Timeless (34 page)

“Why didn’t we recognize her before?” he
asked.

“Because that’s her power,” I answered.

“I thought she was able to bewitch people,”
Damien said, confused.

“She is. Ramona says she’s just a very
powerful witch. I suspect she’s had many past lives. That gave her
time to develop her powers of concentration to a point where even I
couldn’t immediately recognize who or what she was.”

Damien grew speculative, and I knew he was
making his own plans, which didn’t include me. He thought he could
handle Lamia, but I knew differently and told him so.

“You can’t go after her, Damien. She’s too
dangerous and too powerful for you.”

“I’m certainly not going to let her get to
you. Emmeline, she killed you last time. Do you think I’d ever let
that happen again?” he asked.

He pulled me to him close, stroking the back
of my head. I felt so safe in his arms. I wanted to stay wrapped in
the warmth and security of him, but my need to save Ben was
uppermost in my mind.

“What am I going to do?” I moaned, burying my
face in his shoulder.

“No, Emmeline. What are we going to do, is
the question,” he said in a resolved voice I remembered from long
ago when we had to escape Lamia and her evil power before.

It was a relief to know that I didn’t have to
do this alone, though I was frightened by what she could do to
Damien, who still carried scars from his last confrontation with
her. It still puzzled me that she hadn’t gone after him first.
Though I knew she couldn’t bewitch him—I thought she had probably
already tried that—she still had enormous power. I still didn’t
know what she was after, exactly, and I was worried I wouldn’t
solve the mystery in time. I’d been caught by her unawares before,
with deadly consequences. I didn’t want to underestimate her
again.

Damien thought we should wait for her to come
to us; he felt assured that Ben was just a lure, that she wanted to
choose her time and place and to make me watch her kill him before
coming after me. It was just a waiting game, he said. It was part
of her strategy.

Whatever she was doing, it worked. By the
third week, I was completely on edge. Having heard nothing from
Ben, I suspected the worst. I considered joining the Y just to keep
an eye on him, but after our last conversation, I decided against
it. He obviously didn’t want to see me, and I wanted to respect his
wishes as far as I could while still making sure he was safe.

By the fourth week, life had begun to return
to some semblance of normalcy. I couldn’t keep up the state of
nervous tension that I’d felt for the last several weeks, and I
knew that, when the time came, I’d have to focus all my energy on
defeating Lamia.

Six weeks passed before I saw her. I’d just
finished at the drugstore for the day. We’d decided to close early
for the Fourth of July parade happening downtown that afternoon. As
I locked the front of the store, I happened to see them drive up
together. Lamia, looking like Kirsten, sat behind the wheel in the
convertible with the top down. Ben was in the passenger’s side, and
they laughed together. They pulled up to a stop light near where I
stood on the street, and she reached up to smooth back his hair. I
caught the glimmer of the emerald on her hand. It was the ring that
Ben had given to me. She turned, knowing exactly where I stood, and
smiled. The light turned, and she sped away, leaving me in the dust
behind her. Understanding finally dawned on me. She needed
something of mine, something valuable to me personally to control
me. That’s how I’d brought Damien over—the force of my
concentration plus the rosary that reminded me of him. It wasn’t
strong enough to bring him directly to me because it wasn’t
actually an object of his, but it had been enough. But she now had
something I had worn, something that symbolized the love I’d felt
for Ben. She might kill him to get to me, but her ultimate goal had
been to control me, if she could.

My cell phone rang at precisely the same
moment. It was Ramona.

“I see her clearly. She isn’t trying to hide
anymore. They’re driving out to Ben’s parents’ house. She’s going
to kill him. And she’ll try to kill you too,” she said
urgently.

I dropped the phone and ran. The parade was
just getting started, and I had to make my way through the floats
to get to the Saratoga, which was parked two streets over from the
drugstore. I couldn’t use my power to help me. There was literally
no space to get any car through, even if I could imagine it. I’d
have to do it the old-fashioned way, I thought.

No one would let me through, so I started
elbowing my way through the crowd, drawing lots of grumbling
complaints and one ice cream cone, which somebody’s toddler threw
in my direction. Fortunately it missed, but just barely.

Now I just had to get across the street. The
local police made sure people didn’t come too close. They’d already
spied me, ready to make a bee-line in my direction if I so much as
stepped out of line.

One of the floats threw out candy, so when
the children rushed to scramble for the goodies, creating an
opening, I followed. I couldn’t get through the throng of kids, so
I knew I’d have to climb over the float. Lunging over them, I
stumbled onto the Miss DeLand float, landing right in the center of
the largest pie I’ve ever seen—it was the size of a large kiddie
pool. Now covered in peaches, syrup, and whipped cream from head to
toe, I literally stopped the parade, backing up the floats. I
didn’t have time for this, I groaned, too worried about Ben to
think much about the entire town’s seeing me covered in pie.

Undaunted, I stumbled right into Miss DeLand
herself, who just happened to be Angela Rossi. Under different
circumstances, I would have enjoyed seeing her land in the pie,
peaches dripping from her rhinestone crown, but I had more
important issues than embarrassing my old rival. I had a more
dangerous nemesis to contend with.

I finally made it to the other side of the
float, jumped off and made my way to the other side. The crowd
immediately parted. I ran the rest of the way unhindered, climbed
in the Saratoga, not bothering to turn the ignition. I let my power
do the rest.

The car sprang to life, roaring down side
roads to avoid the onlookers and traffic. On my way, I thought
about Lamia’s revenge. She’d wanted me to see her with Ben and to
follow them. I thought she’d probably wait, planning to have me
watch everything. I was glad Damien, at least, was safe. But for
how long? Would he be next on her list?

It took me half the time it normally did to
arrive to Ben’s place. I saw his truck and her convertible. I may
already be too late, I thought in a panic, wondering if I’d guessed
incorrectly as I ran to the front door. Maybe she’d already killed
him.

I didn’t bother to knock, though I didn’t
have to. The door stood wide open, and I could see Ben lying face
down on the deck through the sliding glass. I ran inside, frantic
to open the door, when Lamia’s voice stopped me.

“Don’t bother. He’s dead, Emmeline. You don’t
think I’d leave him alive?” she said, in that low, dark voice I
knew so well.

I slowly turned around.

“You knew I’d come. Why did you have to kill
him too?” I asked, tears filling my eyes. Ben was dead because of
me.

She laughed, a cackling sound I’d remembered
from long ago. She held up her hand, showing me the ring, which
caught the light filtering through the glass.

“I really should thank you, Emmeline, for
bringing me through with Damien. Every time it happens, my power
increases.”

So that was how she’d done it. When she’d
come through, it had added to her abilities. I wondered how many
times she had traveled through time.

I tried to concentrate, to focus on shifting
the context around us, but it was as though she blocked me. I knew
then that it was the ring. She could already hide herself from
other witches, but she was using the ring to control my power. As
long as it meant something to me, she could take my power and use
it.

She moved more quickly than I could have
anticipated, easily overpowering me. I thought she meant to kill me
with her bare hands, but she didn’t, instead hitting me, hard,
across the face and half-dragging me to the Saratoga, which she’d
started even before we reached it. I could feel myself losing
consciousness and fought it as she almost literally threw me into
the passenger’s side. I tried to focus on breaking free, but she’d
locked me in and drained my power, unlocking the driver’s side and
getting behind the wheel before I could act. I thought for a moment
of wrapping my hands around her throat, but if I tried killing her
now, I knew I’d have little chance of success in such a weakened
state. She was too powerful, and with my ring in her possession,
she was capable of using my power against me.

She backed out into the street, and we made
erratic zigzag patterns across every lane, going and coming. If
anyone passed us, we’d all be dead. She laughed as we went along,
talking incessantly as she drove.

“Yes, Emmeline, I really must thank you. When
I came through, I found myself possessed of enormous powers—greater
than I’d ever had before.”

Her voice had dropped several octaves to
another level that I recognized, a kindly voice. The man in the
woods. I looked at her then and stared in amazement. She didn’t
look like Kirsten or Lamia but like the large man who’d found me in
the woods.

“You!” I cried.

She smiled, baring her pointed teeth, and
stepped on the accelerator harder.

“But why? Why didn’t you just kill me then?”
I asked, furiously trying to work out a plan for my escape.

“Believe me, I tried. But coming through
drained me for a time. I couldn’t kill you then; I never realized
how weak you really were, Emmeline. Now I know,” she said in the
same triumphant voice I recognized from long ago.

“But you had enough power to change shapes,”
I argued, angling for more time.

“Yes and no. The man in the woods was the
first person I met when I came through.”

“Then that means…”

“Yes, I can inhabit other bodies too.”

“But why? When you can change shapes?”

“I was weak then. It was easier just to tap
into his life force.”

Poor man, I thought, cringing to think of
what she’d done to him. He had probably been a nice person before
he met Lamia. If it hadn’t been for me, he would still be alive. I
couldn’t imagine her letting him live after taking him over.

“So why did you help us?” I wondered,
desperate to know what she had planned. “I knew I could always find
you later when I was stronger. And I wanted to see what your life
here would be like with Damien” she said, laughing maniacally, an
inhuman sound that nearly paralyzed me.

Even as we spoke, she transformed again, but
this time she looked like me. I didn’t understand why she cared
about seeing what my present life was like, but I didn’t have time
to think about what she said. I was certain of one thing only—that
she would try to kill me again. I knew my only chance was to grab
the steering wheel and try to wreck us. The odds of my dying along
with her were stacked against me, but at least I’d have a chance.
If I didn’t try something, I knew I’d end up dead…again.

I realized in some panic that we were headed
to Sugar Hill, and I became more frantic. So she wasn’t just going
to kill me, I thought. She was after Damien as well. That decided
me. I might not be able to survive this, but at least I could save
him.

I saw the bridge crossing the St. Johns
River. It was now or never. I waited until we were just approaching
it and surprised her, jerking the steering wheel and sending the
entire car over the side and into the river. If I was going to die,
I would take her down with me.

We plunged down into the water. Lamia reached
over, grabbing my hair and pulling me to her. I thought she meant
to strangle me, but she released me abruptly, using the force of
her strong arms to break open the driver’s side window and swim
out. Water flooded the car immediately, and I couldn’t move, the
old fear of drowning coming back to me.

I knew then that I would die again just as I
did before. History moves in interlocking circles. She’d already
gotten away and would kill Damien. Perhaps her plan had been to
make me watch her kill him.

We were doomed to continue repeating this
pattern throughout time. Maybe I could try to save Damien in my
next life. And maybe then, I thought, I would finally succeed. I
wondered before losing consciousness how many times we’d done this
before.

Chapter Eighteen

"Being and Unbeing"

She was a gordian shape of dazzling hue,

Vermilion-spotted, golden, green, and
blue;

Striped like a zebra, freckled like a
pard,

Eyed like a peacock, and all crimson
barr'd;

And full of silver moons, that, as she
breathed,

Dissolv'd, or brighter shone, or
interwreathed

Their lustres with the gloomier
tapestries

So rainbow-sided, touch'd with miseries,

She seem'd, at once, some penanced lady
elf,

Some demon's mistress, or the demon's
self.

Her head was serpent, but ah,
bitter-sweet!

She had a woman's mouth with all its pearls
complete:

And for her eyes: what could such eyes do
there

But weep, and weep, that they were born so
fair?

As Proserpine still weeps for her Sicilian
air.

Her throat was serpent, but the words she
spake

Came, as through bubbling honey, for Love's
sake…

John Keats, Lamia

I awoke in the hospital, an IV hooked up to
my arm. My first thought, when I saw the bright sun pouring across
the floor, was that I’d died. But I heard Aunt Jo’s voice calling
my name, and I realized they’d just given me a cheerful room with
extra light. I blinked a couple of times and saw two faces above
me.