Page 81 of Angel of Water & Shadow

“Hi.” Really? That was the boldest, baddest thing I could think of? I almost facepalmed.

In answer, the psychic unclasped her fingers and pulled a stray thread from her clothes. I should have known I wouldn’t get much out of her—she’d been a woman of few words at Grad Night. But those words haunted me.

Myrian’s arms floated to her sides, the sleeves hanging off her sticklike arms cascading behind. Her hands hovered above the crystal ball, the silver stitching on her cuffs reflecting its pale light. A familiar pattern threaded the fabric—one that matched the charms on the crystal chain looped around her sun-spotted wrists and fingers. One I had also traced onto the door: the four elements.

Unease grew in the pit of my stomach. “Why did you call me the Fourth Watcher at Grad Night?”

She ignored me—shocker—and waved her hands over the sphere, just above its clear outer layer. The interior’s cloudy liquid churned faster, following her wax-on, wax-off motion, gaining momentum as her hips and arms swayed in rhythm.

Spooky, for sure, but what was I going to do? This—unprocessed truth, truth so raw it hurt, truth so mind-blowing it came at the expense of my known reality—this was what I came here for. No more running. No more hiding. No more thinking. From here on out, I was doing.

“Do you know who I am? Where I came from?” I nodded to the crystal ball. “Or can you help me figure that out?”

A hum, similar to the eerie noise I’d heard earlier, came from Myrian’s thinning lips. It intensified into sputters, progressing into consonants, finally harmonizing into language. A faint bolt of light broke from the orb, shooting through the glass barrier, attaching itself to the roof of her mouth. Her eyes flared with periwinkle lightning, each of her inhales draining a little more energy from the ball, then getting exhaled out as enchantments.

“Vultuuuus.” Her croaky vowels shook me down to my nerves. “Looook.” She beckoned me close.

I relaxed my fists, my teeth, my shoulders, every part of my body that’d been strung, and leaned over the orb—ready to accept whatever story the magic wanted to tell.

The liquid in the interior had thickened to a syrup, swirling, roiling, and turning, as if stretched by invisible hands. A flicker of color appeared, a flash of a place or an object, between its taffy-like folds. I craned my neck, my nose almost grazing the glass as I tried to make sense of the image forming within.

Heart jumping with the churning core, I lifted my chin to check in with the psychic. She shoved my head back down—and into the glass. Every muscle in me tensed, bracing for impact, but I went right through its glossy surface.

Although my head had made the initial plunge, every limb followed, like a dive into the ocean. Neither sinking nor swimming, I was submerged, the air inside chalky and thick as Jell-O. It densely draped over my nose and mouth, made each heavy breath feel like a swallow.

I turned to face the reality I had just left, wavering like a mirage behind a brumous veil. I shot my hand out, trying to breach the barrier, but the swirling mist just thickened around it.

Retreating, I compelled curiosity to eclipse my anxiety and took in my surroundings.

This place—whatever, wherever it was—seemed to be the diametric opposite of where I had come from. The light smothered the dark, swallowing the shadows before they could even form. Similar to before, there were no walls, but my footsteps echoed. No color, but the diluted sphere burned my eyes with stark, penetrating white. It was so bright. So empty. My senses revved into overdrive, bringing a wave of razor-sharp tingles to my skin. If Madame Myrian’s home was the center of a black hole, this was the center of a starburst.

My legs slogged forward, each pull and shift lagging, leaving tracers in the air. It didn’t take long for exhaustion to strike. I had barely moved a foot, but my body quivered like I had been sprinting for miles. When I collapsed into the nothingness, I swore others gasped alongside me. But then I was free-falling and the hint of a voice or two flushed into the bitter wind stinging my ears.

At first it was nothing but that feeling of weightlessness. But the farther I plummeted, the more my back arched, the more I felt like a cold, leaden slab of stone. I was spinning, twisting, screaming, with absolutely no control, as a force pulled me further down, until even just taking a breath seemed impossible.

It was like trying to fly without wings.

A brutal pressure slammed into my spine. Fierce, radiating pain shot up my back, across the scar tissue on my shoulder blades, down to my tailbone. The breath whooshed out of me, and I gasped fruitlessly for a full thirty seconds while my brain attempted to register that I’d landed. Hard.

The ground indented beneath me like a crater, dust wafting and settling onto my skin and clothes. A sharp inhale shocked my achy body, my muscles jerking at the sudden motion.

Groaning, I rolled to my side and tucked in my knees, peering at the world around me.

I’d landed on a desolate mesa so high it was surrounded by sheets of clouds. To my left, a tundra stretched into the horizon—no greenery, just miles of soil and rock. To my right, an eroded edge to a sheer drop-off. The icy wind roared with a hostile howl that chilled me to my bones. I’d never seen anywhere so gray and inhospitable.

The fog blanketed the view and seemed to suppress my emotions so the only thing I felt was sorrow. I drummed up the confidence to stand and when I reached my feet, a gut punch of hopelessness almost knocked me down again.

What was this place?

The ground vibrated with a seismic shock that trembled in sync with my nerves. Cracks as thin as hairlines traveled across the dry earth as it splintered beneath me.

I lost my balance, my already bruised tailbone catching my fall, the pain pulling a sharp cry from me. I didn’t get up. Not as the air at the edge of the ridge distorted into putty. Not even when four distinct wormholes appeared, spinning in unison, like floating whirlpools carved into the sky. There was nowhere to escape. Plus, my ass hurt too bad to run. I shrank into myself, hoping to blend in with the rock.

The vortex on the left started to speed up, sparking as if into overdrive. Ruby rays pierced its translucent helix, painting the gravel at its base in the dusky tones of an alpenglow as it spun faster, burned brighter.

Thinking it might combust, I nestled my face in my arms, lowering them only when a dark silhouette rapidly blotted out its center.

Red regalia blazed into being as a hooded figure stepped into a world of mist and sorrow. That wormhole dissolved to ash, scattering around the mysterious person’s feet.

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