Beckoning Light (17 page)

“He would understand. He could come with me, of course,” I told Blake firmly.

“Your place is here. The sooner you accept that, the easier it will be. It is time to grow up; you are not a child anymore. We would not want you to meet the same fate as your mother, now, would we?” Blake asked icily, and with that, he walked away into the crowd.

Calvin immediately appeared at my side. “Charlotte, are you all right? You look a little pale.” I felt anger welling up inside of me. I could hardly breathe, my anger was so intense. I reached toward Calvin, knowing that his touch would calm me. Just as my senses had improved after the Ceremony, Calvin’s presence had an even stronger effect on me.

Calvin took my hand in his again, and I started to feel better. “Your eyes are so beautiful, Charlotte,” he said suddenly.

“Thank you.” I accepted the compliment without blushing as much as I expected.

As soothing as being with Calvin was, I still felt off. I suddenly started to rethink my time at the castle. Had I been blind to Blake this whole time? Had I not realized how mean he could be?  Telling me to
grow up
? The way I saw it, I had been handling the events of the past few days very well for a fifteen-year-old. With the way he had mentioned my mother’s
fate
, I started to get a sick feeling that he had something to do with her death.

“Calvin, I’m suddenly very tired. Would it be all right with you if I went to bed?” I asked, hoping he wouldn’t be disappointed. At first I had been tempted to share my fears about Blake with Calvin, but I couldn’t ruin this event for him. Calvin looked happy enough to burst.  Still, I knew that I couldn’t celebrate anymore.

“Of course, may I escort you to the stairs?” Calvin clearly wasn’t upset by my request.

“Please do,” I responded, and he smiled.

Calvin held onto my hand as we walked down the long hallway. The foot of the stairs was dark, with only a few sconces lighting the stairway. He wrapped his arms around me and kissed me lightly on the lips. I felt a jolt of energy and warmth. He pulled away slowly, as though reluctant to lose the touch. 

“Goodnight, Charlotte, my love. I hope you have the sweetest dreams. I know that I will be dreaming of you tonight like I do every night,” he whispered. 

“Goodnight.” I hugged him before I reluctantly started up the stairs. It was hard to say goodbye to him, feeling anxiety and a sudden emptiness at leaving him, but I knew that I had to get away from the party.

I looked back down the stairs as I neared the top and saw that he still stood watching me; I waved and walked down the hallway to my room. At the door to my room I found an armed member of the Bravado standing guard. He nodded, and I entered my room. 

Tara was already waiting. She offered to help me change, and I agreed, appreciating her help getting me out of my dress. Afterward, I told her she was free to go to bed. She left quickly.  As soon as the door closed behind her, I heard a key turn in the lock.

Chapter Nineteen

Kevin

              The air felt humid when I awoke the next morning. I thought I was used to humidity after growing up in Charleston, but this was even worse. The weather in Energo was full of extremes. The air had felt dry when I went to sleep the night before.

              My sleep had been fitful and full of dreams, most of which involved Charlotte running away from me, always a few steps out of my reach. Monty insisted we take some time to train, but I felt like I was failing my sister by taking so long to get to her. Wasn’t I supposed to be the strong one, the fast one? I started to feel like a weakling who couldn’t even protect his own sister.

              I tried to shake the dreams as I quickly finished the water and bread given to me by Tomas. I looked over at Monty and Liam, who both seemed as out of it as I did. Monty looked more worn than I ever remembered seeing him, or maybe more than worn, he looked scared. I got the feeling that if Monty was scared for Charlotte, then we were in trouble. 

              After breakfast, we quickly cleaned up and changed into different clothes. Liam and I weren’t thrilled about it, but Monty convinced us that we didn’t need to call any unnecessary attention to ourselves. Dressed in our new clothes, we followed Tomas into a huge open space at the back of the cave. My jaw dropped when I saw that Percy wasn’t alone; he was standing next to a girl in her late teens. She was tall, with her blond hair pulled back, and she wore boots that only emphasized her height and her unbelievably long legs. She looked directly at me, and I tried to act disinterested. I quickly shook myself; my sister was missing, and her safety came first.

“Gentleman, this is Samantha. She will help with the training.” Percy gestured to the girl beside him. I tried to hide my surprise. This girl was going to help us train?

              “Samantha was brought here as a young child after her parents became prisoners at Bellgard. Luckily, she has agreed to accompany us on our rescue attempt, and I assure you she will be an important asset.” Percy looked at her with pride.

              “Kevin, let us have you start,” Percy said, as Samantha took a step toward me. She looked at me seriously, obviously ready to fight.

              “I don’t fight with girls,” I objected, as soon as I realized what she was planning to do. Even playing sports with girls was hard. You couldn’t just let them win because they’d get upset but, then again, you couldn’t play your hardest either. And now I was supposed to fight one?

              “You did
not
just say that,” Samantha said furiously. I looked over at her quickly, but not fast enough. Her leg came out of nowhere, knocking me in the chest, propelling me to the ground. From a distance, I heard Liam laughing. I would kill him. I got up slowly, watching as Samantha approached Liam.

              “You next?” she asked.

  Liam immediately stopped laughing. “Uh, no thanks.” Served him right, I thought, still feeling embarrassed.

“Are you afraid to fight girls, too?” she asked without a trace of humor on her face.

“No,” Liam said nervously.

“Okay, then,”

                Even with the heads up, Liam ended up sprawled on the floor as well. Monty took her on next, and he was incredible. He was unbelievably fast and able to anticipate her every move. Eventually, Monty had Samantha on the ground. At first it was weird to see Monty kicking around a girl, but considering what she had done to me, I understood it. I had no idea that Monty knew how to fight like that. But I probably shouldn’t have been surprised, considering he was from another world and all. 

              We took turns fighting all day. It turned out that Tomas was pretty good at combat, too. We didn’t use any weapons, it was more about strength and agility. I pushed myself as hard as I could. I had been through hard practices before, but this was something else altogether. We had short breaks, but never quite long enough to fully recover before we were working again. Percy was an intense coach.

              Late in the afternoon, Percy led us outside behind the cave to an enormous shear mountain wall. I stared at it for a minute trying to figure out what Percy expected us to do. I saw Monty approach the wall and understanding dawned—we were going to climb it. Before Monty started to climb, it looked like there were absolutely no hand or footholds. As I watched him, I realized that there were some tiny cracks in the surface that were just big enough to maneuver with your fingers. I followed behind Monty, just ready to get it over with. It was exhausting. I almost slipped a few times, but I was able to catch myself. Liam had even more trouble than I did, but he made it up unscathed. Samantha followed him easily, although she moved slowly. After Tomas reached the top, I watched in awe as Percy scaled the wall like it was nothing. Percy could barely walk with a cane! So now on top of being beat up by a girl, I had been shown up by a crippled old man.

              Exhausted, I was thrilled when Percy finally suggested we call it a day. Every muscle in my body ached, and I really wanted to sit down. I was about to start climbing down when Percy stopped me.

              “Kevin, I have one more thing I want you to try before we stop,” Percy said, watching me. I couldn’t believe it. As much as I wanted to turn him down, I didn’t want to look weak in front of Samantha.

              “Sure Percy, what is it?” I noticed that the rest of the group was watching us.

              I followed Percy over to the edge of the cliff still unsure of what he was going to tell me to do.              

              “All you need to do is jump to the other side,” Percy said nonchalantly. I thought I was hearing things. There was no way that I was going to be able to make that jump. The gap between the cliffs must have been nearly twenty feet. Assuming there had to be some sort of trick, I moved closer to the edge of the cliff, but there was nothing between the cliffs for hundreds of feet until the dried riverbed below. There was no way anyone could survive such a fall.

              I wasn’t the only one concerned. “Percy, are you sure he’s ready for this?” Monty asked. “Maybe we should wait until he has more experience.”

              “If he is going to handle himself at Bellgard, he had better be able to make this jump now. We do not have the luxury of time, Monty.”

              I was already nervous, but hearing the doubt in Monty’s voice really scared me. Monty had always been my biggest fan, aside from Charlotte, so if he didn’t think I was ready, then I could be in some serious trouble. I tried to think of a way to get out of it when I looked over and saw Samantha eyeing me. Great, I thought, now I really have to do it. I decided to get it over with. I hoped that Percy had some rescue plan in case I fell, but I seriously doubted it.  Logically, I knew that attempting the jump was stupid, but I couldn’t back down from the challenge. I took a running start and prepared to start freefalling. Suddenly, I felt ground beneath my feet. I opened my eyes and turned around. I had made it! 

“Good job!” Monty called over to me, relief clear on his face.

“I told you he was ready.” Percy smiled at me for the first time.

“Nice one, man!” Liam said, clearly impressed.

“I’ll see you all at the bottom,” I called before starting my descent. I was pumped with adrenalin after the jump, but at the same time, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was going to be facing much worse obstacles at Bellgard.

Overall, I was physically spent, and I felt pretty dumb. In one day, I had been taken down by a girl and outdone by my uncle and an old man. The only saving grace was that I had miraculously made the jump. Monty tried to reassure me that more training and patience would go a long way, but I was still in shock. I was used to being the best at anything physical, and this was embarrassing. I started to worry about our chances of saving Charlotte. What if I wasn’t strong enough, and I let her down? I knew that I would never forgive myself, so I pushed harder. Liam seemed to be having an even harder time than I was, but I was impressed by how tough he was; nothing seemed to keep him down. We had barely talked, too engrossed in the training, but I could tell from his face that he had the same concerns I did about rescuing Charlotte.

              Liam and I excitedly walked over to where dinner was being served. We were both starving. I didn’t know why we had gotten our hopes up; the food was no better than it had been for lunch. It was like hummus without any of the flavor, but with crunchy bits that I decided I would rather not identify. Liam and I looked at each other as we tried to swallow it.

“I’m really starting to miss pizza,” I said, as I took another bite.

“I don’t think you’re the only one. Maybe it’s pepperoni withdrawal that has Monty in such a bad mood.” Liam laughed and nodded toward where Monty sat looking miserable.

“Maybe you’re not so far off,” I joked back. It felt good to laugh, even though we both knew that Monty’s mood had nothing to do with pizza.

I was still feeling pretty lousy when Samantha came over.

“You would not be half bad if you stopped trying to show off.” She sat down next to me.

“So, is that a backhanded compliment or—” I started.

“It is advice. Look, I know I was hard on you today, but I need to be. If we have any chance of getting into the castle at Bellgard, we have to be at our best.”

“It’s going to be tough, huh?” I tried to hide how completely humiliated I was.

“Yes. There is no way that they are letting us in easily, especially if your sister is the new Essence.” She pushed the food around on her plate.

“Listen, I’m sorry for implying that girls couldn’t fight. That was pretty stupid,” I said, wanting to clear things up.

“It was, but I will give you a pass this one time. Just do not make the mistake again.” She stood and walked away.              

I was still feeling humiliated when I went to sleep, especially about how dumb and weak I must have looked to Samantha. She really was a lot more than met the eye. I had never met a girl like her before, and as much as I knew I should be thinking of other things, I couldn’t get her out of my head.

Chapter Twenty

Charlotte

I paced around my room trying to make sense of the situation. Blake had made it clear that I wasn’t leaving the castle, and now I was locked in my room with an armed guard outside. Things were getting intense. I knew that I had to find a way to leave, even if it meant leaving Calvin behind. That realization was a hard one to accept. I knew that it would hurt even more if we were separated now. The ceremony had made my connection to him so much stronger.  I felt the pull to be with him even as I plotted to leave. Part of me ached to be in his arms, but another part warned me not to lose sight of my family and home. I also knew that Blake had plans of his own that I couldn’t afford to ignore.

I pulled open the chest and was relieved to find my jeans, t-shirt, and sweatshirt folded neatly inside. I pulled them on quickly and tried to think of another way out. I looked at my reflection in the mirror and almost fell backward. No wonder Calvin had commented on my eyes; they were now bright blue, several shades brighter than they usually were. I walked over to the windows and discovered that the farthest window was actually a door with a small balcony. I was relieved when I was able to push open the door, but disappointed that there appeared to be no way down. As I was about to close the door, I jumped, noticing a small gray cat slip into my room.