All local police stations look the same. The buildings are old, the paint peeling. The officers have that jaded, somewhat disdainful air about them, as though they don’t believe anything anyone says.
I’ve given my statement, as has Portia. I’ve told the truth, or as much of it as I could, and now I’m getting the feeling I should have kept my mouth shut.
“But explain to me,” the officer says for the hundredth time, “how does a person just disappear like that, hmm? You didn’t do anything to him?”
I look at him. I don’t know how many times I have to say it. “He just disappeared.”
He nods. “So let me see if I’m understanding this. You were having an argument. He was afraid he would be the next person to get kidnapped. He wanted you to protect him, and you told him you couldn’t. He became violent. He tried to strangle you. You pushed him and he fell. And then he just vanished into thin air.” He raises his eyebrows.
I nod.
“Very strange behaviour, don’t you think?”
Oh, for goodness sake. Of course it was strange. The boy was scared witless and he took it out on me, then his fears proved valid. End of story.
Before I can provide my standard answer, the officer raises his head. An expression of awe comes over his face, and suddenly the sceptical policeman is gone, replaced by a young man in the presence of a respected elder. He leaps to attention.
“Rre Raditladi! Please, come in. Have a seat right here. How can I help you?”
I turn towards my grandfather with a sigh of relief. He glances at the chair and remains standing.
“Is my granddaughter under suspicion?”
“Eh? Your…” The officer’s eyes swing in my direction. “Oh! Your granddaughter. Ah, no, of course not. Just getting her statement as a witness. These disappearances are becoming a problem, eh? Terrible times, Rre Raditladi. Terrible times. The last days, you know.”
Ntatemogolo grunts. It’s good to hear him use that special, no-nonsense grunt on someone else for a change. “I see the statement is complete. Is Connie free to go?”
“Ah, yes, of course, of course.” The officer beams at me. Man, it pays to have friends in high places. “If you think of anything else, Miss Bennett, you just call me, OK?”
I nod. His cell number is safely on my phone, though I have no intention of using it. The officer escorts us out, babbling about some book of Ntatemogolo’s that changed his life when he was still in training. I glance at Portia. She looks away. Great. I thought I was done with the whole people thinking I’m a freak thing.
“I think I’m going to go home,” I tell her. She nods at the floor.
Ntatemogolo and I finally manage to escape the policeman’s ardent fandom and get into his Venture.
“Thanks for coming,” I murmur.
“What did you tell them?”
“Nothing. Nothing important, I mean. But it looks bad. Portia obviously thinks I did some kind of voodoo on Thuli.”
Ntatemogolo starts the engine. “Don’t worry. The other disappearances were equally inexplicable. People have already decided it is witchcraft. They have no reason to suspect you. They didn’t suspect any of the people who saw Jafta vanish.”
I nod. I should try to be more optimistic, but I feel like I was hit by a truck, got up, and then got hit by a bus. It’s just one damn thing after another. I barely have time to digest one event before another one strikes.
“How did it happen? Did you see anything, any signs?”
I shake my head. “Nothing. No shimmer, no mysterious light. He just vanished. It was over in less than a second.” My mind goes back to that moment when I crouched over Thuli’s prone body. “I thought I had killed him, then I saw that he was still breathing. I was so scared. I thought I might have hurt him really badly. Maybe I did.”
He gives me a sharp look. “What do you mean?”
“I said he deserved to be taken. I meant it, too. And now he’s gone.”
“The Puppetmaster has no use for Thuli,” he assures me. “As soon as he has taken the gift, he will return him.”
“But Thuli’s not a true gifted. What if the Loosening doesn’t work on him?”
Ntatemogolo’s mouth is set in a grim line. “From what I know, it always works.”
“And what about Duma?”
Ntatemogolo is quiet for a long time. When he stops the car in front of my house he unbuckles his seat belt and turns to face me. “The drifter council called this morning. The trip to D’Kar has been postponed until Duma is found, and you are not being held responsible.”
My ears pick up the slight emphasis on the pronoun. “They’re not going to put this on Temper, are they? He wasn’t even there!”
Ntatemogolo sighs. “As cell leader it is his job to keep the others in line. You know how they handle things.”
Ja, like bloody bureaucrats. Poor Temper. This is the second time he’ll be punished for the actions of his cell brothers. I wonder what the punishment entails, then decide I’d rather not know. Drifters can be brutal.
“One more thing.” He reaches into the pocket of his old tweed jacket and retrieves an eyedropper filled with clear liquid.
I wrinkle my nose. Since Rakwena’s serum, I have an aversion to mysterious substances. “What is that?”
“A sleeping draught.” He shakes it and the liquid forms bubbles. “Potent, but safe. It prevents you from going into REM sleep. No dreams. Since your barrier slips when you sleep, you are vulnerable. This will protect you.”
I take the dropper from his hand. It’s cool and heavy, glass rather than plastic. I hold it up to my nose and sniff. Nothing. In spite of myself, I turn to look directly into my grandfather’s eyes, searching for any sign of trickery. His eyes widen. I pull my gift back and swallow, ashamed. I should trust him. I do trust him. It’s the Puppetmaster I can’t be sure of. The anklet on my foot isn’t infallible.
“I’m sorry,” I murmur.
“Don’t apologise. Caution is vital, especially for you. Be careful with that sleeping draught. You only need one tiny drop.”
I nod obediently – and then something clicks into place. “Wait – you said it would keep me from dreaming.” I look up at him. “I need to dream. I have important dreams sometimes, remember?”
He doesn’t respond, but he doesn’t have to. I see. It’s precisely those important dreams he’s trying to protect me from, because he doesn’t trust Connie Who Knows.
I look at my grandfather, swallowing the lump forming in my throat. “You still don’t believe me about the Ultima.” I can’t keep the hurt out of my voice. “You think the Puppetmaster’s done something to make me have these dreams, that he’s somehow created that green energy. You think it’s all part of his scheme.”
To my dismay, he doesn’t even try to deny it. “Yes,” he says. He’s always been honest, I’ll give him that.
“Ntatemogolo, there must be a reason he’s so interested in me. What better reason than the fact that I’m the Ultima’s vessel?”
“There are a number of reasons. Your skill. Your connection with Rakwena. This power is great. I can understand why you would assume it is the Ultima, but it is simply not possible. You think John Kubega is the first person to seek her? People have tried for thousands of years, and no one has succeeded. Believing she is real is like believing in alchemy.”
Huh. Now that Dad finally believes in the supernatural, Ntatemogolo’s become a sceptic. “John might be crazy, but he’s not stupid. If she wasn’t real he wouldn’t believe in her!”
“Perhaps he doesn’t. Perhaps he is only pretending to in order to draw you in. This is exactly the sort of convoluted deception that would appeal to a mind like his. I am not trying to hurt you, my girl,” he adds gently. “But you must remember how young you are, how inexperienced. I have been studying gifted lore all my life.”
“Then you must know all the stories. Like the old man and the boy, and the seers who went blind…”
“I know the stories. Like all legends, they are metaphorical. If you had been in this world as long as I have, you would understand why I don’t believe in the Ultima.”
“I’m not upset because you don’t believe in the Ultima,” I snap. “I’m upset because you don’t believe in me.”
“I have always believed in you, Connie.”
“Sure. That’s why you whipped up a sleeping draught. Because you have so much faith in my ability to defend myself from the Puppetmaster’s lies.”
“Not even I could defend myself. Have you forgotten? He tricked us both! When I met him all those years ago I had no idea what he was. He used me to administer the anti-drifter serum to Rakwena, and not for a moment did I suspect that I was being manipulated. You and I have been victims of this man’s machinations for too long! You have let him in too far, Connie. You have allowed him to matter to you!”
“How can he not matter? He ruined my life!”
“Exactly my point. You have to keep your distance.”
I shake my head, suddenly weary. “Ntatemogolo, you don’t get it. He and I are connected. He knows things about me before I know them myself, and that’s why I understand him better than you do. Better than anyone else. That’s why I can tell the difference between his influence and someone else’s. I know the Ultima isn’t a trick. She’s real. You’ll see.”
I open the door and climb out of the car.
“Connie. Connie!”
I keep walking. I don’t need him to believe me. Before he came home from gallivanting all over the world I dealt with my gift on my own. I managed. I feel the sting of tears, but I’m not going to cry. My world is crumbling, taking innocent (and not-so-innocent) people with it, and I have to stop it. If that means I stand alone, so be it.
I freeze at the gate. Lebz, Wiki and Kelly are sitting on the front step.
“What are you doing here?” I approach slowly. “Shouldn’t you be in school?”
“We heard the news,” Wiki explains. “We figured you’d come straight home.”
“Also it’s the first week of holidays,” adds Kelly.
“Is it true?” Lebz gets to her feet, eyes wide. “Thuli’s gone?”
I stare at them in shock. “That happened a few hours ago!” I fumble for my keys and unlock the door. I hear the rattle of Ntatemogolo’s car pulling back into the road.
“It only takes a few seconds to tweet, choma,” Lebz reminds me, following me into the house. She sits at the dining table and pats the chair next to her. “You look like you need to talk about it.”
The last thing I want to do is talk about it, but I’m going to have to fill them in eventually. I close the front door and sink into the chair. Let’s see, where do I begin? Oh, ja. The council meeting. I take a deep breath, then tell them everything.
To my surprise, I feel better afterwards. They’re kind and sympathetic. Kelly’s eyes don’t pop out of her head, not even when I explain how Thuli disappeared. She’s so at ease with all this that I’m starting to wonder whether I should be worried about her.
“Can I see the sleeping potion?” asks Wiki.
I hand it over. “Sleeping draught.”
“Semantics,” he replies, examining the dropper. “It doesn’t look like much. Any idea how potent it is?”
I shrug. “Very, knowing my grandfather. I’m sure it’ll knock me right out.”
“Cool,” says Kelly, eyeing the draught hungrily. That’s what comes of having parents in the pharmaceutical industry.
Lebz, on the other hand, radiates concern. “Connie, what are you going to do? Duma’s gone, you have no idea how to find him, you have some freaky ancient creature living inside you, and the Puppetmaster is still planning to use you to take over the world!” She pauses for breath. “And someone else has gone missing. A boy. He’s like twelve, or something.”
I shake my head sadly. Now the Puppetmaster’s targeting children?
“Connie.” I look at Lebz and see fearful tears glisten in her eyes. “You can’t do this by yourself.”
“I’m not by myself. I have you guys and Rakwena and Ntatemogolo, even if he’s being stubborn at the moment. It’s going to be fine.”
“You always say that,” she grumbles.
“And have I been wrong yet?”
“There’s a first time for everything,” Wiki murmurs.
I shoot him a dirty look. “That attitude isn’t helping.”
“I’m sorry, but Lebz is right. This isn’t kid stuff any more. We don’t even know how we can help you this time.”
“Just have my back.”
“We always have your back,” says Lebz.
“Obviously,” adds Kelly, and I smile.
* * *
Rakwena drops by later in the day. I let him in and he immediately takes me in his arms.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers. “It wasn’t your fault. I didn’t mean to shut you out yesterday. It was just a lot to take.”
“I know.” I close my eyes and soak up his energy, and when he releases me I pull away with reluctance. “How’s everyone doing?”
“Not good. Temper’s furious. He’s in trouble with the rest of the council…” He sighs. “It seems like someone’s always in trouble. We have people searching, but this isn’t our turf. We don’t really know how to deal with the Puppetmaster.”
“No one does.”
“Except you.” His gaze is pleading.
“You know I’ll do whatever I can to help. I’ve tried talking to him – he’s off the radar. But I’ll keep trying. At some point we’ll find out where he’s hiding.” I lead him to the sofa. “I guess you haven’t heard the news.”
He lowers himself onto the cushions with a frown. “What now?”
“Thuli’s been taken.” I sit beside him and go over the story again, and at the end of it I see something resembling a smile on his lips.
“Well, at least one good thing came out of all this,” he says. I expected this reaction; he was never a Thuli fan, but after that little incident in Thuli’s bedroom the freak hunter has been at the top of Rakwena’s hit list.
“We don’t know that it’s a good thing. The idea of an ungifted in the Puppetmaster’s clutches doesn’t exactly give me a warm fuzzy feeling.”
“Even if it’s Thuli?” He raises his eyebrows at me. “Come on. You must have felt a little satisfaction. Just a little.”
“Maybe a tiny bit,” I confess. “Though I was kind of preoccupied by the fact that he disappeared before my eyes.”
“Poor Connie,” he says, and he’s only half serious.
“It wasn’t like the others. I don’t think he took Thuli because of the Loosening. I think he took him because Thuli was trying to hurt me.”
Rakwena tenses. “You think he was protecting you?”
“Well, it wouldn’t help his plans if Thuli strangled me to death.”
Rakwena withdraws his hand. I sense his discomfort, but he doesn’t say a word. I reach for his mind.
“Your barrier’s grown stronger,” I muse.
“Ja.” He looks at me with a thoughtful frown. “You know, the boys say all their gifts seem stronger around you. Like what we did when we fought the army. We couldn’t do that before, and we haven’t been able to do it since. We tried. We couldn’t synchronise our gifts that way, make them work together. It was you.”
I shake my head. “It was her.”
He falls silent and looks down at his hands. “Are you scared of her?”
“No.”
“Don’t you think you should be?”
I lean back into the cushions. “She’s on our side. She wants to stop the Loosening.”
“How can you possibly know that?”
I heave an impatient sigh. “That’s like asking how I know my conscience is on my side. I just know, OK? The Ultima is a pain in the butt, but she’s a force for good.”
“OK. Let’s say she is good. That doesn’t mean she’s not also dangerous.”
I shoot him a defiant glance.
“You don’t control her,” he continues. “She controls you. Knowing that, how can you not be scared?”
I don’t know how to explain this to him. I sit quietly for a moment, trying to see things from his perspective. Rakwena and I are alike in certain ways, but very different in others. He spent his whole life terrified of his drifter nature. I’ve been ambivalent about my gift. There were times I even hated it. But I’ve never been afraid of it. It’s part of me. I understand it, and I can’t fear what I understand.
When we’re afraid of something, on an instinctive biological level where rational thought has no place, we want only one thing – the annihilation of the thing we fear. Fear knows no reason. It’s fight or flight, and you choose one. Rakwena had no choice. He couldn’t run from his enemy because it’s in his DNA. All he could do was try to kill it, in the misguided belief that killing it would save him. He didn’t see the truth that was so clear to the rest of us – his enemy was not a separate entity, a parasite in his body that he could expel. It was bound to him.
That’s how I feel about the Ultima. She’s not me…and yet she is. She’s not a demon to be exorcised. She’s in my body, and as long as that’s true fighting her is like fighting myself. I can resist her. I can argue and refuse to listen, but that will only get me in trouble. What happened at the warehouse is proof of that. She may have invaded my body and turned my life upside down, but now I’m her vessel and she’s my backup power source. We need each other.
“In the beginning I was scared,” I admit, curling my legs under me. “I didn’t know what was going on. There was something different inside me, something I’d never experienced before. But I was only scared because I didn’t know what it was. I know now.” I look at him, hoping he’ll understand. I can take Ntatemogolo’s doubt, but not Rakwena’s. I need Rakwena in my corner. “I don’t like her, but…I trust her.”
I can see the confusion on his face. He’s struggling to comprehend. “Connie…” His jaw snaps shut, tense with frustration. “How can you trust her when you don’t even know what she is? Is she some kind of spiritual being? An angel? A demon? Is she a form of old earth magic? An alien?”
I lift my shoulders in a shrug.
“And yet you’re willing to let her use your body – your gift – however she pleases?”
I manage a half-smile. “It’s not like she asked permission.”
“But you’re going along with it.”
I nod.
He shakes his head. “What happened while I was gone? You’re different.”
My heart drops and I swallow hard. “Good different?”
He frowns. “I don’t know. Yes, I guess. More confident.” He sighs and reaches for my hand, his tingle running from my fingertips right up my arm. “I trust you. You know that, right?” He waits for my nod before continuing. “But I don’t get this. You have these weird relationships with weird people. The Puppetmaster – John to you – is your enemy, and yet the two of you have this…connection. You’re in each other’s heads. It’s like a secret language that shuts the rest of the world out. And now there’s this Ultima who body-snatches you, and you act like she’s a divine messenger!”
I’m disappointed that he doesn’t get it, but it was unrealistic to expect him to.
“Connie.” I look up into his face. “I’m worried about you.” His fingers brush my cheek and a fiery tingle runs through me.
I can see it coming. I should stop it. I know I should…but I don’t want to. His lips brush mine ever so lightly. The tingle leaps into my jaw. I close my eyes…and see the faces of the council. What am I thinking? They’ll never let us be together. I press my hand against his chest and push him away.
“I miss you,” he breathes, but missing me won’t change a thing.
“You know this won’t work.”
He slumps back against the cushions. “So what do you want? You want us to be buddies? Like you and Wiki? Hang out, give each other advice?” He slams his fist into a cushion and I catch a whiff of burning fibres. “I don’t want to be your buddy!”
“Nobody cares what you want!” I snatch the cushion out of his reach before he does any further damage. “You’re not in charge. The rules say we can’t be together, and maybe they’re right.”
His eyes widen. “You don’t mean that.”
“How is a relationship between us going to work? Are you going to go against your cell, like your father?” I shake my head. “I know you. If they forbid you from seeing me you’ll get in your car and disappear. Sure, you’ll miss me, but you’ll get over it. The world is full of girls! You’ll be fine.”
He stares at me for what feels like a lifetime. This time I don’t see it coming. He grabs me, and there is nothing sweet or romantic about it. It’s almost an attack. He kisses me hard, in anger, but even then I long to lose myself in it, to surrender to the energy coursing through me. But I can’t. I push him away again.
“Does that feel like something you can just get over?” There’s a blue dot in each of his eyes, growing with each breath. “Tell me you’re not going to be thinking about that kiss, replaying it in your mind every chance you get.”
“You’re not that good,” I snap breathlessly. “And even if you were, it’s just biology!” My heart is pounding, but it doesn’t feel like biology. It feels like magic.
Rakwena makes a disgusted sound and gets to his feet. “I have to go.”
I stare at him, annoyed. Why do I have to be the voice of reason? I don’t like that role. It doesn’t suit me. “Hey, why are you upset? Did I ask you to kiss me?” I follow him to the door.
“Obviously I made a mistake.” He opens the door and then stops to glance at me. “We’ll talk later, buddy.”
I roll my eyes at his retreating back. “Don’t be such a baby!”
“Sorry, pal,” he calls over his shoulder, kicking the gate open.
Ugh! Boys. Can’t he see that I’m right? In a perfect world there would be no drifter code, but we don’t live in a perfect world and we have to act accordingly. I watch him drive off in a huff, and slam the door shut. He’s so damn cocky, assuming his lips have some kind of supernatural effect on me. Well, they do, but he has no business taking that for granted.
He’s right, though. Until Dad hurries into the house about two hours later, the kiss is almost all I can think about.
Dad drops his briefcase on the dining table and rushes over to me, eyes wide.
“Are you OK, love? I heard the news. They say someone in your office disappeared, and you were the only witness!”
The romantic bubble bursts, and I’m back in the world of kidnappings and Puppetmasters. “I’m fine, Dad.”
“How can you be fine? You’ve witnessed two abductions in as many days, both of them rather close to home.” He touches my forehead and cheeks with the back of his hand, as though supernatural kidnappings are known to induce a fever. “You must be distraught.”
I sigh. “I’m OK.”
“Have you had anything to eat?”
I shake my head. I haven’t even thought about food.
“Should I make you a sandwich?”
I resist a smile. A sandwich is about the only thing he can make without burning down the house. “No, thanks.”
He sinks onto the sofa beside me. “This Puppetmaster business is getting out of hand.”
Oh, you don’t know the half of it, I think to myself. “I’m working on it. But right now I think I’m going to crash, if that’s OK.”
“Of course.” He kisses my forehead. “I wish there was something I could do. Tea?” he suggests hopefully. “With lemon and honey?”
“We’ve never had honey in this house, Dad.”
“With lemon?”
“I don’t think we have lemons, either.”
“Just tea, then?”
I laugh. “Sure. Thanks.”
I head to my room to change, and a moment later he knocks and enters with a steaming mug of milky tea.
He watches me carefully, as though he’s afraid I might have a sudden breakdown. I’m amazed he hasn’t broken down himself.
“You know, we could go to the UK,” he says suddenly. “Get away from it all.”
I blow on the tea, then set the mug down on my bedside table. “Away from what? The Puppetmaster?”
He nods. “Just for a little while.”
I smile at his naivety. “He’ll just fly after us.”
His face pales. “Please tell me you’re talking about flying in a plane.”
I bite my lip to keep from giggling. “Actually, he has a spaceship.”
“Ha ha,” he grumbles, before wishing me goodnight and closing the door.
I shake my head, pull back my duvet, climb into bed and pick up the mug. I’ve just taken the first sweet sip when I feel the Puppetmaster’s consciousness come barging into my head without knocking, as usual.
You still owe me one meeting.
I put the mug down again. I don’t owe you a damn thing.
You’re upset. I understand.
I’m more than upset! You tricked me, you twisted bastard!
I apologise. A necessary deception.
Aren’t they all, where you’re concerned?
He doesn’t answer. Instead he says, in that infuriating paternal tone, You gave quite an impressive performance, my dear, but you still have work to do. You’ve abandoned the puzzle box. I think you should make another attempt to solve it.
I ignore him. Tell me how to find you.
Not yet.
Where the hell is Duma? What are you doing to him? And Thuli?
That fool. I thought you’d be pleased to be rid of him.
Pleased? Are you nuts?
If you really want to know where they are, come to the house tomorrow. Ten a.m.
And the sneaky psychopath is gone, leaving me, as always, with no choice.
* * *
The next morning I call in sick. My boss is all soothing tones and sympathetic murmurs, and I know the office must be buzzing with gossip. They probably think I’m too traumatised to show my face. Just as well – I need some time off.
I leave the house early as though I’m going to work, but instead take my time getting to Block 8. The combi drops me off near Airport Junction and I walk the rest of the way. By the time I reach the Puppetmaster’s house, it’s quarter to nine.
I try the gate; it’s locked. I analyse the lock with my gift, but unfortunately for me it’s a regular lock, not a magical one. I roll my eyes, but it makes sense. It’s not like there’s anything in there to protect.
I hear footsteps behind me and turn around. Emily stops short, staring at me.
“Morning, soldier,” I chirp.
She scowls. “You’re early.”
“I made a special effort.”
She unlocks the gate and struts into the yard. I follow. There’s no house. The yard is empty apart from bags of cement and other construction materials. I wonder what Emily’s doing here. She certainly didn’t come to prepare refreshments for the meeting.
“Can’t you go away and come back later?” she snaps. What a friendly child. Such lovely manners.
“I’ll wait.” I look around, but there’s nowhere to sit. “Why are you here?”
Ignoring me, she walks across the yard to the back wall, squats and starts rummaging through the rubble. I follow, curious. She unearths a small box, dusts it off and rises.
“You know, Connie, instead of wasting time trying to annoy me you should be working on the puzzle box.” She turns to face me. “Have you made any progress at all?”
“Nope. What’s in that box?”
“The puzzle box is important.”
“To John. Not to me.” That’s a lie, but she doesn’t need to know that. “You know how to get to the Loosening, don’t you?”
She shrugs. “Doesn’t matter. I’m not telling you.”
Clearly someone’s forgotten I’m a telepath. I hit her mind hard and her barrier trembles but remains intact. Her eyes narrow. I rally and prepare to try again.
That’s not how ladies should behave.
My gift snaps back, and Emily’s shoulders sag with relief. I turn to see the Puppetmaster standing behind us. His figure is flickering – the projected image is taking more energy than he can spare.
I hear the gate open and close – Emily’s gone. With a sigh I turn my full attention to my host. “Couldn’t come in person?”
Alas, dastardly deeds are time-consuming, he replies. Welcome to the final chapter.
I already know how your story ends. You started the Loosening years ago to steal gifts from your friends. That’s how you became a sorcerer and shape shifter. And now you can’t stop it.
He smiles and shakes his head. Not quite, my dear, not quite. He waves one hand at the barren yard. I’m not going to bother with special effects today. I’m just going to tell it like it is.
That’ll be a first.
We’ve come to the end of my story, and the beginning of yours.
What does that mean?
Haven’t you guessed yet?
I frown at his thin, elongated features. The Ultima. That’s where we stopped – your quest to find her. And now you think you have.
Oh, I know I have. He smiles, and as always it makes me cringe. I didn’t gain my powers through treachery, by the way. I gained them through effort. I taught myself sorcery. Once I mastered it, shape shifting became far easier.
How can you teach yourself sorcery? It’s a gift!
For most, yes. But what is it, really, beyond learning to manipulate energy? I’m not saying it was easy. On the contrary – it took me over half a century to master it. But I’m a patient man. You of all people should know that.
I watch him through narrowed eyes, pushing aside a thread of reluctant admiration. He taught himself a gift. I suspect there are very few people who would attempt such a thing, and even fewer who would succeed. But this new piece of information raises another question. If you could teach yourself gifts, why start the Loosening?
He clasps his hands together beneath his pointy chin. The Ultima has always existed. When great darkness threatened the world of the gifted, she used a vessel to dispel it. You are not the first, and you won’t be the last. I found tentative evidence of her presence at least once in recorded history, but it was impossible to know how long it would be until her next incarnation. Wars and disasters aren’t enough to move her. She is drawn only by supernatural events of great magnitude.
You can imagine my dilemma. I was desperate to find her, and yet I knew that only a supernatural catastrophe could bring her back. What were the odds that such an event would take place in my lifetime? Slim. Almost non-existent. I had to get creative.
Oh, no. I gape at him as the knobs and dials in my head click into place. That’s why you did it. The Loosening was the most dangerous spell you knew of, the only thing big enough to lure the Ultima out of hiding!
Yes, he says, without a trace of shame. He doesn’t even seem to realise the enormity of what he’s done. I knew of the ritual, but I also knew that there had been Loosenings before and the Ultima didn’t stir. A typical Loosening only covers one area – maybe the size of a football pitch, or smaller, depending on its purpose. I needed something bigger, something that would cover not one town or even one country, but the greater part of the planet.
I swallow, trying to imagine myself unravelling a spell of that magnitude, and failing.
People like thinking in straight lines, the Puppetmaster continues. They dismiss a phenomenon as impossible because they don’t understand how it works, but nothing is impossible. Difficult, yes. Complex and extremely fragile. But after all I had already accomplished I saw no reason it couldn’t be done. It took me a few years to set the markers, and several decades to build my gift enough to begin the ritual.
I thought the potential of the ritual would be enough to draw her, but still the Ultima hid. Then I saw the first signs that she was starting to waken. Certain unspoiled places in the world began to give off more energy. She has to keep things in balance, you see, and my Loosening tilted the global energy levels. So I waited.
And then you found her.
He beams. His taut skin stretches painfully across his skull, his teeth like polished pearls. Yes. Coiled inside the tiny body of an unborn child. You, Princess.
I wish you wouldn’t call me that.
But that’s what you are. Once I found you I had to wait for you to come of age. In the meantime I was preparing to begin the ritual. When it was finally time, I went over the markers and examined them one by one, and I realised something was wrong. One of the markers – one very close to us – was giving off enormous amounts of energy that threw the whole thing off balance.
Something tugs at my memory, but it slips back into the depths before I can grasp it.
But it didn’t matter, because you were almost ready. You, my dear, are my true goal.
Uh-oh. I sense we’re wading into lunacy here, and I’d like a minute to grab a life jacket. I take a step backwards, though I know this weak projection can’t hurt me. I thought your goal was to become the greatest sorcerer who ever lived and rule the gifted world.
He shakes his head. I wanted to rule our world once, but when I learned about the Ultima I knew she’d never let me. She has chosen a ruler. It was always her choice to make, and I was the instrument by which it would all come to pass.
OK, where’s that life jacket? He’s sinking fast, and I’m afraid he’s taking me with him.
You were born a princess, and soon you will become a queen and rule over all the gifted with your lover at your side. A real-life fairy tale.
I blink at him. You’re out of your mind.
He laughs. You’re everything a queen should be! Good, noble and strong. All I’ve done since I discovered my true purpose was to prepare you for your destiny. It must happen, to save the gifted from their own complacency, to raise them to their full potential! You were born to rule the gifted world.
I swallow. I’m feeling a little light-headed. If I’m supposed to rule over the gifted, what’s Rakwena’s job? To be my trophy prince?
To contain your power, of course. You, as the Definitive Gifted Soul, can control all the gifts in the world. He, as the ultimate vessel, can store them all. He can absorb vast amounts of energy – energy you will control. The connection between the two of you is clearly the hand of fate at work.
This is too much for me. My jaw drops, and it takes me a minute to form a coherent thought. You want to use Rakwena as some kind of bank for gifts?
Yes. He’s perfect, you see?
No, I don’t see! He’s a person, not an ATM!
You’re not looking at the bigger picture, my dear.
I’m not your dear!
He nods and smiles. It will take time to adjust to the idea, but it’s inevitable. You are about to be crowned, and there is nothing you can do to fight it.
I can refuse!
Did the Ultima ask permission before she inhabited your body? You can’t fight her. No one can.
This can’t be happening. He can’t really believe what he’s saying. Me and Rakwena, ruling over the gifted? How would that even work? Does he plan to spirit all the gifted away and start his own kingdom in the ether? The scary thing is that I can actually see it unfold in my mind like a dystopian bedtime story. Camelot on crystal meth, or something. I’ll wear a tiara and Rakwena will have a big sword with a stupid name. The Puppetmaster has made no secret of his disdain towards the ungifted, or his belief in gifted unity. But this?
Imagine it, Conyza, he breathes. All the gifted standing together. One tribe with a common purpose, working towards the betterment of our kind. It will be wonderful.
Sure, if we lived in the pages of a comic book. This is the real world, John.
It should be different. It can be different.
That’s not your choice to make! Are you going to force the gifted to co-operate?
His smile fades.
I shake my head, clinging to the last bit of sanity in this conversation. OK, forget the gifted. You can control them, but you can’t control the Ultima. She’ll leave my body as soon as she cleans up the mess you made. That’s how she works, isn’t it? She comes in, fixes the problem and goes. You can’t keep her in one place.
His eyes narrow slightly, and his thin lips curl up in the corners. On a normal face it would be a smirk. On this face it resembles a tortured smile, like a clown with a toothache. Either way, it means trouble.
What have you done?
He blinks innocently. You should really get cracking on that puzzle box, my dear.
John, what have you done? You have to see that this is crazy! It’s a fantasy – it’s never going to work! I take a deep breath. Just tell me how to reach the Loosening and we can make it go away before it gets out of control.
I’m afraid it’s already out of my hands.
What does that mean?
Once you solve the puzzle box you will be brought here, to the vortex of the Loosening. You can’t arrive here any other way, not while the spell is protected by my concealments. So you see, solving the puzzle box is the only way to stop it. You have to do it.
John –
I can’t keep it hidden for much longer, and once it becomes visible to the ungifted… He turns up his palms in a gesture of helplessness. Hurry, Conyza. Time is running out.
John, wait a minute! Oh, bloody – he’s gone again, leaving me alone in the yard.
Fear creeps into my heart. Megalomania, while frightening, is easy enough to understand. But a villain who wants me to rule is something else entirely.
I turn towards the gate. The Puppetmaster is insane, but he’s right about one thing. If the Loosening spins beyond its boundaries there’ll be no stopping it. Everyone – gifted and ungifted alike – will be in danger.