12:19
“Touching me,” Kim said, stiff-lipped.
“You’re back!”
Magick swelled in her, but it was no longer the impossible to ignore noise from when she’d first swallowed the potion.
“Was I gone?” Words still slow, stiff with the cold without and that settling within.
“Gone enough. Prairie and I had to anchor you.”
Kim turned her head. Looked at Prairie’s hand on her shoulder. Followed Prairie’s arm down to the elbow, then back to her shoulder and then her face. Her face with a soft smile and gaze filled with relief.
When the Magick surged again in her, its pulse demanding, Kim blinked and forced herself to focus on Prairie instead. “Prairie?”
“Hi.” Her soft smile was a balm.
Kirby shifted to look around Prairie and Hello bellowed, “Hello!”
Kim forced something like a smile, aware of the stiffness of her face and the chill that clung still. She stifled her initial response to chase it with a surge of Fire, understanding it was the residual of her nascent connection to Ice. She didn’t want Ice to think she was rejecting it. She could handle a bit of cold and stiffness.
She shifted her gaze from Prairie and Kirby to the ice elementals. They all stood in various states of frozen which Kim realized was just their natural state and not her demanding their stillness. Another wave of peace flowed through her, combatting the flux of energy still coursing through her Magick channels.
Thank you, she sent through her connection to Ice. One ice elemental shifted. Its elongated head flowed to the side. The white orbs of its eyes clouded, snow drifting. And then it turned to the other ice elementals. Something unspoken passed between them. Vaguely, somewhere deep in her subconscious, Kim felt purpose that wasn’t her own a mikro before the elementals moved as a group, gliding back to the ice wall and merging with it.
Prairie and Gwen watched the retreat.
“Whoa.” Gwen said. She turned back to Kim. “Whoa?”
Magick swelled in Kim’s channels, demanding her focus again. She fought to keep focused on Gwen instead. On reality.
“Kim!” Gwen’s voice got sharp. She slapped her hand to Kim’s chest.
The image of her second floor room filled Kim’s mind. Heat from an invisible cup of tea pressed against her palm. Peace flowed through her, driving back the insistant pulse of the Magick. And she could breathe again. And the heat of Gwen’s hand on her chest registered.
She looked down at it. Blinked. Her mouth moved but nothing came out. Then Prairie’s hand tightened on her shoulder and she felt a wave of Magick, different than the elemental Magick pulsing in her core. Again she drew a long breath. Again the image of her second floor room, of snow falling outside a closed window, flowed through her.
“I–” her words stalled. She drew another long breath.
Gwen turned and yelled into the mist.
“How much longer?”
“Now.” Siobhan walked out of the mist. She had a big block of ice held out in front of her at arm’s length, far enough from the wings of the fire bird to keep it safe. Probably.
Behind her came Ben, holding two blocks of ice on Dempsey’s shield.
Dan and Abe came next. Dan had two blocks. Abe had one. Then Patti came out of the mist holding two blocks precariously balanced on her upturned shield.
Siobhan looked at Prairie and Gwen bracketing Kim. “There’s one more block.”
Prairie shook her head. “We can’t leave her.”
Siobhan ran her gaze over the three women then bit her lip. “Okay. I’ll get the other one.”
“Ivan?” Kim’s cracked word drew Siobhan’s attention to her.
“Still frozen.”
“Fire?”
“Seems to be helping. I’m hoping once we get out of here he and Dempsey will get better.”
A pulse of Magick rose in Kim. Two fire birds flew out of the mist then turned and headed to where Kim remembered Ivan and Dempsey sitting with Erik and Gia.
Siobhan followed the birds. “You shouldn’t.”
Kim gulped. “I didn’t.” She swayed as more Magick swelled in her. “I’m not completely in control.”
Siobhan’s lips clamped hard then she nodded. She shot Gwen and Prairie telling looks before turning and hurrying to follow the others as they approached the ice wall.
“The holes are over here,” Ben’s voice drifted on the mist.
Gwen’s arms tightened around Kim. Her hand pressed harder into Kim’s chest. “Hey, stay with me.”
Kim looked at Gwen. Blinked as her friend’s features wavered. Shit. She closed her eyes and focused on the cold, willing more peace to flow from it and into her.
Pushing back at the energy she forced herself to remain present. The cold and the serenity it loaned helped. It helped a lot. But she knew with a certainty that it would take only a little bit for her to cascade back into the crazy energy state.
It had felt so good. It would be so easy to let herself drift on the pulse of Magick. In that moment she truly understood the danger Siobhan warned of with this potion. It was too tempting to be more.
Another wave of serenity flowed into her. She looked over at the ice wall her friends stood in front of. An ice elemental partially emerged from the wall far enough away from where her friends clustered to not startle them and she felt more than saw its snowy gaze.
She jerked her chin in acknowledgement and it retreated back into the wall.
Siobhan separated from the group at the wall. She rushed past where Kim, Prairie, and Gwen stood, mist swirling around her skirts. A moment later she came back, holding another ice block.
She cast a quick look at the three of them. “Dan figured out the password was Eternity.” Her words slurred a little. Kim frowned. Shouldn’t she be warmer? “We found blocks of ice with letters. We’re inserting them into holes in the wall.”
Not pausing to see if Kim, Prairie, and Gwen would respond, Siobhan hurried back towards the ice wall with her block. Again Kim frowned as she saw Siobhan weave a little, not quite sure on her feet.
In that moment Kim realized while the elementals had pulled back it was still damned cold. She hoped the others would solve this puzzle quickly and it would be the last thing they had to do. Was it so much to ask? Was it?
She cast her gaze at the Aurora Borealis ceiling. Or sky. Whatever.
ARFA?
No reply.
Is this it?
No reply.
Of course there was no fucking reply.
Would Dempsey and Ivan be unfrozen when they got out of here? Would Gia and Erik be okay? Why did Erik look like Al? What did any of this have to do with Al and his fucking possibilities?
The questions fought each other in her mind. Made her disconnect from her body again as they seized her.
“No!” Gwen snapped and a pulse of heat hit Kim’s chest. “No!”
Kim blinked. Looked down at Gwen’s hand pressed to her chest. “No?”
“You,” Gwen thumped her head against Kim’s shoulder, “Are staying with me.”
“Did I go somewhere?”
“Did you?”
Gwen’s mouth firmed on a hard line. She looked over at Prairie. Prairie just gave a sad smile and squeezed her hand against Kim’s shoulder then ran her hand up to press her fingers against Kim’s throat.
“Your pulse is fast.”
“There.” Siobhan’s voice rippled across the mist. And then there was a snap, a sudden cessation of cold.
Maybe it was because Kim was still kind of half-in and half-out of it, but it felt like the environment shimmered for a mikro and then they were no longer in a castle made of snow, freezing to death. Instead, they were in a garden. The garden outside of ARFA’s cottage to be specific. The familiar cottage wall with its growth circles towards the base loomed large in Kim’s view.
As it did she realized she was swaying on her feet, despite Gwen and Prairie’s continued grips. She cast about for something to anchor her attention to. Her heart started beating really, really fast. It felt like it wanted to jump out of her chest.
Her eyes went all over, cataloging the scene.
Abe and Dan stood shoulder to shoulder. Or Dan’s shoulder to Abe’s head. The point was they were supporting each other, leaning together like a strong breeze would knock them down. The ordeal in the house had to have taken so much from them. Kim guessed they couldn’t be instantly solid and normal and whole, though she might wish it so.
Ivan sat on the ground next to Ben’s braced legs, looking around with a dazed expression. Moving. He was moving! Dazed or not, moving.
Dempsey! Kim tracked her gaze around so fast, looking for the large man, her head went woozy for a moment. Gwen’s arms tightened around her as she swayed, reminding her Gwen still had her in a tight embrace. She looked down at the top of Gwen’s fluffy head with a frown.
“You can let me go,” she murmured.
“No.”
Okay. No fighting the tide and Kim had better things to do. Like find Dempsey. It only took another two mikros of shifting her gaze for it to land on Dempsey sitting in a similar state to Ivan. Maybe a little stiller. Maybe a little less dazed.
Her heartbeat ratcheted up for a moment. That didn’t feel right. Shouldn’t it settle after finding Dempsey? She got it ratcheting up with fear, but seeing him should have settled it. What the fuck?
Draped over Dempsey’s thighs, Erik started to slowly move. Oh, that was good. Did they have Gia too?
Kim tracked her gaze back to Ivan. Shouldn’t Gia be—
A slight movement to the right drew her attention to Patti sitting on the ground a short distance from Ivan. She had Gia over her lap and as Kim watched Patti lifted a hand and smoothed back Gia’s blond hair from her face. The movement revealed Gia’s eyes as her eyelids opened and she looked around with a dazed expression to rival the one on Ivan’s features.
“What?” Before Gia could say more or move in Patti’s loose grip, movement to the left drew everyone’s attention. The air rippled in a way that seemed like the world shrugging and then a hole opened. From it strode Al. Once clear of the hole, he looked around the group. His eyes stopped moving for a moment when he saw Gia in Patti’s lap then he moved on to settle his attention on Erik.
“Good. It worked.”
Ben threw a hand out, nearly clotheslining Al as he approached Ivan and Erik. Probably would have clotheslined him except for their height disaparity.
“Worked?”
Al pulled up short and turned his head to give Ben a narrow-eyed look. “Do you mind? I don’t have much time before Mary notices something changed.”
“What about–?” Patti indicated Gia draped in her lap. “I’m guessing you are taking Erik.”
“I am.”
“And Gia?”
“Not taking Gia.”
“What are we supposed to tell her?”
“She won’t remember a thing.”
“What?”
Al gave a long-suffering sigh. “Not enough time. Just accept it.”
“What about,” Siobhan asked in a quiet voice while looking at her feet rather than at Al, “Erik?”
“What about him?”
“Will she remember Erik?” Siobhan looked up from her feet and pinned Al with a hard look that matched her voice as it shifted from hesitant to determined. “Will she remember her friend?”
“Yes.” Before Siobhan could press further, Al turned to look at Dempsey seated on the ground. “Hey, Dempsey?”
Dempsey turned his head slowly to look at Al. He didn’t rise. Maybe he couldn’t yet.
Al bobbled something shiny between his fingers, dancing it over his knuckles. There was a glint of crystal catching the sunlight and then Al was flicking whatever the object was from his fingers at Dempsey. Dempsey’s hand rose up and he snatched the object out of the air. Then turned his attention to it with a frown.
“Magick.”
Al nodded. “Magick. Keep it safe.”
That said he stooped next to Ivan and slid his arms under Erik’s limp form before rising to his full height with his – twin? Doppleganger? – held against his chest. Bluegrass music came from the vicinity of the house. A moment later ten mice ran across the grass to cluster near Al’s feet. Several held tiny instruments. A banjo. A mandoline. Two guitars. The mice looked up at Al. Al looked down at the mice.
Realization snapped with painful clarity in Kim’s still compromised brain. She surged forward, dragging Gwen and Prairie with her.
“The mice! You!”
Al showed no confusion as he shifted his gaze from the mice at his feet to Kim. “The mice. Me.”
The corner of his mouth quirked. The mice, as one turned and focused their dark gazes on Kim. Again, with perfect synchronicity, they sang, “We’re all gonna die!”
Al looked at the mice then turned a wicked grin on Kim. “Possibilities presented; expectations exceeded.” He hiked Erik higher against his chest. “You done good, kids. I’d clap but my hands are kind of full.”
The enormity of how they’d been manipulated surged in Kim, fighting for real estate against the swell of Magick filling all her spaces. Sure, that manipulation had helped them, she guessed, and it probably would have been way worse, maybe even impossible, without the intervention but still the pure fuckery of the whole thing was like spikes of glass battering against her brain.
The utter ick of when she’d seized control of the ice elementals’ burned through her. She had to clench her teeth to keep it down.
Just how much of their lives were being puppet-mastered by this ass? How many of their decisions were their own? How much of their will was supplanted to this jackass’ purposes? Were they just tools to him? Things to use?
Another wave of despair filled her as she considered the parallels between her own actions and Al’s. Righteous anger pulsed along with her Magick, driving her. Loathing swelled, of herself and of him, demanding an outlet.
She lunged against Gwen’s hug and Prairie’s hand, fists up. “You assh–”
The rest of the word cut off as Magick exploded in Kim. Her eyes widened and she fought to pull a hard breath through her suddenly gaping mouth.
The Magick surged, a tsunami demanding release. Her arms flew to the side on their own. The hand closest to Gwen smacked her friend, hard enough Gwen loosened her hold. Then her toes left the ground as she levitated. She felt her toes scraping grass and then Earth surged up to wrap around her feet, anchoring her.
Jerked by the sudden change in direction, Kim’s head snapped back. Her eyes rolled back hard enough she thought she could see her brain. Her vision went white, then fuzzy. The force of her upward float and then her downward yank dragged her free of Prairie’s grip on her shoulder.
Voices sounded, lapping against her brain like waves that had no coherence. She felt her back impact the earth, her heels kick as her back arched and her entire body stiffened. And then–
Silence. White. Oblivion.
Enter The Woods 