Page 105 of Crossing Between
"There," I pointed. "That's where he is."
"Ironic for ademon." Kenji grunted.
Something was wrong with the building. It seemed to shift and waver, like a television with poor reception. One moment solid and real, the next transparent and ghostly.
"It's glitching between memory and reality," Elias's voice was tight. "This is powerful magic."
As we approached, the air grew thick with power. My magic responded, rising to the surface until my skin glowed with a soft gold light.
"Z...Zo...Zoe..." The whisper grew louder, more insistent.
We paused at the church doors, massive wooden structures carved with religious symbols now warped by time and supernatural energy.
"Ready?" Varon's hand was placed on my back.
I nodded, though my heart hammered in my chest. "Together."
Kenji and Elias flanked us as Varon pushed open the doors. They swung inward with an ominous creak, revealing the interior of the church, but it was not as it should have been.
The space was wrong. The dimensions shifted subtly as we entered, the ceiling seeming miles high one moment and claustrophobically low the next. The pews bent at impossible angles. Windows appeared and disappeared along the walls.
"What the hell?" Kenji whispered.
Each of us seemed to see something different. Varon's gaze fixed on a point near the altar, his expression suddenly vulnerable in a way I'd never seen. Elias stared at a corner where nothing existed, yet his face reflected recognition and pain. Kenji's eyes tracked movement only he could see, his body tensing as if preparing for an attack.
I knew they were seeing pieces of their pasts, my magic somehow giving me that knowledge. They were seeing manifestations drawn from their memories by whatever powersaturated this place. I didn't ask what they saw; the raw emotion on their faces told me these were private ghosts.
Then I saw him. A young boy was sitting on what appeared to be a bed in the middle of the church, flipping through a deck of cards with practiced ease. His dark hair fell across his forehead just as it had when we were children, his skinny legs swinging as he concentrated on the cards.
"Ryan," my voice broke.
The boy looked up, and I saw my brother's face, not as the adult he now was, but as the child I had practically raised after our parents died. His smile was the same gap-toothed grin he'd had at ten.
"Hey, Zoey," his voice echoed strangely. "Wanna play?"
I moved toward him, drawn by a mixture of memory and hope.
"You can see him too?" I asked the others, not taking my eyes off Ryan.
"Yes," Varon confirmed, his voice tight. "We all can."
That meant this wasn't just my vision, this manifestation was real, or at least as real as anything in this distorted place.
"Be careful," Elias warned as I approached the bed.
The young Ryan continued flipping cards, arranging them in patterns I remembered from our childhood. He'd spend hours with that deck, practicing tricks to impress his friends.
"Ryan," I stopped before him. "Is that really you?"
He looked up, his eyes, so like mine, crinkled at the corners. "Who else would it be, silly?"
I reached out, my phoenix-gloved hand trembling as it neared his. "I've been looking for you."
"I know," his voice suddenly older than his appearance. "I've been waiting."
My fingers brushed against his and the world exploded.
The child-Ryan collapsed like smoke,dissipating into nothing. The church warped around us, reality bending and folding. A high, cold laugh echoed through the space, and I knew we'd sprung the trap.
