Lyle’s cheerful chortling echoed from the inner chamber of the cave. He dashed out of the blue shadows just as Cyrus sent another blue stone skipping across the floor.
Lyle changed course immediately and sped after the bouncing stone. He caught it when it hit the wall of the cave.
Euphoric with his success, he scurried toward Sedona and Cyrus, the pebble in one paw.
“About time you showed up,” Sedona said.
Lyle graciously gave her the pebble and made excited noises.
“Thanks,” she said. She examined the small rock carefully. “More blue amber. It’s really beautiful.”
Cyrus watched her tuck the amber into her pack. He shook his head, amazed and a little awed by her cool composure.
“You seem pretty damn calm about everything I just told you,” he said.
“Actually, your story about those experiments on my multi-great-aunt Arizona Snow come as something of a relief,” Sedona said. “At least it explains a few things. I’ve been going in circles, even starting to wonder if I had hallucinated the whole prisoner-in-a-lab scenario.”
“You prefer that it was the real deal?”
“Yes, because it means I don’t have to doubt my memories.”
Cyrus nodded. “I understand.”
Lyle, evidently satisfied with the reception of his latest gift, hustled closer to Cyrus and chortled expectantly.
Cyrus examined the assortment of blue stones in the vicinity and found another piece of blue amber. He sent it skittering across the cave. Lyle dashed after it and trotted back to give it to Sedona.
“Nice,” she said. She patted Lyle. “Thanks.”
Cyrus looked out the entrance of the cave. The heavy psi-snow did not look nearly as intense as it had a few minutes ago.
“I think the weather is lifting,” he said. He rolled to his feet and started toward his pack. “We need to be prepared to move out in a hurry.”
“One more question before we try to leave this place,” Sedona said quietly.
“Only one?”
“Did you come to Rainshadow prepared to kill me if you discovered that I was an unstable multi-talent?”
The shock of the question hit him like a blow. For a moment he could not move. When he finally had himself back under control he crossed the room to where she sat, gripped her arms, and brought her to her feet.
“No,” he said. “I came here to give you the antidote, if it proved necessary.”
She blinked. “There’s an antidote?”
“It was discovered in the twenty-first century back on Earth but there hasn’t been much experience with it.”
“Why not?”
“No one has ever had any need of it here on Harmony,” Cyrus said. “Arcane doesn’t keep a stockpile on hand. There was only time to brew a single dose before I left for Rainshadow. I brought it with me.”
“In case you needed to use it on me?”
“Yes.”
She thought about that for a minute and then managed a decidedly misty smile. “So you were never actually planning to kill me.”
“I told you, Fallon Jones was a friend of Arizona Snow. In our family we take that kind of history seriously.”
“You came here to try to save me.”
“That was the general idea. Turned out you didn’t need saving.”
Tears sparkled in her eyes. “Thanks. No one ever did anything like that for me before—at least not since my parents died.”
“You saved my team yesterday. We’re more than even.” He kissed her forehead and then he released her. When he glanced toward the mouth of the cave he saw that the storm had definitely lessened. “Let’s move.”
She walked to where her pack sat on the ground. Hefting it with the ease of long practice, she slipped it over her shoulders.
“Ready.” She glanced around. “Lyle? Time to stop playing with the pretty rocks. We’re leaving now.”
Lyle chortled and scurried over to her. She picked him up and set him on her shoulder.
Cyrus went cautiously outside, raising his senses a little to get a better feel for the psi levels. The storm was waning rapidly.
He glanced back at Sedona. “One more precaution.”
“What’s that?”
He took a thin, coiled length of line off his pack, snapped one end to his belt, and clipped the other end to Sedona’s belt. At full length the cord stretched about ten feet between them.
“We don’t want to take the risk of running into another freak storm and getting separated,” he said.
“Got it.”
They walked out into a landscape that was rapidly clearing. The blue sunlight sparked and glittered on the quartz and crystal forest.
“It would be beautiful,” Sedona said. “If the whole place didn’t feel sort of dead.”