Night Star

forty-one

“Where to now?” Damen wipes the dirt from his jeans, as I shrug, and gaze all around. Knowing the pavilion’s out, it would be grossly inappropriate after everything that just went down, and it’s not like I want to go home anytime soon…

He looks at me, having just heard the thought, so I decide to fess up and say, “It’s not like I don’t know I have to go home eventually, but trust me, there will be major hell to pay when I do.”

I shake my head, allowing the whole ugly scene with Sabine to stream from my mind to his, including the part just after I stormed out of the house, when I manifested a bouquet of daffodils and a BMW right in Munoz’s view, and seeing Damen wince at the sight of it.

Suddenly getting a whole new idea though not quite sure how to approach it, I glance all around us and say, “But maybe—” I pause, knowing he’s not going to like it, but resolved to broach it anyway. “I mean, it’s just a thought, but what do you say we go visit that dark side again?”

I peer at him, seeing him reply with an are you crazy? look, and, yeah, maybe I am. But I also have a theory, and I’m eager to see if I’m right.

“I just…there’s something I want to see,” I tell him, knowing he’s still a long way from convinced.

“So let me get this straight.” He rakes his hand through his hair. “You want us to go visit that creepy part of Summerland, where there’s no magick, no manifesting, nothing much of anything other than a steady supply of rain, a bunch of burnt-out foliage, miles and miles of deep, swampy mud that practically doubles as quicksand, and, oh yeah, some creepy old lady who’s obviously gone completely mad, and who, as it just so happens, is totally fixated on you?”

I nod. That about sums it up.

“You’d rather do that than deal with Sabine?”

I nod again and this time I lift my shoulders too.

“Can I ask why?”

“Sure.” I smile. “But I probably won’t answer ’til we get there, so just trust me, okay? There’s something I need to see first.”

He looks at me, obviously reluctant to go through with it but even more reluctant to deny me, he quickly manifests a horse for us to ride as I close my eyes and urge him to take us to the darkest, dreariest part of this place.

And the next thing I know, we’re there. Our mount coming to a crashing halt as Damen and I fight to stay on his back. Rearing and bucking and pawing the earth, forcing Damen to coo softly into his ear, assuring him he need go no farther, and calming him down enough for us to slide off his back and have a good look around.

“So, just like we remembered it,” Damen says, eager to ditch this place for somewhere warmer, brighter, better.

“But is it?” I venture toward the spot where the mud begins, tapping my foot softly against it. Testing its softness, its deepness, trying to determine if it’s changed in some way.

“I don’t know what you’re getting at.” He peers at me. “But as far as I can see, it’s just as wet, barren, muddy, and depressing as the last time we were here.”

I nod. “That’s all true, but does it somehow seem…bigger to you? Like, I don’t know, like it’s…growing or expanding in some way?”

He squints, not quite following where I’m going with this, and knowing I’ll risk sounding crazy or, at the very worst, completely paranoid, I still choose to go ahead with it anyway, since I could really use a second opinion.

“I’ve got this theory—”

He looks at me.

“Well—” I take a deep breath and gaze all around. “I can’t help but think that I might somehow be the cause of all this.”

“You?” Damen squints, brows merged with concern.

But I look right past it and quickly continue. Desperate to finish, to get the words out before I have enough time to really stop and listen to myself, before I lose all my nerve. “Look,” I say, voice tense and hurried. “I mean, I know it sounds stupid, but please hear me out first.”

He nods and flashes his palms, showing he has no plans to stop me.

“I’m thinking that maybe…well, maybe this place started growing when all the bad things started happening.”

“Bad things?”

“Yeah, you know, like when I killed Drina.”

“Ever—” he starts, eager to dispel it, to erase all the blame.

But before he can finish, I’m talking again. “I mean, you’ve been coming here for a really long time now, right?”

“Since the sixties.” He shrugs.

“Okay, right, and so, I’m sure that during all this time you’ve looked around a good bit, did your fair share of exploring, especially back in the beginning.”

He nods.

“And during those times, you said you’d never seen anything like this, right?”

He nods and sighs, though he’s also quick to add, “But then again, Summerland is a very big place. It’s quite possibly infinite for all I know. It’s not like I’ve ever come across any kinds of walls or borders, so it’s quite possible it’s been here all along and I missed it.”

I look away, trying to act as though I’m more than willing to drop it if he is, but I’m not the least bit convinced.

I can’t help feeling there’s something here that’s either caused by me or that I’m meant to see, or both. I mean, that’s what got me here in the first place. I simply asked the Summerland what it wanted me to know about it and it landed me here. But what I don’t know is why.

Is it somehow connected to all of those souls that, because of me, have ended up in the Shadowland?

Are they somehow making it grow?

Like adding fertilizer to a batch of weeds?

And if so, does that mean it will continue to encroach and maybe even take over the rest of Summerland?

“Ever,” Damen says. “We can explore if you want, but there’s really not much to see, is there? It seems like it’s just more and more of the same, doesn’t it?”

I gaze all around, reluctant to give up so easily, and yet not really knowing what I’m looking for, or even how to go about proving my theory. So I start to turn away. Start to move toward him again when I hear it.

The song.

Drifting from behind me, as though carried by a long and distant breeze, but still there’s no mistaking it.

No mistaking the voice—the words—the eerily haunting tune.

And I know without looking it’s her.

Turning to find her pointing finger, her crooked, gnarled hand, raised high as she sings:

From the mud it shall rise

Lifting upward toward vast dreamy skies

Just as you-you-you shall rise too…

Only this time, she continues, adding more lines she definitely didn’t sing the last time we were here:

From the deep and dark depths

It struggles toward the light

Desiring only one thing

The truth!

The truth of its being

But will you let it?

Will you let it rise and blossom and grow?

Or will you damn it to the depths?

Will you banish its worn and weary soul?

And just when I’m thinking it’s over, she does the weirdest thing.

She holds her hands up before her, cupping them as though anticipating some kind of offering, as Misa and Marco suddenly step out from behind her and stand on either side.

The two of them flanking her, gazing intently upon me, as the old woman closes her eyes in deep concentration as though trying to manifest something spectacular.

But all she gets for her efforts is a spray of gray ash that emanates from the center of her palms and falls gently to her feet.

And when she lifts her gaze to meet mine, her face appears stricken, as her eyes stare accusingly.

Damen grasps my arm and quickly pulls me away. Away from her. Away from them. Desperate to escape this creepy scene.

Both of us clueless as to who she is, where she came from, or what the song could possibly mean.

Both of us having no idea what her connection to Misa and Marco might be.

Only one thing is clear—the song is a warning.

The words intended for me to heed.

To hear.

She continues to sing, her voice soft, melodic, her words chasing behind us as we run back to our horse.

Back to the place of magick and manifesting and everything good.

Back to the relative safety of the earth plane, where we land side by side on a stark empty beach.

Our hands loosely clasped as we lie back on the sand and fight to catch our breath. Trying to make sense of the words, the disturbing scene we just witnessed.

Gazing up at a black, moonless sky bearing not one single star.

My night star is gone.

And for a moment, I’m overcome by this horrible, foreboding feeling that it’ll never return.

But then Damen whispers my name, his voice piercing the silence, piercing my thoughts.

And when I turn on my side to face him, seeing the way his face looms before me, his gaze filled with such reverence, so loving and kind—my mind floods with relief.

My night star is no longer here because I’m no longer in need of it.

The two of us shine in its place.

“That song is for me,” I tell him, voicing the words I know in my heart to be true. “Haven’s death, losing the shirt…” I pause and take a deep breath, feeling the assuring warmth of his finger as it gently traces my cheek. “It’s all part of my karma. And now, apparently, there’s something more I’m meant to do.”

Damen starts to speak, eager to comfort, to refute it, to erase the concern from my face.

But I’m quick to stop him, bringing my finger to his lips.

I’ve no need for those words.

Whatever the old woman sings about, I’m ready to face it.

Only later, not now.

“We’ll deal with it,” I say, my words at his cheek as I pull Damen to me. “Together, we’ll deal with everything. But for now…” My lips meet his, lingering as I savor the soft, sweet, almost feel of them. “For now let’s just be grateful for this.”