Текст книги "The Underworld"

Автор книги: Jessica Sorensen

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Chapter 11

Something was wrong. Something was very, very wrong. I was stuck. Yes, stuck. Stuck inside the vision.

Not only did this have me worried, but it also made me furious because I wanted to get back to Nicholas and the Ira crystal ball so I could start training to save my mom.

But nope. Instead, I was tromping through the forest, leaves and twigs and grass crunching loudly beneath my angry steps as I charged for the castle. I could see the grey stone tower of it sticking up from above the trees, like an arrow pointing to the sky, and I kept my eyes on it as I shoved my way through the bushes, finally stepping out of the forest with an ungraceful stumble.

The sky had shifted a deathly grey and the wind had begun to howl, causing the waves of the lake to roar up against the shore and leaves to whip through the air. Thunder boomed in the distance, and I could almost feel the terror waiting for me inside the castle.

With a loud breath I started up the hill, trying hard not to look at the lake, but it seemed to be calling me, taunting me with its whisper. I glanced over at it, and through the dark, murky water, I could make out faint white figures. Water Faeries. For a split second—and I mean, a split micro of a second—I actually contemplated going into the water, wondering if I did so, if the Water Faeries would take hold of me and drag me down to The Underworld where my mother was trapped.

But the idea that I would even consider this freaked me out just enough to jerk me back to reality, and I ran.

By the time I reached the front door of the castle, the air had gone ice-cold, and the clouds had started to rain down. I shivered in my wet clothes as I shoved the door open. Inside, the light was dusky, and the air wasn’t much warmer. Extending out on each side of me was a hallway, and in front of me was a marble stairway curving up to the second floor. Three options to choose from– three places I could go. But how was I supposed to choose, when I didn’t even know what I was looking for.

With a shaky breath, I preceded down the hallway to my right, my feet thudding against the rocky floor as I weaved my way further down it, feeling as though my feet were no longer in my control, as if my brain subconsciously knew where it was heading. I passed by doors, not bothering to check what was behind them, continuing to walk until the hallway hit a dead end. There was a set of heavy doors, and that was it. I knew without a doubt that this was where I was supposed to go.

With a trembling hand, I reached for the handle, but jerked back when thunder boomed from outside and scared the living daylights out of me. I took a breath, trying to calm my nerves, clicked the handle down and pushed open the door.

I’d seen this room before; instantly I was aware of that. There was a fireplace squaring the front wall, and a Persian rug spread across the stone floor. A single chair sat at the back of the room. This was the chair I hid behind in one of my visions; the one where I heard Demetrius and Stephan discussing how they had gotten rid of my mother and how they took care of me.

There was no one in the room now, but I felt I needed to be here, because there was something I needed to see. But what?

Just as I thought it, a cold breeze whipped through my body and I gasped as I realized Stephan had walked right through me. My eyes widened. Holy crap.

No one had ever walked through me in a vision. Yeah, I knew I was transparent to them and that I couldn’t touch them, but actually walking through me…and Stephan of all people…it gave me the chills.

Stephan strolled up to fireplace; the bright orange glow of the flames reflected in his dark eyes. I walked toward him slowly, my legs shaking more and more the closer I got.

I didn’t know what I was doing exactly, but I found myself staring at him—the man who’d taken away my life. His dark, soul ess eyes, the scar on his left cheek, rough and jagged as if he’d been cut with a dull knife.

When his gaze moved away from the fire and landed on me, I let out a gasp and quickly backed away.

His gaze did not move away from me. It locked on me like a target, making me tremble from head to toe.

He can’t see you, I told myself. But then I remembered how, during the first time I had accidently slipped into a vision—the one that had taken me to this very room

–Stephan had acted like he could sense I was there.

I started to freak. What if he knew I was here?

The door creaked open behind me, and I jumped to the side as Sophia and a man with light hair and brown eyes walked into the room. It was strange seeing Sophia fourteen years younger. She practically looked the same, though, except with fewer wrinkles. Her auburn hair was still done perfectly, and she was sporting the same 1950’s TV sitcom look; wearing a cream colored dress with high-heeled shoes that matched.

“Where’s the girl?” Stephan asked the man whose name I didn’t know.

“She’s coming,” the man replied, bowing his head as if Stephan was some kind of king or something.

“Marco is bringing her.”

So this was it. This was what I was supposed to see—my last day as a normal little girl. Well, normal except for the whole carrying-a-stars-power-in-me thing.

This was absurd. I didn’t want to see this.

I turned to leave, but the door opened again and Marco and Little Gemma walked in. My violet eyes were huge and I wondered from the terrified expression on my face, if when this had all taken place, I’d sensed something terrible was about to happen to me.

“Here she is,” Marco said, handing me over to Stephan.

Stephan stared down at me with what only could be described as the most sinister look I’ve ever seen.

“hello, Gemma. Are you ready to go?”

Little Gemma shook her head. “No.”

“Well too bad.” Stephan raised his eyes away from me and looked at Sophia. “Let’s get this taken care of.”

Seeing Marco and Sophia standing there, being a part of all of this had me shaking with anger. Yeah, I already knew they played a part in this, but seeing it…

It was sending me into a fit of rage.

Stephan told Little Gemma to go sit down in the chair, and with great reluctance she obeyed. I wondered if I ever thought about running. I wondered if I had any idea of what was about to happen to me.

Sophia stood in front of me as she hesitantly reached for my head. Little Gemma recoiled, pressing herself back into the chair. She knew something bad was about to happen. I could tell —I could feel it in my own bones.

To my surprise, Sophia pulled back her hand. “Are you sure this has to be done?” She asked Stephan.

“She’s just a little girl—Jocelyn’s little girl.”

“I understand that. But even before she disappeared, Jocelyn agreed that this must be done,” Stephan’s voice seemed to have a hypnotic effect on Sophia, like he had lulled her into a calming state of mind. “We have to do this to save the world. If Gemma keeps…” his eyes wandered over to Little Gemma who was listening intently. “Yes, we have to do this.

Now get it done.”

Looking extremely upset, Sophia turned back to me, and put her hands on my head. “Just relax, Gemma. It will be over in a moment.”

Marco put his hand on Sophia’s shoulder, comforting her. And I—and I mean the real foreseer-traveling-me—stood gaping in horror at this scene.

They didn’t know. Marco and Sophia hadn’t known what Stephan was really planning to do. They thought they had been doing the world good. All those horrible, torturous years of living with them, and their cold and distant behavior, had all been because of Stephan’s lies. I never thought I could hate someone so much. But, oh yeah, I did. The rage of prickles on my neck was letting me know that.

“Just a second,” Stephan said suddenly. He moved toward Little Gemma and grabbed hold of a thin chain hanging around her neck—my locket.

“Hey,” Little Gemma protested as Stephan yanked it off of her neck, snapping the chain. “My mom gave that to me.”

Stephan gave her a look that I’m sure had to have sent a shiver down her spine, because it sent one down my own. “You’ll get it back just as soon as Sophia is done.”

Liar.

Putting her hands back on my head, Sophia muttered something under her breath, and her hands started to glow a bright gold. I gasped at the same time Little Gemma gasped, and I actually saw…I actually saw the life slip from her violet eyes, like a light switch had been flipped off.

Sophia pulled her hands away, the golden light fading from her hands. “There, it’s done.” She turned to Stephan. “Now what do we do.”

“Now you and Marco will take her to Afton, just like we talked about,” Stephan said, seeming pleased.

Umm…How could they not be suspicious of him?

“And you’ll make sure she stays this way.

Understood?”

Sophia nodded. “Okay, then.”

As they all gathered to leave, I watched Little Gemma move robotically as Sophia guided her out of the room. I did not follow because I didn’t want to follow. I wanted to go back and forget this ever happened. But deep down I knew only one of these things was possible.

I closed my eyes and willed myself to leave this place. And before I knew it, I was being yanked back.

Chapter 12

My eyes shot open and the first thing I saw was a dark blue ceiling. Then Laylen’s worried faced appeared above me.

What just…happened?” He spoke slowly as if he was too terrified to speak.

I started to sit up, but he put his hand on my shoulder, pinning me down. “Don’t sit up until we figure out why you passed out.”

“I didn’t pass out,” I told him. “I went into a vision.” Laylen’s eyes widened just like I knew they would.

“That’s what happens when you go into vision without a crystal—you just black out.”

I nodded, and then came the voice.

The most annoying voice ever.

“So you went into a vision?” Nicholas asked.

“Without a crystal.”

“Ah, crap.” I didn’t even bother to say it in my head. I lifted Laylen’s hand off of my shoulder and sat up, dizzy and getting a total head rush. I blinked a few times while I waited for the room to stop spinning.

“Did I hit my head?” I asked Laylen. “When I blacked out?”

Laylen shook his head. “No, I caught you before you did. You scared the crap out me, though. One minute you were talking, and then next you were falling out of the chair.”

“Nice,” I muttered.

“Nice for you,” Laylen teased. “But do you know how difficult it is to catch falling dead weight.” I shook my head and got to my feet.

“So you can go into visions without a crystal ball?” Nicholas asked with intrigued.

Nicholas knowing about this was probably not a good thing. “No, I used a crystal ball,” I lied.

“No you didn’t—I’d have known if you had,” he said with a smirk. “But nice try.”

I rolled my eyes. “Whatever.”

“So,” Nicholas said, marveling at me as though I was the most fascinating thing he had ever laid eyes on. “You can go into a vision without the help of a crystal…fascinating.”

Even though Alex wasn’t here, I could picture him giving me a twenty minute lecture about my stupid mistake of letting Nicholas know about my uncommon Foreseer ability.

“I guess,” I said, acting like it wasn’t a big deal, when really it was since a Foreseer traveling into visions minus the crystal is a very unheard of—if not completely unheard—thing.

“How long have you known you could do it?” Nicholas asked with way too much interest.

I shrugged. “Not too long.”

Nicholas’s golden-eyed gaze practically burned into me, not in a bad way, but in a good way. Or should I say a bad/good way, because the guy had already shown way too much interest in me, and with the way he was staring at me, I had a feeling that his interest way going to increase. A lot.

“Do you know how rare that is?” Nicholas awed at me.

I gave a shrug “I guess. I mean, Alex said there might be one other guy that could do it.” Nicholas’s eyes devoured me. “That other guy is Dyvinius’s younger brother, who’s been a Foreseer for a really long time, and comes from a line of many, many powerful Foreseers. He isn’t some girl who just got her Foreseer’s mark only a couple of days ago.

Do you know how unlikely it is for anyone to be able to do that…you would have to be…” He trailed off.

“Have to be what?” I asked, dying to hear what came at the end of that. What if Nicholas knew something about my little gift?

“Very powerful,” he finished.

Well, crap. Powerful I was. Or at least I had a lot of power flowing around inside me. But Nicholas was not supposed to know this.

Play it cool, Gemma. “Yeah, well, if I am, then that’s news to me.”

“Really,” he said, and I could tell he wasn’t buying it.

“Yeah, really.” Was all I could think of to say.

“So weren’t you supposed to be bringing back that Ira crystal ball with you?” Laylen interrupted, in an effort to sidetrack Nicholas.

“Yeah,” Nicholas said, his eyes still fixed on me as he patted the pocket of his jeans “I have it.”

“Well, shouldn’t you get to work, then.” Laylen was trying really hard to direct Nicholas’s attention away from me and my power, but Nicholas wasn’t having any part of it. “I mean, I’m sure it’s going to take awhile to train Gemma, or whatever it is you’re supposed to be doing.”

“Maybe…” The way Nicholas was looking at me made me want to crawl under the table and hide.

“Maybe not.”

“Regardless of how long it’ll take, I think we should get started now,” I told Nicholas. The sooner the better, at least for my mom’s sake.

“Fine,” he said. “Let’s get started.”

I was quickly catching on that Nicholas had the attention span of a child. We sat down on the living room floor, all Séance-style, sitting cross-legged, facing one another, a regular, violet ribbon crystal ball placed between us as he taught me how to become a

“better Foreseer” and control my seeing ability. But it was going to take forever because he kept asking me questions. Questions that I wasn’t sure how to answer.

“Why do you need to go to The Underworld?” he asked, before we’d really gotten anywhere with my training.

“Um…” I hesitated, not sure what to do. Lie.

Probably not, since he was going to end up finding out when he went down to The Underworld with me.

“To get my mother.”

He nodded. “I met her once. Didn’t she disappear quite a few years ago?”

“Fourteen years ago,” I said absentmindedly, my hands hovering over the crystal ball.

“And that’s where she ended up?” Nicholas asked interestedly. “In The Underworld?”

“Yeah…” I stared down at the violet ribbons, swirling inside the crystal. “That’s where she ended up.”

“How?”

Crap. “I…a…I don’t know.”

I worried he would ask more questions, but instead he picked up the Ira that was sitting on the floor to the side of us, the moss colored glass sparkling beautifully when it hit the light.

“Well, this should get us there,” Nicholas said, twisting the Ira in his hands. “Just as long as we can get you to control your Foreseer power a little bit better, which shouldn’t be too difficult, considering you can enter visions without a crystal ball.” I didn’t say anything.

Nicholas tossed the crystal ball in the air like it was a baseball. “So who’s your father?”

Good Question. “I’m not sure exactly.” He raised his eyebrows quizzically. “You’re not sure? How’s that possible?”

“When your mother refuses to tell anyone before she gets trapped in The Underworld,” I replied, with a small amount of bitterness because I wished she’d have told someone. I mean, why did it have to be a secret? Who was he?

“So for all you know,” Nicholas tossed the crystal ball in the air again, and it spun so quickly that when the light kissed it, it looked like a mere reflection.

“Your father could have been some powerful Foreseer.” He caught the crystal ball in his hands and let out a dramatic breath. “Your father could be Dyvinius.”

I pulled a face. “Ewe. Gross. He’s like sixty.” Nicholas shrugged, his eyes glinting mischievously.

“You never know. Some girls have a thing for older guys. I mean how much older is Alex than you.” I glared at him. “First of all, I don’t have a thing for Alex. And second of all, he’s only two years older than me. I don’t think that qualifies him as an ‘older guy.’”

“You know your second reason kind of contradicts your first. If you didn’t like him then why would it matter whether two years was a lot or not.”

“I don’t like Alex.” I assured him, but my inner conscious laughed at me.

“Whatever you say.” Nicholas balanced the crystal ball on the black and white checkerboard floor. “But I think you’re lying. And I think two years could be a lot if you think about it.”

“How do you figure?”

“Well, for starters he’s not even considered a teen anymore.”

I rolled my eyes at the sill iness of his reason. “Well, how old are you?”

“The same age as you,” he replied, being evasive.

Faeries are tricky. “And how old would that be?” I asked, playing his game.

He smiled slyly as if he knew what I was up to.

“Eighteen, of course.”

Of course. “Can we just get back to you teaching me, please?”

He stared at me for a moment with a slightly irritated expression. “Sure, that is unless you want to try our kiss again.” When I shook my head, he rolled the regular crystal ball —my “training ball,” as he’d explained to me earlier—toward me. I scooted back a little, concerned that if it touched me I would instantly be pulled in.

“So, until we can get you going into and out of visions that you’re intentionally trying to go into, there’s really no point in us trying to travel into The Underworld because it’s one of the most difficult places to get to,” Nicholas explained, finally getting to the point. “One false move and we could end up in the bottom of the lake, where we’d either drown or get taken to The Underworld by the Water Faeries which means we’d be prisoners there—we have to go in a specific way or we’re in trouble. Got it?” I nodded. “So how does it work, exactly? I mean we enter The Underworld through that ball.” I nodded at the moss colored Ira Crystal Ball. “Then what? I mean how do we get the Queen to let my mom go? And how do we get her to let us go? Wouldn’t we just end up prisoners as well?”

Nicholas shook his head. “No. The Queen can’t keep us there—it’s the law that comes with using the Ira—part of the reason the Queen hates it so much.

We can show up whenever we want and leave whenever we please. Of course, no one really wants to show up there.”

Law. I remembered Alex mentioning these laws once—about him having to let Nicholas take me to the City of Crystal.

I frowned. “This all sounds kind of difficult.”

“It will be,” he said, not giving me any amount of comfort. “It’ll take a lot of power and control to pull it off, and I have no idea how you’re going to get the Queen to let your mother go.”

Whoa, neither did I. Why hadn’t I thought of this problem before? I guess I would have to talk to Laylen about it and hope he knew a way. “Okay, so to practice for this extremely difficult task we’re going to try and do, we have to do what exactly? Practice going into visions through a regular crystal ball? I thought Dyvinius said going into visions could shift the world or something like that.”

“If we don’t see the vision correctly, it could,” he said. “But we’ll have to make sure we do.” This entire thing sounded so risky, and I wondered if I was being selfish for taking such a risk to save my mom. It could end up costing the world a lot if I messed up. But my mom might have answers that could save the world from whatever Stephan was planning. So it was kind of a lose-lose situation.

I stared down at the crystal ball, the violet ribbons twisting and turning in the sparkling water. “So what do I do first?”

He tapped his fingers on his lips. “First, I think we should take a break and get something to eat.” I stared at him, unblinking. “Take a break and get something to eat? We haven’t even done anything yet.”

He considered this with an amused look. “Yes, but I think it’s important that we eat something before we go, so we’re not weak from our hunger.” I felt like banging my head on the wall. “Tell me what you want to eat, and I’ll go get it.”

“What I want…hmmm.” His golden eyes twinkled.

“What I want is to go out with you and eat somewhere.”

“I can’t go anywhere,” I said.

He gave me a curious look. “Why not?”

Well, for starters because I couldn’t leave the house. And not just because I knew Alex would freak out if I did. No. There were way more risks I would be taking if I went out into public then just pissing off Alex. For one thing, after what happened with the vampires last night, I had a feeling that if I ran into any of them, and they recognize me—which let’s face it they would (hello, my eyes are violet)—then I’d be in some serious trouble. I also had to worry about running into a Death Walker or Stephan. And those were not risks I was willing to take just so I could leave the house to get something to east with faerie boy.

“Because I just can’t, okay?” I got to my feet, dusting off the back of my legs. “If you’re really hungry, I can go into the kitchen and get you something.”

“What I want is to go out with you.” His tone was light, but his eyes were determined.

“Look,” I said, losing patience. “I really want to get this done because the longer it takes you to train me, the longer my mom’s stuck in that godforsaken place.” For a brief second, and I mean a very brief second, I thought I saw the mischievous sparkle leave his eyes, like he actually understood my pain. But it happened so swiftly, I wasn’t even sure it happened.

“Fine.” He leaned back on his elbows, looking at me mischievously again. “We can eat here. Besides its better that we eat here anyway. That way we get more alone time. Just you and me and this quiet, empty room.”

I shook my head and, without saying another word, I left the room to go get him something to eat.

In the kitchen, I found Laylen standing at the counter, chopping onions on a chopping board. When he caught sight of me, he stopped, mid chop. “Wow.

You look really annoyed.”

I went over beside him and dropped my head on the counter. “Nicholas is driving me crazy. He just keeps asking questions, and then when we finally get to the part where we should start practicing, he says he’s hungry, and we should go out and get something to eat.”

Laylen gave a soft laugh and started chopping onions again. “Yeah, that sounds like Nicholas. He’s always been a little…”

I lifted my head up. “Annoying?”

Laylen laughed again. “I was going to say difficult, but yeah, annoying works. When he was younger, he went through this faze where he would answer every question with a question.”

“That sounds fun,” I said sarcastically.

Laylen shrugged, cutting the onion again. “He can’t really help it—it’s a faerie thing. They have this way about them, where they can trick you into doing things

–or saying things that you shouldn’t. That’s why you should be very careful around him.”

“Yeah, Alex warned me about that.” I fanned the front of my nose as Laylen dumped the chopped pieces of onions into a skil et, and the smell over took me. “And he told me not to take my necklace off.” Laylen scooted the onions around in the pan with a spatula. “This is probably the only time where I’m going to have to agree with Alex. You should be careful around him.” He lowered his voice. “You can’t let Nicholas know about the star.”

I nodded. “I won’t.”

The pan sizzled and it reminded me I was supposed to be getting Nicholas something to eat.

“So…what do faeries eat?”

Laylen busted up laughing.

I gave him a mystified look. “What’s so funny?” It took him a second to gather himself. “Sorry. But it’s just so funny.” He laughed again. “What do faeries eat?”

“Hey, I don’t know much about this stuff,” I said, half joking and half defensive. “I mean for all I know they could eat leaves or something.”

He cocked an eyebrow at me. “Leaves?”

I shrugged. “They live in forests, don’t they?” At least in most of the faerie theme books I had read they did.

still laughing, he wiped a few stray tears from his eyes. “Leaves.”

“Oh, shut up.” I gave him a playful shove. He continued to laugh, so I changed the subject. “How did Aislin take it when you told her about Alex having to go to the City of Crystal?”

That stopped his laughing. “I haven’t told her yet.” I opened my mouth to say that he probably should—

that it would be worse the longer he kept it from her, but before I could say anything, he said. “I’ll tell her. I promise, just as soon as she’s done helping Adessa with her store. I think it’ll be better if I tell her when no one else is around.”

“Okay, well, I guess I’ll get back to my training.” I turned to leave.

“Don’t forget your leaves,” Laylen called out with a chuckle.

I ended up making Nicholas and myself a sandwich. We didn’t really speak to each other while we sat on the floor and ate, and I had a feeling something was bothering him, but didn’t feel comfortable enough to ask him. Besides even if I did, he probably wouldn’t tell me. At least tell me the truth, anyway.

When we were finished eating and had slid our plates out of the way, Nicholas put the crystal ball back between us.

“So, the first thing that’s going to happen is I’m going to go into a vision with you,” Nicholas explained, spinning the crystal ball like a top. I wondered how he could touch it and not be pulled in.

“What we want is for you to eventually be able to go into a controlled vision by yourself, gracefully and without any bumps.”

What did he mean by gracefully—without any trips or injuries? “Okay, so how do we get me to be able to do that?”

“With practice.” he shrugged. “Seeing visions is like riding a bike. The more you practice the better you get.”

But I didn’t know how to ride a bike. At least I don’t think I did. No resurfacing memories had contained me riding a bike. “Okay, well how much practice is it going to take for me to be able to be graceful and bump free?”

His mouth curved up into a smile. “Well if I had my way, it would take a very, very long time. But in all actuality, with you being as powerful as you are, it shouldn’t take that long.”

Thank God. “So where do we begin?”

He held out his hand. “First, give me your hand so we can go in together.” With reluctance, I took his hand, his skin clammy and cold against mine. “Now we need a simple vision to go into. I think it would probably be best if you just thought of a memory.

Maybe something from your childhood.”

That was not simple by any means. “Does it have to be from my childhood?”

He shook his head. “As long as it’s simple, it doesn’t really matter.”

“Okay….” I searched for something simple to picture, but all I could see was the madness that filled up my life throughout the years.

“Gemma, place your hand on the crystal ball,” Nicholas instructed.

My heart raced as I tried to think of a memory—any memory—that was simple.

“Gemma,” Nicholas repeated. “Put your hand on the crystal.”

I was still searching as I reached out and placed my hand on top of the crystal ball. A brief glimpse of me and my mother sitting in a field flashed through my mind, and I thought I had it.

Then I was yanked in, falling down the tunnel, toward the light, Nicholas still holding my hand. When I reached the bottom—and very ungracefully I might add—I realized I hadn’t had the memory like I’d thought. In fact, if there was a complete opposite of where I was supposed to be taking us, this would be it.

The vision I was standing in was not of my past, but of the future. And not my future, but the worlds future.

How did I know this? Because I was standing on the main street of Vegas, beside the massive pirate ship I remembered seeing during my first drive into the busy city. But the busy city was no longer a busy city. It was dead quiet. Not a single soul was in sight. Even more disturbing was the layer of ice that covered everything. Just as if a million Death Walkers had marched through here and breathed their Chil of Death on everything in sight.

Just like they would if the portal opened up.