He rezzed his talent still higher and carried Sedona through the eerie silence of the ghost zone that he created around them. He held his locater in one hand and the flamer in the other. He struggled to read the nav screen as he cradled Sedona and kept the sphere in place. Lyle rode his shoulder.
Everything that entered the spectral dimension created by his talent, including the storm psi, flatlined until he had passed out of range.
“You’re good,” Sedona whispered. “Very good.”
“I can’t maintain the zone for long,” he said. “I’m using too much energy.”
“Because you’re protecting all three of us. I understand. We’re aiming for the cave, I assume?”
“Yes.”
In spite of the dire circumstances, or perhaps because of them, the realization that she didn’t fear him lifted his spirits as nothing else except the reopening of the gate could have done. He glanced at the compass and changed direction slightly.
“Give me the locater and the flamer,” she said. She plucked both from his fingers. “I may be psi-burned but I can still read an amber compass and rez a flamer.” She hesitated. “Assuming both will work if I’m the one who’s holding them?”
“They’ll work as long as you’re in physical contact with me.”
“Okay, I’ll keep us on course while you concentrate on maintaining this ghost world thing you’ve got going.”
He did not argue. She was right. They needed each other if there was any hope of surviving the storm and the night to come.
With the blazing energy quiescent within the dead zone he could see clearly inside the radius of the energy field that he was generating. When he drew close, the eerie blue trees with their sapphire leaves lost their inner psi-glow as if they had been turned into clear glass. The gemstone pebbles beneath his boots became a dull, lifeless gray.
If the forest had been a living ecosystem, all of the plant life would have wilted. Any creatures—human or otherwise—that fell within the zone would slide into an unconscious state. If he kept up the pressure for too long, everything he touched with his talent would die.
But he was moving quickly through the crystal forest. As soon as he was out of range the inner light returned to the world. The blue glow once again infused the trees and the leaves and the stones. The silently howling winds of the psi-storm returned as well.
“Left one degree,” Sedona said. “We’re less than twenty yards away now.”
“Are you sure?” he asked.
“Of course, I’m sure.”
“Okay, okay, just checking.”
She concentrated on the compass, reading off directions as if they were driving down an ordinary highway. For some inexplicable reason he smiled, even as his spectral touch drained the colors out of another stand of trees.
Sedona squinted up at him. “Something funny that I should know about?”
“Road trip,” he said.
She got it immediately, flashing him a weak but real smile. “And we all know men have a problem when it comes to following directions.”
“That’s just a myth.”
“Good to know. Right one degree. About fifteen feet. The entrance to the cave should appear any second now.”
“It should appear?”
The last of her smile vanished. “It did occur to me that the storm might have messed up the compass.”
“Not within the zone,” he said.
“What zone? Oh, you mean the area covered by your talent?”
“The dead zone,” he said.
She moved the hand holding the compass in a vague gesture that looked to be the equivalent of a shrug. “But things aren’t dead inside the radius of your aura. They just sort of go to sleep.”
“If I kept up this level of heat for long and if this forest was alive, I would kill everything I touched within a matter of minutes.”
“Oh, yeah? Then why am I still breathing? And what about Lyle? He looks quite perky to me.”
The question irritated him. “The reason you and Lyle are okay is because I’m not focusing on your auras.”
“You know what they say when it comes to talent. Focus is everything.” Sedona stiffened. “Look, there’s the cave. I can see the boulders in front. You did it, Cyrus. We made it. Wow, you really are good.”
He was about to tell her that no one, including the members of his own family, considered his talent a good thing but Lyle suddenly became active. He rose on his hind paws and chortled.
“You can put me down now,” Sedona said. “I can stand on my own two feet long enough to get past those big rocks.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m sure.”
He set her down carefully. She scrambled over the boulders and into the glowing blue cave. Lyle bounded down to the nearest quartz rock and bounced after Sedona, disappearing into the hot blue shadows.
Cyrus lowered his talent and followed Sedona and Lyle into the cave. He was relieved to discover that the interior was free of storm energy. The blue psi locked in the quartz walls glowed softly but steadily, impervious to the heavy psi that surged and churned outside.
“Henderson was right about the energy levels in here,” Sedona said. “The para-radiation from the quartz seems to be suppressing the psi outside.”
Experimentally Cyrus rezzed his talent again. The glowing blue walls started to dim. He shut it down quickly.
“But it doesn’t shut down human psi,” he said. “I can still use my senses in here.”
Sedona surveyed the radiant cave walls. “It’s similar to being inside the tunnels or in the Rainforest, except that all of the energy is coming from the blue ultralight end of the spectrum.”
“Henderson survived for a couple of hours in this cave so with luck that means there won’t be any nasty surprises.” He took the flamer from Sedona. “But I’m going to do a walk-through, just in case.”
Flamer in hand, he moved through the cavern. Sedona trailed after him. Lyle dashed on ahead. The dust bunny appeared curious but there was no indication that he was alarmed. He still had all four eyes open but he was fully fluffed.
The cave was littered with glowing rocks of various sizes but there were no signs of plant or animal life. There was, however, a whisper of humidity in the atmosphere.
“Feels a little damp,” he said.
“Yes, it does.” Sedona looked around. “I wonder if there’s water nearby?”
The question was answered by Lyle. Chortling enthusiastically, he dashed around a corner and vanished from sight. A few seconds later there was the unmistakable sound of a small splash.
“Trust Lyle to find a swimming hole in the middle of a frozen forest,” Sedona said.
When they rounded the twist in the cavern they saw Lyle. He was paddling in circles around a pool of water that glowed as blue as the rocks.
Sedona went forward, crouched on the rim of the pool, and dipped one hand in the water.
“It’s warm,” she announced, straightening. “Must be a hot spring somewhere underground.”
Cyrus went to the edge and looked down into the depths of the water. The water was crystal clear and the view of the blue stone sides of the pool was laser-sharp. But the bottom curved off and away, making it impossible to see the source of the spring.
“It’s probably being fed by a deep aquifer heated by volcanic activity,” he said.
He reached into his pack and took out the packet of test strips that he carried. Crouching, he dipped one of the strips into the pool and glanced at the reading.
“Well?” Sedona asked.
“It’s safe to drink or swim in but Lyle is the only one who is going to take a bath in it.”
“Don’t worry, I don’t intend go into the water,” Sedona said. “I’ve heard Charlotte and Rachel and the others talk about the creatures that escaped from that ancient Alien aquarium awhile back. They say some of them made it into the flooded caves here on the island. Rachel’s little pal, Darwina, almost got eaten by one. I’d better get Lyle out of there.”
“Good luck,” Cyrus said. “Looks like he’s having a fine time.”
Lyle splashed happily, unperturbed by the mysterious blue depths of the pool.
Sedona crouched beside the spring again and held out her hand. “Come out of there, Lyle. Please.”
As far as Cyrus could tell, Lyle wasn’t the least bit concerned but he seemed to get the message that Sedona was worried. He scrambled out of the pool and shook the water from his fur. Then he scurried over to her and made reassuring noises.
Sedona straightened again and looked around. “Who would have guessed there was a hot pool here? Evidently not everything in this place has been frozen into crystal or quartz.”
“If the monsters inhabit Wonderland, they would need fresh water to survive.”
Sedona shuddered. “And something to eat.”
“The food supply may be running low,” Cyrus said. “That could be why the predators have been driven to hunt aboveground in the Preserve.”
Sedona glanced thoughtfully at the blue pool. “Whatever was hunting us may decide to come here for a drink.”
“Maybe, but I don’t think so. There’s nothing to indicate that any living creature has been inside here for a very long time. Regardless, we don’t have much choice. We need shelter from that psi-storm and this is the only place that’s available.”
“Understood.” Sedona glanced at Lyle who was now engrossed with some of the glowing pebbles. “The good news is that my pal over there makes a good early-warning system. I’m sure he’ll alert us if anything dangerous tries to enter the cave.”
“Sounds like a plan. Time for you to crash.”
She searched his face. “What about you? I’m not the only one who burned a lot of energy a short time ago. You must need some rest.”
“I’ll be okay,” he said. “Putting up an umbrella doesn’t take as much energy as . . . some things.”
Her lips twitched. “An umbrella?”
He started back toward the front of the cave. “That’s what it feels like when I crank up my talent the way I did to get us through the storm.”
“A psi-umbrella. Interesting concept.”
“That’s me, the guy with the umbrella.” He stopped when he realized that she was not following him. “I thought you decided you weren’t going to take a swim in that pool.”
“I’m not but if you don’t mind, I’d like to take advantage of the facilities. I’ll be along in a minute.”
“The facilities?” He went blank. Then he realized what she meant. The larger rocks offered some measure of privacy. “Right. I’ll wait here. I don’t want either of us to get too far out of visual range of the other.”
“Don’t worry. Same protocol as working the tunnels or the Rainforest. Partners aren’t supposed to lose track of one another.”
Partners. Well, that’s what they were, he thought. For now at any rate. It wasn’t nearly as good as being lovers, but it was a big step up from being Guild boss and contract employee.
“That’s the rule,” he said. “Partner.”
By the time they both finished using the facilities, it was obvious that Sedona was having a tough time staying awake. Cyrus knew that she was barely hanging on but she was fighting the deep sleep she needed so desperately.
“You’re afraid to go under, aren’t you?” he asked.
“Well, yes. We’re in an unknown place with unknown energy and unknown predators.”
“Listen to me, Sedona. You’ll be fine,” he said. “Lyle and I will watch over you. Go to sleep.”
She searched his face for a long moment and then she seemed to come to a decision.
“Not like I can stop it, anyway,” she said.
“Nope. Let go, Sedona. You’ve got friends to watch your back.”
She finally managed a shaky smile. “Yes, I do. And I signed on with a Guild boss who never leaves a member of the team behind.”
“You got that right.”
It all came down to whether or not she trusted him, he thought. He did not realize he was holding his breath until she nodded once and patted a yawn.
“Okay,” she said.
He spread an emergency blanket on the stone floor. She sank down onto it, her back to the wall, her legs straight out in front of her. He lowered himself beside her.
She leaned her head on his shoulder and closed her eyes. “Wake me if the monsters show up.”
“I’ll do that.”
She was asleep in the next breath. Gingerly he put an arm around her. When she did not flinch away he settled her more comfortably against his side and leaned back against the wall of the cave.
Lyle scooted across the glowing stone floor and settled down next to Sedona’s denim-clad thigh. He closed all four eyes and promptly went off into dust bunny dreamland.
“Life’s simple for you, isn’t it?” Cyrus said very softly. “Any day is a good day so long as you survive to play another day.”
Lyle twitched one ear.
“As mottos go, that one’s not bad,” Cyrus said. “But we humans have a penchant for complicating stuff that probably shouldn’t be all that complicated.”
Like the fierce mix of emotions that he was feeling for the woman who was sleeping so soundly, so trustingly, at his side. He tried to come up with a description of their current relationship.
For now Sedona was his responsibility. His contract employee. A member of the team. His partner in surviving this strange new country in the Underworld.
All of the labels were correct but none of them felt right.
He sat quietly for a time, watching the blizzard of psi flash and burn across the entrance of the cave. It reminded him of the static that sometimes showed up on a vintage rez-screen. But unlike the snow on the old screens the stuff blowing outside the cavern looked potentially lethal. He was not at all certain that he and Sedona would have survived the storm if they had not found shelter.
But they were reasonably safe for now, he decided. With luck the storm would blow itself out in the next few hours. There was no reason Sedona would not be able to open the gate again. The only trick would be getting out of the crystal forest without running into the predators that hunted with music.
Sedona stirred a little in her sleep and leaned more heavily against him.
He looked down at her. Several locks of her witchy black hair had come free of the clip she had used to secure it in a knot. In sleep, the wariness and the subtle tension that sharpened her features and burned in her eyes receded. He knew that what lay beneath the cautious, sometimes brittle surface was a resilient spirit and a surprising streak of optimism.
There were other qualities, as well. It was courage and a sense of responsibility that had been on display today when she had stood her ground, holding the gate open, as he got his men to safety. She must have known in that moment that she would not make it through, herself.
He eased her down into a more comfortable position with her head pillowed on his thigh. She was too deep into the crash now to be awakened by such a small shift in position. It was possible to drag someone out of a deep post-burn sleep, but you never knew for sure how the individual would respond. The person was likely to awaken dazed and disoriented—trapped in the no-man’s-land between the dreamstate and the waking state.
He assessed his own status and concluded that he had told Sedona the truth when he said he wasn’t going to crash.
Like most hunters he carried some “hot shots,” an artificial stimulant in pill form. The meds were for use only in cases of emergencies in which conditions were too dangerous to allow for the luxury of sleep.
The effects of the hot shots were short-lived and, as with all things related to the paranormal, there was a price to be paid for using the crap. The crash that followed was inevitably even deeper and more profound than the original version. He rarely used the shots.
Cyrus reached down and touched Sedona’s hair.
“You’re wrong,” he said very softly. “I didn’t come back for you just because it was my job to protect you. I came back for you because I need you.”