“We’ve found her! We’ve reconnected with her nanolocator! Reginald Chu is there as well. We need everyone to focus. Begin to pull them back.”
The woman paused, and Lisa didn’t dare ask the obvious question. Not because it had been forbidden, but because she was terrified of the answer. Mordell answered her anyway.
“There is, unfortunately, no sign of the boy, Atticus Higginbottom.”
Chapter 17
Finding Tick
Lorena knew something was happening with her Barrier Wand, and it wasn’t just that the Drive within it was helping pool the power of Chi’karda for the Ladies of Blood and Sorrow. Something else was at play. The metal surface was hot, almost too much to touch now, and the Wand had a hum of its own.
Mordell’s words had been like a death sentence. Lorena had suspected the truth from the start, and the people here obviously had different priorities than she did. They wanted Jane back, at any cost. Even if the cost was the life of Lorena’s son. And she didn’t plan to let that happen.
Breaking her handhold with both Lisa and the stranger to her left, Lorena opened her eyes and straightened the Barrier Wand in her lap. She quickly ran through the dials and switches, adjusting and evaluating, making educated guesses since she was in such an unprecedented situation. Sweat poured down her face.
“What are you doing?” Mordell shouted, the echo ringing along the walls and ceiling of the black, rocky room. “Rejoin hands this instant!”
Lorena gave the woman a nasty glare. “Back off, lady, or you’ll be seeing and feeling a lot of blood and sorrow today.”
A quick glance at Lisa showed that her daughter was smiling.
Tick felt something tugging on his heart.
Not like despair, or love, or missing someone. It was a literal tug, as if someone had sunk a hook into his heart and cinched it tight with a strong rope. And then the rope started pulling.
He cried out, feeling a fire ignite within him that scorched his insides with pain. He clutched his chest with both hands, gripping his shirt and pulling his fingers into tight fists, pressing on his sternum. It did no good. The pull on the rope was getting stronger.
It hurt so bad. The gray mist swirled around him; lightning bolts exploded through the air as the thunder thumped and boomed. His body continued to fly through it all.
And his insides screamed with pain.
Mistress Jane knew something had changed. She felt a presence within her, as if some other soul had joined with hers, trying to fight her for occupancy. She looked at Chu, who was still close to her, just as his eyes opened. He’d felt it, too.
He yelled something at her. His words were utterly lost in the deafening noise of the storm around them, but she could read his lips: Save me.
Jane thought of the Ladies of Blood and Sorrow and the things she’d trained them for. The endless possibilities they could accomplish within the Great Hall of her castle, where Chi’karda gathered so powerfully. And finally, something logical clicked into place for her. The Ladies had combined their efforts, pooled all their power, and had reached out for her nanolocator. Tick had pulled them out of the Nonex into some no-man’s-land barrier between it and the rest of Reality. Just close enough to reestablish contact.
Jane smiled, knowing exactly what expression was on her red mask: joy.
Chu reached out a hand to her, his mouth still moving with unheard words. Fear enveloped him, and sweat covered his face even more than before.
Jane felt ashamed for him. Embarrassed by his weakness. But she knew what the man was capable of. And they’d come so close to partnering before. So close. Until the boy Tick ruined everything, including Jane’s body.
Chu—her partner. Utopia—her mission. She twisted her body, straining to reach out with her arm.
Mistress Jane took Reginald Chu’s hand.
Lisa watched as her mom worked furiously over the Barrier Wand, adjusting the instruments, fine-tuning them with the slightest of movements. The Ladies around the circle had continued their efforts, ignoring the mutiny of Lisa and her mom. Mordell and the woman who’d been sitting next to Lisa’s mom had simply moved closer until they could reseal the ring of held hands in their magic circle. Maybe they figured they could deal with the turncoats later.
“Mom, what are you doing?” Lisa asked. She’d been scared to interrupt her mom’s concentration, but she couldn’t wait one more second.
“I’ve almost got it.” She had her tongue pinched between her lips, and sweat trickled down both sides of her face. “I can’t believe it, but his signal is there. Before it wasn’t missing so much as showing that he didn’t exist anymore. But he’s there, no doubt about it.”
“Really?” Lisa tried not to let her hopes leap to the sky.