Stepping forward until the tiny hairs on my arms stood at attention, I stopped with my feet shoulder-width apart.Sliding my right hand into my pocket, I wrapped my fingers around the Rainbow Moonstone and pulled it into the light.Holding it over my heart, I stretched out my left arm with my hand open wide.
“One, two, three, fo… ouch!”Jerking my hand back, I frantically shook away the sting of being zapped by the Wards, hiding Arrhythmia from the world.
Inhaling deeply, I held my breath and gingerly extended my hand.This time, I ignored the Enchanted jolt and walked right through the Wards with nothing more than a tingle and the ends of my red curls standing up in every direction.
“Damn,” I marveled under my breath.“That was easier than I thought.”
“Of course, it was,”Lydia scoffed.“Whether you like it or not, Fogarty’s Magic runs through your veins just like that of your mother.So, it only stands to reason…”
“…that after the initial shock, his dirty crap recognized the same in me?Great!”
“No,”Lydia snapped.“That is not what I meant.What I was about to say before you interrupted me for the umpteenth time was whatever good was left in Fogarty when he created the Wards is alive in you, and that is why you were able to walk in without all the rigamarole you had planned.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, oh,”my inner Necromancer scoffed.“Now, get moving.We only have about twenty minutes of the Witching Hour left.”
“Oh, shit, yeah.”
Retrieving Grandma Cleo’s pendant from my back pocket, I held the delicate, golden chain between the thumb and forefinger of my left hand while my right was still wrapped around the Rainbow Moonstone and pressed against my chest, and whispered, “Show me the way.”
Slowly at first, then quicker with every passing second, the 25-carat, princess-cut emerald set in a spectacular antique pendant swung in counterclockwise circles.In the blink of an eye, it stopped, held perfectly still for a split-second, then shot straight out in front of me and pointed due East.
Pulling me as if it were a leash, the pendant started to glow as its Enchantment grew stronger.Running, something I never did, just to keep up with the speed at which the pendant was jerking me forward, I tripped and skipped and did everything to keep from falling flat on my face in the sand.
Keeping a frantic pace had never been my thing, and I was seriously regretting the second bowl of pasta salad I’d had for dinner as I scurried through the moonlit darkness.Thinking of all the gym memberships I’d paid for and never used, I was scolding myself for my lack of physical fitness when the feeling of being watched hit me from every direction.More eyes than I cared to think about caused the hairs on the back of my neck to stand on end.Then I got goosebumps all over my body.Next came the cold chills.Finally, I was sure I would have to stop or go literally and clinically insane from the sensation of millions of fire ants crawling all over me.It felt as if they were biting every inch of skin they could get to–even though I knew there was no way they would’ve been able to keep up with me.
Digging my heels into the sand, trying with every ounce of gumption I had to stop my forward motion just so I could give my curvy behind a good scratch, I truly thought I was getting somewhere when that damn pendant took a sudden and sharp left that I couldn’t have seen coming if I were Nostradamus.In the next tick, it did the same thing to the right.Just when I was sure I was going to get to take a breath, it swung back to the left and poured on the speed.
Panting and sweating and praying for the nerve to let go and fall to my knees, I saw my life flash before my eyes when the shiny little asshole wove in and out a line of tall, thick-trunked Texas Ebony trees I hadn’t seen coming and couldn’t have identified if they were in a police lineup.
Whapped, slapped, and smacked in the face by every single low-hanging branch, and a few, I am sure, came back for a second swing, I really knew what it was to feel defeated.I couldn’t catch my breath, and tears were streaming down my face.My cheeks were on fire with what I was sure were at least one-hundred-and-ninety-two tiny scratches, and all I wanted to do was go back home.Admitting temporary defeat, proverbially licking my wounds, and coming up with another way to speak to my mother didn’t sound like such a bad idea anymore.
Resigned to the fact that my mission was over before it began, I was half a heartbeat from letting go when the pendant jerked straight up into the air.Just before the delicate, golden links of the necklace broke apart and fell to the ground, the emerald slowly rotated until it floated in the air, lying flat, parallel to the ground.
Spitting and spatting out pieces of leaves and bark from the Texas Ebony branches that had tried to take me out, I let go of the chain.I have no clue how I knew, but I just knew that it would stay hanging right where it was untilImade a move.
Pulling out the bandana I’d stuffed into my back pocket thinking I might need it to hold back any stray hairs that fell out of the messy bun atop my head, I wiped the tears, dirt, blood, and who knew what else from my face.Inhaling and exhaling, trying my damnedest to slow my heart rate, I suddenly realized it no longer felt like I was being watched.
“Well, shit,” I huffed under my breath.“I guess the ‘Monsters’ in Arrhythmia aren’t so scary after all.”
“That you know of,”Lydia grumbled from inside my brain.“Do you really think it’s smart to put that shit out in the universe?Have you even looked around?What if they’re better at camouflage than you are at spotting them?”
“Fuck, Lydia!Seriously!”Eyes sliding left and right, I hissed,“Will there ever be a time that you’re helpful?”
“Don’t even get me started.”
“Like I could stop you.”
Moving my eyes in every direction without moving my head, I opened the enhanced eyesight afforded me by my Magic and prayed to every deity I could think of, and I few I am sure I made up, that I saw nothing and no one anywhere near me.Long seconds ticked by– time I truly didn’t have to spare, but…
Then again…
“You’ll never accomplish what you came here for if something big and furry eats your ass.”
“Lydia!What the fuck is wrong with you?”
“What is wrong with me?”She was yelling.“What the hell is wrong with you?Why the hell are you doing this without any backup?Better yet, why are you doing this at all?You know as well as I do that all you had to do was tell your Aunt Virginia that you…”
