Wraithsong (23 page)

Anthony gets that ‘I don’t
want to talk about it’ look in his eyes. “We’ll have to develop a
plan as we go.”

“
Okay, time out,” I say.
“Can we at least talk about this? I mean, all of our lives are at
stake. We can’t just jump into this blindly.”

“
I have a loose plan
figured out,” Anthony says defensively.

“
Will you share it with me,
please?” I ask.

He sits down onto his bed.
“The plan is, when we get there, we pretend as if we’re following
Maureen’s plan. So whatever she wants, we’ll go along with that for
a while.”

“
That’s a ridiculous plan,”
I say. “Please tell me you have a better one.”

His eyes lower to the floor
and for a moment, I see a young man who has weaknesses and doesn’t
always have the answers. I sit beside him and place my hand on top
of his.

“
You don’t have to do it
all alone. Let’s figure a plan out together, you and
me.”

He glances at me from the
corner of his eye and sighs.

“
What is it?” I
ask.

“
I’ve always had to figure
everything out on my own, so surely, I can manage this time
too.”

“
I can help, you know. I’m
not completely useless.”

“
I know you’re not useless,
Sonia. That’s not what I said at all. It’s just—it has always been
that way, and—”

Of course he’s always had
to figure things out on his own—Maureen is his mother. From the
couple of conversations between them that I’ve witnessed, I get the
feeling that Anthony is more of a burden and a mere tool to be used
than a son to be cherished. Maybe he thinks he’s weak if he doesn’t
figure it out all by himself.

“
You’re just as strong, if
not stronger, if you work with someone,” I say.

His eyebrows furrow and his
face has become tough. “Not having the answers makes me feel—” He
doesn’t finish his sentence.

“
Weak?”

He doesn’t nod, but instead
closes his eyes and presses his lips into a line.

“
You’re not weak, Anthony,
not in my eyes. I think you’re amazing.”

He huffs, as if my
statement is ridiculous. “You wouldn’t say that if you knew who I
really was.”

I tighten my grip around
his hand. “I know who you really are, and anything else that I
don’t know doesn’t matter.”

A faint smile appears on
his lips, and he nods toward me. “You and me, huh?”

“
You and me,” I say,
finding strength in his eyes. “So, is there any way we can delay
our trip to give us more time to plan with the
Lightálfars?”

“
What about your mom?” he
says.

The mention of my mom
nearly brings me to tears, but I manage to swallow the tears away.
“Would Maureen—kill her between now and when we show
up?”

“
Not likely. She’s using
your mother as leverage to get your fifth Huldra gift. As long as
Maureen still believes I’m on her side, following her plan, she
won’t deviate from her strategy.”

“
Makes sense.”

“
I can tell her that I want
you and your mom for myself. I’m convinced she’ll let me have you
after you’ve given your gift to her,” Anthony says.

“
So you think I should just
give her my gift?”

“
That’s not what I meant.”
He frowns. “As long as Maureen believes she’ll receive your gift,
she might not be thinking about or care what happens to you after
you have given her your gift. But of course you’re not going to
give it to her. We’ll just say so to buy more time.”

There has to be something
we can do instead of just wait around for Maureen to give us
orders. I think for a while. “We shouldn’t be on the defensive
here—we should attack. Are you certain my mom is being held
prisoner on Wraithsong Island?”

“
I’m almost one hundred
percent positive.”

“
What about the weapons?
We’re bringing some of those, right?”

“
Yes, of course,” Anthony
says.

“
Can we delay our trip just
a few days and get the Lightálfars here to Sarasota?”

Anthony puffs. “Maureen is
highly suspicious and she’ll know I’m stalling.”

“
Then we need a good reason
to delay. What would a good enough reason be?” I ask.

“
Only death, I think,”
Anthony says dryly.

“
Okay, a realistic reason,”
I say. “An emergency of some sort—a big one—one that’s believable.
Would there be any reason you can think of that would prevent us
from transporting through the Portal of Blufire?”

“
No. Well, if the house
burned down, the portal would be destroyed,” Anthony
says.

“
Could we burn down the
house? I mean, I’d hate to do it, but if it would give us a few
more days…” I say.

“
Or, what if we just tell
Maureen that the house burned down, and then you can use your
Huldra flair on a news anchor, so they’ll do a story on the news
about the fire. We could spare the house,” Anthony says.

I’m not sure if he is being
sarcastic or not because that suggestion might actually work,
though it does sound a little extreme. “Wouldn’t Maureen see
through that?”

Anthony stands up and
starts pacing. “Maybe, but obtaining a few more days isn’t worth
losing the Portal of Blufire. The portal could be very useful for
us down the road.”

“
True.” I sit and think for
a while.

Anthony’s eyes light up.
“You know, humans can’t actually transport through the Portal of
Blufire because the fire will sear them to death,” he says. “Only
Huldras or elves can. I’ll tell Maureen I’m worried about killing
you if we transport you since you are technically half human.
Actually…it
might
kill you because you are half human, now that I think about
it.”

Well, that is new. “Well,
since I turned eighteen, am I not solely a Huldra?” I
ask.

“
Well, theoretically, but
even so, we don’t know for sure since no other half human has ever
been transported through the portal and come out alive,” Anthony
says.

“
I think we just found
ourselves another day or two,” I smile.

“
We’d have to fly up, or
drive, if we can’t get a flight.”

I think for a moment.
“Convince her to let us drive. That way we’ll have a vehicle while
we’re there. We could take my mom’s SUV and stash it full of
weapons.”

“
Now what would we have to
say to make Maureen agree to that?” Anthony asks,
pensively.

“
Well, you could always say
the flights are full, or make sure they are. I’ll be glad to book
them all.” I grin.

“
Good plan,” he says.
“Let’s get going right away.”

* * *

On our way over to my
house, Anthony makes the phone call to Maureen. She buys our plan
without hesitation.

“
Smart
thinking, Anthony,” she says. She isn’t pleased to hear that all
the flights are full, but of course our flight story is very
believable since it
is
the start of everyone’s summer
vacation.

Back at my house, I rummage
through my room, pick up a few of my favorite outfits, some jewelry
and some extra pajamas and stuff them in my large duffle bag. The
house looks exactly the same as the last time I was here, but for
some reason the air-conditioner has been turned off, and the house
feels as hot and humid as a sauna. Before getting into the car, I
pick up the black birthday envelope I received in the
mail.

“
What’s that?” Anthony asks
when I open it. He turns the engine on and lowers the temperature
on the temperature control. It’s a sweltering day
already.

“
I’m not quite sure yet.
When Olaf visited me in my dream, or vision, or whatever it was, he
referred to this envelope, saying there were instructions in it of
what to do next.”

“
Olaf sent you this?”
Anthony asks.

“
Yes.” I begin reading
it.

Happy eighteenth birthday,
Sonia. From Olaf and Maureen.

I flip the card over,
searching for any other writing, and on the back I see a PO Box
number. “That’s it?” I’m highly disappointed.

“
Well, let’s not worry
about it anymore. Actually, can I see it?” He grabs it from me and
then flings the envelope and card out the window.

“
What did you do that for?”
I ask.

“
There might be a tracking
device on it, so we wouldn’t want that on our road trip,” Anthony
says.

“
Oh,” I say, feeling stupid
that I let my curiosity possibly put us in jeopardy.

“
While you were inside, I
contacted Skuld again, and she says she’s on her way to New York
with the other two Lightálfars. We’ll travel together up to New
Hampshire and to Wraithsong Island.”

“
Great,” I say, but I’m
suddenly very nervous to meet them.

Chapter 25

“
We’ll be in New York in
about thirty minutes,” Anthony says. We have driven over eleven
hundred miles in less than fourteen hours, only stopping a couple
of times to use the filthy gas station restrooms along the way. I
text Ashley to wish her a great summer vacation, and explain that
I’m already on my way up to Kensington. When she said she would
miss me and to stay in touch, I started to cry because from here on
out, I know things will be very different.

On our way, every time I
meet a person, I notice their aura and see their whole life story.
Each individual I encounter has a lifetime of memories as rich as
Karl’s. I feel bad for some, for they have grown bitter, letting
life’s hardships keep them from all the goodness around them.
Others have taken the bad and turned it into a learning experience,
and yet others, have taken the bad and turned it into something
beautiful.

It’s nearing midnight, and
my legs feel so stiff that I have to get out of the car before they
wither away forever.
Finally arriving in
New York, Anthony pulls into the Bergdorf Goodman Plaza parking
garage. He parks on the seventh floor and we head for the entrance.
“I’ve reserved a private room in the restaurant where we’ll meet
the Lightálfars.”

“
I’m starving.” I scan the
restaurant as we wait to enter the private room. Mauve chairs stand
handsomely at each perfectly set table. A large brown leather couch
stands by a low table in the center of the bar room and in front of
a large abstract mural. The mural separates the bar from the dining
area and serves as a station for hostesses.

“
May I have your name?” the
hostess asks Anthony.

“
Jensen.”

“
Welcome back,” she says,
checking her computer screen.

“
Thank you. It’s always a
pleasure to be here.”

I wonder why he’s been here before, and how
many times, and why he didn’t mention it in the first place. I also
notice that the hostesses’ aura is darker than other people’s I’ve
seen. I blow it off, thinking that maybe it’s just the dim
lighting.

“
I hope your meal is
enjoyable.” The hostess grabs a couple of chestnut-brown menus,
smiles, and signals for us to follow. We pass the marble countertop
bar, and several tables decked with crisp white tablecloths and
fancy silverware. A plate here must cost at least a hundred
bucks.

The hostess shows us into a smaller room set
up for a private party. “Can I get you started on any drinks?”

“
Sparkling water for me,” I
say, parched after such a long trip. I tried not to drink so much
on the way so that we wouldn’t have too many bathroom breaks.
Anthony pulls out a white framed, mauve-cushioned chair and bids me
to sit. The window gives me a perfect moonlit view of Central
Park.

“
Same for me,” Anthony
says. “Can we get started on the appetizers immediately? Deviled
eggs and the ahi tuna. Does that sound good, Sonia?”

“
Sure, I’ll eat anything,”
I say.

“
Enough for five people,
please,” Anthony says to the hostess.

The hostess leaves and comes back with our
sparkling water. “The rest of your party just arrived and they say
they’ll be in shortly.”

“
Great,” Anthony says.
After the hostess leaves, he sits down beside me and rests one
elbow on the tabletop. “I called the Porter Hotel Central Park
before we left and reserved two double bedroom suites.”

Just then a man and a woman enter the room.
I can’t see their auras at all, so I gather they must be
Lightálfars.

Both Anthony and I rise to
greet them. “Nice to see you again, Skuld,” Anthony says, shaking
her hand. “I’d like you to meet Sonia.” The word I think about when
I see Skuld is fair. Fair as in pale skinned,
and
fair as in beautiful. Her
straight blonde hair reaches her waist, and her eyes are an intense
green. She’s wearing white jeans, white heeled slouch boots that go
up to her mid-calf, and a tightfitting white tank with rhinestones.
Her lips are full and glossy, her cheekbones pronounced, and she
looks like the ideal woman with curvy hips and a round
bosom.