“You’ll want to take a very deep breath of this and hold it. Do you understand?” he said. “The instructions were very clear. You have to hold your breath, until the ritual reaches its apex.”
“How will I know when I can breathe out?” I asked, my voice shaking, my hands clenching tightly around the stones.
He grinned ruefully. “Oh,you’llknow,” he said, then tipped the ember into the vessel. “I want you to thinkveryhard about Naphele. Imagine her face from that painting. Ask her to reveal herself. That should create a gateway for her to speak to us through these stones.”
“Okay.” I closed my eyes. When I had Naphele’s face locked in my mind, I looked at Rainier and nodded.
A thick, billowing cloud of smoke had begun rising from the rim of the pot. Rainier put the container below my nose. I leaned forward, inhaling deeply. The smoke smelled awful, like sulfur, burnt metal, and rancid fungus, but I filled my lungs and sat back.
Levi continued chanting, shooting me worried glances every few seconds or so. I wanted to tell him I was all right, but I had to hold my breath. Nothing was happening. Had Rainier gotten the recipe wrong?
Just as I was about to exhale and ask if something wasn’t working, the entire world seemed to turn into a tunnel. Myperipheral vision went black, and all I could see was Rainier, Levi, and the flickering fire. Then, as though I was on a rollercoaster going a hundred miles an hour in reverse, I slid away from myself and began to fall. My sense of space vanished, and instead of falling backward, I was falling down. Involuntarily, I exhaled, letting the smoke billow from my lungs. At the exact moment I released it, a blinding light flashed before my eyes, like lightning striking three inches in front of my nose. I clenched my eyes shut, still feeling like I was falling, my terror making me panic.
I stood in a clearing.A jumble of tangled bushes ran along a fence beside me, and a woman walked next to me. As I watched her, she bent and plucked a yellowish-white flower, lifting it to her nose. I knew that flower. I’d seen it blooming around Idlewild in the summer. A primrose. Tucking it behind her ear, she walked along, picking elderberries from the shrubs and putting them in the basket hanging from her arm. Glancing around, I realized we were on the outskirts of Idlewild.
What was I doing here?
“Excuse me?” I said, but either the woman didn’t hear me, or she was ignoring me.
“Hey there, beautiful.”
A smile formed on my lips as I turned. That voice was familiar, though it sounded less weary than usual. Levi strode up to me, his shirt tossed over his shoulder, his muscles bulging and covered in sweat and sawdust.
My smile faded. He wasn’t walking toward me, but to the other woman.
“Well, hello there. I thought you were working all day?”
He took her hand. “I thought we could have lunch together.” He pulled her against his chest and kissed her, long and hard, moaning slightly. I still couldn’t make out her face, but she had to be Naphele.
“That sounds good,” she murmured as he pulled away.
“Yeah?” He cocked an eyebrow, his lips curling into a mischievous smile. “Maybe after we eat, we can have a little dessert?”
“You know, I think I could be persuaded,” she said with a giggle.
He led her away from the berry bushes toward town and away from me. A pit formed in my stomach as I watched them walk away together. Left behind and forgotten.
If I was her reincarnation, shouldn’t I have been seeing all this from her point of view? Why was I standing apart? I closed my eyes, trying to focus, to think. When I opened them?—
“Here, this is for you,” Levi said, holding a necklace out toward the woman beside me. This time, her face was in full view. Naphele.
She gasped in delight at the sight of it. I recognized it. It was the necklace Levi had given me.
“It’s beautiful,” Naphele said as Levi stepped behind her and put it on for her.
“Levi, where did you get this?” she asked, touching the silver pendant gently.
“Don’t worry about that. You’re worth it.” He ran his thumb lovingly across the other woman’s cheek. “You’re my everything. I love you, you know that?”
A faint pang of jealousy ran through me at his words, spoken to another woman while I stood right there. I reached forward, trying to touch him, but my hand swept right through, as though he was made of mist. No, that wasn’t right.It was more likeIwas made of mist, not him. I was simply a bystander, watching rather than experiencing this.
“I love you, too,” Naphele said, and reached forward, taking his face in her hands and kissing him.
The world exploded in a flash of white light. I put my hand up to block it out and?—
“Levi? Is that you?” Naphele asked, taking a step out of the bedroom.
Glancing around, I found myself in the room behind her. The house was dark but for the candles flickering on the bedside table. The hallway beyond was cloaked in shadow. She called again.
