A Quarrel Called: Stewards Of The Plane Book 1 (25 page)

68. G.

I felt it the moment that Thompson backed away and headed
outside. It was as if a hot, needle-y rash suddenly receded and smoothed away.
The skin on my back was irritated and itchy now, and I had a slight headache
clustering in the front of my head. My hands were still clenched though,
prepared suddenly for a fight. I hadn’t even realized I had clenched them, but
as I let them relax, the blood rushed through them, pounding in my veins like
battle drums. That was close.

“You didn’t tell me that the guy who was at the garage was
your neighbor,” I ground out accusingly. Sam looked at me, his skin a sort of
pale yellow, and the pulse in his throat jumping underneath.

“I didn’t know,” he said. “It was Lily that got a good look
at the two guys. The rest of us were in the main part of the garage where we
couldn’t see anything. And when we ran out the back, we didn’t look to see if
they gave chase.”

“It was dark,” I said. “Maybe…”

“As far as I’m concerned, you were home doing hot dog night
or whatever with your dad, right?”

“Right,” I said, more confidently than I felt.

We decided to avoid that Thompson character for as long as
we could and waited inside while they rolled the cars out, one at a time. We
watched them come and go, some going for a few hundred
dollars,
and others for as much as ten thousand. This made me hopeful that the
convertible would be in Sam’s price range; while it was in good shape, it was
an older car.

And then it was her turn and they drove the beauty out, top
up, lights on. We were up.

I followed Sam, since he was the money bags, and decided
that maybe what I needed to do instead of handholding him was keep an eye out
for his neighbor.

The bidding began. It started at five hundred dollars and
escalated quickly from there to a thousand and then fifteen hundred. Sam tensed
up. He hadn’t jumped in yet, because he said he was going to wait to see where
it would go. He had watched enough reality shows that he said you weren’t
supposed to show your hand too soon.

Whatever, at this point I wasn’t interested in the lousy car
anymore, or even in our shared dream. I was busy watching for Thompson, hoping
we didn’t get jumped on our way out of the parking lot later.

The auctioneer was barking off numbers but
slowing in pace.
The current number was two thousand and the bids were
becoming more thoughtful.

“
Twenny
-two?
Twenny
-two?
Do-I-have-
twenny
-two?” called the auctioneer.

There was a long pause, and just as the auctioneer was about
to pull his microphone up to his mouth again to announce the sale, Sam threw up
his paddle. Apparently he’d made up his mind to bid after all. I had begun to
wonder.

The auctioneer pointed to Sam and nodded.
“
Twenny
-two.
And Do-I-Have-A-
Twenny
-Three?”

I saw Thompson over at the far end of the crowd, his head
down, talking to another man. I breathed a sigh of relief that he wasn’t looking
at us… me.

“
Twenny
-four!” hawked the man on
the stage, pointing at Sam again.

“How high are you going to go?” I asked Sam in a low voice.

He didn’t say anything for a moment. “I don’t know. I’m
mostly going on instinct right now. I’ve never done this before.”

“Three grand,” called a voice from the edge, and I looked
over to see Thompson snarl at us, his paddle up in the air.

“That asshole,” Sam said through gritted teeth. He turned to
look at the auctioneer and pretended to hesitate for a moment. Then he put up
his paddle and nodded slightly.

“An-I-have-thirty-one.
Do-I-have-thirty-two?”

“Thirty-two!” shouted Thompson again. This time he glared at
me instead of Sam.

“He’s punishing you because of me,” I said, my gut suddenly
hollow. We were just kids. How the heck were we supposed to compete with a dude
who had enough money to drive a sports car and owned his own business?

“Probably,” Sam said. “Thirty-five!” he shouted, holding up
his paddle again.

The auctioneer called out the number, once, twice, three
more times, but Thompson shook his head.

“Sold to the kid in the blue shirt, number twelve, for
thirty-five hundred dollars,” the auctioneer said. “Sheila will take care of
you in the tent. Next up…”

Thompson sidled up to us just then, smirking. “You’re lucky
I already bought three cars earlier today. Or I’d be taking that little rag top
home with me, too.”

“Hey, Mr. Thompson.
I didn’t know
you came out to these auctions,” Sam said, doing his level best to be friendly
and unsuspicious.

“You keep your friend in check,” Thompson said, speaking to
Sam, but looking at me.

I met him, stare for stare. I was ready.

“Sure, man,” said Sam, looking from him to me and back.
“Whatever you say.”
Then he turned to the lady behind the
table. “Are you Sheila?”

“Yes, I am,” said the woman in a friendly tone.

Sam continued with his business while Thompson stared at me
and I stared back. Finally he spit on the ground next to my feet, gave me one
last glare, and walked away.

#

“I’m glad that’s over,” Sam said, pretending not to be
impressed with
himself
. “But I have to admit, it was
sort of addicting to be in the middle of the bidding like that. I can see why
those people on the storage shows do it week after week. I bet I could be on
one of those shows.”

I
grinned,
glad the shakiness in my
legs was finally wearing off after the adrenaline rush was gone.
“Nah, man.
You just blew your wad. You’re going to have to
get Lily to give you another couple of gigs to make up for all the cash you
spent today.”

“I know.”

He sounded woeful, and it made me laugh.

“Dude, you’ve got a car. And it’s a sweet ride at that!
And”—I paused, holding my hand out—“it finally stopped raining. Maybe it will
be nice enough later to take the top down and go for a ride.”

“Yeah,” he said, brightening. “We’ll need sunglasses and
dental floss.”

“For what?”

“To keep the bugs out of our eyes and
teeth.”

We both laughed and I happily slid into the passenger seat
as soon as he unlocked the door. I touched the brown leather upholstery,
appreciating the smooth buttery softness under my palm. As I settled in and
leaned back, I was hit with a sudden, strong burst of déjà vu. This was just
like my dream – my hand caressing the upholstery, the weird greenish yellow
lighting from the storm clouds in the sky. I shivered. I turned to look at Sam,
and he had his hands on the wheel, but the expression on his face was pensive.

“Weird,” I said.

“Yeah,” he agreed. “I hope this wasn’t a bad idea.”

“Me, too.”
I guess we’ll see.

69. TARA

“I’m telling you,” I said, my hand slapping down on the open
pages of my notebook on the table in front of me, “that we have to go.”

“How are we going to go? It’s a six or seven hour drive,
there’s nothing out there except tumbleweeds and pump jacks, and we start
school on Tuesday.” Melody shook her head, not wanting to hear anymore.

But we had to go. Matthew had made it clear that we were
supposed to do something about the vortex, and added to
that,
I had been doing some reading and researching on my own. “Look, the records say
that the energy during a solar eclipse is unbalanced… as in more dark than
light. When it’s dark outside, at a time that it is
supposed
to be light, the balance leans to the left. So like,
during a storm, natural disasters occur, right?
Tornadoes,
etc.
But during a solar eclipse, there is no visible storm. Instead it’s
a spiritual one. A spiritual storm -- that sounds exactly like a vortex,
right?”

Melody was not looking at me. Instead she was drying and
putting away the dishes, and for a moment I thought she wouldn’t answer me at
all. But then she said, “So is this a spiritual battle now? Or is it
supernatural? I mean, my brother’s a ghost, and evil entities from another
dimension tried to suck me dry so… I’m voting for supernatural.” She still
wasn’t looking at me, but the set of her shoulders was annoyed.

I’d seen her like this before. This was Melody being set in
her ways. She seemed easygoing and fun, but the fact was, she was very
stubborn. “I can see what you mean. But why does it have to be different?”

“Because I just can’t handle a war between
good and evil right now, oh-freaking-kay?”
She balled up the damp towel
and threw it across the room.

I took a breath. I’d seen this version of Melody before,
too. She needed to be talked back from the ledge. We couldn’t do this without
her, and if I couldn’t convince her that she had to come, she would regret it
later. “Okay, fine.
Supernatural, then.
You weren’t
attacked by the entities in the daytime, right? And everyone, even Hollywood,
says that the witching hour is 3:00 a.m. Why do you suppose that is?”

She held a hand to her temple, her eyes closed. “I don’t
know.”

“I think it’s because it’s completely dark outside at 3:00
a.m. There’s no last vestige of sunset on the horizon anymore in the summer
time, and it is still several hours before dawn. I think it’s the time when the
earth is at its darkest, literally. And if that’s true, if these things are
amassing here, if they are coming in through the vortex, then obviously they
would be stronger and harder to stop during a solar eclipse. Maybe…” I thought
hard and fast, “Maybe that is the most vulnerable time?”

Mel slumped into a kitchen chair across the table from me
and put her head in her hands. I just watched her, afraid to say anything else.
The moment dragged on, and when I thought it was a lost cause, I slid my chair
back from the table, a farewell on my lips.

“So what do we do?” Her voice was muffled. She sounded very
tired.

“I think we tell our parents and grandparents that we are
going camping before school starts as a “so long” to the summer, and we go out
to Orla to shut down the vortex.”

She looked up at me, frowning. “No, I mean, how do we shut
down the vortex?”

I slid the photo of her brother and grandparents across the
table to her. “We ask Esmeralda.”

#

It was my day off, but Melody and I helped Esme stack the
boxes in the back of the store anyways.
“Hey, Esme.
Let’s say I wanted to dampen someone or something’s energy. You know, to
protect myself from it – what would I need to do?”

She looked over her shoulder at me. “That’s a very
interesting question. Why do you want to do something like that?”

“I don’t necessarily, but, what if I did? I mean, what if
there was a bully at school?”

“Or what if I was getting attacked by those… creatures
again?” asked Melody, handing me another carton of candles to stack.

She paused thoughtfully. “Energy is life. So therefore, to
dampen energy, one must dampen life. Something like sulfur would work for that.
But in the case of your entities, it would only make them stronger, because they
thrive on deadly orgone energy.”

Melody frowned. I frowned with her.

“Then how would you dampen them?”

“Joy. It is always joy. Or love, but bringing yourself to
love the darkness comes with problems of its own.”

Crap. It’s not like we could buy a bottle of joy and whip it
out at the last moment.

“I don’t understand,” said Melody, now resting her arms on
the counter. “I remembered you saying that when the creatures came for me, but
there was no way I could be joyful. All I felt was afraid.”

Esme nodded and came over to stand near Melody. “You are
different. They can taste your energy like dinner, and when you are afraid, it
is not only dinner they taste but ambrosia. For you, fear is like sulfur—it is
deadly. You have to find a place, a moment, a thought, that brings you joy, and
you must envelop yourself in it. You must live it from the inside out.
And when you do, your energy changes, and instead of feeding the
creatures, it will burn them.
And if they do not leave, it will destroy
them. But you are not capable of it now.”

“What do you mean?”

“You must embrace this part of you. If you don’t embrace it,
then you fear it. If you fear it, then no amount of joyous memory you conjure
will be able to counteract that fear. It will be useless, like shooting yourself
in the foot.”

“I’ll never be normal again, will I?” said Melody quietly.

I looked at her sharply.

“No,” said Esme, reaching across to hold Melody’s hand. “But
you still define yourself. And if you want to reject your gift, you can do
that. But you can’t
unsee
what has already been
revealed to you. And really, what point is there in rejecting a gift that you
cannot
unsee
?”

I nodded. I didn’t have any interest in rejecting my ability
to communicate with the Akashic Records, but then again, black-
tentacled
beasts hadn’t tried to eat me in my sleep,
either.

When Melody didn’t reply, Esme turned back to her chores. As
she pulled out a cloth and a spray bottle to clean the glass counters, she
shooed us away. “It’s a beautiful day outside. Enjoy the sun. It gives life in
more than one way.” She smiled at me then, though there was an unsettling glint
of steel in it.

70. G.

Sam was looking a little green. “Of course we have to go,” I
said.

He nodded. Tara’s shoulders relaxed a little bit, and Melody
seemed at least neutral about the plan. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it,
but she seemed different to me somehow. Maybe she was just tired.

“One other thing,” said Sam then, sounding a little
hesitant. “We have to bring Lily.”

“What? No way, Sam,” Tara said. “She doesn’t belong here
with us. This isn’t any of her…” I could tell that she was about to say
business, or maybe family, but I cut in.

“Tara, she was in my dream. And now Sam has the car – the
same one that was in my dream and his. Lily has to come.”

She stared at me open mouthed and took a quick glance over
at Melody who was staring off into space. “But—”

“Tara, it’s okay. G.’s right. If we have to do this, then I
guess we have to do it all the way, and that means Lily has to come.” Melody
looked at me, at Sam, and then at Tara. Then she looked down at her hands
again. “Let’s stick with the camping idea. At least then it won’t be a complete
lie.”

“What won’t be a complete lie?” The voice came from the
doorway of the clubhouse, and I jumped, the gravelly edge putting me on alert.
I relaxed when I realized it was Melody’s grandfather.

“Ah,” said Tara.

“The, uh…” said Sam.

I had nothing.

“We’re going camping,” said Melody. “It’s the end of our
last summer together as high schoolers. We figured it was about time we did
some sort of coming-of-age thing.”

“Right,” said Tara. “We just hadn’t, ah, figured out where
we were going yet.”

“Interesting,” said Gramps. “Your aura’s a bit off, though.
It’s like you’re holding something back. Care to fill me in on the rest of your
plan?”

He motioned to me and Sam to help him with his wheelchair
and the step up into the clubhouse. I was surprised to see that he could get up
and move, albeit slowly, without a cane, though he was clearly not strong
enough to hoist the wheelchair into the room by himself.

When he got situated, he sat back down and rolled across the
room to the little kitchen table we were sitting at and looked at the contents
spread on the surface. Before we could think to stop him, he picked up the
photograph from Fredericksburg. His face twisted slightly; I thought it looked
like sorrow.

“Where’d you get this?” he asked finally.

Silence reigned. Finally Melody shrugged and said “Matthew’s
garage. I saw a vision of him and he was telling me to look in the garage. When
we went there, we found that, and this.” She slid the piece of paper and the
scrap of cloth across the table. “Now we are trying to decide what to do about
it.”

Gramps looked at the items and then looked at each one of us
individually, his eyes slightly unfocused. “I see,” he said. Then he motioned
for Melody to give him her phone. He dialed a number and when it picked up, he
said, “Margaret, would you come out here, please? I think we have a situation.”

#

I sat back and watched. There was no way I was interfering.
I was going to leave the theatrics up to the girls and let the chips fall where
they may.

“No, absolutely not,” said Gram. “You are in no way prepared
for this kind of ordeal.”

“No thanks to you,” said Gramps, blandly.

Gram whirled on him. “Harold, stay out of this.”

His expression was bland, but his shoulders were set. “I
have --for her entire life-- stayed out of this. But now she’s an adult, or
very nearly one, and she’s ill-equipped to deal with the hand she’s been dealt.
If you will not let them go to Orla alone, then we at least, must go with
them.”

Sam looked at me, eyes wide. This wasn’t at all what I had
expected. After the debacle with the
Golden
Queen
, I expected Melody’s grandparents to write us all off as delinquents,
but that wasn’t what was happening.

“What do you mean go with us?” I asked tentatively.

“Gideon, he said exactly what he meant,” Gram said,
irritated.

“You know I am right, Margaret. They have a lot of raw
talent and youth on their side, but they lack experience, and that we have in
spades.”

“But we are not a full quarrel.”

“I know that, but
they
are
.”

“What about Esme?” asked Tara, her voice
hesitant.
“She’s a part of your quarrel, isn’t she?
Along with…
Matthew?”

Gram pursed her lips and stared off into the distance. “Yes,
she is. But I’d rather not have her politics involved in this.”

“Politics?” asked Sam, echoing my own question. It was a
strange word choice.

“Never mind.”
She shook her head
firmly. “You had better tell us everything,” she said, motioning for me to get
up out of my seat.

I gave it up gladly.