Perilous Waters (16 page)

Then I would have been betraying my brother.

She didn’t want to care. She wanted to make him feel the same rejection she had felt. She didn’t want to hear his stupid reasons or logic or whatever it was that had made him ignore her like she didn’t matter to him at all.

Well, your brother found out anyway. You betrayed him, one way or another.

Julia felt the pain her words caused him, and was surprised they didn’t bring her pleasure. She tried to strengthen their connection, and he didn’t stop her. Just as it had been when they first met, everything between them felt natural. They shared a bond that she still didn’t understand. It simply existed, and fighting it made no sense to her heart. With relief she released herself, giving herself permission to sink into their shared connection as his body materialized in her mind.

He was pacing a room, a phone in his hand. He had on a white t-shirt and track shorts… she found she could zoom the image out. She saw his room, a desk, a bookshelf, but her attention kept returning to Ethan. She liked seeing him in his own room, with his muscle-toned arms stretching the cotton of his shirt. She followed the line of his shoulders down his chest. Her gaze lingered there as she remembered what it had felt like to be held by him—

Her eyes flew open and she lost the connection immediately. Had she really been checking him out? A fiery wave of embarrassment washed her face with heat. She heard his voice in her mind and felt the probing presence against her consciousness that meant he was trying to reestablish their connection.

She bit her lip, wincing as she forced her eyes shut again.

Is everything okay?
He asked, a trail of worry edging along her mind as he became careless with the wall between them. For a moment she absorbed his emotions, relishing the fleeting sensation of unity between them before he remembered himself and sealed himself off.

Her chest hollowed at the trace of bitterness that seeped in curling tendrils from the seams of his thoughts.

I’m sorry,
he said, regret lacing his thoughts. Regret, and so much confusion that Julia couldn’t make sense of her own thoughts for a moment.
This is hard for me. Harder than I can explain.

She turned her head aside, bringing her legs up closer to her chest and pressing her cheek to her knee. It was hard for her, too.

A soft touch on her shoulder caused her eyes to open. Her connection to Ethan was immediately lost as she looked up at Angie.

“We should get back to Brian.”

Julia nodded. She shut her eyes quickly and told Ethan,
The other Daughters are waiting for me. We’re going to link up and look into how to help Brian.

Without waiting for his response, she scooted forward and rejoined the other girls at the cushion.

“Something has to show an alternative to Brian turning Scylla,” Angie said quietly, taking their hands.

Julia shuddered, remembering the threads that had shown her Brian turning into a monster. As Kaitlyn drew out their magic and spread the threads before them, Julia’s entire body recoiled at the thought of what she might see next. She clenched her teeth, forcing herself to enter into another timeline.

This time they were on a ship, like a pirate’s ship. Again Brian appeared, his eyes utterly black. She let go and found another, her head spinning at the rapid exit and entry into different threads of time, but no matter how many timelines she entered, nothing ever showed her any clue of how to turn Brian back to normal.

“He’s screwed,” Kaitlyn said.

“There must be a way,” Angie said, her voice laced with hope.

Julia didn’t know what to think. Her throat felt closed off to speech as she reached for yet another thread, almost too terrified of what she might see.

And as she latched on, a familiar voice whispered through her mind, so unexpected that she nearly let go of the other girls’ hands.

There is a way.

Julia retreated from the thread.

That voice… it—it couldn’t be…

Yes, Daughter of Present. It is I.

How many voices were going to hijack her brain in one night? She shook her head with tiny, jerking motions. Icy blood flooded her heart as she tried to protect her mind from this sudden intrusion. “No,” she breathed. She didn’t dare think the name, worried that somehow she might make the gypsy-woman materialize right out of the nether and into Angie’s basement.

But nothing could stop the deep, sultry voice from entering her mind.

You can save the boy…

Goosebumps sped along her arms and neck. With each word Indira uttered, the dark magic she used to breach the nether caused Julia’s blood to frost over. Without meaning to, she thought of the beautiful, dark haired, golden-tanned woman, one of her eyes normal and the other without iris or pupil, only a milky white ball that might very well stare into her soul.

Follow.

The word caressed her mind, ripe with promise. One of the future-threads glowed white, so bright that Julia flinched.

Tentatively, she reached out with her spirit and took hold of the thread, entering into the possible future.

They were on a ship, and again this was no modern ship. It was wooden and it had sails. Sea monsters climbed the sides as she and the others blasted them. But the ship was overrun. Julia watched in horror as Brian led the Scylla attack. His dark eyes rounded on her, his lips curled back in a bloodied sneer. Angie was hauled over the side and dragged down. Claws ripped at her arms, tearing her flesh. Ethan stood helplessly aside. He alone could kill the creatures with his magic. But he wouldn’t kill his own brother. Not even to save them.

She wrenched herself from the vision, sweat spreading along her spine.

You didn’t show me anything new,
Julia accused. Indira was always full of deception, even though she was hexed against lying.

You will fail, in your next task,
Indira whispered.
Unless you go back into your own time and prevent Brian from becoming their leader. He is the only one your darling Ethan will not fight. Scylla know this… that is why they want Brian. They know that with him as their champion, you can never succeed. But… free me, and I will show you how to keep Brian safe.

Go back into their own timeline? But that was impossible.

Wasn’t it?

Seek out the Jewels of Time once more. Revoke my curse. I will show you… show you...

Indira’s voice faded away. Angie fell forward with a groan, but Julia hardly noticed. Her mind spun as she tried to make sense of Indira’s message.

“What’s up with you?” Kaitlyn asked harshly, her accusing eyes burning into Julia’s. She let go of her hand and cradled Angie’s limp form. “Your friend just fell over and you don’t even help her?”

“I…” she faltered, swallowing hard.

“What were you
doing
, anyway? All of a sudden your presence wasn’t with us. What the hell?”

Julia gripped her head. What was Kaitlyn talking about? She blinked until her vision cleared, then looked down at Angie, limp on the floor. “Oh no.” She reached for her. “What happened?”

“How should I know?” Kaitlyn spat. “One minute we’re looking at Brian turn into a monster in a variety of insane ways, the next, Angie falls over and you just sit there like nothing. Like you couldn’t give a crap.”

“I’m okay,” Angie mumbled, holding a hand to her head. “A blast of magic came out of nowhere. It almost knocked me out.”

Kaitlyn kept hold of Angie with one arm and took back Julia’s hand with the other. “Let’s give her some magic so she gets her strength back.”

“Okay,” Julia said weakly, her head a total mess as she tried to figure out what to tell the others. Her chest still held traces of the icy cold of the nether as she remembered Indira’s voice whispering through her mind.

Kaitlyn’s eyes narrowed on Julia, slits of blazing fury. The mark on her arm flared white. “What do you mean, ‘Indira’?”

~ Chapter 11 ~

Julia

Julia
glanced down at Kaitlyn’s hand, still on her arm. She had forgotten about the mind-connection thing.

Before she could stop her, Kaitlyn invaded her mind, seeking her thoughts, reaching through her consciousness.

“Stop it!”

“What are you hiding?” Kaitlyn said, her voice viperish and laced with malice. “You’ve been talking to her, haven’t you?
Haven’t you?
”

Julia yanked her arm back but Kailyn held firm.

“You have no right,” Julia yelled. “That’s the second time tonight. Let go of me now or I will freaking blast you!”

“What are you planning behind our backs,” Kaitlyn demanded.

Julia cried out as Kaitlyn tore viciously through her mind. Her thoughts and memories were ripped apart.

Her magic boiled up inside of her. So much for being like Angie and not letting Kaitlyn bother her, but Kaitlyn couldn’t just go picking apart her brain whenever she felt like it! Julia’s thoughts and memories were being ripped apart as Kaitlyn viciously tore through her mind.

“I said no,” Julia cried, sending a bolt of magic at Kaitlyn. Kaitlyn twisted, darting out of the way.

“How dare you.”

Julia’s beam of magic slammed into the wall, knocking down a shelf of crystals. “Me?” Julia cried. “You were digging around in my head. That’s not allowed!”

Her catlike eyes became razor sharp. “We’re never supposed to blast each other. You’re a jerk.”

“Blasting isn’t as bad as
invading my freaking mind!
”
She took hold of Kaitlyn’s arm and forced their connection. With a cruel jab of power she began probing the membrane separating their thoughts. “How would you like it if I did it to you?”

An unmistakable feeling of panic gushed from Kaitlyn’s mind and coated every other emotion. “Let go! Let go or I’ll—”

She looked down at Kaitlyn’s palms, twin balls of light rolled within them. “See? You were about to blast me, too.” She thrust her aside. “It doesn’t feel good, does it?”

Angie, still curled up on the floor, made a small, whimpering noise.

“Oh crap,” Julia muttered.

She had forgotten that Angie was still recovering from whatever the heck had just happened. Now Angie propped herself up. She blinked, looking first to the destroyed shelf and the crystals strewn across the floor, and then up at Julia.

“I’m sorry,” Julia said, kneeling down to help her sit up. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she said. “But, why were you thinking about Indira just now?”

Julia bit her lip.

“Tell us what’s going on with Indira,” Kaitlyn spat.

“I am,” Julia muttered, leaning back against the wall as her mark returned to its normal gold tones. “I heard Indira. I didn’t seek her out, but she told me things while we were looking through the threads.”

“She’s still trapped in the nether, right?” Angie asked.

“As far as I could tell.”

Kaitlyn’s glare darkened her green eyes by several shades. She straightened her shoulders and walked purposefully toward Julia. “All right, then. What did she say?”

“She said, we can go back into our own timeline to save Brian. She said she could help.”

“She’s tricking us. She wants us to set her free so she can help the Sorceress,” Angie said.

“That witch deserves to rot in the nether,” Kaitlyn said. “There’s no way we’re letting her out.”

“Not even for Brian?” Julia asked.

Kaitlyn gave her an unreadable look. “Not even for anyone.”

“She wouldn’t help Brian anyway, don’t you see? Indira’s only saying these things because she’ll do anything to get out.”

Julia shook her head. “But Indira can’t lie.”

The other girls fell silent. Finally Kaitlyn said, “She can’t lie, but that doesn’t mean she’ll actually help us if she’s set free. She has a way of phrasing things so that they aren’t lies but she still gets what she wants.”

Angie frowned. “Besides, if there was a way to travel in our own timelines, another generation of Daughters would have written about it by now.”

“Or done it,” Kaitlyn added.

“She can’t lie, though,” Julia insisted. It seemed wrong to take Indira’s side, but after seeing Brian transform into a creature in every timeline she had looked through, she wanted to believe that there was some way to help him. “Listen, letting her out of the nether would be a terrible idea. Fine. But she did say there is a way to Voyage through our own timeline. Maybe we can figure out how, without her help.”

“I don’t see how this could be,” Angie said. “Even if there were some sort of deep magic allowing us to travel within our own timelines, what if it’s at the cost of our lives? What if it’s at the cost of the existence of the world?”

Julia chewed on her lip. If there
was
a way to do this, maybe they could be the ones to do the tricking this time. “Now that Indira contacted me,” she said, holding out her hands once more, “let’s see if there’s anything in the threads that changed. Maybe we can see what Indira plans on doing, and beat her at her own game.”

The girls fell silent a moment.

“I finally like the way you’re thinking,” Kaitlyn said, offering Julia her hand.

Angie placed her hand in Julia’s as well, but this time an enormous swell of magic rose between them. Julia could feel it in the other girls, an unbearable wave of shared power. Golden beams of light shot out and wrapped around their wrists. Bindings as bright as sunrays held them connected and immobile.

“Oh my gosh, what’s happening?” Julia cried, gasping for air as an impossible wind tore through the room. Impossible not only for the windows being shut, but because even though the wind felt like a hurricane slamming against them, everything in the room remained utterly still. Even Brian’s hair was unruffled, meanwhile their own hair flew skyward and their thin pajamas whipped against their bodies. Brian didn’t even move in his sleep, his chest rising and falling peacefully as he lay unconscious on the sofa.

“The power is too strong,” Kaitlyn grit out, her eyes blazing like witchfire in the candlelit room. She tugged at her hand so hard, Julia was jerked forward. “I can’t break free.”

Angie squeezed her eyes shut as the magic seeped through her mind. Soon it would overwhelm her. “The Fates,” she whispered. “The summons. A portal must have been opened.”