Ray felt like he had only been asleep for a few minutes when he awoke to a loud pop. The nighttime lights flickered and the entire room went dark. He’d been dreaming of Ellen—she’d been calling out to him from a dark tunnel, but the faster he ran the farther away she receded. Now he was confused, shaking off the dream and groping around in the blackness.
The lights came on again, and a loud thud accompanied the return of the circulation system as it kicked into operation.
“Mantu, you awake?”
“Yeah. What the hell was that, Vinod?”
Vinod was sitting cross-legged on his bed. “That was the emergency generator system. It turns on when the power grid is interrupted or inoperative.”
The lights flickered again. “I’ve never seen that happen before,” Mantu said. “Any idea what’s going on?”
Vinod stared blankly. “Might be the storm. There are a number of possibilities.”
Ray rubbed his face. He was wide awake now. “Can we breathe if it goes out?”
“Yes. Unless the generator stops working.”
“Don’t tell me what happens then,” Mantu said.
“Okay, Brother Mantu.”
The outer door clicked and opened.
Sister Claire stepped into the room with the tylers beside her. “Please give me a moment.” The tylers looked at each other, and for a second Ray thought they were just going to remain where they were. But both stepped out of the room and the door closed. “Listen. I’m not sure what’s going on. Malaika has pulled some sort of coup. She has Hikaru and the sisters and Kimlat. A majority. Jeremy is holed up in the Grove and the tylers won’t let me in. I don’t even know if he’s okay.”
“Fucking Malaika,” Mantu said between gritted teeth.
“The strike team is preparing to go. That’s why I’m here. I’m supposed to be on it, and I want to get you on that helicopter, too.”
“Then do it,” Ray said. “Please.”
“Vinod has the key codes,” Mantu said. “Give them to her.”
Claire didn’t hesitate. She pressed the buttons on the keypad next to Ray’s cell as Vinod told her the numbers. A beep and then a click and Ray shoved the door aside. “Thank you,” he said. He wanted to hug her but there was no time.
“Vinod next,” Mantu said. “Hurry.”
When Vinod’s cell opened he stood staring.
“Get the fuck out of there, man,” Mantu hissed. “Grab your shoes.”
As Claire stepped to Mantu’s cell, the main door slammed open. The tylers stepped inside, arms at angles and legs rooted in martial stances.
“Aww shit,” Mantu whispered.
Ray remained immobile.
Claire turned. “Brother tylers, Brother Jeremy gave me explicit instructions to bring the three prisoners to him. That is why I came here.”
Neither tyler moved.
“Brother tylers, as a member of the Council, I insist you follow me with the three prisoners to the Grove, where Brother Jeremy is awaiting them.”
One of the tylers, a short but wiry man, relaxed his martial pose. “Brother Jeremy is no longer the head of the Council.”
“They speak!” Ray said.
The lights flickered again.
“Brother tyler,” Claire said, her voice rising, “you are beholden to members of the Council in the absence of the current Ipsissimus.” She glanced around the room. “The current Ipsissimus, even if the role has been taken by Sister Malaika, is not present. Am I correct?”
The tylers stared.
“She is correct,” Vinod said. He had stepped out of his cell and held his hands in a prayer position. “According to the Constitutions and Edicts, volume 28, section 17, paragraph 6.” He smiled that odd, fake smile.
The short tyler spoke again. “My orders were just carried to me directly from Sister Malaika.” He pointed to his earpiece. “They are to keep the incarcerated guarded and to repel any attempts at escape with the utmost severity.”
“Well, isn’t that nice,” Mantu muttered.
“Please reenter your cells.” Both tylers assumed another position, their arms held at face-height, palms outward. “Sister Claire, please remove yourself from the premises.”
Claire stood still. “Brother tylers—”
“We will remove you physically if necessary.”
Claire stared.
“Back in your cells,” the short tyler said. “Now.” Both men took one step forward.
Ray didn’t move. Neither did Vinod.
“I will count to five,” the tyler said. “One…two…”
Before he reached the count of three the short, wiry tyler was grasping at his throat and staggering.
“Ray!” Mantu screamed. “Go!”
Vinod was standing behind the tyler, whose face had gone completely red as he clutched at his throat, his eyes bulging. Whatever Vinod had done had been so fast no one had seen it. The tyler’s eyes rolled back in his head and he slumped to the floor.
The other tyler, a much younger man, leapt toward Vinod. He launched a kick but the older man deftly twisted his body and delivered a quick blow to the tyler’s kidney.
Claire punched in Mantu’s cell code.
Vinod and the young tyler were engaged in a rapid-fire burst of kicks and blows. The old Indian man moved like someone half his age, but a sharp kick to his chest, followed by a blow to his head, sent him reeling backward into his cell.
Mantu’s lock beeped, then clicked.
Ray ran toward the tyler but the young man, freed from his sparring with Vinod, pivoted before he was even close and kicked Ray in the gut so hard his breath exploded from his mouth. He fell to the floor. He couldn’t breathe. His vision started to go white. No air. His lungs would not cooperate.
Don’t fail now, he told himself.
He rolled onto his back. Above him was a blur of fists and feet. Then Mantu fell next to him, his face slack. His teeth were covered in blood.
Breathe. Breathe, dammit.
Across the room, Vinod was struggling to stand up in his cell but kept falling back into his bed. Claire swung her fists, but the tyler ducked below her, lifted her up, and flung her against the bars of the open cell. He turned and looked down at Ray, his eyes wide with raging adrenaline. So these fuckers really were badasses after all. It only took one of them to bring them all down, like in an old Bruce Lee movie.
The tyler knelt on Ray’s chest. No air came out of Ray’s lungs because there was no air left in them. The tyler’s face got closer. “Brother Ray Simon, under the order of the Grand Ipsissimus Sister Malaika Alakija, you are now—”
His words cut out as something smacked against his head.
“She is not my leader,” Claire said from above him. She was holding a metal folding chair.
The tyler fell beside Ray.
Ray gasped. His lungs were starting to work again, but it felt like he’d been beaten repeatedly in the stomach with a baseball bat.
Claire knelt next to him. “Come on. We don’t have much time.”
It took a few minutes to wake Mantu, but once everyone could stand up without support Claire took a survey. “Can you all follow me out of here?”
Mantu was still wiping blood from his lips and teeth. “I think so.”
Vinod nodded. “Yes, Sister Claire.” His smile was tinged with a grimace. His eyes looked wobbly.
Ray couldn’t stand up straight, but he could walk. “Yeah. Let’s get the fuck out of here.”
“I’m not feeling so hot myself,” she said.
The lights went out. The generator kicked on again, but then it, too, shut off. They were plunged into blackness.
“Oh, that’s not good,” Mantu said.
Again, the generator came to life. The emergency lights flickered on, tiny pools of yellow light in the darkness, but it was enough to see by.
“Follow me,” Claire said. “Hurry.”
About twenty feet down the underground hallway Ray had to pause to rest. He’d had appendicitis as a kid, and the ache in his abdomen was nearly as bad. “Sorry,” he said. “I’m trying.”
“It’s okay, Brother Ray, my man.” Vinod’s eyes still looked like they were disconnected. Maybe the blow to his head had given him a concussion. His half-baked smile was frozen on his face.
Ray grunted. “Where did you learn to fight like that, Vinod?” he asked.
“I studied to be a tyler. But they said I talked too much,” Vinod said.
Mantu laughed. “My boy is full of surprises.”
The emergency lights flickered.
“I think I smell smoke,” Claire said. “Come on, Ray.”
They hurried down the hall, Ray nearly doubled over and grunting with every step.
They expected trouble at the stairs to the surface of Complex E. But no tylers guarded the doorway. When the doors banged open they all stopped cold.
Eleusis was on fire.
“Oh my God,” Claire whispered.
Several of the buildings were in flames, black smoke billowing and collecting above the compound. Two tylers ran past them to the entrance of the Grove. People were milling about, some running, some holding their heads in their hands or staring in mute disbelief. A woman ran through the gardens screaming for someone.
“Jesus,” Mantu said. He grabbed a woman stumbling past. “What’s happening?”
She stared, her mouth open in horror. “Drones. Drones. Everywhere.”
Just then Vinod pointed to the sky.
A V-shaped drone hummed in the sky high above them. It came to a quick stop and hovered over the building that housed the Grove, then a string of bright streaks fired out of it. The tylers who had been trying to get inside were suddenly nothing more than a cloud of pink vapor.
“No,” Claire whispered, her hand at her mouth. “There are children in there.”
“Where’s the copter?” Ray yelled.
“Out past the gardens,” Claire said. Her face was ashen white.
“Go, dammit,” Mantu shouted.
They all ran.
The Telesterion exploded, raining chunks of marble onto the grass below. The sky was full of delta-winged drones, buzzing like a swarm of enraged insects. Three tylers with automatic weapons crouched behind a statue, firing bursts into the sky. As Ray ran through a cluster of flowering bushes he saw someone floating facedown in the pool surrounded by a spreading cloud of blood. His gut still ached but the ordnance raining down around him helped him forget the pain.
“There,” Claire shouted.
In the distance the helicopter sat in a field. It was enormous—far bigger than the commercial bird he’d flown in with Jeremy. The trees nearby were on fire, and a man lying next to the steps leading into the craft wasn’t moving. The blades were beginning to spin. Ray ran ahead. The man lying nearby was missing his head, which had been sprayed in a gruesome arc several feet wide. Ray gagged. The roar of the engine was deafening and the pressure of the wind from the rotors was like a heavy weight pushing him down.
Claire stopped and stared at the helicopter, her face ashen and frozen in horror.
Sister Malaika emerged from the helicopter’s darkened exterior. She pointed a handgun at them. “This mission has been aborted,” she shouted. A wry smile spread across her face. Ray jumped as something exploded behind him and he felt tiny rocks pelting his back.
A tyler stood behind her in the doorway. He, too, had a gun pointed at them—a military rifle with an enormous clip.
Claire stepped forward and shouted above the noise. “Get out of our way, sister.”
Another boom, this one closer. Everyone flinched except for Malaika. “You’re not going anywhere, my dear sister.”
“You’re sick,” Mantu yelled. “Look around you; it’s all falling apart.”
“She’s gone,” Claire said. “She’s someone else now. It’s working through her. Look at her eyes.”
Malaika’s pupils were enormous. And growing larger, like ink spreading across milk. “It’s all over,” she said. “There is no more Eleusis. Soon there will be nothing but ashes.” The whine of the engine rose in pitch. “My work here is done, and I am needed elsewhere.” She turned and disappeared into the shadows.
Ray started to move but Claire held him back. “Don’t,” she said, nodding at the barrel of the tyler’s gun, which had turned to aim directly at his chest. “It’s over. We need to get somewhere safe.”
Over. So that was it. He’d never see Ellen and William again, even if he managed to survive the horror raining down around him.
Claire gasped. Ray opened his eyes.
Vinod was sprinting past him. The tyler had fallen out of the copter and was struggling to his feet at the foot of the stairs.
Or had he been pushed?
Vinod landed atop the tyler just as his fingers closed upon his gun. The two locked arms, the tyler’s knee slamming into Vinod’s crotch. Vinod’s face screwed up in pain as the tyler lifted the rifle.
Mantu’s foot connected with the tyler’s jaw. The rifle dropped to the ground. The guard appeared to be thinking deeply, his chin zigzagging, staring into the distance, then he collapsed face-first into the dirt. Vinod moaned, his hands cupped between his legs.
Sister Malaika backed out of the helicopter’s door and onto the steps. “You filthy pig!” she screamed. “Traitor!”
A man stepped into the doorway. He was tall, dressed in a flight suit, and his mostly gray hair was swept back into an enormous wave atop his head. He held a pistol—her pistol—aimed at her head. “Keep moving, sister,” he said.
Malaika stepped backward down the stairs. “You can’t do this.”
“Watch me,” he said. He pulled the trigger. Malaika jumped as the bullet struck near her feet. Now he pointed it directly at her face. “Get out of here, bitch. You’re grounded.” He seemed pleased with himself.
Mantu hoisted the tyler’s rifle to his shoulder. “Looks like your ride is leaving without you, sister.” He waved to the others. “Get on. And hurry.”
When Malaika turned her eyes had gone completely black. Ray had seen this before, right before Crawford was overtaken by the thing that had possessed him.
“Don’t look at her,” Claire said.
He struggled to avert his eyes. She was whispering to him with her gaze. Enter the gateways of my eyes, little brother. I have something I want to show you.
Claire slapped him. “Look at me.”
Ray turned. He blinked and shook his head rapidly. “I’m okay,” he said. He reached down and helped Vinod to his feet.
“Thank you, Brother Ray, my man,” Vinod said, coughing and wheezing. The man in the copter helped them all climb the stairs while Mantu kept the gun aimed at Malaika.
“Come and see me, my old friend,” Malaika said. Ray froze on the top stair. Her voice had changed and Ray immediately realized who was speaking. A voice he could never forget, one that still cut into his darkest dreams. “I’ve been waiting a long time,” Lily said. He could hear the toothy smile in the words.
“Sister Malaika, you have lost the true way,” Claire said. “May the gods have mercy on your soul.” She disappeared inside the aircraft.
Malaika shrieked. The sound was inhuman, bestial, the death screech of a cat being ripped to bits by a jackal. Ray covered his ears. Claire grabbed and pulled him deeper into the chopper but he could still hear her screams echoing in his skull.
Mantu stood in the doorway, wincing, the rifle shaking in his hands. “Get us the fuck out of here,” he screamed.
The man who had saved them retracted the door and sealed it. “Roger that.” He scrambled into the cockpit.
As the copter began to move, Ray prepared for the worst. The drones were everywhere, like maddened wasps, buzzing above the decimated compound, unleashing hot white tracers of lead and explosives. They wouldn’t make it. It was impossible.
He’d managed to strap himself into one of the aluminum seats that lined the walls. Claire held tight to his arm. Across from them, Vinod buckled himself in and smiled widely, as if he had never been happier to have been kneed in his balls. Mantu stumbled next to him, dripping sweat, and laid his gun at his feet. Ray closed his eyes, bracing for the impact he was sure would come.
“She hit me with some bad mojo,” Mantu said, dropping into his seat. “That woman is powerful.”
“Hang on tight, folks.” The pilot’s voice crackled through an intercom.
Ray’s guts felt like they had descended to his knees as they rolled forward. Bullets pinged against the exterior. Claire’s fingers dug into his bicep. The metal walls shuddered again, and his stomach lurched as it began to rise.
Vinod laughed. He actually laughed. Like a kid on a roller coaster.
“We’re going to make it,” Claire said. “We’re going to make it.” She laughed into Ray’s shoulder. Or was she crying? He couldn’t tell.
“Why didn’t they shoot us?” Ray asked. It was loud so he needed to put his mouth next to Claire’s ear. They were flying over dense, green jungle, following the river below. Mantu had gone to speak to the pilot. Vinod’s eyes were half-closed, his hands still cupped between his legs.
“They must have thought Malaika was still onboard,” Claire said. “That’s the only thing that makes sense.”
“Jesus,” Ray said. “So she was actually working with Lily.”
Claire nodded. “With her, for her, willingly or unwillingly, I don’t know. Nor do I know how long she was possessed. But it was not Sister Malaika we left back there.”
“No kidding.” Ray still couldn’t shake the cold malice in the deep black eyes.
“Lily may have used the artifact to prey on her. Malaika was the strongest of all the Council, maybe even stronger than Jeremy, but over time Lily’s manipulation may have weakened her defenses. I should have known something was wrong,” she said, shaking her head. “I might have been able to stop her. Or at least let the others know.”
Ray squeezed her shoulder. “It’s not your fault.”
“I felt something was wrong. It was there in my daily divinations, but I dismissed it. I should have trusted myself. But I was—I was just soaking it up like everyone else. Bathing in its energy. While it was eating away at all of us.”
“But you felt some hesitation, right? That’s what saved you. Saved us.”
Claire’s eyes were watery. “It was because of you that it dawned on me. When you said you’d seen Lily looking through it, I knew. I went to Jeremy, but at that point it was obvious he feared Malaika’s power. And the others were already giving their allegiance to her.” She shuddered. “That horrible thing…it was poisoning us, warping our minds, and Lily was watching through it, waiting for the right time so she could destroy everything.” Tears streamed from her eyes. “Everything we’ve worked for. Everything we’ve built. Centuries of the Great Work—just gone.”
“I’m sorry,” Ray said.
“Jeremy was a good man. A good leader. But it fooled him just like it fooled us. Like she fooled us.” She buried her face in her hands.
Ray held her. It felt good to be in the embrace of a woman. How long had it been since he’d been physically this close to someone? He felt a momentary twinge of guilt, but willed it away. She needed this. He needed this.
Mantu returned from the cockpit. “Good news and bad news. What do you want first?”
“I need some good news right now,” Claire said.
“All right. Well, the pilot—his name is Will Burnham—is still on with the original mission. There’s also a grumpy Russian copilot named Konstantin, but he barely speaks English. Guess what, brothers and sisters? We’re going to pay a visit to the redheaded Wicked Witch of the North.”
Ray clapped his hands. “Fuck yes.”
“What’s the bad news?” Claire asked.
“It’s roughly thirty-five hundred miles from here, as the crow flies. In the fucking Canadian Yukon. And if we have absolutely perfect conditions the whole ride, we won’t be there for three days.”
“Damn,” Ray said.
“Yeah, no shit. This is a big-ass bird, with spare tanks built into her. That means we need to make at least three, maybe four stops to refuel, depending upon the weather. And we have food and supplies for the dozen strikers who were supposed to be onboard, so no worries there. But our man Burnham has had limited contact with the brothers at the refueling stops along the way. They might be fine, but we don’t know. So we’re flying blind into one potential clusterfuck after another.”
“That’s disconcerting,” Claire said. “The entire U.S. is in chaos. If we can’t find the means to refuel…” Her words hung in the silence.
“Well, there’s some more good news,” Mantu said. “We have guns out the wazoo. And enough ammo to take out a couple of villages.”
“Good,” Ray said.
“And some winter clothes. Snowsuits, boots, snowshoes, the whole deal. Russian stuff, just like everything else on this flying fortress. No idea if they’ll fit, but if they do we’ll be toasty. And if you haven’t checked yet, under those tarps way in the back are a half-dozen snowmobiles.”
Ray nodded. “Canada, here we come.”
The loudspeaker crackled. “Hey folks, this is your pilot, Will Burnham, but you can just call me Burnham. We are now at our cruising altitude and I apologize for the earlier inconvenience with our unruly passengers.” Ray laughed. “Looks like you have some standup competition, Mantu.”
“We are on course for the Yoo-nited States of America,” Burnham said. “Weather looks ideal, sunny and clear, should be smooth sailing for the time being. So sit back, fasten your seat belts, place your tray tables in the upright and locked position, and enjoy the ride. There’s a cooler full of Diet Cokes and some pretzels in the back you can help yourselves to.”
Mantu shrugged. “He ain’t bad. Could use a little work on his delivery, though.”
“You’re jealous,” Ray said.
“You are still the funniest of all, Brother Mantu, my main man.”
Mantu held out his hand, and Vinod high-fived him.
Claire rolled her eyes. “Gods, you two.”
Burnham and Konstantin sat at the controls. The cockpit had seats for two other crewmen. Maybe these two didn’t need them, but the empty seats made Ray nervous.
“Wow,” Ray said. The landscape rolled below them.
“Beautiful, ain’t it?” Burnham answered.
Ray nodded. “How does the Brotherhood have a Russian military helicopter?”
“She’s on loan from brothers in the Venezuelan army. Used to fly oil execs and heavy machinery all over South America. She’s starting to show a little wear and tear, but they took pretty good care of her. This baby was jiggered by our mechanics to go ultra-long distances, so she’s basically a flying gas can. If one of those drones had unloaded into us…” He shook his head and spoke to Konstantin in Russian, then stood. “Hey, I need to stretch and get a Diet Coke. You want to walk with me?” He gestured through a door into the passenger section. Ray joined him.
“Why did you kick Malaika and the tyler out of the copter?”
Burnham chuckled. “Jeremy gave me my instructions. It’s pretty simple. I took an oath to defend the Brotherhood, and as far as I’m concerned Jeremy was my captain, not that crazy sister. I’m loyal to the man—that was never in question.”
“So what happened at Eleusis?”
“Hell if I know. I showed up and the strike team was AWOL. No one answered my radio. So I turned this bird off and caught some Zs. Figured the mission had been postponed for a few hours or something. Then a couple of tylers pulled up in the fuel truck to top me off. They didn’t say anything, naturally. But I could feel something was wrong—bad vibes hanging like a dark cloud over both of them, and they were twitchy, which I’ve never seen before. I was getting ready to go find Jeremy when another bunch of tylers showed up and told me Sister Malaika had taken over. What the heck, I said to myself. Then she shows up, kooky as a coconut, and says, ‘Hey, Burnham, I’m in command and you are going to fly me and this here tyler to the artifact.’ So I says, ‘Sure, sister, whatever you say.’ But her eyes were…well, I’ve seen crazy eyes before but nothing like that and there was no way I was taking her anywhere. Not when I had no idea what was happening to Jeremy. And then all hell started breaking loose out there.” He shook his head. “I hope I never see anything like that again.” He made the Brotherhood gesture—forehead, lips, heart. “So here we are. On a mission that makes no sense anymore. There were supposed to be a dozen strikers onboard, on the way to take out the Queen Bee once and for all.”
“Well, I’m still ready to do it,” Ray said. “I have a personal stake in this.”
“Yeah?”
He nodded. “She took the woman I love from me. And her son. And I plan on bringing them back.”
“Attaboy, brother.” Burnham laughed and fist-bumped Ray. “I’ll do my best to bring all three of you home in one piece.” He paused. “Although I don’t know where exactly home is anymore. With Eleusis gone—well, I guess we can figure that out later, right?”
“Yeah. I guess we can.” Ray hadn’t considered what the destruction of Eleusis meant for the Brotherhood. Were they finished? Were they all finished?
Burnham dug into a cooler and pulled out his soda. “Excuse me, Ray. I need to hit the pissoir and get back to my job.” He stepped away, then turned back. “You hang in there, brother. I’ve been on worse missions before.”
“Seriously?”
Burnham scratched his head. “Well, no. That’s actually a bunch of crap. But I always like to look on the bright side.”
Ray smiled. “Speaking of the bathroom…where is it?”
Burnham stepped over to the wall. “Right here.” He pulled a wide plastic tube out of its housing. It had a vaguely urinal-shaped opening at the end. “We have one in the cockpit, too. This ain’t a commercial vehicle, remember. Just do your best to keep your business properly aimed down the hole, otherwise it can get messy. Pour some water down the thing when you’re finished with it.”
Ray stared.
“You’ll get used to it, and it beats unloading into a plastic bag. Trust me,” Burnham said. “Toilet paper is in the locker with the MREs.”
Ray was jacked up on adrenaline, and his bruised stomach ached, but after several hours the hum of the copter’s engines lulled him into an uneasy sleep.
When he opened his eyes, Sister Malaika sat across from him. “Hope you don’t mind me tagging along,” she said. Her eyes were solid black.
Ray felt his chest tighten. “You’re not real,” he said.
Sister Malaika’s tongue flicked across her lips. “Oh, I’m real. As real as you are. When we meet like this, we’re both real. Realer than real, in some ways.”
“Go away,” Ray said.
Sister Malaika laughed. “Oh, Ray. Are you always so rude? Let’s enjoy our little visit while it lasts.” Her black eyes had grown enormous. Now they took up most of her face. Her lips were purplish-red and her long braids were curling and writhing like snakes.
“Eleusis is gone,” she said. Her voice was deep, baritone, and gurgly, as if coming from underwater. “The Brotherhood is lost, ashes scattered to the winds, their blood draining into the earth. And the doorway to a new world is opening.”
Ray saw the artifact in front of him, the film of quicksilver bubbling around it. There were things inside it; he couldn’t see them but he could feel their powerful presence, as if a million invisible eyes were staring at him. They wanted out. They wanted to be free of the black orb imprisoning them.
“Go away,” Ray whispered.
Now Malaika’s face was in his, eyes bulging black half-spheres like the artifact, their surfaces swirling with stars and white symbols. “The gates are opening, traveler.” Her mouth was twisted into an ugly grin. “There is no hope. No way to win. Death awaits you and everyone you love. We are waiting for you. All of us.”
The copter’s engine screeched. Metal against metal. Something popped, and he smelled acrid smoke.
“No,” Ray screamed.
Outside the window he saw flashes of green. The copter was plunging into the jungle.
“No!” he screamed again. Malaika laughed, and it wasn’t her laugh anymore, but Lily’s.
“Ray. Ray, wake up.”
It was Claire. She held his face in her hands. “It’s okay. You were dreaming.”
Ray felt sweat running down the back of his neck. He’d fallen asleep sitting in the flip-up seat. He rubbed his aching neck. “Sorry.” He breathed deeply. “Malaika was in my dream.”
Claire frowned. “What did she say?”
Ray shook his head. His heart was still hammering. “It’s hard to explain.”
“That was not an ordinary dream. She can use your dreams to contact you. Because of your skill as a—”
“Traveler,” Ray interrupted. “I wish I had never heard that word.”
Claire’s eyes lowered. “I understand. It can be a heavy burden.”
“You’re telling me.”
“But you could learn to control it. Put it to good use. I’ve been thinking about that. I can help you.”
“I don’t think so. In fact, I wish you could help me turn it off.”
“But what about William and—what’s his mother’s name?”
“Ellen.”
“Ellen. Right. Wouldn’t you like to make contact with them if it was possible? Even briefly?”
Ray sat up straighter. “You think I could do that?”
“I think it’s worth a try. Don’t you?”
“I don’t know.” The thought of dissociating again—of letting go of his mind—was terrifying. What if the bug-eyed Malaika was waiting there? With Lily? But if he could see Ellen and William, even for just a moment, maybe it was worth it. “If you think it can work. When can we try?”
“Now would be perfect. Your link with Sister Malaika has left you energetically wide open. I can feel it.”
He rubbed his eyes. “I still feel weird. Like when you wake up from a dream and can’t figure out whether you’re still dreaming or not.”
“Let’s try then,” Claire said. “Brother Vinod, do you mind leaving Ray and me alone for a few minutes? Maybe join Mantu in the back while he’s checking out the snowmobiles?”
Vinod lowered a Russian manual he had been flipping through. “Yes, Sister Claire. I will leave you alone with Ray.”
“Thank you, brother,” Claire said. “Okay, Ray. Sit with your back straight, hands in your lap. Good. Now just listen to me, and follow along.”
It didn’t take long. Claire’s slow, singsong words led him deep almost immediately. I’ve led you into the Void, Ray. No one can reach you except for me. You are safe, surrounded by comforting darkness. You can go here anytime you need and nothing can touch you. Do you understand?
Yes, he whispered. Claire’s voice was far away and hollow, as if it was coming through a long cavern.
Good, she said. This is the safe house for all travelers. You must pass through the Void each time you travel, and return through it. It will shake off all parasites and break any unwanted connections.
It was so utterly gray and empty. He couldn’t feel his boundaries, as if he had dissolved and stretched out into this eternal nothingness, infinitely small and immeasurably massive at the same time.
The Void is the great realm outside of life and death, formless, shapeless, without beginning or end. But now I want you to think of Ellen. I want you to see her walking toward you, growing larger as she approaches in the darkness. Do you see her, Ray?
He did. Yes. She was slowly materializing, as if walking into a patch of spotlight on the floor of a darkened stage. His heart leapt. She was wearing loose clothes, like hospital scrubs. Her hair was disheveled but she had never looked so beautiful. Ellen, he whispered. But she wasn’t looking at him. She couldn’t see him. She was looking right through him.
Don’t try to talk to her. She can’t hear you. Push your feelings at her. She will feel you. Try.
He pushed. An outpouring of emotion rolled off him like a wave.
Ellen blinked.
Keep doing it, Claire said from far, far away.
He pushed again.
And then Ellen’s face was right in front of his. It was blurry and ethereal, but her eyes were seeking him. A look of shock and fright, but then something else—familiarity. Could she see him? Was she seeing him? He pushed again with all his might. Ellen opened her mouth and started to speak, but her voice was silent.
Talk to me, Ellen, I love you, I miss you, I am going to find you and take you away.
And abruptly, she was pulled away, snapping into a pinpoint of light that faded into nothingness. In front of him now was a glowing white symbol, made up of angles and circles and strange shapes that shifted and mutated.
Do you see her? Claire asked.
No, Ray said. She’s gone. There’s stuff there—symbols. Shapes.
A ward, Claire said. It guards her against intrusion.
She saw me, Ray said.
Yes. She did. You did well, Ray. That may give her hope, even if she only thinks it was a dream or a flight of fancy. Now let’s try the boy. See him emerging from the emptiness of the Void. He’s walking to you. Reach out to him like you did with Ellen.
Oh my God, Ray said.
William stood in front of him. The boy blinked, then stared at Ray as if shocked.
William, Ray shouted. He pushed with all his might.
William held up his fingers. Shh.
Okay, Ray whispered.
William traced a shape in the air before him and his mouth moved as if he were uttering words. Then Ray heard the jumbled words in his head, although William’s mouth was no longer moving.
You’re alive. Where are you?
I’m coming to get you, Ray whispered.
Claire’s voice from a vast distance: Think it, don’t say it.
Ray pushed his thoughts. It felt like squeezing them out through a ketchup bottle. In the Void they emerged like colored streams of light from the center of his forehead and melted into William’s head. I’m coming to get you and your mom. Soon.
William nodded. Please hurry. Things are getting out of control. She is using us to do something bad. To let bad things in.
I will. We are flying to you. In a helicopter.
Please be careful. I am worried about Mom. She—
William startled. Shapes were coalescing in front of him, glowing circles and sharp-angled polygons. Letters that looked like Hebrew and Arabic sparkled and flashed into existence. He waved his arms wildly, brushing them away, but they re-formed and grew brighter. William seemed caught in them, like a fly in a spider’s web.
I’m coming. Soon. Please hold on.
But William had vanished. The symbols radiated immense power, nearly blinding in their iridescence. And then they quickly shrank to a tiny point of light before fading into complete darkness.
Ray. Claire again, her voice ghostly and resonant. Come back. Turn around and walk back through the heart of the Void. Feel its emptiness embracing you.
He did. A sense of pure nothingness enveloped him. No thought, no feelings, no sensations. He could stay in here, in fact, in this abyss, where nothing could touch him and he had no form or boundaries. He was everything and nothing. Nothing could hurt him because there was nothing left to hurt.
Come back, Ray, Claire insisted. Follow my voice.
He followed.
“You did it,” Claire said. Vinod had returned and sat next to them. Mantu walked by, saw the expression on Ray’s face, and took a seat beside Claire.
“Yeah,” Ray said. “That was intense. I’m still feeling weird.”
“It will pass. It’s like a diver decompressing. The deeper and farther you go, the longer it takes to adjust.” She opened up a paper bag. “Here. Have some chocolate. It’s good for grounding your energy.”
Ray took a bite of the chocolate bar. “I talked…well, I guess I should say I communicated with William.” He told them what the boy had said.
“She’s trying to activate the artifact. Not surprising,” Claire said.
Vinod nodded. “I think that is what all the others are doing. With the ones scattered around the planet. Opening all of them at the same time.”
“God knows what will come through,” Claire said.
They all stared at one another.
“There were some rather interesting developments over the past few years,” Claire said. “Much of which I discounted. Now I wish I had paid more attention.”
Mantu leaned closer. “Such as?”
“Warnings from some of our seers. And messages from the elemental realms. Word about an upheaval that would drastically change the political, social, and economic systems. So much so that the earth would be unrecognizable.”
“What do you mean by elemental realms?” Ray asked.
“Undines, sylphs, salamanders, and gnomes,” Vinod answered.
Ray sat back. “Gnomes? Like the little plaster guys people put in their gardens?”
Claire rolled her eyes. “You should know better by now, Ray. The universe is full of entities, ranging throughout matter and the realm of the spirits. Elemental beings exist within the four classical elements—earth, air, fire, and water. They are more of a hive mind than individuals like us, acting under their kings, but they can still operate individually. And the seers—myself among them—were aware of alarms coming from all of them. We assumed it was part of what Jeremy called the endgame—what we saw unfold recently, with the dirty bombs, assassinations, and the purging of our brothers and sisters.”
“But now you think it’s even bigger than that,” Mantu said.
Claire nodded. “They felt it coming, the elementals and the spirits—whatever the dark brotherhood is preparing to unleash.”
Mantu wiped his forehead. “Which means the planet itself is threatened. Not just humans.”
“It has been written about in all the world’s mythologies. Kali Yuga, Ragnarok, Frashokereti, the Christian apocalypse, and so on. The end of the world. We’ve known unprecedented changes were coming—massive climate alterations and everything that brings, from economic collapse to mass extinctions. Everyone at the highest levels of world government has been preparing for the collapse, even while they spoke out of the other side of their mouths in public. Why do you think governments were building shelters deep in the earth and buying up land in remote places? The same reason Eleusis was built atop an aquifer. But what we didn’t know is that all these changes were being hastened by whatever Qlippothic forces are behind the artifact.”
“Qlippothic?”
“It’s a Cabalistic term,” Claire said. “When the universe was formed, giving rise to intelligences and spiritual beings, the broken ones came into being as well. They are negative entities, mirror images of the creative beings. Some call them demons.”
“Like the thing I saw in Blackwater?”
“Precisely.”
Ray shuffled uncomfortably in his seat. “And the things I saw hiding behind the artifact, too. They’re from somewhere else. Another world or universe. They’re not just against us. Their consciousness felt so alien…like they’re anti-us.”
“Like matter and antimatter,” Vinod said. “Each cancels the other out in a catastrophic explosion.”
Ray shook his head. “But why would Lily do that? Wouldn’t it destroy her, too?”
Claire nodded. “One would assume. But maybe she knows something we don’t. Only the gods know how long she has been working with the beings behind the artifacts. Maybe she has made some sort of deal. Or maybe she is being used by them the way she used Malaika. All we can do is speculate.”
“May I comment, Sister Claire, please?” Vinod asked.
“Of course, brother.”
Vinod’s eyes seemed far away. “If the artifacts are a gateway, and these beings want to come through to visit us—might it be possible, Sister Claire, that she can go through hers to wherever they come from?”
Claire was quiet. The only sound was the incessant turning of the rotors. “Perhaps, brother,” she said.
Burnham walked into the cabin from the cockpit. “I’m going to string up some hammocks so y’all can get some shut-eye. I don’t like flying at night but we don’t have much choice if we want to get to our fuel supply tomorrow. And since I can’t get through on the radio, I suggest we reach out for contact. Sister Claire, can you help with that?”
“Absolutely,” Claire said. “Let’s join hands.”
Claire, Vinod, and Burnham sat in a circle, hands linked, with Ray and Mantu watching. After a few minutes they became so still it seemed as if they were dead. Ray watched them closely but they didn’t appear to be breathing. The only sign of life was the faint throbbing of the artery in Claire’s neck and a twitch below Vinod’s eye.
Then Claire began to murmur, so softly Ray couldn’t hear it above the engine noise. The others joined, their lips moving in synchrony.
Ray felt his eyes closing. Was he just tired? His eyelids were so heavy he blinked and tried to keep them open. But it was no use. The drone of the engine was strangely soothing. With his eyes closed, he could hear what sounded like voices within the incessant thwup of the rotors. Claire’s voice, Vinod’s lilting and strangely mechanical cadence, and Burnham’s monotone. Chanting in a mix of syllables and words that turned to images in his head, like a TV with someone channel surfing.
Brothers sisters hear us in our time of need
Helicopter. Clouds. A piece of a map, zooming in to a small, square building and a large patch of concrete in a scrubby desert.
Coming to you
A clock, its hands moving rapidly.
Jeremy and Eleusis gone
Flames, the Telesterion flattened and spewing black smoke, bodies of the dead sprawled across the compound. Drones zooming above, unleashing torrents of white fire.
Help us, brethren, we beseech thee
A new face—a man, heavily bearded, eyes closed. His eyes open, he blinks rapidly, and he stares straight into Ray’s eyes. He’s wearing a baseball cap—L.A. Dodgers. Ray smells cigarette smoke and coffee on his breath.
And music. Classical music. Piano and violin and—
“Ray.”
It was Mantu. “Brother, you gotta learn to control that shit.”
Ray wiped his eyes. He had that rising-to-the-surface feeling again. Claire and Vinod and Burnham were still sitting in their circle, but their eyes were open and they were no longer holding hands. They smiled at one another silently.
“You got pulled into that, didn’t you?” Mantu asked.
Ray blew out his breath. “Wow. Yeah, I guess I did.”
Claire got up and sat next to him. “I suppose we should include you in our circle the next time,” she said. “You are more talented than you imagine, Ray. It usually takes years of training to make that sort of contact. And you just dropped right in.”
“I’ll go sit in the cockpit the next time you do that,” Ray said. “I’ve had enough of this for the day.” He stood and shivered.
Burnham helped Claire to her feet. “You’re a good leader, sister. I always thought you should have been next in line. Not Malaika.”
Claire smiled. “Thank you, brother. Leadership never interested me. My first love was teaching. And working with our contacts on the inner planes.”
“Well, I hate to break it to you,” Mantu said, “but as far as I see it, you are the leader now.”
Claire’s smile vanished. “That remains to be seen. But right now I need some sleep. All of this inner work is taxing.”
“Get some shut-eye,” Burnham said. “We’ll be landing in a few hours.”