Thunderstone

by Barbara Pietron

  “Dream stone.”

  Ice wasn’t sure if it was a question, but he answered it anyway. “Yeah. For premonitions…like an answer to a question. Or sometimes they’re warnings.”

  Jeni wore a faraway look, he wasn’t sure she’d heard anything he just said. “Wow…uh…wait.” Jeni popped up from the bench and left the room. She returned a minute later with her statue. She held it out to Ice. “I don’t know what’s out there, but if you think this will help, take it. You don’t have to give me any…collateral.”

  “I’d feel better about it.” She shook her head and leaned against the counter, facing him.

  Green. He realized her eyes were green.

  Ice rose from the bench. “Thanks, I’ll return it. If I can.”

  “If you can? You said that last time. What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Ice shrugged. “What we’re attempting to do is dangerous. Nik was hurt just investigating.” Man, that sounded so grave—which it was, but he wasn’t here to lay a guilt trip on Jeni. “You didn’t think battling a mythological monster would be a walk in the park did you?” He gave her a full-blown smile.

  It had the desired effect. Jeni returned the smile and the cloud of tension surrounding them dispersed. “Well, from what I’ve read—and I’ve read a lot—those battles are never easy,” Jeni said. “But heroes usually have a special weapon. I guess I just gave you yours.”

  He looked down into her upturned face and flashed back to the night at the campfire. The urge to kiss her was overwhelming. No, that’s not why he was here. His business was done—he should go.

  But the seriousness and the potential hazards of what needed to be done made him feel rather reckless. If Nik wasn’t okay, Ice was going after the monster alone. So he took a step closer, crossing the line between safe distance and personal space. Jeni didn’t move.

  “Mmm, hero? I don’t know about that.” He inched a little closer—close enough to feel her radiant body heat. “But I am going into battle…” Ice wondered if Jeni could hear his heart pounding. He made an attempt at a calming breath. “In case I don’t make it…I thought…” he was going to ask to kiss her, but when she raised her chin and stretched toward him, the unspoken question was answered.

  His lips touched hers and—

  She jerked her head back, a shocked look on her face.

  Ice backed away and suddenly it dawned on him. “Vision?”

  Jeni nodded.

  “Well, that’s a problem.”

  “Ya think?” She laughed a little, but Ice thought he detected restrained disappointment. Without thinking, he opened his arms. She contemplated him for a second and then stepped forward. Her hair smelled like pears. He squeezed her gently, relishing her warm softness, then turned and slipped out the door.

  He’d reached the grass when he heard her call out. “Ice.” He turned.

  “Be careful.”

  ***

  Jeni watched Ice disappear into the darkness, a tumult of emotions churning inside her. His intrinsic sincerity made her want to believe him. The rational side of her still insisted all that was out there was a submerged tree or an unnaturally large fish. Alter-Jeni—who was becoming more and more bold lately—thought maybe she needed to open her mind to other possibilities.

  The blue stone lay on the table. Jeni wasn’t sure when he put it there; she hadn’t intended to take it. Whether or not she got the statue back didn’t seem very important anymore. She picked up the stone and headed for the bedroom. With her grandma fast asleep, it was the next best thing to being alone. And she had a lot to think about.

  When her dad told her Ice was here to see her, she’d run to the bedroom and exchanged her pajama pants for a pair of jeans. Then she grabbed a hoodie and pulled it on over her cami. In a hurry and distracted, the night-light had been sufficient. Now she felt the need to dispel the lurking shadows, so Jeni turned on her book light and propped it up on the nightstand.

  Once she was back in her pajamas, she slipped beneath the covers and settled on her side. She plucked the blue stone off the nightstand and set it next to her pillow. Though she stared at the stone, the kiss hovered foremost in her thoughts. Well, the almost-kiss. How did that happen? Who was she? For that matter, who was he? She barely knew him and he’d told her this cockamamie story, yet came across so real—so genuine.

  Her physical reaction to him was unprecedented. Apparently she’d just experienced the definition of chemistry, because the closer he got, the closer she wanted him to come. And then, when she was sure he intended kiss her, she didn’t turn away, she leaned in.

  Chemistry. Perhaps the missing link in her other relationships. (If she could even call them relationships.)

  Suddenly she huffed an ironic chuckle. Awesome. The first guy Jeni actually wanted to touch her—couldn’t touch her. At least not without making her see visions.

  Figured.

  Wow. She had so much to tell Carolyn.

  Jeni trailed her fingers across the stone. Emotionally drained, her eyes drifted shut.

  She stood at the top of an embankment overlooking a lake. Although thick clouds blotted out any chance of moonlight, distant lightning outlined the figures of Ice and an older man working their way along the shoreline. She’d never met him, yet Jeni was certain the older man was Nik.

  As they drew closer, Jeni could make out Ice’s anxious face. “Will we have any influence without the statue?”

  The medicine man carried some sort of pouch or bag and wore a worried frown. He patted the bag. “Medicine men have other tools.” His tone sounded as though he was trying to convince himself.

  They stopped at the base of the bank. Nik rummaged in the bag, removing items. He gave Ice a pack of cigarettes. “Open them,” he instructed, placing the other items in easy reach.

  “Give me five or six.” Nik tore the filters off and emptied the tobacco on the sand in a trail from the water to the embankment. He disappeared for a minute and Jeni dropped to hands and knees at the top of the mound to peer over the edge.

  A flash of lightning showed a rough opening in the bank amidst rocks, sand, brush, and…wire? Distracted, she traced the wires and realized they ran up, over the outcropping and into the woods. Before she could investigate, Ice’s voice drew her attention.

  “Will this draw the manitou—” A rumble of thunder drowned out the rest.

  “—ncestors used tobacco to mollify him or show respect, so it should at least get his attention,” Nik answered. “His motivation, however, is hunger. And greed.”

  Nik and Ice climbed the bank and laid flat in the brush, peering through the foliage. The forest behind them moved in the wind of the coming storm. Nik nudged Ice and they studied the lake intently. Jeni gazed across the water and saw two sharp points pierce the surface of the lake. They drifted toward shore, followed by a large snake-like object.

  Jeni’s eyes grew wide as the enormous head protruded from the water. Cunning, elliptically-shaped eyes scanned the shoreline. Black liquid streamed off the creature’s scales as it extracted itself from the lake.

  It was her statue come to life.

  The dragon-like monster maneuvered its considerable bulk across the strip of sand to the opening in the bank. As soon as its head was inside, Nik and Ice silently descended the slope. They perched on either side of the hole marking the beast’s progress.

  The medicine man raised something in his fist and looked to the sky, his lips moving noiselessly. Soon, only the creature’s massive tail remained visible.

  Without warning, the monster’s tail lashed to the left, slamming Ice hard against the rocks. His unconscious body slumped to the ground. Jeni winced and cried out, though she made no audible sound. In a fluid motion, the tail swung back to the right and caught Nik under the arms. It lifted him from the ground and flung him out into the water.

  Terrible laug
hter resonated. “You have no power over me.” The voice came from everywhere—penetrating her skull and sending an icy shiver down her spine.

  The beast disappeared. Poised to jump, Jeni jerked backward, realizing the creature had turned around. The snout emerged from the cave opening and its mighty jaws clamped over Ice’s limp form. Screaming soundlessly, Jeni scrambled to the shoreline. She grabbed for Ice’s arm, her ghostly fingers passing right through.

  The underwater manitou plunged into the water, sinking beneath the surface.

  Horrified, Jeni gaped at the swirling water and Nik’s figure bobbing facedown nearby. Suddenly the bestial tail spiraled up out of the water and smacked down over Nik’s body, curling around him and taking him to the depths as well.

  Jeni let out a silent wail of despair.

  She clawed up the bank and ran blindly into the woods with no idea where she was or where she was going. Sobs wracked her body and tears blurred her vision. Her toes struck an overgrown log and she stumbled, somehow managing to stay on her feet, but the ground was a minefield of them and the next time she tripped, she went down.

  She opened her eyes and stared at her book light. She didn’t move for a long moment, slowly comprehending where she was and what had happened.

  She’d fallen asleep with the book light still on…and dreamed.

  Her hand drifted up to feel her cheek, still damp with tears. The dream was so vivid, so real, Jeni expected to find leaves in her hair when she sat up. Slipping out of bed, she crept to the bathroom for a tissue. She dried her eyes and blew her nose. As she climbed back into bed, she realized the blue stone no longer sat next to her pillow.

  As she searched the area with her small light, she remembered Ice had called it a dream stone; perhaps it was the reason for the realistic dream. When she didn’t find the stone in the bed, Jeni guessed it had fallen on the floor. She’d have to find it tomorrow. There was no way she was going to search under the bed in the dark.

  Feeling spooked, Jeni grabbed a magazine. She tried to tell herself that after the day she had, the content of the dream wasn’t hard to justify. Reasoning didn’t help. Neither did Seventeen. Anxiety gnawed at her. What else did Ice say about the stone?

  Premonitions and…Jeni’s heart skipped a beat…warnings.

  What if the events she saw were destined to happen? She must tell Ice.

  Maybe he’d say that’s not what the stone did. Maybe a medicine stone had no effect on her. Even as she tried to form plausible responses, they were buried by her intuition.

  What bothered Jeni more than anything else were the words: you have no power over me. If the medicine man had no power over the creature, who did?

  Her head immediately rejected her first thought.

  But Jeni felt it lingering in her heart.

  What works for us is who we are.

  It is empowering.

  We know our blood, we know our heritage.

  —Carol J. Jorgensen, Tlingit

  Chapter 8

  Jeni hadn’t slept much, though that’s not the reason she was agitated. She needed to talk to Ice and had no way to contact him. Her mom, grandma, and aunts went to some kind of market. Her dad was fishing, and Jake and Josie took Molly somewhere. Unfortunately that left Tyler, Nat, and Nat’s dad at the cottage with Jeni.

  She wandered around the resort, hoping she might run into Ice, and wishing her friend wasn’t at work. Carolyn hadn’t been the first thing on her mind this morning and now it was too late to contact her.

  A thorough search of her bed and the floor around it had produced nothing. The blue stone seemed to have vanished. The ominous connotations of the missing stone on top of the contents of the dream itself filled her with a sense of urgency that grew as time went on. By lunchtime, desperation overwhelmed her. With no other prospects, Jeni swallowed her pride and entered the resort office.

  “Ice?” The woman peered at Jeni over the top of the glasses perched on the end of her nose. “Yeah, I know who you mean—with the blue eyes. Haven’t had him do anything here since last summer.”

  “Oh…I…” Jeni struggled to recover from the unexpected information. “Well he was here the other day. Do…do you have a number for him? He left something behind…at our cottage, I mean.”

  The woman appraised Jeni, hands on hips. “I don’t mean to be rude honey, you seem like a nice girl and all, but you understand I can’t do that, don’t you?”

  “Yeah, I guess.” Jeni took a step back. “Thanks,” she mumbled. Her head snapped up. “Maybe you could call him? Tell him he left a…a tool at our place?” The flimsy explanation sounded so contrived, she felt her cheeks burn.

  “A tool? If Bernie’s hiring help without telling me, he’s in big trouble.” She pushed her glasses up and began scanning pages in a weekly calendar. “If I talk to Ice, honey, I’ll let him know about the tool.”

  “Thank you.” If Ice did get the call, he’d definitely wonder what was up.

  On her way back to the cottage she remembered Ice said Nik was in the hospital. In Bemidji. By the time she came through the side door, Jeni decided it was worth a try. What she saw in her dream could happen tonight—she had to try to contact somebody. Problem was, with only a learner’s permit, she either needed an adult in the car or someone to drive her there. Nat’s dad was out of the question.

  Which left Tyler.

  Jeni opened the refrigerator. The best way to get a guy to do something is bribe him with food. Good grief, she must be some kind of crazy to even consider doing this.

  Aside from the phenomenal sandwich she made for Tyler, Jeni thought he was persuaded by sheer boredom. He downshifted and accelerated on the blacktop. “You know where we’re going, right?” he asked.

  “Yeah, Ice said Bemidji. I figured I’d try to look it up on my phone if we happened to get service along the way, but I did bring a map,” Jeni said, extracting it from her purse and holding it up.

  “I can’t believe you talked me into this,” he grumbled. “I hate hospitals.”

  “I told you, you don’t have to come in.” In fact, she was counting on him not going in with her. “And you might not have to wait; Ice might be able to drive me back.” She had to make him think this was prearranged; that Ice would be there.

  “I’m not so sure your parents would be thrilled if I came back without you.” Tyler looked over at her. “Why is it so important that you go to the hospital to see this guy—Nik? You don’t even know him.”

  “I know…it…it’s important to Ice, though.” She’d given this story some thought ahead of time.

  “Right. And…” Tyler waved his hand to indicate she should continue. “You said you’d explain on the way,” he reminded her.

  “You know that statue I picked up the first day?” Jeni explained that Ice was apprenticed to Nik. She wanted to stick as close to the truth as possible without telling Tyler everything. How could she? Look how she’d reacted—he’d laugh her right out of the car. “Ice borrowed it so Nik could see it. And it turns out that he wants to use it for some tribal ceremony, but he has to ask my permission first since I own it.”

  “You couldn’t tell him it was okay over the phone?”

  “No. It’s a cultural thing. He has to ask me in person.”

  “The dude’s in the hospital but he’s still going to do this ceremony?”

  “I guess so.” Jeni fell silent. She saw no reason to embellish her lies and dig a deeper hole than she’d be able to crawl out of, should it come to that. She checked the map. “Take a left at the light.”

  Tyler slid a disc into the stereo and Jeni breathed a silent sigh of relief. She’d been through the dream over and over and kept coming back to the same answer: she’d woken the monster; therefore she had to put it back to sleep. It’s the only thing that made sense.

  A man had lost his life—his blood was technically on
her hands—she couldn’t step back and let it happen again. Nor could she allow Nik and Ice to put themselves in harm’s way to correct a problem that she’d caused. Especially after she saw what would—or could—happen to them.

  “Turn right up here. I think we’ll see it after that.”

  Tyler pulled up in front of the hospital’s main entrance. “This won’t take long right?”

  “Right.”

  The antiseptic smell that barraged Jeni as she pushed the door open raised an immediate lump in her throat. How many times had she gone to the hospital to see her grandpa before he died? Each time he looked less like the man who’d read her stories on his lap and taught her how to win at checkers.

  She swallowed and approached the reception desk. Because of her recent experience, Jeni had already thought about how to find someone in the hospital when she only knew his first name. She hoped her story worked. “Hi. My boyfriend is here seeing his grandpa, he asked me to meet him here.”

  “What’s the patient’s name?”

  “Nik…oh gosh, I don’t know his last name.”

  “What’s your boyfriend’s last name?”

  “Oh…uh…no,” Jeni shook her head. “It’s his mom’s dad.”

  “Mmm. Is he a Nicholas?”

  “I’m not sure, sorry.”

  The woman stared at her for a moment. “All right. You wouldn’t happen to know why he’s here? That might help narrow it down.”

  “A head injury. He had some kind of accident.”

  “Now we’re getting somewhere. That rules out quite a few areas.” The woman tapped her keyboard repeatedly. “Okay, I do have a Nik, spelled N-I- K. He’s in room 208. If that’s not right, you just might have to wait for your boyfriend to come and get you from the lobby.”

  “Thanks for your help.”

  “Yep. Have a good one.” She pointed over her left shoulder. “Those elevators.”

  Jeni hurried to the elevators and stepped out on the second floor. She took a deep breath as she approached room 208. She’d never met Nik, how would she know if he was the right guy or not?