by Lee French
Drew froze, making Ki bump into him. Power arced between them like static electricity and Drew stumbled away. “What are you?”
Ki’s eyes lit up with joy. “No, no. What are you, little boy? Tell me you’re here for the ley line. Please tell me you’re here to do something stupid.”
“We’re not here to do something stupid,” Claire spat. “We’re here to fix something. You can stay here. We won’t be back this way.”
“No? Why not?” Ki bounced on his feet. “Are you opening a rift to the Knights’ demesne down here? Can I watch?”
“Who are you?” Drew asked.
“Pah. No one important. But I’m very interested in what a Knight is doing down here when none of the ghost sightings have ever been the real thing. Except this one, apparently.” He pointed to Drew. “That’s funny to find a ghost working with a Knight, and the Knight’s a girl, to boot. What a pair you are! I love irony!” Clapping with glee, he danced in place.
Whatever Ki wanted, he seemed completely insane. Drew had no interest in giving it to him and nodded up the tunnel to Claire. “Let’s go.”
“Wait!” Ki rushed into Drew’s personal space with his hands up but not touching anything. “You don’t know what it’s like to be stuck here forever, watching all the normal people in their normal stupidity. They worry about such silly things. No one cares about what really matters anymore.”
Drew stepped back, but Ki stuck with him. “And this is our problem because…?”
“I just want to follow along. To watch.” Ki pouted. “I can’t do anything except watch anymore, and there’s nothing to see. It’s grotesquely unfair. Like gargoyles.”
When Claire rolled her eyes and shrugged, Drew had a feeling she wished the same thing he did—that they’d both just let Ki do his tour spiel.
“Fine,” Claire said, pointing at Ki with her dagger. “But keep your mouth shut.”
“Not a problem. I can keep my mouth shut. I’m excellent at quiet. Just ask Raven. If you can find her. She’s flighty, you know.” Ki grinned.
Drew groaned at the terrible joke. He nudged Claire forward and kept an eye on Ki as they continued on. The lunatic so far only seemed to kill with his sense of humor, but that jolt of energy made him wary.
The tunnel opened into another room, this one with brick walls and support joists around a long, rectangular cutout in the ceiling. A latch and thick, rusty springs kept the cutout shut. Beyond it, he saw a flicker of power through the stone arch in the wall. The air and ground hummed with energy.
“This trapdoor was used to move unconscious people from the ground floor down here, especially ethnic minor—” Ki clapped his hand over his mouth and said, “Sorry. Just call me a nun.” After a moment of Drew staring at him, Ki’s eyes twinkled. “Because I have a habit.”
Claire stared at Ki for a long moment, then shook her head and turned away from him. Drew groaned and followed. He felt power pulsing nearby, through the earth and stone. His fingers reached out and brushed the wall of their own accord, which he only noticed when Kay gasped inside his head.
“It’s so much,” Kay whispered. “We could live off this ley line forever. You could stay young forever.”
The Fountain of Youth, ready and waiting for anyone willing to be possessed and live in a cave. He suspected a fair number of people would be happy to overlook the minor downsides. Snatching his hand away from the wall, Drew ground his teeth together to avoid answering Kay in front of Ki.
They reached another aged brick room and he stopped at the threshold to stare in awe at the magnificence of power rippling across the floor. Claire walked right through it, apparently unaware of its existence. He couldn’t imagine how anyone could be oblivious to so much. Tendrils of the vast ley line licked up through the dirt throughout the room, whips flinging enough power to slice an elephant in half.
He saw Claire continuing to the other side and called to her, but his voice cracked and broke over her name. “Stop,” he croaked, unable to muster more than a hoarse whisper in its presence. “This is it.”
Claire paused in mid-step and blinked at him. “Really? I thought I’d feel something or see something.” Fingers of white-hot energy caressed her legs, wrapping around her boots and releasing them when she moved.
“How fascinating,” Ki gushed.
Drew knelt, unable to decide if he should touch it or not. So much raw energy seemed like it should be dangerous.
“Careful,” Kay said. “We need a mediator to interact with something this massive. We’ll get swept away and burned up.”
Claire returned to Drew and crouched at his side. “I guess this is like standing in a volcano for you?”
He gulped and nodded. “Something like that. I can’t help you with this. Not if I have to be in that to do it.”
“But I can’t see it or feel it. How am I supposed to interact with it?”
Enion chirped from around her neck.
Ki squealed with delight. “A real dragon! Here I thought it was just a questionable fashion choice. You know, I knew a dragon once. He liked to dress up as a girl. Get his drag on.”
“Shut up, please.” Drew thought he might dive into the ley line if it would spare him having to hear any more of Ki’s awful jokes. He waved at Enion. “Use him. If you really need me, I’ll help, but I can’t go into that. It’s too much. Maybe when I’ve been doing this longer. If you can do it with Enion, do it with Enion.”
“Okay. I can do this.” Claire squeezed Drew then she squared her shoulders and faced the room. Her determination awed Drew.
He needed to find some of that inside himself.
Chapter 18
Claire
With a silver flash, Enion grew to his full size. He had to lie on the floor to fit in the room and his tail snaked out the far doorway. Though they could do this with him small, Claire had a feeling she might need physical support.
Ki fanned himself with a hand and let out strained squeaking noises while dancing from one foot to the other. Stopping, he sucked in calming breaths, then clutched his chest. “Your seals were broken,” he gushed, on the verge of tears. “How did it happen? Can you break mine too?”
“Your what?” Claire stared at him, not comprehending. She knew creatures had been bound by collections of seals all over the world. Ki didn’t strike her as something fitting the category of “creature.”
“Of course,” Drew said. “He’s one of them. He makes sense now.”
“Sure he does. Tell me later.” Finding Ki a distraction, Claire rested her hand on Enion’s head and focused. Since she’d done it once, the ability to see magic came at her call. When she blinked, she saw the immense slosh of power streaming through the room.
Enion jumped and backed into the wall. “Scary!”
“It’s not doing anything to us, Enion.” She covered his eyes and shushed him. Calming the big dragon with sharp claws and teeth felt silly. At least he hadn’t shrunk himself and flown off in a panic. When he relaxed, she kissed his nose. “I’m going back to Drew, okay? I’m going to prepare the crystal and my hands, and then we’re going to do the thing and leave.”
Enion nodded and curled up as much as he could.
She took the crystal out of her pocket and noticed Drew had a misty, silver glow around him. Its edges rippled in a pattern she’d need more time to puzzle out. Kneeling beside Drew with both hands full, she offered him the crystal so she could deal with the dirt.
He snapped his eyes open and scrambled away, his back hitting the wall before he got out of reach. “Don’t touch me with that here.”
Though she had no intention of asking Ki for help, he raised his hands in surrender and backed away from her. His body had a thin, brown outline of power huddled close around him. “Don’t look at me. Not in my best interests either.”
“Okay.” Claire balanced the crystal on her knee and smeared the dirt from the clod all over her hands. When they were covered, she picked up the crystal again and looked to Drew. �
��I need your blood on it.”
Drew swore.
Ki gasped and retreated another few steps. “Hide the squirrels, you’re both nuts.”
“Cut my arm and let it drip,” Drew said.
Claire frowned. She had to cut him no matter what, of course. Before now, though, she hadn’t thought about it. “Okay. I can do this.”
When she lifted his hand, she remembered him holding her two weeks after her parents died, telling her everything would be okay. He’d been in the system for years and she trusted him to know how things worked.
“Just get it over with.” Drew clenched his jaw and closed his eyes.
She slid his sleeve aside and moved the knife close, hovering the tip over the outside of his forearm. As she clenched her jaws and tightened grip on the dagger, another thought popped into her head. “What if the enchantment on the blade hurts Kay?”
Drew swore again. “Enion, come here and bite my arm.”
“Do it?” Enion snaked his head closer, looking to Claire.
She took a deep breath and nodded. It hurt to watch her dragon scrape open in Drew’s arm. Even though he’d braced for it, Drew squealed. Claire held the crystal under the wound and watched the blood ooze out. His flesh healed while she coated the crystal.
“I’m sorry.”
Drew leaned against the wall, acting more drained by this than an already healed wound should cause. “Just make it count.”
Claire shuffled back to the room on her knees and, gripping the bloody crystal in both dirty hands, leaned into the ley line. She expected at least a tingle. “Nothing’s happening.”
“Nothing at all?” Drew asked.
“No, it’s just…gross.” The blood mixed with the dirt in her hands, making a disgusting, sludgy mess.
“Get in there and help her already,” Ki said, clutching at the archway of the previous room down the tunnel.
“I don’t know how without frying myself.”
“Goodness gracious, what kind of a possessed man are you?”
“I’ve been like this for two days! Excuse me if my ghost and I don’t know how to do everything yet.”
“Oh, you poor things. You’re both just babies climbing Wy’east.” Ki sighed and hurried closer, shooing Drew toward Claire. “Hold her. Reach for the line, but not with your hand. Let her touch it. Claire, focus on what you’re doing and why. Koosak lum, let it be a good thing.”
Claire closed her eyes. Drew slipped in behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist. She let him move her while she focused on her desire to be free to survive without the Palace. In this moment, she wondered if she could be completely free of the Palace and still have her dagger and her dragon. If cutting herself off from the palace meant losing Enion, she didn’t want to do it.
Enion gripped her hands with a claw. Drew rested his forehead on her back and his muscles tensed around her. He leaned forward, pushing her hands into the room again. When she touched the energy, he whimpered. Then she felt it.
Fire surrounded her hands, burning with heat more intense than anything she’d ever felt before. Enion groaned in pain. She watched in wide-eyed horror as the crystal grew hundreds of needle-sharp spikes, piercing her fingers and hands in every direction. Someone made shrill, reedy noises and she realized it came from her as she hyperventilated.
“Don’t drop it,” Drew said through gritted teeth, his voice high and anguished.
“Courage,” Claire tried to say, but she made only unintelligible squeaks. “Strength of will. Tenacity.” She squeezed her eyes shut harder, refusing to watch as the ley line stripped the flesh from her hands, then the meat from her bones. Intense agony shot through her arms to her chest. Everything burned. Her heart and soul shredded and still she held on.
Drew slumped against her and everything stopped. Claire didn’t want to open her eyes, but she forced herself to anyway. Enion lay on the floor in the room, his limp claw still wrapped around her clean, intact hands. Pulling her palms apart, she found no sign of the crystal. She eased her hands out of the claw and turned them over, looking for some scar or other sign of what had happened. The skin seemed smoother than before and the bloody dirt was gone, but she noticed no other change.
“That was…” Ki sighed where he’d collapsed to the ground. “Please tell me you’re not a supervillain.”
Claire shifted and Drew fell to the side. Though she thought she should be exhausted, she felt energized. She brushed her fingertips across Drew’s reddened face. “I’m not a supervillain.”
“Thank goodness. Supervillains spend too much time talking about destiny and how incredible they are. Very boring.” Ki struggled to sit up. “Don’t ever let anyone push you around, Claire. You have more than enough tumekum to conquer them. Whoever they are.”
“Thanks, I think. What language is that?” She prodded Drew, who stirred with a groan. Beyond him, Enion lay slumped in the ley line room. The crystal thing had shut off her ability to see magic and she groped for her bond with her sprite, not sure if she’d find it or not. Everything seemed disconnected, though, like she floated in a pool.
Ki waved his hand. “It doesn’t matter.”
“Did we win?” Drew saw her and smiled. He took her help to sit up.
“I think so.” Claire crawled to Enion’s side and patted his face. “C’mon, dragon. Time to wake up and get out of here.”
Enion blinked his eyes open. “Win!” He trilled with wordless happiness. “I feel clean. Cleaner than clean. Really clean. A lot.”
Claire looked down at her spotless hands and grinned. Since she could understand him, she assumed their bond remained intact. “Yeah. Now that you say it, I do too. Like, inside and out, if that makes sense.” Despite everything about this day, she also felt a peculiar glow of joy simmering inside.
“Home?” Enion shrank with a flash of silver and draped himself around her neck.
“Yeah. Let’s go home. Drew? Can you take us?”
He grinned. “I have juice to burn. But I need a minute. My brain is cooked.”
Claire hopped to her feet and felt the urge to run, skip, jump, laugh, and dance, all at the same time. Giggles spilled out of her. She rushed to the far doorway and peered into the dark tunnel beyond, wondering how far she could run and still come back before Drew recovered enough to take them home.
When she stepped out of the ley line room, mist bubbled out of the ground. Silvery fog wrapped around her and she figured Drew needed less time to recover than he thought. She waited, looking forward to jogging through the woods. The fog failed to obscure her vision.
She turned back and saw Drew shaking his head to clear it. He hadn’t stood yet. “Drew, you’re leaking or something.”
“I’m not doing anything. I’ve still got scrambled eggs in my head.”
The gray fog formed shapes. Claire waved her hand through one, disturbing the mist. The moment she pulled her hand away, the figure reshaped itself. Her giddiness faded, replaced by concern. She drew her dagger and sliced through the nearest of the dozen figures, cutting it in half. Tendrils snaked out of both halves and reached for each other, pulling them together again.
Claire backed toward Drew. “Uh, this is probably not good.”
Shapes solidified, becoming people. The style of their clothing reminded her of brothels and saloons in old western movies. An Asian woman in a low-cut dress with her long hair in a bun held by chopsticks reached for Claire.
By instinct, Claire leaned to the side. The ghost’s fingers swiped through her shoulder, filling it with ice. Rancid, bleeding terror washed over Claire. She fought it down as hard as she could and stabbed with her dagger, shoving it into the unresisting ghost’s side and ripping it out. The ghost looked down at the wound. It touched its side and seemed confused.
Every ghost Claire had ever seen before dissipated when stabbed with a Knight’s blade. She slashed the blade again, this time catching the ghost’s arm and cutting a gash across it. The wound bled faded green mist.
Terror gripped her. She panicked and fled past Drew and Ki, charging for escape. Turning to check if the ghost followed her, she saw Ki helping Drew to his feet. Drew still seemed disoriented. Ghosts poured out of the ley line room. She should have paused to help Drew. Why didn’t she pause to help Drew?
“What’s going on?” Ki shouted.
She slowed. Her breath caught at what she saw behind her. A throng of mist people shambled up the tunnel like zombies with fog obscuring their feet. Wasn’t the Palace supposed to prevent this? Ki ducked under Drew’s shoulder and helped him follow Claire at a near-jog. The ghost in the lead swiped at the pair, missing by inches.
Claire felt an echo of those fingers in her shoulder again. “Ghosts,” she breathed.
Drew seemed to be regaining his wits. He straightened with every step. “Isn’t stabbing ghosts kind of your job?”
“I stabbed it and it didn’t go away!” Claire reached the ladder and surged up it. She didn’t know what to do. Would the ghosts chase her through this hole? She hesitated, battling the urge to throw the trapdoor shut. That should be an easy choice. Obviously, Drew and Ki needed to escape too. Wrestling with her fear, she took a step away from the door.
“Oh. Great,” Drew groaned, barely on the edge of her hearing. “Knight-resistant ghosts. What’ll they think of next?”
“I doubt it’ll be ghost-resistant people,” Ki said. “But…do you see that?”
“Yeah. I don’t know.” Drew paused. “Maybe this’ll help.”
Fog billowed out of the hole. Hands reached out at Claire, grasping at the air. Claire squeaked with a fresh surge of panic and fled. She needed Justin. He’d know what to do. He always knew what to do, and when he didn’t, he knew how to improvise. Her skills included flailing, flailing, and more flailing. Also, she could ride a dragon.
“Enion,” Claire said, panting for air. “Get us out of here.” She hit the front door of the bar, forgetting she had her dagger out, and smashed through the glass. Jagged shards ripped holes in her clothes without slicing through her armor. Her momentum carried her into a man on the sidewalk.
