Chapter 23

 

 

Grace blinked. Her eyes took a moment to adjust to the strange light. When she realized where she was, she found herself in another quaint little one-room cottage like those in Kinlochleven.

She couldn’t be in Kinlochleven, though, because this cottage stood perfectly intact. A fire blazed on the hearth, and a young woman sat in a rocking chair beside it, gazing into the flames.

Grace went down on her knees by the chair. “Alexis!”

The girl turned her bright eyes on Grace. “Hi!”

“What are you doing here, Alexis?” Grace asked.

“I don’t know.” Alexis looked around the cottage like she was seeing it for the first time. “I just… I just sort of came here.”

“Do you have any idea where you are?” Grace asked. “Do you know where this is?”

“Not really.” Alexis studied the floor at her feet. “I just wanted to be somewhere comfortable and out of the way, so I came here.”

Grace took a deep breath. “Listen to me, Alexis. I know it sounds crazy, and I know you want to be somewhere comfortable and out of the way. I don’t want to bother you, but I need to ask you a favor. I know I’m nothing but a stranger, but I really need your help right now.”

“Sure thing,” Alexis chirped. “What do you need?”

“There’s something happening right now, something really dangerous. I don’t know much about it, but I think you might be the only person who can stop it. Someone I care about a lot is in danger, and you’re the only one who can save him. As a matter of fact, there are quite a few people in danger. I know you wouldn’t want to stay somewhere comfortable and out of the way if there was anything you could do to help them.”

A shadow of doubt crossed the girl’s face. “No, I wouldn’t, but what can I do? I can’t do anything. I’m just one person.”

“I know, but I really think you can. Are you willing to try if I help you?”

“Sure. Just tell me what you want me to do.”

“Well, the first thing you need to do,” Grace told her, “is to transport yourself there the same way you transported yourself here. Think about it and concentrate. You were somewhere not comfortable and not out of the way, and you wanted to leave, so you came here. Now you’re going to do the same thing. Think about those people who are in danger, and think about going out there and helping them. Then you’ll go there. Just make sure you take me with you. Okay?”

“Okay,” Alexis replied, but she didn’t seem very sure about it.

“Once you get there, you’ll see what you need to do.”

“Are you sure?” Alexis asked.

“Well, not really, but it’s our best shot.”

Alexis turned back to the fire. She rocked back in the chair. “Something weird is going on. I don’t know what it is. There have been so many strange things going on, and I don’t know how to stop it.”

“Can you remember what happened?” Grace asked. “Can you remember how you got here in the first place? Did it have something to do with Ivy.”

“I can’t really remember anything. I remember I was lying in my bed in our room, and Ivy was in her bed. She was talking to me as usual, and we were both drifting off to sleep. She was telling me this story about a princess in a land of dragons and magic and spells and all that. She was telling me this princess used a magic spell to do…something or other. I can’t remember what. I think there was a wicked witch in a castle that made all the people disappear, and this princess had to work the spell to save them all and help a hidden prince get back his throne so he could become King. Ivy started repeating the magic words. She kept repeating them over and over, and I remember her voice got more and more slurred as she fell asleep. I started to fall asleep, too, and that’s the last thing I remember.”

Grace sat back on her heels. “That must be how it happened. She must have cast the spell and sent you both here.”

“I wish I could see her again. I would give anything to see Ivy right now.”

Grace grabbed her shoulders. “Don’t think about Ivy right now. You’re not going to Ivy right now. Think about those people who need your help. Think about them running through the woods and trying to save their children from monsters. That’s the best way you can help them right now.”

“What about your friend?” Alexis asked.

“He’s there, too. He’s fighting them.” Even as she said these words, Grace realized they were true. Oh, Jamie, where was he right now? Was she too late already? “He’s fighting these monsters, but he can’t win. He’s only one man, and they have all the power. He’ll die if you don’t help him.”

Alexis nodded. “Okay. I’ll do it.”

Grace got to her feet, and Alexis stood up. That’s when Grace noticed certain details of the cottage she’d seen before. A shield hung on the wall by the bed. The Cameron family crest emblazoned its surface. A sword hung on a wooden hook behind the door. A dirk with a deer-antler handle stuck out of a leather holster on the belt.

Grace blinked. She’d been inside this cottage once before with Jamie. This was the cottage where she slept on the bench that first night. Jamie called it Ganny and Jock’s cottage. The roof didn’t cave in at one corner, though. The place showed no sign it was ever broken.

Grace went to the door and looked out. All around her, the village houses stood up as tall and perfect as the first day she set foot in this village. Alexis’s magic must have restored it. She wanted to go somewhere comfortable and out of the way, and her mind fixed the village for her.

Grace inhaled a shaky breath. She couldn’t get distracted by this now. She had a job to do, and Alexis needed all the guidance Grace could give her. She returned to the girl’s chair. “Are you ready?”

Alexis nodded.

“Okay. Do it.”

Alexis frowned again. “There’s something else.”

“What?” Grace asked.

“There’s something else. There’s other people who need my help, but they aren’t running around in the trees. They’re somewhere else.”

“Can you see who they are?”

Alexis shook her head. “They need me, though. I should go to them, too.”

“You can go to them afterwards.”

“There’s a hole in the fabric,” Alexis replied. “I don’t know how it got there, but I have to close the hole. All these monsters are coming through the holes.”

Grace studied the girl. Where had she heard this before? “Do you know how to fix it?”

Alexis shook her head. “Not really. I don’t know how to do any of it, but I bet Ivy does. She knows stuff like that.”

“Does Ivy play around with magic and stuff?”

“I don’t know half of what Ivy does,” Alexis replied. “She could be doing all this, for all I know.”

Grace nodded. “Okay. Let’s get out of here. Once it’s all over, you can come back here or you can decide to go somewhere else.”

“I don’t really want to go,” Alexis admitted. “I don’t want to go anywhere. I’d rather stay here. I like it here.”

Grace smiled. “Me, too. I love it here. I never wanted to go anywhere else. Let’s just get this done, and then you can come back.”

“Okay.”

“Think about those people who need you. Think about the people who are going to die if you don’t help them. Don’t think about anything else.”

Alexis nodded. Her eyes glazed over, and she stared into the fire. Grace recognized that look. The same thing happened to her when she passed through the doorway. She would never pass through that doorway again. She would stay here, in this world, forever.

Alexis blinked, and the cottage shivered. The image of the firelit hearth, the scrubbed wooden table, the rocking chair—all of it winked out and vanished, and Grace found herself standing in a bare stone cave.

The cave mouth looked out over the wide mountains. Dense, dark forest covered the valley floor. Grace recognized Piper’s cave, but she didn’t see the old man anywhere.

At that moment, a golden dragon zoomed past the opening going a mile a minute. The wind screamed off its scales, and it rocketed out of sight as fast as it appeared. The next instant, a massive giant thundered across the gap. It charged after the dragon and vanished just as fast.

Grace took a few tentative steps to the cave mouth and looked out. Giants covered the landscape as far as the eye could see. She couldn’t see Jamie anywhere anymore. All over the place, giants smashed their way through the forest. They cleared wide swathes of forest with their clubs. They pulverized the mountains all around, and their towering bulk blocked out the sky.