Upon the Stars (Love Lines Book 5)

by Diana Nixon

  Evan hugged me tight and I headed for the gates. No matter how much I wanted to stay and just wait for my father to hear any news about my mom, there was one more problem that demanded my attention.

  My father said I needed to find a certain six-year-old boy who belonged to the tribe, and bring him to Dever. He said it should be easy to recognize the boy. I was supposed to feel something special about him; though I still didn’t know why he was so sure I would bring the right kid, and Dad refused to tell me more about him. I felt like I was missing something very important.

  Another thing that I needed to do was to make the Waroi people believe that we had come here for good. In fact, no one was going to hurt them. We simply needed to know more about their magic and the ways to suppress the powers we were born with.

  In short, I had a long list of things to do, and very little courage to do any of them. My only hope was that I would be able to play it cool and wouldn’t give away my fear and screw up everything my father and Patrick had planned.

  Well, Good luck to me…

  Chapter 7

  I could feel Christian’s eyes on my back. With every step I took away from Dever, I could feel his worries about me growing. He was trying to hide those feelings from me, but apparently, they were stronger than his willpower. Which was not surprising at all, considering it was the first time ever that he let me go somewhere that he knew I could get into major trouble, without trying to talk me out of it first.

  I didn’t turn around to look at him. I knew he could feel every single thing I was feeling at the moment, as well as how close I was to going back to the university and giving up on the crazy idea of finding the tribe we knew so little about.

  But as soon as I stopped thinking about Christian, I felt something changing around me, as if my body and mind were suddenly caught in a hurricane of the things I couldn’t explain. I stopped and looked around carefully, trying to understand what was going on. Nothing gave away the presence of humans or other magicians. There was something else, the something that made blood run faster through my veins, as if everything around me was filled with powers so intense, I couldn’t move. I just kept standing there, listening, watching, and searching for anything that would explain the sudden rush of excitement within. For a moment, I felt like it was not the first time that I felt something so weird, yet so good.

  And then, the realization hit me… I remembered the day Evan and I went to find the ruins of an old church near Fontainebleau in France. It was a very special place, just like the one where I was now. And the magic we felt there was very similar to what I could feel coming from everything surrounding me at the moment: trees, flowers, grass, birds, and even the wind.

  The traces of magic that Evan had warned me about… I didn’t know who they belonged to, but they were everywhere. It was not the magic I used to work with, or the magic I felt from the people I met in Dever.

  This magic was so different, so powerful and so…pure.

  A child? I thought to myself. Could the magic I felt be performed by a child?

  “No, it’s impossible,” I whispered, stunned. Children don’t know how to rule over magic, or do they? Again, I remembered about the ghost of the child we saw back in Fontainebleau, and again I felt like I knew the answer to my question even before I could ask it.

  I moved forward, going deeper into the forest. And with every step I took, the powers of magic I couldn’t feel grew stronger.

  I didn’t know how to find the tribe, but something was telling me they were close.

  My assumptions were confirmed when the smell of burning leaves hit my nostrils.

  “The fire,” someone said behind me.

  Slowly, I turned around and saw a woman standing just a few feet away from me.

  “It never stops burning,” she said, watching me closely. I would say she was in her late twenties. Her long bronze hair contrasted with her bright-blue eyes. Her worn dress looked terrible, but it didn’t look like she cared. I didn’t feel any danger coming from her, rather on the contrary. If I didn’t know better, I would say she was glad to see me.

  And, of course, I knew who she was. One look into her eyes, so familiar, yet so mysterious, was enough to know it all.

  “You are their daughter…” As far as I remembered, there were only four pure-blood Wizardies in the clan. And the girl was one of them.

  “My name is Amitola. It means ‘rainbow’. And yes, I am the daughter of Songaa - the tribe’s head man. And you must be Eileen, right?”

  “How do you know my name?”

  She smiled, lowering her gaze to the bouquet of wild flowers she was holding in her hands. “Everyone knows who you are. Your father is a living legend.”

  “Right.” I wasn’t quite sure how to tell her that I needed to see the rest of the tribe, but it turned out it was not needed. She knew why I was there.

  “Come with me. I’ll accompany you to the pueblo where we live.”

  “How far shall we go?” I looked cautiously around, not sure how far away from Dever I had managed to go.

  “Don’t worry, Eileen. No one is going to hurt you.” She looked at me briefly and started to walk.

  Looks like I don’t have a choice but to follow her, I thought to myself.

  “By the way, this is for you.” She gave me the bouquet, but never stopped walking.

  I tried to see her aura, but no colors were visible. Apparently, she didn’t trust me enough to show them. And that made two of us.

  We walked in silence, neither of us daring to ask any questions, even though I was sure she was dying to ask me about a million things, and that, again, made two of us.

  I listened carefully to my feelings about the girl, and frowned, puzzled. I recognized the traces of magic I felt when I got to the forest. Only it was not the exact same magic. Did it belong to her father or someone else from her family?

  “We are here,” she said about half an hour later.

  I didn’t see anything but old trees around me. The tribe was hiding their location with the spells I didn’t know anything about. Would someone be able to find me if I get into trouble? I hoped they would.

  Amitola raised her hands, palms up and closed her eyes, as if she were asking the sky to open the invisible doors to her home.

  When she opened her eyes again, I saw the spells of invisibility breaking, making a transparent cupola surrounding the pueblo disappear.

  “Welcome to my home, Eileen,” Amitola said.

  As soon as we crossed the invisible border of the pueblo, I saw that the cupola, shielding us from the rest of the world was sparkling from the inside. No doubt, it had been created with the help of magic, probably performed by Amitola’s father.

  My heart raced in my chest. This is it, I thought to myself. I’m trapped.

  Could Amanda read my thoughts? I truly hoped she could, because I had no idea how to get out of the pueblo if I felt like I was not welcome here.

  I took a deep breath. It was just about the right time to calm down and concentrate on my mission.

  “My parents can’t wait to see you,” Amitola said. She smiled, just a little, as if she was suddenly afraid of her parents seeing me here, where no stranger was allowed to be. “Follow me please.” She nodded to a stone hut, with a roof made of tree limbs. It was situated in the middle of the pueblo, with about two dozen smaller copies of it around.

  There were not many people outside, but those who saw us coming to the pueblo were not happy to see me. They whispered to each other, giving me terrified looks, as if I were here to eat them alive or something.

  A huge fire was burning right next to the stone hut. Kids of different ages were running around it. Unlike their parents, they were not scared of me. Rather on the contrary – they looked like they were excited to see me. A girl around eight years old ran up to me and gave me a small flower the name of which I didn’t know.

  I hesitated for a moment.

  “Take it,” Amitola said. “She’s welcomi
ng you here.”

  The girl didn’t talk, so I took the flower and nodded, thanking her.

  “Can they speak English?” I asked Amitola, following her into the hut.

  “Some of them can. But our old men think they should pay more attention to their tribe’s traditions and language. We usually start teaching them English when they turn sixteen. By that time, they know everything they need to know about the life of Waroi and it’s up to them whether to stay with us or leave to live their own lives outside the pueblo.”

  “I thought you always stay with the tribe.”

  “It is not a prison, Eileen. We can’t make people do something against their will.” She said that with the notes of accusation, as if she wanted to tell me something so much more than that, but was not allowed to. Did someone tell her to be nice to me?

  “They are waiting for you,” she said, opening a dark-blue curtain for me.

  “Aren’t you going to stay with me?”

  She smiled. “You’ll be fine. Trust me.”

  Well, that was something I was not sure if I could do.

  But still, I stepped forward, entering the room, the only illumination of which was another fire, burning in the middle of it. There was about a dozen people sitting around the fire, all of them were men. I guess it was the council of elders. Women were not allowed to be a part of it.

  All of them were dressed in long, dark-brown and green robes, with different amulets hanging on their necks. Their hair was long and dark, matching the color of their eyes.

  Except for the eyes of the man who rose to his feet and came to greet me, saying “Eileen Clark… It’s such an honor to have you here. My name is Songaa, I’m Amitola’s father and the head of the tribe.” Well, of course, I should have guessed. His eyes were bright-blue, just like his daughter’s.

  “Nice to meet you, sir,” I said in response. I felt my hands shaking. I didn’t know how to act in the presence of so many people I didn’t know anything about, but who apparently knew a lot about me and my powers.

  “Please, take a seat,” Songaa said, nodding to a chair right next to his own.

  But all I could think about was running as far and as soon as possible away from here. I didn’t like the looks the rest of the council members were giving me. Some of them were judging, others were studying. But the look of one particular pair of eyes was filled with so much hate. I started to think of all the protective spells I knew, just in case the man would try to hurt me.

  He was the youngest of all. Around thirty I would say.

  “This is Leno,” Songaa said, introducing the owner of the evil look. “He is Amitola’s husband.”

  “Oh, I see…”

  “What exactly do you see?” Leno smirked sarcastically. “You think you can see everything, don’t you?”

  “I…”

  “Leno! You promised,” Songaa said in a harsh voice.

  But my attention was no longer focused on the man’s unreasonable hatred. “Are those emeralds?” I asked, looking at the beautiful amulet he was wearing. It was made of silver; I could tell that even without touching it. A beautifully designed dagger with about two dozen small emeralds decorating it.

  Leno gave Songaa a weird look that I couldn’t understand. It looked like he didn’t expect me to ask questions about his jewelry piece. Then he said, “Yes, these are emeralds. It was Amitola’s wedding present.”

  “Really?” I looked at the piece again. I could swear it was made with the help of silver magic. Only I didn’t know Waroi possessed it. “It’s beautiful,” I said aloud, keeping my thoughts to myself. Something was telling me it was better to not ask any unnecessary questions.

  “So, tell us, Eileen, how do you find Tahoe Lake?” Songaa asked. “Do you like staying here?”

  The rest of those present in the room suddenly tensed, waiting for my response.

  “I…well, I’m not fond of new places...or people. You never know what to expect from them.” I said just exactly what I was thinking at the moment. I was not going to lie, as well as I was not going to show them how scared I was. After all, I was the daughter of one of the most powerful magicians ever. They saw me as his heir, I could tell. They knew I was capable of many things. I bet we all knew it was better to keep this conversation on a peaceful note.

  It was the very moment when I realized something very important – I was not the only scared person in the room. They were afraid of me, maybe even more than I was afraid of them…

  “I came here to talk,” I said, feeling my courage suddenly growing. I don’t know where I got the strength to talk, but I knew I should make my point before they tried to do something that no one from Dever would ever approve of. “We didn’t come here for war.”

  “Then what are you doing on our territory?” Leno asked with as much venom as he could put into his words.

  “The Lake doesn’t belong to anyone,” I said as calmly as possible. “We came here, because we didn’t have a choice. Leaving Dever in the Cumbrian Mountains was not safe.”

  “So you decided to bring the danger here?” He said angrily.

  “Leno! This is my last warning,” Songaa hissed. “Let her speak.”

  “We believe that the hermits who attacked us in Britain are getting ready for the war. They want to destroy Dever. Do you want the same thing?”

  There was no reason to pretend I didn’t know about their hate for Dever and its dwellers.

  “We don’t want to kill anyone,” one of the men said. “All we want is peace on our land and all over the world.”

  “Good to know that we are on the same page,” I said. “We don’t want the war to begin. All we want is to have a chance to develop our gifts, for good.”

  “For good?” Leno rose to his feet and came closer to me. But I didn’t flinch, or try to stop him. “What good are you talking about? Do you have any idea of how much evil the foundation of Dever brought into our world? You started to teach gifted people, showing them different tricks on how to be stronger than nature itself. Is that what you call good?”

  “It is not our fault that we are being born gifted. And speaking of the tricks…” I stood up and came to where he was standing, touching his amulet and saying, “Isn’t it magical?” I wrapped my fingers around the dagger, pulling it slightly. The moment my skin touched the silver piece, I recognized the energy of its creator – it belonged to the same person whose magic I felt back in the forest. Or at least it was very close to it.

  And it clearly wasn’t Leno’s wife who created the dagger. Not that I was going to tell anyone about my doubts.

  I spoke again, “You say that you hate magic and everyone who has anything to do with it. But you yourself are married to a magician, a pure-blood Wizardy. You are wearing this amulet that has been created with the help of magic – which, according to your words, is just a trick to fool the powers of nature. And magic, as you know, is not something everyone can possess. It is the strongest of gifts ever, and the tribe uses it just like we do. Maybe not as often as we do, but you do use magic. So tell me, how your tricks are different from what they teach students of Dever?”

  If Leno could kill with his eyes, I would have been dead a long time ago. But fortunately, his fear made him even more helpless than the absence of Wizardy blood in his veins.

  He said in a whisper, “Unlike you, we don’t use our gifts for evil.”

  Chapter 8

  Leno and I stared at each other, as if there could actually be a winner in our silent battle. He was hiding something from me, as well as everyone in the room. But I had my secrets too.

  “What do you want from us, Eileen Clark?” His dark eyes became even darker, if that was possible.

  “I want you to help us restore peace in our world.”

  “And how exactly do you suggest doing that?”

  I let Leno’s amulet go; he was glad that I did. He looked a little relieved to know that I was no longer touching it, which gave me another reason to believe that the stor
y of its creation was just another mystery that I needed to solve.

  I spoke again, “Talk to the other hermits. Make them believe that destroying Dever will only make things worse. People won’t know what to do with their gifts, or how to control them. Disorder will start reigning everywhere.”

  Leno shared a glance with Songaa.

  “We need time to think about it,” the head of the tribe said. “We will let you know when our decision is made.”

  “How?” I seriously doubted they would let any of the tribe members come to Dever to deliver the message.

  “Come back here in two days. Alone.”

  I didn’t hesitate with the response. “I will.” Now that I knew how scared they were to know that Dever was so close to their home, I knew they wouldn’t hurt me. Not even Songaa’s poker face could fool me. They knew the power of my magic was stronger than anything any of them was capable of.

  “Can I ask you something?” I said.

  Songaa nodded wordlessly.

  “You didn’t seem to be surprised to hear about the hermit’s attack. How did you find out about it?” They didn’t allow any strangers to come to the pueblo, and as far as I could understand, they rarely went anywhere but the Lake. “You dreamed about it, didn’t you? You knew the Clarions would attack us. Why didn’t you try to warn us?”

  Songaa nodded toward the exit and everyone, except for him and Leno left the room.

  “Leave us,” he said to his son in law.

  “But father…”

  “I said, leave Eileen and me alone.”

  Leno gave me another murderous look. Then pushed the curtains open and left without saying another word.

  “You say you don’t want anyone to die…and then you let innocent people die…don’t you think the two things are contradicting each other?”

  “Eileen, listen to me. There is something you need to know. Not even Leno or anyone from my tribe knows about it.”

  He watched my reaction, waiting patiently for me to take a seat and let him tell me whatever it was that he had on his mind.

  “The attack in Gloster was something we would never be able to prevent. Because the Clarions who did that were not going to kill anyone. The order they executed was made much later, when we couldn’t dream about it. It was planned by someone we didn’t know or ever heard about. We can’t foresee the decisions made by complete strangers.”