Nephilius - A Walker Saga Book 5 (26 page)

“Caty!” a woman shouted and moved toward us.
“What happened?”

As she strode across the glittery sand, I
noticed how much she looked like Caty. They had similar features
and gestures, although the other woman had different hair color. It
was very light, almost the color of the sun in the Utopian sky.

“That’s my mother, Lasandra.”

Again something was familiar about this. I
could feel it in the back of my head. Another little niggle that
would not go away. I searched further into my mind. I paused as a
glittering light caught my attention. What was this golden cord in
my head? I was about to send my mental energy in to touch the
unusual cord when Lasandra reached us and distracted me from my
task.

“Hello,” she said to me, her voice light,
musical even.

When I
didn’t answer straight away, she turned to Caty. “Does she remember
anything? This is the first Walker to fall into the Utopia
in such a long time.”

Caty shook out her masses of straight, dark
hair. “No, I got to her almost immediately and she was already
blank.”

“Excuse me. I’m standing right here.” They
were talking over me like I was stupid. Their actions created a
storm inside, my annoyance warring with that calm, golden place at
the back of my head.

Lasandra studied me closely. “You’re much
more coherent and well-spoken than most that fall. Generally it
takes the Angelica a long time to even remember their language
skills.”

I was pretty
sure I had no wings, so I was not an Angelica.
Plus, they’d called me Walker.

“What is this place?” I was starting to
wonder why I was there. Before, I had just accepted it, but now it
seemed odd to just appear in a world. There must be a reason.

“This is Utopia. The most perfect place in
all of the worlds,” Lasandra said.

The two women led me over to sit on a small
grassy hill.

“No one ages, or gets sick; it’s as if time
stands still. You’ll be eternally happy and safe, but there’s a
catch.”

“Isn’t there always?” Caty snorted, leaning
back to rest on her elbows.

“Is there always a catch?” I was trying to
wrap my mind around this concept. “So do you have to die to get to
Utopia?”

A big sigh from Lasandra was my answer.

“We don’t know.” Caty’s voice was low. “No
one remembers how they arrived here.”

When I tried to think back to what I had
been doing before waking up in the meadow all I recalled was the
sensation of falling.

“
I fell,” I
mu
rmured. “I fell for a long time, and
then I woke in the field.”

Lasandra and Caty both became animated in a
way I had not seen from them before. “You remember something? Don’t
stop pressing into those memories, force them to come back to
you.”

My head was starting to ache. I dropped it
into my hand, blocking out the light and the two faces of the
Walkers whose desperate expressions told me how much they were
relying on me to help them.

What the hell was a Walker anyways?

The golden cord captured me again. I let my
consciousness glide closer and the sparkling warm that fizzled
through me was almost as lovely as the fuzzy happiness I felt in
Utopia.

I skimmed around the outside, before
deciding ‘what the hell’ and throwing myself straight at it. Voices
exploded at the same time that energy flooded me.

Abby. Thank the gods. Where the hell are
you?

I knew that
voice and yet I was confused for a few more minutes; why was there
a voice in my head? Had I gone crazy? But then a shot of hot power
blasted into me, and with this flow of lava through my veins came a
sweep of clarity. As if I
’d been drugged,
the cloudy, euphoric nature fled my mind and I could think clearly
for the first time.

Holy effing hell!
I shouted and
cursed for a few good moments. Finally I managed to get words out
together, like in a sentence and everything.
I fell into this weird world where everything is
perfect and it takes away your memories so you never try and
escape.

I knew Fury
had been the one to speak earlier, and while I could feel the
ot
her girls, they weren’t talking at the
moment.

Everyone went crazy when you fell in to the
abyss on Nephilius. And, girl, is something going on with you and
Brace, because he’s one scary mother, and he’s on a warpath to get
you back.

Brace. Oh,
shit. My heart was pounding hard now. I could feel it smashing
around in my chest. The two women I’d met, Caty and Lasandra, I
remembered why their names were so familiar. They were
Brace’s
sister and mother. They’d been
lost in Utopia all this time.

Why didn’t he follow me down here?

I was glad he hadn’t, but I still thought it
was strange.

Colt practically tied him down, which worked for a little
bit, but then he turned into this weird cyclone-energy thing.
Badass basically destroyed everything that came in his path.
But
Wolfboy managed to calm
him down. He agreed to try a few other things to find you
first.

I’d forgotten about Brace’s deadly other
power. He could literally rip anything that got in his way to
pieces. Fury’s nickname for Brace had never seemed more
appropriate.

How long have I been gone?
I
asked.

Two days.

Alright, we hadn’t lost much time. But I
needed to get out of there straight away. I had a feeling that if I
broke the connection with Fury it would be harder to connect a
second time. This Utopia would adjust to my unknown power and
somehow counteract it.

Okay, Fury, I’m thinking if I break our connection I’ll
forget everything again. There’s strong energy or magicks at work
here. But I need you to speak with Brace, Colt or Dad. Can one of
them open a doorway using my memories?
I
sent her images of the beach area we were in.

I’m with Badass, Wolfboy, P
ixie and Josian. I’ll see if I can sign-language them a
message. Don’t disconnect from me. And I’m also going to try and
trace to you.

I’d forgotten she now had that ability. I
waited, wondering where the other girls were. I could feel them,
but distantly. I thought there’d been other voices when we first
connected, but it must have only been Fury. I gasped as a stinging
sensation slapped back at my mind.

Fury,
I said.

No answer. And no energy any longer.

Damn, I was
alone in my head … wait a minute … I remember
ed everything. I had all of my memories. I lifted my face
from my hands. Lasandra and Caty were still beside me, waiting
patiently, and it seemed as if they hadn’t taken their eyes from me
the entire time I was in my head.

“Did you remember anything? About falling
into Utopia.” Caty’s voice was thin, higher than usual as her eyes
pleaded with me.

I jumped to my feet. The two Walker women
followed my movements to stand beside me.

“
I remember
everything.” I scrambled to open a doorway, searching for
the
link between Utopia and the land of
Nephilius above. I needed to get it open before this place
compelled me to forget again.

But I
couldn’t find a connection
or
tether.

I turned to Brace’s family. “There are no
doorways out of here.”

“The cage,” Caty said.

My confusion had Lasandra explaining
further. “We knew that if we ever remembered how to open a doorway,
it would never work with the cage. The energy that surrounds Utopia
is what clouds our memories, contains our energy so no one can find
us, and holds us prisoner,” Lasandra said.

Was that the energy that held the souls
captive up on Nephilius? I had a brief mental flash of the land
above. Maybe it had a dual purpose above and below Nephilius.

“Can you show me this cage?”

“Follow us,” Caty said.

We strode back across the huge field I’d
originally fallen into. Our pace was fast; we were taking no
chances in case this world stole my memories again. As I watched
the beautiful Walkers I realized then how much they really reminded
me of Brace. It was almost painful to be around them. I had a
feeling Brace was the reason I’d been so susceptible to Utopia. It
had been nice to let the fuzziness wash away the agony of my broken
melding bond. They started to run and I quickly fell into step, my
long-ago honed running muscles enjoying the sudden stretch. I felt
good, as if I could jog at this pace forever.

The stunning
scenery passed us in a blur. I was trying to understand how a world
like this could exist within Nephilius. Was this
Walker
-created, and how was it powered?
Or was this actually the land that existed below the clouds of
Nephilius, and had someone simply used it to their advantage by
utilizing the powers of the cage?

Finally we
came to a path that se
emed to lead
between two massive mountains. And as we stepped around the first
side I noticed the cage. It looked just like the isles above, the
crisscrossing of energy rising high into the sky; energy which
seemed to originate from a rhythmic scattering of large purple,
crystal-styled stones.

“
We
’ve tried many times to destroy
this, but the power is too great. Nothing has worked,” Caty
said.

“
The stones
cannot be removed and
, while we can
approach the cage, we’re repelled if we move too close,” Lasandra
said.

I had an idea of a way to break the
cage.

I wished
that my father or Brace were
there to
check the viability of my idea, but they weren’t, so I’d have to go
on my own instincts. And do what I knew how. Which was suck this
energy into my power well inside. That endless pit which loved
masses of power.

I turned to
Lasandra and Caty
. I’d probably need
their help with this. “I’m going to see if I can draw the energy
into myself, and hope I can weaken this cage enough for you two to
steal away the stones. And plan B involves me using the accumulated
power to destroy these stones,” I said.

The looks on
their faces did not inspire confidence, but really, what other
options did we have right
then? Wasting
no more time, I threw out my tether, the one that had destroyed the
room of horrors; the one that was always hungry and never satisfied
with any amount of energy. I let it go free to do what it did best:
energy vacuum.

It connected
with no problem, and my head fell back as
the intoxicating swell of power flowed into me. The visible
bonds of the cage rose up before us, higher than anyone could see,
disappearing into the mists – far above into the land of
Nephilius.

But as the
energy began filling me, the stones began to flicker. Starting with
the ones closest to me. It seemed as if
I
was draining them one by one. The drawing of the power went on for
infinite amounts of time, and I heard Caty’s gasp each time a stone
flickered before going dark. And every time this happened we
stepped forward, following the trail through the mountain pass.
About halfway along, I started to feel the massive overload of
energy.

This was the
most power I’d drawn into myself without having to expel it. But
there were still many stones lit in the circle before
us
. I knew then I wasn’t going to be able
to drain them all. Finally the energy forced me to my knees, as if
my legs could no longer physically support me.

What the hell
was I
supposed to do now?
I couldn’t suck
anymore power into myself, and I had to get rid of what I had
before it destroyed me.

Acting
purely on survival instincts – and not having much other choice – I
formed an arrow
-like shape with the
power. A screech left me as I exploded the missile from my body
like a shooting projectile, aimed at the second half of the
still-lit purple stones. I hoped the blast of energy would destroy
them.

That wasn’t exactly what happened.

The visible
expulsion of energy surrounded us in a swirl of color and light.
And then, as if they had their own vacuums attached, the stones
simply reabsorbed all of the power I’d just drained from them.
Those that had gone dark were now lit up again
, and the cage was back and functioning.

“
Shit
,” I said, before realizing
I’d just cursed in front of my future mother-in-law.

I hoped she
didn’t mind a potty
-mouthed Earth girl
shacking up with her son.

They were
expressionless when I faced them. “Okay, so plan A and B are
looking like a no
-go. I’m not strong
enough to drain them all.” I bit my bottom lip, trying to think of
another solution.

“
Maybe we
can help by grounding some of the energy
,” Caty said.

Grounding energy?

“What would you do?” I had no idea what they
were talking about.

Lasandra’s
brow furrowed. “You’re very powerful
, and
for some reason your marks are permanently on display like the
ancients, but if I had to guess I’d say you don’t know much about
Walkers.”

Ouch,
Brace’s mom had a bit of an attitude. Arrogance was cute on Brace,
not so much on his mother. Oh
, well, I
might as well give them a brief rundown so they understood the
reasons for my incompetence.