CHAPTER 7
Talan’s statement hung in the air of the rock cavern while the water continued to rush by as though nothing of import had just happened. Peta, Raven, and I didn’t move, we didn’t so much as twitch a muscle.
Talan’s eyebrows climbed, and his gaze didn’t move from me. “Am I really that terrifying?”
I stared back at him. “It’s not fear that holds me here. Shock, I believe, would be more appropriate. Shock and disbelief.”
Raven grunted as though I’d punched him in the gut. “You should be afraid of him if that’s true. He could be manipulating us even now and we wouldn’t know it.” As he spoke, his voice rose, and anger flooded his words.
I put a hand out to him, palm facing him. “Stop it. I can see if he’s using Spirit. And right now, he’s not.”
“You sure about that?” Raven threw the question at me. I didn’t look at him, but kept my eyes on Talan.
“Yes, I’m sure.”
Talan laughed. “It is a gift some Spirit Walkers have, to see the lines of power. It is not a gift I have. It was only in your mother’s family and it developed on its own. Strange how the powers did that after they left us. They often twisted on their own, forming to what the elemental needed to survive.” He ran his fingers through the water. Us. He meant his other siblings, of course, the other forebears of the elemental world. I shook my head to clear the lingering disbelief.
“Still, there is no proof. You could just be a strong Spirit elemental who has learned to survive all these years, not unlike Viv. I would think that one who was truly the original child of the mother goddess would be able to take Viv out on his own. He wouldn’t need to manipulate anyone else.” I smiled. “So maybe you aren’t so much who you think you are?”
From the corner of my eye, I saw Raven nod. “What are those places the humans stick their mad ones?”
“Asylums,” I said. “That’s a good point. Perhaps we should send him to one of those.”
“Yes, they could let him think he’s in charge there.”
I barked a laugh. “In charge. Please. He’ll be trying to convince all the humans they are really elementals who need to save the world.”
Raven burst out laughing and I couldn’t help joining in. Peta’s concern came through loud and clear. “Are you all right?” she whispered in my ear.
I couldn’t help myself. “It’s a sibling thing.” And it was. This was how Raven and I had always bantered back and forth. Ganging up on the other kids in our family and making them look like fools.
Talan frowned at us both. Like an adult dealing with naughty children. Which only set me laughing more. A part of my brain realized it was a combination of shock and sheer overload. Because even though Talan hadn’t proven anything, what he said made a wicked sort of sense. Which brought me out of my laughter as fast as I’d started.
“Wait,” I drew a sharp breath as I struggled to form the question that slammed me between the eyes, “why do you not just get your other siblings then and deal with Viv?”
Raven’s laughter died as suddenly as mine had. “Now that is a good question.”
“You two are going to be the death of me,” Talan muttered. “I told you I would show you the story. Will that suspend your disbelief of who I am?”
I shrugged. “Maybe.”
“Then we will start there. We start with a girl named Vivica.” He reached up to the waterfall and ran his fingers through it, his arm coated in pink lines so bright that I wondered just how I had not noticed before. And then I remembered. Shit, he could hide his power from me. He’d done it before. Had I forgotten or had he taken that knowledge from me? Fear slid down my spine like droplets of icy cold water.
“Put your hands in the water,” Talan said, “and you’ll be taken to the past.”
“You mean we’ll see the story,” Raven said.
“No,” Talan shook his head, “your spirits will go into the past and you will see how things happened. What brought Vivica to become Viv, then to become an effigy of the mother goddess.”
Peta butted her head against my cheek. “I will be with you.”
I was not afraid, not really. But I was unsure I wanted to send my spirit anywhere without my body. “I thought we were on a time crunch.”
Talan smiled. “The story happened in the past. Here in the present, the time that will lapse will be less than a few seconds. A heartbeat or two.”
That didn’t make me feel any better. “Can we be trapped there?”
He shook his head. “No. If you become afraid, you need only take a step back. As long as you walk forward, you will see the story unfold.”
His instructions seemed simple, and yet, I was not sure. “All of us are going?”
Talan shook his head. “Just you and Raven.”
I fought not to hunch my shoulders. “And you are staying behind why, exactly?”
“Suspicious much?” He smiled at me, but it wasn’t mean. “I stay behind because if something were to go wrong, then I can pull you both out.”
“So something has gone wrong before?” Raven asked. I was glad it was him and not me.
Talan rolled his eyes as though we were being ridiculous, but I saw the motion for what it was. He was avoiding the question.
I took a step, closing the distance between him and me. “You might be the last born of the true mother goddess. But don’t you dare lie to us now. You want us to work with you, then you’d better think about how you want us to see you. As a liar? Or someone we can trust?”
He rubbed a hand over his face. “Damn it. You are too perceptive by half. Yes, this has gone wrong once before. But we both survived, so I am being cautious now.”
“What happened?” Peta asked.
Talan shook his head and then slowly answered. “The one who went with me tried to interfere. We both did, thinking if we could change the past, then things would be better. It doesn’t work that way.”
“What happened?” The question came from Raven and me at the same time.
Talan let out a groan. “Mother, help me not kill them all.”
Peta hissed at him. “Don’t you take that tone with us!”
Talan looked at her. “Fine. We were both hurt, the injuries were not life-threatening, but we struggled to connect with our ability for a time.”
“But you got it back?” Raven asked.
“We did,” Talan said.
“Will the people in the past be able to see us?” I asked.
Talan shook his head. “No, you won’t be visible to them, though as I mentioned, you can be hurt. You will need to watch yourselves.”
I glanced at my brother. It was like a three-ring circus and it would keep going if we didn’t at some point just jump forward. Or in this case backward.
“I will go. No more questions. If you swear to me you will pull us out if there is trouble.”
Talan nodded. “If you are in there longer than ten seconds, I will pull you out.”
I had a feeling it was going to be the best we would get. And suddenly I was eager to go, to see what had happened and understand what the hell was going on in my world.
“How long will that give us on the other side?” I stared into the water as I spoke.
“Long enough.”
Without another word, I lifted Peta off my shoulder and set her on the ground. She looked up at me, her green eyes narrowing before she gave me a tiny nod. No words. We couldn’t say what flew between us without speaking. Because if Talan knew she was my safety net, he might put her out of commission. Assuming he was not playing by the rules.
I smiled at her and she winked up at me.
I drew a breath and put my left hand into the waterfall. Raven moved up beside me and put his right hand in.
“Ready, sis?”
I shrugged. “Nope.”
He gave me a lopsided grin. The moment stretched, Raven disappeared, and there was nothing but the sound of water rushing around my ears, the feel of something tugging on my feet. I took a step, then another, and another, and the world as it had once been, long before I was born opened before me…