Quinn watched, jaw to chest, as the guitar pick levitated six inches off the board, twisting and spinning as if caught in a whirlwind.
“Please tell me you see this, too.” Marcus didn’t answer. He sat frozen, eyes closed, full lips parted in a half-grin, and hands clasping the board. His usually rich brown skin looked pale and ashen against the cloud-laden sky.
Quinn jerked her hands away, but her body didn’t move with her. Instead, it mirrored Marcus’s, still as a statue, fingers still gripping the board, forehead creased in concentration.
Whoa! So that’s what an out of body experience was. Was she in some sort of trance? Her translucent spirit shimmered ghostlike, somehow connected to, yet separate from, her physical form. Quinn swallowed the panic rising from her stomach. Had she done this, or was it something else entirely? She took three deep, calming breaths and surveyed her surroundings.
It was as if she’d stepped into a sepia-toned photograph. Everything was frozen in time, all but the spirit board. The once ordinary letters adorning the surface radiated a strange, iridescent, glow-stick green, the only color among the reddish-brown landscape.
“Is anyone there who wants to communicate?” She tried to sound confident, in control as she asked, but her voice squeaked.
Letters floated off the board and joined the plectrum in a swirling light show.
“Aaron?”
In answer, the letters mixed and spun until they arranged themselves into a single word.
Quinn.
Her heart became a thunder of hooves within her chest. “Aaron? Is that you?”
Quinn.
Characters flew in and out, pulsing and dimming.
“Where are you? Are you hurt?”
Instead of a direct answer, the letters morphed into strange runes like those on Azrael’s sword. She focused all her attention on them, trying to make sense of what they could mean. What kind of language was it anyway? Sanskrit? Sumerian? She was a teenager, not some expert in linguistics.
“Seriously, how am I supposed to read that? It could say anything for all I know,” Quinn huffed in frustration.
As if by magic, the symbols started to unravel, pulling apart and morphing back into letters she recognized, rearranging themselves into words, faster, a frantic cyclone of glowing green.
When the tears of Eve have turned to blood and her sins have turned to flesh, the key will fall. For love is bound by the power of the Trinity. Their destiny is written by chaos and betrayal and on the first eclipse on the eighteenth year, the voice of the sacrifice will break the lock, restoring darkness unto the light. By this promise, be compelled.
Be compelled.
Be compelled.
Be compelled.
“What does that mean?” Quinn asked.
Seize your destiny.
The letters arched above her head like a comet and dove into a small pool near the river’s edge. She hadn’t remembered seeing that pool before leaving her body. It only seemed to exist in this strange alternate universe. Quinn glanced at her corporeal form still sitting cross-legged with Marcus. What would happen if she strayed too far from her body? Surely walking a few yards away wouldn’t hurt anything. Both her body and Marcus would still be within sight. Giving up now wasn’t an option; she had to see this through.
Her heart hammered as she inched down the bank of the river and approached the place where the comet fell. She stood looking down into a hole about three feet in diameter and half as deep.
Myriads of gold, blue, and green shimmered beneath the murky puddle, reminding her of fireflies dancing in a darkened field. She rubbed her chest at the ache the memory evoked. At the bottom, the source of the mysterious light beckoned to her. A box, half-buried in silt, flared bright as the letters, once on the spirit board, now etched into runes along the sides and top. A sense of déjà vu brought a sick feeling in her stomach. A forgotten dream, and something more, something older. Visions of her handing the box to an angel with golden wings flashed before her then vanished just as quickly. This was her box.
Quinn shook her head to clear her mind. Impossible. Yet it wasn’t. She gritted her teeth and dipped a finger into the water. The colors of the runes shifted faster and faster, from green to gold and back to blue. Swallowing her fear, she lowered her hand into the cool water and wrapped her fingers around her destiny.