A Quarrel Called: Stewards Of The Plane Book 1

by Shannon Wendtland

  I watched my friend in the circle, her eyes closed as if handling everything by feeling. The roiling clouds parted and a shaft of light streamed down. It was like a crack in the storm, but not to let the sunlight through, because this light was dark, purplish, unlike anything I had ever seen before. And where Melody stood was a swirling dervish of debris and something like crackling golden energy at her feet.

  As I watched, my awe turned to horror. In the purple light that was descending from the clouds vague shapes swam past the rift—as if the entities on the other side could sense the veil rending and were waiting hungrily to burst forth. Tentacles waved behind the veil, and long sharp claws raked the air only inches from Melody’s head. The giant beast, more like the mythical kraken than a creature of earth, flowed forward scary-fast and collided with the veil, its craw open, ready to devour whomever it encountered on the other side.

  The energy from the collision caused a ripple in the energy field and I watched, horrified, as Melody’s forehead wrinkled in concentration. There had to be something I could do.

  81. SAM

  G. had finally managed to choke out Thompson and was helping us to tie up Thompson’s friend with a couple of USB cables he had in the back of the car. Not for the first time in the last few minutes, I wished for some rope.

  As G. wound the last cable and knotted it tightly around the man’s ankles, I pulled Lily close and buried a relieved kiss in her hair. Over the top of her head, I marveled at the sight of Melody in the middle of the circle doing something wicked cool with the energy of the vortex.

  A purplish-black light descend from the clouds, and the entities swam around inside it, as if they were flooding the gates, waiting for the opportunity to burst forth. And then I saw Melody’s face, serene, her hair blowing around her face as it stood out in a static-electric halo.

  And my blood went cold.

  “G.,” I said. When he didn’t hear me, I grabbed his arm. “G., you have to go in there.”

  “What do you mean?” he shouted back.

  “This is just like my dream.”

  “What do you mean?” he shouted again, shaking his head. “You’re not making sense. We didn’t dream this.”

  “No. Before I met you. Right before, in fact. I dreamt of Melody sleeping and the black tentacles reaching out to get her. Look, look up there.” For Lily’s benefit, I left out the part about kissing her, because I figured that didn’t really matter so much right now.

  G.’s gaze traveled up to the descending column of dark light and his face grew very concerned. The sword suddenly sprang to light in his hand, and he leapt forward, heading for the circle at a sprint. But before he could break through and get near Melody, Margaret stopped him.

  82. G.

  "Yes, you can," Gram’s mouth formed a hard line. “You were born for it."

  "How do you know?" I asked. I had a hard time tearing my eyes off of the dark light and the entities swimming along behind it. Fending those things off with a thoughtform in the shape of a sword was one thing, but anchoring the quarrel while they pulled Matthew through, that was something else altogether.

  “I thought you said that we couldn’t count on him being saved. That there might not be a way to bring him through.”

  She gave me a long look and nodded. “I did say that. But I had a waking dream earlier… and in it I saw you pull Matthew through, with the rest of us to anchor you. You can do it, Gideon.”

  "Are you sure I’m strong enough?" I clenched my fists. I wasn’t a coward. But I didn't want to fail my friends, either.

  "Gideon," she said firmly, and her stare into my eyes was very direct. "Do you know what your name means?"

  "No." I said.

  "It means Guardian. And that's what you are. Tara is the Sage, Sam is the Lantern, Melody is the Light, and you are the Guardian who watches over them all. That is who you are; it's who you've always been."

  Tara gasped. I turned to look at her and her face was slack. As I watched, the animation came back; it was unnerving to watch her when she consulted the records.

  She stepped to my side and gripped my hand tight. "G., she's right. You're the only person who can do it."

  "Stewards are called when the plane is in need. There are always four."

  Sam was beside me suddenly, his hand gripping my arm painfully. The expression on his face was furious. “I told you that you have to save her!” he said savagely.

  “No, Sam,” said Gram. “You know better than that. G. will pull Matthew through. I’ve seen it. You have to save her.”

  Gramps craned his neck to look up at me. “The light will continue to descend, and lightning from the ground will reach up to meet it. When the vortex crowns, the gateway will be open for a split second. Melody knows she has to hold it stable while you pull Matthew through – but don’t take too long or the whole thing will fall apart, and we’ll have a flood of nasties that might just eat us alive.”

  “What about those two?” I nodded to the unconscious Thompson and his trussed up friend.

  Gramps studied them for a moment. “I think Lily has them covered.”

  I looked back and noted that Lily was definitely taking her guard duty seriously. She’d have made a good Guardian, I thought.

  “Okay, let’s do it.”

  83. MELODY

  I felt someone plunge into the circle – like feeling the tide swirl around my feet in the ocean, except I could feel the other person’s energy too, and I knew it was G. I didn’t even have to open my eyes.

  “Matthew will be here soon,” I said.

  “That’s what your Gram said,” he answered. “I’m supposed to pull him through.”

  I felt a pang in my heart – was this really happening? Was I really getting my brother back? I felt the energy tremble and heard Gramps shout to me over the din beyond the circle.

  “Concentrate, Melody! Focus!”

  I redoubled my focus and turned my attention inward. I could see the vortex behind my eyes, and I could see the descent of the dark light as the two planes bowed in the middle to meet each other, like the force of reality on either side was too heavy to bear. The closer the bowed sections got, the hotter the energy flared. It burned me up inside. I was on fire. I couldn’t take it anymore—I screamed.

  84. SAM

  This wasn’t exactly like the dream, I thought, but then nothing about this experience so far had been exactly like any of my dreams. But what did that mean anyways? Nothing, abso-friggin-lutely nothing.

  “Take my hand,” I yelled to Tara. “I’m going in.”

  And just then, Melody screamed. She was swathed in burning energy that looked like plasma, her hair still whipping furiously in the gale. G. was reaching up into the dark light and the entities were crowding the rift, poking tentacles through, reaching down to curl around his and Melody’s necks.

  “No time,” I yelled, and ran into the mix. I lost Tara’s hand along the way but I couldn’t stop now.

  And suddenly I was inside the circle and noise was less, the wind was less, but the screaming from Melody was much worse. She was in agony and it was all I could do to keep myself from grabbing her and hauling her out of there.

  “Now, G.!” she screamed. “Now!”

  I stopped to look up and was amazed at the sight above us… a whirling tornado of light, golden from below and blazing dark purple from above. It looked just like Harold had said. A crown. “Holy Shit,” I breathed, forgetting why I was there for a moment.

  And then Melody screamed again and I knew, without a doubt that she was being burned up from the inside out. I didn’t know what to do, so I reached for her.

  “Sam, no!” Tara shouted, and then she tossed me a long extension cord. “Tie it to her feet, and then bury the end in the ground!”

  I didn’t understand what Tara was asking of me at first until I looked down and realized that Melody’s feet were no longer touching the ground. She was burning up because she wasn’t grounded. There was nowhere for the
energy to go.

  85. G.

  I could see him. He was there. He wasn’t on the other side of the veil, he was in the veil. Like he’d been sewn inside, like a body in an old-time body bag. His eyes were terrorized and his body was motionless. It was obvious this was going to be all up to me since it didn’t look like he could move at all.

  “Matthew,” I called. “We’re coming for you!”

  I willed my sword of light to change into a shepherd’s crook and extended it to the length of my reach, and even with my long arms it wasn’t quite enough. So I jumped.

  86. TARA

  I watched in horror as Melody burned up from the energy, almost forgetting that it was my turn to go into the circle. Gramps reached up to hold my hand, staring at Melody, unshed tears in his eyes. Then he looked at me.

  “Together,” he said.

  I nodded. We held hands and crossed into the circle. When we got to Sam, I reached out and put my hand on the waistband of Sam’s pants and Gramps reached out to put his hand on Melody’s foot.

  “Harold, No!” Gram cried from outside.

  Gramps let go of my hand just as I turned to see Margaret jumping up to run inside. I held onto Sam, who had tied off Melody. Gramps was grounding Melody as best he could since the extension cord wasn’t doing much. Beyond the circle, in the shadow of the building, stood Esme.

  Esme, we’d forgotten all about her.

  And she held something in her hand. There was a mad, violent look in her eyes as she cast her gaze upward at the things in the sky, the things that were tearing to break free. Then she looked at me.

  “Never again,” she cried. And without loosing my gaze, she took the little bag of sulfur and pulled the string loose, letting the yellow powder swirl on the breeze.

  There was a frightening crack of thunder and a bolt of lightning that shot down into the ground, and I was blinded for a time. I smelled sulfur and ozone, and the ensuing shockwave sent me tumbling to the ground. A sharp pain slammed my head full of stars, jagged streaks tearing across my vision. When I came rolling to a stop, I didn’t see anything at all.

  87. G.

  I had Matthew by the neck now and was pulling him down as gently as I could considering the circumstances, and when he was half in and half out of the dark light, he was able to move his arms and help. I felt a well of relief surge inside me and shouted to Melody, who still had her eyes closed, but for now had stopped her awful screaming.

  “We got him! You can let go now!”

  But she didn’t open her eyes. She didn’t wake up. There was a terrible smell of sulfur and a tentacle wrapped around my neck. I looked up in time to see the baleful gaze of a shadow beast stare down at me before it yanked me off my feet and into darkness.

  “Tara!” I tried to reach for her before my vision went black, but she was lying in a crumpled heap on the ground.

  88. SAM

  It was just like my dream. I tried to wake her, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t tell if she was dead or alive, focused or asleep. But the tentacles were snaking out in one last desperate attempt to break free.

  “You can let go now,” I said to her, almost a whisper really. “We’ve got Matthew. He’s safe,” I said.

  When the shockwave hit, I wasn’t even surprised. I knew the beasts were going to try and take her from me, to drain her dry; I couldn’t allow that. So I pulled close, stroked her cheek, and finally kissed her.

  I didn’t think about Lily. I didn’t think about what Melody might say. I just did it.

  And she opened her eyes.

  89. MELODY

  The pain was intense. My blood was on fire, my head blazed like a torch, my skin was bubbling up and blistering like burnt plastic. I was done for, I knew it. I wasn’t just going to burn up my synapses like Gramps, I was going to shish kebob myself. But it would be worth it. Matthew would be back, and that was worth a thousand times worse than this.

  I felt the sorrow well up inside me like a volcano, all the pain I had endured, the uncertainty, it came up from the depths and threatened to overtake me. I knew that the entities fed on fear; I could only assume they fed on sorrow as easily, so I let the energy burn it up before it could leak out of my eyes. I felt the sorrow go and replaced it, little by little, with joy.

  I started with memories of hanging out with my brother, of sitting at the dinner table telling jokes, of playing video games and him letting me win, of him teaching me to ride a bike. And then I took those memories and lifted them to the surface, and they did not burn in the energy. Instead they filled me up. And I added that brief moment of joy I felt in the desert the night before. That sense that I was a part of something greater, that I was loved, so loved.

  The pain subsided. The burning was gone, replaced only with the barest buzz, almost as if someone had turned a switch off. I heard Sam’s voice and felt his presence. Then I felt his lips pressed against mine; finally the joy that filled me burst forth and I opened my eyes. There he was, nose to nose, looking at me, worry clearly etched on his face.

  “You’re okay,” he said, relieved.

  I shook my head. “I’m alive.”

  90. TARA

  My head pounded mercilessly in time with the receding thunderstorm. Every time the lightning split the sky I had to squint to keep the pain from bursting my eyeballs.

  To my right, Sam was sitting on the ground with his head in his hands, face slack with what looked like disappointment. Lily was nearby, but she was giving him the cold shoulder. To my left, Esme sat still like a statue, her face a mask. She wouldn’t meet my eyes.

  A wail cut through the stillness and I turned around to see Melody and Gram hunched over a still form lying on the ground. There was someone huddled on the other side of the little group and I let loose a sigh of relief until his dark head bobbed up and I could see that it wasn’t G. after all. It was Matthew.

  “Hey,” I said to Sam, whispering though I wasn’t sure why. “What’s happening over there?”

  Sam stared straight ahead. For a long moment he said nothing, then “Harold’s dead.”

  A wave of cold washed over me. I licked my lips, feeling a sudden surge of emotion. I slumped to the ground in a heap. I’d known Gramps for as long as I had known Melody. In other words, forever.

  Sam and I sat there for awhile and tried not to eavesdrop on the grieving. It was good that Matthew was home, Melody and Gram would need him now that Gramps was gone. I got the urge to lean on someone and looked around again, for G. Where was he? I scanned the area. He wasn’t near the abandoned building, he wasn’t near the car – Thompson’s vehicle was long gone I was betting. He wasn’t sitting with Esme, either.

  “Where’s G.?” I asked Sam in a soft whisper. He shrugged. I called over to Esme who gave me a baleful stare. “Where’s G.?” I said. She turned her gaze away without giving me an answer.

  I got up to pace around the building, each step further turning my insides into a quivery mess. He wasn’t there. He wasn’t anywhere.

  “Hey,” I tried to say but my throat had tightened in the grip of sudden fear. “Hey,” I said again, louder this time, licking my lips, forcing the words out, “has anyone seen G.?”

  Empty, defeated stares met me wherever I looked.

  The fear gave way to a sudden burst of anger. Why wasn’t anyone saying anything? “I said, has anyone seen G.?”

  Nothing. Nothing at all from Esme, Sam, or Lily. Melody and Gram didn’t even look at me. Finally Matthew did, his face grim and tear streaked. He worked his jaw back and forth before grinding out an answer.

  “He’s gone, Tara. Something snatched him away as he pulled me out. No one knows where he was taken.”

  Epilogue ~ MELODY

  The next few weeks were just awful with a capital A. We had a funeral for Gramps, and it was small and intimate; he would have hated it. He’d always said he wanted us to bury him in a cardboard box in the backyard with no pomp and circumstance, but in the end, funerals aren’t for the dead, they’re for
the living.

  I couldn’t quite get over the fact that he was gone. I know he saved me. I would have burned up even worse than he had if he hadn’t reached out to take the damage into himself. Whatever joy I had regained by having Matthew back, was made bittersweet by losing Gramps.

  And Gram? She was a wreck, in her quiet and reserved way. She was angry, and she blamed him for being foolish, and then a moment later she would burst into tears and tell me how fortunate I was that he loved me so much to sacrifice himself. It was going to take some time. Maybe having Matthew back again would help.

  Tara on the other hand, was inconsolable. We never found out what happened to G. We think he was sucked back to the other side – though not like Matthew – who as it turns out, was stuck in between planes in a tesseract and never actually made it all the way through to the other side.

  But that didn’t really matter, did it? G. was gone, and we didn’t even have a good story to give his dad. So right now they have a bulletin out for him as a runaway or worse, and what can we tell them? Call off your search because you’ll never find him?

  I went over to Tara’s to spend some time with her and to give her a shoulder to cry on, but she won’t even speak to me. I can’t blame her, but it’s hard to be in most of the same classes together and have her give me the cold shoulder every day. I just have to give her some time. We’ll figure out how to find G. somehow. Matthew has a few ideas that we’re going to try – the sooner, the better.

  Sam and Lily were on the outs for about a week after he kissed me and Lily saw the whole thing. After he told her everything, including the details of his dreams, she finally forgave him and they’re a hot and heavy item again. It’s been hard for me; since the kiss, my feelings for him are even more quixotic than before. And now that I don’t even have Tara to talk things over with…