"Yeah, we"ve had to have a few chats lately about the difference between smothering and protecting. He said he"d play it my way for now, but something tells me the first time I get into trouble, we"ll be back to Colton on my a.s.s at all times."
I wrinkled my nose. "Don"t pretend you don"t love it."
She threw back her head and laughed. "Eff yes I do. If I had to have anyone permanently attached to my a.s.s, at least it"s someone I love ... and it doesn"t hurt that he"s hot as h.e.l.l."
Sigh. Lucy"s happiness is my happiness. I had to remind myself of that when I wanted to pull out her blond hair. Just a few strands, promise.
"Alright, let"s get moving. It"s going to be dark in a few hours, and I don"t fancy walking the forest-of-disappearing-people in the night," I said, scuffing my shoes along the join in the ground where the sand and gra.s.s intermingled with each other.
Lucy sucked in a deep breath. "Gosh, I"m nervous. I"m not sure how to process that I"m not an Earthling. That I"m not even full humanoid. Pixies are like a mythical creature."
She tilted her head at me. "How did you handle it?"
I shrugged. "Guess I haven"t had too much time to really think about it. I never felt like anyone but Abby. I just held onto that fact and the rest I dealt with when I had to."
She bopped her head a few times. "Yes, I just need to remember I"m Lucy. Kick-a.s.s, highly fas.h.i.+onable and mated to a wolfy, blond Walker."
I laughed, my head falling back a little at her c.o.c.ky stance.
She was all hands on hips and chin in the air. Her twinkling eyes met mine, before her expression sobered a little.
"Are you sure you"re okay with Brace fighting? Colton promised that he wouldn"t even mention it to his princeps unless you gave permission. I made him swear it or he wouldn"t be getting any Lucy for a long time." She raised her eyebrows.
"Thanks, Luce, for your generous deprivation of s.e.xual liberty. I just temporarily lost my mind when Colt mentioned Magenta. Now I have to figure out how I can spend all this time around Brace without accidentally walking into moonstale light."
"Or jumping his bones," Lucy added helpfully.
"Yep, or that." d.a.m.n, that was going to be hard.
She linked her arm through mine. "Oh, well, he should be mostly fighting and we"ll be trying to find the half-Walker, so overlap will be a minimum."
I knew she was trying to stay positive for me, and right now I was holding on to the hope that she was right.
"Okay, open your mind and I"ll send you the images." Lucy was jittering around. "It"s time to find out why all this weird s.h.i.+t is happening to us."
"Sounds like a plan." I had a thought. "So you do realize that when you officially mate Colton, you"ll be related to Magenta."
"Gah." Lucy coughed. "I"ll be like freaking Cinderella with two evil step-sisters."
"Two?" I asked.
"Yeah, the b.i.t.c.h and the wolf." She paused. "Same name, two faces."
I laughed at her again; she was funny today.
Lucy sent me the forest image. A long straight line of greenery, its foliage distinct enough for an accurate tracing.
I found a close by tether and, reaching out with my right hand to capture Lucy"s wrist, I used my other to grab the s.h.i.+mmering cord. I hoped on this adventure we found out more about her visions and if they were able to be changed.
Otherwise the end of the worlds was coming faster than anyone was going to be happy with.
Chapter 3.
We stood on the edge of the creepiest jungle I"d ever seen. The outer tree line seemed to be nothing but a ma.s.s of th.o.r.n.y brambles. They intermingled in an array of green tones, with some random splashes of color from yellow roses and huge drooping purple flowers.
"Do you ever have visions that don"t end up with everyone dying or us having to explore someplace creepy?" s.h.i.+vers wracked my spine. Every part of me wanted to turn and run. I wrapped my arms around myself, shrugging the warmth of my coat closer.
"You should be in my head. It"s a right old riot up in here." She winked at me. "Texas Chainsaw Ma.s.sacre style."
Ah, old-school horror, our favorite. I just wished it would stay in the movie world and stop leaking into real life.
We started to walk along the forest edge. Its seemingly impenetrable barrier revealed no entry portal. As we searched I decided to voice some of my worries. Lucy was the one I trusted above all. Especially with a sensitive subject.
"I need to ask you something." She caught my eye; I hurried to continue. "Have you noticed anything strange about Josian?"
My voice didn"t waver as I asked, and I hoped that the icy fear coating my insides wasn"t that obvious. I loved my parents, but Josian had been off lately.
Of course there was no fooling Lucy; she knew me too well.
"Tell me what you know?" She didn"t smile or joke, which was never a good sign.
The tone of her question had me grinding to a halt halfway along the lengthy line of forest. "d.a.m.n, I was hoping you"d relieve my worries. Instead it sounds as if you"ve been waiting for me to ask."
Lucy didn"t s.h.i.+ft her stance, just stood there, staring at me. I realized how strong she"d become in the time since we"d left New York. From the funny, sa.s.sy girl who wouldn"t leave the compound, she now traversed the universe with me and didn"t blink an eye. And she had powers and strength that I"d never imagined.
"If I didn"t know better, Abbs, I"d say you were checking me out." Her full lips quivered as she held back laughter. "But your look goes a little deeper. Stop trying to see into my soul; it"s not as light in there as it used to be."
"I"m just proud of how far we"ve come from our days with Olden."
"Me too! We"re awesome. It"s never been in contention." She reached out and gripped my wrist. "But no avoiding any longer, what have you noticed about Jos?"
Pulling my hand free I started to slowly move again, worried about losing daylight, and Lucy followed along. But I knew her unwavering laser eyes were glued to me.
I wasn"t even sure what to say, so I just went for the biggest worry.
"Did it seem strange that he wanted to separate all of us girls? He was really insistent and then before I could blink they were gone."
Talina, Fury and Ria, the half-Walkers from Spurn, Crais and Regali, were off training with the princeps of their clans. Which was Josian"s suggestion.
"I mean, shouldn"t we be working on strengthening our powers as one unit?" I paused as I noticed a small inlet to the otherwise vined barrier of Lucy"s pixie forest. Finally an entrance. Moving into the opening of the darker environment, I finished my sentence. "It just struck me as odd. What would his reasoning be?"
"Have you spoken with Lalli about this?" Lucy was close enough to my back that she kept shoving me as I tried to side-step through without touching any plants. We knew from Regali that unknown plants could be deadly.
I didn"t speak for a few minutes, allowing my eyes to adjust to the darker environment around us. It was cool inside, with a moisture in the air that left wracking cold s.h.i.+vers caressing my limbs. I was immediately glad for the coat.
"There"s energy here, some sort of barrier that"s to deter visitors, right?" Lucy had lowered her voice to just above a whisper. "Because I"m fighting the urge to run my a.s.s right out of here and never look back."
"Yes." My voice quavered as I hugged my arms closer to my side. "I can feel the magic beating along my skin, but my Walker strength seems to be holding it off." My energy had risen to coat my skin, an added protection.
"That"s good." Lucy straightened. "Don"t let me freak out and bail."
I reached out and grasped her hand, and together we continued to step along the worn little path through the dark and dense forest. Unlike Regali or even the forests surrounding the First World castle, there was no structure to the pixie land. As if everything here was wild and just did what it wanted. Plants grew in every way: through, over and around each other. Until there was such a tangled mess that, besides the very small path we were walking on, the rest would require a machete to move in any other direction.
"So back to Josian." Speaking seemed to help fight off the hum wanting to invade my mind. There was a c.r.a.p-ton of energy surrounding us. "I haven"t spoken to Mom, but maybe I should. She sees into his mind. Surely if there were something weird, she"d know."
Lucy"s voice rose, which was odd because she was whispering. "I did have a vision about Josian, long ago before I even realized I had soothsayer abilities. It was very obscure. I"ve never mentioned it because I really have no clue what it means."
My heart started beating faster. I both wanted and didn"t want to hear her next words.
"But for some reason it plagues me still and I feel it"s because I ignored it."
"What did you see?" I choked out.
She bit her lip, working the lower pad through her white teeth. Her free hand ruffled her blond curls, something she did when nervous.
"You and Josian were on the beach, and you were crying." Her voice hitched. "No, not crying, sobbing your G.o.d-d.a.m.ned heart out. And Josian stood there, staring at you."
"Doesn"t sound very obscure to me." I attempted to keep my voice light.
"Josian had two faces, Abbs. From my viewpoint I could see the one that faced you, and then there was another on the back of his head. This one was sorrowful. And he had all these weird strings on his arms and legs." She shook her head. "I have no idea what it means."
I wondered if the strings were like tethers.
"Did you see this before we even met my parents?"
She nodded. "Yes, when I started having the dreams after leaving New York. But then we met Jos, and he clearly didn"t have two faces, so I just forgot about it. And then bam, last week, same dream again."
I"d been ignoring my instincts, pus.h.i.+ng down the feelings that something just wasn"t right with my father. Sure, he"d seemed down lately, but I tended to agree with Brace from our conversations long ago, before the broken melding bond Josian was probably worried about the final battle. I just hoped it wasn"t more.
"Maybe next time you"re chatting to Lalli, just ask a few questions and see if she"s had any concerns," Lucy said quietly.
I should have asked her during the last two weeks. When I wasn"t training with Josian, I"d been spending a lot of time with Lallielle and Francesca trying to figure out why I continued to have weird, infrequent dreams about ruling First World. My mother"s gifts were in dreams and my aunt was a born soothsayer, so they had great insights. But basically we"d come to the very unhelpful conclusions that my First World half, and the energy that belonged to it, was trying to direct me toward my destiny with Lucas. Well, it could keep on trying. A much larger destiny had claimed me long ago.
We were walking deeper into the crazy landscape. The light was dim, but it wasn"t fading any further as we traveled. Although the cold was increasing. Our breaths were visible now, small puffs of condensed air that filled the s.p.a.ce in front of our mouths. Lucy"s eyes flicked back and forth; she was looking for something so I didn"t interrupt her. But she broke the silence.
"I need to find a path in here, one with a weird formation of flowers. It led into the inner forest. I know that"s where I"ll find the pixies."
I paused. "Besides those flowers along the outer edges of the forest, I haven"t seen any others."
She laughed. "I know. That fact has really put a kink in my plan to follow the color."
"Wait, were they definitely flowers?" I asked. Her words had triggered a response from my eyes; I"d noticed a pattern in the foliage. "Because there are colors. Look at that red."
I pointed toward a spiraling pattern of leaves. They started out in a dark green, but slowly morphed around to red and then pink. It almost looked like a bouquet of flowers in this dim lighting; without my Walker vision, I"d never have known it was leaves.
"Yes!" Lucy fist-pumped into the air. "It was so dark I didn"t notice that it wasn"t flowers but leaves. That pattern is just like the one that surrounded their main gathering place. Although the colors were yellow and orange."
After that we followed the swirls of leaves. The colors did vary, but no yellow and orange yet. After a while we reached a junction in the path. The forest had been close and cloying but then, all of a sudden, it opened and the path spread out in four directions.
"Any feelings about which trail to take?" I peered along them, but everything looked the same in the dim light.
The energy was stronger in here than when we"d first entered, the cold and chills along my spine increasing. The urge to run pressed harder into the base of my skull, like a sharp spike. More of my energy rose to counteract this; it was as if a war was raging across my skin.
Lucy closed her eyes and placed her hands in front of her. "I can feel them," she breathed. "My blood is singing, burning through my veins and I ... I need to dance."
Dance?
Her eyes were still closed and she began to move. I had to get out of the road because all of a sudden Lucy was twirling. Her arms swayed around her as she s.h.i.+fted her body left and right.
"Luce?" I said, keeping my voice low. I didn"t want to startle her from this trance-like state she was in.
She didn"t answer. Her feet left the ground and she started to twist in the air as she drifted along the path. She took the smallest of the four paths, her lithe form swirling and moving in graceful arcs as she traveled. I called power to myself as I silently followed, prepared for anything. There were so many strange things going on right then. Zoned-out Lucy was a huge number one, but there was also the fact that the dim light in the forest never altered, becoming no lighter or darker as we moved through the trees. That wasn"t normal forest behavior. Not to mention, it was almost night now and it should be black under the canopy.
Ahead of us was another fork in the road, and as Lucy drifted she suddenly leapt to her right and I saw it then. A ma.s.sive swirling portal of orange and yellow. It looked like a flower portrait, but it wasn"t, and for the first time it wasn"t leaves either. It was an actual portal of swirling energy.
I was going to take a wild guess that we had found the entrance to pixie land.
I dashed forward to Lucy, my heart rate increased at the thought of losing her in here. I was afraid I"d never see her again. But just as I was about to capture her hand in mine, the portal s.h.i.+fted, the yellow faded out and an angry red erupted. At this same moment a horn-like noise sounded, in one long unbroken note. It vibrated through my energy. Flashes of light exploded from the portal and Lucy opened her eyes just as the red extended in her direction and she was sucked into its grasp. Using my Walker speed, I lunged for her and just managed to grab hold of the back of her jacket.
We were pulled through, the speed and brightness forcing my eyes closed. The influx of negative energy which had surrounded us since we"d entered the forest had changed from small p.r.i.c.kles to more intense stabbing attacks. And then in unison the horn ceased and the energy abated. I found myself flung forward to land in a crouched position. Lucy was next to me, her jacket still clutched in my closed fist.
My lids flicked up without pause, eyes darting left and right as I took in our surroundings. What the h.e.l.l?
Without thought I released my grip on Lucy, my face slackened as the sight before me registered in my brain.
We were definitely no longer in the forest. We were in a gully of gently sloping green rolling hills that spread out for miles. The sky was a brilliant blue, brighter than any I"d seen, and it was warm without being hot. There was nothing dull about the ma.s.sive land spread before us. Everything seemed to sparkle with its own light or essence. But as welcoming as it seemed, something still felt off about the entire place.
Lucy drew my attention then. "Holy eff?" She sounded like herself again. "What just happened?"
I moved, my legs straightening until I stood at my full height. "Welcome to pixie land," I murmured.
"State your business or I"ll leave you here to die." The deep, masculine voice sounded from ... well, everywhere around us.
It echoed across the landscape, hitting my skin like the biting breeze on a winter"s day.
Lucy jumped to her feet, spinning around as her brows drew together and eyes widened. There was definitely no one close to us and on this side of the portal I couldn"t feel any living beings" energy besides mine and Lucy"s. Not even the negative from the forest. But there was still that low hum that seemed to hang suspended in the very air. I was starting to think maybe this entire place was one big source of energy. A low growl began to swirl across us, building in intensity as the man"s words shortened in clipped cadence.
"Answer me."
"He sounds scary. You should probably answer him, Abbs," Lucy said as she moved closer.