Arrows of Time - Kim Falconer [85]
‘I don’t believe you,’ Selene said.
‘Why not?’
‘Look at you.’
‘Look at what?’
Maudi! Move it! her familiar roared in her head.
Rosette was about to fire another challenge. Instead she let her shoulders relax and exhaled. ‘Come on. This is absurd. We have to travel the corridors and it’s best done without anxiety. No telling where the Entity will send us otherwise.’
‘It doesn’t change what I know.’ Selene directed her comment to Shane.
He looked at her, eyes pleading. ‘Selene, she was like that when I met her.’ He nodded to Rosette.
‘How could she have been?’ Selene snapped the words back. ‘You said you’d been trapped in that loop long enough to learn each other’s language. That is longer than it takes.’
‘Longer than what takes?’ Rosette screwed up her face. ‘What in Passillo’s bright fire are you two talking about?’
Another groundswell rolled underneath them, sending the cliff face down like a waterfall.
‘No more time,’ Jarrod shouted. ‘Into the portal.’
Rosette hesitated long enough to grab Selene’s hand and turn her around. ‘Enough! Peace now. Come with me.’ She led them all into the corridors, brushing past the plasma stream as it burst from the Entity, her intentions focused on finding Nell. She was panting as she leaned against the smooth wall of the corridor, a quiet darkness around her. Her mind reached towards her familiar. Drayco?
Here, Maudi.
Did we get Fynn?
He’s here too. Sleeping again.
Everyone else?
They all came in.
Rosette sighed, letting go of Selene’s hand. After a moment’s reflection, she spoke to Drayco. Do you know what she meant by ‘longer than it takes’?
I’m not sure, Maudi. Some kind of task?
That doesn’t make sense to me at all. She rested her hand on her familiar’s back as they whirled through the corridor streams in silence.
Nothing’s made sense for quite some time.
‘I know, but now that Jarrod’s here, it will.’ She scratched Drayco’s spine, her fingers disappearing into the plush fur. His tail rose and whipped back and forth. She leaned over him, reaching to pet the long silky fur of the pup.
Maudi?
‘Yes, my lovely?’
You’re not going to like this…Her temple cat sat next to her, wrapping his tail around his front legs like a winter scarf.
‘What won’t I like?’
I can’t see Jarrod any more, or the others.
‘What do you mean, you can’t see them?’
There are no electrical signals running from my optic nerve to the visual cortex that indicate their presence.
‘What? They are right here. They have to be. We all ran in together. I held Selene’s hand.’ Rosette stiffened, her head scanning left and right, arms reaching out to touch her friends.
They did, and they were, Maudi, but they aren’t here now.
‘How did that happen?’
I think we’ve taken a different turn.
Rosette closed her eyes and sank to the ground as her legs collapsed beneath her. ‘Entity! Not again?’ She sat on her heels, rocking slightly in the dark as the stillness of the corridor floated around her.
Seems that way, Maudi. Must be for a reason. It’ll be all right.
Rosette didn’t move until Drayco nudged her with his nose.
We’re somewhere now, Maudi. See? We might as well have a look around. Check it out?
She got up, brushing off her cloak. ‘You’re right. We might as well, Drayco,’ she said aloud. ‘How much worse can it get?’
Teg crossed the central square of the temple grounds, nodding to a few faces he recognised, keeping the eye contact brief so they wouldn’t stop and talk. He was amazed at how chatty these people were. Almost everyone took an interest in him, even though many knew he was Lupin. Especially because I am Lupin. What a curious bunch. Hotha had warned him there could be fear or resentment in some of the Gaeleans, but they seemed more inquisitive than biased. It was a refreshing contrast to growing up in Los Loma, Gaela, a land steeped in prejudice against his kind. Here, so far, the only two with hard