The vision left Vicky’s eyes like a dream that wouldn’t let go. It haunted her, called to her, and she couldn’t shake the feeling Damian had known she was there. But the vision that greeted her waking eyes was no less bizarre.
A tunnel of power surrounded the Bone Sails. Bursts of light and searing blue flame towered above the masts as they rocketed through a passage no commoner could see.
“You good, lass?” Graybeard asked as he helped her up, the desiccated flesh of the skeleton’s hand cracking under her weight.
“Yeah,” she said, exhaling slowly as she grabbed the railing of the ship. Below them was the earth, so far below they might be in orbit, for all she knew. The vision rippled, and then it was gone, replaced by golden stars and the pitch black of the Abyss.
Graybeard followed her gaze to the flickering tunnel around them. “A pilot I met at the school called it a jet stream, whatever the hell that is.”
“It’s an air current,” Shiawase said. “She explained it quite thoroughly. Which you’d know, if you’d been paying any kind of attention.”
“Bah,” Graybeard muttered.
“Girl,” Zola said, drawing Vicky’s gaze. “What’s wrong?”
Vicky thought she’d hidden her reaction, but she must have let more slip than she’d realized. She thought about lying, holding that vision of Damian to herself so as to not upset her friends. But Damian was why they were there. He was why they were even trying this insane plan to re-anchor a Devil’s Knot and pull him out of Nudd’s trap.
And as she looked up at the old Cajun, power slipping by behind her, forming a glowing aura around her gray cloak and tightly braided hair, the words passed Vicky’s lips in a rush. “I could see him. I could see Damian. But, there are things attacking him. Trying to get to whatever’s left of him inside that thing.”
“You’re sure it was him?” Zola asked, not showing any reaction to Vicky’s story other than a slight hunch of her shoulders.
Vicky nodded.
“We’re running out of time,” Sam said. “Damian’s running out of time.”
Zola reached out and squeezed her shoulder. “We’re all running out of time, Sam.”
“I thought he was supposed to be immortal now,” Sam whispered.
“Immortals can still die,” Graybeard said. “Harder to kill some of them, sure, but you can do it.”
Zola shot Graybeard a look that shut him right up.
“The Seal,” Shiawase said, raising his arm to the shadow encroaching on the horizon.
“Aye,” Graybeard said before drumming out a command on the railing beside him. The crew burst into motion, pulling the sails tight before scrambling back down to the deck. Even the old skeleton in the crow’s nest came down.
Vicky worried about what was coming. The crew of the Bone Sails weren’t exactly the most cautious beings she’d ever fought beside.
Luna hurried over to the railing and wrapped her arms around it, her ears twitching as they all turned to watch the Seal. It reminded Vicky of the tattoo Camazotz wore on his chest, like an ancient calendar, only here all the symbols were different. And with each passing moment, the symbols changed, or at least her perception of them did. As they closed on the impossible gray stone disc, it grew to a point there was no beginning and no end, only the intricate swoops and whorls of countless Celtic knots, each intertwined with another like some bramble gone mad.
But there was order in that madness. Distinct layers, yellow lightning traced the ring-like patterns before lancing out and crashing against their jet stream.
“I don’t see a path through that.” Vicky said, stepping up beside Graybeard. Jasper chittered his agreement from Sam’s shoulder.
Vicky remembered the stories Damian had told her about passing through the Seal. How he’d thought he’d catch fire or be swallowed up by the power that called to him, but as the Bone Sails smashed into the front of the Seal, none of that happened.
When the ship slowed, everyone on deck stumbled forward only to be thrown backward as it sped forward once more. Sam flailed her arm, catching Graybeard and pulling the squawking bird off his perch. Shiawase caught the tumbling ball of vampire, bird, and dragon before they crashed into the staircase.
The darkness of the Seal vanished, along with the tunnel of power they’d been traveling in.
Luna leaned over the railing. “Holy shit! We’re falling!”
“Brace for impact!” Graybeard squawked as he took his perch once more. The captain held on to his hat as he sprinted for the ship’s wheel.
“Ah noticed!” Zola snapped, locking her arms into a loosely tied rope at the mast.
A flurry of clicks and bangs echoed around them as the crew grabbed onto whatever they could. Luna charged at Vicky, picked her up, and launched into the air. They barely missed one of the crossbeams as Luna spun.
The Bone Sails was a good forty feet above a river of fire when they cleared the deck. Moments before the entire thing crashed down, a gray shadow exploded over the ship, Zola and Sam clutched in the dragon’s claws.
Vicky stared, her heart racing as Luna’s claws dug into her torso. The ship sank into the fiery current, only to bob back up like a message in a bottle. Fire cascaded across the bow and rolled around the skeletons, but they didn’t burn. Their clothing didn’t catch fire, which meant this place was much like the Sea of Souls. A damned place to be sure, but it could be survived.
“Too old for this,” Graybeard squawked nearby.
Vicky grinned at Graybeard, his flight uneven with the half-rotted feathers on his back. But it was enough to glide.
“The boys’ll meet us closer to the sea. Follow me, yeh daft salamander!”
Jasper puffed out a ball of blue fire. Zola yelled something unintelligible as the dragon swooped closer to Graybeard, briefly sending the old parrot into a tailspin before he caught himself.
Luna followed the bickering pair while Graybeard insulted Jasper’s parentage, and the dragon snapped his jaws at the bird.
Luna looked down at Vicky. “This is going to be a long trip, isn’t it?”
Vicky grinned at the death bat.