***
I woke the next morning to a stinging pain. I was stiff and sore when I crawled out of bed. The stiffness I could attribute to having slept like the dead for nine solid hours, according to the bedside clock. My beet red and parched skin could attest to the soreness. I skipped the shower I would have normally taken and applied liberal amounts of lotion instead.
One glance at the vast array of shells littering the top of one of the wide dressers in the bedroom reassured me that it had been worth it. Mark and I had collected over a hundred shells together. They ranged in size from small to medium. The smallest shells were about the size of a fingernail; a few of the medium sized ones were as big as my palm. They were all different patterns, colors, and textures. Some were wholly transparent, while others were pearly like quartz rock. I traced a finger over the shell that I considered my favorite. It was dark blue, with an all-over, wrap around pale blue swirl. Although the shell was smooth, it seemed to shimmer as though it were covered in silvery glitter.
“Good morning.”
I jumped, taken by surprise. Mark lounged against the doorframe, a cup of coffee in his hand.
“Good morning. Is that for me?”
“Nope. But this is.” He pulled a mug from behind his back and handed it to me.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it. You look as red as I feel.”
I laughed and held my arms out for inspection. “Pretty much, yes. But it was worth it. Have I thanked you yet for a wonderful evening?”
“Oh, only about a hundred times,” he said dryly.
“Huh. Well, then I won’t go for a hundred and one.”
“Any plans for the day?”
“Hmm.” I cupped the mug with both hands and took another sip. “Actually, yes. I need to find a library.”
“That’s easy. Grandview has a library near the town square.”
“Ah, no, that one didn’t have the book I am looking for,” I said quickly. “Is there a bigger one close by?”
“There’s one about an hour and a half north of here, in Briggston.”
“Protected?”
“Yes, and so is the route.”
“Then I’ll go there. Can you write down directions for me?” I asked as we descended the stairs together.
“Sure. But if you wouldn’t mind a little company, I can drive you.”
I considered that for longer than I probably should have. It was risky business having Mark accompany me on the excursion and I was well aware of that fact. It would be difficult if not impossible to hide what I was doing. But I found that I truly welcomed his company, challenges and all.
We ate in companionable silence and dressed in jeans and t-shirts for our outing.
The drive to town was interesting if not relaxing. The towns we drove through were larger cities for the most part. It was a warm summer day and other people had taken to the road as well. The traffic showed no sign of thinning as we entered Briggston and circled the library in search of a parking space. We ended up having to park three blocks away and walk to the mammoth stone building. Like the library at Grandview, the building was ancient and resembled a castle. I wished once again that I had thought to bring a camera.
I inhaled deeply in the sunken in lobby of the building and grinned.
“Yep, it smells like a library.”
Mark laughed quietly and edged us toward the reception desk. “You’re one of a kind, Annabelle, you know that?”
“So I’ve been told.”
“What are you looking for?”
“I need some historical reference. Maybe you could look around for yourself while I find what I need?”
He nodded. “Not a problem. I’ll find something interesting and find a corner. Come find me when you’ve finished?”
“Will do.”
I wandered around for longer than I would have had to if I had been able to ask the librarian for assistance, I lamented bitterly. But after Grandview, I thought it was best to keep my research to myself as much as possible. I hated to keep a paper trail, but it was necessary in order to keep all of the information straight and stay focused on the task at hand. I set the clean pad of paper I had packed, along with a fresh pen, on the desk in front of me and spread the books I had selected around, in an arc, creating a small workstation.
I printed the word ‘OBJECTIVE’ in bold print at the top of my page and scrawled ‘find Kahn’s meadow’ below the heading. It was not only the most important task, but the one I was having the hardest time completing. Common knowledge seemed to dictate that the meadow I sought be referred to as Kahn’s meadow. The maps dictated otherwise from what I had seen thus far. No record of the place existed on the maps that I had double and triple checked.
According to Miranda, the seeing stone was a summons, and I would be led to Kahn—and the meadow—in due time. I had no idea when that would be, and ‘due time’ did not satisfy my curiosity one bit. I needed to speed up the process. Not only that, but I was certain I needed to meet him on my terms rather than wait for him to reveal his location to me. If he can even be taken by surprise, I added glumly.
It occurred to me that maybe I was not making good use of the seeing stone, considering it had been sitting in my closet for three days. Perhaps there was a way to manipulate the stone for my own purposes. I wrote ‘INFO/SEEING STONE’ on the second heading and, beneath that, ‘general research.’
I also wanted to find out more about the four strangers I had read about the previous night. I created the third and final heading titled ‘FOUR MEN/REVOLUTION.’ I had memorized their claim to the people and I scrawled it beneath the heading ‘talisman of the portal was the key to Kahn’s downfall.’ I underlined the statement, then circled it twice. I knew that it was important not only to Terlain’s history but to me as well, somehow.
I tapped my pen against the paper and soon became lost in thought. I took each part of the statement and dissected it on a clean sheet of paper.
The talisman. It could have meant anything, I realized; a weapon, a substance, an item…there were hundreds, if not thousands, of possibilities. Whatever it was, they had believed it to be the equivalent of Kahn’s kryptonite. Based on the phrasing, I made the assumption that the talisman was an item rather than a weapon per se.
Next I printed the words ‘of the portal.’ The portal could have meant a lot of different things too, but I scrawled the words ‘meadow’ and ‘Africa’ below the heading. It was entirely possible that Kahn knew about the portal that had brought me here…possible but not probable, I surmised. If he knew much more about the portal other than the fact that it existed, he would have guards stationed in the forest. The section of woods where I had entered the land was unprotected. The clearing that led to Faith’s house was where Lerna’s town fence ended. So basically, anything beyond Faith’s massive front yard was rogue territory.
I frowned and wrote ‘key to his downfall’ under the final heading.
“Interesting choice of words,” I murmured as I scanned my notes once more. Could it be my key? No, too obvious, I decided, and quickly discarded the scenario. Or was it? The key was an object and it was certainly a very powerful one at that. It could have been the talisman the men had spoken of. The talisman of the portal…it fit…maybe. I shook my head and frowned at the books in front of me. It would take more time than I had right now to figure out the answer to that question. Besides, I had not come here to kill an evil immortal sorcerer, and that was assuming I could in the first place—which I doubted. After all, there was self-confidence and there was stupidity. The line between the two was often very fine and blurry, but not in this case.
Anyway, if the key in my purse was the ’key to Kahn’s downfall,’ then that would explain why he was after me. My next question was ‘how.’ How had he known I had come to Terlain to begin with? How did he know I was in possession of the key? How had he known that the key would lead to his downfall? And how would it lead to his d
ownfall? Of course, that was based on the assumption that the four strangers had been talking about the key; the literal key that was in my purse, rather than a figurative key. I dropped my head onto the desk and groaned when I felt the headache coming on.
Hot stabs of pain sliced through my temples when I tried to lift my head from the desk. The room blurred and shifted until I was squinting to see two feet in front of me. My ears began to ring and the sounds around me became muted before gradually fading away. I gripped the front of the desk hard and tried not to feel like I was being enclosed in my own private capsule of pain. The meadow, I thought dimly. The last time I had felt like this was when I had dreamed of the meadow, right before I had awakened at the auction. All of a sudden I had the sensation of being sucked into a void. The library was gone in the next instant and so was the pain. I was back in the meadow, lying on my side in the grass.
“Oh my God,” I whispered in a shaky voice. I climbed to my feet and turned in a complete circle. It was just as it had been the last time, except now I was alone. I was too stunned to grasp the implications of what had just happened, which was just as well… I scanned the area again, but more slowly this time, taking note of every detail. The emerald seeing stones hung all around me, and the only sound that I heard was my own ragged breathing. Details, I commanded myself. I tried to pick out anything that was out of the ordinary. Strange as it sounded, I was forced to admit a second later that everything seemed perfectly ordinary, save for the fat gemstones hanging from the trees and the fact that I had just been sitting in a library ten seconds ago. Nothing unusual about that at all, I snorted.
My eyes strayed to the boundaries of the meadow. From where I was standing, it was hard to see what lay beyond. I wondered if I could leave, and took a step forward.
A twig snapped somewhere behind me and I whipped around in time to see the shadow of the man emerge from the trees.
“Who are you?” I cried out.
The man stepped into plain view then, and I gasped and froze. He had no face…he had no body, either. He wasn’t a shadow, because shadows were wispy and see through. This man was solid, and cold, and black as night.
“What the hell are you?” I demanded. I don’t know why I expected him to answer me. He had no mouth, at least not that I could see. I backed up slowly, without much thought as to what I was going to do. My mind was racing though, and all I could think was that I hoped he couldn’t hurt me. I dared to take my gaze off of the man for a moment and a flash of copper to my left caught my attention. A bell. There was a bell in the distance, beyond the meadow. I spun around and ran toward it, only to be knocked flat at the edge of the trees. Forcing myself to catch my breath, I got back up. I reached out to touch the air at the edge of the meadow. I should have been able to walk right out, but my hands met with an invisible but solid wall. My arms tingled as a mild shock was delivered. Shit, I thought, I’m trapped in here with whatever the hell that thing is. For the tenth time in two weeks, I kissed my own ass goodbye for good measure.
I leaned over as far as was safely possible and squinted to see the bell. Most of the inscription was impossible to make out at this distance, but ‘1784’ was visible at the top of the bell. To the left of the bell was a dilapidated old building with a sign hanging crookedly in the dingy window…‘Triniti Supply.’ I would have jumped for joy, had I not been reasonably sure I was about to die.
“I got you,” I growled triumphantly.
The thing behind me began to screech. It was a terrible, ear-piercing sound. Then it flew at me. Covering my ears, I dropped into a crouch.
“Wake up! Wake up!” I screamed. I felt the pull a second before the shadow figure collided with me.
Awakening in the library was akin to breaking the surface of the lake seconds before drowning…or waking from a particularly horrifying nightmare.
From the looks of the other library patrons that were directly around me, I had made some noise while I was ‘out.’ Glancing around, I smiled apologetically at everyone.
“Night terrors. I’m fine,” I explained and exhaled sharply.
Had the books gotten it wrong? Had the shadow man been Kahn, I wondered, and not an adviser? Then again, did it matter? Either way, a warning had been delivered loud and clear. I didn’t wait for my heart to stop thudding crazily in my chest, but instead grabbed the pen and struggled to remember the number that had been inscribed on the bell. 1789? No, that was wrong. I frowned and closed my eyes, concentrating. It had been 1786? No, 1784. That was right—1784. The sign in the window was easier to recall. ‘Triniti Supply.’
The name was hastily jotted down and the paper hugged to my chest. He had not intended for me to see anything beyond the meadow—of that I was certain. But the why and how didn’t really matter—knowing how to locate the meadow meant that I had him now, although the timing of the incident had to be significant. I had been contemplating the key, and that must have made Kahn nervous. Again, I wondered about the seeing stone. The timing of what had just happened was too much to be coincidence. Somehow, Kahn was tuned in to me…to my private thoughts, at least on some level. I shivered, my glance darting uneasily around the quiet room. Even though I was scared, I tried to remind myself that if there was no hope, then there would also be no reason for the sorcerer to bother with a mere mortal like myself. Perhaps I was a formidable enemy in my own right, after all. I couldn’t image why, but what other reason would there be to take an interest in me? My gaze dropped to the bag containing the key, and I frowned thoughtfully.
“Annabelle?”
“Oh, hey, Mark.” I stretched. “What time is it?”
“Just after three.”
“We’ve been here two hours, then?”
“Yes. If you need more time, that’s okay too, but…were you screaming a minute ago?”
“Yes. Yes, I was.” Gathered the books in my arms, I headed for the front desk to return them to the librarian.
“And you were screaming because…?”
“I saw a spider.”
“A spider,” he repeated in disbelief.
“Yes, a spider. I hate the things.”
“You don’t seem like the type to be afraid of spiders.”
He had obviously never been to Africa.
“Well, I am. Was there anything that you wanted to do today? We still have a lot of daylight left,” I observed as we walked down the street to the car.
“Actually, I did have something in mind. Are you up for a little skating?”
“I guess so. Ice skating or roller skating? Because I have got to warn you, ice skating with me is a dangerous activity.”
He laughed as we climbed into the car. “Wind skating.”
“Wind skating? I’ve never heard of it.”
“Then you’re in for a treat.”
“Lead the way.”