Speed of Light (41 page)

“I do,” I huffed.

We merged with the crowds trying to get a great seat in the infield. We’d broken the enormous track, bigger than most towns, into sections. Quite a few Woodsmen were heading to the inside of turn three because it was called the Snake Pit and we’d been warned by their dead brother it was part of the plot. Tens and I thought our best guess was to assume the Nocti plan involved balloons, because I’d seen Ms. Asura and others near the hot-air balloons, not to mention the white powder in the parade balloons.
Guesses are all we have
. A group of Woodsmen headed there as well.

If Juliet showed up, she was supposed to position herself near the start/finish line.
If she is okay. Big if
.

Not a cloud filled the sky and it was already seventy-five degrees before the sun even started to bake the aluminum stands and black asphalt. They predicted setting new heat records.

We jostled through crowds, intent on reaching the lake and trees around it. By the time we made it closer, there were six hot-air balloons filled and tethered.

And a giant inflated pink bunny selling batteries?
So
enormous it made the traditional hot-air balloons seem like toys. The size of an aircraft carrier, the bunny wore sunglasses and held a drum. Its feet were the size of trucks, and I watched people continually scramble to keep it attached to the ground.
The bunny has a mind of its own
.

I didn’t spot the same balloon I’d seen Ms. Asura riding in. Ryder and U-Haul trucks parked next to each other in a nice line that blocked the view behind them. No telling what lurked inside those bad boys.

“Dammit,” Tens said under his breath as we rounded a corner.

A flimsy plastic fence cut the masses off from getting near the balloons. Yellow-shirted guards asked for credentials.

“Now what?” I asked.

“Ah, we find a place to sit and watch. There’s time.”

How Tens could be so serene and Zen, I didn’t know.
He’s never ruffled
. “What’s with you?” I griped.

“What? I have a good feeling about today,” he answered, sounding as calm as he appeared.

“Nothing’s going to happen?” I asked hopefully.

“No, something’s up, but I think good may come too.” The fortune-cookie answer did nothing for my attitude.

“Have you seen Custos recently?”

“Not since last night.”

“Mini?”

“I think she’s probably with Juliet. What’s with the roll call?” Tens stopped me.

“I just want to make sure we’re prepared.” I felt itchy with anticipation.

“Supergirl”—Tens tugged me into his lap and nuzzled my neck—“haven’t you figured out that preparation means acknowledging we’re never in control? Best we can do is the best we can do. So we sit and watch.” His hand slid over my hip.

“And make out?” I asked with an unrepressed giggle.

“It makes us less conspicuous.” His lips curved against my ear. “It’s important work.”

“In that case.” I saw a woman and a black cat striding purposefully toward me. “Uh, Tens? Soul, two o’clock.”

“I gotcha,” he said as I flowed to the window.

I
had to shield my eyes against the glare.

“What did you do? What did you do?” the girl kept screaming.

“Shut up!” Fara smacked her on the head with the chain and she collapsed.

Where moments ago the Nocti stood, nothing but singed earth remained.

What just happened?

“Fara? Tony?” I called out tentatively, almost afraid to
move. Blinking my eyes back to normal.
Like Ms. Asura
.

“I’m here.” Tony’s voice sounded funny.

“What’s wrong?” I turned around and my headlamp shined on a growing red splotch on his arm. “You got shot!” I sprang into action.

“Just a flesh wound. Just my shoulder.” Tony was pallid and his tone weak.

Fara stripped off one of her many black layers of clothing and wound it around his shoulder. “You’ll be okay. But you’re shocked.”

“In shock?” Tony laughed weakly. “I’ve seen combat. I’ll be fine. Are you girls okay?”

“Yes.” Fara reached into the backpack and yanked out a roll of duct tape. She wrapped the girl’s wrists and ankles and put a small piece over her mouth. “She’s not Nocti, but she’s not a nice person,” was the only explanation Fara gave.

“Juliet? Are you okay?” Tony asked again.

“I think so. I don’t know how I did that, though. It took all of us with Ms. Asura and I’d barely even started thinking about it …” I trailed off as Fara stilled.

“Maybe you didn’t do it by yourself,” Fara said, looking behind me. Her eyes narrowed and her breathing slowed as if she wasn’t sure what to make of what she saw.

Tony’s eyes widened too.

I twisted and gasped. “You?”

The man I’d seen outside my windows, looking up,
disappearing, then reappearing hesitantly approached. His arms were full of Mini, purring so loud I could hear her ten feet away. She flexed her paws as if kneading dough.

“Hello, Juliet.”

And I knew, in that instant, I knew this man. “Dad?”

I
n a long, faded cotton gown, like something out of
Little House on the Prairie
, I stood at the window with an ancient crone and her black cat. With her white hair braided up into a crown, her fingers were gnarled and bent like Auntie’s used to be. The sunbaked folds of her skin almost covered her eyes, and her bare feet were filthy hooves from walking shoeless for years.

“Polly Barnett?” I asked.
Can this really be her? All these years waiting at her farm for release? Relief? To right a wrong done to her family?

“How’d ya know?” she said without looking at me. She stared past the window at the scene unfolding behind it.

“Lucky guess.”

Across the panes in the next world, the track faded in and out, like a clock being rewound.
As if she isn’t sure which time is hers
.

“They be back here. The devils. This time they not git the chil’ren.” Her hands fisted and her face scrunched. “You can’ let ’em git ’em.”

“Do you know how we can stop them?” I asked.
Please know
.

She shook her head and nodded consecutively as if she kept changing her mind. “Follow the stream home. They like the water; it’s got magic.”

I hadn’t seen every inch of the racetrack grounds, but a stream?
I haven’t seen a stream
.

She hummed a tune I vaguely recognized as Juliet and Rumi’s song while she picked up the black cat and stroked it.

“Where’s the stream today?” I asked. “In my time. Where do I look for the devils?”

The cabin I saw with the Woodsman came into my view. I heard laughter come from inside the house.

“Find the well. Find the shadows.” Polly handed me the cat, which immediately relaxed into my arms like a bag of flour. He was heavier than he appeared. His golden eyes blinked up at me. “I’m tired. I can’t fight no more,” Polly said apologetically. “I thought with many people they would leave this place, but they keep coming back. I need my love, my child.”

“It’s okay, go on.” I nodded. “We’ll take over.”

She nodded and climbed through. I stayed as long as I could. Each step easier than the last, her elderly form sloughed away like so much dirt until her previous youth unfolded fully. Once again straight and clean, she moved to the side of the house, and I saw the water gurgling up from the ground. It bubbled up and ran down a stone trough toward the woods.

“Is that the stream?” I asked.

“Is what the stream?” Tens asked me as I opened my eyes.

“I saw Polly. There’s water coming up out of the ground, like the hot springs we went to with Auntie? Remember?”

“Yeah?”

I paced in a tight circle. “She said we’d find the devils at the water, at the well. Where’s running water here?”

Tens pulled out his walkie-talkie to ask the Woodsmen. His phone rang, and he handed the phone to me.

“Rumi? Are you okay?”

“Ay, lass, we’ve cracked the code. There’s an artesian well on the grounds.”

“What’s that exactly?”

“Deep water pushed to the surface by tectonic pressures and energy. People say it has special minerals and healing properties. Have them all over this state—there’s even one in Carmel folks come from miles around to fill up jugs at.”

“So the water bubbles up on its own?”

“That’s right. My uncle’s journal, all the water, all the
notes are about an artesian well at the Barnett farm. It’s the track now.”

“Where is it?” The stream I saw at Polly’s window. Her well. I tried to see around the crowds of people.

Rumi sighed. “None of us know. There’s a tiny map here we can’t figure out. Tim is at the computer trying to find more.”

“Can you call Gus? See if he knows?” I knew we were grasping at straws, but we had to try anything.

“We already tried that. I’m sorry, lass.” Rumi sounded crushed.

“Just call us if you think of a clue, okay?”

“Course,” Rumi said.

Tens grabbed my hand and started walking. “Woodsmen don’t know. Best guess is to look by the lakes. Maybe at the golf course—they’ve sent a team over there.”

“The lake is near the hot-air balloons; it’s the only water here. We’ve got to get closer,” I said. The sun grew hotter and higher. Planes circled overhead, towing banners for restaurants and team sponsors; even an engagement proposal fluttered above us.

As marching bands played a lap around the two and a half miles, their brass and drums gave a lively soundtrack to all the humanity around us. Scattered applause erupted for hometown favorites. I knew Woodsmen mingled in the crowds. Though I couldn’t help but feel as though we were severely outnumbered.

The viewing screens jumped to life and the thirty-three drivers began to walk out toward the pits from the cement
block garages. Surrounded by their families, they wore stony and resolute expressions. They all wore the same type of jumpsuits, covered with patches, symbols, and words.

Pickup trucks with members of every military branch sped around the track to thunderous applause and salutes from a very patriotic crowd. After all, service and sacrifice were the reason for the weekend.
Fitting
. I wished they had an inkling of what was coming. My dad used to threaten to call the National Guard if I misbehaved.
I wish he could do that right now
.

The screens filled with shots of the stands. What started out as empty gray benches became speckled with colorful hats and clothing. Then the camera panned the photographers set up every few feet all around the inside of the track. A group of sunglassed yellow shirts huddled together and the camera zoomed in as they argued with a photographer.

“Tens, wait. Look up,” I said as the screen filled.

“What are they doing?”

“They’re taking him away?”

Tens and I stared transfixed as one photographer was replaced by another, and an upset shouting man was physically carried off to a security vehicle.

Abruptly, the camera shot shifted back to the main stage by the Pagoda.

“They had the tattoos.”
Nocti aides or Nocti themselves?
I easily recognized the skull, wings, and snuffed candle.

“They’re not bothering to cover them up anymore,” Tens said grimly.

Not a good sign
.

“Where was that? Turn three?” I asked.

“Turn two?” Tens swiveled his head, trying to place the few landmarks. The crowd was in front of the skyline. The camera panned down. “Gotta be three. Over there.”

I gripped his hand and we tried to weave between people.

The announcer said, “Please stand for the National Anthem.”

The crowd surged to its feet and whipped off their hats, leaving us unable to see where we needed to go.

“We have to stop,” Tens said to me under his breath. “Try moving something with your mind. Fara says you can invite energy to change direction.”

“Like the telepathy I’m so good at?” I complained, but concentrated on a blade of grass.
No go
.

I heard a clock ticking behind my eyes.
Every second counts
. That was the longest song in my life, until they began playing “Taps.” Faces of soldiers and marines I’d helped transition came to mind. I’d begun writing bits of stories down in March, but now I was convinced that words were my thing. Auntie’s were quilts. Juliet’s were recipes. Mine were stories. Life stories.

The race itself was starting. Tens plugged in earbuds to listen to the radio and the Woodsmen. I smashed in earplugs. My job was to watch for souls. For Nocti. I didn’t need distractions.

We wrestled our way closer to the barrier, keeping spectators away from the photographers and the track.
Eyes set on the replacement photographer.
Trigger man? Spotter?

“Do you think he knows when and what they’re planning?”

“Don’t you think?” Tens handed me the binoculars and radioed to the Woodsmen.

A moment of silence was held for all the drivers injured and killed this month. Then the drivers were introduced. Eddie Smith, the replacement driver, received by far the loudest cheers; people loved to root for an underdog.
If only they knew
.

“Merry, check out the patch on Smith’s jumpsuit.” Tens nodded.

I swallowed back bile. Above his heart, next to the black armband he sported, was the same artwork as the tattoo. Wings around a skull and a smoking, snuffed out candle. It could have been interpreted as an artistic expression of grief, but we knew it for what it was.

Tens’s expression was grim. “Let’s move.” At least we had confirmation who drove for the Nocti today.

We headed toward the lake around the perimeter of people. A woman’s voice came over the loudspeakers. “Ladies and gentlemen, start your engines.”

The crowd surged to its feet in a deafening roar and a wave of energy. My heart picked up its rhythm.

Here we go
.

“Y
ou have your mother’s eyes,” he said, stepping a little bit closer. The headlamps fell unneeded at our feet with early morning light.