The doorway opened to a tunnel that led down to the cavern. Grace was familiar with every inch of the property. She had played in the meadow, walked that tunnel and had been down to the cavern more times than she could count, but Don and Margie were wide-eyed and stared at everything.
Grace collected a couple of flashlights and the mask, from which the Oracle had spoken since the temple at Delphi, and that was when Margie broke down in tears. “I can’t do this,” the older woman said to her brother. “This is too much, too strange. I just can’t.”
Grace was unsurprised. It happened sometimes. People might travel from all over the world to consult with the Oracle, only to balk at the last minute. She said, “I’ll wait outside while you decide what you want to do. Just remember while you talk this over—you don’t have to try this right now. Your father just passed. You can give yourself some time and come back when you’re ready. The tunnel is quite roomy, and the cavern looks just like the ones at Mammoth Cave National Park or the cave systems in southern Indiana.”
Don said, “We read about it on the Oracle’s website, and looked at the photos.” He looked at his sister sadly. “I guess it’s all a bit much in real life.”
Niko had created a simple website in an attempt to prepare petitioners. It had a brief section on the Oracle’s history and another one on what to expect when they arrived. There was also a page that explained the ancient social contract, that while the Oracle acted in service and did not ask for payment, donations were essential for the upkeep and maintenance of the property. He had even set up a PayPal button. The website pulled in between two and three hundred dollars every six months.
Grace said again, “You don’t need to do this right now. You can come back when you’re more ready.”
She stepped outside and waited in the sunshine while Don and Margie talked. While she tried not to listen, she could still make out snatches of their conversation. It was difficult to hear their struggle, and their grief touched too close to home. She crossed her arms and scowled at the tall grass. The meadow was dotted with bright colors, mostly yellow from dandelions, but also white and purple wildflowers.
Going into the cavern was strange for people who were not used to it. The old stories told of petitioners approaching the Oracle of Delphi in awe and supplication.
But the Power had come so strongly the other morning. She could not think of a single reason why it could not do so again.
She felt along the edge of her consciousness, and there it was, nestled inside of her, deeper than gut instinct, an ancient well running through her like a dark subterranean sea. Was it really a gift from the goddess of the depths, or was it from some other strange, Powerful creature? The oldest stories her grandmother had told were a tangle of superstition and myth. The earliest Oracles had worshipped the Power and believed they spoke the words of the gods themselves. Over thousands of years, that attitude had evolved and changed, but Grace’s grandmother, and even Petra, had talked about serving the Oracle’s Power as if they were subservient to it. Without having any real experience herself, Grace had listened and accepted what they said, pretty much without question.
Until now. She patted along the edges of the Power with her awareness, really exploring it for the first time since it had come to her. It felt unruly and untamed, almost as if it had a mind of its own, except it wasn’t quite a person. She knew what personalities felt like from the ghosts she had encountered and the dark spirits she had driven off the property. Growing familiar with Khalil’s presence had only sharpened her understanding. She could see clearly that even though the Oracle’s Power seemed vast, it was too incomplete to be a personality.
She thought, how could you have Power without a person? You couldn’t, like you couldn’t have the ability to draw without someone to manifest it. But families carry inherited abilities and traits that manifested through generations.
She wasn’t the first person in her family to have an affinity to spirit. The difference between the two was, the Power she was born with felt just like a part of her, while this Power felt old.
Maybe it had been part of a person once, someone who had died or been killed a long time ago, and their Power had sheared away. Only, because it couldn’t exist without someone to manifest it, it had grafted onto someone else. Then someone after that. The thought felt right to her, somehow true. She felt again the sense of a dark ocean that flowed everywhere but seemed to recede from her touch.
She focused all of her attention inward and reached for it again. It receded again, as if pulling back from her.
Something clicked over in Grace’s head, the same way it had when she had heard Khalil talking with the kids in their bedroom or when Chloe had said she was bad.