“This stuff is amazing,” I say, resisting the urge to lick my fingers. “And you can produce this out of thin air, anytime you want?”
“I ask, and it comes,” he says. “But now, focus. Where were we?”
“You said that in glory we can access anything.”
“Yes. That is how one passes between heaven and earth, and how it’s possible for me to travel from one place on earth to another. One time to another.”
I get momentarily excited. “Are you going to teach me how to move through time, too?”
I like the idea of giving myself an extra hour to study for exams, or finding out who’s going to win the Stanford-Berkeley game before it happens. Or—a lump jumps up in my throat—I could go to see Mom. In the past.
Dad frowns. “No.”
“Oh,” I say, disappointed. “Not part of the plan, huh?”
He puts his hand on my shoulder, squeezes gently. “You will see your mother again, Clara.”
“When?” I ask, my voice suddenly hoarse. “When I die?”
“When you need it most,” he says, ambiguous as ever.
I clear my throat. “But for now, I can what, cross to wherever I want to go?”
He takes my hands in his, looks into my eyes. “Yes. You can.”
“That could come in extremely handy when I’m running late for class.”
“Clara.” He wants me to be serious now. “Crossing is a vital skill. And it’s not as difficult as you might think to achieve,” he says. “We are all connected, everything that lives and breathes in this world, and glory is what binds us.”
Next thing he’ll be talking about the Force, I know it.
“And every place has a piece of that energy, as well. A signature, if you will. So to move from here to there, you must first connect to that energy.”
“Glory. Check.”
“Then you must think of the place you wish to go. Not the location on a map, but the life of that place.”
“Like … the big aspen tree in my front yard in Jackson?”
“That would be ideal,” he says. “Reach for that tree, the power it’s generating from the sun, the roots stretching themselves out in the earth, drinking, the life of the leaves….”
For a minute I’m hypnotized by the sound of his voice. I close my eyes, and I can see it so clearly: my aspen tree, the leaves starting to turn colors and drop, the movement of the chilly autumn wind through the branches, the whispering as it stirs the leaves. It actually makes me shiver, imagining it.
“You’re not imagining it,” Dad says. “We’re here.”
I open my eyes. Gasp. We’re standing in my front yard under the aspen tree. Just like that.
Dad lets go of my hands. “Well done.”
“That was me? Not you?”
“All you.”
“It was … easy.” I’m shocked by how simple it was, such an impossible-sounding thing as going almost a thousand miles in the literal blink of an eye.
“You’re very powerful, Clara,” Dad says. “Even for a Triplare, you’re remarkable. Your connection is strong and steady.”
This makes me want to ask him a dozen questions, like, If that’s true, why don’t I feel more, I don’t know, religious? Why aren’t my wings whiter? Why do I have so many doubts? Instead I say, “Okay, let’s do this. Teach me something else.”
“With pleasure.” He takes off his hat and suit jacket and lays them carefully on the porch railing, then goes to the house and returns with Mom’s kitchen broom, which he promptly snaps into two pieces like it’s a strand of uncooked spaghetti. He holds out one half to me.
“Hey,” I gasp. I know it shouldn’t be a big deal, but I connect the broom with Mom dancing around the kitchen, sweeping theatrically, mock singing “Whistle While You Work” in her most nasally high-pitched Snow White voice. “You broke my broom.”
“I apologize,” he says.
I take my half of the broom, narrow my eyes suspiciously on his face. “I thought this was about glory swords.”
“Brick by brick,” he says again, raising his half of the broom, which is the end with the bristles on it. He brushes it behind my calves, and I jump. “First let’s work on your stance.”
He teaches me about balance, and angles, and anticipating the moves of my opponent. He teaches me to use the strength of my core rather than the muscles of my arm, to feel the blade—er, broom—as an extension of my body. It’s like dancing, I realize very quickly. He moves, and I move in response, keeping time with him, staying light, quick, up on the balls of my feet, avoiding his blows rather than blocking them.
“Good,” he says at last. I think he might even be sweating.
I’m relieved because this fighting thing isn’t too difficult. I thought it might be one of those things like flying, where I totally sucked for a while, but I pick it up pretty quickly, all things considered.
I guess I’m my father’s daughter.
“You are,” Dad says with pride in his voice.
On the other hand, while part of me is all glowy and sweaty and proud that this is going so well, another part finds it crazy. I mean, who uses swords anymore? It feels like theater to me, like play, trouncing around the backyard whacking at my dad with a stick. I can’t imagine it as something dangerous. I’m holding this broom like a sword, and half the time I want to bust out laughing it’s so ridiculous.
But underneath it all, the idea of really wielding a weapon, trying to cut someone with it, totally freaks me out. I don’t want to hurt anybody. I don’t want to fight. Please don’t let it be that I have to fight.
The thought makes me miss a step, and Dad’s section of the broomstick is at my chin. I look up into his eyes, swallow.
“That’s enough for today,” he says.
I nod and drop my piece of broom into the grass. The sun is going down. It’s getting dark now, and cold. I hug my arms to my chest.
“You did well,” Dad says.
“Yeah, you said that already.” I turn away, kick at a fallen pinecone.
I hear him come up behind me. “Sometimes it’s difficult to be the bearer of a sword,” he says gently.
Dad’s known for being tough, the guy who’s called in whenever some big baddie needs a slap-down. Phen talked about him like he was the bad cop in the “good cop/bad cop” scenario, the one who smacks the criminals around. In the old artwork Michael’s always the stern-faced angel hacking up the devil with a sword. His nickname is the Smiter, Phen said. That job would definitely suck. But when I try to peek inside Dad’s mind, all I get is joy. Certainty. An inner stillness like the reflection on the surface of Jackson Lake at sunrise.