December had finally arrived. More than a week of quiet had passed, and everyone felt a bit on edge. They were waiting for the other shoe to drop and wondering just how long of a reprieve Minstrel would give them. Tasia continued to train Logan and Terry in their conjuration gifts while Raine tended to Kari's healing skills, and Theo worked on Kimber's Sight.
The latter had proved a quick study and she had picked up aspects of meditation and divination with impressive speed. Still, she did feel a bit nonplussed to find herself sitting naked in the middle of the attic one night. "Why are we doing this?" she asked her husband. She eyed his loose robe with some wistfulness. "We're technically still on our honeymoon."
He grinned at her. "Are you addicted to me by any chance, Kimber?"
She merely lifted a brow. "Are you shocked if I am? I don't see you discouraging such a thing. You say I seduced you the first time, but let's be real, Theodore: by the time I tackled you to the floor of your apartment, you had been doing a fair job of not-so-subtly seducing me first."
"Family tradition, really."
She snorted. "Good to know for the future. Now please tell me why I'm sitting here getting splinters in my ass."
He tried not to laugh as he finished drawing a circle around them with white chalk. "We're doing this because it's time to see how far you've gotten, and you volunteered to make the first attempt at using Sight to get insight into Minstrel. As for the nudity, being skyclad helps shed bonds of mortality and enhance gifts. I'm not naked because I'm not making the dive, and I'd distract you anyway." Not that seeing his wife sitting there naked did anything for his concentration, either. Her skin glimmered beautifully in the candlelight, and her soft curves always tempted his hands to wander. Down, boy, he told himself. He sat down across from her, and his robe dipped over a shoulder. "Alright. Concentrate."
"He expects me to concentrate when he sits there like a redheaded god of desire." She reluctantly closed her eyes and put the image of her near naked lover out of her mind. "What am I concentrating on, love?"
He rose to his knees and leaned closer to lightly place his hands on her temples. Both of his visible Flower Marks began to glow softly, and the glow rippled down the streaks of orange and yellow over his eyes. Gold majik moved across his cerulean eyes as he harmonized everything inside him. "On my voice," he said, and his Virtuoso voice vibrated with power and music. "Simply on my voice." He caught her when she slumped toward him. Until she could learn to look alone, he had to anchor her. "What do you see?" he asked softly.
"A big piece of plaid material." The words sounded almost monotonous for she had gone deeply into her Sight. "Every color under the sun."
"Pick one. Start with the most common." If she could see even one little piece, it could be fed to Storm and perhaps he could unravel the entire damned scarf. And if not Storm, then maybe Tasia. Theo could not shake the feeling Tasia might know more than even she realized, but whether or not she would share remained another subject entirely.
"Red. Lots and lots of red." There was a moment of silence. "I can't unravel it."
"Then it's a big part of him. We'll look later. Pick another color."
"Black. It's under the other colors." Pause. "It looks like death." Her eyes opened suddenly, and the blue had disappeared into the black of her expanded pupils. "It's consuming everything."
"Pull out." He gave her a shake. "Pull out, Kimber, now!" When there was no response, he slapped his hand over her forehead and forcefully blocked the vision. "Kim, focus on me, honey. Hear my voice." He softly began to sing the first thing that popped into his mind in the hopes of severing the ties for her.
Her entire body went slack, and he felt the danger pass. For long moments there was silence, and then she mumbled against where her face was pressed to his chest, "I haven't heard the Dancing Rainbow song since I was a kid on a playground."
He managed a weak laugh. "I was desperate." His arms tightened around her. "I'm so sorry. I should never have asked. I should have realized you weren't ready to try to touch something potentially evil."
She straightened. "Hey. Shh. Shh." She gently framed his face with her hands and brushed at the tears under his lashes. "I have to learn somehow. I have to be stronger if I am to help you." She drew him closer and wrapped her arms around his shoulders as she rested her cheek on his head. She didn't need to invite him in to see what she had; he was already there inside her mind as two mated visionaries always were. Before the black had overtaken everything, she had seen twenty colors. Twenty very familiar colors. All of them being slowly bled out.
* * * * *
In another apartment not very far across the city, Kari rolled over in bed to snuggle her lover and discovered his side of the bed was empty. It disoriented her and she opened her eyes quickly. Where had he skipped off to? "Stormy?" she called as he sat up. She felt a charge of static a moment later, and her hair quivered in the air. It crackled as she got out of bed.
She went toward the living room slowly, not wanting to intrude on whatever he was doing. Candlelight flickered around the room, and she saw that he had pushed all the furniture out of the way. He sat on his knees in the middle of a cast circle and only the candlelight covered him.
Her entire body flushed with desire that never seemed to go away for more than minutes at a time. He had always, and would always, have a devastating impact on her entire being. Just one look at him from across an entire university racetrack had brought her senses wildly to life, and nothing had been the same since.
She honestly did not think he had any real clue that she had taken the culinary class just to be near him. Sure, she loved to cook and bake, but she had never felt a need to take a class until she had discovered that was why he was on campus. She had been an alumni and only borrowing the racetrack for training but she had immediately asked to join the class as well. Luckily, she had gotten in. Everything about Storm had been such a . . . breath of fresh air. She had never fit into the Rebirth Era, and Storm had made her more comfortable than anyone else. Arriving in the Resurrection Era had felt like coming home. She had always belonged here with her beautiful Cultivator.
He continued to lightly age like a drink made to be savored in a century; in thirteen years, he would reach his peak and stay there as immortality entirely kicked in. He still had a nearly willowy frame, but there could be no mistaking his lethality when he clearly had distinct muscle. He frequently dumped his larger brothers-in-law on the sparring mat as needed. His ashy brown hair had grown out to just past his shoulders, and he usually just left it down because he knew Kari liked to play with it. Honestly, no matter what he did to his appearance, she always felt enthralled.
She sighed. Yeah, she was hopelessly in love. "Hey," she said softly. "Can you hear me?"
"Mm." His eyes didn't open. "I was trying to read the pattern. I think Kim tried a few moments ago herself. I linked to Theo. I thought maybe I might have a better chance since I'm used to walking the Immortal Fields and finding others to link to. I don't have Sight, but I don't need it for this. I'm just going deeper into the pattern I've already seen."
She sat down to watch him. "Do you ever regret it?" she asked softly.
"Being chosen as a Defender Cultivator who risks his life for peace? Or being a witch with majik?" His eyes did open then and he looked at her with a smile. "The latter never had a chance to bother me. I grew up in the Martine house as much as my own. Mom and Tasia made majik feel so . . . normal. As soon as I thought of a question, one of them answered it. And as for the former, well, it's literally a gift from Gladiolus and Destiny that I be chosen as a Dual Cultivator. Yes, it was terrible how we came to be Activated, but I don't regret it."
"You don't talk about that time," his lover noted. "Why not?"
"It was . . . horrific. Almost a sort of reminder of the burden on ourselves. Aria was dying, Kari." He tilted his head back. "Falling to pieces literally. Poisoned and tainted water. People dying. Armand could have been a kind and just man, and Aria would have still be dying without a Ruler Cultivator on the throne. Here, it's okay as long as we just live, but not there." He took a long breath. "I think more than any other war yet other than this one, we had the biggest risk of dying. LeAnn and Tasia nearly drowned. Tasia had to shatter her own soul. The first time. The second was the Dragon War." Under his breath, he muttered, "I don't want to know what the third will be." He shook his head. "Honestly, it just hurts too much to remember."
"Storm?" She pressed her hands against the circle preventing her from getting to him. "Put this down. I want to hold you."
He smiled. "Okay." He started to straighten up to dissolve the circle and break the connection when he felt something slipping back along the link he had been holding. Quick as a blink he slammed up his mental shields and locked the doors he had opened.
The force slammed into the shields, and it was so hard and powerful that it broke into the physical realm. He went flying across the room to smack into a wall. He broke through the circle as he did, and it shattered violently. The invisible shards slashed into his flesh, and Kari rushed through the hidden debris to his side. "Stormy!" She fell to her knees beside him and eased him into her arms. "Stormy, are you okay?"
His eyes opened and they looked murky with pain. He could barely focus on her hands as they glowed softly gold with majik while she tried to heal his wounds. "When we see him, he sees us." Tears welled up suddenly. "I saw inside him. It was . . . empty. It hurts."
She gathered him closer and began to rock him gently. "I know, my love," she murmured. "I know." Both of his Masks had been sitting near, and his communications one lit up with yellow and purple ombre. She reached for it without releasing him. "Hi, Tasi. It's Kari."
"Is Storm okay?"
"Yeah." She held him closer protectively and put the mask on the table to use her then freed hand to gently massage his forehead. "He was testing the pattern. Something ricocheted back at him and slapped him pretty hard. Broke the circle too."
"Shit." Tasia let out a long and weary sigh. "That's what I thought. Did he say anything about it?"
"He said that when we see him, he sees us, and that he saw inside him and he was empty. Any clues on that one?" She grabbed the mask and then lifted Storm in her arms and stood. Not an easy feat because he did pack a fair bit of weight, but unlocking her majik had increased her own strength enough to finally allow her to manhandle her slightly shorter Cultivator. Thankfully. She carried him back to their bedroom.
"A few. Kim was trying the same thing. You and Storm should meet up with Theo and Kim. I don't want any of you diving solo, understand? It's more than obvious that Minstrel is unexpectedly familiar with and comfortable accessing energies normally reserved for majik users. Unless I'm there to anchor, the four of you work together."
She had to smile. "Yes, Mother."
"Oh, shut up." The mask stopped glowing.
She put Storm down gently on the bed and then put the mask to the side. He began to shiver, so she crawled in next to him. She cocooned them in the blankets for warmth, and he finally fell asleep as he tried to recover. She remained awake for a long while, though. Something was bothering her. Eventually, she slept as well.
They were both awakened a few hours later by someone pounding on their front door. Kari tried to roll over to go back to sleep but had forgotten she and Storm were all tangled up. She remembered when she found herself pinning him to the bed. Her barely open eyes blinked. "Hi."
Storm, now more than awake himself, rolled his eyes. "I can't move." His hands lifted without thought to thread through her rust colored hair. "Not that I'm complaining, mind you. You make a far better blanket than any feather comforter."
She lowered her head to kiss him when the person outside began knocking again. The candles he kept around the bedroom flared to life at the same time. He grumbled and shoved her aside to find his robe. He belted it tightly as he stalked to the door and opened it. "I should take offense," he said, "but if anyone is entitled, you are."
Theo snorted. "Damn right." He hugged his friend tight. "You okay?"
"Kari's good with her hands." Storm knew how it sounded and didn't bother to clarify it. He just smiled. "I'm fine. Really. But come look at this." He held the door for Theo and Kimber and then led the way into the living room. There was a burn mark in the carpet where the circle had been, and the couch had cuts in it.
"There goes your deposit," Kimber said to Kari as she came down the hall wearing her running shorts and a workout bra.
"Better the apartment than my lover. He's worth more than any money." Kari aimed directly for the coffee pot and discovered Storm had set it to brew the night before. There was already a cup waiting, much to her delight. She wanted her morning run still, but damned if she would do it without any measure of coffee in her system.
"She's such a cute addict," Theo decided. A bracelet with a raw agate stone shimmered as he shoved his hair out of his eyes. Not unusually, the Resurrection Cultivators had found themselves harmonizing to a stone of their Mother world as their protective charm. "Tasi told us to stick together, so I figure we might as well get started on it. The two of you together should be able to get us further than either of you alone, right?"
"Let's find out." Storm held a hand out to Kimber. "Here. Link with me." When she eyed his hand, he rolled his eyes. "Theo, your wife is afraid of me."
"I'm afraid of you," his own lover mumbled as she drank her coffee. Mornings were not her thing by a long shot; hence the run to wake her up. Without that, she usually only managed enough cognizance for one thing, but having guests forced her to keep her hands to herself.
Storm felt the heat in her gaze and curled his toes into the carpet. He had started to really love mornings since knowing her. Theo sensed the byplay and grinned slightly. "Kim, take his hand so we can go home and Kari can have him instead."
Kari coughed and Storm grinned. "Please do."
Kimber laughed. "Life can be so odd sometimes. I've been through so many strange times of my life where I fluctuated between thinking boys were weird and then thinking they might be the best thing ever and then thinking they were scary and then back to liking them. Then I met Theo." She smiled at her husband. "And somehow he convinced me that the right one could be all of the above."
He tapped a foot lightly on the ground. "Well, hell. What I'd like to do in response to that would be inappropriate in polite company." He shot her a smoldering look from under his lashes and made his eyes appear a blue mystery.
She felt heat climb her cheeks and rush through her blood. "I pity Beth," she grumbled. "Theodore, stop that."
"Seriously. Don't mush up her brain. It's her one decent working feature."
Kimber fired a rude gesture in Kari's direction, and Storm and Theo both muffled snickers. "Alright, kids, let's behave." Storm held out his hand again. "It'll be okay. Linking with me isn't unlike linking with Theo. Just open your mind."
She was still a little uneasy if only because she was still getting used to having her majik at all. At least she did not have magikry; she needed both Ruler and Defender magic for that, not a lone skill. They all heard a flutter and turned their heads to see Haeth sitting on the windowsill watching them. The morning sun shined on her blue scales. "Just open your mind," the Elder dragon said. "It will all work out."
She reached out and took Storm's hand. Theo stepped up behind Storm and put his hands on the slightly taller man's shoulders while Kari stepped up to brace Kimber as well. Once they were all together, Haeth flew around them in a loop to create a circle of blue-green flame. It was stronger than a normal cast circle and carried an echo of dragon power that added additional protection.
Storm could delve into a pattern to unravel it, but without Sight he could not speak of what he saw nor determine how to move deeper. Kimber could. Their unity meant he could work and she could translate. Her eyes opened, and the pupils had contracted to pinpoints. "Plaid."
Kari had no idea what to do to guide, but Theo did. His voice was deliberately soft and commanding to create a strong anchor. "Kim, you saw the black as death. Storm, pull on the black string."
There was silence and then a brief expression of annoyance flickered over Storm's face. Kimber said, "It won't remove."
Theo felt a little chill. That meant death was a deeply intricate part of Minstrel, which made him all the more dangerous. "Pick another color."
"Blue." Pause. "It's a single thread all by itself." Frustration filled her voice. "We can't remove it either."
"In my limited experience," Kari said, "that implies to me that whatever makes up Minstrel is all tied up. We're going to need to find the single thread that links it all."
"Yeah." Theo was watching Kimber's face. "What is it?"
Puzzlement was in her tone as well. "I hear a bell. There's a bell chiming somewhere. It's so methodical. The blue thread is quivering." She took a sharp breath. "He sees us."
"Get out!" Theo pulled on Storm as Kari pulled Kimber and their hands came apart to severe the connection.
The circle quivered and shuddered as an invisible outside force slammed into it. The entire building shook with impotent fury, and the circle threatened to break. The four within were all knocked off their feet and to the floor where they stayed for safety. Haeth let out a single piercing roar and the circle blazed red. The force outside whirled through the room, ripped through the couch, and knocked everything over and off the walls. Then, just as suddenly, it disappeared. Haeth searched the room and then dissolved the circle. "It's gone."
Kari carefully crept over to Storm and pulled him into her arms. "Stormy? Honey, talk to me." There was no response, and she saw angry welts marking his arms. He had still taken some of the backwash. She immediately began healing them.
Kimber shook her head and reached for Theo. "Theo?" He gave a faint groan and his head fell onto her shoulder. It was then that she noticed his hair, and her face lost its color. "Kari. Check Storm's hair."
Kari glanced down and began to curse softly. The colored locks of hair that each Cultivator possessed that showed their planetary heritage no longer looked vivid. They had faded to a sickly hue as if being bled out. "Shit." She spotted Haeth sitting on the counter. "Can we fix it? What is this?"
"Minstrel is able to use evil magic. He can notice when you try to see him. He follows the path to the source, and he can touch those who are open even through the circle. He did not bother with you or Kim because you are not as important to him. He went after the boys. He forced them to push for their limits to protect themselves. Unlike three others we know, they are not in possession of infinite power of any sort." She flew over to land on Kimber's shoulder. "You can refresh them, yes. Witches who resonate to Cultivators can do such a thing, and because you are Caretakers, you resonate to your lover. Only him, though. You could not aid anyone else. Be warned, however, that to revive Theo and Storm wholly, you two will push yourself to the edge in turn. You'll have to sleep it off, or be revived in turn by Tasia and/or Ryan."
Kari looked at Kimber. "I don't care if it incapacitates me. They're needed more than we are. There's not a lot we can do, but tons that they can do. We're relatively useless in any fights that come along."
"I agree." Kimber held Theo closer. "However, I think we should see about changing that. I won't stand by much longer while they're hurt like this. You think we could get Rodi and Allister to teach us how to use swords or something?"
"I say we go the whole way and have Terry and Logan teach us advanced physical combat too. We've already got some basic skills we can easily expand." Kari lowered her head and pressed her lips to Storm's forehead. She could almost literally feel the pain inside him from the mental slap and physical drain. "You gave me your power once. Now take mine."
When Theo awoke, he found himself lying on the bed down the hall. Storm was lying beside him. He groaned and sat up. "What the hell?" He felt slightly groggy, and strangely refreshed and also on a bit of what felt like a sugar rush. An odd combination, to be sure.
Storm groaned and turned over onto his side before sitting up. "My head. I feel hungover." He considered that. "No, I feel slightly drunk. Kari fed me her power. What the hell?" His eyes widened sharply as the pattern came clear. "Shit!"
"What?" Theo asked urgently.
"Minstrel must have tried to drain us and the girls refreshed us by giving us their majik!" He leapt out of the bed and ran down the hall toward the living room. He quickly raced to Kari's side where she was lying on the floor. Kimber lay not far away. It looked as if they had been trying to reset the room and dropped where they stood. "Kari, you idiot."
Theo knelt beside his wife and smoothed her hair back with trembling fingers. "We need Ryan and Tasia. They can replenish their majik without risk. Damn it, they should have just called them to start with!"
"There was no time," Haeth told them from where she was lying on the kitchen counter. "You were both so far gone they needed to fix it immediately."
"I'm going to get dressed." Storm headed back down the hall.
Theo gently touched Kimber and then reached over and touched Kari as well. "Sleep," he ordered softly. The two women relaxed even more as his powerful voice compelled them to truly rest and their breathing evened out. He could not have sent them under to begin with, but once there, he could indeed take them to the deeper and more restful stages. He had aided Sayena or Kacey at the hospital more than once, actually.
He fetched a couple blankets and gently tucked them over each woman. He was adding pillows when Storm came back down the hall in denims and a plain shirt. He also wore a necklace now that held the chunk of citrine that worked as his protective charm. His bracelet with its two Masks hung on his wrist as well.
Theo pulled out his PCA and started to say Tasia's name when he sensed a presence. He turned his head sharply and saw Minstrel just outside the window. He was watching them with a jovial smile on his face, and he waved when he saw Theo's gaze.
"You bastard!" Storm ran toward the window but the madman was running off with a laugh that chilled him. "Haeth, protect this place."
"Of course."
Theo lifted his phone again. "Tasia Aria." It connected almost immediately. "You probably already know because you're you, but Rodi and Logan need to come babysit. Ryan and you are needed too. While you do that, Stormy and I are hunting Minstrel. If we need you, you'll know." He disconnected and shoved the phone into his pocket and then grabbed his Mask from its earring instead. "Let's get that asshole. No one touches our Caretakers."
It was such a rush, Minstrel realized as he leapt from rooftop to rooftop. Why, he felt almost high as he floated on the power he had sucked from the Resurrection Cultivators. The feathered necklace he wore made him think he could fly, and he leapt higher and higher, laughing as he went. The bell on his hat chimed cheerfully. "One, two, tie my shoe," he sang. "Three, four, shut the door!" He twirled in the air with another laugh . . . and was suddenly hurled through the air as a bolt of lightning infused with fire plowed into his chest.
He slammed into another building and fell to the rooftop with a grunt. He got back up to his feet to see Storm and Theo in armor and Masks standing on the rooftop with him. Both looked furious. He couldn't have been more delighted. "You came to play with me?" He turned a cartwheel gracefully. "What shall we play? Cards? Skipping stones?" His smile sharpened into something almost evil. "Roulette?"
A giant roulette wheel appeared underneath the two Cultivators, and they fell into it with yelps. Storm scrambled back up to his feet and looked around sharply. It looked just like the real thing, and that alone made it more unnerving. "What is this?" he demanded.
Minstrel leapt over to the piece in the middle that spun the wheel and smiled down at him. "Why, it's a game!" He dodged as Theo tried to blast him with raw majik. "Tsk tsk! How very naughty of you. Those aren't the rules." He kicked the wheel into motion and spun along with his arms held out in the air. "Whee! Fun! So much fun! Let's have more fun!" The wheel spun even faster.
Theo and Storm hit the ground on pained yelps and then held onto the colored plates for dear life as the wheel kept spinning them dizzy. They had once liked roulette because it took as much luck as it did skill to spin the wheel and make your marker stop on certain plates to gain points. They would probably never play it again after this. The wheel stopped without slowing down, and it sent both Defenders tumbling head over heels. Luckily their armor protected them. They carefully straightened to their feet and then heard an ominous click. They slowly turned their heads and found a door opening under a crossed out number.
"You won a free trip to the Underbelly of the Plane! Congratulations!" Minstrel hopped down to the edge of the bowl to look inside. "What prize have we got for them, Fred? Why it's a trip into your worst nightmare! Have fun, and thanks for playing!"
Theo's eyes widened as a boulder rolled out onto the bottom with them. It was too large to dodge, and the sharply sloped sides of the wheel could not be climbed. The wheel abruptly tilted slightly, making the boulder begin rolling toward them, and there was nowhere to run to escape. Theo reached for his transport magic only to find it muffled again. "Start running!"
"Welcome to How Long Can You Last!" Minstrel's tone matched that of a host from one of the productions released on Visualities. Over the last few hundred years, people had grown to love watching contestants compete in various sorts of games as entertainment. Shanae and Sayena had only three rules about the production of those shows: no shock factors, no humiliation, and no rigging the outcome. Clearly, Minstrel had missed those rules. "Today's contestants: the Resurrection Cultivators! Who will live? Who will die? Find out after this advertisers' break!"
"I'll break his ass!" Storm said under his breath.
Theo managed a weak laugh. "I'll help. Damn it, we can't run forever!" Something suddenly touched his Sight, and he looked up sharply. Shocked, he could only stare. A little girl almost identical to Anna Aria was hovering in the air in front of them. It could not be Anna, however, for this girl looked translucent in a familiar way. "A ghost?" he whispered.
The little girl wore an unfamiliar style of dress, and her hair hung in loose curls. She clutched in her arms a little doll with a minstrel's hat. Her eyes locked with Theo's, and she held the doll up. She gave it a shake, and the bell on the hat chimed merrily. Theo suddenly remembered the bell Kimber had spoken of and took a quick breath. "That's it!" he exclaimed.
"It?" Storm stared at him.
Theo dropped his voice so Minstrel wouldn't hear, and Storm's eyes sharpened like a sword edge. He reached out with his magic to call lightning bolts to his hands, and then began running up the sloped side instead of the basin. The bolts worked like climbing picks to let him get high enough the boulder could not strike him. He immediately called his bow to hand and whirled to fire an arrow at Minstrel before the startled enemy could move.
The arrow seemed to whiz harmlessly over his head, and he just laughed. "All that just to miss me!"
"I never miss." Storm grabbed up the lightning bolts and summoned more to his hands. He released the high-pressure blast at the boulder and blew it apart into fragments of dust too small to hurt anyone. Theo fell to his knees and worked on catching a breath as his partner slid down to stand beside him.
Minstrel puzzled over Storm's words until he turned around and discovered that his hat had been shot off his head. It was pinned to a flagpole with an arrow. An unholy scream bellowed up from inside his chest and the roulette disappeared as he dove for his hat.
Storm helped Theo to his feet, and they both watched as Minstrel tore the arrow out and clutched his hat close. A chilling rage filled his eyes as he looked at the two Cultivators. Without a word, he disappeared. Theo let out a long breath. "Let's go back and make sure our Caretakers are okay."
The entire apartment building had been invisibly wrapped inside a particularly potent dual-cast majik circle from Rodi and Logan that no enemy would dare try to pierce. Storm and Theo rushed into the apartment to find Rodi armed with his sword, but he sheathed it at seeing them. "You look exhausted," he noted. "What were you doing?"
"Playing games." Storm hurried across the room to where Tasia and Ryan knelt over Kari. The apprentice had his hands on either side of Kari's head and the priestess was covering his hands. Silver-gold majik from Tasia and gold majik from Ryan flowed together into the unconscious woman. "Is she okay?"
"She will be. We just finished with Kim." Tasia looked to where Theo had sat down with his wife's head on his lap. "He was not after you two as we thought. It was an intent to harm them all along. He didn't get them in the circle, so he got you two in a way that he knew would make them sacrifice themselves for you."
"But why does he resent us so much?" Logan demanded from near the window. "Why not you? We're a drop in the bucket compared to all of you. We can't save worlds. You can. Is this an extension of his hate of Raven? Hate one Caretaker so hate the rest?"
Storm frowned deeply as he saw part of the plaid unravel. "That sounds right, yet somehow doesn't seem to be everything. It's definitely part of it. The green thread just unwove itself. I think it's envy. What he's envious of, however, I don't yet know."
Theo drew a long breath. "Well, things also got more complicated, too. When we were trapped today, Storm got us free by shooting his hat off his head. He went nuts. I've never felt such a chilling force in my life. And . . . the reason I told Stormy to shoot his hat was because I saw a ghost." He looked at Tasia. "I saw a little girl. A ghost. She looked exactly like Anna, but in a little blue dress. She was carrying a little doll with a minstrel's hat. She made the bell jingle, and I knew."
Storm took a sharp breath as the entire weaving in his mind seemed to suddenly unravel wildly. Rodi's hands instantly came down on his shoulders and anchored him. He had never had a pattern explode like that. "The blue thread," he whispered. "The ringing bell. Tasi, what did Raven say about why Minstrel hated him?"
Tasia's chocolate eyes looked older than usual, as if she had suspected the truth all along. "He said that Minstrel killed his little sister but blamed Raven."
"Then that's it. That's at the core of him. Somehow . . . his sister is at the root of this. That tiny little blue thread holds all of it together." Storm closed his eyes as Rodi gently massaged his pounding temples. "I just don't know why."
* * * * *
Deep below the Alurian castle, Minstrel sat in a darkened corner with his hat clutched against his chest as he rocked back and forth, back and forth. He was breathing hard, and tears slid down his ashen cheeks as his eyes stared sightlessly ahead. "They can't take you away from me," he whispered. "They can't take you away. I'll protect you. Don't worry. I'm here. They can't take you away."
©Stacy J. Garrett. Do not reprint or redistribute without permission.
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