She looked at me, her eyes wide, and I nodded for her to go on.
“I remember thinking that was so creepy when I was a little girl. They were like a cult, if that’s what you called it back then.”
“That’s it,” Ren said. “That’s what I’ve been trying to remember. They were called something like the Bringers of the Dark Light, only not in English, obviously. And eventually they fought with the missionaries.”
“Go on,” Eric urged.
Ren bit his lip, obviously trying to remember. “Most people called it folklore because it never ended up in textbooks, but I read about it when I was a kid. I used to read all sorts of stuff about the Aztecs and Mayans. All those civilizations.”
“The part about From many to None, Abandoned yet Full makes sense too,” Fran said. “At one point, it was supposed to have been a thriving community. Then they died out.”
“Might have been a city of demons,” Laura suggested. “Then early hunters found them. Or is that stupid?”
“Not stupid at all,” I said.Forzaactually existed back then, and its Hunters traveled all over the globe. Even to places the Vatican won’t acknowledge now.”
“Now, they say it’s haunted by the ghosts of those past worshipers,” Ren said.
“A place for incorporeal demons to interact with those who are embodied,” I suggested. “This is all promising. It’s out of the way, clearly had space, and most likely had cells for those who stumbled upon them.”
“So how do we find it,” Jared asked.
“Good question,” Eric said. “If it’s as old as that, it’s certainly not going to be in architectural records. Ren, since you seem to remember those details, do you think that you could look at some old maps of the mission trails around San Diablo? It’s likely the missionaries set up camp close by the demons, hoping to convert them.”
“On it,” Ren said. “Someone else should search, too, though. We’ll race to the answer.”
“Done,” Ana and Laura said in unison.
“So if we’re lucky, we’ll know her location soon,” I said. “But we still don’t know about the Remnant. Eric’s waiting for calls. How about Quiric?” I asked Jared. “Were you able to find him?”
“Yeah, I tracked his scent. He says he doesn’t know anything. But he also says that he’ll keep his promise and help us when and if we need him and his merry band of demons.”
He started to pace. “I need to go back out there,” he said. “I need to be doing something. The two women I love are out there, and we don’t have a clue where to go.”
“Trust me,” Eric said. “I know how you feel. But there’s nowhere to go until we know our destination.”
“It could take these guys days to find this place,” he said, his hand indicated Ren and the others. “In the meantime, we can’t just—”
He froze.
His body just went completely stiff and then, very slowly, he put his hands to his forehead and squeezed his eyes closed.
“Jared?” I hurried toward his side, suddenly terrified. “Jared, are you okay?”
For a moment nothing changed, then he gasped and opened his eyes. They were glassy, and he shook his head as if trying to remember where he was.
Then he said one word: “Celia.”
I moved closer. “What?”
“It was her. She was calling out to me.”
“Telepathically...?”
“Yes,yes. She must have somehow gotten free.” He’d lost the tone of shock and was all business, crisp and efficient. “She showed me a symbol. Showed me some landmarks she remembered from when they first took her. And she asked me to hurry. Begged me. She said they’re planning something, and then she screamed, and then the vision went away.”
“A symbol?”
Jared grabbed the Sharpie and went to the wall, then started to scribble until the wall displayed a circle filled with crisscrossing lines intersecting another circle.
