The Yanti Read online

  “No. I differ from Vak in that I desire balance. I intend to leave half of humanity alive, half the elementals. There is no need for total genocide.” Sheri added, “But I must be free to wield the Yanti, as I please, not you.”

  “Because you don’t trust me?”

  “Trust! For now, time has halted, but it could be stopped forever, and we could talk forever, and still neither of us would trust each other. Nothing is going to stop the invasion. However, if we work together, we can lessen the destruction.”

  “You act like you want to help? You’re the one causing the whole mess!”

  Sheri did not answer, just stared at her.

  Ali growled. “Half the world dead? I can’t accept that.”

  “Come Tuesday you will.” Sheri paused. “Where is the compassion Geea is so famous for? Let the war end quickly, and with the least loss of life. That’s best deal you can get at this point.”

  “So this is just a deal to you?” Ali sneered.

  “Yes. That’s exactly what it is.”

  “The way you describe it, the green world is to be left empty?”

  Sheri shrugged. “I have plans for it.”

  “Such as?”

  With contempt: “You wouldn’t understand.”

  “At least tell me why you feel this war is necessary.”

  “I can’t do that without revealing certain long-range goals we . . .I have.”

  We? Did Sheri have a partner? The woman was crafty—the slip might have been intentional. But perhaps she did have a partner, maybe even a superior. Ali had never considered the possibility before. Since swallowing an overdose of the fairy stardust atop the kloudar, and reclaiming many of her memories, Ali had seen her sister as someone who was desperate to rule, to have absolute control. The revelation of a we—if true—might alter her view of her sister, make her rethink much of what Hector had said about Lucy Pillar.

  Ali acted like she had not noticed the slip. She gestured to the frozen clock. “It seems to me you have enough resources to do the job without my help. Why do you need the Yanti?”

  Sheri was nonchalant. “It’s a powerful tool. Besides, it should have been mine. You must recall—before you brainwashed him with your constant whining—that Father was going to give it to me. You know as well as I do that it’s wasted in your hands.” She paused, shrugged. “You don’t even know how to use it as a weapon.”

  Ali bluffed. “Sure of that? How do you think Radrine died?”

  Sheri was not easy to bluff. Again, she just stared.

  Ali continued. “What if I do decide to use it as a weapon, and fight on humanity’s side? I forced Lord Vak to retreat before. I can always force him back again.”

  “Ha! Even if you somehow discovered how to reverse the Yanti and invoke the violet ray—which you can’t do, not without my help—it’ll make no difference. You were always a poor leader because you could not bear to make strong decisions. Admit it, you’ll never unleash the violet ray and risk killing millions of fairies, dwarves, leprechauns, and elves—because they’ve chosen to fight for Vak. You won’t go against him. The elven king used to be the father of your lover, one of your best friends.” Sheri shook her head. “You’ve no choice, Geea. You have to accept my offer.”

  “Just accept three billion deaths?”

  “There’re too many people in this world as it is.”

  “So you give Africa, Australia, and Asia to the elementals? The rest to humanity?”

  Sheri smiled. “Something like that.”

  “You’re lying. You keep bringing up memories of the green world, and yes, there is one thing I remember about Doren. She lied whenever it suited her.”

  Sheri lost her smile, spoke in a deadly tone. “I warned you not to anger me.”

  “Oh, I tremble in my shoes. What are you going to do, mark me like you did our mother?”

  Sheri did not reply, but lowered her head.

  Ali pressed on. “How did the fairy part of you feel? Putting your filthy thumb on her forehead, obliterating the last drop of who she was? Tell me, I really want to know, did you enjoy it?”

  There was a long silence, but since time had appeared to have stopped, perhaps it was short. Yet it was dark inside the room, and in the darkness, Ali knew she had hit a button in her enemy. A painful button.

  Finally, Sheri cleared her throat, spoke.

  “We’re here to discuss the fate of this world. Who’s going to live. Who’s going to die. You don’t trust me, I accept that. You’ve already pointed out how I know of the link between humanity and elementals. Why would I wipe out one side, over the other? Logically, it makes no sense.”

  Reluctantly, Ali let the question of their mother go. “Nor does it make sense to drive the elementals from their rightful dimension. You have to explain why you’re trying to do that.”

  Sheri spoke with sudden impatience. “I did. I tried.”

  “When?”

  “Before.”

  Ali was suddenly alert. Sheri referred to their previous life together, as fairies. “When?” she repeated.

  “When I invited you and Jira to the Isle of Greesh.”

  The remark shook Ali. Unfortunately, her memories of the Isle of Greesh were sketchy. She’d had a horrific nightmare during her recent sojourn in the green world—while sleeping in Queen Geea’s bed, in the Crystal Palace at the center of Uleestar—about the island. In the dream, she had been trying to stop Jira from entering an archaeological site Doren had insisted they see.

  The place had terrified her. For seemingly no reason.

  Sheri sensed her confusion, continued, “You spent only a short time on the island. If I recall, it scared you, and had a devastating effect on Jira.” She casually added, “A pity the place upset him so much. Honestly, I never saw that kind of reaction before. The way he killed himself, I suppose he just didn’t have the stomach for—how should I put it?—major revelations.”

  Ali sucked in an involuntary breath, felt a stab of pain in her heart that momentarily caused the Yanti to go cold. Ali had remembered that the archeological site on the Isle of Greesh had driven Jira insane. But she had not recalled him committing suicide . . .

  Suddenly it all came back to her. The bloody images—bathed in the blue light of the elemental kingdom’s stationary moon, Anglar—roared in her head. Jira stumbling to the edge of the balcony in Lord Vak’s castle. Screaming in a language neither of them had been taught. Her trying to stop him, to hold him . . .

  Then, his unexpected jump, that long deadly leap, that she had not been able to stop, despite a mighty leap of her own. She could fly, he could not, and she had flown after him faster than she had ever flown before. Yet she’d been unable to prevent his head from smashing the boulders that rimmed the river, Tior, which ran beside Thorath, the elves’ mighty fortress.

  Jira had died there, in her arms, at the foot of Lord Vak’s castle.

  His last words had been very odd.

  “Net . . . The . . . Enter.”

  At least, that’s what she thought he said.

  Lord Vak had come upon them minutes later. Just stood behind them.

  Jira had been his only son.

  How cruel it was of her sister to make light of such a matter. Ali felt the same bitterness she had experienced when Steve had died. Yet she hid her pain, not wanting to give Sheri the satisfaction. She mimicked Sheri’s casual tone as she changed the topic.

  “Why did you give me Nira?” she asked.

  Sheri snickered. “She makes a good little spy.”

  “More lies. You know I won’t expose her to anything I don’t want you to see or hear.” Ali paused. “Know who’s watching her now?”

  Sheri was silent a moment, her attention inward, then she scowled, spoke in an annoyed tone. “Why did you call him?”

  “Why not? He’s her father, isn’t he?”

  Sheri’s turn to suck in an agonizing breath. Ali had scored a bull’s-eye, and had her theory finally confirmed—again. From th
e beginning, after viewing Cindy’s memories of her and Steve’s visits to Toule, the truth should have been obvious. First there had been the librarian’s remarks about Lucy Pillar: how bright and brilliant the girl had been; how devoted she had been to Hector, even after he had caused the accident that had cost her most of her skin. Then Hector had pointed out how Lucy had taken him deep inside the power plant, just before it blew, to a spot that just happened to be, miraculously, shielded from the blast.

  The conclusion was clear. Lucy had taken him there because she knew the blast was imminent. She’d wanted to protect Hector, to have him survive the explosion, even after all he had done to her.

  When Steve and Cindy had spoken to Hector, the contractor’s devotion to Lucy had shone brightly. After the car accident, Lucy had been transformed into a mass of scar tissue. Yet he had stood by her, had tried desperately to make their relationship work.

  How many eighteen-year-old boys would do that? Ali had no bias against young males, yet she knew the answer to her question was—one in a thousand.

  Hector had been that one in a thousand.

  The thousand scars had not mattered to him.

  He had truly loved Lucy. And she had loved him.

  Yet, when it came to Sheri, he had made that strange remark.

  “I try to stay away from that woman.”

  She frightened him. Why? Something had happened between the two of them that had somehow slipped his conscious mind—or else been purposely erased—that caused his anxiety. Ali had a pretty good idea what it was.

  An hour ago, when Ali had finally met Hector, and sat across from him at her own kitchen table—Nira sitting in his lap—she had known for a fact that her theory was true. The similarities in their faces had been undeniable.

  Hector was Nira’s father. The elusive Mr. Smith.

  He was the child’s father, and it was clear he did not know it. Like most truly honest people, he was easy for Ali to read. Hector sincerely believed that thirteen years ago Lucy had perished in the power plant explosion. Certainly, he did not know that Lucy Pillar and Sheri Smith were one and the same person. It was equally clear that he had no memory of ever having been intimate with the woman. He hated her!

  So what had happened?

  The witch had seduced him. Then cast a forgetting spell on him.

  That part was easy. The hard part was . . .

  Why had she done so? Was it because she still loved him?

  Was the Shaktra even capable of such an emotion?

  Ali considered all of this as she watched Sheri strive to regain her composure. The woman was so shaken by Ali’s last remark, she did not even bother to flash a fake smile. At last, Ali knew she had found the monster’s Achilles’ heel.

  But perhaps that was wishful thinking. When Sheri finally did answer, she was all business. She held Ali’s eye as she spoke.

  “You go too far with your insolence. I’ve made you a reasonable offer, that will allow a large portion of the beings on both sides of the war to survive, and you turn me down. Fine, Geea, let the missiles soar through the sky. Let the nuclear mushroom clouds glow over every major city on Earth. Let Vak—and the weapons I’ll provide him with—ruin this lovely planet. It doesn’t matter—the end result will be the same to me. It is just that so much suffering could be avoided if you would cooperate.” She added, “It will be on your head.”

  Ali felt the need to gamble. “So you don’t want Hector and Nira to die?”

  Sheri pounded the table. “They’re irrelevant! You’ll not speak of them again in my presence!”

  Ali stood, letting her chair fall to the floor at her back. Striding halfway around the table, she glared down at the woman, and pointed a bitter finger at her.

  “Let us talk about you then! Let us go back to the question you refused to answer at the start! How did you turn into such a monster? In the green world I knew an older sister who was disappointed she was not named queen of the fairies—disappointed is all. She was not ready to harm a soul to gain the title. But then she runs off to the Isle of Greesh, where our father works but soon disappears, and where my boyfriend is fatally wounded. Then, years later, I have a monster called the Shaktra knocking at my door! I don’t know what it is but it’s attacking Uleestar! And the rest of the elemental kingdom! Then, in the yellow world, this world we call Earth, fourteen years ago, we have a teenage girl named Lucy Pillar, whom everyone calls a saint, who gets in a car accident, and ends up horribly burned. Yet this same Lucy Pillar has a boyfriend who still loves her, and who, from all outward appearances—so it seems—still loves him. His name is Hector by the way. Hector! Remember that name. Because thirteen years ago, she hides this same Hector in a part of a power plant that she blows up. Yes! She’s the one who blew it up! She’s the one who killed hundreds of innocent people! And for what reason? Not to hurt Hector, he was one of the few people to survive the explosion. So why did she do it? God help me, Doren, I’ll not bargain with you until you answer these questions! You’ll not get the Yanti from me. You’ll get only my scorn, and I swear to you, on everything that’s sacred to me, that I’ll use the last shred of power at my disposal to destroy you! So answer me now! Why did the fairy princess change into the Shaktra? Why did good-hearted Lucy Pillar transform into the wicked Sheri Smith?”

  Another long silence ensued. There was so much pain in it that it seemed as if the haunting purple light that filled the room and made the world outside stand frozen really was fed by their blood. Ali felt a vein pound in her head, one that threatened to burst, and the coldness she suddenly experienced in her heart seemed to belong to another world; to another place, perhaps, that was not a world at all, just an ancient hole in the fabric of space from which evil could emerge into their galaxy.

  What had her father and Doren found on the Isle of Greesh? All she could recall was that he had said it was not of this world. Yet somehow it was related to Earth. Yes, those were his words.

  So much, Ali wanted to ask her sister . . .

  Where is our father? Is he alive? In which world?

  Sheri looked up at her as she answered, and her voice came out remarkably soft, almost gentle. “You do not know what it is like to burn. Worse, you do not know what it is like to see someone . . . someone you . . . know . . . burn.” She paused and lowered her head, and added in a whisper, “I don’t have to answer your questions.”

  Ali felt as if her sister was trying tell her something profound. It was not so much the woman’s words, but her tone. For the first time since entering the room, Sheri acted human. Ali felt her knees weaken, sat on a chair beside her. Almost, she reached out to touch her . . .

  Then Sheri caught her eye, said, “No.”

  Ali spoke anxiously. “But I can heal you.”

  Sheri shook her head. “No.”

  “I can. You need not wear that silly mask. I’ve healed many, in this world and the green world. You know that. I can take away your pain.”

  Her bitterness returned with a vengeance. “You think it’s so easy. Put your hands on my heart and head. Let the Yanti warm. Then I’ll be whole again, and everything I’ve gone through will be forgotten. Why, I might even bow at your feet and thank you.” She stopped and shook her head. “You know nothing.”

  Despite herself, Ali heard truth in the words. She spoke carefully.

  “Tell me what I need to know. Tell me what happened to you.”

  It was Sheri’s turn to stand, to glare down at her. “You have the nerve to ask! You who have never really suffered a day in all your lives! A pity Jira could only die once on you! Had he died a thousand times, then maybe I would consider answering you. But you, Queen Geea, you disgust me, with your compassion and your empathy. It’s born of ignorance and conceit. It’s no more real than your title. Again, I say it, you know nothing of what’s real in this universe, and because of your ignorance, and your mockery of me, this world is going to burn. And all the souls in it, be they human or elemental, are going to burn with it. And
it’s going to be your name, not mine, that they curse as they die!”

  Sheri suddenly raised her arms above her head and clapped her hands. A light flashed, but it was unlike the light that had shone when the wizard had vanished from the barber shop. This light had no color, and although that seemed impossible, it was a fact. Like the fear in her heart, the light appeared to emerge from no set place or time. Out of the void it came. It was just there, and it hurt, so deeply, and in so many ways.

  The purple glow faded.

  The second hand on the clock began to move.

  Slowly, around the table, people began to raise their heads, and glance sheepishly at one another, as if embarrassed to let it be known that they had accidentally dozed off. No one wanted to say they had fallen asleep. For that matter, no one knew what to say, not even Judge Lincoln, who rubbed his sore head. So Sheri Smith said it for all of them, as she whirled and turned toward the door.

  “These proceedings bore me, I’m leaving,” she snapped.

  With that, Sheri was out the door. Gone.

  CHAPTER

  5

  With the main party to the discussions gone, Judge Lincoln had no choice but to halt the meeting, even though Officer Garten pushed him to continue. Yet even he did so without passion. He was like everyone else: dazed and confused. When Judge Lincoln called for another meeting in four days, everyone nodded as if that would be a good idea, and got up and left the room.

  Even Cindy was quick to leave with her parents. She hardly glanced at Ali. The only exception was Karl’s parents. They glared at her with overwhelming hatred before departing. She ignored them, and yet, it broke her heart to see Steve’s mother weep as she left the police station with her husband. Why didn’t they want to talk to her at least? What had they been told?

  The only one who remained behind with her was Mike Havor. He stood as the room emptied, but did not seem to know where the door was. Without asking for help, his dark glasses searched aimlessly. Instinctively, Ali reached out and took his hand.