Crowned (37 page)

He nods and lowers his barrier. “Take it.”

This time there is no magical object. There is only a spell, constructed from the energy signature the Puppetmaster left in the minds of his victims. My grandfather has left it at the front of his mind for me to solve. Because of the time constraints, a complex spell was out of the question. I asked him to make it as simple as possible, and he did. It’s a ball, made up of countless tiny strings of energy. The Ultima bubbles up inside me, and with her eyes I can already see that this spell has only one key.

I take a mental snapshot of the ball, and once it’s in my head I begin the process of unravelling it. Thread by thread by thread, until I can see the underlying pattern and the single word that unlocks it. Then, with painstaking care, I bind the threads back together, lacing them around the key, making sure I’ve copied the energy patterns exactly. I’ll only have one chance to unleash it, and I can’t afford to make a mistake. Finally I nod. “I’ve got it.”

Ntatemogolo’s shoulders drop; he was holding his breath. “I owe you an apology.”

“For what?”

“Doubting you.” He sighs. “I did not want to believe it. After so many years of thinking that the Ultima was nothing more than a legend, I could not accept your version of the truth. I think of myself as a wise man, far more knowledgeable than most. If she were real, I would have known.” He raises his gaze to mine. “I sensed a power at work in you but I refused to believe it was the Ultima. Until now.”

My eyes widen. “You believe me?”

He nods. “The amount of power required to create what you asked is immense. Finding traces of the Puppetmaster’s energy was easy – all I had to do was hold Marshall’s hand and let my gift work. But releasing those traces from his limited psychic energy was far more difficult. There was a moment when I thought I was going to fail. It was then that I felt my gift expand, and sensed that there was power at work beyond my own. My gift increased tenfold, as the legend says. I felt it happen. It was then that I realised that I had let my pride blind me. You were right. The Ultima is real. I can’t explain her existence, but I can’t dismiss it, either. Not any more.”

I’m too moved to speak. I knew he’d come around, I just didn’t think his realisation would be quite so dramatic. That Ultima sure knows how to get things done. “You don’t have to apologise, Ntatemogolo. You were trying to protect me.”

“And yet you are no longer a child,” he says softly. “You are a young woman now, and I can no longer keep you under my wing.” He leans forward to touch my cheek. “I’m not as wise as I think.”

“You’re wiser,” I counter. “And you taught me well.”

He smiles. “Come – there is not much time.”

We get to our feet. “I need you to do one more thing for me, Ntatemogolo.”

He nods. “Of course, my girl.”

“Stay with Dad until I get back. I haven’t told him where I’m going and he’s not going to handle it well. He’ll need you.” I reach into my pocket for my house key and press it into his palm.

“I will go as soon as you have left. Be careful.”

I manage a small smile. “I will.”

As I walk to the door, he pulls Rakwena aside and they exchange a few whispered words, then Rakwena and I climb into the car, wave and set off to save the world.

“What did he say to you?” I ask.

“Oh, he just told me if I don’t keep you safe he’ll cut me into pieces and use my organs for
muti
.” His tone is light, but I can sense the underlying fear.

“He’d never use your organs for
muti
. He might cut you into pieces, though.”

“Thanks. That’s comforting.”

The drive is tense. We’re quiet, thinking about what lies ahead. The daylight is fading, and by the time we turn onto the road to the airport all that’s left of the sun is a few ribbons of orange on the horizon. We leave the car in the same spot as before and continue on foot.

The warehouse is gone – the Puppetmaster no longer has the energy to maintain the illusion – but I can feel the energy pulsing in the air. We walk until we’re standing in the general area where the warehouse used to be. I reach into my bag and take out the puzzle box.

“Wait.” Rakwena pulls me against him and kisses me, catching me by surprise. The tingle is sharp, almost painful. “For good luck,” he whispers when he pulls away.

I open my eyes and look into his; blue points spin in his irises. “Your eyes.”

He blinks. When his eyelids rise the blue dots are gone. “Better?”

I grin, marvelling at his control. “Perfect.” I take a deep breath. No more stalling. I glance at him. He nods. I take the puzzle box in both hands, summon my gift, and let the Ultima loose.

Chapter Fifteen

At first it stumps me. Too many locks, too few keys. And then the concealments unravel, and I see it – the solution. The trick. My body is filled to bursting with green light. The Ultima is unconcerned about the puzzle box – it’s a tiny, insignificant toy. It breaks open and falls apart, the beautifully crafted pieces scattering on the ground. My hand finds Rakwena’s.

Don’t let go.
It’s her voice. It’s my voice. It reverberates in my head and his, echoing through time.

I feel the Puppetmaster’s elation all the way down to my marrow. It’s terrifying and pervasive, acid eating through the edges of my brain. He already thinks he’s won. A staircase appears before us, rickety and topped by a black door. It looks absurd in the middle of the bush. I feel as though I’ve stepped into one of those surrealist paintings. My head aches at the sight of the staircase, trying to make it fit into the landscape and failing.

I look at Rakwena. He nods. We climb, and climb, and climb, and push open the door. Beyond it is darkness. We step through…and fall. It feels familiar. The faster we fall, the more familiar it feels. Someone else fell like this, someone who has since been lost and is never coming back. The woman from my premonition. She tugs at the edges of my memory, her stylish brown shoes flashing into my mind, and then fades. Our feet touch the ground. Solid earth. Sand.

“Oh my God,” Rakwena breathes.

We’re in the middle of nowhere, ashy sand all around us. There’s a gaping hole in the ground a few metres away, wide enough to swallow a truck and ringed with wooden stakes. Bright red light shoots from the hole, pulsing furiously. Strings of it reach out across the field in nine different directions, stretching to the markers.

I’ve never seen a Loosening, but I know it’s not supposed to look like this. There’s too much energy spilling out of the vortex, crackling wildly and increasing before my eyes. This is the man-made magic machine that does the unthinkable. It peels apart things that should be bound for life, releasing power that can no longer be controlled.

And then I notice something odd about the stakes around the vortex. There are four figures tied to them, bodies limp, heads lolling to one side. One of them has long, straggly dreadlocks. Thuli.

“Welcome! As you can see, you’re just in time!”

The Puppetmaster is standing beside us, hands clasped behind his back as though we were observing a butterfly landing on a flower rather than the end of the world as we know it.

“Isn’t it remarkable? Not quite what I imagined, but extraordinary, nonetheless.”

“Those people…” Rakwena turns to the Puppetmaster, eyes flashing with anger. “Are they still alive?”

“This is your masterpiece?” I gasp, staring up at the tall, faded figure. “This is what you did so you could find your precious Ultima? How could you possibly think you could control something like this?
Look
at it!”

“I never intended for it to last. I want to stop it as much as you do.” There’s the slightest trace of petulance in his voice, and my stomach twists with disgust. “Remember, I could have left it alone and done nothing.”

“And risked someone else finding the Ultima first?” Rakwena glowers at him. “You’d never let that happen. This is about achieving the goal you’ve worked towards all your life – becoming the world’s greatest gifted. That’s all you want. Eternal glory. Immortality. Everything else is a means to that end.”

I knew this, but part of me still feels betrayed. I held the Puppetmaster to a higher standard. I thought he believed in something other than himself. I thought he believed in a united gifted world – a preposterous, dangerous ideal, but an ideal nonetheless. I disagreed, but I could understand where he was coming from. Now he’s just another sad little villain with a sad little motive.

There’s no time
, the Ultima tells me.
Look.

I turn my head towards Thuli and the other captives. My gift looks deeper, and I see the jagged fingers of red light slicing into their heads, sucking their gifts away. But Thuli’s stolen power, shallow and buried just beneath the surface, is already gone. The red finger isn’t taking his gift. It’s taking whatever’s left.

“Rakwena! Now!”

He doesn’t hesitate. He runs towards the first stake, using his gift to release the prisoner’s bonds and then carrying the limp figure to a safe distance. I see him move towards the next person, then close my eyes and summon the Ultima. She stirs, but doesn’t emerge. Not yet. First she has to live up to the legend.

I feel the energy enter me slowly, faint pinpricks all over my body. Through the Ultima’s eyes I see millions of thin, fragile threads of light floating towards me from all directions. I watch them touch the surface of my skin and slip beneath it, each one adding to the flame burning inside me. She’s bringing all the gifts in the world together, binding them to herself, and to me. The Puppetmaster has his army, and now we have ours.

Power surges inside me, hot and fierce. The Ultima comes rushing from the depths, a tidal wave of energy so powerful it flings me backwards. I hit the ground hard, the impact forcing the air out of my chest. Green energy gushes into the vortex of the Loosening. The two energies swirl around each other, green and red, locked in a fierce battle.

But I’m resisting, and she can’t use the full force of her power until I succumb. There’s one prisoner left. I wait until Rakwena reaches him, and then I let go completely. It feels like a flood pouring out of me, making my insides heave. The vortex explodes in a riot of green and red light. The light shoots up into the sky, the two energies still grappling with each other. The red energy dims, then surges, and more green light spills out of my chest in retaliation. I try to raise my head but I’m no longer in control of my body. My limbs stiffen as the energy pours out of me. It tingles at first, then it starts to hurt, and then the pain becomes unbearable. I open my mouth to scream but I’m not sure whether any sound comes out.

I can’t move. The power is too much for my body to take, and all I can do is lie there and wait. The world becomes a raw, ringing, pulsing light, drowning everything. It goes on and on and on and on and then it stops, and time stops with it. I float for a minute, for a millennium, and then I feel the ground, cold and hard beneath my stiff, sore limbs.

“Connie!” Rakwena is at my side, pulling me to my feet. “Are you OK?”

I nod. We’re surrounded by smoke and fog, and my body is mine once more. My heart is racing. Did it work? Yes. There is no more red light. I squint through the fog and I can make out the stakes, but there’s no longer anyone tied to them. My shoulders slump with relief. I knew the amount of energy the Ultima would have to produce to counteract the Loosening would be immense, and I didn’t want the victims to end up as collateral damage.

“Where are they?” My voice is groggy.

“Close. I couldn’t move them too far – there wasn’t enough time before she hit the vortex.” He slips his arm around my waist. “They’re alive. I couldn’t tell much more than that. Once the green light collided with the red, it was hard enough keeping myself on the ground. But she did it.”

“How? Did you see it happen?”

“It was incredible. The green light eclipsed the red – it diluted it until the red light faded altogether, and then the green light went back into your body. Were you awake at all? It was hard to tell – you lay there shaking like you were having some kind of fit.”

“It hurt like hell. All I could see was light, and I couldn’t move. It was like fire shooting through my body.” I wince, still aching. “It was the Ultima’s show. I was just her transport for the night.”

“And now we need to focus on the next task.”

I nod. I’m grateful we both made it through the first ordeal. Then the Puppetmaster steps out of the fog, and I know we’re not going to have a moment to recover. He has something under his arm – it looks like a stack of papers.

He bows low before us. “Well done, Princess.” When he rises his eyes glitter with zeal. “Let me speak to her,” he rasps, licking his lips. “I’ve waited so long…”

I start to refuse, but the Ultima stirs again. I heave a weary sigh.
Fine. Go ahead.

Her words tumble off my tongue. “You have found me, seeker. Your methods are monstrous, but efficient.”

The Puppetmaster goes into a fit of glee. His features contort into a hideous semblance of a grin, and his nostrils flare exactly the way Thuli’s did when he witnessed my premonition. They
must
be related. I see a different side of him now, simpering, almost obsequious, but I know it’s just a front. As much as he values the Ultima, he’s no true seeker. She’s nothing but a prize jewel for his crown.

“I didn’t know how else to get your attention,” the Puppetmaster purrs. “Please, let me see your true form.”

“You saw it as I destroyed the abomination you released upon the world. That’s as much as you’re able to see.” I have to say, having my tongue move of its own volition is a bit of a head-trip. “I know what you have done,” she goes on. “I see it now. The vessel is unaware, but it makes no difference. She plans to destroy you.”

Um…hello? That was a secret. Whose side is she on? And what does she mean, I’m unaware? Unaware of what?

The Puppetmaster laughs. “Conyza is brilliant, but not nearly as brilliant as I am. There’s nothing she can do.”

“She doesn’t fight alone.”