by K. J. McPike
Lali’s eyes darted out toward the water, and I wondered if she could read the murderous thoughts on my face.
I shook my head to clear it. “We shouldn’t have lived together in one spot. It was too easy for them to get to all of us at once. We should’ve lived our lives apart like your family instead of clustering in San Francisco.”
“San Francisco?” she squeaked.
“Yeah. What’s wrong?”
“My parents used to live there. I used to live there.” She swallowed. “Is there a chance we lived in that community, too?”
I felt my brow furrow. Was that how Xiomara knew me? How Delta knew me?
“Maybe,” I replied, running through the possibilities myself. Not that it mattered. Even if Xiomara and the rest of the group had been my neighbors, it didn’t change anything. We weren’t suddenly going to be friends. They had destroyed my uncle’s life.
“But I thought you said your dad doesn’t know anything about Astralii,” I said, remembering Lali’s earlier rant.
“He doesn’t. But how old are you?”
Her question caught me off guard. “Seventeen. Why?”
“Well, if you were only three when the raid happened, then it was around the time my family moved to Browshire. That seems like a big coincidence.”
She was right. That had to be it. Maybe Xiomara only lived there before she met her husband, and then left. Apparently, she’d kept Lali’s dad in the dark. But even if they hadn’t lived in the community itself at the time of the raid, they had to be near enough and in contact with the people there for Xiomara to hear about it and flee to the opposite side of the country.
I shifted my weight, feeling the sand mold beneath my feet. We couldn’t afford to get hung up on our potential shared history. I knew Lali deserved to know the truth, but we were going to waste all the time we had talking instead of practicing.
“Well, we can only get answers from one person,” I said, doing my best to pull us back to the task at hand.
“Yeah.” The corners of her mouth drooped. “One person who’s impossible to find.”
“Not impossible.” I reached for a story that would keep Lali focused and motivated to get to Alea without sending her into another series of questions. One came to me easily, and my mind jumped to when she had scolded me for coming up with my plan to lie to her friends so quickly before we’d gone bowling. With everything she’d asked me already, I was surprised she hadn’t just flat out asked if I was making this up as I went. Honestly, it seemed like I was. I just had to remind myself that it was for a reason.
“I have a pretty good idea of where to start,” I told her.
“What? How?”
The hope in her gray eyes gutted me, but I couldn’t stop. I needed Lali as invested in getting to Alea as I was, and I could only think of one way to make that happen.
“Well, the crystal that blocks astral energy can only be found in Alea,” I lied.
She stared at me with her mouth hanging open. “You think my mom is in Alea?”
“She has to be. That’s the only place to get the crystal.” I half-expected my nose to start growing as I spoke. “And even if she’s not, there’s a way to get through energy blocks.” There. Maybe if I threw in at least some truth, my fibs would be less obvious. “Cade told me it’s possible, but only the most powerful Astralii know about it. We just have to find out what that is, which should be easy with your invisible spy skills.”
Her face lit up. “So once I get to Alea…”
“I’ll project to you,” I finished for her. “Then when I’ve seen the area, I’ll be able to get there whenever I want, and I’ll be able to get us around quickly.”
“You can project to places, too?”
“Yeah. I just visualize landmarks instead of people.”
“And you know where to find Kala once we get there?”
I explained that Cade would know what to do, but I could tell from Lali’s reaction that she didn’t trust him after what she saw happen between him and Solstice. I still defended him. He was my uncle after all. And I was sure he would help us figure out what to do once we made it to Alea—once Lali figured out how to get into the lab.
Next, I ran through some quick instructions on how to figure out if she could fly in astral form, and a determined look passed over her face. She bit her lip and closed her eyes. I could hear her forcing herself to breathe faster to mimic the body’s response to fear, just like we’d talked about earlier.
She started sounding like she was about to hyperventilate, but then her breath moved into a peaceful rhythm. Her face relaxed, as if she were sleeping on her feet. I scrutinized her serene expression, looking for any flicker or hint of what she was doing in her astral form, but her features gave nothing away.
As I studied her, I couldn’t help but notice that she really was pretty—when she wasn’t ranting. Her olive skin was smooth and even, and her thick lashes curled up where they pressed against her cheeks. A light gust of air shifted her hair along her shoulders, and I had to fight the urge to reach out and touch it.
I wasn’t sure how long I watched her like that, lost in examining her face and imagining what we could accomplish once she mastered her ability, but without warning her breathing became choppy again. The next second, she was falling.
I lunged to catch her, my arms looping around hers just in time. “Easy,” I said, easing her to the sand. “I think you pushed yourself a little too far.”
“I did it,” she whispered, her eyelids struggling to stay open. “I flew.”
Chapter 34
Peace
“I think that’s enough practice for today. You’re looking a little queasy.” I eyed Lali, surprised she hadn’t passed out yet. She’d spent the last few hours on the beach projecting, and even with the darkening evening sky, I could see how her eyes drooped.
“Yeah, I’m starting to get dizzy,” she admitted, wiping her forehead. The temperature had dropped since Lali shed her sweater in favor of the tank top beneath it, but the strain of projecting still made her sweat.
“Don’t worry, you’ll get stronger the more you practice,” I promised. “It’s kind of like working a muscle.”
She inhaled deeply, studying the water as it ebbed and flowed. She looked the most relaxed I’d seen her, and I realized I felt lighter somehow, too. It was nice to have confidence in an approach after so many recent failures.
Lali was getting pretty good at triggering her projections—at least, from what she’d told me. It wasn’t like I could see anything with her invisible astral self. If it weren’t for the fact that I knew she was borderline incapable of lying, I might not have believed how quickly she was picking it up.
I let myself get carried away with the possibilities. Now that Lali had figured out how to project, we could spend tomorrow focusing on permeating—or moving through objects in astral form. She would have to be able to permeate in order to get to the transposer that switched astral forms to physical bodies in Alea. Unfortunately, I couldn’t project to Lali’s astral form—I’d tried while she was practicing—so I needed her to switch to her physical body before I could project after her to get to the other realm.
But before she went there at all, I wanted to make sure the transposer would work for her. As far as I’d heard, transposers hadn’t been tested on semmies. Full-blooded Astralii used them to switch into their physical bodies when they traveled between realms, but I didn’t want to have Lali work up her strength and go all the way to Alea if I couldn’t follow her.
I’d figured the best way to make sure the transposer would work on Lali was to have her try out the one in this realm. She would still have to be able to permeate to reach it—it was hidden in a closed tunnel under the San Francisco Bay—so basically, if she could successfully get to it and switch to her physical body, all systems were go for the transposer in Alea.
“You never told me the name of this place,” Lali said, pulling me out of my thoughts.
&n
bsp; My smile was weak at best. “Lanai.” Just saying the name filled me with peace, but it was always tinged with sadness.
Lali made an agreeable sound. “Cool.”
I could tell she had never heard the name. “Hawaii,” I informed her. “This is one of my favorite beaches. My mom and dad brought Kala and me when we were little.” I left out the fact that I didn’t really remember it.
“It’s beautiful.”
“We can come back to practice again tomorrow if you want. But right now, you should get some sleep.” I clambered to my feet, deciding not to overwhelm her with details of our next steps until the following day. I knew permeating would be hard to learn—Cade told me how much work it took to master it back when he thought I might be able to do it. I couldn’t, of course, which we’d concluded was because I didn’t have an astral form. But Lali at least had a chance, so long as I could help her maintain her composure.
“Come on,” I said. “I’ll take you to the hotel.” I already had one in mind; I figured out where I’d book a room for her while I was sitting around watching her practice projecting.
“Hotel?” Lali asked, looking scandalized.
I tried not to laugh. “Yeah. It would kind of blow our cover if you show up at your house again.” I reminded her that she’d told her family she would be spending the night at her friend Paisley’s house.
“I can’t just sleep on the couch at your place?”
“Eh.” What was the best way to word this? I had already told her in the parking lot of the bowling alley that my uncle wasn’t happy about my working with her, but she was so flustered about lying to her friends that she hadn’t asked me why. “I’d rather Cade not know we’re working together until after we’ve made it to Alea.”
“Oh. Right.” She squirmed. “So what exactly is his problem with me again?”
More questions I hadn’t thought through how to answer. I couldn’t tell her he thought it was too dangerous when I’d finally gotten her to agree to help. I made up an excuse about how Cade didn’t want to waste time explaining stuff to a semmie when a full-blooded Astralis would already know everything. Before she could suggest I go with a full-blooded Astralis instead of her, I told her we hadn’t found one yet because they all kept their true natures hidden to be safe.
“I thought you said Cade can trace astral energy,” she said, making me cringe. It was like she was poking for holes in my story. If I didn’t know any better, I would have thought she’d figured out that I was full of crap.
“He can,” I lied, straining to keep up with her. Technically, I never said he could trace astral energy—I only said there were ways to do it—but making that distinction would only lead to more questions. “And he’s trying. I don’t fully understand how it works, but there are limitations.” She yawned, and I pounced on the opportunity to change the subject. “We can talk about all this later. You need rest.”
She paused, and her face fell. “Um, can you take me home first? I left all my stuff in Nelson’s truck.”
Nelson. I fought the urge to scowl at his name. He was the guy I’d seen bringing Lali to school the previous day, and the guy I’d almost come to blows with at the bowling alley because he didn’t want me driving her home. He was way too protective of her, and just as big a goody-two-shoes. They were like a little morally-superior match made in heaven. Something about the thought made my stomach turn.
“Sure,” I said anyway. I took Lali’s hand, fighting off disturbing images of her and Nelson in nun and monk gear.
I projected us to her room, and she started digging out clothes. I caught a glimpse of her bra, and I couldn’t stop my mind from running with the image of her in it. I looked around her room to distract myself and spotted the half-finished painting on her easel.
Lali announced that she was ready to go, but I didn’t take my eyes off her art. I tilted my head toward the canvas. “You’re really good.”
“Er, thanks.” Even without looking, I could tell she’d shifted her weight. Apparently, she didn’t take compliments well.
“Why don’t you hang up any of your stuff?” I asked, glancing around at her prints of other people’s paintings.
“Dalí intimidates me.”
“Why?”
“Are you kidding? He’s incredible. Just look at this.” She pointed to a boxy image among the cluster on her ceiling. “Gala Contemplating the Mediterranean Sea which at Twenty Meters becomes a Portrait of Abraham Lincoln.”
I failed to hide a snort. “That’s quite a title.”
“Yeah, I know. But it’s amazing,” she gushed, more animated than I’d seen her all day. “Up close, it’s a woman looking out a window, but from far away, it looks like Lincoln.”
“Ah.” I felt the corner of my mouth twitch. It was cute when she fangirled.
“Don’t act like that’s not awesome.” She gazed longingly at the painting, which did sort of look like Lincoln now that she mentioned it. “I’d give anything to see it in person.”
I studied the print and decided I’d project Lali to the real painting one day. Maybe that would be my way of thanking her for her help once we got to Alea.
“Forget it,” she muttered, her cheeks flushing. “I’m easily amused. Ready to go?”
“Only if you’re done drooling.”
She grabbed my hand, half smiling and half scowling. “Shut up and take me to the hotel.”
“Lucky for you, I actually can do both of those things at the same time.” I gave her a playful nudge.
She fought it, but I could tell she wanted to laugh. “You’re still a moron.”
A fluttering feeling took over the top half of my body. Was I flirting with her?
Was she flirting with me?
I pushed away the thoughts. The last thing I needed was to get emotions involved. Still, I knew it would be much easier to work with Lali if she liked me. Now that we seemed to have made peace, I wanted to keep it that way.
With that in mind, I took her to the nicest hotel I knew. For some reason, it made me feel good to put her in their best suite, as if it somehow made up for what I’d done to her and her family. Thankfully, the concierge working third shift was happy to take a little extra cash to let me book the suite despite my young age.
Lali made a fuss about the cost, and I had to work to keep myself from laughing in her face. If only she knew how little of an issue money was for me. But there was no way I was going to tell her that I ripped off various stores when Cade and I were low on cash. She had just stopped looking at me like I was pond scum, and I knew she’d never understand that I had to steal so my uncle could stay home with me. She couldn’t even handle a little fib to her friends.
After reassuring her that the cost wasn’t an issue, I led Lali up to her accommodations for the night. The awe in her eyes as she took in the lavish suite was the last thing I saw before I projected to Solstice’s apartment.
It was late, but thankfully Solstice was still awake and staring into the flames crackling in her fireplace. She jumped when she saw me. “What do you think you’re doing? You can’t just show up in my home whenever you want.”
I shot her a look. “Considering that I don’t have to let you stay in your home, I say I can.” She glowered in response, but I kept going. “Listen, do you know how to permeate? Or, did you—you know—before you lost your ability?”
She crossed her arms over her maroon sweatshirt. “Why does that matter?”
“Because I can’t do it, so Lali will need your input. Obviously, I can’t have Xiomara explain, and I’ve already told Lali that Cade wouldn’t be involved.”
“So I get the pleasure by default?”
“You’re also the only one who gets to stay at your own place,” I reminded her. “I’m sure Xiomara would love to be home, too. So if you want to keep staying here, I’m going to need your help.”
Solstice sucked her teeth. “Fine. Let’s go.”
“Well, she’s going to sleep now. I’ll come get you t
omorrow after she wakes up.”
“Can’t wait.”
I was too excited to let her sarcasm get to me. If Lali picked up permeating as quickly as she’d picked up triggering her projections, we could be in Alea even sooner than I thought.
Chapter 35
Coach
Lali sat bolt upright on the hotel sofa. “I almost had it.”
My heart skipped as I pushed off the wall to face her. “Really?”
She nodded, her ponytail wobbling so the hints of blue wove in and out of the dark locks. She almost looked like a different person with her hair pulled back and without all that crazy eyeliner. From what I could tell, she didn’t have any makeup on, and she looked radiant—if a little out of place with her long-sleeved shirt and jeans in a Hawaiian resort.
“Don’t get your hopes up.” Solstice slunk back into the white leather chair she’d claimed. “I’m sure it will be a while.”
I shot her a glare, and not for the first time since I brought her here. Though she’d explained the basics of permeating to Lali, she’d been discouraging the poor girl at every turn. As a result, the two of them had been bickering all morning.
“Thanks.” Lali gave Solstice a dirty look of her own. “That’s really encouraging.”
I shook my head. With all Solstice’s discouragement, it was a miracle that Lali had managed to make progress with permeating at all. She’d been trying to get through the glass coffee table in her astral form for the last twenty minutes, and from the sound of it, she was getting closer to pulling it off.
No thanks to the worst coach of all time.
Solstice at least went along with the story we made up about the Eyes and Ears stealing her ability—it was the best I could come up with to avoid explaining why a bunch of women trapped Cade’s astral energy—but she’d done everything else to make this experience as painful as possible. Lali held her own, though, for once making me glad she had a fiery side. Even so, it was all I could do not to tear my hair out listening to them argue.
