foster? You really believe a ghost is talking to you, huh?” He raised an eyebrow and winked at me.
I shuffled my feet together to warm my lower parts as I replayed the conversation with Roger’s spirit. “Yeah, I do. Let me tell you about it.” Then I gave him the entire story, the details of how Roger looked snow-covered and desperate, begging me to help him.
Moss stared at me with an intent look, his eyes squinted as he considered my story. With a sharp nod, he said, “Okay. I’ll see what I can do on that, but don’t expect anything to happen quickly. It’s a low priority case now and Hernandez and I have other things with higher stakes. If I can clear it for you to look at the vehicle, I’ll let you know.”
I offered a small smile with my thanks. At least, I had a chance there. “Now, about Nick Sarkis, any luck finding him?”
“I’m not looking,” he said quickly. “That one is out of my hands. It went to the Feds and it’s their problem to find him now.”
“Well, that’s not good enough for Zoe. I’m afraid. She thinks we can track him down.”
“We who?”
“Mostly me, I guess, with her help. What if I could get him to contact me? Could you track him through a computer address?”
“Maybe. But it’s risky and I don’t want you involved. What makes you think you can reach him?” His brow furrowed as he leaned a little closer to me, eyes narrowing as he stared.
“Zoe gave me some information that could lead to where he went after he fled Spain,” I hedged. “It’s only a guess, but if anyone knew him well, it was his wife.”
“So well he killed her,” Moss reminded me. “Give me anything you got and I’ll see if any of it might turn into a real lead.”
As it happened, I did have some information for him regarding the two friends in Reno, including the one that really worried me. I handed it to Moss and he glanced through it. It included three possible places Sarkis might have gone, plus the names.
His eyebrows shot up when he read the Greg Jensen’s name. “Shit... He lied the whole time.”
“Yep. And he had
to know I wasn’t Sarkis’ secretary when I went there. Unless he had never met her.”
“This puts a whole new wrinkle in this,” he muttered. “Don’t do anything until I have time to check into this. Definitely stay clear of Jensen. Thanks for the complications, Foster.” The words were sarcastic, but a gleam shone in his eyes that suggested he was eager to take down the liar.
Relieved, I left this part of my problems with Moss and headed back to my Jeep. I had bigger worries to tackle than those.
I’d barely climbed into my Jeep when my phone buzzed with a message from Gavin. The text simply said to come to his house as soon as possible. It was urgent.
There went my dinner date with Ferris. At the same time, a sense of dread touched me. What now?
I sent my guy a text telling him I would be late. Then I turned the Beast, as I sometimes referred to my vehicle, toward the freeway to get to the nearest exit to Gavin’s. Flakes of snow splashed onto my windshield, the wind picking up as a storm began moving in.
Gavin was waiting for me, opening the door as soon as I hit the porch. As I followed him into the living room, I saw he had his computer on the coffee table with the screen displayed on his flat screen television.
Larger than life, Orielle’s face filled the image space and she looked all business. She seemed to be in a hotel room, judging from the bed and nightstands behind her that looked like a typical setup. As to where in the world she was, I had no idea.
Gavin turned on the sound and said, “Gillian’s here. Go ahead with what you’ve found.”
A Song of Forgiveness Page 24
