Entangled (71 page)

‘Shit,’ said Ria. ‘What the fuck happened? How can I be here?’

‘I opened a stone gateway for you,’ said the blue woman. With her words she sent an image of the megaliths set into the floor of the Cave of Visions.

‘Brindle’s stones!’ Ria exclaimed. ‘He said they’d help us fight Sulpa.’

‘That was my intention,’ said the blue woman. ‘But unfortunately a vital element of the plan has failed. We’re going to have to rethink.’

‘Vital element? What vital element?’

‘I speak of Leoni, the one with whom you are entangled. Without her to help us, in her own time, the gateway cannot serve its purpose. Do you forget her so quickly?’

Ria was stung by the question. She didn’t think of herself as the sort of person who forgot her friends, but she didn’t know what to do about Leoni: in their last fleeting encounters she’d sensed that her time-sister was in danger. She’d vanished in the thick of things, returned to warn of the sneak attack on the Naveen women and children, and then vanished again. After that Ria had heard no more from her. Had she simply been called back into her Earth body? Surely this was the most likely explanation? Nonetheless her disappearance had haunted Ria’s thoughts throughout the long day as she’d trekked the vulnerable column of refugees across country and up to Secret Place.

‘What’s happened to her?’ she asked, with dread in her heart.

‘Leoni has fallen into the underworld,’ replied the blue woman. ‘She gave her life for you.’

A flood of memories and images filled Ria’s mind and she saw what she had not seen and learned what she had not been told.

She saw again how Leoni had come to her in the valley before the Naveen camp and told her of the little winged creatures Sulpa used as his spies. Two of them had found Ria, Leoni said. She’d killed one and pursued the other but it got back to its master before she could catch it.

What Leoni had not mentioned was that she herself had been attacked by hundreds of Sulpa’s monstrous little creatures and been weakened by them. Nor had she told how she had overcome her weakness by force of will in order to help Ria long after she should have fled back to the safety of her Earth body. In mortal danger, she had stayed to pinpoint the locations of the Illimani sentries guarding the neck of the valley and to supply the vital intelligence Ria had used to plan her assault on the camp.

Leoni’s strength had given out before the attack began – hence her sudden disappearance. She’d been pulled back into her Earth body but had put her life at risk again and returned to perform one last service. In thought-images filled with emotional power Ria witnessed the arrival over the battlefield of two more of Sulpa’s spy creatures, Leoni’s unhesitating courage in grappling with them despite her feeble and damaged state, and the fight to the death that had followed.

‘There has to be a way to bring her back,’ said Ria as the last images faded. ‘That wasn’t her Earth body I saw killed. That was some other part of her.’

‘That was her spirit, Ria. That was her soul. She walks the dark road now, in the company of ghosts.’

‘So that’s it? That’s the fucking END? Is that what you’re telling me?’

The blue woman’s gaze was penetrating. ‘It need not be the end. Alone amongst all humankind your entanglement with Leoni gives you the power to bring her back. But you must journey to the underworld and seek her out on the dark road. Are you ready to do that?’

‘I’m ready,’ Ria said.

‘Monsters will confront you there. Can you master them? Loss of heart and madness will assail your wits. Can you overcome them? Perils and difficulties will crowd in on you from all sides. Can you defeat them?’

‘I can try.’

‘Even so, it may be too late. If a morsel of food has passed Leoni’s lips in the underworld it will be impossible for her to leave.’

‘Then we have to hope she hasn’t eaten yet...’

‘There is one other matter. It is the weightiest.’

‘Yes?’

‘Bring Leoni back and your own life becomes forfeit. You will live only for a year and a day. Do you accept?’

Ria thought about it. She wasn’t going to turn coward and leave her sister in the lurch, no matter what the cost. Besides, a year and a day was a long time. Long enough to defeat Sulpa.

‘Of course I accept,’ she said.

With a flash and a swirl, a tunnel of light opened at her feet.